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모든 것은 기본에서 시작한다
축구선수로서의 삶, 아버지로서의 삶, 지도자로서의 삶
자신의 삶에 대한 반성과 성찰로 빚어낸 강건한 신념과 철학!
“나의 축구는 온전히 아버지의 작품이다”-손흥민
‘겸손하라. 네게 주어진 모든 것들은 다 너의 것이 아니다’, ‘감사하라. 세상은 감사하는 자의 것이다’, ‘삶을 멀리 봐라. 욕심을 버리고 마음을 비워라’… 손흥민 선수의 아버지이자 축구 지도자로서 세계인의 주목을 받고 있는 손웅정 감독의 메시지는 ‘삶의 본질’에 초점이 맞춰 있다. 축구선수로 뛰던 자신의 경험을 반추하며 ‘나처럼 하면 안 된다’는 생각에 손흥민 선수를 직접 교육했고, ‘기본기’의 중요성을 강조했다. 기술을 가르치는 데서 끝나는 것이 아닌 선수로, 사람으로 길러야 한다고 믿었다. 손웅정의 교육 방향, 삶의 방식은 사람들에게 회자되며 큰 반향을 일으켰고, 그는 이 책을 통해 최초로 자신의 삶의 궤적과 생각들을 담담히 풀어놓았다.
그는 어떤 삶을 살았을까? 그의 철학은 어떻게 만들어진 것일까? 어린 시절 가난도 막을 수 없던 축구에 대한 의지, 축구를 잘하고 싶은 마음에 스스로를 담금질한 시간들, 프로선수 시절과 은퇴 후 녹록하지 않던 시절 이야기, 아들에게 축구를 가르치며 연구하고 개발한 훈련법들, 손흥민 선수와 함께 독일과 영국에서 생활하며 쌓아온 생각들…. 평생에 걸쳐 책으로 받은 은혜가 너무도 컸다고 말하는 손웅정 감독은 ‘누군가에게 작은 도움이 될 수 있다면’ 하는 바람을 담아 자신의 이야기를 꺼내놓았다. 많은 이들이 궁금해하고 알고 싶어 했던 손웅정의 축구 철학, 교육 철학, 삶의 철학은 우리 삶의 또 하나의 지침서가 될 것이다.
자신의 삶에 대한 반성과 성찰로 빚어낸 강건한 신념과 철학!
“나의 축구는 온전히 아버지의 작품이다”-손흥민
‘겸손하라. 네게 주어진 모든 것들은 다 너의 것이 아니다’, ‘감사하라. 세상은 감사하는 자의 것이다’, ‘삶을 멀리 봐라. 욕심을 버리고 마음을 비워라’… 손흥민 선수의 아버지이자 축구 지도자로서 세계인의 주목을 받고 있는 손웅정 감독의 메시지는 ‘삶의 본질’에 초점이 맞춰 있다. 축구선수로 뛰던 자신의 경험을 반추하며 ‘나처럼 하면 안 된다’는 생각에 손흥민 선수를 직접 교육했고, ‘기본기’의 중요성을 강조했다. 기술을 가르치는 데서 끝나는 것이 아닌 선수로, 사람으로 길러야 한다고 믿었다. 손웅정의 교육 방향, 삶의 방식은 사람들에게 회자되며 큰 반향을 일으켰고, 그는 이 책을 통해 최초로 자신의 삶의 궤적과 생각들을 담담히 풀어놓았다.
그는 어떤 삶을 살았을까? 그의 철학은 어떻게 만들어진 것일까? 어린 시절 가난도 막을 수 없던 축구에 대한 의지, 축구를 잘하고 싶은 마음에 스스로를 담금질한 시간들, 프로선수 시절과 은퇴 후 녹록하지 않던 시절 이야기, 아들에게 축구를 가르치며 연구하고 개발한 훈련법들, 손흥민 선수와 함께 독일과 영국에서 생활하며 쌓아온 생각들…. 평생에 걸쳐 책으로 받은 은혜가 너무도 컸다고 말하는 손웅정 감독은 ‘누군가에게 작은 도움이 될 수 있다면’ 하는 바람을 담아 자신의 이야기를 꺼내놓았다. 많은 이들이 궁금해하고 알고 싶어 했던 손웅정의 축구 철학, 교육 철학, 삶의 철학은 우리 삶의 또 하나의 지침서가 될 것이다.
284 pages, Paperback
Published October 15, 2021
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June 2, 2023
Wouldn’t be far from the truth to say that I was hesitant to post a review, because no one else has done it here yet. Please bury my review with better ones. My primary intention was to tell GR friends about SWJ’s book as I had a pretty ‘rewarding’, and worthwhile experience reading it. Essentially, I am just writing an English review about a book written in Korean, which may be of little use to any interested reader who is only familiar with one of those languages. Hopefully a proper English translation will be published soon. I want Fitzcarraldo Editions (one of my all-time favourite publishers) to be the one to do it, but who am I to make such demands?! Please hurry up though, because this awfully lonely excitement that I have picked up as a consequence of reading this book is not fun to be stuck with. I am both in want and in need of a collective literary rave.
SWJ’s personal essays are separated neatly into a few parts (other than the obvious references to sports) a reader can expect to stumble on his affection for documentaries of killer whales, poetry, food/domestic rituals, philosophical ideas from classic/ancient literature amalgamated with his own personal experiences; and his of course, his views and experiences as a parent. Even as a reader in her twenties, who has no desire to ever become a ‘parent’, I still find essays on parenting interesting. SWJ highlighted in his book that just because ‘you have children’ that doesn’t always make you a ‘parent’. Ironically, the last couple of books I’ve read with some regards to ‘parenting’ were written from men’s perspectives. The other one being Jack Underwood’s Not Even This: Poetry, parenthood and living uncertainly (one of the best books I read last year). Despite the two writers essentially being two ‘strangers’ (to one another) who lead very different ‘lives’, their writing carry uncannily similar sentiments with regards to mortality, ‘love’, and what it means to be parental figures in an increasingly unpredictable climate (in the most general sense of the term).
Reading about SWJ confessing his constant need for books – reading around a hundred books annually, finding solace and nourishment in literature – intrigues me. I vaguely remember chatting with GR friends about which FC my heart leans towards (a while back); but to clarify, at some point after, I found myself settled in a most selfish, and non-committal position. Sports fans tend to liken neutral fans to the most bastardised kinds, but I truly think that that position suits me. From what I’ve seen/experienced, extremely committed fans ricochet between intensely hateful and passionately loving sentiments with so much ease. From firsthand and secondhand experience, I can confirm that I would physically explode from participating in those kinds of extremely bipolar bubbles of contrasting energies. It’s not their problem; it’s just me, I’m hypersensitive, okay? While I’m uncertain how long I will enjoy being a sports spectator (it could just be a case of a rekindled ‘phase’; on and off), I know that if SWJ ever decides to write another book later, you can count on me to be excited and keen to get my hands on it.
A literary experience akin to this (reading SWJ’s book) which reveals one’s most intimate and personal thoughts is not something to be ‘judged’, so I think it’s less important that I ‘like’ or rate this book highly. I should like to place the attention on how serendipitously (albeit surprisingly) SWJ’s philosophies and writing resonated with me. Confessedly, I hesitated making such a cocksure statement because it somehow sounded rude to insinuate that I had no problem understanding what he is trying to convey in this book? Not only do I lack the ‘life experiences’ to hold up any kind of reliably empathetic feelings about the text, but I also have inadequate ‘intimacy’ with regards to the KR language to begin with. But SWJ’s relationship with ‘Nature’, and the natural world around him (growing up by the mountains, and his experiences of/with farm work), described with such keen sensitivity and respect to the environment felt familiar even though absolutely unfamiliar to me.
In the later half of SWJ’s book he expressed his grief of losing a notebook (filled with personal notes) of his on the train(?). And I think anyone who reads/writes with some commitment can empathise with that. With that in mind, having written this, posting this, ultimately sharing this, feels like a small but weighted consolation. In a nearby line/paragraph, he asks the question : what is the first material thing that one would ‘save’ in the event of a fire (presumably a hypothetical situation of one’s living spaces on fire or alike)? It reminded me of a very particular scene in Jang Eun Jin’s No One Writes Back, but I feel differently about it now compared to then (in my review of Jang’s book). Perhaps, if I were to be asked the same question now, I would probably say my box of handwritten letters (which is annoyingly similar to the narrator in Jang’s book). Regardless of how my ‘value’ of them fluctuates through the passing of time, I think I can still appreciate them. They are resistant to the commodification of ‘love’ – preserved most humbly in only paper and ink.
This should be a pretty obvious fact to anyone who knows a little or enjoys a little bit of football, but other than being a retired athlete himself, SWJ is also well-known for being the father of an athlete (in Premier League). SWJ repetitively emphasised in his book that there is no point or value in being the best athletes in the world if you don’t prioritise being a decent human being. He quotes Cruyff to support his statement as well. I didn’t expect to read a book that holds both Cruyff and Zhuangzi quotations, a medley of excerpts of Korean and Chinese poetry; and also Bob Dylan altogether. But I thoroughly enjoyed it. I like that he never romanticises the ‘bad times’ and hardships he had to overcome and/or survive through. I never felt SWJ was ever being ‘preachy’ when he tells the reader about his own life experiences (which makes for an even lovelier read). And I found comfort in SWJ’s descriptions of the quiet mornings in their house (even though it’s only a very brief and small part of the book) – it reminds me of the tender phrase : ‘I want us (both) to eat well’ (which is a phrase quite often used in more recent poems (written in English) to express one’s feelings of ‘love’ without the gaudy embellishments of ‘romantic’, Hallmark-esque superfluity).
It was a slightly ‘challenging’ read for me but only because I’m only barely, if anything, colloquially, familiar with the KR language, which is also a language I haven’t needed to use on a daily basis for many years now. It’s ironic, and personally funny to me how the titular emphasis of the book is about the importance of the ‘basics’/’foundation’ of – well, life itself. And here I am, trying to say that the reason that this book ‘makes sense’ to me (through my own imperfect understanding of a precious sliver of SWJ’s world tucked carefully into this book) is because of my basic understanding of a bunch of ‘East Asian’ languages. I would say I had read every line in SWJ’s book carefully, but because I lack a strong intimacy with the language, I personally believe that I was only able to experience a third of what the writer offers (even though I understood what he was conveying but mostly just on a ‘surface level’ of understanding?)? And the rest is ultimately compromised through imperfect understanding and translation of the text (because I’m only understanding the text in my own flawed and inelegant way which would only make for an understanding that lacks depth and cohesion (even lacking insight of some cultural significance). To explain my point further, I will have to borrow an excerpt from a book I’m currently reading on the side, Nabokov’s Think, Write, Speak: Uncollected Essays, Reviews, Interviews and Letters to the Editor:
All of the above might be a rather strange understanding and appreciation of SWJ’s book, but to reiterate what I’ve previously mentioned, I would really like for an English translation (hopefully by translators whose work I already love) so that (for essentially selfish reasons) I can properly discuss the book with some people that I already have in mind. It’s easy for me to shelf this as a 5-star book (even though it feels inappropriate to rate someone’s personal ‘thoughts’ as with memoirs and such, so more than the content itself, I'm rating it for how well I think it’s written, and how reading it left me in a ‘sunnier’ mood (allow the pun)). And that’s because it was mostly everything I didn’t expect it to be; and/but like all well-written personal essays, some of these brought me a little bit of comfort.
SWJ’s personal essays are separated neatly into a few parts (other than the obvious references to sports) a reader can expect to stumble on his affection for documentaries of killer whales, poetry, food/domestic rituals, philosophical ideas from classic/ancient literature amalgamated with his own personal experiences; and his of course, his views and experiences as a parent. Even as a reader in her twenties, who has no desire to ever become a ‘parent’, I still find essays on parenting interesting. SWJ highlighted in his book that just because ‘you have children’ that doesn’t always make you a ‘parent’. Ironically, the last couple of books I’ve read with some regards to ‘parenting’ were written from men’s perspectives. The other one being Jack Underwood’s Not Even This: Poetry, parenthood and living uncertainly (one of the best books I read last year). Despite the two writers essentially being two ‘strangers’ (to one another) who lead very different ‘lives’, their writing carry uncannily similar sentiments with regards to mortality, ‘love’, and what it means to be parental figures in an increasingly unpredictable climate (in the most general sense of the term).
Reading about SWJ confessing his constant need for books – reading around a hundred books annually, finding solace and nourishment in literature – intrigues me. I vaguely remember chatting with GR friends about which FC my heart leans towards (a while back); but to clarify, at some point after, I found myself settled in a most selfish, and non-committal position. Sports fans tend to liken neutral fans to the most bastardised kinds, but I truly think that that position suits me. From what I’ve seen/experienced, extremely committed fans ricochet between intensely hateful and passionately loving sentiments with so much ease. From firsthand and secondhand experience, I can confirm that I would physically explode from participating in those kinds of extremely bipolar bubbles of contrasting energies. It’s not their problem; it’s just me, I’m hypersensitive, okay? While I’m uncertain how long I will enjoy being a sports spectator (it could just be a case of a rekindled ‘phase’; on and off), I know that if SWJ ever decides to write another book later, you can count on me to be excited and keen to get my hands on it.
A literary experience akin to this (reading SWJ’s book) which reveals one’s most intimate and personal thoughts is not something to be ‘judged’, so I think it’s less important that I ‘like’ or rate this book highly. I should like to place the attention on how serendipitously (albeit surprisingly) SWJ’s philosophies and writing resonated with me. Confessedly, I hesitated making such a cocksure statement because it somehow sounded rude to insinuate that I had no problem understanding what he is trying to convey in this book? Not only do I lack the ‘life experiences’ to hold up any kind of reliably empathetic feelings about the text, but I also have inadequate ‘intimacy’ with regards to the KR language to begin with. But SWJ’s relationship with ‘Nature’, and the natural world around him (growing up by the mountains, and his experiences of/with farm work), described with such keen sensitivity and respect to the environment felt familiar even though absolutely unfamiliar to me.
In the later half of SWJ’s book he expressed his grief of losing a notebook (filled with personal notes) of his on the train(?). And I think anyone who reads/writes with some commitment can empathise with that. With that in mind, having written this, posting this, ultimately sharing this, feels like a small but weighted consolation. In a nearby line/paragraph, he asks the question : what is the first material thing that one would ‘save’ in the event of a fire (presumably a hypothetical situation of one’s living spaces on fire or alike)? It reminded me of a very particular scene in Jang Eun Jin’s No One Writes Back, but I feel differently about it now compared to then (in my review of Jang’s book). Perhaps, if I were to be asked the same question now, I would probably say my box of handwritten letters (which is annoyingly similar to the narrator in Jang’s book). Regardless of how my ‘value’ of them fluctuates through the passing of time, I think I can still appreciate them. They are resistant to the commodification of ‘love’ – preserved most humbly in only paper and ink.
This should be a pretty obvious fact to anyone who knows a little or enjoys a little bit of football, but other than being a retired athlete himself, SWJ is also well-known for being the father of an athlete (in Premier League). SWJ repetitively emphasised in his book that there is no point or value in being the best athletes in the world if you don’t prioritise being a decent human being. He quotes Cruyff to support his statement as well. I didn’t expect to read a book that holds both Cruyff and Zhuangzi quotations, a medley of excerpts of Korean and Chinese poetry; and also Bob Dylan altogether. But I thoroughly enjoyed it. I like that he never romanticises the ‘bad times’ and hardships he had to overcome and/or survive through. I never felt SWJ was ever being ‘preachy’ when he tells the reader about his own life experiences (which makes for an even lovelier read). And I found comfort in SWJ’s descriptions of the quiet mornings in their house (even though it’s only a very brief and small part of the book) – it reminds me of the tender phrase : ‘I want us (both) to eat well’ (which is a phrase quite often used in more recent poems (written in English) to express one’s feelings of ‘love’ without the gaudy embellishments of ‘romantic’, Hallmark-esque superfluity).
It was a slightly ‘challenging’ read for me but only because I’m only barely, if anything, colloquially, familiar with the KR language, which is also a language I haven’t needed to use on a daily basis for many years now. It’s ironic, and personally funny to me how the titular emphasis of the book is about the importance of the ‘basics’/’foundation’ of – well, life itself. And here I am, trying to say that the reason that this book ‘makes sense’ to me (through my own imperfect understanding of a precious sliver of SWJ’s world tucked carefully into this book) is because of my basic understanding of a bunch of ‘East Asian’ languages. I would say I had read every line in SWJ’s book carefully, but because I lack a strong intimacy with the language, I personally believe that I was only able to experience a third of what the writer offers (even though I understood what he was conveying but mostly just on a ‘surface level’ of understanding?)? And the rest is ultimately compromised through imperfect understanding and translation of the text (because I’m only understanding the text in my own flawed and inelegant way which would only make for an understanding that lacks depth and cohesion (even lacking insight of some cultural significance). To explain my point further, I will have to borrow an excerpt from a book I’m currently reading on the side, Nabokov’s Think, Write, Speak: Uncollected Essays, Reviews, Interviews and Letters to the Editor:
‘Is it indiscreet to ask you in what language you think?
Do we think in language? We think, rather, in images. That’s the mistake Joyce made, it seems to me, the difficulty he couldn’t completely overcome. Toward the end of Ulysses, in Finnegans Wake, it’s a flood of words, without punctuation, trying to express inner language. But people don’t think like that. In words, yes, but also in ready-made formulas, in clichés. And then in images; the word dissolves in images, then the image produces the next word.
What difference in usage would you point out in these three languages, these three instruments?
Nuances. If you take framboise in French, for example, it’s a scarlet colour, a very red colour. In English, the word raspberry is rather dull, with perhaps a little brown or violet. A rather cold colour. In Russian, it’s a burst of light, malinovoe; the word has associations of brilliance, of gaiety, of ringing bells. How can you translate that?’
All of the above might be a rather strange understanding and appreciation of SWJ’s book, but to reiterate what I’ve previously mentioned, I would really like for an English translation (hopefully by translators whose work I already love) so that (for essentially selfish reasons) I can properly discuss the book with some people that I already have in mind. It’s easy for me to shelf this as a 5-star book (even though it feels inappropriate to rate someone’s personal ‘thoughts’ as with memoirs and such, so more than the content itself, I'm rating it for how well I think it’s written, and how reading it left me in a ‘sunnier’ mood (allow the pun)). And that’s because it was mostly everything I didn’t expect it to be; and/but like all well-written personal essays, some of these brought me a little bit of comfort.
February 4, 2025
Great teachings about how to live your life, and explains the "why" behind them.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews