Dialogue With Jerax: Flow, Failure & Finding Yourself - A Deep Dive

Yeah. Thing, right?

Yeah. It's like, all my serotonin and everything. It's like I'm burned. Yeah. I went to Vipasana and then when I came back, first day in London, I just felt like all the noise and the [00:02:00] vibrations were attacking me so much that I could not at all be there. There was so much noise, so many vibrations.

I don't know how people do it, you know? But some people are okay with it. And I believe some people are really okay with it, and a lot of them are lying to themselves.

Some people like the sensory inputs in those environments, and it like boosts them do that. It's almost like they grave for that activity or the energy to raise it up for themselves I think a lot of very extroverted people have a tendency to like those because then they get to their normal where it's like high activity, high energy.

Somehow I think some people just like that

Is there really that kind of thing, at those old times? Is it more like you just get a dopamine, it's like a dopamine oriented environment for them.

It's like a small party in a way that you go there and you see all kinds of things. It's like playing a video game that's just a ton of things thrown at you.

And like that chaos is something they enjoy to like, be there.

Because I've had that why I used to like video games is like, I like to being put into those environments when I know what I'm supposed to do in a way you get used to it. And you sort of manage your way out of it. And it's, it's a cool feeling, but, I just don't see it in like a New York, I don't get the same.

I just hear noise and people going around. I can imagine myself there. And then it's like, what am I doing there? I'm just walking on the street to a store.

Yeah. Did you feel depleted afterwards? Did you have to recharge

You know, you play video games. Sure, sure. You do it as your profession, it's still enjoyable at the same time. You know, you feel good, just pay . but when you're in tournaments, it changes it becomes more serious, more, okay, there's a challenge. This is what I've getting ready for and it's time to perform.

When it's happening, it's like more adrenaline, now we need to get stuff done .

Basically are you okay with the feeling of, okay, now it's high pressure because. I think some people are not ready. They may not say it out loud, but it's pretty clear to me that that's often the case for some because, they're not confident or they think, okay, past two months of my team has been doing pretty bad.

It's gonna happen again. Whatever. And especially not in the beginning of the tournament, but in the whatever group stage, and you have played, let's say six matches of anything. Maybe you lost half, maybe you lost one half you don't really know where it's going.

And that concerns you. Some people may twist it.

Do you see like a [00:07:00] map? No, it's a, it is a complete sense. It's just as if there's like a compass arrow pointing, like home is that way. And it's interesting, I feel like some people don't have it at all.

Right. I don't think that can happen to me unless maybe you parachute me in. Yeah. I I think then it's probably very hard for you. Yeah. Yeah. Because then you don't have that compass and then you're, I dunno, I might, I need to experiment. Blindfolded pressure means, but

It doesn't, it doesn't get mixed up sometimes.

You can spin me many times. As many times as you want.

And then I have a sense of like, I went here, maybe I should go right, left forward, wherever I want to go.

Whereas I don't have a sense of, I, look at the map in a way that it's north, south, east, west, just like [00:09:00] normal. But I don't have a, sense where my home is necessarily. But I have a sense of like, okay, this is the map. I went here about this much and now I'm

Some people have this ability, like me, like I have a compass. Yeah, you have a map. Yeah. I know people who have synesthesia where they basically aren't able to imagine any.

Like the mood, like the average mood [00:10:00] Yeah. Of the room. I can sense it, there's nothing I can do about it. It's there. But this is not something I learned in school

And the interesting thing about these superpowers is it's very, very hard for you as an individual to discover them. Because you go through life assuming that everybody has the same thing you have.

And then you learn it, and then you're like, okay, I got this power. Yeah. But it's not like a innate, you learn things, but there is something of, innate kind, and then you just have a sense of like, this is how it works for me.

I seem to know how to do it. And then, you have the arena room. What are your innate, that you have discovered so far? So far I clearly have a inclination towards what's good for me, there's a stronger sense. I don't call this intuition.

I think it's different. It's like a deeper [00:11:00] sense of intuition. So my understanding of intuition is that, intuition is built over long time where you build your sense of like, okay, this is how the world works. I did this and then this happened in the world. How you're building the intuition, like for repetition. I think there is, an alternative, it's like a connection to things.

For example, games. Have that for me. It wasn't just like, oh yeah, it's fun to play games. Clearly, there is more going on here than me just having fun with the game. Can you

Because when you approach it, then you get the feeling. And by feeling, do you mean like a physical sensation on the [00:12:00] body or do you mean like just some sort of both? I think it's like mind and body. But I think the knowing. Is behind it. It's like a level above. That's how I understand it. I don't know, if it's the case. I haven't really looked into it, but, certainly something I'm more and more curious about. But, this is sort of who I am.

Like this interaction with this thing clearly speaks for me more than many other things. And I think that's superpower. Many have that though, but there are things in this world that clearly speak probably louder, and if I catch it and I interact with it. It's like, let's say it's soccer and ice hockey and soccer is the one speaking for me.

There's clearly something more happening to me when I play soccer, even though I liked ice hockey. But like, there's just

And how did that work for you in, your gaming career? And did it change? Because I assume this kind of feeling is not there forever.

And then you're like, oh yeah, but this other game too,, it seems to be like a larger concept.

And then it's showing a direction to go towards and then you interact with that and then there's next thing, next thing, next thing . I clearly remember, in my childhood, I think it was like I just got very interested in finding new ways around the game.

And trying to puzzle solve and try to be creative with it, like an artist. With painting, I, think of this as part of me knowing this is like wanting to be creative with the game through problem solving, finding new ways to problem solve within the game and trying to interact in, new ways,. Building something new, but I, there's something that's what I'm like very interested [00:14:00] in with this. I think once you get a sense of that. You come up with some new way, you get some new thought, or you're, and then you're like, oh yeah, this is what I can do in this game.

And then you make it work. And that's a very satisfying feeling.

But, it's never an end point. It's never like, I have a goal and I work indoor and now it's night's done, but it's more like, oh, I got this now, but I have all these other things that I'm also interested in and it's keeps guiding me to the next.

I

But they go like, oh no. Yeah, it's psych a logical mind, mind comes to, but there's more money in football. My parents told me to do football. Or like, there's more money in Delta too, but I like Counterstrike.

Somehow I get a grasp of it, and I don't know how to go the other way. Like, in a way, I'm stupid in this physical world [00:15:00] where even though there is more money to the other thing, it doesn't motivate me at all. External motivation doesn't beat the internal motivation, at all.

This is being such a hard thing for me in this field because somehow I keep playing these games and I get these feelings that people think that I'm just wasting my time.

But I'm having a good time. . But I'm very sensitive with like other people, I used to be at least very, very sensitive 'cause I was trying to predict what, do other people think of me? And that was really impacting me because I got the sense that, people have a think that I'm wasting my time and I'm also thinking, okay, they, they must be right.

In a way they're right because I'm playing just this video game over and over again. It's not getting me anywhere. There's no path as in it's gonna become money. At that time, there was nothing. There was some tournaments,. Maybe you're good at the game, maybe you compete.

Whatever. But there's no clear [00:16:00] input to how this will affect the real life. What are the consequences? Is it going to bring me anything good? And in a way, logically thinking, I know made no sense what I was doing. I was just basically wasting my time.

In a sense, in a

They didn't motivate me for some reasons. Wanting

So I know for a fact that when I played computer games I played Counter Strike, I played many other games, and in some of those moments I feel that I was really listening to my inner self. And in some of them I was really procrastinating and killing my time. [00:17:00] Yeah. And I guess the difference based on what you said is that in one you are creative, like you're trying to find these ways

and you're resonating with your inner desire to be creative. Mm-hmm. And in the other, you are like almost going to robot mode and you don't even know that you spent, 10 hours. Like, you know, there's a lot of people who play chess or ga, Dota, whatever, and they never improve. Mm-hmm. Because, well, they never change anything.

They're just like a, a game after game, after game, after game, and therefore you're not. Connecting to this desire to experiment, to create, to change, to practice. Mm-hmm. Because that's not the interesting part for you. Mm-hmm. The interesting part for you is just to get the dopamine hit. Yeah. And you don't care actually about the game.

Yes. Or being interested about the actual concept of the game.

And sometimes [00:18:00] as in I don't wanna do my schoolwork, this. And then some other times it's , I have difficult emotions. I just wanna, get rid of them, wanna just play video games. So I think that was certainly like a healthy relationship as in I was self expressing there. I was deeply curious of where it's gonna take me. But then there's like the unhealthy interaction where I didn't understand the deep, I really loved being there, playing the games, but there's a limit and I didn't understand when it turned into this procrastination and just like looking for dopamine and doing it to avoid things in life in general.

The thing that I was very passionate about, it consumed me because I didn't understand when it's , money is enough . When does it turn into, okay, now I'm escaping my life, my feelings?

How do I now sit with those because those seem to be relevant. I did not have that. I just kept playing a game because it initially it felt very good.

Yep. But there was also more to it. So somehow for me, the more to it that there is more to the video games. It was the thing that kept me going. But for many other, I know many people who had this like deep curiosity for the game and they're really pushing themselves, right? They're figuring things out.

They're like very, very involved. Not just wasting their time there. Do fun, have fun, whatever. Yeah. And I think many people looked away from that and they just [00:20:00] went, okay, I think I'm done with video games. I think that this is not good for me. I'm gonna go study. And then they just stop playing video games.

They play very rarely. And then they're just like, this is in the way of me moving forward in life.

But then there are people like my mom who would be like, that's pointless.

I've done things that I, thanks to the journey of tea that would [00:21:00] not have been ever possible without it, just because I have a passion for tea. I spoke to, one guy, two years ago. We were just talking about business. We had a simple business call.

And then suddenly, I don't remember why, but I mentioned I like tea ceremonies. And he goes, Hey man, I'm having this secret invite only, conference in the most expensive hotel in Switzerland with this CTO of GitHub and like top level people. There's only a couple hundred people.

Can you come host the tea ceremony there? Okay. I'll pay for your flight accommodation. And the event is for free. It's a really cool event.

It's, made by the guy from Tito, the event company.

Just because the hotel is so expensive, it's like three, 4,000, 5,000. I don't remember how much it is.

And I got to go there because I have a hobby. For tea, and you cannot predict those things. And I feel like sometimes by trusting yourself, you have to let go of the expectations of results and they kind of just happen to [00:22:00] you. And, I want to ask you about this because I think very often when people put a goal, sometimes they make themselves go further away from it. Like, I dunno, I want to be, a TI champion. Yeah. Twice. Yeah. Right? Yeah. I feel like if you put it on a wall, you might actually take a step away from the goal.

What do you think?

How do you even know? What that path looks like. How would you ever know? Like you have a sense of it, okay, this is what you do, you play 10 hours a day, you you focus on, okay, getting better at these heroes and okay, let's find my role, let's be a good teammate. Like, how do you know?

What is it really? And if you now chose, okay, this is what the path is gonna look like and it's gonna stick to it. I don't think it's gonna that path.

Stay in the frame of , this is what I set for myself. Okay, 10 hours today I'm gonna keep playing 80 hours. 80 games a week. They stick to it. And then I think they realized at some point that, they're not really having fun. They're just committed to this task of becoming the world champion.

And sure they become good, but I also think they lose part of themselves in the process and, at least all kinds of suffering. Do you need that part of the self that you lose to become the world champion? I don't think so. I don't think you've become world champion by losing yourself. Right? I think it's the opposite.

I think you're supposed to find yourself, because that is the superpower in those games where, because you're so connected with yourself and you know what you're doing and you feel good about what you're doing in the high pressure moments, you just excel. You don't have to [00:24:00] think how to perform. You just perform.

It comes through you. You're channeling the performance. This is my understanding of it. Now think of the person who has been strictly doing it and being like, okay, this is how I play the game, they get the technicals right? And they have a construct of how the game's supposed to be played.

They're constantly in their conscious mind thinking about the game, how it's supposed to be played. They're very good at it the problem with this is that when you go to high pressure moments, things are not gonna go as you think they're gonna go. Right. They just don't go that way.

Yeah. Somebody's gonna be like, oh yeah, he does this thing. I'm just gonna do this against him. And now you're put into environment where you're supposed to deal with that. Now it's like high pressure moment. Maybe, you talk about this match is worth $500,000. Maybe you think about that and you're like, oh shit, now it's time to perform.

Now it's time to get it all correct. And now you cannot think about how you do it instead of just doing it. This is such a [00:25:00] trap, but many people think now you're gonna like, think how you make it and you're gonna create a plan and you're gonna make it all happen, but it doesn't work that way.

When you have to perform, all kinds of things happen. They're thrown at you. And at some point I think it's very easy to misstep when you construct this idea how it's supposed to go and now you lose yourself. And now you try to correct it with your conscious mind. And now it's like you are just building yourself like a massive cardhouse that's gonna keep falling and now you're gonna think more and you're gonna think more and soon you just can't perform anymore.

You're just like gonna overthink

Yeah. And then, but your brain is still overwhelmed by, thousands of people watching you and all these things. How were you able to detach from that and stay in the channeling present moment?

Mm-hmm. And I don't think more to it as in like, I'm gonna figure it out this way. Okay, this is gonna happen. I'm gonna be prepared. Maybe you visualize something, okay, maybe this happens, whatever. But you don't put a lot of energy to that because it hasn't happened. It's, not in the present moment. Now, the only way I figured out that really works, and it's not easy, is let's just stay in the present moment.

Sure. There is like, in three hours somebody's gonna win. This one they have millions of money. Sure. But it's in the future doesn't help.

And it's very hard [00:27:00] because in those moments, there's all kinds of thoughts very easily coming to you. Yeah. As in like, you start to think, okay, now it's going a little bit worse for us. Are we gonna lose like this? Like, when you give up to those thoughts, when you start to think about them, you logically think, okay, yeah, it looks like you're losing this game.

You're like building a story, right? Whereas if you don't try to build stories, you're in the moment trusting of like, okay, I'm here, , I'm deserving of this moment because somehow I'm in the finals, let's say.

For some reason out of all these people, you are in the finals, right? So you are probably doing something right. Can you trust that you are doing things right? And can you trust that it is enough for winning the finals, so be it. If it's not, can you be okay with that as well?

Yeah. These are ways to accept the situation as it is. And this helps the person to be okay in the moment.

You were thinking the thought of, well, we might lose. Yep. And they blink and therefore your reaction time is 0.2 seconds slower because your thought [00:29:00] was Yeah. There instead of being in the game and therefore you misclick or miss time your reaction. Yep. Because literally your brain was busy .

With something else. They were not in the game. And I feel that in my line of work, I don't have such short reaction times. Yeah. So I think in something like daughter or Formula one, it's even more important. Yeah. 'cause the time of reaction Absolutely. Is , so quick. Right. In things like business, do you usually have more time to actually go like, I want to be in a present moment,

I have time to breathe in, breathe out.

Yeah. Because, , I think it goes deeper to like, okay, now I'm reacting a little bit slower. Okay. I performed, less than optimal than I'm supposed to now. That is [00:30:00] the key is how do you perceive that, that now you were not thinking about the game. Are you okay with that?

Or are you gonna blame yourself? Oh, I should have focused, you can make it much bigger for yourself, and now you're just like, keep thinking with your mind. The thinking might keep staying in between you and the game and the present moment, again, you're just distancing yourself from the present moment of what's actually happening.

But yeah. [00:31:00] Authenticity, channeling your performance for you, an artist doing a painting, right? He can constantly think, I'm gonna do it technically correct. This is what pleases people. This is like a smart color. It combines very well.

And then I have this , clear structure yeah, everybody's gonna like the square and the circle together. It's like nice. But then soon enough you realize what the did I create? Where is me in this art? Yeah. And like people read into that. Yeah. And I think with art it's easy to understand, but then it's harder to understand in the performance.

Okay, you lose yourself. But isn't there like a optimal way of performing? Yes, there is, but nobody's that. Right? So in a way, you're making the best out of yourself performing in those situations. And I think the best comes through, at least at this time. Maybe one day it's ai, whatever. Yeah. But at this time, it looks to be the case for that

the authentic you is able to [00:32:00] perform on their best at those moments. I think

What I mean by that is that, we're talking to you in a sense that, you've won ti two times, but there are people who lost ti many times. . . That experience of them losing might still be the best for them. In a sense that, okay, like they don't understand it right now, but maybe because of that, I don't know.

They move to another country, they meet their wife and their kid and they're like infinitely more happy than if they won.

Maybe it's gonna be a thing, but like many times in my life when I thought I failed later I learned. That was the best thing. . But it's very hard to trust in the process. And I think that's what you said, it's kinda like, whether you win, you lose, that doesn't matter. And I think by [00:33:00] that, what I would mean is that trust it, , because if you're constantly seeking and actually trying to figure out what is this life, then I think it'll bring you there.

Mm-hmm. And some people will get there through winning. Some people will get there through losing. Mm-hmm. Because maybe they should not have played this game. Right. And it took them some time to figure that out. Yeah. And maybe they should be, I know a coach or maybe they should be an artist or a musician who knows.

Yeah. Because for you also, like you won the game, but now you're not actively playing. So you said transition to something else. Yeah, it's a stepping stone.

Not necessarily Right. But I clearly was inclining to, okay, I gotta leave at some point. It's pretty clear to me. Yeah. That that's, that seems to be the next direction. I dunno where, but clearly I wasn't happy [00:34:00] the same way, or authentic the same way to myself playing the game.

So did that happen before you won already? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

The way I want to. And I started to go the direction of, okay, I'm gonna become a better teammate. I'm gonna be more like a, I'm gonna focus on myself, communicating better. I'm gonna focus on myself, making things better for everybody around me. I'm gonna start to think through that rather than I'm gonna make the most beautiful art in the game.

It wasn't anymore at the same level as interesting as it was before. Mm. Because I think I've seen enough, it looks like it's time to move on and , do more

Yeah. Like for example, I come from a completely different background of entrepreneurship. Mm-hmm. And , I feel that in the beginning when you start. Your path of being an entrepreneur, you actually focus what in Delta you would call be mechanics. Yeah. You'd be like, what is profit? What is loss? Mm-hmm.

What is a customer? How to, do accounting and you start focusing on these elements that are on the surface level and you go to make money, we have to make a product. Yeah. So a lot

And then almost nobody goes like, well actually it's about your team and it's about your communication and it's about how you feel in the team and emotions and the husbands and wives of the people that work and the feelings of your customers and all these things. And all these things are like ignored.

And then later you learn , oh no, that is the core in [00:36:00] some sense, like that core can in, I dunno about Delta because I think it's super competitive, but in business that core I feel, can definitely allow you to make a lot of mistakes from a practical level. If you have a really good team and business in terms of how you organize the culture and the feelings of the team , , if all of you are less than the best.

In terms of being able to do, I dunno, marketing. . This cohesion of the team will outperform many of those who actually have better skills. Because they have cohesion. And actually in eSports, well not eSports, but for me it was, uh. Sports I did paintball. . , We were one of the top teams in the B Wait.

Paintball? Paintball. Yeah. Running with gun. Oh, cool. Did you do that? Yeah. Yeah. Oh, shit. Oh, cool. For a few

And , it's like a more strategic Yeah. Straight from the get go. I think Airsoft is more [00:37:00] loose. Yeah.

. So everybody was like 40.

.

And I was , young kid, I was 20 something. Yep. And all the other teams were basically young. But in my team, the other guys, , one of them was the head coach of the police academy and the other guy was from the Special forces. But we were not fast.

Because one of them was chubby, one of them was old but our communication was the thing, like the way we talked, the way we communicated, the way we trusted each other. And yes, we would lose to the young guys sometimes, but we would constantly be in the top two, top three.

it was all about spending time together and building the communication and trust instead of focusing, I mean, you have to focus on the skills too, but that was not our strengths by far.

That, many professional teams at eSports or sports don't have that because they think it as a profession. And let's say, just an example, like in league, how they hire people, it's much about hiring the top individuals and putting them all together. . The cohesion is obviously not gonna be there unless you have a giga luck and then you're like, oh, shit, we got the nice people.

Somehow they just seem to connect, and very many cases it's just like you put the best together and you try to make the best of it. But I think there is so much to building the team chemistry around the people.

Around the people who actually wanna be together. . Initially there's some chemistry, whatever, connection, whatever people wanna call it. Once you start to lean into that, I think it's so much easier to make sense of what you actually want to do together. And you have a much better understanding what are your strengths and weaknesses, just as you said.

And then you can work around whatever you're not good [00:39:00] at. You can try to, work on that or you can try to lean into your strengths more. I think very rare thing that many people experience is this. People have the experience of flow state as in like, you're individual in the flows that you read or whatever you study and you then you get to this feeling, oh shit, this is so easy.

I'm taking this text, I'm not really doing anything. I'm learning so much. Whatever. You can do this many things. People usually have it around hobbies the most. But I think in teams you can have this team flow thing where. Everybody is in the flow, but also there's like a, shared flow.

Yeah. As in like, you know how your body thinks. . You know how they're gonna do and now you will compliment that. And this is what I had experience with OG winning tis where I just know how my teammates think and act before they even say things. And I can [00:40:00] already, make that happen in a more, enhanced way.

In a way I'm already working towards something that we are gonna be making together later. But it's not clear. It's not being said, but I have a feeling that it's gonna happen.

I feel like I'm connected to what we are already gonna be doing soon. And I have a sense of that. And then doing that thing together is also there's like many, many things in Dota.

It is a very, complex game. But I think once you're able to focus on what's key and once your teammates are able to focus on what's key, and once your teammates and you come together to think the same way , it's a very powerful tool and you don't need to be the best at everything.

On individual level, I don't think our team wants, for example, like mechanics wise. Similar to your paintball. . But I think we just have this innate trust towards each others of putting the team in front [00:41:00] and everybody really trying to lean into the, what are we doing as a team

I think

'cause I feel like a lot of people and teams lock into it, right? They just go like,

the right set of circumstances, right Set of individuals. And I also look at eSport teams, but also companies and a lot of the time the. Flow of people is very fast. Like any eSports, especially like team members seem to change every second week.

. And there are other sports where, teams take like a 10 year plan. . Like we'll be world champions in 12 years. Yeah.

do you feel that there are things that can be done practically to enhance this shared flow?

I think you're not gonna have that. . It's not gonna happen. Not gonna happen Yep. I think so. There's no sugar coating it in a way that, this is just like, oh yeah, but we gonna have it with other people. No, because if there's just conflict between two people and they don't like each other and they don't make anything out of that, it's just in the back of everybody's minds.

Yeah. It's not even just those people, it's everybody's minds. Right. It's just like corrupts, it's like a corruption kind of thing in a slider sense, but it's still there and everybody gotta read the room. Unless you're very disassociate of yourself. Of course. But, it's not gonna happen because it's much about also feeling.

So that's one thing. So you really wanna be carefully selecting the individuals are they complimenting each other? How are they interacting? This is natural, it's forced. Yeah, what's going on? Because I think initially it can feel forced, but perhaps they find [00:43:00] something and they click, right?

You can help them, come together more. So I think it starts from there. Then I think a very crucial thing, themes is like this shared feeling of safety. I think this has to be catered around by everybody, and I think it starts very much from like, okay, do I feel comfortable like bringing my own problems into this team?

Do I feel comfortable giving feedback to my teammate when I feel like he's doing something wrong? And safety is the base of this, because if you don't feel safe, you feel like you're not able to say these things out loud, and then at some point you're gonna have a problem as in like, you're holding this self, you're holding this in.

Oh yeah, he made this bad play five years ago. And now he's doing it again. Yeah. Just this moment. And it's like you connect them and then you , start to see the person in a bad life, because why didn't he [00:44:00] change? So being a fucking five years, how can you not change? Right. For example. I also think that as like a corruption of the mind in a way, you, you make it much worse than what it is because you had the sense that, it's supposed to change.

Right. It's so obvious that he's, gonna change in this amount time. But no, maybe he never even thought about it, changing it. Yeah. Never even noticed it, maybe. Yeah. Yeah. , And I think if you don't get to those conversations of like, okay, this is nagging me about you, and we have a talk and it doesn't even need to resolve as in like, he's gonna change this behavior.

. But it's more like you just have the conversation. Maybe it's gonna be like, no, I'm not gonna change that. . Are you gonna have a new conversation? Okay. Okay. What's going on here?

It's the same thing what you're saying. , I feel that if I bring the same concept to entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship teams, what happens a lot, I don't think it's exactly the same, is I feel that there is no dialogue. And I mean, like, real dialogue.[00:45:00]

Again, we always talk about the mechanics and the business. We just go like, oh, we don't make enough money, or, this is a problem. I would imagine , in the auto other sports, it might be about the sport itself. Yeah. But, everybody in the room is sitting there and going like, and this is my favorite question in some sense, and I like to bring these dialogues to teams and companies and be like, what is reality?

What is the reality of this? Mm. Or of the situation. And by reality I really mean every component of reality of this situation. Mm. It might have to do with say two people have conflict and we don't talk about it. Yeah. We just don't mention it. We just don't, we just don't like, I know you hate him and he hates you, but we're never gonna talk about it.

Or a reality might be something practical. Like in my company, it was like, we are not making enough money and we just ignore it. We just hope it'll go away.

What is the underlying level? [00:46:00] And if you go deep enough and have a dialogue long enough, which teams don't. Allow those attempts to do Yeah. To speak for six hours straight, right? Yeah. , This is sometimes how long it will take to get to the deeper layers. Like maybe the deeper reality is like, oh one don't have enough money because, I dunno, uh, two co-founders have a deep inner conflict

Yeah. And that might be affecting most certainly the whole organization. That's

. And then it's like, yeah, you want me to do social media? Five hours a week, but I'm a professional player. I need every single hour to my video [00:47:00] game. Right? Like, how, how do I, but they keep pulling you with the five hours and then you keep being not okay with it, and you just sustain, but , you also have a problem with it.

Sort of like not being discussed.

. But parents and kids, it's kind of the same by the way. It's very similar. I look at people on the streets, like we're walking now and I see parents and kids and I'm going like, parents, your only job in the whole life is to be on the side of the kid. . That's your only job.

Not against them. . Be on their side all the time. . When they scream at you where they unhappy, you can tell them kindly why, you know they should do something. . But you should remain on their side. . All the time. . That's your only job. And I feel that's the same with companies, if you're a CEO, you only job is to be on the side of both clients and your [00:48:00] employees, but you are not, you are on the side of money making and investors .

Most of the time.

There's , so much to argue that my actions, how I see them is the best of yours. Now the problem is if the other person doesn't feel that way, , then you problem because like, clearly. You do something and you think it's the better of them and from the other person's perspective, , it's not that.

Well, and

. Because I'd feel your happiness. Yeah. And joy. That's the best thing for me. . And I would imagine like with [00:49:00] teams it's the same. It's not a practical thing that you do. Yeah. It's the, when I say that, you have to be on their side. I mean emotionally. Yeah. Like with feelings.

Yeah. Not with practical. Oh, I got your money, I got your sponsors thing.

Then your actions will very likely follow that. It's not always the case, but very often it's the case, and I think as long as you are able to, share that feeling with them that this is what you think is the best of your interest and you're doing it things because you really, care.

If your actions match that and other people notice that and they feel that you care and you also like you're doing it, that creates the, okay, I can actually trust this guy [00:50:00] right now. It's like, okay, the safety is there Now, maybe when they receive that from you now they're like, oh yeah, I can do the same.

That's okay. Somebody has to start usually. Yeah. Yeah. And often the case in teams in eSports, eSports. Somebody's has a better understanding of how this works. Like they have a better emotional understanding. Yep. A better emotional skills, whatever, communication skills. And they have to be their, , first in a way to set the standards for the others.

Then it's easy to follow when somebody sets the culture to be this. . It's much easier. But the setting the culture is the hardest, I think, because the person who knows how it's supposed to be done, they don't get this reinforcement from others. Yeah. It's difficult again, but you can still do it, but they still stops you if you really believe in it.

Why does it matter how other people think? Yeah. [00:51:00] Because if you're the example, you just do it. You believe in it, connection is good. I think it's gonna build trust and safety between us. We're gonna get conversations going, seems to be working that way. Why not just do it anyways? Even though there's resistance,. And then I think once people are under the influence of that and , they can also understand it. We talked about how can we cooperate? How can we get the connection going between the individuals? I think, , it's the individuals, but also like, can we maintain this?

Right? It's like, okay, we did it once. Can we maintain this?

Like I introduced the teams , concept of dialogue and [00:52:00] breaking them outta a comfort zone. Like guys, you always have meetings with a table and chairs. Mm-hmm. We're gonna sit down in a circle, drink tea.

And I'm like, yeah, yeah man. And then they go like, no, no. I'm like, from X big company. Yeah. You know, I have to have, what the fuck you do? You have to have suit a waste of time. I'm like, no. Tomorrow, no suits. Everybody come in like the most comfortable clothes you can find. . We're gonna sit down, have tea.

I told you I have this place , on the island in Estonia. Well, I want people to completely detach from reality. , And I think actually detaching from reality in a practical sense helps people too. Reconnect to their true selves and put them in a different environment and I think that helps.

I think it's very important to ask yourself the question, , what is reality and why are we doing certain things? Mm-hmm. Like in, in a sort of world, everybody has, 10 minutes, stand standup every morning where everybody shares what they do.

And most people hate it.

. And nobody goes like, why are we doing it? Literally everybody hates it. And [00:53:00] nobody goes like, Hey, like, sorry, I hate this. Let's not do it. ? Yeah. And I think if you are the team, create your own ritual and you look for it and everybody likes it. Yeah. Then it becomes a real standup.

, There's nothing wrong with having every everyday a catchup session. I think it's very useful. Yep. But you need to find one that works for your specific team and organization because, , maybe you need to do it differently. Maybe you need to do it funny. Yeah. Like in your way. Not my way.

Yeah. Like in my company, I would have tea every morning. . But some people hate tea, right? Yeah. So , maybe I shouldn't hire them.

What are we doing? Can we just use 10 minutes of our work? Looks like we are more efficient that way. Yeah. And then, okay, there may be something there. Maybe the person [00:54:00] is just, frustrated because. It's like it's 10 minutes and somebody's maybe just , keeps talking and there's nothing for them in that.

Yeah. Or maybe it's some other thing. It's not necessarily because it's 10 minutes and it's always in the morning. It's maybe something in the 10 minutes that's bothering him. Right. And can we get to the reality as in like, what is , the thing nagging him really ?

Is it the 10 minutes of being wasted? Okay. Why are we feeling it's wasted? , What's the thing that's making it feel like it's waste of time? Because, it's probably good to think about, okay, what are you gonna do? Did you guys do something like that in og?

Uh, we did debriefing. We didn't do in the beginning of the day, as in like, what we're gonna do. . , Sometimes we did talk, okay, what are the things we wanna be focusing on in the upcoming days? And set that for ourselves, but we didn't necessarily always follow that, but at least we had a, a conversation about , what's gonna be probably following these days.

But the debriefing part was , after the day, sometimes we were better at this, sometimes worse. [00:55:00] We were very into trying to talk through of what happened today, , it's like very simple. What are the good things? , What are the bad things? , What do I think should be worked on next?

What do I think we should be doing less? Whatever, be able to frame their questions a little bit differently. People would make things out of it, as in like how they wanted to interact in the debrief. The main thing was that we have the space where you can share what you want. , Whatever you're feeling.

Okay. , It was a shit day, dude. I think we are just a waste of time today. That's how you're feeling. , You can share that. And then maybe there is sometimes, , you go deeper into that, but you can ask how did you come up feeling that way? What do you think was going on?

We have the debrief. In the end of the day. I think it also teaches you that it's not that you can only talk those things after the games, but now you have a same time slot. You can pile up things throughout the day.

You don't have to share them immediately. Or you can also be like, [00:56:00] oh yeah, I don't actually feel like waiting till the debrief. I'm gonna say before. Because maybe we can talk about it. Debrief also when I mentioned it now, but now I feel like it's relevant

And I think that was very helpful because you can decompress with that.

And some individuals for us benefited much more than others. . Some were more participants. They're just more to take in more than to share. Some people were more sharing, but then at some times the people who were usually just there to listen and maybe share a little bit.

Not, not much. They sometimes had the day where they were like, dude, this fucking sucked. Yeah. And then,

One by one , in a table. Yeah. Yeah,

It's , very simple. You kind of go in a team and you do two circles.

.

And you do one what's, uh, not working for you today. Yeah. And you do one more circle. What is working for you today.

. Because sometimes you go like, I don't wanna have a debrief, or I don't wanna have this clearing thing. Oh, it's like every Thursday at 12 you're like, oh man, like this Thursday , I just don't feel like it, man. I wish we as a society would be conscious enough to also be honest about needs and changes.

And like authenticity. And I think it's all about talking and , being able to say, guys, we've done debrief 112 times in a row.

.

I'm tired of it. , Let's try it in the morning. Or let's try a new system.

I can't do it anymore. It's become repetitive. And the life energy of the intent is dead. This event does not deliver anymore.

. Do you guys feel like we can push through today going through the debrief, or do you think it's too heavy? Okay. If we don't do it today, can we try to a little bit think of those things that we wanted to share today and maybe go for it tomorrow. , It's been rough and.

Now maybe, when it's a very bad day and now you're supposed to decompress all that. Maybe not today. Yeah. And that happened, once in a while. And I think it's also very good to not feel guilty of that Oh yeah, we failed because we didn't do it.

Yeah. It's like, can you be accepting of that? That just happens that sometimes, things don't go as you plan, . And change , what you're normally supposed to do into, okay, what do I need today? What do I want to get done today? Because I think that keeps changing. And if you don't change, [00:59:00] if you don't go with the change, , I think you're, building a harder future.

I think you are dismantling what you truly are, ? You are not listening to that. And in teams it's hard because you also have to be some cases as in like, okay, somebody doesn't want to do the debriefing. You go into the conversation and you feel like yeah, I don't feel like it.

You don't have to share so much. You don't have to do so much. Can you just be there? Because there's other people who care about this,

Especially on the hard days. We actually do this clearing thing I told you about with my family, with my wife and my 5-year-old kid every day. Oh, okay. Every night before going to bed, [01:00:00] we do this little circle, but then sometimes we don't do it. Yep. But then sometimes I feel like when traveling, for instance, sometimes it's hard.

And actually our kid is , the biggest fan. Sometimes me and my wife were tired and he just go like clearing. Who are we raising here, man? And he goes like, no, no, we're doing clearing. And we're like, way too start. He's like one word each. But, but sometimes I feel like that's so cool.

It is. We started from really early on, , I think it was two. But sometimes we skip it, but I really know, like what you said, like sometimes we, I dunno, like maybe we had a fight during the day. Yeah. And I feel like now is the most important thing to actually do it.

.

Mm-hmm. But if you don't wanna do it because you feel that the purpose of the thing is no longer there. Right. Or [01:01:00] it's not gonna work today for another reason. I think , there might be a valuable reason not to do it. Yeah. But what is your, what is your feeling for today?

What do you wanna do today?

I'm not really sure. I like this open flow of a conversation. I think I want to pee soon. I'll be looking, which place do I do? I go to pee? I think enjoying the summer weather. And just looking around is also nice.

I have a good time. I feel, uh, in a, in a way, like I don't need much right now.

. I dunno, I'm guessing. And I'm also trying to feel like, to me the conversation is already coming to a closing stages. Yeah. Maybe, but one thing I also wanted to say is like you just said, I want to pee and I think like when talking to people, even this can be important to say.

Yeah. Yeah, I think so. [01:02:00] Like, to even share your feelings. , I went to a Banana conference last week. It's a, conference in Estonia, really cool people.

And there was a group sharing, we did the tea ceremony and we had a group sharing. Mm-hmm. And then there was one guy from, , Germany he was sharing basically he shared like every single internal feeling that he had in the moment. Like his fears, his body sensations, the status of his stomach, like everything. It completely changed the energy in the room.

'Cause everybody was like, whoa, this guy just heard everything. . All his fears about talking, all his desires. And I felt, my God, that is so cool. . I love to actually start meetings with, , a question , what's your state of being?

Or what is it like to be you? Okay. And I like to ask that question. I like that question. That's a good one. Then people really go like, whoa, whoa. What did you ask me?

Yeah. But then when they, they answer , you connect immediately and it changes every day, like every time I ask. [01:03:00] Right, right, right. Completely new person. , New senses, new beings. Yeah. .

And you can also take some of that energy that he's sharing. Okay. He's having a bad day. Can I be compassionate towards. Right. Okay. He's nervous talking.

Can I resonate with that feeling that he's nervous. Maybe I would be too. ? How would I want the crowd to be like, okay, I'm gonna be that, encouraging, [01:04:00] focused, attentive, and I think it's very powerful for the person itself, but also for everybody else too, because now you are in this together.

This is how he is right now. How can I make the best of myself gonna listen to this guy help him.

And maybe I feel like it might mean something as in like, okay, I'm tired. Maybe you're gonna notice it, right? Maybe you're gonna think I'm less interesting. . Maybe the recording is gonna be like total failure you got, but once you share it. [01:05:00] It goes away. Yeah. Yeah. It's very powerful.

Yeah. And I think people are afraid to share. , And the same works for positive things too. When you're really having a good feeling, it doesn't go away when you share it, you enhance the moment that you share the same energy. Yeah. And now everybody got grasp of like, oh yes, it's feeling good.

Yeah. Dude. Like, holy shit, look at this energy. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm like, I'm getting it also. Yeah. Dude,

Yeah. Maybe we balance each other out a little bit. Yeah. I really loved our talk and our walk. We walked through like some of the most beautiful parts of Helsinki with, uh, lakes and trees and people and birds

The place where I say it can, do we have the time to go here? It's called Lama.

Well cool. Thank you for doing this. I just noticed everywhere. Yeah. It's beautiful, right? Yeah. It's like snow. Yeah. It feels like snow, but it's going up. Yeah.

If anybody that listens to this, they'd be like, what that water earth are they talking about? What are those called? I

Me neither. It's uh.

Maybe.

you know, there's like a shift that there is like a moving forward.

And that, the conversation seems to be going to, a closing,

And whenever you honestly deeply engage with somebody, it always has that.

Awkwardness, ?

That was a lot of fun. I think we've covered a lot of cool topics.

I had a good time and I like it when it's not planned and stuff, and I just talk about whatever comes.