HealthyGamerGG - Dr. K Chats with @Mizkif

Episode Date: June 3, 2024

In this interview, Dr. K and Mizkif discuss professional burnout and the stresses of life, and how best to tackle them in an effective and efficient way. Check out more resources, including Dr K's guide here: https://bit.ly/3xsk6fE Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, buddy. Hey. Can you count to 10 for me? One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten. Is that good? Okay, perfect. How are you doing, man? Uh, I'm all right. I'm stressed out of my mind, honestly.

Oh, no. Yeah. Last time I saw you, I think you were fostering dogs. Yeah, that was also stressing me out of my mind. Or is that part, are you done with that task in life? Yeah, that was a very stressful task I mean the dogs are Do you know who Fandy is?

Vaguely Yeah, she took one of the dogs Some of the dogs went to other homes They all got adopted at the end of the day Cool, awesome, good for you dude It was interesting I mean it was just That was a lot of work

But it was a good time I think it's people think that You know, lots of puppies Is going to be lots of fun But it can be super challenging Yeah, I didn't think that at all I knew that they were going to be it was going to be terrible work, but I mean, it was

rewarding because I mean, you got to help out. It was nice. The chat liked it too. Yeah. Awesome, dude. Yeah, it's cool. It's interesting because I, you know, I've been to that room a couple of times, but I haven't seen it from like a stream perspective.

Because last couple times I think we've just talked in person. Is it that big of a difference though? Yeah, because I think I look at different things, right? so I'm usually sitting next to you. And so my angle is different. Yeah. Yeah, like there's pictures. There's weird stuff over here.

Yeah, that's cool. I'm sorry. Is that written on the wall directly? Yeah, it's because I had to stare at a wall for 12 hours. Oh, my goodness. What was that? What's that about? I basically, I think I owed my chat it.

So I stared at a wall for 12 hours. And I just kept writing on the wall because I was going and saying. But I do have to say staring at a wall is actually pretty nice and it's meditative. Tell me about that. I felt better afterwards. Tell you about it? I mean, I don't know what it does, but it was on string too. And after I was done staring at the wall, I actually felt a lot better.

I think, I don't know if it's because I was just only using my brain to entertain myself. so I was more engaged with myself and I was just thinking better or clearer but it was it actually worked I remember feeling like because I know you said before like oh staring at a wall actually can help you for like an hour

I wouldn't recommend 12 at one stretch but I just tried to get it out my year you know what's interesting I actually listened to you a lot and I even bought a Luttholeon okay you said the because you said that can possibly help with

what was it, I think brain rot? Yeah, so I don't think we usually, I don't recall recommending supplements. So, you know, your mileage may vary, but I don't remember. Luteolin can be helpful. So some studies will show that like that kind of stuff can be helpful. But the challenge with a lot of these studies is that sometimes they'll have small sample sizes. Sometimes they're not well controlled. But have you noticed a difference since you started taking it?

No, I think my environment is too tough to really notice a difference. I genuinely just am way too stressed. I'm stressed on my mind. Yeah, you mentioned that a couple times. Is that something you want to talk about today? Yeah, sure. I mean, basically I feel like I've definitely put on way too much of a workload for myself. I mean, I, I, this is going to be to be.

sound really cringe, but I do own like seven companies, right? And I think, you know, instead of me just focusing on my stream and my job, I focus too much on other things, which is also like my companies or my work and not things I care about. And I thought that it's things I would care about, but it's at the end of the day that's just really stressful. And I don't know how to manage my stress. Like, I try a lot. I go to the gym. I'll do other things. And it helps for sure, but it's not enough. I just get too stressed to the point where I'm like not as entertaining because I'm being stressed. I don't know what to do. Okay. Can I think for a second? When people hear that we offer coaching at HG, their first question is like,

what on earth even is that? So here's the basic problem. When you, struggle with something in your life, you don't see the problem from the outside. You see it from the inside. The value of a coach is that they can look at your life from the outside. They can understand what's going on and they can help guide you to improve things like motivation, accomplish short-term goals, and even increase a sense of purpose in life. And over the long term, we also see improvements and feelings of depression and anxiety. And the best part is we've had over 100,000 coaching sessions and we incorporate that feedback to continually improve our program. So if y'all are interested in actually making a change in your life, check out the link in the description below.

Okay. So I think there's, I don't know the specifics of your situation. We'll learn a little bit more about that, but I think one thing that may be helpful, and this is kind of, you know, I'll kind of punt to you is, so I've noticed, I've worked with many people who are chronically stressed. And if we look at sort of like, let's pull things out of your specific circumstance and understand, we can get it back into it in a second, but like let's understand like how is it that people end up in chronically stressful situations. So it's almost interesting because, you know, sometimes when I work with people like clients or patients, they'll come to me and they'll be like, I'm stressed, I'm stressed, everything's falling apart. And then at some point, I'll have a conversation with them about, okay, like, I can patch you up and send you back into the fray. But at some point, we should have a conversation about, like, why you keep on getting into these situations. Right.

So sometimes people will come to me. They're like, in crisis, we kind of put them back together. And then we like, they continue living their life in the same way. And then things kind of build up, build up, build up. And sometimes what I find is incredibly helpful with people. And I think this happens to, like, most people is we're not really a way. of the internal drivers that push us to create the situations that we're chronically in. What do you think about that?

I realize it was a complex sentence. Well, you know, you basically said we're not aware of what we're doing sometimes to be stressed in the first place, right? Absolutely, right? So you're talking about how managing your stress, it sounds like you're doing all the right things that managing your stress is insufficient. So this is kind of like you're tanking some amount of damage on a daily basis. And then you have some amount of like heal over time shit like that's going on. And that's how you're trying to balance it. But if you're a heal over time, if working out

and doing this and taking Ludiolan and all this stuff is like it's insufficient for like the DPS, like then we have to really think about how can we reduce the overall DPS. And oftentimes we don't realize that the situations that we create our, oh, find ourselves in. And I don't want to go too much into detail because we can ask you about that. But, and, and really, there's some, like, like, principles, even from, like, the discipline of, like, yoga and, like, sort of Buddhist thought about how to understand, like, how our mind works and how we end up, it's almost like a karmic perspective that we kind of reap what we sow, right? So you're saying that I have seven companies. Fair enough. I don't think that's cringe at all, but I understand why you

say that. My question is, how did we get from zero to one? and then one to two and then two to three and then four to five and five to six and six to seven and what was happening in your brain when someone was like hey let's do another company and you're like sure yeah I mean for me a lot of the idea was uh it was I mean the hard part for me is like I need motivation for a lot of what I do okay and for me like the motivation is like I do I do love I do love streaming, but I always wanted to have like kind of mid-maxing almost where it's like, oh, well, while I'm doing that, I can promote something that's on my stream at all times, like StarForge or whatever I want to promote. And basically I could just utilize that while also streaming. So it's like you get, you know, kill two words, almost three words with one stone. And I think that that idea sounds great in your head, but then you realize off stream, you still have to deal with that business all the time. And what I did is I essentially, just took on too much stuff over the years and now I have to do those things and off stream which is basically my job so off my job I have to do you know 700 different calls going places

trying to figure stuff out and I don't necessarily mind doing that and I really don't mind the stress but my problem with my stress now is it's not making me as entertaining because when you're stressed you're just not as funny or at least for me I'm not nearly as entertaining and I want to as entertaining as possible. Okay. So what's stressful about your situation right now? What's stressful about my situation is I just feel like I have no time to breathe. And if the problem with me is if I do have time to breathe, like let's say I'm watching a show or something, I know it while watching that show that I could be doing something else that would be beneficial to something else, so to another company or to my business or to my job or to my stream.

And that watching TV a lot of times feels like a waste of time because I could be doing something else. I could be messaging somebody because the problem with being entrepreneurial is you can always be doing more. And it's hard to say when that it's enough. Okay. So what I'm noticing, this is kind of wild, but it sounds like your relaxation is stressful. Yes.

Oh, very stressful. Like I'm stressed of relaxing because when I relax, I'm like, oh my God, I should be, you know, doing something else. So I'm not even enjoying the moments. Now what we've got is a hot that's turned into a dot. Yeah. What do you think about that? It sucks. Because you're supposed to balance those, you know, that time off with relaxing.

But I just can't do it. I mean, even at the gym, I'll take. calls, I'll be texting people about stuff, I'll be checking things. And honestly, I think the entrepreneurial life is not the best sometimes for me because I just get too hyper-obsessed with, well, you could be doing this, you could just give you a little bit better and things would be better. And it's just kind of taken a huge toll on me over the years. I don't know, I don't know, I wish I could just manage it a little bit better.

Like something that, because I know what you can do. You can say to me, hey, here's this, this, and this. oh thank you doc i feel a lot better but in you know two weeks from now something will happen and i'll be stressed again and i i just i want to figure out how to manage it sure we can we can talk about that so so i'm i'm i'm a bit confused so when you say i could say oh miss just do this this this and things will be better what kind of stuff are you imagining i would say that would help for a week or two um it's almost like you said what you said about patching up it's like you can just you know make me feel decent for like the day.

And I'm like, oh, I feel much better. But in two weeks from now, I could be stressed again. And then I just want to learn how to manage that. Okay. So let's start with that. So why is it that something can help in one day? So this is going to be tough. Okay.

So I'm going to ask you some hard questions. So how is it that something can be helpful for today, but not helpful two weeks from now? You said like I could patch you up, right? But then two weeks from now, like we're kind of back to square one is the vibe that I'm getting. Right. Why? Yeah. Because I don't know.

I mean, I've talked to people about stress and things. And I usually just talking to somebody makes you feel a lot better. Okay. Maybe you just let some of your emotions out or your stress itself by just talking through it. Okay. And then two weeks from now when, you know, something bad happens or I have to focus on something, it'll just come right back and I don't know how to manage it. Okay.

Okay. So here's the way that I would kind of conceptualize this. That's a really good point. So let's say like I could we could crit heal you today. Right? So we could do like we can talk about your emotions. But if we think of or like whatever stressing you out, we can offer some compassion. We can offer some peer support, some social capital.

Like there's all kinds of things that you can do like one dose, like one injection. right like we can just inject you with some compassion and but that like so i i get what you're saying and i'm just going to kind of repeat it back to you there's like one-offs and then there's like the stable level of like stress right and one doesn't fix the other do you see that one is like a systemic stress and one is like an injective relief so what is it that how how can we possibly fix this day-to-day stress i don't know and what's sucks too doc i'll be honest is even when you're talking i'm thinking about oh i could be doing this i should be doing that i should be focusing on this it's every second of my day is you could be doing something else unless you're

i'm doing something else and it's it's debilitating okay so have there been periods of your time of your life where you haven't been stressed oh yeah it was before i did all this it's before i gave myself this massive workload that i should not have given myself and i really do think of it's it was also before I was in the entrepreneur business. Like before I was a streamer, before I was a, you know, try to make businesses, I almost enjoyed the time of, you know, hey, you are, here's work. You work nine to five. You're done.

You clock in, you clock out. And when you're on the weekend, you're saying yourself, oh, well, this is what I'm supposed to be doing. I'm supposed to be relaxing with my family on Saturday and Sunday. So you enjoy those moments. But for someone that's in the entrepreneurial business, you can always be doing better. And that mindset has just taken complete control over me.

Okay. And I just feel lost. Yeah. So, I mean, what I'm kind of getting the vibe of is that you're relentlessly chasing efficiency and doing more. Yes. And so here's kind of what I'm wondering is like if we can understand, because I think this is like driven by you in some ways.

Does that make sense? You cut out right when you said driven. So this is kind of driven by you in some ways? Yes. It's all by me. How is it driven by you? Because I have such a high standard of making, you know, of like of myself. Like I want to be the best.

I want to make sure everything works. Where does the high standard come from? You know what's funny? I don't even know. Because my family was never like that. They were always like you can chill, you can relax, enjoy your life. My family's very middle class. They were just like, hey, let's focus on the moment, not focus on, you know, businesses.

Like, I mean, granted, my parents were very work oriented. They worked all day and they would come home at night at night to see me and then go to bed. But they were always telling me like, yeah, try to enjoy your life, try to enjoy the moment. I don't know where this work idea came from where I just am working so much. I don't know. Maybe it's an insecurity. Maybe I'm just insecure about failure or I want to be better so I can feel like I have a higher social status than the person next to me. but whatever it is, it's not worth it.

So when we, how do you feel about yourself because doing all this stuff isn't worth it? Um, I feel like it's not necessarily that it's, I just feel like I wasted my time. Like I feel like I've just, you know, instead of doing like seven different things, I wish I did like two. You know, just like, hey, like, calm down. Stop trying to do so much because, and maybe it's phoma. that I got for a while with these things. I don't know. I feel very just upset.

I'm just like, dude, did you really just get stressed for three years, four years straight when you started making these things and doing these things? Because I hate it. Like, I'm like, dude, you make all these things. You do all these things so you can enjoy the time off and be, you know, hey, you know, let's watch a TV show. Well, when I'm watching that show the entire time, I'm just thinking to myself, holy fuck, I could be doing anything else. that's work oriented to make my, you know, company grow because streaming is a business. And I just taken my life. Can I process for a second?

I think you're sending a lot of good stuff my way. Okay. So it sounds like you're very unsatisfied with yourself for having created this situation. Yeah. And what would you like to happen? If I could wave a magic wand and do whatever I could make some, we've got some magical genie situation and I could make wishes on your behalf what would you wish for when I ate doc I would wish that I just stopped caring as much I wish I would just relax

and say you know what like that extra 10% you can be getting from you know focusing on this so much and hyper you know just caring about it so much to the point where you can't even enjoy your life off stream or off you know whatever you're doing is not worth it and I can enjoy my life I just want my mind to be cleared. Okay. And... Like, you know what TMJ is? Yeah.

Like, I got TMJ from all the stress. Like, my jaw cracks. Yeah, it sucks. All day, it cracks. My neck cracks really badly. My eyes hurt all the time. It's all from the stress. Okay.

So you wished you stopped caring as much. So what is it that makes that hard for you? It's the, idea that you can always be doing more. Where does that idea come from? It could be that I, I, competitiveness with others. Okay.

Maybe I just, I'm very competitive. Are you competitive with others? I would say I'm more competitive with others when it comes to, you know, it's trying to be, or like trying to have like a higher status. I guess you could say because it's my, You know, it's kind of my job.

How does it feel when you have a higher, when your status improves? No, you don't feel anything. Okay. So if your status improves, does your hunger for status increase, decrease, or stay the same? It stays the same. That's the worst part. Okay. So how, so let's say like, this is going to be tough, okay?

So let's say, like, I feel thirsty, right? And then I'm going to drink some water. And if I tell you, Ms. I feel thirsty, I'm going to drink some water, and then the water has no impact on my thirst. How would you understand what's going on inside me? I would have no idea. Okay. What do you think is the relationship between the water and my thirst? Well, the water would quench your thirst.

And if it doesn't? It doesn't do anything. Okay. Right? So it's kind of weird. right? Yes. Okay.

Good. So, let me just think. How long have you wanted to be better? My whole life. Of course. I mean, I've always wanted to be better. I've always wanted to be successful. Even when I was a kid, like when I wanted to be the first person to get a job of

my grade, so I went to Toys R Us and gave a lady a notepad and said, hey, here's my number. She's like, oh, you're hitting on me? I'm like, no, I want a job. I was like, when I first got my phone, I was in fourth grade or third grade. How old were you when you first wanted a job? Oh, what is third grade? Nine. Okay.

Why did you want to be the first person to have a job? Because I wanted money. Why did you want money? I guess it shows maybe it's power. Maybe it's, you know, the feeling of, security, it could be, I don't know. Okay. I don't think it's power or security.

So I'll tell you why. So you said you wanted to be the first person. Yep. Right? So the power or the security that you get from money at the age of nine is relatively fixed, whether you're the first person, the second person, the third person, or the fifth person. Does that make sense?

When you say fixed, is that because basically there's not really anything you can get at nine? No. What I'm saying is that first is important. But like, so if I get a, if I'm looking for security from a job, whether I'm the first person and migrated to get it or the last person, the only thing that matters is I get the money with the security, right? Right.

First doesn't enter the equation. Does that make sense? Yep. But the fact that you wanted to be the first person tells us that the need is not security or power. And we also have a second clue to that is that sometimes when I ask you questions, you'll say, maybe it's this, maybe it's this, I don't know, maybe it's an insecurity. So that tells me that it's not an answer from in here, it's an answer from up here.

Right? So it's probably true on some level. But like if we pay attention to your words, we'll understand what's important. Why do you want to be the first person? What does that tell you? That I'm an asshole. That I'm competitive, that I want, I mean, I don't. I don't know. How does it feel to be the first?

It just felt, I mean, it's hard for me to conceptualize how I felt when I was nine. Yeah, of course. I just know I wanted to be someone with a job. I wanted people to say, wow, that guy's got a cool job. He works at Toys R Us. I don't even know what I was going to try to do. I sell gumballs. I had no idea.

But I wanted a job badly. And I wanted to work because I wanted to grow my, wealth and stupid as it sound. I wanted to grow my wealth, make money so I could become rich one day and relax. What made it hard to relax when you were nine? Um, that I felt like I was just wasting my time when I do things. Like if I wasn't, uh, even when I was like 15, I wanted jobs badly and I always wanted to work harder and work, work, work. And I think, I don't know what that drive was, I really wish I can think, but I think it almost could be the same drive I have today because it just never stops. Does it feel the same? And it's funny, that nine-year-old kid of me

would have said, you're good today. Like, hey, relax. You did what you were going to do. You said you were going to try to make money and you did it. But I'm here and I do want more. And I'm like, I don't know what to do with that. Okay. So I think we'll be able to maybe understand some of the that play here and not just for you but for anyone who's watching I I think I think there's a lot here I hate to do this but we have to take a I have to take a quick break just to talk about nine eight eight is it okay if we do that right now because I don't want to interrupt things so I think I've got like a pretty good I've got like a page of stuff that we'll try to stitch together but before we do that I

want to just talk about nine eight eight real quick so this is probably something that's useful for y'all's community as well. But just wanted to give you all a quick heads up that today's stream is sponsored by 988. So this is something super cool that the United States government put together. That is a crisis line, crisis and suicide lifeline. So it's an emergency services line that y'all can call 24 hours a day, seven days a week, if you're in the U.S. or the seven territory, or five territories. A couple of things to keep in mind that's awesome about this is if you all are in some kind of crisis.

You can call this number and you can speak to a human being who is a trained crisis counselor who can help you through that actually like help you manage that crisis, connect you with resources. So they deal with anything that I think is basically mental health or crisis related. So if you all are just concerned about, you know, anything that you're going through, you can just call the 988 number. So you don't even if you're feeling like overwhelmed or extremely anxious or just looking for someone to talk to, These crisis workers are there on hand here to listen to your problems. And if you or someone you know is struggling, you all can always reach out to the 988 Lifeline. And for more info, y'all can check out 988 lifeline.org. So thank you to 988 for sponsoring today's stream.

All righty. So I am curious, what are you taken away so far? Has anything kind of floated to the surface for you? Nope. Okay. So let me, let me kind of, I'm just trying to think about, do I want to ask you more questions or? Okay, so you said that your family was like very middle class. And what time would your, what time would your both of your parents worked?

Yep. All day. And what was that like for you? I missed them a lot. I would think about it all the time. I'm like, you know, I wish they were around more. I mean, obviously when I was a teenager, I said I wish they were around less, right? Like, I just wanted to be alone or in the house.

But when I was a kid, I did wish they were around more, but I understood what they're doing. I mean, they were working to support us to make us have a good life to put us through college. But I did see what it did to them. And I saw that my parents, yeah, my, especially my mom, all she cared about was work, her whole life. She was a workaholic, and maybe that's where I got it from. And she worked so much that she just missed all of the years. You know, when I was a kid, it was like she did not, she was not there for my baseball game. She was not there for anything because my mom was working so much that she would come home at 6.30, 7 o'clock.

You know, she'd make dinner. She'd be in bed by like 9, and that's it. So my mom even had two jobs at one point, because she just, liked working. She didn't have to do it. She just wanted to work. Um, so it was kind of, I don't think she, let me put it this way. She definitely regrets it. I'm sure if I asked her today, do you regret working so much? She would say yes, because she missed out on a lot of my pivotal years of my life and my, my families. Did you all need the money? No. How do you understand, how do you understand why she took a second job if y'all didn't need the money? I, well, I understand

that she worked a lot because she wanted to support us and make us have the best life possible. Like she liked that we were, you know, living in a pretty nice house for middle class, I would say. She liked that our colleges were paid for for the majority of it. And that's what she worked for, was for us. But at the end of the day, we didn't need that. We would rather have been there for things. But I think for her, she thought her place was to work. How do you remember what it was like to have baseball games and have your mom not show up?

Honestly, Doc, it would be real. No, because I was so focused on trying to make everyone laugh around me that I didn't even pay attention. Why were you so focused on making everyone laugh? Because that's what I'm good at. Where I was, when I'm stressed, I fucking suck ass at it. But when I'm not stressed, I'm a funny guy. Why do you want to be a, what's the importance of being a funny guy? I feel like it's what I'm good at. And I, it's, I've always been really good at. it and it makes when I make someone laugh like genuinely laugh it's a euphoric feeling that I've never had in my life no matter of no sex no nothing has ever made me feel better than when I make someone laugh in my life what does it feel like when you make someone else laugh it feels

like I I'm successful almost it makes me feel like I did what I was supposed to do and I don't know it's the it's the best feeling I ever had in my life is when someone genuinely in front of me is like that was fucking funny like a witty response a clever joke, you know, or like something stupid. Like I just fall on the ground. And someone laughs, I just feel, makes me feel happy. Okay. That is all I've ever cared about is making people laugh. But then I also have another side of me. It's like, well, you like business. But the business side stresses me out. So then that other side isn't as funny. I don't think those are two different sides. But we'll get to that in a second. So, so when you make someone laugh,

How do you feel? Can you describe it at all? Like, what goes through you? Like, it literally feels like I just nutted. It just, it feels like a godlike feeling I've never had experienced in my life that I love having. It's just amazing. It is my favorite feeling. Who do you become when you make someone laugh? Who do I become? I don't know. If I'm really making people laugh and I'm in a good mood, I almost feel euphoric. Yeah, so you feel euphoric, but like what I'm kind of, I'm kind of pushing for an answer here, but I'll just share my observation. So in my mind, there's two kinds of misgifts.

There's the misgift who's trying to make people laugh and the misgift who makes people laugh. And these seem to be very different human beings to me. Like their internal experience of who they are is like very different. What do you think? Is that resonate with you at all or not so much? Yeah, no, I agree. There's the one that's trying to make people laugh is very stressed. Yep.

The one that does make people laugh is not stressed at all. So where does that euphoria come from? I don't know. It's just me feeling like that's my place on earth and I'm good at it. And when I'm making people laugh, I feel like I'm the best at it. But when I'm stressed, I don't feel like I can do it at all. They just feel like I'm closed up and I want to hide in a bunker. I don't want to be around.

Okay. Can I think for a second? Mm-hmm. How do you feel when people criticize you? The problem with my brain with ADHD is if someone criticizes me and I resonate with it, I'll think about it a lot. I'll just like close my eyes and almost I'll see the image of what someone said about me. It's definitely gotten a little bit easier over the years with criticism. I don't really take it as much because I just, I've seen it all.

But it does, I do still see it and it hurts. And it hurts more when the person is being genuine. Like I know when someone's like, oh, well, Ms. is a loser and boring. Like, I don't care. But if it's someone that's like, yeah, like I watched Ms. for five years and now he's just not entertaining, yeah, that kills me. So would it be fair to say that the way that you feel about yourself is influenced by how other people treat you? Absolutely. Yeah, of course.

How tight is that correlation? Like if you get like, and what about compliment? Like if someone authentically praises you, then how do you feel? Oh, amazing. Yeah, it's all tied to how people think about me. I'll read one good thing about me and I'll feel good for a week. But I'll read one bad thing and I'll feel like shit. Or hear one bad thing or see one bad thing.

I'm very tied to how people think about me. Which is, it's not good. What's not good about it? That I have no confidence in myself with it. Like, I, it's weird. Sometimes I feel like I'm the most confident guy in the world. And sometimes I just feel like I'm a shell of who I once was. What changed?

Trauma. Okay. That'll do it. Yeah, that fucked me up pretty bad. How long ago? Was my trauma? Mm-hmm. A year and a half ago.

Okay. That'll certainly do it. So, uh, and if, if these seven, companies were successful. How would you feel? They are successful. How do you feel? Nothing.

So what is it that, okay, so the success doesn't matter to you, or not, doesn't matter isn't the right word, it doesn't seem to fulfill you. Yep, doesn't fulfill me at all.

Okay. And, uh, what was in your mind when you started number seven? That, um, it's interesting. Like each one's kind of different.

Like I did make the gym that I have. I really just made it for fun. I didn't make it for profit. Which I don't mind that one. And I don't mind that I've made these businesses. They're all successful in doing their own thing. My problem with my businesses is more so I just care too much. And it's not even a care that matters.

It's you're getting 5% more. Great. Your company's worth 5% more for all the stress you have, but you don't even enjoy your off days. You're just sitting there contemplating what you could be doing better, contemplating this and that. For what? For 5%? That 5% doesn't matter.

And I don't mind the work. And I don't mind putting the business in working hard. But what I do mind is I just basically have created this loop of where if I'm watching a TV show, my brain instantly starts thinking, hey, do something else. This is not good. This is not smart. Work harder. You should be working. Someone else is going to get better.

than you. Someone else is going to catch up. And I'm just dying on the inside. Okay. So when someone, when someone, oh, so when that voice says that to you, what happens inside you? I get anxious. And do you have to listen to the voice? It's hard not to because the show, I mean, TV shows are, there's a lot of downtime in TV shows where someone's just talking and it's not that interesting. And in those moments. and in those moments I'm just thinking about everything else. You should be doing this, maybe you should message this person. And what sucks is sometimes my inner thought during those shows is right.

Where I'm like, oh, fuck, I didn't do this. Oh, I could do this. Oh, maybe I should try this thing tomorrow. And it actually helps sometimes. And so it sucks is that 9,999 times, it's not correct and it's annoying. But that one time it is, I'm like, damn, that's a good idea. Why do you have to pursue good ideas? To make sure I'm still doing well.

What does that mean doing well? But you are doing well. I don't know. To make sure I'm doing the best I possibly can. So when I look back at this, when I'm 50 years old, and I say, you know what? Good job. You know, you worked really hard.

But I know what I'm 50, and if I keep working like this, I'm going to say you fucked up more than you possibly ever can imagine. because you got to enjoy zero moments. What's it like to not do the best you possibly can? I feel like I'm a failure. Okay. That's a problem? Yeah.

I just don't like feeling like I'm not doing the best I possibly can because I say to myself, wow, you have insane opportunities that no one else has. And you should be utilizing that opportunity. And I just feel like I'm wasting it sometimes if I'm not. trying to be the best because you know how does it feel to waste your opportunities it feels like i'm a failure and it really does it just feels like i'm not i'm letting myself down and that's money that's a lot of money you know it's it's it's tough for me to really say it's not a big deal and what happens when you don't let yourself down oh it feels like a two out of 10

like it feels like okay well you do what you're supposed to do it doesn't feel great But when you don't do what you're supposed to do, I feel like a nine out of ten stress because I'm like, God, fucking damn it, you idiot. Like, you fucked up so badly. So it sounds to me like you're kind of like stuck, right? So on the one hand, you like give in to that voice, you optimize. And even if it's a long shot, that one out of a thousand makes it really important for you to take that shot. And even if you succeed, you're overly stressed. You can't even enjoy your wins.

You can't even enjoy your downtime. And if you don't give into that voice, then you're kind of fucking. up. You're not like doing a great job. You're letting all these opportunities go by. So it sounds to me like basically your life is dictated by like the avoidance of one kind of pain on any given day. You're never moving towards something. You're moving away from something. Always. Yeah. And what sucks about being so stressed is not enjoying those times where you're supposed to be having fun makes it. So, you know, all work and no play makes Jack. a dull boy. It really does make you worse because, yeah, like you're stressed in those moments.

You're thinking about your job so that I'm not enjoying the time I'm supposed to be enjoying, which results in me being more miserable. So it actually always has hurted my job. It's never benefited me being stressed. It's always hurt me. It's not good. What do you think about this person who is making decisions in your life? I think this is not who I ever wanted to be. Who do you want to be? I want to be an idiot. What does that mean? I literally just want to be like, I don't care. I used to be so carefree when I was, you know, even in college and stuff.

And it's because it's what I said. I think when I was younger, it was just like, hey, you have homework to do. Here's 17 things you can do for homework. And then when you do that, you're done. You can always study a little bit more, yes. But it's not as important. What is the name? How do you

How does caring manifest within you? How does caring manifest in me? How do you know when you care versus you don't care? Like if I was... When I think about it a lot. Okay, when you think about it a lot. Yeah, but I hate thinking. I don't want to think.

Yeah, because when I think I'm not as entertaining. What I'm not thinking, I'm fun as hell. I'm funny. I'm great. I'm thinking so much. I'm stressed. I'm pissed. What causes?

thinking. The cause is thinking is it's almost like a checklist that's infinitely going in on my brain saying, hey, you need to do this, you should be doing this, you shouldn't be enjoying yourself, you should be working, you could be doing more, you can be making more money, you could be more successful, you should, and that that checklist is an infinite loop that just hasn't turned off in years and I want it to shut off. I'm going to read something. No, no, go ahead. No, that's really it. I'm going to read some stuff to you. So I wanted to be a cool guy. I wanted other people to say he's cool. I want to relax. I want to be the first person who has a job. What do you think about those statements? Sounds like a douchebag.

It sounds like a guy that's going to be like my mom. Yeah. Going to be like your mom? Is your mom. Right? Right? Yeah. So what's it like to be a douchebag? You know, it sounds there's, it's not even near a douchebag. A douchebag is someone that doesn't care. It's usually someone that's just, but this sounds like a workaholic. It sounds like someone that just constantly, like, I want people to say like, oh my God, he's so successful. When the truth is, it's like, does that really matter? No. Okay. So I'm going to try to draw some stuff out, okay? How are you feeling about today, by the way? What do you mean? Like, how do you feel about this conversation? No, I like it. The only problem is,

I've had this monologue in my head for years where I just, like, you know, stop being so stressed. Stop. And then I get stressed about being stressed. And then my eye twitches now. Like, I don't know what the fuck's going on with me anymore. Okay. I can't. What sucks the most is, I just wish I could just enjoy moments.

Like, I wish I can compartmentalize my life. Okay. So I'm going to go ahead and let's see if this works. Can you see this? Okay. So let's try to understand this. Okay. So, I don't know how exactly we're going to do this.

Let's start with your parents. So your parents were, as you put it, workaholics. Yeah. And they didn't need to be workaholics, right? Nope. So what did they tell you growing up? They told me to get a job, go to college, work after college, live a normal life. Okay. What did they show you growing up?

Show me. What did they model for you? My dad was much more relaxed and said just, you know, live life and do what you want. My mom was much more work, work, work, put an effort, try to be better. She wasn't necessarily pushy. She wanted me to live a very average life. Okay. She wanted me to...

What does she model for you? What does she do? Uh, what did she do? She was in a cabin. No, no, like, like, so she's, so, I guess this is kind of the point that I'm making. So, like, I've worked with some people whose parents are alcoholics. Mm. And what they tell their kids is, don't ever drink. Don't ever drink.

Drinking is bad. Drinking will ruin your life. And what do you think those kids end up doing? Drinking. Absolutely. Why? Because fuck you to the man. Right?

So, this is really important to understand. as children, we learn what our parents do, not what they say. And furthermore, one of the most confusing things for a child is when your parents tell you to do something and show you to do something else. I'll give you an example. Why the fuck aren't you more confident? You should be confident in yourself. Why can't you stand up for yourself? If a parent says that to a child, what do you think happens in the child?

child. He becomes a a beacon of light of confidence. Why? I'm kidding. He becomes insecure. Why? The parent is telling him.

Because, I don't know, maybe he gets nervous and starts overthinking it and... Is he confident? No. And where is his lack of confidence coming from? It could be anything. I mean... Why the fuck aren't you confident, Ms. Giff? What the fuck is wrong with you?

You should be more confident. Stand up for yourself. His parent? Absolutely. So I should hate my mom. Nope. We're just starting with your mom. We're going to leave her far behind.

This is all you, buddy. So the first thing is like, I think it's important to understand that we do what our parents model. Like, we're, like, we use the same language. So I remember when my grandmother, so my grandmother had an injury when she was a kid. And so I don't know if you've seen this. Like, this is like definitely true in my mom. my culture, but I think it's somewhat like universal. Have you ever seen like the old person sigh when they like sit down?

They're like, oh, have you seen that? Like when old people do that, they're like, oh my God, like, oh. So she would sigh. She would do this like old lady grunt every time she would sit down. And it was the funniest damn thing. So when my daughter was like one year old or like a year and a half, she started sighing like an old person every time she sat down. And it was like the funniest damn thing.

She's like, ah. She's like this 18 month old. kid who's like sighing like she's been on this earth for 70 years. And you just internalize the behaviors, the mannerisms. Like it's really cute in her. But this is the first thing to understand, right? So you were taught from an early age that like work is more important than everything else. Right. So there's some amount of like inheritance of workaholic. Now some of this may even be genetic. Like it's very surprising like what percentage of this could even be genetic. So we have studies that show, for example, that conscientiousness, which is the ability to, like, move relentlessly

towards a goal is somewhat inherited. There's also neuroticism, which is the tendency to worry that is also somewhat inherited. So if you look at people who are, like, medical students, they're very high in both of these qualities because they're like, they work really hard and they're super worried about if they don't work hard, what's going to happen. So this results in kind of like this situation where like basically they're relentless. They don't feel happy. They just work really hard.

They're stressed out all the time. But what both of these things lead to is good outcomes. So these are the kids that wind up in medical school because they worked really hard and they were stressed all the time. So they studied extra hard and they were paranoid. So this is just something of your background. But we're going to kind of steer a little bit away from this if that's okay with you. Yep. So here's the thing. So when I listen to you, what I hear is someone who wants to be.

So I hear someone who wants to be, let's say, accepted. So when you make people laugh, this is like a shortcut to acceptance. Does that resonate with you at all? Yeah. So this too is very common. I think we've talked about this. This is very common in ADHD. So an ADHD, huh? Do I have ADHD? You told me you had ADHD. I have severe ADHD. I have the worst ADHD. So this is what happens in kids who have ADHD, okay?

So what happens is by the second grade, the average kid, I don't know if this is true, but I've seen the statistics seen this cited in some places. Get invited to zero birthday parties. Do you know why kids with ADHD don't get invited? Did you get invited to birthday parties? Because we're fucking annoying. Why are you annoying? Because we don't shut up.

Okay, right? So when you realize, you're, you probably have an above average IQ. Have you ever had your IQ tested? I don't want to because I bet it's way lower than above average. I think it's probably not, but fair enough. So this is what happens in kids who have ADHD is like they recognize their deficits. So what happens is you, you, so kids are actually really good at judging IQ. And you probably recognized, I mean, I would bet money.

that when you were growing up, you got frustrated with yourself because you could tell that, like, you're not stupider than these other kids. That you're just as smart as they are, but you can't do the things that they can do. And then what, huh? Yeah, it was so annoying. And then what you sort of conclude is that, like, there's something wrong with you. You're kind of screwed up in some way. Yep. So there is a dissatisfaction with the side.

Yep. Okay. And so this is really important. So one antidote to the dissatisfaction is to make other people laugh. Because when you make other people laugh, what? I'm listening, but yeah, that sounds accurate. When you make other people laugh, like, where is your mind? Not there. Not there, right? Where is there? A lot of times when I'm trying to be funny, I'm not even in present thought. Absolutely. So this is really important to understand. The reason this is euphoric is because most of the time you're in your fucking head. And in your head, there's more to do, more to optimize, more to possibly fuck up.

And you also have this like director's cut of self-judgment. You know what I'm talking about? No. So, like, you're always thinking about yourself. Like, it's not just, there's like a parallel track. There's like, I need to optimize this thing. I need to do this thing for work. But in the back of your mind, all of those things are driven by who you will be if you don't do that.

Does that resonate or no? Because I haven't asked you these questions. So this could not, may not do it. Oh, yeah, that's pretty accurate. Okay. Because I've asked you a couple times, what is the euphoria? and I think you're having difficulty with words, which is fine.

So I'm just filling in some of the gaps as I understand them, okay? So it's kind of like, because like, if you do all this stuff, you won't be you, right? Yep. And when you make other people laugh, you're not you.

You're just like, vibing with another human being. You're out of your head. You're just kind of existing with them. Y'all are kind of like, you're creating something beautiful. You're creating, but you're not you anymore.

Your sense of self actually disappears. and so there's also a correlation between your sense of humor, an inverse correlation. So if we look at the degree of your self-referential thoughts, okay, which I'm going to call stress, or even the activity of mind. And we look at humor. So the more you think, the less funny you become. So we want to go back to here. No thinking.

Just viving. just hanging out with chat, no pressure. And if we look at the nature of pressure or stress, the nature of pressure or stress is increased thoughts. Does this make sense? Yeah. So stress and thoughts go hand in hand. So this too, it's like, what prevents you from enjoying a show and relaxing this gift?

Thoughts. Absolutely. Right? So you can't even relax because when your mind has idle time, your thoughts increase, your stress increases, you become less funny. So this keeps on like this is like a cycle. And then furthermore, we have this issue of like rock and hard place where if I relax, this is like, I don't even know how to say this. It's kind of like if you relax, then you are inefficient. Yep. And if you're efficient, you'll feel better, but this doesn't really work. Nope. Right? So if you really look at it, like, it is the fear of inefficiency that keeps you from relaxing.

And it is the fear of something else that, like, keeps you going. Like, you always have to work, you have to work, you have to work. Because if you relax, then you're being inefficient. If you're inefficient, like you'll turn into something. I don't know what, but you don't want to be that, right? You don't want to be that guy. You want to be the person who has the first job in your class. You want to be the cool guy.

You want to be liked. Do you want to be respected? You want to be valued? Now, the question is, because when you make people laugh, right, you're valued. That's how you know. They're laughing. Ms. That was fucking hilarious, bro. You just made my day.

your poison. That's your addiction. Yep. Right. So now the question becomes, why? Why are you so addicted to this? What do you think? Why am I so addicted to making people laugh? It's weird because I feel like I'm, as much as I'm addicted to making people laugh, I'm also addicted to business and growth and money and stuff like that. Sure. That's the stress that is the exact opposite of me being funny and entertaining. Yes, very good. Right? So those, appear to be opposites, but I don't think you're addicted to opposites. I think it's just one thing with two manifestations. So this is what's kind of weird.

I think there's something within you that you're unhappy with yourself. Does this make sense? Yeah. So this is what's kind of weird. So even your desire for relaxation, this is so hard to string together. But okay, so let's say like version number one, version 1.0 is not having friends growing up. But I did have friends growing up.

Okay. That's what it is statistically for most kids with ADHD. So why did you want to be first, the first kid in your school to get a job? Oh, I looked cool. Okay, so looked cool. Now we want to think about, let's understand this, because there's a lot in those two words. what kind of kid wants to look cool? One with insecurities.

Right? So if you want to look cool, does that mean you are cool or are uncool? You're uncool. Are uncool. Now, here's the crazy thing. Even if you accomplish your goal, will you be cool?

No. Why not? Because being cool is, I feel like it's a mindset more than this is a... Absolutely. So already, hold on a second because you're setting yourself up to fail here, right? Because you want to look cool. So this is the problem.

You feel you are cool. And even if you accomplish your goal, does it circle back and fix this? Nope. Nope. So now I'm drinking water, but I'm still thirsty. Mm. Doesn't work. So now we get to maybe version 2.0 at some.

point. So then you sort of end up becoming a content creator and you make people laugh. And when you make people laugh, do you look cool? No, you don't. Think about it. Are you cool? Absolutely. Do you look cool? Oftentimes you're undignified. You don't think me making people laugh. It makes me think I'm, makes people think I'm cool. I think it makes you cool. I don't think it makes you look cool. I think oftentimes the things that we do when we make others laugh are actually undignified. What does that indignify mean? You're like sometimes debasing yourself. I think there's a chadness to it.

There's a chadness to it, but sometimes you look like an idiot. When you make people laugh, sometimes you look like an idiot. That's what I would say. Yeah, but I genuinely enjoy looking like an idiot. Yeah. So if you are cool, then you can look like an idiot. Right. But when you're not cool, you can't look like an idiot.

idiot. It's weird though. A lot of times when I'm like really funny, I feel like I'm the coolest because it's like, I don't think there's many people that can do that. Like anyone could be successful. Anyone can have nice clothes. Not many people can make people laugh. I agree.

But that so, so what happens to your estimation of yourself when you make people laugh? It goes up. Absolutely. You value yourself, right? So this is like, this is the key thing. Is my screen share working with you? Yeah. Okay.

Right? Because when you say not many people can do that. Now, I want you to just, this is so subtle. But when you say not many people can do that, you're not talking about how it looks. You are talking about the value of it. If I say a diamond is a beautiful thing because it is rare, that is not saying that a diamond is pretty or that people like the way that a diamond looks. That is talking about an intrinsic value of the diamond because of its worth. You are contributing to society when you make people laugh.

looking cool and there's no first or last you're not even saying I need to make people laugh more than other people I need to be the first person you see like all the comparative statements disappear

I know it's like subtle maybe it's wrong but so there's no like first or last right you don't give a shit like I'm not hearing you say if you make someone laugh and then someone else make someone laugh how do you feel I gotta do it again

Like you got a one-up them? Uh, not. Yeah, kind of. A little bit. Okay. So I think there's some of that flavor there. Fair enough. But like, I don't know if this makes sense, but when you say not many people can do that, that is a statement of value. Yeah. Not many people can really make someone actually laugh. I, most people can get that like, ha. But not many people can be like, wow, like, I'm actually laughing. Right. So, so when, when you. you do that, you feel really good about yourself.

Yeah. Right? So that's euphoria. That is also like outside of your head. Like it's getting rid of this. And that's like euphoria. Now there are a couple of other things here, which is like we got to be super careful. So when you are unhappy with yourself, right?

So you want to be more. I think that's part of the reason you are a serial entrepreneur. and then also if you're unhappy with yourself, you need to be better. Right? And if you need to be better, you need to be more efficient. Because efficiency is better.

Got to hit three birds with one stone. Yeah. Or 10. Or 10. And you're so good that you can even do that. But the problem is that much like this whole

water thing, like, it doesn't actually fix your problem. And even now, when you've achieved what you set out to achieve, you're unhappy. And this is where things are going to get really subtle. So would you like me to teach you work-life balance, Ms? Yes. Okay. So your desire for work-life balance is a manifestation of this thing. It is the same problem. I need to be better. Ms. needs to be better by starting one company, by starting seven companies. Now I need to be better by getting more work-life balance. It's the same problem. You're not willing to accept or be happy with yourself.

Yeah. You see that? That's why it doesn't work. Because it's stemming from over here. Now we need work-life balance. And if I get better at work-life balance, then I will be better. It's just another optimization. It's the same fucking thing.

This is really important to understand. I could be wrong. But do you see what I'm saying? Yeah. No, it's completely true. Right? And so then you're like, okay, I'm going to take Ludiolan.

And I'm going to do this. And I'm going to listen to this. And I'm going to learn this. And I'm going to meditate. And I'm going to do this. And I'm going to do all these things because I'm not happy with the person that I am right now. So I'm going to fix it. Not going to work.

Yeah, it doesn't. Weird. Right? So how do you fix this? Stop talking. to my mom. Your mom is not to blame for this. Okay. I'm not sure, honestly. Do you want to fix it? I try to fix it. I've done everything you said. I go to the gym. Yeah, you tried to fix it, right? So those are all work-life balances. Do you want to fix it? Yeah, absolutely. You sure?

Yes. I, I, this mental state that I'm in is not one that I, that I, I, the thing is, it's one thing if I was like very unsuccessful, right? Like, let's say I was like, You know, I just got a free therapy session from you and I was just not doing well, but like, I am in a spot where I should be happy. Like, when I was at my 10 year old self, I said, dude, if you're ever like this, you should be happy, but I'm here and I'm still wanting more because numbers can always go up. But I know that that's a toxic way to live because numbers can always go up. And you'll never be happy no matter what if you just keep going that route. Exactly, right? So this is where like we're getting to a point where like, so now I mean, I think this is.

is going to be really hard, but there's very important things to understand here. So the first is like, this is going to happen as long as this is at the root. Yep. Now, here's the problem. So we can talk about how to address this. So we're going to like, I'm going to introduce a couple concepts to you, okay? The first is like activity of the mind. A lot of your moment to moment piece.

So there's like two or three different issues here. The first is how can we help you be happy? in one day. And then the second is, how can we help you maintain that happiness over time? These are actually like two separate issues. So the more active your mind is, the less happy you'll be. Yep. So what results in an increase in thoughts in the mind?

What do you think? Not being happy with myself. Okay. Unhappiness, sure. So there's a couple of other things that we're going to learn here. So sensory input. So you said that you stared at a wall for 12 hours. Yep.

And what happened to you over the course of those 12 hours? They felt like my mind raced like crazy for about an hour. And then I kind of just was more. I don't know. I just felt like my brain worked. I felt like it was like the cogs were turning. Okay, good. In a bad way.

Okay. So let's understand this, right? So let's say here's your mind. The more sensory input I get, the more thoughts I create in my mind. Let's say each of these creates a thought. Is sensory input something like even going on like like, like checking messages and stuff like that? Absolutely. That is the number one form of sensory input, right?

So then what happens is each of these like little things in the mind actually has its own momentum. So I would say it's kind of like a, these are actually thoughts. This is what happens. It's not just one thought that then disappears. We then play with the thought. So you get an email message and then what happens is like you're thinking about the email message, should I do this? Should I do this?

Should I do this? So one thought actually becomes many thoughts. And each of these branches off and each of these branches off. And since you're managing seven companies, this means that you've got seven sets of inputs. So your mind is fucking overwhelmed all the time. Yep. So this is probably what your thoughts feel like. They don't come and go.

They start to spiral and branch. and then they become this. Yeah. Okay. So this is what your mind is cluttered with. So what do we do to fix that? When you stare at a wall, you get no input. So what ends up happening is this kind of goes like this,

but then it starts to like fizzle and then it'll eventually stop. So this thought over here starts to slow down. Maybe it picks up a little bit. And then it starts to slow down. And then this one is like going really, really strong for a while. And then it's like, okay, let's slow down. Because if the mind doesn't have any input, it has no, nothing else to play with. Yeah.

Right? So you can't, like, read one book. And for the, like, let's say you read a book. And then after, at the end, there's a big climax. You're like, oh, my God, that was fucking awesome. You're thinking about it for a little while. You're like, that was great. That was great.

It's not like you're happy for the next 40 years filled with excitement because you read one great book. Thoughts in the mind fizzle if they are not fed. what's going on right now is you are feeding your mind so many stressful thoughts that then pile on to this in some way. So this is like your base of operations and then something about these thoughts will like pile onto them. Does this make sense or not so much? You can yon.

That's exactly how it is. Okay. So the first thing that we need to do is recognize that the more time you have this thought input, the worst things. are going to be. And furthermore, watching a show doesn't work because watching a show, here's the show. Let's try to create a relaxing thought. But you have all these mind spirals that are going on and they keep on interjecting. So you can't relax. Like this one thought is over here, but look at all these like past inputs that are like lingering in the mind. Or like the show will say

something. And I'll be like, fuck, I forgot or I have to do this or I should do that. Like, right? So it's thoughts popping into the mind. And if you if you have a neurodiverse brain and you have ADHD, this problem is exacerbated. Wait, neurodiverse, doesn't that mean I'm stupid? No. Oh. It just means that the way that you're, well, so this is a, this is a concept of, that has, like, different sides to it.

So some people believe that neurodiversity is a debilitation. I think there's a reasonable argument for that. So you could say that people who are on the autism spectrum and people who have ADHD, for example, are like, they're, they have like a negative aspect to their brain, their brain malfunctions. There's another camp of people that says that their brains are different and that in the current society, it acts as a malfunction. But there is not something fundamentally wrong with the person. I think both approaches are like reasonable.

I don't, I don't really care. Okay. For me, I like, I like being stupid. Like, my favorite time of my life is when my brain is off and I'm acting like an idiot. Yes, your brain is off, right? That's the opposite. This is, and this is where humor comes in. So humor comes when your brain is like this.

Because humor, it's fascinating. You can even look at the, maybe I'll pull up a paper a little bit later, but you can, you can look at like the science of, the neuroscience of humor is absolutely fascinating. How in, how non-logical humor is. You can't think your way into being funny. And in fact, if you dissect a joke, it kills the humor. Yeah, the key to humor is just confidence in being an idiot. Well said.

Right? And then the question is like in the brain, where does that come from? Like, who knows? So you want an empty head. You want to be an idiot. Fair enough. Yeah, because I can. Like the thing is that brain, you're looking at the, you know, Naruto seven chakras.

That, that brain is. is one that, you know, it's understandable I did this. You know, I had to work hard, make a lot of money. And I've had a, you know, you don't want to miss your opportunities you have for the years you're in. But now I'm like, dude, I'm 30. Like, I've been doing this for six years now. When am I going to start having that brain again? Because I deserve it.

Like, you did your time. You've got the money. You did the things. But now your brain is worse than it was before. It's because you pile on so much crap. So, yeah. So this is this is is so this is not just you right so some people may say like oh like you were saying it's it's cringe to say that you're running seven companies or whatever I don't think that this matters whether you're a successful person unsuccessful person

Whether you're a serial entrepreneur or your homeless like it doesn't matter as long as your mind is like this You will be unhappy yes I know this isn't just correlated to me I know many people right so so now the question becomes how do we stop this from happening? So this is where we get to a couple of really concrete, concrete, concrete things that we can think about. The first is, have you ever talked to your mom about being a workaholic? No. Okay. Because she's working.

Huh? She's too busy working. There it is again. Right? So now we've decompressed you a little bit and the humor shines through. Right. And that's something that sucks is I want to just be like an idiot as much as I can. Yeah.

So you want something. I want to be an idiot. What does wanting, when you want to be an idiot, what happens to your, okay, so I'm going to draw another one, okay? So I know you're not the smartest kid on the block. But so let's say, let's say this is being an idiot. So this is being a big idiot. This is being a little idiot. And if I want to be an idiot, what does this do to my capacity for idiocy?

Right. So there's two options. One is, the more that I want to be an idiot, the stupider I become. The other option is that the more I want to be an idiot, the less of an idiot I become. And then I guess the third option is that there's no correlation. Oh, I think the more I'm an idiot, the smarter I am. The more I'm an idiot, the smarter I am. So what about the wanting to be an idiot?

The more you want to be an idiot, does it become easier to be an idiot or harder to become an idiot? harder absolutely right this is the right answer so this is what's really weird as long as you want not going to work idiot idiocy is spontaneous

right I mean all you have to do is play any video game on the internet that is multiplayer and you will see how man these nobs on the internet they can pull idiocy they can throw games that are unthrowable

the depth of idiocy on the internet is unparalleled. And they're surely not trying, right? You, like, to throw that hard and to be that stupid, you can't even try. It's like some brilliance of its own. Something happening with you, or you traumatized from, like, Valoran or something?

Dota, yeah. Oh. Well, well done. Dr. Miskiff. So the first thing, you know, this is just something I encourage people to do. I don't know how this is going to have an impact on anything. I think I would talk to your mom about being a workaholic.

Okay, I will. Like, I would just have a conversation with her. I don't think she's bad or anything. I think just asking her, hey, mom, like, you know, I noticed you worked a lot. Sometimes I got the impression you didn't need to work. What was your experience like growing up? Right. And then you'll be amazed at how much you can learn from, like, her experience.

And you may even find that it's almost like talking to yourself. And I think just in general, like, we don't do it. a great job of like connecting with our parents and like sometimes having a conversation with them about our impression of what our upbringing was like not to try to blame them and be like mom you never came to my baseball party and like why like i mean if you want to share that you can but i think it's more just like hey what what was going on inside of you when you were like working so much and and she may say oh it's because i needed to do all this stuff for you and you can like politely push back against that and i'm like i'm not sure that you needed to do that much i'm wondering

wondering if there was something else to it. And then if you want to, you can even share with her, like what your experience is. Yeah. Because it's interesting. My dad's much more like the idiot where he just, you know, he worked for sure, but he much more of us relaxed and funnier. And my mom was much more of a workaholic, but she was so much more cold, like very cold. Yeah.

So there may be something there. I just think it's like we don't, you know, a lot of times we think that parents, stops when your children become adults. And I think it's really sad, but I see so many adults that I work with that are scared to have their parents continue parenting. But like parents are here even for this stage of your life, right? When you're 30 and like trying to figure out like what the next 30 years of your life are going to be like.

And in having a conversation with them about, hey, you guys said that I should relax, like I can't. like can you help me with this that's the first thing and unless you're really in a frank abusive or neglectful relationship like I think it's really good to like talk to your parents okay I'll talk to them um second thing is is when you're relaxing I would do so without sensory input so I would let because when you're adding new thoughts from the show it's not going to work you need to think about your mind as a top you know like a

top that spins. How do you get a top to stop? Or actually, this is the way you should think about it. Forget about the top. Think about your mind is a pool that has like a pool of water that has a lot of ripples. Okay? So I'll tell you a story. So a student once went to their Zen master and they said, master, so the, the, the, fucking A, this, I kind of fucked up the story, but whatever.

So the student comes to the master and the master says that I need you to get this like water to stop having ripples. And so what the student does is a bad story. I butcher it already. But what the student does tries to push the waves down. They tries to push the ripples down. They like try to get it to stay still. They try to get it to stay still. They try to get it to stay still.

But if I try to push the ripples down in a pool of water, what's going to happen? It's going to be worse. Absolutely. So what's the right way to get a pool of water? to be still. It rustle out of the pool. Don't. Don't.

Yeah. Yeah. Don't. I mean, obviously, have nothing in the going on. Yeah, right? So you need stillness. And like your mind craves stillness.

Even if we talk about your experience of euphoria, what is it? It's stillness in the mind. Even when we see that genuine humor start to peek through for you, even in this conversation, there's moments of stillness. Right? It's like, it's like even when you make a joke. you leave this conversation and you go to an oasis. Does that make sense?

I do. Like I notice it. Like I notice he's gone. He's in a different place. And sometimes that may be frustrating to people. I wouldn't discourage you from doing that. I think go to your oasis. And that's what humor is.

It feels like an oasis. And all of this mess, what we're going to do is we're just going to take one chunk and we're going to make one chunk of your mind disappear. And now there's one area that is protected. This is what a joke is. middle of a conversation. So when you're relaxing, don't do anything.

And notice that when you're relaxing, there is going to be a torrent of mental activity. Now we get to the hard part, which is inaction. The other thing that you need to learn how to do is stop acting. So there's going to be a thousand different messages in your mind of like things you can do in ways that you can optimize. you need at least some time in the day. Let's say this is your whole day. Some time in the day to not act. This is going to be very hard for you.

Can you imagine why? Because my mind's overacting because I have ADHD. That's one. There's even a harder reason. Because I put so much work and effort. Yeah, good. Getting closer, right? So this is going to be the cost of inaction.

If you are not active, It's going to cost you a lot. Do you understand what I mean? I'm not active. It's going to cost me a lot. Right? So why do you need to be efficient? Why do you need to be working all the time?

You can be doing more. Yeah, to try to be successful and try to... So what does it cost you to not act? You're going to be doing less. Can you do less? I could. I know I could. What makes it hard for you to do?

to do less. I am almost, I feel like, addicted to what I do. Very good. We're going to get to that in a second. So when you say you were addicted, or let's get to it now, what is the nature of that addiction? How do you know you're addicted? What does that addiction look like? I'm constantly thinking about it nonstop every second of the day, checking messages, thinking that there's messages, thinking there's something. I need to do. It's just taken over my entire life. It hasn't taken over your entire life. It's taken over one very specific part of your life. Which part? My brain. Absolutely. Your mind. My mind or piece of, yeah. Right? That's the only part it's taken over. And then the mind runs the rest of the show. So this is like,

this is really tricky to understand, but like you have a mental habit. This is something called a Basana. Yeah, I do have a mental of it, yeah. Right? So you have this habituation of, I need to do this, I need to do this, I need to do this, I need to do this. And be prepared for this because if you stop doing that, your mind will scream at you. It'll say, but this could go wrong and you

hit these 10 birds with one stone. Throw the stone, bro. The efficiency is so worth it. You need to act. You need to act. You need to act. And what is it being driven by? It is being driven by this. Because if you

don't act, you will be unhappy with yourself. But you're unhappy with yourself no matter what. Even when you try to fix the unhappiness in yourself, it doesn't get happier. It doesn't work. The way to fix the unhappiness in yourself is not to solve your problems. It is to short-circuit it. That's what happens when you make a joke. No more unhappiness.

It gets unplugged. Do you understand the difference? Chasing after something is not going to work. If it would have worked, you would be happy by now. So this is going to be hard for you, Ms. Kiff, because when you move towards inaction, your mind will rebel. It will be like an addiction. You will go through withdrawals. Yeah, I can see that out.

I've had a feeling when I've, like, for like a day, I don't do anything like that. And I get very antsy and angry and stressed. Right. So just like any withdrawal process, the discomfort rises and then over time it'll fall. this is what you have to do. You have to do this. Otherwise, you're going to keep doing what you're doing. Right.

Right? So you have to, like, set aside the time for work. And this gets like, this becomes all very much more difficult with ADHD because there's problems with impulse control. There's problems with emotional regulation. There's all kinds of intersections for why people with ADHD become workaholics. So there's like, I guess let's just go through those. So here is a quick rundown of why people with ADHD.

actually become workaholics. And we think about as ADHD is something that is debilitating, but I have seen people with ADHD who are incredibly successful. And the reason is because their ADHD makes them vulnerable to being a workaholic. The first thing is that they're impulsive.

And if you look at someone who's a workaholic, someone who's a workaholic is someone who's working 24 hours a day, which means that when you have an idea at 7.08 p.m. on a Sunday evening, oh shit, let me send an email. Yep. You do it.

Yep. Whereas neurotypical people will be like, it's my day off. The thing is, the world rewards you for this. Holy shit, this guy is sending emails at 708 on a Sunday. Right? Issue number one. Second thing, emotionally dysregulated.

Which means that as you feel unhaping, with yourself. So this is important to understand. Unhappiness from a neuroscientific and evolutionary perspective is a source of motivation. So the more unhappy that you feel with yourself, the more action you will take. Right? That's why our body makes us feel unhappy. I don't like feeling hunger.

Anytime the body punishes you, it is to induce action. Hunger and thirst will cause human beings to kill each other. lust will cause lust is a dissatisfaction can even induce things like sexual assault right so unhappiness is a very powerful motivator for action and what we see in people with ADHD is that their um limbic system is prone to experience a lot of activities this is their emotional circuit of the brain so there's an emotional dysregulation and then those emotions can really drive drastic behavior The third thing that's really interesting is we haven't really talked about this, but there's also a paradoxical hyperfocus. So we haven't talked about this, but I'm curious, right?

So when it comes to being an entrepreneur, I would guess that there are periods of time where you can really grind. Yeah. Right? And so then what happens is like there's no balance, but over here, during your rest time, you have this intrusive, impulsive thought to do a little bit more work. but by the way, you woke up at 7 a.m. on Sunday and worked until 5 p.m. anyway. So this can induce, like, you can have intense periods of work, but then you don't get a break. Yeah. So all of this stuff can really result in, like, actually being a workaholic.

And then the other thing that's correlated with workaholic is that you do have a dopamine sensitivity. So sometimes some of the rewards from work will really, like, like hit you way better. Actually, we see this. Actually, you have a great example of this. 999 times, it's a waste of effort. But one time, it's amazing. That's amazing. Do you know what that, you know what? That same part of your brain makes you vulnerable to one kind of addiction. Do you know what it is? Particularly vulnerable. What's the addiction that people have where 999 times out of a thousand? They fail, but the one success out of a thousand gets them to keep going. Can you guess? Huh?

Gambling. Childbirth. Okay. Gambling, absolutely. Right? So, so that's what that is. So even,

so this is really important to understand. When people are dopamine sensitive, they are impervious to negative consequences. This is what dopamine sensitivity does. It causes us to not think about the negative. and makes us vulnerable to like lopsided views of the positive and results in things like gambling addiction, spot on.

Right. So when you have this set of things, you're very likely to be a workaholic. It actually can work out really well. Which is why sometimes people with ADHD are very, very successful. And this is also where there's like a lot of like, you know, there's a growing movement in parts of academia, but primarily in like the social media space to stop viewing ADHD as,

an illness because some people have discovered this. Oh yeah, it's not an illness. I mean it could be the worst thing in the world for you, but it could be the best thing. If you can manifest and make ADHD work, it's amazing. Yeah, so I think people see this. And so a lot of people, when we see these people in our, in like our community too, you'll have people who are like programmers at places like Google and stuff, who have really bad ADHD, but man, can they be like coding fiends? Yeah, yeah. It's like, it's crazy how much you can accomplish. Just people with ADHD are told that they can't do anything.

but they can. Yeah, so I think there's also, like, your mileage may vary. I've worked with plenty of patients with ADHD who don't seem to have some of these advantages and for whom it can be quite debilitating and crippling. But I think that there's a spectrum, which is why it's not one way or the other. But I think going back to this, I think you've got to be super careful about your addiction. So recognize that you have a mental habit. And the mental habit means that your mind will reflexively do.

some of these things. The main mental habit to really watch out for is this is the most important thing. The desire to fix yourself. This is really important. Because your brain will tell you like if we don't if we do this, we will be better. If we do this, we will be better. If we do this, we will be better. And in wanting to be better, you are actually reinforcing your unhappiness.

Can you connect those two dots? does it not make sense? No, it makes perfect sense because it's the Naruto lines. It's you're just, yeah, like, it's, it ties in everything with the gambling. It's like, yeah, well, nine hundred and 99 times it won't be right, but you'll get that one time. You'll say, oh, wow, I did it. You'll just think about those other nine, you'll do it again. And your brain will just, you know, you'll have four bad days in a row of stress and anger,

but that one second in the shower where you had a good idea, you're like, wow, this was worth it. But it's not. It's never worth it. Okay. Great. So I think articulating that is very important, but recognize that, right? So you're going to have that mental habit of always thinking about the upside. Right.

So there's another aspect of this, which I think is that, see, when you're unhappy with yourself and you do something to improve your life, it reinforces the idea that the current version of you is unacceptable. Okay, so like if I'm unhappy with the way that I look and I get Botox, what does that do to my self-esteem? It doesn't do anything. I feel like it kind of makes you worse. Absolutely. And we see that, right? Once you get on the cosmetic surgery train, like, it's hard to get off. And so this is what's really crazy is like what you really need to learn, Ms. is acceptance of who you are.

You don't need to be better. And this is going to be very difficult because this is very deep rooted. Goes from when you were a kid goes to, I want to be the first. What does first mean? That is a relative thing. You're right. It's an insecurity. It's this idea that I am not good enough the way that I am right now.

That's why you need to be the first person with a job. That's why six companies is not enough. Seven companies is not enough. But the whole problem is that none of those things is just like Botox. You do it and you do it and you do it. But the underlying thing that makes you unhappy with yourself is, not getting fixed. And 15 companies won't fix it.

Your company's being worth a billion dollars or a trillion dollars won't be enough to fix it. Well, maybe, but, yeah, no. Maybe, right? So this is where, like, it's going to be hard. I want you to be, like, mentally prepared that when you stop doing as much work, your mind will rebel and it'll beat you up. Yep.

It'll be like, and so this is where, like, I know it sounds kind of weird, but, like, you got to ask yourself in that moment. moment like would an idiot do this an idiot would not go out and do all of these things so you need to like that's that self-acceptance i think your path is going to be through being an idiot an idiot is idle yeah but it'll come in it's funny i feel much more you know i feel when i'm being an idiot and being fun it's like that yeah like that person is much more liked in any circumstance with friends or people in general like it the money and the power and the businesses and all that stuff, it does absolutely nothing. The people like more as an idiot. They like someone that's more fun to hang out with than someone who do you like? I don't care what other people like. Who do you like more? Oh, I like the idiot. I mean, I just genuinely have more fun. So choose yourself. Yeah. Right? And some of that involves self acceptance. And if you can get a couple of these foundations, like the main thing, Ms. is like the way that I see your life right now,

you have way, the reason that's so overwhelming is because you have so much momentum. All you need to start, all you need to stop doing is feeding the beast. You don't actually need to fix anything. You just need to stop fucking it up. Do you have, do you want to just kind of summarize for us like what you're taken away from today's conversation, if anything? I learned that a lot of my problems could be rooted through either genetics or from what I learned from my parents because my parents told me not do it, but by actually, when you see your parents doing it, it makes you do it, which was me being a workaholic.

And I need to do things that are not trying to be less stimulated, because when you try, that's going to make you more stimulated, which is kind of similar to the idea of your parents, where it's like you're being told, hey, don't, you know, try to do something. but the thing is what you need to do is just not try to think, which, you know, like trying to distract yourself with TV shows and stuff is not the smartest route. And the thing is, it's an addiction. And what I need to do to beat that addiction is to just not do it. Because it's going to be really hard.

But when that's really hard, which, you know, it's going to be for at least a while, yeah, I have to beat it. which can take a long time. So I would think about your mind. So stress is increased thoughts in the mind. This is number one thing to understand. So the more active your mind is, the more stressed you will be. And even if we look at some of these things like flow state,

flow state is not parallel tracks of mind. The problem is that you always have more than one track. That will be the nature of stress. I can't even focus on my work because I'm so stressed about my work. Oh my God, what's going to happen? I can't be with my partner because I'm worried what do they think? What do they think? So and the main thing for you is letting your mind run out of steam.

That's very important. And when you engage with it, you teach it how to get more steam from you. Yeah. Right? And then this is where that gambling thing comes in where like even once in a while, it'll, you know, it doesn't have to always work. But like all you need to give it is an excuse where sometimes it works and then it's going to demand it from you all the time.

Yeah. So I'd say just let your mind run out of as much steam as you can. That's what you need to do. And this is a fancy way of slowing down. The problem is that it's going to feel hard to slow down and you're even trying to induce relaxation. Like, let me watch a TV show to relax. It's not going to work.

And I think you'll, you're not screwed. I don't believe that. I think that the patterns, the mental patterns that you have have have gotten you where you are. So one really interesting thing, one really interesting simple solution in life is if you keep doing something and you find the same result, like do something else. So in your case, the last thing that I would be super careful about is you seem to act a lot to avoid some negativity. So if I don't act right now, then I'm going to feel inefficient. But if you do act, then you're going to have too much on your plate and you're going to be stressed out. Yeah.

So you have to take a loss, like somewhere in there. But it's not a real loss. It'll be a loss. It'll feel like a loss in here because your mind is attached. I want to be better. I want to be successful. I want to be cool. I want to be respected.

But you are all those things. And it's not working. True. Thoughts, questions before we wrap up? It feels like we're at a good stopping point to me anyway. No, I think it's just stopped a lot. As always, I think I'm going to call my mom. and go from there.

Sounds great. And I'll do those deep breathing exercises and I will, because I do think TV shows are not the way to go because I'm just thinking about the fact that I should be relaxing. Yeah. Yeah. So I would even say, I know it sounds kind of weird, but try less hard to relax, right?

And you can even accept that today you're not going to relax, but you're not going to work. Yeah, yeah. Just don't overwork it. Right? It's an addiction. Yep. Cool.

Any questions before we wrap up? I got nothing. All right, man. Look at that. What's going on in your head? You seem very tired. Oh, that meditation is going to knock me out. Good.

That's what it's for. Go take a nap, bro. If I can, I got to go live. Ah, look at that. Yep. There it is. There's the addiction. Yep.

It doesn't stop. Okay, so we'll see. So we're going to talk to your mom. You're going to go live, and then we'll see what happens tonight. So hopefully you'll get some time to rest. I will. And I have time off, and I'm going to relax, and I'm not going to, yeah, I think I know what to do. Awesome, dude.

Good luck. And best luck with your stream today, man. Thank you, Doc. Take care, buddy. Bye.