HealthyGamerGG - How to build "Confidence from Within" ft. Yvonne

Episode Date: July 15, 2021

Taken from stream dated July 13, 2021. Stream Schedule: https://www.twitch.tv/healthygamer_gg on Twitch. Youtube: https://youtu.be/s5cjlHMkOUM for VoD Archive. Support us at https://ko-fi.com/healthygamer if you enjoy our content and would continue helping making it accessible to everyone! Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/healthygamergg/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Yeah, so how you been? Good. Thank you for coming back. Yeah, thanks for having me. Yeah. Is there something in particular you wanted to talk about today? Not like specific, specific. Mm-hmm.

Yeah, nothing like particular in mind, maybe like slightly about confidence, perhaps. But other than that, like there's no clear general, or no clear direction, I guess. I guess. Yeah. So let's, I think confidence is a great place to start. What do you think?

Okay, sure. Yeah. Yeah. So tell me a little bit about confidence and, you know, what you were, what you were thinking about when you, um, I just feel like I have very low confidence. And I, um, and just really not, just want to explore that, I guess I don't really know why or like, how, maybe it was like, how I was raised, I don't know. Yeah, absolutely. Dude, Yvonne, that's such an awesome topic.

Because I think confidence is like something that we don't really understand, right? So we like know that some people have confidence. Some people feel like they don't have confidence. But like, what is it? Where does it come from? Why do some people have it? Why do some people not have it? How to get it if you don't have it?

Those all sound like really, really important things to explore to me. What do you think? Yeah. Okay. So tell me a little bit about what, when you say you may not have very high confidence, let's start with this. How do you know? What do you experience that makes you think that you don't have more confidence?

Well, well, Tostoy says have some more confidence, you bitch. Like, I think that's like one to start. Okay. I feel like, basically, a lot of my friends will say a lot of great things about me whenever I struggle to I guess have a positive view of myself and I just I'm very much like huh like I don't really see it the same way that they do um and yeah I don't know that's just like yeah I kind of don't really see like much of what I've done as accomplishments I see them more as

as like, like, things I'm supposed to do or like things that like just happened and stuff like that. I see. So it sounds like what other people seem to think is like praiseworthy. You think is like pretty run of the mill. Yeah. I think it's very like very standard or very I'm like just doing my job or I got really lucky with like my group of friends and the people that I know. Um, yeah. Okay. So, so what do your friends say about you that they think is great that you think is pretty standard? Can you give us an example? Maybe like if they say that I'm good at doing my job, like I work at offline TV and stuff.

And then it'll be like, oh, like, you're doing great. Like you do this and that. But I'm like, oh, I mean, I'm just doing what, like, you know, a job. You're like, you know, you go to work. You have like a job description of like stuff that you're supposed to do. I'm just doing like, or I'm trying my best to do like everything that's that I'm supposed to do. And then also like there's always things that you could do more of. And I don't even necessarily have all the time to try to do that or necessarily.

There's always something more you could do in like every and everything, I guess. Yeah, that's true. So it sounds like people say, you know, good things about you that you think are not really deserved or like you don't deserve praise for him. it's like standard yeah and what do you think would be like appropriate for you like you know what would qualify as something that's like okay to be proud of like what would you have to do to feel confident or proud of what you've done uh maybe if i was like really really good at a game then if people ever complimented me in that i would feel like a little more confident or validated or if I would have like, I don't know, a skill, like a specific skill set or talent or something or,

yeah, I don't know. Don't really know what I'm good at, I guess. Yeah. I know it sounds kind of weird, but what makes you think that having your job at OTV and doing what you do is not a specific skill or talent? I guess I think of it. like if someone else were to be in my position, like, could they do the same thing and possibly yeah, like, yeah, possibly better. And I just think like, yeah, you know, there's so many people

out there. There's, what I do, I feel like is not very, like, special, I guess, or, um, but my housemates tell me that, like, no, like, not, I guess it's, They're more concerned about, I think, like, getting along with everyone, and I can get along with everyone and stuff. But that's like, uh, I mean, I feel like if you just hired like a really nice, really nice person too who also like could work. Like that could also be the same thing. Great. So how hard do you think it is to get along with everyone? Um, I mean, it did.

It doesn't seem like the hard. hardest thing in the world possibly, but maybe it's like, I guess you just have to mesh. It's hard to say, I think. It's a vibe or personality. I don't know. Yeah. So like, here's, so here's the tricky thing. We'll get to like past and stuff like that.

But one observation that I've made is that people tend to take for granted what they're natural at. So like when you're a natural, it feels natural to you. It doesn't feel special. Right? But the whole point of like, like, you know, if I was like a chess prodigy, let's say, and I was just a natural at chess and like people were like, hey man, you're really amazing at chess. But I was like, I'm like, it's not that big of a deal. It just feels easy. Like I don't think it's that big of a deal. Yeah. And does that make sense? So I've just noticed that people tend to undervalue what feels natural at and actually bizarrely, therefore, the things that they tend to be the best at are the things that they devalue the most. because there's a perception that what people should value is correlated with difficulty. Right?

Like the more we value things, the harder that, like the harder something is, the more we value it. And therefore, we kind of create this weird situation where, like, the more natural I am at something, the more likely I am to like undervalue because it feels easy to me. Mm-hmm. Does that make sense? Yeah. So, because I would say that, you know, getting along with someone is exceedingly, getting along with everyone

is actually like exceedingly difficult to do and that if you look at most problems in like content creator groups or even friend circles that like a lot of people a lot of the reason a lot of the drama like if you were a drama reducing influence like you are worth your weight in gold

what do you think about that? Yeah, I agree with that. Are you a drama reducing influence? I hope so, but I don't know. I feel like that's difficult for me to say more for like easier for other people to say. I think they, and I think they do say that, right? Well, they never said that specifically. Yeah, but I think, yeah, but when they say you're good at getting along with people,

I think that they don't know how to, I think part of the issue is that they may not be able to articulate what the value they see in you is. but if I had to bet money just you know having seen a little bit of like what different groups of like because like why do content creators break apart? Because of drama. Yeah. And like what is the OTV like turnover in terms of people coming on and people leaving? Like pretty low, right?

Yeah. And so I mean I don't know. I mean maybe I'm wrong here maybe but I can definitely see I think you're it's easy to undervalue like. what you're good at, first of all, it's just an interesting dynamic of the mind. And if you're if you're kind of like smooth things over and you get along with everyone,

like that's not easy to do and that's actually very valuable to me. How do you, how do you feel about what I'm saying? It makes a lot of sense. Like when you say it's like, okay, like that does make sense. And that makes it easier for me to like digest that like what I do bring some sort of value. When it's like, explained in that way.

So it's like you're a, you know, if we think about drama as like, I'm trying to think about what the right video game analogy is. You're like a cleanse for OTV, right? There's like poison ticks. And as people create content together, like you stack up the poison stacks. Yeah.

And like you need some, like you need a healer. Right. And the interesting thing is like the thing about like someone who specifically, it's not even like a healer, it's like a cleanser. is when the cleanser does their job right, like sort of no one really notices,

but when they do their job wrong, like everything just starts, like, everyone's like sitting around at half health in the raid and everything is falling apart. Mm-hmm. You know, you don't even see, like, because even if you look at the end, when you look at the, you know, the heel meters,

yeah. The cleanser doesn't have, like, looks, they haven't healed for anything. And like some other heel meters are like, oh, you know, I healed for like 20K. Like the cleanser sitting there like, I'm just spamming cleanse. You don't see it on the heel meter.

So it's sometimes hard to recognize. But anyway, I suspect that your confidence has more to do, you know, there's more to it than that. What do you think? Yeah, probably. Yeah. Let me just think for a second. Yeah, so how long have you felt like, I mean, do you feel like you don't have confidence or that's just what other people tell you? I do.

I do feel like that a lot. I didn't realize it until it was more prominent and in my head more when one day I had a call and I was like talking to I was talking to toast and then he was just I can't remember I was like kind of he was saying something good about me or he was saying something good I can't remember and I was like oh no it's like it's not like I was playing it down a lot I guess. And then he was just like, hey, like, that's my friend you're talking about right now. Like, you be, like, like, and I made me think, like, why am I so mean to myself in a way? And I, yeah, that was just where it mostly, like, stem from.

And what, when you say you're mean to yourself, like, what kind of thoughts do you, does your mind produce about you? Um, I guess just not really thinking too highly of my. myself, like anything that I maybe possibly accomplish or do well, I attribute it to a bunch of other things. And I guess I just don't really see what I did as like that amazing or hard or so many layers of it. So what does, can you give me an example of like something that maybe people thought was praiseworthy or an accomplishment and like literally what your mind said? I guess like one of the things was like

I got masters in league and I had like a bunch of my friends who were like really happy for me and I had a bunch of my friends who are also like pro players who were like oh my God like you work so hard and like you're actually I like I had to ask them like do you think I'm actually like a master's player and they're like, yeah, like, your, like, your Caitlin is actually, like, really, really good.

And I, but, like, I still couldn't, like, I couldn't get that validation. So, like, I couldn't feel it myself. And, or people say, like, my friends will come up to me, like, oh, my God, Yvonne, like, you're so pretty. But, like, I never feel like I actually am. Like, I don't like how I look a lot at the time. So I don't feel like I'm actually. when people compliment my looks, I almost like never believe them.

What does your mind tell you about why they're saying that? I think, I don't know, there's always like different reasons for it. They're either like my friends, so they like love me no matter what or their bias or other people who are just really supportive,

like viewers and stuff, just very supportive or just like, yeah, so. Yeah, so just to, I'm going to see if I understand. So like, if I were to tell you, Yvonne, I think you're quite pretty, you would say, your mind would say, oh, that's Dr. Kay, he's going to say that. It has nothing to do with you. It has everything to do with me, right? They're just, they're just saying that. Um, I mean, it's not like I think that everyone is just saying that, like they would lie to me or just say something like, you know, just to make me feel.

better, but I just never, like, believe it. Okay. I don't know if it's like, it's like that doesn't necessarily have like a correlation, but like in my brain, I still won't really like believe it. Okay. I like believe that they mean it, but I won't believe myself that I'm like pretty. If that makes sense. Yeah.

Okay. That's, thank you so much. I think that's a really important nuance. Let me see if I got it. So it's almost. like you're you don't discount what they're saying like you think that they actually do believe you're pretty they're not just saying yeah they could right like they're not just saying that because they're your friend you can understand that people outside of you may consider you to be

pretty or good at league or whatever but you just don't believe that about yourself like they're entitled to their beliefs but they're just you know it doesn't affect the way that you feel about yourself what do you think about your league play Um, I think in the beginning, I was a lot more unsure, but as time goes on, we see a lot of players in like the same rank, I think like, you know what? Maybe I am best, or was Masters at that time when I got it. Because I see the other players. I'm like, oh, man, what is this? And then that's what I believed it more, but it was through seeing other people, you know, not really through myself.

Sure. But yeah, so I've also, I think like as some point just trusted my friends as well, because I feel like I kept asking them like no bias, like serious judge. Like can you tell me like if you think like and then the, a lot of them will always say yes. So that like made me feel better. But it took time. I didn't. It wasn't something that I believed.

I actually think like I just recently like what they said. I just absorbed it and was just like, okay, like, believed it a bit more. That sounds so interesting, Yvonne. Can you help me understand how one goes about absorbing what other people say? It might go along with, like, observing more, like, seeing, like, other players who were the same, and, like, just over time, thinking about, I guess, more, like, how much I know about the game when I'm talking about it with people or playing it. like just to, I guess sometimes when you lane against other people, you just know, see

the skill difference. And so I felt like I was freaking a lot more, a lot worse than I was because I'm comparing myself to my friends who are, who are pro players, you know, like that's my, my league circle is like, a lot of them are pro players. So it's like, I'm, I'm never going to be that or like try to go for that. So why am I comparing myself to them, you know? So I always felt like I was so bad because I can't do this, like, kind of similar things that they do, not realistic. Yeah, so that sounds kind of weird.

I'm going to repeat the question that I asked, and I'm going to repeat your question. I'm going to share a couple of tidbits from your answer back at you. And then I'm going to ask you one more question. Okay. So I asked, what allows other people's words to sink in? and the interesting thing is that you said it's observing more and it sounds like and then you started to say things that happened in your own mind and really don't have anything to do with what other people are saying

like your answer was like when I play a game and I really pay attention and I realize that this scrub is a master's level player oh maybe I really am master's level right yeah like if you could be this bad and wind up in masters I certainly deserve to be here. Yeah, but it takes that, you know, I wouldn't believe that on my own if it didn't have like other people there. Well, but the interesting thing is that it sounds like for other people's words to sink in, it actually has nothing to do with what they say. It has everything to do with what you observe. Possibly, yeah. And then like what they say starts to make more, I start to

agree with or like makes more sense. Exactly, right? But so that's you agreeing with it. But that conclusion you formed by yourself. So the first thing is like there's a really important principle here because people will say things to you. And whether you deflect or dodge or whether you accept them doesn't actually have to do with what they say. It has to do with like what you internally believe. So that's kind of interesting. So is it okay if I ask you about your appearance some? Like we're talking about league.

Like I just want to be a little bit careful here because, you know, I know that especially in our society today, especially streamers, female streamers, get judged a lot on their appearance, that there's a lot of like value and self-worth that society will attribute, will be place on you or that you will place on yourself depending about your appearance. And I just want to kind of make sure that it's okay that I ask you questions about that. Because talking about, you know, how you don't suck at league feels safer to me. No, I actually am okay with that. I think it would also be helpful to other, like, girls or people out there who just struggle with anything similar as well. So, yeah, I don't mind. Yeah.

So what do you think about, are you pretty? I can feel pretty at times, like when I put on makeup or do you? whatever, but then like I look and I'm like, oh, not as ideal as how I want to look. And that's just how I feel. Like, I just think like, oh, like, sometimes like my face is too like round or I just don't like a lot of it. I don't know what it is. I just, yeah. How do you feel about not liking a lot of the way that you look? I feel like it's a big struggle in terms of being in this space because I think if I wasn't in this space I would feel better because there's not as much emphasis I think on how you look

but being in like photos videos everything like you naturally want to look good if you can especially just for me like as a female I want to like look good. All my friends are freaking beautiful. And it's just like, I don't know, it just sucks not really feeling like you're pretty as well. Sounds like it sucks. Yeah. I mean, it also sounds like you may even think you're pretty,

but compared to your pro-level league players who are freaking beautiful. Yeah. You know, I'm almost noticing a correlation there that like your standard of comparison, on the one hand, you compare yourself to pro-level league players and on the other hand, you compare yourself to people who are, as you put it, freaking beautiful. I'm sort of noticing a correlation there. What do you think? Yeah.

I think so. Hmm. And so help me understand when you look in the mirror, what does your mind tell you? or when you see photos of yourself? It could be anything, I guess. Like, to be, like, completely candid, like, I'll just look at a photo sometimes, be like, oh, like, I wish I was taller.

Like, you know, sometimes you just look short. Or then, um, or, like, my face will look, like, really, it'll look fine sometimes, but some days it'll look, like, more round. And I would just be like, oh, I wish I was more consistent. Like, I wish I was, like, I wish I could just like take pictures and not worry about how I look after. But that's also a thing that I could also work on if I just like, for example, they worked out more or like did something to improve like or lost weight and stuff like that.

Like that could also help. So it's something that I could complain about, but I can also actively do something about the same time. Yeah, I'm noticing some self-judgment there. You're saying in a weird way, right? Because you're saying like, oh, I don't, I shouldn't complain because I could fix this if I tried harder. Yeah. I mean, I think I don't like complaining if it's something that I can do about it, although I still do at times.

But it's like, you can technically do something about this. So you don't deserve to complain if it's within your control. Just complain less, you know. I don't give me as much. Yeah. So let me, so we're talking about confidence, right? Mm-hmm.

So let me ask you something. If you were prettier, do you think you'd be more confident? I'm not sure, to be honest. Because I feel like, even if I was prettier, there's probably like something else. I'd be like, you know?

I think you're right. I'm picky in the picky about, yeah. Right? So I would say that, you know, I know it's kind of harsh, but I think that our society sort of can objectively rate people's attractiveness or people can agree, you know, out of a statistical sample. And my experience has been that, you know, oddly enough, confidence doesn't seem to correlate with attractiveness. In fact, if you look at, you know,

Instagram reality, arguably the people who are even like objectively in the top 1% of physical attractiveness feel very, very like a big lack of confidence and will need to Photoshop the shit out of their pictures because they're not confident in the way that they look. Does that what do you think about that? Yeah, I totally agree with that. I really don't think that even if I was like even if all my problems were solved like if I thought I was like super pretty or if I like was really good at games that like there wouldn't be other aspects in life that could make me still feel not confident. So.

Oh, yeah, I would even disagree with that just a tiny bit, which is that you're assuming that if you were objectively better at league or objectively prettier, that your mind would feel not confident about other stuff. Is that what you're saying? Possibly, yeah. And what I'm telling you, having worked with a fair number of league pros, is that even if you're objectively better, you can still lack confidence. Mm-hmm.

And even if you're objectively prettier, you can still lack confidence. Yeah. So then that begs the question, Yvonne, if you were prettier and you still sort of, like, if there are people who are prettier than you are that are still lacking a ton of confidence in their appearance, even though on paper, theoretically, they shouldn't, then where does that confidence come from? I don't know. Maybe through other things that they are good at. Because the thing is for me, I feel like I'm not good at anything. Yep. I'm like, okay.

Like, you know? Yeah, so we can play this game as long as we want to. Yeah. And I can tell you that you are better at me than league, that you are prettier than I am. And you do a better job at OTV than 99% of people than I know. And it's not going to matter, right? Because earlier we already discovered that until you were ready, you're going to swat away what people say. and oddly enough, I know it sounds kind of weird, but like, if you really observe people,

what you find is that they can be anywhere they want to in terms of objective attractiveness, but their confidence can still is almost like independent of that. Does that make sense? Mm-hmm. Yeah. So let's try to understand that. Like, what do you think? Stick in.

Yeah. Okay. So how long have you felt? Can you, I think you had told me a little bit about like where you grew up and how you grew up. But can you tell me a little bit about that again? Can you refresh my memory? Yeah. So I grew up back in Canada in Calgary with my parents and I was an only child. They were kind of strict on me growing up because I was the only child and I was a girl. So my mom very much was very strict and tried to like check up on who was hanging out with all the

time and stuff like that, but basically how I was raised was, um, they always tried me it to obviously like to do well in school. Um, always tried, like in Chinese school, they would always like try to, uh, make it so that I get positive reinforcement for getting like per second or third place. It's like a top three in the class. Um, so every time I got like a top something, I would get like a sort of reward of some sort. And then, I also they also sign me up for like a bunch of tutoring classes for like math and other things

I always had to do something that was like a couple grades above or ahead of what I was actually so like grade three I'd be doing like grade five math books or something but I feel like in a lot of Asian or Chinese cultures it's very much like work hard like you do what

supposed to do, keep your head down, and, like, you just, like, try to succeed in life somehow. Ideally, be a doctor or a lawyer. So, yeah, there's a lot of that. And also, they always, like, kind of talk down on you in front of their friends, but they praise, like, the other kids. There is, like, oh, yeah, so-and-so's doing, like, so-well in school. But, like, Yvonne, you didn't, look at you. You never cleaned the house.

Look at this person. They're cleaning up after the... themselves. So it's like that kind of thing, but for like everything. Um, so I think a lot of it probably did stem from that in terms of if you, even if you do do well, even if you do get like for a second, third place, whatever it is. Like, you can always either do better or like don't get too ahead of yourself type of thing. Help me understand don't get too ahead of yourself. Like don't get too overconfident. and then just like think you're like I'm I'm great I'm like doing grade five math right and I get to grade five I'm kind of like I'm chilling and I'm like not like you know progressing or doing anything after that it's kind of like don't get too comfortable like you can still work hard and like try to get ahead yeah I hated it though tell me about what you hated about it oh I just hated doing extra work and math and stuff like I was a kid I just wanted to like you know

play games or like go outside or something but instead I had to do all these math pages like and then but at the time it just felt like something I had to do and I just did it it didn't it didn't really feel like I had an option anyway or I want to watch TV can't watch TV so Yvonne this may sound weird but like can you hold on let me think about how to ask this so what was it like So I'm actually detecting that you didn't have a choice, right? Yeah, I mean, I was, yeah, had to listen to my parents. Yeah, and so sort of like your feelings didn't matter, right? And so I know it sounds kind of weird, but like how much did you hate doing that?

I didn't like hate hate it because I don't recall in my memory despising it that much. I think I did enjoy like, I mean, I had nothing else to do. If they didn't let me go watch TV or do other things, it's like, well, like, I guess I have time to do this, you know? Yeah. Can I toss out what I'm sort of feeling and then you let me know? But this is like definitely leading, okay? So this could be wrong. So I'm hearing that you actually hated it a lot, but that you felt like you didn't have a choice.

So there's no point in hating it. So you kind of turned down the volume on the hate that you felt. Yeah, I think so. I'm very good at like minimizing things. Yes. Yeah. Like your accomplishments. I think I probably, now that you're saying, I do minimize in everything in life.

Yeah. Which is, yeah. Which I think is, what do you think? What other aspects do you minimize in? Literally everything. I mean. event, things that happen to me, things that, um, how I'm feeling, uh, or. And when you minimize your feelings, what do you tell yourself to justify that minimization?

I'm really sure. I think it's different for everything. Okay. Um, certain things, it's like, want to maintain relationships. So we'll minimize that. Another thing might be, like this is just what I have to do or like work you know it's like current pain for future gain so it's like yeah I got to just work hard do this um try to get ahead mm uh well I don't know if I think of try to get ahead anymore I know that's what my parents wanted me to do but I actually like that thought itself never crosses my mind almost I never do work to get ahead I do work because I just want to like you have a better future but maybe that's the same thing. Yeah, I was going to say, current pain for future gain sounds to me like trying to get ahead.

Oh, I guess I don't see it. It never like registered the same way because I don't think of like trying to get ahead of others. I just think of just trying to have a comfortable life later. Yeah. But it's like one is almost, I guess they're the same thing, but it's just one feels like you're trying to like get ahead of other people. Yeah.

But I'm not trying to get ahead of other people. I just want to like make sure like I'm okay and like my the people I care about will be okay and then. Yeah, I'm not hearing that there's like a race against others. But I am hearing a lot about delayed gratification, sacrificing the present for the future. And how you feel in the moment isn't actually that important because getting ahead, not of other people, but in your like. And I think it's interesting because that's probably part of the reason why you're, you know, a drama cleanser. Does that make sense? Yeah.

Like help me understand. I'm seeing some connections there. I'm curious, do you see any connections between minimizing your own feelings and like being a soothing presence for other people? Yeah, there could be a connection. Help me understand that. I mean, I ultimately just want everyone to get along and for things to just be okay. because I think when that happens, like, we're just, I don't know how to describe it. I just think everything is just better.

I mean, that's just ideal, right? Like, we, ideally, we just want everything and everyone to get along. Yeah, and I would even, I would venture, so let me know if you think this is related, but that sometimes, like, you're willing to set your own feelings aside or minimize your own feelings for the sake of harmony of the group. Yeah, that's happened. But not in like a bad way. It's like always in a positive way. Everyone sacrifices somehow to like for the happiness of the group.

Yeah. I think I didn't I didn't want to imply that it was bad or that the group is like predatory on you. And they're like, oh my God. You know, pooping all over you all the time. But I do think that when it comes to successful relationships, you know, a certain amount of minimization of your own feelings is like, generally speaking, there's a healthy amount of that. And as long as everyone's doing it to the same amount,

it doesn't become toxic. Yeah. And even sometimes it doesn't have to be to the same amount. It's like, you know, 70, 30 is usually like what you can get away with and still maintain a healthy relationship. What do you think? Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, it's just how like friends, you know, and just like how it works. Like everyone, no one is perfect, but it's like how you work together and how you, like, like how much you love each other and everything that like makes it all like work out. Yeah. So I'm going to just switch gears on you for a second if that's okay and go back to something you said earlier. What did it feel like getting first second or third?

It was nice. It made me feel like though that I had to like keep maintaining that though. So that was pressure. And what did it feel like to not get first second or third? Um, disappointing. Can you help me understand more about what would happen if you didn't get first, second or third? I don't think anything would have happened, but it was just like, I was just getting it, like, somewhere in the top three all the time. And then it's like, if I didn't get it, then it's like, what's going on type of thing, you know?

And it's not like, I guess maybe if I was never for a second or third. maybe that pressure would have never been there. But, uh... Okay. So did you ever relax, like mentally? Um... Could you ease up on the gas pedal? I don't think I ever really relax,

except for... When I first graduated university, and I just, like, told my mom I was taking a month off to just take a break before looking for... work and I D-Gen play league for like a month. And I think that was when I relaxed. But prior to that, I would say, no, unless I was ever like on vacation or something, I never really like relaxed. It was always just school to work to like stressing about finding work after university because it was so difficult to after and then to also moving to L.A. and then all this as well.

So what Let me just think for a second And when did you start to have thoughts about your appearance And being unsatisfied with the way you looked Um I mean, I never liked how I looked all my life Almost or never thought I was one of like It sounds very dramatic when I say it like that

But it's, I just never like grew up thinking like wow, I look pretty or I'm good, like, it just, it was never like a, I don't know, I like woke up very, I asked my mom before. I was like, mom, can you honestly tell me how you think, like, do you think because I wasn't sure. I was a kid, basically. And I asked her like, um, do you think I'm like pretty or am I average? And then my mom was like, I think you're average. I was like, oh, okay, I'm average. And then that was just like a no. It is. And then, um, I also had a bunch of friends back then and like maybe I also had like a long-term boyfriend at the time as well

and so I never got it's not like I got validation through other people telling me I was pretty or like through other guys like potentially like going after I was in a long-term relationship and like he always called me ugly girl as a joke I know it sounds weird but it was like it was like a yeah he just always said that and then um uh i guess i don't know i'm trying to think um i just never felt like i really got or really was pretty i do think i got i looked better when i started in this space because i started caring more about my my appearance a bit more but it's not like I think I just like

was prettier than before that's just it that's like the one thing that I got in comparison to before so I got to ask about the ugly girl thing yeah right I don't even remember that that's so long ago

yeah do you have a sense of like what was going on there like was that like a term of endearment where he sort of meant the opposite is sort of what I'm feeling. Yeah, I think he, like, is trying to mean the opposite, but he doesn't say it, so he said the other thing to make it easier to say all the time, if that makes it.

I'm sorry, I lost you there. Like, I think he just called me, like, ugly girl to, like, tease or try to, like, be, like, obviously implied that I'm not, but just, like, saying that, calling me that. Yeah. Because he wouldn't say that if you were. were really ugly. Yeah, that's what I think was intended when he called me that in our, during our relationship. How did getting called ugly girl make you feel pretty? Nope.

But it, it was just like, no, it didn't make me feel pretty, but it didn't make me feel awful at the same time. How did it make you feel? It felt like it was just like a nickname. Okay. Did it make you feel loved? Not necessarily, but I didn't feel like it was really, you. mean at the time either.

It sounds mean when I say it now, but it didn't feel mean at the time. And how old were you if you don't want me asking when you were in this relationship? From when I was like 16 to 22. Okay. So oddly enough, I think that makes a lot of sense because I think when you're 16, you don't really know how to communicate with a significant other, right? Yeah. It's, you just haven't learned yet.

Yeah. So instead, what you're, do is you tend to say like insulting things in an endearing manner because actually saying something endearing makes you feel like vulnerable and exposed and especially if you're a dude like you have trouble doing that. You want to sound tough and you want to keep things playful and you want to keep things I don't know it feels safe somehow to you know and and and Are you, do you mind if I ask about like dating recently? Mm-hmm.

Like it isn't you, it's okay for me to ask or it's not okay for me to ask? Yeah, you can ask. Okay. So are you in a relationship now? Now I am, yeah. And how do you feel in that relationship? Uh, happy. Do you feel confident in the way that you look?

Um, not necessarily in the way that I look. I think I just, I don't know. I don't feel worse, though. Okay. I'm going to ask you a weird question, Yvonne. Is it okay? Can you be confident in not being very pretty? Yeah, I think I've been trying my best to do that.

I'm kind of just like going my way through being like, you know what? I don't look the priest, but it's okay. Like, just, you know, you cope you me, it's like that. That's how I feel. Yeah, is that actually how you feel, though? Are you okay, okay, not being the prettiest? Yeah. I'm, like, there are obviously days where I wish I was free.

I don't expect myself to be the prettiest at all. I think I'm just, like, trying my best to, like, get through with just being okay with myself. And, like, I'm, there are days where I'm completely okay. And obviously, there's going to be days for you. feel lower, but yeah. What's the difference between those days? Well, the difference, sure.

Not very helpful, but I guess some days I just worry more about my appearance. Those are the days that I don't like as well. Where I'm like, I just... Yeah, so when you worry about your appearance, what kind of thoughts do you have? like I'm very thankful that there's masks now so I cover like most of my face. Okay. So I know this sounds kind of weird. I'm going to ask you sort of a leading question, but I would guess, I'm just going to say it, I would guess that on the days that you don't feel confident in your appearance, you're thinking about what other people think. But yeah, possibly. And on the days where you feel more confident in yourself, you're not thinking about what.

what other people think. Yeah. Or I care less about what other people think. I'm like, ah, if it doesn't matter. Some days I have a really like, effit mentality. And other days, I'm like, I mean, I don't want to. I don't like how I look like. Yeah.

Let me just think for a second. So I feel, Yvonne, I don't know. I mean, are you, are you wanting to have some kind of like deep emotional catharsis today? Like, do you want me to help you cry on stream? Is that what we're shooting for? Oh, God. I was looking at the difference between, I actually looked at our last session a little bit before this. I was looking like, oh, wow, I look freaking depressed or sad or something. I don't know. It was so, it looked so different to how I feel now compared to before. How do you feel now?

I feel so much better. Yeah. So I was just, just, I'm going to ask again. Do you, do you want me to help you have a deep emotional catharsis? Sure. I'm up for anything. I didn't come in expecting anything in particular. So here's, here's the thing.

I've got like a fork in the road here. Okay. I'll let you pay. Okay. So we can talk about, you know, if you want to, we can talk about like, you know, how your parents sort of taught you like that your value is not intrinsic, right? So what I'm sort of hearing from you is that you can never rest. So I think like confidence comes from like the ability to like be where you are. Right. So confidence is not about being prettier actually. In fact, it's the opposite.

It's about being okay with however pretty you are, whether you're on the ugly end of the spectrum or the freaking beautiful end of the spectrum. Yeah. And so it's interesting. But then then the question of like, you know, why, where did you, how did you learn that it's not okay to be you? Because that's what I think confidence comes back to, you know. And so this is where it's kind of interesting because when you talk a little bit about your upbringing and stuff, like it was never okay to chill, right? Like you had to work harder because what you were, you weren't there yet. You always needed to be better.

Got to be better. Got to be smarter. Got to do higher level math. You know, it's never enough. Like, Yvonne, like, basically what I'm hearing is like, you were never enough. Yeah. And so we can talk about that, right? So we can share stories and stuff and you may have a good cry.

You know, or what we can do is like, since you are better, I feel like it's sort of almost, it feels a touch predatory to me to like go down that direction and like give everyone something fun to watch. Mm-hmm. And on the flip side is like we could actually like learn something about confidence and help you sort of like under. understand how it's built. So it's sort of like we can be entertaining or we can be helpful. And it sort of depends on what you're looking for. Hmm. Um,

there's like, yeah. I don't really know. I also feel like at this point, I'm not even sure if it's like a nitty gritty thing that we could get at because I feel like the confidence thing, like you said before, it's just something I have to probably. or like something that I just like have to believe in.

I don't know if that's what you're not saying that's what you said, sorry, but like or something that I just have to slowly come to a realization of in a sense for other things maybe. Yeah, as you don't want to believe in it. That might be like a thing that we can't even. That's a terrible. That's a terrible idea. That's what happens when people tell you something that you disagree with is you rely on belief. Right?

Confidence is not about belief. in fact, it's the exact opposite. It's like knowing that you're good. Uh-huh. Right? Like, you can try so hard to believe what everyone tells you about how pretty you are. But, like, if you're confident, you don't need to try to believe what other people say. Like, you just know it yourself.

Does that make sense? So I don't want you to believe anything. I want you to naturally come to the conclusion that I know sounds kind of weird, but that you may not be the prettiest person on the planet, and there ain't no problem with that. Yeah. Right. I feel like that's just like a work in progress. I don't know if that's like,

is it? I think so. What do you think? Yeah, I think it's manageable. Like it's not like a huge, it doesn't feel like it's a big crippling part of my mental, although it does happen pretty frequently, but I can still like do everything.

Yeah. I can still do what I need to do. Yvonne, are you in? Enough. In what way? In all of the ways. In all the ways. I can ask it.

Yeah, okay, go ahead. I'm not sure. Are you enough for your boyfriend? Yeah, I think so. Are you enough for OTV? I think I could be more. It's not what I asked. Oh.

I maybe Okay Do you feel like you're enough for your boyfriend? Yeah But that's only because he's like Very this to me Like What does that mean?

Um Like he's extremely loyal and like Sees me in like very positive ways Like he would like only Like he makes me feel like I am like That's just it just like what he wants. Okay. So I know

it sounds kind of weird, Yvonne. That's a little bit concerning. Because what I'm hearing you say is that if he was less loyal, I wouldn't be enough. Oh. Because you're doing that thing where I ask you

a question about you and you respond with someone else's attitude. I see. Do you see how you did that? Mm-hmm. Whether you're enough doesn't depend on your boyfriend's loyalty. I feel like it's just different in relationships because, you know, sometimes you're not enough for some people and sometimes you are for it.

It's just like, it's like. That's well said. Yeah. Yeah. So, so let me just think about what I was saying earlier and whether maybe I was wrong. How do you feel about yourself in that relationship? Um, myself in the relationship. I think I'm not sure how to describe it, I guess.

I would just say that I'm, I think I'm like a pretty understanding or pretty decent girlfriend. Are you a catch? Yes. Do you really believe that? Uh, yes. Good. Help me understand why. What makes you a catch?

Okay, well, that I think I am decently, like, independent. I don't really, I, like, have my own stuff going on, so I'm fairly busy and don't need to, like, have someone, like, joined at the hip all the time. You know, we all can, like, do our own thing, which I think is healthy. and I think I'm fairly reasonable when it comes to anything general, like just talk it out or like discuss or anything. I don't know. So, Yvonne, I'm noticing a couple of different things, okay? The one thing I'm noticing is that I'm asking you challenging questions

that I think you're giving good answers to that you genuinely believe. and I'm noticing that you have to work to get there. Does that make sense? I could be wrong. So like I'm like just if I pay attention to your body language and stuff, it's like when I ask you the question, I'm almost seeing like a flash of one answer in your mind, which then creates a war with like another part that has gotten stronger.

And then you're like deeply uncomfortable for like three seconds. And then you come out with a yes, I actually like am awesome in this relationship and I am a catch. which I do genuinely think you believe. But is it fair to say that you have to work to get there? Yeah, I mean, it feels a little weird being like, I'm a fucking catch, you know what? Yeah, so what? I have to be like, well, I think about it for a second.

At least think about it, you know? Like, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So here's the thing. You'll be confident when it no longer feels weird. Yeah. Yeah, I think so. I think it's just like a working.

Yeah, so help me understand what is that initial feeling of like, why is it hard at the very beginning to say yes? Like, what is that? Because I absolutely agree that this is a work in progress and you seem to have come a long and very healthy way. I do genuinely believe that like you see the value you bring to the relationship. You're absolutely a catch. You know it. He knows it. We all know it.

And yet there's that little barrier you have to get over. to be secure in that. Does that make sense? Help me understand what's that barrier? I just don't want to for once you're super conceited because I don't feel that way. But also too is like

there's always room for improvement or there's always just something you can do better possibly or in any aspect, not necessarily relationship, but I just don't think that you should be like, oh yeah, like I'm chilling. I'm good from here on out type of thing. Because I, that's just how I feel. Because I think like you don't really grow as a person maybe since if you just feel like you're good.

So I'm totally with you. Like I think that there's and I'm wondering whether there's like nuance here. Like are you okay with where you are. Actually, let me rephrase that. Can I rephrase that? Are you, let me think about, there's something I wanted to modify in that question. Not is it, are you okay with where you are? Is it okay to come as far as you have? Yes. Are you okay with where you are? Yes.

So when you feel like you're not confident, what do you think the answer to those questions are? Can you help me understand that? So when I don't feel like, as confident. I think, like, other people in my position would have done better. I think that what I do is replaceable or that I just don't see myself as that great. Okay. So those are, yeah.

I think I stumbled upon something. Let me ask you something. Are you, can your boyfriends find someone else? who's as good as you are? I always thought he was like the type of person who could get along with like so many people. He's just that like I mean, I think he can meet someone else and also be like, oh, you're pretty cool type of thing. And like they could, you know, I don't know if they'd be as compatible. I think we're very compatible.

But I think he could definitely find someone who's great as well. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I think, you know, all of us could find some, you know, there's not just a one person unless, you know, depending on what you believe that love. Yeah. But do you feel replaceable in that relationship? I think it's different.

I think because people are so different, it's very hard to feel like you could be replaced in a relationship because that's a lot more intimate and there's so many more layers to it. So not as much. Yeah. Yeah. So then let me ask you this. How long have you felt replaceable? Like, how long is the feeling of being replaceable been something that you've kind of lived with?

It's not necessarily something that's so prevalent. Like, I never think, like, all the time, like, wow, I'm so replaceable. But I think, like, the work that I do maybe, or I'm not sure it's that. Like, I feel like tasks are very replaceable. Like, you need someone to always. order or something, like someone else could do that job type of thing. Here's what I'm, here's what I'm kind of detecting. So first of all, I feel like you're well on your road to becoming confident.

What do you think? Yeah, I think it gets better. And it's not getting worse. Yep. I see that. So here's what I'm, here's the way I would describe your lack of confidence. So in your brain, there is replaceable. exe.

And on some days, your brain is like turn on replaceable. exe. And it runs like a script. And over time, what is happening in your life is that the number of times

that you click replaceable. exe appears to be going down. What do you think? Yeah, I think so. And so it's not that on a cosmic level, you feel like, oh my God, I'm so replaceable. Like you're starting to,

see that you have value in like, you know, in real relationships. But that there are times where like this, it's almost like a script that like activates in your mind where your mind is telling you like, oh, you could have done better. Someone else could have done it better. And it seems like your boyfriend doesn't really like trigger replaceable. Exactly. Yeah. But there are some circumstances or people or situations that trigger replaceable.

Right. So if we think about confidence, what I'm sort of detecting in. you and also from your story is that like early on like someone wrote the script for replaceable. Does that make sense? Mm-hmm.

Do you have a sense of when that script was written or how it got written? I think so. Can you help me understand that or explain that to me? Um, I think it's stemmed from how it's something a little more complicated

but I don't know if you follow a bunch of the drama and stuff that's happened in the past but I think at some point I was going to leave OTV and as I was going

through like the job description and everything everything that I was listing in the job description felt very like someone else could do this. And I remember like that was a really sad time for me because, yeah, it just felt like someone else could do it. But it was like a position that I valued a lot. So I thought we were going down the non-emotional catholicist route. I'm sorry. It's this thing that I'm talking about.

Maybe my time of the month is coming, you know? I've been a little emotional. It's sure it started coming in the last 60 seconds. It kind of just random weekend. You're over. He's like, boom, ovulation time. Here we go. Yeah, maybe.

So I want you to pay attention to that feeling, Yvonne. Like, remember how you felt. Right? And like what I want you to really think about. is like in your mind whether when I ask you, are you enough for your boyfriend? Whether that's the lump that kind of rises up and then you're actually like, no, you don't belong here. You don't belong here. But is that like the quality of the feeling that kind of comes to the surface?

Does that make sense? Mm-hmm. Is that what it is? I can try asking you again. Like, sorry, just to, I guess, re-ask the question is to make sure I got it right. It's like, do I belong here? When I ask you, are you enough for your boyfriend? Remember how we talked about, you come to the answer that, yeah, I'm enough.

I'm great. It's awesome. We're chilling. It's all good. But in order to get to that, you had to do a little bit of work, right? You had to, like, move past something. Is that fair? Yeah.

So what I'm curious about is that thing that you moved past, does it feel, look, taste, or smell like what you felt when you were going over the OTV job description? I don't know if this answers it, but I feel like now there are fewer people who can do, like what's listed in the job description. but I think maybe it just takes more of like there's just different aspects too I guess that I do believe that there is some value that I bring that's more but that's just also based off my

friends and my roommates like constantly reassuring me and validating on it too so like as time goes on I like believe it more and more Yeah, I think that makes sense. So I'm going to ask you once again about the job description. So like that feeling that you had when you were looking at it, can you tell me a little bit more about what was happening, what was in your head or what you were feeling? Well, when I was looking over it, it just felt sad because it's like, oh, like you're leaving this stuff behind for like someone else to do. And they're all stuff that you used to do.

And I don't know. It's just like that just, it was a sad feeling. That's all I could really attribute to it. There's not a whole lot other than it was a really difficult time. And I was, it wasn't even about the job description. I think it was more like leaving the people that I'd grown really attached to and that I value a lot because that's also part of the job. But yeah, it was, I just remember thinking like, I wouldn't really have a general direction to walk towards anymore.

Like if I, at TwitchCon or at any event, I always have like a general direction. I always walk towards like OTV. And that's like a very, I was thinking about that a lot. I remember prying to an old housemate of mine about that, about how like there's no one or like I wouldn't have a general direction to walk to anymore and then it's fine because he said that at the very end when he was moving out that he thinks back to what I said a lot because now it applies to him

wow when you say general direction to walk towards can you help me understand that it's almost like you go to an event you see like a group of people you're comfortable with and you naturally would gravitate and like walk towards them to hang out talk it's it's just like feeling like you belong or that you're involved somewhere in the group yeah i think i know what you're talking about it's the exact opposite of going to a party and not knowing anyone yeah right you're just sitting there like maybe you've got a drink in your hand and you're like i don't have anyone to talk to do people think i'm weird i don't know like should i approach these people sound like they're having fun, would I be intruding?

Mm-hmm. It's the relief of all of those feelings. Yeah. A lot of comfort and just feeling, like, safe, really, like, yeah, comfortable. I'm not really hearing anything about confidence there. Yeah. I think it kind of went off a bit of, but, yeah, it's different. I mean, did you feel like they were ready to discard you?

I'm not trying to trash them or anything like that. I'm just curious. I'm just trying to think about how that could relate to someone's confidence. And the best that I can come up with is like if you, you know, if they were like if they could just, you know, you could move on and it wouldn't make a big difference to them. Like they're fine. Like it's like whatever. Um, no. No.

I think it was like, I don't feel that way right now. I think back then, obviously I felt like I was leaving. so sad, but they actually made it very like, like they didn't seem like they really wanted me to go. Yeah. Yvonne, do you have any questions for me? In terms of anything? Anything. Like, yeah, I feel like we've covered a lot of different ground and I was about to sort of share what I've learned from you. But kind of before we go there, I was just curious whether you wanted to talk more about something or, you know, if there were anything that I should have asked more about or you wanted to talk more about.

Not off the top of my head necessarily. But can I go to the bathroom quickly? Yeah, absolutely. Okay. Thank you. I'm sorry. I have a really small bladder. It never, it never, oh, oh, testing, testing?

One, two, three? Oh, there we go. it never ceases to amaze me how how people apologize for needing to use the restroom. I think I lagged there for a second chat. Sorry, Dr. Kay, I have a kidney. Yeah, man. How dare you?

Yeah, right? I'm just reading chat. I guess I should be responding. I really, there's so much interesting stuff here. Blatter-related stuff. Yeah, it's weird, right? Like in school, how we kind of, we talk about you know, like using the restroom is like punishable. It's like a punishment. It's like, I remember when I was in middle school, like we would have a certain amount of time to like go to our locker and then presumably pee.

And we had these like gigantic textbooks. So you really had to map out your day because like, you know, peeing a couple times a day would be a real problem because every class you have to go back to your locker, put away like one textbook, grab the next textbook. It was idiotic. I'm back. Welcome back. So, Yvonne, here's what I was kind of thinking is, you know, so it seems, I understand that you've got, sometimes you've got like confidence issues, but it seems to me like you're working on those and they're growing.

I was thinking actually since you're, so sometimes when people have confidence issues, there's like some kind of root thing, which we can kind of talk a little bit about. I think we could sort of touch on that a little bit. But what I was actually feeling from today is we can sort of almost put together a lot of what you've shared about your journey so far and see if we can understand a few principles about where confidence comes from. So that as you continue to walk this journey, you can maybe be a little bit more mindful or focused about building your confidence. How does that sound? Yeah, sounds good. Okay. So it may not be, I know we had a little bit of emotion there, but it may not be like a, oh my God.

the reason you're not confident is because like at the age of seven, like you know, someone like yeah, like there's a dog that was walking down the street and it was about to lick your hand, but it went and it preferred another human. And then I don't know if my brain can even like, I don't even know if I remember like a freaking story. Like I can even pinpoint that. Yeah. So, so we'll get to that, right? So the first thing is I want you to just look at your mind and recognize that sometimes

people say things to you and your mind like swats them away, right? Or it, like, makes excuses. And it's like, oh, this person is saying this because he is loyal. This person is saying this because they are my friends. What they're saying doesn't have as much merit is like the fact that they are the ones that's saying it. And so it's almost like your mind kind of like discounts it, right? the second thing is that we do have a tendency, generally speaking, to undervalue what we're natural at. So, like, you know, you may think that this is something that anyone can do, but, like, really, it's not the case. Like, a lot of people may be able to theoretically do what's in the job description, but to do it, like, as well as you do. And as, you know, because people can do it and still be like complete pains in the ass.

does that make sense? Like it's hard to describe it. But like I think it's very easy to undervalue like what people are natural at. And then the third thing is I want to point out that, you know, when you were talking about like when you feel more confident, there seems to be a correlation between when you think about other people and when you don't think about other people. So when you compare yourself more, the confidence goes down. when you observe like when the focus when the telescope is pointed towards you confidence will actually increase and when the telescope is pointed towards other people it'll actually decrease so that can look like comparison or it can look like what will people

think oh my god it's so nice that i have to wear a mask because now people don't have to look at my face right it's kind of a brutal thought but it's like literally what your mind will say The point, though, is that confidence, you know, it's kind of, people say stuff, oh, that confidence comes from within. Like, literally it does come within from within. Yeah. And then people get confused because, but people don't understand, like, the mechanism of how do I get the confidence within? And literally it is like the more time your mind spends thinking about other people or thinking about what other people think, the less time you will be confident. Mm-hmm.

Now, you also said that you exist in a space where there's a lot of inherent comparison. right? And that's tough. So what I see, and this is like what we found, so we have a content creator program at Healthy Gamer. And what we've found is that absolutely. Like the more that we can help content creators see themselves as like individuals as opposed to like comparisons, like the more that we can help content creators not think about what other people are doing or how this person, oh my God, this person is completely blowing up. And even though I'm growing at a steady clip, I feel bad about myself because I'm not blowing up. So there's like a lot of comparison that will negatively impact your confidence. The next thing to kind of think a little bit about is that I do think there's something about you not being enough or replaceable, which was like definitely like it's just part of the Asian upbringing. You know, and it's funny. Like you kind of said, you know, like it's like be a, a.

doctor or a lawyer, otherwise you don't deserve to be confident. Like, you were literally taught that. You get to chill when you get into medical school and not a day before. I mean, literally, my dad told me when I was nine years old and my brother was 12, he was like, one of y'all is going to be a doctor and one of y'all is going to be a lawyer. And then I used, like, that was not like he wasn't kidding. Yeah. He was like, those are the options. And also that we both couldn't choose the same thing. because he's like together we will be the Uber family because one of y'all will be a doctor

and one of y'all will be a lawyer so we will have both boxes checked so if someone runs into legal trouble one of the two y'all can handle that and if someone runs into medical trouble one of the two y'all will handle that that is

that's crazy does that happen? Yeah he became a lawyer I became a doctor oh my god that works that just works You don't give them an option?

It works. I think it, I don't, I actually don't really think the two are related. But I will say like, so when I was in med school, people would ask me, right? Because when you interview for med school, they're like, why do you want to become a doctor? And I would tell them this story. And then I would say, my brother was older, so he chose, he got to choose first and he went to law school. So here I am. And then we laugh about it.

And then I wouldn't have to answer the question why I was there because I didn't have a good reason. Yeah. Okay, that's good. That's a good one. Yeah. But I do think I see this a lot where people like struggle with being confident and because like this is the this is the lesson you were taught, right? Like you were taught like there are like there's like the best, they're the perfect kids. They're the great kids and they're the good kids. And whether you're confident is determined by which group you fall into. Right. And so the interesting. interesting thing is that let's say for a second, I'm not going to try to be mean or anything here, but I'm going to say something that maybe some people will find mean. Let's say you're not the prettiest person on Twitch, which I will agree with. Like if you were to say, Dr. Kay, I don't think I'm the prettiest person on Twitch. I would say, Yvonne, I think you are correct. Yeah. And the issue, though, is that if you were to tell me, like, Dr. Kay, I wasn't perfect in school. I will also agree with you. If you were not valedictorian, you were not perfect. That's fine.

You were not the best. I will agree with you. I will not try to convince you otherwise. The difference is I will say that's actually okay. That you don't have to be the prettiest person on Twitch. You don't have to be perfect. And that actually if you want to give like the most value you have in the world and the most benefit you can give to the world is not by living up to an external standard,

but being confident in who you are. And there's an interesting point here because it doesn't mean that you can't be better or that you shouldn't be better. I don't think you should chill. This is the other thing that, you know, the Asian upbringing gives you, is the idea that unless you're grinding, you're chilling. It's like, there's two groups. There's the people who are two years ahead in math, and they're the deadbeat pot heads. And there's nothing in the middle. And if you're not one, you're the other. Does that make sense? Yeah. Right? That's the way we were raised. It's like, if you're not ahead, you're behind. Yeah. Like, it's weird. It's like, there's no, there's no like being just where you are. And it's like,

to be where you are. Yeah. It's just, and so I think it's kind of interesting because, like, in your mind, you're going to have all these different, like, XCs. It's going to be like, you know,

when you, it's going to be your boot order and, like, your processes that boot up when you load up windows. And there's going to be a lot of that crap in there. And so when it comes to confidence, I know it sounds kind of weird, but, like, there's a part of me that says, you know, the next time you feel like you're not very pretty,

instead of trying to convince yourself that you should be pretty, prettier that these people are prettier than you or whatever, I would encourage you to think a little bit about what's wrong with that. Right? Like, I would question the structure that your mind is telling you, because I think when it comes to people like your boyfriend, when it comes to the people who really care about you, like, you don't need to be prettier.

Like, what do you think? What does your mind say when I say that? Yeah. I agree. I just, uh, it would just be nice to be. I'm going to the gym and like all this stuff to try to like at least feel better about myself, which I do. So going to the gym has actually recently been very nice because I at least feel like no matter what you go to the gym, you make progress. You never like regress.

So I think that's that's like super healthy and I would encourage that because it's not about living. Because the interesting thing there is that it's not about living to a standard. Right. It's just saying, hey, like, I can, that's where confidence comes from. It's sort of like looking at your life and saying like, this could be better. I'm going to do something about that. And so the interesting thing is that the confidence doesn't come from your progress at the gym. The confidence actually comes from, because like if you're thinking about progress at the gym,

I know it sounds kind of weird, but then you're thinking about other people. Oh, if I go to the gym three times a week, then people will think I'm sexy. As long as that's the thought process in your mind, you actually won't gain confidence. Yeah, that's not it For me at least What is it for you? I feel better, I feel healthier I feel like

It's just like having the discipline That makes me feel good that I went Is like The battle is really just getting up and going And leaving your house So when I already do that I feel better And then also just like you feel yourself making progress or getting stronger because it's visible. And then so like that feels really good.

So who are you thinking about? Where is the telescope pointed when you go to the gym? Not thinking about other people. Absolutely. And that's why it leads to confidence. And I've worked like so the, let me just think about this for a second. One of the hardest, if not the hardest patients, I have. ever worked with are people who are bodybuilders with body dysmorphic disorder.

So, like, these are people that, like, no matter how, like, it is the, like, it's hard to describe, but it is, like, the mental illness that is, like, the hardest to displace. Like, I can convince psychotic people that they're wrong. I can convince depressed people that they should live. I can even convince from time to time manic people that they have not fixed. figured out, you know, the grand unified theory of physics. The one person that I have never succeeded in convincing is like the bodybuilder with body dysmorphic disorder.

No matter how hard I've tried, I cannot make a dent that despite being one of the most absurdly chiseled people on the planet, that it is enough. And it's so weird. It's like the hardest thing to treat. Like, I feel pretty confident treating just about everything else, but like body dysmorphia specifically in body. Even women with body dysmorphia, I do a pretty good job.

It's like men with body dysmorphia that like it's impossible. Like as long as they're thinking about the other person, they can be in the best shape of their life, which is the other interesting thing about confidence is that as long as you're thinking about becoming prettier, you're not going to be confident. Mm-hmm.

Right? So this is a very common misconception about confidence is that people think that confidence comes from achievement or success. What do you think? I mean, it could help. I just don't think it's like the one, like solving factor, I guess.

Yeah, which, which I think it can help too. But the interesting thing is when people chase confidence, what they chase, if they're looking to be more confident, what they chase is achievement. Right? They think, oh, if I achieve, then I will be more confident, which is missing the point. Because that's actually, what it actually does is places your value in yourself to be conditional on your success. And that actually is the opposite of confidence. So like your parents basically, you know, I'm not trying to bash your parents here. My parents were sort of the same way, right?

It's Asian parents. And they were like, or Jewish parents or Nigerian parents. It's not exclusively Asian as well. Yeah. But they were basically like, you know, we will be proud of you, not based on who you are as a person, but based on your achievements. And so that's where like Asian people, like I've worked with thousands of, not thousands. of, not thousands, hundreds of, you know, Asian and Indian kids who, like, they were taught, like, they have troubles with confidence because they are taught that your value as a human being is dependent on your performance. And so I think, like, that's where it started.

And then I think you have had a couple of these other experiences where you felt like replaceable. And then the third thing, if I wanted to understand your confidence, was that I think you live in an environment that causes you your mind to compare more. Yeah. And that the more you look towards yourself, your confidence will grow. And the last bit that I would say is just pay attention to the next time you feel, you notice that your mind is like swatting things away. And then like the more that you look and observe that within yourself, because when we asked you, how did you gain confidence?

You were like, oh, I started to observe myself. I started to make my own observations instead of thinking about like, I started like watching players and be like, these people suck. Yeah. Right? And so the more you make your own observations, the better off you're going to be. if you really think about it, when you swat away someone's compliment, you're not making an observation. It's a conclusion that you're putting forth. Does that make sense? Do you understand what I'm saying there?

Mm-hmm. It's like a reflexive pushing something away without actually like objectively looking at it. Yeah. Like a reflex. Exactly. So it's not like it's a reflex. It's not an observation. Mm-hmm. And so the more that you observe, the more you go to the gym, the more that you look at yourself, like, the more your confidence will grow. And I think you're well on your way. What do you think?

Yeah, I think so. I think like just doing small things along the way definitely helps. And it's not like I'm instantly going to be there, but I'm getting there, I think. And just like I'm not trying to be like super mega confident like. I can accomplish anything, but I just want to be more than where I am right now. And I think that's, like, achievable. Are you okay with where you are right now? I'm fairly okay with it.

I would like to be, like, improve overall in general. But, like, other than that, like, I can't complain too much. So, Yvonne, you sound confident to me. I do. Yeah. Well, maybe right now. Do you feel confident? Uh, I mean, not necessarily, but, uh, do you feel a lack of confidence?

It comes in waves. Like, yeah. So I, I feel very like normal right now. There's not like a fluctuation, not like an upward down. Right. Yeah, so I know it sounds weird, but it's a. that normality, which I think is actually the essence of confidence. Oh. You know? It sounds kind of weird.

But it's like as you go into different places, like when you meet your boyfriend and you feel normal, like that's what a healthy relationship looks like, right? Like that's how you feel like it's not feeling if your mind is like, oh, I should be prettier or I'm hot shit. he is so lucky to have me like both of those like one of those is ego one of those is a lack of confidence yeah which you may be I mean it seems like he's a lucky dude

TBH yeah yeah I'll show him this clip what do you think oh I mean I think I'm lucky too I'm like just as lucky so as soon as I said that you crossed your arms how are you feeling did it pop up again

uh Did it? I don't know, because it could just be embarrassment because I complimented you, or it could be like, which one was it? Um. Was it an aw, shucks. Oh, stop it. I mean, I think like, I think also, like, it's not just me, you know? I think he's, I'm also, or I think I'm also very lucky because he's also like, great.

Why the fuck are we thinking about you, though? And I don't know. Why can't you just, dude, he's a lucky dude. Like what? Why can't you just bestow upon him the awesomeness that is Yvonne? I, because maybe I just see it like both, it goes both ways. You know, relationships is just like, like, you compliment each other. I may not be lucky.

Like, I may not be a good girlfriend to someone else. Right. Yeah, I'm, I'm really confused now because there's a part of me that's like, you know, if he's a lucky dude, Like, you think he's a lucky dude? Um, is you, is you, like, I know that sounds like a really simple question, but I'm just like, I mean, I don't know. What would you have to be for him to be a lucky dude? What would have to be different? Oh, sure.

I'm not even, maybe if I was like, better in like every aspect, a little bit more, it'd be like, oh, yeah. They're really like, you know, like, no, we're not like. They're just confident with each other. Yeah, so it's interesting, right? Because I think it's like, it's weird because it's like, it's 50% there. Yeah. Because there's a part of me that's like, you know, what you're, you sound confident. I think it's there.

But there's also some resistance. Like you can't, you feel like you need to be better in every dimension for him to be lucky. I just never think like, damn, you're so lucky to have me. That's like never a type of thought. Yeah, that sounds healthy. That sounds healthy. It's just very much like, oh, I think we just like get along and compliment each other well. Okay.

So I don't know if that's like a, I don't look at like my criteria or like my resume and be like that they're lucky to have me. It's always just like a compatibility thing or like a. Okay. So like other, it's a different thing for me. Yeah, I hear you. So I think what was happening there is that I was trying to apply a particular like system to your relationship. which is just not the way that you see your relationship. Yeah.

So it's not necessarily. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know that it was actually like a lack of confidence thing. It was just more like a lack of arrogance thing and just sort of like a this is how relationship work. Relationships work.

I just don't think of him. It is like I'm, you know, God's gift to this particular person. I don't think I'd be like that for anyone, you know? It's just like, do you guys get along? Like how well do you mesh? I think that's like the, a huge essence as to like whether a relationship works out or not, not really like is this guy or girl freaking attractive AF and like all these other things. Got it. So that actually sounds to me like if you had said, yeah, so it sounds like you're moving

away from an objective standard and just appreciating what you have. Yeah. I don't feel like a huge emphasis when it comes to like above the things that we discussed like in that, in this relationship. Yeah, I get that. So I think that was me trying to apply a particular set of language to that didn't seem to fit. So it was just weird, though, because I thought when I, you know, I mentioned something that seemed like a compliment, like it was hard for you to take. What do you think? Oh, yeah. It's been like that with a lot of things in general.

Every time there's like a compliment, I just think like, it's just so hard for me to take compliments. Yeah. And just like, yeah. So what are we supposed to do when you receive a compliment? Like, pay attention to your mind. Think about what you're thinking. We're going to try again. Okay. Oh, gosh. I want you to pay attention to what your mind says. If you can think out loud.

Uh-huh. All right. So you ready? Yes. It's going to be a tough one. You're very pretty. What is your mind doing? It's like 50% there. Okay. So tell me. what it's saying.

Oh, like, I just, I just think in my hand, like, oh, thanks. And then like, that's like, my confidence doesn't waver, but it doesn't like, I don't feel there's not like a huge up or down. Does it make you feel uncomfortable when I say that? But that is mainly because I'm uncomfortable with compliments. Or I don't like accept them right away. Yeah, yeah. So what's what pushes back?

Tell me what pushes back. I think I just don't. Okay, it's weird. Like, I just don't hear it very often. That someone will say that outright to me. Yep. Yeah. So you're uncar.

So should we try again? No, that's what I meant. So let's, let's, we're going to, we're going to teach you how to. That's, that. Okay. I mean, like, nobody like, looks at me and says that. Like, I did that. Oh, God.

That's not, that's all I meant. Here we go. Yvonne. Prepare yourself. This is not what I meant. This, we're going. Yvonne. You're really awesome at league.

Oh. Am I now? Yeah. Not anymore. Even if I was. I haven't played in a while. So. You used to be really awesome at league.

How's that one? Because you may suck at league. Yeah, I just think like, you haven't seen some of my games. See, there it is. So where's that thought coming from, right? Well, it's coming from the bad games that I've had. I've seen them all. You know, when it's you, you've seen all the good and the bad.

Yeah, but your mind is not going to the good games. It's automatically going to the bad game. So we're going to try one more time. So what's your job description at OTV? Do I name him? Yeah, like what's your, what's your job? Like, what's, like, what's, not description title? Like a manager.

Okay, so you're an awesome manager. That I feel pretty confident in. What does your mind do there? I think I'm decent, but I could do better. Right. So like, I want you to notice, like, what your mind is doing, right? Like, where is it getting those thoughts? Um, I just think it's the truth.

I think if I had like I could there are always things I could do to do better in that aspect. Like there's so much I could learn or that I could put time into. Yeah, I could do better, but I'm still awesome. Why can't you be both? I could be both, but I just don't feel in. entirely there yet, maybe. But I feel like I'm putting my heart into it. Just like my capabilities or experience-wise may not be there, if that makes sense.

Like, I'm not like, there's other areas that I'm not as interested in or that I'm not as, like, experienced in, which is just, you know, natural. And I think that's okay. but I could be better in those areas. Okay. So you said something that was really interesting to me. You put your heart into it. Mm-hmm.

That seems really amazing to me. What do you think? Well, I think that mainly just goes into like caring about the people in it. So I like care about it. I think what makes you an awesome manager is that you care so much about the people that you work with. How is that? Yeah. I can agree.

with that. And what are you feeling now? Emotional. What's the emotion? Well, um, seriously, I think what's,

it's awesome. Like, I think that's why everyone around you appreciates you so much. Because there may be people who have more skills. There may be people who have more experience. But you care so damn much. And you give it everything you've got.

And they can count on you to do that. And that's, That's what really sets you apart. That's why you're irreplaceable. I cry every time I want to hear. How do you feel about that? It feels better. I feel better hearing that, yeah.

It's weird. But I think that that's something that I can feel you own. Mm-hmm. Which is good. I think you're on your road to con. Because that's a hefty one, right? I was like, really like, I mean, that's some high praise right there. That's some good shit.

I mean, I can only believe because I feel the emotions very intensely. Yeah, right. It's like, yeah. So, so I, and I think that's where it's like, it's, it's what you feel in here. Like, that's when we say like confidence comes from within. That's what it is. Because that was, that was clearly, I think, a better compliment than anything else I've said. Yeah, that's like the best.

Yeah, that's like the best thing. Yeah. And so I don't know where we are now, but I feel like we've learned something. I just don't know what. You're getting there. And honestly, I appreciate that so much more than someone telling me that I'm pretty. I like that, like so much more. I don't know if that's a correlation or anything, but I don't like, I, yeah.

I'm going to meme with you here. But if I went into as much detail about why I think you're pretty, that'd be a TOS violation. and we all get banned to go home. So we got we got to stay with safe professional stuff. Yes. You know. Yeah. Any questions, Yvonne?

Um, no. Yeah, nothing that comes to mind. Um, what about you? I mean, I think, not really. I mean, I shared what I, I've loved talking to you. I think it's been awesome. I think it's been really. interesting because what we see is people who are at the beginning of their confidence journey

and we see people who are confident. I think it's been an absolute pleasure to talk to someone who's like halfway there. I was really, really happy to see that you can actually like receive authentic praise that's well deserved. I think it demonstrates to me that you know, you have your mind will latch on to whatever justification in a sense that it has that maybe someone can do stuff better, but that you can genuinely see like what you were worth to OTV. You can genuinely see what you're worth to your boyfriend. You can genuinely see, you know, what you're worth to like the Twitch community and other people and that it, you don't have to be the smartest person. You don't have to have the most followers. You don't have to be the prettiest. You can just be you.

and that's like awesome. And so I think it's cool to really like talk to you and see exactly where those barriers of like what you can take and what you can't, right? Like what feels natural and like okay and what doesn't. And that's the tricky thing is we think about confidence. I have confidence if it's binary. But it's not binary, right? It's like a slow process. And I think you really did an awesome job of illustrating, especially when you talk about going to the gym.

about being prettier because like when you hear yourself talking about it's not you know it's like I'm doing something that I can be proud of and that's where confidence comes from it's all internal it's very much like for me progression helps me build like confidence if I could like see it or feel it yeah and I think the really tricky thing is when people lack confidence they swat away the progression right because there's there's this voice in your head that for some people when you go to the Jim, it says it's not enough. You could be doing more. You could be doing more.

You could be doing more. And so it's interesting because we can hear actually in specific cases where your mind defaults to you could be doing more and where it's like, you know what? I'm actually pretty great. Could I do more? Absolutely. But I feel okay with what I've done. I'm genuinely like bringing value.

So that's what I really enjoyed about this. It's kind of nuanced. But yeah. Last thoughts or questions. before we wrap up? Nothing, but I'm just really glad that, like, I don't know. I feel like the two sessions that we had were so different, obviously, but like I feel really happy that we had this session, like, just like very, like one year

later. And like, I feel, yeah, it's been, I think it's been a little over a year. Yeah. But, uh, you just helped me so much the first time. I really appreciate it. You like hit the nail on the head a lot of how I felt. And put a lot of like, I guess feelings that I had in my head into words that like perfectly described it. So yeah, just wanted to thank you for that.

Yeah. Yvonne, I'm debating. I'm just going to go ahead and say this. So the first thing is that I'm incredibly proud of the progress you've made in the last. last year, I think it's truly amazing. I think what you have managed to do with yourself and the person that we're talking to is a testament to like the resilience of the human spirit. And, you know, the other thing is that sometimes particular events will happen to people that will shatter their confidence. You know, and it doesn't necessarily have to happen in your

upbringing, but like there are particular things that can happen to people that can really shake the way that they feel about themselves and be confident about themselves. And it's been really nice to see like how confident and comfortable you are. It's cool. Like it gives me hope for humanity. So thank you for being you. Yeah. Well, you too.

Thanks for helping a lot of people as well. You're most welcome. I guess that's it. Well, best of luck to you, Yvonne. let us know if you need help on your journey down the road. You know, if you're all the way there at some point and want to share with us, that's totally fine. Or if something else comes up. But I think you're crushing it.

So keep crushing it. Thank you. You're welcome. Take care. Thank you. You too. Oh, shit. I forgot meditation.

Yeah, I completely flubbed. I forgot that. I need to ask you if you want to meditate today. Okay, I've never done it before, but I'm happy to try. Okay. Let's start with this. What would be the goal of you meditating? What do you want meditation to do for you?

Maybe to de-stress. I feel stressed a lot. Okay. And when you get stressed, what happens to you? I just, I lay down or something. I don't know. Okay. So you feel like mentally overwhelmed and you become like inert?

Like you don't move around? Um, it depends. Sometimes I feel stress and I work. So then I feel less stress because I'm productive and I've done stuff. Um, and then sometimes I just like feel stress or tired. So I lay in bed and just like take a break for a bit.

Okay. Um, I'm going to teach you a meditation practice. called Bellow's Breath. Okay. So it's a particular kind of breathing practice that is going to be forceful inhalation followed by forceful exhalation

and we're going to breathe like relatively rapidly and then kind of calm down a little bit afterward. For people who have watched this before, I actually got the names confused. So this is different from actually what I used to teach is called Breath of Fire. But so Bellow's Breath, I want you to sit up straight. I'm going to blow my nose.

I think you should. should have I got teary towards the end. Oh, yeah. And got caught up with how awesome you are. Oh, go. I'm just going to toss those out. Okay. Okay, so I want you to sit up straight.

Oh, good. Super straight. Okay. So are your knees lower than your hips? No, I'm sitting cross-legged. So no. Oh, okay. So that can be good.

Do you have a small like pillow or blanket that you can sit on if you're sitting cross-legged? But just... I have this. Yeah, so can fold it up? Oh, it's a robe. Yeah. I thought it was a blanket. Well, it's a blanket robe.

Okay. Can you sit on top of that? Yes. But not under your knees. You want to put it under your hips. and then sitting cross-legged is good. So now you may notice if you sit cross-legged, are you sitting up straighter now that you're sitting on the robe?

Okay. So this technique is actually super simple. So what it's going to hopefully help you do is kind of calm you down and energize you at the same time. So what we're going to do is I'm going to breathe in. Got it? Mm-hmm. Okay.

So this is, yeah, so what we're going to do is like 15 breaths. So I'm going to close my eyes and I'm going to demonstrate one round. So and you kind of want to do like one second in, one second out. So one, two, one, two. Okay, but you're going to count for like 15 breaths. So I'll demonstrate. And then you're going to be like super chill afterward, okay? All right.

You ready? Yes. I don't know if I'm going to do it right, though. Of course you're not going to do it right. It's your first time doing it. Okay. Who does something right the first time? Really talented people.

Basically no one. All right. Okay. Okay. So close your eyes, sit up straight, and then begin. Okay. Okay. Were you breathing out pretty hard, like in and out hard, or could you give it more oomph?

It felt hard, but I don't know how hard I'm supposed to go, because I feel like if I went harder, it wouldn't be very... it wouldn't feel very nice. Go harder. Go harder? Okay. We're going to do 15 rounds. Okay.

So I wasn't sure how many times do I do it? 15? Yeah. Okay. Or if you want me to, I can keep track and I'll tell you, you want me to count with you? Would that help? Sure.

Okay. So close your eyes. Go hard this time, okay? Okay. Three, two, one, go. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, eleven, twelve, thirteen, thirteen, fourteen, now just sit. How do you feel? That's really comfy. It's really relaxing. Were you exhaling hard too? It seemed you're putting everything into the inhale.

I think, oh, well, yes, but I feel tired. Yeah. So it's like, I think it worked, right? Is it supposed to make you tired after? Well, I think if you inhale really hard and you don't exhale as hard, it may have a slightly different effect. Okay. Well, I felt like I was chilling.

Yeah, you were chilling. That's good. So you can have a chilling. So if you want to be, if you want to balance the energizing a little bit better, I would push out, practice a little bit more on pushing out the exhalation. Okay. Because let me think about what this is doing. Yeah, you may be becoming slightly hypercarbic, which is the opposite of hyperventilation. Mm-hmm.

If you're not exhaling forcefully enough, if you're just like sucking in a bunch of air, like if you're sucking in more air than you're exhaling, you may actually. actually start to feel a little bit trippy. Mm-hmm. Is that when you say relaxed, are we talking to like a little bit woozy, trippy? Or more just relaxed? I think just relaxed. Okay.

Yeah. Okay. You want to try one more time with hard exhalations? Are you done? You can be done. I might just feel too tired for it. I don't know. I feel like tired now.

Okay. So just let's stop then. But I swear I'll do it afterwards. Yeah. Try again. Because the, I mean, I guess it's, this is the how to tire yourself out meditation. I suppose. We may have stumbled upon a new technique, which I'll have to think about.

But it might also be me waking up like a little bit earlier than usual. I mean, I had some coffee and then it's like, no, I'd say it's possible, Yvonne that you have, you have unknowingly stumbled upon a wonderful technique for insomnia. Because you have your coffee and you feel tired. It's a coffee crash. I don't know. So I'll experiment with this. I encourage if people are watching and practicing with you,

I wonder if you do like sharp inhalations with minimal exhalation, whether you feel tired. Yeah, it's useful. I'll meditate because sometimes people want to calm down and they want to like mentally chill out, right? Like they want to like calm the half down. Yeah, that's really helpful too. So we may have stumbled upon something. I don't think I've ever seen this.

It's interesting because we have the opposite where we have forceful exhalation with very mild inhalation. And that is breath of fire. And then this one is bellow's breath. But I don't think that there's a there's an opposite version of this. It's interesting. So I'm going to experiment. Thank you, Yvonne. You may have stumbled upon something.

Good job. Yeah, no problem any time. All right, take care, Yvonne. Yeah. Thank you. Bye. Bye. All right, chat.

That was unexpected. But, hey, Yvonne may be super, yeah, breath of fire is the, it's the Yvonne method.