The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 587: Daniel Negreanu - Responding To Failure, Risking It All, Getting Rich, Embracing Criticism, Taking Ownership of Your Life, & How To Read People

Episode Date: June 16, 2024

Read our new book, The Score That Matters https://amzn.to/3VlZHCA Full show notes at www.LearningLeader.com This episode is supported by Insight Global. Insight Global is a staffing company dedicated to empowering people. Please CLICK HERE for premier staffing and talent. Notes: Daniel Negreanu has earned over 52 million dollars at the poker table, which ranks him as the highest-earning player in live tournament poker history. He's won 6 world series of poker bracelets, two world poker tour titles, and Daniel was inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame in 2014. He's often referred to as "Kid Poker" and is known for his charismatic personality at the table. Commonalities among the greatest poker players in the world: Self-Awareness Humility In order to avoid criticism, "say nothing, do nothing, be nothing." Daniel is obsessed with the Rocky movies and the lessons learned from each one. Rocky 3 - Don't get complacent. Rocky 4 - It's heart versus machine. Rocky Balboa - But it ain't about how hard you hit. It's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward. That's how winning is done! The luck factor... Dealing with things outside of our control. A victim versus an owner mentality. Victims will complain, give up, sulk, be passive-aggressive, or procrastinate. Owners will seek solutions, take action, or ask for help. Victims will focus on things they cannot control, while owners will focus on things they can control. "A big mistake is a beautiful opportunity." It's easier to be a victim and not take responsibility. "Failure builds muscle." "I don't care what others think anymore. I do not have that fear." Rounders (the movie) is the greatest poker movie of all time. Why Daniel is inspired by Sylvester Stallone... He's not complacent In Rocky IV it was heart versus machine. Rocky (Sly) was all heart. Outspoken and direct – "If you have a problem with me, text me. And if you don't have my number then you don't know me well enough to have a problem with me." – Christian Bale Phil Ivey said about Daniel: "I can't think of too many people who have done more for the game of poker than Daniel." When was Daniel happiest? "I would say in very high-stress situations. During the World Series of Poker main event [in 2015], when I actually was eliminated in 11th place and felt a gut punch." Early life – Be Rich – At an early age, Daniel was ambitious: "From the age of four, I thought I'd be rich. I told my mom I'd build a house out of Popsicle sticks and move to California." Sharing both the wins and the losses with his fans: "This is what holding yourself accountable looks like. I could lie, right…or B. I could just not share this with you but then that wouldn't be authentic and real, right? I'm not just going to share my winning years, I'm going to share my losing years." Daniel is willing to go outside of his comfort zone... Head's up matches with Doug Polk (a head's up specialist): On July 29, 2020, after a years-long feud, Daniel publicly accepted a challenge to a high-stakes grudge match with Doug Polk. They played 25,000 hands of No-Limit Texas Hold'em at $200/$400 stakes. The duel ended on February 4, 2021, with Polk winning approximately $1,200,000 over 25,000 hands. Then in 2023, Daniel got a rematch with Doug and beat him for $200K and a championship belt.

The skill actually in poker is self-awareness to know where you stand. How do you stack up against your opponents? Because that's really the difference. Andrew Broder poker player. You're inducted into the Hall of Fame. I didn't play poker for the money. I play because I love it. I want to get to that next level.

What's the feeling like knowing these chips are like all the money I have? There's two types of people in all situations. They're those that absolutely just crumble under the pressure. and cannot later. And there's others where when they're backs against the wall, something deep brings out the animal. What are some of the commonalities among poker players who sustain excellence over an extended period of time? Self-awareness and humility, it teaches you the difference between being a victim to circumstance or standing responsible for your results. Whenever you make a big mistake, that's an opportunity. It's a beautiful opportunity. Without pain,

there can be no glory. There can be no joy. Welcome to the Learning Leadership. presented by Insight Global. I am your host, Ryan Hawk. Thank you so much for being here. Text Hawk to 666866 to become part of Mindful Monday. You, along with tens of thousands of other learning leaders from all over the world, will receive a carefully curated email for me each Monday morning to help you start your week. All right.

You'll also receive details about how our new book, The Score That Matters, will help you become a more effective leader. Text Hawk. to 666866. Now, on to tonight's featured leader. Daniel Negroon has earned over $52 million at the poker table, which ranks him as the highest earning player in live tournament poker history. He's won six World Series of Poker Bracelisk, two World Poker Tour titles, and Daniel was inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame in 2014. He's often referred to as Kid Poker. And is known for his charismatic personality at the table.

During our conversation we discuss, Daniel's exceptional skill to read someone and know what hand they're holding and how he and you can apply this skill off of the table. And then he shares the importance of having an owner's mentality as opposed to a victim mentality, especially when dealing with bad luck or other adversity in your life. Daniel described how he maintains a high level of self-awareness, which I think his tools could help you. And then we talked about why he loves the Rocky movies and the lessons we can learn from each one that will make us better leaders.

Ladies and gentlemen, this one was so much fun. Please enjoy Daniel Nagranu. Daniel, man, a longtime fan. It is awesome to have you here on The Learning Leaders Show. Welcome. Thanks for having me. Appreciate it. I wrote a story that you told your mom at the age of four that you were going to grow up and be rich.

You were really ambitious even as a young kid. I'm curious, where does that ambition come from? It's funny you knew that because very few people do, but it's actually kind of a silly story. You're four years old. You don't know anything. And I told my mom, I said, I'm going to move to California. I couldn't say California. And she said, well, how are you going to move?

And I said, were you going to build a house? And I said, yeah, she said out of what? And I said, out of matches. I don't know. I'm a kid, right? It ended up being poker and playing cards, but I don't know. I feel like we're all different. My brother was raised by the same parents, right?

He didn't take the same path that I did. So part of that is innate. Part of that is who I was. A sort of a competitive, driven, self-motivated believer in myself. And that would, again, I don't believe in the idea that we're all born a blank slate. We all have our own unique. I mean, otherwise, you know, you couldn't make sense of two kids being grown in the same house. just totally different lifestyles or as ways of thinking. So for me, I just have that innate

resilience and confidence in myself that if I say I'm going to do something, I'm going to do it. And even be able to fight through something. So let's fast forward a bit in your life when you're in pool halls, you're gambling, your high school dropout, right, all the stuff before we get to you making it big as a poker player. So what was it like in your late teen years? Yeah, so I grew up in Toronto, right? And in Toronto, we've played snooker, you know, here in America, it's mostly eight ball, nine ball and whatnot. But we played snooker and I just started playing pool and I really enjoyed the competitive aspect. As I said, I've always had sort of that competitive spirit and started to get better

at that. And then some people introduced me to poker and they're like, we're going to go play this game. I grabbed six beers with $10, lost my $10. My six beers were gone. But I enjoyed it. And we started to do that more regularly. And I started to notice the same guys keep winning. And I thought, wait a minute. I thought this was all luck. Well, if it's all luck, well, what's on here? So then my observational skills started to come out. I'm like, what are they doing? What are they doing differently than the other people that makes them win? And then it became like a puzzle that I had to solve. And I became sort of, I guess, for lack of a better term, obsessed with solving the puzzle. How quickly did you get good at the game? I would say, you know, varying degrees of good,

right? Yeah. So at that early level as a teenager, good enough to beat those guys that I was playing with probably two months because again it's very elementary very beginner right as far as like you know like again it's such a i mean it's a fair question but it's such a interesting term like good right yeah if you're good in relation the thing about poker is if you're good in relation to the people you're playing you're great yeah but that's the mean that if you played with the five best players you'd not be good you'd be terrible right so that's part of the skill actually in poker is self-awareness to know where you stand how do you stack up up against your opponents because that's really the difference. Let's say, for example,

I could be a much better poker player than you, right? But if you find seven, eight guys to play with that are terrible that I don't get access to, you can make a whole lot more money than I do, even though I'm a better player than you. So some of this game selection, which you then found out, right? Because you're good where you were. You decide to go to Vegas to say, let's see if this can make it happen. What happened once you got to Las Vegas? So again, I've sort of was cut from a different cloth, right? So saying all the things that I did about, you know, finding games where people are weak and all that, that's not why I did this. Because I didn't play poker for the money. I play because I love it. And I want to get to that next level. So rather than just

sit with the players I knew I could beat, you know, and maintain and, you know, make a decent living, I wanted to test myself. So I kept reaching higher. And when you do that, you go broke often. Okay. That's just part of the process. And you can see a lot of successful entrepreneurs. They rarely got it right on their very first try. They failed several different things before they found the one thing that worked. So for me, I always pushed myself. I did things that were high risk in terms of my bankroll and things like that. But it's just how I was built. And I always knew that, okay, when that doesn't work out, I'm just going back down there, play the smaller stakes against the guys I can beat. Then I'm going to build my money back up. I'm going right back. I'm getting right

back in the ring and I'm going to, you know, fight against the best. What's the feeling like early in your life because now you don't really you're not putting your entire net worth on the table anymore. You have enough money. You don't have to do that. But at those days, you literally did and then you lost it all. What's the feeling like knowing these chips are like all the money I have? I just can't imagine how hard it would be to try to run a big bluff or to make decisions when your net worth is literally on the table in front of you. Yeah, I'd say there's two types of people in those situations. They're those that absolutely just crumble under the pressure. cannot play their vice. And there's others where when their backs against the wall, something deep

brings out the animal in them that you're not getting my money. I'm going to win. Like every little decision is just life or death and you're going to fight till the death. And that was mean more so. When I had my back against the wall, I felt like I was at my best, if you will. I love the Rocky movies. And one of my favorite movies is Rocky 3 where Rocky's already the champ, right? So now he's doing commercials. He's doing kissing babies. He's doing all this stuff. What's clubber lang doing grinding sweating in the gym what happens clubber lang beats rocky so which tells rocky's like you got to go back to your roots you know you got to learn that grind so another sort of thing i heard was i can't remember the boxer's name but he was asked you know because he's already

successful he's rich they asked them like is it you find it difficult to motivate yourself he says you know what it's a lot harder to do the 3 a.m. run and silk pajamas right so i think for a lot of people the journey towards the top makes sense. It's easy, if you will. Not easy. I mean, but you have a daily goal. Once you reach the top, staying there, maintaining, continuing to find ways to challenge yourself, that's where things become very difficult, especially in poker.

Well, think you're like the best example of this in the world when it comes to poker. You're inducted into the Hall of Fame 10 years ago. I remember like looking at the pictures and seeing that night and reading about it on social media and reading your blog when you got inducted, It felt like yesterday, but it's been a decade. And I feel like you've evolved and updated your style of play and learn from the young guys, the computer guys. It feels like you've really been adept, especially when you compare to like a Phil Helmuth or somebody who's kind of stuck in his old style of like, no, I don't need to evolve.

So I'd love to hear your philosophy on I'm in the Hall of Fame 10 years ago and yet constantly evolving and updating and trying to get better and better and learn from people younger than me who haven't accomplished what you have accomplished in order to improve? Yeah, so there's two key words I would bring up. One I sort of touched on, which is self-awareness. Yep. And the other one is humility. The self-awareness to realize, listen, you're great at the game,

but these kids are learning things that you don't understand, right? Then the humility did say, teach me, right? I remember early on back in the horseshoe in the late 90s, actually. I was a young up-and-comer, and I was playing with some of these guys who were established big names. And I was doing things that was really better than they. But they were scoffing. Oh, these kids today, they don't know.

And I remember in that moment, say, never be that guy. Never be the guy who rests on your laurels and thinks you can't learn something. I think this applies to everything, like whether it's business, you know, guys who used to pick stocks and they did so based on feel and instinct. It's like, all right, you know, there's these quant guys who can parts this data. You can poo-poo that stuff or you can use it as a tool to improve upon how you proceed. So what I did was I hired a couple guys to teach me. I didn't know how to do all this solver, AI stuff, but they taught me.

And it was a process because, again, I've spent 30 years playing a certain way. And now they're teaching me all this new stuff. But the thing is, I took that. I combined it with the wisdom I have of 30 years to create, you know, sort of a bridge between old school exploit play versus game theory base play. Not to get too into the weeds of poker because, like, I'm not a very good poker player, but I love watching poker, Daniel. It's amazing, especially how your recent seasons of high stakes poker are literally, you

got asked my wife, I've probably watched those episodes a lot over and over and over. I'm like, how does he know? How does he know when the guy's bluffing? How does he know when he has the best hand? Because I'm trying to cover up the cards. I'm like, there is no possible way I would know. And so maybe we could get into your mind of whether it's running a big bluff and pulling it off or knowing when to fold a great hand or knowing when to.

say, yeah, I think I got it. I'm going to get maximum value out of this hand. I'm amazed at all of the decision making and the thought that goes into it. So I know this is pretty deep and it's a lot, but I'm curious like what goes into, especially high stakes poker. These are cash games. It's not a tournament. You can rebuy if you lose it, but it's deep, deep stacks often. So a lot of money can be won and loss and there's just so much that goes into it. So overall, I'm just curious what goes into your mind, especially because early on in high stick poker, you struggled to, you. at times got unlucky, I think quite a bit. And then later on, you've gotten really, it's become a really profitable game for you, it seems like. Yeah. Well, here, here's the thing. Before you even

get to like, you know, the specific hand or anything like that, step one, really, in every poker game is figure out, all right, who am I playing? Right. What are their tendencies? That's step one. How do they play? Do this, does this guy bluff a lot? Does he never bluff? What types of moves does he make? What does his bet sizing mean? Things like that. That's step one. Step two. is what does each individual player think of me, right? Like Bill in seat one might think I bluff all the time. So I need to know that and go, okay, you know what? Don't bluff this guy because he calls too much. C2 might be Joe. And Joe's like, dad, I get never bluff. So I got to come up with some creative ones there. So it's player profile. And how do you do that? You do that by being observation.

You pay attention. You look at the hands they're playing, the ways in which they play them. And you collect that data. I use my phone and I take notes whenever I see specific things, whether it's physical tells, whether it's, you know, betting patterns that are unique and different, right? So once you've done this, now game theory, for those that don't know, like game theory is about just like being unexploitable, this is the baseline. This is what you do, right? So learning that baseline is value, right? But what I do is I'm like, okay, this is the baseline, but I'm not playing against the computer. I'm playing against Joe. And Joe thinks I never bluff. So even though the computer says, don't bluff here, it's Joe. I'm going to, I'm going to do something that's

outside of game theory. I'm going to exploit Joe because Joe thinks I never bluff, right? So there's always this psychological back and forth, this what we call leveling game where, you know, now that once he starts to figure that out, then I am bluff and then maybe I have to switch again. And it's like a cat and mouse game in that regard. So some people, I think, show their hands when they don't need to.

And I don't know if they fully think it through. I feel like every time I've watched you on TV show your hand, there's a reason. You're not doing it just for fun or just for TV. There's a reason. So can you explain why, let's say you run a bluff and they fold and you show them or they fold and you actually had it like you had the hand? Can you walk through the decision-making process of that alone of why you would show your hand to somebody after either a bluff or you had the best hand? Yeah.

So I would not recommend amateurs to never show your hand. I use psychological warfare. So what I call that is I call that planting seeds, right? I want you to see this. I want you to know what I just did. I want this to stick in your brain because I'm going to find a way to take advantage of that later. In a week from now or two weeks, we're playing again.

And, you know, I have it this time. But you remember, oh, no, but he does bluff here, right? Where I might never do it again. And it's all about, again, the leveling or the psychological aspect. Again, I don't recommend it unless you play at a very high level. Generally speaking, there's no value in showing your hand and giving people free information. it's only valuable if you think you have an advantage. Like, I'm not going to show Phil Ivy my hand.

No, there's no seed. You never show it because he's too damn good. So you think, like, I'm not going to. So the thing is, you show hands to people that you believe you're better than and you can exploit. You don't do that against the killers because the killers are just going to see what you did. They're going to know why you did it. And they're going to know, okay, he's showing me this because he thinks I'm going to think this. So you end up shooting yourself in the foot against really good players.

So I think decision making is a massive element of poker. And there's probably your full masterclass, which is on masterclass, that you could probably learn about decision making. How do you go about making big decisions both on the poker table as well as how does that transfer off? Maybe in your business life or making decisions of who to partner with or who to work with, who you're going to take on as a sponsor. You're put to the test to make decisions all the time. Do I fold? Do I bet? do I raise? What do I do here? So what's your overall mentality when it comes to making big decisions?

So that's evolved too, right? As a result of sort of taking in solver work, you know, A, using AI, the way in which I approach a problem now, and I don't know if this applies necessarily at all things, but poker it does. The first thing I do is in the situation, what is the correct answer? Okay, all things, forget about who it is, forget about that. Like, in theory, if it was game theory optimal. What is the best play to make here? What is the correct frequency or whatever? Now that I've got that baseline, I say, okay, but now who am I playing? Right? So now I'm understanding my customer, if you will. And then I'm understanding what I need to tailor to do differently for them. So I guess the analogy would be like if I were to try to sell something to somebody, I need to know

what they care about, what matters to them, what type of person are they? Are they a numbers guy? Like, do they just want to hear like the data, the numbers? Are they someone who actually wants to meet, like, feels like they need to be cared for? Like, that shows that I actually care about their best interest. Are they somebody who's just like, you know, ADD kind of thing? They just want to know that it's going to be fun and cool, right? So once I figured out the different quadrants that they're in, then you know how to relate and speak to people in a much more efficient way.

And again, it starts from a baseline, but always, I'm always looking at situations in people and thinking of like, where do they, come from? What type of person am I dealing with? And that does translate. Like how quickly can you learn that about a person? How many rounds? Like how long do you think it would take? So I'll give you an example. If you're playing poker with me, you would learn probably pretty quickly that I have a problem of always believing people, right? This can be good off the poker table, bad at the table. Meaning, if you bet, I'm like, well, he's probably got it. Right. And so you'd realize that and you'd bluff me and then you would win. It would be pretty easy. You'd probably learn that pretty quick, right?

plays premium hands, struggles to think somebody's bluffing, and so he's pretty easy beat. That's why I don't play much poker anymore. I like to watch it. So how long does it take you to learn something like that about me or about anyone else you're playing poker with? All right. Well, first of all, what you said about your traits, that's actually a very good trait to have. It is because the biggest mistake most beginners make is they never believe anybody and then they end up calling too much. Sounds like you're not wasting those chips. I think I've been full too much. No, no. Generally, when people bet, that means they do have something really, really good. I forgot the second part of your question as I was thinking about that.

Well, I was saying, like, how long does it take? Oh, how long is it take? Because some of the guys you play with, I'm thinking, again, of high six poker, I wish you were on the most recent season. Hopefully you're on future ones. But anyway, how long is it take if you don't know the person? You've heard a little bit about them. They're probably a rich guy or something if they're out of a table where you're playing. But how long until you're like, okay, I got a pretty good feel of how they play. Well, it really does obviously depend on the type of person you're dealing with. If it's a quiet person who's not saying much, not engaging, not doing anything, just playing their hands, then all you really have is the hands they play. And if there's nine people at a table,

they might be playing 20, 30 percent of the hands. That's not enough of the sample size in a short period of time against them. I would say typically within an hour or so, I have some sort of idea of what my opponents are doing, sometimes much more quickly, depending. But usually, like, the thing is, at one hour, I have a general idea. At two hours, I have a much better idea. After a session, I have a pretty good idea after a month. you know, I'm pretty dialed in. But like, there's always new information coming and you always have to pay attention to see, like, the thing that's hard, I think, for people in general is like, when you have a belief that something is true, right?

Then when you are confronted with evidence that sort of dispels it, rather than just accept it and so, okay, I mean, I was wrong. People try to justify, oh, he probably just did this one time. You know, that's not him. Like, I think that's true away from the poker table, too, like confirmation bias. We want to believe that we're right. So when we see information that corroborates our beliefs, okay. that must be right. We don't even look into it. Whereas if there was information that contradicted our belief, we go, well, who wrote the study? Where did it come from? Who backed it? But you don't do

that when it's stuff that like is aligned with what you believe. One of the things I think you used to be more famous for and maybe not as much anymore is talking through a hand, realizing you were beat and then paying the guy off, right? You would literally talk through exactly what happened. they would have the exact hand you would say they had and it was better than your hand and then you'd call. I'm like, I'm sure you get like people, your friends talk to you about this. It's been on TV quite a bit. And I feel like less of that has happened over the last maybe few years. So I'm curious like your mindset of talking through the entire thing, saying what they have,

it's better than your hand and still calling anyway. Yeah, that ultimately is a battle. It's an internal, internal battle of trust. of trusting what I just said, right? So I'm saying what I think they have I work through the hand, right? But when you play poker, you're getting what's called pot odds.

Like I have at 500, but there's 3,000 out there. Okay, so even though I think that's it, in theory, I should still call with my hand because I'm getting odds, right? So once you start to have more trust in yourself, then you can say, okay, you know what, I'm just gonna go with what I believe. But again, when you do that,

it's an internal battle because you're making them play, you're making a move that isn't, as I used the term before, correct. In theory, it's like, you have to call it this hand. But something about it says, I know that this guy has it. So that's probably something that over the last 10 years I've really improved upon in terms of like trust myself. You know, even if sometimes you're going to look stupid and you're going to make a fold and you were wrong. But more often than not, you know, if you're that dialed in, you're going to be right.

I love studying the commonalities of leaders who sustain excellence over time. That's again, one of the big reasons I wanted to have you on because you've seems like even improved as you're, you've continued on in your poker career and not all players do. It seems like a lot of the ones that were popular or famous back in the early days of you being on TV are not really around anymore. Some of them are, but not a lot of them are. And you are. When you think about your profession, what are some of the commonalities among

poker players who sustain excellence over an extended period of time? Yeah, again, you know, going back to self-awareness and humility, always continuing to look to do suit to improve upon your game. Because if you ever get to the place in poker where you feel like, I've got it figured out, I'm there, right? So now you're here and you stay here, okay? Well, everyone else is getting better. So while you were a step ahead, they're continuing to get better and you're not. So at some point, they surpass you. And when that happens, you have to have the recognition to say, okay, well, I need to update some things. I need to fix things. I need to think about what I'm doing. So I would say every six months or so, I kind of take a look

at that, but really it's like every, sometimes every like two to three years, I'm like, wait a minute, all right, what's this about? What are they doing? Why isn't this thing that I've been doing working? What can I use? What can I switch? I'm always looking to update. That's the beautiful thing about poker. Really, you never will master it. You'll never be perfect. It's a game of incomplete information and you're always going to be making mistakes. But similar to golf, the goal is to make the mistakes very small. Rather than the big miss where it goes in the woods, you're like, All right. Well, instead of being within three yards, I'm six yards. Okay, that's fine. But I'm not out of bounds or anything like that. And with poker, you want to avoid as you get better, just making the big mistakes. How do you deal with the luck portion? Let's say you make the exact right decisions and you get it in good and then the cards don't turn your way. Like maybe on the turn in the river or whatever and you get it all on the flop, you are a four to one favorite to win and you lose. And this happens in poker. How do you manage and deal with the luck when it's? not going your way.

Yeah, I think that's because of the luck factor, I think this is something they should actually teach in school. Because it teaches you a resilience. It teaches you the difference between being a victim to circumstance or standing responsible for your results, right? So the losers, the failures, the ones that don't make it, all they do is complain and bitch about, oh, my God, I had pocket aces. I went broke.

The guy had a nine and a six and he beat me with this stupid hand at it. I'm like, okay, well, what value is there in you telling me this story? Like, what do we gain from that? How do we improve from there? You just was like, what am I getting? What do you just shrug? You're like, well, nothing I can do. I guess you're just an unlucky person. And I promise you, if you believe you're unlucky, then you're right. You really are. What the real pro does is they say, okay, well, okay, I lost the hand. Was my strategy correct in that spot? Okay, good. All right. Long term, that's going to pay off for me, right? But what I'll also do is I'll look at,

okay, I busted from the tournament. Oh, I had ACEs. What happened before that? How did I get to the chip position where I was short? Was there any other small little things I can improve upon, did I miss a bluff, did I call a guy with a hand that maybe I shouldn't know, right? Focus on the things that you can actually learn from. I'm a big believer in whenever you make a big mistake, that's an opportunity. It's a beautiful opportunity because now you can take a deep dive and go, what happened here? Let me plug this leak, right? So the next time I'm in a similar situation, I now know a better strategy out of it, right?

So I look at breakdowns, if you will, as like opportunities for a breakthrough. Like I kind of, I don't think so. I would say I enjoy making mistakes, but when I do make one and then have an epiphany about it, I'm like, oh, baby, I just got better as a poker player. Hmm. I think your outlook is rare. Maybe it's just because it makes you feel better by saying I just got unlucky. If luck wasn't involved, I would win every time, right? The famous line from Phil. Why is it so hard to have that outlook? Because you're surrounded by poker players who love telling you bad beat stories because they're actually really good. They just got unlucky. But this seems to be a common outlook. probably not only in poker, but just in life in general. It is really. Most people, and everyone is at different points of their life. Most people are just sort of like, it's easier to be a victim of circumstance, right? Because then you have no person responsibility. You can just shrug and be like, well, woe is me.

Nothing I can do versus the person who stands responsible and says, well, here's what I'm going to do about it. Now, the thing with poker, right, like you said, I put my money in as a four to one favorite. Okay, and I lost. Well, guess what? Math alone says that's going to happen 20% of the time. Yeah. So one out of five times you're going to lose. Okay. The problem with the human mind is we have such a deep connection to the failure and the loss that we remember those things vividly. So you'll think in your mind, oh my God, I always lose as a four to one favor. You forget about the other

times where you held as a four to one favor. And in the long run, you'll see that you win about 80% of the time. But the losses are so much more painful, which is why I think especially for the younger generation, like really learning that resilience, learning failure, because I think now more than anything, if you've read any of Jonathan Hayes' books, Colling of the American Mind, the Anxious Generation, which I just finished, a lot of our kids are not being allowed to fail. But that failure builds a muscle, right? When you fail at something, you learn how to deal with it.

And if we coddle our children, we caught the next generation from never having that experience, then we don't set them up to be at their best. Like, failure is required. One of the things about you that I admire is that you're not afraid to speak up if you think there's injustice or there's something wrong, and potentially alienate your fans. A lot of people that become well-known in their sport or whatever they do, they're like, I'm going to tow the line here a little bit, and whether it's on Twitter, or it's a part of your blog,

or just speaking on TV or a podcast, if you think it, like, you say it. And so I would love to learn more about how you've gained the courage or where this comes from to have the courage to speak your mind on pretty much any and all topics, even if you know you're going to get some hate from it. One of my favorite quotes is, in order to avoid criticism, say nothing, do nothing, and be nothing. And that's really not the way that I live my life. I think part of it, I always had a big mouth as a kid. I was a short kid. I was really tiny. My brother in the sixth grade was six foot. So I'm in the first grade. He's in six. These kids in the third grade would pick on me. My brother would grab them both by their collars, throw them against the wall. So I had big bro,

you know, backing me up or whatever. But frankly, I'm not afraid of controversy. Like, sure. I A famous quote many years ago, Michael Jordan said something like Republicans buy shoes too or something along those lines. And I'm like, listen, I'll tell you what, based on my positions or views, if you disagree with me, that's totally fine. I'm more than willing to have that conversation. If you dislike me or hate me because I have a view that's different to you, that's a moral about you than it is me. And frankly, the people that typically like the ones that don't like me, I can't think of a single one that I look at and go, man, I wish I could be friends with that right? We just see the world through a very different lens. And I'd say probably in the last

six or seven years, I would say, or even less maybe, I've learned more, I've probably most five since COVID, really, learned to realize that just because people have different views than you doesn't mean they're evil, doesn't mean they're bad, you know, it's not a, it's not a tale of two tribes, you're this side, or that side. They've just had very different life experiences that led them to a place that's different. So I can have conversations with people where I disagree vehemently with certain positions or things they believe, but that's okay. It used to be like that, right? I mean, back in the old days, didn't people used to say, like, I don't know, don't talk about religion and politics at the dinner table and everybody will get

along just fine. Obviously with social media now, people just talk about whatever they talk about. And I'm one of them. But again, like I said, I don't hate people. And I think that was, I could see that sort of happening to me with social media as well, where you get pushed into a tribe, if you will. And I'm tribeless now. Like, I don't know. adhere to a tribe. Both tribes don't like me, basically. I think there's more and more in that camp because it just shows kind of independent thinking. Tim Ryan's on this podcast said the exhausted majority. I think it's in the middle as where it's because we, I can't subscribe just because you say you're here or here. It's like if you're independently thinking, you're obviously not going to

fall in line with just one of the other. I'm a big believer in this. There's no way. It's actually impossible that you're doing any critical thinking of your own. If you agree 100% with either extreme. If you do, then you're not doing the thinking, you're being told what the thing. And, you know, when I go on X or whatever, I mean, extreme progressives on the left and the right-wing party, the right-wing guys will call me a lib part. The left ones call me a right-wing fascist. I'm like, okay. So then it tells me something. It tells me I'm in the right place. I look at issues independently. For me, I'd say the eye-opener, the big eye-opener was that whole COVID-Lab league theory that happened. You remember? So Republicans said it came from the Wuhan left.

Democrats said, no, it came from a wet market. And if you think it came from a lab, you're racist. I'm like, how about guys? How about this? How about we have no idea? Okay? How about either is plausible, right? Why do we have to decide what we think about this issue based on supposedly who you vote for?

It makes no sense. And it really didn't happen in a lot of places in the world, but it didn't America because we're so divided. So that was kind of an eye open for me because I'm like, oh, yeah, seems plausible. There's a coronavirus lab in Wuhan, the only one in China. and there happened to be a coronavirus spread from there. Could be the lab. I'm not saying I know, but I'm like, I'm not dispelling it.

I don't think that you, if you think that, you know, that means you're racist. I think that's really silly. And I think that's what's happened to both extremes is they've both gone a little cuckoo. Yeah. One of the other elements about you that I think is pretty cool is that you're willing to take on challenges and maybe even play against somebody where it's their specialty but not yours. Thinking of Doug Polk and playing heads up, which you're obviously really good at it, but it's not, you're not like a specialist like there are. those that exist in the world. And I think you lost like a million bucks or so and then got got some of that back and won a title. What's your mindset towards accepting a challenge like that,

knowing that the person you're going to play against is a specialist in that particular game and you're good, but you're not a specialist at it. Well, it was even more of an uphill climb than you described because not only was it heads up, right, which is a special, but it was online. Yeah. I don't even get to see them. Like if it was live, like we did play live a little bit. you did play live. Didn't you win when it was live? I won when it was live. We played a heads-up match for another like high-stakes feud. I won that as well. Like live is a different animal, right? Because there's more information available to me. And again, I was stepping into arena that I knew I was the underdog, but I relished those opportunities. Because again, what it did for me, but again, I'm in a position

in life where I can afford the wins and losses. It improved my poker game overall. Like I got better. Even though I was the underdog, I feel like especially as the match started to wear on, I started to really close the gap and have a real chance. But that's part of the investment, really. That was like, that's like study. That's that's homework. That's working out. So going into it was that part, because I've heard people say, you know, when I sign up for projects, even if it fails, it's a victory if there was like a big learning opportunity. So like that's part of the decision making process of whatever I'm going to do or whatever I'm going to sign up or whatever person or project I'm going to partner on is even if it doesn't work or doesn't go well, I'm still going to have

learned a lot. So was that part of your mindset going into that particular game against him? Yeah, no question about it. I mean, the days looked like this. We would play for about four hours. And then immediately after play, I'd walk my dogs. I'd get in there in the lab, if you will, with my guys that we started using the solvers and we would go over the entire session for about eight to ten hours. So I played four hours, but studied about eight to ten and was doing that as a regular pattern, right? And that study sticks with you forever and you improve as you go. But yeah, no question about it. Part of the process was I was like, okay, I need to get better.

Like, frankly, to take on the challenge in the right way, it would have required me to spend three to five years studying this stuff. I had about six weeks. So we did the best we could with what with the time we had. And as I said, like after halfway through the challenge or whatever, starting to feel like I was really improving. The other thing you've done really well is document the journey, whether it's writing in a blog, which I remember reading lots of those, as well as YouTube vlogging.

So doing a bit of both of those things where you've kind of shown everybody, this is what's going on in my life. The highs, the lows, the wins, the losses. Like, your fans have gotten to see the authentic stories in real time, not like going back and like, oh, yeah, I remember that year when I won it all. You just talk about the highlights with a little bit of tension in the middle and then I'm the champ. But in real time, what's your mindset around both documenting the journey writing it as well as vlogging it on video like you do during the World Series? Yeah, well, since nobody really reads anymore, vlogs have sort of taken to center stage. And you know, you mentioned something too about the highs and the lows.

My wife is super authentic. She likes authentic people. I'm in the same way. So the thing is, is when you see me in a bad moment where I'm acting like a jerk or an asshole, I filmed it. I can delete it. I don't have to show anybody, but I choose to leave it in there because I want people to see the authenticity. I want people to realize that like, oh, he gets mad too, just like me.

Oh, he sometimes acts like a jerk too. I know when you do that and you put, I believe it sometimes I know. I'm like, oh boy, I'm going to get a lot of shit for this one. But I leave it in there because I want people to see the authenticity. I don't want, like I broke a selfie stick one time. I was pissed off. I took my selfie stick and I threw it in the corner. I could have deleted all that, but I wanted it in there because I wanted to see people.

I wanted people to relate because everyone who plays poker. they go through those moments where they just want to smash everything, right? Obviously, that's not good behavior. I laugh at myself when I do stupid things like that. But again, I'm a big believer in just authentically covering the journey. And I think that's part of why people make it a point in TV, if you will. They watch it every morning during the World Series. That's part of your brand building.

How much do you think about building the Daniel Neganou brand, the Kid Poker brand as you're building your career. Well, I would say this, the brand's built, you know. I spent a lot of time in my 20s and 30s, well, mostly my 20s and 30s sort of doing that, you know, building a brand. Now I am who I am. Like, I look at it this way too. I think, I don't know how old you are, but how old are you?

42. Okay, so you're there. So I'm a believer, like at least this was true for me. In your 20s, you might not, you care what people think about you. It's just a fact, right? Yes. In your 30s, maybe you don't think you care as much, but you still kind of care. For me, as I've gone into my 40s, I really don't give a shit anymore.

I'm like, this is me. Take it or leave it. You know what I mean? And the friends that I have know who I am, they know my heart, they know my integrity and those types of things and those that don't know me. I can laugh at it. I don't look at comments on social media and feel bad about myself. Sometimes people like say some really mean things and I think they're really funny because

like, oh boy, that's really called me bald, this, that. It's like he went through the whole spectrum. I can laugh at it because I think now I've matured and I understand that that's not the real world anyway. Because when I'm out in public tournaments, I'm taking pictures with people. I'm signing autographs. Like the love is there, right? The thing is it's human nature to focus on, let's say you go, let's say you're a singer, right? You're saying for 100 people.

99 people just couldn't believe it. You were amazing. One guy goes, didn't love it. What does the human brain do? They go, focus on that guy. I wonder what you didn't like. The feedback was 99% positive. You had one dude, I didn't like it, and you're focused on that, but that's what the human brain does.

And that's something I sort of broke free from. Is that, I'm curious, though, because you share as if that's like a life repetition thing, meaning, like, as you age, you'll get better at that. And, like, I love the later years of Kobe Bryant's career because, like, that's where he was. Like, he just said it. And I think we all loved them because we know, like, this is just what he thinks. but is it an age thing or is it a kind of like a dominance thing that you've dominated your sport your game for so long that you're just like I'm kind of the man and so I'm just going to do

what I do because what I'm trying to get out of this, Daniel, is how can other people even in their 40s or 50s get this beyond just like okay I'm older now I should feel this way when I don't know if everybody does? Yeah, no, you're right. Listen, some people never learn the life lessons, you know, they're 45 and they're still acting like they're 17 or 20, you know, they just haven't developed at that level. I don't think there's a magic bill, but I do think you're also right. It's a combination of that with succeeding. You know, I've made it, right? If I got the beautiful wife that I want, I have a beautiful home. I'm financially set, so I've made it. I have nothing to look like you're not, there's no, there's no fear from internal

fear about being who I am or anything like that. And I don't really worry so much about public opinion in that regard. Like I, again, like I said, I think the authenticity is lacking, especially with Instagram world where everyone takes airbrushed, filtered photos of themselves. It's not real to show only the best sides of themselves. And throughout my career, I think for the most part, I've been well received. People like watching me play and the numbers reflect that. But the studio, when I'm on a stream, they get seven times the viewers that they would normally,

right? So I'm doing something right. And I think part of it is just being authentic. And like, again, not worrying about the one guy who didn't like my singing and just focusing on the 99. I've read that you've said you're a self-proclaimed introvert, but if we watch you at the table, part of the reason why the streams are seven times as much and why ESPN's always going to have you on and high-stakes poker probably always wants you on is because you're really fun to watch,

mainly because of how talkative you are, how much you're willing to get others talking like. The table's going to be more jovial if Daniel Grunner was there. And I think that's a big deal. So how does this self-describe introvert almost transform himself into this really talk? joyous extrovert once you're at the table. Okay, so I'm what's known as a talkative introvert. Okay. Now, introvert, I think a lot of people mean like that means that you're socially

awkward and socially afraid and whatever. And that's not really the accurate definition. The question is, where do you charge your batteries? Right. Some people charge their batteries when they're out with people at a club, all that kind of stuff. For me, when I'm out and I'm exhausted by it, it drains me beyond belief. I charge my batteries when I'm alone at home, relaxing with my puppies.

That's how I recharge. That's why, frankly, for over a decade when during poker tournaments, a bunch of people usually go to dinner and they talk and they do this kind of stuff. On dinner breaks, I'm alone in my room, not talking to anybody because I need that recharge for the next four to six hours of the tournament. Because I'm so talkative, that's probably why I expend so much energy. I think there's sort of a misnomer about the idea that introvert means socially awkward. And that's not obviously the case. It's a question of where do I need my alone time to recharge.

But the talking is also a strategy, right? I have to believe strategy to win and strategy to be entertaining, especially when it's on TV. Honestly, the fact is it's me being me, right? But as a byproduct of that, strategically, it does benefit me in so many ways. Loosening up the table, having people more relaxed, getting more information about my opponents, all these types of things. on a TV table under a stream, me being this way is essentially a dominant presence because I'm like, look how comfortable I am. You're not. You're afraid because you're under the TV lights. Their people are seeing your cards. It's uncomfortable for you. I'm totally comfortable. How about that? So I think in that regard, it benefits me as well. But really, nothing about it is fake. It's just,

you know, I see somebody new at the table. It's who the hell they are. So I ask questions, you know. Were you like that in the early days? Or did it take you a while to get comfortable under the bright lights, people seeing your card, stuff like that? I think I was always comfortable. I think when I was a child, like even from five, six years old, I thought I was going to be an actor. So I was very comfortable on camera. It didn't make me crumbed. I was very comfortable.

So I think when poker started to become televised, it was a natural fit for me because I already like got that. And I get it too. Like there are probably some times where you have an opportunity to ham it up with people and make some funny moments. Like I'll try to do that. Because listen, sometimes when I'm playing poker, I just don't want to be bothered. I just want to be left alone. when you're on TV, you've kind of expected to sort of, you know, make it a little more engaging. I don't always. It really depends on the dynamic of the table. Like, recently I played a couple

of final tables on Pokergo Studio. One was a group of six people. We were all chatty. It was fun. It was jovial, a good group of people. The next one I played was two guys I don't really talk to. Another guy didn't speak English. So I know. Who am I going to engage with here? So I just, I just shut up and play. What did you think of the movie Rounders? loved Rounders. I mean, anytime Rounders is randomly on, listen, I have access to every movie anytime I want it. But when it's on TV, I pop it on. The quotes are deep in my memory. It was really the best poker film ever made by far. It really did spawn late in 1998. I remember Ed Norton and Matt Damon came to the World Series poker. I was there that year to play. And Matt Damon played. He went broke to Doyle Brunson with Pocket Kings against Pocket Aces. So pretty cool moment for him. But yeah, I remember them being out there. It's funny because the movie didn't do great when it came out, but it became a cult hit years and years later where like anyone who plays poker knows should know rounds. I watched it over and over in college during like lunch breaks and stuff. I just loved it. I got to fly out to New York to interview Brian

Cobberman and that was one of the coolest experiences for me because I mean, I love billions too and some of the other stuff Cobberman's done, but I was like, man, Rounders was just the movie. And I think it probably made you very rich in addition because I got so many more people into the game that could not hang with guys like you. Oh, yeah, it pumps me up. The music. There's a scene where Matt Damon's girlfriend leaves him.

I hated him. She's such a great actress because I feel like if I met her, I'm like, I hate you. I don't even know you, but I hate you. There's a moment where she left him. And he's sitting there with Edgar Norton Worm, and they're talking about going to the Taj. Like, let's play some fucking cards.

You know, and they get going. And it's like, oh my God, that gets you pumped up. That's a good idea, by the way. World Series coming up, I'm going to pop rounders in before it starts. I know Rocky's big for you, right? So you already mentioned Rocky 3, but I know Rocky 4, and I've seen you get pumped with Rocky. What is it about that that gets you going,

especially for the World Series of Poker? Yeah. I'll tell you what, I think Sylvester Sloan's, like, in so many ways, like obviously he's in so many ways he's a genius, really, in the ways in which he makes these films. And, like, there's literally life lessons in each and every one that is unique and different, the ones that I take from poker, right? Well, start with three, Rocky three, don't become complacent. Rocky four, it's about heart versus machine. So the analogy

for me is, listen, I got the heart, I got the wisdom. I've been there before. I can take the kids, the kicks. These kids are using computers, steroids, whatever, like Drago. But you know what? With heart and determination, you can figure it out and you can beat them. And then later, you know, one of my favorite quotes is from Rocky Balboa, where it's not how hard you hit. It's how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. That's how winning is done. He's got these little nuggets in there that are really fun. Now the thing about, because the World Series, I always watch all the Rocky movies, and they've sort of extended now to the like the creeds as well. So it's a lot of movies. They're not quite the same, especially the last one without Rocky. That's, that was sad to not see

Rocky in a Rocky theme movie. You've done a little bit of acting. You've been in some movies and shows. Do you still want to like get into that more? It's not something I pursue, but obviously when people ask me to do cameos or different things like that. Like I find it fun. I like being on sets and doing little things like that. So yeah, I've done a few things here and there, nothing big. But it's fun. I'm not planning on getting a new job or anything.

We talked about your reading skills and how good you are at understanding what hands are. There's so many YouTube mashups of you calling out literally the exact hand that people have and blowing people's minds. I'm curious, do you like think that way off the table? Are you like reading people and body language and the way they are? Is that something you take off the table? So imagine practicing doing something for 40 to 50 hours a week, right? And this is what you do, and just how you think and how you approach things?

And then just somehow turning it off, how? It's not doable, right? This is partly why, you know, with chess, you think of a guy like Bobby Fisher, right? The game chess, it requires you to be constantly, for lack of better term, paranoid about what your opponent may do next and then they may make this. You're thinking so far ahead about all the things to be paranoid about. So he lived in a constant state of paranoia playing chess, which ended up spilling over to his regular life where he was wearing a tinful hat in the whole deal or whatever. But yeah, no question.

I'm not consciously saying, okay, I'm going to use my poker reads to get a read on this person. But you're not going to not see things you see. When someone's talking to you and they're not looking at you and they're telling you something, you're like, okay, well, I'm some of the same suspect. I'm not sure this is true. I'll bank that for later. But again, it can benefit you. It can help you in a lot of ways, especially with dealing with people in terms of figuring out if someone's being honest with you. What about for a non-poker player who wants to get better

at awareness of others, of tells, of human behavior? Like, you have to be a master at that, I think, to be good at what you do. What are, like, some general pieces of advice you'd give to that person who, you know, doesn't know anything about poker has never played, but obviously it's important to understand humans and the way they behave and the decisions they make and body language, all of that that goes into it. Pay attention. So here's the thing. I used to actually do this.

I'm not even kidding. I'm a people watcher. I love watching people. I used to go to the mall. I'd sit on a bench. People would walk by. And I did as a sort of like a little game, a little practice, if you will. I would like watch how the person walked, watch what they're wearing, who they were,

and totally make up a story about exactly who they are. What they were like in high school, what they do for a living. Are they confident? Are they not? all these types of things. I remember, you know, we all have this ability, by the way, to an eight, we do this. I remember very young. I was five with my parents. We were at a mall with another couple. And there was another guy with us, right? And this couple was married. And I told my mother, I said, Mommy, mommy, she likes that one, not that one. And they're like, no, no, no, no,

that's her husband. That's just a friend. Nope. We found out a couple months later, obviously that she was having an affair with the other guy. Because it's true when you, well, listen, you think about a baby, right? A baby doesn't speak anything, but a baby can communicate. A baby looks at their mother, right, looks at their face and says, they can tell when their mother's happy or sad, all these types of emotions they can feel. As we get older, we get further and further away from trusting what we see, what we know. How many studies have been done where you look at somebody for less than three seconds and you

already decide if you like them or not? There was a book called Blink, I believe. Blink, where he talks about they had these kids in a classroom. They had a teacher speak for a minute and had the kids say, do you like them or not? Then they did it with three second interview. Didn't change. The number didn't change. People just made up their mind already.

And part of it is just, the subconscious is so developed and so intriguing and so interesting. We don't know why, but have you not saw someone and be like, I don't know if I liked it. Like for no reason. But there's something that that's something in your subconscious telling you that there's something you saw that you just can't access, but it's there. And it's real. Sometimes it feels off. You don't know why it just does. And other times it feels like on. I don't know why, but I'm really drawn to that person. I'm attracted to their vibe. And yeah, I think it goes both ways. You've hit on self-awareness a number of times being very self-aware, understanding how good you are at something or where you have skills or where you may have a weakness combined with humility. And I think, Daniel, from a leadership perspective, that's a really important combo, self-aware and humble enough to learn. learn. This is a tough one, but how do you remain and continue to be a self-aware person, especially for you when you become rich and the best at what you do and when others around you want to be

in your orbit? So they may be scared to tell you the truth or to tell you if maybe you're lacking in something. I think it's even harder for you than it would be for most people because of all those things. So how do you stay and increase your level of self-awareness? Ultimately, that requires you surrounding yourself with people that will be honest with you. My wife, for sure. She's the most authentic person I've ever met in my life. If you're inauthentic, even the least, she's like, ugh, gross. I also did a course.

This was very valuable to me. I did an emotional intelligence course in 2013. It's transformational type stuff. There's one in Vegas called Choice Center. And part of what you do there is you're going to be like in a room with, you have blind spots. You don't know how you show up, right? But then 50 people that you don't know all tell you, you show up this way, that way, and that way. And you're like, no, I don't.

You're like, well, you do because they're telling you directly. So I think like being aware of those blind spots and doing courses like that, working on impotional touches. There's so many ways in which you can do that these days. For me, the course was life changing in so many ways because it really woke me up to some things that I didn't realize were holding me back in terms of things that happened. Actually, it's funny because it was with my now wife around 2010, 11. We were dating.

I bought her an engagement ring way back then. Never gave it to her because we split. things went bad, you know, and that one's stung, really bad. And I didn't realize that I was carrying that around for years in terms of the way that I was even just dealing with other, any woman or any person like that. There was like still a wound there. And then just addressing that. And then, of course, many years later, she came back to Vegas and I kept the rings and I gave it to her eventually. So we've been married for five years. Today is our anniversary, by the way. What? What are you doing? She's still sleeping, so we're good.

Congrats. That's amazing. Yeah. Oh, that is very cool. How did you, I don't know if I say win her back, but how did you make it happen after a breakup and some time and space? I had, it's funny because I was, I remember way back then, I was the one chasing her, and she was young, having fun, living the Hollywood life. She wasn't ready to settle down, but I was.

I was 31. She was probably 21 at the time when we first met. And then she came back to do a show. She's a host. She used to do the Fox, the Big Game, Poker Star, the big game there, and she's to host a lot of shows and things. So she came back to do a show called Friday Night Poker, and we went to dinner.

and I had no intention of like getting back with this woman. No, you kind of had it a little bit. You had to. I really didn't. I'm like, this is fun hanging out for a minute, but I have no intention at all. But she did.

She flat out told me because I, here was the thing. I just got an out of relationship and so did she. And I was honest with her. I said, I'm going to date. I mean, I'm dating here and there and whatever.

And she said, I get it. I don't like it. I'm not doing it, but you do you. I was like, whoa, who is this woman all of a sudden,

right? So from then on, I was no longer dating anybody else. And it was just me and her. And we got married really fast after that, actually. Because it's not like you get married not knowing this person. I've known her for 15 years. We just got together again, probably it was, I think October. I proposed on New Year's Eve and we were married by May.

Wow. What's the key to having a strong relationship with her? I think with her specifically. So she's bipolar. And that was one of the things that she shared with me when we went to dinner. Because before that, I would have been like, I don't want to mess with this girl. When she shared this, she was very vulnerable, open, honest, told me what it would be like and all that stuff. So for me, it's been a blessing to know that.

And she's so intelligent about her moods and where she's at that she communicates with me on a real deep level. So the best benefit of that is I never take anything personal. I really know. Like it's like, because it probably isn't about me. Sometimes she just wakes up in a bad mood. Sometimes she does wake up and she's happy, whatever. So my goal every day is just to make her as happy as possible. I need to be her rock, right? Like, that's how I see things. I'm the stable rock and she's the one that's at her ups and downs and I'm the

one that levels her out. But ultimately, it's communication. And I think for both of us, we both are quite independent and we need our alone time and we get plenty. During the day, this house is two floors. Most of the day, she's upstairs on downstairs. And then we convene at night. Speaking of like being happy and being content, somebody asked you when you were happiest and you'd said in very high stress situations. And there was, I think, the main event one year when you got knocked out in 11th place. And it was like his gut punch and it killed you. But like that's when you were happiest.

And I thought, whoa, that seems weird. So are you still at your happiest in the highest level stress situations? I love it. I mean, it makes you feel alive. You know, I don't know. Some people jump out of an airplane. Some people bungee jump. I have no interest in that.

You could die. What are you crazy? For me, I get those thrills at the poker table. Like, I love being in it, you know? And the truth is, With poker, you're going to experience some pain. But without pain, there can be no glory. There can be no joy, right?

So I understand it's a necessary evil in terms of experiencing that kind of joy. But I love being in it. I love being deep in the competition. I love the feeling of adrenaline taking over and it's putting you in this hyper-focused state. I love being in that state. It's a lot of fun for me. After I'm done, I'm exhausted. Like my hair hurts.

I'm so tired. While I'm doing it, there's nothing else I'd rather be doing. Is that when you feel most? alive. It's funny you say that because that's a rounder's quote where Matt Damon, Mike Dick Derman says to his girlfriend, he's like, I just, you know what? I felt alive for the first time of years. She's like, she's like, you just told me that you felt alive for the first time at a poker table, Mike. How am I supposed to take that? I'm like, shut up and leave. Okay. You suck. Yeah. You know, for me, it's about competition and it's about, you know, my craft. And I think there's

something attractive, frankly, about people having a passion. I know Amanda loves it when I'm deep in a final. She's sitting there watching online. She's watching the stream. She's, you know, she loves seeing me succeed. She loves seeing me in my element, you know, succeeding at doing what I do best. I agree, man. Like, there is something deeply attractive about a person who you can tell they're giving everything to it.

And they love it. They love like. You mentioned him, right? Yeah. I'm waking up at three in the morning. Guys are coming back from the club. I'm going to the gym. I work a pass.

You know, that's like. That's badass. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sure you get requests from young poker players all the time. And I think these lessons could probably apply beyond just the table. But what are some general pieces of life slash career slash poker advice you give to somebody who's earlier in their career?

Well, generally the first thing I want to know is like, what do you want to use poker as? Is this something you want to do for full time as a living? Or is it something you just want to get better at for fun? Because there's two very different avenues for what, you know, you can. want to do there. I think in both cases, don't do what I did, basically, because it's very rare that you succeed doing this. But typically, I tell people to like, it's never going anywhere, right? So finish school, do whatever you got to do, have a primary job, then start playing poker

on the side if you'd like, and if you start to notice and track it diligently your results, don't be like, yeah, I think I do pretty good, know exactly how well you do or don't. Track every penny. And then you can take a look at the end of the year and say, you know what? I was making like $80 an hour playing poker and I make 40 at my job so maybe I can make the transition. But do so from a stable place rather than because it's a lot different playing poker when you need to win to pay your rent. Not everyone is cut out from that club. I am like I love those moments, but not everyone can handle that kind of pressure. Does it make it harder to bluff in those days when you needed it?

I know it would for me. Maybe I'm just projecting myself onto you. but early days you need that money to eat to pay rent i feel like it'd be tougher to bluff but maybe that's because we're cut from that clause that's exactly what would be the most difficult thing the most difficult thing would be like bluffing it off and realizing oh my god the guy called and now i'm done and that's something that you can avoid right you've got your case money here if you just check and don't bet you know you still have that money but if you throw it in there you know and that's that's where the you know when i say people like crumble into that you have to be able to do that you have to be willing

to do that. If you're playing, if you're not able to do that, then the stakes you're playing are probably too big. To close, man, I want to focus on last year, this year, and going forward. Last year, I believe, is one of your worst years ever. You lost $2.2 million, I believe. You've won every year of your career, except for like one or two, and last year was your biggest loss. And you've started this year pretty good already. One, what made you want to share all of that? Because you could have probably said, yeah, it was kind of a rough year, but I'm ready to get back after. But you shared like specifics of, because people here are 2.2 million are like, oh my God. So that part of it. And then two, what have you changed in order to make this year better already? Yeah. Well,

again, we talk about authenticity. I've been sharing my results in 2013. Like I share publicly the end of the year. Who imagine me sharing every year and then having a losing year and I'm, no, we're not going to talk about that. No, that's how it works. You share every year, right? And frankly, I've been pretty lucky since 2013 to only have this big losing year and then one other. That's rare because when you think about I only play live poker, live tournaments, it's a very small sample size. Over 100 and 150, it's very common where you're going to be down a little bit of money, especially with the way tournaments work. But I've been pretty consistent, pretty lucky to not have those big numbers. And frankly, whatever, I lost 2.2 the year before I won like two. And that's going to

happen. It's just one of those years. What I do is I look back at the year and I say, okay, rather than wine, which is completely about bad luck, which existed, right? Obviously, I'm not going to lose two million without having bad luck. But then I look at what can I control? What can I, what areas can I fix? What worked in 2003 and what didn't work? Let's continue to improve upon what worked, right? And let's take a look at what didn't work and let's see if we can make some upgrades.

One thing that didn't work for me, which is a big change, is in 2024, I'm focusing on quality over quantity. I have a little bit of fomo. I don't like to miss out on stuff. And it all, frankly, was an epiphany thanks to my wife Amanda. We were in Bahamas. It was December. And I just busted a tournament.

And there's another tournament. It's a small buy-in. And I was talking around the floor and I said, yeah, I don't really feel like playing. I'll go jump in this tournament. And she said, you've never done any good when you don't feel like playing. And I was like, wait a minute. No, yes, I had. Remember that time when?

And I couldn't think of one. And I was like, oh, my God. So I didn't play. I just said, you know what? I'm going to go to bed. And then the next day I played a big one. It was a $25,000 one. I had a really nice run in that because I was fresh and really to do ready to do that.

So I think in 2003, I played way too much. I just, I played too much volume and didn't take enough breaks and rest. And as you get older, at least for me, you know, me resting and I have to be at the poker table and really want to be there. If there's any part of my brain that's like, yeah, I kind of wouldn't mind laying going to bed right now. That's going to affect how you play spots, right? You might take high variance situations, be like, whatever. I'll either get some chips or, you know, I'll go broke. And that's not playing your best poke, right?

So I'm going to focus on if I just don't feel like playing, take the day off. Quality over quantity tonight. Thank you so much, man, for doing this. This is amazing. Patty was awesome to work with. And I want to publicly note, I appreciate you being early. Not always the case, but that's important. And I think those little details matter.

So thank you so much, man. Love to continue our dialogue as we both progress, Daniel. Sounds good, man. It was fun. Thank you. It is the end of the podcast club. Thank you for being a member of the end of the podcast club. If you are, send me a note, Ryan, at learningleader.com.

Let me know what you learned from this great conversation with Daniel Nogranu. A few takeaways from my notes. I love his obsession with the Rocky movies and the lessons learned from each one. Like Rocky 3, don't get complacent. Rocky 4, it's heart versus machine. Rocky Balboa, it ain't about how hard you hit. It's about how hard you can get hit and keep. moving forward.

How much you can take and keep moving forward. That's how winning is done. And then his quote, which I think he really lives, is in order to avoid criticism, say nothing, do nothing, be nothing. And Daniel is out there voicing his beliefs and opinions. And I think that's something as leaders to aspire to. And then the luck factor in dealing with things outside of your control, A victim versus an owner mentality.

And it seems the people with an owner mentality have a greater chance to sustain excellence over time. Victims, they'll complain, they give up, sock, their passive aggressive, they procrastinate, whereas owners seek solutions, take action, ask for help sometimes. Victims seem to focus on things that are outside of their control and blame it on luck, while owners will focus on things that they can control. Once again, I would say thank you so much for continuing to spread the message and telling her friend or two. Hey, you should listen to this episode of The Learning Leader Show with Daniel Nogranu. I think it will help you become a more effective leader.

And because you continue to do that and you also go to Apple Podcasts and Spotify and you subscribe to the show, you rate the show, hopefully five stars and you write a thoughtful review. And by doing all of that, you are continually giving me the opportunity to do what I love on a daily basis. And for that, I will forever be grateful. Thank you so, so much. Talk to you, too. Can't wait.