$50M Poker Pro Shares His Best Advice For Founders

You know, I went broke many, many times, but the downswings are probably the most important part. And typically with like a breakdown, things are going badly. That's an opportunity for a breakthrough. I feel like I could rule the world. I know I could be what I want to. I put my all in it like no days off. On the road, let's travel.

Well, we're at 7, but it should be a lot more if I'm being honest.

And he's humble to boot. So there he is, Daniel Negreanu. Listen, people are going to be like, why are you guys having a poker player a business podcast. And the reason is, A, I'm selfish. I played poker my whole life and I wanted to talk to this guy, and that's what the podcast is. But B, there are so many parallels between poker and business, uh, whether it's, you know, thinking about it in terms of investing, around bankroll management, around pot odds and things like— there's all these frameworks that I've used from poker in business, but also the, the people side, the human side, the reading people side. And you are one of the best at that. So, uh, thanks for coming on, dude.

Absolutely. You're absolutely right with your description too, because there's just so many things about poker. Poker, you know, you have to register as a small business anyway, right? You're just self-employed and, you know, you know, getting outta bed to go into work is up to you. But, uh, you still have to, you know, make smart decisions, invest, and look for plus EV situations.

So look, Sam, I don't know if you, uh, if you followed poker like back in the day, the, the sort of the famous players. Yeah.

I watch it on TV with Phil Ivey and Daniel.

I've seen Daniel so many times and they look like, A lot of this, like Doyle Brunson, they looked like cowboys, right? And they had these per— big personalities. And it was like superheroes who would come to a table and one guy was just like the stone cold, you can't read him. Another guy was the talker. Another guy, he just was, you know, had no fear gene in his body. He could just risk it all. And that was the sort of persona of like these charismatic, like personality poker players. And then if you fast forward now, it's like hoodie on, sunglasses on, scrawny kid who's doing math and basically like, is, is, is, uh, in many ways, like, it's a, it's a numbers game and versus like the way that poker used to have this sort of gunslinger mentality. Daniel, is that accurate how I described it?

Pretty much. I mean, you know, the difference between, and I think this is true with chess and other games too, the difference between like, like Bobby Fischer was asked, you know, he is like, well, who's the greatest chess player of all time? Right? And he's like, it's not fair. You can't make this, like the players in 1905, right? Brilliant people. They didn't have access to the tools that they have now. So with poker, yeah. Oh, are these kids more— back in my day, people had to figure it out on their own. Doyle Brunson, before he had computers, he would run simulations by literally getting a deck of cards, a piece of paper and a pencil. He would take an ace and a king against a pair of fours, run out the board and say, okay, ace-king won. And he would do it like 100,000 times. Right now, obviously the click of a button, you know, you have this data available to you. So it was a different type of skillset. And you're right. Um, a lot of the more modern players. Are much more deliberate. They take a lot more time because they're actually doing, for the most part, they're doing calculations we didn't used to do. It used to be like this. I'd look at Sam and I'm like, yeah, Sam's full of it. He doesn't have it. I call, right? That's the equation. However, now people are doing what's called, this might be a little bit above your, uh, audience's, uh, level of understanding, but counting combinations. I'm just saying, 'cause it's very, even for most poker players, they don't understand like combinatrix. Okay. So for example, you think your opponent has ace-king. How many ace-kings are possible? Right? That's a difficult question for somebody who doesn't play poker, right? Well, there's 4 aces and there's 4 kings, right? So that's 16. Okay. So what you're doing in your head or what these people are doing is they're counting not just ace-king as 1, but 16, and then using other effects to decide, like, you know, the pot odds, what they have. It, it, like I said, it's kind of complex and I probably shouldn't go down this.

It's sort of like why, like, I like this idea of like Babe Ruth who shows up hungover and like is smoking a cig right before he goes on to like hit. And then now it's just like all jacked dudes who just hit home runs and like foul, like, who are technically perfect. But I'm like, I want the guy who ate steak and eggs in the morning and smokes a cig while he's like, he's practicing.

The more updated version of that is absolutely John Daly, right? Tiger Woods was asked one time, like, why do you practice so much? Right? Like, why are you up at 4 a.m.? He's like, if I was as talented as John Daly, I wouldn't have to, 'cause like, you know, really, 'cause Tiger Woods is getting up at 5:00 AM, right? 4:00 AM to go golf. And he sees John Daly at the bar drinking, smoking, whatever. And they tee off at like 9:00, right? And if, you know, John Daly goes out there and shoots 63, you know, I, I agree with you, Sam. It's kind of romantic, frankly. Yeah. Just that old swashbuckler who just shows up and, and can still, uh, you know, was, was there a moment like that that hooked you?

'Cause you know, I, I, I think the first poker boom that I was a part of was the, the Chris Moneymaker thing. And I remember the final table with him and Sammy Farha, and Farha's trying, you know, this kind of experienced player. Moneymaker was this amateur who kind of like won a, won a mini tournament that got him a ticket to the thing. It was like Willy Wonka. He got a golden ticket, then he got in and got all the way there. And I just vividly remember that was great TV. Was there a great TV moment or like a poker final table moment that for you, you were like, this is awesome. I want to be a part of this.

Well, yeah, I'll answer your question, but first, you know, the moment you talk about, that's the sort of a watershed moment in poker, right? 'cause it was the first time where some amateur guy named Chris Moneymaker, like you can't make this up, you know, he put $40 in on an online site, turned it into $10,000 seat, sits there and now he is against the grizzled vet, Sammy Vette, you know, far out with the cigarette and the suit and the whole old school vibe, you know, and he ends up winning. So that, for me, my moment was a little further back. I don't know if you're familiar with the movie Rounders.

Yeah, of course. Love Rounders.

Rounders, great movie. So obviously in that movie, Matt Damon is watching a scene between Johnny Chan, the master, and Eric Seidel, you know, I go, I used to watch those tapes as a teenager and I remember Phil Hellmuth actually, who's a buddy of mine who I like to needle. Um, I remember watching him as a young, you know, in his 20s, you know, he, he, Johnny Chan had won 2 years in a row and then he was heads up with Phil Hellmuth and Phil Hellmuth won this young kid. So in that, it was a little bit inspirational for me. I'm 16, I'm like, I'm gonna be the next bat, you know? Right. So that was a big moment for me. I believe that was 1989.

Did you, by the way, Shaun, let me, let me ask a question really quick. Have you ever heard Daniel tell the story about Scotty Wynn?

That's the one I was thinking of.

That's exactly, Sean, what Conor McGregor did to, uh, Jose Aldo.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah. There's a sort of mind game to this whole thing, and you're, you're famous for reading people. And I'm curious, you know, there's probably some natural element to it, but it's a practice skill. You've done it a bunch. And in entrepreneurship, in business, there's a big element of reading people. You're doing a deal with somebody, you're selling. It's really important to understand what's going on in the head of the other person and understand where they're coming from. And so I'm curious, like, if you were going to give us like a mini masterclass on reading people, what comes to mind? What are the, what are the big big factors.

You know what I mean? Yeah.

'Cause, 'cause you know, you know, so you have to like get a sense for, and, and often what you do with people is when they're lying, you wanna like remember what they look like when they're lying and look for that pattern again. I'll give you a simple example with poker. It was in Europe, World Series Europe. I played with this guy on day 1 and he was chewing gum. Okay. Well, I was watching. And there was this hand where he was chewing gum, chewing gum, then he bet all his money, he was all in, he stopped chewing, wasn't chewing his gum anymore. So I'm like, I really want to see this hand. He turned it over, he was bluffing, okay? So I banked that in my memory. Now on day 5, 5, 4 days later, the big spot between me and him at the final table, he bets all his chips, right? He's chewing away. I throw the hand away, okay? Later, he bets all his chips, he's not chewing anymore. I call, he's bluffing, you know, I'm able to, to, to, to knock him outta the tournament. So absolutely the, we all have that ability. I think it's really observation, you know, noticing and looking for patterns cuz everyone's unique and different. But there are some true, there's just some tried and true, uh, you know, examples. Like if people are not looking you in the eye, typically like they look away or they look down to the right because they're uncomfortable about you looking at them cuz they're doing something that they should, or they're saying something that they shouldn't be saying, or they're lying to you.

Can we actually invert that? So let's just say that I think, you know, you've been involved in, uh, owning, uh, and investing in a handful of companies. If I was trying to get you to invest in my company and I wanted to successfully lie to you, what would the checklist be that I would follow?

I think certainty for sure. You know, being— but again, this is the thing. The best con artists are also the best liars, right? So they can, they'll fool you, right? Like, um, I'd say an overexuberance of confidence though is problematic. Like if you're just too like, oh my God, this is the greatest thing, da da da da. If you actually acknowledge, um, both good and bad, right? Yeah. So you're like, listen, we're in good, we're in great shape. However, you know, we got, we really gotta work on this. So sort of admitting some, being humble almost like, cuz that shows some honesty. Like, wow. Okay, well this guy, why would he tell me this bad thing? You know, if the other part's not true. So if you were gonna lie to me about A, tell me the truth about B. That doesn't look good for you. And now A is far more believable to—

So I would be, I would be confident but self-deprecating a bit and admitting to flaws. What else would I do?

Well, there's honesty there. I think, you know, looking the person in the eye, you know, is a big one. And I think also, like, never come off as desperate.

All right. I read a ton. I would say almost a book a week. And the reason I read so much is because my philosophy towards reading is I want to see what works for the winners that I love and what strategies they use. And then I want to see What mistakes, uh, did they all make? What were the common flaws that they all had? And I just wanna avoid that. And so HubSpot asked me to put together a list of the books that have changed my life so far in 2025. And I did that. And so I listed out 7 books that made a meaningful difference in my life, and I explained what the differences that they had on me or what actions I took because of the book. And then also I listed out my very particular ways of reading because I'm pretty strategic about how I read and how I read so much and how I remember what I read and things like that. And so I put this together in a very simple guide. It's 7 books that had a huge impact on my life, and you can scan the QR code below if you wanna read it, or there's a link. You guys know what to do. There's a link in the description. Just go ahead and click it and you'll see the guide that I made. So it's the 7 books that had a massive change in my life this year so far, and then also how I'm able to read so much. So check it out below. What's an example of, uh, of not being desperate and also of being desperate?

You mentioned that when you were on your come up, you would, you know, you'd go to the mall, you sort of practice just your observational skills, like, like without distraction, actually just observe people, try to really like understand how, you know, how they move, how they think, you know, try to build up a profile of them. What were the other things you did to get good? Right? Like, you don't just become who you became without doing something that was uncommon. If you just did the common set of actions, you would have had a common result. You must have done something uncommon to get you an uncommon result. What else did you do on your come up that, that was, uh, very helpful for you?

Yeah. On that note of obs— observational, we'll go, I dunno if you guys remember a show called Heroes many years ago. There was a character called Siler and all these people had like, you know, you know, superhero type talents, right? And he would go in there and he'd like pull their brain out and he would now have this, you know, ability himself. So when I started out quite young, I would play with people and I'd see these, I'd start to notice the same guys are winning, right? So I'm like, okay. This week I'm getting inside Sam's head. I'm gonna be like, I'm gonna, I'm gonna sit like him. I'm gonna put my chips like him. I'm gonna sort of try to become him for this week and understand exactly how he thinks. Okay, now I take all the good, I leave the bad. Now I move on to Shaun and I'm like, okay, let's be Shaun for this week. Let's really soak in what makes him successful. Why is he winning?

Right?

The idea is to create this super player where I take the best skills from all these different people, look at what works and what doesn't. And then formulate like, uh, you know, a game plan that way. So really for me, it was, it was learning from those that are already successful, and that's easier to do today than it's ever been. Like, I'm gonna be streaming later today, playing for 8 hours. You can watch me play for 8 hours and see my hole cards and hear me explain my thought process, right? So without even risking any money at the poker table like we used to have to, you could just watch and learn that way. Then you start to think outside the box just from observation. So I had a friend, a group friend that we have ultimately did start talking poker. But early on it wasn't like that. Early on I was, I wasn't going to go up to him and be like, hey, would you just tell me all your strategies? Thanks. You know, cool.

So I, the listeners are going to hate hearing this story again because I say it 10,000 times, but I previously owned a media company that I sold and it was wonderful. And when I sold the company, I sold it via, it was during COVID I sold it via Zoom. And so it was a lot of phone calls and it was a lot of Zoom. You've talked a lot about negotiating and like being able to read someone, but it's very physical. Is there a way that you could teach me how to be better to, to read or to understand what someone's thinking via Zoom or phone calls? Like, can you hear in someone's voice or just see them on a camera, or do you think you have to be in real life?

Yeah, well obviously, you know, you can with Zoom, but I think frankly, let's say for example, when it comes to business, I think, and this, this is like, this would be my go-to. I think the best way to get reads on people is when they are relaxed. Okay? When are they relaxed? So not during a business call, not the Zoom, everyone's buttoned up, you know, and like ready to talk. How about when you guys go for dinner and drinks? You know, just like, hey, you know, we should go, we should go check out this restaurant and have some drinks or whatever. And then talk about things unrelated to business. Understand who these people are, get a sense of who they are and sort of disarm them. I do this in poker all the time, right? Where, um, I'll give you an example what I do often. The idea is I want the person to be relaxed and I'll get more from them. So I'll be in a spot where my opponent, you know, they bet all their chips. So it's decision on me. Instead of looking at them, I look at the dealer and I go, why did I do this to myself? This is so silly. This is what I always do. And then I see him over there in the corner of my eye. I see him laughing, right? He's giggling. So that means he's, you know, he thinks he has the best hand, right? So I'm looking at the dealer and saying, yeah, okay. What, you know, I said, what if he just has only like ace jack? And then I look at his face and he goes, hey, Mm, shit. That is. And I can beat that. So all of a sudden the demeanor, but the thing is, is he's disarmed cuz I'm not looking at him, right? So the analogy there with business is you're still at that dinner meeting, at those drinks, whatever you're doing, you're, you're in reading mode. Then that is when you're gonna need the best reads on who this person is and how they think. And there'll be, especially with a little bit of alcohol, they'll be probably a little looser with the lips, you know?, and disarmed, and that makes it much easier. It's much more difficult when everyone's very, very stiff, you know, to get authentic reads cuz it's practiced, right? Like if you're taking a pitch from somebody, they've probably done this pitch before, so they're just sort of like going through the motions and that's not authentic. That's not real. You need to see the real, and usually that happens away from those environments.

Is there a certain body part? Because you're describing this example of like poker where you say, what's he got, ace-jack? And you said he stops smiling, but it's never that. Or it doesn't, to someone like me who doesn't know what I'm looking for, it doesn't seem that obvious.

Yeah. Well, there's a myriad of examples. The eyes are very, very telling often, like in poker and, and otherwise. But the other one too is, and I, this is why, like I said, I like to use this as a, as a strategy, is a smile. If you looked at 10 smiles right now and I showed you 10 and 5 are real and 5 are fake, you'd be surprised how good you are at telling which ones are fake and which ones are real, right? Like a fake smile is one that's kind of like this. A real smile, you see more up stuff up here like that. So that, that's a, you know, telltale sign. But like I said, everybody's unique. The eyes are probably the most telling. Body language too. Body language is a big one, right? Um, are they, when they're talking, are they stiff? Are they like this? Or are they laid back in their chair? They're talking, because if someone's laid back in their chair, they're not really afraid of you looking at 'em. They're, they're, they're, they're comfortable. You know, they're, you can sense when someone's comfortable versus not. And, um, Like I said, there's no— everyone's unique and individual, but body posture, eyes, um, you know, smiles, uh, a lot of guys are looking at pulse now. That's like a new thing. So everyone's covering their necks, of course, with scarves and things like that.

Sean, have you guys ever heard this story? So in 1991, the election between— I think it was '92— the election in '92, it was between George Bush Sr. and it was Bill Clinton. And Bill Clinton, their reputations weren't entirely known. Their reputations eventually are going to be that Bill Clinton is this charismatic young guy who could, like, woo people. And then George Bush Senior was known as kind of an uptight, not everyday type of guy. And there's this famous debate where a lot of, a lot of, like, political folks say this is when George Bush Senior lost to this up-and-coming guy. This young lady in the crowd was asking a question about a very everyday thing, like, I can't afford groceries.. And while she's asking the question, George Bush Senior, very subtly, he looked at his watch like that. Boom, it's over. And then the, the analysts go, look at— now look at Bill Clinton. He grabs the mic, he walks closer, and he goes, what did you say your name was? Can you tell me about your background? What do you do for work? Man, it's so hard to hear what you're going through. I'm so sorry. And, and look, you know, a decade later, they did this test where what they did was they got rid of the audio of the video. And they just showed you the body language of the two people, Bush and Bill Clinton. And then this other test, they— you could only listen to the audio. And what they found was the people who only watched the video and didn't hear the audio could predict exactly what happened to the outcome, whereas the people who only listened to the audio, they couldn't exactly tell what happened.

Right.

And so the idea being is that body language and seeing with your eyes communicates significantly more than just audio. And it was this amazing story where it was literally just this, like he just looked at his watch just like that. And that was the, that was the end of the election. That's what a lot of people have folks say. Have you guys ever heard that?

I remember that too. And, and it makes so much sense. It's so, it's so on point, right? Because like the difference there is, you know, like you said, Bill Clinton got personal. The body language mattered. How often are you talking to somebody like today in our age? Like people have cell phones, right? Like you're talking to someone and they're just going, yeah. Uh-huh. Right. You, do you feel like you're being listened to really? You know, like, oh yeah, I'm all, you know, you feel like you're being ignored, you feel like you're being dismissed versus somebody puts their phone down and looks and he goes, uh-huh. And they, you know, they give you a head nod or whatever like that. Like that person is someone you're more likely to want to engage with or feel respected by. Right. So that, like what the, the, uh, the example you gave is George Bush in that moment, people see that as that's disrespectful. That's the same as looking at your phone. What did Bill Clinton do? Oh, that was very empathetic. What do you do? Where are you from? You know, tell me about your story. Oh, wow. Well, like, just look at those two different people, right? Just on that alone. Like, it's such a drastic difference, right?

When you, uh, how did you get into poker? So what's the origin story for you? And, um, I'm curious if it just worked right away or you hit some rock bottoms early on and it sort of shifted you.

There was a guy, uh, I was in college and I used to, I took one class my senior year called Getting Rich, and it was probably, uh, I was a pre-med kid, so this was like, I'd done all the hard physics, biology, whatever. This was like my blow-off class. Turned out to be the most valuable class I took my entire college career. They invited in this guy from a hedge fund, or maybe it was a venture capital fund. So this VC comes in and he, he's like, okay, cool. Like, who here wants to start a business someday? And so like, I would say like 75% of the kids raised their hand like, hey, I like the idea. I'd like to own my own business. And he goes, awesome. Who here is going to start a business? Like, you're all graduating seniors, right? So who's going to start a business this May when you graduate? And the 75% of hands dropped and there was like 2 or 3 hands left. And he goes, what just happened? He's like, that is, uh, and so he started asking people, he goes, you, you said you want to start a business. What do you, why aren't you doing it now? Like, why, what's coming first? Oh, I got this great job at, uh, you know, McKinsey. I got this job at, at a bank, Goldman Sachs, wherever. I got this internship. Uh, you know, so I'm gonna do that for a few years, get some experience, and then I'm gonna go do the business thing. And he goes, um, he said, you guys have it backwards. He goes, when you're 21 and 22 years old and you can live off of a futon and you know, you have no, no mortgage, you have no kids and you have no expectations. He's like, this is the time to just go broke repeatedly. He goes, you should just try so many businesses, um, during this era. Don't wait till you're 28 to 32 because that's when it's gonna feel a lot harder and a lot more costly to go start that business. 'Cause you're gonna have a better salary, you're gonna have a job, you're gonna have a reputation. You're not going to want to be a beginner in your 30s. You should be a beginner in your 20s. And literally that shifted the course of my life where I was like, oh, he's right. I should just go. I can afford to go broke several times now, similar to poker. Like when you have a small bankroll is when you want to take the most risk. And like you, because you can recover and bounce back quickly, you don't actually have that much to lose. Today's episode is brought to you by HubSpot. Being a know-it-all used to be considered a bad thing, but in business, knowing it all, it's everything. Because right now businesses are only using about 20% of their data. Unless you have HubSpot. That's where they take data that's buried in emails and call logs and meeting notes. They become insights that help you grow your business. Because when you know more, you grow more. You see, being a know-it-all isn't so bad after all. Visit hubspot.com to learn more today. You said you started when you were in your teens and you started learning the game and you would go broke, but then you would borrow some money, get back in it. What happened from there?

We're very good, people are very good at real, at thinking of all the reasons why something's not gonna work and something's gonna fail. So it's very easy to be like, oh, I wanna start this business, but I don't have the money. It's not good timing and do this. And it's like, when I'm set and everything's good, then I'll do it. And I remember I did a course years ago on sort of emotional intelligence and there's a thing called be, do, have, right? Many people think you need to like have everything in order to be something. Right? Where the truth is, it's like, be it right, you know, do it and you'll have it. Like, just, just live like you got, like, go for it. If a little bit more, like you said, as for me, like to segue into your second question, that's kind of what I did. I went for it, you know, I went to Vegas and I remember the first time I went to Vegas, I had like $3,000. 24 hours later, I did not, but I had 3 more days in Vegas with no money. Learning experience. Got kicked in the nuts, went back home to Toronto, rebuilt, kept going back. So it was a trial and error thing where I went from being the big fish in a small pond in Toronto to the top pros, you know? And I remember a very distinct moment, um, when that happened. It was like 4 in the morning and I was playing 7-handed, 7 people at the table. And, uh, I, I lost my money, you know, and I went to the bathroom, washed my hands. You know, came out and they're all gone. And I realized in that moment I was the sucker. They were only playing because of me. I was their EV. I was their expected value. And I remembered every one of their faces with vengeance, right? And I said, I'm gonna get you one day. One of them was a guy named Hawaiian Bill. You know, he'd wear those Hawaiian shirts or whatever. And, uh, hated him, you know, at the table because he was taking, he was playing aggressive, you know, I was like a bull. He was just, he just knew how to beat me. And then about a year or two later, he sort of became a little bit of a mentor of mine, you know? Yeah. 'Cause I was like, oh, this guy knows what he is doing. You know, he's been around the block and I'm gonna learn from him instead of, you know, being angry. And, uh, you know, I just eventually, I had persist, I had persistence, you know, I understood that like, and I had many walks home from the casino to my motel where I wondered like, what am I doing? You know, I'm not in school, I'm not going anywhere, and this is it. So, Good news is I'd wake up in the morning ready to go. I'm like, all right, today's the day. Let's turn it around.

There's that, uh, one of my favorite scenes is, um, from, from a movie is a poker movie. It's with Mark Wahlberg where he's talking to John Goodman. And, uh, do you guys know what scene I'm talking about where he's, uh, he basically says like, I was up $2 million and I lost all of my money. And John Goodman's like, look, every idiot knows that when you're up $2 million, we all know what to do. You take $1 million and you buy a house and then you buy a really crappy car. And you put the rest in savings and that's your fortress of solitude. You can never mess that up. And then you go and gamble with the rest, but you never screw that one bit up. And he like tells this amazing story. Um, was there a point in your life, or at least, or rather what point in your life or what age were you, were you like, okay, I have a base, I have my fortress of solitude, things feel good. Um, how late into life were you or how early into life were you before you felt some security? Because it sounds like your line of work it's a lot of ups and downs. Was there ever like a, okay, I've, I'm at a place of safety?

The first time it happened, I was very wrong. So I'll go there and then I'll tell you about when it actually happened. 1999, I had a good year. I, you know, I won the US Poker Championship to end the year. I had like, you know, $400,000, $500,000. I thought, okay, well, you know, we're set. You know, we're good. We're never going to go broke again. Then in the year 2000, I got complacent. I was living the Vegas life. We're going to strip joints, we're going to dinners. I go play poker, gambling, you know, not taking it as serious as I should. And oh wow, by the end of the year 2000, the money gone, right? And I was like, it was a good learning experience. I'm glad it happened. 'Cause I watched many of my peers who went through this pattern of building up a bankroll, blowing it all, and then rebuilding it again. And part of that was they didn't have a foundation, like actually a reason. They didn't have a why, right? So, They wake up in the morning, they gotta, what's their goal? They gotta go make money right now. They have money. Okay, well, what's next? So subconsciously they self-sabotaged. They would self-sabotage, lose all the money so they had a purpose again, you know? And I remember watching my peers do that and I said to myself, I'm not gonna be that guy. So I started to take things more seriously in the early 2000s and probably by my late 20s, early 30s I'd say is when I finally realized that like, I got it figured out. I've got enough money. You know, we're for sure not going broke anymore. Even though we're playing higher stakes, I'm much more careful than I was. But that was a very important year for me to fail the way that I did in the year 2000, to really just bottom out in a sense. And then that's a decision point. Am I going to just keep doing what they do and be 50 or 60? I mean, I watched a guy, no joke, he built up, he, you know, I used to play with him in small games where, you know, maybe he had $1,000 or $2,000. He's playing the big game where he's got $2 million. Right.

And then does that mean he had $2 million saved or he was betting that game? $2 million was on the line.

He had $2 million total. Like, that's what he would, you know, that's his, that's his bankroll. It's $2 million. Now he's up there playing the big game. He's got a couple of ladies with him. He's doing blow. He's drinking, whatever. 3 days later, this guy with $2 million in front of him, he comes up and he says, hey, man, can I get $500? Because he's back to nothing. Right. So he wants $500. And I thought I saw that and I was like, wow, man. You had $2 million and you blew all that. And there's a lot of crazy stories like that. And I knew I was never gonna be that guy, but it was a real wake-up call, right? Mm-hmm. Guys I looked up to in a sense, and I'm like, what are you doing, man?

What's the biggest, um, discre— or what's the biggest amount that you saw someone have and it go to zero?

Yeah. It's, it's also funny, like if you, it, it's almost frustrating 'cause it's like I keep going to this well trying to scoop up some happiness and there's just none there. Uh, right. If you, if, if you keep trying the same strategy and it's not working, it's actually not just, that you didn't get happiness, you actually get frustrated because diminishing returns, right? You're getting diminishing returns.

Yeah, exactly. It's like you get that and you take, but I don't do kick. I've never done cocaine, but the more you do it, you know, you have that little fleeting dopamine hit, but the more you do it, the more your body becomes accustomed. It doesn't even have that same effect. Same thing, I think, with material objects. You have 6 cars. Okay, now, oh, I'm gonna buy this 7th car and this 8th car. What now? Like, it's, it's becomes like unimportant.

So what motivates you then? Because you're, you know, you're playing a game that's literally for money. It's the chips on the table. The goal is to get the chips from the other guy into your little pot. And so, um, you know, why do you do it? You've made plenty of money and, you know, you don't have to keep playing. So what is it for you?

Isn't it funny how the line between degeneracy and loving it, like, we could be, we could describing very similar things. Like, for example, I, I'm a little bit of a workaholic. I love it. But then my wife or someone else would be like, well, well, you're just a degenerate. Like, I like, you know, you're a workaholic. Yeah. Like there's, It's kind of interesting when you describe it in the way that you describe it. I'm like, gambling's awesome. And then when I like think of it, I'm like, oh, uh, you know, Larry the Greek or whatever, Archie the Greek, he's, uh, he's a degenerate. Um, but couldn't he describe it as the same way? I loved it.

Yeah. You know, Doyle Brunson had that famous quote once. It was on a TV show where they asked him, he said, you know, we're all really just degenerate gamblers. We just found something we could beat. Right? Yeah. So he was a, you know, a lot of the old school guys, they gamble on everything. You know, poker players, they didn't just play poker. They'd play, you know, golf for big money, bet on every game, bet on everything, you know. Some really famous bets from back in the day and some really cool ones, but they're always looking for action or EV. And a lot of it is 'cause it gets their juices flowing. But I found, like I said, for me, that's not the be-all end-all. Like it doesn't do it for me. I'm not really a thrill seeker in that way. Like people say, Oh, you know, you should bungee jump or jump out of a plane. I'm like, I have zero interest in that. Zero. It's just dumb for me because it doesn't do what it does for other people. Like some people go, oh my God, it was a thrill of a lifetime, whatever. I'm like, for me, I just look at it and go, well, you might die, so what's the point? You know, like if I believe that it would give me that thrill, you know, I would, you know, maybe take it on. But it's, yeah, I don't, it doesn't do it for me.

You mentioned loving the competition. Who's the best poker player you've ever sat down at the table with? Has there ever been anybody you sat down, you're like, wow, this guy's, this guy's better than me?

Yeah, for sure, several. One of them is my good friend who I've been friends with for 30 years, and he did what I didn't. I'll tell you, we, we sort of split in terms of like our focus. He's the best player, poker player in the world as far as I'm concerned, when you count all the games, and that's Phil Ivey. Okay, so Phil Ivey and I took different paths. There was a time where poker started to get popular on TV, you know, and there's all these opportunities and this and that. Phil didn't He was not about that. He didn't like that. He was nose to the grindstone. I'm gonna sit my leather ass in this chair and I'm gonna play for 10 hours. I'm gonna make all the money. And I had that when I was younger, but then I saw these other opportunities to be, you know, sort of a name in the game and potentially get some money through sponsorships or different business side, the business side of poker. And I was more well suited to that than he was because I enjoyed it. You know, I, when I was a very young kid, I wanted to be an actor. So being on camera, speaking these types of things, that was comfortable for me. So I felt like I could position myself to do quite well that way. And I did, you know, and he went a different path and, you know, did, did well his way. But the difference is once I start doing that, my focus is now diverted, right? He's focused on one thing and one thing only, just this game of poker, right? I'm playing poker, but I'm also doing this stuff too, right? So the intensity with which he plays at, I can't reach, right? Because I've got other things going on. You know what I mean? Which is fine. I don't regret it, you know, looking back. But, uh, yeah, I think that's part of why, you know, what made him so successful. He was completely consumed by poker and nothing else.

So he was— he's completely intensely focused on it. What's his kind of like superpower? So like, if yours is the ability to sort of like get inside the mind of the other person and read them and try to, try to be able to see through the cards, what's he— what's his superpower?

He was a very, like, he was quiet. He was a quiet assassin when he played, but he's paying attention to everything. He sees everything, right? So he'll sit in a game for cash and he'll see like 15, 20 minutes in the wrong guys are winning. Okay. What does that mean? The wrong guys are winning.

Okay.

Well, the wrong guys are winning means they're gonna play well. 'Cause sometimes when people are winning, they play well, and when they're losing, they're gonna go off for a big number. So sometimes he'd go down there and he plays for 15, 20 minutes. See, there's nothing here. And he'd leave. He'd go home. Or other days, he's there for 4 days without, you know, leaving his chair because he sees that they're vulnerable, right? Often in that environment, it's all a bunch of sharks. So let's say it's all sharks, right? So every shark is circling each other and they see one shark is wounded. Oh, one shark lost his tail. Ho ho ho ho, we're gonna rip this shark apart, right? It's a dog eat dog world in that sense. And he was the king of that. And still, you know, still, still has that killer sign of intensity. Yeah, I would say it's just his ability to, like, dial in and have, like, uber focus.

If you had to teach me, someone who frankly I've never even been to a casino really, how to, like, keep calm under pressure in these high-stakes games, you and Phil, I have you as my coach. We're going to spend like 3 days in a hotel before we go down, like, preparing, not not the actual like math or the cards, you know, what would you teach me? What would be my checklist on how to be calm in a stressful situation?

Yeah, well, first of all, virtually impossible. Okay. Like in a 3-day span, because here's the thing, it's an emotional thing, right? I mean, I would, you know, you can do like a meditative retreat, a yoga retreat, learn to get zen, you know, learn to get centered, all these types of things. But in 3 days entering an environment you've never really experienced before, dealing with that sort of stress, that's a you thing, right? Can, like, we could like set you right with, you know, explaining like it's all part of the, you know, there's, there's things you could probably do, but over 3 days to somebody that's completely new, I would say that you wouldn't be an easy, easy person to help in that regard. You're just gonna have to go through it on your own. Now that's different for people that have played the game for years, right? You know, I can, you know, get them to focus on The fundamentals of what they're doing, right? Are you making good decisions? Okay, let's focus on that. Okay, let's not become victims to the idea. They're like, oh man, I'm so unlucky. That, that does you no good. There's no value.

So being input focused, not output focused.

What are the most common leaks? 'Cause you've coached people and people ask you for advice for years. What are the most common leaks that like a smart, competent player still has that kills them, that's really hurting their, their game? So like, you know, they're, they're not at that beginner level, but they're sort of like, you know, intermediate and they are a smart person. They have enough talent. What leaks did they have?

Have you ever read The Inner Game of Tennis, Daniel? No. We talked about it on here, and what you're describing exa— is exactly that. So it's this amazing book. I, I don't play tennis, but it's about how to play tennis, but it's one of these books where it teaches you about life. And the concept of the book is basically that you have two selves. Self 1 is like the conscious, critical mind where you like judge yourself like, oh, that was a bad hit, that was a bad hand. Self 2 is like you don't think, you feel your body. And that when you like listen to your body and you don't judge yourself, that's oftentimes when hot streaks happen. So I think about— I don't know, Sean, I forget the phrase, but they call it in basketball where you're like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. You're like, you can't miss. And people always say, well, don't pull them out. Like, let them just go. And that's that moment where you're listening to self too, and you're just feeling it. And what you described is exactly that.

Golf too. Like, I don't know if you guys golf, but like when you golf, most people when they golf, they have a swing thought, something they're working on, you know, like, oh, get this. There's always a swing thought. But I remember one time when my swing thought was this. My swing thought was nothing from nothing is nothing, which means nothing. Just swing. I would literally go over the ball and in my head I'd sing this song. Nothing from nothing is nothing. You know, just let the body do it. 'Cause when you're over technical, overanalyzing and all that kind of stuff, it can actually be a detriment.

And that's true. Isn't that funny? You're describing this, you and this author are saying the exact same thing. That's so fascinating to me.

Yeah. And it's true in poker too. You're like, you're like, you see a move and you're like, oh, I don't know, but I, do I need to take this risk? I mean, I don't know. It seems kind of crazy. It might work, but it might not. Instead of just being like, and frankly, and this is a secret weapon that I don't use too often, but it really helps. Is alcohol. Okay? I'm not, I'm not pro— I'm not saying you should drink and play, but there was a guy named Bill Smith many years ago. They said when he was sober, he was the easiest, weakest player in the game. When he was drunk, he was just a sloppy mess. He couldn't win. But when he was just a little buzzed, my God, just a little drunk, they said he was the best player in the world. Right? Why would that be? Because with poker, alcohol can lower your inhibition a little bit. So you're gonna just go trust your instincts again. When I, you know, whenever I've done that, I feel like it's almost like a superpower. Because it allows you to sort of get past the, the fear and the rationalization for why you shouldn't take this risk. And that's all going against what your instincts are saying is gonna work, right? So having that little bit of, uh, but enabl— learning to, to create that and trust that without alcohol is the ideal goal. And, uh, that's what we all strive for. Uh, and I've been, I've actually gotten a lot better at that just naturally, just by just saying, okay, listen, if you think this is probably right, you know, forget about all these other reasons. I just thought, just do it, man. Just do it.

I'm writing this book right now on creativity and getting into creative flow. And in the research I'm looking at, I mean, writers and authors, it's amazing. These guys are drunks. These guys are all drunks. And they would wake up and they had this discipline part, which is wake up and immediately start writing. But they're like, yeah, our best work was also when we added this other habit where we wake up and right before we start writing, we do the whiskey part or, you know, we start drinking. And, and there's another analogy to this, which is actually kind of an interesting thing about napping. And so there's this, there's this famous study that was called the Paris Sleep Study. And it's similar, like you get in a state of mind where your inhibition is lower and you're basically, you don't self-censor. So we all have this sort of editor in our head, like in a game of tennis, like the guy, the ump sitting on the tower. We all have that sort of ump who's calling balls in and out. And when you say something, you censor. If you're If you're doing a golf swing, you start to think, you start to censor what you're, what you're doing. And if you can get that center to just shut up and trust yourself, you actually do a lot better. And so they did this thing in the Paris sleep study. They gave people a very complicated, um, pattern, like a math pattern, like a number pattern. And, you know, let's say 10% of people solved it right away. Great. You guys are done.

Congratulations.

Here's some chocolate. You guys are out. Um, the rest of the people, they basically let them work at it for something like an hour. And they were all like stuck. They're like, I can't see this pattern. I don't know what the hell it is. So they split the group into two rooms. They're like, hey, we're going to take a quick break, you know, sort of 20, 30 minute break. You guys go over here and hang out in the waiting room, do whatever you want. And they took the other group, the other half, and they put them in a— they said, hey, we'd like you to go ahead and take a nap. So you're going to lay down in a calm environment. You're going to take a nap. They took a nap for about 25, 26 minutes. And then when they woke up, they all went back in the room. And the group that had napped basically had a 3 times higher rate of just solving the problem right when they got in. And there's a state that, and there's all these great, and, you know, um, Edison used to nap and Einstein used to nap and all these guys used to nap and they would famously nap with like a spoon in their hand because they didn't want to sleep for a long time. They wanted to get into that state where you just start to fall asleep. And then when you fall asleep, you drop the spoon, it would clang, and then you'd wake up. And they would use that state, which is called a hypogogic state, where you actually are way more creative and you're, you're in a, uh, you can get into a flow much more easily than if you were just in your normal pattern.

That's super fascinating.

Yeah, that's wow. I mean, I, I'm, I was, my first thought was that just like, obviously sleep in general for poker is the most important thing. It's like, it's the ti— it's like if our mind is a computer, it's the time where it shuts down and it reboots and, you know, you downloads all the information so that you're ready to do it the next day. I remember hearing that with some, uh, they did similar things where they like did some tests with people where they had them, you know, do this test, um, morning, night, and then sleep, and then next morning. And you know, next, and the, the, the results the next morning were always better than, you know, the previous night or whatever. So I don't, I mean, I didn't know that napping could do that or this flow state or this state idea, but that sounds cool cuz I like, uh, I'm a big fan of naps. You know, when we used to go to Europe and play, you know, the jet lag thing, sometimes I'd be at the table with my, like, a head down and I keep a hand out and, you know, then I could feel the dealer throw the card on my finger and I'd start to wake up.

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You, you mentioned at the beginning, you said, I went to a course or a seminar about emotional intelligence. And, um, that's not what I expected you to say. That sounds like, you know, I don't know. I thought you would talk about poker and math and stats and all that stuff. That's pretty fascinating. Why did you go and what did you get out of that?

One of my biggest things that I've learned from Sean is, uh, I, for years I thought, well, I'm very good at that. I know that I am responsible for my own outcomes. I believe that fully. And one day I think I was in a bad mood and he was like, well, why are you in the bad mood? And I said, this person did this and it pissed me off. He's like, well, so you're, you're not responsible for your mood. What's going on? Like, this person just— and I— and that's when it, like, clicked. And frankly, it's still really hard, but it was like that was being having that internal locus of control isn't just for like making money or starting a business. It's also for how do I feel on the inside? And that was the biggest thing. Sean, what do you say? Like you have some like different version of someone living rent-free in your brain. Like you have all these like phrases where it's like—

The one that stuck with me, I went to, so I went to a Tony Robbins thing. It's very similar. Like I kind of intuitively knew, hey, like I'm a learner. I'm a curious guy. I always want to improve. Why would I not invest in this? Then I get there and he's like, all right, everybody stand up. I want to hear you. And I'm like, oh God, I'm here just for the learning part. I don't need to dance. Right? And then like 5 minutes in, I had a choice, a fork in the road. It's like, you're either going to play full out here. You're going to like do the experience or you're going to have to do the experience and get half the results. I was like, whatever, let me do this. Nobody here knows me.

I could just— we're dancing.

No, I actually love that. That's really good. 'Cause I think we, we all strive to be like, you know, be above that, but we're human, right? Like I get annoyed by the dumbest things. I'm gonna use that today. 'Cause I, like I said, I do streams where sometimes I'm sitting there and you get comments. I get thousands of comments like while I'm streaming and you know, the brain, I've already known this, but like we naturally gonna gravitate toward the negative comment. The one who calls me a bald idiot or whatever. So, I mean, I, so instead of like, I've learned this a long time ago, but like allowing that to affect you and to sort of, you know, divert the stream, it's like kind of like what they're wanting to do. But I've learned to just like sort of respond to positive reinforcement and good stuff and ignore it. But when, let's say for example, I play a hand and I lose and I'm already frustrated by the fact that I lost the hand, but I'm comfortable with how I played it. And then you read a bunch of armchair quarterbacks saying, oh, what an idiot. He just gave all his money away. That was terrible. You're, you're the worst. And I see that and I wanna go, oh really? Sam 65934, come here and say that to my face. How about that? I would bust you. I'd take all your money, dude. And I sometimes do that, but it's silly, like you said, cuz why am I allowing this?

Well, sometimes it feels good. Like I trick myself into thinking it feels good. And, and the reality is it doesn't feel good cuz I've like, check, I'm refreshing the page. I'm like, let me see the reply. Let me see. No, I can't go out to dinner yet. This guy on Facebook said something. I gotta wait for his reply.

I will say this though, I am a big fan of venting, like in the sense that, like rather than hold stuff in, you know, and let it bubble and let it fester, I laugh at myself sometimes when I act like an idiot. I'm like, I get mad about something dumb and I'm like, okay, that was okay. And then I could like very quickly after I can go, okay, that was stupid, but I got it off my chest. You know what I mean? Like I see the river card come and I lose. I'm like, what the hell is going on here? How did I lose this? Whatever. And I can laugh at how unhinged I was behaving. Is, but it's not going to be, you know, it's not, but it's now not something that I'm just going, okay, everything's fine.

Sure. Right. It's better than repressing.

I think there's some value in sometimes just letting it out.

Sean, you, you had that thing in, in the, in the 5-Tweet Tuesday the other day where it was, um, what was the name of it? It started with a K, something theory, which states that like if you write something down, if you, if you have a problem and you just take the—

Kinlan's Law was basically like, um, like a problem well-defined. Like if you write down a problem, you've already half solved it. Like if you actually can write it down accurately, what is the problem? You are already halfway to a solution at that point. Uh, Danny, I want to ask you about this one thing from that seminar, because when I was thinking about the Tony Robbins experience, they'll tell you something, but it's usually like an exercise you do. There's some like thing you do that you wouldn't have wanted to do, but now you're sitting in the room and you signed up to be there and you paid the money and now you're here. So you go ahead and you do it and you kind of have this like moment of enlightenment that really only happened because you were actually immersed in it. You actually did a thing versus just listening to like an idea. And you know it intellectually, but you didn't get to actually feel it. Did they do anything? Was there an exercise that stood out to you?

That's pretty impressive.

Yeah. You're doing coaching calls, you're doing all, you actually learn how to coach other people and you know, you sort of was speaking to this about, um, writing down stuff cuz that's part of it, you know, the idea behind journaling as well. But one of the things you, you know, on that note, like sometimes when I would coach other people, you find that like one of the questions you ask is like, say you came to me for coaching, for coaching on something and I said, well, how would you coach yourself on this?

Hmm.

Right? So then as you do that and you're like, well, I would probably tell myself this, this, this, and this, and this. And then you, I just look at you and go, there you go. Right. You already know the answer. Right. You know, it's just like, but a good coach, what they do is they help ask good questions that sort of help, you know, get you to a place where you may, I don't think a good coach is one that tells you what to do. A good coach is to set you up where you see, you tell me, you know, I'm, I'm, I'm helping you see what's possible so that you get there.

I like that a lot. When you, um, one of the things about poker is handling downswings. And I think that's not just a thing about poker, that's a thing about life. Now in poker, it's just very immediate and it's very, uh, quantified. I lost this much money just now. Um, my buddy, uh, back in college when I used to gamble, uh, a lot, my, uh, me and my buddy Dan, we would go to Vegas and we would go lose a bunch of money. And we, you know, every once in a while we'd make enough money to keep us coming back to Vegas, but most of the time I would say we, we didn't do well. And I just remember him, uh, the psychology of losing money is so— it gets you to act so strange. So one thing you were talking about was like you chase the loss, you know. I remember going back up to the room, he's going to the ATM machine, it's like, bro, don't do it, uh, but he wants to do it. And then, then he would lose money and then he would try to get the pit boss to like comp him a breakfast or the room to like just salvage some dignity out of it. Or he would come back to the room and he would use all the toiletries and wear the robe as if he was getting the value back out of what he just lost. And he would look in the mirror in the hotel. I remember he thought we were asleep. He just goes, 5 iPhones. You lost 5 iPhones. He's hating himself in the mirror. And I just remember thinking like, man, we focus so much time— me and him, we used to focus so much time on the strategy of how to win. And what actually we needed to be spending time on is the psychology of how to lose, because there were always going to be downswings and we handled them so poorly. That our strategies went out the window. And so I'm curious, Daniel, like, what is the strategy of handling adversity or these downswings? What do you tell yourself and what do you think is applicable to people outside of the world of poker?

The downswings are probably the most important part of, like, how you deal with them is the most important part of becoming a professional poker player. And for me, I learned over the years, you call them a breakdown, right? And typically with like a breakdown, things are going badly. That's an opportunity for a breakthrough. When things are going fine, right?

Mm-hmm.

You're probably not really delving that much into your strategy. You're like, okay, things are good, you know? But when things are going badly and things are going wrong, it requires you to be more introspective. You have to go, okay, what is really happening here? Let me dive deep. Is there, is what I'm doing working? You know, is my, is there anything I can do better? What strategies can I adjust? What strategies can I change? And those usually come from breakdowns, whether it's in Poker downswings or life, right? Like when you're in a downswing in, in your life with whatever else, that's an opportunity for a breakthrough. You either say, okay, this is the point where I'm at. Am I gonna accept where I'm at, you know, and just woe is me? Or is now the time to reinvent myself, to try a new, you know, a new angle or, or, or try to do things differently to get myself to a better place. And often, you know, people call it rock bottom, right? So if you're a, you know, an addict or something, you know, that's getting by. People look at that and say, well, this person's not gonna be helped until they hit rock bottom. 'Cause what's rock bottom? Rock bottom is the decision point. This is it, right? I'm either gonna die here like this or, you know, some change has to happen.

There's a, a quote from J.K. Rowling about this. I dunno if, have you guys ever heard her talk about rock bottom?

No.

What is it? So J.K. Rowling who wrote Harry Potter and, you know, billionaire author, right? Uh, so she said this thing about when she was— I think she had been, um, rejected. And so she said, I was set free because my greatest fear had already been realized. I was still alive, I still had a daughter I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea. And so rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.

That's beautiful. That's so well said. And yeah, essentially encapsulates what we're sort of talking about, where I think like the most impactful stages of your life. And like for me too, even with the, like going to that course, right? It required me to be in a place where I had that lost love, that breakup, that painful experience of, you know, losing someone that I loved. And I was at a, at a low point. So I went out and I said, okay, well let's do something. Then boom, completely shifted my relationship with that event. And then eventually became the man that could look past, you know, our differences back then and realize like, I'm responsible for this relationship working. And now we're happily married, you know? And I, and I constantly think of those things. Like it was one of those courses. I don't know if it's similar for you with the Tony Robbins thing, but, um, I still use in practice a lot of the things that I learned there on a daily basis. Like I'm not perfect by any stretch. I still have my bad times, but I, I recognize them more quickly. When I'm being an idiot or a jerk or arrogant or whatever, I notice it faster, you know? Yeah. And I'm able to shift out of it.

It's like, uh, I remember thinking afterwards, I was like, dude, I feel like Neo in The Matrix. But I, but I thought that was like, you know, Neo in Matrix, he's seeing everybody else, but it's actually just seeing yourself. It's like, you see, oh, I'm just acting this way because of this thing. Oh, I'm saying these words instead of saying, I have to go do this. I get to go do this. Right. Little shifts. Right? A little like two, two-word shift, right? Like, I, I gotta go, I have to go pick up my kids. No, I get to go pick up my kids from school right now on this bike. And we're going to spend time like, this is amazing. Um, you know, me 5 years ago, what, killed for this. And now it's a, now it's a have to, what's going on here? And so you get curious about those things. Um, so I totally, I totally agree with that. And, you know, I think we came onto this podcast thinking like, hey, there's going to be some poker lessons, you know, as in like, oh, we can learn about, you know, poker and the, the art of bluffing and reading and all of that. But You know, this turned into a podcast about the mind, right?

Right. Can I ask you about your content diet? What do you read and listen to on a daily or weekly basis? Because I find your attitude interesting and I want to like, I want to be inspired by the same things that inspire you.

Well, I'll tell you, I mean, nothing recently, but one of the books that I loved, it was such a simple book. It's by Don Miguel Ruiz. It's called The Four Agreements.

Yeah, I've heard a lot of people talk about it.

I'm terrible at that. Not just the timing thing, but the keeping your word to yourself. I'm pretty good actually about keeping my word to other people, but keeping my word to myself is like, well, I'm the judge, the jury, and the executioner. So, you know, I can always let myself off the hook. Like, I have a food coach, so I'm trying to get in great shape. And, you know, obviously I had a personal trainer, but most of getting in great shape is controlling, you know, what you eat. And so she calls me every day at, you know, 10:45 and she says like, hey, like, how did yesterday go? We have to talk through— it's food therapy basically for 10 minutes a day. Every morning. And in that, there's all, there's all these little things where it's like, I tell her, hey, I'm gonna do this. I'm deciding I'm gonna do this. I'm gonna have this at this time. And then tonight, I'm not gonna late night snack or anything. I'm gonna get to bed on time. Next day, uh, you know, I did, um, see the thing, but there was all these crackers out and like, I didn't even actually think about it, but like, I was actually kind of hungry. And there's all these compromises and she was just like, the amount of energy you're spending. She like let me kind of realize like, man, it's not about the crackers or the chips that you're having. Sure, that's not going to kill you. This chip's not going to kill you. But being the guy who breaks his word to himself all the time, like, that actually will kill you. You know, you will, you will like let yourself down and not even trust yourself because you don't believe what you say. And that has been like, like, ironically, like one of the things that I've struggled the most at and like I'm trying to overcome this year. And if I do that, it's like, wow, then I do learn to play the piano better and I do do better with my companies. I do do better with this because I become a type of person who I trust myself that if I say something, that's what it's going to be and that I won't renegotiate and relitigate these things myself. And the problem is I'm a very persuasive person, so I can persuade myself back into anything. But I don't want to use that, you know, use that, that skill against myself.

We have a bunch of guests on the pod like Sean and I aren't particularly like big, big investors or anything, but we love having investors on like, you know, we haven't had them on, but the most famous example of this is Warren Buffett and how he really can teach you about life via investing. And it's very evident that you are in that same category where it's not necessarily the poker thing that is the interesting part about you. Poker is just your vehicle for showing that you have mastery over your own emotions and your own, uh, and you, you're, you're a master in emotional intelligence. And so it's really cool to hear your perspective on these things because I'm not gonna play poker, but you've said of many, many things that will change my life just in a non-poker field.

Well, I appreciate you saying that. And like I said, I, I'm a big believer in sort of what you're saying is like looking at successful people, listening to how they got there. There's value in there. This isn't me telling you this is what you need to do with your life. I'm sharing what's worked for me. Right. And if you hear some of those things and you think, oh, you know what, that would be something that would be, you know, something beneficial for my life. That's kind of how I look at other successful people too.

We didn't get to talk about this, but I do want— in the research, this came up and I was like, that was really cool of him. So it's a compliment to you, which is, you were talking about the young players and you're like, I never wanted to be that guy who was the old head criticizing the way all the young players are playing now and how the— how it's ruined the game and blah, blah, blah. And you've talked about— you said something like, you know, I get really curious. I want to learn from them. I want them to coach me as much as I'm coaching them. And I thought, man, that's a great attitude. I see that in so many in basketball that happens. It's sort of always criticizing the younger generation and just saying like, they, you know, they don't get it, they've ruined the game, that it's all changed. It's not the same anymore. And I thought that was a pretty cool attitude you had. And I wanted to give you a compliment on that.

That's awesome. Daniel, thanks for coming on, man. Really appreciate it.

You got it, guys. It was fun.

All right. We appreciate you. That's it. That's the pod.

I feel like I can rule the world. I know I could be what I want to. I put my all in it like no days off on the road. Let's travel. Never looking back.