The right people are the key
After streaming for 150 days in a row, 6 hours on average each day, I finally had a weekend off.I went to the RaiseYourEdge Vienna meet-up! To simply put it: it was awesome! The food, drinks, hotel, karting... it was great. But there is one thing that was the most important thing by far: the people.
We started the meet-up with a meet and greet, everybody got to tell their stories and that on it's own was already really inspiring. There are/were a lot of people who didn't have people around them that shared the same passion and mindset and that is one of the reasons lot of them came to the meet-up. They realized that having likeminded people around you, people that are going through the same stuff as you are, people that have already accomplished what you aspire to be, is one of the most important keys to success. It is a catalyst. But the only way it is going to work, is when you are in an environment where you cannot only talk about your strengths but more importantly your "weaknesses" without being judged. The reason why I put it between quotation marks, is because the majority of people think they are weaknesses while they do not have to be. Life is up and down, if your lifeline is flat, you are dead. If you put your downs away as weaknesses and don't talk about them, it is very unlikely you will be able to help yourself let alone others to help you to improve them. You need to embrace the downs and not shy away from them, there is nothing to be ashamed of because everybody has the downs, just some are better at coping/hiding them which causes lots of stress and anxiety.
What RaiseYourEdge has done really well and what I am trying to do on stream as well, is creating an environment that allows you to open up so you can work on improving yourself rather than masking it and allow others that have gone through the same to give you advice and help you. This is so much more effective and powerful than what nowadays is the norm, where people act like life is great and they don't struggle, just so that they do not get judged. On the outside they look happy, but on the inside they are crippled. That shit is broken and needs to change.
People were connecting and sharing, like family, like they knew eachother for years. To accomplish this, RYE and to be honest the same for me, have to sacrifice some growth. Because like I say, some people do not see the bigger picture, they see sharing the downs as a weakness and judge and leave. But I am so happy that RYE has in that regard the same vision as me, where quality is sometimes more important than quantity, that depth is sometimes more important than width and I am really grateful for that and I think with me everyone that attended the meet-up but also people that didn't make it to the meet-up but do share the same vision.
Seeing people grow, not just as players but as persons... is so motivating and inspiring. I happily give some growth up for that. I want to continue surrounding myself with likeminded people, helping eachother to achieve goals and get the most out of life. I am thankful for everyone that shares this with me, that realize all this, life, is more than just poker. This is just the beginning, let's continue to crush and help eachother grow.