Overcoming The Opinions of Others To Achieve Your Wildest Dreams w/ Imane “Pokimane” Anys EP 1443

30:14And I was just always thinking of like, what should I do? do the quote unquote right thing. And it was only within the last like two years that I've, I'm really trying to rewire my brain to think about like, what do I want to do? All right. The wants instead of the shoulds. That's what my therapist said. He's like, you have a bad case of the shoulds. It's like, what do you mean? Stop thinking about what you should do. What do you want to do? Yeah. How has that been a struggle to kind of break the rules of what your parents want or you feel like your community wants and actually doing what you want yeah absolutely especially because when you fall into that feedback loop of like what do other people want of me you get validation from that right like oh i posted this thing and i you know calculated it to be what they would like and they liked it it worked right and then maybe you post what you want and they don't like it not as much and you're like craving that validation you know so it's for sure a part of the job that you need to manage so that you don't because if you keep feeding that beast oh it gets bigger but it is a part of the job as well so yeah how do you manage how do you how do you manage now dealing with ego and validation and also just feeling really good about you not doing something for ego or validation, but for you and also being able to impact people.

31:42How do you manage that? I, a lot of journaling. I plan on my whole life. Um, so basically, and also it's almost like I'm rehabilitating myself, like, you know, cognitive behavioral therapy. I feel like I do that to myself. For example, instead of posting something and immediately looking at like, are people liking this? What are they commenting? How is it performing? Et cetera, et cetera. If I know it's something that I liked and that I feel good about, or I feel like it's going to reach and resonate with the right people, I just let it go. And I try to just forget about it. So I'm almost like training myself to not crave that feedback loop as much.

32:27The dopamine hit. Yes. And not be so tied to the results. So that and instead setting other goals for myself. Because the thing about validation from other people, frankly, to me, it was like a school rubric. And for a long time, I'm like, I wish with content creation, you could get a rubric. Like, am I doing good enough? The numbers never stop going. So what is good enough? And even maybe people climbing like the corporate ladder might be able to relate. It's like, when are you supposed to feel enough or in any aspect, right? Whatever you're optimizing, how do you know it's enough? So figuring out what is, make your own rubric, make your own goals, as opposed to following what is maybe more traditional, whether that's like, what does success look like to others or just focusing on like monetary value, things like that.

33:21Figure out what you actually want to optimize or reach. Yeah. Do you feel enough right now? luckily yes I want to say yes um I feel like I am reaping the rewards of like I feel like a year or two of trying really hard to work on myself so that I don't keep being the same version of myself that I was all of these years not that that was a bad version but I just feel like you know the beautiful thing about life is that it's so dynamic and you can choose who you want to be at any point just by changing the decisions that you make, right? Because we are kind of just like a culmination of our decisions.

34:03Absolutely. Yeah. So it took a lot of thinking and planning of like, what do I want the next phase of my life to be? Because I can a hundred percent keep streaming every day forever. I don't know. But I felt like I wouldn't change at all. I wouldn't grow as a person. I wouldn't experience new things. So how do I make this change? How do I let go and try something new. Right. What was the biggest thing you had to rewire in your brain in the last couple years? What was that shift that you had to really transform to get you to the current place you're at now? We're all work in progress, but to be where you are right now, what did you rewire?

34:42For sure, just like, I'm so type A. I mean, studying engineering, I'm just always thinking about optimization. Optimize, optimize. That's why, you know, I'm a content creator. I work with algorithms and stuff, right? So I think letting go of that a little bit and recreating new goals has been difficult, but very worthwhile because you can find like what you find fulfilling might change over years, right? So figuring that out constantly. When do you feel the most loved and the most enough? I think it was really, really important for me to find ways to recreate those sentiments that are not relating to my work.

35:32And like really carving out a private life, like good relationships with friends that I trust. And that is actually such a priority for me. I think with them, I feel very loved and enough. And also when I put myself out there in a way that I know is not optimized to my audience, but people still really enjoy it. That means a lot to me. Yeah. So you're not trying to do what they want or what the algorithm is telling you to do, but you're just like, you know, I want to talk about this. I want to create this type of content. And here's what's on my heart and my soul and my mind. Put it out there.

36:10And maybe it's not the biggest thing ever, but it still does well. Yeah. or some people say like oh it it really resonated with me or i took this away and have implemented it into my life that is so fulfilling makes me feel good do your parents actually know what you do now yes because it took my parents my whole family probably i don't know until two years ago to know what i was doing because they're like what do you do with this online marketing thing this part what is this how do you make money you know once my mom's a teacher so once her students pieced it together and they started calling her pokies mom then she started getting it she stopped telling me to go back to school that's right not pokemon the pokies mom yeah that's hilarious it's so cute she's like i get a lot of benefits at school from being your mom i'm like good you deserve them you've sacrificed so much for me as you should you know that's amazing but they're thinking a few years yeah when you were like when you finally said they still don't really understand streaming they can get around like youtube videos tiktok streaming is still a little bit of a bubble yeah yeah but how long because you essentially quit college so how long until they were like okay you don't need to go back like we get it you're okay on your own you're not gonna starve and be alone the rest of your life how many more years was that after you paused college?

37:34Four or five? Wow. A while. I would say maybe four. Four years of like, everything okay? Are you coming back? You need some money. Yeah. Even now, I paid for my parents' retirement and my mom will still be like, do you need some money? But it's really, really sweet. And frankly, I feel like the biggest privilege I've had in life was having caring and attentive parents regardless of like oh were they kind of strict did that make me feel like whatever they were there for me they cared they like they loved me a hundred percent and even when I like ran off to LA to do god knows what they still always told me like if all else fails you have a bed in our home with us like you can always come back here and I feel like that's something that everybody deserves.

38:32And it like, it hurts my heart and soul so much that it just feels so unfair that some people don't have parents that treat them that way. I don't know. I'm like, can I treat you that way? I'll make an extra bed for you. Right. Right. But yeah, it feels like genuinely the greatest privilege I've had. Oh, that's cool. what decision have you made that you're the most proud of frankly um

39:04persevering through very difficult weird online situations really yeah there were a lot of times where like as the number one twitch female streamer i was put in a position where i really didn't want to be not that position in particular but just like being talked about in certain ways either like people being inappropriate towards me or like sexualizing me when I really didn't want to be or spreading rumors or this and that especially on like a like a large stage in front of communities and communities and whatever happened um doing my best to react in like the right way, in a way that would make other women in the space feel safe.

39:57And I think the messages that I still get to this day of people like being grateful for that means the world to me.

40:07Yeah. So when you were, when you were facing some of these difficulties, you know, the ego wants to defend, it wants to react, it wants to... And sometimes I did. And then I had to apologize for that. It wants to, you know, say what it needs to say. It wants to, you know, whatever it might you want to do. Right? You know, it wants justice. Yeah. It wants fairness. It's like, this doesn't feel fair. It's not fair. It's not right. That's not true. This is, why did they do this? So how did you respond in a, I guess, conscious way that people still talk about today? How was that response? I think when you're in tough situations like that, especially when you feel that ego kicking in, you need to get advice from other people.

40:57People that you trust, people that you know will give you an honest answer. And don't get advice from one person. Ask like 10 people, you know? So don't just jump on video and say how you feel right away. Been there, done that. Not the best idea. But really formulating like how do I want to go about this? And as I said before, like, if I was in the audience instead of in my shoes, how would I want to see my favorite content creator or someone that I look up to respond or react? You know, what would I find inspiring? What would I find benefits this ecosystem as a whole of like live streaming of gaming this community?

41:40how can I make a good impact when I know people are watching or are waiting for my answer right how many people are on the the streaming twitch world oh many how many million people are on the platform I'm not even aware well I have like nine million followers so more than that right um and how many how many people just to give context because I'm assuming a lot of people who watch or listen to this, my community isn't on Twitch as much. What is, like, what is the top people on Twitch? How many live viewers will they have on an average day? Well, Twitch has gone through, like, its ups and downs.

42:21So, like, the peaks were, like, 50, 100 ,000 viewers. Live. Yeah. For some of the top people. For you as well? When everybody was at home during the pandemic, yeah. I've had numbers like that, which is insane. 100 ,000 people watching live. What, like, you can't even fathom that. Yeah. Right. Football stadium. Exactly. But nowadays it's calmed down a little bit. And it's more so people who are like really dedicated to watching. So like probably the top live streamers maybe have like 50 ,000. I'm around like 10 ,000, which is still like a ton. I feel like that was like, I hit one to 5 ,000. I'm like set for life.

42:57Like that's fine. Right. And then you get into it and you're like, the way that it can snowball is crazy. Wow. And what is the strategy moving forward for you with business, branding, with managing, you know, this community and this audience and kind of reinventing yourself? What's the vision you have moving forward? As I said before, I've just like written down a bunch of mantras that I want to live my life according to. What are those? some are just like i mean if i had my phone i'd tell you by the way but um like for example instead of just focusing on content that either i know people will like or that is like optimized for the algorithm or whatever balancing that balancing that with an equal amount of content that is for like a specific community of people that i want it to resonate with Like every piece of content doesn't need to be a banger.

43:55Sometimes you just want to cultivate a community or tell like-minded people how you feel, what you think, make them feel like they're not alone. And sometimes that's not everyone and that's okay, right? It's more so about, again, creating that community of people that you will be proud to be a part of. Yeah. And what about the business that you have going forward? Is it less streaming and so therefore potentially less revenue there and you're trying to generate revenue in other places? What's that strategy for you? Yeah. So it was a little bit twofold making that decision. Because you're not streaming all the time anymore, right?

44:35Not anymore, no. I'll stream maybe like two, three times a week as opposed to like almost every day kind of thing. Still six hours or a little less? I'll do like four to eight hours, something like that. But half the week. Yeah. Yeah. Which is different. And I'm working on other projects. As you know, like when your income is directly tied to your time, it's not very scalable and it can be very tiring if you're trying to optimize how much you make, right? Well, it's all on you too. It's like the energy of your face, your persona, your brand, you've got to be on constantly. Yeah. And as I mentioned before, I love the business marketing aspect of everything.

45:18So interesting to me. So I'm in the works. I have a project that will launch when it launches. Sure. And that's been such a fun, like passion of mine. And I wouldn't have had the time to pursue it if I didn't actively make the decision to, you know, stream less and explore other things. but for a long time it was really hard especially as I said like coming from an immigrant family or like being an immigrant it's like the number one thing is to make it financially and like pay back your parents and that has always been like such such a heavy factor in my decision making that to rewire that was a little bit difficult and again I'm I'm so lucky to even be able to make the decision not to.

46:09But I'm sure I'm not the only one out there. Like I find there's probably a lot of people who end up working so hard in one direction. For example, especially like the corporate ladder. And then you wind up somewhere where maybe you're making good pay, but you might not be as happy as you thought you were. So what do you do then? Right. And I feel like, I feel like there were like different seasons of my life and I intentionally decided to make one season like the the season of like i would just grind let me just grind until i'm financially stable enough to do whatever i want so that was even having that opportunity is very lucky again it's very difficult for me to talk about these things because i don't want to come off like out of touch um or privileged even though being a content creator you frankly just are.

47:02But speaking frankly, that was just a decision that I decided to make. I was like, I'm going to make less money so I can have a more fun life. But before that, I'm going to grind my ass off. So yeah, my parents don't have to worry. I don't have to worry. That's amazing. Well, you wanted to have more peace, more harmony, more balance in your life. And I think, you mentioned being a content creator is a privileged life. And I think for some, I think there's a lot of content creators that don't make any money that don't have either the timing, the talent, the skill, you know, the, the drive that you've had where it's really popped off and worked for you.

47:38Some people try and it doesn't work for whatever reason. And there's a lot more people that, that, that struggle, um, trying to make a living from content. I think it's a challenging thing. So if you need to be able to do what you've done is inspiring and impressive, but it sounds like you figured out, you know, you can't keep doing the same grinding thing thing nonstop. For some people they can. And if that makes them happy, right. You know, all the more power to them. I'm curious, you've had a, you know, eight, nine years of kind of experience in the streaming world and just reinvented yourself a few different times and grown and, you know, been to therapy and all these, had some hardships and dealt with some stress.

48:15You didn't feel like you belonged or fit in at times. If you could go back to your 16 year old self and give three pieces of advice before you kind of jumped into this world of streaming and online personality to set her up for success, what would you say to her? I would actually start off by saying like, disarm yourself a little bit, you know, apologizing is not a bad thing. sometimes things may feel unfair but not everything is about what's fair or not life in general is not fair um so take a moment like anytime you feel defensive or reactive it's much better just take a moment i also like to think like i don't dwell on this kind of question too much because i'm like what if i this what if i that would i go back and change this decision.

49:16At the end of the day, I'm like, as cheesy as it sounds, I really do view every mistake as like a learning lesson. That's also how I cope. I'm like, I might've made that mistake, but I learned from it. What else can I do? So you just let it go. Definitely that would be number one. Number two is like, try very hard to stay true to yourself. But that's also, that's a lesson and you learn. Sometimes you stray too far one way and you're like, I don't really feel like me. Then you, you know, you're back a little bit throughout life probably. And lastly is probably to prioritize your health as much as you can.

50:01Physical, mental, in whatever ways that you can because that's the number one limiting factor of anything you want to accomplish. Right? For those who look up to you and whether it be young women or men that are like, I want to get into streaming. I want to make this a full-time career or content creation. What's the one thing you would have people do with an hour a day before they did any of their content? If you could have an hour to do this one thing to set yourself up for a better life, what would that be? Before making more content? Before you start, yeah, before you're 10 hours a day grinding and just going for five to 10 years, if you had to carve out an hour a day for something else, what would that be?

50:48Honestly, before your day, get some sunlight, 10 minutes, meditate, 10 minutes, and have a well-balanced meal, 10 minutes.

51:02Honestly, move your body somehow. That's those four things and your quality of life will improve significantly and you will be minimizing the downsides of however hard you want to work right yeah because i feel like there's a lot of i mean i see the younger generation and i see a lot of them just either on their phone for 10 to 15 hours a day and it looks like they're either consuming tiktok or snapchat or twitch or whatever or just messaging their friends all day. Or they're on a screen, you know, some type of screen. And I just feel like I see the power of using social media. It's what I've done to build my business as well, but I also know how powerful it is to disconnect every day.

51:49Not just powerful, I think necessary. I wish there was more education surrounding that topic, especially for the younger generation, parents nowadays, who have to figure out how to manage their kids' relationship with these devices. It's all very new territory, but people need to be very, very cognizant of the ways that it can shape your mind. And I mainly speak to this, especially for young girls, because I know how detrimental it can be to their self-perception, their confidence, all of these things. Yeah. What do, what does looking at yourself, looking at other women on social media or streaming with filters and, you know, modification apps do to young women?

52:50it makes you feel not right you know i feel like we're constantly being told whether we recognize it or not when we see something repeatedly and we see something be praised repeatedly we know oh this is what's right and anything that doesn't look like that is wrong wow and so i think it's very important to one be wary of who you follow are you diversifying who you follow are you following them because of how they look because of what they say what are the reasons for that and are those reasons good um and then two i just implore people to spend more time in real life frankly because online you you see a lot of the same but when you're just walking around real life you see what real bodies look like what people look like up close.

53:42We all have wrinkles and spots and this and that, and not everybody's flat stomached. And even the people who post photos like that at some point are not like after a big meal. So like, yeah, go to the gym, see real people working out with those things actually look like. Otherwise, our entire, our perception is just a culmination of what we see. If all that we see is optimized, filtered, modified in some way, it's not realistic. So make sure to spend an equal amount of time in a more realistic environment. Has that affected you at all, seeing other women, you know, on social media with filters and everything else?

54:21For sure. And I mean, partially just as a viewer or as an audience or a woman in her 20s, you know, it's like, oh, this kind of style is praised a lot. Should I do this? Should I do that? And then secondly, as a content creator, like, oh, people really like this kind of look. Would it be optimizing my business to look this way? You get what I mean? There's so many levels to it. And I think going down that rabbit hole too much, one, hurts your brain. And two, honestly detracts from the fun and more like fulfilling parts of content creation, which is like making someone happy. or putting something out that means a lot to me as opposed to focusing too much on appearances.

55:07It can be hard sometimes. Yeah, sure. Yeah, so I've had like anytime I feel my brain getting caught up in that a little bit too much, I'm like, okay, let's reel it back. Let's reevaluate how much time I'm spending online, what I'm thinking about, the kind of content that I consume. That's really important too. Right. Yeah, like you said, your whole TikTok is motivational stuff. It is, motivational. And so that's what your brain is going to be all about and the things that you talk about is going to be all about that too. Exactly. I'm curious about your perspective on money. You started making really good money in your late teens, early 20s.

55:42More than 99.9 % of people in their late teens and 20s in the world probably. How did that affect you? Making, you know, more money than your peers, most of your peers at a young age. and what is the dark side of making money for someone who's really young? Well, I don't want to act like it's such a detrimental thing, you know? Yeah, because, I mean, I started streaming when I was in high school, didn't make much. In college, was still in debt for like two years and then it started taking off. And then maybe two, three years after that, I started making significantly more, like more than what a doctor makes.

56:27And then for like two, three years, it was much, much more that I could have ever imagined. So initially it was, it was really just like step by step. Like I'm just looking to have like a part-time job. Basically, I can make a little bit of money here while studying engineering. Cool. Then I was like, wait, if I focus on this for a couple months, I can pay off my student loans. Cool. And then frankly, for me, my dream in life was always to make six figures. Because that's like what a doctor makes. Sure, sure. Let's go. And I really felt like at that point, I was like, okay, I'm good. But it felt like the expectation in life is to optimize that.

57:18So when you see the opportunity, right, it's like, go for it, go for it. but at some point it's like you don't really realize what you're sacrificing or if you should keep going for it um and I I think there were a lot of times where I just put like my health and my mental on the back burner because I was so fixated on like I need financial stability and just like with anything else it can get like it just becomes a habit, almost like addicting. It's like, okay, need to focus on this. And I just, I lost sight of, again, like, what do I want? What actually makes me happy? And it's like, there was such a scarcity sentiment.

58:03Yeah. I mean, even with content creators, it's like, you don't know where your career is going to be in a year or two. Right. What if the algorithm changes? What if they cancel my account? What if, Who knows, right? Yeah. I'm not going to say that there were crazy downsides aside from things that I had to figure out myself, right? Like how to really manage my life and my business structure. But I do feel like sometimes to my peers, maybe they viewed me differently knowing that. Really? How so? Well, I think depending on the person, it might be something that they judge you off of. How much money you're making?

58:47Yeah. Really? Yeah. I think for some people it can be inspirational, but for some people it's like, oh, you're over there and I'm here kind of thing. But it's like, oh, I don't come from money. Like, I'm not like that man. Yeah. Which I understand, right? Everybody makes assumptions based off of what they might know about someone. But I also think the lifestyle that I was leading when I wanted to save up as much as I could, take care of my parents, do this, do that, that lifestyle was also isolating. Really? Oh yeah, for sure. How so? It's just work, work, work all the time. And when you're optimizing for work or for financials, everything else is on the back burner.

59:33And it takes so much effort to like, oh, wait, I need to keep up with friends. I need to create a friend circle. I need to do this. I need to do that. Even taking care of like your health. It's so easy to set everything else aside when you're focused on career goals. Right. Now it sounds like you didn't, you weren't raised with a ton of money, but you had money, you had a home, you had, you know, opportunities, but you weren't having this rich lifestyle growing up as a kid, right? Not at all. I feel like, you want to know how I learned like really the value of a dollar? Sure. Which in hindsight, I'm so glad that I did.

1:00:08I've had like numerous jobs before streaming. My very first one was, I was like, I was a newspaper delivery girl. Nice. In Canada. Yeah. I've always had like a very mathematical optimization kind of mindset. And I would make maybe like a hundred dollars every two weeks or something. And I would do it like two, three times a week. And I had this kind of a route and I did meet everything up to be like, okay, every time I drop off a newspaper, that's five cents. Yeah. So I'm like five cents, five cents, five cents, five cents. Yeah. So that was, I mean, that was great. And I was so excited, you know, cause I didn't get like, um, what do you call it when your parents give you money?

1:00:50like entitled or allowance an allowance I didn't have like an allowance or anything like that so for me to have money to spend on my own that was the only way like go get a job so I was like 13 years old five cents five cents but it was so exciting to be able to do something on my own to exchange my time and labor for any amount of money right and then you start thinking okay how can I optimize this? Let me ride a bike. It's a little bit faster. And then, you know, a couple years later, you're able to work elsewhere. You also divvy that up. So. What, when, I mean, how did you learn how to manage money when it started to come in, in abundance really, and more and more because you grew up, you know, five cents at a time with newspapers to six and seven figures and beyond.

1:01:40How did you handle it? Like, how did you manage it, handle it and not be scarce with it still, but think abundantly? Or was there a period of still scarcity? Because you're like, I don't know if this is going to keep coming in. So... I think I was very lucky that everything came like one step at a time, you know, from that one newspaper job to getting a part-time job, to getting a full-time job, to streaming, to... Incremental. Yeah. Everything was incremental throughout my whole life. So I've been able to have a bit of an adjustment period. When I started making like pretty good money, I mean, I'm very lucky.

1:02:18My dad raised me well. He like got me a bank account at like 13. Even if there's not much in it, it's like, this is your bank account. This is how much you have. You should have a savings account. You should have a checking and, you know, rule of thumb, try to save at least this much percentage of your money. So I was always very considerate of these things, no matter how much I made. It's like, I need to be saving at least, let's say like half of my income and your, your spending money should only be like this portion. And having that mindset already going into it allowed me to not spiral too much one way in terms of scarcity or spiral too much one way in terms of let me just spend, spend, spend, spend, spend.

1:03:01Right. And I also, um, I try to be very experimental Again, I feel like I've learned so much in school, engineering, but experimental in the sense that I would experiment on spending on different things. If I spend a lot more on a video, what does that return look like? If I invest in myself in terms of my health, if I get a trainer, if I invest more in like nutrition, therapy, what are the things where I get the most return and that are actually very helpful? and some things don't make that large of a difference like frankly as much as i love clothes and fashion it's like some shirts if it's good quality it could be 50 dollars if it's 500 dollars is it gonna make that much of a difference no but honestly um leveling up with like therapy that was huge nutrition health yeah my therapist is like yeah he's he's honestly like partially a life coach um very very worthwhile any sort of health investment i've made most investments in myself, I feel paid off a lot.

1:04:09So I started prioritizing that investments in that in my business. And I feel like looking at it very holistically is what helped me. That's beautiful. I love that. Investing in yourself is never a bad investment. 1000%. And honestly, just try stuff. Experiment. Experiment almost like very considerably and safely. Like I'm going to try this intentionally and I will jot down how it goes. Should I keep doing it? Yes. No. Yeah. Right. I've got a few final questions for you. This has been fascinating amount. I appreciate you. So by the way, feel free to ask me anything about like the streaming space.

1:04:46I love talking to people who have no idea what it's about. So if you have like weird question, I'll see what I can come up with. I'm curious. I wanted to ask you first about how to navigate relationships while being a streamer, while being a big personality, live streaming all day. You've got a massive community watching you constantly, subscribe to you everywhere. How do you build relationships with friends and intimate relationships over the last 10 years so that you can create harmony in relationships and not stress? I mean, it's for sure a learning process. And frankly, just like anything else that's worthwhile, good friendships and relationships require effort, like regular communication, time with each other.

1:05:40um and I think during perhaps the most like successful parts of my life I mean people say it a lot but it can also be the loneliest but now when I feel successful because I spend so much time building out these relationships I can try to like maximize both at once but you really really need to be intentional with those things. Otherwise, it's hard to have those deep, deep relationships. And how do you manage an intimate relationship with, you know, working nonstop and having this big audience or, I don't know, people being jealous or not? Like, how do you manage that? I think compartmentalizing time is helpful, you know?

1:06:27You're like, if I want to manage these relationships that mean a lot to me. I need to create time and space for them. Um, especially with any friends that I have that aren't in the public eye, it's about having that conversation of like, are you comfortable being in these things or not? Um, seeing like in the live streams, or anything in vlogs, in photos. I think sometimes people can be a little bit like worried, obviously or like unsure because it's such a new space and it's very easy living in LA you'll always meet people who are a little bit too excited to be in front of the camera and you can tell maybe that's their priority in the friendship yeah so I think communications helped me I mean it's just the key to making sure that you're on the same page with anyone and ultimately creating very specific times when I'm on I'm Pokimane I'm working I'm doing whatever and very specific times when I'm off.

1:07:26And if I get along really well with someone when I'm just being me, there's no cameras, no nothing, no nothing to benefit from. And we develop a beautiful friendship relationship based off of that. That's how I know I can carry that into my public life if they're comfortable with it. Sure, sure. Do you feel pretty safe in LA? Like as a street, you mentioned before, like the streaming world's like a different type of, I wouldn't say crazy, but fanatics, right? Like if people, if they're watching you six, 10 hours a day, they're probably really like into you in certain ways and get to feel like they get to know you and you're their best friend and all these things.

1:08:02It gets parasocial sometimes. Parasocial? Yeah, that's the term we use quite a bit. What does that mean? It just means when people, it's a one-sided relationship essentially. If someone is watching you for eight hours a day, it's easy for them to feel close to you, but you don't know them at all. so they might come up to you like oh my god hey act like your best friends you're like you're a stranger to me so it's such an interesting does that happen a lot for you is it different in LA because celebrities everywhere and people are more like true chill about it luckily I feel like um general understanding and yeah knowledge or education around these parasocial relationships has gotten a lot better so even from like the viewers perspective.

1:08:49They're like, oh, we need to be considerate of these things. We need to approach people respectfully. So nowadays, to me, people are really, really nice. That's good. Yeah. I have had some like security concerns. People always want to find out where you live, what you're doing, who you're with, these kinds of things. But frankly, the less that I stream, again, a very like connected, long format type of content, the less of these issues I have. and I've tried very, very hard. I'm eight years into this. I've set those boundaries publicly. I figured out like, what are the things and topics that I should avoid so that people don't get too curious?

1:09:30What are things that you keep to yourself? I don't even like, I can't post photos like outside of my window. To show anything. It's just a wall. Sometimes I'll move in somewhere and I'll like paint the place differently. I'll get things removed, things changed to make sure it doesn't match anything online. Wow. Yeah. I mean, it's been quite the learning experience just to avoid any sort of security concerns. Yeah. Wow. What is the psychology of being really great on Twitch and live streaming? Like, what is the psychology to make someone a great streamer to build a bigger audience? I think... I mean, I hate to say it, but we really are all people pleasers.

1:10:13to some degree we are um we just want like that positive viewer reaction and feedback loop especially with the chat uh i think people who learn quickly adapt are great because it's interesting you can look at your chat as like constant feedback and if you take that in properly, you optimize how you are as a streamer, how you talk, what you say, what you do, what do people react positively to. Um, so I would say that, and people who just have a big personality and like to talk. I mean, you have to talk the whole time, basically. Yeah. Do those things. Yeah. Do those things. And you have an opportunity, a chance.

1:11:00That's amazing. Um, a couple of final questions for you. This is a question I ask everyone towards the end. It's called the three truths question. So imagine a hypothetical scenario. I'm going to put this in your context. Twitch and streaming is still massive, a hundred years away, but it's your last day on earth. And you have done and created everything you want to create in your life. You've had the life of your dreams. You've accomplished everything. I sure hope so. Relationships, family, fun, all these different things you've had. but for whatever reason all the content you've ever created no one has access to anymore it has to go to the next place wherever you go after we we die um but you get one final live stream and this piece of content will stay in this world forever wow and you only get to share three lessons that you've learned from your life if you could imagine this future scenario what would be those three lessons or what I like to call three truths that you would share if you were streaming live your final time and there was no other content to watch of you.

1:12:10The first thing I would say is that I feel like compassion is the key to humanity. so cultivate that treasure it utilize it as much as you can put yourself in other people's shoes talk to other people all the time no one is below or above anyone else we all lead such cool unique individual lives right that's such a beautiful thing and something that i find a little bit difficult about the internet is that sometimes it removes that humanity like oh you're just a person you're one sentence you're one comment you're one 15 second clip but everyone you encounter online or in person have like a whole backstory to them and that is what really informs their behaviors good or bad or whatever right i think that's just something that's good to keep in mind.

1:13:14I don't know. Two, I'd probably say something about gratitude. Another thing that I feel requires a lot of cultivating

1:13:31because we live in a really, really cool day and age where we have access to so much. But sometimes I feel like as humans, we weren't meant to. it's like these neurons start like firing a little bit too much your brain becomes a little bit fried and it's easy to lose sight of things and gratitude above all else is what's going to keep you grounded and maintaining some type of contentment no matter what life you lead

1:14:04and lastly i just hope everybody's happy and healthy and has a good life and like take care myself it'll be so hard you're like i'm gonna disappear this is the last thing i can say yeah honestly at the end of my stream i like to just wish everyone well like drink some water go for a walk do something good for yourself today take care i'll see you in the next one yeah and then never come back really um i mean you can you can go on and on about like deep lessons and this and that. But take care of yourself and tend to the garden you can touch. The people around you that you see treat them well. You don't have to worry about every problem in the world.

1:15:00Just help those that you can help. Take care of each other. of yourself. Yeah. You sound like a true life coach. I like it. You've got a lot of wisdom for your youth. All the mantras I have in my journals. Exactly. I've got another final question for you and I want to see where we should follow you and support you, how we can support you in a second. But I want to acknowledge you for a moment because I think it's really hard when you're in the public eye as a young age and have a lot of audience and have a lot of pressure, a lot of great stuff happening, but also some, some challenges to face money, all these different things that you just feel like you're in a very solid place right now.

1:15:39And I acknowledge you for acknowledging that you might have different breakdowns in your past and saying, what can I do to pause and get some support and go to therapy, get coaching, get advice. I really acknowledge you for that. Cause I think it's hard for anyone to want to go to therapy. I've been doing it for years. I love it. It brings me a lot of peace, especially the youth. I think it's hard to acknowledge when, hey, I'm not doing so well. I've got some breakdown. Let me get some support here. So I really acknowledge you for doing that and talking about it. And I also acknowledge you for reinventing yourself to do what fills you up.

1:16:13Not just what makes me the most money or what other people want me to do, but what also fills you up. So I really am inspired that that's where you're at in this stage of your life. And I acknowledge you for that. Thank you so much. You are an amazing listener and conversationalist. I feel like you really just summarized the last year of my life. That's good. That's good. Thank you so much. Before I ask the final question, how can we follow you, support you? Where are you going to be hanging out the most online? I've been having a lot of fun posting random TikToks. On TikTok, I'm P-O-K-I. Pokey, that's it.

1:16:47But feel free to look me up anywhere. P-O-K-I-M-A-N-E. On Instagram, I like to post day to day. Twitch, if you want to check out some live streams, I read. I mean, this is probably my greatest and oddest life skill. When I stream, it doesn't matter how many messages are in chat. I genuinely can read all of them. Wow. Yeah. You can game and read. You can play and... Yes, a little bit. But even if it's going super, super fast, I just... You see it all. Yeah. I mean, you just learn. Doing something for 10 years, that's probably the oddest skill that a live streamer has. it's like you can skim books super quickly, but chat messages instead.

1:17:29So that's my most fun way to be like, wow, I can essentially meet or interact with a human being just like if they tune into my live stream. That's amazing. Yeah. And answer anything. And then YouTube more so for like bigger moments. So whatever you're interested in, go sports. We'll follow you everywhere. Pokey. Appreciate that a lot. Thank you so much. Pokey everywhere. Make sure you guys follow. Final question for you. What is your definition of greatness? My definition of greatness is someone who is secure in what they find fulfilling and what brings them joy. And they pursue that with all their might.

1:18:11I hope today's episode inspired you on your journey towards greatness. Make sure to check out the show notes in the description for a rundown of today's show with all the important links. And if you want weekly exclusive bonus episodes with me as well as ad-free listening experience, make sure to subscribe to our Greatness Plus channel on Apple Podcast. If you enjoyed this, please share it with a friend over on social media or text a friend. Leave us a review over on Apple Podcast and let me know what you learned over on our social media channels at Lewis Howes. I really love hearing the feedback from you and it helps us continue to make the show better.

1:18:46And if you want more inspiration from our world-class guests and content to learn how to improve the quality of your life, then make sure to sign up for the Greatness newsletter and get it delivered right to your inbox over at greatness.com slash newsletter. And if no one has told you today, I want to remind you that you are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And now it's time to go out there and do something great.