E387 | Mike Reiner (432 Legacy), Fred Destin (Stride) & Rupda: Founder-VC dynamics & deep personal work impact on our relationships

Welcome back everyone to the European EasyBockhouse. Today I have what I think, at least for me, is most important episode we've done in a long, long time. I am joined by Mike Reiner from 432 Legacy, of course, Fred Destin from Stride, and then wrote that our guide on our many deep work retreats that we're doing with founders and VCs in this ecosystem to really try and get us all more in touch with ourselves, open up our minds, open up our ability to connect with others and really just further our industry, further our ecosystem and our ability to connect with each other and be grounded in ourselves and thus also show up as sport members, as VCs, as partners, as friends, as spouses. So yes, this is one hell of an episode. It's a long one, but if you care about this work, the words that Fred, Mike, and Robda have to share with you are just absolutely incredible. On top of it, I just want to say we're doing a trip and the next one is in April 1st to 6th, and we're doing it in Italy this time, and it's going to be just as amazing as the last time, and we're going to talk a bunch about that in this episode as well. So yes, please do reach out if you care about this work and want to be involved. I'd love to talk to you and connect you with the right people. Here's a few words from our beloved sponsor. This episode comes to you by the support of our partners, Portfolio IQ by Synaptic. Portfolio IQ is the most effective way to track your portfolio. It pulls data from all sources, board decks, financials, MIS sheets, forms, emails, everything, and creates a single source of truth for your portfolio data. With Portfolio IQ, you can track all the metrics that matter, not just the standard metrics. All metrics are reviewed by a team of certified accountants. You'll get 100% accuracy. 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So now we are in for an episode that's a bit special, because I've brought with me three very dear friends, Mike Reiner from 432 Legacy, Frat from Stride, and wrote that who is our deep dive coach and guide on many of the retreats we're doing with this, or specifically, to help founders and VCs get deeper into the world of deep work. And this episode is going to be fully dedicated to that. But before we go there, and we're doing another one in April, and we will have many more to come. But before we go there, I just want to make sure that everyone knows who we're talking to, the context from which we talk. Mike, we just did a full episode with you and your partner, Joachim, on this work and how you've put it front and center for 432 Legacy. For that reason, I won't ask you to talk too much, but I would like you to just say a little bit about why you're in this call, why you're dedicated to this work, and how it relates to the fund. - Yeah. - Yeah. So, as mentioned earlier, as we did the last episode, so I won't talk too much about the fund. I mean, we do seed stage investments, and we're enabling tech, and self-development is key part to what we do with the fund. So offering coaches to all our founders we invest in, but also now together with you guys, to bring the work to the YDK system. Why we feel that's so important is because, there's so much in the head, so much here, and it's really important, we feel, to bring more, this to the body, to the heart, to be more stressed resilient, and to help founders with a person of journey and not just the business journey. That's a good nutshell. - Beautiful. Now, Fred, you are an OG. I just sat to you because you were mindful how do we intro this so that it's actually interesting for people to hear. And I sat, don't worry, Fred. Everyone, every time I mentioned you asked, so what's Fred up to? What is his next step? And for that reason, I sat, don't worry at all. Everyone will want to hear what you have to say. But Fred, tell me, why are you involved in this work? Why are you doing it? And what's the next update on stride and iteration of Fred Destin? - Thank you. That's a lot of questions, Rob, why? - First of all, work-wise, because of the nature we work, which is very artisan and very in the weeds with our founders, that's continues to be the bulk of what I do. So I spend five hours locked in the room with Kalim at Kashmir, thinking through positioning strategy, what we do with the company. And that's what I continue to do. And it's my craft. So that's what gives me the most joy. I've been very interested in the topic of how we've fixed the broken VC founder relationship, which when you talk to founders is deeply broken. It is a question of trust at the heart of it. And trust comes in part from presence. And so when you think about doing the work, as we call it, the work, it's all related to whether you can generate quality relationships based in trust and truth and quality conversation. So I'm really deep diving a little bit into what are teachable skills that we could bring to board members so they can be better board members. And we can start having these a founder VC relationships be better. And I've recently shared a survey from Chris Morton, ex-list, who's trying to get some scaled up data around this issue. I think it's a very important problem for our industry. And actually something where we can have impact. And the more people understand how to interact with each other, which is listen, being full presence, be cognizant of the emotional states of the person in front of us, mind our own emotional baggage, as we're going through a difficult conversation, we're actually building better investors, better board members, better leaders. And we are always talking about presence. So kind of everything comes back to the same point, which is where this deep work, if you're like joins up with everything in your life, whether it's your work relationship, your relationship with your spouse, with your kids, or with yourself, importantly, you're all this is part of a package. And on the personal side, I'm deep into integral and Ken Wilbur, and kind of deepening my knowledge of integral theory, which I won't go into now, but so there's this sort of three primary strands. But you're not the heart of it today, still stride and the work had stride. And in terms of weather and when I raise a next fund, I'm happily staying in the discomfort of not knowing for a while, and I'm kind of okay with that. - Now, Rubda, let's go to you. I want you, you're the only one on this call that no one who has tuned into the European VC podcast before it have heard from. So I want you to tell us a bit about yourself, your journey, and I think very importantly, how you relate to tech and venture, 'cause you do have a very unique blend of experiences. There's not a lot. I think that come with this mix of experiences. But I think everyone when they hear it will see, ah, okay, so that's why these guys have picked Rubda as one of the coaches that you're using a lot to help better the industry. - You're right, my background is not conventional by any means, and I have come into this work really partly to do with meeting people like yourself and my conferred in relation to how I came into this work was very organic because of my upbringing. When I was raised in a spiritual community that I don't really want to go too deep into, to be honest, but I can say that, you know, because I was born in the '60s, it was really a time of revolutionary thinking and philosophy and psychology, everything was starting to open up in that, and my mother's generation was looking at the conventional kind of mainstream therapy and then she was seeing that lots of other things were starting to take place in the '60s and '70s and she decided to enter into that world and it started with Tibetan Buddhism in the mid '70s was where it started for me. You know, it was a perfect storm because at that point I was seven in the mid '70s and I had just gone through seven years of shock and trauma which, you know, is a really in a way big impetus to do this kind of work, you know, when you have so much shock and trauma in your life because the contrast was so strong being in that, you know, Tibetan monastery that it really made it very clear to me that my spiritual path, so to speak, began at that moment. So from the mid-70s until. present day, it's been a world that I've dedicated myself to, which is a little bit like both my confrontive indicated that deeper inner work, to more myself. And what is it that separates me from believing that I am worthy of love or good enough? And you know, what is the story that I tell myself and how identified I am with it and the conditioning and the upbringing and, and because of that, I was raised in that environment of meditation and retreat work that I got to work in the realm of so many people. Today, of course, I work with the spouses of people in helping and supporting them to come closer to themselves and not to orientate outward in, you know, adjusting who they are and believing that that is their truth, but to recognize it in themselves. And it's an ongoing journey for myself to be the being human, you know. So I can't imagine a life without this kind of work, you know, and, and I have to say, I, my, I speak very candid in saying that until I met Mike and then he brought me into the kind of meeting you guys, and to do this adventure that we did in Austria together with BCs and founders, I didn't really see the, the bridge as strong as Mike was saying, let's do this, you know, and then of course I got to meet Fred and then I got to meet you and this. And it was a big art heart opening for I can speak about myself, yeah, for me, I got another layer of just aha, wow, you know, it was just such a big yes that the potential and the possibility of these people wanting this work, they don't just want to have a big sum of money in the bank only, yeah, because, you know, there's more to just having a big sum in the bank, you know, so it was good for me from my background and not bringing to see how much people want this. Maybe Mike and Fred, you can talk a bit to this because you work closer with founders and your co-investors and friends in the industry all the time and I always kind of describe venture as the hippies of the finance industry, which means that we probably over index an interest in this type of field, but also where the big water of cash is maybe a bit less what drives all of us, or at least it's that together with having an impact on the world. I love to ask you kind of, why do you see because clearly the spiritual awakening so to say of our industry is actually something that you see in at least sub communities, but I actually think in quite significant parts of our community. Can you talk a bit to that? What you're seeing when you're working with founders, how are you seeing it impact them? Look, there's so many different ways in, let's say what I would describe, you know, so first and rationale, there's tons of reasons as to why this work is so important and the broad sense will work because around 20% of startups fill due to team, often like founder struggles, there's an increasing amount of burnouts, Fred already mentioned dynamics between investors, founders when it comes to you know, like board meetings, when it comes to communication in general, I mean the list you can go on and on, and all the business reasons as to why the work is important, but I would like to take a bit more of a personal angle here because I feel once you are on the path, whatever that path means because that again is very different for different people at different end of points, some people go find meditation, get deeply into meditation and find like beautiful results there, maybe breath work, different types of coaching, there's so many different ways, for me personally, I found that everything shifted, the way I work, you know, instead of being so focused on the outcome, being more focused on the journey and the present moment and the way I deliver right now and just be more authentic version right now and the results, the way yeah also to be present with people, Fred mentioned it listening to really be present and feel more from the heart, I used to be so much in my mind for me that that journey was really, really important and now work with a lot of founders and I just see the shifts happening, you know, with when you work with different coaches that like get those shifts, you just see that the level of anxiety reduces massively, you see their happiness all wrong work increases massively, you see the sense of purpose, you know, it can feel increases massively, so this, I mean this tons of elements we could go deeper into but I'll hand it over to Fred not to talk too long here but the bottom line is the reason why to do it can there can be tons of business reasons but I think the real the real game changer is once you've had a certain experience because you can talk all you want about it but once you're bit deeper into the work, there will be experiences you've had that are true game changer for you and and that shift is something that is very difficult to explain. Yeah, Luca, I think we most found that we live in an industry that is driven by trauma or by obsession right so and I understand why people want to hang on to that because it is what makes a lot of founders special you know the trauma that comes from a father never seeing you you having a giant chip on the shoulder and obsessing over proving the world wrong it actually what makes you special right and there is you know in that narrative by the way there's a lot of truth because in the anger for example you're going to find a lot of energy and so we live in an industry that at the moment is is particularly high in achievement hustle culture etc and it's even more and more the case I would say and then what happens to people in various stages of the life so they might for example sell their company and then realize that their entire identity was wedded to the company that just sold which will typically be a moment where you move from being a high achiever to sort of thinking well who am I we're going to start asking those kinds of questions and so I think in our industry there's a lot of fuel in people's trauma and obsession and you know through a certain extent some people just don't want to let that go because they don't want to lose that specialness now if you go a level broader than your archetypal heroic founder which I just talked about and you ask most people is your attention scattered and destroyed do you feel overwhelmed do you feel lonely do you feel connected to your kids most people say no to one two three or four of these questions and the list could keep going so when people pause for a minute from the running and they breathe and they go how do I really feel right now how do I feel about my spouse my children my work my general state of mind or questions like what lights my soul am I feeling truly alive am I feeling truly alive in the moment most people will say no so you can choose not to do anything about it because it's still running towards a certain goal or you can go well okay do I want to perceive my experience of this journey of being alive differently so that's in the eyespace what I'm also interested in is in the we space because we talk about the benefits of meditation breathwork and your what it does your nervous system all of which is true but then there is the who are we who are we to each other who are we to nature you know if you start thinking of yourself is not being different from a tree because they're an emanation of life here's an oak here's bread both things a versions of life we are not separate from nature we're not looking at nature something other than us then you get into I think a also interesting space of thinking about the week what differently and you know what do we want what do we long for there's a what we want you know money and house of boats is Martha back separation right we want success security safety a house whatever and then what do we long for to be loved to be seen to be connected you know and what do we long for we never really stop to ask a question and it is the thing right it's when you read all these books about regrets of people on their desk bed they all have to do with I didn't love enough I wasn't connected enough I didn't spend enough time to see my spouse and all that stuff so at some point you kind of have to decide for yourself whether that's important to you or whether you just want to keep running until such time as you are on your desk bed go well that was a cool ride you know my bikes a bit beat up but I wish that spent a bit more time actually noticing the flowers how do you respond to because is there necessarily a forced decision between on the one hand being able to live life and experience life and and and being touched with yourself and they connected to your wife and to your children and so on and being a high achiever does someone this if when you start this work can you start this work and walk with this work and still be this incredible founder that you are today. Or do you have a trade-off? If you do this, you will most likely start a path that will take you down a route where you're not working 120 hours per week because you realize it doesn't make any sense or it's not there's there's other things to life. So my question to you because that's a question I imagine that many VCs would also have. Am I going to let my founder into the lion stand with this person that's going to make them go on our ask a trip instead of building the company? Is that a fair critique? Is that a fair fright? And wrote there maybe you can comment on that because you have also worked with many executives that you know has started this work? I can speak of course from the perspective of what I'm witnessing but I think of course Fred and Mike will be able to say something from their own direct experiences. So what I can say is you've said something that is really in a way a direct concern and I even might even go as far as a direct fear for some people that if I open that Pandora's box or if I dive deep into something yeah some kind of work or journey or experience that that I'm going to abandon this other life or this this career or something is not going to or the other person that they're in in partnership with and the best way I can speak to that is but from the witness position of observing people going through that journey and seeing that the outcome is far greater than their you know intellectual mind could have conceived because of the experience the expanded awareness that they receive from it and also the deeper connection with themselves that they got out of it that then actually has benefited all aspects of their life not just professionally but personally. Is it a potential for going through a dark night of the soul where they have to kind of peel away layers of some of the things that have held them back or the beliefs that they have you know and kept themselves encapsulated in do they go through feelings and they're uncomfortable and feel really raw and you know do strong emotions come yes and as long as we label them as not okay we will presume that they're not okay but the the realization is that when we do walk through these corridors of you know our own personal development journey in whichever path you decide to take that you you meet yourself in a different way and the way that you meet yourself is a deeper recognition and also it changes how you relate to the world how you how you see yourself in the world and how you relate to others and I personally have the privilege of witnessing this for so many thousands of people over the years and I have watched people come out of depression I've watched people come out of isolation I have watched people come out of such debilitating beliefs about themselves and about who they are as a human being and I've watched people land in the heart and as we are developing collectively I can finally say that heart work is important without sounding like woo you know because in you know when I was doing this like 20 years ago I say heartwork people were just like ah she's too yeah and yeah we all have a longing just like Fred said all have a longing and it's it's much stronger than a bank account and Andreas I would I would answer your question threefold so I used to also struggle a lot with the question Fred mentioned a trauma and chip on the shoulder I used to struggle the question are narcissists great people to invest in purely from a business perspective yeah where you have the one they the trade off the one hand this enormous drive often to just build from the ego with the highest probability of success potentially versus the risk nature of destruction later on but what what I came to realize is I feel there's three massive benefits of this work and there will my belief that that founders are going to perform so much better one is energy I think doing the work is giving you so much more energy to not only work but to be with your family to do all of it and at the end of the day that's at the core of what you need right to execute and energy is a big one and also especially doing the work with the rubed out words lot around going into core motion and when you deal with anger as an example a lot of energy comes free the more you use to you work with energy your body the more energy will feel day-to-day and the more you can let it flow three bodies energy is a big one the second I would say is is purpose a link to purpose is effectiveness you know so like just better better prioritizing yeah it is like what do I really focus on because it's not about how many hours I work in the day you can work you know like the maximum amount of hours with it with as little steep as possible but the real the real game changer for any founder is always to know what to focus on right and and to prioritize it the right way and the reality is that if you would only focus in business in your neglect family etc that is going to also have a significant impact on your energy on your happiness level and everything and hence make you a worse of a leader so purpose and priorities is the second one that I think the work really enables you to do way better and a third one is talent acquisition you know just people wanting to work with you it's just it's that simple the the game changer as a CEO any leader is to be able to convince great people to work with you and the reality is like if you're say better human being more present you know a more empathetic leader especially also focused more on impact as Fred Fred was hinting at earlier more people want to work with you that's it you get the top talent and and the best people to build a company with you so that's how we break it down look first of all I think if you have had if you're not connected to yourself for example people might say I had a problem in my youth say my father beat me but I'm okay because I put it in a box and the box is under my bed you don't realize it but you live inside the box like either your anger is present within you but you can't control it or you shame yourself for your anger and you can't access that energy of creativity or that power that is residents in anger which is you know one of our natural emotion so first thing to say is you know there's a saying I love which is you can either go learn yourself or life will teach you you can wait for life to come and like smack you at some point and teach you what you need to learn or you can go do it yourself it's usually much more interesting and less painful to go do it yourself and not wait for a divorce or to be on your deathbed and realize you haven't made peace with yourself or your parents right now I think it should not underestimate that some people open you know they open the window to the waking up process they start seeing the water they swim in you know fish don't see the water this women but David Foster Wallace but once you start realizing you kind of go like wait hang on a minute am I playing my game I'm playing someone else's game what is this game I'm playing and so you you may end up you know taking a left turn and deciding you're gonna go meditate in a cave for the next eight years it's possible and you may have a rough time through the dark night of the soul I mean I went to full on nihilism where I thought life was like a theater play and we're just going through the motions until we died now thankfully I got out of that but I was kind of stuck in that place for about probably a year plus which was necessary to my own journey and growth now having said that if you think about it purely from a business then but so you don't know the thing is you don't know where you're gonna go and the question I would ask is what are you afraid of right like what's your fear and secondly what are you willing to risk for full aliveness to call Jim Deatmer do you want to feel a bit dead inside or do you want to feel fully alive and fully alive requires connection to yourself to others to the moment to the experience are you going purely from a business standpoint one of the reasons why you want to do this work is you will hit a ceiling as a leader in terms of what you're able to do notably in terms of complexity so to take a very quick example in so called achiever mode is I know how to recruit and motivate a group of people to go after a specific goal and we're all fucking running like a SWAT team at the same goal that's achiever mode you then had a hit a ceiling where you're not able to relate to the complexity of people all the world around you and you need to shift to be able to shift your level of leadership you need to be able to shift what's inside of yourself so achiever mode might be Uber we grow with scale we launch new cities and fuck everybody else and it's Uber is about Uber and its mission and then maybe be a more elevated form of leadership, might be Airbnb. And there being biz like, wait a minute, we need to talk to the cities, we need to make sure the suppliers are happy and everybody is having great experience and you know, we're not getting banned in the cities we launch in and we are thinking about all the constituents as a wee thing, not an ass thing. And that's a company with clearly has a higher elevated level of culture and that's why Brad Chesky puts his best people on culture, that's why they bring in, I forget his name now a creative conley to be the CEO whisperer and because they're just more sophisticated. So it's fine to be the obsessed achiever for a while and then you can only get so far and if you're trying to build exceptional companies at some point to switch to a different mindset. There's also a question with the work of when, because if you're in the first three years of building a company at a high speed and you have a mission, it's probably not the time to go see Rubda and open up the box about how mom never saw your feelings as a child. You know, so there is, I think also a, there are times when it is appropriate to do that and it will help you grow as an individual as a leader and all that stuff. It does not need to kill your motivation, in fact the opposite, it's like you're emptying your backpack of the stones that you're carrying so you become lighter and then you're calming the voice in your head, you're that freaking roommate in your head that's always talking to you and he's exhausting the shit out of you. He gets quieter as you do your internal work to the point where you're like, "Oh, I can actually focus. I can stay on task a lot longer. I think more clearly about complex problems. Fear does not impact my behavior, anger does not impact my behavior, guilt does not impact my behavior." You become, you know, a better decision maker in the field because you're more settled into yourself. Another way to look at it is that initially try to make sense of the world primarily with your mind and you may read a lot of books in order to figure out where you need to get. With more and more experience knowledge becomes more wisdom and as we all know experience is key but that also means there's more of an embodied feeling to it. And then finally the stages of embodiment and Fred's point, the most amazing leaders embody what they do, right? And that has such a deep effect not just from a communication perspective but just for the way they stand in the room, the way they inspire people, even nonverbal and it's also what the word contributes to. But I want to ask you a provocative question that I, because I've been on a bit of this journey with you, I know the answer to, but I want to ask it because I'm sure that we have many in the audience thinking it. And I think you said something incredibly important about around the timing. There's a time for this and there's a time not for this. And that is exactly why I think specifically for VCs, this work is incredibly important because I think both in terms of what we deliver as VCs to our founders, being more in touch with ourselves, having a better understanding of how you connect and respect for more complex systems and the journey that individuals are on and so on. I think any VCs is in, is daily in a situation where it would definitely be better if this individual was more grounded. Whereas you can definitely argue that the first three years of a founders experience, it's head on. You don't necessarily want a lot of reflections and so on. I can follow that a lot. But my provocative question to you Fred is, I think there's a lot of VCs that would look at you and say, I don't want that. Fred had exactly what I wanted. One of Europe's most successful funds, everyone's talking about it and then the fucker goes out and says, I don't know if I want to do fund three, now we're going to go in a cave and I'm going to find a nihilistic version of life and go through all this. I don't want that, fuck that. Fred tell me if you want to go down this personal route and explain a bit. Why is it that it's actually a good thing that you did this? Let me separate me and the work. If you're a venture capitalist, you need to make decisions in conditions of uncertainty. You need to work with often complex individuals and teams in chaotic situations that are fast evolving. You're constantly dealing with too many things to do, overwhelm, clutching and straws. It's an endless treadmill we're on. The nature of your work is deep knowledge work in a highly chaotic fast-moving environment. Then you have to do this with other human beings, with whom you're having somewhat complicated strategy discussions every morning, which is called investment committee. As a venture capitalist, I am convinced that the work I've done in the last few years has made me a better decision-maker, a better listener, a quieter in my head, being able to envisage the world in a quiet way, being able to connect with founders in the moment they get on the phone, et cetera. If you purely talk about the benefits of skill-set, I'm convinced that this stuff is transformationally good as an investor, given the unique nature of our work. I can really do not see any downside. For me, I'm 52, I'm 25 years in the industry, I know the game like the back of my hand. And the question then becomes, do I keep playing the same game because it's lucrative? I know how to do it. It gives you prestige or whatever gives you some form of influence. Or do you go play a different game? And my personal journey is more influenced by Arthur Brooks and people like that who are like, "Hey, what do you do with the second half of your life?" And once the nature of your contribution is the best nature of my contribution to raise another fund, possibly maybe it would be in human potential, for example, or it may be that you go back out there and you say, "Hey, why don't we fix this venture product?" It makes it better for everybody. And I don't know what that looks like yet, but it becomes a question of aim at contribution and being my journey. And by the way, also having the humility to realize that at some point in some 30-year-olds going to kick your ass on pure CPUs, focus, capacity to work, inspiration, et cetera, because that's the nature of the thing. And I'm okay with that. Like, I'm not attached to being like the best bloody blind. This comparison is the thief of joy statement is incredibly true. So then you get to that place where I'm like, "Well, don't really mind what narrative you're attaching to me, because I don't even mind what narrative I'm attaching to myself. Like I'm not defined by the stories that I tell myself or that you tell about me or anything. So you get to this point of identity being something that you can use when needed, but kind of put to the side and go, "You know, I'm just a biped who is a grain in the sea of time, and I will make a very brief appearance, I will have no legacy. And I'm, you know, supernovas don't give a shit if the earth disappears. That kind of vibe, right? So you kind of get to a place where you're like, "Hey, this is an amazing journey. It's just been this thinking human on two feet who can interact with things around him or her." But also, we're just, we're just, we're just a fucking blip, right? So just relax a little bit, you know, whatever path you take in your life is okay. Life is like a flow game. Go with the flow and then there were a thousand path that are okay. And the circumstances are as they are, you know, it doesn't mean you don't have agency. At all you have agency, but just, just relax, you know, like life will unfold and kind of flow with it. And it's a lot more fun to be that way than just try and fucking try and determine the outcome all the time. So that's the short answer to your question, but I think if I was a young VC and somebody told me, I can develop capacities of presence, peace, equanimity, peace of mind, freedom to see the world as it is, freedom from my biases, capacity to connect emotionally, intellectually and somatically to others, etc. I'll be like, "Yes, please. These are the skills that we actually need in our job," you know, I always keep thinking, I want to see every founder turn VC and I want to see every VC turn LP because I think that when you reach the OG level as a founder, you have so much to bring to other founders. Same thing when you reach the OG level of VC, you have so much to bring to other VC's. And just out whatever the structure that you might do in the future, Fred, I'm always like dreaming that you'd have an OG VC funder fund where it's like, all we do is just help the best VCs, upcoming VCs build incredible firms and become much better than they could be without the experiences. That's a timing question and I think that that would be beautiful. I want to ask you about timing. What is the right time for people? to start this work. - It depends in which zone I would respond to in this, because there's one area I can go into, which is anytime can be the right time. And then there's the other area where we can go into this, where we can say that we go somatically and we say if the body is holding you back in some way and you're holding a lot in your body, because you know, it's talking to you and you feel exhausted, collapse, you wake up and you're just like pushing yourself or you feel numb or no energy or tension and so on and so on. Then I would be very curious as to what the hell's going on. And something is not in congruency. And if I'm pushing myself and it's not flowing, then yeah, I would be, I would be curious about that. At my age I have to say that because of this kind of work, I have energy, I don't need coffee anymore, I don't need caffeine, I don't need things to stimulate me to have my energy to motivate me. But I'm motivated by now things that have kind of moved me from the inside. And they don't seem as appealing on in the mainstream world, because they don't sell because it's something you already innately have and it might even seem boring to some people. But I would say if you feel a disconnection, if you feel secret, if you feel like you're not sure where you belong and you feel in this kind of isolation or loneliness or depression, I would be questioning, you know, how you want to proceed in life, you know, if you can't, if it's a feeling or a sensation and it's not in congruency, I just feel such a great opportunity to explore what is that, yeah, you know, what is that? And do I want to continue in such a way? Because whatever you do for a living, no matter what, wouldn't it be beautiful if you could find a deeper connection with yourself and feel through that connection with yourself that you're connected to all and everything in life that you're not separate, which I believe is the biggest lie in the world, by the way. And I also believe a lot of marketing is built on creating that image, you know, that separates us. So the deeper truths are your own journey, but if some people, of course, you know, it might not be so clear that they need that until, you know, depression hits them in the face or, you know, body, you know, break down hits them in the face and then they go, fuck, my life is not in accordance to what is going on. And sometimes people need a breakdown to have a breakthrough, you know, and then they go, okay, now is the time, which is also okay, you know, and if you get it, then you get it, then, and if you get it, right, when, you know, a partner is saying, you know, what, I'm not happy in this relationship, I feel lonely in this relationship. We've not connected in years or if you get it when, you know, you somehow can't meet your kids, you don't have time with your children or whatever, but there's different points in our lives that we get signals. So, I think it's important, especially in the Western culture, Andreas, we are at a completely different rhythm, mentally, we're like Ferrari minds, you know, and we're kind of disconnected and disassociated from, you know, our inner being and slowing down and being present. And if you go back to the natural world, I'm living in Australia part-time, you see the indigenous people there, or you know, you see it in South America, you see it in parts of Asia and Africa, they're just connected to land, connected to nature, and you see a completely different way of being. When we lost that in our, sadly, in our cultural, Western style, and we also lost that coming together and not isolating, you know, and being together and sharing together, I'm not alone in this, which is one of the biggest things that comes into my work, you know, people feeling isolated, that nobody gets them, that they don't know how to get support, they don't know where they belong, and they don't feel seen or loved or heard. It's a big wound, and it doesn't matter how big you are and how high up in a company you are, and you know, we all carry that wounding. So, I think the timing really is that recognition in yourself before hopefully a car crash, you know. - You know, I think I can only speak for men, but men are typically so lonely and have absolutely nobody to talk to about whether it's shame or anger, or there is sexual life, or there's porn addiction, or whatever it is, or there's nobody to talk to. And the moment you open it up, again, I'm just looking for men 'cause I ran a man's circle for a while. The moment you open it up, you realize that they are in this provider role, that they feel stuck in, this performance role, and that they just are exhausted. So, they're in their role definition, kind of stuck as much as women are stuck in their role definition, and nobody's talking to each other. So, the reason why I bring this up is one of the beauties of this work with Rubda and the deep dive work is you do it as a group. And the power, again, is the power of the we. You know, we see a young woman who's expressing anger at her father, and I'm standing there in the constellation representing the father, and you know, I am going through the same set of emotions, she's going through in a different way. And we are collectively understanding each other on a much deeper level, you know, in the brain, in the body, in the heart. And we are, you know, giving and receiving aren't the same thing. As you support someone going through a process, you realize that you're receiving as much as you perceive to be giving. So, this power of the collective is so incredible. And then you end your four days of work, and you're like, wow, I don't need to pretend to be a certain way. I don't need to do anything. People just appreciate being in my company without me needing to do anything at all. I just be here, and other human beings appreciate being with me, and all I need to do is show up. Like, I have value, I virtue of just existing, and spending a second looking at another person. You know, I didn't have nothing for me to do. And I mean, that gift, honestly, yeah, whatever productivity benefits we're hoping for the work, I mean, the gift of just being there, being you and not having to do anything, not having to need a purpose and meaning and a mission, et cetera, and just like being with other humans and going, fuck you now. We're alive in this together. We can see each other, hold each other, connect each other, and like, thank you. - But Fred just said, the key element in this also is the understanding that you're not alone. 'Cause the rational thought is that we are alone in this. Whatever problems we have, which may be relationship-based, which may be around growing the company, around raising money to survive, it doesn't matter. Even much more unique problems. And then you're sitting in a circle, exact to Fred's point, and not only is every single experience touching you, but also you recognize yourself in almost every single sharing. And that gives you something unique because it makes what we may perceive at the suffering or loneliness much more universal. We're all in this together. And that is such a beautiful feeling, which on top of it, and what Fred already said, also leads to this incredible love you feel for the others in the group. It was incredible how everyone at the end said, I feel more love for these people. I have just met four days ago than some of my best friends, which is insane, right? The container this creates, and that is truly unique. - I actually thought, it's funny how we all, so even if you go on this type of retreat without the ambition to change anything in your life, or you're just doing it for the experience. I actually think that kind of like you might go to India to see Taj Mahal and I don't know what, and you come home and you're filled up with entity because you saw all these beautiful buildings and nature and stuff. I honestly would say, even without the impacts had on my life afterwards, seeing the beauty of human beings at full exhibition here at the retreat, what's the most beautiful thing I've seen in my life, I think? Like I've seen the wall, the great wall of China and so on. Like that did not move me in any way as much as it did, seeing the beauty of the different people in this group. And even if you don't wanna do the work, even if you're just going there as a tourist to experience human beauty, I actually think it's worth the time and the money for anyone. No, we wanna go. I wanna ask in a very different question, bring it home to our small venture industry again. There's a lot of VCs or not a lot, but more VCs that have started to have coaching programs as part of their investment offering to founders. Some of them do it as part of it. ticket, meaning the earmark 50k or whatever for a coach or some of them have their own internal person that does the work. What is your take in Mike? I'll let you go first on this one because I know it's it's part of your firm's belief as well and then after that we can have a bit of discussion on whether this type of program makes sense. What's important when you design them those things? I feel a lot of people use coaching but actually mean mentoring and there's a big difference you know because it's one thing to have very experienced people advice others which I would call mentoring or advisory. Coaching is something different right coaching is primarily around asking questions and it's people who've really you know like made this a profession to understand what questions to ask and how to engage in that dynamic to let a person grow and find out things themselves. Find different techniques and I think that's already important distinction in beginning because a lot of people talk about coaching or a coaching program and raise to your point actually have more of a mentoring program have ex-founders that are helping then the portfolio companies with growth and go specifically into different areas like growth marketing etc that's not really coaching right that's advising and I think that's important distinguishing factor to start with when it comes to the program itself and how to structure it I actually don't have a strong opinion you know there's all kinds of different views in terms of many coaches will say it's important to let the founders pay them themselves because you know it's important to put in the money to have that commitment. I don't really think personally I just don't think it matters as much and how you structured in terms of does it be see payfully or does the founders payfully is it a blend or not what I do think matters a lot is the matchmaking I think that is key so every person is different and every person is also triggered in a different way so that unique matchmaking is the most important I feel in the coach and coachy dynamic and there it's a combination of style and the particular chapter the founder goes through where particular coach may be best but also just a personal report you know you can have this perfect matchy ahead of thinking hey whatever let's say Fred would be an amazing match for John but the reality is that if in a call for whatever reason ideally face to face it doesn't vibe you know the energy is important as well so the matchmaking I think is the most crucial element here to get right yeah look I love coaching I think it's important to separate there are many different types of coaching so the so-called horizontal schools are about skills development how do I develop laterally as a leader within specific it's very much what coaching you know how do I do my work integral is one of these schools that is in vertical coaching so it's the development of personality and consciousness across sort of levels of consciousness if you want to take the can-well review of the world that is a very different type of work has more much more to do with the eye how do I show up and the we how do I interact with others and coaches then have a lot of methodologies and may a lot of frameworks and may mix all of this stuff up so some people do lateral and vertical together it is about the quality of the coachy what I would observe is you know the teacher rises when the demand for teaching is there so do we have too many coaches probably are a lot of coaches people who were in transition so I'm going to do coaching without necessarily thinking about whether that's their vocation probably I think we are in sort of an interesting time where this seemingly is a coach where absolutely everything you ever wanted to do everywhere or that people like I would never present myself as a teacher because I don't feel that I've earned that monitor I'm not even sure I present myself as a coach because I think there is something about learning the craft like everything that's important so yes coaching amazing as usual with these integrated services from VCs can you deliver the right coaching to the right person at the right level back to Mike's matching point so I take all of these things with a pinch of salt which is are they part of positioning in perceived value proposition and can you really deliver on that versus here somebody is going to be transformational either horizontal in terms of the skill set or vertically into the high you present as a leader so like most things that come out of VCs treat with a little bit of suspicion and a little bit of goodwill kind of go figure it out to to add here also Andreas to question I think there's a big big difference between focusing on just the business and the person because the reality is if you're building a business and you going through a divorce and you do not address the divorce as an example it's a blocker for the business as well right so a holistic approach means you have to dress whatever is a life currently for the person because it has a direct impact on all the other fields right so and that's crucial and rubed also mentioned the somatic part now there's so many different elements here that can be blockers for a person at any given point that need to be addressed and if we have a singular focus on just one area in in the case of VC and the startup growth and how to grow the fastest you neglect others and I think that's quite crucial there's a little secret about all this shit everything goes back to presence eventually because if you say I'm not leading my company effectively and I don't feel like my team is with me now so that would be what you would call a presenting issue then you go one level down and you go well why is that well because I'm kind of angry and I'm overly directive etc it's like well why is that well how do you show up in the meetings whether you know do you listen are you really present to the quality of what's being thrown at you and then you end up going back to presence you know even if you want to be a strong leader are you present to the emotional response of the people in front of you so you know it's funny how everything at the end of the day goes back to presence what's presence it's the same as breath as an object in meditation it's the same as meditation itself actually so when we say the breath you know this autonomic thing we do and then you kind of go like oh my breath is here okay so I'm present to my breathing then you can let go of the breath you don't need an object to just present everything goes back to that that's what is freaking meditation teachers when they say when you breath brush your teeth only brush your teeth and you go what are you talking about they're talking about the right thing are you present to your breath your body your thinking your emotions the emotions of person in front of you and from the air can you be the leader that you want to be so it's it's like whatever whatever wrapping there is around it we always go back to the same thing it's just a question of what language you use to guide people back to that you know I think it's like it's always it's always about presence at some level maybe this is a beautiful segue to ask you a rope that to talk a bit about the importance of the body because that is you said it early as well everything is intellectually void as in the west not a lot is in the body and in the heart anymore maybe you can talk a bit about the importance of this how you work with it what you see is the you know steps people can take so on why is it that there's this fixation this uh this obsession with the body and the breath and uh need to do yoga stuff with this weird crowd and hibi clothes I want to say something a little bit controversial to that just to piss off a few listeners because why not I hope I was in provocative as well yeah yeah yeah it's good because there are people who do extreme sports and you know they they have to do 100 push-ups a day and they have to go out and do you know the gym like crazy and they have to do their yoga as well but doesn't necessarily mean that they're meeting themselves and uh in fact the yoga community I used to be with actually yoga teacher who runs one of the biggest yoga communities in the Netherlands and they can do bypassing a lot of bypassing in that you know because of um it's very connected to a very ancient um philosophy in India around how they do feelings yeah and what we work with in the deep dive and you know it's not isolated to the deep dive it just happens to be one of the areas that I'm very passionate about in the work which is through the body and through feelings through the intelligence of the heart which I believe has an acute intelligence which I wanted to be the biggest place of wisdom and uh you know signalling you know and resonance and connection and also the intelligence of the body which never lies so often when but example actually we take our experience together, all of us, when we run Austrian together. And if I looked at some of the bodies coming in, how tense they were, how high up the shoulders were and you know, and how people were tapping their, the restlessness in their feet and their body and you know, the shifting in the chairs and the constant eye movements and the restlessness in their hands and you know, and not really being able to be still. And then when we started to work somatically through the body and releasing some of the tension we have and how we did that, of course, is also through feelings, uncomfortable feelings, maybe feelings are like the analogy that Fred said, the ones that we keep in a box under the bed and they're still there, you're still sleeping on them, you're still holding them and stored and then when we are able to work through the body with our feelings, our release can happen. But I can't, we can't do it through, you know, sort of intellectualizing but ask you what is freedom and you give me a concept of freedom, it's very different than if you feel an embodied experience of freedom, you know, that expanded state. Same for if I ask you what is connection, you can give me an intellectual response but if you are holding someone and they're holding you, you have a direct experience of what connection is. So I saw the value in that very early on in my life, my childhood, I don't want to go into my trauma story, but I saw that then the need for that in the nonverbal how important that was, which is a lot of, you know, allowing space for what I feel and also to work somatically. And I want to just add a piece to what Fred said, he indicated it already, but I want to just expand on a bit because it's important for those listening about presence is that the more that you can be present with your own feelings, even the uncomfortable ones, the agitations, the vulnerability, the more we can hold space and for another, we have a wider capacity and men in many ways they had a kind of challenging upbringing, not all men, but some in how they had to compartmentalize their vulnerability. So it's not easy for them sometimes to see people in their vulnerability. The tendency for some men, I say underscore some men, is when they see a partner cry, they immediately want to fix it because it's uncomfortable for them to be in it. So when they, when they make familiar with their own inner home, their body, their heart, you know, these two areas of intelligence and how to hold the container inside themselves, they have a capacity to also then be with the other who's vulnerable and not have to rush to come up with a solution. Can I just allow space for it for a moment? It's not that that, you know, you can't, you know, want to, you know, provide support, but it's just your own inner kind of capacity really impacts, you know, the other. Am I patient with myself? Am I able to be still? And then I'm able to be patient with others, you know, when they're not still, for example. So these things, I think, I mean, I'm going to say another thing that I know, I know it's coming from my own observation. But personally, I feel like leadership today, what's happening in the world today in the last four or five decades is, it's really, if I look at some of the big leaders and politics, I see really, you know, you know, poor leadership of I'm honest. And I see, if I go deeper than that, and I look at some of these big leaders today in politics, I see big wounds. I see areas where there's hurt. And of course, I can go to that place as a therapist, but that's what I, if that's not addressed, we end up being these very unconscious, narcissistic, you know, one direction, one-dimensional kind of leaders, and, you know, and almost turn into dictatorships, you know. So I think doing the inner work makes you not just aware of self, but aware of the whole humanity and consciousness. And we need it today more than ever, having just come from off like climate change. The next breed of leaders really need to include nature in how they, you know, lead their footprint. Rob, can you expand just a little bit on the nervous system? Because of what I love about your work and what you say, also in how you work is the moment a person actually experienced something in a body as shift happens. While the person may have known it mentally, yeah, for the last decade, the moment it's experienced something else happens entirely. So maybe very short, can you explain what happens in nervous system? Why is this important? So let's take, for example, anger. Maybe there is somebody who recognizes they've been angry and a parent who overwhelmed them across their boundaries and they never were able to address that anger. So it's stored. And if they don't honor the anger, they can become passive or they can become explosive or implausive, yeah. So then the anger gets held back or becomes, you know, uncontrolled. And even we can even go to numbness with anger, by the way, that we don't give it any airtime or oxygen. And by the way, numbness is pervasive. I'm often dealing with men who are dealing with numbness because they don't feel anything, you know, because they won't allow any of those feelings. But then they also don't allow the joy of the work that they've been doing, you know, enjoying their, you know, fruitful success. So then what we do when you bring it in through semantically is we allow that individual to complete a movement that they might not have been able to complete. Taking the story of the child that was angry at the parent for overstepping the boundary and finally having a release and that might look like a body movement might look like a sound coming out might look like a kind of an action or a gesture and finally letting that almost tension come out that's been held and compartmentalized. And sometimes I even push against the person a little bit just to give a little bit of a coming into the body because we get so stuck in the head for so many years that we become used to this operating system here, yeah. And when that finally happens somatically, the other side of that is often a relaxation can come, sometimes a vulnerability can come because they've been holding so many feelings, sometimes the sense of empowerment comes because they've been so collapsed in their life and they've been a pleaser to get everybody's love and approval. So this whole somatic experience gives them a kind of almost like a new perception of self, a new realization of self, a new experience of who they are. Maybe before we close and we should sometime it's been a long conversation already thank you for everyone who's still with us. I want to ask you just all three touch a bit on why retreats, why is a retreat setting a good one to start this work or get into it somehow and maybe also specifically touch on what I think is one of the real strengths in our design of these is we're doing it with people from the tech sector and some people have come to me and said I don't think I want to talk about these things with this group. I don't want it in the ecosystem. So to say the things they're going to talk about and so on. And I know many of us also walked in with a bit of that thought. So because obviously that's something that you walk in with when you're meeting 15 people or 20 people that you have never met before and now you're going into something where you're going to be sharing deep stuff. What I would just say to everyone is that we all unanimously or ever one of us shared things we normally would not share and we felt perfectly comfortable doing it because a trust relationship is really built within this group. And so if anyone has that caution I would say you would never violate the trust of any of the people you were there with. I promise you that. And actually I think it was incredibly powerful also because it's also a teacher in terms of knowing that okay if 20 random people that come here all deal with this probably we all do. So I think that there's an angle to that as well. But this retreat question why are retreats a good way to embark on this journey and maybe specifically also within tech. So I look at I've done a lot of work right and I think the different modalities so you do therapy. The limits to talk therapy is typically it's a somewhat intellectual process so you understand shit where you get stuck. Then you can do psychedelics for example you can have this breakthrough experiences and if you do a good sense making out of it that's pretty good. You can do meditation, you can do a whole host of things. The coming together as a group whether it's the Huffman process or deep dive brings that level of you know this shed human experiences incredibly powerful. And then the retreat container just allows everybody to build this fabric of trust which allows you to go deeper and deeper and this is when the exceptional releases happen and these moments that are seeing somebody else go through a live transforming experience, inspires you to go to the same place or actually may shift something in you at the same time. And to your point on trust, it's so not even a question that, you know, the people who are with us in the group, it's a fucking tribe. Like if any of them needs anything for the next 20 years, they will call me, they'll be like, sure, I'm flying over. Like that's where you get to, you don't get to, oh, we trust each other not to talk about it, we go like, hey, you need me to fly you to the John Hopkins in the US because you got a problem and, you know, your brother can't make it in time. Sure, I'll be over. That's where you get to, I think, you know, that's like that quality of container. But I would say about it, first retreats in general and then, then more specifically, our retreat is, why retreat setting is so important is oftentimes to disconnect often in nature. So it's already multiple days where you disconnect it. Typically, you also don't have the phone, which is a massive distraction, right? And you're with a group where there's guidance in a certain container you are being held. And that's just so much easier to do the work than doing it yourself, one-on-one and even worse, in the environment you're already normally operating in and working. So I think that is a big, big part as to why retreat in general is very powerful. I want to add to what Fred said around the group because there's another layer to this that I gradually came to really, really not only deeply value and appreciate, but for me, it's a true game changer when you have one-on-one work versus group work. And that is the energy of a group amplifies, meaning when you work and grief comes out, sadness, yeah? It starts somewhere and this is a ripple effect. When you see a person crying, your body reacts to it. What happens in a group setting is there is then whether it's anger, whether it's grief, something, it is in the energy in the field. And that is such an incredible way to go through yourself, to be part of it, to amplify everything that's there for yourself, to grow. That once you've experienced this, you realize it's a very different way of working. And to me, that is extremely powerful. And then finally, to the point of why our retreat, why it's such a beautiful opportunity to do this with other investors and founders, is because not only do you work on all the points Fred mentioned earlier, that are highly beneficial for you as a leader, but you're also developing such deep relationships. And Fred already said it, you do anything for each other. Last weekend, it was with Rupta and Valencia, we did this in a very short format, one half hours, people were crying, people came to us afterward, that this is so needed. And there were a few people from the deep dive. At the very beginning of their conference, we look at each other, we enter the room, you walk straight at each other, you hug each other, there's so much love. It's such a deep connection. So even to your early point, Andreas, even if you would only do this as a tourist, as visiting and you want to do this for the relationships alone, not even for your own personal development journey, the relationships you're building there are completely next level. And that means that whether the next person could become an alpine your fund, or whatever it is as a business outcome, it's just a different level of relationship that enables completely different levels of connection. So that's it. I often say to people with four years of therapy, because I do do a lot of one-on-one with people, but the truth is when I'm doing one-on-one sessions with people, I'd rather not keep them four years in therapy, I'd rather have them have a four-day experience in the retreat. I'd rather that instead of them facing me, I'd rather take the therapist away and there together with other people, because for me, that I have seen accelerate leaps and bounds in how much they resolve and repair and go to deeper places because of what is being reflected back, what is being mirrored, what is that human experience that they're having way deeper than just facing a therapist each week. So actually, most of the time when people do sessions with me, I say, "Do you want to consider also doing some group work together where you really meet with others?" And it takes the therapist out of the equation, but way more profound. And the other part that happens there, and without getting too, in the woo-woo, and I'm trying to go and try to ground this as much as possible, but the mystical comes in. Something much bigger than all of us comes in. And you can call it spiritual. You can call it, we're held by something. You can call it whatever name you want to call it, but it's bigger than all of us. And it moves through that space when we're all in that experience together. And it's, it's, it may be untouchable, maybe it's unseeable, maybe it's formless, but it's powerful, it's palpable, and we're all feeling it. And it's, and it's like a swirl wind that's moving through that circle of people and through hearts, and it's opening. And I can't understand it in my rational mind, and I don't know how to explain it to the next person, but it's bigger than any one person. And I love that. And I want to, I want to say that I've been on a spiritual path for 48 years. And I've been to so many processes, and I've been touched by so many experiences. And I decided one day to put together something that just kind of the best of the best experiences and and and journeys and touch points and, you know, and put it all together into kind of a four day boom. Yes, it is full on. Yes, we deep dive. It's a no bullshit approach. I ask people come when you're ready, not just out of a curiosity. And I feel it, it really works. It's bigger than any single one of us, because the most uptight, resistant minded person has come through that process. And on the last day, kaboom, and not one person made that happen. So I, I do think that there's something there. I call it mystical. You can call it whatever you want. That happens. It takes place that takes any, it's like I say to people in deep dive, you can put your grief, your pain, your sorrow, your anger, your anguish, your fears, your insecurities, your unworthiness into the cauldron of the deep dive. And it has the capacity to transform. Maybe to add one more, just very practical element Andreas, because I think that's maybe good to know. There in our retreat, the groups will be divided, meaning there's also a choice to be in a group together with, let's say you, you would come with a good friend. There's a choice to do the sharing together in a group or to separate. I think that's important now, because it gives you a choice as to, if you're thinking about taking another VC, you want to do it together, but you would like to be separating group, the choice is there. My personal experience here is for the last retreat, I invited also a few friends, founder, friends, VCs. And what I came to realize is there was one friend of mine in our group, in our pot. And most of my friends were in the other. Afterwards, I actually regretted it to the point, well, it's not regret I love connecting to all the people in my pot, but what I realized is, again, the depth of connection, I wish I would have shared it with them as well, right? And there's always a trade off, but it's such a beautiful opportunity to do it, also with friends. And at the same time, there's opportunity, if you really want to do this in a group where there's no people that are friends, more strangers, that opportunity is there as well. I would much rather bring my friends for retreat like this, then I would bring my friends to Las Vegas. I must say that I can clearly understand what you say there might. So let me end this episode by just stating that we're doing the next one in April, April 1st to 6th in a beautiful place in Italy. So anyone to whom this work is, you know, seems interesting, seems like something you want to get deeper into. Just reach out to me, personally, I'll follow up and follow through on that. We're doing it all four of us together, and it's going to be just as magical as it was last time. And now to Fred, Mike, and Robda, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. Thank you so much for doing this work, all three of you, I think it's incredibly important. So thank you. Pleasure. And thank you, Andreas, for being our voice in the universe. Thank you. Just a microphone. I'm just holding the microphone. This episode comes to you by the support of our partners. Portfolio IQ by Synaptic. It pulls data from all sources, board decks, financials, MIS sheets, forms, emails, everything, and creates a true single source of truth for your portfolio data. With Portfolio IQ, you can track all the metrics that matter. Not just the standard metrics. Not sure about the number, just click on it to see the exact sale in the document it came from. Portfolio monitoring that's you'll fall in love with. [BLANK_AUDIO]