21. Podcastukkah #5: Feedback is feedback with Sam Altman, Max Altman, and Jack Altman

Hello, my name is Annie Altman and I've spent my life on a quest for true shit. Welcome to episode 5 of Podcastica. So far I've learned that the truth hurts, is some true shit, and that there is no ultimate true shit because my truth is different from someone else's truth, and my truth now is different from my truth a year ago. Some true shit that has held up over time, one, be honest, the truth will come out eventually and lying only complicates things. Two, the truth is simple and lies are complicated. Three, be kind and treat people how you want to be treated. If you are uninterested in someone else imposing their true shit onto you, do your best to be mindful about imposing your true shit onto others. This show is basically an opportunity for me to shoot the shit about things I want to shoot the shit about with people I want to shoot the shit with. Thanks for listening to me practice humaning. In today's episode I'll be discussing projection with all three of my older brothers. Sam, Max, and Jack Altman, I'm very grateful and privileged that you were all willing to take some time during this Thanksgiving holiday to circle around a microphone and record some thoughts on projection. Thank you all for coming. Thanks, Charlie, that song's candy. It's all to be here, canny. Thrilled. Thank you. So let's start just with the definition because we've been talking about it a lot, this Thanksgiving holiday. What does the word projection mean to you besides the projector? What are you start thinking about? It's when you tell somebody else that they are a certain way, but really you're that way. Oh, you fear that way. Yeah. Or it's when you're bringing up a problem you see or worried about in someone else and it's actually just you talking maybe verbalizing that you might actually be worried about that in yourself and you don't want to say I'm worried about that or it's the things that I'm internalizing. It's a different way of sort of bringing someone out that you might be afraid of to kind of put it on to yourself. I like all of that to go right into my hippie extremism, bringing out some things I have heard from people I'd be curious if any of you have heard ever the idea that when people say you they're saying I, if you've ever come across people saying that idea and if you buy into that at all or if you think that's sort of extreme to say you can never really be saying you to someone. I guess that would be what projecting is. So I suppose if projection is real and if it really is a thing that happens any frequency that it's worth talking about then that's what that would be. I'm not sure I think it happens as much as people think it happens. I think a lot of times when people name that others are projecting they are feeling insecure about the feedback they're getting or they can't handle criticism and so it's much easier to say you're projecting rather than to say you might be right I should think about that. So I think people probably over-prescribe projection. I think definitely you're at the jack when it's when someone say oh when they're always saying you they're actually meaning I to say that's often or even 50 per cent of the time I don't think I could agree with that. I think if someone says hey you know you are x or y or you're doing z and you don't like hearing that it's a really powerful thing to just be like oh this person is just projecting. It's a lot harder to suck it up and be like what one I agree with that's really harder to that person's just being mean but to really turn it around and just say well actually the only reason that person's just saying that is because they feel that that self is like a very powerful deflection and it's an easy way to sort of not take serious or any responsibility if someone just called you out on something and said even the point if you know someone's boss is it works hey you're not doing a good job if you can change your brain to say oh the person just saying it because he's not doing a good job at work it's a really good way to sort of not take responsibility for someone saying you to anything. Responsibilities definitely a big word here I'd be curious how do you distinguish Sam between projecting and deflecting? I think that any of these things most of the time you can just take my face value like I think most statements someone else makes you can take it face value and that people do like to try to make something into it it's not sometimes it is projecting or deflecting but I certainly think most people try not to hear criticism most of the time and most people try not to give it most of the time so I think a lot gets lost in the noise there and I think it's I think it's like a generally a mistake to try to find criticism when it's not intended. I think there's a certain blend that happens sometimes from someone might be both giving somebody a criticism that's true about themselves and they're hypersensitive to it because it's theirs as well so for example if I called you know somebody else like lazy let's say and I feel a little self-conscious about being a little lazy myself then you might say I'm projecting but it might just be that I'm actually accurately assessing someone else is lazy but I'm hypersensitive that because I think about it a lot so I'm looking out for the signs of it. Whoa yeah both is an answer. I think it's also an indisputable sort of unrelated projection of what Sam just said that people often aren't looking to give criticism is definitely true I don't think people are generally trying to mean or critical and I think a lot of times people who feel criticized by something actually either were insecure worried about something themselves you know if someone gave feedback about someone's work that wasn't totally positive and they felt criticized it's possible that person is just feeling that maybe they aren't doing a good job or whatever so I think when people take everything as criticism that was just meant to be normal feedback a lot of times it might not actually be whatsoever a projective person who gave the feedback it's the person internally you know oppositely projecting and actually like you know just like taking something that wasn't said at all and being really worried about something so I really think it is true that more offense is taken than given and I think like having observed a lot of people that either go on to do much better than I thought they would do in their careers or much worse I think a huge variable is how open you are to receiving criticism and whether you treat it as like in a front or like a gift so you can improve and as a rule the people that I know that talk a lot about anything in this class of ways to not accept criticism I think it's it really gets in the way of them sort of feeling that potential and so I think it's really important when you hear criticism any kind even if it may be projection that the first thing is always like I appreciate that that person said that it may be right let me think about it before you respond with that's projection or anything else even if it might be I think just having a mindset where you take all criticism at face value first and improvement of you can is like super valuable I agree I like that a lot I think that even if whether or not something is someone projecting does not have to dictate whether or not it's to me that's the growth mindset first fixed mindset so having the growth of whatever is happening is here to teach me something and I can learn from this and I can learn from this feedback and I'm also believer in and there's lots of quotes about you know if you look at things that annoy you the most or anger you the most and other people that's really where you have the most to grow and it is saying something about you that is somewhere that you can learn and improve upon and be receptive to feedback so you feedback is a big part of your for jackets a big part of your job it's what your business is built on giving feedback and how you communicate about these things so we can talk about that we can also talk about within families and I can speak as a very sensitive of the Altman children here and how that influences I think that's a big theme with this too is what someone someone's baseline is about how they're going to receive things and then how you how you talk about it so what would you say do you think it feels similar how this stuff comes up both in your professional lives and in your personal lives does it feel like there's a big distinction I think one weird trend to happen right now is that people are writing like user manuals for themselves and how to work with them and like managers in particular have started doing these in the last six or twelve months whoa I think of the people they manage now I hear some of my user guide and so you know like here's how I give them a feedback you hear from them sensitive too do you like actually it's a terrible trend I hate it yeah I haven't heard of this I think it's terrible trend I think people usually use it to excuse bad behavior people often use it to sort of like it's some version of either I'm going to be a jerk or you need to treat me with kibbles any of these wrong you don't get to blame other people for your own lack of ability to receive normal course of action feedback and you don't get to sort of say people have to deal with you being a jerk because that's what how you are so I hate this trend I think in general you have a responsibility to behave well towards others and you have a responsibility to accept feedback in whatever imperfect form it's offered as long as it comes with good intention which I think it almost always does I think the interesting thing on sort of sandwich that talked way too much the last year about intent versus impact and I think that's a terrible trend we have going there too where someone's like well doesn't really matter what you know if I gave Jack feedback and he gets upset about it and or it's made a comment and someone says well doesn't really matter what your intention was you could have had a good intention but Jack the impact was negative because Jack is very sensitive to a word that you use in there so in you know I've gone and so it happened to me at summer camp I drove me insane that intent doesn't matter whatsoever if someone's impacted negatively it's your fault so forget the intent and all you think about is impacting it so you could try as hard as you can to be as nice and get really really nice feedback and the person can say well this triggered me or this was just micro aggression or the impact with negative and it's on me for saying that and that's just gonna make for a really difficult day and world and life of everything if impact is what matters and intention doesn't matter I generally agree with Sam that like feedbacks and perfect as long as you have good intentions and try to do your best people should not be impacted by that negatively and if they are then that's a little bit on them to kind of you know well I mean I of course they rather not be offended but I much rather people speak openly to me yeah and I get the data and I get to know what they're thinking rather than then be afraid to express oh yeah I don't mean it gives anyone the I think you still need to try to be oh yeah that's what's ever not so let's say I mean intention no one no one gonna have a user manual say hey I'm gonna be a jerk but my intentions are good but if you're gonna say hey I'm gonna try my bet you know you try your best but you might have a word choice that someone doesn't like and then they're impacted in a way but you really try really hard to be nice about it it's gonna be a long day if you know all it matters was one person wasn't was offended by it and you tried your best the whole time I think a big part of it is sort of the trust premise because like let's say you give feedback to a family member hopefully they understand the intent is that you're gonna try to make their life better you're trying to help them in some way so it makes it better somehow versus if a stranger gives feedback to a stranger in most cases you don't necessarily assume that the person is trying to help the other stranger you might assume that they're you know maybe virtue signaling on Twitter or they're trying to make themselves feel better about a choice that they made in the past you'd assume some other intention before just trying to randomly help a stranger so I think a lot of it because feedback is a weird thing and if you call let's go back to the lazy example if I call somebody lazy I could be trying to do a thousand different things so depending on what my relationship is with the person they'll take it very differently so I think this the the more random the connection the more objectives and data driven you want to be in your feedback and the more trust you have and the closer you are the more sort of generic you can do with the feedback because they'll trust that your intentions are good I appreciate the reminder to look for the positive is another life thing to not look to be offended to look for people having positive intentions and to look for people wanting to help you grow and learn a quote that came up in my head that had come up on a different podcast as well is a Lewis C.K. quote that has I seen a totally new light now that he said if someone tells you that you hurt their feelings you're not allowed to say no and this is where I get into what what do we do when everyone's feelings are valid and we all want to learn and share and we can only learn and share from each other can you define I never understood this valid valid feeling you say all the time I do what does it mean what does it mean for feelings to be valid that feelings aren't right or wrong that inherently there is not an incorrect or correct in feelings that feelings happen so are all feelings valid yes I can have a horrific feeling and it's valid yes from my personal feelings are valid but all actions as well from feelings are not exactly a reaction response I can feel whatever I want but I can't respond in a way that I want or at least I can't if I want to be a productive happy person and so like if someone says something to me that I don't like I think it's projection I'm it's certainly valid for me to feel a flash of annoyance but it's up to me and whether or not I let that like we're in my day or if I kind of find value out of it and I would argue that I'm a state that a lot of people make is to look for ways to ruin their own day and again like the feeling is certainly valid to response like you know maybe that's valid maybe it's not but like there are a lot of people who look to be offended or look to be angry or look to be upset there are a lot of people who look to be upset on behalf of other people even one the person in question is not upset or offended and like I don't know if that's valid or invalid but I don't think it is a recipe for life I definitely agree with where people are putting their energy and if you're looking to get offended if you're looking in many different philosophies a different this is a general theme of look for the positive focus on the good look for like well I but I don't want to pretend like if someone says something about me on Twitter I will feel a flash of annoyance or hurt or whatever but either you can choose to engage with that well there's nothing to do about this person you never know says about you're never gonna meet never know says about you you can try to describe a bunch of projection like they're just a bit or about their own lives or whatever whatever or you can either try to put it out of your mind and focus on something else or even better or you can take a second say is there something bad and that comment that I can learn from and then decide yes or no and either way kind of move on do I at least I'm gonna be back we also have to take a brief a moment for our sponsors Sam's to her handles at Sam a S a m a thanks hit me with some thank you jack have you any of you heard the phrase hurt people hurt people what are your thoughts and feelings on that one I mean I think there's probably a lot of truth to that if generally if you're someone who's upset or hurt or having a rough week or year decade you're probably more likely to leave me in Twitter comments yeah exactly and if you and if you are a person who is having a good week or a good year or just more off like so just someone who's not hurt because you don't easily get offended you're less likely to get angry and right mean Twitter you know responses but I think the interesting thing to is about like you said hurt people a lot of those people that are hurt and are then you know say mean things back are sort of like choosing to be hurt they're looking to be offended they're looking to like Sam's looking to be offended on someone else's behalf so like they're always offended so they're always hurt so there's people seem to be the angry people that are going back and other people where they could another person could have heard exactly what they said and said well I'm not offended I'm not hurt so I don't know you know I think it's true but I wonder if most hurt people that are hurt and other people sort of just wanted to become hurt for no real reason or they just like getting offended they're always hurt everyone has awful things happen then in life yeah maybe you kind of like if people some understanding for that but then excuses that behavior like when when the media sort of talks about you know all these terrible things that happen to school shooters I kind of hate that like I know it did I know that bad things happen to them but it doesn't like yeah like lots of people get hurt and don't walk into schools and shoot up kids similarly I think a lot of people use this as an excuse for themselves and like people will be like oh I had a heart year I had a hard thing happened to me and so I'm gonna not try as hard and so like at a societal level I don't think that like I think we should be more giving to the people who have had bigger struggles but at the individual level I think people should strive to take more responsibility for themselves and not you know take responsibility the other way from other people who are misbehaving also it's so tempting like when someone says a me too say something me back and then you have like two upset people it's just like I don't think that's like if you play it all the way out it's not a good answer yeah it's true although the other option is which I guess is somewhat better but I also don't think it's the most productive is that a lot of people will just sort of stonewall or ignore or you block them on Twitter or you you know ignore them from your personal life or whatever it is I think that's the it's a better reaction than getting in a big fight all the time but it also doesn't necessarily address the problem how would you three say that media and social media has influenced this in Twitter being brought up and people being able to give feedback electronically or to put themselves out there on social media in different ways. Twitter's unusual is a platform because it it rewards the worst in behaviors. Would you say that holds in other places on the internet too? Yes but not quite as much. Okay. I think the other platforms don't reward kind of like like the thing that always bothers me on Twitter is the way you sort of build up influence on Twitter is to get outraged about everything. I just didn't ask for it but those are the things. I never heard that. There's the outrage that's the stuff that does the best and like the thing each day that people are losing their mind about Twitter is forgotten a month later. It's only to distracts from like the real systemic issues and if you try to talk about like the roots of systemic issues you know attention if you talk about the outrage of the day you've got a lot if you're sort of like mean and like you know witty and mean way gets a lot of attention it gets troubles well on Twitter much better than those other platforms. That's a really interesting point. I think the other interesting negative impact of social media let's go to like Facebook and Instagram so sort of maybe opposite problems that Twitter causes is a lot of times it sort of like creates people like I don't even say like relationships with people talking about people and stand at times with people that they really have no real business. or need to stay in touch with. It's like, "Oh, can you believe that this girl that I went to high school with got married to this person or to her moved here or did this?" And then you sort of give either positive or negative comments about someone that you haven't seen in 10 years and you barely even know, but you saw pop up on their Instagram story and the world would just be a better place. It's like those people don't need to interact with each other and who really cares what it's so ever. So I have what 3,000 friends on Facebook and I probably don't give a crap what 27, 90% of them, you know, 2,700 people, I don't really and shouldn't care at all what they're doing and it's sort of forced relationships that don't matter. So I think about our crack-and-pire, just the fact that it's even all other people around my mind when they're not real relationships is pretty negative. It was only a pretty small circle of people you should care about. So I mean, a Twitter like why should Sam care about some random person he's never met, given crazy feedback, it'd be a lot easier if someone that he's somewhat close to professionally or personally doing that. So just sort of creates these weird connections that really don't deserve to be connections. I could take the other side of all this though, like without these social media platforms it was much harder to stay in touch with old friends, much harder to build new ones around like interests that you have. Twitter also helps to spread good ideas. If you look at the very top Twitter accounts, they aren't trolls. They're actually, you know, well-liked celebrities or thought leaders or politicians or people who are meant to be sort of prominent in society. So I would actually argue that the very best way to succeed on Twitter is to sort of, you know, be emanating positivity and idealism that there is a way to get there with the negative but positive gets you further and that this is just a projection of sort of human norms. Yeah, I mean, I think it's easy to blame technology for everything. I certainly believe the internet isn't that good. But the emotions, the negative emotions that social media brings out in people and the sort of anger, whatever, like those are such strong and sort of deep that you remember those a lot more. So even it's like 90% of the time people spend on social media is good. The time that they got bashed by a bunch of angry people on Twitter or the time that they were like really jealous that all their friends got to go on this vacation, they were going to buy it on like those stick. The other interesting thing on your side of this is that the very top tweets from all of like, you know, Ariana Grande or Barack Obama, the most common reply, the biggest reply will often be a very negative nasty reply on the opposite side, which on one hand maybe is just showing debate, but I think in practice is often just showing sort of nastiness. Well, that's kind of, I mean, it's the point about that's what that's what that's how it's well. Yeah. People are interested in whatever's charge. That's part of, so you brought up with you. I also wonder how much of that is what travels well and what the algorithms are set for. Like this, you know, Facebook tried to redo their algorithm this year is the stuff that floats to the top and this, I don't know, it's an algorithm which is just human psychology. It's generally pretty negative contentious stuff. There's never a, you know, Facebook post or Instagram post that's going to be the very top that is engaged babies. But I could engage though as people being jealous or unhappy about that because I'm not engaged or whatever it is, but there's that, but a lot of the stuff that comes to the top is not always the most like, here's 10 friends being happy together. It's often sometimes negative stuff. But on that point, if we don't like the very most negative stuff and we don't like the position because it makes us feel bad, then what do we like? Yeah, no, I'm not really sure and it's also possible that this is just human psychology and that the people love the reaction. There's so much longer than the negative things that's the stuff that bubbles them. You do see all these studies showing that like all of the positive stuff is actually worse for people's psychology than the negative stuff. Right. It's like, I'm always on a trip and I've got, you know, a new spouse. The highlight reel. Yeah, it makes people feel disgusting. Probably even worse than the negativity makes people feel. Of course. So that's what it says. Like, is it a positive thing when, you know, there's 800 likes on someone's engagement or the all 800 people happy about it. Probably not a lot of people probably like, share that where I was engaged and I wonder if you could somehow figure out or those 800 people out like, did happier or less happy on average that they saw that post. Didn't Facebook for a while? Didn't they see that Facebook was, was intentionally trying to manipulate people's feelings? They tried. They did studies to see like, hey, can we make someone more happier or less happy by showing them? And they were too right? Completely able to. Completely able to. This is where, well, I do believe that projecting can be deflecting and it can be another buzz word in a lot of ways. It also is you brought up, it points to very intense feelings and very, as you brought up Max, human psychology of things of in some ways were wired to remember painful experiences so that we do learn from them. And so to remember negativity and to remember those things. More than that, I think one thing more particularly wired before, I don't know why is to not like hypocrisy. That's like a very deep human thing. Yes, which is hilarious because we're all immigrants. Very degrees. To varying degrees. We're all inconsistent about something. We're certainly not inconsistent, but I think one of the reasons people, a good reason people don't like projecting, I think better than kind of using it as a way to not think about something is it feels really bad to be criticized for something that someone else tolerates in themselves. And I think that's like, I don't know why that is so powerful for people, but it definitely is. Which is also why if you're you can and should be able to give feedback about something or criticize somebody about something that you yourself are not good at, but I think the technique is to call it out first. So to say, hey, I'm not very good at this thing, but you're not very good at this thing either. And I think it's holding you back. And I don't even want to talk about the fact that it's holding me back to, but it's holding you back. And in order to give that without the person getting really pissed at you, they have to trust you. How would you receive that if someone said that to you? They're like, hey, I know that I am challenged with X. And I see that you're really challenged with X. And I really love for us to talk about you being challenged with X. I mean, my first thought when you're saying that is the way I would want to be approached about something like that as someone saying, hey, I've noticed that we both have a similar challenge. How could we talk and work on this together? Yeah. And do you think it's more on the giver or the receiver here to do this, right? Like whose obligation? The projector. No, some of us can give like criticism that's probably helpful. Is it more on, is it more the obligation of the giver to do it in a way where people will be happy about it, or is it more than a receiver to be thankful for the feedback and be willing to accept it in an imperfect form that helps that stuff a little bit? I think it's both. I think it's a shared response. I think it's 50/50. You think it's right? I really do. I think it's shared responsibility because to me both of both of those people are dealing with their own whatever things. And to get to me the only if we're going to get into what is a moral or ethical obligation of someone, it is to treat people how you want to be treated. And people want to be treated differently because really you could say to treat people how they want to be treated, then you don't know how people want to be treated. So I think this comes to both parties saying to me part of why I talk about this is both parties having the awareness that projection is a human tendency, that we all have the psychological ability to get very scared about our egos and attach to them. And so for all of this stuff to come up, so for me it's just so exciting. Here's the way that I look at it. I think I used to take feedback very badly. And what happened is people just stopped giving it to me because it wasn't worth their effort to try to figure out how I would best receive feedback, which is totally right. That's not me, not them. And what it meant is people just stopped giving me feedback. And then even less opportunities to learn and grow. And so my new thought on this is I will take feedback in basically any form, even accepting that sometimes I think it's totally wrong and very hurtful. Well, the combination of those two. But otherwise any rational person is going to decide if they like if I might go off the rear of them or if they don't know what my triggers are, it's not their obligation to figure that out. It's not. There's people who will give me feedback if it's easy. There's a very close set of people who give me feedback even if it's hard. But like I think one good thing I get, and I get it because I ask for it and then I try to be faithful towards receiving it that way, is I think I get a lot of feedback from people that would normally not give it to me. And that's such a gift that I'd much rather just occasionally get a little bit hurt. And hear it. And it's not it's not other people's responsibility not to offend me all the time. And to put in a bunch of emotional and mental labor is to figure out how to say it to me. I just want them to say it and I'll take it in good faith. So I don't I think thinking about it as response building obligation is who knows. My thinking is like what's effective. So like in general you can either be very effective at giving feedback. You can be effective at receiving feedback in a workplace they have different outcomes. So being really great at giving feedback and power is very good manager for example. So like giving good feed, being good at giving because not everybody is trained on giving the receiving feedback. If you're really great at giving people feedback in a way that makes them feel comfortable, regardless of who your target is. Like let's take Sam from when he was very hard to get feedback to an expert feedback giver could still give him Sam that feedback versus being an expert feedback receiver. If you're really great at receiving feedback you make even the most shy person comfortable giving you negative feedback. So I just think of it in terms of what's the impact of being great at either. Ideally you get great at both but they each have like you know a straightforward set of techniques that's more about mentality for both. It's a little bit like getting back to impact versus intention which I don't believe was your intention with that but bringing up the word impact. You leave it as far as that when you said you know who's yeah responsibility might not be the exact right. right word, is it the feedback giver or receiver? You know, who's it on, but you always have yourself, it's like, hey, I definitely agree, like just treat people the way you wanna be treated and try your best to be nice about everything, but you just said you don't know how both people wanna be treated, and especially now, everyone, you know, let's say I have a user manual, like you have no clue how people wanna be treated. So it's really hard to sort of go through your day, being like, I'm gonna try my best to tailor everything, exactly how I think this person wants to be treated, and you sort of go going around, try to alter your feedback based off every person, and it's a lot of guesswork. - It's a lot of energy too. - It's a lot of energy and it's tiring, and it's maybe just a lot easier for you to give feedback roughly the same way to each person, and hope that they can do their best to sort of take it in their way. - Right, so if you're gonna do that, then you wanna have a style that is received well by its pros and cons. - And it might only work for 90% of people, and 10% of people you're gonna find the hell out of, and then you just have to say, well, that's on that. - Yeah, I mean, like, one guy, the most people that I work, I think, Steve feedback, well, there's one guy that just doesn't. If I give him even mildly critical feedback on something, I know that it's gonna take, no matter how nice I say, I know that it's gonna take an hour of-- - It's exhausting, you know, and it's exhausting, and so I just don't do it. - Yep. - That's what happens. - And that makes you feel better at it in a moment. - That's bad. - That it's not gonna make him a great long term. - So that example of that specific dynamic between you and this person makes me think of for me with my friends, I have received feedback about being super receptive to feedback from friends, whereas with the three of you, I'm much less receptive because I get more sensitive for whatever reasons. So why do we think, like, why is it, do you think that that person you were talking about, Sam, that he gets offended more easily from other people as well? Do you think it's something about that particular example? What do you guys think about how this, how it distinguishes both family and business and also just different, the different dynamics? And I do for the record, like, I am on the camp of wanting, I would always rather have someone say something offensive and imperfect than not say anything at all. I think that's a big thing with political correctness. - This person in particular, I asked about it. - Oh, that's cool, you had a conversation about it. - Well, one time, I don't try to get into that. He basically, he's at least self-aware. And he was just like, look, I grew up with, I grew up in a world where, like, people always tell me I was doing a great job. And I never had to learn how to be, that people tell me I'm not, and I'm like, okay, well, when you learn that, I can be feedback again, but when I'm not in the security, I just have to do that. - No, that's not your job. - Yeah, I think that's a big thing. - Yeah, that's a big thing. - From my perspective, I feel more receptive to feedback, from family than I have previously. I feel, especially with friends, more receptive as I've gotten older as well. So in all of life, I feel like you could ask that question and it's a valid question to make that joke or that joke that doesn't land. That. - Do you think that you think your family has different intentions for you than your friends do? So are you less trusting of your family's intentions with their feedback? - Yes. - Why is that? - This is great to get into. I, because I project my insecurities, it's because of what I'm projecting onto you. - You think Sam wants to tear you down? (laughs) - Occasionally, or that there's, because our family gets so competitive, as we would all agree and actually not debate about the tendency in our family for debating, I find that, I mean, we've been making jokes this whole trip and there's the running joke about ranking everything down to colors and fruits and things that ranking is silly in some ways of and it can still be interesting and we can learn from. I believe for me in growing up in a very competitive family, where there's a lot of focus on doing things and achieving and this very work and career focused success and success really in a work environment that I project my insecurities about taking a different path and doing work and my professional whatever as the young 24 year old I am. - Well, what everyone's really competing for is just trying. - Be mom's favorite. - No, no, no, little bit of that. But the real common, everyone's competing to try to be the happiest of anything and so maybe some people are trying to compete by doing the most in that theater path, but if achievement or whatever doesn't make you as happy and something else makes you happier, then that can be your thing. Like I think different people drive their happiness from like accomplishment, some people drive it more from family and relationships, some people drive it from like learning with no particular thing, some people drive it from like hedonism so you just have to like play your own game and you shouldn't worry about what other people are doing to make themselves happy. - I appreciate that. I appreciate that feedback and also it's a funny concept to compete over happiness or to compete over who is the most happy. - I think what Jack is saying is everyone should just play their own game. - Yeah, well I think that's a lot of projection. - Well, I actually know, so I think it's only projection if-- - I'm saying it's a lot of-- - They think you have to play, like I don't know you have to play my game, I don't know Jack is to play your game. - And maybe that's what you mean by projection. - Yes, I was saying that projecting is assuming that other people have to play-- - Or that you have to play someone else's game. - Yes, is putting that in position on yourself but that's gotta be on you to say it's not on the planet. - That's why I started this off with it's me projecting my things. Then how do you, how do I, go into any feedback you want to give of how to turn? - Like two weeks ago, I was at work. I was having a busy stressful day. Get a video from Max where he jumped off of the boat, landed in the water, changed after a whale shark and I was like, what am I doing with my life? So it's very easy to get, that was an Instagram moment. So it's easy to get at that. But then I was like, you know what, he's doing, makes him happy, I'm doing something, I'm happy, it's okay, we can both be happy and for us. - Yeah, and then on the opposite side, you can be like, oh, this is really fun, but Jack's like started a company and like maybe I want to start a company one day and he's five years ahead of me on this and maybe I should be starting that sooner and you get very easy just to change your brain to be like, well, this was really cool. And I didn't get into that whale shark, but I would like to start a company eventually and I'm behind it starting the company and he's watching this video while starting the company. So it's just super easy to get into that, but I'm not gonna make your day pretty miserable if it's constantly changing. - Yeah, just focus on your happiness. - Yeah, that was a very cute moment. A lot of it comes, I think, from how do we feel, secure in our own path and that we're making our own decisions that feel good to us and then doing them and enjoying them. That was very sweet. Nobody knows what they're doing, we're all just winging it and we all have a lot to learn from people's feedback. Anyone have any closing points on projection or thoughts or feelings? - Thanks for having us all. - Yeah, thanks you all for coming. I'm grateful and I'm proud we could all crowd around the mic for this period of time. - And happy Thanksgiving everyone. - Is there a revshare for the ad revenue that's eventually gonna come? - It's our sponsor ad. - Max, you're gonna have a ad. - And that's a big help. - Thank you all for listening and thanks for being you.