Heart of the Cards

GT Radio - The Geek Therapy Podcast

#341: What starts as a conversation about YuGiOh and Pokemon turns into a discussion about passion, perseverance, frustration, and reflection on purpose and goals.

Transcript

Josué Cardona 0:11
Welcome to GT radio on the Geek Therapy network here at Geek Therapy. We believe that the best way to understand each other and ourselves is through the media we care about. My name is Josué Cardona. And I’m joined by Lara Taylor.

Lara Taylor 0:22
Hey,

Josué Cardona 0:24
Link Keller,

Link Keller 0:25
what’s up?

Josué Cardona 0:26
and Marc Cuiriz

Marc Cuiriz 0:27
Yo,

Josué Cardona 0:29
Mark, you went last, because it’s your turn. What are we talking about today?

Marc Cuiriz 0:32
Oh, okay. So, you know, I feel like this is a trend now. Because I feel like in almost every episode, I’m saying that, Oh, I started rewatching this or I started replaying this. And

Josué Cardona 0:43
there’s new stuff, too, you know, there’s new stuff that comes out.

Lara Taylor 0:46
Yeah. Marc doesn’t like new things.

Marc Cuiriz 0:47
No, I like to live in the past. Thank you very much. So I started rewatching. Yu-Gi-Oh! but not the the original, because I’ve already rewatched all of that. And it’s actually my first time actually watch. I guess I shouldn’t say rewatch. I watched for the first time the entire first season like a long time ago. So this time,

Josué Cardona 1:08
before you continue, what is yugioh? And how many series are there of yugioh like, please give us context.

Marc Cuiriz 1:15
Okay, so for context, Yugioh is a card game where it has like a lot of monsters and stuff. And it’s basically like, kind of like, Pokemon

Josué Cardona 1:26
is this a real card game like, like a physical card, you can play?

Marc Cuiriz 1:28
it is a physical card game that you can play,

Josué Cardona 1:30
okay,

Marc Cuiriz 1:30
it’s got so many different sets. The rules are very complicated. And I know next to nothing about actual, the actual card game itself. But like with every card game, and with every toy, and everything, every franchise, there has to be a cartoon adaptation. So like Pokemon YuGiOh came along. And since then, there’s like, I don’t know, eight different subsequent series. Now. I’m actually not quite sure how many seasons or series there are of yugioh. But I started rewatching. The second one, which is YuGiOh. GX. So it’s like a, it was to, like, introduce, like the newer cards and sets and stuff that were being introduced into the game itself. And this is a you know, fun little episode, like, you know, fun little anime to, you know, watch along with. So I started rewatching it because I remember, in this series, there’s a specific set like the elemental heroes, and I always thought they were really cool. And they’re in the like, they’re like the primary set in this in this anime. So it’s been kind of nice. And then like, like, when I’m watching it, and I’m listening to kind of what they’re talking about. I’m watching the dubbed version. And just like some of the things that they’re talking about, really got me kind of thinking about kind of, like, following your passions and sort of persevering through all sorts of different challenges, and, you know, like adversity and stuff like that. And I also know that recently, because it’s a double whammy here. Recently, there was some major updates in the Pokemon anime. So I know some of you guys had opinions and thoughts on that. Plus, there’s Scarlet and violet. So yeah,

Josué Cardona 3:25
yes. What are you referring to? Could you possibly be referring to?

Marc Cuiriz 3:29
Okay, if you’re referring to Okay, well, sure. For this, I guess this is big spoilers for people. But Ash Ketchum has finally, a Pokemon champion, finally did it. After all these years

Lara Taylor 3:47
after years of being the same age for all these years,

Marc Cuiriz 3:50
after all these years, this 11 year old kid has finally won a Pokemon Championship.

Josué Cardona 3:55
The real spoiler for people is that now they know he had never won before. In the 25 years that the anime has been has been going

Lara Taylor 4:05
there are a lot of Pokemon championships throughout the years and he he loses them all.

Marc Cuiriz 4:10
He’s always a runner up.

Josué Cardona 4:12
Yeah, but but the reason I thought that that would be a cool thing to also bring up in the context of you know, of going deeper into yugioh because ready you talked about like, oh, this idea of perseverance and like you have this goal and you’re pushing through and immediately I felt like to have like the protagonist of the of the Pokemon anime we’re always following him and Pikachu from the very beginning. It’s been over 20 years and and but his he never wavered, right like that. That was the goal. That’s what he was working toward. And it’s a big deal for a lot of people to finally see that happen. And honestly, I don’t know how long they could have kept like, not letting him finally win, it’d be too depressing. But But yeah, yeah, like it’s I think, I can’t think of a Just to have that much content, you know, following one person for so long with that one goal that they’re trying to achieve. And then, you know, it’s a 25 years for us, but it happened he did it. So I thought that would be cool context to add to this as well. Two very different shows. Pokemon and yugioh

Marc Cuiriz 5:23
Yes, but I feel like they, there are two very different shows, but they’re also kind of the same.

Josué Cardona 5:29
Please elaborate?

Marc Cuiriz 5:31
Well, I mean, like in terms of like what they’re trying to

Link Keller 5:34
they’re made to sell cards.

Marc Cuiriz 5:36
Yes, they’re both made to sell cards.

Lara Taylor 5:38
and video games

Link Keller 5:39
they’re to introduce gambling to children.

Marc Cuiriz 5:43
But like, also, there’s monsters

Josué Cardona 5:44
who’s the Egyptian god that possesses someone in Pokemon?

Marc Cuiriz 5:50
I mean, you could argue that like, there’s this whole connection thing with ash and his Greninja. I mean, there’s getting there’s there’s there’s these types of things that they incorporate here. I mean, there’s ancient gods and pokemon. With the movies like you have Arceus

Link Keller 6:06
they’re not Egyptians, but Egypt doesn’t exist in pokemon. So that’s the loophole.

Josué Cardona 6:13
So Arceus isn’t a god, he’s the God. He’s the creator of everything. I believe

Link Keller 6:17
there are many God, God, Pokemon,

Josué Cardona 6:20
but he’s the right. Isn’t he the creator of everything?

Link Keller 6:23
I guess I haven’t played that one.

Josué Cardona 6:26
Yeah.

Marc Cuiriz 6:30
But I feel like in this sense, though, like, they’re kind of the same in terms of like, the lessons that they teach you at the end of every episode.

Josué Cardona 6:40
okay

Marc Cuiriz 6:42
And it’s like, again, like that idea of perseverance and stuff. Although I will say that the biggest difference is that, you know, ultimately, in the end, though, like, up until now, Ash has, always lost. And then he’s just been more determined, and he’ll come back. And then that’s when he starts in a new region. But in YuGiOh, the protagonist almost always wins. And he, they make in the show, they make him lose, to prove a point, or to further a plot point. But other than that

Lara Taylor 7:15
how do you not get tired of watching one kid lose all the time, and one guy win all the time.

Josué Cardona 7:20
Exactly. But you jump back and forth, you like when you’re sick of watching one person when you go to the other one.

Marc Cuiriz 7:26
Like, like in the original YuGiOh series, the biggest loss that happens in that, or there’s two major losses, but and one, that’s a duelist kingdom, when yugioh’s facing Kaiba. And Kaiba says, If you win, I’m going to basically throw myself off this wall. And so he purposely gives up, because he wants to, you know, save Kaiba make sure Kaiba but doesn’t do anything, you know, drastic. And then later on during the seal of Orichalcos arc, he chooses to not listen to his cards, and he gives into his rage and plays the card, which ultimately makes them lose and then he and then Yugi sacrifices themselves. So Atem can continue the fight. To stop the dude, I forget what his name is. But again, that’s to prove a point of like, you need to be like, you can’t let your emotions over, like, overwhelm you. In that sense, you can’t let them dictate you and you have to have some semblance of control, like self control and stuff like that. And then in GX right now, I’m in the second season. And it’s following this whole arc of like this society of light and everything. And they say that, like the main, the main character, Jaden, he’s like this, like, for whatever reason, this like, kid in a prophecy to bring balance to the world and stuff. And so the, the mastermind behind it forces him to fight against a guy knowing that he’ll lose and, and in order to like the wants to make him lose so he can capture his soul. So that way, he can continue his plans. And he loses. But because he’s so powerful, he gets to keep his he keeps his soul, but he loses his will to duel, like he lost. And now he’s like, Oh, I don’t want to duel anymore. And they symbolize that by like, he can’t see his cards. It’s like they’re just blank, white, like a completely blank white background. And then he goes on this self discovery journey, and then finds his passion for dueling again and then comes back and then he wins in a rematch duel.

Josué Cardona 9:36
How, like, what what significance did that have for you? Or like what kind of metaphor was it for you?

Marc Cuiriz 9:42
So for me that was kind of like, like that idea of like, you’re really into something and you think like, Oh, I’m gonna give this a try. And I’m gonna like I’ll use this for example, like artwork, like some people like really into art. They’re really Enjoy art. And then let’s say they want to go out on a limb and they post their art on like Reddit or something thinking that like, Oh, I really proud of this, and then they post it. And it gets completely torn to shreds by trolls and stuff. And for somebody that can be really disheartening, and then all of a sudden, they lose that passion to do their artwork again, because they forgot the reason why they wanted to create the art like why they even started creating art in the first place, which was to express themselves to have fun to create their own characters and their own designs, or whatever it is. And in this sense for yugioh, he realizes that the whole purpose for him and why he even started dueling to begin with was to have fun, and that’s ultimately his goal. In the end, it’s not always about winning. It’s about having fun, and dueling with everything that he’s got and trusting his deck. And so, for me, specifically, I can think back to you know, there’s multiple times when I would get into something think like, I’m ready to kind of take this on, like, like, when I was in high school, there was League of Legends thinking that I could try my hand at ranked, getting absolutely demolished being completely discouraged. And or even with Assassin’s Creed, like, there were times when like, I wanted to, like try and 100% the games, I wanted to try and find all this stuff. And it got to a point where I wasn’t playing the games to have fun, I was playing them to be a completionist, which just led to frustration. And that would make me want to like stop playing the games for a while. Kind of forgetting the reasoning, why even picked up the game to begin with. And then after a while going back and replaying it, and realizing, okay, I’m just doing this to have fun. Then it was like, Oh, now I remember why I even wanted to play this series in the first place. And then, you know, persevere through it. And now here I am with the Assassin’s Creed on virtually every platform I own.

Marc Cuiriz 12:00
What about destiny.

Marc Cuiriz 12:06
Destiny, I think that one’s more just like a hyper fixation. That one comes and goes that I don’t I don’t really know if that one’s like, Oh, I lost the passion for it. I think that’s just like I would play it because I have friends that got into it. And I would enjoy playing it with my friends. And then they would fall off, they would transition to a different game. So then I just fell off of it. And I mean, that was kind of like with Counter Strike too. Like I got into it because I saw people playing it. And then my friends got really into it. And then we all played together, I was trash at that game too. And then I because I kept trying so hard to try to be good. So I could play with my friends because they were better at the game, I would get so frustrated to the point where I didn’t want to play the game anymore, because it lost that meaning of having fun, or it lost whatever meaning it had to me. And so that I just gave up and just walked away from it. And ultimately, I think for me that in the end, that was probably the best because all it did was lead to a lot of frustration. And it I would usually walk away feeling more pent up and frustrated and angry than I was when I started up the game. And then I found joy in playing different games like Assassin’s Creed like Fallout, you know, and other things like like the Wolfenstein games like I started playing those. still need to finish Youngblood it’s staring at me on my screen right now. I’ll get to it.

Josué Cardona 13:34
So so this idea of the like, the perseverance and all that it are their passions. It’s like, what I hear you saying is how kind of we lose that along the way, and then maybe come back to it can have that relationship that we have with? Like the original, the original reason why we started doing something or maybe losing touch with what, what benefits it gave us at some point?

Marc Cuiriz 14:06
Yeah, I think it’s one of those things where you kind of have to be a little careful when it comes to pursuing your passions. Because a lot of it for a lot of people you can get caught up with the other things that come associated with it. Like some people might get caught up in the money part of it. Some people might get caught up in like, what image you’re going to be presenting. Like we know when it comes to like streaming, for example, you stream for fun, but then when you get a following that it becomes more of okay, how do I cater to the viewers? Like you know, I gotta make sure now I’m staying on top of things and I’m up to date on this or I’m up to date on that or I’m playing the latest game. And then you lose the reason it gets dangerous because then you could lose the like you can get lost in the whole sea of things trying to stay relevant or trying to stay on top of things or trying to make money. They you kind of forget the reason why you started the passion to begin with you And I feel like a lot of view, like a lot of creators out there, they eventually come and touch on this topic, but they have serious conversations like, I know that there’s a few times where like Markiplier has like, posted videos, having serious conversations of like, I need to take a break, because I’m losing the reasons why I am losing that passion that that joy that I feel when I’m making new content. And I want to find that again. And so I think it’s one of the one of the bigger things that like remembering like, even when you’re in the pursuit of pursuing your passions, and whatever it might be, to always try to carry with you that the original purpose as to why you started doing the thing in the first place, because that’s what makes it your passion. And that’s what makes it fun and worthwhile. And makes it feel like it’s not actually a job or a chore. Because if you lose it, then that’s virtually what it becomes is a chore or it just becomes all about winning in the Yugioh sense. Not having fun.

Josué Cardona 16:05
I’m curious how all of us would define passions. Because I’m, that’s not a word that I like to use. Much. I think I used to use it more. I think it’s dangerous for some of the for some of the reasons that you brought up. So I’m curious. Link and Lara, what are your what’s your take on on passions? And maybe what what are some of your What would you consider a passion.

Lara Taylor 16:36
I used to think that passions would just be something that I really liked that I want to do all the time. But you can be passionate about things that you don’t like to you can be passionate about. Fighting against things you don’t like, you can be, it’s something that holds your attention and something you want to partake in want to do. But Marc, like what Marc was saying about like it feeling like a job. Whether you call it a passion or not, you can definitely turn your hobbies, you can definitely, especially in the culture we live in, you can turn it into a job, and you can start feeling like a job. I stopped playing World of Warcraft, when I logged in, I was like, all I’m doing is logging in every day and doing my daily same with Animal Crossing. It started to feel like work. And I was like, That’s not fun anymore. I’m going to do things that I enjoy. But yeah, passions don’t have to be necessarily fun. It’s something you care about.

Link Keller 17:46
Yeah, that’s, that’s my take as well as passion. And being passionate about something is just it gives you strong feelings. And that can be positive or negative. It’s just they are large, and sometimes overwhelming. I’m not passionate about anything right now.

Josué Cardona 18:15
Thanks for that.

Link Keller 18:16
Depression is a hell of a drug. um No,

Marc Cuiriz 18:20
I don’t know. It sounds like you’re very, very passionate about the healthcare system earlier.

Link Keller 18:25
Well, I have a lot of rage. But it doesn’t necessarily

Lara Taylor 18:28
passionate rage

Link Keller 18:30
doesn’t necessarily translate into action, which I feel is maybe part of the equation here.

Lara Taylor 18:38
Could be Yeah,

Josué Cardona 18:40
I like you all hit on the points that I was interested in. So yeah, is it is it a passion or is it hyper fixation? Right? Like, I don’t know.

Lara Taylor 18:52
Hyper fixation. I’m like, How is Assassin’s Creed not a hyper fixation for you?

Josué Cardona 18:58
Well, it’s like, like, I don’t know, like, oh, I care so much about that right now. You know, and then and then you have kind of that mode where you’re like, Oh, this isn’t fun anymore. Like you said, Lara. And it can be something good or bad. And Link you had on exactly where I want to go with this. It’s like you just got strong feelings about something. And then and then you’re driven by these feelings. Often illogically, like you’re not thinking rationally, and you’re you’re like diving headfirst into into this. Like, we could have a conversation about how, like, your goal is. I don’t know. Noble, worthy, good, bad. Or, like, Ash just wants to be the best the very best. The best ever was. Yeah, right. And then you what is what is yugioh doing?

Marc Cuiriz 19:55
Just gotta believe in the heart of the cards.

Josué Cardona 19:57
No, that’s not his. What is it Why Why is you know, like, why is this Egyptian god possessing this kid? Like what is what is the mission?

Marc Cuiriz 20:07
Well, in the original series, it’s basically to go home. Just wants to go home to rest

Josué Cardona 20:13
Okay, Gotcha, gotcha. Okay. So like, there is a goal, right? Like with my therapist, one thing that continues to come up more and more is that I don’t seem to have a North Star is the word we use. She’s like, Well, what do you want to do? What’s your goal? Like? What are you striving towards? I’m like, I, I don’t know. And, and I don’t want to go into the reasons why the insights I have about that now. But it’s, it’s, it’s hard. But sometimes when I do get excited about something, we’ll talk about all those hyper fixations, it feels so good to feel driven toward something. And, and that feeling of persevering and like pushing through and actually achieving a goal is fantastic. And I think I know that I’ve been inspired by a lot of shows. To do that. And actually, I mean, I’ll say inspired, but I don’t know, for discussion with the group, if it’s kind of maybe had a detrimental effect at times, where it’s like, oh, I believe I can do anything, I believe in the heart of the cards. If I just keep going for 25 years, I can make it you know, or my favorite examples like DBZ, it’s like you can always get stronger, you can always just see the train harder, and you can make it. And sometimes those things are kind of unrealistic, but at the same time, they’re helpful and motivating you and so you can persevere and move forward, especially through something that’s both attainable, and maybe difficult. Right, something that might be beneficial to you or to someone else. I feel, especially when you’re trying to get out of something. Or trying to move towards like an improvement of some sort, it’s helpful to have those kinds of inspiration. Comments from

Marc Cuiriz 22:08
I can definitely see that. And I think this is what kind of separates for me, what these passionate things are for me, and how they differentiate from like my hyper fixations is that a lot of the things that I have grown to have these strong feelings and emotions towards usually have driven me to make a change either in my life or with just me personally, in some way, shape, or form. Like Assassin’s Creed taught me to kind of view things differently, kind of view things from all sorts of different perspectives, because there’s never going to be an absolute truth, there’s never going to be an absolute right side about things. So best to get as view things from as many different angles as possible. And also just challenge the way things are taught. That’s kind of where I learned all that Dragonball Z. For that very reason, just gotta persevere Believe in yourself train. And you can really overcome any sort of challenge that can come you’re in, in my personal life has taught me to kind of when things get rough, I know that I can overcome them, I can push through the struggles and whatever sort of hardships might come in my, in my life, I just can’t lose that idea of hope or lose that idea of inner strength from for myself. Not even necessarily that I can like, you know, move mountains, or anything like unrealistic but you know, it comes with comes in handy when tackling personal issues. Whereas like something like destiny, into hyper fixation merely because it’s just something that I’m into at this moment, it might it helps relieve stress. But it hasn’t really caused me to make any sort of what I would consider substantial change in my own personal life. Or in any capacity like that. It’s just a nice little stress relief I get to shoot aliens. But things like, you know, what I mentioned, have caused me to kind of view things differently, interact with the world around me in a different way. Things like that, and how I view myself.

Josué Cardona 24:32
Do you have anything that you’re persevering toward now that you need that motivation for

Marc Cuiriz 24:37
oh man? Ah, what isn’t there? No. Definitely through school with trying to push through that and trying to maintain my grades while also making sure that I am actually you know, learning and applying the skills that I am learning in those classes, as well as just perservering through my job because it’s a very, it’s a very stressful time both like with the holidays around and just with a lot of changes within the organization. It’s just stressful or stressful for everyone involved. And so kind of persevering through, through those particular hardships is right now my current my current struggle, it’s my, my freiza or my cel right now.

Josué Cardona 25:31
Lara, do you have anything that you’re working towards right now? Need some motivation?

Lara Taylor 25:37
No.

Link Keller 25:42
Before you even ask me, I’m just gonna zag on us. And

Josué Cardona 25:44
I wasn’t gonna ask you

Link Keller 25:45
good. thank you. That’s very respectful. I think it’s important to reflect and be cognizant of whether you are currently experiencing being goal oriented or growth oriented, because I think those are very distinct. You know, is Is the goal to you want to be the champion, you want to be the best that there ever was? Or is it about growing your friendships and understanding your your buddies better, and connecting with your friends and learning about the spaces you exist within? I think I think it’s important to do that reflecting in your own life, especially when you’re talking about school and work and stuff is like, it’s very easy to focus on just being goal oriented. And then when you lose, or diminish some of the passion, like it can be really hard to like reconfigure, get yourself to keep going and to keep persevering. As compared to being more growth oriented, where it’s like, the persevering is kind of the point because that’s where when the growth is happening, is when you are struggling. When there is conflict and stuff like that. Yeah.

Josué Cardona 27:00
Yeah, there’s, there’s, there’s a big difference between having a maybe a goal, like when we’re talking about work and stuff. I’m not sure if I heard you, right, Marc I’m putting, you know, I’m gonna put words in your mouth, but some of it, some of it maybe sounds like thriving, right? Maybe school, right? It’s like, oh, I want to accomplish this goal, so I can move towards something else. Work sounds more like surviving, than thriving. I think. I’m thinking, Link based on some of the stuff that you were talking about, it’s like, yes, there’s this whole growth piece. And Lara, correct me if I’m wrong. But we don’t we don’t do a lot of like, growth stuff, right? Like, we’re, we’re because of insurance and all that stuff. We work from a deficit model. So people are like, from negative 10, we bring em up to zero.

Lara Taylor 27:57
As much as possible. I try to come from a growth mindset and a growth perspective with my clients. But I always gotta put down a diagnosis, and it’s how much improvement happened. Okay, they’re healed bye,

Josué Cardona 28:11
right. It’s, it’s growth right in the negative to get them to baseline or neutral, but you can’t just work with people to be like, like, at that point, right.

Lara Taylor 28:19
Let’s Get you from zero to like five like, ten

Josué Cardona 28:22
yeah, yeah, exactly. Exactly. So it’s like, it’s like, how do I escape? Like, I’m trapped in a mind. In the, in the Johto region, I need to get out. Versus like, I want to, you know, meet.

Lara Taylor 28:39
I wanna be the best!

Josué Cardona 28:39
I want to beat the final four. Yeah. There is a huge difference. And I think, yeah, I think of Viktor Frankl, right? And, and a man’s search for meaning. And he’s, he’s talking about being in a concentration camp. And, like, everything he had, like the mindset he had to have, but that was for survival. Right. And so I think it’s so important to have stories. Anything that’s a reference that can help us move forward? And maybe it may be motivate and inspire and even just get you hyped? Right, like, like, I get it. Like, sometimes that’s just sort of like, I want to do something now. I think I want to, I want to I think something else

Link Keller 29:29
that’s the other part I want to touch on is that I think for talking about passion. I think a really important aspect is community connection. Right? Like hyper fixation. Like you can get super obsessed with a thing and you spend your time engaging with it and thinking about it and mulling it over but taking that next step of connecting with other people and being like, hey, I want to introduce you to this thing or finding other people who are already in it and being Like, okay, what do you think about this theory? Or what was your favorite part and having that that community aspect of connecting with other people? I think that that has that that is an important distinction to make as well is like that is right is like you don’t play Destiny alone. Like it’s online. You’re you’re playing with other people, you’re doing PvP stuff. But are you spending a lot of time like communicating with your team outside of the game about the game? Does I’m speaking as though I’m asking you this question. Specifically, Marc, I’m not you don’t have to answer that I’m just sort of posing this idea of being like, even things that are already with other people’s like, there’s an extra layer of engaging with it on a community level. Rather than just like, it’s for me, I enjoy it. I’m doing it for me. It’s yeah, there’s like that, that extra, like, passion is pushing you to engage with other people about it. Which can be really, really rewarding and can also be kind of scary, because you are opening yourself up to being like, Hey, I care about this thing a whole lot. And they’re like, cool, dude. Anyways, you’re like, oh, no, you’ve rejected my passion that I showed you. Oh, I’m embarrassed now

Josué Cardona 31:16
my yum!

Link Keller 31:18
It doesn’t even have to be yucking. It can just be like, like, I’m, I’m at top tier level excitement. And I’m showing it to you. And you’re just like, Oh, yeah. I’m only like a two.

Josué Cardona 31:33
That’s the eh yeah whatever

Link Keller 31:34
I think it’s cool. But like, I only played, I only played that game for like, 15 minutes yesterday. And I’m like, Oh, I put in my, my eight hour workday into the game. Oops. Heehee.

Josué Cardona 31:46
So so I’ve a question about this link. Because I, I think that, like, I think a valid lesson is that you probably can’t do whatever it is that you’re thinking that you want to do alone. You’re going to, there’s going to be people along the way. My favorite example of that is the if you’ve seen Final Fantasy seven Advent Children, that movie, there’s a scene where like, they they go like that all the characters that you met along the way in the game, they’re basically pushing cloud up vertically, right? Like one catches him and throws him up. And the other one like goes and kicks him up. And someone like puts him

Link Keller 32:24
best scene, best scene in the movie

Josué Cardona 32:25
I love that. it gets me every time, right. But it’s like, he can’t make it up there on his own. But also, it’s representative, like you couldn’t have done it. Like, you didn’t go through this whole story on your own, like you get to this point, because of these people. And these are your friends, and they’re helping you get up to that point. So you can do what it is that you got to do. But I’m not sure that that’s what you were saying. Link, when in terms of the community aspect. So I want to understand better

Link Keller 32:53
I think there’s a certain aspect of that. But I think it’s it’s like, it’s easier to be passionate around other people who are also passionate about that thing. Mirroring, perhaps? I don’t know, I as you’re talking, I’m like, Yeah, I used to be really passionate about grad school. But then every single person who was supposed to support me and mentor me, failed me. And so I lost that passion, big time. I kept going for a little while longer, but eventually was like, Oh, I’m fucking done with this. So that’s what came to my mind when you said that was gonna maybe reflect on that one for a while. oooh

Lara Taylor 33:42
It’s interesting, because that brings up like, passion and perseverance can look different, right? Like, I am very passionate about Legend of Zelda. I’ve never beaten a legend. But I have played all of them. I’ve played all of them. Same with Pokemon. I’ve never made it to the championships never finished a Pokemon game never collected them all. And they used to be someone that

Josué Cardona 34:08
it takes 25 years.

Lara Taylor 34:08
25 years. Well, I’m almost there, then, you know, I’ve been playing since the game came out. But it’s one of those things that like, you can still stick with something even if you know to let go of certain aspects of things. If you’re more goal oriented than growth oriented, like, I used to be a completionist I had to get 100% of everything. First run through of a game. I never looked at an FAQ, or walkthrough and now I’m like fuck that. I want to finish the games. I want to play the games. I want to have the story and be immersed in this aspect that made me passionate about the game, right? So you can look at different things. So knowing when to fold them and move on and still keep that thing in your heart. I think that’s also something to be aspired to.

Josué Cardona 35:08
That’s great insight to have when you’re striving towards something. And like, it’s hard to come to that point, like maybe. And also, sometimes it’s like, oh, I can’t achieve this thing that I wanted to do. And it’s that may be true may not be true. But there’s something about like going through, like, why? Yeah, I think that you can be anything that you want to be or if you just work hard enough, you can achieve it. That’s not true. It’s just not true. Despite how much media has told us that. And

Lara Taylor 35:46
there are a lot of things you can do. And there are things that you can strive and reach for that you can get. But not everybody is going to be an astronaut. And not everybody is going to cut it as a doctor and not everyone is going to be President of the United States.

Josué Cardona 36:03
Just just just, yeah, you can’t you can’t everybody.

Marc Cuiriz 36:08
Does that mean, I can’t be Spider Man.

Josué Cardona 36:10
I mean, I mean, there’s definitely more than one Spider Man, but everybody can’t be Spider Man.

Josué Cardona 36:16
And you don’t necessarily have to be powered, like we’ve talked about on this show you anybody could be Spider Man, anyone can be behind the mask.

Link Keller 36:23
I think that’s an important distinction. Anyone can be Spider Man, not everyone can be Spider Man.

Marc Cuiriz 36:31
Was like ratatoiulle right now where everybody can cook.

Link Keller 36:36
Anybody can cook,

Josué Cardona 36:38
like raccocoonie?

Link Keller 36:43
Yeah, I think sort of shifting back to Lara, what you were talking about finishing games. And when I was younger, I was the same words like I didn’t want to look up hints or FAQs, I wanted to figure it out myself, I was very much motivated by figuring it out and doing it myself. And as I’ve gotten older, I’ve become much more focused on I want the experience of getting in this space and seeing what what is in this piece of art that I’m engaging with?

Lara Taylor 37:19
Why bang your self, your head against the wall over and over and over and over again, when you can I have a tool that will help you move forward?

Link Keller 37:26
Yes, yes. And there are certainly still times where I, you know, I get the the good feeling of doing it myself. But I think as I’ve gotten older is like, ooh, time is short. I only get so many hours to do anything at all. So like I want to experience as much as I can. And if there are tools available for me to do that, if there are people I can connect with to help me get into those spaces. That’s That’s good stuff for me now. Maybe it’ll change again, who knows?

Marc Cuiriz 38:03
I used to remember with Assassin’s Creed, trying to do those subject 16 puzzles. And I remember, what also helped was that I did not have internet at those times. So I spent three hours once on a puzzle, trying to figure it out. I was putting my head through my wall basically with how frustrated I was getting. But it was also this point where I was like, No, I need to do this on my own. I know I can figure this out, there’s something that I am missing. I mean, ultimately, I did figure it out. But now like, nowadays, there’s something like that I’m like, I’m just gonna look this up. I’m just gonna find somebody like use utilize the tools or like, I was playing through the Modern Warfare two campaign. And I looked up an achievement guy cuz I’m like, I want to do the achievements. I want to have that nice feeling of doing all the things. And instead of like trying to figure out how to do it and figuring out the strategy, I just watched a play. I watched a walkthrough that told me exactly what to do and cool now I just had to repeat it. And then it felt this,

Link Keller 39:04
I just I yeah, I think that that’s easy to sort of feel like oh, you’re like giving up. But I think that is also part of perseverance is being able to like recognize that there are tools available to help you and then utilizing them appropriately. Like that is an important skill to have.

Josué Cardona 39:23
I read a book recently that had this phrase, like what is the pain you want to sustain? And it’s like, there’s there’s a cost to things. It might be time it might be energy, it might be strength. And that’s how I’ve been reflecting on a lot of things like even even personal stuff. They’re like, Oh, wait a minute. No, that’s a disability. And I’ve been trying to and I can compensate for that. But it’s so exhausting. It’s so hard. Right? And it’s like to even want to go through that trouble, to Do that, like, is it? Is it worth it? Do I want to persevere if that’s hard, because there’s so many stories, right, that we see where somebody is just driven and driven and driven to the point of obsession, or and often to their detriment. And, and and I don’t even mean but that’s without going into the specifics of like, if, if the intentions are good or bad, because you can be obsessed about taking over the world or genocide or whatever, you know, idea you have, whatever reasons whatever it is, you can like you can push yourself to to a breaking point. I’m trying to get there but

Lara Taylor 40:41
what are we gonna do tonight brain? What do we do every night Pinky try to take over the world.

Josué Cardona 40:48
Never worked out for them always got hurt.

Lara Taylor 40:50
Never, never.

Josué Cardona 40:52
Always got hurt, right. But so I think of like, what’s the cost of it? I think it’s funny. Yes, Ash has been 11 years old for 25 years. So you know, so for him. It wasn’t that long.

Lara Taylor 41:06
no, it’s only been a year?

Josué Cardona 41:08
It’s been Yeah, I mean, technically, I don’t know how many I don’t know how much time has passed. Right, actually in the game, but he’s still a kid. did he die in one of the movies? I guess. I don’t know.

Link Keller 41:19
Yeah. he did he sure did

Marc Cuiriz 41:20
I feel like I feel like he’s died in multiple movies.

Josué Cardona 41:24
But really, is that just the thing that happened in the movie?

Marc Cuiriz 41:27
Oh, well, I mean, like in the first. In the Mewtwo. Movie, he gets turned to stone and he dies. And Pikachu tears just happened to bring them back to life.

Josué Cardona 41:37
Yeah, that’s I mean, that’s, that’s it that that’s that or not? That’s, and

Marc Cuiriz 41:41
then the pokemon i choose you like

Josué Cardona 41:44
that’s the one where he he?

Marc Cuiriz 41:45
Yeah, he just straight up dies.

Josué Cardona 41:48
Yeah, he doesn’t come back. We just ignore it right when the series continues.

Lara Taylor 41:53
So the series all takes place before the end of that movie.

Josué Cardona 41:55
I think it’s a multiverse thing. It’s a Yeah, that’s a that’s another universe. But But yeah, like, and so I think that there are things worth dying for. There are a lot of things that I wouldn’t die for that a lot of things that I don’t even want to be inconvenienced for. I don’t want to feel uncomfortable. Like, oh, I disagree. Do I care enough to like, get punched in the face for it? lose all my money that? I don’t know. lose any money,

Lara Taylor 42:28
choose your battles?

Josué Cardona 42:29
Well, yeah, yeah. Like that

Lara Taylor 42:30
and choose your Pokemon correctly in battle.

Josué Cardona 42:34
I mean, I know this is going all over the place. I don’t know that you know, that. We’re anywhere near where you want to go with this Marc. But you know, it’s a lot of like, I think it’s cool to talk about the, the flip side of it, you know, it’s like, what are you? What are you like, just reflecting on what you’re persevering toward? And why are you working so hard? Like, why? What is it costing you? And is it worth it? And I think some stories like yeah, like, it’s so funny when I whenever I think about Dragon Ball, I love Dragon Ball. And Goku is simultaneously like, just so selfish. He’s just like, oh, this is fun. I want to challenge like, oh, no, no, heal up. Let’s go for another round. And, but then other times, he’s like, actually, I’m gonna save I’m gonna protect my family and the world and the universe, eventually. Right? And the multiverse eventually. Right? He’s and he’s willing to, to, to push himself beyond his, you know, as far as possible, and he’s died multiple times as well. You know, saving saving people. I love that. But that’s because like, I agree, I agree with those with those motivations as well. And I would hope that that I could at some point, but like, yeah, I don’t know if he doesn’t have a job. He’s just training all the time. It’s like a singular focus. But there’s other stuff too. Once you have a family to pets, kids other stuff? I don’t know. It’s something it’s something that again, yeah, I think it’s it’s good to to reflect on that. Because sometimes we get stuck in a loop. And we don’t even like you mentioned before marc like we don’t even know why we’re are we doing this anymore? You forgot what you were what you wanted to do it in the first place. To a point where sure we can talk about oh, well, it’s a game like this is boring now. Or oh, this is this is like just agonizing right over this like that’s so boring. I hate it or like well, or it could be clinically significant than your you know, you’re wasting all this time you’re not going to work. But regardless if you’re not like what what is the benefit? And what is it costing you, I think is is important to keep in perspective.

Lara Taylor 44:59
One of the things When I’m working with clients that are have like, feel stuck at work or stuck in a relationship or stuck with any kind of relationship, family relationship, romantic relationship, friendship, whatever feeling like asking, Well, what are the reasons that that thing was important to you in the first place? What are the Why did you start that job? Why did you go this direction? Why? What made you happy? What made you drawn to this person that you’re in a relationship with? And that question can help them figure out well, how do we get more of that, whether it’s staying in that job, that relationship, that whatever, or finding something new that helps spark that thing? Again,

Link Keller 45:44
I think that’s ultimately the strengths and detriments of stories in media is that they can be really good as a way to reflect on your own life and struggles and invigorate you to do more and to try harder and try something different. But also, they’re stories, they have a structure to them to be narratively satisfying to the people who read or watch them. And real life is not that. And so it’s sort of this double edged sword of like, it can be really helpful tool for helping us push through and reconfigure and find passion again. And they can also be like, Wow, this is a really not useful story for my lived experience.

Lara Taylor 46:45
Can you imagine a story that like just follows the day to day and you have an arc that like, drops off one day and picks up like, in three seasons? And you’re like, where did that come from? I don’t remember that. Yeah,

Josué Cardona 47:01
reality TV shows are very, very edited, because they gotta remove all the boring stuff in between. That the question that you posed, Lara, like, do you remember why you were doing this in the first place, I think is a really important question. Because also, lots of times, the answer is not a good one or one. Yeah, someone, I didn’t see any other choice. I felt forced. My parents, you know, obligated me, it was the lesser of two evils.

Link Keller 47:32
I didn’t think that there was other choices.

Josué Cardona 47:35
Yeah, that one comes up a lot. And, and then you’re stuck there, and you’re still like you’re trying to, maybe the reason you’re stuck is because you didn’t care in the first place, or it wasn’t your choice. You like lost all agency, and there’s no, there’s no reason for it. And you may you may not be conscious of that, but that’s a good question. To, to ground. You know, that kind of struggle, like, why, why are you doing this?

Marc Cuiriz 48:03
I feel like that’s actually, probably the lesson that my current supervisors they’re trying to instill in me at this moment. Because now that I’m thinking back on it, they’re basically trying to do this if like, Why did like, what is it that brought you to this job in the first place? And why, you know, why did you come to it, and, you know, to me, ultimately, is it was the kids, it was the idea of working with these kids, and being able to, hopefully, help them in some capacity to make better decisions and to grow and to learn how to better handle their emotions and everything else that might follow in life. And, you know, the, where the, you know, they told me about, like, when, when I first started, I was actively engaging with the kids, I was laughing, joking around with them all the time. And now they like, every time we see you, you’re usually running around and your hands are full of whatever, whether that be luggage, whether that be, you know, packages for the kids, whether that’s something like they’re like you’re usually now locked into the office do taking care of the administrative stuff of the job. And, you know, so they’re trying to instill that, like, find your passion for the job, like, try to see if you can find that again. And to me, it’s like that sounds all fine and dandy, but again, this is like kind of Link’s point of like, this is also real life. And there’s not always going to be a satisfying or a happy ending to this where I can try maybe to find that passion. I could try interacting with the kids more and being more engaged with them all I want and it still might not bring that back. For me, at least in this particular job, which may mean in the end, ultimately, yeah, I may find a different opportunity out there. Or even taking a step away and working in a completely non related field for the time being, at least until I’m done with school. And you know, I’m through with internships and stuff like that, and then I can make that return. Or it may have that satisfying conclusion where I do reignite that passion. And I do like, remember why I was drawn to the job in the first place. And then that idea of perseverance kicks in of like, I can push through these difficult times and with a company, because I found that passion again. So like, I wasn’t expecting it to go that way. I wasn’t expecting to have a realization here. But I’m glad I did.

Josué Cardona 50:55
you had It here, right here you had the realization?

Marc Cuiriz 50:58
Oh, yeah. Well, like 10 minutes ago. Gotcha. Gotcha. Yeah. Like we were talking about it. And as I was listening, that’s when the wires just be like, lightly grazed each other and was like, a whole lot. Wait a minute, wait a minute. And then I put it back together and started. Yeah, yeah. And then then the lights went off. And I was like, ah, there we go. That was that was the connection I needed.

Josué Cardona 51:21
That’s good. I don’t like the word passion. Because I think maybe sometimes it’s like purpose. Like I hear part of your job is like, oh, yeah, no, this job used to be fun. But it’s not now. It’s boring. Right? Where it used to be fulfilling and not it’s now it’s, it’s not giving. It’s taking? Yeah, yeah, it’s like sucking from me instead of instead of the filling me. But I think it’s because we can we frame things, the way you frame the situation is also very different. You know, like, I’m not enjoying this anymore, versus I’m making a difference. Because I don’t know, maybe the work that you’re doing now is actually more impactful than you were than what you’re doing before. But it depends how you measure that, you know, and maybe, that’s not enough to push you forward, that’s not the fuel that you need. You know, you want that, that interaction with them, you want the connection, and then you lost that. So it’s like, it’s kind of sucks, depends on how you look at it. And kind of relate it to that you mentioned before, like, what different games have taught you or different shows have taught you. And again, it’s like I, at least eventually, I’ve started using, I don’t use the term Oh, like that, like that book taught me this, or that movie taught me as I say, I learned from this or that because you take from it, maybe what you need, or what you want to see where like someone can see the same story and learn completely different things, because it means something very different to them. So I think I like how much we’ve talked about reflecting and taking a step back and looking at and what’s going on, like what really sure the passion is a strong feeling. But what like what is your purpose for being there? What is the goal? Is it to is it to make a difference in these kids lives, and then like you’re stepping in and doing something that’s really important that has to get done. Maybe Maybe you are fulfilling that goal, or that purpose, right. But it just maybe it doesn’t feel as good, which happens a lot. And and there is a lot of like that honeymoon phase at the beginning of a lot of stuff like almost, you know, a lot of different jobs. And especially, I know we’ve all studied or worked in psychology and mental health. And we work with people. And at the beginning like that feels sometimes it’s scary, but it feels good. When you start and I remember Marc you being like, oh, like, had this moment, you know, and it was like it was amazing, and it feels so good. But things you know, those I think it’s also it’s an unrealistic expectation sometimes of what the outcome will be that kind of maybe when we realize it unconsciously, it kind of dims the flame a little bit. Gives me like, Oh, it can’t be like that every day. Oh, yeah,

Link Keller 54:12
nothing is static.

Josué Cardona 54:14
Nothing is static. Except static.

Lara Taylor 54:20
That’s true.

Josué Cardona 54:22
Static

Marc Cuiriz 54:24
Truer words have never been spoken. Thank you.

Link Keller 54:29
This has been kind of a bummer you guys.

Josué Cardona 54:32
Yeah, yeah

Link Keller 54:34
I’ve been playing Pokemon violet and I’m really enjoying it.

Josué Cardona 54:40
Talk about persevering through bugs and glitches and yeah,

Link Keller 54:43
yes. I haven’t had any particularly bad ones just funny graphical issues. But you know, I I played Pokemon Blue when I was a kid and I keep I keep coming back. I keep coming back because I love catching those little monsters and making them my friends. my buddies

Josué Cardona 55:09
Lara Pokemon. Lara played Pokemon Blue when she was in college that’s not true, that’s an old joke. That’s

Lara Taylor 55:20
that was like in middle school or high school when that came out Josué.

Josué Cardona 55:24
Yeah, no, I know. I was I was making a joke about how old you are.

Lara Taylor 55:28
Yeah. You could have you could have even made it more.

Josué Cardona 55:34
No, I didn’t. I thought that that was enough. Because link said

Link Keller 55:38
goodness gracious.

Josué Cardona 55:39
They were a kid. Yeah. Yeah.

Link Keller 55:41
Welp

Josué Cardona 55:42
Make it fun.

Marc Cuiriz 55:43
Joke’s on you guys. I mean, I was a newborn when they came out.

Josué Cardona 55:47
Were you born?

Marc Cuiriz 55:49
96 Yeah.

Josué Cardona 55:50
Okay. Okay. I thought you weren’t even born yet.

Link Keller 55:54
You were born in 96?

Marc Cuiriz 55:56
Yeah.

Link Keller 55:56
you weren’t born yet.

Lara Taylor 55:58
He’s as old as my nephew.

Josué Cardona 56:00
Oh, because green probably. Before

Marc Cuiriz 56:01
oh you’re right you’re right

Josué Cardona 56:02
before you were born.

Marc Cuiriz 56:03
Yeah, that went dead. Yeah. All right.

Josué Cardona 56:06
Yeah. pokemon predates you Marc.

Marc Cuiriz 56:10
Not by much.

Josué Cardona 56:11
No, not by much. No.

Marc Cuiriz 56:14
I’m basically as old

Link Keller 56:15
you live and breathe in the Pokemon era. And the yugioh era.

Marc Cuiriz 56:21
It’s a never ending era.

Lara Taylor 56:24
And not all perseverance has to be a struggle. And, and a torture like, I’ve been playing God of War all week. And I was talking with a client about it, who is playing on the hard mode, the hardest, hard mode? And I was like, why would you do that? And they’re like, I’m having fun with it. It’s a lot of fun. And then we talked about how hard some of the, some of the creatures are right? To beat and like, Oh, good, good. At least you’re still struggling with it on the easy mode. So I know, it’s meant to be hard for everyone.

Josué Cardona 56:59
I don’t know if this has anything to do with anything. But I saw Tiktok recently that laid out the different ways, the different reasons why people enjoy books. And I believe what they said was world building. characterization and plot. Right. And so it’s like, we can all read the same book. Right? And we can all have very different opinions about it based on what we like or don’t like. So like, I’m a world building person. I love like, yeah, give me like,

Lara Taylor 57:39
all the lore

Josué Cardona 57:39
like, yeah, push me there, right. And then some people don’t care what the setting is, right? They like just want these characters. You can have the same characters that they love in a million different stories doing, you know, whatever. And it’s fine, because that’s what they’re here for. Or it’s the plot where it’s like, oh, you know, I need that.

Lara Taylor 57:55
I need to know what happened

Josué Cardona 57:57
I mean, yeah, it’s like, oh, that story flowed, you know, and stuff like that. So I think I think that that plays into everything that we’re that we’re talking about. Even Even these games like why do you play? I love these games, you can play for completely different reasons. Can I? Actually come on is one of them.

Link Keller 58:16
I think that that’s actually a really cool point is that in Pokemon violet in scarlet, like they are explicit about that there are gym badges. There are star badges, which are like a battling thing. And then there are Titan badges, which is collecting

Josué Cardona 58:35
the Pokedex

Link Keller 58:36
Well, no collecting items to for food, you make sandwiches in this game, which I love. But one of the characters is like, oh, so like, what? What do you what are you you’re going to school? Like what are you interested in? Is it completing your Pokedex? Or is it becoming the champion? Like what what is it for you? And I love that they’re explicit. Like, it’s like, yeah, there are lots of reasons why people engage with this. And it’s, it’s not, you know, the game is set up in a certain way to support certain things, but like, you’re here to enjoy yourself and you can make your own fun.

Josué Cardona 59:11
Yeah, yeah. My favorite game that does that. Most recently, I haven’t played violet and scarlet yet. I, I bought I think every almost every Pokemon, and some I’ve only played for like two hours. But like, I want to get into them so bad, but they are they are. They are huge. I’m really looking forward to violet and Scarlet because of some of the changes, but and I’m in Genshin impact. I love that. There’s so many different things to do. I can come in one day and I’m like, I’m gonna play the story or like, No, I’m just gonna upgrade my my weapon, right? And that’s like a whole like, you can just do that for hours and hours and days. And just pick what you want to do. And yeah, Pokemon Exactly. It’s like no, I’m just I’m just gonna catch catch Pokemon. I’m just gonna

Link Keller 59:59
I want to fill My Pokedex I want to buy cute outfits. And I want to make

Josué Cardona 1:00:04
can you breed. And you breed them.

Link Keller 1:00:05
Yes.

Josué Cardona 1:00:06
In this video game.

Link Keller 1:00:07
Yeah,

Josué Cardona 1:00:07
yeah. And it just going shiny hunting for it.

Link Keller 1:00:09
Yeah, you can go shiny hunting. I haven’t done any of the shiny stuff yet. I did. I did go and find a ditto so that I could get an egg from my starter, because it grew up and I was like, you’re still cute, but like, I missed my baby.

Josué Cardona 1:00:24
So which one did you choose? Quaxley?

Link Keller 1:00:26
no, I picked the kitty.

Josué Cardona 1:00:29
didn’t like it’s teenage self.

Link Keller 1:00:32
they’re Fine. It’s not it’s not a it’s not offensive. It’s it’s two evolutions, but as soon as I got to the last one, I was like, I need the baby. Like, oh, I’m gonna I’m gonna go get a ditto. I’m gonna make an egg. And I’m gonna give that baby the everstone. So it does not evolve. And now I have it in my party. I’m leveling it up, so it’ll be strong. I can keep it in my party. da baby

Josué Cardona 1:01:00
Ah, I’ve been thinking about which. Yeah, which starter I want. And I was leaning towards that one. But now I don’t know. The names are very funny. At first, I was like, fuecoco is that the one I want? But I don’t know. Still leaning towards sprigatito.

Link Keller 1:01:22
It’s such a cutie it’s so cute

Josué Cardona 1:01:25
I know. alright Marc Is there anything we didn’t touch upon? Um, do you want to or did we? I mean, we went pretty.

Marc Cuiriz 1:01:34
Yeah. There we went directions that I didn’t even think of or going into. But I love it

Lara Taylor 1:01:39
I feel like that’s a theme for when you pick a topic might go a lot of different places with it. And you ended up being like, I learned something

Josué Cardona 1:01:48
as long as you have those insights. Yeah. as long as it’s helpful For for you.

Marc Cuiriz 1:01:52
I like having more open ended like topics like something that’s very blanket because I like

Link Keller 1:02:00
seeing where it goes

Marc Cuiriz 1:02:01
I like to like just Yeah, I just want to see where where our conversations go. Because I like unless that’s like, I want to react to this specific thing. It’s like, Nah, here’s a general umbrella topic. And let’s just see where it goes. And I’m usually thoroughly surprised at where we end up.

Josué Cardona 1:02:20
And really, I mean, link is the only one that really suffers. We have to come up with a title and explain what we just did.

Link Keller 1:02:28
Oh, I didn’t even think about that. All right. Oh, no.

Josué Cardona 1:02:36
Title is I want my sprigatito baby.

Lara Taylor 1:02:40
But is it a sexy baby?

Josué Cardona 1:02:43
no it’s a monster on the hill

Link Keller 1:02:46
Yeah, it’s it’s the only sexy baby and everybody else is the Pocket Monster on the hill. Oh, no.

Josué Cardona 1:02:58
Got it. Okay. Well, all right, then. Good luck Link. you’re Welcome.

Link Keller 1:03:06
Thank you.

Josué Cardona 1:03:07
Yeah, closing thoughts, Lara? You can pass

Lara Taylor 1:03:13
I’m almost tempted to buy the new Pokemon game because of this conversation.

Josué Cardona 1:03:18
Yeah,

Lara Taylor 1:03:19
almost. I gotta play god of war right now. I gotta finish. Gotta

Josué Cardona 1:03:22
follow your passion. Link any closing thoughts?

Link Keller 1:03:25
Life is not a story. It is too chaotic for that. So when you do have moments in your life that are yummy, tasty, fulfilling story moments. just wallow in that that’s the good shit. And keep persevering through the chaos in the meantime.

Josué Cardona 1:03:51
Don’t give up Link. And Marc. What is your closing thoughts?

Marc Cuiriz 1:03:59
You know, you know how life always like the saying goes, you know, you gotta know when to hold them and know when to fold them.

Josué Cardona 1:04:07
Lara? Yeah, that’s a quote from Lara

Marc Cuiriz 1:04:09
Yeah, yeah, exactly. So in this case, I think right now, I just, you just gotta trust in the heart of the cards. That’s what I was getting together. You got to always know that. If you trust in the heart of the cards, then when you need the right card. It’ll come to you. Yeah, yeah. And it might not be necessarily the card that you’re expecting. But it’s the one that you need.

Josué Cardona 1:04:32
Yep. Yep. And I just spent the last hour saying the opposite of that. So you know, go back and listen to everything I said. And then you know, choose whichever one of these is more helpful.

Link Keller 1:04:44
You could say it’s your move.

Josué Cardona 1:04:46
Thank you. Thank you,

Link Keller 1:04:48
End it. end it now

Josué Cardona 1:04:52
alright everybody. Yeah, you know, if you want to play any of these card games with us, that was the original idea. I mean, if you remember that far back There’s online versions of all these. Go on to discord just talk about it. Let’s let’s let’s duel. Join the conversation on all of our community spaces which are in the show notes. For more Geek Therapy, visit geek therapy.org. Remember to geek out into good and we’ll be back next week

Link Keller 1:05:18
mm byebye

Josué Cardona 1:05:20
Geek Therapy is a 501 C three nonprofit organization dedicated to making the world a better place through geek culture. To learn more about our mission and become a supporter, visit geek therapy.org

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Characters / Media

• Yu-Gi-Oh! series
• Yu-Gi-Oh! card game
• Pokémon series
• Pokémon Scarlet/Violet (video game)
• League of Legends (video game)
• Assassin’s Creed series (video games)
• Destiny (video game)
• Counter Strike (video game)
• Fallout series (video games)
• Wolfenstein series (video games)
• World of Warcraft (video game)
• Animal Crossing: New Horizons (video game)
• Dragon Ball Z
• Man’s search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl
• Final Fantasy 7: Advent Children (2005)
• Legend of Zelda series (video games)
• Spider-Man
• God of War: Ragnarok (video game)
• Genshin Imact (video game)

Themes / Topics

Conversation Topics:

* Perseverance
* Burnout
* Hyper-fixations
* Finding Oneself/Identity Development
* Passion
* Resilience

Relatable Experience:

* Frustration
* Clarity/Understanding
* Finding purpose

Questions? Comments? Discuss this episode on the GT Forum.

—

Links / Social Media

Check out the GT Network: network.geektherapy.com

GT Forum: forum.geektherapy.org

GT Discord: geektherapy.com/discord

GT Facebook Group: facebook.com/groups/geektherapy

Find us at www.GeekTherapy.org | @GeekTherapy | Lara: @GeekTherapist | Link: @CHICKENDINOSAUR | Josué: @JosueACardona

Ask us anything through the Question Queue and we’ll answer on the show: geektherapy.org/qq

Join the Conversation!

What have you been passionate about, and how did you persevere through low points in that passionate drive?

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