But I really think this shows up in person too, especially in women's spaces that we're comparing our bodies, we're comparing the way we're dressed, we're comparing our confidence, we're i've had women ask me like in one-on-one kind of coffee chats that met me in a group scenario at an event like how do you do it how do you walk into a room so confidently and it's like that's hilarious i walk in with just as much insecurity as every other woman in the room but we just have this perceived notion of everyone else's performance but since you do a lot of in-person events i'm wondering like how do you see that come up there

yeah that's a great question i think my it's funny because the main one of my main driving factors or the things that i'm really really intentional about designing for my in-person events is i really don't want that there i don't want that ghost in the room i don't want that like sort of set of rules that are often present in networking types of events or in business types of events where it's like you and especially in entrepreneurship types of events like you must be impressive you must show the room why you're worth talking to why you're worth being connected to and you almost need to like put on this front right And so with the events that I design, I think as we're talking about it, that's like the number one thing that I'm designing to get rid of is that feeling.

And I'm designing for how can we bring people into a room and have them be open and honest with one another, maybe not necessarily vulnerable right away, because I think that vulnerability is something I have made a mistake in the past in events of introducing that too quickly with strangers.

And it feels great and it feels so amazing in the moment.

And then people go and they describe like, oh, I got a vulnerability hangover because I felt so comfortable in this space that I opened up actually more than I wish that I had.

And so it's like, oh, fantastic.

You created a comfortable space.

So is there another version of this comparison-itis that might be true for you that is different from that comparison-itis tale?

Tell us a bit more about your thesis about IRL Studio, because it just felt like what we are building just seems to align to what you are trying to introduce into an industry that, quote, we said that just has a weird fixation with ballrooms.

Yeah, I think my thought process was IRL Studios.

There's kind of two main directions.

One of them is just obviously I have this big obsession with bringing people together.

You guys know I have a previous event that was, sorry, a previous business, a previous events business.

It was all about bringing people together to make friends and find community.

And so I love that feeling when you get everybody in a room and they're kind of on the same page.

Like, so I'm...

... a really isolationist culture.

Yeah, absolutely, and I think what that makes me think about is...

Basically, what that makes me think about is this idea of, I'll often hear kind of like, "Oh, people these days, people these days are so individualistic," or, like, "People these days don't want this," or, "They don't wanna say hi," or, "They don't want to talk to me," X, Y, and Z.

And I find that really interesting, and I sometimes find that a very frustrating stance.

I can understand why people feel that way and they wanna put things out there that way, but what I'm seeing is really the opposite.

What I'm seeing is that for me, the second I started my previous business, which was called Happier, and it was events for adults to make friends, it blew up on social media.

And I... my events were selling out in 48 hours from the second that I started, and it was something that people were craving.

[laughs]