foreign
[Music]
okay our next talk is on mental health
and avoiding burnout in your crypto gig
and is going to be hosted by Hudson
Jameson Hudson is a long time ethereum
contributor having previously worked at
ethereum Foundation For Five Years on
numerous efforts including protocol
development coordination specifications
and co-running devcon's two three and
four he co-founded the ethereum
educational and coordination group
ethereum cat herders he has three cats
and five chickens and lives in Texas
with his spouse please help me and
welcome me Hudson to the stage
[Applause]
but hello thank you so much for the
introduction
all right so before we start I gotta
apologize I kind of partied too hard
last night at the element Lido thing so
my voice is out
however dead ass I was just at the
coffee table and I had honey I just
grabbed it and just like squirted a
bunch of my throat so I should be okay
all right so yeah today we're gonna be
talking about mental health and avoiding
burnout
um next slide I also the clicker's not
working I'm gonna have to be like click
a lot because there's animations
click
all right so just a bit about me uh I've
been in crypto since 2011.
um I am have been in the ethereum
community since 2015. mostly at the
ethereum foundation doing stuff like the
all core devs calls EIP management and
Devcon
um I left in 2021 and joined flashbots
for a little bit
and then I also co-founded Oaken
Innovations and ethereum Cat herders if
you've heard of them
um I'm trying to get a hobby outside of
crypto that's hard we'll come we'll come
back to that later but uh I like ice
cream whiskey and uh taking VHS tapes
and they can put them on YouTube
uh also can we start the timer
okay so before we begin just a quick
heads up presentation is going to be on
some heavier topics around mental health
uh maybe like mentioning self-harm
completely relate to not being in a
place to want to hear that you can just
walk out at any time or you know turn
off the video and if you're watching you
know on the internet until you're more
comfortable hearing it or never
um I'm also not a doctor I'm not trained
in mental health
um this just draws from my real life
experiences in mental health and should
not be taken as medical or legal advice
click
all right so let's get to some mental
health tips today I'm kind of like
structuring this just not to like be
like Webster's defines mental health as
but just kind of doing things that I
thought were like important to say to
people that's it's not always talked
about
um next slide
so tip number one adjust your
perspective on Mental Health
it should be treated as serious as a
physical injury
um so like if you broke your hand and
you can't code anymore you're going to
do everything you can to like heal that
hand until you can code again
um I it seems like there's like a stigma
though especially in work some
workplaces where it's like mental health
things like severe anxiety depression
other stuff like aren't taken as
seriously in some parts of the world uh
when really that's going to cognitively
affect your work much more sometimes
than a lot of physical injuries so it's
a taboo subject but talking about it
helps um there are many places around
the world where like it's kind of like a
suck it up uh you know just be stronger
that kind of stuff I really don't
believe in that I think that you know if
you're not okay it's okay to be not okay
you can talk about it you can reach out
and get help for that
um so the first thing yeah first tip
adjust your perspective it's as bad as a
physical injury we should treat it more
seriously
next one
okay build and maintain a support system
click
I do not mean this support system we are
all addicted to crypto
and if you were just in if all your
support is people who are also in the
same Echo chamber as you
then that's not going to be as effective
uh next
so don't do that next
instead next
yeah
do something like this my support system
is my parents uh my friends in the
middle and I have a therapist a
therapist has been one of the most
helpful things for me but again it's
just one piece of your support system
and
um hit one more time click
and you can have a little crypto friend
support As a treat like if you want it
like there are like some really good
Discord groups I'm in where we have a
mental health Channel and we can just be
really open about what we're feeling
that day and everyone's support system
is going to look different I mean maybe
you're just like a total introvert and
you just have like your cat
great that's part of your support system
everyone should make sure that work
isn't encompassing their life and that
they have some kind of support system
where they can like actually say this is
who what I do to uh clear out by mind
and to make myself understand the issues
I'm having click
all right don't be afraid to ask for
help I kind of alluded to this in tip
number one you are not weak uh people
around you especially people from
different Generations than your own
might not understand what you're going
through and that's okay like you you
should be the number one priority to you
I had this problem for a really really
long time it was very difficult I was
helping a lot of different people not
taking care of myself uh still
struggling with that to this day but I'm
starting to finally come to an
understanding myself that like if I
can't help myself others are going to be
affected as well and if I don't help
myself I'm just going to keep burning
out harder and harder so yeah that's
kind of
um yeah just the tip is just don't be
afraid to ask for help next slide
now we're going to talk about burnout
next
right so burnout is individualized it is
different for different people
um I I I I've never admitted this
publicly but um some a mistake I made
early on in working for ethereum I was
at the ethereum foundation early like
2015 2016. and I would travel with
vitalik a lot and we've all seen how
vitalik works
so in my mind I was like oh if I'm not
matching vitalik I'm not doing good
enough
but in reality vitalik does take time to
himself he does take care of his health
and his body and breast and stuff but I
I was kind of naive and just thought I
just need to be pushing myself harder
and harder and harder to accomplish
things and I mean I'd be I'd be lying if
I didn't say that got me places but it
was at the toll of my mental health and
I've had a multi-year mostly burnout
period because of it like 16 18 hour
days of nothing but ethereum for like
three to four or five years gets to you
um so yeah don't don't compare yourself
to others and and do yourself check-ins
this is something where a lot of people
I find in the crypto space are very
analytical they aren't going to do like
a body check of like their emotions I
had a lot of therapy before I could come
to empathize with myself and I think
that's something more people should do
to maybe put a reminder in their
calendar and say you know
how am I feeling like is everything good
do I need to adjust things so yeah um or
check it with your support system too my
spouse Lillet is amazing
um I'll go up and I'll be like hey am I
Manic and they're like yeah you're a man
it goes like I had no idea and they're
like you've been up for 20 hours I'm
like okay so uh yeah next slide
here's some resources also just by the
way uh start thinking of questions we're
going to have a good amount of time for
questions
um additionally if like people don't
have exactly questions but like under 30
second personal experience that they
want to share
um that's fine too at the end of this
um okay resources next slide
all right internet's your friend there's
online therapy that I found a lot of
people have found very helpful I have a
therapist in my town but we work
remotely
um it's not like super expensive and you
can sometimes get work to pay for it
so I'll talk to that about that in a
second also something that was really
good for me and understanding myself and
coming to terms with how I operate as a
person is taking a neurocycle to
neuropsychological tests one of them one
of them was a general one and that once
they said you have bipolar two you have
ADHD you have OCD and I was like okay
cool and then years went by and uh
everyone in my life was like Hey you
really seem autistic and I was like
you're diagnosed right it's like No And
so I I'm not the kind of person who
likes to self-diagnose with when it
comes to medical stuff so I did that
test and the autistic testing people
came back were like yeah you're autistic
however you're so good at masking and
mimicry that and I and eye contact that
like you just naturally or like do that
but it's or unnaturally do that but it's
taken you a while to get there I didn't
have any friends till High School no one
wanted to talk to me so I kind of just
learned and I think a lot of us do this
what we what what facial Expressions we
have to do to get a positive response
from people so yeah join or start chat
rooms that are crypto or non-crypto to
build a support system those are really
important don't let all your chat rooms
be work related that'll just drain you
uh touchgrass go outside
don't I mean you can walk with your
laptop it's not the weirdest thing in
the world maybe
um and being outside and getting
exercise is a very important thing I've
ever I've also heard there's like Sun
lamps or something that might be helpful
I'm actually really bad at this so like
do as I say not as I do but going
outside and getting exercise really does
do physical and chemical things to the
body to help with a lot of the emotions
we struggle with
slide
okay so in our ecosystem in ethereum
what can we be doing to push the topic
of mental health forward slide
so if your company doesn't have
proactive mental health measures
advocate for them we need to make them
common
um some examples mandatory vacation days
I've heard of this working more so
recently for people who are truly
Workaholics
um I mean it's going to be an
interesting subject but when you know if
you're approached about it or if you
talk to your work but I've heard it
works uh stipends for therapy or
Psychological Services I mean they give
you like what like a couple thousand
dollars for a new Macbook and you get
like a rolly chair that's really cool if
you're working from home why not monthly
stipends for therapy I think that's
going to be really important and going
on like everyone's going to have to be
doing that eventually
um and then the last one's very
important and close to me because behind
the scenes because I've been in ethereum
so long I've dealt with a lot of
mediation uh and major projects where
they didn't have
um like a traditional HR or anyone that
would mediate conflicts within their
organization so I don't like the term HR
because like
HR is hired by the company to protect
the company's interest so sometimes
they're great and they really do go to
bat for you but there needs to be like a
new term or a new kind of person that is
like
paid by the company but is like legally
and in all other ways separate from the
company so that they like if you have a
problem with the highest levels you can
go to them instead of having to escalate
it through other means or being too
scared to escalate it so if you're a
crypto company right now and you have
employees
um see what your employees need maybe
they don't need any of this uh they
probably need number three at minimum
and I've talked to a few companies about
them implementing this and I'm going to
see how this goes uh but yeah just
really advocate for this stuff because I
mean
they're going to be Pricks if they say
no right so yeah
all right next slide
okay be kind take care of yourself and
ethereum we'll continue to have a soul
ethereum is the best cryptocurrency
ecosystem project because it has a soul
and what I mean by that is that unlike
other projects that kind of like uh have
uh Debs they hire just for a short
amount of time and then they get
uninterested and drop them there's a lot
of fun cool things there's a lot of
great people there's a lot of good
discussion in ethereum and there's
values that the earliest people in
ethereum have like instilled in us
around censorship resistance and
decentralization and other stuff but
also just like not being a dick like you
see it with metallic you see it with
Danny Ryan you see it with Tim baiko
like they all exude this value of like
not getting into sticky situations or
you know having useless fighting with
people so
um yeah and also like when you're on
Twitter just stop for a second when
you're about to like just post that rage
tweet like to reply to someone and think
like they might be going through a hard
time right now I've actually reached out
to people on DM if someone's acting a
little off about something they're
saying and I'm like hey are you cool and
sometimes they're not sometimes they're
in a manic phase sometimes they just had
a rough thing happen and they're just
trying to escape that by going to
Twitter and being off off kilter so uh
yeah just like have empathy in that area
I guess it's the best way to put that
next slide
thank you so much we're going to do
questions now we have at least 13
minutes so yeah uh oh thank you
Hudson thanks for the talk I like your
T-shirt what's your take on psilocybin
psilocybin oh oh I'm not I'm not working
anymore right now I can talk about that
um so
um psilocybin is an amazing amazing tool
for mental health
um I've tried a lot of non-traditional
things for my bipolar 2 and depression
one of them is IV ketamine it's very
expensive it's legal in the U.S but it's
very expensive that is I've it's helped
me a ton sometimes other times it
doesn't help me at all additionally uh
psilocybin
um I've heard on when you take a major
trip it can do a lot of things in my
case when I took a major trip on
mushrooms it gave me more empathy
because that was a hard thing for me
additionally I uh in a very dark dark
time when I was had to be working I
microdose psilocybin for a year and it
was one of the only things that helped
me because the prescription medicine
wasn't doing its job exactly and I was
doing them together but you know I just
was on the wrong stuff for a while so
yeah love psilocybin next up excellent
so psilocybin is like a scientific term
for magic mushrooms
oh um wonderful talk Hudson
um I wondered what your recommendation
for like post Devcon like recovery is
because like Devcon you come here it's
like really intense I'm like really
tired it's like you know doing stuff I
always decides interactions and then
after this I'm going to get on um do 18
hours of travel and then like sit in my
house again like how do I recover from
that like Drop
yeah there's gonna I mean a lot of
people actually go into a little bit of
a depressive slump or anxiety slump
after a big conference where they're
like overly social for a week
um I used to go way harder at Dev cons
and I would crash for a whole week
afterwards I'm actually pacing myself
this time but uh to answer your question
everyone's gonna be different some
people like just want to watch Netflix
all day after they get back from a
conference and just not do work for a
day or two others need like multiple
days to sleep depending on where they
came from others want to get right back
to work because they stay energized I
don't understand those people some of
the time but you know it's different for
different people so just
um just kind of like really focus on
what you think is the most relaxing
thing for you and what will help you
recharge
okay uh yeah thank you um so in the
title of the talk there was like your
cryptocurrency or gig your ethereum gig
um you have any particular advice for
people who are doing gig work where they
might have multiple projects or you know
not just have like one full-time job
that's a really good question so yeah if
you're just doing gig work
um it's it's there's good and bad with
it because I've also been there to an
extent as a contractor and stuff usually
depending on where you are in the world
you might not get benefits
um things like that I would set aside a
little bit of money for like therapy and
stuff like that especially if health
insurance in your country if you're if
you're lucky enough to be in a country
that just does it for free great but
like for us uh that you know you need to
like set aside some money and time for
it
um yeah also like one thing I'm not
going to show this company because I
don't know the ins and outs of it but as
a gig employee check out opolis they do
some stuff around having gig employees
get Group Health Care through them in a
cryptocurrency way it's actually the
East Denver guy John powler runs it so
yeah check that out that might be a good
thing for Gig employees
hi that's an amazing talk thanks so much
thank you um I noticed that a lot of
people in crypto often have like Mania
or like sometimes just a little bit like
myself included when I first got into
crypto I was like very manic
um and people tried reaching out to me
about no no I'm fine
um so I was wondering like what is a
good approach to dealing with like
someone that you care about who may be
manic
yeah so um
if you yourself are Manic and you're
kind of coming to that realization
um definitely talk to Medical people um
the ones that I would recommend um to
look up for would be like therapists can
do so much but then there's other ones
who can prescribe medicine like
psychiatrists and sometimes
um them working together or like getting
a piece of paper that the therapist says
like yeah this person's Manic and then
the third then the psychiatrist is like
I agree and then they get you something
that's one thing
um as far as other people in your life
um just like if they were having any
other things that you were concerned
about in my in my case I think I would
just message and be like hey I'm
concerned and wanted to get your take on
this I've done that line a lot
um and also it's gonna depend on the
person some of them are much more
responsive with that kind of feedback
some of them are like no no talk about
health don't talk about health So like
um showing that you care is usually
going to break down a lot of barriers to
people so that's kind of what I've done
uh so
quitting a position for mental health
after a certain period of Time how do
you deal with uh the sort of the
drudgery of not doing anything and not
triggering further mental health issues
yeah that's a tough one because I've
actually been on a mental health break
since February and I know other people
who are struggling with this too
um one thing that I did was try to make
myself busy with um non-crypted stuff
like explicitly non-crypto stuff so
um we had a friend move in with us
temporarily so we were getting their
room together we in the last year we've
acquired nine chickens please don't tell
where I uh my uh my uh County in Texas
that we did this we technically have an
illegal chicken there's only supposed to
be eight uh but
so yeah so like just dealing with like
you know and there's like a garden we
have like there's a lot of things to
deal with and so it's like manual work
like that gets your mind off it
additionally rekindling old friendships
is a good idea like finding you know
support groups that are in or outside of
crypto to just kind of stay up to date
and um for people who are just getting
out if there are opportunities for
little bits to help little advisory
roles or like throwing in a few GitHub
commits that can kind of help a little
bit with like I'm you know I'm still
here I'm still doing stuff
um but yeah don't ever Rush getting back
into something just because there's that
kind of void that's just something that
maybe a therapist can work out or you
can find by doing other little tasks
thank you so much such a great talk uh
my question is somewhat related to that
is
with your spouse how do you
you guys have three cats um yeah and I'm
going in that direction as well so
what's it like like
when you're when you're off the mental
break and do you guys discuss crypto do
you not do you intentionally just leave
it there or yeah if you get this if I
don't mean to Pride into your priorities
yeah you know yeah that's kind of like
how do you interact with those closest
to you about this while you're going
through this it's kind of what I take
from that so I can kind of give my
personal thing I really don't mind
um so uh my spouse Lilith who's amazing
um does isn't exactly like crypto that
much uh to be fair they did volunteer
and actually work on devcons two and
three which wasn't the best experience
behind the scenes so that was a little
bad but also like
they just they don't jive with many
people in this space
um it's just not their interest they're
just like artists and artists and stuff
so and not into nfts so uh basically
what I do is uh I don't really talk
about crypto that much sometimes when I
have like interesting conflict
resolutions or like uh hot tea for
crypto like I bring it to them because
it's kind of just fun to talk about like
oh I can't believe this conference video
is ridiculous I can't believe uh what's
what's one that I showed them oh like a
dfinity the launch video and stuff I was
like they look like robots so like
showing cool stuff like that is fine but
like yeah in general
um there are some crypto power couples
that make it but for the most part most
people I know that are happiest with
their spouse in crypto try to keep their
work separate and because it can blend
so easily that can cause further
problems so yeah um and then also I
actually you had one more point which
was when you start getting back into it
after leaving
um just be in close communication with
that person to say
let me know if it's too much or like hey
today am I spending enough time with you
I had a lot of problems early on where
like ethereum would replace my friends
and family so I'm now like hey are you
feeling do we need are you feeling
connected today like do you want to
watch a movie like that kind of stuff
and that's helped a lot
we have time for one more question
anyone else hello uh great talk thank
you so much
I would just really love to hear you
riff a little bit on how managers can be
empathetic and caring when they have to
give corrective feedback or or sometimes
even help an employer realize that it's
time for them to part ways with the
organization yeah I can rip a little bit
on that
um empathy is really important managers
should have that and my personal
experience
um my two most recent full-time
Employments for the ethereum foundation
and flashbots uh the ethereum foundation
I had to I broke down and I was getting
sent to
um I took a grippy sock vacation to
brain jail aka the mental health
hospital so I was doing synth there and
I messaged
um the leadership at the EF and I was
like hey I'm coming here
so sorry I feel like I'm letting you all
down and they're like no you take as
much time as you need you will have a
job when you come back that is the
number one thing I think managers may
not realize is that they think oh if I'm
going away for one two three four weeks
at a mental health ward
you know I will lose my job because of
what I'm doing but though they said you
take as much time as you need we're here
to support you everyone's covering your
back so shout out to the EF for that and
then later I worked for flashbots first
but I got into it too quickly and um
there was a point in late last year
where I was just like absolutely a mess
with like home life stuff and or family
or family stuff and other things and uh
I just was like bawling on the phone
till to Phil dying and I was like I
can't do this I can't do this and he
said there's nothing we have full
support you are getting a two-month paid
mental health break and at the end of it
you can come back if you want or if not
we're totally cool so like flashbots had
a policy in place to like you know deal
with this and I was really happy about
that and it took me a while in February
when it was over I said I can't come
back yet my medicines aren't right Etc
since then I've been doing a lot better
but like it was just amazing to me that
like they're so Progressive in that so
as a manager yeah you need to to just
people are P people first that's what
like the EF has done in various ways and
flashbots does in amazing ways so um
yeah put people first be empathetic and
make sure they know they have a job
thank you so much all right thank you so
much for your talking for sharing your
story