Content and Real life update

Hey everyone,

Long time no see. I apologize for such a long gap between uploads here. At the beginning of the year I said this would be a diary, reflection, update channel, and then a few months ago I said it would be about the Dojo. It isn’t a huge shift because the Dojo is pretty much my life right now. The funny part is I haven’t been updating you because it’s hard to update people when I’m struggling to keep up with all the changes in my life.

Life update. I recently moved into a new place. First house I’ve ever bought. My partner and I moved in together. I’m in the Netherlands, Utrecht, same area I’ve lived the last four years. New setup, not decorated yet, moved in about a week ago.

Community and schedule. I realized a large portion of you are in the Western Hemisphere, including the US, Canada, and even a decent chunk of South America. If I want to build this community right, I need to shift my schedule. I tried a normal 9 to 5 for stability and routine, which was what I needed then. But two years later, a few things clicked:

I’m updating the Twitch schedule this weekend. It’s tentative by about an hour either way. Check it on my channel: twitch.tv/bananaslamjamma under the Schedule tab.

More life bits. New house, new area in the city. I’ve been looking to get into a racket sport, and there’s a squash gym nearby, so I plan to do that.

Dojo updates. We opened a Founders tier at $15 per month with a free trial for about 100 people. Of the 110 that signed up, between 96 and 97 percent stayed. Only 3 to 4 percent canceled after the trial. That blew me away. Thank you. Whether you stayed for the coaching or to support what we’re building, it means a lot.

What we’re running now:

Social side. We added game nights to make the Dojo your Dota home. Europe: Wednesday and Friday. Americas: Saturday. Check the Events tab (in Discord), hop in voice, find a stack, and play some Dotes.

Conversations and culture. In the last month I’ve had around 15 conversations with members. Some were about alignment, some were nudges for people trying to help, and some were thank-yous to heavy contributors. Not everyone has the same goals or viewpoints, and that’s okay. You don’t have to engage with every aspect. Maybe you’re here purely for coaching, or the social side, or the mindset movement. At the end of the day, we all love Dota.

What’s next. We’re working to perfect and add perks on both free and paid sides, structure classes more, potentially bring on more coaches, and build lightweight bots to make party matching easier inside the server. We’re taking it deliberately slow with a few key objectives each week so that when problems pop up we can trace the root cause instead of plugging holes all over the ship. Better to be good than prompt.

Back to weekly updates. Life is settling down slowly but surely, and that’s positive.

Content plans. More streams, more videos, and more shorts pulled from coaching classes. These will be quick educational nuggets you can use right away.

Personal note. A fair criticism was that I didn’t seem to be enjoying myself. I was carrying the weight of the world, feeling like if I wasn’t working toward change 24/7 I was wavering on the mission. That isn’t healthy. We can’t always be in grow mode. We need intentional times to reflect and times to just be and do. About five days ago, with the help of my partner, that clicked. Since then I’ve felt lighter and more chilled in Dota and on stream. Sometimes awareness makes the problem fade, at least for mentality stuff.

Thanks for caring enough to read this and for being part of what we’re building. See you in the Dojo, on stream, and in the next update.

P.S. This was a transcript from the Brian Canavan channel. Join the Dota Dojo Discord for more