00:00:08 Avik: There's a kind of courage that doesn't announce itself. It doesn't come with a clear plan, a safety net, or the right moment. It shows up quietly in the middle of chaos, in the middle of war and says, I am going to build something anyway. It is. Guest knows that kind of courage from the inside. This is enlightening, listeners, and this is the conversation about what it means to keep your light on when the world is doing everything it can to put it out. Welcome to Inner Light, part of the podcast, a podcast where we explore the quiet strength that lives inside every human story. and I'm really grateful that you all are here today with us. And I just love to introduce our guest today. My guest today, please welcome Alex. So welcome to the show.

00:01:12 Oleksandr Buratynskyi: Thank you for having me. Thanks a lot. Amazing.

00:01:15 Avik: Thank you so much. Yeah. Thank you so much for joining us today. And, uh, so before we get deep into this discussion, I'll quickly introduce you with Alex. So Alex is the founder and CEO of T travel, a twelve year veteran of the tech world. Author of the e-book twelve lessons from the twelve years and a man who bootstrapped a thriving platform of over thirty seven thousand users. Yes, in the middle of the war without a single cent of outside funding. Yeah. Alex, welcome to enlightened. I mean, it, uh, when I say that this is a conversation that I have genuinely been looking forward to. And yeah, I mean, thank you. Thank you so much. Yeah.

00:02:06 Oleksandr Buratynskyi: Amazing. Yeah, I'd love to be here. And I'm glad that yeah, we have this conversation because I'm also, uh, you know, keen to, to share experience and, uh, always looking forward to people who want to ask questions, you know, how, how we struggle. But yeah, but, you know, survive and thrive.

00:02:33 Avik: So yeah. before we, um, talk about the app, um, uh, the books and the leadership lessons, I want to start with some more, uh, a bit of personal, like, um, you have lived through something most of us will only ever read about. Um, and yet obviously somewhere in the middle of all of that, you choose to create, to build, to Right to keep going. So the curiosity is like not about the strategy, but about the human moment. What was the inner conversations that you were having with yourself when you decided to keep building? During the invasion, what kept the light on you?

00:03:14 Oleksandr Buratynskyi: I think that, uh, like for me, um, when I was like growing up in a, like very, uh, de repressive, uh, context, you know, in, in my native city in Odessa, I was always thinking about, you know, maybe, maybe it's Hollywood movies or something. I was thinking about that there is a better place or there should be a better place for all of us. And, uh, like, I'm kind of, um, each test that I do online like showing that I'm more futuristic than, than reality. So my inner light comes from. I think the image of the future because, um, I always imagine that it, it is brighter. And when people, people say, you know, many people say that, you know, before it was better or grass was greener or something like that. But if you really like, learn the history and check the history, now is the best moment to live because it was worse. Definitely. And, uh, like, uh, because it was, you know, worse. I see people, uh, around me and I believe in people around me who are builders, who are creators and who also, uh, perform at their best to, to, to build something great for others. So I don't know if it's like only in, in Ukraine. I've seen a lot of people, as I said to you before interview. I had a lot of, uh, friends from Bangalore, and they are also creators and builders and want to build a better future. So, uh, maybe it's my, you know, bubble information bubble, uh, but, uh, but, uh, I, I tend to find those people and like, kind of keep my motivation, uh, while, you know, talking with them, working with them. Uh, so like, even in the worst times when you keep that, you know, future, uh, kind of image, uh, it, it can bring you up, you know, like sometimes it can frustrate you because you're in, uh, not in the best shape or not in the best mood. Um, but still, I think, uh, like some, some time I, I was, uh, living without, um, this picture, this image in a depressed mode. And it was like at the end of the first year of full scale invasion. And it was tough. You know, it was it, it was a condition where I didn't want to do anything. Like I was just kind of living day by day. When they when this day will end. Oh my God. So like in keeping this kind of, um, uh, like just momentum when I, when I'm just moving in like, uh, because I need to move and that's it. So, so yeah, future, uh, can motivate a lot.

00:06:40 Avik: Exactly. Future can motivate a lot for sure. And, um, I mean, there's something so profound in what you just said, like, because it speaks to a kind of purpose that is not, uh, kind of dependent or circumstances. Uh, and, and I think that, um, that's exactly what our listeners need to sit with, uh, for a moment that, uh, so definitely, I'd love to get deep, but, um, I, I'd love to also ask you about the misconception, right? The word resilience gets used a lot. And, uh, I'd say in the, in leadership circles or maybe wellness conversations, entrepreneurship, but I think most of the time we use it from a comfortable distance, like, uh, you lived it at a scale that very few people have from, uh, where you stand. So like, what do most people fundamentally misunderstand about that resilience actually is what you, what you say.

00:07:43 Oleksandr Buratynskyi: MM. That's a great question. Um, I think that like. Um, most people, um. Most people think that resilience is being tough in each moment, uh, of their lives or each, uh, kind of while you're solving each challenge, you know, being tough, being like, right, uh, we have, have like, uh, right decision. Um, but resilience is about being honest with yourself and keep going, treating each emotion or emotion, I would say emotional state, uh, as kind of a. Like signal as a coping mechanism, as a helping mechanism. So even being depressed is a like is a state where you can gain insights because like when you're at the bottom, you can, you know, uh, finally at the bottom, you can push, uh, yourself from the bottom and go up like so not while you're just, uh, you know, swimming around in the middle of the ocean and cannot basically touch the ground or something. So the bottom is ground. Uh, and the depressed state is when you're finally grounded, when you need like one day you need to sleep twelve hours, for example, because you're exhausted and you actually need to say to your team, to your beloved ones, like, I need to sleep twelve hours. You know, um, I'm also human and I'm like fragile as any human.

00:09:55 Avik: But yeah.

00:09:56 Oleksandr Buratynskyi: Like when I will receive this, you know, twelve hours of sleep, I will be better. Maybe like, like three days in a row. But I like it will be better for me. I will be in better mental state and I can go on because in, in the end, the life is a marathon, not a sprint.

00:10:17 Avik: Yeah.

00:10:18 Oleksandr Buratynskyi: And you need to treat it as a marathon. And resilience, like during this marathon is sometimes you need to sit down and rest, sometimes you need to, you know, uh, sip, uh, water or like eat chocolate or like twelve chocolate in a row to keep you, you know, yourself in a better condition and, uh, like gain energy to go on because you need to outlive us like bad moments of your life. Your competitors, if you're in business. So like I would say, resilience is not being like stoic or tough. Each moment of the day, each communication. Uh, no, it's being honest with yourself with emotions, uh, that you know inside you. And, um, if you have a lot of courage with other people because when, uh, they understand your condition, they like, if they are good people, they will stay with you and help you. If you are bad people, they will leave you, leave you in, uh, like it will be better for you. Yeah, yeah. You will stay with, with the only people that, uh, support you. So yeah.

00:11:47 Avik: Lovely. Yeah.

00:11:48 Avik: I totally understand. Um, and you're currently writing your next book, uh, systemic, um, adaptiveness. And, uh, the premise is extraordinary that entrepreneurs can learn something essential from watching how a country navigates ongoing conflict. And, uh, here, one thing I definitely love to ask you is like, um, what is the deeper pattern that you keep seeing? Like, uh, what does, uh, Ukraine's experience reveal about the human capacity to, um, adopt that business schools and, uh, leadership courses have somehow missed me, missed, I guess.

00:12:30 Avik: Uh, yeah.

00:12:31 Oleksandr Buratynskyi: It's also a great question because it, it adds, uh, another layer to previous one. Uh, the, the main pattern is, uh, that we had, like a network of like small adaptive groups and communities. And they had all the, like, uh, all the accountability and like kind of ownership, uh, to defend, um, like their homes or, uh, they are part of the land as, uh, they want to defend it as they could defend it. So like, it wasn't the rigid structure from the day one when like some commander said, okay, you go left, you go right, uh, you do this, you do that. Nothing like that. It was, like small groups of people that are actually, if you look at the how, how our brain is functioning Is there a lot of its neural network? Right. And we all like language models right now. AI and neural network. And it's kind of a set of algorithmic, uh, groups that interact with each other, but, but pretty autonomous, right? They include each other, like then exclude each other like base. Uh, and they like based on the context on the situation. So they respond to the situation, they adapt to the situation. And like if we were a rigid structure, uh, as right now we are fighting with rigid structure with, with actually bigger country, more aggressive, uh, with like it's basically aggressive, right? Because more kind of, uh, um, ruining international law and going to our territory killing people. So. But they are rigid without like seven levels of command and control. They cannot exist. And but Ukrainian community exists and survives and doing even better than them because we have like this, um, adaptiveness and autonomy. So that is the main pattern that should be in business because, uh, like, uh, you can like launch a product, you can change the product. Uh, but it's, uh, and, uh, it's all about feedback from the market. It's all about feedback like, uh, and the context where you are operating, uh, so you can adapt and you do not follow fall in love with idea you fall in love with, with, with, with your customers, with your users and adapt to their needs. And that's how you survive. And you can, uh, you know, um, you can start your new venture and you can sunset this venture and bring up new one with AI. Like, uh, it's really, uh, possible and faster than ever. Uh, but like community of people that, that is doing this, you know, uh, starting and sunsetting is the main asset, you know, because it's autonomous and it's adaptive. So, so yeah, uh, this is the main pattern that will help you survive and perform, I would say.

00:16:35 Avik: Exactly.

00:16:37 Avik: Amazing, amazing. I would say, and, uh, it's really great to hear from you. And so the time is constrained, but still, um, if someone, someone wants to connect with you, how they can connect.

00:16:51 Oleksandr Buratynskyi: Yeah, it's, it's really easy through LinkedIn, uh, with the name Alexander, surname Boratynski and how it's written here. Uh, I'm the only one there with such surname. So it's, it's easy and yeah, um, I, I also, uh, have, uh, one more like small product on, uh, digital product on the same name and surname on Gumroad if you want to check, um, I've built a cheat sheet that, that is called the fifteen minutes MBA. I've just like studied, uh, many resources from Harvard, from like business schools, um, and professors and build, uh, like a set of frameworks that are not only, you know, help you to like, be efficient right away. But, um, like, uh, it will save you two thousand, uh, one hundred K of usds of cash, you know, and two, three years of learning. This MBA course because, uh, it shows the main concept straight away and you can use it straight away. So, uh, yeah, I would be pleased if you check the product. Uh, I'm thinking about building some something even like better or more in depth, I would say.

00:18:26 Avik: I really love that. So what I'll do is I'll put all the links and the details into the show notes for easy reference. And with this, I definitely have to mention that. Thank you so much for joining us on today. And if this conversation does something in you, there are quite recognition, a renewed sense of possibility, or simply a reminder that the human spirit is. Some are more durable than we sometimes believe. Carry that with you. You don't have to have it all figured out, but you just have to keep the light on. Please share this episode with someone who needs a little of that light today and leave us a review. Of course, if if it means something to you. And come back because there are more stories like this just waiting for you. So until next time, this is your host and be gentle with yourself. Be purposeful with your days and keep your inner light burning. Thank you so much.

00:19:34 Oleksandr Buratynskyi: Thank you guys. Beautiful words. Thanks.