Ismar, Igor and Frank meet on the day before Igor’s 32nd birthday. And he has a question for Ismar and Frank, who are both 30 years older. But, who is the wiser? Listen with the transcript or watch the video to learn even more.
TRANSCRIPT
Frank: and we can start. So we are gathered this afternoon or this evening on the eve of Igor’s birthday.
Igor: Yes, exactly.
Frank: Igor is going to reach the dizzy age of 32 from our calculation in less than five hours from now. In five hours, we will be past midnight and then it will be officially your birthday. Igor, do you know what time you were born?
Igor: I don’t know the exact time, but it was during the morning.
Frank: You can’t remember?
Igor: I don’t remember. I’m not sure if it’s nine o’clock or eleven but it’s in the morning for sure.
Frank: It’s very civilized. Your mother must be happy that you were born at a civilized hour.
Igor: Yeah, my mom she had six children, so she has a lot of experience.
Frank: Okay, fair enough. Ismar, do you know what time you were born? Can you remember the event?
Ismar: Yes, 9 pm.
Frank: 9 pm?
Ismar: Yeah, according to my mother.
Igor: What’s your birthday, Ismar?
Ismar: It’s just in this month 29th.
Igor: Oh, July as well? Yeah. And your s frank?
Frank: Mine’s gone, it was the 22nd of April.
Igor: Okay.
Frank: So, it slipped under the radar which is the way it should be. Okay.
Ismar: You’ll be turning 32 tomorrow, yeah?
Igor: Yes, 32 years old.
Ismar: You almost were born in the United States Independence Day.
Igor: Yeah, that’s true, that’s true. The day after.
Frank: So, this begs the question, Ismar, can you remember 30 years ago? What were you doing when you were 32?
Ismar: 30 years ago, it was 93 and it was my first day in San Jose de los Campos when I came back from Manaus where Lisa lives, and it was very challenging because I was in my early 30s as Igor. I was 32, yeah, 32 and it was a very, a great transformation from one city to another and my life as a whole.
Igor: Wow. Yeah. Oh, no, please go ahead but I want to make a question today.
Frank: Okay, Igor, fire away. Okay, how old are you, Frank? 62?
Frank: 62, yeah. And Ismar as well?
Ismar: Me too, yeah.
Igor: Okay, so here’s my question. What advice would you guys give me? In terms of what I should pay attention from now on that I wouldn’t find easily on the internet. So unconventional things that most of people don’t pay attention and I should pay attention from now on. It can be anything like financials, health, relationships, whatever. You guys can think about that. I know it’s a difficult question.
Frank: So let’s break this down into something more simple, you know. Okay, so I can already tell you now, Igor, sort of the older one gets, the more simple one wants things to be. So, complexity is not necessarily a good thing. So, you basically, just to rephrase this here, if I have understood this correctly, and Ismar, you can certainly help me here. Is there any advice that we can give you out of our experience that is not available on the internet?
Igor: At least not easily available, like something that I wouldn’t find easily.
Frank: Okay, so we’re not going to go into the dark net or any sort of obscure.
Igor: No, please.
Frank: We’re going to stay above board and we’re going to stay mainstream. What a question. Ismar, come on.
Ismar: Igor, as I know you, I think you are a man that tries to follow the way of good things. Good values. And I think it’s the first step to be a great human being. Now, don’t damage or harm your body. For example, don’t stay some years sleeping badly because you have to finish some work because you think that it’d be very important because your health is your most important, your most valuable treasure and not job or any kind of material thing. And as I told you, I think you are in the right way. Then cultivate the virtues, study, and respect to all life beings. It doesn’t matter which one. Respect people and don’t think that you control anything in your world or even in your life because you don’t control anything, and the things will happen naturally. They don’t need your maximum efforts to do something. Things will happen.
Igor: Thank you.
Frank: I sense a certain hypocrisy in your question.
Igor: Why?
Frank: I’m going to share my screen.
Ismar: But, Igor, I would like to be so smart as I think you are with the same age 30 years ago. Probably I have lived the last 30 years in a better way. Something as I told you a minute ago.
Igor: Thank you. Thank you. I don’t think I’m smart and I have good arguments to prove I’m not smart, but I appreciate your words.
Frank: I have to sort of second what Isma was saying. Igor, you and I know we’ve had some pretty interesting conversations over the last couple of months. And I, for one, have to say, I have learned an incredible amount from you. Even though I’m 30 years older, I actually have learned a lot from you. And this is one of the leitmotifs, I think, of what we’re doing in this community. It doesn’t matter how old you are, doesn’t matter where you live, it doesn’t matter who you are. We can all learn from each other. And I think the thing that we can, we can sort of say is just do your thing. Yeah, do it with with the pleasure and the fun that you are obviously enjoying it. I mean, we talked about it on Friday. You know, you’re going to Los Angeles in a couple of weeks and then you sort of see this huge field of opportunity. You see this this excitement of maybe just popping across to New York and doing stuff, having your own excitement of maybe just popping across to New York and doing stuff, having your own jiu-jitsu school and whatever else we’ve been talking about. And I think this is a, this is a a love of life, a love of adventure, because this is what life is. Life is just one adventure from the minute you are born to the minute you take your last breath. And you have somehow learned the capacity to read, to enjoy this adventure. And you have somehow, you say you’re not smart. I would disagree. Yeah, you are you are fit. You are extremely clever in seizing opportunities when they present themselves to you and making the absolute most of them. And then you also know when to stop.
Yeah. So, you know, you sold off your marketing agency or just over a year ago. OK, nobody knew what was going to happen with all this artificial intelligence scenario unless you had some sort of inside information. But I am already beginning to see and hear the first signs on the horizon that anything to do with Internet marketing is going to change rapidly and fundamentally over the next 12 to 18 months and that everything anybody did before is going to be obsolete.
And you got rid of your agency, I presume at a good price, and you got out of the rat race just in time. Now, whether this is luck or whether this is just a six sense that you have or whatever, that’s not really important. But the fact is you took the opportunity, you’ve made a decision and you are going forward and you’re going forward on this on this terrific adventure of four years in Los Angeles. And, you know, you know, we’ll see where we go from there.
The hypocrisy of your question is hidden in your blog.
Igor: Oh, oh, my God. What did I write that I don’t remember? OK, I think that. OK, cool, cool.
Frank: 91 random life hacks updated constantly. So, when this thing started on the May the twenty on May the 21st, I think it was it was eighty-nine. So you’ve added. And Isma said that your health, which is I fully agree with it because I’ve had the experience, your health is the most important thing that you have. And it’s quite down. But hack number 69 goes to the dentist and the cardiologist regularly.
Igor: I have that on my calendar since I was 21 years old. So, every year I go, it doesn’t matter what I’m feeling, I go to the cardiologist. I think that’s because my dad had issues with heart and the dentist, because my well, basically everyone of my family never cared, showed their dental health. So I didn’t want to have like bad teeth when I get older. So just make this observation. But yes, I didn’t even remember of this one.
Yeah. So, you know, that’s that is a problem. So I think at 92, re-read this list on a regular basis. Yeah.
Igor: I love that. I love that. I write that down.
Frank: You know, so here you are. Here you are asking Isma and me with a combined age of 124 years. Yeah. What can we teach you? And you have 91 points plus one in the making. And that’s the hypocrisy. So, I mean, let’s go through this. I mean, I’m taking away a podcast I wanted to do with you a little bit later.
Ismar: The guy knows everything, Fred. Sorry? The guy knows everything and is asking questions for us.
Igor: Yeah. Okay. But here it is, the proof that I’m not smart. So, I know in quotes many things, but at the same time, I don’t value, and I don’t remember what I know. So, you guys just taught me something very valuable. So I don’t think I’m smart. It’s not smart to have knowledge and don’t remember of that.
Frank: Well, you can’t remember. I mean, there’s a couple of things which actually are interesting. I mean, learn Excel. You’ll thank yourself in the future for this.
Igor: That’s a classic one. Don’t send people files to download that you can simply host in the cloud. Yep. Fully true. Yeah. Create the habit of saving money as soon as possible. The pattern is more important than the amount. Perfectly okay. Don’t send audio over one minute long on chat apps. Yeah. Create the habit of saving, investing as soon as possible. The habit is more important than the amount.
Igor: Oh, it’s repeated. Yeah. I have to fix that.
Frank: Yeah. Learn to invest as quickly as possible and aim for a 10% year of return. Okay. That in Europe is actually a little bit challenging, but you know.
Igor: Yeah. That’s true. I have to contextualize. Yeah. Yeah.
Frank: It depends a little bit on the geography. Make notes you don’t need and won’t want to be able to store everything in your head. There you go. See, you’re even making your own advice here. You’ve already forgotten half the thing. So have you made a note of your hack list?
Igor: Yeah. Yeah. That’s a good point. I haven’t. Yeah. So that’s a point to reflect on. Maybe I’m just an imposter.
Frank: Use a calendar. I couldn’t live without one. Use Calendly to set up meetings more effectively. I’m exploring that option for the Brida Café. Practice exercises that make you feel joy. Okay. So, okay. So tell us about this one.
Igor: Well, so a classic mistake. So, I have been doing exercise since I was 15 years old, when 16 years old, when I started with parkour. Actually, it was 15, I think so. So, and when I started parkour, I went through this world of physical challenges, and I went through basically everything. So, I have done really crazy things in terms of physical challenges, right? And one of the things that I learned, actually I have a blog post that I can share with you guys. It’s English, I think. Oh no, it’s in Portuguese, unfortunately. But it’s a blog post which I wrote when I just ran 100 kilometers right away. So without stop. So I did that in 2015.
Ismar: Excuse me, how many kilometers?
Igor: 100 kilometers.
Ismar: Really?
Igor: Yeah. If you type my name on Google, you’re going to see a picture of me crashing the finish line at 21 hours. So I did that. Okay. So let me frame my thoughts. So I did that. It was amazing. I have that on my curriculum. So when I say that, I got this reaction. It’s my God. So I have that on my belt of achievements, right? But now I am mature enough to realize that I didn’t feel joy. I just was up to the challenge. I want to kind of mark that off my checklist, right? I didn’t feel joy. Actually, it was very painful. It was like when I was running, at the end I was in a bad mood. It wasn’t a joyful experience. And what happened after, and I have seen that happen with many people, people just stopped. Like in the first challenge, especially when you get through adulthood, you stop because you get more challenges. Maybe you have children, maybe you have a demanding job, and you stop to do that because you don’t feel joy.
And something that helped me to realize that is when I started with jiu-jitsu because today with jiu-jitsu, it’s physical challenge as well, but I really feel joy. So, I counted the times to do jiu-jitsu because I feel joy. And at the same time, it’s a good exercise. And I didn’t feel that running. I felt that it’s parkour. And even today, sometimes I feel like I should do parkour. I don’t do for many reasons, but I feel like I should do more parkour because it was very joyful. So that’s where this tip came from.
Frank: Okay. So yes, but the picture of 2015. So, someone in his late 20s crossing the finishing line, running after running a hundred kilometers. It’s quite a feat, but yeah, but if it doesn’t give you any joy, then it’s. There’s no benefit. Set time to interact socially with friends and family. It seems actually strange that you have to write this sort of thing, but it’s also a sign of the time.
Do something random at least once a month. Okay. So, okay. What did you randomly do in June of this year?
Igor: So, in June, something I did in January, I had something on my to-do list. I have a Trillo with a lot of random things I want to do. Trillo is like a management software. And one of the things I was very interested in is space exploration. And in July, I signed up for a conference, which would happen in June. So in June I went. It was terrible. Because I am in Brazil, right? I’m not in California where you’re going to see SpaceX, NASA. I’m in Brazil. So, the most exciting thing about this conference was a Brazilian startup that was building, like they didn’t have built, they was building a satellite like of the size of my cell phone. And they were planning to send to space next year. That’s the most exciting thing of the conference. So, it wasn’t exciting, but that’s the random thing I did in June. And these I have on my calendar. These I have on my calendar. Sometimes it’s just like talk to someone random. Sometimes it’s go to events. Sometimes it’s to go somewhere that I have never been. Things like that.
Okay. Ismar.
Ismar: Excuse me a minute, please.
Frank: Yeah. Yeah.
Ismar: The 15 is very interesting. What can you say about it?
Igor: The 16?
Ismar: No, 15.
Frank: Yeah. I was just going to come to the…
Igor: Oh, that one. Okay. So I am a advocate for clown workshop for the rest of my life. Because when you imagine clown, you imagine that kind of funny guy or girl would go to the circus or go to the children parties and do funny things, right? But I have a cousin, a very, like kind of my brother, who is a street clown. He goes, he makes living of going to the street and doing clown spectacles, like shows, right? In the street. They make people gather, people who are going through the streets in their lives, they gather. He does something with his girlfriend and then he asks for tips. That’s how he makes his living. He’s a true artist. And he presented me that there is a very deep philosophy behind clown. Before I continue, did you guys have any idea about that?
Ismar: That there is a philosophy beneath the clown?
Frank: No. Carry on, Ismaa. Yeah, Igor, carry on.
Igor: So I had no idea, but then he presented that. And in summary, there are like, it’s a very deep philosophy, but in summary, a clown is someone who accepts their faults, right? So usually when you see a clown, like you see a Russian clown, for example, that’s like the artist, it’s over exaggerating their fault. So if you are like stubborn, you’re going to see, you’re going to be a stubborn clown. If you are kind of, if you are agile, you’re going to be agile clown. And this is a very deep life philosophy, which, and when I discovered this life philosophy, I seek, I started to seek clown workshops here in Curitiba, where I live, and I went to three clown workshops and all of them was like life changing because basically a clown workshop, the clown will guide you through the process of realizing like, what are your faults? What, how, like, how do you walk? How do you pick the funny parts? And once you learn and you develop the courage to express that you are free of that, right? So for example, I have an eye issue. And so I have a lazy eye. My right eye is lazy, right? So before going to the clown workshop, I had many issues with that. So, I wouldn’t look people in the eyes. I would be shy when people look at them in the eyes. And after going through this process, going through the workshops, understanding the philosophy, I just accepted that. And now I think it’s funny, right? So, when a child looks at me at street and point to me, I started to make funny with, and things get lighter. People feel more comfortable talking to me. I don’t feel this anxiety, the social anxiety. So that’s where this came from.
Frank: That’s actually a really good piece of advice.
Igor: Yeah. And that’s amazing. Like this, there are many books about that, by the way, but the philosophy itself, once you accept that and you use that, you express that you are free from this, it’s amazing. Like it’s unbelievable.
Frank: Okay. So, Ismar, that’s going to be your task between now and the end of the year.
Ismar: Probably I think that if I master a clown activity, it will be very good to my political intention.
Igor: Oh, wow. Yeah. That’s great. That’s a good idea. That’s a good idea.
Ismar: I will be able to attract many people attention and for sure they will be my fan and I will be able to realize, to make real my plans.
Igor: Yeah. I would add that as someone who worked and worked with marketing for very long, something that people can really spot, like one skill that human beings have and they spot and they value, it’s authenticity, right? So probably you guys have known someone like that in your lives or you know someone like that, that there is nothing very special about someone, but just the fact of this person being authentic, you want to be around. Sometimes it can be someone who is a little bit moody, like someone who is angry with easy things, but like the authenticity just sparked you the confidence to trust. I have a tip related to that, which is surround yourself with people you trust, even if you disagree with them, because once you trust someone, at least in my opinion, that’s the most important thing.
Frank: Definitely. Trust and respect, yeah. I think they go hand in hand. Okay. The transportation, yes, that works if you live in an urban area. In the country it’s slightly more challenging, it’s doable. Cuddle a cat or a dog when you see one. I can relate to that. We have three cats running around the house and I think there’s nothing nicer, well there is something nicer, but there is actually nothing nicer, because the love of an animal is unconditional.
Yes, they have an ulterior motive, they want to be fed, but when they know where the food comes from, and one of our cats, he says sometimes he wants nothing more than a cuddle, and there is something in his eyes which sort of signals to me, cats are, I don’t have any experience with dogs, but cats can be fantastic communicators, and so they sort of send a signal, at least our three send a signal, that they want to cuddle or they want to communicate with a human, so I can relate to that.
So, Ismar, we have an almost 32-year-old person wanting advice from us, and then we come to point 19, and this is a clanger.
Assume people are friendly. So Ismar, we were talking about what’s happening in France at the moment, with the violence that we’re having on certain streets. This is a tough one, but it’s true. Assume people are friendly. Perhaps they’re just at the wrong time. Do you want to add any thoughts to that, Igor?
Igor: Well, not really. I think that basically sums up what I think. I think most of people are friendly because there’s no point of not being friendly unless you are at a bad time, you know, like you have to protect something, even something physical or something like some belief, so sometimes you get someone that would be friendly in other situations, but at that situation they are not. Yeah, but I think humans in general, they are friendly. They have to be, like we have to be friendly to cooperate.
Frank: Yeah, we have to, otherwise we wouldn’t survive as a civilization. Ismar, do you have anything to add to that sentiment? Assume that people are friendly.
Ismar: I wouldn’t say that, yes, I would say that unfortunately I think the opposite. I trust people after they convince me. I don’t think that in general people are friendly, and at least from my experience the most of people that approach to me, they did it in order to take some advantages.
Frank: Maybe they were at the wrong time.
Igor: Yeah, or maybe I’m wrong. Maybe people are really not friendly. That’s a possibility as well. That’s a difficult question. Yeah, that’s a very difficult question.
Frank: I think it’s also really, I mean, I think what we have to differentiate here is the civilized interaction with other people. So you don’t have to like them, you don’t have to agree with them, but you have to at least be civilized towards them. And I think that’s the benchmark that we’re sort of beginning to lose in general. We just see the negative sides in everybody. Where this is coming from is open to interpretation. But I think it’s also just an attitude. As I said to you on Friday, Igor, you’re looking for an apartment in Los Angeles and you have not the best cards to play with. You know, you come from Latin America, and I coined the phrase you are automatically guilty and you have to prove your innocence. Whereas in actual fact, everybody is innocent until proven guilty.
And I think we’re sort of moving in this direction. So, if we were just to say, look, okay, I don’t know this person from Adam. I’ve never met this person before. I have no idea. And it goes back to this analogy in the fish in the water. What is water? We talked about that as well. Because we just don’t know what people are thinking and doing at any particular point in time. So just be open.
Donate money or time to some because you think is important, goes without saying. Reply to people even if it’s just an okay. God, you’re opening doors here. fundamental communication. Yeah. Yeah.
Okay. Don’t feel shame about something. Remember, everyone will die someday. Yeah. That’s a nice statement. But in the day and age of internet, it’s all somewhere. Yeah. It’s recorded and maybe you can find it. Learn a second language. Well, that’s good to hear.
Igor: I should the link to Brida?
Frank: Yeah, you should do that. brida.eu and why is it only on point number 23? Ismar, are you a mathematician?
Ismar: Although I don’t know much about mathematics, I like it. I think it’s something very interesting. It’s something that never lies to us. Maybe we misunderstood but mathematics never lies.
Frank: Yeah, that is true. I find mathematics incredibly beautiful. I don’t understand it for anything. Yeah. I just don’t know. I like the logic of it. I just don’t understand it. But sort of having a mathematical process unfold is beautiful.
Keep going when understanding something hard. Breathe, give yourself time and try again. Yeah.
Ismar: This one is very valuable.
Frank: So far, probably the most important of the ones that we’ve looked at. So, going to your hundred kilometer run, Igor, how many times did you want to sort of pack it in and say I can’t do this? And what kept you going?
Igor: Impossible to count. Impossible to count many times.
Frank: What kept you going?
Igor: Well, I think at the time I was very fanatic about running and I would read books about people who have ran so far. I had my heroes and I thought that I wanted to be part of this plan. So, it was mostly pride and status, I think.
Ismar: In how much time have you run a hundred kilometers?
Igor: 21 hours.
Ismar: How much?
Igor: In 21 hours running.
Ismar: And how was your muse? (meals)
Igor: Muse? What do you mean?
Ismar: Your food.
Igor: Oh, cool. So, this run, I ran in Canada and they had six checkpoints along the route. So, on average for each 15 kilometers, we had one checkpoint where we could get water and get food.
Frank: Okay, thank you. Yeah, yeah. Okay, the next one’s interesting. If you know a child with problems in school, check their eyesight before they’re assuming they are lazy. So, I suppose there’s a link to your lazy eye with that. Is that where this went?
Igor: Yeah. So, it’s linked to my experience because it happened with me many times. Like, I always was very bad at school, especially when I was very young. And professors, colleagues, everyone thought I was lazy because basically what happened, and it’s not with me, it’s happened with a lot of people, kids cannot communicate everything, right? So, if I am in a classroom and I can’t read the blackboard, if I am an adult, I will say that, or I am going to go to the front. But for the kids, it’s like we don’t understand why, like for us, the world is the same for everyone else, right? We can’t communicate everything. That’s why children cry every time because they don’t know how to communicate what they feel. And unfortunately, that’s what happened when we… It’s very common. Something is vibrating here. Oh, sorry. I think it was my watch.
So, it happened to me many times and I always had this concept in my head that, okay, so I had many problems in school and most of the part was due to my eyesight. And then recently, I read someone, I don’t remember where, but I read someone talking about that. I think it was ophthalmologist on a blog, I don’t remember, but he mentioned that, and I said, oh my God, that’s it. That’s what I had in my head. Like if some kid is with issues on their school, check their eyesight before making any judgment because sometimes it’s just something simple as that. They can’t read. So, how are they going to learn?
Frank: Right. Yeah. Yeah. That sort of ties in with going people are friendly. There’s a link between it. Okay. Yeah. Now, Igor, point number 27. When are you going to start writing something that is more than three words long?
Igor: Well, that’s a good question. I wish to develop this skill someday because I have trouble with abstract ideas. Although I like to read a lot, I just can’t write about, like I can’t describe a place, for example, as a good romance writer would. So that’s a good question. But this tip is basically, I came up with this sentence when I was thinking about my life values, which is something I have been doing frequently. And something like for me, a romance writer, they see everything as a part of a story, and they tend to see people as personas and characters. So, it makes life, at least for me, a little bit lighter. So other day, for example, I was in the airport, and I saw a very grumpy old man complaining about everything. He would complain about the coffee, about the seat, about the flight, about the airplane, everything. And I was like, of course, inside my head, laughing, like thinking, oh my God, that’s such a good character for a movie. Just make things lighter.
Frank: So, the blog would be a start. I’m going to do a little bit of self-promotion here, but there’s one client of mine who she’s not in the community, doesn’t want to be. And we’ve actually written a book together. We’re sort of doing the final reworking of it. And then I will spend the next two months fine-tuning all the small grammar mistakes.
And it’s actually something that would really please you Igor. And I think it’s more to it because you’re a Francophile. It’s about food. It’s a character that I created pre-pandemic times. It’s a character called Vicky and she lives in the town of Brida. So, I have to explain that Brida actually is a fictitious town. It’s a sort of into this abstract website, but there is a street map of Brida. It does exist. And Vicky is a catering person, an English catering person who lives in Brida and Brida is on the French Spanish border. It’s sort of landed there. That’s another story.
And Vicky went to the United Kingdom to explore food there. And there’s about six articles that I wrote. So, I was putting myself in this woman’s role describing food in England. And Geneviève and I have written a little booklet. It’s about 60 pages long, 16 chapters of Vicky going through Burgundy and discovering food and wine from that area. And it should be out. Even thinking of putting it on Amazon as a self-published book, it should be out in September.
So, it is a very rewarding thing to do. And I think the best way to start in your case is, you know, the minute you touch down in Los Angeles, just take out a notebook and just start describing and just looking at things that you see. And then, you know, it can be developed. Yeah. Ismar, when are we going to see a book from you? You have a blog!
Ismar: I have a blog, but I don’t write on it too much.
Frank: Which is a pity. Because if you look at point number 28, be interested in what people are talking. So how can we be interested in what you are reading, writing, and doing if you don’t produce anything?
Ismar: I suppose I had it since 2008 is about 15 years and I had maybe 100, maybe something more than 100 texts. Some are very small and others are a little longer.
Frank: Yeah. Okay. So maybe we, you know, okay. Look into other people’s eyes when they’re talking to them. Yes. Okay. Number 30. That’s an interpretation thing. That’s a generational thing. I personally actually don’t like LinkedIn, but okay. Well, it’s just, you know. But I see the value of it.
Now, point 31, attend therapy, even if you don’t think, even if you think you don’t need it. I remember Igor, you and I were talking about this as sort of fell on the sidelines of one of our conversations. That therapy is actually a good thing because you can speak to somebody who is totally detached from you. He or she is completely neutral, emotionally not involved. Is that the reason why you sort of suggest people go and attend therapy? Not because they need it, because they are ill, but simply as someone just to let off steam and talk with somebody. Is that the thing?
Igor: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I suggest that for everyone, because usually when we talk to people in our daily lives, we have many filters, right? So, when I talk to my girlfriend, I have a filter of being a good boyfriend. I have filters of not offending the family. I have many filters. With therapy, you have no filter. You can talk without filters, and it helps you to understand a lot of things. Actually, it’s kind of right and you know better than me. When you write, sometimes you understand things that you didn’t even know that you didn’t understand before. You are in the process, like this intellectual process, because to write or speak, you have to have your thoughts organized. In therapy, it’s a safe place to do that. That’s a place you can do without filters, and you have nothing to lose. I know people who went to therapy and say, they didn’t get any value for that, but you didn’t lose as well. So, you have nothing to lose by trying, right? So it’s a very low risk, high probability of value endeavor.
Frank: Ismar, do you agree?
Ismar: I tried therapy in two occasions, and I think it didn’t help me, I think.
Frank: No? Okay. All right. Maybe it was the wrong therapist. What was this thing?
Igor: And as I said, maybe people don’t need, but by trying, you don’t lose anything.
Ismar: So there’s no point in not trying.
Igor: At least I have an idea how it works.
Frank: Yeah, that’s true. Exactly. So you’ll know that this solution for whatever problem you were having doesn’t work. So, you have learned something. Knowing what doesn’t work sometimes is very useful. Okay. Learn the rule of three. 80% of your math problems in life can be solved. Keep it short, but explain that one.
Igor: Yeah. The rule of three, I’m not sure. Although I wrote that, I’m not 100% sure if that’s how it’s called in English, but is when you want to know, for example, if I have 1,020 apples and I give 719 apples, how much percent of apples I will give, right? So, by the rule of three, you can figure out these things. And basically, you can figure out so many things in life for that. Let’s say you want to understand how, I would think is some quick examples. Okay. How much money could you spend in a certain thing in your life? So, by knowing how much you receive and knowing your costs, you can have a percentage of your cost and then you just think by percentage. So, I can, from my income, I can spend 20% on such things like going to a restaurant, for example. So, it’s just an example of how it’s useful, but it’s useful for so many things to calculate chemical things and that’s amazing.
Frank: Yeah. You’ve actually got me stumped because I know the German word for some strange reason. I know the German word, I can’t think. I think it is the rule of three in English, but I’d have to check up. Okay. Sort your trash. Well, that’s automatic over where we live. Ismar, do you make your bed when you get up? Let’s be honest here.
Ismar: I didn’t understand.
Frank: Do you make your bed in the mornings, Isma?
Igor: Yes. Yes. Well, with a military background, it would be surprising, Ismar.
Ismar: I have heard something that if you don’t make your bed, probably you aren’t read for your day or maybe for some other things that are more important or require more efforts.
Frank: Yeah. There’s this speech on YouTube somewhere about this American general who says, who brings up this point and says, if you don’t make your bed, if you cannot master a simple task like doing that in the morning, how are you going to master the more complex tasks in your life later on in the day? Yeah. I’m training my cat to do that for me.
Igor: Good luck. Yeah. Yeah. Taking consideration, the tip of not when trying something, don’t give up, breathe, relax.
Frank: Exactly. Okay. Now, so just to remind ourselves, Isma, can we remember the opening question that Igor asked us?
Ismar: Yes. What kind of a device we that you are 62 can give him that is not an internet?
Frank: Okay. All right. And then you come up to point number 36. Don’t confuse who you want to be with what you want to do. I mean, that is such a interesting little sentence. Yeah. And you have this 32 year old, excuse my language. We have this 32 year old punk coming to us and point number 36, he just hits you straight in the guts and says, well, look, this is all you can’t tell me anything because I know what I want to do and not? I accept myself as I am. And with that, I’m going to go out and do what I want to do. I mean, what can you say?
Igor: Yeah. Well, I have a very recent memory on what it means in practice. So, when I was 16 to 17 years old, I met a friend, which is still my best friend. I just met him a couple of weeks ago and we had a dream. Our dream, like everything we did in our lives, from the moment we woke up to the moment we went to bed was to be a sergeant in the army, the Brazilian army. That was our dream. I don’t know. I don’t remember why, but that’s what we wanted in life, right? Maybe for the respect this kind of people have, the idea of being in a military, being a warrior, all those things that we grow up watching on TV. So, we trained like every day, the physical aspects of what the, through the requirements we would have to accomplish.
We studied a lot because in Brazil, to have this position, you basically have to go through a proof, which is difficult in terms of mathematics, physics, and things like that. Ismar probably knows better than me. So we did all of that. And I, at some point, I didn’t keep pursuing that because I was recruited in the army. So not as a sergeant, but as when you are 18 years old in Brazil, you are obligated to present yourself to the army. And basically, they will tell if they want you for one year or not. Then I went to the process. I was 18 years old, and they refused me because my eyesight, of course. And then at the time it was heartbreaking because, oh, I will never be like that. And oh my God, what am I going to do with this life? Nowadays, I make fun of this time because it’s ridiculous. I have achieved it and I’m very happy the way I am. But at the time it was frustrating and my friend, he got through and he then studied it. He went through the physical process and now he is a sergeant in the Brazilian army. And he hates that. He says, yeah, he says that’s the worst decision he made in his life.
And actually, I, of course, he told me that years after entering the army, he always complained about that. But I always thought, okay, like everyone complains about their jobs, right? That’s common.
But a couple of weeks ago, I went to this place in Brazil, Sao Joao Del Rei, hey, which I showed you in the map. And I went to the army, the headquarters of the army in the city to meet this friend and get his keys, like his apartment keys. And I went through the army, and I saw everyone were so unhappy, like people hating what they are doing. I saw people going through a training that made no sense in terms of physical terms. So, I realized like 12 years later, 13 years later, that I would be very unhappy doing what I would do if I was a sargent. That illustrates a lot. So, okay, I wanted to be a sargent because the figure I had in my mind about a sargent was great, but I didn’t reflect and thank God I was lucky enough to be rejected by the army, but I never thought, okay, but what’s a sargent to do actually?
And I made these mistakes other times in my life of trying to be someone because I had this idea of my mind of being this person would be nice. But when I started to do something, I said, oh, I want to be that, but I don’t want to do what this kind of person does. And that’s where it comes from.
Frank: Yeah. I mean, that ties in with the teacher I once had, who said he had, I think he was a language teacher, but he had a deep love for biology. And we asked him, why didn’t you do that? And he said, well, in biology, I would have to do a lot of things I don’t want to do. And if I treat it as a hobby, I can cherry pick and pick out the things that interest me and leave the rest to one side. So, so that’s, that’s sort of it.
Ismar: And Igor, excuse me, how old is your friend?
Igor: He’s one year younger than me. He’s 31 years old.
Ismar: I think it’s terrible because today is necessary to work at least 35 years to get the retirement. And he’s 31, probably he will have to work maybe around 20 years or something around, and it’s not good to wait 20 years to get his retirement.
Igor: Exactly. He is in this unfortunate situation. Like he basically hates, because what made he, like, and I was in the same boat, is like the physical training, like the image of being someone who would go to war if needed. And now like we are watching the war movies.
Ismar: Everything is different when we are outside.
Igor: Yeah. So that’s the situation. So I just make a comment. I have to go exactly at 3 p.m. in Brazil because I have a meeting, but we still have three minutes.
Frank: Okay. All right. So let’s wrap this one up. So, Igor, I’m kind of tickled that I could, I could actually trip you up on your question because it wasn’t it, unless, of course, this was some sort of ploy that you wanted to direct us to.
Igor: No, I didn’t even remember.
Frank: Yeah. Okay. So 92, make notes of my life hack list.
Igor: Yeah. I will check that on next Monday because I will update that on the weekend.
Frank Okay. All right. Okay. So you have to go. So let’s call it a day. It’s in Europe or listen, Germany, it’s superstitiously bad to wish you a happy birthday. So, I still have to wait four hours until I can do that. Okay. But I’m sure you’ll have a good day tomorrow. And so, a completely unplanned and unscheduled topic today. And so did we learn anything? Ismar, did we learn anything today from this kid?
Ismar Yes. I think that some of the statements are very, very interesting. I like many of them.
Frank: Okay. I’ll send you the link to via WhatsApp and then we can pursue this one. And I’m sure people generate lots of more conversations out of it. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Gentlemen, see you next time. Next week.
See you guys. Have a nice week.