In this conversation, the speakers reconnect after years apart, sharing personal stories about their upbringings and how these have shaped their current mindsets. They discuss strict parenting from their fathers, which led to lying as children, but both express a commitment to being more open and honest with their own kids. The speakers reflect on feelings of jealousy and wanting more as kids, but emphasize the importance of appreciating what one has and focusing on self-improvement rather than playing the victim. They stress that individuals should be their own number one supporter, as nobody else can be there 100% of the time. The conversation also covers the pitfalls of trying to control others or relying on a partner for happiness, advocating for independent happiness and personal responsibility. Both speakers come from immigrant families where their parents did not graduate high school, motivating them to succeed in education and life to provide better for themselves and their families. They highlight the need to educate themselves on adult tasks like buying a car, as they lack parental guidance, but view this as an opportunity for growth. Overall, the dialogue centers on self-reliance, positivity, and the continuous effort to improve oneself while accepting what cannot be changed.
We're back again guys. Episode 8! -Liquor Sava Miranda. -Hello, pleasure to be here. We had a great time shooting. And it just talked about like a whole lot of fucking life pretty much. I rambled a little bit, but it's hard to gather my thoughts with such incredible feedback. I had a great time shooting with you, bro. And I think the viewers are going to enjoy this one, all right? I hope so. All right. That's crazy. I haven't seen you in a while, man. Yeah, I mean, it's definitely been a while. I mean, I've seen you in high school, but even like towards senior year, we didn't really talk too much because I didn't get to see you like that. I started working a lot. Yeah, you were at tops. I didn't really do like sports or anything like that. Like track or volleyball kind of just stopped. Yeah, that was kind of like when we kind of stopped talking just because I didn't see you as much. Yeah. You were like really having the sports, I don't remember. Yeah, it was something for me to do. I feel like that comes from when I was little, I was never really allowed to do a whole lot. So I kind of wanted something to do in high school. Why would you allow? Um, that came more from my dad. He was more like, you go to school, you come home. If you need to go anywhere, you ask me, you don't lie to me. It was kind of, he just didn't want me doing a whole lot. I felt like a lot of kids got to the like, that's how almost like a challenge of like getting their parents trust to go out. Yeah. And it was one of those things where when I was little, I felt like he just didn't want me out the house at all. So I always lied about where I was going and lied about what I was doing. And that just made it worse. So I kind of realized as I grew older that I could just let him know what I was doing. And he was kind of cool with it. He just didn't want me to be lying about it all the time. Yeah. I feel like, I don't know what I'm apparent. I don't want to have that kind of like lying relationship with my kids. Like I want my kids to be completely honest with me. And I won't get mad, you know? I know they're pretty scared of me because I'm their parent or everything, but I'm your blood. And you know, we're family. No matter how bad you fuck up, it's okay. If you just call me, I'm going to do my best to help you because that's my best intentions. I definitely intend to be more open with my kids. I feel like a lot of what I want to do is the opposite of what I had. I always said that I don't know what I want to do with my life. I am studying civil engineering, but it was kind of like a last minute pick up. So I wouldn't be undecided. Okay. But the one thing I always said is that I want to succeed for myself, but if for nothing else, just so like my kids get more than I had. Yeah. Because I know that me growing up, I was always like, I looked at people and I was always like damn, like you have so much and you don't entirely appreciate what you have because you don't realize exactly what it's like to not have it. Yeah. That's going to want our parents to, like you can't force a door, right? Yeah. And my parents came from Ecuador and you know, like they just took this journey and this trip to America and just raised kids and just like for a better life for them. Yeah. Yeah. And it's one of those things where I never dislike my parents for not being able to like provide me with everything I ever wanted. But as a kid, you still feel that type of jealousy when you see other kids and you're thinking I wish that was me. I wish I had that. I grew up with that a lot. I don't think my family was really well off. So I used to see other kids and be like, damn, why don't I have that? Why don't we have like two cars? Why don't we have a big house? You know, intersection. It's just like a whole different life that I was like kind of wanted. And I was just like, why didn't we have this? They shouldn't be like that. It shouldn't and should appreciate what you have. I did appreciate what I had and I appreciate my mom more than anybody. But you know, you always get those feelings when you see people that more than you do, especially as a kid because you don't really understand exactly what's going on. You're just like, wow, I can't do that. But I found my ways to have fun though. I don't think I had a bad childhood. I feel like I really started understanding that to really appreciate what you have. Like when they started moving out and like just having my own life and having my own like just thoughts like, you know, able to think on my own. It was just really interesting to like, I feel like they're just always taught. It's like, look at it, the people would be like, damn, you want more, like consumerism. Like, you know, we want the nice issues, the nice clothes, the nice car. But it shouldn't be like that, you know? Yeah, people definitely do that and people judge each other a lot too. It's kind of an on-site type of thing. Even people who aren't naturally judgmental, you still, when you see somebody, their image says something about them. There's this big thing where people associate somebody's image with their personality. So your image is kind of a reflection of yourself. Even though I don't think it entirely should be because who you are could have absolutely nothing to do with how you dress, say like a homeless person. They don't, their image says something about them. But you have no idea what their personality is like, but you still, you associate them kind of negatively just because of the way they look. Yeah. So that's kind of just a thing people do naturally. People naturally kind of judge each other and people get jealous and it's always going to be like that. I don't think that's ever really going to end. That's a joke, yeah. Look at far more like that. I always did say though, you have to appreciate yourself because at the end of the day, you can have a lot of people there for you and you can care for a whole lot of people, but you should be your own number one supporter because nobody knows you the way you do and nobody can be there for you as much as you can. Nobody's there for you 100% of the time except you. So you have to appreciate yourself and support yourself and strive to always do better and always improve, but still appreciate who you are now and what you have. I feel like that's why I say like attachment to the bitch almost because you know like you get attached to people, you get to touch our lives and you want to be in their life and you want to be appreciated and you want to be known like you're there. And then you know people really get hurt when you know like they want to go on to themselves and then you definitely have your own life but you don't want to accept it. So you don't want to be by yourself and it's like to some people it's scary to be in your own thoughts and everything and like develop your own character. Me like myself, I probably started going out like when I was like 17 or 18, like I really started hanging out with myself and then people used to think it was weird like these to be like why do you just like go to like New York City or like why do you just go places by yourself but it's like I just love myself you know. I just really like spending time with myself and then I just like really build character you know. People find it so weird when somebody does things alone that's another one of those judgment things where people are like why is he eating out here by himself like what the hell that's so weird like he doesn't have anybody who could come with like maybe I just don't want to hang out with anybody. Maybe I'm treating myself I'm just chilling I'm out I'm seeing new things I'm exploring I just you know I just felt like coming here but it's one of those things where you shouldn't be judged for doing things alone you don't really need nobody to go out and have fun and do things. I spend a lot of time with my own thoughts and I'm somebody who's like an extrovert and I thrive off of support and I thrive off of you know just being able to socialize with people but I still spend a lot of time on my own with my own thoughts thinking about what I have to do for myself and how I could improve myself but I still appreciate who I am now all the time because if I don't appreciate who I am now then I can't really improve and I can't really move forward because I'll be too hung up on what I don't like instead of what I could make better. Yeah and like a big reason like I really wanted to be on this podcast because we were texting the other day probably like two or three weeks ago I don't know if you remember. They were talking about people like just victimize themselves like they just like play the role of like just saying like the world sucks and like everybody sucks and like my life sucks because everybody else but what do you have to say about that kind of mentality? The whole playing the victim where people feel like my life sucks I can't really do anything about it. There are some things you can't do anything about and there are things that you can always do something about. If your life sucks there's always somebody who's doing worse than you are and there's always some positives in your life and there's always something you can work on. I mean it's obviously really hard for some people. I will definitely say some people have like a 0% chance like the whole crisis in Yemen like yo some of those kids like they're never going to be able to do anything like they're probably going to die before they get a chance to even live. But some people they sit in like an apartment you know like a one room their moms working two jobs and they're kind of there going to school but they don't have a lot of nice things and they're like damn on this kid yo he gets everything he wants his both his parents
are there for him. He has a whole family, like my life sucks. That's one of those things where some people get depressed and they get caught up in, wow, I don't have the things that other people have. But in a scenario like that, there's always stuff you can build off of. Me personally, I always took school as a way to make it. So I know that I didn't have a lot and my parents didn't finish high school. It was different for them in the 60s, 70s and Portugal. They just had the work. How do you feel now? You're in university and your parents didn't even graduate high school. Yeah, I'm just kind of like, "Yo, I'm doing something for myself that they haven't done and hopefully I'll be able to give back to them for everything they did for me." We never had a lot, but I was never like, "Wow, my life sucks." Obviously, sometimes I was like, "Yo, I wish I had more." But then I came to that mentality where I was like, "If I work my ass off and I do what I got to do to succeed, I'll be able to have everything that I don't have now." And even more so, I'll be able to give to other people what I wasn't given and what I never had. Of course. But I think it's also important to be helping people while you're on that journey to get to the "top" of what you want to be. But I think it's just so interesting how like, also my parents didn't graduate high school. They dropped out. I go to trade school now, but I have something they never got to experience. My parents just experienced like, "They just got to do their own things." That was it. High school was like, "Dano being in everybody." And then, I was going to ask some people, "Look at it now." High school was like, "Don't socialize. We've done making friends." But it shouldn't be that way. There's just so much life out there that there's so many friends to make. There's just so many opportunities out there. And people just really need to reach. They need to stop blaming themselves. They need to stop being home. They need to just go for a walk, go journal, go workout, go do something for yourself. Focus on the things that you can't control. I feel like a lot of people get caught up in controlling things. Trying to control things that they can't control. They always get caught up in that fact. And it just brings insanity almost. Because I start freaking out sometimes too. I'm like, "Damn, this is going to kind of a way." Kind of a direction like, "I can't really control." Man, you can't control that. You can control your body. You could put healthy food into yourself. You could work out. You could go for a walk. You could control your mind. Which one to think about. It's just, don't get caught up and thinking about things that you can't control. I've definitely personally, that's something I can speak on. I've gotten caught up in things that I can't control. And it's one of those things where you're like, "I want this to be this way, but you can't do anything about it." It does drive you insane because you're thinking, "Why can't it be like this? Why can't I make it like this? Why can't I fix things?" But if it's out of your control, you have to let it go. If you keep getting hung up on that and you keep trying to drive yourself insane, trying to change things that aren't meant for you to change, then you're actually going to go insane. I don't know. Some people, they fall into some dark places. Me, it's kind of hard to be vague about it. I'm talking more because I had a conversation about this last night. Somebody I talked to. It's more of a relationship thing where I've gotten caught up before in thinking I could change someone. I didn't realize I was being controlling, but now I look back on it and I was like, "Damn, I was trying really hard not to come across as controlling, but I was also trying really hard to change this person." To really improve this person almost. Yeah, but the thing is, you can't really change other people if they're not open to change. So even if your intentions are good, sometimes you can't force yourself on somebody like that. And I drove myself insane because I saw one side of a person that I really liked and that I saw a whole lot of other sides that I didn't like. And I was like, "Damn, if only she could just focus on this one side and be like this all the time, but you can't force somebody like that." Yeah, it's unrealistic. I realize that now. But yo, I went crazy trying to change this person and the only person you can really change is yourself. So sometimes you got to know when to call it quits and just focus on what you got to do. I started realizing more like the more I can change myself, the more I can make myself a leader, the more I can improve myself overall. People just kind of like the people who do want to change are going to come and talk to me and they're going to listen and they're going to follow my path. I usually go like reach for people and like sometimes it comes to a point like you're just reaching so hard, you're almost hurting yourself. Yeah, it definitely is. But the thing with relationships is some people have a really bad idea of our relationships. There are two things, two things that I really think are bad in a relationship. So the first thing is that sometimes people feel like in a relationship you're responsible for each other's happiness. Nobody deserves that kind of burden. If you're in a relationship with somebody, you have a responsibility to not fuck them over 100%. But you're not entirely responsible for keeping them happy and making them happy two people need to have their own independent happiness and they come together and they share that happiness with another person. You don't rely on somebody for your own happiness and you don't depend on yourself to make somebody else happy because if you're relying on somebody to be happy when they're not there, what are you going to do? Yeah, you're crazy. You're literally yourself. Yeah. And some people do. They get so attached where the whole world revolves around this person because they rely entirely on them to be happy. Yeah. And that never works out. That's like extreme toxicity. So I don't think people should burden each other with their partner's happiness. And it's one of those things where too many people do it and I see it happening. And I'm like, yo, you have the wrong idea. And even when people tell me, yeah, I know you're right. It's so hard to change someone like I hold on. All I can do is give my advice. And if you don't, you can listen to it. But if you don't take my advice and you don't do something with it, I can't force you to. I'm just trying to look out for people because I think one of the best blessings in my life is that when I was going through tough times as a kid, I didn't feel like I had anybody I could relate to that I could reach out for advice. So I got really good at giving advice and I learned how to support myself because I didn't have anybody else to support me. And I think that's why I am so positive today. And people tell me like, I'm such a positive person that could never be me. But I really think it's because I never had anybody there. So I had to learn to support myself. I had my mom, but there's a lot of things like when you're a kid, you don't want to go talk to your parents about. Of course. So I really relate to that. Just being by myself and just growing up and just like, I'm the oldest child before. And like, you know, you get to that point where it's just like, there's three other kids and they're all growing. And like, you know, Damien's kind of the adult now. Like you got to like let him kind of grow and do his own thing. And then like people really call me like positive and really just like maturing or anything because like I didn't have anybody. So I had to do it. I had to do it for myself or I just had to play the victim and just, you know, be a fucking loser. They fucked that. You know, like I want to just keep living. I want to keep doing better for myself. And like, if you put your mind in anything, you could learn whatever. You could learn whatever you want. You just got to put your mind to it, man. Me, I'm the youngest child, but I'm also the one that people rely on to get things done. That's an awesome position. It's it kind of is, but it's also one of those things where my mom, she didn't go to school. She doesn't really know a whole lot. My sister graduated high school and then never ended up going to college. Now she's working, but you know, she can't support a family. Okay. So like my mom looks at me and she tells me like you have to do something with yourself. And sometimes the pressure is like, all right, I don't really mind the pressure. My only thing is there's so much for me to learn about being an adult that I can't ask anybody about. My mom isn't going to know how to help me. She didn't really get to do a whole lot with her life. So now I'm kind of people tell me it's crazy because they're like, you're 19. I'm 25. I'm not even worried about the things that you're worried about. You're trying to be an adult so hard. You're so young. And I'm kind of like, these are things that I have to learn eventually. And people are kind of depending on me to get shit done now. So I realize that I still have to graduate college before I pursue a career and all that before I'm really stable and able to support anybody. But there are certain things that I got to get done for myself right now. Like I told you, like I'm trying to buy a car. Like I can't ask like my mom, like about car buying. I figured that I
myself, I don't have the people I knew. And what are you doing? You're going to educate yourself. Yeah, there's a lot of things that I'm like, well, it would be great to be able to ask like my dad about this or my mom about this. Other people are probably asking their parents about this or their parents are just teaching them a whole lot about adulting. I kind of have to educate myself and obviously sometimes it's a pain in the ass but I look at that way though. I like educating myself. I feel like it's cool. At the end of the day, regardless, you're still learning the same stuff. It's probably harder to do it by educating yourself. But I mean, there is a sort of sense of accomplishment like, wow, I got this done. I didn't need any help with this. And now I'm really big on giving. So my mentality would be, wow, now I can help somebody else with this. Yes. And I think to me, because I didn't have a lot, I thrive of being able to give to others. It just makes me happy to be able to help people and to give to other people. So it's one of those things where when I educate myself about something and if somebody needs help and I understand what they need help with, I don't really hesitate to help people if I have the chance to. I'm really just like a huge advocate for just spreading knowledge and just like, hey man, if you're going through this, I'm going to tell you what my experience was and maybe you could take some lessons out of that and try to apply them to your life and see what works. But I'm just like a huge advocate for trying to help other people because we can help each other. You can build each other up and then just keep going up it, which we're saying about like being 19 and just keep growing up. And I just did really overthinking a lot like holy fuck. I'm 19. But I don't want to keep going. I want to keep progressing my life. I want to have more and more and more. But then sometimes I'm like fuck. I need to take a step back, take a breath and I'm 19. I'm still a fucking kid. You know, I've been still enjoying life, but why are you enjoying life? Keep working. Yeah, you're definitely not in any rush. You don't want to be in any rush but where you feel like, oh, I have to get this done now like above a bug. I'm going crazy. Like I didn't do this. I didn't do that. I didn't do that. You can still sit back and enjoy your life, whether you're 19, 20, 25, even when you're like 30. I don't really think there's an age too young to start or too old to start your life. Yeah. Obviously if you're like 50, you should have things, you know, settled for yourself. But then again, even if you don't, if you have the chance to go to college and it's something you never did when you're like 50, I mean, why not do it? Some people feel like it's delayed, but it's not. Especially with the 30s, some people feel like if they don't have their life figured out by the time they're 30s, they start freaking out. It's over for them. If I don't have my life figured out by the time I'm 30, it's over. I can't do anything. It's too late for me. My life is over. It's not. You can still go to college when you're 30. You start a career when you're 34. You could start a business when you're 40. You could do a whole lot with your life, regardless of how old you are. But some people, they just don't realize it. They think, people tell me, oh, you're being optimistic. I'm being realistic. And I'm like, you focus too much on your plan B. You know what you want. I always ask people, I'm like, what do you want? And people know what they want, but then they get too caught up in, oh, but in case that doesn't happen, I'll have to settle for this. And then I'll have to do this. And I'll have to do this. I'm like, you're putting too much thought into what if it doesn't work out instead of just chasing what you do want. And obviously, I realize that you can't get everything that you want. But at the end of the day, if you have your life set up and your stable, even if you don't get everything that you want, you'll be able to support yourself regardless. So I just personally don't like when people feel like they're being realistic by putting too much thought into, oh, what if I have to settle for this as opposed to just chasing what they really want out of their life? People think too much of like, what if, fuck what if, man, just like, fuck, truck, fucking, man. Just try. Just try. Start a podcast, make your own music, do some art, like, fuck it, man. Like, what's the worst that could happen? Like, just go and shoot your shot. Like, people think of what if too much. And then that's just like, if you think what if you're already going to fail, like going in, like, it is good to have other plans, but like, man, like, just shoot all the way with like, plan A, just keep going and keep going and just keep working after your dream. You know? I can imagine any 30 year old listening to us talking about this right now. I'll be like, ah, they're kids. They're 19. I would have thought that way when I was 19. They're just being optimistic because they're kids. But there are so many people that prove my point. There are people who start businesses later in life. They still become successful stock traders. They, they sometimes start when they're in their 30s, 40s. They still become successful. I might be wrong. It's just a quote I read one time. I think it was Arnold who said that you shouldn't have a plan B that you should focus on your plan A. Whatever it is, you really want. That's what you need to focus on. Of course. I feel like just looking at you, like, just brings me back to like track. Like just because like, I just really remember you from track. Like, I just remember our track days and just like, practicing like with core and press and I'll made it at some point. Do you remember that those days? I remember track. I remember track all too well. That was a big part of high school for me. I mean, I tend to be really competitive. So it's just something that. That's fucking awesome. I always wanted to get better. But I realized like, I complained about a lot of things, which kind of contradicts my nature a little bit because like, I want to be competitive and I want to get better. But I was frustrated most of the time just because throughout high school, in track, I saw people progressing so much faster than I did. As a freshman, I don't think I was bad. I thought I was pretty good as a freshman actually. I was pretty even. I probably give myself like a top five spot out of the freshman guys in our class. But I felt like come senior year or come junior year actually because I kind of got my shit together senior year. I was like, damn, I don't feel like I've really progressed that much on a whole like I'm there are people like breezley dropping from like a 64 400 to like a 51. And I'm like, damn, like I haven't made that type of progress. I haven't gotten that much better than when I was a freshman come senior year. I came to realize that some people they could eat whatever they want. They could never lift in their life. They're going to be naturally gifted. As long as they go to practice, they're going to keep getting better and their progression is going to be exponential. For me, I need to watch what I eat, lift, sleep, make sure I'm doing everything right by the book, really taking care of myself to see that type of progress that I felt like some other people were getting without actually giving a fuck kind of just going to practice and running. From the head to this point, I was just kind of like fuck everybody else like they might be doing way better than you. They might be doing worse than you. They're like, man, look at me straight in the eyes like fuck everybody else. Just focus on yourself and keep building yourself. Because the more you're going to keep focusing on everybody else, the less you going to be focusing on yourself. Yeah, senior year, I really started focusing more on me and I realized like I was like six, one, 140 pounds. I was like damn, like I've always been wanting to gain some weight, but I've never really been like consistently in the gym. So I started working out and I think senior year was the first time I actually had to take a whole week off or any time off from track just because my legs were so fucked up because I was going to practice. No, I was going to practice every day and I was also working out. I got the gym for two hours after I got off. And it was one of those things that I wasn't lifting as a supplement to running. I was lifting like I was going to compete in like a powerlifting me. I was going like I was going six days a week, two hours right after track and I always felt like shit, practices were terrible. My first couple of meets were awful. But then come the end of the season when we had like a whole lot of meets coming up in a row. Yeah. I stopped going to the gym for probably almost a month. And I actually let myself recover and yo, I was hitting PRs every single week. I was like yo, I'm getting better, better, better, better than the track season ended and I was like damn what could have been, but I don't think it was good to kill my body like that for so long last minute. But had I learned earlier how to take care of my body and how they've been working out. I probably could have hit some crazy progression that I just never did because I didn't really give a fuck. I didn't watch what I was doing to myself. And now looking back, I'm like yeah, I would have been great to figure all that out sooner, but there's nothing I can really go back and change about it. So I can't just have to live with it. We get the learning curve. Yeah. Now I know how to take care of myself and I know I mean now it's not like I'm competing in anything. So it's more of like health benefits. I also like personal satisfaction. Like I like going to the gym and being able to hit bigger numbers.
numbers all the time. But for me personally, I'm like, wow, I didn't learn this sooner. I could have been really useful for me in high school when I was competing. But now I'm like, I'm not gonna be like, ah, damn, it's too late. I mean, even if I don't run anymore and I don't compete and I don't race people, I'd still have a reason to be in shape and be fit and go out and go on a run and go to the gym, just for my own help. - Well, made you like wanna start track. So that started my freshman year as well. - So this kinda goes back to what I said when we first started about how my parents didn't let me do a whole lot when I was little. When I was little, my dad forced music onto me. So he said, you go to school, you come straight home, you play music. And now I enjoy playing guitar. I started when I was really young because it was forced on me. But I didn't stop for a while because it became one of those things where I'm a really active person, I'm extraverted. So I was always like, damn, I wanna go to the park, I wanna play, I wanna be able to go outside. And I was always shut off in the house. So when I middle school, that's when I was like, yo, I gotta like play sports or something, get out the house and I begged my dad to let me play football because I remember it at football. Yeah, I think it was Omar. Omar came up to me one time in middle school and he was like, hey dude, join the football team. And I was like, man, I remember. They harassed everybody. But I was like, you know what, yo, I've been trying to get out the house. I played soccer for a year, then I kinda got hurt, the coaches quit. So I was like, whatever, I'll try. And I don't know nothing about the sport. Yo, I was awful at the beginning, dude. I showed up to practice. I was like, bro, I don't know what a route is. I don't know what any of this means. I'm like, it's a Portuguese kid. Yeah, we're, but I just don't fuck her. Yeah, I was like, yo, I have no idea what the hell's going on here. But I also was like, you know what, this is a cool spot, some cool people. Obviously there was drama. Up to my senior year at high school, there was drama with the football team. There were their own little groups in there. It wasn't really very unified. Bum, I was like, you know what, I'll keep trying it. Just 'cause I suck at it, doesn't mean I should give up right away. By the end of the season, I realized like a lot of people quit, but it was my first year and I was starting. Yo, I almost caught a pretty nice pick in the last game. Tipped over some kid that threw himself behind me. But, yeah, I was like, yo, I'm having fun learning something new. Some people don't really want to try new things because they're gonna be like, yo, I'm gonna suck and it's gonna be embarrassing. To this day, I try new things. I went ice skating for the first time this winter. Well, I was awful, yo, I bust ass like eight times. I was watching like six-year-olds tear their up. I was like, what the fuck? But, yo, I still had fun learning something new. It's not bad to learn new things, even if you look fucking stupid at first. I mean, eventually you'll get good at it. As long as you got fun with it, some people just can't enjoy it because they don't like to, you know, feel embarrassed like that. They don't wanna fuck up. Yeah. But, how do you learn if you don't make a mistake? What are you gonna do? Just never try anything new. Kind of just like shut yourself in. That's so boring. I hate to think like that. I just, I always like to be able to do things, do new things. I really like to travel. I think that's all in the sleep. Really cool for people to wanna try new things and always learn something new. But, so when I hit high school, I continued with football. And I had no idea what I wanted to do during winter and spring. I hadn't given it any thought. And my coach was like, dude, you should do track. Focal players are either gonna wrestle or do track. You're a skill guy, you wanna do track. You wanna learn to be faster. And that was pretty much it. And then I just enjoyed, I enjoyed track. I think the culture I enjoyed more than Focal, just because it was a little more individualistic. So if you perform poorly, it's not like anybody was gonna kind of shit on you and be like, oh, you drag the team down or any of that. And there was a new man. Yeah, that's just one of you. You just gotta keep doing better. But there was definitely less drama on the track team. And even if there was any kind of drama, you could kind of avoid it. You could just run, man. Yeah, just keep running. So I have my own little group in track and I like the culture. I still talk to those guys to this day. It was David's birthday today. We all watched him happy birthday. It's everybody's still cool. Even if we don't see each other all the time. For me, why I joined track? It was a winter track. And it was my friends who were joining. And I was like, damn, fuck it. My friends are doing it. I'm gonna do it. But then I just really like, got a love for it. And then my first board, I joined the high school. And so many people miss out on joining sports and joining clubs. They do it. It's still awesome to be part of something. Be a part of a club or be part of a sport. 'Cause you just make these friends with people like your age and you make new connections. And the culture you said, it's just good vibes, man. And it just sucks that so many people look back on high school and they're like, I didn't get to do anything. But now you can change that. Now you can change your future and be a part of more things. Yeah. I mean, if anyone's listening this and you're in high school and you don't do shit, unless your high school really doesn't have anything to do, yo, you gotta do something. There's something else for you. There's something. Yeah, even in college, if you don't do anything, especially with college, there's somebody clubs, sports, all that in college. Yeah, there's something out there for you. You just didn't find it yet. It's not a label-aiding yourself, people. Yeah. They say, the people you meet in college become some of your best friends for life. So you don't want to just be going to class and going to your dorm or going home and not associating with any clubs or groups or talking to nobody. That'd be a waste. Yeah. What Track Like Really told me, though, was like, I don't really have someone to push me. And Track was just these practices and these races. You always have that support. Someone just keep going faster, keep going longer. Just get your stand up better form. And it was just really amazing to have someone just there like improving you, you know? I always had somebody that I was looking at in front of me. Since I am pretty competitive, obviously, I didn't take care of my body outside like I should have. But when I was on the track and I was running with other people, I always had that person that I was, you know, trying to catch up to. Or if I was in first for whatever reason that didn't happen a whole lot. But I was making sure nobody caught up to me. I was in a lot of-- Yeah, you're out. I don't care if it's practice. You know, I'm hauling ass. As you should, man. As you should keep pushing yourself. And running is just amazing. So many people complain about running. And it's something I still do today. And it's just like, it's a really big stress reliever when I'm just running. Because all I'm thinking about, man, it's just like run, run, and breathe. You know, just keep running and breathing. They're so therapeutic. Yeah, I mean, exercise in general releases hormones that actually make you feel happier. They de-stress you. So that's actually a scientific fact for people that don't work out. And that's why I work out. It's an amazing benefit for like that. Because you can't go all day just thinking about life and like fucking Betty, how you know you hook up with her and all this shit. Like just a bunch of stupid stuff, but then when you're just thinking about weights and up and down and running and like when you're just thinking about simple shit, it's good for your brain, you know? So now let me just be stressed out. There are always going to be some off days, even when you're working out. But it's definitely a good distraction. It's a, it's good mentally and physically, I mean, because it's not only about being physically fit. It does relieve stress. And you have less to worry about while you're working out. Yeah, what I want to ask you about like Portugal, like how are the really when you can't care since the States? So I was born in Portugal. I grew up there until after first grade. So it was April 29, 2007 when I moved here. And I remember the story behind that is my mom had my sister in 97. And then she had me in 2000. And my dad, I've mentioned them before. I was referring to my step that my actual dad, he never wanted a son. He only wanted daughters. So he walked out when I was born. He didn't like me at all. I really sucks. I don't know the dude. I don't remember in my honesty. Don't care. No contact. What's up? You would never go talk to him or anything? I was around him occasionally, but I never associated with him. And I don't really remember talking to him much. So when I was probably three maybe, yeah, I think I was three. My mom, she had met my stepdad. I forget exactly how, but they were calling each other. He had moved to the United States in '84 from Canada. He went from Portugal to the Netherlands to Canada to the US. So he was telling my mom, yo, take your kids, come over here because it was kind of toxic my family in Portugal. What is that? So my aunt was the spoiled child, so she wanted everything that my mom had and I
at some point she teamed up with my dad to try to like steal the house and everything else from my mom. It was really, yeah it was really weird now that I think about it. I'm like what the fuck was going on? But my stepdad was like yeah just take your kids come to America. So when I was three or four she came by herself for a year just to check things out. She worked at a restaurant with my stepdad. He was a chef. She was a waitress. That's the real shit. Yeah and I remember the day she got back so well because it felt like an eternity. I didn't remember what my mom looked like at all. I was living with my grandma for a year and I guess when you're that young your memory isn't that good because I was looking out the living room window and we lived on a hill so I was looking down the hill and I remember my mom walking out the car. Her hair was really short black. She was wearing all pink kind of a weird choice. Now that I think about it pink isn't really a- This is her coming back or her leaving for the first time. No this is when she came back after a year and I couldn't remember who she was or what she looked like at all just because I was so young that a year felt like forever. So I remember exactly what she looked like that day and I remember my grandma went outside to greet her and my sister went outside to greet her and I was still looking out the window so I went outside and I was hiding behind my grandma. I was like who is this person and she's like this is your mom and I couldn't even tell you who she was but I feel like we connected pretty easily and I've always been really attached to my mom because she was like the only stable parent I always had there for me. And then my aunt got- she heard that my mom was going to take my sister and I to move here so she like teamed up with my dad to try to kidnap us so my mom couldn't- What? The kidnap you? So weird shit. Yeah people like- they always feel bad for me when I tell them about my life and I'm like dude this is like a- this is a story for me I don't care anymore. Yeah it happens. So we ended up coming here on April 29th and- Had you feel when you were coming here? Yo I was looking at the airport I was like yo where am I looking around looking at all the cars in the parking lot. I took the keys from my stepdad and he told me what the car looked like and I was like running down the aisles looking for the car in the parking lot I was like six years old. And I remember the first place we went to wasn't even our house. One of his friends his daughter was having a birthday party so that's the first place I went out to airport and I was just like- I was like I don't know these people I was just like they like spoke Portuguese but half the time they were speaking English and I couldn't even tell you what the hell they were saying. Wow yeah you still have to learn English. Yeah I had no idea what was going on. Then we checked out the house it was right by Washington school still where I'm at right now actually I was in the process of moving a couple times but it just didn't happen. And I started school pretty late actually even though I got here in April. I think it was just trying to get everything sorted out and all the records in from Portugal. I started on October 27th I think and the first day I showed up to school she handed out a spelling quiz she put that paper on my desk I stared at it I had no idea what the fuck it said and I cried and everybody stared at me and I was like the failure. Yeah so you have to go to ESL and everything to learn English for us. Yeah they actually wanted to take me out early I've always had a talent for learning things pretty quickly so I got to hang out English in half a year but they wouldn't- I think it was one of my teachers was trying to get me removed early but it wasn't allowed so I did ESL for a full year and then I never went back never needed it. Wow it's pretty impressive. I did ESL a little bit too I had like a little bit of Spanish accent I had trouble trying to understand English at the same time because I love the Spanish parents. Yeah and that's interesting you just like learn English and then just like fuck it started doing a thing in the US. Yeah I already spoke Portuguese before I came here obviously so I didn't have to learn two languages at the same time. I'll definitely say I can hold the conversation in Portuguese but I never learned how to write and my Portuguese is definitely not great. I talked to my mom even now sometimes and there are words that I never learned and I pull in out Google translate trying to figure out what the hell I'm trying to say. You left off like especially young age you still have to learn you know. Yeah. Wow and then like where'd you live kind of like a more like a rural area like more in the city like kind of Portugal. Oh in Portugal dude I had a big ass farm. We didn't have a farm land type ship. We didn't have as many animals as my grandpa did when he was there but yeah I used to go out climb trees play it was just a bunch of open space. Wow that's awesome like a whole different life. Yeah. Like a different kind of farm and shit. Yeah it was a mean ass trip to school though. Why did we say that? It was pretty far. There was like one school there. It was like newly built. Oh you would have to like walk there. No there was a bus. I remember one day though like on the way home it broke down and we were waiting for another one and it just never showed up so my sister and I like walked home and we showed up at like I don't know the middle of the night probably like 930. Where if I remember correctly though the school day ended at or clock. It was I want to say your normal classes until like 2 to 30. Yeah probably 2 to 30 was normal classes and then it was your extra curricula like gym and what you would call like an elective in high school. Okay cool. Would you ever like plan to go in back to Portugal? I would honestly go back. I know the house we used to live at isn't in the family anymore and obviously my family is kind of pretty toxic over there so if I went back it would just be to like I basically be a tourist. They wouldn't really feel like I'm going back to my family at all. Wow so like the only family you really have here is like your mom and your stepdad right? Yeah my sister that's it. No like aunts, uncles. No. Wow so that's really like first generation you know like you're here. I'm zero with generation. Oh yeah you weren't born here. Yeah my kids will be first gen. That's so interesting wow I was born in the US so I can't really relate to it being born in a whole different country and taking that trip to the US and like looking and examining everything to be like holy shit like this is all new. Not gonna lie though. I knocked out the entire plane ride. Really? I was out. I did not care. My mom told me I remember I was in the backyard in Portugal and she's like yeah we're gonna go to America and I was like ooh foreign country. Yeah I had no idea what in that all. So you were excited to come here? Oh yeah yeah yo ever since I was literally I love to travel I wanted to see new places. I'd always been in the same spot really. We got to go out a lot in Portugal but I was like yo I'm down to see a different country that's fine. I love traveling. Have you been like anywhere else like country wise? I've been to a couple places. I know this summer I was planning a trip to Japan and then I didn't get to go and I'm probably gonna try to go for that next year. I think it's really cool to go out and see different places. People are so unique in different areas of the world and there are so many different cultures to kind of immerse yourself in and experience and obviously you're not gonna like all of it. It's a journey and it's really cool. I think personally just to get to see everything and you learn so much about other people and other places and you kind of from immersing yourself in those cultures you learn so much about yourself too. Even just like going to like different states and like different countries when I come back I almost feel like I completely like a new chapter in my life because I just came back from a whole different society. A whole different world almost like people just like act differently they eat different food they just everything's different and when I come back I just come back with that information and knowledge and it's like holy shit there's more life out there you know it's just not New Jersey it's just not car and it's just not union like there's just so much life out there and I gotta keep going. Wherever you are everything seems pretty normal to you but when you're able to immerse yourself in a completely different culture that you know nothing about you can kind of reflect on yourself by just comparing yourself with other people and you pick up on so many things that you wouldn't have noticed otherwise and it's I think it's a good experience just to learn more about yourself. Of course I love driving man like it's just something that I was kind of like got hooked on like ever since I did my first trip so I think it was Mexico first country like I went to I was just like man I gotta keep going I gotta keep going like new different life forms I gotta keep exploring I love exploring because it's it's a way of learning you know school is not the only thing that teaches you life teaches you a whole fucking lot and people like forget about that. Yeah they definitely do there's a whole lot you learn from life that you
You don't even realize you're learning obviously, but for me, it's that thing where I always want to do more, I always want to see more, I always want to improve. There's always something you can improve on. You got to, like I said, appreciate yourself, recognize what you don't like about yourself, but don't get hung up on that. Try to fix it. Do a little bit at a time. Don't overwhelm yourself thinking about I got to do this, this, that trying to do a whole lot at once. Focus on what you want. Sort it out and take baby steps. Even if you feel like you're not progressing fast enough, you'll be able to progress period. You can look back and realize I'm not perfect, but I'm not who I was a second ago, a minute ago, a day ago, a month, a year ago, and you can appreciate the progress, even if you're nowhere near where you want to be. That's so interesting. I already tell people a lot about that. Just even a week or a month ago, you're just so different. You're in a whole different place and you're just experiencing a whole different life. You keep progressing forward and people forget that. People forget that next week's going to be different. Next month's going to be different. Next year, you're just going to be a whole different person. You can't even be growing. I can't even imagine what I'll be doing next year. There's just no way to tell. I know what I want to have for myself next year. It doesn't mean I'm going to get everything that I want, but I work for it. I'm not worried about what I'm not going to be able to have. If things don't go my way, then I'll have to figure it out. Like there's a lot of obstacles in your ways and you just got to fucking jump over that shit, man. You got to keep going. You definitely do. You can't get hung up on the past or to hung up on what is like you said earlier. I feel like with this, I'm just really building myself discipline. It's really hard to have that discipline. What is it for you that really gets you like just stay on track and just stay on your schedule and just keep going? Because a lot of people, they get lost in that way and they get caught in a rut. I feel like for me, it's just, it's probably ego-price. I like work ethic and I enjoy what I do. People are like, damn, I don't know how you go and you work out every day before work. Damn. That's the best feeling in the world though. People don't know that feeling. I'm like, good work out before you go. I'm like, I have an ego. I have a helipried. I love being able to hit bigger and bigger and bigger numbers. I also get more upset than I should be sometimes when I have a bad day, but at the end of the day, I like to work out. I like what I do. I think I'm lucky that I have a talent for learning things and I'm also lucky that I like improvement and even if it's something that hurts or it's annoying or it's hard to do, I enjoy it. Not a lot of people can find enjoyment in things. I feel like the way I can and that's why I'm also so positive. But I say the biggest factor that actually influenced me and the person who makes me so optimistic, I think, is my mother. That comes from the fact that she's always busted her ass off her whole life. She's clinically depressed. She's been diagnosed with depression. Sometimes I've seen her in a really dark place, but she always fights through it and when she's not having a really hard time, she's probably one of the most positive people I've ever met. She's always like, her work ethic is insane. She never slacks off. She's always smiling. She's always trying to smile and she's always trying to get shit done and she doesn't really let her depression get the best of her ever. Sometimes she gets stressed out and she has like an anxiety attack, but when she bounces back, she's on top of everything. She's honestly probably one of the strongest people that I've ever met. And I take a lot from that about being positive and how it actually helps you to stay away from those dark places. Also because my mom's not the only one depressed. My sister and my stepdad are also both diagnosed. So it's one of those things where I've lived with people like this my whole life. I never want to be that person. I see what it does to people. I can't be that person. And it's one of those things where you have to want more for yourself. I've lived with people that are depressed and people go, wow, I can't believe it didn't hit you too if you were surrounded by people like that. And I'm like, it doesn't hit me because I'm surrounded by people like that. You're learning to be a son. I have a reminder of what I don't want to be and I know it all too well. A lot of what I want for myself doesn't come from, oh, I like the way this person does something. So I want to do it the same way. Me, it comes from I don't want to be anything like this person. So I'm doing the opposite. Yes. I can 100% agree with that. I feel like every person you could learn from in a sense. Everyone who will the valuable lesson, whether it be I want to be more like them, well, I don't want to be anything like them or maybe a lot of specific traits from that person and the other traits, you know, I rather not get into that kind of field. You know, I just love enjoying talking to people. Like, maybe I don't think I'm an extrovert, but I love to learn and I love to talk to other people and take the good out of what I should take the good out of every situation. You know, you feel me? You learn so much throughout your life and even such a short time. I've always said that I appreciate everybody who's ever been a part of my life. I appreciate my dad. I appreciate my awe. I appreciate anybody who's ever fucked me over because at the end of the day, every experience you've ever had impacts you in some way. You wouldn't be the person you are today if anything was done differently. If you didn't experience every single thing, well, maybe not every single thing, but if you didn't experience the things that you did, you wouldn't be the same person now. Yeah, it's easy to say, well, if I had better experiences, if my life was perfect, I might be a better person now. But then that comes from you don't appreciate who you are. You need to appreciate yourself or who you are with your imperfections and recognize that every experience you've ever had made you who you are now and that you should appreciate everything you've experienced in your life in some way, even the negatives. And that's when perfectionism just really kills man. Just idea, how it could be so much better in your head, and it's like fuck that. Enjoy the moment, man. Nobody has a going. Nobody is ever going to be perfect. There's no one on the planet who will ever be perfect because the idea of perfection is. Oh my God. It's unrealistic. Yeah. It's unrealistic. Not that it's unrealistic, but it's subject to perception. So everybody's opinions are slightly different. No two people on the planet or in the universe think exactly the same. Everybody has, although you could influence people's opinions, everybody has slight variations on opinions or completely different opinions. For somebody to be perfect, you need to appeal 100% that every single person on the planet. How can you do that if everybody thinks a little differently? That's why I always tell people, you'll never be perfect, but you can be perfect to somebody, even if that somebody isn't yourself. Somebody out there can think you're perfect, but you're never going to be perfect to everybody. I've just been way more like, just living in the moment, man, like, you know, like, fuck it. Like just live life as it is. Like, stop trying to like make it better in your head or worse in your head. Like, the moment is what it is and just keep living with it. Try to make progress, improve and do your best in whatever you do. I really do think that if you're going to do something, you should give it your best effort, but don't try to be perfect. That's unrealistic for everybody. Like I was saying earlier, that's casual. You work out and then you go to your job. Like, a lot of people really just lack that structure. You know, they just get up. First thing, look at their phone. Second thing, watching Netflix. Like, I thrive off of a structure. If I don't have a structure or some type of organized plan of what I'm going to do, I find it sometimes hard to have the motivation to get things done when when COVID hit and everything closed and I was in my house, I was like, shit, that just ruined my entire schedule. I don't really know what to do now. There's always something you can do. You could find different things to do, like I said earlier.
But sometimes when people get thrown off their routine, it hits like really hard and then people have no motivation to do anything That's when you got a really take time to Re-evaluate what can I still do now? What can I pick up anything new can I improve on anything? There's always stuff you could do like if you're stuck at home in COVID. I don't know by an instrument start drawing cook something That's what I started doing man. I bought a guitar. I was like fuck it. I'm gonna start reading. I'm starting meditating and like Stop taking the easy way out like a lot of people like they just rather land their ass all day and just watch Netflix and just like keep binge watching shows Which is like pretty like fucking a sense like limit yourself to like what I do I do an episode a day or I do like a movie or whatever But like when COVID struck the first month was like awful to me like being in that lockdown and just being like everyone felt it like What the fuck do we do, you know, we're just kind of like stuck at home and like We're required to stay home because it's a lockdown and a lot of people just kind of gave in and I Mid myself I did give give in the first month, but then you know I got a job and then I started realizing like Why you're in home like you can still do simple things like go out for a walk and you could still just read and there's so many other Activities that people get stuck stuck in their bubble and then just like Fuck like Kobe truck and I'm just gonna like take the hell and I'm just gonna stay home and I'm just gonna keep like Being a fucking bomb it fuck that man. Yeah, I mean have I put on an episode of something or like a leaven and then it's 5 a.m And I just finished like 13 But I still get my shit though and at the end of the year getting a shit that man. Yeah When I was on routine I was going to class going to the gym going to work. I think the only time I was really like on my PS4 or watching something was When I got home at the end of the day and I was like all right I need some time to like relax. I don't want to go to sleep right away and then feel like all I do is work and sleep That's when I like maybe I'm gonna put something on maybe I'm a like play guitar take a little bit of time to just chill but Me like I always got my shit done. I also I like to go out and do things I'm not a really big home body Even if you know even if you are though There's still better things to do at home than sleep the whole day and just have like YouTube renapp like so on but Even I guess video games even are an improvement like yo that could be your living shit I mean if you're gonna be laying in bed watching YouTube the whole day might as well be grinding out a video game We're gonna have that balance, you know, yeah I think everybody needs balance nobody wants to be doing the same thing all the time But I know that for me It really hit hard at the beginning having to be at home Especially since I was still in classes and they were assigning like hello work all the time And then I'd have to go to work and stay up at night and finish all the extra that they felt like giving me because they thought I had no life anymore since I was home But I can see that I look at my parents. They're like oh your home load time. All right. You want to clean the kitchen? You want to sweep the floor? Yeah, but I came around and I still managed to find stuff to entertain myself with and have fun and Even our work I had fun. I enjoy where I work and what I do. I think everybody's pretty cool We have our problems sometimes, but it's a Good environment where you get to socialize with people. I really thrive off of socializing with people I tell everybody I'm not really like a big texture my phone probably I hate it. Yeah, my phone got got the one person I talked to every day And then they got a whole lot of nothing Got a lot of unopened stuff I'll say that, but it's just one of those things where I Feel like every year I kind of lay low a little more and I keep my close group of people that I fuck with but I just I like In person interaction more than texting. It's one of those things where you can't really see emotion It's just I get a better vibe off of people in person than I do when I text I just for me if I was given the option to Just be chill in our home texting somebody or just hang out with them and like have a talk in person like I'll take the person Oh, interaction and interaction like texting is just like it's not there It's not the same to like go and talk and like Converse and bring you ideas out of people you can really vibe with somebody spiritually if You're you're actually there in person. It's just it's a more fun for me. I still people up I still think people are cool through text because at the end of the day it's the same person, but yeah I like having all that actual like the emotion and the actual physical interaction For me that's just something that Uncomfortable with I know some people are more comfortable talking through text than they are in person That's something that I'd say get used to being out of your comfort zone Hanging out with people more as opposed to texting them and get more comfortable with people in person Because at the end of the day you're not gonna spend your whole life texting people You kind of have to get over that barrier Especially if you're getting close with somebody you're gonna be around each other a lot so you can't be like Chilling over text and then every time you got to see them in person you're like Sorry, the awkward incident. Oh, I'm a human again. How do I be a Regular conversation. Yeah, I have a normal comp like human interaction with somebody. You can't be like that But it's just like I've really been trying to let me like my phone news and like just social media and just texting and everything I love phone calls. I think phone calls does bring that genuine connection We're talking to someone. But it's just like phones like it's crazy how much time you take away from your life like you can be on Take talk or Instagram or Snapchat for like 10 20 minutes You couldn't step red a book and read like two or three chapters Yeah, that's in time for me Sometimes I still want to interact with people so like I'll still be hidden them up if I don't have the chance I'll be with them in person but for me too, it's like I Hate texting like too many people because then I'm like going through conversation to conversation to conversation Yeah, and most of it's just like small talk like the people I'm real close with we don't text every day I mean we got like wear weird ass group chats. Yeah, but It's one of those things where we don't have to small talk like that over the phone if we got something to say We talked to each other, but it's one of those things where a lot of times when you're texting somebody It's just like small talk and I got other shit I could be doing yeah, so I don't text a lot I don't talk to a whole lot of people. I got a bad rep anyway, so it's kind of like one of those things where If you want to fuck with me and you want to talk to me and you think I'm cool and I think you're cool yet or whatever we could vibe but A lot of people even in college like they don't approach me because they get like yeah, I've been getting some weird looks sometimes and I'm just kind of like but I thought that was more of a high school thing because I was a stupid as middle schooler But no, I get just carried with me to college. So I guess this is something by the way I look The person who I wasn't high school is like just so different now Like I remember just being so shy like human interaction was just such a challenge for me You know, I was so scared to like really just talk to people and be like what would they think about me? But now I'm like fuck it even when I do text people I just be like man How's life treating you like what are you up to right now like what's going on in her life? Like I really want to know like I'm genuine. I really like fuck the small talk bullshit like let's just talk Let's actually have like a conversation about something like and sometimes man I'm trying to get deep a little bit like you'll talk to me about something other than like hey, what's up? What do you do? Yeah, yeah, I'm like yo, let's talk about something if we are nothing to talk about let's make conversation But at least make a good one. I love these deep congos though because like when I walk out I walked out of something I learned something about this person. I learned something overall, you know It's just so interesting how these deep combos with other people and just like really just Socialize and interact, but then there's just other people who just like really to themselves like hey, what's up? Like that's it like Some people I know they're obviously some people are dry because they're not interested But yeah, you can't force anybody to talk to you. No, you definitely can't some people have me Nazz barriers like they've been fucked up before they don't want to feel that way so they're like I'm taking my Sweet ass time. There's nobody. I'm a fuck with on that level. I'm I'm like shut off from everybody for now like I'm not yeah, I'm not Like they just won't open up to people at all They just feel like oh, I've been fucked over so I need a put up this barrier and people got to do some serious ass effort to earn my trust and Don't get me wrong. I get that but some people they get too paranoid about Everybody got second intentions People are trying to get something out of me and they get like Into this state where they don't want to fight
fuck with nobody. If you wanna be independent like that and you wanna be on your own, that's fine. But a lot of people are just too scared to get hurt and they don't wanna be alone. - That's another one, if, like why? Why are you so scared? I know people really get traumatized by past experiences and everything. Like trust issues get fucked up. That you're hurting yourself. You're making it worse, by not interacting with people and just like staying isolated and everything. I'm not gonna force anybody to talk to me, but I feel like I'm a really great people person. I really get people open up and I'm really genuine when I talk to people. I just go to like any like coworker or a rent person. Maybe we haven't talked much in the past. But I'm like, fuck a man, like right here, you're there. Let's just talk. Let's just converse and like, we build more of a bond after, you know? - I don't expect everybody to be like this, but I always say that I'd rather trust people than be that person that's like, I'm putting up a wall and I'm not talking to nobody. Just because at the end of the day, I've said this a bunch of times already, but at the end of the day, the person I wanna be with is somebody that I'm able to trust 100%. So I can't be coming across to people. It just doesn't really feel right for me to be doubting everybody like, oh, they might be trying to fuck me over. They might be trying to, you know, they might be trying to play me. It's one of those things where, have I been hurt before? Yeah. Does it suck? Yeah, that doesn't mean I'm put up a wall and try to, you know, make sure it never happens again. I'm more on that side of like, if I end up getting hurt, like it's gonna suck, it's not gonna be the end of the world though. I mean, if people wanna fuck you over, that's fine. There's other people out there. You'll find the right person eventually. You can't be scared, too scared of getting hurt to where you won't fuck with anybody. If you do wanna have somebody there for you. So my thing is kinda like, the person I wanna be with in the end is somebody that I wanna trust 100%. So when I find somebody that I feel like, this might be you, I'm full faith in you. You could end up, I'm a pretty good judge a character I feel. I can pretty much get a good idea about people off of like one or two conversations. It's one of those things where I can't assume everything about your life, but I can kinda pick up on our similarities. - I really well. - I think that's what you're trying to say. - Yeah, I can pick up on our similarities and I can make a whole lot of like good calls about you based on myself. That's like, sometimes people are like, wow, how did you know that about me? Like I talked to you like twice and I'm kinda like. - I really analyze, you know? - I'm, I don't really over analyze. I'm like, you know, we just seem similar on this point. So I took a while to ask guys to be honest. I just happen to be right. But sometimes people think I'm like a wizard or something 'cause I pick up on things that like people don't wanna share. Like I pick up on some private stuff, but it comes from my own life. It's stuff that I also experienced. And I'm like, I have a feeling, you know, we're kinda the same on this point from the talk we had. So I kinda take that and I'm able to get a good read on people. So for me, I trust people. I think you should trust people. I don't think you should be like, I'm not fucking with nobody, permanent wall barrier, nobody's getting in. Obviously you should realize that something bad might happen. Things might not go your way. But if you're with somebody, you can't be preparing for something bad to happen and you can't be expecting them to have other intentions. That's just, it's not good for you mentally and it's not good for your relationship. That's right. I feel like you have to be more open. I'm not gonna say like open up to somebody right away. Obviously that does take some time, but the person you're gonna end up being with is somebody you're gonna share your whole life with. So if you're really into somebody and you feel like this might be the person, let 'em in. Like, yo, open up a little bit. See if you're right, you can't be holding back because you think they might end up hurting you. That's how they're eventually gonna be like, all right, you're not interested. And then they're gonna leave and then you're gonna be like, oh fuck, Clay, I shouldn't have done that. I should have, you know, been a little closer. But you learned, you know, I hate people that just like shut them stuff out. Like I feel like a lot of females go to that problem right now 'cause a lot of guys unfortunately just want to fuck. That's it. It's just a realistic thing. Like a lot of people just want to fuck. The females know it too. But there are people who do want to have genuine connections and you could just talk. - Do I ever just want to fuck? Yeah. If I do, will I let you know? - Yeah, I do. - Do you know why? Because that's totally fine. If you're both on the same page. I've had girls come up to me and be like, yo, I'm not looking for a relationship. I just want to fuck. And I'm like, all right, fuck it. But, and I definitely approached people like that, but you don't have to play somebody and play with somebody's feelings. Just a fuck. - That's a evil. - That's actually a lot of shit. - You're hurting somebody and you're the reason they don't trust nobody anymore. But at the end of the day, people still do it because sometimes they see somebody and they're like, yeah, she's definitely not down. If I say I just want to fuck, but I do just want to fuck. So you know, I'm a fuck with her a little bit, a player and be out, but. - That's just a fuck man. I feel bad about that. - I feel bad about that. - That's a cruelty. - It happens. You shouldn't have take that one experience with one person and judge everybody else like that. - That's just shut yourself out. - Don't do so many experiences. - Do not shut yourself up from the world, dude. Honestly. - You're hurting yourself. - Yeah, you're missing out on a whole lot. You gotta realize like, you gotta get over it. And when you get over it, you realize, yeah, I was hurt, but I'm good now. Move on. Don't be like, everybody's gonna be like this and don't keep thinking about it. It's in the past now. And if somebody's fucked you over before, it does, it literally, it's. - Everybody's been fucked over. - It's literally a thing that everybody experiences. I think personally, most people don't wanna experience it and aren't gonna do it to somebody else because they know what it feels like. There are people that are like, I don't give a fuck about you, but that's a pretty big minority and that's not a reason for you to shut yourself off from everybody else. - If you don't jump, you're never gonna fly. - Yeah. - You're never gonna see the other side. You're never gonna experience that. You're never gonna learn the lessons that you could have learned. There's so much that you're missing out. If you don't trust us out of the person, if you don't trust society, trust is a hard thing. And I, like, with people, I meet first time like you have my trust. I trust everybody, but then once you fuck it up, then I'm like, I look at you differently 'cause you fuck me over once. But I'm not gonna judge everybody else off what you did. - Like what you said. - If you needed, I should have. I've told people before, I respect everybody, unless you earn my disrespect. If you do something and you really fuck off, like you fuck up bad, bad, then I don't have to respect you anymore. I'm not gonna hate you, but. - Hate the strong word. - Yeah, I don't have to respect you, but I respect everybody when I see them. And then if you fuck me over, that's on you. That's not on anybody else. It's not nobody else's fault you did it. And I'm not gonna assume everybody else is gonna be the same way you were. - I just, I don't like believe in hating people 'cause hate is just such a strong word. It's almost an evil. It's like, you don't just dislike this person. You kind of almost like just really don't like them. Like you know, you're just really gonna fuck with them. You don't trust them at all. You almost go out of your way to not like them. But I'm never like that 'cause I don't wanna waste my time and trying not to like you. All right, maybe I don't respect you, but that's it. And we just live our lives, but by guns, we by guns. - Yeah, at the end of the day, if I don't like you, I can just not associate with you. - Just don't force me to associate with you. I can respect you. I don't have to be close to you. I can just let you be. - Yeah, I just don't like when people say, oh, I hate this or I hate this person. Because you probably don't even know what that person's really like. You don't know their reasons. And I'm just really open-minded to everyone's perspective. That's something I really like gained. Recently, I would say over the past like one or two years, like I just started realizing like, everyone has their own reasons of why they did that. They came from a different way. And if I just take a step back and like look at like, their shoes, like you know, live in their life, I understand a lot more. I understand why people do the things that they do. And they believe me a lot more with clarity. And sometimes all the answers aren't there. And that's okay. - You have to understand though. It's one of those things where sometimes people don't wanna understand. They kinda just like, this is my opinion, I'm sticking to it. I think it's good to, you know, go out of your way a little bit to understand why things are the way they are. As opposed to just accepting, oh, this is this. But not everybody's like that. Some people are like, yep, it happened, whatever. It's that's how it is. But they never really know why. And sometimes there's no good reason why, but that's just life. Life was never really fair.
to be good with. It's not fair. But I'm always like just that kind of person just take the high road, look at how things just turned out and I hate grudges. That's always been something with me like, "I haven't grudges with people. I haven't this kind of like almost as negative energy with somebody like, "We can't talk because of what happened in the past." It's like fuck that man. Like, you could learn from everybody and us just not talking. It's just like limiting from what we could learn. Yeah, you definitely learn from everybody or you can if you're open to and you pick up certain things from different people. Who you are is a whole combination of everybody you've ever met before kind of combined with just your nature. I still have things that are a part of me that I realized that I picked up from somebody that was a part of my life at some point and I have things that are a part of me or that were a part of me that no longer are. That I knew like, "Oh, I picked this up from this person." And you change over time so you're not always going to be the same but it's your experiences and the people you meet that kind of rub off on you. So everything you are comes from what you've experienced and the people you've met. I feel like just living in Karniags wasn't the best person that could have been. You know, like how you were saying like, "Your life is what it is because of the people closest to you." Show me your five closest friends and I'll show you your future. And when I was in Karni, I was just smoking a lot of weed and I was just kind of being a bomb and I was just like playing the victim and not me moving out. I got this structure. I got this step back almost and they're like, "We know that's like, that isn't the way." You know, it's not good because all my friends were smoking O.D. they were being bombs. They were just like letting them pass them by. And then once I moved out and get this new perspective of like living by myself and like realizing that like, "Man, like you yourself could take care of yourself." Like, you know, you got it, man. You could do your own things and you could influence what you want. Like you being by yourself, you could read what you want, you could watch what you want, you could learn what you want. I mean, not being in school. Well, I'm in trade school currently a bit. When I was in university and I feel like a lot of kids go to this in university. They're just always being taught. They're always being taught. But there's just like pointing your life where you need to also be teaching yourself. I feel like that's kind of like a fuck thing like in the school system or like, there's all these like class classes perfectly fine. Like classes are great thing. How is your supposed to be there? But then it's like that excessive homework, excessive essays and quizzes and all this shit. It really makes a person stress out. And I just feel like a lot of people, a lot of people that are in university right now, you need to teach yourself like a bunch of shit too. Because school won't teach you everything. There's things that you need to teach yourself like cooking, finances. There's all these other things that you can teach yourself. And remember that don't always just listen to everybody. Also, create your own voice and listen to what you have to say. Yeah, you got to be your own number one supporter. Nobody's ever going to be there the way that you can. And that's not what I was saying. Like, there is in bad days. Of course, there's bad days. There's some days where I just overthink a lot. And I just play like the enemy like I'm my own worst enemy sometimes. But sometimes I'm also my best friend, you know, I'm pushing myself and like what I really advocate and which I think a lot of people should start following is my reward system. So when my reward system is like when I wake up, whatever, I do something good, you know, like even if it's just brushing my teeth, whatever, like I brush my teeth, I shower. But then I go workout or I read. And then after I'm done working on a reading, I reward myself with like an episode of Netflix or like some time on my phone because I almost like talk to myself like shit, like man, you're just going to get up and go on your phone and be like a bomb. I go do something good. And then you could come back and then do something quote unquote bad. It's not really a bad just for awarding yourself because you know, you got to take a break also as well. Yeah, I mean, personally, I get personal satisfaction from doing things that I feel are good. Like people right now, I feel all over the world. You're too much into that like fuck everybody else. Like I worry about me. And yes, you should be your own biggest fan. But it really doesn't hurt to care about people and do good for others. Like I get so much personal satisfaction from that just because that's what I feel like I always needed in my life was somebody to help me. But nowadays people are too closed off to each other. There's not that level of like unity that there should be in my opinion. When we were talking about like being by yourself and like eating by yourself and like how people think it's weird. It brings me back to the story when I was like at Apple Bees and I was a server. I was only there for like two or three months. But I remember this little boy, I was a server and he came to my table and he was just sitting there whatever and like he was probably like 15, 14. And I'm there. Like all right, taking his order. I greeted him and I'm just like, all right, like it's just you ordering or anybody else. And he's like, no, I'm just here. I was like, oh shit. Kind of like you're just 15 or 14. You're here by yourself. And it's really interesting to you know be dining by yourself at that age because a lot of people think it's weird. A lot of people are against it. People think that's so weird. I think that's cool. Like you don't need nobody to be there. It's fucking awesome to do things. But back to that boy, like I remember like just taking his order and I was like, I kind of sell myself in him like a little bit. And I was like talking to him. And when people go down by themselves and I'm a server, I really try to establish a connection with them because look, they're by themselves. I imagine they would love to have a combo right now at this moment because they're by themselves not saying that they don't like being by themselves. But hey man, like whatever server school and so I was talking to you and you guys just get like a cool relationship going on, you know. And when that boy, like when he orders his wings and whatever food and when he finishes eating, I brought him the bill and I was like, it's just your first time like eating by yourself. And he was like, yeah, it is. I was like, okay, you just leave. I'm going to pay for it, though. And I was like, I saw myself in him and I was just like, man, I knew like if I was my boy, I was eating by myself and my server, paid for my food. Like I would be so happy. I would make his day. People get so shocked when you do things like that for them. And I'm like, wow, that's actually so sad. Dude, the meal is like $15. I was so happy to do it. I was like, $15 and I made the whole kid's day fucking worth it. Yeah. People, like I said, people are so closed off to help in each other and just do good for each other. Do nice things that when somebody does something like that for you, it's almost kind of like, oh shit, like what the hell? Yeah, I remember like kid, he was like just shocked. He was like, what do you mean? And I was like, I'm a paper. I don't worry about it. And like before you left, I remember I told him, I was like, you know, don't ever be like afraid to hang out yourself. Don't ever be afraid to like be with yourself. Don't ever be afraid to be by yourself. Some people are going to think it's weird, but it's not. It's not at all. It builds self-care. It builds who you are. It definitely does. You need your own personal time, even if you thrive off of interaction and you thrive off of being surrounded by other people and you thrive off of attention. And even so, it's never weird to do things on your own. There are so many things that you probably could have done that you didn't do because somebody wasn't there with you. But if you really look back on it and you look back on what if I did it? Honestly, you'd probably now think that you should have done it. So why didn't you and you were there? People get too caught up into like, oh, you seem like a loner if you're not with people and you seem like you have no friends and you have no one there for you. Yo, now I kind of put myself in a spot where I don't want to have a lot of attention from people. That's fucking me, girl. You just said life, my whole life. But even back in like, when I hit middle school, which was when everybody wanted to know what I was doing at all times, what I was eating, who I was with, where I was. Everyone wants to know. It was one of those things where I'm like, yo, I'll still go and do things by myself. And then some people look at me weird. Like, I got no friends. And at the end of the day, I fucked with like everybody in the school. Yeah, I remember just being so young and like me and my friends, like just texting a group chat like, oh, we're supposed to go hang out this time and do this or whatever. Like maybe because the city you go to a whole bokeh and people end up canceling. It always happens. People just cancel and me just being out on like, then everybody can't. If your friends cancel on you and you're like, wow, they all canceled. I can't do it now. Go and do it yourself. You don't need them to be there. It's cool if they want to be there with you. If they don't want to be there or if they can't be there, don't sit on your ass at home and be depressed about it. Go and do it alone. Exactly. Have fun by yourself. It's more fun with your friends. I'll guarantee that. But you'll still get a cool ass experience if you go out and do it, even if they can't be there. It's a different experience. I don't know if it's always better with your friends because sometimes I really enjoy going by myself. Oh, yeah. I get to spend as much time as I want to be there. I get to do whatever the fuck I want. I don't have got someone nagging me to be like, when are we going home? When are we going home? But it's just like, don't rely on people. Never rely on people. People like, they're going to cancel. Just go. Do it. Do it for yourself. I think that obviously that's true. But with relying on people overall, you should have somebody close to you, at least one person, that you really like and you feel like you two share the same values.
because at the end of the day, you could be the greatest advice giver on the planet. You could be the most mature person on the planet. You could be the smartest person on the planet. Me personally, people tell me all the time, they're like, wow, you give really good advice, but that's something that's hard to do. And I'm like, all right, well, it's something that it's best if you do it. I know it's going to be hard, but it's something you have to do. But me, do I practice what I preach? Yeah, like 20% of the time, what the fuck? I'm like everybody else. I know what the right thing to do is, and I can tell people what the right thing to do is, that doesn't mean when I'm in a tough spot, I'm going to look back and I'm going to do it. Sometimes I can't even realize what the right thing to do is when I'm the one in that spot. So I really feel like you need to have somebody close to you that you can rely on to tell you the things that you'd want to tell yourself. It is good to hear that advice from somebody else because I do give, I think I get pretty well advice to people, but sometimes I'm happy to create, I don't even follow it. But to hear for somebody else to give that advice to me, I'm like, yeah, that's a good idea. You're like, wow, you're like, wow, that makes so much sense. And could you have thought about it yourself if you were helping another person, fuck yeah, but at the end of the day, it's really hard to practice what you preach. So you really should have at least one or two close friends that can kind of tell you these things. So you hear it from another person because also people thrive off of getting that second opinion, that kind of validates their own. Sometimes people don't really want to be right. They want their opinion to be validated. Even if they're wrong, if somebody else agrees with them, they're like, yes. They want to hear what they want to hear. Yeah. The people want to hear what they want to hear, but you shouldn't tell everybody what they want to hear. I tell people straight up, like what the situation is. You got to be honest with people. If you always tell people what they want to hear, people might like you and nobody will have a problem with you, I mean shit, you know, they think you agree with them 100% on everything, but at the end of the day, you're being fake. And sometimes you need to disagree with people. They need to hear the truth rather than what they want to hear. So I'm really big on honesty for that. Do you remember being a Mat sauce? Yeah, I remember Mat sauce. I still go to Mat sauce. You still go to Mat sauce? That was like my group of people that I met freshman year high school, while some of them were older than that. But that was like my group in high school. And it's something I didn't have in middle school at all, was that group. It's so important to have like fit into that group. Have a little click or something, because you know, you feel almost lost out if you don't have a group. Yeah. It's one of those things where like we don't have deep-ass conversations like that all the time, we're just cool with each other. And we enjoy hanging out. It's like a good time and it's people you can count on at the end of the day for things. I remember being like 16 or 17 going to Mat sauce and seeing all of you guys, it was like you, braised, lean, Mat, and what are you guys doing? You were playing fucking Super Smash Bros. Yo. That should be so competitive though in the house. I remember. Oh shit. Really got serious when we were playing though. I mean, yo, people came in there and they weren't always good. They didn't even know how to play. But yo, shit got serious and we had fun. Yo, we had a good time. It's one of those things that I really appreciated because when I hit middle school, and elementary school, I mean it was a small place. People didn't really care too much about me. I was kind of there. When I hit middle school, I guess people thought I had like a pretty face. Yo, I remember we had like orientation barbecue or whatever. It was like what, August 27th of probably 2040. Yeah, those are very unique. They really try to get people to like know each other and stuff. Yeah. And the point of the barbecue was to get people interacting with each other. But I had like, hell of people coming up to me. They were trying to fuck with me. I had girls asking for pictures. I was like, yo, what? The thing is I was never used to attention. So I fuck it. I definitely didn't go about it the right way. I kind of, I ate it up at first. And then I was like, oh, I'm the shit. And then, you know, I had so many options. I was like, oh, I'm fucking with this girl. And then like the next week, I was like, oh, I'm not really feeling it. I'm fucking with this other girl. And I definitely built myself a bad rep for that. And it got to the point where like halfway through the year, I realized that too much attention. It's just not for me. I used to think like I thrive off of validation. I thrive off of attention. I thrive off of support, which I still do to an extent. But now I pull more value into getting the attention from people that I care about. Instead of just having everybody all over me looking at me all the time. Because I really gonna like you. Yeah. The more attention, the more love you have, the more hate you have. Yeah. So it was like halfway through eighth grade. And I had already done a bunch of bullshit. And because everybody was so into me. And what I was doing, you shit spread like a fire. Everybody knew what I did all the time. And I fucked up a whole lot. So I kind of built this bad rep for myself. And you know, it's like a game of telephone, shit escalates. People, you know, twist up the words and the story. So I sometimes I'd be hearing shit about me from people that I was like, when the fuck did this happen? And it was all, it was mostly negative, which was partially mindful. But also a lot of like, oh, this girl's into me, but that guy was into her. Or her friends don't like me or her friends are also into me. So now people are gonna shit talk. So by the end of like the eighth grade, I was so done with it. People were trying to fight me all the time. People were so stupid. I'd be walking down the halls and people would be looking at me weird, shit talking me. And I still had my like one best friend, but it was like, damn, man. The people that I have class with and that I talk to, the people that actually know me for me, they're pretty cool with me, but everybody else, I can't change their opinions. I can't go out of my way to try to reach out to everybody and you know, explain to them that it's not really like that. And I'm not a bad person because half of them don't even want to hear what I have to say. And that'd be a pain in the ass. So when I hit high school, I was like, I don't want the attention from everybody. I need to find my quiet place to be and find my group of people. And that's it. I don't need people all over me. I don't need the chase cloud. I don't want all that attention. It's just not something that's for me. I really dislike that about people when they like formed their own opinions of like what other people said about you. Because it's like, if you want to know about me, come talk to me. Come find out who I really am. I hear saying people are twisting words because people are going to get the story wrong. The only people are going to get the story wrong. Yeah, if you want to know my story, come talk to me. I found a group of people, like you said, Matt in the high school and the people that I played sports with. I had that group of friends that like I played video games with. I had my football group and I had like the track group. And people that got to know me for who I am, not everybody liked me, not everybody's entitled to like me. But you know, we were cool. But then other people just because I had already carried over a bad rep, I realized now that in high school, I cared way too much about what everybody thought about me. I sometimes like, I tried to be so fake for people. I tried to be who people like wanted me to be. That I got to the point where I was like, wow, like I'm, I can't fake myself to every single person. I can't be like 400 different people. So naturally, I was like pretty bad at it. And I, a lot of people ended up disliking me even more. Because I was trying to be somebody else. When at the end of the day, the best approach is to just be yourself. Appreciate the people who like you and accept that there are people who don't and let them be. If they ever want to, if there are people who never even gave you a chance, let them be. If they really feel like you don't even deserve a chance and they'd rather believe what they heard rather than talk to you directly, that's probably not the type of person you want around you anyway. You deserve better than that. So, I mean, sometimes you could be a little fake for somebody. You know, you could tell people like little white lies and be like, like girls do like, oh, that looks good on you and all that when you don't kind of think it does. But I don't think it makes people happy. It's not going to be the end of the world. But it's one of those things where you shouldn't try to be a whole different person to try to appeal to somebody. It just, it doesn't work out right?
be able to do it and then that person's gonna end up disliking you even more. It also happens in relationships. When you're talking to somebody sometimes both of you do it. You try a little too hard to be perfect for the person but you gotta realize that once you start going out you're gonna slip. You can't be fake for the rest of your life. It happens so often when you're talking to somebody and you're like oh this person's so dope and then you start dating and they start changing up on you and you're like why are they changing up when we now that we're going out. It's because they were trying to be perfect for you because they were interested but you can't hold that forever. You can't do that in a relationship and you can't do that in life. You've got to stop worrying too much about what people think about you and just be yourself. Appreciate the people who like you and accept the people who don't. That hit even harder for me when I started college. When I started college I realized that I had been caring too much about what people thought in high school and I was like all right whatever I'll just do whatever in college. I'll be me. I don't need nobody else to be there. I don't need people to love me in college. I could just be me and you know like that I'll find the truest group of friends that I could probably ever find and a lot of people didn't approach me in college. Usually I was the one approaching them first. I sat down with this kid to do math homework and we talked for the first time for like five minutes and he's like whoa bro you're like way different than I thought and I was like okay what do you think I was like and he's like I don't know I didn't realize you were even like smarter. I thought you were just like a stupid fuckboy and I was like you give that like look the thing is like I had never talked I had never talked to this kid and I'm like why what the hell and he's like I don't know you just look like what and I'm like I look like I'm like what does what does one look like you know even when I don't even do nothing even with people that don't know me they look at me and they're just like that's a fuckboy right there you look at it and I'm like at this point I'm kind of like whatever if you ever do want to get to know me you know you could come up to me I'm pretty approachable I'll talk to anybody like whatever but if you look at me and you think I'm a fuckboy and you'd rather like not even approach me because you feel like it's kind of a waste of your time that's fine too you're not entitled to want to talk to me you're not entitled to love me but I might I might surprise you I feel like I don't know when I had to talk to you in high school I just noticed you like really just smart like I remember talking to high school and you were just like really like when I had a conversation with you I was like wow he like has a really good conversation it's good vocabulary and I just always wondered about you like how does the kid just know so much shit I remember even you being in like honor classes AP classes I was like yeah I'll just hear like this kid just killing it that comes back to like I just have a talent for learning things quickly I'm really good at picking up on things but I now I talked to people that are older than me and they're like wow like you're pretty mature for your age but I get to have a lot in high school bro like I had a girl tell me one time um yeah like I was really into you but I don't know like you're so smart I kind of felt stupid talking to you so like I couldn't do it and I'm like that's so stupid that's such a bad reason like you wouldn't want to learn off somebody who's like smarter than you I don't like being the smartest guy in the room like me talking personally because if you're a smart guy in the room you're just next to so much idiots almost like I want to keep learning I want to be like somewhere in the average in the room but you know I want to like be able to talk to other people and learn often yeah I mean you should want to be the smartest guy in the room you should always want to be the best but you should always be humble and that's not something I was always good at and that's still not something I'm entirely good at sometimes you know I have an ego and I have pride so I like to show off but when it comes to um especially at work now I I make a conscious effort not really show off I take pride in my own work and I pride myself in being better than others when I am um I don't also get like petty or gay salty when people do something better than I do uh that's a learning experience like no matter how much pride or how big an ego you have you can take pride in your work and what you've accomplished but don't get mad when other people do it better than you do learn from that and then one day you could be better than them you want to be better but you also with people that aren't quite at your level you don't want to be like you got to be more like me you can help them but that's one thing that I won't do now since I try to be more honest and open with people when people fuck up like I let them know I'm like yo you're doing this wrong like you could be doing better but I'm never gonna tell somebody you need to be a little more like me even when I know even when I know that you know what I'm doing is better my my work is better my you know whatever we're talking about if I feel like I'm better I'm not gonna be like you need to be more like me I feel like that's like one of those things but you just can't do that to somebody I hate comparing people like yeah you have your own identity you have your own character you're your own person you have your own name so when I look at people I never try to compare anybody because you have your own story I think that you shouldn't compare people but I will compare myself to other people I'm not I'm not gonna compare it's pretty good I'm not gonna go and compare you to anybody I don't have the right to do that you're your own person but I'll compare myself to other people I'll be like this person is doing better than I am this person is somebody that I could chase after that in that sense I'll compare myself to people but if you're doing something like that because you know people say oh the only competition you have is yourself you're fine as long as you're doing better than you were before I am a little more competitive than that I'm like wow I see this person who I feel like I can relate to like if I'm at the gym and I see you do that's like six six four hundred pounds squatting a thousand pounds I'm not gonna be like oh fuck I need to be like that but if I see somebody around like my body weight who's like about the same size as me and they're doing some like crazy ass weight I'm gonna be like it's not gonna be today it's not gonna be tomorrow but I'm catching up to that that's that's what I'm going for next that's a great way to look at it that's an amazing way to look at actually some people though when they start thinking like that when it doesn't work out say they have a bad day then they get caught up into like fuck man I can't do it I'm never gonna be able to be like him or her that's where you can't go wrong you can't do stuff like that you got to realize that progress isn't easy you're not gonna be like oh this person's doing better than me I need to catch up to them and then it's not gonna take you like a day you might make some progress you might lose some progress but at the end of the day it's good to have a goal that you want to reach even if it's based off of another person but you can't be upset when you feel like you're not able to reach that goal either you need to re-value it yourself your process what you're doing or you need to re-value it the goal you need to know what to call it quits and when something's too just unrealistic for you I feel like the most important part of that like reaching that goal is just trying doing your best effort you know like sometimes like you aren't as good as that person but you're trying you're doing your best and that's okay it comes back to what I said before you aren't gonna be perfect today or tomorrow in a year your progress might be slow you're never gonna be exactly where you want to be but you can look back and appreciate the progress that you've made I said earlier that people should be more optimistic they should chase what they want instead of being quote unquote realistic and focusing on if it doesn't work out I'll have to do this yeah I think people should really chase what they want and who they want to be and what they want for themselves but don't chase something unrealistic you have to know when you're being unrealistic but you can't always make that quick assumption that something's out of your reach and it's like a hard judgment to make because obviously if I'm like yo in the future I want to learn how to fly like that ash just jump off a building and fly that's unrealistic it's literally never going to happen you could work your whole life to try to fly it's not in your biology but some people are like I really want to have two kids raise a family be with somebody but I tend to fuck up in relationships a lot so it's probably more realistic that I'm gonna be on my own so I gotta be ready for that fuck that that's you being pessimistic you could fuck up a hundred thousand times there's nothing telling you that you won't be able to still find somebody in the end
So Some things aren't that easy to judge between what's unrealistic and what's you know, you kind of just given up on yourself But it's calls that you have to make and at the end of the day You can't regret your decisions living life with regrets isn't something anybody should do I Feel like if you're in a split road and you're really trying to silence you on your life And you keep asking everybody the best choice Just go with your gut go with your conscience and I think you know what's best for you. Yeah A lot of people are just like let people tell them what to do or what they think is best But you can't let anyone decide their life for you you decide your own life You build your own life and you set that path and you follow through with it Take people's opinions Listen to what people have to say and then you make the final decision of what you think is best People's opinions might really influence your opinion But don't do something that you don't agree with just because somebody says like I think this is really good for you Sometimes to be honest that'll work out well because you know you can be wrong and somebody else could be right But at the end of the day That's why you need to get a collective opinion from a whole lot of different people if you were really having a hard time Deciding something for yourself People you can trust and then sort out their opinions compare that to your own and then just you know Do what you feel is right. Don't listen to any one person and Don't listen to people if it's just not what you want to do And at the end of the day you might still fuck up But you could fuck up a hundred times that doesn't mean it's over for you people always get more chances More or less because there are circumstances where you won't be able to get a second chance But then that's something you have to come to accept and you have to re-value it yourself and find something different for you
Podcast Summary
Key Points:
The speakers reflect on reconnecting after drifting apart in high school due to different activities and work schedules.
They discuss childhood experiences with strict parenting, lying to gain freedom, and the desire to raise their own children with more openness and honesty.
Both speakers emphasize the importance of self-appreciation, self-support, and not relying on others for happiness, especially in relationships.
They critique the tendency to play the victim and focus on uncontrollable factors, advocating instead for personal growth and focusing on what one can change.
The speakers share their motivations to succeed, partly to provide better lives for their future children, drawing from their own immigrant family backgrounds and lack of parental guidance on adult responsibilities.
Summary:
In this conversation, the speakers reconnect after years apart, sharing personal stories about their upbringings and how these have shaped their current mindsets. They discuss strict parenting from their fathers, which led to lying as children, but both express a commitment to being more open and honest with their own kids. The speakers reflect on feelings of jealousy and wanting more as kids, but emphasize the importance of appreciating what one has and focusing on self-improvement rather than playing the victim.
They stress that individuals should be their own number one supporter, as nobody else can be there 100% of the time. The conversation also covers the pitfalls of trying to control others or relying on a partner for happiness, advocating for independent happiness and personal responsibility. Both speakers come from immigrant families where their parents did not graduate high school, motivating them to succeed in education and life to provide better for themselves and their families.
They highlight the need to educate themselves on adult tasks like buying a car, as they lack parental guidance, but view this as an opportunity for growth. Overall, the dialogue centers on self-reliance, positivity, and the continuous effort to improve oneself while accepting what cannot be changed.
FAQs
The episode covers life experiences, personal growth, relationships, and self-improvement, with a focus on overcoming challenges and supporting oneself.
They grew up with strict or limited upbringings, which made them want to be more open and honest with their own kids, ensuring their children feel supported no matter what.
They believe you should be your own number one supporter because no one else is there for you 100% of the time, and self-appreciation helps you improve and move forward.
Focus on what you can control, like your body and mind, and let go of what you can't change to avoid driving yourself insane.
They think it's unproductive; while some situations are truly hopeless, most people can find positives and work on improving their lives instead of blaming others.
They argue that partners shouldn't be responsible for each other's happiness; each person should have independent happiness and share it, not rely on the other.
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