Enemies and Obstacles

I started thinking about enemies and obstacles today, while doing 120 squats at the gym, and I realized that this was the most difficult exercise in my set... and that made me wonder: if I do the same number of repetitions lifting 150kg on the leg press, why is the exertion so much greater here?

Surely some stage coach or martial arts master has already capitalized on this, but the truth only hit me when the lactic acid screamed in my quadriceps:

Since I don't consume this type of content, the closest I'd come to this line of reasoning before must have been in some video game or anime, but never in such a practical and realistic way!
But my mind just won't stop, and, extending my reasoning and attempting a syllogism, I formulated the phrase "I am my own worst enemy"... whoops!!!
That's not true!

Passionate about language and reasoning, I was astonished by this unprecedented development, as I had never considered that these two terms are not even close to being synonyms!

The Difference Between Enemies and Obstacles

PremiseUntil I was 13, I studied—paid for with great sacrifice by my "sister-mom"—at a private school, in a mixed class, with people who had been with me since kindergarten, and suddenly, at 14, I went to a preparatory course for military schools, in an exclusively male class (with all the bad things that puberty and its testosterone can bring).

1987 was a very difficult year: in the morning, from 7:00 AM to 12:00 PM, it was 8th grade; then, with Euzébio "Carroceiro" and Fábio Moreira, I would quickly eat my packed lunch because afterwards, starting at 1:00 PM, Jorge Marques would arrive from Monteiro Lobato and join us for pre-military classes, which lasted until 6:00 PM!
Of all the teachers, given the purpose of this text, I want to highlight the "terrorist of the Portuguese Language," the dreaded Professor Ramos, who had an extra space for memory on his forehead and would call the student to the board to demand even the minutiae of syntactic and morphological analysis of sentences. According to his own self-definition, he "asked one question, and another, and another... until the student fell!"“

One day I hope to have time to write in more detail, perhaps an entire chapter, narrating the misfortunes of our heroic, manly stupidity, but the fact is that—despite all the effort, adaptation, and development I've put in—I ended up defeated in all three competitions.
This concludes the premise.

Learning from the educator Severo

1988 was another very complicated year, because the only thing that changed from the routine described above was that in the mornings I was taking the first year of high school… it may seem like little, but it introduced extensions of subjects, mandatory at the high school level, that had nothing to do with the competitive exams I was aiming for, and one in particular filled me with terror — Literature! — which would also be taught by the king of phonetic inquisition, the dissector of figures of speech, the master of elliptical phrases… Professor Ramos!

Apart from that, I remember well, I, a macho teenager without any of the pressure of today's politically correct nonsense, also thought that poetry was for gay men!

And an obstacle had been built that, in my immature teenage vision, would be insurmountable… until the moment my mother called me aside and gave me her most unforgettable example of wisdom, saying:
Pretend you like it.

What?!?!?!
That's right: when you find the whole thing really boring, really fussy... do like the actors do and pretend you're really enjoying it!
— But Mom, how am I supposed to like this thing full of strange, old-fashioned words, full of rhymes at the end of sentences?!?!
Go ahead, my son, and try... if they're rhyming, go ahead and rhyme too! If they're using complicated words, go ahead and find even more difficult ones to see if they'll understand!

Do you know what happened?
I went... and I did it.
And if you're reading this text, it's because I fell into a trap: I was actually good at Portuguese and already enjoyed reading, but after that "attempt," I quickly stopped pretending and truly began to love writing, whether in prose or verse…

If my wife—back when I was just a platonic love interest—hadn't treated the sincere and heartfelt poems I dedicated to her as if they were soiled toilet paper… perhaps I'd still be writing poetry today.
But at least I persevered in writing prose and I have the pride of having been her pedagogical support while she pursued higher education and graduated in Literature!
(At the same time, I have acquired and still hold the firm conviction that a higher education degree is useless in this country!)

Finally, today I believe I am able to express myself better through written language than through spoken language, and I chose to recount this episode because it makes it easy to identify one of the greatest obstacles I have ever faced in my entire life… and one that today brings a pang to my heart when I remember, filled with longing, my dear Professor Ramos.
(Damn onion-cutting ninjas!!!)

Casting Enemies into Limbo

While I was washing my face and drying some water that was getting in my eyes, I ran into my wife putting the kids to bed and tried to tell her beforehand what happened at the gym and what I'm writing about…

(It doesn't help much, because—more or less like in the days of the ignored poems—she ends up watching a lot of other people—Lara traveling to the East, Mi DeSimone and her many jobs, Dr. Barakat…—more connected to the health field. I admit that I even enjoy listening to her summarize everything they publish, but, at the same time, I can't help but feel, as Christ himself said, like a "prophet without honor in his own house"...)

Finally, when I mentioned the term "enemies," she immediately became displeased and said that it was a "childish expression"...
I stopped, I thought (and when I think, it's in a macro sense, not just about what was said, but about everything that led the person to say it)... and I discovered that she, like many other sophisticated people (especially in the professional field), tries to avoid using certain words or even adopting more assertive stances.

I refuted it verbally, but, as I said, I write better than I speak, and I will develop here the argument about the existence, yes, of enemies.

• The enemy is the person who wants to see your evil.
• The enemy is the person who, even without reason, wants to cause you harm.
• The enemy is the person who, regardless of what you do, He will never recognize either your efforts or your merits..
• The enemy is the person who They'll accuse you even of things you didn't do..
• The enemy, in the face of any conflict, You'll always look for a reason to side with and justify whoever is against you..
• The enemy is who It doesn't accept that you excel at doing something., even if he himself does nothing.
• The enemy is the one who lacks ability, knowledge, and/or wisdom, but He gets angry when he sees his "comfortable niche" threatened. When you, even without intending to be a threat, demonstrate ability, knowledge, and/or wisdom.
• The enemy will always demanding more and more from you, but without ever contributing in any way to its improvement.
• The enemy doesn't offer constructive criticismHe will always look for the worst, and if by chance you have done something perfect, he will simply remain silent.
• The enemy He's eager to see you fall, fail, falter, weaken. and will not miss the opportunity to to prey upon you with predatory voracity. if that happens.
• The enemy He will remember any mistake you made., no matter how small, it will always be alive in your memory, ready to throw it in your face at any opportunity, regardless of whether decades have passed.

The enemy is probably someone incapable of bringing people together, even worse when they are in a prominent position, because because they don't know how to share their prominence (whether professional or familial) giving credit where it's due, they will resort to all possible caustic, defamatory, offensive, and harmful tactics.

If, by chance, your enemy does something that benefits you, you can be sure that it will be thrown in your face for the rest of your life: it's a debt that only death, yours or theirs, will extinguish.
(And if it's yours, you can bet there will still be mockery and questioning of your memory.).

Ultimately, I wish it were just childishness, and I don't even have many, but I do have people who act as enemies.
I could list them by name, one by one, since I have fewer of them than the fingers on my hands, but… that's a more convenient option. cast them into limbo.
And you… do you have enemies?

The Art of Discernment and Overcoming

This is the video where I recorded the embryonic stage of the reasoning developed in this text: I am definitely my biggest obstacle, but I am certainly not my biggest enemy, and it is up to me to strive and improve in order to do better everything within my reach, whether in the physical or intellectual realm!

Overcoming obstacles improves us, and we usually come to consider them easy: at the gym we simply increase the weight or the number of repetitions; in life, I believe our role becomes that of helping other people who may be going through similar situations.

Ah! Based on what I've learned about COMPETENCIES, professional obstacles are challenges that, if they go beyond the limits of your academic knowledge, can certainly be solved by someone properly qualified in that area.

It's up to you to assess whether the obstacle is so significant that it's worth training to deal with it... or (stop being stingy and) Hire someone competent in that area to surpass him for you!
There's no shame in that.

Thank you very much for your attention, and I hope that I was able to help you in some way, or at least distract you.

Pediatric Sonnet

When from your green eyes
The flashing light is driving me crazy.
All the madness and the lucidity
They have your name on them… Carina.

Perhaps it is the nonexistent.
which contains the universes,
mysteries that a penitent
what he wishes to express in these verses.

I'm crazy, and I'll admit it.
My sin is wanting you.
I will not cease searching for you…

I'm looking for access.,
I don't measure my crazy efforts:
… I will only be happy with you.

Me, after discovering that poetry isn't just "for gays," at age 17.

(I finished writing around 4:00 AM, but for her, who won't read it, what matters more is that I wash the dishes... and, to tell the truth, to me too!)
Without likes or applause, without comments or shares, the expectations for a book vanish.
Only you can help me.
Thanks.)