Alberto Arrighini: Self-development and motivation
Kris Broholm and guest Alberto Arrighini discuss personal development and motivation. They explore overcoming motivation struggles in language learning and daily life. The episode offers practical self-improvement tips applicable to various life areas beyond languages.
October 24, 2014 · 40 min
EP 33: Alberto Arrighini: Self-development and motivation
0:00 / 40:20
Guest
Alberto Arrighini
What You'll Hear
- 1 Welcome: Motivation & Personal Development, Not Just Languages
- 2 Alberto's Language Learning Path & Methods
- 3 Teaching Italian Through Engaging Content
- 4 How Alberto Discovered Personal Development
- 5 Convert Knowledge to Action: Find Your 'Why'
- 6 Daily Discipline: Morning Routines & Habits
- 7 Bodybuilding Discipline & Future Endeavors
Links Mentioned
Questions Covered in the Show
When did Alberto Arrighini start learning languages and how long has he been doing it?- 5m
How did Alberto Arrighini choose the languages he learned?- 11m
When did Alberto Arrighini discover self-development?- 20m
How to convert knowledge into action for self-improvement?- 26m
What motivates Alberto Arrighini to achieve his goals, such as waking up at 5 AM?- 29m
What is the importance of a morning routine for motivation and achieving goals?- 33m
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Actual fluency podcast episode 33 with Alberto Arrighini.
Welcome to the actual fluency podcast, the podcast that gives you the tools and inspiration to learn languages faster and more efficiently. And now your host, Kris Broholm.
Hello, hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of the actual fluency podcast. My name is Kris Broholm as per usual, and I'm bringing you episode number 33 of the actual fluency podcast. For way more information about language learning, about me or anything you might be interested in regarding learning languages, go to actualfluency.com. I've lots of cool stuff there for you.
Today is a little bit different, and the reason that it's different is that me and Alberto talk about not so much learning languages specifically, we talk about the personal development and sort of the motivation behind putting the hours in that is required to learn a language. And, you know, I'm always totally honest and up front with you guys out there. So today I just wanted to say that, you know, the way that I find guests are, you know, of course I talk to people who are prolific language learners, who can share their experience. People have developed products, people have courses and classes and whatnot, but I also really love to take problems that I'm having and then asking people who have kind of ideas on how to improve them.
And one of the problems that I've been having lately is to do with motivation. And although I've had a lot of motivation to put in for language learning, uh maybe unusually high motivation, I've really struggled in my day to day life. And I know that I've struggled with motivation for learning languages before, so, you know, it's kind of a, it it turns around. Sometimes it's one topic I'm not motivated for and sometimes it's something else. And I saw Alberto on Facebook, and he was posting all these, oh, I'm up at 5:00 AM and, you know, he's reading all these motivational books, and inspirational books, entrepreneurial books. And all that stuff really interests me, and I know that it it also interests some of you guys out there.
But basically I just wanted to get Alberto on to talk about this because I think it's hugely important topic and it's something I only just discovered the tip of the iceberg of. And the episode today is probably the most motivating that has ever been on the podcast. So I'm super excited that you're going to listen to it, because I'm sure it's going to help you with whatever you want to do in your, you know, your language learning career or anything really. I mean the tips that we talk about today are so useful in every area of your life, whether it's cleaning your room or, you know, taking out the trash or anything you wanted to do is kind of works under this umbrella that is self-development and motivation. So I hope you'll really enjoy the episode today.
And also, this kind of a topic of self-development, motivation, personal development in general is something that I'm going to write about on the blog in the upcoming months, because I'm I'm really fascinated about this topic, about improving oneself. And I think one of the ways that we can upgrade our lives or upgrade our characters is by learning more languages. So I think fundamentally, if you are interested in learning languages, you're also interested in developing your personality, your persona, uh self-development, self-help, all these things that can guide you towards that success that you're craving, whether that is, you know, success in learning languages, success in your school career, anything that's related to life. So I hope you'll enjoy these posts coming up on Actual Fluency in the next few months that kind of tackle these sort of general problems that is not specific to language learning, but definitely, definitely, definitely helps it.
So, uh with that in mind, I just want to say as always, thank you so much for listening. And it would mean the world to me if you took the time to leave a review of the podcast. You can do that on iTunes if you subscribe there. You can go to actualfluency.com/itunes to be sent to the page. You do need an Apple account or something funky to do it. So, you know, it's a, it's a big ask, but I really appreciate it. And uh as a thank you, you know, I I I occasionally send the people who review the show free iTalki lessons. So, and this is a little shout out to iTalki as well. They've been very generous lately with sponsoring a lot of, you know, free vouchers for you guys out there. So, just a quick shout out, if you're interested in language learning uh lessons with professionals or, you know, community tutors, I I recommend iTalki. I use it every single week. So, you know, it's not just a hollow kind of endorsement, it's a full-on endorsement.
But enough of me yapping about, I know you're all pumped up to hear more from Alberto about how to change your life, how to be more motivated, and just how to be awesome. I guess that's the sub-title. So, I hope you enjoy, and let me know in the comments or anywhere you can reach me, Twitter, Facebook, whatever, what you think of this kind of new theme I'm bringing up on Actual Fluency, this self-development theme about improving yourself, not necessarily restricted to languages. I'd love to hear what you think.
Well, fantastic uh everyone. I'm joined today by probably one of the most motivating people on Facebook, in my opinion, uh Mr. Alberto Arrighini. And I met him the first time at the Polyglot Conference in Berlin, and we became friends on Facebook. And since then I have been met with a flood of posts about working out, running, healthy meals, drinking water and everything.
And you know, just like everyone else out there, there's I have problems with motivation sometimes. So I thought I'd get Alberto on here and talk about all his discoveries in self-help and motivation and sort of help us out with uh how to become better language learners. But first of all, Alberto, how are you today?
I'm doing great. It's cold here in Italy like everybody speaking of the weather at the beginning. And uh thank you so much for the lovely introduction. Uh yeah, I'm doing great. I see that you're doing great too, so great, awesome.
My pleasure. We're all great. We're all great. And you're it's sort of normal to start the podcast with how the weather is in the country. I don't know if that's special for language learners. We want to know about other cultures, but. The weather here is fine.
Always fine.
All right. So Alberto, if you could give people, the people who might not have heard of you, a little introduction to yourself, sort of how when did you start learning languages and, you know, how long have you been doing this?
Of course. Okay, everything started three years ago actually for me. I was in a high school where the main subject was math. I don't know what they call it how to say in English, but uh math and physics, I think you understand. And I decided to change. I thought that that wasn't for me, math and physics and I said, let's change school. I went in another high school where languages were the main thing. I was a bit disappointed and I started to learn how the system doesn't really work where teaching languages and I said, let's see online what what's about. I found Luca, I found uh all these guys, polyglots and uh Steve Kaufman, let's, oh, they speak 10, 20 languages. At the beginning I thought they were like geniuses, but then you start to understand that it's not about that. It's about consistency, loving what you do. And that's how I started to understand a lot of things.
I started to learn English in a different way because at 16, 17, uh just two, three years ago, my English was so bad. I thought, oh, I'm good in English at school. I have eight, but the time when the time of uh watching movies and everything, I couldn't understand nothing. And uh even if uh even right now, I'm gonna make mistakes in English. You know why? Because 10 years of school learning only grammar and uh not listening to the language have really made in my English like stuck, like I had to think past perfect and these things, no.
So, I said, uh, why not uh after one year uh from this that point, why not to learn uh some languages by myself? I learned Romanian, French, Spanish. I can speak them very quite well right now. And uh I'm learning right now German, Russian. So I started to open a blog uh where I teach Italian through is a natural method, methods. Uh one year and a half ago, something like that. And that's uh pretty much it.
Oh, great. And how did you kind of choose these languages? It sounds like they were a little bit all over the place. Uh can you walk us through that?
Yeah. Uh so, Spanish and French were the new languages that I was gonna study at school at the other high school, but they were so bad. Like two hours of French for a week and you think that you're gonna learn French two hours for a week, not listening to the language, listening to the teacher talking about grammar. And I said, what the what the bip? So, uh I decided to learn it by myself at home and uh that's how I found out how to learn languages and these kind of things.
And uh the other language, Romanian is because my father is a hunter. Uh sorry for everybody loving animals and not hunters but he's a hunter in Romania and uh I have friends there, so I said, okay, this is my first trial. The first language all by myself. It worked out pretty pretty much pretty well. And that's why I decided to open the website because I if I I found out that it was very, very useful. Uh that method and now Russian and German because they were on my list. So if something's on your list, you're gonna do that. Okay.
And and it must have been I mean, even when you're so motivated and you have the personal connection, I mean, learning Romanian must still have been difficult for you.
Yeah. It was very, very easy. I mean, it is a Romance language, Latin language, Romance language, actually. And uh so I'm Italian and I knew French, Spanish. It's like uh when I'm gonna learn Portuguese, it is going to be very, very easy.
Oh, okay. So you found it easy to learn Romanian.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's uh very, very. I think like for you, knowing English and German, if you're gonna learn Dutch, I don't know if you already know it. Dutch. Uh it is gonna be very, very easy I think for you because you have a lot of similarities. It's gonna be really, really easy.
Right. Well, that's fantastic. And and so you started the website to sort of help people learn your own language, the Italian. And it's called what's that?
Yeah. Because uh as you do, uh when you learn new things, you want to share it, so that's why you opened I think this channel, the website, uh the podcast. That's all about it, to share.
Yeah, exactly. And and in in my case it's also sharing that you don't need to be that genius like you first discovered, you know?
Yeah, exactly, exactly. Not at all, not really. Anyone could do it. The things you do. Exactly.
Awesome. And then you you started the site uh Italiano, Italiano Automatico.
Yeah, Italiano Automatico. And uh there I teach Italian through it's a new way of teaching Italian because actually I teach it through things that uh you probably would like to read also in your languages, no. So the whole concept is uh that one. You are gonna learn Italian reading stuff in Italian that you find you will find interesting also in your native language. So you're not even thinking about, well, I'm learning Italian.
Of course, to do that, you need that basic knowledge and that's uh the most difficult part in every language, that beginning part. Where you have from nothing to something where you can start doing things you like. So, how do you do that? You do that through Assimil, Teach Yourself, uh Colloquial, Pimsleur, Michel Thomas, uh podcasts that are very easy and uh this stuff and uh it is something that uh we have to go through. Right. When there will be a man that will be will create something like uh very interesting at the beginning, that will be a success.
Oh. So that's a business idea for people out there.
Of course.
If you can make the the the hard early part of a language very interesting, then you'll have a big seller.
Yeah, exactly. They tried it with Pimsleur and uh many things and they are kind of um it's okay but after a while you say, damn, I want something in different so you change uh you try to mix things up. That's it.
Yeah. I I think some people do get excited about like a a a textbook and then they can kind of dig their head in, but that's definitely not me. That's uh very hard for me to focus on a textbook for a foreign language and then have your headset in and you're like, ah, ah.
Yeah, exactly. Especially with the the distraction of today, like uh everything is going so fast and to stay there, concentrate, focus. Uh it's it's difficult. It's possible maybe 10, 20 minutes but after a while you start to look around what's happening. Like uh yeah, it's uh it's difficult. Every person has a different way of doing that. That's it.
But of course, um one of the reasons that I I wanted to bring you on uh was to share your, I would say, passion for self-development.
Yeah.
Because that's something you've you've you've done a lot of and I can see it, you know, you post links all the time on Facebook. And I just want to ask, when did that kind of come in in your timeline? When did you discover that that you could actually improve yourself to improve your life?
That's that's an awesome question. I think I love this question because uh actually it was casually, it happened casually. I said, I found on internet a book that was Leader di te stesso in Italian. It will be Leader of yourself. I said that that sounds interesting. I've always been curious like reading stuff about history and this stuff. It was like, uh okay, let's buy, let's see what he says. On the cover there was like a person like that, like this. Like, uh okay, this guy wants to sell me a book and then it's gonna nothing. For many people is like that. They say, oh, this is just one that wants to make money with you and then but I I'm not so cynical any in any case. I like to be open-minded and I said, okay, let's buy it. Let's see it.
And I started to read about Anthony Robbins. I don't know if you know about Anthony Robbins or Napoleon Hill and all these people around the personal development thing. And I didn't know what it was personal development. It was like and then I discovered, oh, it's uh whatever, it's about improving yourself. It's not something it's a it's just improving yourself. They can be autobiographies or videos on YouTube. That's all personal development.
And uh so, uh I followed the suggestion of uh this book and from there I was like, bam, I was like, uh uh books on personal development in five languages, reading it in the last year of high school, like while the teacher was talking, I was reading a personal development book in Romanian. Like uh under the desk, like uh and uh so everything started from that because you start to understand the thoughts that you have and how you can change the things you don't like. And that's powerful. I mean, everything starts from there. Uh how to use your mind and uh these things. When you can control that, you start to feel a sense of control on your life and that's all we want. The freedom to live how we want, no. And these things, reading this stuff helps.
I have here the books of Phelps uh yesterday I got it. And uh you see how he thinks, how he did that, how he achieved that, and you start to think about these people as not as normal people, but like uh really hard working, determined with persistence uh uh people, not special at all. Special but that you can be like that too if you want. So that's that's all about it.
Fantastic. And were you into reading when you picked that book up or?
No, that's another thing because I went from nothing to like 300 books right now.
Wow, really.
Books at this moment like uh in the evening, in the morning. It's uh because uh I found something that was interesting to me. That's the whole point. It's like I mean, uh if someone seeing he's afraid of something like real afraid of driving or real afraid of whatever, like uh speaking in public and you see a book about it. You say, you start to read and you start to see, oh, there's a solution for that. Uh reading is not about reading anymore. It's about, oh, I'm finding a way to uh overcome this fear and this stuff and uh wow, this man had this fear too. Oh, that's another book about this. Oh, this guy. I mean, for every problem we have, there's a book about it. That's powerful. That's powerful and it's I find it amazing, really.
Right. And and do you think the activity of reading, let's ignore what you are reading, do you think the activity of reading a book, sitting down and and thinking, do you think that in itself helped you or do you think it's mostly what was in the books that helped you?
I think it's it was uh what was in the book because uh I I I read something when I was uh 12, 13, it I think it was Harry Potter, the saga. I read it uh up to the fifth book, but that I must say that did nothing uh to improve my life. So, uh so, apart from uh entertainment, of course, enjoying the book, but that was entertainment like PlayStation and these uh computer games and this stuff.
When I started to read things that make me made me think, that was the the shift. Because while you're reading these stuff, you start to think about what you do, how you do things, how you can improve them and like idea pop pops up everywhere. Uh like every morning I'm reading this this magazine that is Success Magazine for 10 minutes. And uh it gives me like um 10 ideas like every morning. And uh that's powerful. It's like it's not a magazine, it's ideas from successful people. So that's what I like.
Right. Yeah, it's really interesting and you know, I I told you before we started recording, I sort of discovered this two months ago or something, but I've been uh I've been struggling not to, let's say, I understand a lot of the concepts and I'm beginning to understand why we do as we do. But how did you sort of convert knowing what to do to actually freaking doing it, because I think that's what most people struggle with, right?
Exactly, exactly. That's another thing that I was asking myself the last year because uh there is a quote that says, uh the more you know, the more you do. And uh someone changed that in uh the more you know, the more you can do. And that can is the the powerful thing because I gave to friends when I discovered these things. I gave to my friends maybe a book or to other explain the same thing. Spent like one day to talk to tell him because they asked me like, why are you running a marathon? You are the last in the class. Why are you learning there's seven languages? You're in the classroom. Why you're in the gym at 5:00 AM? Like and they asked me. Some some friends uh are going to ask me that. And uh I tell them but uh to someone, uh there's a shift. They're gonna do something. And someone else is not gonna do nothing with the same information.
So, the point is, uh I think that uh Jim Rohn, I it's a business philosopher of uh United States of America said that that he called this the mystery of life because some people just uh uh like wake up and you want to change your life and some people just don't. And uh I I love that because uh I I found it a mystery as well. It's like, why someone uh listening to a sentence says, wow, uh and tomorrow he's gonna start to change everything and uh from one year uh from now, he's like another man, millionaire and uh whatever. Maybe not one year, five years we'll say. And uh why other people listening to the same information don't do that?
Yeah. I thought about that was that uh maybe it depends on our experiences and what happened before to us because if to me happened like uh someone robbed me or uh like tried to convince me of one thing and uh that didn't work. The next thing the next time I'll hear about it, I say, oh, that's not true and I don't do nothing. And so maybe that's it, but I like to call it like a the mystery of life like Jim Rohn.
Right. So what what motivates Alberto to get up at five for instance? Do you have anything where you think, I'm gonna be amazing or do you have anything you draw on? Is there an Arnold's quote or, you know, is there anything specific you can tell us about your own?
I can indeed. And that's the best thing uh you could ask me because that's uh the whole point of this, how can you wake up at 5:00 AM? How can you learn seven languages? How can you uh not sleep when you're tired? How can you uh do every day something uh towards your dream, no? And that's uh what I love because uh it's all about vision.
I listened to I think it was 10 hours of videos of Arnold Schwarzenegger on YouTube. Everything there was on YouTube, I watched everything and I created a video for myself to watch every day. And uh like an inspirational movie for myself from an hours of videos. And he talked uh most of the time like one out of two, it was you have to have a vision. And people, yeah, people don't know what a a vision is but like Michael Phelps that was there, Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Tiger Woods, they all talk about vision. What was that vision? Like two years ago, I didn't understand it, but now I of course I understand it after I've spent so much time with these books and applying it to me. And it is knowing where you're going.
Uh the most important book that was written uh by Napoleon Hill, Think and Grow Rich said that knowing where you're going, knowing your purpose, where you're going, it's the most important thing because that's your why. Without a why, you can't do nothing. There are a lot of stories about uh the power of why. I mean, there is a there was like a child under a car uh on fire and uh he was like gonna die, no? Two people tried, two men tried to get him off the car uh and they they couldn't. After a while, a woman went there and uh like super strong like she moved the car the the children the child was safe. And they told the the woman, how did you do that? And he said, that was not your child. And that's amazing to me because the why for her was bigger than the two men and uh he moved the car that they couldn't.
And uh away from the concept of the car, uh away from this thing in particular. I think the concept is amazing because when you have a why, when you know, where you're going, like uh waking up at 5:00 AM, I tell myself like if I'm not gonna do that, uh my dream will going will will uh be back from me like for other six months, every day that I don't do that.
That sounds like Eric Thomas.
It's like uh exactly. Eric Thomas. Uh I think I heard it from him because I have some inspirational uh videos that I put on my car while heading to the gym. Like uh I woke up at 5:00 AM in the morning.
Oh yeah. I I think I know which ones. I also watch those.
Exactly, exactly. It's fantastic. Uh it was the last from Matteus. Uh I don't know if you know him, he's a YouTuber that does them. But anyway, um uh that's the most important thing because uh you have to know uh where you're going, an idea of how your life will look like. Uh now, for example, I see myself in five years with the the body that I want, like uh other five languages or four or five languages. So that's why every day I do my Russian and German because if I don't do that, uh I will I I mean, I will feel so bad. And uh when I will be 30, if I haven't done that, it's like a failure.
But another important thing is to write down your goals. Michael Phelps, in the book that I showed before, said he wrote down everything because he went to the swimming pool every single day for five years. Christmas day, his birthday. Wow. I was wow. I mean, you can be like, how I'm doing nothing. So I uh from these people that uh that I also decided to start at 5:00 AM because if you start at 5:00 AM, you're like uh at 9:00 you've done so much and uh that you feel so powerful like, okay, you have to go to bed uh I go to bed at 10 and 30, but it's a sacrifice that I want to make right now. Of course, many people don't understand that. They tell you, oh, this guy is so he's crazy. He's going to bed uh 10:30, it's 19, what the but I'm happier now that when I was 18 going to the disco.
So, uh that's the point. If it's something that makes you happy and uh because you're in pursuit of your goals, uh that's the main point. And you have to know, of course, the goals. If you don't have a goal, there you can't do you can't do it. You wake up and you're gonna say, oh, there's a YouTube videos uh that I want to see, it's funny. And because you have no reason why not to see it, you say, oh, I'm gonna do it tomorrow. But when you have a goal, you put uh you write your goals with data, you're gonna stick to it. You're gonna stick to it. If you have that vision, that this why that is powerful.
Right. And do you do on a daily basis have a little quiet time and think about your why or is it strong enough for you now that you can sort of just ride off of it?
Okay, so, uh there was a time I I I've tried everything. As you know, because uh I'm still in the process. I mean, I keep on reading, I keep on growing, I'm just 19, it's uh been three years right now. So I'm uh in the process of doing that and I've done many things. One was uh the Arnold video, for example. I used to watch it like uh 30 minutes in the morning. So, uh you you start because another thing, uh very powerful is uh suggestion, auto suggestion that you can do to yourself. And uh like people that wanted to acquire mindset, they kept on listening to uh people talk a person talking about that. And that's what I was doing with Arnold like uh day listening to 30 minutes to him. I was acquiring his mindset like, when I was tired, I was thinking like him. Like uh I was thinking his words like, uh you need to sleep six hours a day. Like.
You need to sleep faster.
You need to sleep faster, exactly. Sleep faster when I was tired.
Yeah. I love Arnold.
Yeah, exactly. When you have these spots in your mind like them, results are gonna be sooner or later like there's and uh that's incredible because everybody can do that. If you choose a person that you like, whoever is your mentor or guy you admire. I don't know you admire Luca, his style of learning languages. Create a movie of Luca like one hour of you know about motivation and this stuff from every video he made and you're gonna watch it every day 10, 20 minutes and uh and then after two months if you get bored of it, you go on another person, another person. Right now I'm creating another one with uh like uh hundreds of successful people for myself to see. So that's uh there are many things you can do. You can read books, you can uh start to write down every morning five minutes your goals, you can close your eyes and visualize it. Uh so many things and uh you can use all of them or one of them, it's your choice. And then you're gonna discover them while reading, while improving, while talking to people and this stuff.
Right. But I think uh but I think just to uh summarize there, what what you said was that do something that has something to do with your why or your dreams every day. Like you can't just wake up and just go start doing whatever you're doing. You have to kind of start with the why, right?
Exactly. Oh, and uh another important thing is uh the morning routine. This uh thing changed the whole game for me. I started doing that when I was at high school, uh because I was waking up at 5:00 AM in the last year as well. So to tell people, it's not because right now I finished high school and I'm at home and I'm doing that. Uh the opposite actually. I do I did that because I wanted to do 30 minutes of reading, 30 minutes of like uh uh sport in the morning. Also while at high school, and I woke up at five, uh it ate breakfast. I did uh this uh whole thing of sport, read in different languages and then take the bus. While on the bus, listening to French. So, uh that's the point. No excuses. If you want to do something, you're gonna do that. At that time I slept five, six hours because in the evening I had to do all works and these things. Right now I grow before as uh but if you and then I take, of course, I took an app of one hour in the afternoon, it works for me. And um if you want to do something, you do it. I mean, uh there's no no excuse.
And the morning routine sets you up for the day. That's why it's so important. Just two minutes talking about it. Because uh if you have uh like Darren Hardy, a famous writer, the the publisher of Success Magazine, the one I showed you, uh uh puts a a lot on this morning routine because if you start every day like with a morning routine, that's one thing that you'll do every day. So, if it is like that hour where you do sports, reading and uh breakfast, uh you have it every day and you start the day in the right way. Right now I'm doing that like uh the same way, uh reading, breakfast and a gym. I come back that I start with Italian automatic, Russian, German and uh whatever.
But uh if it's so it's so important to set up a morning routine to create the motivation because it's not about always being motivated, but to create like uh routines that after a while are automated. Like I don't know if you do that uh thing for uh that thing for 60 days or 100 days. Then you don't have to think about it. Right now, I still have to think about my routine because it has they're not uh 100 days or 60. But for Germany and Russian, I do that automatically. It's uh one year right now, 30 minutes a day, I can do teach yourself, Assimil, Assimil, YouTube videos, German and Russian, it's not something that I have to think about it. I have to think about if in the evening I I didn't do that because I feel bad. And that's when you won because when in the evening or after having not done that you feel bad, it means that uh there's kind of a routine, a habit in you. And uh that's uh when you win because when you have the habit, you just have to don't have to stop that thing. Please don't stop. I lost so much time stopping habits because uh to retake them, it's uh a difficult. It takes a long long time to retake the habit.
Right. And I guess the proof of of the fact that habits exist like that is that just look at all your negative habits. If you watch TV every day, that's not hard, is it? Because it's a habit. So if you change it, you can you just need to work hard and I guess the problem is many people do it for, let's say, two weeks or something and they say, oh, it's not sticking. And.
Exactly, exactly. I agree completely. When I came back from school uh 16, 15, when I wasn't a reader or nothing, just a normal guy. Uh back uh from school, on the couch, eating sweets, chocolate, update. I was so happy. I was happy, cartoons and everything, playing video games, but uh you're happy today, you're happy tomorrow, you're happy maybe in seven days, but when you see uh you and uh another guy with different habits, from two years from now, you may be, I don't know, uh I was probably gonna be fat and that guy was gonna be uh I I was gonna be fat, financial broke and whatever. And that guy, uh trim, uh fit, uh knowing multiple languages, uh going up financially. And that's the difference. You don't have to see the difference months, not even maybe one year, but when you start to two years, three years, the difference is like huge. It's like huge.
There are so many examples like I'm gonna make you one. If you start with two airplanes and uh this one is just 1 millimeter out of direction and the other one like 1 centimeter let's say and the other one 1 centimeter here. They're gonna be like this for many, many, much time, much time, much time. After like uh let's say a lot of time of travel, one is gonna be here in New York and the other one in Miami.
Right.
So uh the difference in the long term is huge, huge, huge.
Yeah, yeah. Um, just for the people out there, it is of course an audio podcast, so I just wanted to give an example. Uh Tony Robbins said that uh he was playing, he doesn't play golf or anything, but he tried golf one time and he had a coach and he hit like 200 meters off of the field where he was supposed to hit. And the coach told him, oh you're just a millimeter off. And he said, a millimeter? What are you talking about? I was 200 meters off. And he said, because of the way a golf club is made, you know, it's an angle, that 1 millimeter angle translate to 200 meters of the wrong way. I guess that's uh another way of describing this. Fix fix one little millimeter and uh
It's crazy. Perfect example. Exactly. You you got it all right. That's that's really about it. And uh the same is with position of athletes. I mean, like Tiger Woods is the first, he's gonna take like uh uh three times uh uh the price of the second one. It's all about that daily practice that they more where you stick to that while the other guy was already at home in the shower. It's all that daily thing.
Right.
That little thing, really.
Yeah. It's it's fantastic. Uh what is it? I think it's one of the bodybuilders who say that uh championships aren't won in the arena, they're won in the millions of hours, in the training room, in the labs and then the 5:00 AM runs, right?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Eric. I think it is. It's Eric. Yeah.
Yeah. I I love him. He's pretty cool. It's funny how all the bodybuilders are more are doing all these motivational stuff. Why do you think that is? It's just so hard.
Why they are?
No, why why when you go when you type motivation into YouTube, 95% of the videos show some kind of bodybuilder talking about success.
Because I think because right now that I'm really into gym because it is uh the gym is one uh it's why it fascinates me so much because uh it is something that if you're not consistent, if you don't if you're not willing to improve every day and listen to other people and learn from other people, you're not gonna get that body. It's like uh taking away people taking steroids and other stuff too much, but to get it naturally, it's so it's like years and years, every day you have to watch your what you eat, every day or at least six days a week, but it should be even more. And uh it's eating six times, getting your sleep, putting the hour every day because if you don't put the hour of work, it's not gonna break the muscle tissue and not gonna grow.
And uh that that's I mean, that's crazy apart from the fact that it's really aesthetic and you look well after that. It's also the fact that you health improves and uh of course many things. But the discipline and the the vision that Arnold that said that without that vision, he couldn't stay five hours in the gym, of course. How can you stay five hours? Eating every day all the things you have to eat. Five hours in the gym, posing because they're in bodybuilding there are also things to get that body, you have also to pose just like stay in the mirror to flex the muscle, to bring out the definition. There are so many things. Every day you have to do that without that discipline, that vision because I I think in fact because bodybuilding and these things, if you do it naturally of course, uh includes a lot, a lot of this personal development stuff and uh these things. If you see in fact many of them, the best one read. I mean, they're muscular and uh they're also smart because they read and they speak many languages maybe, I don't know. They are business people. They're whatever. They're they're smart people, not only the body.
Right. Yeah, it's really incredible. I really love uh having digged into this and I I hope that the listeners out there will also have been, you know, motivated a little bit to uh you know, to just uh find that why and and and move on because, you know, learning a language is no different from becoming a bodybuilder or, you know, running a marathon. It's all about motivation.
Exactly.
So, uh so I want to thank you so much for for coming on and and and helping me a lot. And uh I'm sure that uh we'll be uh we'll be seeing each other at at 5:00 AM.
Of course, of course. Me too. There is a 5:00 AM club. You can sign up.
Oh, wow. 5:00 AM.
It's like it's just for 50 euros.
Oh, no. 50 euro penalty fee if you when you don't show up.
Exactly.
How's that? Awesome. Do you have any last shout outs Alberto, where can people find you? You know, what are you working on right now?
Okay. So you can find me on uh YouTube. I have a channel where I teach Italian, Italiano Automatico. And uh the website is uh www.point. uh point dot uh Italiano Automatico dot com. Yeah. It was Italian, sorry.
Uh then I have a YouTube channel, Simply Learning 1994, where I taught languages and uh spoken different languages. Or on Facebook, Italiano Automatico the same page. Mostly I'm doing that and I'm uh into bodybuilding and open a channel about fitness and health. I'm writing a new product and uh and doing podcast with people amazing like you. So I'm really happy.
Fantastic. Life's good. All right, thank you so much and I'll see you soon.
See you soon. Bye, Kris.
Thank you for listening to the Actual Fluency Podcast. For more information, be sure to check out actualfluency.com. Until next time, enjoy learning and have a great day.
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