NEW INTRO
Top stands for triple optimized right of mind, body, spirit.
of, you’re a really good example of that.
Somebody who’s has the external success people wanna see like business like the lifestyle success, which people see.
Then there’s the fitness, like the healthy stuff, which people see.
you also put a lot of attention into like your psyche and your mindset,
—
What (INCLUDE THIS) comes up for me way, I’m like, if we actually trying to be that triple optimized, it’s almost like that might prevent at least me in the past of being like, oh, I need to be perfect. I need to be so optimized. I need to hit all the milestones. Right. And then actually prevents me from being vulnerable, accepting my shortcomings, and actually being
enough to miles.
Right. And So that’s what I, that’s part of what I wanna do is like redefine what optimized means, you know?
And cuz there’s the mindset piece, which people don’t dive into a lot. And then the other
aspect of a lot of this stuff is like the energy side of things. But just
like, yeah, like working at that level.
It’s the most efficient way.
I think we both have, cuz we both have tech background, that we have that mindset of optimization. And what’s the, you know,
And right. And the, effective
the most efficient. Totally. Yeah. Literally that’s why I’m doing this. it’s like what it all comes down to.
Exactly. So energy. Right? It’s like the most, it’s more efficient than feelings. And feelings are more efficient than thoughts.
INTRO
hey Catarina, thank you for coming on the podcast and recording this episode.
Okay, Andre.
Happy
Yeah, I’m so excited. I’ve got a little quick intro on our guest today on who Caterina is. We met in Mexico right at, uh, entrepreneur event, business event, whatever you wanna call it. Became friends over that week. And so I’m excited to have you here and here’s what I wrote about you, and then you can give your little spiel, your little intro afterwards. but I wrote down that for you, you’re, you’re not only killing it in business, but you’re an experienced digital nomad, a great salsa answer. And you speak several languages, all of which are very, like, accomplished things. They take a lot of time and effort, but you also put a lot of time and attention into your mindset and your psyche. So when I think of the type of people who embody what I envision as as top human. you’re definitely one of ’em. With all these aspects of like the lifestyle, the health, and the mental side too, it’s all really important. So kind of nailing those three, right? Health, wealth and relationships is,
Wow.
I’m honor
uh, cuz you have that, right? You have the, the success that people see on the outside. And you’re also, you know, really focused on the internal success, right? The, the psyche, the mindset, which people don’t see,
Yeah. Which is
much more
which, well, there you go,
only one
So, yeah. Do you wanna kind of add to that? Do you wanna give yourself a little.
Yeah. No, I think, I think you captured the high level. I would say. for me, only in the last few years were actually switched to, to that internal success that you’re talking about. And before, to be honest, it was, it was, um, pretty unbalanced, you know? So it’s been a journey for me in the last few years. I think in 2019, that’s when I started traveling
Okay.
Ram.
Remote years signed up. But I was in Silicon Valley for a decade being, you know, traditional Silicon Valley technical cofounder with all the grinds, all like, let’s the milestones, let’s be the unicorn. And um, I think like end of 2018, I was burned out. I was completely spanned. . I was very smart. I would say it was, was like very brilliant in the IQ part of it, but it was just, I kind of hit the wall.
I was like, I don’t know. Wrong. I don’t even know how to fix it, but I just can’t keep going like I’m going because it’s been a decade of just, you know, going and going, going and me coming from Ukraine, from, you know, that background of switching to the US it was a lot of just keep going, keep riding, you know, um, keep achieving.
But at then end of the day, it didn’t really bring me that peace and fulfillment me personally. Right. And, um, and yeah, at that point I basically, . Keep the story short. I booked the remote year for four months and I flew to Santiago,
Chile,
Yes.
far away from South Francisco. You can get away. Like South
Than I did. I think
Yeah. Like pretty much Patagonia, you know, like at the very
very bottom. Yeah.
Um, and yeah, that’s where my journey started. I was like, wow, there are things much more than Silicon Valley bubble and achieving,
it’s a, it is a bubble.
external success. Yeah. No, people there are brilliant. It’s amazing. Um, but I think what a lot of us is miss are missing there is the balance of, and like the
why, like why we trying to achieve that success.
You know, that alignment between here’s what your customers want, you know, here’s what you’re doing, but here’s your sole alignment.
Yes.
what, what makes you wake up in the morning and why are you passionate about it? Right. Um, so yeah, and that’s when I started. But because I was such an achiever, I was like, well, I can’t stop cheating
So that’s why I became so good . I was like,
if not computer programming, creating tech product, it needs to be like something else.
your name. And now I would say it’s, it’s much more balanced for me, like when I hear the word success or optimized. . For me, it’s not just that external success, I sometimes I look at people, I’m like, I kind of feel bad for you because I know exactly where you’re at.
I’ve been there, but it’s just like, oh, and you don’t even know what you don’t know.
We all have blind
spots.
Mm-hmm. .Exactly. So hopefully your podcast’s going to help people gonna listen and be like, oh, , I didn’t even know people think like that. I didn’t even know
this
Yeah. And
yes, I definitely hope so. It’s really a
challenge to unplug somebody
oof.
and change, and
change their thinking. You know? It, it
really is. Uh, I was looking for that and it still took me years to like fully make like a good switch. But yeah, it’s, it’s work to unplug somebody from their way of thinking,
whatever it.
Yeah. Do you think people, you can even do that for people, because I feel like unless a person is ready,
like you can’t pull them, ,
you’ll
I’m not in the business of unplugging people, you know? Like if someone, but if someone’s looking that, they’re like,
all right, let’s go. You know, because for that’s, and that’s a big reason why I’m starting, starting this. And I resonate with a lot of what you said. Not only is our journeys like very similar, you know, Silicon Valley digital nomad, salsa dancing.
Yeah. I can’t believe, I mean, you lasted a decade in Silicon Valley. I was there if you include
school. I was there six years,
Yeah.
and a half
for school in like three, uh,
three professionally. But. That alignment of what you were talking about, of like what you’re passionate about, plus, you know, your success
in business. Uh, the reason why I decided to start this was I don’t want other people who are struggling to grow and like make these transitions to have to struggle. Cuz I’m very much, you know, achiever. Like I can do things on my own, I can figure things out. And when I started, try to try and figure out my mind and my psyche and my mental health and some physical health things that I was having as well. There were so many things that people could not help me with or tell me or explain, or they didn’t know the answers.
So I had to literally find a lot of answers myself,
it out
by yourself.
which thankfully I’m good at. If I wasn’t good at it,
who knows where I’d be right now. Right? But thankfully I’m good at
figuring stuff out on my
but imagine if you had somebody who done the same
thing
and could relate
and so that’s who I wanna be for people, right? That’s, that’s the,
that’s my like purpose. That’s my why. Right? My soul alignment, as you said, with this, with top human, it’s helping people who want the help, but don’t know what the answers are.
Um,
know the,
it’s literally the how, like what’s the how you know, like the how to,
And it’s literally, I was reflecting on it today and yesterday, um, and just in general how much people can save of their life by using
yeah.
somebody else to walk them through the same things versus be like, oh, I’m good at it. And because, and I think that’s where vulnerability comes in because, and self-acceptance and self-love.
Because if you. Have that you can be like, Hey, it’s, it’s okay that I don’t know. Right. It’s okay that I’m failing. It’s okay that I’m stuck. And only when you accept that it’s okay, then you can be like, oh, it’s okay. And who can help me? You know? Then you can like go and actually ask for help or even look, cuz if you, if you are not working, you’re not going to find it.
Right. So being open and vulnerable with yourself and others of sharing. That’s, that’s how
I
Yeah. And being willing. Right. But like you said, awareness
is step one. You know, like, like you saw
my, my talk at in Mexico for beer and pancakes and like that
whole slide of like two columns. This is like, I have all this stuff. How do I fix it? like, I was very aware, but just because you’re aware doesn’t
mean you have like, that’s not enough, right?
It’s step one, but you still have to do the.
Yeah. Do you have any particular, um, , like step by step system. . I know system thinker, but I’m just thinking, right, like all these advanced techniques for people who just started out, it’s kind of over the head. Right? So do you have any, um, things that you recommend people to start with? Like, I dunno,
meditation
Yeah. I mean that’s what my MindWorks program is.
mm-hmm.
the
MindWorks program, it’s what it’s designed for is like even if you’ve never meditated before we start baby steps,
but we very intensely focus on the mind and like your
mental posture. And it’s very personal. It’s
parts for life. Yeah.
A lot of us had bad physical posture, right?
Like I did.
But like our mental posture too, it’s like it’s not just your state of mind, which can be like an hour to hour thing, but you’re kind of. Personality, your mental posture is like, well, that’s how you’ve been for, you know, probably a year or multiple years. And I knew mine was
bad and I was like, I need to fix this.
And no one could really, like, and I had been meditating in a lot of stuff. So, um, yeah. So that’s, that’s, my program. But to start,
Mm-hmm.
just start like have some sort of practice that is internally focused, that’s a habit for me, it was meditation
and I think,
I think it’s the best one. I, I really do. Um,
what got me started on meditating, there were a couple things, but it was Tim Ferris, it was one of his quotes.
He has a quote, I think it was like from Abraham Lincoln too. He is like, if I had four hours to chop down a tree, I would spend the first two sharpening the ax
Mm.
and
meditation is sharpening the ax.
Wow.
And so if you do that a little by little every day, like it’s gonna change.
And then as far as, and then mine work dives into like specific things to do in your head while you’re there.
Yeah.
yeah. For me it was very helpful, the Headspace
app for the meditation because it kind of gave me the structure. Cause otherwise it’s like there are so many different types of meditation
and so many different ways to do it.
word sports. There’s so many different
types of
start. Yeah. I think I’ve done it for two years.
Maybe Headspace
Okay. Oh, so you’re doing that now? You’re still using it.
Um, no, that’s, I mean now it’s more like, um, Jose Silva method and a little bit like different, but I do it by myself. But no, when I just started, I didn’t, I mean, I still had, my startups still was Silicon Valley, you know, full on grind. But, um, . But yeah, a couple years was just to get to the point where, um, I could stop my anxiety, for example, or I could stop because Right.
The anxiety works as a loop.
It’s like a spiral. You
get one little
anxiety
right. It got me a little bit to get
there.
because I didn’t know I had anxiety.
and then I was like, oh, this is
what’s called
inside
Yeah. Literally
Yeah. I feel like we’re all, I don’t know, at least, at least me all speak for me, but I don’t mean have a vocabulary for emotions, you know? I mean, ideally we’ll get in the childhood to just an education on, you know, what is, how is it to feel anxious? How is it to feel embarrassed? How is it to feel proud?
How is
to
But we’re not taught that. Not all of us.
not at all.
You know,
Yeah.
mean,
you, you saw me at, at the last day of beer and pancakes, right? We were sitting on those chairs by the pool and my body
posture was in a way, and you were like, oh my God, are you sad? And like, I didn’t even know I was sad, right? Like even as adults, we can get
to this point where we, we aren’t aware of what’s, what our body is telling us.
You know? And so like building that
mind body connection is so important to start learning these skills and learning our emotions and then like the energy behind it, right? Which is like really what
emotions are. Energy.
it’s super powerful, right? Like if you actually listen to your emotions, that’s the compass for your life, right? Because if you can identify, oh, I go to this job and I’m unfulfilled and I feel sad, I feel stuck, I feel all this. If you can actually realize further that’s what you feel, you’ll be like, oh, maybe this job is not aligned.
With what I should be doing. Right. Um, or then you do something that you truly love and you identify that you feel enjoy and you feel fulfillment. Then you’d be like, oh, let me lean in that more. And then like, compass of where you go. But, but if you don’t even know what you feel, if you just like, oh, I
feel bad.
I
or if you push them down, which we’re usually taught to do socially,
it’s like emotions. I don’t feel those, you know, I’m a
Like I’m a man. I’m whatever, like
exactly. No, it’s um, it’s
super
powerful.
Yeah. And I mean, when I graduated from Berkeley, even then,
nice.
Even then I knew, I
do like, I, and I was, I was thinking this when I was in like my first job. I was like, I do not wanna be a software developer forever. I don’t wanna be that
guy who’s like two desks over from me and in his like forties, or guy. No. Cause I was like, I, I don’t want this to be my life long, like my career long term. And I stayed in that career, you know, 10 plus years. Right.
Yeah.
It’s still kind of like my, my thing during the day. So
Mm-hmm.
Hmm
we know, and this is another thing, right? We just, I still dunno the answer to this one. Why do we still do things that are bad for us?
Like humans, you know, we, we stay in jobs we don’t like. Right? That’s one. That’s my example. We have bad, like we smoke, we eat
food that’s bad for us or whatever. You know, like there’s things that we know are bad and we still do them. I haven’t figured that one out, but that’s, you know, just trying to get rid of as many of
those as possible and start listening to like your intuition and your emotions, like you said.
Right. And like everything changes when you do that.
So I, I read a book recently. I finished the book. It’s called, uh, existential Kink
Existential king.
Kink
Oh, king
I’ll just check that one
which is the, the premise is that if we take as an assumption that heaven is an evidence of
wanting.
Having is evidence of wanting,
Yeah, Yeah, So if we say, and like if I say like, oh, I wanna be super fit, right, but then I’m not, then instead of, you know, kind of overlooking them, be like, oh, let me see if I actually want to be unfit. You know? Or for example, if I don’t know, a person is late all the time, right. and you know, they apologize.
Like, you know, I have a couple friends like that, like no matter what, like I tell them, actually told them a different time now . But yeah, like if you think and you dig deeper, be like, and I’m talking about them not one-offs, right? Like, not
like an
Right. but if it’s a pattern
chronical pattern, right?
And you’ll wait. Then you’d be like, oh, maybe I enjoy being late. And if you accept that, be like, oh, it’s okay that I enjoy being late, but like why? I’m just curious. And then you’d be like, oh, maybe it gives me a sense of importance. And then people actually pay attention to me and I get that validation that I matter, right?
And then forgive me, and they give me love this way. So if you underlying things you’re like, oh, okay. So, um, so the premise of the book is that it is not that we actually taking joy, , and that’s where all the shadow works comes in. Um, that if we own our shadow and we accept that on some levels, we actually enjoy torturing ourselves and people , that there is a darker side of us that is not like this light and, and, and perfect that we are human beings and kind of part of it.
That the, the problem is not that we torture people, the problem is that we’re not torturing them exquisite enough.
Which is
enough.
Yeah. So for example, right? The same example of you being late, you know, you’re kind of torturing people by being late, you know, like
which,
yeah, for certain definitions of torture.
but if you accept it and be like, Hey, I am, I’m accepting that I’m doing it, but instead of just. Doing that on this little level, how about I just make something so incredible and completely blow these people minds that they will never and ever forgive it, you know, forget it for the rest of their lives.
And I actually make an impact that way, right? Because at the end of the day, I think it’s not about torturer, not torturing, um, human nature, that we want to be important and make an impact in certain way. But if you accept sometimes like this dark sides , we might on the subconscious level actually enjoy having that patterns in our life, , that it gives the freedom to, to move fast and then actually choose how we want to make that
impact.
Yeah. And being late’s not, I mean, I think using the word torture for being late to a meeting is a little, a little extreme, but it’s even to do that, right, you have to want to look internally, you know? And there’s
a really good God there. There’s a couple things I thought of as when you were saying that.
Um, the first one was this book called Loving. What is,
Mm.
don’t know if you’ve heard
of that one, by Byron Katie.
heard about it. I
haven’t,
haven’t
In that book she talks about like, okay, you, you write down the sentence of whatever you feel about some other person. I’m pissed off at
coworker Joe because he’s late all the time, or I am mad at my significant other because she does X, Y, Z. And then you literally beneath that, you rewrite it with your name in there. I.
Mm-hmm.
of like,
I get mad at myself because I’m late all the time, or I get mad at myself because I do X, Y, Z. And then that’s how you start to turn it inside and then you look for evidence for how is that true? Right. Like what you were saying, maybe I do like being late.
Maybe I do enjoy being unfit because otherwise you
have the cognitive dissonance of like, I need
to be this certain way, but I’m actually being this way. But our minds are like
just going back and forth of like, I should do this, but I’m this, I should do this, but I’m not. I, you know, and we, it
wastes so much mental energy,
yeah.
yeah.
It’s God, it’s
yeah, it’s
No, absolutely. After I was doing this work, like the shadow work, I had this moment of like matrix moment where I realized like, wow, I’m as a human being, I’m so powerful because all the things in my life, the bad patterns, the things that I thought that I don’t like or whatever, it’s actually I generated them.
It’s not like life happened to me, it happened through me. Right. So everything in my life, I have exactly what I actually wanted. It just,
I
it’s just,
subconscious.
Yes.
And there’s
survival mechanisms in there too. So it’s not necessarily what you wanted,
but it’s definitely what you needed at some
point in time. And then some of those
stick ,and now it’s part of who you’re,
Yeah. You don’t let go. You don’t need it
anymore.
Right.
But we don’t need them anymore, so how
Right, right. Yeah. Yeah. Like this, um, what did Carl, Carl Yun said? Um, still, you make unconscious conscious it’s
going to rule
your
and you’ll call it fate
Yeah.
I love that quote.
Yeah. But it takes courage. Right? Like, it, it’s not easy. It’s so not easy to, to be working on this.
So ,here’s, here’s my thing, right? We say it’s not easy. It’s not easy
because we don’t know how to do it. And what’s the opposite of easy, hard? And we use
the word hard for stuff. Like, oh, it’s so hard. Like that thing’s so hard. Like, okay, most of those things are not hard. Like a table is hard, right? Like this is hard. These things are uncomfortable.
Hmm.
And if you
can just, if you can reframe it that way, and then you start listening to all the successful people that Tom Bill used, the Alex Hermo of like, if you can be uncomfortable like a little bit every day and push through that, like that’s how you get to the success thing. And so if you can just realize
like, these things aren’t hard, they’re just uncom. and be willing to walk through
that fire on a daily
basis. Then that’s how you get through this stuff and that’s how you let it go too. When it comes to emotions, that’s also how you let it go, which is great. Like that’s the
how to right there, but most people are not willing to voluntarily go through the discomfort.
Yeah. And I feel like it’s also a fear of unknown
totally
because if you start doing this and their feelings that come up, for me, at least in the beginning, I just felt like it will never end. It’s like you open in this Pandora box and it’ll just never run out. And you’re like, well, I need to be productive. I need to get
stuff done
right.
I have all this feeling , can I cough in ? But it’s, you know, the more I start doing the work. Um, and I really love the book by David Hawkins, letting Go where he actually talks through the process of
letting go one thing by another thing. .
one.
Yeah. It’s amazing. It’s, uh, and different vibrations of emotions, right?
You can have love, like the highest vibration. You can have fear and you can work it up. So it’s not necessarily, you will go from fear directly to love, but you’ll have courage somewhere in the middle and they’ll push you through. Yeah, yeah. Or sometimes you would even have emotions and you cannot let them go, but you can let go of resistance to even feel that emotion first be like, okay, like at least like I’m willing to even
look at it.
right.
but yeah, I feel like the more you do it, the easier it. Because your mind is like, oh, it’s not as bad as you think it is. Like ice bath, right? First you’re like, whoa, I’m gonna die . But then you’re like, oh, it’s actually not as bad. And then you’re like, oh, I can see the results afterwards. So it’s like, oh, it’s actually
pleasurable
in
right? It’s like, Ooh, I kind of like this.
yeah.
one
thing too, which which is interesting is you said, you know, sometimes there’s these emotions which you can’t let go. Or like, maybe we’re not ready
to yet, but, or they’re
blocked, right? So these get
stored in your body, right? They
really do. So even if you want, and this is like the state I’ve been in or was for, for several years, and once I realized it, I was like, dang, okay, I really need to do the work. which is like, it’s stuck in your body and you can’t think your way out of it. there’s nothing you
can do that’s going to, you’re gonna think or talk through that’s gonna release this trapped energy from your body, these trapped emotions. And so just when you were saying too about like the ice bath, like the first time, like,
oh, it’s really bad.
But you know, after you do it a couple times, it’s not so bad. that happened to me when I started taking cold showers. I literally couldn’t breathe in the shower. And then you train
yourself. So part of that is like you train your nervous system.
Mm-hmm.
And so the nervous system is
affected by all these trapped emotions and stuff.
And so like working with the nervous system is super fascinating as you work on your own and you start to learn like, oh, clearly there’s some something blocked here. Or, um, you know, if I do this exercise like a nice bath or a cold shower, I’m starting to kind of do the physical level of the. and there’s ways to like release,
uh, release the, the trapped emotions physically too, which are really interesting. Uh, and that gets into like
bio energetics and all that stuff too.
which is so cool. But, that’s what I was thinking when you were saying those things.
Yeah. No, I think it’s, um, I think sometimes it’s even a problem of being smart,
It’s,
these intellectual people,
it’s
us being very intellectual, like you and I definitely can relate to that, that we are so smart that we can outsmart a lot of, even psychologists, you know,
literally like like I’m trying to tell someone like, cause I’ve spoken with several therapists over the years. And I try
to tell them like, I’m, I need help. Like, I’m asking for help and they still can’t, like like I might sound like I know what I’m talking about, but I really don’t.
I found myself that when, when not. when you are in the beginning stages, especially, right? Like you don’t wanna feel emotions, so you suppress them yourself. But then let’s say a therapist wants to get you to those emotions you on your subconscious level. So don’t even go there. You’ll be like, okay, how do I escape it?
But you’re like, you cannot just get up and leave. You’re stuck in the meeting . But I found myself like, wow, I’m actually so smart and such a good storyteller sometimes that I can totally bullshit all those therapists and come up with some story to, to move down to some other place. And they’re like,
were you doing that consciously or subconsciously?
subconsciously. Yeah.
So like I wouldn’t know that I’m doing it to me. I would just explain things and, but I think, I think that’s where it’s so valuable to do some body work and some energy work because you cannot trick your body like.
When you get in that eyes bath or you start doing maybe breath work, it’s just something that gets activated that you cannot fully, as long as you actually do the work.
And let’s say you breathe and, and push through, but you cannot talk your way out of it. You, you, it
just happens.
So
no, but you can think kind of like out of it.
Oh, you can think yourself out of breath work, you think.
So
Tell
me
if you’re, well, like once you’re deep in it, no, I, I cuz I, I’ve done it
a few times and it’s,
you definitely get it to like natural high kind of state, right? But if you’re
doing other things that are maybe require a little bit more of your effort, like, this is why meditating is so hard for people because. they start to think and thinking is the opposite of feeling. And it’s
because of, so like, like you were saying, like smart people, people like n B and P and like that, like my friends over the years they, they’ve told me like, Andre, you’re like hyper intelligent. I don’t know what my IQ is or whatever. And like I wouldn’t, I probably don’t score super high, but like I’m really good at a lot of stuff and I’ve figured things out on my own. But it’s a problem because
in our society, being smart is the same as like intelligence, which is like thinking like you’re book smart,
you’re school smart, all of that.
And like it’s literally the opposite of feeling and intuition and you be like
embodying your soul basically.
EQ over
The E
the eq which Which is funny, like
I read that book about EQ years ago and I was like, this it, I was like, I understand how it makes sense to know, but they’re still putting words to everything.
mm.
and words are a human thing that we invented way after emotions existed. And so even
words can be a problem sometimes, right? Because when
you get into like the breath work or like deep meditations and what I do in mind works, it’s like we get to the point where there’s no words, it’s just all sensation, it’s all somatic, it’s all feeling, it’s all energy.
Cause we, we just like, we stick to it otherwise, like we latch onto this word and then like we start thinking about it and then like
what do they call it? Intellectual,
inte.
intellectualizing ,
intellectual Right. So we’re not, we think about them, we think the feelings versus
refu,
right? Someone told me this literally like two months ago because I’m an Enneagram six and he said, oh, so you, you think
your feelings. And I never thought of it that way. is funny cuz I think
a lot. But I was like, it makes
so much sense.
Yeah, for sure. I think, um,
You think or you feel
I see you . I feel like people should even start asking others, not how you do it or, but be like, Hey, how are you feeling?
Yeah.
Imagine, imagine people like, Hey Andre, how are you feeling today?
And I bet most people would still respond with, I’m good. I’m fine.
Mm-hmm. .Yeah. That was such a weird thing for me too. Coming in from Ukraine, when I just moved
Oh, really
it took me a year, , it took me a year to switch, to actually stop, first start, stop telling people how I’m actually doing what they ask,
You made that conscious switch to like match the culture.
I had to work it, of course. .
Wow.
Well, in Ukraine, if you actually ask somebody how they’re doing, you actually ask somebody how they’re doing.
Right. So You would, so what would it look like I’m just curious now, when you came to the US and someone
asked you how you’re doing, like how much time would you spend answering that question?
I would start on telling them about how I’m doing. Maybe like
five minutes
Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Cause otherwise it’s like, I’m good, which is like two seconds maybe. Right.
Yeah. Yeah. I had to switch in the, I remember the elevator things cuz people ask me, no coworkers. I would go in and you literally have maybe what, 10 seconds till you get to a different floor. And they would ask me how I’m doing and I’m like, I start answering them
And
I
Wow.
did you answer?
Wow. That’s interesting.
Yeah, that was um, I had to work through and then also learning to ask and not expect, and not be like, oh, you didn’t tell me
So yeah,
that
Right,
right. yeah, cuz that’s really interesting cuz how would you actually start that conver if you actually wanted to have that conversation? If you wanted to actually ask somebody, Hey, how are you feeling? How are you doing? Like you’d have to ask them like
10 times in a row before they like, got it.
yeah, sometimes like now when I do want people to switch, I literally like touch them on their hand or
something, be like, Hey, no, actually how you doing? Cuz it gets them out of the thinking and be like, oh, somebody touched
me. You know?
Right. Oh that’s a good one.
But yeah, like nobody does it in the US
No
No, they really don’t. And that’s, that resonates for me
cuz when I was in. Even when I was in college,
Mm-hmm.
probably even
after college, like I didn’t know how to have a deep conversation.
Hmm.
I would literally
Google Quest, like, how do I have a deep conversation? Like what
Oh my gosh.
do I ask? I would
I was asking that to my
therapist
actually.
really
go on.
Yeah. So we have this like, so superficial culture, like if we can’t even interact with other human beings on a deeper level than something that’s superficial, how are we gonna even like, interact with ourselves on a deeper level?
Mm. Or I would say it’s the opposite because we don’t interact with our fellows.
We cannot
Ooh, yes. definitely like a and egg kind of thing. It it’s both, right? It’s,
it’s on both sides and both sides fuels the other side.
Yeah. . But yeah, I remember for me, when I finally realized how to do it, I was like, this is so obvious, Catarina. Like, what? ? Well, cause I was even having conversations with my therapist when I was in the beginning stages of, you know, this self-exploration and I was trying to think through things, and I was like, Hey, like I do enjoy deep conversations.
At least I know that, and I do wanna connect with people on a deeper level. How do you do that? Like, I was literally asking for instructions. I was like,
okay, gimme
a
right? Like step one, . step two,
How do you get people to talk about things? And then when I finally realized, I was like, you’re gonna start with yourself.
You’re gonna, you’re gonna actually be
vulnerable
You gotta share first.
so easy. It’s
so
This is what I talked about literally in episode three of this podcast. We were talking about
self-disclosure and how important that is to discovering who you.
Hmm.
So it’s not
even just like a deep conversation thing. It’s like that is how you will find
your unique aspects.
Hmm. Because we all have a story to share.
Right. And
Yeah. And
to you it’s, it’s your normal, so how do you know who you are and what’s unique about you until you start letting other people see that and telling them things and then getting
feedback.
Right, because for you it’s like, well, is there any other way? Right. And other people will be like, wait, you think that
Yeah.
Interesting. Yeah, for sure. But yeah, it’s, it’s amazing how you can just be if you are vulnerable first, or actually, I mean, for me it doesn’t actually feel vulnerable anymore,
I
Right, because It’s your
normal now, it’s such a
better normal to have, I think.
You accept yourself and then you share it. Right. Um, but it’s amazing how I had those realizations when I started doing it. How you can connect with somebody within 10 minutes so deeply by sharing deeper parts of yourself and then they share open up in return that then you might not see that person for a year and they’re still gonna remember you.
You know, versus this has been hours of people just talking about, you know, weather and
the sports
this sports all the, there’s always sports
always sports , I know nothing about but
It’s like that, that quote right.
People will never remember what you say, but they’ll remember how you made them
feel.
Feel.
Yeah,
exactly. That’s amazing. It’s like a superpower, right?
yeah. No, it is, that’s.
ability. The Renee Brown thing.
right? Yeah. Ah, she’s good.
Mm-hmm.
And step one, if there is any, step one, right? It’s like you start with yourself. How do you be vulnerable with
yourself and learn
about you? Cuz that’s how I figured it out, right? Once I had done the inner work and once I started finding my own weaknesses and my own vulnerabilities, I was like, okay, let me start.
And I started to talk to people about ’em, right? Like friends or I would just bring them up or something here and there. That’s when I was like, oh, this is how it works. Right? So starting that kind of putting your attention inwards, right? And, okay, we’re, we’re techies right from Silicon Valley.
Yeah.
Tech companies are spending what, billions of dollars maybe per month, like collectively to get people’s what exactly like it’s that
valuable.
Yeah.
we put it outside, all on everything else but ourselves.
Interesting. Wow.
Wow.
only you
took that power and put it internally, right, like imagine what you could discover, what you could do
Yeah. I’m still working on these kind of boundaries with myself, where I already realized that I, I have a relationship with this
Catarina
thing.
with this Catina
longest, longest relationship I’ll
ever
It’s, you are the person you’ll spend the most time with
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And at the end of the day, like that’s the only person gonna be always there, right?
You can’t get
So what I’m working on now to feel a bit bad at the boundaries, like I have alarms going off already, but I’m like, okay, I need to be a little bit more proactive. that, for example, last week, I’m in Ply del Carmen now catching up with all these amazing human beings, and by the end of the week I’m like, wait, but where’s Karina time?
Like,
she’s like, she’s like there like, Hey
She wouldn’t
by
That’s
why you like to do your own thing.
that’s not true. I guess. I guess I’d take everybody’s input and then make my own thing, right? , but no, but it’s not true. I feel like it’s a balance, you know? At the end of the day, it should be your coming, right?
Definitely a balance. But you have to, you have to have your, your your you time, right? And like, who is Catrina? What does she want, who is Andre? What does he want? Like what are my, some guy
asked me years ago, like, What are your needs? What do you need? And I was like, I don’t know, I, I literally, I was like, I don’t know the answer.
Like, I was so out of touch with who Andre is, who he was like back then.
You know, I, no
Yeah, because we never, we never taught that for me last,
Not really.
especially summer. So I read this book, non-Violent Communication. I heard about it. Um, I, I was crying on chapter two. I was just bowling. I was like, I had to put it away. I had to, I had to take a break for a week just reading about our human needs, that we are super needy creatures,
It’s not only about the shelter and the basic stuff. It’s like, oh, we need to be seen. We need to be accepted. We need to be heard. We need to. , we need to have social connection and all this human needs that I didn’t even know they exist. And because I didn’t even know that it’s okay to have those needs, you know,
because we think like, don’t need anything. Don’t want anything,
Yeah. And, and I think it’s, it’s comes from childhood a lot too because for example, for me, I grew up in, you know, it’s the whole Soviet Union thing where you sacrifice yourself for the society, right? And that’s the culture. So you actually are being conditioned to suppress your needs for the sake of somebody else.
And then, you know, if, if your parents are the same way and, and they teach you, you actually start feeling guilty and ashamed for having certain. You know, well, like you, you push it down so much that you don’t feel anymore that that’s need and you don’t have a vocabulary for
it.
That was me.
Yeah. So, and then imagine like if you already know that you have those needs, and that’s okay, how would you even, how would you ever get it? Because for you to get it, you need to communicate it, especially if it’s with other people. You need to be able to communicate the, the need. But if you don’t even know that exists, if you’re out of touch with yourself, like there is no
Yeah. And, and I think this is, um, it’s something that, that I’ve been incorporated in my work too, is not just personal. Uh, this book, for example, I think the Microsoft CEO was, um, it’s like a required book for all the like board people and the C-suite there. So, Like mandatory thing. Um, but yeah, because like if you, for example, I, I help tech teams, right?
Streamline communication. We work a lot with engineers, so they have needs and they have a lot of emotions going on cause they cannot communicate it and stated clearly, right?
code.
I know, right? Just like program , then there’s a very, very low likelihood it’s gonna happen. So yeah, for me the whole last year was, okay, we’re very needy.
It’s okay. And how about we communicate, but it’s also not communicating with demands. Right? That’s the fine point
between
right?
and requests, right? Because you can be like, Hey, with demand, you kind. , you are assuming that the person is obligated to give it to you. Right? Which is nobody’s obligated to do anything but you saying like, Hey, here’s a need I have.
Here’s how you can fulfill it. Would you be willing to do this? And it’s okay if no, but here’s an opportunity, right? ? It’s
quite a
balance,
Yeah. yeah. No, that’s,
it’s, it’s impressive that you’re bringing that into like the workspace, you know, cuz that’s
one thing I’m trying to do with top human is like, how do I bring the inner work, right? And like, working
at this raw level of energy and like our emotions and learning all of that. How do I bring that into like the everyday life of other people? And how do I
make people see how it’s in their lives every day, whether they know it or not,
But I feel like you don’t have to. because how you do one thing, it’s really how you do everything. You know? So if people are transformed, and it doesn’t matter where you start, like if you learn this at work, how to communicate your needs, I’m pretty confident when you go back to your family, you’ll be like, you better equipped to, to communicate, right?
So it translates. And even the whole, the life work balance, it’s not like you are one human being, you know, . It’s not two separate things, it just one. So I feel like the work that you’re doing and, and teaching people how to be more in touch with themselves and all these tools, so that, that’s just gonna automatically translate.
yeah. No, it, right. I guess my mind was in like the, the unplugging people side of things, right. , which is like, how do you, yeah. How do you get people to realize like, oh, this is, you know, important and it affects everyth. Right, because
it’s, yeah, like you said, how you do, it’s kinda the other way around. How you do everything is how you do one thing, cuz it’s, it’s,
just all encompassing,
yeah,
And talking about the plugin, I think, um, I feel , I feel, I feel that having certain things where you put yourself in a situation when it’s unavoidable for you to change, like not to change, for example, to nature.
Mm-hmm.
recently had a calling to, at some point, maybe do a chain of glamping spots where I can bring.
And share it with maybe a membership program or something, because once you put any human being in nature, and it’s more or less unplugged, right?
Ideally with no
a retreat or something.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
You cannot
escape
like your whole psych changes
We, it really does. Like living in a box with air conditioning like It’s so not good for us. It’s not natural.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Since you’ve done a lot of the inner work,
Mm-hmm.
I think you said it at the beginning, it’s the most important piece or more important than like the other work. Um, what have been some of like your favorite things to do along that journey? Or what are some of like the really big, if you’re willing to share, like blind spots that you had that you discovered by doing the inner work that you were surprised? There’s two questions there, so take the one you wanna answer.
Let me tell you that two, three years of work in a few minutes. Um, I can tell you a little bit about my psychedelic
experience.
Okay. Yeah. No psilocybin. At least that’s was my psychedelic of choice was really
interesting. Um,
Did you do it more like a one
time?
I did it several times, but never like a big dose. Never like a big, big dose. So very curious to hear.
Oh, the big dose, what is it? Like three or four grams is like the hero dose or whatever it’s called. Yeah. Never did one that big,
PLANT EXPERIENCE
Well, my, my big dose was a good experience for, uh,
psychedelics. So I did a three gram,
like
so you did a full, a full thing? Yeah.
Yeah. It was with a shaman, like proper ceremony. Ritual. It was absolutely life changing.
Wow.
It was incredible. I’m glad we said the intentions properly.
She, she did
a good job. It, cause it’s not about, you know, like taking a bunch of
shrooms in the
No, it’s, you gotta, when you take a big dose
like that, you have to really be
yeah, it’s the tension. And my intention was, I was like, you know what? I want to feel more connection with the world and more. Um, and I was like, I don’t even know what I don’t know, but please come in and do whatever you need to do.
I’m open. I’ll accept it. You know, just show me . And yeah. If I didn’t have that intention, and if the shaman was like, no, no, you gotta surrender, you cannot fight anything. You, you gotta surrender. Like whatever happens, just, just surrender to the medicine. Um, because things were like going in and it was, it was total eco death.
It was, there was no such thing as Catarina. And that’s the biggest thing that I’ve get out of it. It was like, oh, how does Catarina be, feel more connected to the world. It was like, oh, there is just consciousness
are the world.
there. There’s not even, I, it’s like there’s consciousness and through me, because I, I had quite a lot of still insecurities of like, oh, who is Catarina to, to speak up and share her things and her experience and like, you know, is she deserving things like.
worth and, Yeah.
Yeah. So all this insecurities, but then after that I was like, it’s not about Catarina is there just like light inside of each of us and we’re all part of one, and it’s my responsibility to express it.
Like
you seen, have you seen fantastic fun guy on Netflix?
Yeah.
Uhhuh.
So, you know,
with the mycelium, how it just, like, it just grows like this, you know, and like branches and bra, like,
I feel like we’re each, we each have that inside of us. and it’s just energy cuz
it, what is my ceiling? It’s like the most energy only thing that exists.
That’s a lie. Right?
And so it’s like we all, we’re all that it’s, we’re all energy, right? And so like this little thing is just trying to grow and like see the world. Like there’s that inside all of us. And then we have kids and like, that’s a branch, right? Then, you know, just like a tree, like you have branches and everything.
And so we’re all just
this little ball of energy that’s just trying to like grow and explore the world and be seen and you know, but then we’re like,
no, go this way. Go this way and do this thing and look like that. And don’t be this taller, don’t be this,
you know,
Right, right, All the
con,
You’ve gotta let it like grow and,
The biggest thing, like I, I understood it before in my mind and maybe somewhere in my heart, but like one thing is to understand the concept and another one is like, it’s like going to New York. One thing you can, you can watch the movies about New York, you know, you can read about it, you can talk in there.
But another thing, you actually show up and you experience it and you are like, oh, now I got it. You know,
Yeah.
No, it was beautiful.
END PLANT PART
Mm-hmm.
but yeah, we
done
So I’ve done microdosing for about probably four or five months when I was in Vancouver, which British Columbia is the most open liberal. They literally go down the streets and they’re fungi
shops all over the
Oh, no way.
Yeah. So it’s all, you know, legal stuff there. And actually I started in a clinic, which was amazing because I didn’t wanna do it, you know, like people do recreational.
I was like, okay, there needs
to be an
intention.
Yeah. And they’re starting to study that
in the US too. They’re starting to bring it into
clinical settings.
Yeah, definitely. So that, that, um, the clinic was integration of, of that and reiki and hypnosis and whole kind of like, very holistic approach. So I started doing it and it was incredible how it got me so introspective. It was like the support system where I would, cause the dose was super, super tiny.
It was like 1 25, so it’s like 10 times. Yeah. Point one gram. So you don’t, you almost only
Oh yeah, yeah,
Okay. yeah, So super tiny. yeah,
yeah, yeah. It’s like people are like, oh, that’s not even a dose. like, what are you talking about? But it does change your brain a little bit where you become more introspective. So I would like totally.
Have work calls, like you don’t even feel it that much. I started journaling. That changed my, my whole habit because before that it was, um, I would journal occasionally when I need to, but I think combination of, of this microdosing and also reading the book, what, what was, um, I forgot the, the name of the lady, Julia, somebody, she has the morning pages ritual
I don’t know.
where basically you, you start your morning with just writing three pages and it doesn’t matter if you don’t have any inspiration whatsoever, you just, you just write down, I don’t know what I’m
talking about.
I
don’t know
Right, right, right, right, right. You just
doesn’t matter . But then once you started, you kind of like get in the state of flow, right? And also in touch with your inner world. So for me, that was such a big catalyst because. ,
Nice.
I got into a habit of writing, so I cannot not write anymore. So if I don’t write for a couple days, I’m like, something is wrong.
I feel like there’s all this stuff.
I’m the same way with meditation. Yeah. With the mind word stuff.
Oh, nice, nice. That’s amazing. Yeah, so that was a big change and a big tool for me because
nice.
I feel like this is a way , and I guess, I guess it’s reference to the, um, programming world where you can debug yourself, you
know,
literally debugging ourselves. Like that’s what I do.
Because then you can ask all the questions. It can be just, just asking why. Even a simple fact of asking why maybe like five times, you know? Like for example, for me, at some point I travel, I was troubleshooting. I was like, why? I sometimes enjoy, like why is my room messy when I was traveling a special few years back?
I was like, why is it messy? Like I, I know how to clean, I love cleaning. You know, like, like why is things all over the place? And then I was keep asking why, and then I got to a point where I was like, oh, it’s because I want, it’s kind of giving me a, a sense of freedom. Like I can do, it doesn’t need to be in the box.
Like I can have things all over sense of freedom. But then once, once I got to that point, I was like, oh, it’s actually, if my value is freedom in that point, I can achieve freedom by having it organized. So it gives me a good
platform
You redefine what
anything I want. Yeah. And that was it. That was incredible.
Like since then, , I don’t have any messy rooms anymore or nothing because you’ll just understanding that why, and I feel like that to having a way by yourself to troubleshoot. And the bug , kind of like your, your live dating, that’s incredible.
yeah. It’s. I, I don’t think I would have gotten to the point to where I am of like one doing all the work myself, and then two, now even like
starting to teach other people
Mm-hmm. .
software developer,
Ooh,
wow.
because what do we do as software developers? Like we debug
Yeah.
good
software developers don’t, you don’t just put a bandaid, you have to find the root of the problem.
Right?
And like
asking five why’s. That’s, that’s one way if five is even enough depending on the thing, right? And so like
finding the core thing and then like working at it at that level and like, like you did, you
redefined the word freedom, like changing a definition,
like that’s pretty deep,
right? If you can get there and like actually redefine that word for you,
Mm-hmm. . Yeah, I think, I think there’s so much power in, you know, in the software engineering analogy, actually
Yeah. Yeah. I.
been reflecting on it recently, how in the software world, we think a lot of times in systems, right? And actually if you can apply the same thinking to feelings and things like that, right?
Like making it more optimized , um, if you, if you like, in terms of debugging how you were just describing, for me it’s, it’s more like, okay, what’s the most effective way to, to fix things, right? And when you try to fix your thoughts, like, yeah, you can fix your thoughts to an extent, but then you might have one feeling, like, one traumatic experience that happened to you that generates one feeling and that one feeling gonna create thousands of thoughts and then just gonna come back and come back and come back.
So, so actually debugging at the level of thinking it, it works to an extent, but if you actually go, yeah, it’s not deep enough, you’ll have to, it’s like put in then date, like you said, right? So if you actually go deeper and then you fix that feeling by looking at it, bring it up and accepting it, and then letting go, then all those thoughts are just gonna disappear.
So it’s super, super effective. And then I’m super excited to. to continue following you, your work with energy, because I think
that’s
even
that’s the
deeper. Yeah.
You can’t
All this. Yeah. So that’s like the most effective in my
Yeah, no, it’s, it’s true. It’s crazy. Uh, there was something you were saying, oh yeah. The, uh, having a, like, thinking about our emotions, you were kind of saying that, right?
Which, first of all, if you think about it, it’s like it’s one of the most human things we can do
to
think
about
to think about our feelings and to like
process
them in a systematic way because
animals don’t do that.
They. And we think, and like the
whole, the whole reason why we’re human is because we think, and we have this prefrontal cortex and language is a big part of it, but it’s really like the, that
that ability to really think and like decide what we think about and past and future and all this stuff. So if you can
turn that to like your energy and your emotional side, your animal side, like that’s one of the most human things we can actually do,
Mm-hmm.
which is cool.
And it’s like, I love that idea. Literally like years ago and I was, you know, a couple years into this journey, I was thinking like, I wanna write a book called Logical Emotions
Ooh.
Okay.
to like have this process because we do like process and as much as emotions
are this wave not particle way of being, right. Of
like, it should just be, yeah. We’ve had year, decades of conditioning, of being particles, not waves, of being like very logical and systematic. And so if that’s the way we’re currently operating, we need to switch somehow. And so there’s ways you can like
getting out in nature, uh,
Mm-hmm.
psychedelics, right? Plant medicines.
This is also like why people drink,
like it’s an unhealthy way, but it gets them outta that mindset.
But if you can have, if
we can have a system for like actually processing and starting to look at the emotions, the energy,
yeah.
then it’s, it can literally just change everything for you.
I hundred percent agree. I think you are right with, um, that it’s not about abandoning our logical thinking and our minds because we’re so good at that and, you know, instead of starting from zero and going in this emotional world and not have. No system to deal with that. It’s about how do we use your mind and your system thinking to now apply to make that bridge to emotions.
But you don’t start from scratch, right? So it’s, yeah.
Oh,
man.
I feel like we could talk for another hour, two hours. We’ll have to do another episode at some point. You’ll have to be back. We’ll have to have you back on
here.
what is it gonna be? It’s gonna be
episode
four.
This will be, I think, episode four. Yeah.
Ah,
So thank
you so much for, for coming on. I love this chat. Yeah, it’s, it’s.
I love this chat more than you love this chat,
MAYBE END HERE
Oh man. But it’s, I was thinking about this the other day. One of my, um, one of my ex-girlfriends
Mm-hmm.
my top human Instagram and she messaged me. She said,
it’s wild to me that this is what you do now. And when we were
dating when I was 19, you know, this is like Jesus, over 10 years ago, she was, she was a massage therapist.
Like she was kind of getting into this world already. She was like kind of in this space.
Yeah.
I was thinking about it and it’s just like those of us who are like seeking truth, like truth will find those who seek it, is what I kind of
came to. And it’s always good to speak with someone else who’s on that same path.
On that same journey, right? Because we all, eventually we find the same answers. you know, it’s just a matter of like getting a little closer, participating in the conversation and like, let’s keep getting closer and closer, closer to like truth, uh, as we can. And
and you can see those people right away. At least like I can now, like I almost can look in the
eyes. I’m
yeah, I’m not there yet. Not yet working on it.
okay.
Yeah. Yeah. Well, thank you again and we will, we’ll definitely do another one at some point.
Yeah. Sounds good. Well, let know once you Super, now I wanna go and listen to your first three episodes,
Yeah, you should.
third one sounds like the third one’s gonna
resonate with,
The, yeah, the set. So the first one was really good
cuz that was my friend
Mm-hmm.
who
he’s had some really interesting ener that was a very energy based conversation where he kind of got introduced to the world of. in like playing with partners like sexually. So that was really interesting
like in the tantra side of things.
And then my episode two and three are the same person. We ended up talking for an hour and a half. So I split it into two episodes.
So we talked for the first one, that whole conversation. And there’s some stuff from from that com conversation that are like, it’s a little out there. You know, she’s talking about how there’s kids who can like read with a blindfold on that can remote view or like who, how someone can like see bones.
I believe it. Mm-hmm.
So like that’s for me. And I said this in episode too cuz I didn’t, some of that’s like out there for me cuz like I haven’t gone
down that world enough yet. But she’s been doing this stuff for like 10 15. So,
I mean, if you believe that, then definitely go listen to episode number two, And then number three was the number three was the second half of that where it ki the conversation kind of turned into this, how do we self-discover? How do we just discover, like if I can see bones, I’m like, oh yeah, that’s just, that’s just what I see. But no one else can see that. Like, how are you ever gonna find out that that’s unique to you and that that’s a gift that you have?
and I think it comes to what you were talking, that
you need to
And that’s literally what, that was literally her answer. And that cause Yeah. it’s self-disclosure. And I, I talk about
it, I answered her how I’m reading this book about fear of abandonment called Love me, don’t Leave Me. And
it’s about how do you have, how do you, you know, there’s, how do you work on fair enough abandonment, but what do good relationships have?
And one of those things is self-disclosure. And if you don’t have. Then like growing up again, it all starts where you’re very young, right? If you don’t have that growing up,
then you’re not gonna have that in yourself, and then you’re not gonna do it as an adult.
Yeah. And if you are not self disclosing to yourself and being comfortable with that, you’re not gonna
self disclose
to
Because we repress, we bottle things up, we push things down, we
keep ’em in, and we don’t let ’em out.
Wow.
Oh, I love this.