THE IMPERFECT SHOW NOTES

To help make this podcast more accessible to those who are hearing impaired or those who like to read rather than listen to podcasts, here are our show notes.

These show notes come via the Otter.ai service. The transcription is imperfect. But hopefully, it’s close enough – even with the errors – to give those who aren’t able or inclined to learn from audio interviews a way to participate.

Mike O’Neil  00:00

I am, technically, I can feel confident in saying this without growing a nose, but I’m the world’s first LinkedIn expert. I know that because when a friend of mine invited me to LinkedIn back in 2004 I went out to find experts, someone to learn from, and there was nobody you got on Yahoo and put in these words, LinkedIn expert, LinkedIn trainer, someone to teach me. However you put the words in, there was nobody there at all.

Achim Nowak  00:31

Welcome to the MY FOURTH ACT PODCAST. I’m your host, Achim Nowak, and I have conversations with exceptional humans who have created bold and unexpected lives. If you like what you hear, please subscribe on any major podcast platform so you won’t miss a single one of my inspiring guests, and please consider posting an appreciative review. Let’s get started. You I am just delighted to welcome Esmeralda, Diaz aroka and Mike O’Neill to theMY FOURTH ACT PODCAST. Mike and Esmeralda are married, and their story is in many ways a perfect fourth act tale. Mike is a two times Forbes top 50 social media influencer and a LinkedIn Sales Navigator expert from Minnesota. Esmeralda is a digital strategy and branding expert from Madrid. They met in Costa Rica. They now reside together outside of Madrid. They are both in their 60s now, what had to happen for their current life to become a reality? Well, I am just thrilled that I get to have this conversation with both of you. Welcome.

Mike O’Neil  01:55

Thank you. Achim, great to see you again, my friend,

Achim Nowak  01:58

great to see you as well. I Mike and I know each other from the past, and I just and I followed your story in social media because it’s compelling. And Esmeralda and I have just met before we get to how you two connected in a romantic way that led to marriage, because you grew up in different parts of the world, so I’m curious like you as miralda, when you were young girl growing up, and you know how parents sometimes want to know what we’re going to do with our life, I’m wondering what you were thinking, likewise mine, when you were young man growing up, what did you think you wanted to be as a grown up?

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  02:35

First, sorry for my English is not so good. Okay, I try to do the my best. Okay, when I was teenager, was a person very passionate about science. May I want to be a scientist in my future. I have always been a very curious person, and at that time, I was inspired by Jaco stop Isaac azimow And Felix. Rodriguez Fuente, here in Spain. At that time, my father bought me binocular magnified I could spend my time computing my studies with the small marine, terrestrial animals, and in the end, I studying molecular biology.

Mike O’Neil  03:19

Very cool. That’s how she got started with her operations. Mine were quite a bit different. Can you imagine? I was good at math, so I went down the path of being an engineer in college and stuff, but I was really into cars. I thought I would do something with cars, and there’s just not a lot of big upside future in a guy who likes to work on motors and cars. But I did, fortunately, engineering directed me in the right way, and I really didn’t grow up and figure out what I wanted to do until my senior year in college. It took a while, and I had been studying personal computers. I had always kind of thought of I used to read Popular Mechanics magazine, these things that engineers like to read. And I got the idea to buy an IBM personal computer when I was still in college, in the days where they had 64k of memory, a green screen, a single floppy kind of thing, and it changed my whole life. My senior year in college, I geared all my studies towards computers. There was no computer classes you could take. They didn’t exist. You take a Fortran class or a cobalt class. Remember those your

Achim Nowak  04:38

interests are giving us a nice bridge to the social virtual reality that we all live in right now. But I’m also struck that when both of you were growing up, you’re talking about computers at the very beginning, the work that you do right now didn’t exist, right? It just wasn’t. It didn’t exist in your childhood, because both of you. You don’t do the same work, but you do related work, right? As my brother and Mike. I love you. From both of you, I don’t care which order. How did you end up working in? I’m going to use a bunch of different words, social selling, social media, LinkedIn, influencing. How did you get into that? And individually, it’s

Mike O’Neil  05:21

probably better that I start with this because you’re because you started later than me. Okay, I started early. I am technically, I can feel confident in saying this without growing a nose, that I’m the world’s first LinkedIn expert. And I know that because when a friend of mine invited me to LinkedIn back in 2004 I went out to find experts, someone to learn from, and there was nobody. You got on Yahoo and put in these words, LinkedIn expert, LinkedIn trainer, someone to teach me. However you put the words in, there was nobody there at all. And the other reason I got involved in LinkedIn is because I’d lost my job, and I was a telecom engineer, Sales Engineer for 20 years. I worked in computers and telecom and the twin towers came down. 911 came and everyone lost their job, and shortly thereafter, LinkedIn came along, and I kind of jumped out of one frying pan into the other. It wasn’t more than a couple months of being a LinkedIn user that I was an expert. I knew everything it could do. And people were calling me saying, Mike, can you teach me about LinkedIn? They were recruiters, recruiters at the time. So that’s how I got how I got involved. It was I got invited to join. I dived into it as an engineer, I kind of had to know everything it did. And frankly, in two days you could learn everything you needed to know, all the strategies you name it about LinkedIn, probably in one day. Now,

Achim Nowak  06:53

Esmeralda Mike already said that you got involved in that world a little later, when anybody goes to your LinkedIn profile, you’re both on LinkedIn and so forth. I checked out how you present yourselves on LinkedIn, so I introduced you as a branding and marketing strategist, but also social selling LinkedIn specialist, influencer. I hope I’m getting this right. How did you end up in that world?

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  07:23

Well, this is a large history about because at the beginning, I was working as scientifics in a molecular biology laboratory. I was working nine years, and after, I was layoff and searching other job, but anymore money, I don’t want to work anymore in the science market, because here in Spain, we earn very little money all the all the biologists. Then I changed my life studying an MBA. After MBA, I started to work in a insurance company by money only because really I don’t know the insurance market, yeah, but I had a good boss. And when you have a good boss that inspired you and passionate you, you work very happy. I was that was my situation. Then I started working in this insurance company, and after I worked 23 years in this market, in different companies, in 2005 2006 the last company starting to lay off people, including me. I starting to write books. My first book about nutrition, anti aging, because it’s like, I love this matter. This were related with my profession. Then I wrote three books related with that, anti aging, Antiox. I found a publisher trust on me, and I starting to write with this publisher, and my idea was to promote the strong these books, even the effort of the publisher, but doing by myself and I found block platform of Google. I started to write my blog that was in 2007 and I discovered other social media as Facebook and Twitter at the beginning. And I put all my promotion of the books in these networks. And one day I discovered linking, because really, I have relationship with a daughter from Canada who also a research in the anti aging nutrition and I saw in his web page the icon of LinkedIn. And also, what is this? Then I research. I go, I register, and I discovered a new universe, very interesting, but in Spain, nobody knows what is linked. Then I starting to see to put my eyes in the map in the left side, that means in United States. And I discovered a my colleague, between all the professional expert in LinkedIn, and I start to follow my colleague to. Read his post to follow in Twitter, and only for Lenny and that time ago, market and Mike also has a girlfriend.

Mike O’Neil  10:08

Yeah, we were not available.

Achim Nowak  10:12

That’s a great story. You both. Your stories are different, but you’re both circumstances forced you to be creative and innovate, right? Which is cool. Now, that’s mirola. I don’t want to just ask, giving me an honest answer. You said you followed Mike because he clearly was an expert, yeah, but when you looked at his photo, do you think, oh, that’s an attractive man, or was it purely about, oh, no, he’s an expert. And follow Him because,

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  10:39

well, honestly,

Mike O’Neil  10:40

I think better now than I just

Achim Nowak  10:44

had a bad photo. Is that what we’re saying? The photo wasn’t good.

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  10:49

I don’t know. Maybe, baby, I don’t know. No, when I saw the first time I read his post in tweeted, really, he has no a real picture. I remember you did like warfare style. You paint in seven and colors is your Oh,

Mike O’Neil  11:03

that one, yeah, yeah, I was a very stylish. Yes.

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  11:06

There is no a real person. I read his post up, I saw his Facebook, but Facebook was late when we met together. And one day, I post one of my blog posts in Twitter, and suddenly he retweets me. Then for me was my God, my Connie retweet my book. Then I say, thank you. Thank you very much. And after he found me in LinkedIn and send me a request connection and connect with him, he asked me, Do you all remember we met in Twitter? I said, Of course, I remember how purposely. Then I at that time I was finishing my book about linking it, the book was done, but I had no problem. Still, then suddenly, a light, it was in my brain. I writing, I say, I go, lie. You throw up my book. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You say, Okay, I send me the index. Okay, do that. So

Mike O’Neil  12:12

her book was about how to write 10 perfect LinkedIn profile. And I knew a lot about that because I had written several books on profiles as well. So, and I didn’t know anything about, I mean, I’d read a little Spanish, hola como estas, but, but her, I sent it to her in English. And what did you do with that? Yeah, I

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  12:32

asked to a neighbor to translate, because my neighbor was from United States, and they say, oh, it’s perfect, my neighbor. Then, please translate this. I have to send this man to Mike. I send the index. Donna sent me till 20 days. Then I thought, maybe this man think, but he says, Miranda from Spain,

Mike O’Neil  12:54

Genesis to Chica.

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  12:55

And one day he answered me I’ll say, Yes, I was very busy. Sorry for the delay. When do you need the text? I say, when did you have time? Then he sent me the product. I published the book. This was the first book published in Spain about LinkedIn. Then for me, was very important, because, of course, when I I make the presentation of my book, of course, was the big picture of Mike O’Neil in the second slide of my PowerPoint. Yes, now we saw that. We I can’t believe the line, how is the life? Well, is that? How I met Mike? Because my book, and after that, I wrote all the book, social selling book. At that time, we are more relationship. For example, Happy Christmas, Happy Birthday. Was very grateful to him, because for me, was very important his support. And I invite him several times to come to Spain with his girlfriend, Lori RAF. At that time, I said, with Lori Ruff, here you have a room for both blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But he was very busy, very cooperative with his family, his parents. I never do, no, isn’t it couldn’t come No, exactly.

Achim Nowak  14:13

I appreciate the details about how you first established contact, and I love the fact that, like a LinkedIn love story, right? It started to LinkedIn, but take me to and they want to throw to you, Mike, first, if you tell this, and then Esmeralda can elaborate her experience. But how did you actually end up connecting in Costa Rica? How did you get to Costa Rica? Mike, and then, how did you know that? Oh, this is more than a professional LinkedIn contact among you, first and Esmeralda can add to it, okay. Well,

Mike O’Neil  14:50

it was during COVID, the very beginning of COVID. I’m working in a basement in Minnesota, not enjoying winter so much. Really not a. Great place to be in January, February, March. I had gotten the idea to go to Costa Rica three, four months before, with some friends I knew in Denver. So I went to Costa Rica, and I went all over, five different places in Costa Rica. This is not with Esmeralda. This is the year before, and I was working in flip flops and a tank top or no shirt even, I mean, literally, don’t I put a shirt on for my Zoom calls. But with my work, I can work remotely like that. After the first year, I thought, wouldn’t it be great to have some people I know, other business people that I know, Friends, friends and not family, but friends to come and join me down here. So I the next year, I was, this is going to be annual, and it was for years, I invited other people to come. I got a list together on Sales Navigator. I used my messaging systems to send out messages, and Esmeralda was on the list, but there were 30 other people on the list. And Esmeralda was very quick, very quick to say yes. Well, very quick, quicker than anybody else. And I stopped asking anyone else, because we started to flirt, a little bit, flirting, you understand? Yes, I did. I flirted with you. You were back to me and and we ended up doing daily calls on WhatsApp. We showed up in Costa Rica together, and that’s a good spot for her now to talk about January five, the day we meet in person in Costa Rica, right?

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  16:37

Yes. Well, it was very funny, because when he invited me, was october 2021, I was having a lunch with my friends, and suddenly I received the SMS with invitation at the beginning. I think what I do in Costa Rica, I want to say I was alone nine years because I divorced for my second husband in nine years ago, I living with one of my sons, and really, I was happy with my life. I was gone with my new company because I closed the company I had with my husband and opened a new company in 2015 free in my life at this moment, was very in peace. But really, this SMS, it’s okay for me, but I like I don’t tell a friend. I don’t know why Adelina is a way it left me thinking about but my sons push me, and my friends push me. Why don’t go to Costa Rica? This is the problem. There is no problem you have the pets, but pets is take care of your sons. The home or exactly the same. Then I say, Mike, okay, but he don’t know this part of the history, because he received, yes, okay, Mike, I go. But the time I need, this time to take the decision. When I take the fly. I take the fly this January five, but between october 2021, and five of january 2022 of course, as Mike said, he’s sending us a message every day WhatsApp and starting cultivating the relationship and working. I

Achim Nowak  18:14

like your language. Cultivating relationship. It’s a little more elegant than flirting. Mike, I want to say so I appreciate his marvelous choice of language here. Thank you.

Mike O’Neil  18:25

Now you’re speaking better English now, when we met, she didn’t know any English, and she was the queen of the Google Trends. She wouldn’t do a voice call or a video call with me for many, many years because she didn’t want me to know that she knew nothing, nada about English, yes or no, happy birthday. That’s all she knew. Only

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  18:50

that when I arrived at five of January, I tell him, please talk me slow, because only I will understand the 30% that you to tell me, but we don’t need to talk,

Achim Nowak  19:03

so I’m going to be a little mischievous right now. So was this secret at the beginning that you didn’t understand everything you were saying, and it was much more about the energy between the two of you,

Mike O’Neil  19:18

I think so. First of all, I was in a relationship, but I was not very happy. She was in a relationship, but she was not super happy either. We weren’t in the perfect relationship, either one of us. At the time when we found out that we were both of avail able, as she likes to say, things really changed, because I was looking for something new in my life. You know, big part about your show here is, you know, what’s new in life? How? What do you do later? I’m in my 60s, and I could really use a jolt of something great. And that was Esmeralda. She was that wonderful thing that came into my life that now my whole life is about her,

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  19:58

me, I think the same. Here in Spain, my friends say, but what is happening? There is no man in Spain. You go to move to United States to look at men, I guess, yes, I found the real person that I need, because it’s true. When you are getting older, one more, no, all the person is good for you. I don’t know exactly. I know

Achim Nowak  20:21

what you’re saying. We got it. You understand

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  20:23

me, and in this nine years I spend alone, I don’t need any other person, because really, I don’t perform. First and second, the person who who come to talk with me is not for me, but I prefer to be alone that to be with a person that don’t fit with me, but like when I met him, really, Mike is very singular. It’s not the government, it’s not the government. It does I love well.

Achim Nowak  20:49

But let me ask you a question again. This is I’m asking it for you, but also for all everybody who’s listening, because you two met in person, finally, in in a sexy place, Costa Rica, there’s the beach, some people might say, Oh, I feel all these feelings, but I’m in this beautiful place, and it could just be an affair, right? And then I go home, you go to Madrid, and he goes to Minnesota, and then we forget about it. But you didn’t forget about it. So you made the decision to continue and get married. How did you know that this wasn’t just just a fun affair in Costa Rica? How? And I’m going to go to Mike first. How did you know that I think this is more than than that? Um,

Mike O’Neil  21:37

it came from when I touched her hand first. Literally, my hand touched her hand, and there was an electricity there that goes, like I could touch this hand for the rest of my life. I really like this. We had dinner, and I kept holding her hand during the dinner. You know, there’s a story that she tells. It’s probably too X rated for here about when I walked her back to her room. I said, you know it’s not I’d love to not say goodbye to you. Now, I’ll make it more. PG, she wasn’t having that. She decided that was going to be it that night. We were going to take it to all the way. Yeah, she had her room and I had my room at the hotel, the hostel. From that on, we just had one room, and we knew it. I knew right away that, right away that this is going to be it for the rest of my life. I was in the right position. I was able to do it, but I still, at the time, I’m caring for my mother at the time back in Minnesota. So it had to wait a little bit, and my mom passed away, and within 10 days I had moved to Spain. Literally within 10 days I was there, yeah, my mom was in hospice. We knew it was going to come, so I was able to prepare. And really it was not two weeks and I had moved,

Achim Nowak  22:59

I want to ask you as miralda, because I know Mike moved to Spain, Madrid, where you were. But one option for people who are older, in the 60s, who fall in love is you could decide to just be together and not get married, right? You could just be happy and live together, but get and say, I’ve been married before, two times you said, like, I let me just have fun with Mike, but maybe I don’t have to get married, but clearly you two chose to get married. So why was for you getting married, in this case, to Mike? Important? Well,

Mike O’Neil  23:36

that is a good question. I really want to hear the answers.

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  23:42

Certainly, we’re living in two worlds, different, separate but one person, okay, then the solution was traveling and go and back and go and back and spending money, spending money. This is true. Then by other side, his mom passed away, then is the opportunity for him to thinking to make a new life here in Stein white, here in Spain, but,

Mike O’Neil  24:09

but the question is, we could, I could move here and not be married to you here. We could just be a boyfriend and girlfriend, Novia, novio, but we decided we wanted to get married, not just to live together. Well, they’re

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  24:22

a big reason. It’s a big reason. If Mike is coming here only as boyfriend, he has to make legalese like his situation in Spain, yeah, as in this United States, is complicate all the documentation you got to do and the hospital, many, many, many things. Yeah, these are very complex. Then we decide to marry it. Because if we marry what all is easy. First, his labor, immediately. Secondly, more important, in our age, he has free health insurance. Yes, we have. One of the best in the world in medical service, public and this is for me, one of the more important is because when he arrives, he takes a private insurance. This is okay, but would you know when you are getting older, the private insurance don’t like you only one young people, because you are not profitable, then starting to growing the prices every year. And this is not the problem, because if you have money, you pay. The problem is the certain sickness don’t cover, don’t cover, then the more easy is get married, because we want to be together, and we want to be together easy way, not with complication. And

Mike O’Neil  25:41

so I think there’s more than just the financial side of that. We were deeply in love

Achim Nowak  25:47

with each other. You know, I live in Portugal. I’m a European citizen. I have a partner. We’ve been together for when I was seventh year, we’re not married, and I suggested we should make just get married. It will make it a lot easier for you to live in Portugal with me. Everything you were saying is meroza, and he said, he’s basically said, I want to get married for the right reasons. That is so unromantic, you know. But the point is, you two love each other anyway. So we got that,

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  26:16

yes, right, yes, right. But also you have to pay attention to the real things. We love each one together. But the real things is we are getting on there, and we need a coverage. And the only way is to do that is the easy way.

Mike O’Neil  26:34

Now we were deeply in love, and we’re all the other boxes were checked. This is just the exclamation point, yeah,

Achim Nowak  26:43

I love you. Remind me of my partner who has to just explain that we really do love each other. It’s not a fake marriage. So we got, we got no

Mike O’Neil  26:54

Achim. There’s one thing that comes up. I’ll put it up little bottom line on this. Yeah, I recently was diagnosed with prostate cancer, and it came into life, and they had to remove my prostate. It was a really big deal. And without the public health insurance here, like we’re talking about here, I would have been in a difficult situation. I might have had to go back to America to get the care that I needed. I

Achim Nowak  27:16

appreciate you saying that I’m living in Portugal now. I’m very familiar and for anybody who’s listening, you know, who’s thinking about living in a foreign country, obviously, the ability to have health care and appreciate you is Morella talking about how positive you feel about the health care system in Spain. That’s a consideration. Let’s look a little bit to the future. I’m talking to two LinkedIn specialists. Suddenly, they’re married to each other. So I’m curious, are you working on stuff together? Are you like the LinkedIn superstar couple now, or are you doing your separate projects? Is it changing the way you conduct your business. Let me start there.

Mike O’Neil  28:05

You’re exactly correct. We are the super couple. We’re the golden cup on LinkedIn. There are no other couples on LinkedIn that have 35 years of experience helping others on LinkedIn, 20 for me and 15 for her. I mean, it’s just not out there. But at this stage, we want to focus on things that we enjoy. You know, we need that spark to get to the next few years and less than five, less than five because ezmeral is going to be able to retire next year at 65 my number is 66 and we still want to work a while. We just want to work on things we really enjoyed. We did a project for Mercedes Benz here in Spain earlier this year. It spawned us to write a software application called sales helper. And I’m not going to dive deep into what it does, but on the surface, it helps people find customers on LinkedIn using a manual, personal, customized approach, as opposed to the automated spamming systems that people are used to seeing. And it’s very inspiring to me, in developing a software application with developers, it’s targets the kind of people we want to be working with, the most Esmeralda goddess, the developers here in Spain. So we talk to them, and developers say, let me talk to you in Spanish, Esmeralda. And they go back and forth. And then she says, Alright, Mike, let me tell you where she is doing her branding work with people she really likes, and she’s getting really good referrals coming coming into her so I think we’re going to be pretty inspired to work for another two, three years, perhaps. But we got our eyes on the beaches. You know, we’re thinking about condis and Canary Islands. We just were there. We want. Spend life with sand in our toes a little bit more? Yeah,

Achim Nowak  30:03

I’d love to hear from from you. Esmeralda, too, because of getting married again in your 60s, you’re successful professionals. Mike already talked about it, but what are some things that you maybe want to do more of in your life because you have a husband you love. I heard the beach. Are there any other things in us? Marijuana ago. These are things I would like to do more of in the next few years.

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  30:31

Yes, I had a life very rich in the sense of the experience, but a good experience I had. I was the owner of different type of companies, advantage companies in Morocco, Turkey. I have a big experience in the life. Really, I don’t need big things. Yeah, I enjoy with the little things. For example, walk with Mike and my pets and the pets for the forest, go to the swimming pool, go with our flip flops for the into the beach. See the sunset, go to a concert. Well, in my case, loving much than me the concert, very much, but doing the tamper things and be in peace with without pressure. One thing that I hate is the pressure and the stress. And this is the the two things that I want to slow, to slow, step by step, to abandon in my life.

Achim Nowak  31:33

Yeah, you said that so beautifully. That was so clear. Now I want to just pivot to you, Mike, because to have a life with less stress, it means being willing to let go of some things, even things that we’re very good at, that people celebrate us for. I’m noticing myself living in stubal, Portugal right now as I I still feel like I do too much, and I do a lot less than I used to do. So the process of like slowing down that you’re describing Esmeralda and letting go things is not easy. How? Why don’t you elaborate on what Esmeralda was saying, Mike, and how do you see yourself being more of that?

Mike O’Neil  32:17

You know, well, my life has slowed down since I moved here, I have slowed down. I running at 70% of the pace that I was running in America. Esmeralda has a very complicated life. She manages the home relationships. Her mom is 90, and we care for her mom every third week. Her kids have got things that are important. And going on, one of her sons trying to be a fireman, and he’s going through his work to be a fireman. Here, she has a complicated life, and my life is quite a bit easier. So I’m the supporting person. It’s a flip how it is in the United States, very often the man, the man has a complicated life, and the woman is supporting the man. I’m doing more of that here. Little things around she hasn’t taken the garbage out in quite a while. Let me put it that way,

Achim Nowak  33:07

but the way that, let me just go a little deeper with that one. Because you all see, you’re creating a life together as a couple, but you Mike left familiar place in the United States, and you’re the one who moved to a foreign country. I’m assuming you’re learning more Spanish, so that’s a pretty radical change, right?

33:27

Talk some more about how Mike is changing being in a foreign country now,

Achim Nowak  33:32

sometimes not understanding what Esmeralda is talking about when she’s on the phone speaking with her people in Spanish. Like, how are you adjusting to all of that

Mike O’Neil  33:43

well, when we have family dinners here and they and often we entertain a lot, we have a really great home, yeah, swimming pool, big yard, lots of friends. People come over in the summer, and I just kind of sit there and just kind of try to catch a word here or there, because they talk so darn fast, yeah, and they don’t talk one at a time. They’ll talk and listen and talk and listen at the same time. It’s like, you know, here we’ve got a speaker and a microphone going at the same time. They go so fast and and I can’t tell where one word stops and another word starts, because it’s like cursive language, and they don’t have spaces in between the words. It’s all troubled together. So I’ve struggled with the Spanish. I’ve struggled learning Spanish here. It’s one of the big things I got to learn. Alright,

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  34:29

yeah, very funny. It’s true. In this home, we have always people in the even in summer, more because we have a swimming pool, then everybody comes the weekend to make a paella, to make things at the beginning my state, I don’t understand you say we got we go to take lunch together. How is possible the last last six hours?

Mike O’Neil  34:52

Unbelievable meals go on and on. You have lunch, and then it’s

Achim Nowak  34:56

dark. I’ll leave it at that. But again, that’s one of the. Beautiful adjustments to living in another country. You know, I’m learning Portuguese. I used to speak it as a child, but the Portuguese speaker, they speak really fast. There is no break between words. It just comes out. So anyway, let me stop here. I would like to wrap it up with this question for and I’d like to hear from both of you individually, as two adults, in your 60s, fairly newly married with you, both have a lot of life experience. If you had a chance to give some advice to your younger version of you when you were a teenager, based on what you know now about life, what would you want them to know that you couldn’t have known when you were in

Mike O’Neil  35:48

just because you’re good at something doesn’t mean that that’s what you should do. I was good at math, so I became an engineer. And frankly, if I’d have gone into taking business classes and stuff, I would have been retired long ago. I had great ideas and with some business sense, but I was kind of boxed in by being good at one thing. And I thought, you know, the world has defined that for me, I am good at this. So that must be what I do. And I was, I think I could have been more open to other things, I had a little bit of tunnel vision. And I, frankly, I blame my dad a little bit for that. My dad is the one who suggested and kind of pushed me in to going into engineering school instead of, you know, going into college in general and deciding what I liked when I got there. I like the idea of going to school and having general studies to figure out more, to learn more about yourself, because you’re exposed to more things when you go into college, if you’re in a more general environment, that’s for me, I would have the variety pack instead of the single thing to study. That would have changed my life quite a bit. I have a few regrets about that. Actually, Esmeralda,

Achim Nowak  37:00

if you could give some advice to young teenager Esmeralda, based on what you know now, what would you say to young Esmeralda?

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  37:13

Well, I had very good memories about my father and my mom. My father passed away several years ago by he was an example for me, both an example for me, because they always trust on my decision and support my decision. I remember when I decide to abandon the science, they put a lot of money investing in my career. Send me to Madrid, because we don’t live here. We live in the northern Spain. Then I spent five years studying my career of biologists. They invested money time, and suddenly, after nine years after I decide to say, bye, bye, don’t do any more of this path and choose other. And they always support me, even the idea for other people was crazy. Then I tell that, because be confident of yourself. This is very important. But this is not easy. That’s depend on your family, your education, no, but if I have to give the advice to young people is that never stop dreaming, and above all, never stop taking action. Because many people have ideas, but never good idea. Working working on the foot, then, because those who don’t take risks don’t win. This is a sentence that I love, and also I love all sentence from behavior in the innate book, say fortunes favors the brave in Latin, Fortuna audac. And this is a sentence that I recommend to young people or to everybody in general.

Achim Nowak  39:05

Well, as I reflect on your stories, both of you have been risk takers, you know, and both of you have gone through significant changes in your lives to to get to where you are today, which is very inspiring to me now. Mike, just as before, I say goodbye. If anybody who’s listening to us wants to learn more about Esmeralda or about you, where would you like to direct them? Is it? LinkedIn is a website. Where can we find you?

Mike O’Neil  39:37

Yeah, LinkedIn would be the place, probably for both, for both of us. And I would assume that we can put a link or something, somewhere that associates with the with the podcast, with the podcast here, what I do with my name Mike O’Neill, and it’s 1l o, n, e, i, L is. I put an American flag and a Spanish flag after my. Eight. So it’s easy for people to find me just pick the one with the flags, because with the with a billion people, you know, how many Michael Neal’s are there on on LinkedIn? Quite a few, although I do tend to show up first, yeah, and my

Achim Nowak  40:15

name is exactly.

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  40:18

Esmeralda diazaroca with a dash in the middle. Dash in the middle. Diasa, okay, this is me, yeah, and

Achim Nowak  40:27

I’m assuming if people send you a message, you will respond Correct. Of

Esmeralda Diaz-Aroca  40:32

course, of course.

Mike O’Neil  40:34

We’d even do a call if they meet us in person. We even do a free call, yeah,

Achim Nowak  40:39

well, I thank you for this conversation. I’m inspired by your journey. I’m glad you recovered well from your health issue. Mike, thank you for talking about that and reminding us of the importance of healthcare. You know, which really does matter. Goodbye for now until the next time. Okay, bye,

Mike O’Neil  41:01

bye. Say hi. Thank

Achim Nowak  41:05

you so much for listening to this episode of The my for the ACT podcast. If you like what you have heard, please like us and leave a review on your preferred podcast platform. And if you would like to engage more deeply in fourth act conversations. Check out the mastermind page at Achim nowak.com it’s where fourth actors like you engage in riveting conversation with other fourth actors. See you there and bye for now. You.