We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Jïo Alèxio. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Jïo below.
Jïo, appreciate you joining us today. Can you share an important lesson you learned in a prior job that’s helped you in your career afterwards?
I’d say the most important lesson I learnt from my time working in a gym for a few years as a service associate and fitness trainer was understanding the balance between ambition and self-care. I went into the fitness industry, as a backup plan to be honest, with the passion to help others, but the reality of the job—constant sales pressure, client retention struggles, and emotional investment—was draining in ways I really didn’t expect at all. I’d say the experience taught me resilience, independence, and the importance of advocating for myself in a work environment.
Tho’, what really shaped me from that experience wasn’t just learning the technical skills of training—it was realizing that just because I’m good at something doesn’t always mean it aligns with happiness. That’s a huge entrepreneurial and creative lesson. It showed me that passion needs the right environment to thrive, and that’s why I now approach my career with more self-awareness, ensuring that whatever I chase after (whether fitness, art, mixology, or freelancing) serves me as much as I serve it.
Out of the many years I clocked in studying fitness science to then not be supported by a company I worked for a while (including helping with “beautification” of the place, such as sketching out custom advertisements to attract people’s attention) made me rethink my whole plan to still not only purse fitness training but to reawaken my true passion for art. I mind as well find a way to combine both, and make a freelancing business out of that.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
I find myself into all of these interests to be some sort of “jack-of-all-trades” guy. When I was young, you can say I was forced to learn something creative since the country where I grew up in required all students to know some form of art/craft. Luckily, I enjoyed sketching- making traditional fine art. While later on in life, I took culinary arts in high school, in which it quickly evolved into mixology instead. By the time I was in college, I already knew multiple languages; I simple studied them for fun. Now a days, I switched to learning a science to include looking fit, living longer/healthier, great pay, and flexible schedule to have a lot of open free time to hone my creative skill tree. Hence, it explains why fitness training wasn’t my first career choice.
As a freelancer, I offer both product (traditional fine art), and service (fitness training). I did spend a life time learning how to work with pencils, pens, and colored pencils/markers to create products. As well as, a few years learning the fitness science, believing that I was going to make a career out of that for a company, but hey, I still have my certificate proving otherwise, and the mountain of notes I still have that helped me ace my exam with flying colors.
Clients and folks always do have questions regarding one’s own health and pains that they have. Most common would be how does one lose weight, or gain muscle. As I still recall a lot of information from the years I dedicated to learning fitness, I can over explain a lot of what they ask for; which then it turns into not only finding solutions to their fitness needs, but the next thing they have trouble with in the motivation and self discipline to actually do it. That is something I can’t fully solve for them, it needs to be met half way.
Perhaps this whole “jack-of-all-trades” thing I feel like I have is something very niche about me. I couldn’t just simple rest all other curiosities I wanted to explore more and invest some time to learn a new skill. It also had to do with what I have been told by my father (may he rest in piece) that “There aren’t any art jobs here.” “I have never heard of a company needing artists to keep on drawing out portrait, or cartoons around here.” He made it clear that this is something that should be mainly focused as a hobby, so “pursue something else that you might be good at. Take culinary in high school for a steady career” Thus as all of that evolved from culinary to mixology, surrounded by many foreign languages in the touristic country I spend about half my life in, and lastly taking up a hidden interest in biology that of which is fitness science. It’s all a mess; a great mess in a sense.
I could say that I am proud that I really stuck to my huge belief of not breaking my back during my school years. I know that sounds odd, but I’ll explain. Ever since my middle school years, I started to ask… what’s the point of all these core classes? it all seems repetitive. I don’t see myself ever needing to learn how to calculate the surface area of shapes, needing to write essays about books (that were later banned), or needing to know the life of some of the earliest American presidents. During the majority of my school years in the states, I spend MOST of my time doodling, sketching, and learning a new language. I may have graduated with a D- at best, but I had a massive portfolio of portraits, and photography (photo editing that I was experimenting with) and fluent in 5 languages. So, It would seem that graduating from grade school didn’t guarantee a career, nor does college (unless its a major study such as medical, or law etc) as many people who did graduate with honors, and/or attended college are usually still stuck at a dead end job, unable to find employment, and/or are generally still unhappy. While I stuck to my guns, and said “I found these core classes useless, while I self studied materials and crafts that I personally enjoy the most to open up more skill trees and advance on that.”
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
As I stated earlier, I was pushed by my family, and the school system that doing good school was tHe OnLy ThInG that was going to give me a “bright future”. The many people I have met in the work force, mostly say that they did very well in school but are still unsure of what they want to do in life. Many people aren’t career driven. Other’s are completely happy working in a warehouse, others work in IT and are unhappy with the same repetitive life styles. Lastly, the most successful people are the one who talked to most in school, and had the most friends due to the vast amount of connections and charm they have of being an extrovert. Those are the sales men/women who quickly obtain management and corporate jobs. I am very very very certain that it wasn’t the pressure of doing good in school that will get them both: a good job and happy life, BUT it’s the connections you have AND the “sales” skills in the social tree, the gift of gab.
Have any books or other resources had a big impact on you?
As I was quitting my last job, in the gym, I stole a few books from my manager’s office out of frustration. I even sent a picture text to an ex-coworker of mine who disliked the manager we had of the books I stolen. Not only he laughed and approved of my pilfering acts but he also HIGHLY HIGHLY recommended me to read with GREAT focus on the choice of books I pilfered: ‘Sell or Be Sold’ and ’10x’ both by Grant Cardone. He told me that those books are one of his favorites, and it’s what’s going to help me understand HOW important it is to learn how to sell in general. I have always been timid by nature, so if freelancing is going to be my next step in life, then I must learn how to “sell”. It has made me understand and solidify so much more that how much people who have such a sense of charm and extroverted natures are the ones who had the most success in life. It wasn’t enough for me to break free from my timid nature but it did help me greatly see the importance of “selling” (as in selling yourself in the form of ideas, thoughts, etc)
Contact Info:
- Instagram: @artejacked
