I’m Nelson Lopes. I write about difficult people, and I am not a therapist.
That second part matters, so let me get it out of the way first. I have no degree in psychology. I am not licensed to counsel anyone. If you are dealing with abuse, or something that has your health in it, you need a professional, and I am not one.
What I have is seventeen years in Brazilian banks.
If you have never worked in a bank, that number probably means nothing to you. Let me put it another way. Seventeen years of angry customers. Of managers who said one thing in the meeting and another in the hallway. Of colleagues who smiled at you and then went around you. Of learning, slowly and badly, that being right is not the same as being effective.
Why a Brazilian writes about this in English
There is a lot of good advice in English about difficult people. Most of it assumes you can be direct.
Say what you mean. Set a boundary. Address it head on. Have the hard conversation. It is good advice, and in the culture it comes from, it works.
I did not grow up in that culture.
In Brazil, the direct approach often costs you more than the problem does. You do not tell your colleague he undermined you in the meeting. You do not tell your aunt she was rude at lunch. Not because you are afraid, but because the relationship has to survive Monday, and the family has to survive Christmas. So you learn something else. You learn to be indirect on purpose, and effective anyway.
That is the part I have not seen written down much in English.
I am not going to tell you Brazilians handle this better. In a lot of ways we handle it worse. We avoid things that should be said. We let resentment sit for years. But we are very good at one specific thing: staying in a relationship with someone who is difficult, without either exploding or disappearing. When you cannot walk away, you get creative.
If you have a coworker you will see every day for the next three years, or a family member you cannot cut off, that skill might be worth more to you than another article about setting boundaries.
What I write about
I write in Portuguese at Como Lidar com Pessoas, which I started in 2025. It gets read mostly in Brazil and Portugal.
This English section is new. I am starting with five articles, and they cover what I actually know something about: people who twist your words, what to say back when someone is rude to your face, the feeling of walking on eggshells, coworkers who undermine you quietly, and passive aggressive coworkers.
Not the theory of why they do it. What you say on Tuesday morning.
A note on what I get wrong
I am going to be wrong sometimes. Two reasons.
The first is that I am writing in my second language. Not the grammar, mostly. The tone. There is a way of saying something in English that lands as firm, and another that lands as rude, and the line between them moves depending on where you are standing. I will cross it without meaning to.
The second is bigger. Advice that works in Brazil does not automatically work in Chicago. Some of what I know is genuinely useful anywhere. Some of it is Brazilian in a way I cannot see, because I am inside it. I will not always know which is which.
So if something here does not fit your situation, that is a real possibility and not you missing the point. Tell me. I would rather know.
Contact
Two ways to reach me:
- The contact form on this site
I read everything. I do not always answer quickly.