SEO business targeting international clients

Hello Warriors!

Over the last few months i have been studying a lot about various SEO techniques (did a couple of courses too) and web designing.

I met a guy recently who deals with SEO for the past 6 years (owns a marketing business) and i told him my plan: That I decided to pursue SEO and web designing as a possible career and my main target to be international clients(individual & corporate) and secondary target would be where i live (Cyprus) for obvious reasons He simply said that the keywords would be too competitive and to general for me to even be able to rank them anywhere near the 1st page of google. He also asked " why would anyone want to find someone for SEO on the net?" because of the amount of complexity a project may have .. its best to find a local SEO expert to have face to face communication. To top it off ... he didn't even try targeting other countries ... his clients are 100% all in Cyprus and he's not doing so well ... obviously!

This absolutely destroyed me and I am still devastated by what he told me ... but something inside me is telling me that there's a chance this all might not be true ...he seems a bit dodgy

Any advice please? is it possible to target internationally? And would is this even a good idea to you guys ?

Looking forward to your replies

Thanks in advance

Aris