Akbar Sheikh / Coach. TEDx Speaker. Author. Entrepreneur

Building a Life and Business with Purpose

Akbar Sheikh went from living in an electrical closet with no windows, showers, or hot water to coaching entrepreneurs to six, seven, and even eight-figure success.

Along the way, he conquered anxiety, lost 50 pounds, and rebuilt his life with a purpose: to help others make more so they can give more. In this episode,

Akbar shares his inspiring story of personal transformation, the importance of balancing faith and business, and how his "Make More to Give More" philosophy is changing lives around the world.

5 Key Takeaways:

• The power of resilience in overcoming personal struggles
• How to adopt a “Make More to Give More” mindset
• Strategies for scaling a purpose-driven business
• The role of philanthropy in business success
• How to balance faith, family, and entrepreneurship

LINK: AkbarSheikh.com

Paul Povolni, the founder of Voppa Creative, has been a creative leader for over 30 years, with clients around the world. He’s led teams in creating award-winning branding and design as well as equipping his clients to lead with Clarity, Creativity and Culture.

Headsmack Website

Transcript

Paul Povolni (01:37.007)

Welcome to the HeadSmack podcast. My name is Paul Povolni So glad you've come along for another interview with Misfits and a couple of head smacks along the way. I am so excited to have Akbar with us today. Been looking forward to this. He's got quite a story, quite a story of head smack moments that have brought him to where he's at doing some amazing things in the entrepreneur space. He's collected some commas along the way.

but he's also had some moments of revelation and some moments of life change right now. He's focusing a lot more on making more to give more. And so before we get to that, Akbar, thank you for being here, man.

AkbarSheikh.com (02:23.501)
Yeah, man, it's nice to be here.

Paul Povolni (02:27.119)
And so let's start as far back as you want to start with your origin story, because, you know, right now you're doing some, some amazing things with entrepreneurs and, and in business. And so before you got to that place, I know you've had quite a journey to get there. It wasn't always with all these awards behind you, it wasn't always, you know, doing well. So tell me a little bit about your origin story. Where did it, where did this all start?

AkbarSheikh.com (02:55.086)
You know, honestly, man, I think it's a story of discovery. I think that...

I'm just gonna, I was not always God fearing or God loving, I should say. So I am now, so I kind of speak from that lens, but I'm not here to preach. But I do believe that everyone is born with a gift. And I believe one of the keys to contentment is to understand your gifts and to use it to make the world a better place.

In order to do that, you need to be in the right environment. In other words, if I'm awesome at raising cattle but I'm in the desert, well, yeah, I'm not, there's gonna be a misalignment of energy. So I think that's really my story, and I think that's most people's story in the sense that I was the dude who's great at raising cattle in the desert, meaning,

Paul Povolni (03:44.687)
But it's not gonna quite work, yeah.

AkbarSheikh.com (04:00.494)
I was in the wrong environment ever since a young age. I was in a traditional public school. I should not have been in that environment. I think I needed to be in a more Montessori or a different type of school that was more hands -on, that you didn't just sit in classrooms all day. That's not how I am geared to learn. Then I was in the wrong businesses. I was selling cars.

in an environment that I didn't like. I didn't have an understanding of how it worked. I didn't have the right mentors. Um, I don't know, man. It's a little sad. Actually. I, I don't know. I mean, it's, I guess I just did a podcast earlier today and we were going over some of this stuff, but, um, you know, I haven't thought about my past in such a long time. You know, I, if I was to redo thing, man, I would redo a lot of things, you know, I'd redo a lot of things. Um,

I was in retail, totally wrong environment for me, too boxed in, too dependent on clients, were the customers always right? And I don't believe that to be the case. So I was just in a bunch of wrong environments, which is why I kept failing. I also didn't have the right mentors in my life.

AkbarSheikh.com (05:30.158)
for a lot of my life. So, you know, things changed for me once I...

Paul Povolni (05:32.303)
Yeah.

AkbarSheikh.com (05:38.478)
fell in love with God, once I cleansed myself, went, you know, lost 50 pounds, got rid of my toxic friends, got rid of my toxic habits, then I was primed to succeed. Then I found where I'm best at, which is, you know, just, you know, helping businesses grow. Then I was given the freedom to do so.

on my own accord and that's where I finally thrive. So yeah, you know, things, we started from scratch. I mean, I used to live in an electrical closet with no hot water. No hot water, no showers, no windows. I kind of ruined the story by being totally honest because I've been telling this story for the better part of a decade and people have the reaction that you just had. But you want to know the truth, man? I loved it.

Paul Povolni (06:16.367)
Wait, he lived in an electrical closet?

Paul Povolni (06:34.575)
Yeah, why?

AkbarSheikh.com (06:35.374)
I miss it, yeah, I miss it. Well, it was very low stress. The landlord charged me roughly $100 a month, utilities included, electric. Well, there wasn't any heat or AC, but I mean, it was just kind of like California, so it was fine. It was always fine. The temperature was always fine. I joined Planet Fitness Gym, $10 a month. I would take showers over there.

Paul Povolni (06:47.791)
Wow.

AkbarSheikh.com (07:03.118)
It was, to be honest with you, it was fantastic. But yeah, you know, I did, I did start from scratch. There's no doubt about that. I did fall for a lot.

Paul Povolni (07:10.159)
So, you know, living in the electrical closet and, um, you know, showering our planet fitness, what was the trigger moment that started changing things? Was that when the change happened? Did something else happen to you or that changed you?

AkbarSheikh.com (07:25.262)
The change it started before that, it was starting to change while I was going through that process.

The moment that changed my life is when I was in network marketing and I was gonna give up, you know, when you're broke and desperate, where do you go? Network marketing. No offense, anybody. It's just kind of just a little cheeky, but I was about to give up, just like I gave up in so many things. But then like what happened was the network marketing is every morning they'd have a conference call.

Paul Povolni (07:45.071)
Right.

AkbarSheikh.com (07:58.67)
And all the dudes would share like, yeah, this week I signed up five people, this week I signed up 10 people, this week I made 10 ,000, this week I made 20. And like you're doing the math and it's like, I remember one call, it's like, you know, there's only a few people in the calls like, dude, this small group of people made $75 ,000 this week. And it just hit me because I'm listening to the people and I'm like, you know, these are like, no disrespect, no ego, but I'm like, these are not like superstars, sharp, amazing people.

They were, they were like, they were chill, cool, kind of like you said, a little misfits like, like me. Uh, I'm just like, dude, if they can do it, I can do it. And it was just a moment where I'm like, you know what? It's actually not the system. Cause everyone says, you know, they blame the system of scams. It's always you. And so I just had that moment where I'm like, it's me. Wow. And.

Paul Povolni (08:39.087)
Yeah.

Paul Povolni (08:47.791)
Yeah.

AkbarSheikh.com (08:52.91)
And I just had this beautiful moment. This is the moment where I became a millionaire and I was completely broke at the time, but that's the moment I became a millionaire. I was like, Oh my God. It was the first time I truly believed that, wait a minute, I can be successful because other people are. So why can't I? And I made this decision. I'm like, I'm going to make this work or die trying. There's no option B. I'm just not going to leave here until I succeed. Um, and I did end up being, um, a top 1 % earner. I think that's definitely one of the biggest head smacks of my life. There's no doubt about that.

Paul Povolni (09:05.615)
Yeah.

Paul Povolni (09:15.791)
Yeah.

Paul Povolni (09:23.407)
Yeah. I think for a lot of people, they feel that way. You know, why are people that are not as skilled as I am doing better than I am. And so when, when the person feels that way, what do you tell them? Do you have people that tell you that?

AkbarSheikh.com (09:32.43)
Yeah.

AkbarSheikh.com (09:39.79)
Man, to be honest with you, you know, we got to be honest. We got to be real. Um, there's a lot of factors at play here, man. There's a lot of nuances. I'll give you an example. I was telling this interesting story. Where were you based out of? Okay. You're not originally from there though.

Paul Povolni (09:52.015)
I'm in Jackson, Mississippi right now.

No, no, I was raised in Australia.

AkbarSheikh.com (09:58.382)
Yeah, okay, my wife's from Sydney.

Paul Povolni (10:00.687)
Cool, very cool.

AkbarSheikh.com (10:02.126)
Um,

When my wife and I first got married, we had no money. I was still in that network marketing phase.

I had no money, zero in savings, nothing. As a matter of fact, I told my mother -in -law before we got married, I'm like, you know, I call her mom, like, mom, like, you know, we got to delay this wedding. I don't have any money. And she said something I'll never forget. She's like, listen, don't worry about it. God provides. And I was just like, whoa, okay, let's do this. And, you know, I had made some sales. I was an overnight success after my head smack, meaning after 10 years of failure.

Paul Povolni (10:24.207)
Wow.

Paul Povolni (10:41.679)
Right.

AkbarSheikh.com (10:42.51)
You know, so I started making sales right away. I remember I made a $500 or $1 ,000 sale. We had zero in savings, nothing. And this is an interesting story. There was a restaurant in New York at the time it was ranked the number one restaurant in the world called Eleven Madison. $250 per person, prefixed meal, Michelin star restaurant. We went, my wife and I. Cost us $500, which was literally half my net worth.

Paul Povolni (11:12.047)
Wow.

AkbarSheikh.com (11:12.206)
because all I probably had to money was a thousand dollars. So that's a very interesting story. You're gonna say to yourself, well dude, what the hell? You just spent $500 on a meal when you guys have no money? Like, are you insane? But the reality is, I did grow up a little differently. I grew up in retail. My family had dollar stores. I was a cashier in the stores growing up. I always saw money coming in.

I always saw on the weekends they're busy. I always saw, I was like, people come giving money constantly. It's a dollar store, they're busy on the weekends. And I never had a money scarcity issue. Because I always, like even right now if I needed whatever, a thousand bucks, five hundred bucks, whatever, $10 ,000, just go get it. Just go make an offer, just go sell something. Go do something, go tell some jokes, go do just ask for it, whatever. You know.

Paul Povolni (11:48.815)
Right, right.

AkbarSheikh.com (12:09.294)
So I've always had a very healthy mindset in that regard. So all that to say that, you know, you had mentioned like some people are like, oh, how come other people can't see? You know, you have to look at the holistic situation. The first person to look at is yourself. Look, the hustle culture dictates, no excuse.

Paul Povolni (12:13.199)
Right.

AkbarSheikh.com (12:31.438)
The hustle culture is extraordinarily false and toxic.

Paul Povolni (12:37.135)
Yeah, talk a little bit about that. Cause it, you know, people have been talking about the hustle culture for a few years, but not as much now it doesn't seem, but for a while there, everything was about the hustle. Everything was about the grind. Everything was about that. Talk a little bit about that for the person that maybe still is in that place of hustle and grind. And I'm just not working hard enough. I'm just not grinding. I'm just not, you know, what do you tell them?

AkbarSheikh.com (12:44.718)
Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah.

AkbarSheikh.com (12:57.614)
Oh gosh. True growth comes from balance. I mean just study nature. True growth comes from balance. And just like nature, they are seasons. Right now is the spring, where I am, and all the dead trees are budding. And all these beautiful flowers are coming up. In the winter, everything's dead. Similarly, you have to look at the season of your life.

When I first started getting success, I didn't have anything crazy going on in the sense that I was healthy, you know, family's healthy, nothing crazy going on, didn't have kids. It was a good environment for me to grow in. It's kind of like if you put a seed, an apple tree seed in the desert, well, good freaking luck. You know, you need the right soil and rain and sunshine.

Paul Povolni (13:51.023)
Hehehe

AkbarSheikh.com (13:55.15)
You know, I almost went bankrupt last year because my sister was diagnosed with cancer and I just stopped paying attention completely to my work and I was focusing on my sister and getting her cure. It was not a season for me to grow. So give yourself some grace. Maybe you have a crap marriage and I did too and guess what? I was broke.

I couldn't grow. When you have a crap marriage, good luck growing, like good freaking luck. And so, you know, when I had a crazy marriage, no success. When I had people sick in my family, no growth. This is normal. This is fine. There are seasons for growth. So, you know...

Paul Povolni (14:26.383)
Right. Right.

AkbarSheikh.com (14:42.51)
And understand that, you know, and again, I, you know, I apologize. I do feel awkward, you know, talking about God and stuff because I'm not here to preach and I don't know what people believe, but it's just my own personal story and beliefs. You know, God has a plan for everybody. You know, that you might have a plan for you to succeed at age 21 or 61.

Paul Povolni (14:54.703)
Right.

AkbarSheikh.com (15:01.294)
You can't look at other people and think, oh, well, why them? Why not me? Everyone's got a different plan. I got, I got success late in life. I mean, I, and, and, and sometimes it is annoying to see these kids half my age killing it where I was like, you know, you have to remind yourself, okay, that was, that's what, that's what's meant for them. And this is what meant for me. And, you know, I got a late start in life and all this is okay. That's fine. It wasn't at the end of the day, it doesn't matter. You just have to look, here's the thing.

Paul Povolni (15:24.207)
Right.

AkbarSheikh.com (15:28.878)
The goal is to enjoy the journey to the goal. My in -law, yeah, my in -law drives me nuts. He doesn't drive me nuts, actually he's a really cool guy. But he's one of those people, like for example sake, for example sake, let's just say you're going on an hour drive somewhere. There's two types of people.

Paul Povolni (15:36.367)
That's good.

AkbarSheikh.com (15:57.934)
There's a type of person, they're not stopping at all. They're just, they're all about the destination. They go, they're not, no bathroom break, no McDonald's break, nothing. You know, that drives me nuts. I want to be honest. I'm the kind of guy, Oh, look at that cool antique store. Pull over. Oh, look at that cool ice cream stand. Pull over. I'm all, yeah. Yeah. And, uh, that's what I really recommend to everybody is really just enjoy the journey. Cause you honestly have no idea what the destination is. You might think, you know, but, uh, you know, God might have other plans for you.

Paul Povolni (16:02.863)
Right.

Paul Povolni (16:08.271)
Yeah.

Paul Povolni (16:13.199)
You enjoy the journey, right?

Paul Povolni (16:27.247)
And I do want to talk about your relationship with God and you know, is that, you know, something that is a new recommitment? Is that something that's always been a part of you? Um, but well, so, so, so, you know, when did that transition happen? If it happened, or was this just always a part of who you are?

AkbarSheikh.com (16:37.582)
Well, no, no, go ahead.

AkbarSheikh.com (16:47.054)
Oh no, I was a very bad person. I was a very, I mean all humans are sinners. I'm still a sinner. I try my best, but you know, you definitely, everyone sins, unfortunately. We try our best. When we sin, we try our best. We try to learn from it and not do it again. You know, we try to discover the root cause and take ourselves out of different environments.

But no, no, no, I was not really a God -fearing or God -loving person. Most of my, hold on a second, yeah, I would say, well, most of my, when I was younger, I was not. No, I didn't pray, I had a lot of bad habits, I was a party guy. I ended up half dead from partying too much. And, you know, I was saved, and then I really took that seriously, and I changed my life, you know, dropped my bad habits, went organic, started praying.

started building my relationship with God by studying him and listening to lectures by people Joel Osteen type even though I'm not Christian but you know I'm just giving an example you know like the Muslim version of Joel Osteen kind of thing

Paul Povolni (17:46.927)
Yeah.

AkbarSheikh.com (18:00.846)
And so then education, I'm not one of these entrepreneurs who's like anti -school. I've always been into education, albeit I do enjoy different types of education, but I educated myself on my religion. I started from scratch and yeah, it did wonders for me. I mean, I never found success until I did that, until I built a better relationship.

Paul Povolni (18:37.743)
You froze up there. Okay. Yeah, I can hear you. And so, you know, when, you know, when it comes to incorporating your beliefs and your faith in your business, um, you know, now you've intersected them. Uh, it seems a little more than you had in the past. Uh, what, what brought about that transition? You know, now you talk about making more to give more, um, that wasn't always a part of your message. Um, you know, when did that transition happen? And, and.

AkbarSheikh.com (18:39.086)
Oh, can you hear me?

AkbarSheikh.com (18:59.438)
Yeah.

Paul Povolni (19:05.967)
What was the moment that you decided to take that next step towards doing what you do now?

AkbarSheikh.com (19:12.398)
A make more give more was born five, six years ago. Definitely. It was born, you know, what had happened was I had an accountant. Um, and that accountant represented a lot of online entrepreneurs as well. And I only donate like at the time, like 10 % of gross. And my account was like, Whoa, you know, it's really cool. You're doing a great job. We're proud of you. You're donating a lot.

And I said, oh man, you guys screwed up the numbers. I only donate 10%. You guys have to like redo my numbers. And they're like, no, no, we understand that we got that. But they're like, you realize that none of these other guys do that. And I was like, whoa. And that was like somebody punched me in the throat and the gut at the same time. I'm like, okay, wow, these guys just don't know. They don't know that this is the key to living. They don't know that this is the ultimate giving is the ultimate biohack.

And it's the ultimate business growth hack. When I, you know, we all have slow months. When I have a slow month, you know, the hustle culture will tell you do a promo, do an email, uh, do, do a discount, make an offer, do a JV, blah, blah, blah, all this typical stuff. That's very logical. It makes sense. I don't do any of that. I will, uh, go sponsor a water well.

or sponsor an orphan or something like that. Because God promises that you will get an extremely high multiple on everything that you give. And the key to living is giving and that's how you be happy. There are people who don't understand this that make a lot more money than I do and they're depressed, even suicidal. And it's because they don't understand this, this rule. This is a, again, I think one of the biggest head smacks I've had is, you know,

Paul Povolni (20:41.135)
Wow.

AkbarSheikh.com (21:08.526)
It's about servitude. It has to be bigger than you. And it's a struggle, man. Life is a struggle. This life is a struggle. You're never going to get it just right. You solve one problem, there's another one, right? It's kind of like a soap opera. It's like...

Paul Povolni (21:15.983)
Yeah.

Paul Povolni (21:26.319)
Hahaha.

AkbarSheikh.com (21:27.373)
It's like, you know, we were the soap operas in Australia that are like 20 years long. I think they're called Neighbors and stuff, right? Where it's like, okay, this one ex, you know, this one troubled ex -husband who is gonna like, who's blackmailing me. Okay, he left, but then the next episode's like, well, his brother's back. You know what I mean? And now he's causing problems. And so, I mean, you know, you're never in this world, there's always gonna be headaches and problems, but I think we can reduce them.

Paul Povolni (21:55.183)
Right.

Paul Povolni (21:59.023)
So it gives you a perspective, right? It gives you a better frame in what you're doing and to keep going when things get tough is because you've got something else that's driving you. It's not just about collecting commas. It's just not about, you know, growing a business. There's a little more purpose behind it. And so what brought about that transition for you? What brought about that? You know, you said five years ago, you started thinking about that.

give more, you know, was it was this something somebody said? Was it something you read? Was it an experience with God that you had? What was that transition that happened?

AkbarSheikh.com (22:38.446)
The make more give more?

AkbarSheikh.com (22:43.214)
I mean, how I came up with that exact slogan.

Paul Povolni (22:45.871)
Well, and how you came up with that mindset as well. Like, was there, was there a moment that that, that triggered?

AkbarSheikh.com (22:48.27)
Yeah.

AkbarSheikh.com (22:51.95)
It was, it was that moment with the accountant, uh, for sure. And then how he came up with the actual sentence. I think, I think that kind of funnel hacked that in the sense where I saw someone else saying like, you know, um, whatever sell more, sell more, be more or something. I'm like, well, why do I want to make more? I thought I'd do a little workshop with myself. It's like make more. Why to give, because it's like, what are you going to do? Like once you have.

Paul Povolni (22:54.511)
Yeah.

Paul Povolni (23:16.815)
Ryan.

AkbarSheikh.com (23:20.494)
Stuff, you know, once you have a nice house and a nice car and you know, whatever the hell you want. It's like, well, what do you want? Another, you know, what do you want? A tiger, another tiger with a pink diamond on its paw? Like, what do you want? You know what I mean? At some point you're just like, all right, man, there's gotta be more to life than this.

Paul Povolni (23:36.879)
So what do you tell the person that is in the place that you once were? Whether it's they're all the way back in the electrical closet or they're in a place where their business is struggling, they're struggling for that next step. What do you tell somebody that was in that same place as you once were?

AkbarSheikh.com (23:56.878)
You know, be an explorer. Success is nothing but an option. If you're not thriving, see why. Look at the root cause. What environment are you in? What's your physical health like? What's your mental health like? What's your relationship health like? Who are your friends? Who are you hanging out with? That's what's a relationship with God. This is the first, this is the key to success is really optimizing all that.

What I just mentioned, once you do that, you will find success. I haven't met anyone who's optimized and all that. And they refuse to give up.

and they're not doing well. You know, I've handed out over 80 trophies to my clients when we help them make six, seven, eight figures. And I'll tell you the avatar, this is what they look like. This is the commonalities of all the trophy winners. They're very nice people. They're givers. They refuse to blame anybody but themselves. They work consistently and persistently. They take fast action. Um.

And most importantly, they refuse to give up. They've had some sort of success in their life. So this is, you know, it's not complicated. We complicate things. It's really more about the art of letting go, which is not easy, but the reward is worth it.

Paul Povolni (25:18.287)
Yeah.

Paul Povolni (25:25.071)
Right. Now I've noticed, I've noticed a trend, at least in the, in the circles that I'm in and, and maybe you've seen the similar trend of entrepreneurs that have, you know, what I call collected the commas they've, they've, they've reached success and they're starting to talk a lot more about their faith. Why do you think that is? Why do you think that, you know, it seems to be a lot of entrepreneurs are kind of getting back or, or starting or finding a new, uh, their faith.

AkbarSheikh.com (25:59.95)
None of us, this is a very interesting and deep conversation. None of us went to school to, none of us grew up thinking we're going to be like an online coach or an online agency or whatever the hell people do like Amazon or crypto or, you know, any of this stuff that all of us do, all of us online entrepreneurs, none of us grew up thinking we all primarily we're all here because something went wrong.

We had a different plan, our plan wasn't this. Something went wrong. And being lost and desperate brought us into this world. And once, you know, and people who are lost and desperate, they're generally not God -fearing people. I keep saying God -fearing, God -loving people, generally speaking. And so...

I think it's just a very natural progression that once they start getting a little bit of success, they're unsatisfied and they search and they explore and they search for contentment and happiness and peace and then they find God in that journey. So I think it's just a very natural progression.

Paul Povolni (27:13.487)
Yeah. Do you wish you were at the place you are now earlier or was it a necessary journey?

AkbarSheikh.com (27:20.814)
Well, I mean, you know, I try to have this mindset of no regrets, but I mean, you know, yeah, I mean, why not? I mean, you know, why not? Why not have it earlier? I mean, it is, you know, getting older is tougher, you know, I've definitely, you know, got a little bit more kinks in my neck now and, uh, uh,

Paul Povolni (27:39.983)
You make new sounds when you get up out of your recliner. Yeah.

AkbarSheikh.com (27:44.142)
making you sounds and you know, kids, you know, kids take a lot of energy and time and effort. Although that's not necessarily entirely true. I mean, I still work Monday through Friday. I don't work on the weekend, but I never really did. Um,

AkbarSheikh.com (28:06.254)
Yeah, I mean, listen, you know, I think it's important to get your life sorted as soon as possible. There's no need to suffer for years and years like I did. If you know, which is the beauty of, of, you know, podcasts and YouTube is that you can learn things that, you know, we, we didn't know. I'll give you this, like a, like a small example. It's like, when I bought my house, I is just ignorance. I didn't know. I just.

got a 30 year mortgage because that was just the standard and I didn't even know there was anything else. I didn't even know to ask for any other option. It turns out that a 15 year mortgage saves you hundreds of thousands of dollars.

you just don't know what you don't know. I was ignorant. So I did end up switching. But that's the beauty of listening to podcasts like this and consuming content is that you learn these things that could hopefully give you big shortcuts, save you a lot of time and money. I'll give you another example. My cousin just spent a couple hundred thousand points on an international flight for him and his family.

Paul Povolni (28:47.119)
Right.

AkbarSheikh.com (29:05.646)
He booked it through American Express, which is a ripoff. He didn't know that you can actually transfer your American Express points to British Airways, and you can get the ticket at a fraction of the cost via points. You just don't know what you don't know. And by the way, I think I wasted a million points before I knew about that myself. So.

Paul Povolni (29:17.647)
Yeah, wow. Right.

Paul Povolni (29:24.239)
Oh my goodness.

AkbarSheikh.com (29:28.238)
It's important to educate yourself early on. That's definitely one thing I would really do in my life is educate myself more at a younger age, have right mentors at a younger age. These things are very important.

Paul Povolni (29:45.583)
So who's been the biggest influence for you to get you to where you're at? Has it been a person? Has it been a book? Has it been a quote you read somewhere? Like what was the biggest influence to get you to where you're at?

AkbarSheikh.com (29:59.63)
I mean, besides the obvious, besides obviously God, I was lucky when I had sold my car to get my first mentor in network marketing. I didn't have any money. And I was fortunate. There was a lady there. She was basically kind of semi -retired. She was a little older. Back in her heyday, she was like the number one earner. And she, for some reason, she was a talker and...

She developed a liking for me. I don't know why. I think I was young and energetic and excited and, uh, I was very nice with her. Um, so she took a liking to me and she really spent a lot of time mentoring me and teaching me the ropes. Uh, and I learned a lot from her. And then I went, you know, I, I, my mentors, definitely. Um,

You know, Russell Brunson, Sam Ovens. These are some of the more recent ones. To be honest, I'm kind of in the market for another one right now. But there's spiritual people like Mohammed Faris, who wrote some amazing books that have been very insightful, very helpful. Talking about blessings, how to get blessings in your life and how to be more productive. So, yeah.

Paul Povolni (31:28.527)
Well, then it sounds like, you know, for you and I think for a lot of people, you know, those, those people that impact them aren't always the, uh, the big names, the ones that people know, you know, you had mentioned this lady that made a huge impact on your life. Um, you know, and it was just somebody that just said the right thing, the right time gave you time. And that's kind of what I'm hoping even with, with head smack, this podcast is, you know, something somebody says, um,

AkbarSheikh.com (31:54.446)
Yeah.

Paul Povolni (31:55.599)
that just changes somebody's life. They just implement one idea and it changes everything. And so I appreciate you being on today Akbar and this has been really good and thank you for sharing your heart and your story. And I know it's gonna inspire somebody with what you've shared. If somebody is interested in being a part of what you're doing and part of your world and they wanna learn more about making more so they could give more, how do they get a hold of you? What's the next step they need to take?

AkbarSheikh.com (32:21.742)
Just go to my website, akbarsheikh .com and you'll see a pretty funny video. And it'll get you in our world.

Paul Povolni (32:28.239)
Ha ha.

Paul Povolni (32:33.103)
Awesome, man. Well, thank you so much and you have an amazing day and I hope those that are listening to this today, you know, take some of the valuable things that Akbar has shared and implement them immediately. You know, take the next step, you know, wherever you're at, whether you're, it's in your faith, whether it's in your business, whether it's in your mindset, because I believe that one idea executed can change everything. And so thank you Akbar and you have an amazing day.

AkbarSheikh.com (32:46.67)
It's a.

AkbarSheikh.com (32:57.23)
Absolutely. Yeah, thank you, man. Appreciate you. Thanks, everybody. Peace.