After A Long Time At The PSX For Meetings. #MirMak

KAASH This Had Happened Or AGAR That Would Happen...#MirMak

KAASH This Had Happened Or AGAR That Would Happen...#MirMak\

 

 

Hazrat Ali A.S. said that us humans live our lives between 'Hope" and "Despair"... Nothing could be closer to truth than that. We have hopes and for that reason we are optimistic and we pray to Allah hoping for our prayers to come true. We have Iblees always following us and trying to pull us out and away from hope to despair and maayoosi because it is his ultimate goal to put negativity, in human mind. And this tug of war is what Allah likes because it proves to him that despite of Iblees trying to pull his people away from hope, he is not succeeding. He is not being able to shake the faith of humans in their creator. He is not succeeding in putting negativity in our minds. He is failing to embed in our minds that Allah is the only answer to all our problems.

Take it a step further and you visit another perspective of thoughts. A different approach towards belief in Allah. People who spend their lives wishing (KAASH) and hoping for "What If" (AGAR) are actually living closer to confusion and further from faith than anybody else. Why ? You may say that we all have wishes and what is wrong in having wishes ? Yes you would be right in saying that but wishing is a hollow approach towards faith. It is a scapegoat for people who do not want to develop solid faith in Allah. People who have solid faith, put in an effort and then believe, not wish, believe that if it is good for me, what i have put in an effort for, Allah SWT will definitely give it to me. He will provide it for me. The timing will be his, the effort will be mine.

Now let me take this to another level further in thoughts than the previous paragraph. People who say Kaash Aisay Ho Jaata are actually questioning Allah's wisdom. Yes they are. Because if you believe that Allah does whatever he does, for your best, then how in the world can you say that Kaash waisay hojaata. It means you are saying that what he, the almighty chose for you was not, first, the right thing, And Secondly, you are saying that you are not happy with his decision for you because you are still wishing for something against his wisdom. Shukar has many levels. We humans think that saying a few words from our mouth in Allah's praise is shukar...its the lowest step of shukar on a staircase of million further steps. Saying Alhamdolillah is like taking your first breath as a child, you still have the rest of your life ahead of you. It is the thoughts that matter more than your words when it comes to thankfulness. Being thankful with your words and wishing for something else in your thoughts is an absolute dichotomy, an absolute Tazaad in your mind and your heart. And people with Tazaad are just a few steps away from being Munaafiqs and the people Allah dislikes the most are Munafiqeen.

When you put in your 100% effort into something and you do not get the desired results, but the condition is that you put in 100% effort and not 60% and think that it was 100%, bow down in Sajda to Allah and thank him. Yes thank him for not getting what you wanted even after your 100% effort because believe with 100000% surety that if you did not get what you wanted, it must have been so bad for you that Allah, being an Aadil, still did not give it to you. Imagine a mother not giving something to her child who is the best child in the world. It is almost impossible to believe but if i said to you that the child wanted to blindfold himself and run and play on the road, you would immediately say that, of course the mother did the right thing by not letting the child have his way. ALLAH loves you more than 70 mothers love combined and what you were wishing for or doing "Zidd" for was perhaps you blindfolding yourself and running in the direction of traffic, traffic of life. So he saved you.

Next time you say Kaash or Agar, think twice. Instead of saying these two words say, Achha Huwa and Usko Behter Khabar Hai....

BUY HIGH, SELL HIGHER Needs To BE Taken As A Caution In The Markets. #MirMak

BUY HIGH, SELL HIGHER Needs To BE Taken As A Caution In The Markets. #MirMak

 

 

First of all lets begin with clarifying that i love the value in Pakistani Stock Markets. It is still trading around 10.6 multiple compared to the regional multiple of 16 or so. So there is room to grow. Interest rates are at the lowest. GDP growth is expected to be around 5.3% for 2017. International outlook towards Pakistan has become favorable. We are declared one of the best stock markets of the world. Corporate earnings are strong. Chinese consortium has bought into PSX that has brought international attention to PSX in abundance. And the list can go on for the long term perspectives of the markets. PSX came out like a roaring lion in 2017, entire January. Euphoria was created and social media gurus are luring people into buying everything in sight. This gave birth to a phenomenon rarely known by people in this part of the world, which is, BUY HIGH, SELL HIGHER.

Buy high, sell higher theory defies the age old theory of Buy Low Sell High. Buy high sell higher gives birth to non savvy investors. It gives birth to unscrupulous financial agents looking to generate commissions only. It also gives birth to a euphoria which starts to defy current price discovery of stocks. Future price discovery is very different than current price discovery. Future looks great. Future of PSX looks bright. Future of the prices look excellent but current price discovery is a bit high to me. Another phenomenon is that since we do not have any short selling in ready markets, this means that the upward trajectory of stocks had no resistance. Not all stocks can be shorted in "Futures Market" thus it leaves people with one choice only, which is, sell at a higher price then wait for it to come down so they can buy it again at a lower price. That leaves no room for liquidity while the stock is going down because nobody is buying and covering their short positions when the stock is going down. So the stocks come down faster in Pakistan then other countries i have seen throughout my career.

Plus the Lower Lock phenomenon is the worst psychological deterrent to new buyers. It has failed to bring any positive results in any markets. The worst effected market by Circuit Breakers (Locks & Caps) was China itself in recent history. It had to reverse their decision, and they did. Once a stock goes to a lower lock it gives an impression based on the number of shares offered for sale that it will go down further the next day, this scares the buyers and further selling comes in.

Having said all what i said above, i believe that a minor correction at these levels would be the most healthy thing for our markets. It will bring in new buyers. It will create more confidence. It will be a natural event. Correction only means a correction. It does not mean a crash. SECP has put in enough measures in place, according to its Chairman itself who made that statement few days ago that we will not see a crash. And i fully agree with him. So make your decision based on logic. Buy more or take profits, its your choice. I did my job of educating all of you of what i think. Thanks.

The Youngest Pakistani Female To Have Given A Speech About Pakistan At The PENTAGON America. Anza Saqib. #MirMak

The Youngest Pakistani Female To Have Given A Speech About Pakistan At The PENTAGON America. Anza Saqib. #MirMak

The Young Heroes Of Positvity In Pakistan. Anza Beta Keep It Up. And Many Thanks To Maria Miandad For The Signed Bat From Javed Bhai.

On A Lighter Note. American Cartoon Legacy. #MirMak

On A Lighter Note. American Cartoon Legacy. #MirMak

DONALD (Duck) is the President. MIKEY (Mouse) is the Vice President. Washington D.C. Will now be THE DISNEY WORLD and cartoon characters will run the affairs.

WASSUP DOC.... will be the OFFICIAL greeting at THE WHITE HOUSE.

Pakistanis And The ECONOMIC JIHADIS..#MirMak

The most misunderstood word in Islam to me is the word "Jihad". Every war mongering, peace hating, human rights violator understands it to be his right to destroy others in the name of Jihad. We all know what Jihad stands for, at least the ones who have any basic understanding of Islam, its a continuous process of struggle or to strive for betterment, a betterment which is internal more than external. A betterment of "Self" more than the betterment of society because a society is made up of many "selves" and individual betterment brings collective betterment.

Economic matters work in the same fashion. Individuals contributing towards themselves translates into a collective betterment of the entire national economy. It is not the other way around. If you study the history of economic improvements, rarely has it been a task of the governments, governments have only been the catalysts that remove the barriers for individual economic progress. Nothing more.
In Pakistan the cart gets fixed before the horse. I think it goes back to our pre-independence mental training of depending on  "Our Masters" to bring about a change in our lives instead of us thinking of ourselves to be empowered enough to do it ourselves. The same stranglehold translated into the villages and the tribal systems of our country where one man considered to be the controller or the dispenser of economic betterment in the form of the village head. But the day is not far in Pakistan when each individual will begin to realize that economic prosperity is like an economic jihad. A continuous struggle for betterment of ourselves in absolute tough environment. Just like the concept of "Real Jihad" of self in Islam where it becomes almost impossible to not have opposition on your path to betterment, economic jihad is the same. The moment you start to do well for yourself, people from within your own circle start to distract you to deviate from your Jihadi path. And the Jihadi path is not of war or attacks on others or violence, a true jihadi is only concerned about bettering himself through discipline.

Making a halal living and contributing towards the betterment of the society from that earned bounty is the economic jihad. Hurdles at every step. Negativity at every corner. Discouragement at every nook. Us Pakistanis have suffered for decades, some out of our own mistakes and some because of the mistakes of the people who steer our government and our defence institutions. But the time has arrived when we need to become one. we need to rely on ourselves rather than look towards others. It is that moment in our lives where Pakistan is rising and rising high. Take a note of your attitude towards the betterment. If you, yourself can not be a economic jihadi then realize that you should not stand as a hurdle in the way of the ones who are doing the real jihad, the real jihad of making Pakistan a country full of economic jihadis. Insha Allah that day is not far. Ameen.

Forget Your Ambition. Create A Passion. #MirMak

Forget Your Ambition. Create A Passion. #MirMak

Walk out of your house, close your eyes, extend your arm and the first person you touch, ask them this question. "You want to make a million dollars ?" And the answer, undoubtedly, every time will be a yes. Now ask that same person, what is your plan to make a million dollars. And mostly you will find people baffled by your 2nd question. Why ? Because ambition is nothing but a "Want". It is easier to have ambition. It takes no effort to have an ambition. It sounds great and makes you look important in other people's eyes as well. People call you AMBITIOUS. Very nice sounding word "Ambitious".. Isn't it ? Even your parents will be proud of you when someone calls you ambitious in front of them.

In actuality, ambition is nothing but a want without a plan. The easiest thing in the world is to declare your ambition in public. Most of the people do it to impress others and to make their own self worth increase in their eyes. People who have a plan do not have time to sit and discuss their plans in public. They do not have time even for discussion and even if they did discuss, what benefit will they get from it ?
So, Ambition is just a want to have something. Passion on the other hand means you will go and get what you want at any cost, at the cost of hard work, at the cost of acquisition of knowledge and skills, at the cost of others standing in your way..At the cost of fighting negativity..you name it, and you will do it when you are passionate about something in life. Passion is actually having such belief in what you love to do that even the biggest of obstacle can not stand in your way. The problem with the youth around the world is that they keep changing their ambition from time to time. They spend their life chasing ambition instead of creating passion. If the Technology field is "In" season, they develop ambition to become a techy without ever asking themselves if they even like what they are chasing after. Thus becoming an average TECHY and hating what they do, in most cases or in others, forcing themselves to like what they do. They end up spending their entire life, "Making A Living" instead of progressing in what they do. They may get promoted with experience but they will never be leaders who create and lead ideas.

Passion is to human mind, what water is to a fish. One of the greatest humans ever to inhabit this earth, Albert Einstein, once said " I have no special talent, i am just passionately curious".... What a statement that is. If you look deeper, the man has described the recipe of success as passion. Passion accompanied by all the other relevant traits, such as positivism, resilience, tenacity, optimism, and Belief In Allah, will guide you through life like the wind guides the sails in the ocean. You do not see the wind but it takes you to your desired destination, even across the longest of oceans. Life is an ocean. Let the winds of passion take you across. Never forget that in order to achieve something great, you require greater effort than others. Keep pushing yourself for excellence. Never stop to even bother. Create that focus in yourself. Find your passion in life and stick to it. If you want to do something do it with passion or walk away from it, altogether.

Being A Good Person Is A Learned Behavior...#MirMak

Being A Good Person Is A Learned Behavior...#MirMak

You want others to look at you with kindness in their eyes, look for goodness in everyone through your eyes first. You want others to speak good about you, start to use your own lips to talk good about others. You do not want others to hear evil about you, stop believing in rumors about others. Give, and give in abundance to others what you want for yourself. Give even if you know you will get nothing in return. Exhale goodness first and soon you will begin to inhale goodness.

Being a good person has nothing to do with your religion, your nationality, your color, your social status or your political views, it has only to do with who you are inside. If you do not respect who you are, you will not respect others. If you do not believe you are decent, you will think others are indecent as well. Once you begin to look for faults in others, you will have no time left to correct your own faults. And correcting your own faults is the beginning of becoming a better person. Yes, i said "Becoming", which implies that goodness is not from birth but it is a choice.

Goodness begins with a belief and ends with behavior. If you believe that you are a good person then the hard work begins. You have to turn that belief into a behaviour. And the road from belief to behavior is the road less traveled because it is a road full of hurdles without any immediate results. It requires patience, it requires resilience, it requires positivity and it requires thankfulness. It also requires a desire to become a better person. And all desires require a learning process to shape it into reality. And reality is first for yourself and then for others. So becoming or learning to become a good person is not to get praised by others, it is for your own self first. Becoming a gentle friend, becoming a good son, a good brother a good sister, a mentor to others, speaking positive even when surrounded by negativity, not reacting to anger even when you are absolutely right, all these things benefit you as a person before they benefit others.

It will not matter when you are 90 years old as to how famous of a life you have lived. How many deals you have closed. How many people you have employed. What will matter is what kind of deals you have closed, have they benefited others ? The people you employed have you treated them with kindness ? How humble you were if Allah had given you fame and power ? At the end, someone else will take your place. You will be forgotten within a few decades if not a few years. Your great-great grand children will not even know your name in most cases.

But what will matter is, how much you loved others while you lived. How gentle and kind you were when you dealt with others. And how gracefully you let go of the things that were not in your control and smiled instead of being irritated. And all these things can be learned with a WILL and with TIME.

My Lessons From My Failures. #MirMak

My Lessons From My Failures. #MirMak

The biggest deficiency i have seen in the youth of Pakistan is their fear of failure. And the funny thing is that they do not admit that they are afraid of failure, rather, they come up with other psychologically impressive excuses to avoid trying, thus avoid failing but they do not understand that by avoiding failure, they are avoiding success. Their excuses are very logical ones for a common man to hear... and by the way..All of IBLEES's reasons are logical as well.

They may not be true, but they sure sound logical. I was born to a poor family. This country is not fair..There are too many corrupt people in this country. I need to look for perfect financing for my idea, I do not have an MBA degree, I need a political backing to get a job.. And the excuses can last for ten days and these young brilliant minds on top of that will defend their excuses with such tenacity and belief that sometimes i think that if they used the same tenacity and belief to convince themselves that Life is not fair in every country. some places less and some places more but life is not fair anywhere. There are corrupt people everywhere, Here may be more financially corrupt but other places they could be morally corrupt of prejudice or unethical or anything else.
You can find one million reasons to fail, you have to find that one reason to succeed. Failure is not a person, its an event. Just like any other event that you can learn from. I have yet to see any other nation where the youth is equipped with every other quality that is required to succeed, such as resilience, tenacity, positivity, belief in a higher being, thirst for financial freedom, and the list can go on.

With all the bombs blasting in the past 14 years, not a single youngster has given up on life and stayed back home or quit his education. That is resilience. Even knowing that after graduating from the best of the university, they may not find a job, yet, they keep forging ahead with their education. That is tenacity and positivity. With all the terrorism around these young people for the past decade and a half and knowing that their life can be taken away from them at any given moment..yet they still roam around their cities like they are living in some heavenly place. That is belief in a higher being that nobody can take their life but Allah. I can go on counting another 20 more qualities in these young people which the youth of the western countries would give their right arm to have them. The sad thing is not that you have talent and you failed..the saddest thing to me is that you have talent and you do not even realize that you have it. Its like having a car in your garage but you are walking to the farthest of places on foot because you refuse to learn to drive because of the fear of getting into an accident yet you keep complaining that others are driving and you have to walk.

There is no perfect time, their is no perfect business plan, there is no perfect mentor, Their is no perfect education, There is nothing perfect in this world. You have to make it all perfect. The only perfection that exists is with Allah. He is the only perfection in this world. The rest is imperfect. And the beauty of life is to come up with an imperfect idea and spend your entire life working hard and making it close to perfect one year at a time, one month at a time, one day at a time and one hour at a time.

What i learned from failures is far more than what i have learned from successes. If you want to define my life based on the success i have achieved, i am a failure to me but if you want to define my life looking at the failures that i turned into successes, then consider me successful. One thing i learned from failure is that it should never be feared. I also learned that once you face your first few failures, you automatically get confidence to try new things and succeed. I learned that if you keep your mind focused on your problems, you will magnify them and if you keep your mind focused on the solutions, you will magnify them as well. Stop repeating your problems to yourself or to others. Nobody cares. They may show you sympathy momentarily but by showing sympathy they are killing your mind because once your mind gets used to sympathy, it enjoys it like a heroine addict enjoys his highs.

Nobody gives a damn about your sad story. Stop creating one. Nobody cares about your problems, stop telling them to the world. The hardest reality of life is that nobody cares about anything unless you are successful. Nobody. So become successful or stop pretending that you want to. There is nothing grey in life. Its either black or white. So remember that failures are part of life. If you do not fail you will never learn and if you do not learn you can never change and if you never change, You will be exactly where you are 20 years from today...

ProPakistani.pk, My Article And The Incubation Mafia. #MirMak

ProPakistani.pk, My Article And The Incubation Mafia. #MirMak

3 years, thousands of positive articles, hundreds of speeches around Pakistan, thousands of meetings with the students and the young entrepreneurs from across Pakistan, encouraging them, guiding them, being involved personally in their lives and one article i write pointing out the ills of the incubation process in Pakistan, and crap hits the ceiling.

Poor Dr. Umar Saif gets dragged by people implicating him as the target of my article. How pathetic could this get ? I have immense respect for Dr. Saif. He is doing a great job. I have visited Plan9 and have met him personally. I visit Plan9 whenever i get a chance. They are doing a good job. But for every Dr. Saif, there are 99 Dr. Unsafe in the incubation business. Yes it has become a business and that is what i was pointing out in my article. Of course i must have hit a cord in the right place that 90% of the people agreed and it was shared over 3500 times on ProPakistani.Pk and another 2800 times collectively on other platforms. 

It would be absolute ignorance to say that "All" incubation centers are producing nothing. But we are not at a stage where we can take the hit or miss approach when it comes to the Startups. One: because the youngsters need clear direction to fulfill their business dreams. Two: Quality is needed instead of quantity. Yes 7 out of 10 startups fail but we can not take that approach in Pakistan because even after 7 out 10 fail in the west there is still "Risk Capital" available that chases after the 11th deal. We do not have that risk capital in Pakistan. Here we are a culture where gold, real estate and fixed deposits are the mantra for investments. Three: Not every company is going to be bought out like Whatsapp for $18 billion. It does not even happen in America. We need to create businesses that generate EMPLOYMENT and REVENUES not just silly VALUATIONS that no investment banker or the VC will attest to.

Pakistan is a land of opportunities. Pakistan eCommerce landscape has ample room to grow but eCommerce and "Technological Innovations" are absolutely two different things. We are hardly producing technologically innovative companies that can scale up. We are mostly producing eCommerce websites. We need to do both and not just one. We need to do more. The world is watching us. Due Diligence, R&D, Legal Help, Risk Capital, Road Shows, Bridging The Gap Between The Technology Industry And The Capital Markets, a lot needs to be done and i shall write an article with my humble views as to what needs to be done in a suggestive manner in the coming days, Insha Allah

Confusions While You Struggle...#MirMak

Confusions While You Struggle...#MirMak

Never confuse your journey with the destination that you are seeking. Your journey and your destination are absolutely two different things. Your journey will almost always seem confusing, difficult, painful, fruitless and dejecting but it is this period of your life that will decide if you will reach your destiny or not. People do not reach their destiny because they concentrate on the difficulties of their path instead of visualizing the fruits of their destiny. 

Eventually all the confusion fades away. eventually all the difficulties pass. Eventually all the pieces of the puzzle fall into their right places. Do not ever be confused about the struggles that you are going through today. Stop pretending that it does not hurt or it should not hurt. Let it hurt. Let it hurt to its best because the hurt of today will mold you into an icon of tomorrow. It hurts more when we start to fight the pain instead of accepting and moving on with the pain. Pain is there to make you stronger. Pain is there to teach you about life. Pain is there to make you wise. Pain is not your enemy. Pain is your teacher. You can make that teacher your friend or you can make that teacher your foe, its entirely up to you. There is no confusion in life, we make it confusing.

Laugh at your confusion. Smile at your pain. Remind yourself that Allah has chosen you to succeed because you are being taught and being prepared for the future. Your present may look confusing but your future is clear. Even if it seems foggy at present, believe me its clear enough once you forge ahead through the fog. If you want to learn to transform yourself then first learn to rid yourself of confusion. Stay focused on the destiny and let life shape you for your future.

Confusion comes from uncertainty and everything about life is uncertain except death. Death is the only certainty of life so until that certainty and its eventuality raises its head, enjoy every moment of life by embracing it. You are a mountain of energy within yourself. Dig into it. Dig deep. Smile at your difficulties. Focus on your future. And embrace confusion because by embracing confusion you will defeat it. And once you learn to defeat confusion, your future will become absolutely clear to you.

How I Fired My First Employee...#MirMak

How I Fired My First Employee...#MirMak

He was a young ambitious man. Full of dreams and aspirations. He wanted to make it big in his life but deep down inside he was afraid to take the risks. He wanted sureties in life but life offered none. His parents were the only support system for him while others put doubts in his minds about accomplishing what he wanted to accomplish. He was just 22 and was working for the world's largest financial services company at that time, The Prudential Financial Services. He was making a cozy salary plus commission on sales and at that tender age of 22, it was coming out to about $63,000 a year. A basic salary of $28,000 a year plus the rest in commissions. That was more than enough to support himself and give back to his parents. But it was not the money, it was his dream of working on Wall Street in the capital markets. But working in capital markets offered no salary. It was just a commission job.

And to let go off the comfort of a salary was extremely difficult and an enormously risky move as well. Some would even call it an outright madness to let go off a guaranteed salary in return for chasing a dream of making it big without any guarantees. He would think day and night about this. Every person he consulted told him not to make such a move. He was told repeatedly that such a good employment would never come again. He was getting more confused day by day. He went for a few interdepartmental interviews within The Prudential to move from Estate Planning Division where he was working at to stock brokerage division on Wall Street but again he was told there would be no salary. Wall Street, he was told is a place for people with an entrepreneurial mindset. For people who believe in themselves. For people who are not looking for a comfort of a salary but have the courage to earn according to their performance. Specially in the field of stock brokerage.

Wall Street in today's terminology would be an incubation center where people were the startups and their courage was their product, their belief in themselves was their marketing department, their self discipline was the administration department, and working 18 hours a day would be their revenue model. This sounded more like an entrepreneurial journey than an employment. But Wall Street he thought was all about just walking in the first day and making millions the next day. Reality was different. Absolutely different. It was not about a cozy environment. It was not about having doubts about yourself. It was the survival of the fittest. It was like swimming with the sharks. It was like starting his own business. And to start his own business at the age of 22 leaving the comfort of a huge salary was nothing but a disastrous move in the eyes of many.
He needed to decide to either be an entrepreneur without any guarantees of the future or to be an employee with the guarantee of a salary but with the death of his dreams. He realized that he could only learn to swim by jumping into the pool. He realized that he would have to fire the employee within him who wants guarantees. He realized that until the FIRST EMPLOYEE within him, himself, is not fired he could never pursue his dreams. That first employee was Mir Mohammad Alikhan and Mir Mohammad Alikhan fired him without thinking twice. And that was the best move he ever made in his life.

I Love Our Political Parties...#MirMak

I Love Our Political Parties...#MirMak

If you listen to PTI it seems that Nawaz Shareef will be ousted from power within the next few seconds.
If you listen to PPP it seems that Sindh is progressing better than Switzerland.

If you listen to PML-N it seems that Panama Leaks is a conspiracy against them.
If you listen to MQM it seems there is a SAAZISH against every Urdu speaking person in Karachi.
If you listen to ANP it seems that every Karachiite is an enemy of KPK.
If you listen to PSP it seems that they were the most innocent people in MQM and everything was done wrong only and only by Altaf Hussain while they performing Umrah for 30 years everyday.
And if you listen to the anchors, it seems that Qayamat will be happening in Pakistan tomorrow morning. Lol.

Recording Of The Program. PSX HOTLINE With Rohail Intekhab. Topic. Pakistan Markets In The Coming Months. #MirMak.

Recording Of The Program. PSX HOTLINE With Rohail Intekhab. Topic. Pakistan Markets In The Coming Months. #MirMak.

PSX Hotline Host Rohail Intikhab (10th January 2017)

Even The TOUGHEST OF PAIN Is Your Training To Appreciate PLEASURE..#MirMak

Even The TOUGHEST OF PAIN Is Your Training To Appreciate PLEASURE..#MirMak

Just like you can never be a soldier without going through a boot camp training... You can never become a person who completely appreciates the pleasures of life unless you have felt the pains of life as well. Even a General has to go through his initial boot camp training. Life has the same boot camp training..its called pain. Without learning to cope with pain you can never develop tolerance, appreciation, endurance, tenacity, resilience and a million other qualities that a successful person must have. Boot Camps are temporary...And so is pain. But while it is happening, it may seem like it will break you into pieces. Well, that is the idea. Let it try to break you.. because it can not. It can never break you..never. It may seem like it is about to break you every second while you are going through it but it will not because human endurance is much stronger than wordly pain. Worldly pain is no match for your god gifted tenacity. So in actuality the pain is a test for you to show your belief in your God instead of bowing down to the World.
The best tool you can use while you are facing a painful situation..Any painful situation is to exercise patience and positivity. Both patience and positivity are the instructions given to you by ALLAH SWT in times of pain. It is HE who has repeatedly said that 'I am with the ones who have Patience"..and secondly, you need positivity because it is HE who has declared the opposite of positivity, which is MAAYOOSI..a sin. So how could you not win against pain when your creator has given you a PERFECT solution in advance as o how to handle pain. And after every painful situation and after you have followed ALLAH's instructions while in pain.. you will be rewarded by pleasure.
Your pain of today is your strength of tomorrow...Always remember that. So be happy and optimistic when in pain that Allah has chosen you to train you for future strength. And Allah only chooses to train someone for the future whom he chooses to get big things one by. So if he has chosen to put you in a boot camp of life..it means that your future is great... He has already planned to use your abilities to get something great done by you, for yourself and for the greater benefit of humanity. This is what i have learned practically after having gone through pain of the highest order. Where could i have gathered the wisdom to write even two words of encouragement for you if he had not chosen me to go through years of pain. I thank him every moment of my life to have chosen me to inject doses of positivity, Belief, and all the other things into my fellow Pakistanis. My Boot Camp was America and other countries, My Battle Ground was to be Pakistan and i did not even know that. It was all his planning that i sit in front of my laptop and write articles for you. I am the happiest i have ever been. Yes i still go through pain..but i have my belief so strong that i smile when pain even tries to creep into my direction. Because i know.. I will have pleasure coming into my life if pain is walking in my direction. Just like clouds come before rain, Pain comes before pleasure. Its a heavenly sign that pleasure is about to show up in your life..whenever pain is showing up in your life.
Patience and belief will take you intro the land of pleasure, while you are facing pain. Pain is just like a bad patch on the highway of pleasure. Nothing more. So hold on to your steering wheel..Keep driving..drive over the bumps with patience and total control of the vehicle of your life and keep your eyes on the highway of life, you are driving towards good times.

One Of My Favourite Shows I Have Done. #MirMak

One Of My Favourite Shows I Have Done. #MirMak

CPEC. Financial Literacy. Financial Inclusion Of Pakistan Into The World. Rarely does it happen that you do a program and right after you finish you realise that the discussion truly was the most engaging one. And this one was that show.

In Focus Host Dr Athar Ahmed (27th December 2016)

On A Lighter Note: #MirMak

On A Lighter Note: #MirMak

 

A man receives a message from his neighbor.

" Sorry sir that i have been using your WIFE every time that you are not home. As a matter of fact, i only use your wife in your absence due to the fear of getting caught, never when you are home. But today i feel very guilty and i finally wanted to Confess and Come clean . I hope you accept my apology."

Man has a heart attack and drops on the floor. He immediately receives another message from the same neighbor.....

" Sorry sir, Typo. I meant to say your "WiFi"... Not your "WIFE"....

Keep Moving Through Your Pain..#MirMak

Keep Moving Through Your Pain..#MirMak

Everything i know today i know because i did not give up in my worst periods of pain. The pain you go through is temporary no matter how prolonged it seems while you are going through it. But if you quit while you are facing problems, then the pain of quitting will last forever. It will make you into a bitter person. It will turn your willpower into a defeating attitude forever. Once you get your mind used to quitting, every time a problem comes your mind will suggest for you to quit. It will convince you to quit. It will give you logical reasons to quit and once you get used to quitting, you will only feel good in quitting and you will give a million reasons to others that why you quit. You will blame the government, the society, the people who put hurdles in your way, your socioeconomic background, heck, you will even find a way to blame the pollution in your city for you giving up. And the next step will be that you will become such a negative person that you will encourage others to quit while facing problems. You will not out rightly tell them to quit because you do not want to look bad in front of them but you will discourage them in a million different ways in subtle manners. How many of you know people like this in your life ? Almost all of us do.

Face your pain and keep moving it will make you stronger. Face your fear and keep moving it will make you braver. Face your failures and keep moving it will make you successful. Face your disappointments and keep moving it will make you wiser. The secret of all of this is in the words "Keep Moving". Keep moving because life is in motion and for you to go with life you have to be in motion as well. You can not be standing still while time moves on. You will be left behind. You will be broken forever. Its ok to break but its not ok to stay broken.
There is no glory in pain. There is no triumph in difficulties but there is no triumph and glory without going through pain and difficulties either. When the fire inside you to keep moving through your pain and succeed is higher than the fire outside you which is trying to burn you down, you will move through pain with ease and come out a winner. Create endurance in you. Create endurance in your mind more than your body because your body can go through any level of pain. Its your mind that gives up easily not your body.
So become stronger. Become resilient. Become tough. Become focused. Become positive. Become fearless. Become thankful during painful times. Become a believer in "HIS" mercy. And once you become all of the above during your painful times, you will become what Allah intends for you to become.....SUCCESSFUL.

How Driving A Taxi Prepared Me To Run An Investment Bank... ‪#MirMak

How Driving A Taxi Prepared Me To Run An Investment Bank... ‪#MirMak

(Yes Its A Long Article, but If you are young and want to change yourself to prepare for success, I suggest you read it.) Re-posted From My LinkedIn Articles.

If something in life does not challenge your inner self, it will not change your life outwardly. Success comes when your inner ego breaks into pieces. The " I " in you has to shatter before you rebuild your new you. Its like a wall of bricks, each brick put together in totality makes an entire wall. Consider your character made up of bricks. Each habit, each trait you develop consciously or unconsciously over your lifetime from birth makes you who you are. You walk a certain way. you talk a certain way, you think in a particular manner, your likes your dislikes, your approach towards life, your thought process towards a certain situation...they are all like individual bricks, when put together, they make a wall of your personality called " I " or "ME"... And this I or ME is not by conscious effort that it has been developed. You look at other people and learn subconsciously, you witness events in life and you unknowingly develop a liking and start reacting a certain way towards those events when they appear in your life. You have no choice as to where each brick should have been placed, the wall of your personality Just developed over a period of time and you inherited it. You like it or not, It has become you. If each brick is considered a habit, for example, confidence is one brick, laziness is another, positivity is another, optimism is another, and all bricks together make your personality. But you dont have a choice by the time you are in your late teenage years, to rearrange the bricks as per your liking. Maybe you want to have more bricks of confidence in your wall of personality, you cant add or delete a brick because if you try to, then the entire wall will come trembling down.

THEN

Comes a time in your life when you know that the wall is about to break down and all the bricks will be falling before your eyes. It will be the most scariest event in your life and the most beneficial if you handle it right. Because now you can rebuild the life as per your liking. Take out the bricks of negativity and pessimism or the bricks of fear and impatience and replace them all with the bricks of your liking. But it scares you when you know that the wall will break down soon and you dont know how many ugly bricks of your personality will appear that you will not like. And the process of rebuilding the wall will be the most painful process you have ever gone through. My wall of personality was shaken when i landed in America and my first job as a teenager was to Mop floors and wash bathrooms at Burger King on Easton Ave, Somerset, New Jersey. I had so many bricks of ego. My entire wall was bricks of ego, pride, thinking of myself highly, considering mopping floors a derogatory job and everything else you can think of. I had two choices, either not to do it and keep looking for another job making excuses or rise to the occasion and break the wall quicker so i can rebuild it quicker. The thoughts that would come to my mind were many, A person with my family background will wash bathrooms and mop floors ? " I " Mir Mohammad Alikhan will be seen with a mop in my hands cleaning floors at a restaurant ?

But when I decided that as a student i will do everything that all others do in America. I will blend in. Leave my old habits aside. Will have no ego. Will work harder than even the Americans. All of a sudden the wall started to break and there were so many bricks in my wall of personality that i did not like or know that they were there. Then began the process of rearranging the entire brick formation and rebuild the wall one brick at a time. But at least this time around i began to put the bricks in places that i wanted in my personality. positivity, optimism, humility, confidence, pleasantness, and whatever else i wanted. I realized that very soon this process will become my past and it will be the most beneficial thing i would have ever done for myself. Because past is where you learn your lessons, future is where you apply them and its the middle where you should not give up.

Then came a time when i started driving a taxi in summer time. Taking passengers from all over somerset county to Newark airport. Every time without fail i would get a different personality of people. Angry, pissed off, talkative, happy, pessimist, overly confident, you name it and i would have to deal with them. Never could i have guessed what the next passenger will be like. I started having a conversation with each passenger. I would drive the cab for 16 hours a day, from 7am till 11pm at night. Seven days a week trying to save up for my next semester's fee. I realized that all my hardships were coming from outside but if i failed, my failure will only come from inside because i gave up. I decided never to give up. I started to learn from such diversified group of people with such varied personalities. It developed an interest in me for human behavior which till this day i am fascinated with the subject. Learning about situations, personalities, events and many many more things from my dear teachers, my passengers, prepared me for Wall Street.
yes, driving a taxi prepared me for success. Wall Street is the same, you never know the next move of the market, if its in a good mood, bad mood, confused or whatever. The same is with the clients. you never know what he is thinking. You never know if the deal will work out or not. You have to leave your ego aside and deal with every situation at its own merit. Without per-proposed expectations. Be ready for anything. Any Hardship. Use the new arrangements of your personality wall of bricks to your advantage. No point in stressing over something you cant change, rather, change yourself and grow stronger. People say you only live once. They are wrong. Very wrong. You live everyday. You only die once. So live everyday and get closer to your dreams. Live your dreams. Dont let your dreams die before you. Your death should come before your dream's death. Thats called die trying. And thats the only thing you have in your favor, trying. All the hardships of today will look easy if you believe in your deepest part of your subconscious that tomorrow will be a better day.

"Impossible" .......Never Believe It For A Second. #MirMak

"Impossible" .......Never Believe It For A Second. #MirMak

"Impossible" is not a fact. Its just an opinion. Always remember that right from the beginning of this year. And on top of it remember that it is an opinion of a person who does not have the courage to live his dreams. Its an opinion of someone who does not want to come out of his comfort zone and change the landscape of his life. What seems impossible to you will become a reality over a period of time if you do not give up. Yes it is difficult, yes it would look like it can not be achieved, yes there will be an immense pressure on your mind trying to pursue your goal, yes there will be people who will not only laugh at you but also create hurdles for you, but your competition is not them. Your competition is YOU versus YOUR THOUGHTS. If you believe the thought that comes into your mind that what you are pursuing is not possible, soon enough by the repetition of thinking the same thought, you will begin to believe it as well, like others do.

You reading this article was an impossibility a few years ago, like many other impossibilities of my life. 3 years ago when I decided to come onto Facebook, I only wanted to join a social network if I could play a positive role in the lives of other people. I never had a single account on social media prior to that. And in the beginning when I used to write articles like these, I would not get a single like for days upon days. That never discouraged me even for a second. My goal was not likes. My goal was to dispense whatever knowledge and positivity I had gathered over the years to the youth. My friends told me that it was impossible to put positivity in the minds of Pakistani people. I was told that I was too “Amreeki” in my approach. I was told everything under the sun to make me think that I was chasing a mirage. But I kept telling myself, like I have always done throughout my life that its fun to purse the impossible because impossible becomes possible only with your determination.

Life sometimes is nothing more than going after a dream, risking all you have for a goal that nobody believes in and nobody can see except you. Everything in life you know today and every successful person that you read about, in the beginning was ridiculed, laughed at, his character assassinated, his goals pitied, until the day came that he stopped listening to them and they gave up discouraging him and from that moment onwards began the journey of his success. A lonely road, a road full of hurdles, a road where you cry alone, laugh in solitare, doubt yourself like others, sometimes, but you keep moving on. Its like walking through a desert where the public is at the oasis, your walk through the desert will be lonely but your goal of reaching the oasis will be greeted by many and cheered by a lot of people.

If you want to accomplish the impossible. First start by doing what you need to do. Stick to it like your life depends on it. Stay positive. Stay focused. Stay passionate about it. And once you have become used to doing the things that you need to do, then go and do what is possible to do in pursuit of your dream of doing the impossible. Once you do the possible and become good at it, within no time you will come to a point where you will be doing the impossible. And if you face any hurdles at any stage, repeat the same process again from the beginning.

Success is not impossible. Reaching success without having failed is impossible. Its that simple.

I Apologize Publicly For The First And Last Time....#MirMak

I Apologize Publicly For The First And Last Time....#MirMak

After my article about the incubation centers and wrong startup culture being promoted went viral and i started to receive calls and messages from all around i realized that i needed to apologize...

I needed to apologize that i tried to shake the status quo and shaking the status quo in Pakistan is wrong. I needed to apologize for lifting the curtains on a drama being played while the unsuspecting youth sits in the audience waiting for a script that would give them a role but their role never comes. I apologize for not owning an incubation center, or having anything to gain from the article because if i had owned one i would have kept my mouth shut and let the games continue. I also apologize for being sincere to Pakistan like 199 million other Pakistanis while 1 million hold us all hostages through their self interest. I apologize for not giving a damn about what others think when i speak the truth and friends warn me not to. I sincerely and deeply apologize for being a thorn in many eyes who are sitting on their laurels while Pakistan needs improvement.

And lastly, let me apologize in advance for not apologizing in the future because i will continue to write such articles, unveiling the truth and contributing to our great Pakistan's brilliant future. And i apologize to the ones who really think i would apologize under pressure, EVER. Lol.

P.S. For further clarification refer to my picture below on my timeline which i posted in response to Israel.

The Only Creation Of Allah Who Has Been Given The Ability To Smile Is A Human Being. No Bird No Animal No Fish No Reptile Can Smile. They Can Show Teeth But Not Smile. Smile Involves A Chemical In The Brain Called SEROTONIN And SEROTONIN Is Only Found In Human Beings.
So Use Your Gift Of SMILE More Often. Smiling Is A Way Of Being Thankful To Allah And A Way Of Making Others Happy Around You. #MirMak