September 20, 2024 • 46 mins
In this episode, Arfa, an experienced copywriter, discusses her career, the impact of AI on copywriting, and the importance of coaching for personal and business growth. She shares how coaches have helped her navigate challenges and improve her skills. Arfa also emphasizes the significance of a strong network, continuous learning, and balancing personal health and spirituality for overall success.
Timestamps:
00:00 Introduction
04:43 The Importance of Coaching for Business Growth
08:21 Personal Experiences with Coaching
15:09 Choosing the Right Coach
21:18 Health and Wellness Coaching
23:53 The Importance of Holistic Health
24:17 Investing in Coaching: A Personal Journey
26:00 Empowering Others: Resources and Support
26:38 The True Cost of Time and Coaching
29:16 Balancing Business and Personal Life
35:05 The Power of Networking and Masterminds
36:51 Choosing Your Circle Wisely
About Arfa Iqbal:
Classically trained in direct response, Arfa is a 9 figure copywriter, digital marketer and bestselling author of the book ‘Mind-Hack™ Marketing – How to Turn Customer Psychology into Breakthrough Sales’. Since 2010, Arfa has worked with some of the best thought leaders, celebrity influencers and experts in the world to help them grow and scale using sales funnels.
Connect with Arfa Iqbal:
Resources Mentioned:
- Your Next Five Moves: Master the Art of Business Strategy by Patrick Bet-David
- How to Win Friends & Influence People by Dale Carnegie
- Oversubscribed: How To Get People Lining Up To Do Business With You by Daniel Priestley
Sign up to the Muslim Life Hackers newsletter: https://muslimlifehackers.substack.com
Listen to the Podcast:
Connect with Muslim Life Hackers:
Connect with Mifrah Mahroof:
🏖️ This episode is sponsored by Sisters Explore, a company I founded to offer guided small-group travel for Muslim women to connect, explore, and enjoy faith-centered journeys. Learn more at http://www.sisters-explore.com
Disclaimer: Some links in this description are affiliate links.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Arfa Iqbal (00:00):
Your business cannot grow unless you yourself are
growing.
Mifrah Mahroof (00:07):
Asalamu Alaikum and welcome to the Muslim Life
Hackers podcast.
I'm your host Mifrah Mahroof,and in today's episode we're
going to be having Arfa Iqbaljoin us.
So Arfa is a direct responsemarketer and the best selling
author of MindHack Marketing.
She specializes in creatingsales funnels and pre selling
mastery, skills which hingeheavily on understanding how
customers think.
(00:27):
Since 2010, she's helpedgenerate over nine figures in
sales for her clients, whichinclude celebrity influencers,
thought leaders, and industryexperts.
So without further ado, let'sget started with this.
Asalamu Alaikum, Arfa andwelcome to the show.
Arfa Iqbal (00:41):
Wa'alaikumsalam Warohmatullahi Wabarakatuhu
Thank you so much for having me.
How are you
Mifrah Mahroof (00:45):
Alhamdulillah, I'm doing well.
How are you going?
Arfa Iqbal (00:47):
Yeah, I'm doing good.
It's been a long day, it's quite
Mifrah Mahroof (00:50):
yeah, it's actually late for you and
Arfa Iqbal (00:51):
isn't it?
Mifrah Mahroof (00:52):
It's very early for me.
This is going to be aninteresting conversation.
Arfa Iqbal (00:54):
InshaAllah, InshaAllah.
Mifrah Mahroof (00:56):
So you are a copywriter.
So it's a direct responsemarketer and you've been in this
space for a very long time.
So 2010,
Arfa Iqbal (01:05):
Yeah, since 2010
Mifrah Mahroof (01:06):
How many years is that?
Yeah.
14 years,
Arfa Iqbal (01:10):
That's 14 years.
So yeah, long time.
Mifrah Mahroof (01:13):
um, growing in this space and like changing a
lot, right?
Arfa Iqbal (01:17):
Oh yeah, definitely.
When I started it, I didn't evenknow what copywriting was.
I'll tell you something reallyfunny.
I thought copywriting was thatthing that you do when you're
trying to legally protect yourwork.
Mifrah Mahroof (01:28):
Oh, yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (01:28):
I didn't understand what it was even.
So yeah, and then when I gotinto it, I was like, oh wow,
it's not what I thought it was.
But yeah,
Mifrah Mahroof (01:36):
so what is copywriting for our guests, who
aren't aware of it, who stillthink that it's got to do with
the legal stuff.
Arfa Iqbal (01:42):
So it's basically a salesmanship in either print or
digital, right?
Anything that you see online,like a brochure, an email, a
landing page, a sales page,anything that is designed to
sell something is normallywritten by somebody like myself.
Mifrah Mahroof (01:57):
Oh, okay.
Arfa Iqbal (01:58):
So that's how I want you to think of it, right?
Like, even if you're like on TVand you're watching an advert,
somebody like myself will havewritten that advert.
I
Mifrah Mahroof (02:06):
see.
And, I wonder though, like inyour space, how has AI actually
affected it?
Or has it not affected it atall?
Arfa Iqbal (02:13):
Do you know what?
I think there was this whole bighoo ha that, oh gosh, AI is
going to take over your jobsand, no one's going to want to
hire you.
And I'm going to be completelyhonest.
At first, I was a little bitscared because I was like, Oh,
like if the machines are takingover, what am I going to do?
But then when I started playingaround with it and I tried to
(02:34):
get like ChatGPT to write somecopy, I was like, no, it's not
that good yet.
Do you know what I mean?
So you have to really understandsomething called prompt
engineering, which is theability to instruct the AI
correctly, and if you don'tunderstand how to do that, then
that was saying like, the betterthe quality of the input, the
(02:54):
better the quality of theoutput.
But the truth of the matter ismost business owners are not
prompt engineers.
They don't understand, how towrite a really great prompt.
They don't know exactly what tosay.
They don't know the nuances ofwhat a prompt involves.
Now, in terms of how has itdisrupted my industry or has it
replaced people?
Yes, it has replaced people, butwhat it's actually done is it's
(03:19):
replaced the copywriters thatwere not that good in the first
place, right?
So if you're a bad copywriter,or you're someone who's very
mediocre, doesn't reallyunderstand strategy, you don't
really understand marketing,you're just writing whatever
anyone tells you, that type ofperson absolutely can be
replaced by AI, but I thinkwe're still a long way off AI
(03:42):
completely replacing us.
You still need someone to, sensecheck the copy, someone to make
sure that everything is makingsense, that it reads the way
that it's supposed to, thatyou're on brand, it's still got
that creative streak to it.
So there's still so many thingsthat, I mean, AI is very good at
helping you get like a roughfirst draft when you know what
(04:02):
you're doing.
But it's not going to give youthe finished article, maybe that
will change in the next, five to10 years.
Who knows?
Mifrah Mahroof (04:08):
I agree.
I find that even if you have thebest prompt, like you still have
to have that human touch, causeyou can tell when something's
written by AI, it just has this.
Arfa Iqbal (04:16):
Oh, I can spot it a mile
Mifrah Mahroof (04:18):
whether A or Whether B, you know, that saying
that it has at the end, it'slike, Oh, whether you want A or
whether you want B, then this isright for you.
It's like, a classic AI, AIwrite up.
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (04:34):
but it's not been around long enough that
something would be a cliche, butalready you can spot AI written
text from a mile away.
Mifrah Mahroof (04:41):
Yeah.
And I can imagine you can seethat come up a lot.
I'm curious to know, the actualworkings of like how you got to
where you are with thissuccessful business.
Cause I know a lot of ourlisteners here are very
interested in starting their ownbusiness or they have their own
business and they want to jumpup to different levels and get
higher and higher.
(05:01):
And I know that you've spokenabout your story a lot in
different interviews andpodcasts.
However, one thing that youspeak about a lot is the whole
idea of having coaches to helpyou.
And I want to hear more aboutthat.
Why would you say that coacheshas been one of your most
important investments in yourjourney of becoming a successful
(05:23):
business owner?
Arfa Iqbal (05:24):
Yeah, that's a really great question.
I think it's more about like howfar do you want to go, right?
Like, I think if you're seriousabout building something that is
built to last and you'recreating something that is going
to be with you for the longhaul.
You have to take it veryseriously, it's not a joke,
right?
(05:44):
Because I don't care if you'restarting a business online or
whether you're doing it offline.
It requires a lot of time, a lotof energy, a lot of resources.
But also, you don't know all ofthe answers, right?
And many times, like I alwaystell people, like people who are
like on the fence about coachingor they're a little bit iffy
about it, I'm like, the greatestgrowth that I've had in my own
(06:05):
business is when I've hiredcoaches, right?
Why?
Because they can spot the thingsthat I can't.
They can see things, or they cananalyze things from a slightly
different perspective.
The thing is, when you areworking, You're emotionally
attached to what you do, right?
Whereas a coach, when they comealong, there's zero
(06:25):
subjectivity.
They're completely objective.
They're looking from theoutside, looking in, and they've
got zero emotional attachment towhat you're doing.
So something that you think is abig deal to you, to a coach,
might not be such a big deal,but they need that objectivity
to be able to tell you,actually, do you know what?
You haven't considered this.
This isn't going the way thatyou thought it would, what are
(06:47):
you gonna do in order to try andcounteract that?
So what they'll do is they'llgive you a different
perspective, they'll give you adifferent way of looking at
things.
Even if we, let's take our deenfor example, right?
If you look at the Prophet SAW,right?
He was coached by Jibreel AS,
Mifrah Mahroof (07:02):
Hmm.
Arfa Iqbal (07:03):
right?
And, so he couldn't do what hecould do without Allah's help
and without being coached andbasically taken through it, like
the verses of the Quran wouldcome down and they would come
through Jibreel, like he neededthat to be coached through the
process.
Like it's not easy changing theworld, right?
And I'm like, well, Allah SWTcoached the Prophet SAW, Jibreel
(07:26):
AS coached the Prophet SAW, andhe was a mighty messenger,
right?
So it's like, if you think aboutit from our perspective, we
don't have all of the answers.
We just don't, right?
I don't care how good you are atsomething.
You don't know whether you'redoing something right or whether
you think that you are doingsomething in the correct way
(07:47):
until someone else comes andsays, But you haven't considered
this, or what about this, orwhat about, X, Y, and Z, right?
What if this changes?
What are you gonna do?
And so they force you outside ofyour comfort zone, right?
They will challenge you onthings that will, in my opinion,
helps you to grow.
And that's how I view coaching,right?
Seriously, I think like when Itried to do this on my own, it
(08:10):
was so hard because I was makinga lot of mistakes.
There was a lot of
Mifrah Mahroof (08:14):
of, start of your business when you were
trying to
Arfa Iqbal (08:16):
that was right
Mifrah Mahroof (08:16):
How long, how long were you trying to do it on
your own for until you decidedI'm going to get a
Arfa Iqbal (08:21):
So I tried to do on my own for about a year.
Yeah, or maybe a little bitlonger, but it was really hard
because I didn't like, when youdon't know what you don't know.
So it was difficult because Iwas like trying a bit of this
and trying a bit of that, andsometimes I would do something
that would work really well.
And other times I'd do the samething and then it wasn't working
and I'm like, I couldn'tunderstand like what's going on,
(08:43):
like, I think I'm doing all theright things, but clearly I'm
not.
My first ever coach was actuallymy mentor who taught me
copywriting because I did a lotof like self study courses.
And then I thought I knew what Iwas doing until I got coached by
him and he mentored me for awhole year actually.
And then I'd look at my workthat I'd done myself and then
(09:05):
I'd feel really
Mifrah Mahroof (09:06):
embarrassed.
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (09:07):
I'm like, oh my god, I really didn't know what the
heck I was doing.
Because here's the problem, whenyou do something yourself, how
do you know you're doing itcorrectly?
You just don't.
That's the problem, right?
So I think from the perspectiveof, because I coach students
myself as well, they're notaware of what they're not aware,
and it's the job of the coach tobring that into someone's
(09:28):
awareness.
Mifrah Mahroof (09:29):
It's like knowledge is transferred, not
from like just book to human.
It's like human to human.
And that's the best.
Arfa Iqbal (09:37):
Yeah, it's an experience, isn't it, right?
So you have to live theknowledge, isn't it?
it's not good enough to justread a book and then think that
you have all of the answers,because I tried that on Believe
Me.
It just doesn't work like that.
I wish it was that linear, butit's not.
Mifrah Mahroof (09:52):
So where would you say like books and courses
and say videos and things thatyou watch come in then?
What are your thoughts on that?
Because like people say investin courses, learn about this and
where does that come in then?
Arfa Iqbal (10:05):
I think that they all have their own value, right?
So it's not like they don't havevalue.
I think it's extremelyimportant.
I try my best to read all thetime because the reading will
give you lots of differentperspectives, right?
What it can't give you is itcan't give you a bespoke action
plan.
It cannot give you insight intosomething that is specific for
you.
(10:25):
Do you see what I'm saying?
and it can't give youexperience, like books are great
for knowledge and enhancing yourunderstanding, but it's not
going to be unique to you andwhat you need.
Right?
Even same with courses, right?
Like I said, I've done hundredsof courses in my lifetime,
right?
And, I'll go through them on myown accord, but again, it's
(10:47):
like, it's great for theknowledge, it's great for the
understanding, but actually whenyou start applying it, it's a
completely different ballgame.
It's a completely differentkettle of fish.
So they have their value and Iwould say, use things like books
and courses to give you thebackground, understanding, to
give you that knowledge, to helpyou to understand how something
(11:09):
works.
But, until you've actually livedit, And you've gone through it
as an experience, you're notgoing to have the in depth
knowledge and understanding thatyou should have, right?
Because in depth knowledge onlycomes when you have that, it's
that I've actually gotten myhands dirty.
I rolled my sleeves up and I didthis myself.
And that's how I learned.
(11:30):
And I always tell my studentslike, you learn more from
failure than you do from yoursuccesses.
Actually, failure is going toteach you a heck of a lot,
right?
Your Failure is going to teachyou what success can never teach
you, right?
and it'll tell you where are yougoing wrong and it'll help you
to formulate better ideas and totry different things and to try
things that, quite frankly, youmight not otherwise have tried.
(11:53):
If you did well on absolutelyeverything, that doesn't teach
you anything because whensomething goes wrong, then you
don't know what to do.
Mifrah Mahroof (12:01):
Ah,
Arfa Iqbal (12:01):
Whereas if you've done something and it went
wrong, you learned the lessonand now you can apply it to the
next thing and the next thingand the next thing.
So yeah, it has its place and ithas its usage, but if you want
to quantum leap your business,then getting a coach is, in my
honest opinion, the best way
Mifrah Mahroof (12:19):
So, it sounds like, growing and leveling up is
possible through just books andcourses, but the time is what
takes longer.
And when you compare it withhaving a coach or another human
being to help you, then it'sjust the time is faster because
now you get the knowledge and
Arfa Iqbal (12:37):
you're going to shortcut your learning curve,
definitely.
Yeah, you're going to, shortcutyour learning, curve it.
It slashes the learning timedown.
So the books will, like I said,they will give you the
understanding.
Mifrah Mahroof (12:49):
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (12:50):
You don't get the insight or the experience that a
coach can bring.
Mifrah Mahroof (12:53):
It kind of reminds me of that quote.
It's like, you either pay withyour wallet or your time.
Arfa Iqbal (12:58):
Well, a hundred percent, right?
Mifrah Mahroof (13:00):
but you can learn regardless, but it's just
like, how do you want to do it?
Do you want to spend your timeor your money?
Arfa Iqbal (13:06):
The alternative question to think about is how
fast do you want to
Mifrah Mahroof (13:09):
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (13:10):
If you've got all the time in the world and you'd
rather just figure it out foryourself, good luck.
I wish you all the best.
Because that is something thatyou have to be then prepared to
put in as much time as, and thatcould take years for you to get
to where you want, right?
And I've seen people who dothis.
They're like, nope, I want tofigure this out for myself.
I want to figure this out formyself.
And it's three years have goneby, five years, I'm stuck.
(13:32):
But yeah, did you ever get acoach?
No, I didn't get a coach.
Why not?
Oh, I thought I could figurethis out on my own.
Whereas the people who, youknow, you take two people, one
can be incredibly knowledgeablein their subject matter, but you
compare that to someone whomaybe doesn't have anywhere near
as much knowledge, but becausethey've hired the coach, they
(13:53):
will get to where they need togo faster than the other person.
Mifrah Mahroof (13:55):
Hmm.
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (13:56):
That's the beauty of that.
So yeah, a hundred percent.
I have a coach who's beencoaching me for the last 10
years and counting.
And I think at one point I hadlike five
Mifrah Mahroof (14:07):
coaches.
Oh, wow.
Five coaches.
So, was it like different areasof your life or like, how was
that?
Arfa Iqbal (14:13):
Yeah, totally different areas of my life.
I had one was helping with timemanagement.
Another one was helping withpodcasting.
Another one was helping me withmy business.
Another one's helping me with myhealth kind of thing.
So at any one point, I hadmultiple coaches at any one
point.
And so for me, because Iunderstand the value of that,
it's not something I think Ican't grow unless, like, your
(14:36):
business cannot grow.
And I think this is like the keytakeaway here.
Your business cannot grow unlessyou yourself are growing.
Mifrah Mahroof (14:43):
Hmm, that's a very important point.
Because there's even this thingI heard when like people are
like, I'll invest after I makethe money, like I'll spend on
myself after I made some moneyin this business that I'm doing.
Arfa Iqbal (14:56):
good luck with that.
That might take you a long timeto do.
Mifrah Mahroof (14:58):
Okay.
So, that's interesting.
So it's like, the more you wantto grow, the more you need to
invest in yourself so that youcan be able to get the results
that you want.
And that brings me to a coupleof other questions.
When you say get a coach, wouldyou just say, get someone, one
to one or what about groupcoaching and what about those
community
Arfa Iqbal (15:17):
mean, I've done both.
Mifrah Mahroof (15:18):
what are your,
Arfa Iqbal (15:19):
Yeah, I've done both and there's definite value with
both of them, right?
You have to look at what you arecomfortable with.
Normally when you go private,you're paying a lot of money,
but that's totally okay.
But again, it depends on what itis that you're looking to
achieve, right?
There are certain instanceswhere you're not comfortable
sharing your private life with agroup of strangers, right?
(15:42):
And so in that instance, I wouldsay to you, go private with the
coaching, right?
But if you are in a space orlet's say it's just like
business and you're in a groupthat is better than still doing
it on your own.
Mifrah Mahroof (15:55):
Yeah.
I see.
Arfa Iqbal (15:56):
Because there's a lot of, I mean, even I do a lot
of group coaching.
I do private coaching.
I do group coaching and thegroup coaching works extremely
well.
And actually what I found withthe group coaching, people learn
from other people.
Mifrah Mahroof (16:08):
Yeah.
They do.
Arfa Iqbal (16:09):
Right, so I've done this many times.
So, I actually coach for MarissaPeer, she's one of my Clients
and basically, I've noticed likea student will ask a question.
I'm answering the questioneveryone is writing down notes,
right?
So there is that because it's acommunity, you know learning
environment Everyone is learningfrom everyone else and I think
(16:29):
the thing that I have found,because I've been doing this for
a number of years now, isstudents are actually quite
surprised at how much they learnfrom the other students.
I think in their head, theyprobably thought, well, I've got
the questions that I wanted toask, but actually so many times
students have said, I came herewith just like one question and
I've ended up making pages andpages of notes because this was
so valuable.
(16:50):
It really helped me to learn,and I'm like, that's the reason
why we have these group coachingcalls.
But the private, of course, itcan be done in so many different
ways, right?
That might involve the coach.
Physically, like for example, Ihave a coach that is coaching me
privately.
I share all of my businessfinancials.
I would not be comfortable doingthat with, you know, I would not
(17:11):
be comfortable pulling out allof my numbers In front of a
group, but because my coach hasbeen working with me for over 10
years, he sees what my cashflowsays, he knows exactly what's
coming in at what point, heknows how much profit's coming
in, how, what my cashflow issaying over the next 12 weeks,
he knows how much my net is, heknows what my projections are,
(17:31):
like he knows all of that, andthat is fine because I'm doing
that on a one to one basis withhim, but I wouldn't be
comfortable sharing that in a
Mifrah Mahroof (17:40):
group.
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (17:41):
So you have to choose your poison, basically,
you know, if you've got to,yeah, if you know that you need
the coaching, you've got tofigure out, what am I
comfortable doing in front ofother people?
And if the answer is not verymuch, then go for the private
coaching.
That's what I would say.
Mifrah Mahroof (17:56):
Okay.
Then that makes sense.
So how would you go aboutfinding a coach?
Because there are so manycoaches online and then you want
to, let's talk about how you'dfind it in business.
And I'm also curious to hearabout how you find it for your
other areas as well, but let'sstart business.
Arfa Iqbal (18:12):
Yeah.
So this is a really goodquestion, actually.
It involves a couple of things.
Number one, you've got to bewilling to have a lot of
introspection.
So, you yourself have got to bewilling to understand what are
the areas of my life that I needserious help with.
And that means that you have todo a lot of reflecting and you
have to figure out, andsometimes this also looks like
(18:35):
you swallowing your pride andremoving the ego.
Because, I think this is witheveryone.
I think once you've, especiallywhen you've been doing something
for a long time, You almost feellike because you've put in the
hours or you've put in the yearsOh, I don't need a coach for
that because my knowledge issufficient.
Do you see what I mean?
So and I've seen people who havethis problem.
(18:57):
They're like, no, I don't wantsomeone telling me what to do.
No, a coach is not there to tellyou what to do.
They are there to help challengeyou and help you to grow past
the blocks that you otherwisewouldn't have seen, right?
But it first involves you havinga little bit of humility and
figuring out, actually, do youknow what?
This area of my life is not thatgreat, I need help here.
(19:18):
So it's that, first it's thatadmission that I need the help
and then I always prefer to workwith coaches that I've got a
personal recommendation of,right?
So I will ask, Alhamdulillah,I'm very well connected.
So what I will do is I will askthe people around me, listen,
you know what?
I'm looking for someone that canhelp me solve this particular
(19:39):
problem.
Does anyone recommend, doesanyone have any recommendations?
And so I always go byrecommendations and then I don't
even just go hire the person asis.
I'll go check out all of theirreviews.
I'll check out their casestudies.
I'll check out the testimonials.
I will even have to, if I haveto, I'll go speak to some of
their clients, right?
(19:59):
That's how serious I take theapproach of coaching because I
think there's nothing worse thangetting yourself a coach that
doesn't align with you or yourvalues, right?
And not everyone, not everycoach is suitable for every
person.
You have to find the coach thatis right for you.
Mifrah Mahroof (20:17):
I agree, also in that researching phase, even
going through their content andmaterial makes a difference
because it gives you that whole,like,
Arfa Iqbal (20:25):
That makes a
Mifrah Mahroof (20:26):
yeah, like it gives you this feeling about
like, can I really resonate withthis person?
Or is it just like, they'retotally off?
Hmm.
What if you reasonate with theknowledge
Arfa Iqbal (20:35):
right?
So the things that they aresharing.
If you share that viewpoint,then actually it makes it 10
times easier for you to say yes.
Because when you read theircontent, their emails, you're
consuming their videos, thatactually gives you a really good
indication as to whether or notsomeone knows
Mifrah Mahroof (20:54):
what they're talking about.
Yeah, and also, I guess thisresearch also shows it's who
that person is.
And essentially when you workwith someone, you want to become
like them.
Do I see myself becoming them?
And if so, then, okay, well,that's a good sign.
Arfa Iqbal (21:09):
Exactly, exactly.
Mifrah Mahroof (21:10):
that's an interesting one.
Okay, what about in other areas?
Like, how would you go aboutwith that?
for example, help or so no,that's a big one
Arfa Iqbal (21:18):
So I think with health, health is a very
interesting one.
Simply because you have to alignwith their philosophy.
For example, I'll give you areally good example actually.
Unfortunately, I do have anautoimmune disorder and I firmly
believe, like when I go to thedoctor and I said, I'm
experiencing, problems here,problems there, I'm very stiff
(21:39):
in the morning, I can't move myfingers kind of thing.
They're like, the first thingthey want to do is they want to
put you on really harshmedication and what not, but
they're not willing to go to theroot cause, right?
Whereas, My fundamental beliefis that, your body, your
immunity lies in your gut,right?
So if I'm going to go work withan expert, I'm going to work
(22:00):
with an expert that understandsthat first of all, immunity is
found in the gut.
But secondly, you don't treatthe symptoms.
Cause what I found with doctorsis they're very good at
prescribing medicines for thesymptoms of the problem, but not
so much helping you get to theroot cause and helping you
figure out why you're sick inthe first place.
So for me, when I'm working withsomeone, I want to know, does
(22:23):
this person share the samephilosophy as me?
Do they believe that my body isan entire system?
And not just compartmentalize.
Oh, you've got pain in yourshoulder.
You've got pain in your fingerskind of thing.
Oh, so what we're going to do iswe're just going to give you a
bunch of painkillers, but we'renot going to get to the root
cause, right?
We're not going to figureanything out, right?
Like for me, that is just awaste of time.
(22:44):
Because yes, it helps to apoint, but it doesn't help you
get better.
And so I think when, especiallywhen it comes to your health,
like you have to find someone,like I go for functional
practitioners because they viewyour body as an entire system,
and they know that, let's say,for example, if you have,
Typically as entrepreneurs, wehave highly stressful jobs,
(23:05):
right?
you go to a normal doctor, theywill tell you that the stress
doesn't have any impact on yourbody.
That's nonsense, right?
That's a classic one, by theway.
I've been told so
Mifrah Mahroof (23:15):
many times.
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (23:16):
And I was so grateful that the doctor that I
had, the first question he askedme is, have you been under a lot
of stress lately?
And I was like, Yeah.
And he was like, yeah, that'swhy.
Mifrah Mahroof (23:25):
is so important
Arfa Iqbal (23:27):
wow.
Mifrah Mahroof (23:27):
in like, it really affects us a
Arfa Iqbal (23:29):
lot.
So important, but I was soshocked because I was like, this
is probably the first doctorI've ever spoken to that
acknowledged that my lifestylemight actually have an impact on
my health, right?
So it's insane.
So yeah.
I,
Mifrah Mahroof (23:42):
So it sounds like, having that alignment in
belief and actually seeing that,okay, are they going to approach
health for example, in the waythat I'm looking at it.
That makes sense.
Arfa Iqbal (23:53):
Oh my God.
Yeah.
That's so important.
Yeah.
Because if theycompartmentalize, and they just,
No, it's just like this and it'slike this and almost like
putting your condition intoboxes.
But you don't really getanywhere with that because then
it's just you're on arollercoaster of drugs
Mifrah Mahroof (24:09):
Yeah.
Do you
Arfa Iqbal (24:09):
what I mean?
And there's no to it kind ofthing.
Yes
Mifrah Mahroof (24:14):
actually the reality for so many people,
right?
So I want to step back a bit andalso ask you about, in the early
days and you investing the moneyfor coaches.
What if you don't have enoughmoney and you want to get the
business started, to what extentwould you prioritize this?
Arfa Iqbal (24:34):
When I got started, I actually didn't have the money
to do the mentoring with mycoach.
And I still remember, I went tomy sister in law and I just
basically said to her, I reallyneed your help.
And bless her heart.
I always make dua for her.
She paid for my mentoring, andthen Alhamdulillah, within three
months of me doing thementoring, I was able to pay her
(24:55):
back, which was fantastic.
So, the way that I look at it iswhere you can either find a way
to make the money, okay, get themoney, or you can make a lot of
excuses, but you have to choosethat like you either decide I'm
going to do it and then youfigure out how to do it or you
wait with a full intention thatwhen I've got the money I'm
(25:18):
going to save up for this andthen when I've got the money I'm
going to go invest.
But the way that I look at thatis that's just putting off.
It's just putting off somethingthat you could get done a lot
quicker.
You could make the money so muchfaster and when you have that
help, make the money and thenpay the person back.
But that in itself is a bigresponsibility because obviously
you have to put a lot of workinto it.
So it's one thing having thecoaching, it's quite another
(25:40):
actually doing the
Mifrah Mahroof (25:41):
work.
Yeah, it is.
And also it did actually alsocomes back to, if we really need
something and we make du'a forit, and even if we don't want to
go to, through the root of debt,then Allah SWT will always open
up a way for us in ways we don't
Arfa Iqbal (25:55):
Oh yeah, of course.
Of course, I believe that.
Mifrah Mahroof (25:57):
So, it's, yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (26:00):
You know, I've had a student who come to me and said,
I really want to work with you,Arfa.
Mifrah Mahroof (26:03):
Hmm.
Arfa Iqbal (26:04):
But do you know what?
I physically don't have themeans, I don't have the money.
And so what I will do with thosepeople is I will like literally
I'll send them a copy of mybook, right?
And I'm like, right, okay, letme send you this, go read the
book, go put things into action.
So basically what I'm doing isI'm helping to empower them to
be able to make the money sothey can go work with me.
(26:26):
You know, or that I will pointthem to resources, if they don't
need my book but it's somethingelse, I'll point them to other
resources that I've got, or Iwill pass them on to someone
that I think can definitely helpthem, even if that's not
Mifrah Mahroof (26:37):
me.
Yeah, of course.
I think it's easiest to dismissthese things like coaching and
saying, Oh, it's too expensive,but then it doesn't cost you any
money to actually want it inyour mind.
Like, it doesn't cost you anymoney to dream it or at least
say, Hey, I want this.
Arfa Iqbal (26:51):
Well, it doesn't cost you any money.
No, but it does cost you,doesn't it, right?
Because your time has a valueattached to it, right?
And I think that's the greatmyth that people like get rid
of.
Oh, I've got loads of time.
Yeah, but at what cost, right?
That's time that you could bespending with your family, with
your loved ones, right?
Like there's an associated costwith that, right?
(27:14):
I don't ever look at coaching asa cost.
I always look at it as aninvestment into my well being,
in an investment into mybusiness, an investment into
whatever it is that I need helpwith, right?
That's how I view coaching.
It's always, it's never a cost.
It's always an investment.
Mifrah Mahroof (27:31):
True.
Of course.
I mean, like actually desiringit and actually wanting it, for
example, like a person may notimmediately have the funds to
pay for a coach, but there'snothing stopping them from
actually wanting it in theirhearts, because, because like at
that point, like a person couldmake excuses and say, Oh, I
can't do that and they'realready dismissing it at the
(27:52):
start.
Like, Oh, I can't do that.
Or I can't afford that.
So that kind of becomes theirreality.
And then they never get to buyit or invest in it and move
forward.
And that's actually pretty sad.
Cause you kind of like cut itoff at the roots.
Arfa Iqbal (28:05):
Yeah, it's definitely sad, but what you
know the way that I would lookat that is if you're not ready
to work with a coach, there areother ways like read the books,
do the courses, do the selfhelp, right?
Get yourself in a supportiveenvironment with other like
minded, people who are also onthat same journey.
And find ways to help yourself,right?
(28:27):
Like one thing I have learnedfrom being in business for 14
years, you cannot do this onyour own.
You really can't.
It's impossible to do it on yourown.
And I think if you're looking atdoing it on your own, just be
prepared to put a lot of, timeand effort and energy, into
trying to figure it out, right?
(28:47):
Whereas with the right coach.
They're gonna literally justshortcut that learning,
something that might take youtwo years to do, you might be
able to do in three months with
Mifrah Mahroof (28:57):
the coach.
Yeah.
And like time, and time islimited right at the end.
Whereas money you
Arfa Iqbal (29:03):
Well, time is your most precious resource, right?
You can always make more money,but you absolutely cannot make
more time.
Once that time is gone, it'sgone.
You're not making it back.
It's not
Mifrah Mahroof (29:14):
That's So true.
Subhanallah.
Okay.
We're actually getting close tothe end of the interview and I
want to present to you thequestions that we have for all
of our guests.
So what would you say is onelife hack that's improved your
life?
Well, other than coaching, sincewe've explored it.
Arfa Iqbal (29:31):
Yeah, so I'd say read a lot.
Definitely read a lot.
Actually, there's two life hacksthat I would say.
Read a lot, and that alsoincludes the Quran.
So have a daily Quran habit.
I think that I don't believethat you can have success,
without, having success in thatarea, right?
Like, for me, success is abouthaving success in every area of
(29:51):
your life, not just, Oh yeah,I'm great at business, but you
know what, my deen completelysucks and I'm not praying five
times a day and I'm notbothering, like, you know where
you need to level up, right?
And so for me, it's when I do myplanning, especially when I'm
doing my planning on how mybusiness or how my life is going
to improve, there's always asection on how is my
(30:12):
spirituality going to improve,right?
Am I developing a betterrelationship with the Quran?
Am I, really exerting myself inworship?
What am I doing to try and helpmyself, right?
So, definitely that.
And also, You have tounderstand, look, we're Muslim
at the end of the day, right?
We do things with excellence.
We're supposed to do things withIhsan, but you can't do that if
you don't have a goodrelationship with God.
(30:34):
But so you can't expect to besuccessful if you're not doing
the thing that He's telling youto do, right?
So I think that's reallyimportant.
And then I'd say that the secondthing which I think is a non
negotiable is taking care ofyourself and that looks like
getting to bed on time going fora walk like literally getting in
(30:56):
the gym, eating healthy, like,this for me, I would say in of
all the different areas of mylife, the health part has always
been the most challenging.
Because when you're a parent,especially if you're doing
things on your own, like I didfor the last, well, I've been a
single parent for a long
Mifrah Mahroof (31:12):
time.
Yeah.
And you, started when yourchildren were like very young,
like 10 months, right?
It's
Arfa Iqbal (31:16):
Yeah, literally, Yeah.
I mean, I started, my businesswhen I was going through a
divorce, right?
So this is my point, right?
And so I've been on my own for along time and I got so good at
taking care of everything elseand everyone else and putting
myself last, but that is such a,that is the
Mifrah Mahroof (31:35):
worst thing.
Yeah.
Cause it comes back and then theconsequences.
Arfa Iqbal (31:38):
thing to do.
Yeah, absolutely.
So you have to dedicate time,get outside in nature, go for a
walk, do your dhikr while you'rewalking, make du'a while you're
walking, get out there innature, reconnect with what your
real purpose is and that isgoing to make you a better
business owner.
Definitely.
Mifrah Mahroof (31:56):
Yeah.
A hundred percent.
It's not just about the hustleof the business.
It's all the other areas of yourlife.
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (32:02):
That's true success, right?
It's not, how much money you'vegot in the bank, that's a nice,
that part is like, yes, that'sgreat.
We'd love to have that, right?
But the real wealth that I wouldsay is spending time with your
children, right?
Being able to have a nicerelaxed morning, not having to
stress about deadlines.
This is what I call true successand not being tied to anything,
(32:25):
being able to travel where youwant, do what you want.
That's what I call true success.
Having it all, you can have itall, but it's going to come at a
cost.
And you just have to choose yourheart.
That's what I say.
Mifrah Mahroof (32:37):
Okay.
And what
Arfa Iqbal (32:38):
is.
Yeah.
Being successful is hard, right?
But being a failure is alsohard, right?
So choose your
Mifrah Mahroof (32:44):
heart.
Oh, true, right?
Being a failure is hard becausethen you're always finding the
consequences of that, that startcoming up and biting you in
every area of your life.
Arfa Iqbal (32:54):
Exactly.
So choose your
Mifrah Mahroof (32:55):
heart.
like that deadline you put offstarts to chase you and then
this one that, your healthstarts to chase you and
everything starts coming back toyou.
So,
Arfa Iqbal (33:04):
Well, every single thing that you do, there is what
we call that consequence to it.
So you have to get clear on whatis the consequence, right?
If you want to be successful,what does that look like?
It's going to look like beingdisciplined.
It's going to look like, beingfocused, being consistent,
showing up when you don't feellike it.
(33:24):
Everyone has days when they rollout of bed in the morning and
they're like, I can't bebothered today, right?
But it's like, What do you dowhen you're feeling like that?
This is all important things,there was a saying actually,
what was the saying?
It was something along the linesof, if you want to build
character and you really want tobuild your character, go start a
business.
I don't know who said that, butwhoever said it was very
Mifrah Mahroof (33:46):
wise.
So true.
It teaches a lot about you.
Arfa Iqbal (33:48):
Of course it does.
And how you do everything isreally determined by how you
show up for yourself and forother people.
Mifrah Mahroof (33:54):
That's a really good food for thought.
My next question I have here is,what's a book that's helped you
level up in your life?
Arfa Iqbal (34:01):
Oh, that's a really good question.
There's so many
Mifrah Mahroof (34:04):
books.
Well, you can name a couple.
Arfa Iqbal (34:05):
The one that I think, hands down, everyone
should read is Your Next FiveMoves by Patrick Bet.
David.
That is what a spectacular book.
that
Mifrah Mahroof (34:16):
I've never heard of that one.
Arfa Iqbal (34:17):
that really got me thinking.
Have you never heard of that
Mifrah Mahroof (34:20):
Okay, it's going to be on my list.
Arfa Iqbal (34:22):
Yeah.
So, so good, like really good.
I'm like, every singleentrepreneur on the planet
should read this book.
And the other one that I wouldrecommend, actually, there's a
number that I would recommend.
So the other one, I'm going torecommend three actually.
So that one would probably benumber one on my list.
Number two would be How to WinFriends and Influence People by
Dale Carnegie, like the greatestbook on sales ever written that
(34:44):
was never meant for sales.
And then the third book that Iwould highly recommend is
Oversubscribed by DanielPriestly.
Brilliant books.
All three of these are
Mifrah Mahroof (34:53):
really superb.
And it's actually quiteinteresting that you're
mentioning Dale Carnegie's bookas the best sales book and was
like, how to win friends, right?
Arfa Iqbal (35:01):
Yeah, how to win friends and influence people.
So this is a really importantthing, right?
So aside from the coaching, whatelse is going to help your
business to grow?
It's your network.
Your network equals your networth.
Mifrah Mahroof (35:12):
Yes,
Arfa Iqbal (35:12):
Right?
So the more you level up withyour network, the more money you
will make.
That's just a natural, it's anatural byproduct because you're
literally the sum of the fivepeople that you hung around
with.
So if you're not making verymuch money, look at the five
people that you're hungingaround with and change your
company.
Mifrah Mahroof (35:29):
Does that mean you would also spend money on
masterminds, how do you findthese people?
Yeah,
Arfa Iqbal (35:34):
totally.
So I've been part of amastermind now, 2014 I joined a
mastermind and I'm still part ofit.
Mifrah Mahroof (35:43):
That's very interesting.
So the mastermind would bedifferent to like a group
coaching, like the communitythere, for example.
Arfa Iqbal (35:48):
Yeah, it's different.
Depends on what kind of programyou go for.
So the one that I'm currentlyon, that is the masterminding
element, which is the physicalget togethers that you do once a
quarter for two days, and thenit's combined with coaching and
then they have like skillsessions in between.
So every quarter they'll work ondifferent areas or they do
(36:10):
things like workshops, like cashflow is one of them, sales is
another one, operations isanother one, scorecards is
another one, kind of thing.
So it's quite a well roundededucation, I think, if you're
looking at being a reallyfantastic entrepreneur, I would
say is definitely, that shouldbe on your hit list of things.
But I think at one point, I wasin three different masterminds
at the same
Mifrah Mahroof (36:29):
Yeah, it does really go to show I'm so glad
that you brought it up about thepeople around you as well, and
the network, because it'ssometimes we just get stuck with
oh, the same friends from ourhigh school or our neighborhood,
and then we're trying to getbetter, and then it's just not
happening.
Like we're trying to figure itout on our own.
We don't have a coach.
We don't have the people aroundus.
And then we don't really get farbecause the people around us
will be like, what are you doingonline?
(36:51):
You know,
Arfa Iqbal (36:51):
That's a really interesting point that you've
said, because I do want to pickup on this, because I think one
of the things that I havedefinitely seen is if you're
doing better than the peoplethat you're hanging around with,
either they're going to level upto you, or you will find them.
(37:12):
somehow no longer wanting tohang out with you.
Mifrah Mahroof (37:15):
Interesting.
Arfa Iqbal (37:16):
And so what I've noticed is that over the years,
as I've gotten, as my businesshas grown, my circle of
influence and my circle offriends has gotten smaller, I've
And smaller And smaller.
Like, I'm connected to very wellto do people, right?
So when I say well to do, like,very successful in this, right?
I'm connected to some verysuccessful people.
(37:38):
It doesn't need to be a bigcommunity.
It just needs to be the rightpeople, right?
And you will lose people.
And I think what people arenaturally afraid of, they are
afraid of leveling up becausethen they're going to be
different to everyone else.
They're scared that, if Isomehow change, and I make
myself better, everyone else isgoing to get left behind, but
(38:01):
it's not your job to dimyourself or dumb yourself down
and dim your light for otherpeople.
It's for other people to levelup to you.
No one should ever have to dumbthemselves down just so that
they can sit with a certaingroup of people.
And that's not being like, oh,you're being all snobby or
anything, God forbid it.
It's not about that, becauseactually when entrepreneurship
(38:22):
is done, properly, you actuallydevelop a lot of humility,
right?
And more importantly, you have adifferent level of respect for
people when they're goingthrough a difficult journey.
You respect more what they'redoing because you're going
through it yourself.
But it is important to surroundyourself with people who get it.
And if they don't get it, youneed a new circle of friends,
and it's not because you'rebeing mean, or you're being
(38:44):
petty, or stuff like that.
It's not like that, but you'regonna get to a point where the
wrong people will start fallingaway in your life.
And I actually make du'a forthat, the du'a that I always
make is Allah, keep good peoplearound me and keep bad people
away from right?
Because sometimes it can descendinto things like negativity, it
(39:05):
can descend into things likejealousy and envy, and you don't
want of energy around be honest.
Life
Mifrah Mahroof (39:12):
is already stressful as it is.
And then all this drama.
Arfa Iqbal (39:14):
Yeah.
I imagine having that additionallayer of drama because somebody,
doesn't like the fact that youare suddenly leveling up and
they're feeling threatened orleft behind.
Well, the way I look at it istoughen up and if you want to
join me, you're more thanwelcome and I will help you on
your journey, but I'm not gonnadumb myself down to that level,
(39:35):
because it's just doesn't becomeimportant anymore.
I think, it's the toughest partI'd say of entrepreneurship.
That's why they say that beingan entrepreneur is actually very
lonely because very few peopleunderstand or get what it is
that you do and you have to beokay with that.
Mifrah Mahroof (39:50):
I think it's also like making the most of
what Allah SWT has given you andbecoming the best version of
yourself because that's whatworks.
We're here to do on this dunyaat the end, get close to Allah
SWT
Arfa Iqbal (40:01):
Yeah, of course.
Mifrah Mahroof (40:02):
wants us to keep improving and growing.
And if we just feel like I needto be small because my friends
around me are small.
Arfa Iqbal (40:10):
Well, you know what I always say to my children, I
always say to my kids that youknow, You should never ever
bring yourself down to anyoneelse's level.
If they're being silly or pettyor being like, just not
bothering Rather you should holdyourself to a better standard
because ultimately you have tolive your life yourself, and so
(40:31):
if you're hanging around, thisis just it's the law of the land
averages, right?
Even the Prophet SAW said that aman is the sum of the five
people that hang around, that hehangs around with, right?
So it stands to reason if youhave, let's say a young guy,
Let's say he's, I don't know,18, 17, 18, and he's hanging
around with a bunch of losers.
(40:52):
if his top five friends, they'reall losers, and they're all
getting themselves into trouble,and they're constantly in and
out of trouble with the police,I can almost guarantee that
person, 110%, is going to end upjust like his friends, and he's
also going to be a loser.
So you have to think about, likeI always say this to my
children, you have to thinkabout yourself.
(41:13):
You cannot put your life on theline and you cannot jeopardize
your future because you'retrying to impress your silly
mates.
It's just not worth it.
I don't know about the girls,I'm sure they have like, people
that they find it hard, but Ithink with boys in particular, I
feel that it, sometimes can bereally hard to break away from
(41:35):
that peer pressure, and to gooff and do your own things.
A lot of pressure on you.
Oh, you don't want to hangaround
Mifrah Mahroof (41:41):
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (41:41):
We're not important anymore.
It's like, the homies or,whatever you call it.
I'm only saying that because Ilook at my children, right?
And so I have two boys,MashaAllah.
My eldest is 20 and my youngestis 15.
That is the thing that I tellthem all the time, right?
If you want to level up yourlife, you have to do it.
(42:02):
Like, don't look at your friendsand think that they're going to
do that for you, that's on you.
And if that means then that yourfriends are not aligning anymore
with your values, you have tochange your circle of friends.
It's hard to do though.
It's very hard to do.
It's
Mifrah Mahroof (42:15):
I think, I think a gradual approach is also good,
like getting in more people thatyou want to become like, and
then having your friends, butalso you can have your friends
for other areas.
Like if you just want to havefun.
Yeah.
So it's like you kind of, butyou don't have to talk to them
about your business or howyou're earning money.
Arfa Iqbal (42:31):
No, no, absolutely not.
Yeah.
no,
Mifrah Mahroof (42:33):
different
Arfa Iqbal (42:34):
I would say the people who are on the same level
as you, of course, absolutely,if you feel comfortable enough
sharing that with them becausethey're also, let's say, they're
also entrepreneurs, that'sdifferent and that's totally up
to you.
But I think with everyone else,don't even bother having that
conversation with them becausethey're not gonna understand.
They're not gonna get it.
Mifrah Mahroof (42:53):
Yeah.
And I think it's like being verycareful.
It's like the kind of peoplethat you have around, like, are
they actively bringing you downwith their drama and like bad
behaviors, I guess.
It's like that bad companies.
So it's like, was the point youmentioned earlier about, the
Prophet SAW alluding to the fivepeople that you're around?
(43:13):
Was it the hadith about theperfume seller or the believers
like a mirror to one another.
Arfa Iqbal (43:17):
Can't remember what the specific hadith was, but it
was literally about you are theaverage of the five people that
you hang around with to makesure that your company is good.
Yeah.
So the importance.
So it's true though, isn't it?
Especially as a parent, whenyou're watching your children.
Like, you can see, no, you don'twant to be hanging around that
person, that person is no goodfor you, kind of thing, and the
(43:38):
kids don't get it the whole,your mum being so mean for, you
know, no, I'm speaking fromexperience, you don't want to be
hanging around people like that,it reflects badly on you, but
that's something that they don'treally get until they get a
little bit older, and then theyfigure out, well, actually, that
friend was, really was no good.
Mifrah Mahroof (43:53):
We just opened up a whole can of worms about
friends and people.
And I think that could be awhole other podcast because
there's so much to dive into
Arfa Iqbal (44:01):
be a whole other podcast, it could be a very
interesting one as
Mifrah Mahroof (44:03):
well.
But I guess that ties in witheverything that we mentioned
about coaches, because in a wayyou're getting a new person into
your circle, with new beliefsand new way they're seeing the
world.
And that kind of challenges youand rubs off on you.
So you are getting anotherinfluence.
Arfa Iqbal (44:19):
Oh, totally.
That's what I always tell mychildren, right, pick friends
that are going places in a goodway, and seek to be a person
that actually, will emulate thatsuccess.
Don't hang around with peoplethat you know are going nowhere
with their life, that's soimportant because the quality of
(44:39):
the friends that you're hangingaround, it really is going to
determine how far you go in yourown life.
Mifrah Mahroof (44:44):
Yeah, a hundred percent.
I tell my brother the same thingas well.
I was like, some of his friendsare like negative.
I was like, why are you hangingaround with them so much?
Like they're actually rubbingoff on you, they're like holding
you back.
from who
Arfa Iqbal (44:54):
rubbing off on you in a bad way.
Yeah.
Mifrah Mahroof (44:56):
So, and Alhamdulillah, like he was able
to see that and stuff.
And he's like, yeah, that guy isvery negative.
Arfa Iqbal (45:02):
yeah, yes, Alhamdulillah, yeah, MashaAllah.
But I think sometimes like theyhave to
Mifrah Mahroof (45:07):
Oh yeah.
They do.
They do for sure.
I mean, we are all on a journeyand I think that with time we
realize it.
And, I think the nice thingabout being on a journey of
growth is that you startrealizing these things and you
keep growing and you keepgetting better.
And it's a step by step journeyat the end.
Arfa Iqbal (45:21):
Yeah, of course, definitely.
Mifrah Mahroof (45:23):
So Arfa, where can people find you online?
Arfa Iqbal (45:25):
So, you can check out my website,
arfasairaiqbal.com.
or you can check me out onFacebook, just typing my name
and it'll pop up.
but I haven't posted on Facebookin the longest time.
But yeah, if you're going tofind me anywhere on social,
that's probably where I'm goingto
Mifrah Mahroof (45:39):
be.
Awesome.
Well, look, thank you so much.
It's been an absolute pleasurehaving this chat.
Arfa Iqbal (45:44):
Thank you for having
Mifrah Mahroof (45:45):
Yeah.
Like it's nighttime for you,early morning for me, and we
managed to have an amazingconversation.
Arfa Iqbal (45:50):
to go to sleep now.
Exactly, I can see the
Mifrah Mahroof (45:53):
Yeah.
The sun, yeah, the sun iscoming.
Arfa Iqbal (45:55):
uh, in your office.
Exactly, yeah, we're gettingready to wind down and go to
sleep now, so
Mifrah Mahroof (46:01):
Thank you so much.
I appreciate it.
And InshaAllah, let's chat soon.
Take care.
Asalamu alaikum.
Arfa Iqbal (46:07):
Take care, thank you so much.
Mifrah Mahroof (46:09):
Hey everyone.
That wraps up another episodefrom the Muslim Life Hackers
podcast.
I really hope you enjoyed ourchat today.
I've got some great takeaways.
if you like what you heard anddon't want to miss out on our
next conversations, hit thatsubscribe button on YouTube,
Apple Podcasts, Spotify, orwherever you're listening to
this from.
It means a lot to us, and ithelps us reach more people who
can benefit from this show.
(46:29):
Thank you again for tuning in.
Until next time, keep strivingand getting better every day.
Your business cannot grow unless you yourself are
growing.
Mifrah Mahroof (00:07):
Asalamu Alaikum and welcome to the Muslim Life
Hackers podcast.
I'm your host Mifrah Mahroof,and in today's episode we're
going to be having Arfa Iqbaljoin us.
So Arfa is a direct responsemarketer and the best selling
author of MindHack Marketing.
She specializes in creatingsales funnels and pre selling
mastery, skills which hingeheavily on understanding how
customers think.
(00:27):
Since 2010, she's helpedgenerate over nine figures in
sales for her clients, whichinclude celebrity influencers,
thought leaders, and industryexperts.
So without further ado, let'sget started with this.
Asalamu Alaikum, Arfa andwelcome to the show.
Arfa Iqbal (00:41):
Wa'alaikumsalam Warohmatullahi Wabarakatuhu
Thank you so much for having me.
How are you
Mifrah Mahroof (00:45):
Alhamdulillah, I'm doing well.
How are you going?
Arfa Iqbal (00:47):
Yeah, I'm doing good.
It's been a long day, it's quite
Mifrah Mahroof (00:50):
yeah, it's actually late for you and
Arfa Iqbal (00:51):
isn't it?
Mifrah Mahroof (00:52):
It's very early for me.
This is going to be aninteresting conversation.
Arfa Iqbal (00:54):
InshaAllah, InshaAllah.
Mifrah Mahroof (00:56):
So you are a copywriter.
So it's a direct responsemarketer and you've been in this
space for a very long time.
So 2010,
Arfa Iqbal (01:05):
Yeah, since 2010
Mifrah Mahroof (01:06):
How many years is that?
Yeah.
14 years,
Arfa Iqbal (01:10):
That's 14 years.
So yeah, long time.
Mifrah Mahroof (01:13):
um, growing in this space and like changing a
lot, right?
Arfa Iqbal (01:17):
Oh yeah, definitely.
When I started it, I didn't evenknow what copywriting was.
I'll tell you something reallyfunny.
I thought copywriting was thatthing that you do when you're
trying to legally protect yourwork.
Mifrah Mahroof (01:28):
Oh, yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (01:28):
I didn't understand what it was even.
So yeah, and then when I gotinto it, I was like, oh wow,
it's not what I thought it was.
But yeah,
Mifrah Mahroof (01:36):
so what is copywriting for our guests, who
aren't aware of it, who stillthink that it's got to do with
the legal stuff.
Arfa Iqbal (01:42):
So it's basically a salesmanship in either print or
digital, right?
Anything that you see online,like a brochure, an email, a
landing page, a sales page,anything that is designed to
sell something is normallywritten by somebody like myself.
Mifrah Mahroof (01:57):
Oh, okay.
Arfa Iqbal (01:58):
So that's how I want you to think of it, right?
Like, even if you're like on TVand you're watching an advert,
somebody like myself will havewritten that advert.
I
Mifrah Mahroof (02:06):
see.
And, I wonder though, like inyour space, how has AI actually
affected it?
Or has it not affected it atall?
Arfa Iqbal (02:13):
Do you know what?
I think there was this whole bighoo ha that, oh gosh, AI is
going to take over your jobsand, no one's going to want to
hire you.
And I'm going to be completelyhonest.
At first, I was a little bitscared because I was like, Oh,
like if the machines are takingover, what am I going to do?
But then when I started playingaround with it and I tried to
(02:34):
get like ChatGPT to write somecopy, I was like, no, it's not
that good yet.
Do you know what I mean?
So you have to really understandsomething called prompt
engineering, which is theability to instruct the AI
correctly, and if you don'tunderstand how to do that, then
that was saying like, the betterthe quality of the input, the
(02:54):
better the quality of theoutput.
But the truth of the matter ismost business owners are not
prompt engineers.
They don't understand, how towrite a really great prompt.
They don't know exactly what tosay.
They don't know the nuances ofwhat a prompt involves.
Now, in terms of how has itdisrupted my industry or has it
replaced people?
Yes, it has replaced people, butwhat it's actually done is it's
(03:19):
replaced the copywriters thatwere not that good in the first
place, right?
So if you're a bad copywriter,or you're someone who's very
mediocre, doesn't reallyunderstand strategy, you don't
really understand marketing,you're just writing whatever
anyone tells you, that type ofperson absolutely can be
replaced by AI, but I thinkwe're still a long way off AI
(03:42):
completely replacing us.
You still need someone to, sensecheck the copy, someone to make
sure that everything is makingsense, that it reads the way
that it's supposed to, thatyou're on brand, it's still got
that creative streak to it.
So there's still so many thingsthat, I mean, AI is very good at
helping you get like a roughfirst draft when you know what
(04:02):
you're doing.
But it's not going to give youthe finished article, maybe that
will change in the next, five to10 years.
Who knows?
Mifrah Mahroof (04:08):
I agree.
I find that even if you have thebest prompt, like you still have
to have that human touch, causeyou can tell when something's
written by AI, it just has this.
Arfa Iqbal (04:16):
Oh, I can spot it a mile
Mifrah Mahroof (04:18):
whether A or Whether B, you know, that saying
that it has at the end, it'slike, Oh, whether you want A or
whether you want B, then this isright for you.
It's like, a classic AI, AIwrite up.
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (04:34):
but it's not been around long enough that
something would be a cliche, butalready you can spot AI written
text from a mile away.
Mifrah Mahroof (04:41):
Yeah.
And I can imagine you can seethat come up a lot.
I'm curious to know, the actualworkings of like how you got to
where you are with thissuccessful business.
Cause I know a lot of ourlisteners here are very
interested in starting their ownbusiness or they have their own
business and they want to jumpup to different levels and get
higher and higher.
(05:01):
And I know that you've spokenabout your story a lot in
different interviews andpodcasts.
However, one thing that youspeak about a lot is the whole
idea of having coaches to helpyou.
And I want to hear more aboutthat.
Why would you say that coacheshas been one of your most
important investments in yourjourney of becoming a successful
(05:23):
business owner?
Arfa Iqbal (05:24):
Yeah, that's a really great question.
I think it's more about like howfar do you want to go, right?
Like, I think if you're seriousabout building something that is
built to last and you'recreating something that is going
to be with you for the longhaul.
You have to take it veryseriously, it's not a joke,
right?
(05:44):
Because I don't care if you'restarting a business online or
whether you're doing it offline.
It requires a lot of time, a lotof energy, a lot of resources.
But also, you don't know all ofthe answers, right?
And many times, like I alwaystell people, like people who are
like on the fence about coachingor they're a little bit iffy
about it, I'm like, the greatestgrowth that I've had in my own
(06:05):
business is when I've hiredcoaches, right?
Why?
Because they can spot the thingsthat I can't.
They can see things, or they cananalyze things from a slightly
different perspective.
The thing is, when you areworking, You're emotionally
attached to what you do, right?
Whereas a coach, when they comealong, there's zero
(06:25):
subjectivity.
They're completely objective.
They're looking from theoutside, looking in, and they've
got zero emotional attachment towhat you're doing.
So something that you think is abig deal to you, to a coach,
might not be such a big deal,but they need that objectivity
to be able to tell you,actually, do you know what?
You haven't considered this.
This isn't going the way thatyou thought it would, what are
(06:47):
you gonna do in order to try andcounteract that?
So what they'll do is they'llgive you a different
perspective, they'll give you adifferent way of looking at
things.
Even if we, let's take our deenfor example, right?
If you look at the Prophet SAW,right?
He was coached by Jibreel AS,
Mifrah Mahroof (07:02):
Hmm.
Arfa Iqbal (07:03):
right?
And, so he couldn't do what hecould do without Allah's help
and without being coached andbasically taken through it, like
the verses of the Quran wouldcome down and they would come
through Jibreel, like he neededthat to be coached through the
process.
Like it's not easy changing theworld, right?
And I'm like, well, Allah SWTcoached the Prophet SAW, Jibreel
(07:26):
AS coached the Prophet SAW, andhe was a mighty messenger,
right?
So it's like, if you think aboutit from our perspective, we
don't have all of the answers.
We just don't, right?
I don't care how good you are atsomething.
You don't know whether you'redoing something right or whether
you think that you are doingsomething in the correct way
(07:47):
until someone else comes andsays, But you haven't considered
this, or what about this, orwhat about, X, Y, and Z, right?
What if this changes?
What are you gonna do?
And so they force you outside ofyour comfort zone, right?
They will challenge you onthings that will, in my opinion,
helps you to grow.
And that's how I view coaching,right?
Seriously, I think like when Itried to do this on my own, it
(08:10):
was so hard because I was makinga lot of mistakes.
There was a lot of
Mifrah Mahroof (08:14):
of, start of your business when you were
trying to
Arfa Iqbal (08:16):
that was right
Mifrah Mahroof (08:16):
How long, how long were you trying to do it on
your own for until you decidedI'm going to get a
Arfa Iqbal (08:21):
So I tried to do on my own for about a year.
Yeah, or maybe a little bitlonger, but it was really hard
because I didn't like, when youdon't know what you don't know.
So it was difficult because Iwas like trying a bit of this
and trying a bit of that, andsometimes I would do something
that would work really well.
And other times I'd do the samething and then it wasn't working
and I'm like, I couldn'tunderstand like what's going on,
(08:43):
like, I think I'm doing all theright things, but clearly I'm
not.
My first ever coach was actuallymy mentor who taught me
copywriting because I did a lotof like self study courses.
And then I thought I knew what Iwas doing until I got coached by
him and he mentored me for awhole year actually.
And then I'd look at my workthat I'd done myself and then
(09:05):
I'd feel really
Mifrah Mahroof (09:06):
embarrassed.
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (09:07):
I'm like, oh my god, I really didn't know what the
heck I was doing.
Because here's the problem, whenyou do something yourself, how
do you know you're doing itcorrectly?
You just don't.
That's the problem, right?
So I think from the perspectiveof, because I coach students
myself as well, they're notaware of what they're not aware,
and it's the job of the coach tobring that into someone's
(09:28):
awareness.
Mifrah Mahroof (09:29):
It's like knowledge is transferred, not
from like just book to human.
It's like human to human.
And that's the best.
Arfa Iqbal (09:37):
Yeah, it's an experience, isn't it, right?
So you have to live theknowledge, isn't it?
it's not good enough to justread a book and then think that
you have all of the answers,because I tried that on Believe
Me.
It just doesn't work like that.
I wish it was that linear, butit's not.
Mifrah Mahroof (09:52):
So where would you say like books and courses
and say videos and things thatyou watch come in then?
What are your thoughts on that?
Because like people say investin courses, learn about this and
where does that come in then?
Arfa Iqbal (10:05):
I think that they all have their own value, right?
So it's not like they don't havevalue.
I think it's extremelyimportant.
I try my best to read all thetime because the reading will
give you lots of differentperspectives, right?
What it can't give you is itcan't give you a bespoke action
plan.
It cannot give you insight intosomething that is specific for
you.
(10:25):
Do you see what I'm saying?
and it can't give youexperience, like books are great
for knowledge and enhancing yourunderstanding, but it's not
going to be unique to you andwhat you need.
Right?
Even same with courses, right?
Like I said, I've done hundredsof courses in my lifetime,
right?
And, I'll go through them on myown accord, but again, it's
(10:47):
like, it's great for theknowledge, it's great for the
understanding, but actually whenyou start applying it, it's a
completely different ballgame.
It's a completely differentkettle of fish.
So they have their value and Iwould say, use things like books
and courses to give you thebackground, understanding, to
give you that knowledge, to helpyou to understand how something
(11:09):
works.
But, until you've actually livedit, And you've gone through it
as an experience, you're notgoing to have the in depth
knowledge and understanding thatyou should have, right?
Because in depth knowledge onlycomes when you have that, it's
that I've actually gotten myhands dirty.
I rolled my sleeves up and I didthis myself.
And that's how I learned.
(11:30):
And I always tell my studentslike, you learn more from
failure than you do from yoursuccesses.
Actually, failure is going toteach you a heck of a lot,
right?
Your Failure is going to teachyou what success can never teach
you, right?
and it'll tell you where are yougoing wrong and it'll help you
to formulate better ideas and totry different things and to try
things that, quite frankly, youmight not otherwise have tried.
(11:53):
If you did well on absolutelyeverything, that doesn't teach
you anything because whensomething goes wrong, then you
don't know what to do.
Mifrah Mahroof (12:01):
Ah,
Arfa Iqbal (12:01):
Whereas if you've done something and it went
wrong, you learned the lessonand now you can apply it to the
next thing and the next thingand the next thing.
So yeah, it has its place and ithas its usage, but if you want
to quantum leap your business,then getting a coach is, in my
honest opinion, the best way
Mifrah Mahroof (12:19):
So, it sounds like, growing and leveling up is
possible through just books andcourses, but the time is what
takes longer.
And when you compare it withhaving a coach or another human
being to help you, then it'sjust the time is faster because
now you get the knowledge and
Arfa Iqbal (12:37):
you're going to shortcut your learning curve,
definitely.
Yeah, you're going to, shortcutyour learning, curve it.
It slashes the learning timedown.
So the books will, like I said,they will give you the
understanding.
Mifrah Mahroof (12:49):
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (12:50):
You don't get the insight or the experience that a
coach can bring.
Mifrah Mahroof (12:53):
It kind of reminds me of that quote.
It's like, you either pay withyour wallet or your time.
Arfa Iqbal (12:58):
Well, a hundred percent, right?
Mifrah Mahroof (13:00):
but you can learn regardless, but it's just
like, how do you want to do it?
Do you want to spend your timeor your money?
Arfa Iqbal (13:06):
The alternative question to think about is how
fast do you want to
Mifrah Mahroof (13:09):
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (13:10):
If you've got all the time in the world and you'd
rather just figure it out foryourself, good luck.
I wish you all the best.
Because that is something thatyou have to be then prepared to
put in as much time as, and thatcould take years for you to get
to where you want, right?
And I've seen people who dothis.
They're like, nope, I want tofigure this out for myself.
I want to figure this out formyself.
And it's three years have goneby, five years, I'm stuck.
(13:32):
But yeah, did you ever get acoach?
No, I didn't get a coach.
Why not?
Oh, I thought I could figurethis out on my own.
Whereas the people who, youknow, you take two people, one
can be incredibly knowledgeablein their subject matter, but you
compare that to someone whomaybe doesn't have anywhere near
as much knowledge, but becausethey've hired the coach, they
(13:53):
will get to where they need togo faster than the other person.
Mifrah Mahroof (13:55):
Hmm.
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (13:56):
That's the beauty of that.
So yeah, a hundred percent.
I have a coach who's beencoaching me for the last 10
years and counting.
And I think at one point I hadlike five
Mifrah Mahroof (14:07):
coaches.
Oh, wow.
Five coaches.
So, was it like different areasof your life or like, how was
that?
Arfa Iqbal (14:13):
Yeah, totally different areas of my life.
I had one was helping with timemanagement.
Another one was helping withpodcasting.
Another one was helping me withmy business.
Another one's helping me with myhealth kind of thing.
So at any one point, I hadmultiple coaches at any one
point.
And so for me, because Iunderstand the value of that,
it's not something I think Ican't grow unless, like, your
(14:36):
business cannot grow.
And I think this is like the keytakeaway here.
Your business cannot grow unlessyou yourself are growing.
Mifrah Mahroof (14:43):
Hmm, that's a very important point.
Because there's even this thingI heard when like people are
like, I'll invest after I makethe money, like I'll spend on
myself after I made some moneyin this business that I'm doing.
Arfa Iqbal (14:56):
good luck with that.
That might take you a long timeto do.
Mifrah Mahroof (14:58):
Okay.
So, that's interesting.
So it's like, the more you wantto grow, the more you need to
invest in yourself so that youcan be able to get the results
that you want.
And that brings me to a coupleof other questions.
When you say get a coach, wouldyou just say, get someone, one
to one or what about groupcoaching and what about those
community
Arfa Iqbal (15:17):
mean, I've done both.
Mifrah Mahroof (15:18):
what are your,
Arfa Iqbal (15:19):
Yeah, I've done both and there's definite value with
both of them, right?
You have to look at what you arecomfortable with.
Normally when you go private,you're paying a lot of money,
but that's totally okay.
But again, it depends on what itis that you're looking to
achieve, right?
There are certain instanceswhere you're not comfortable
sharing your private life with agroup of strangers, right?
(15:42):
And so in that instance, I wouldsay to you, go private with the
coaching, right?
But if you are in a space orlet's say it's just like
business and you're in a groupthat is better than still doing
it on your own.
Mifrah Mahroof (15:55):
Yeah.
I see.
Arfa Iqbal (15:56):
Because there's a lot of, I mean, even I do a lot
of group coaching.
I do private coaching.
I do group coaching and thegroup coaching works extremely
well.
And actually what I found withthe group coaching, people learn
from other people.
Mifrah Mahroof (16:08):
Yeah.
They do.
Arfa Iqbal (16:09):
Right, so I've done this many times.
So, I actually coach for MarissaPeer, she's one of my Clients
and basically, I've noticed likea student will ask a question.
I'm answering the questioneveryone is writing down notes,
right?
So there is that because it's acommunity, you know learning
environment Everyone is learningfrom everyone else and I think
(16:29):
the thing that I have found,because I've been doing this for
a number of years now, isstudents are actually quite
surprised at how much they learnfrom the other students.
I think in their head, theyprobably thought, well, I've got
the questions that I wanted toask, but actually so many times
students have said, I came herewith just like one question and
I've ended up making pages andpages of notes because this was
so valuable.
(16:50):
It really helped me to learn,and I'm like, that's the reason
why we have these group coachingcalls.
But the private, of course, itcan be done in so many different
ways, right?
That might involve the coach.
Physically, like for example, Ihave a coach that is coaching me
privately.
I share all of my businessfinancials.
I would not be comfortable doingthat with, you know, I would not
(17:11):
be comfortable pulling out allof my numbers In front of a
group, but because my coach hasbeen working with me for over 10
years, he sees what my cashflowsays, he knows exactly what's
coming in at what point, heknows how much profit's coming
in, how, what my cashflow issaying over the next 12 weeks,
he knows how much my net is, heknows what my projections are,
(17:31):
like he knows all of that, andthat is fine because I'm doing
that on a one to one basis withhim, but I wouldn't be
comfortable sharing that in a
Mifrah Mahroof (17:40):
group.
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (17:41):
So you have to choose your poison, basically,
you know, if you've got to,yeah, if you know that you need
the coaching, you've got tofigure out, what am I
comfortable doing in front ofother people?
And if the answer is not verymuch, then go for the private
coaching.
That's what I would say.
Mifrah Mahroof (17:56):
Okay.
Then that makes sense.
So how would you go aboutfinding a coach?
Because there are so manycoaches online and then you want
to, let's talk about how you'dfind it in business.
And I'm also curious to hearabout how you find it for your
other areas as well, but let'sstart business.
Arfa Iqbal (18:12):
Yeah.
So this is a really goodquestion, actually.
It involves a couple of things.
Number one, you've got to bewilling to have a lot of
introspection.
So, you yourself have got to bewilling to understand what are
the areas of my life that I needserious help with.
And that means that you have todo a lot of reflecting and you
have to figure out, andsometimes this also looks like
(18:35):
you swallowing your pride andremoving the ego.
Because, I think this is witheveryone.
I think once you've, especiallywhen you've been doing something
for a long time, You almost feellike because you've put in the
hours or you've put in the yearsOh, I don't need a coach for
that because my knowledge issufficient.
Do you see what I mean?
So and I've seen people who havethis problem.
(18:57):
They're like, no, I don't wantsomeone telling me what to do.
No, a coach is not there to tellyou what to do.
They are there to help challengeyou and help you to grow past
the blocks that you otherwisewouldn't have seen, right?
But it first involves you havinga little bit of humility and
figuring out, actually, do youknow what?
This area of my life is not thatgreat, I need help here.
(19:18):
So it's that, first it's thatadmission that I need the help
and then I always prefer to workwith coaches that I've got a
personal recommendation of,right?
So I will ask, Alhamdulillah,I'm very well connected.
So what I will do is I will askthe people around me, listen,
you know what?
I'm looking for someone that canhelp me solve this particular
(19:39):
problem.
Does anyone recommend, doesanyone have any recommendations?
And so I always go byrecommendations and then I don't
even just go hire the person asis.
I'll go check out all of theirreviews.
I'll check out their casestudies.
I'll check out the testimonials.
I will even have to, if I haveto, I'll go speak to some of
their clients, right?
(19:59):
That's how serious I take theapproach of coaching because I
think there's nothing worse thangetting yourself a coach that
doesn't align with you or yourvalues, right?
And not everyone, not everycoach is suitable for every
person.
You have to find the coach thatis right for you.
Mifrah Mahroof (20:17):
I agree, also in that researching phase, even
going through their content andmaterial makes a difference
because it gives you that whole,like,
Arfa Iqbal (20:25):
That makes a
Mifrah Mahroof (20:26):
yeah, like it gives you this feeling about
like, can I really resonate withthis person?
Or is it just like, they'retotally off?
Hmm.
What if you reasonate with theknowledge
Arfa Iqbal (20:35):
right?
So the things that they aresharing.
If you share that viewpoint,then actually it makes it 10
times easier for you to say yes.
Because when you read theircontent, their emails, you're
consuming their videos, thatactually gives you a really good
indication as to whether or notsomeone knows
Mifrah Mahroof (20:54):
what they're talking about.
Yeah, and also, I guess thisresearch also shows it's who
that person is.
And essentially when you workwith someone, you want to become
like them.
Do I see myself becoming them?
And if so, then, okay, well,that's a good sign.
Arfa Iqbal (21:09):
Exactly, exactly.
Mifrah Mahroof (21:10):
that's an interesting one.
Okay, what about in other areas?
Like, how would you go aboutwith that?
for example, help or so no,that's a big one
Arfa Iqbal (21:18):
So I think with health, health is a very
interesting one.
Simply because you have to alignwith their philosophy.
For example, I'll give you areally good example actually.
Unfortunately, I do have anautoimmune disorder and I firmly
believe, like when I go to thedoctor and I said, I'm
experiencing, problems here,problems there, I'm very stiff
(21:39):
in the morning, I can't move myfingers kind of thing.
They're like, the first thingthey want to do is they want to
put you on really harshmedication and what not, but
they're not willing to go to theroot cause, right?
Whereas, My fundamental beliefis that, your body, your
immunity lies in your gut,right?
So if I'm going to go work withan expert, I'm going to work
(22:00):
with an expert that understandsthat first of all, immunity is
found in the gut.
But secondly, you don't treatthe symptoms.
Cause what I found with doctorsis they're very good at
prescribing medicines for thesymptoms of the problem, but not
so much helping you get to theroot cause and helping you
figure out why you're sick inthe first place.
So for me, when I'm working withsomeone, I want to know, does
(22:23):
this person share the samephilosophy as me?
Do they believe that my body isan entire system?
And not just compartmentalize.
Oh, you've got pain in yourshoulder.
You've got pain in your fingerskind of thing.
Oh, so what we're going to do iswe're just going to give you a
bunch of painkillers, but we'renot going to get to the root
cause, right?
We're not going to figureanything out, right?
Like for me, that is just awaste of time.
(22:44):
Because yes, it helps to apoint, but it doesn't help you
get better.
And so I think when, especiallywhen it comes to your health,
like you have to find someone,like I go for functional
practitioners because they viewyour body as an entire system,
and they know that, let's say,for example, if you have,
Typically as entrepreneurs, wehave highly stressful jobs,
(23:05):
right?
you go to a normal doctor, theywill tell you that the stress
doesn't have any impact on yourbody.
That's nonsense, right?
That's a classic one, by theway.
I've been told so
Mifrah Mahroof (23:15):
many times.
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (23:16):
And I was so grateful that the doctor that I
had, the first question he askedme is, have you been under a lot
of stress lately?
And I was like, Yeah.
And he was like, yeah, that'swhy.
Mifrah Mahroof (23:25):
is so important
Arfa Iqbal (23:27):
wow.
Mifrah Mahroof (23:27):
in like, it really affects us a
Arfa Iqbal (23:29):
lot.
So important, but I was soshocked because I was like, this
is probably the first doctorI've ever spoken to that
acknowledged that my lifestylemight actually have an impact on
my health, right?
So it's insane.
So yeah.
I,
Mifrah Mahroof (23:42):
So it sounds like, having that alignment in
belief and actually seeing that,okay, are they going to approach
health for example, in the waythat I'm looking at it.
That makes sense.
Arfa Iqbal (23:53):
Oh my God.
Yeah.
That's so important.
Yeah.
Because if theycompartmentalize, and they just,
No, it's just like this and it'slike this and almost like
putting your condition intoboxes.
But you don't really getanywhere with that because then
it's just you're on arollercoaster of drugs
Mifrah Mahroof (24:09):
Yeah.
Do you
Arfa Iqbal (24:09):
what I mean?
And there's no to it kind ofthing.
Yes
Mifrah Mahroof (24:14):
actually the reality for so many people,
right?
So I want to step back a bit andalso ask you about, in the early
days and you investing the moneyfor coaches.
What if you don't have enoughmoney and you want to get the
business started, to what extentwould you prioritize this?
Arfa Iqbal (24:34):
When I got started, I actually didn't have the money
to do the mentoring with mycoach.
And I still remember, I went tomy sister in law and I just
basically said to her, I reallyneed your help.
And bless her heart.
I always make dua for her.
She paid for my mentoring, andthen Alhamdulillah, within three
months of me doing thementoring, I was able to pay her
(24:55):
back, which was fantastic.
So, the way that I look at it iswhere you can either find a way
to make the money, okay, get themoney, or you can make a lot of
excuses, but you have to choosethat like you either decide I'm
going to do it and then youfigure out how to do it or you
wait with a full intention thatwhen I've got the money I'm
(25:18):
going to save up for this andthen when I've got the money I'm
going to go invest.
But the way that I look at thatis that's just putting off.
It's just putting off somethingthat you could get done a lot
quicker.
You could make the money so muchfaster and when you have that
help, make the money and thenpay the person back.
But that in itself is a bigresponsibility because obviously
you have to put a lot of workinto it.
So it's one thing having thecoaching, it's quite another
(25:40):
actually doing the
Mifrah Mahroof (25:41):
work.
Yeah, it is.
And also it did actually alsocomes back to, if we really need
something and we make du'a forit, and even if we don't want to
go to, through the root of debt,then Allah SWT will always open
up a way for us in ways we don't
Arfa Iqbal (25:55):
Oh yeah, of course.
Of course, I believe that.
Mifrah Mahroof (25:57):
So, it's, yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (26:00):
You know, I've had a student who come to me and said,
I really want to work with you,Arfa.
Mifrah Mahroof (26:03):
Hmm.
Arfa Iqbal (26:04):
But do you know what?
I physically don't have themeans, I don't have the money.
And so what I will do with thosepeople is I will like literally
I'll send them a copy of mybook, right?
And I'm like, right, okay, letme send you this, go read the
book, go put things into action.
So basically what I'm doing isI'm helping to empower them to
be able to make the money sothey can go work with me.
(26:26):
You know, or that I will pointthem to resources, if they don't
need my book but it's somethingelse, I'll point them to other
resources that I've got, or Iwill pass them on to someone
that I think can definitely helpthem, even if that's not
Mifrah Mahroof (26:37):
me.
Yeah, of course.
I think it's easiest to dismissthese things like coaching and
saying, Oh, it's too expensive,but then it doesn't cost you any
money to actually want it inyour mind.
Like, it doesn't cost you anymoney to dream it or at least
say, Hey, I want this.
Arfa Iqbal (26:51):
Well, it doesn't cost you any money.
No, but it does cost you,doesn't it, right?
Because your time has a valueattached to it, right?
And I think that's the greatmyth that people like get rid
of.
Oh, I've got loads of time.
Yeah, but at what cost, right?
That's time that you could bespending with your family, with
your loved ones, right?
Like there's an associated costwith that, right?
(27:14):
I don't ever look at coaching asa cost.
I always look at it as aninvestment into my well being,
in an investment into mybusiness, an investment into
whatever it is that I need helpwith, right?
That's how I view coaching.
It's always, it's never a cost.
It's always an investment.
Mifrah Mahroof (27:31):
True.
Of course.
I mean, like actually desiringit and actually wanting it, for
example, like a person may notimmediately have the funds to
pay for a coach, but there'snothing stopping them from
actually wanting it in theirhearts, because, because like at
that point, like a person couldmake excuses and say, Oh, I
can't do that and they'realready dismissing it at the
(27:52):
start.
Like, Oh, I can't do that.
Or I can't afford that.
So that kind of becomes theirreality.
And then they never get to buyit or invest in it and move
forward.
And that's actually pretty sad.
Cause you kind of like cut itoff at the roots.
Arfa Iqbal (28:05):
Yeah, it's definitely sad, but what you
know the way that I would lookat that is if you're not ready
to work with a coach, there areother ways like read the books,
do the courses, do the selfhelp, right?
Get yourself in a supportiveenvironment with other like
minded, people who are also onthat same journey.
And find ways to help yourself,right?
(28:27):
Like one thing I have learnedfrom being in business for 14
years, you cannot do this onyour own.
You really can't.
It's impossible to do it on yourown.
And I think if you're looking atdoing it on your own, just be
prepared to put a lot of, timeand effort and energy, into
trying to figure it out, right?
(28:47):
Whereas with the right coach.
They're gonna literally justshortcut that learning,
something that might take youtwo years to do, you might be
able to do in three months with
Mifrah Mahroof (28:57):
the coach.
Yeah.
And like time, and time islimited right at the end.
Whereas money you
Arfa Iqbal (29:03):
Well, time is your most precious resource, right?
You can always make more money,but you absolutely cannot make
more time.
Once that time is gone, it'sgone.
You're not making it back.
It's not
Mifrah Mahroof (29:14):
That's So true.
Subhanallah.
Okay.
We're actually getting close tothe end of the interview and I
want to present to you thequestions that we have for all
of our guests.
So what would you say is onelife hack that's improved your
life?
Well, other than coaching, sincewe've explored it.
Arfa Iqbal (29:31):
Yeah, so I'd say read a lot.
Definitely read a lot.
Actually, there's two life hacksthat I would say.
Read a lot, and that alsoincludes the Quran.
So have a daily Quran habit.
I think that I don't believethat you can have success,
without, having success in thatarea, right?
Like, for me, success is abouthaving success in every area of
(29:51):
your life, not just, Oh yeah,I'm great at business, but you
know what, my deen completelysucks and I'm not praying five
times a day and I'm notbothering, like, you know where
you need to level up, right?
And so for me, it's when I do myplanning, especially when I'm
doing my planning on how mybusiness or how my life is going
to improve, there's always asection on how is my
(30:12):
spirituality going to improve,right?
Am I developing a betterrelationship with the Quran?
Am I, really exerting myself inworship?
What am I doing to try and helpmyself, right?
So, definitely that.
And also, You have tounderstand, look, we're Muslim
at the end of the day, right?
We do things with excellence.
We're supposed to do things withIhsan, but you can't do that if
you don't have a goodrelationship with God.
(30:34):
But so you can't expect to besuccessful if you're not doing
the thing that He's telling youto do, right?
So I think that's reallyimportant.
And then I'd say that the secondthing which I think is a non
negotiable is taking care ofyourself and that looks like
getting to bed on time going fora walk like literally getting in
(30:56):
the gym, eating healthy, like,this for me, I would say in of
all the different areas of mylife, the health part has always
been the most challenging.
Because when you're a parent,especially if you're doing
things on your own, like I didfor the last, well, I've been a
single parent for a long
Mifrah Mahroof (31:12):
time.
Yeah.
And you, started when yourchildren were like very young,
like 10 months, right?
It's
Arfa Iqbal (31:16):
Yeah, literally, Yeah.
I mean, I started, my businesswhen I was going through a
divorce, right?
So this is my point, right?
And so I've been on my own for along time and I got so good at
taking care of everything elseand everyone else and putting
myself last, but that is such a,that is the
Mifrah Mahroof (31:35):
worst thing.
Yeah.
Cause it comes back and then theconsequences.
Arfa Iqbal (31:38):
thing to do.
Yeah, absolutely.
So you have to dedicate time,get outside in nature, go for a
walk, do your dhikr while you'rewalking, make du'a while you're
walking, get out there innature, reconnect with what your
real purpose is and that isgoing to make you a better
business owner.
Definitely.
Mifrah Mahroof (31:56):
Yeah.
A hundred percent.
It's not just about the hustleof the business.
It's all the other areas of yourlife.
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (32:02):
That's true success, right?
It's not, how much money you'vegot in the bank, that's a nice,
that part is like, yes, that'sgreat.
We'd love to have that, right?
But the real wealth that I wouldsay is spending time with your
children, right?
Being able to have a nicerelaxed morning, not having to
stress about deadlines.
This is what I call true successand not being tied to anything,
(32:25):
being able to travel where youwant, do what you want.
That's what I call true success.
Having it all, you can have itall, but it's going to come at a
cost.
And you just have to choose yourheart.
That's what I say.
Mifrah Mahroof (32:37):
Okay.
And what
Arfa Iqbal (32:38):
is.
Yeah.
Being successful is hard, right?
But being a failure is alsohard, right?
So choose your
Mifrah Mahroof (32:44):
heart.
Oh, true, right?
Being a failure is hard becausethen you're always finding the
consequences of that, that startcoming up and biting you in
every area of your life.
Arfa Iqbal (32:54):
Exactly.
So choose your
Mifrah Mahroof (32:55):
heart.
like that deadline you put offstarts to chase you and then
this one that, your healthstarts to chase you and
everything starts coming back toyou.
So,
Arfa Iqbal (33:04):
Well, every single thing that you do, there is what
we call that consequence to it.
So you have to get clear on whatis the consequence, right?
If you want to be successful,what does that look like?
It's going to look like beingdisciplined.
It's going to look like, beingfocused, being consistent,
showing up when you don't feellike it.
(33:24):
Everyone has days when they rollout of bed in the morning and
they're like, I can't bebothered today, right?
But it's like, What do you dowhen you're feeling like that?
This is all important things,there was a saying actually,
what was the saying?
It was something along the linesof, if you want to build
character and you really want tobuild your character, go start a
business.
I don't know who said that, butwhoever said it was very
Mifrah Mahroof (33:46):
wise.
So true.
It teaches a lot about you.
Arfa Iqbal (33:48):
Of course it does.
And how you do everything isreally determined by how you
show up for yourself and forother people.
Mifrah Mahroof (33:54):
That's a really good food for thought.
My next question I have here is,what's a book that's helped you
level up in your life?
Arfa Iqbal (34:01):
Oh, that's a really good question.
There's so many
Mifrah Mahroof (34:04):
books.
Well, you can name a couple.
Arfa Iqbal (34:05):
The one that I think, hands down, everyone
should read is Your Next FiveMoves by Patrick Bet.
David.
That is what a spectacular book.
that
Mifrah Mahroof (34:16):
I've never heard of that one.
Arfa Iqbal (34:17):
that really got me thinking.
Have you never heard of that
Mifrah Mahroof (34:20):
Okay, it's going to be on my list.
Arfa Iqbal (34:22):
Yeah.
So, so good, like really good.
I'm like, every singleentrepreneur on the planet
should read this book.
And the other one that I wouldrecommend, actually, there's a
number that I would recommend.
So the other one, I'm going torecommend three actually.
So that one would probably benumber one on my list.
Number two would be How to WinFriends and Influence People by
Dale Carnegie, like the greatestbook on sales ever written that
(34:44):
was never meant for sales.
And then the third book that Iwould highly recommend is
Oversubscribed by DanielPriestly.
Brilliant books.
All three of these are
Mifrah Mahroof (34:53):
really superb.
And it's actually quiteinteresting that you're
mentioning Dale Carnegie's bookas the best sales book and was
like, how to win friends, right?
Arfa Iqbal (35:01):
Yeah, how to win friends and influence people.
So this is a really importantthing, right?
So aside from the coaching, whatelse is going to help your
business to grow?
It's your network.
Your network equals your networth.
Mifrah Mahroof (35:12):
Yes,
Arfa Iqbal (35:12):
Right?
So the more you level up withyour network, the more money you
will make.
That's just a natural, it's anatural byproduct because you're
literally the sum of the fivepeople that you hung around
with.
So if you're not making verymuch money, look at the five
people that you're hungingaround with and change your
company.
Mifrah Mahroof (35:29):
Does that mean you would also spend money on
masterminds, how do you findthese people?
Yeah,
Arfa Iqbal (35:34):
totally.
So I've been part of amastermind now, 2014 I joined a
mastermind and I'm still part ofit.
Mifrah Mahroof (35:43):
That's very interesting.
So the mastermind would bedifferent to like a group
coaching, like the communitythere, for example.
Arfa Iqbal (35:48):
Yeah, it's different.
Depends on what kind of programyou go for.
So the one that I'm currentlyon, that is the masterminding
element, which is the physicalget togethers that you do once a
quarter for two days, and thenit's combined with coaching and
then they have like skillsessions in between.
So every quarter they'll work ondifferent areas or they do
(36:10):
things like workshops, like cashflow is one of them, sales is
another one, operations isanother one, scorecards is
another one, kind of thing.
So it's quite a well roundededucation, I think, if you're
looking at being a reallyfantastic entrepreneur, I would
say is definitely, that shouldbe on your hit list of things.
But I think at one point, I wasin three different masterminds
at the same
Mifrah Mahroof (36:29):
Yeah, it does really go to show I'm so glad
that you brought it up about thepeople around you as well, and
the network, because it'ssometimes we just get stuck with
oh, the same friends from ourhigh school or our neighborhood,
and then we're trying to getbetter, and then it's just not
happening.
Like we're trying to figure itout on our own.
We don't have a coach.
We don't have the people aroundus.
And then we don't really get farbecause the people around us
will be like, what are you doingonline?
(36:51):
You know,
Arfa Iqbal (36:51):
That's a really interesting point that you've
said, because I do want to pickup on this, because I think one
of the things that I havedefinitely seen is if you're
doing better than the peoplethat you're hanging around with,
either they're going to level upto you, or you will find them.
(37:12):
somehow no longer wanting tohang out with you.
Mifrah Mahroof (37:15):
Interesting.
Arfa Iqbal (37:16):
And so what I've noticed is that over the years,
as I've gotten, as my businesshas grown, my circle of
influence and my circle offriends has gotten smaller, I've
And smaller And smaller.
Like, I'm connected to very wellto do people, right?
So when I say well to do, like,very successful in this, right?
I'm connected to some verysuccessful people.
(37:38):
It doesn't need to be a bigcommunity.
It just needs to be the rightpeople, right?
And you will lose people.
And I think what people arenaturally afraid of, they are
afraid of leveling up becausethen they're going to be
different to everyone else.
They're scared that, if Isomehow change, and I make
myself better, everyone else isgoing to get left behind, but
(38:01):
it's not your job to dimyourself or dumb yourself down
and dim your light for otherpeople.
It's for other people to levelup to you.
No one should ever have to dumbthemselves down just so that
they can sit with a certaingroup of people.
And that's not being like, oh,you're being all snobby or
anything, God forbid it.
It's not about that, becauseactually when entrepreneurship
(38:22):
is done, properly, you actuallydevelop a lot of humility,
right?
And more importantly, you have adifferent level of respect for
people when they're goingthrough a difficult journey.
You respect more what they'redoing because you're going
through it yourself.
But it is important to surroundyourself with people who get it.
And if they don't get it, youneed a new circle of friends,
and it's not because you'rebeing mean, or you're being
(38:44):
petty, or stuff like that.
It's not like that, but you'regonna get to a point where the
wrong people will start fallingaway in your life.
And I actually make du'a forthat, the du'a that I always
make is Allah, keep good peoplearound me and keep bad people
away from right?
Because sometimes it can descendinto things like negativity, it
(39:05):
can descend into things likejealousy and envy, and you don't
want of energy around be honest.
Life
Mifrah Mahroof (39:12):
is already stressful as it is.
And then all this drama.
Arfa Iqbal (39:14):
Yeah.
I imagine having that additionallayer of drama because somebody,
doesn't like the fact that youare suddenly leveling up and
they're feeling threatened orleft behind.
Well, the way I look at it istoughen up and if you want to
join me, you're more thanwelcome and I will help you on
your journey, but I'm not gonnadumb myself down to that level,
(39:35):
because it's just doesn't becomeimportant anymore.
I think, it's the toughest partI'd say of entrepreneurship.
That's why they say that beingan entrepreneur is actually very
lonely because very few peopleunderstand or get what it is
that you do and you have to beokay with that.
Mifrah Mahroof (39:50):
I think it's also like making the most of
what Allah SWT has given you andbecoming the best version of
yourself because that's whatworks.
We're here to do on this dunyaat the end, get close to Allah
SWT
Arfa Iqbal (40:01):
Yeah, of course.
Mifrah Mahroof (40:02):
wants us to keep improving and growing.
And if we just feel like I needto be small because my friends
around me are small.
Arfa Iqbal (40:10):
Well, you know what I always say to my children, I
always say to my kids that youknow, You should never ever
bring yourself down to anyoneelse's level.
If they're being silly or pettyor being like, just not
bothering Rather you should holdyourself to a better standard
because ultimately you have tolive your life yourself, and so
(40:31):
if you're hanging around, thisis just it's the law of the land
averages, right?
Even the Prophet SAW said that aman is the sum of the five
people that hang around, that hehangs around with, right?
So it stands to reason if youhave, let's say a young guy,
Let's say he's, I don't know,18, 17, 18, and he's hanging
around with a bunch of losers.
(40:52):
if his top five friends, they'reall losers, and they're all
getting themselves into trouble,and they're constantly in and
out of trouble with the police,I can almost guarantee that
person, 110%, is going to end upjust like his friends, and he's
also going to be a loser.
So you have to think about, likeI always say this to my
children, you have to thinkabout yourself.
(41:13):
You cannot put your life on theline and you cannot jeopardize
your future because you'retrying to impress your silly
mates.
It's just not worth it.
I don't know about the girls,I'm sure they have like, people
that they find it hard, but Ithink with boys in particular, I
feel that it, sometimes can bereally hard to break away from
(41:35):
that peer pressure, and to gooff and do your own things.
A lot of pressure on you.
Oh, you don't want to hangaround
Mifrah Mahroof (41:41):
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
Arfa Iqbal (41:41):
We're not important anymore.
It's like, the homies or,whatever you call it.
I'm only saying that because Ilook at my children, right?
And so I have two boys,MashaAllah.
My eldest is 20 and my youngestis 15.
That is the thing that I tellthem all the time, right?
If you want to level up yourlife, you have to do it.
(42:02):
Like, don't look at your friendsand think that they're going to
do that for you, that's on you.
And if that means then that yourfriends are not aligning anymore
with your values, you have tochange your circle of friends.
It's hard to do though.
It's very hard to do.
It's
Mifrah Mahroof (42:15):
I think, I think a gradual approach is also good,
like getting in more people thatyou want to become like, and
then having your friends, butalso you can have your friends
for other areas.
Like if you just want to havefun.
Yeah.
So it's like you kind of, butyou don't have to talk to them
about your business or howyou're earning money.
Arfa Iqbal (42:31):
No, no, absolutely not.
Yeah.
no,
Mifrah Mahroof (42:33):
different
Arfa Iqbal (42:34):
I would say the people who are on the same level
as you, of course, absolutely,if you feel comfortable enough
sharing that with them becausethey're also, let's say, they're
also entrepreneurs, that'sdifferent and that's totally up
to you.
But I think with everyone else,don't even bother having that
conversation with them becausethey're not gonna understand.
They're not gonna get it.
Mifrah Mahroof (42:53):
Yeah.
And I think it's like being verycareful.
It's like the kind of peoplethat you have around, like, are
they actively bringing you downwith their drama and like bad
behaviors, I guess.
It's like that bad companies.
So it's like, was the point youmentioned earlier about, the
Prophet SAW alluding to the fivepeople that you're around?
(43:13):
Was it the hadith about theperfume seller or the believers
like a mirror to one another.
Arfa Iqbal (43:17):
Can't remember what the specific hadith was, but it
was literally about you are theaverage of the five people that
you hang around with to makesure that your company is good.
Yeah.
So the importance.
So it's true though, isn't it?
Especially as a parent, whenyou're watching your children.
Like, you can see, no, you don'twant to be hanging around that
person, that person is no goodfor you, kind of thing, and the
(43:38):
kids don't get it the whole,your mum being so mean for, you
know, no, I'm speaking fromexperience, you don't want to be
hanging around people like that,it reflects badly on you, but
that's something that they don'treally get until they get a
little bit older, and then theyfigure out, well, actually, that
friend was, really was no good.
Mifrah Mahroof (43:53):
We just opened up a whole can of worms about
friends and people.
And I think that could be awhole other podcast because
there's so much to dive into
Arfa Iqbal (44:01):
be a whole other podcast, it could be a very
interesting one as
Mifrah Mahroof (44:03):
well.
But I guess that ties in witheverything that we mentioned
about coaches, because in a wayyou're getting a new person into
your circle, with new beliefsand new way they're seeing the
world.
And that kind of challenges youand rubs off on you.
So you are getting anotherinfluence.
Arfa Iqbal (44:19):
Oh, totally.
That's what I always tell mychildren, right, pick friends
that are going places in a goodway, and seek to be a person
that actually, will emulate thatsuccess.
Don't hang around with peoplethat you know are going nowhere
with their life, that's soimportant because the quality of
(44:39):
the friends that you're hangingaround, it really is going to
determine how far you go in yourown life.
Mifrah Mahroof (44:44):
Yeah, a hundred percent.
I tell my brother the same thingas well.
I was like, some of his friendsare like negative.
I was like, why are you hangingaround with them so much?
Like they're actually rubbingoff on you, they're like holding
you back.
from who
Arfa Iqbal (44:54):
rubbing off on you in a bad way.
Yeah.
Mifrah Mahroof (44:56):
So, and Alhamdulillah, like he was able
to see that and stuff.
And he's like, yeah, that guy isvery negative.
Arfa Iqbal (45:02):
yeah, yes, Alhamdulillah, yeah, MashaAllah.
But I think sometimes like theyhave to
Mifrah Mahroof (45:07):
Oh yeah.
They do.
They do for sure.
I mean, we are all on a journeyand I think that with time we
realize it.
And, I think the nice thingabout being on a journey of
growth is that you startrealizing these things and you
keep growing and you keepgetting better.
And it's a step by step journeyat the end.
Arfa Iqbal (45:21):
Yeah, of course, definitely.
Mifrah Mahroof (45:23):
So Arfa, where can people find you online?
Arfa Iqbal (45:25):
So, you can check out my website,
arfasairaiqbal.com.
or you can check me out onFacebook, just typing my name
and it'll pop up.
but I haven't posted on Facebookin the longest time.
But yeah, if you're going tofind me anywhere on social,
that's probably where I'm goingto
Mifrah Mahroof (45:39):
be.
Awesome.
Well, look, thank you so much.
It's been an absolute pleasurehaving this chat.
Arfa Iqbal (45:44):
Thank you for having
Mifrah Mahroof (45:45):
Yeah.
Like it's nighttime for you,early morning for me, and we
managed to have an amazingconversation.
Arfa Iqbal (45:50):
to go to sleep now.
Exactly, I can see the
Mifrah Mahroof (45:53):
Yeah.
The sun, yeah, the sun iscoming.
Arfa Iqbal (45:55):
uh, in your office.
Exactly, yeah, we're gettingready to wind down and go to
sleep now, so
Mifrah Mahroof (46:01):
Thank you so much.
I appreciate it.
And InshaAllah, let's chat soon.
Take care.
Asalamu alaikum.
Arfa Iqbal (46:07):
Take care, thank you so much.
Mifrah Mahroof (46:09):
Hey everyone.
That wraps up another episodefrom the Muslim Life Hackers
podcast.
I really hope you enjoyed ourchat today.
I've got some great takeaways.
if you like what you heard anddon't want to miss out on our
next conversations, hit thatsubscribe button on YouTube,
Apple Podcasts, Spotify, orwherever you're listening to
this from.
It means a lot to us, and ithelps us reach more people who
can benefit from this show.
(46:29):
Thank you again for tuning in.
Until next time, keep strivingand getting better every day.
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