How I Would Build Wealth From $0 (If I Had to Start Over)

I went from a broke waitress with a broken English to a multi-millionaire in just a couple years building a following with over a million people across all social media platforms. This journey not only has it given me the freedom to live the life that I want, that I've always dreamt of, like being able to travel from Miami to Bahama on a private jet, being able to live anywhere But here's the thing, if I lost everything tomorrow and I had to start from absolute zero, I know exactly what I have to do to get back to millions. Not because I'm this special girl, but because I've done it before and I know what actually works versus what sounds good on social So the first thing that I would start with is mindset first. Stop the victim mentality of everything happens to me, this person did this, I come from this family, I lived in this country, I am a woman. All of these, you're basically handing off the power to someone else and you're basically saying I cannot solve my life and I cannot get the dream life that I want. I could have sat down there and probably came up with a bunch of excuses. You want to know what the excuses are? I could have said, well, I'm Middle Eastern and usually Middle Eastern women are, you know, just sitting at home and not building businesses. Our goal is not to make money, we're raised to sit at home, raise the kids, be a wife after being a daughter. I could have said I have a broken English. I could have said I'm not the smartest. I could have said I trip over my words sometimes. I could have said I'm an overthinker. I could have literally put all the odds against me. But what would have that have done? It would have basically made me feel like I cannot change and do something about my circumstance. So the worst thing that you can do as a woman, as a man, if you want to get to millions of dollars, start taking responsibility like this is my life so I can do something about it, whether I allow them in the future, whether I take this as a lesson or a blessing, but I am the person in power. So everything is my responsibility and that also comes with everything is my fault. And not to be very harsh on ourselves, but when everything is your fault, you either learn from it or you fix it. And that is probably one of the things that women are so like, we're not good at it. We just want to blame for real. So you want to be, okay, my fault. I can be rich in the future or poor me and actually have poor income in the bank account. Now, when we say mindset first, of course, fixing the mindset is very important because a lot of people are extremely smart, but they don't end up being the most successful because their mindset is not very positive. They don't think very highly of themselves to the point where they are delusional that they can get crazy achievements in short periods of time. When I say mindset first, and I say, we're going to stop being mentality. What have helped me get there was getting obsessed with learning guys. I literally became a drug addict and the drug was learning a knowledge because I was not powerful. I did not know a lot of things. I was hungry because I knew information is what changes situations. If you are in a situation today and you're not happy with it, it's only because the information that you know, and you don't know. And that's exactly why you're in that situation. People that are making millions. They're not smarter than you. I know you've heard it before. They're not smarter. Matter of fact, they're not even working harder than you. You're probably working way harder than them, but they know things that you don't know. And that's why they get to levels that you don't get to get there yet. So I got obsessed with consuming business content on a daily. It wasn't one day, maybe, you know, something that's fun to do. I was religiously doing it morning afternoon, any hour that I have, if I'm eating and I want to watch something, if I'm just laying in bed, instead of Netflix, I'm putting like, what can I learn right now? So I can become more of value because in this life, you are paid depending off your value, right? How much value do you bring to this world? So I got obsessed with becoming better, whether it's general knowledge or truly researching more about the industry or the niche that you are interested in. So I was interested in social media, in branding, scaling businesses. How do businesses scale? Getting equity in businesses? How do businesses get equity? How can I sell a company? Like, have you ever just Googled how do companies sell for a hundred million for a billion? And how can I get a company to get there? Like, have you ever just was so curious? So not only was I so excited, so interested, I replaced everything. I replaced music with learning. I replaced talking on the phone for hours with my girls with learning and watching a YouTube video. I replaced when I'm getting my makeup done, instead of just being in silence, I'm listening and I'm feeding my brain. My brain has to always be fed because here's the thing, right? You're going to get lucky in the future. You're going to have opportunities that come to you or maybe people that are placed in your life. That's luck. Now, once you get lucky, what do you do with that luck? Are you prepared? So when that luck comes to your life, you actually capitalize on it. You make millions. Or are you trying to wait until the opportunity comes, until that luck comes? And then now you're like, wow, imposter syndrome. Wow, I'm not so good. Wow, I know nothing about this. Boom, you lose that luck. People get lucky all day long. They just were not prepared to make money and be profitable when that luck arrives. But if you're prepared, you know exactly what to do with it. So get obsessed with learning. Consume business content like your life literally depends on it. Once you find someone that you love and you know they can get you to where you want to go, buy programs, buy mentorships. I am where I am today. I promise you guys, not because I've only watched YouTube videos for free. I have invested probably over $200,000 in the past couple of years just in mentorship, events, one-on-one programs, high ticket offers that poured into me and gave me the shortcut on, okay, you're here. You want to get here to where this person, this is the life that they're living. Here is what you need to do. So invest and get obsessed like nothing matters. I don't want to go out. I don't want to have fun. I want to learn so much that I become an undeniable person that it's impossible for me to not be successful. And I embrace being the uncomfortable person. I embrace that every single day when I am learning, when I am on my growing journey. If I want to become something that I've never became, I have to be uncomfortable. So I went to events that I'm just like, oh my god, every single bit of me is so uncomfortable. I'm scared to talk to people. I'm scared to network. I'm scared to learn because it's a new environment. But I made it like literally it was in my notes an alarm that pops in three times a day. Make sure you do something that gets you uncomfortable. And if you need a reminder, put an alarm three times a day. Did you get uncomfortable? Did you do something? Did you walk up to a stranger? Did you DM someone? Did you book that ticket to the event? Did you invest in yourself maybe money that you're not really comfortable in spending? I got very, very comfortable being uncomfortable that now it became my norm. I am that crazy girl that loves risk. When I see risk, I'm like, of course calculated risk, but it's like, oh, let's do this crazy next business and see how things are going to go and how much money we're going to make and how much we can scale it and sell it. That excites me. It almost becomes like a drug that you're addicted to, but you have to go through the uncomfort and just know that all of this is temporary. You're going to change all of this, but only if you get obsessed with learning long enough. I'm not saying a month, two months, three months, guys, I'm saying years. You want a big life forever. You want a wealth that runs in generation. You're going to have to get obsessed for years with learning to get to that destination. Now, once my mindset is right, the first skill that I would want to master to immediately make money, because if you're broke, you're still obsessed with learning, you know, you're like, okay, I've done, I got it. I'm going to get obsessed. You still want money right away. At the end of the day, you know, I don't want to wait years and years to make my first dollar from, you know, a business, right? First and easiest thing to make money is sales. I would become a beast at sales. Why? Because life is sales. Everything in life is sales. Communication is sales. Posting on social media is sales. Content creation is sales. Persuasion is sales. Influence is sales. Deals is sales. And you can do so much with sales. Because I'm so good at sales, throw at me any business, go, throw at me any business, and I will make it a million dollar business. You want me to go sell cars? I'll make millions selling cars. You want me to go sell gym memberships? I will make millions selling gym memberships. How I got into sales initially without really realizing that I was in sales was through being a waitress. When you're a waitress, and when you're a good waitress, because guys, I was just in the US and I've had some horror stories with waitressing experiences. So if you are in the hospitality industry, please get better at your job, which is not only serving food, it's you're selling an experience. If you came to the restaurant that I worked at, and you sat in my section at a table where I'm going to be helping you with your drinks, with your food, you're going to get the best experience of your life. Because I took pride that you guys are in my section tables, right? And I will give you the best experience reading body language, reading the energy. Am I talking to the man or am I talking to the woman? Am I being more chill? Am I being more excited? That all is sales. Once you master all of that, you're going to try to make the bill higher because you want your tip to be more. And I also got so good at recommending things that are of course better, but they also cost more. So the bill always ends up being hundreds of dollars. And my tip ends up being also hundreds of dollars. So that was the first time that I'm like, wow, I'm really mastering this when you are a salesperson. And this is just a side tip because I love you guys. If you want to master sales, you want to become a doctor. People are coming to you, to your clinic, and they're telling you their problems and you're just solving them. You're giving them solutions. And that is sales instead of like shoving every single idea and product and service that you have. How about you get so good at listening so you can understand what exactly is their pain points and I can give them the product and service that will solve the pain point. That's when you know the sale is done. But you can also practice on everyone. Like if you want to get something from your parents, if you want to get something from your partner, that is also all sales. And I just got obsessed with mastering how to get what I want in life, which is sales. So what I'm basically saying is you have to master the art of solving the problems that people will pay for. If you master that, you have a lot of businesses, a lot of ventures that you can take and you can make a lot of money immediately because sales will give you a commission. And the commission, it doesn't depend how many hours you are working. It depends how big is the sale. Now with sales skills locked in, now we've made the money immediately. We are masters at sales. I would immediately start selling something. I would start a service business myself. I would choose and look and find what is my uniqueness. What am I so good at? And you're like, well, how would I find my uniqueness? You would find your uniqueness by what people always come to you for free advice. Look at friends, look at family members. What do they naturally come to you to ask you for? Is it a service for maybe you're a great listener? Maybe you are so good at editing content. Maybe you're so creative so you can be a creative director. Maybe you're so good at consulting. Find what people come naturally to you. And you have to sit down and dig deep and maybe ask people that are around you that respect you as a business person. What am I so gifted at? And then you're going to start a service business from that. And it can be anything. We pay for so many services every single day because we love services. Services is like, okay, there is no overhead cost. The overhead is you. You're the service. You're getting the service done and you're selling your time and expertise before you have products. I think creating products is amazing, but there is manufacturing, there is shipping, there is handling, there is cost. It is a very expensive business to be in right away if you're trying to make money fast. So if I would go back and rebroke again, I would start selling something that I am so good at. And one thing that I have always been good at is I've been so good always with social media, analyzing content, coaching and motivating and consulting clients. So I would find one of those depending on what stage I am in in life. And I would start a business from it, a service business, something that you can deliver today, not something that you want to build tomorrow. Because again, you want to make money immediately. I'm trying to be rich immediately. But I would also focus on high value services that would solve expensive problems because you have heard it before, solving rich people problems will pay you more because they have the money that will pay for that service. And rich people, they want a lot of things done for their convenience. And you can always charge more for someone that can actually afford it and they need it. So I would look at what do rich people want me to help them with? I would find what I'm good at and then put the pieces together and create a service business. Now that my mindset is right, I'm good at sales. Now I have my service business. It would be a full circle moment, a full ecosystem on how I can be making money truly within a couple of months if you know what you're good at. While I was serving, I was very interested in the financial markets. I wanted to learn how to invest in crypto, in forex, in the stock market. I wanted to understand that complicated world, especially as a woman, because I did not see a lot of women back in the days, almost like six, seven years doing it. So I started learning it. I joined a program, again, investing in yourself. I learned a lot. And I'm like, wait, this is not as hard as people make it seem. And then I started helping so many other women join the business as well, take an affiliate commission. But then, you know, we're all learning from experts. I'm also coaching them on the steps as a guide. And from there, I have made millions of dollars, not only from investing into crypto, but also from coaching and selling that service business. My first month, I made $18,000 just coaching people on something that I got so good at, which is investing and trading. And then you take that money and you reinvest it into the financial markets. And you're making even more money because I've mastered the financial markets. From there, I started, of course, as you guys know, building my brand. And now more people are watching me. And now I can be even making more money because I have the platform, I have the brand to share this knowledge with so many people. And the results were immediate. Within six months, I was making like six figures. Two months later, which within eight months of me being in that business, I was making like $25,000 a month. And I was 25. You could not tell me anything. My ego was like all so high because again, I was young, new money, never seen anyone make that much money around me. So I really thought I'm the goat. What I'm saying is I made so much money fast because I literally did what I'm teaching you guys to do. And this is exactly what I would do again if I would go back. And then from there, we made millions of dollars. Start a service business. Sell that service. Now you know the mindset, you know how to sell, and now you are selling whatever you are an expert in. While I'm doing all of that, guess what I would be doing? And guess why exactly that I would do again and again and again? Because it works. I would basically, while I'm building my service business, I would also want to be building the most important asset of all that I will be talking about today, which is building a brand. How do you build a brand? Because you know, I know this word is thrown around so much, but I would document the journey from day one because people don't want, oh, an expert that we don't know where you came from. You're just a great person and we see all the results. It's so good. No, people love a storyline, a journey, a transformation. This is why I feel like I have so many people on my social media that they love me so much and I appreciate the love. It's because they saw little Afnan. They saw little me grow. Like we grew all together on social media and they saw my transformation day in, day out. I was not perfect. I was not the most knowledgeable. I was not well-spoken. I did not even, matter of fact, look how I look right now. But they love being in a journey and the transformation. So I used my voice to share what I'm doing, not just the pretty pictures. I didn't post just behind the scenes. I took people along the way. Like these are the accomplishments. This is what we're doing today. These are the struggles. This is what we're doing throughout the journey. I have learned that even until today, when we show people like, oh, we went on a private jet. It's like, cool, really happy for you. Can you show me how to get on a private jet? Because that's what's important for people. People don't care about your private jet. They care about, can you help me be on a private jet as well? So sharing stories behind every failure, every lesson, every trip, every accomplishment, every event is why people are going to be obsessed with your brand. So not only are you making money from your service business, but now you're also building a brand that will pay you for years and decades later, the big money. You're going to have businesses literally flooding your DMs with, I want to give you equity of my business. I want you to be the face of the brand. I want to pay you this brand deal. I want you to have, let's be partners. And these examples are true stories of my DMs. If you guys see my DMs, you would be like running to build a brand and share every single day, the journey that you are going through in building your brand. So don't only share your wins. Then you just look so fake. Share the struggles, share how relatable you are, share your backstory, share things that you love. People will love you and trust you and want to be on the journey with you. If they know that you are a genuine person and there's no agenda behind whatever you're doing, the agenda is you want to show them how great your life is. I remember for the past three years, I have been telling social media that one day I'm going to make a million dollars. And sometimes I said, I'm going to make this year. And it maybe did not happen. But two years later, when we made it, everyone was so excited because they saw how much I have worked, hustled, sleepless night, because I have shared all of that. So share all of it because your personal brand will be eventually, if you do it right and you take people along the journey, the biggest business asset that you will have that will give you that generational wealth. If you know exactly how to position yourself and how to Here's where most people mess up. They start spending as soon as they get money, whether it's liabilities, whether it's assets. For me, one thing that I have done over the past six, seven years, guys, I could have had a Lamborghini probably the first year of my business because I was making $25,000 a month. You think I could not afford a Lamborghini? Matter of fact, you think I could not afford a Rolls Royce on finance? You can afford all of these things once you're making that much money. But here's what I've done so well so I can position myself in a way that I will always win. Every single dollar that comes in my business. I was telling my best friend yesterday this. I said, it's so crazy because I'm in the investing world. I am so used to truly investing over 90% of my income every single month. And I only live on 10%. I could literally be making so much, but you'll have to question how much I make because I don't ever want to raise my expenses so much like, oh, let's buy a bigger house. Let's, let's actually buy a house. Why would I buy a house? I'm one person. I don't even know where I want to be next year. Maybe I want to go somewhere else. Oh, let's get, you know, three cars. And I'm not against any of that. If that's what you would love to do, go ahead and do it. But me, someone who has the background in investing in the financial markets, I've always been so smart with my money. I invest literally all like 90% of my money to the point where sometimes I'm like, I'm actually broke. I have no money. It's all invested. Where is my money? Where's my liquid cash money? But this is what's going to set me apart. By the time I'm 30 and my net worth is a hundred million, you know what I have done, right? And this is what I would do over and over again. I will resist investing into, you know, the lifestyle inflation. I still have the nice things, right? But compared to my income, I truly don't care about anything versus investing in me. Because again, I know I am the biggest asset investing in my business. Most of my money truly goes either investing into back the business to make it bigger, to make it more powerful or investing into mentors, coaches, tools that will accelerate my growth and have me get to my goal, which is a hundred million before I'm 30. Guys, that's three years away. That's a lot of pressure that won't come. If I'm just investing in a couple properties here in Dubai, like, no, you're not going to make a hundred million, a hundred million. We'll take knowledge opportunities that you're going to capitalize on it. And then boom. And then once I have a hundred million, matter of fact, I can on a debit card by three houses on the Palm in Dubai here, which is very expensive, but that is what I've always believed in. And this is how I live my life. So this is why I don't care to ever look rich. I truly genuinely want to be rich because for me, you know, we retired both my mom and my dad. And it's not like, Oh, this young girl that's just living life traveling Miami. No, it's way more than that. I'm doing this for, you know, my mom and my dad and my siblings to never ever struggle because money has been a struggle before. And I don't want that to ever happen in our household. I don't want even my future kids to ever be like, we can't afford this. Not everything we can afford. We just get to choose. Am I going to buy it for you or not money-wise we can afford it all. But this is the foundation that I am setting up. I only invest in things that can serve that serve the goal, serve the bigger picture. So always, always, always invest in the most important thing, which is your business and yourself. Now, the moment you can afford it, you need to stop doing everything yourself. This was the point, probably for the past two years, year and a half, two years where that's what helped me scale way faster is I started hiring help. Don't be that girl. Don't be that guy that thinks, Oh my God, I am superwoman. I am Superman. I can do it all. No, because number one, you don't know it all. And you can't do it all because you are limited always on timing. So number one, I always, always hire people that are better than me in areas where I am weak. Sometimes even areas that I'm good at, but can I hire someone that is, you know, so good to replace me, but I still get paid. That is when you become so powerful because me, guess why I'm important. I'm important for the brain that I have been pouring into because I've been obsessed with learning, right? Because I'm obsessed with learning. That is where the value is just my ideas. Just this alone is why I'm important. Everything else can be delegated. Everything else we can hire people for everything else. Now, not only that, I also created systems processes. So they happen seamlessly without interrupting the money that we're making. So I can have a week off. I can travel to Miami for a month, but my business is still going to be generating the money that it needs to generate. And the team knows what they need to do. So I would rather, I wish I can show you guys literally the expenses I got yesterday, the bill finance of not, Oh, perfect. How much am I going to pay guys expenses for my team that's without my assistants, without my directors, that's without my videographers, my editors, that is just the bill for just one of our projects. How many people we've hired for that project, which is, you know, the brand code over $25,000 in expenses a month. But that just shows you that if you are someone that desires the crazy money, you're going to have to truly hire and get systems in place. So you can only focus on the high level strategies while others can handle the execution. You're going to be scaling your time by multiplying it through other people that you're going to be hiring. And then you look like, wow, you're so perfect. You do everything perfectly and seamlessly. No, you just hired the right people for the right jobs. Now, once you have systems and a brand, it is time to create passive income and the best and easiest way to create passive income. I would still do this over and over again is launch digital products. That's when you're going to be turning your expertise into a program, into a mentorship, into a course, into a digital product and sell it. Why? Because the most paid thing today is transformation. We want shortcuts to transformations and results that we desire in this life. And whatever your expertise is, whatever you're so good at, make something that gives people that shortcut. And it can be a shortcut on a lower level for beginners or a higher level for experts as well. So put that together, create the best program, the juiciest program, like the brand code or other products that we have. And I would use my personal brand to sell the knowledge at a scale. So now you have the audience, people that trust you, people that know that you are an expert at that thing and that you want that shortcut and you can create something that makes you money without you actively exchanging your time. Because now it's not a service. It's something that you create once and you sell it. So your service business funds your product business. And that's how you're going to have passive income from something that people probably already would love to pay for. These are really the things that I would be doing to get to where I am again, even if I'm starting from zero, even if I have never done it before. I know this sounded like, if not, I can do this in a month. No, let me give you a realistic timeline so you don't get actually discouraged. Okay. So the first $10,000 that you're going to be making in a month, right? So you can have it individually. If you're truly focused on effort and the right strategy, it can take you anywhere from three to six months. And now if you're crazy, it can take you less. If you're not as dedicated, you're not as committed, not as consistent, it'll take you longer. Right. But usually it should take you three to six months. Now the first $100,000, you can expect it within the first 12 to 18 months. If you don't quit and you stay consistent on the right things, and you always think, how can I get better? My best today can always be better tomorrow. And my best tomorrow will be better the day after. Now your first $1,000,000 that can happen in two to three years with discipline and smart scaling. Now, again, I've seen people literally get their way faster, but maybe because they did have the right skills in place. They already knew sales. They already had a brand and that can make things get there faster, help you get rich faster, basically. But I want you to remember that overnight success takes years of preparation. It might look like an overnight. I might look like an overnight. But if you guys have seen all the years of work, work, work, work, work, and no result, you'd understand exactly why Afnan is where she is today and how can no one take away from her success, whether you like it, whether you not. She is where she is because she's done everything that I mentioned previously. When I look at 21-year-old me and the 27-year-old me, if I knew the steps that were mentioned in this video, I would have truly achieved it even faster than I have. And this is why my mentees, people that I coach and I help them scale their businesses, they get the results way faster than I did because we're giving them the steps above but even in more detail. So this is not just theory. It's exactly what I have done and what I would do because it works and I've seen it work not only for me but for millions and millions of people. The difference between dreamers and millionaires is not, oh they're so lucky or they're talented. No, it is following the proven system and not quitting when it gets hard. Let's and let me know if I create a millionaire by mistake from the YouTube community. I love you guys and let's make a lot of money because what else?