Rotarians amazed and delighted by Arfeen Khan’s talk on performance evolution
Arfeen Khan
Arfeen Khan is a world-renowned Peak-performance strategist, speaker and consultant. For more than 20 years, he has helped over 500,000 people in 43 countries achieve personal and professional transformation. Khan also takes his programmes to schools, businesses and corporations and has spoken to over 150 companies such as Vodafone and ICICI Bank.
He is the author of two books:
‘You Can. You Will. It’s Your Choice, a holistic approach to leading a better life’ and ‘The Secret Millionaire Blueprint, the path to sustainable wealth creation and management’.Khan started by stating his biggest challenge was that his seminars usually lasted for 10 hours but he only had 30 minutes to do that now. He said, “To convey 10 hours in 30 minutes, I am going to need your support. Now, I am not here to teach you anything, because I know nothing. I need to earn the right of having you as my listeners, or why should you listen to me? Let me introduce myself better to you first. When I was 18 years old, my father asked me where I saw myself five years in the future and that is when it hit me. I had always blamed others for the situations I ended up in life, but that day, I decided to take control of my life by taking control of my emotions and actions.”
The next step was to make a game plan, to start something new, Khan shared the secret to his success. “What I decided to do next was to model. Not to become a model, but to model successful people. To find people who are already successful, observe their behaviour and I learnt that if you model existing success, you will have a chance.
Then I came across a behavioural science called NLP, which stands for Neuro-linguistic Programming. It is a very strong study and I have helped people get rid of their phobias with the help of NLP in less than 15 minutes! It is not because I am a magician; I just understand human psychology,” he added.
Khan then elaborated on the process of unlearning and how important it is for human growth. He said, “I am not going to teach you anything, because I believe there isn’t much to learn. It is more about unlearning the belief systems in our head that actually limit us. My objective is to demonstrate that to you because that will give you evidence of my work.
“I don’t believe in motivating people, because motivation is an absolute waste of time. I am a big believer of anti-positive thinking and I will tell you why. If I am depressed, in a bad phase and I keep telling myself that life is good despite that, it is not going to make a difference, because nothing is getting better by my saying that! I believe that one has to take actions to instil a positive change in their lives. You just have to put your mind to it.”
Khan moved on to his demonstration and explained to Rotarians how it works. He said, “I will let you demonstrate to me how our entire lives are based around belief systems. What if I told you that everything that exists on the outside is just an opinion of yours? The way in which we look at the world shapes how we live in it. If you are constantly complaining about how miserable you are and looking for challenges in your life, you will be troubled by them. When I first bought an expensive car, I thought I was the only one who had it but I soon realised that it was everywhere because whatever you wish to focus on, you will see. I went through phases of being extremely broke and extremely rich and I realised that no matter how rich or poor, everyone eventually wants just one thing, which is to be happy.”
Khan shared the framework within which one can create this happiness. “This framework is really powerful and you can see it for yourself. The first part is the cause and its effect. Most people live in effect. In order to be in control of your environment, you have to take responsibility and create situations that lead to happiness. If I depend on someone else, they may or may not give it to me.
“If you are facing challenges in your life, I can guarantee you that they have cropped up as a result of incorrect thinking. If you are unwell, you have to take the responsibility of improving your health. If you are in a bad relationship, you have to work towards improving it or getting out of it. So either you be the cause or stay in the effect. We live in a reactionary world and result-oriented thinking is the only way you can be in control of your environment,” he explained.
Khan then proceeded to conduct his demonstration, where he made Rotarians walk across eight feet of broken glass and coached them through it. It was both a nervous and exciting experience for Rotarians as Khan encouraged them to walk with confidence and, despite walking barefoot on shards of broken glass, everyone emerged unhurt and amazed.
Khan has worked with an extensive range of people including CEOs, students, Bollywood celebrities and industrialists. He considers all people intrinsically the same, but what sets them apart and determines their future is the reach of their thoughts and ambition.
Using a proven self-development curriculum, Khan guarantees an optimum increase in performance in all areas of life for participants who are committed to their own success. Through his company, Peak Performance Seminars, Khan has broken new ground in the seminar industry by hosting interactive and experiential events.