Interview with fable author Azim Jamal

Writer, inspirational speaker, leadership coach, and facilitator Azim Jamal is chatting with me about his new non-fiction fable, SPARK: Journey from Success to Significance.

During his virtual book tour, Azim will be giving away a $10 Amazon or Barnes and Noble (winner’s choice) gift card to a lucky randomly drawn winner. To be entered for your chance to win, use the form below. To increase your chances of winning, feel free to visit his other tour stops and enter there, too!

Bio:
Azim Jamal is the founder & CEO of Corporate Sufi Worldwide Inc., a company dedicated to inspiring leaders at all levels to achieve material success, blended with a deep sense of purpose, passion and happiness. He calls this the synergy of Business, Balance & Beyond, and it’s achieved by unleashing the power within that we all share.

He is the author of several highly acclaimed books andhas twice been a # 1 Amazon bestselling author and in 2005 topped Harry Potter on Amazon. He has also been a # 1 bestseller with Barnes & Noble, then the largest bookstore chain in the world, and his co-authored book – The Power of Giving – won the Nautilus Gold Award in May 2009 for books that create social change.

Azim has conducted high-level coaching assignments with billion-dollar corporations, Fortune 500 companies and sports stars – and his inspiring message has been heard live by over 1 million people in 100 cities in 5 continents. Through his books and media messages he has reached over 5 million people.

Azim Jamal has shared the stage with Deepak Chopra, Brian Tracy and Wayne Dyer and has spoken to more than 1 million people in over 100 cities in five continents.

Welcome, Azim. Please tell us about your current release.
In a world vigorously chasing classic ideals of success, find your spark and become significant.

Your journey starts here.

Meet Steve, a hotshot lawyer fighting to climb the corporate ladder in this inspiring fable. His life transforms seemingly overnight as he is sent to India for a task he considers pointless. But things quickly fall apart. Steve, forced to reconsider his path, realizes that the curveball life has thrown at him is an opportunity to find his true purpose. This spiritual odyssey is about to transform him beyond his wildest dreams.

A powerful lesson follows each chapter, making up the SPARK that transforms Steve’s life: Selflessness, Purpose, Attraction, Resilience and Knowing.

This SPARK is hidden within you too. It may be dormant now, but awakening to it will catapult you from the “Present You” to the “Best You.” It’s time to light up your SPARK today.

What inspired you to write this book?
For the last 25 years, I have been fortunate to work with some of the most successful and brightest minds in the corporate world. I learned that while they are outwardly successful, they struggle to find purpose, fulfillment, inner happiness, and balance. The more I worked with them, the more it made me realize that it is not success that these individuals are looking for—it is significance!

Success is personal; you can have wealth, fame, titles, and power, but unless you are making a genuine impact on others, something will always be missing. To me, significance means that although I am successful, I still want to strive to create impact by making others’ lives better and successful also. So while success is often personal and limited by what the individual desires, significance aims for a goal larger than self. I want to share this realization with as many people as I can because I think many of us can relate to this very feeling, especially those who realize that their outward and material success hasn’t yet completed them, and they are looking for something more – something deeper! The book has been written to connect with those who have found success by helping them understand the missing pieces, and also those who are yet to taste success by helping them reflect on what they want to do in life and how they want to be, as individuals, when they arrive there.

The main protagonist in the book, Steve Harmon, not only resembles a mixture of people I have worked with but also mirrors my own journey, which I share at the end of the book. With this, I hope to help more people transition from merely aiming for success to creating significance that can positively touch many more lives than their immediate friends and family.

Excerpt from SPARK:
Steve cautiously peered through his large, floor-to-ceiling windows, gazing at the carpet of lights twinkling outside his 48th-floor corner office. He immediately took a step back, feeling the same dizzying rush of blood to his face he always got when he remembered how high up he was. It was a stark reminder that his fear of heights wasn’t getting any better with age. He looked away, back towards his beautiful oak desk, which he had bought from a handmade furniture exhibition in Toronto last year. He picked a sheaf of papers up from its surface. After a year of bitter wrangling, he and Christina were finally divorced. A marriage that had begun with such aplomb a decade ago now lay in tatters (and with that 30% of his assets, too). He flung the divorce papers down and checked his watch. It was time for his five o’clock with Michelle, his boss and CEO at Miles Inc., one of the top three management consulting firms in Canada. Steve felt a tiny rush of excitement. The COO had recently resigned to spearhead an e-commerce start-up, and the firm was looking for a replacement. There Story: Self to Selflessness 12 AZIM JAMAL were three contenders. Steve was one of them. His assistant, Stephanie, popped her head in to inform him she had booked an appointment with the Cypress Valley Golf Club at seven tomorrow. Cypress was an exclusive club with an invitation-only membership criterion and a whopping $50,000 in annual fees. This was more than he was paying at his existing club. The wait-list was three years long, and Steve had to nudge quite a few of his contacts to even get shortlisted for a meeting with the elite membership board that could approve or deny him entry. Steve did not really enjoy golf. But this was the big fish pool, where the who’s who of the city swam. If he wanted to be seen as a dominant player in corporate society, being seen at all the right places was very important. And no place was more right than Cypress Valley.

What exciting project are you working on next?
I am very excited to announce that I am in the process of creating a seven-week facilitated online program based on the book. The course will be specifically built to help leaders seamlessly convert their knowledge and experiences into a habit-driven, daily pilgrimage of lighting and sustaining their inner SPARK, and to pay it forward so others can be inspired to do the same.

This course will run for seven weeks with small exercises every day for 49 days that will help participants convert their learning into action-oriented habits.

The overview of the seven-week program is as follows:

● Week 1: Introduction to SPARK: Journey from Success to Significance

● Week 2: S for Service – How to effectively implement Service in all walks of life, especially leadership

● Week 3: P for Purpose – How to lead and live with Purpose

● Week 4: A for Attraction – How a burning desire leads to Attractions

● Week 5: R for Resilience – How a leader’s Resilience helps sustainability and turns a minus into a plus

● Week 6: K for Knowing – How Knowing creates decisiveness and conviction

● Week 7: A SPARK Future – How to keep your SPARK alive no matter what!

My objective with the course is to excite, energize and inspire leaders at all levels, and those around them, to obtain great achievement with a view to sustain it by instilling an authentic intention to perpetuate advancement beyond themselves to a wider community.

When did you first consider yourself a writer?
I don’t think I considered myself a writer until I was first published in my early 40’s when I finally realized I had something important to share with the world. Yes, I may have made notes here and there or scribbled my ideas down, but being a published author was the furthest thing from my mind to be honest. Sometimes I still pinch myself that this is my tenth book!

Do you write full-time? If so, what’s your workday like? If not, what do you do other than write and how do you find time to write?
I have never been a full-time writer mainly because I have always done other things. I am also an inspirational speaker and executive coach. I also love to volunteer my time for community and social causes. If I were to break down how I split up my time, it would be as follows: Writing (20%), Leadership Coaching (30%), Public Speaking/Facilitation/Interviews (30%), Volunteer Work (20%).

I do keep up with my love for writing when I am posting to my regular blog, completing articles, and creating other online content. However, I do devote more and more of my time to writing when I am developing or authoring a book. I just set crazy deadlines and get cracking!

What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?
Always start with the end. Meaning my vision, the conclusion, book cover idea, the types of endorsements I want to receive. Then, I work backwards to achieve them.

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
As many young children growing up in Africa, I wanted to be a professional soccer player (footballer) or cricketer. Those were the two sports I spent a lot of time playing – from the time I could walk all the way into my late 20’s, early 30’s.

Anything additional you want to share with the readers?
First and foremost, I hope everyone gets a chance to read the book, and if you love what you read, please tell others. Also, do kindly consider writing a review on Amazon and Goodreads if and when possible. The more you help share and spread the message I am trying to convey, the more I truly feel the world will be a better place for it. I have seen, first hand, how it helps those I work with on a daily basis and I am confident that it can apply to all of us, no matter where we are in our lives. Thank you!

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