September 4, 2019 8 min read

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

It comes as no surprise that some entrepreneurs are solely focused on financial rewards. If you ask Fam Mirza, he’ll quickly tell you that’s the easiest way to end up in a place you may not want to be, mostly because you never bothered making an actual plan.

Fam is a serial entrepreneur, investor, American marketer, and philanthropist. He is best known for creating brands in consumer retail, apparel, tech, biotechnology, and music. In the philanthropic world he is known for being the founder of the 1:Face Watch movement which has changed the lives of millions. 1:Face Watch partnered with NGOs to fund greenhouses, water wells, and treatment projects across the globe.

During our chat, he shares his daily routine and discusses the importance of developing and focusing on your vision.

The life-changing advice Fam received from his father

“When I was 13 years old, just after we arrived in the U.S., my father gave me some great advice. He said, ‘This is it, this is the place where with enough knowledge and hard work a man can become whoever he wants to become.’ And I think that’s what spurred me to create my first business when I was 15.

But I think the most interesting part of that sentence was, ‘he can become whoever he wants to become.’ So it’s like who do you want to become? I think that’s what some people are missing — they lack the vision of who they want to become. If you ask most people who are just starting in entrepreneurship what they want to become, they’ll say, ‘I want to be rich.’

What the hell does that mean? That is such a vague statement. ‘I want to be rich’ or ‘I want to be successful.’ When people say things like that, it doesn’t mean anything. That’s an extremely vague statement, that’s not how life works. You have to have a vision of why you want to be rich, how you want to be rich, when do you want to be rich. What are you doing? What impact do you want to make on the world to be rich? Being rich is a byproduct of an impact on the world.”

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The drive to become an entrepreneur

“I was raised in the slums so for me even being in America was an amazing situation. That’s not something that we ever imagined when I was young. So, I wanted to be an entrepreneur. I wanted to make an impact on the world in some way shape or form. My first business was in fashion with the split jerseys and then the jersey trend caught on through hip-hop, that led to another journey. We did all the custom-made clothing for all the music videos. That led to another journey working with Diddy and that led to these other products which then led to 1:Face changing the world.

But if you look at my brands a lot of them have stemmed out of some type of fashion or some type of utility. But to me that’s who I am, I’m just a guy that solves problems. A lot of our brands and products have solved some type of problem.

I think that’s the main key when it comes to like creating products. People are like, ‘Oh man, how do you become a millionaire? How do you build this business?’ I’m like solve your own fucking problems because like nine out of 10 times, someone else has the same problem you have.”

No one is coming to save you

“One thing I hate is when people reach out and ask for money, or ask me to change their life. I’m like dude, I cannot change your life. But, I could teach you to thought processes so you can change your life. That’s what people don’t understand in entrepreneurship or innovation or doing what Elon does. These are all thought processes. 

In one of my recent Tweets, I wrote: ‘Whatever goal you think about the most is the one that will be accomplished first.’ This is a focus game, and that’s literally the main thing that you need to be successful in life.”

Related: When It Comes to Your Business, Are You Competing or Creating?

Fam’s morning ritual

“When I wake up in the morning I spend the first hour in purposeful silence. I said purposeful silence for a reason, I don’t just like to sit in silence not doing anything — that’d be weird. It’s a purposeful silence like where I’m trying to go through the day, what tasks I can do to make the biggest impact on either the project we’re working on or whatever it is that we’re trying to accomplish. I just think about that and I think about a larger cohesive vision of where all this is going. Then with that, I execute on the micro. 

I also journal sometimes the first hour in the day, just about random things. Like, ‘Hey, this is what life could look like in five years’ because that first hour that you have is the most important hour. Your mind functions very differently, especially with the affirmations. You have to make those affirmations because your affirmations eventually become your identity, they become your reality. This is a fact: an affirmation primes your brain to believe you are capable of more, and your actions will follow that. 

Think about it this way, in the end, success is what we attract by who we become. So, who do you want to become? You have to lay out a road map to who you want to become. The brain cannot process goals that don’t have measures on it, without key performance indicators and without a road map your brain can’t process a goal. So ‘I want to be rich’ doesn’t make any sense. The brain is confused as to where to go next.”

Action aligned with vision

“You have to have a larger cohesive vision in mind in order to construct your dream. I would argue that a lot of people don’t even know what their dream is. They don’t know what that larger cohesive vision is. They’ve never really taken a look inside. People don’t know, that’s why they need to do meditation sessions and stuff like that. 

For example, I was speaking at an event and this other guy, Tim Grover, was also speaking. He’s an athletic trainer and mentioned he used to train Kobe. I started talking to him after the speech and I was like, ‘Man, what’s the craziest story you got about Kobe?’

He said one day he went into the gym, and Kobe had been there since 4 a.m. Kobe was practicing the same shot for over six hours. He goes to Kobe, ‘Man, why do you just keep shooting the same shot over and over? It’s been like six hours?’ And Kobe looked at him and said, ‘Well it’s not done yet is it?’

The game that Kobe played that night, it was the same shot over and over because he had been practicing for so long. You know? That means nothing to him now. He’s doing the same exact shot over and over in the game and scored over 40 points. That’s the power of having focus, and aligning your actions with an overall vision.”

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The benefit of providing value

“You’re never lonely if you live in a world of your own creations, that’s what I tell my team. We create things for the betterment of humanity. For example 1:Face was a watch. Who would imagine that a charity watch would change over 4 million lives? That was before we sold it and it’s still going. 

I went overseas to India and Africa, we saw these greenhouses that were built by 1:Face funding. We saw these water projects that were completed because of a watch. That was unbelievable, to see water projects that were built to supply water to the village. Come on, man. I can never. I don’t even know how to describe it in words. This is all about sustainability, the impact we’re making will be felt for a lifetime.” 

Fam Mirza and 1:Face are dedicated to helping those affected by Hurricane Dorian. To find out how you can help, visit 1:Face.