Smile, as it increases your face value, is how most motivators encourage their audience to relax. However, that notion changed, when we met Ruqya Khan. Ruqya Khan, or RK as she is known, is a wordsmith. She works with words – and makes you want to smile.“In a world where there is a gap between what we have and what we want, I see myself more as a smile strategist than a motivational speaker. Inner dialogue and pattern clearing are essential so that one can move forward and step into their greatness. I am a wordsmith - I work with words; delivering stories on stage and in print,” she says.
Elaborating on how she began her journey as a smile strategist, Ruqya tells us that it was inspired by her own life story. “I got into personal development more than 7 years ago and am right now in the process of writing my book, Just Smile,” shares Ruqya, who is currently part of a training session in New Delhi.
Ruqya juggles many roles finding a balance between her personal life and her professional goals. She shares, “The roles that I play did not come to me from destiny. I had to reach out to them and make them on my own. I am a daughter, a mother, a friend, a vlogger, a writer, a speaker and a life coach. I am inspiration in progress.”
“Being a certified Master Practitioner of Neuro Linguistic Programming, Hypnotherapy and Timeline Therapy I understand the significance of mindset, and powerful communication skills. It governs not just the roles we play at work but also in life at large.So how does she manage to make people smile? Ruqya says, her workshops, Smile to move forward, are based on five steps, which are based on her acronym for SMILE which she formulated when she did a TEDx talk on The Art of Possibility in 2016. “I teach people how to use gratitude and acceptance to go from being stuck to unstuck,” she says.
“I encourage people to achieve goals, shatter limiting beliefs and break patterns that do not serve,” she adds. She has had a successful stint in the UAE and visits Delhi to share her knowledge. “I’ve spoken at the Happiness Carnival run by the Prime Minister’s Office in Dubai, run sessions at the Women Economic Forum in New Delhi, conducted workshops for students and educationalists at the International Youth Leadership and Innovation Forum in Singapore and my book is slated for publication by Q2 of 2019. Each time life felt still I took it a level up using the SMILE strategy - I know it works and that is why I run my workshops based on it.”
It wasn’t an easy journey for Ruqya to take up what she does now. “At a time when most career women hang up their boots I chose to wear my shoes. My son was eight months old and my daughter had just started school when I began to write. The path has not been easy. There were tough choices to make, balance to maintain and stereotypes to break. There were times when I was unsure and shaken by the rudeness of life and its realities. But I chose to be driven.”
Sharing her personal journey, the mother of two said, “When I set out all I wanted to do was to be a mum of whom my children would be proud. I pushed forward knowing that they were watching. It is a privilege to be admired. Everything I do and did was to show them there can be balance in life. We can live many roles with honesty to self. Dreams can be lived. Goals can be achieved.”“My work is different because I write from a place of passion not profession. I am a graduate of sciences - double major with genetics and microbiology as my lead subjects.”
An Inspiration every day
2017 was tough on me and I found myself silent and lost when my father passed away. I was unable to deliver as a coach and speaker - I felt alone and stuck. I stopped writing even. Thanks to the encouragement from my tribe on www.fb.com/RKwrites I began to share again but I wanted a real shift and breakthrough. So I committed to doing a live video daily at 2pm UAE time. I will be on the other side of 360 days of this commitment soon. Not a single day’s gap - I do the live daily no matter where I am or what I am doing. The tribe has grown 40 times over.