This Is Me

I’ve been working since I was thirteen.

Back then, it was sweeping floors and emptying change machines at my parents’ laundromat in Ohio. We had moved there after immigrating from Pakistan when I was six. New York City was our first landing pad in America, but like many immigrant families chasing stability, we eventually found our version of the American dream in the Midwest.

My parents worked constantly—multiple jobs at a time. They bought the laundromat when I was still a kid. And as the oldest of several siblings, I became more than just a big sister. I was a stand-in parent, a translator, a problem solver. We were latchkey kids, raised by each other and by whatever systems we could piece together around us.

Nature, nonsense, and my little sidekick (brother).

In that laundromat, I got my first taste of what it meant to run a business. I saw the hustle. The stress. The endless repairs, customer complaints, cash runs. But I also saw the pride—my dad watching his machines hum, my mom rolling quarters with quiet purpose. They weren’t trying to be entrepreneurs. They were trying to survive.

I carried that with me as I became my own boss.

Mastering RBF before I mastered the P&L.

Years later, I bought my own company—a legacy real estate platform with 150 agents and to my surprise, a tangle of broken systems. I broke it with crippling bank debt. I fixed it. I exited. People congratulated me. Said I’d made it. But I didn’t feel triumphant. I felt... emptied out.

Burnout isn’t a buzzword when it’s your actual body. Your actual life.

I realized I’d been running on a loop I didn’t question: grow fast, scale hard, sell big. The hamster wheel of entrepreneurship. But here’s what they don’t tell you: not every business is meant to exit.

Some businesses are meant to last .
To stabilize .
To create steady, generational value.

That realization changed everything for me. Now, through Chief Rebel, I help founders build systems that let them breathe. Not every entrepreneur wants to raise capital or flip their company in three years. Some want to run profitable, durable businesses that support their lives—not consume them.

I still believe in ambition. But I’ve also learned that freedom doesn’t always come from the exit. Sometimes, it comes from choosing to stay and build something sane, something solid, something yours.

If you’re feeling stuck or burnt out, I see you. You’re not doing it wrong. You’ve just been fed a version of success that might not be yours.

The wheel spins fast. You can get off.

-kay