Most people assume that learning how to reinvent yourself begins after failure. For Ramin Sohrab, it began when success finally arrived.

 

He had spent almost a decade making Layers of Lies, seen it win more than 50 international awards and realised nearly every dream he had pursued since childhood. Then, in London, all of it came down to one question he had never expected to ask:

 

“Is this it?” — Ramin Sohrab

 

His conversation with Brij Thankey is about far more than filmmaking. It explores what happens when the version of you that brought you this far can no longer take you where you need to go next.

 

 

1. Reinvention Begins With Honest Questions

It is easy to imagine reinvention starting with a dramatic decision: a new job, a new city or a business plan. In practice, it often begins with the question you are most reluctant to ask yourself.

 

For Ramin, that question emerged only after the recognition and success arrived.

 

“Everything I ever dreamed of came true, but the feeling I was expecting to feel, there was nothing. I couldn’t feel anything. I was like, ‘Is this it? I’m only 40, and this is it?’” — Ramin Sohrab

 

Rather than immediately chasing another achievement to cover that feeling, he allowed the question to remain. Reinvention does not always begin in failure. Sometimes it starts in the uncomfortable gap between what success promised and how it actually feels.

 

2. Stop Waiting for an Opportunity From Someone Else’s Era

When Ramin first arrived in Los Angeles, he believed a familiar Hollywood story: be in the right coffee shop, at the right moment, and the right person might discover you. It did not take long for that story to unravel.

 

“The more I was in Hollywood, the more I went, ‘I don’t think it’s real. I think it’s a myth, something that happened maybe in the 70s or 80s.’ So then I became more excited about creating the opportunity for myself rather than waiting for something outside of me to come or make me feel something or discover me.” — Ramin Sohrab

 

That shift helped make Layers of Lies possible. Rather than waiting to be cast in someone else’s project, Ramin learnt to write, direct and produce. He had not planned a multi-hyphenate career; he developed those skills because nobody else was going to hand him the opportunity he wanted.

 

Reinvention often starts without a perfect plan. It begins when you stop waiting on somebody else’s timetable and start building the next chapter yourself.

 

A sign marking the beginning of a new chapter

 

3. The Hardest Dream Will Require More Resilience Than You Planned

It is easy to admire a finished film and overlook the years behind it. Securing permission to shoot in Tehran took four years. Sanctions restricted access to American equipment, so Ramin drove from Finland to Iran. He was arrested on suspicion of working for a foreign government, broke his leg during filming and later spent more than two weeks in hospital with COVID-19, where he feared for his life.

 

“The doctors keep coming to my room saying, if you don’t stop, you’re gonna die. So they basically tricked me every night by putting sleeping pills in my IV. I slept so many nights with the script in my hand.” — Ramin Sohrab

 

Most people see only the awards at the end. In Ramin’s case, resilience meant deciding, repeatedly over almost a decade, that each setback would become part of the story rather than the reason to end it. His experience also carries a warning: determination can achieve remarkable things, but no ambition should require you to ignore the limits of your health.

 

4. Growth Often Means Letting Go of the Version of You That Got You Here

We often assume that whatever made us successful must define us forever. Ramin could have remained simply the filmmaker who achieved the impossible, the martial artist or the action star. Instead, after his success left him feeling empty, he began exploring consciousness — first through a psilocybin ceremony in the US and later through a documentary filmed over seven days in Puerto Rico.

 

“Once you are ready to give up all of the things you’ve ever believed in your life, welcome consciousness.” — Ramin Sohrab

He did not abandon martial arts or filmmaking. He simply stopped expecting either of them to answer questions they were never designed to answer.

 

5. Success Is a Terrible Place to Stop Growing

Three days before this conversation, Ramin took part in another ayahuasca ceremony. It was his shortest yet and ended with a message that challenged him to stop seeking answers outside himself.

 

“It lasted five minutes. The first thing I heard was, ‘What are you doing here again?’ I said, ‘I want to learn.’ It said, ‘There’s nothing I can teach you any more. Anything you want to see or feel, you can create it yourself. Now go create.’” — Ramin Sohrab

 

Even after achieving something extraordinary, Ramin does not treat success as a finish line. Achievement answered some questions and created others. His response has been to remain curious — and to keep creating.

 

In Summary

Learning how to reinvent yourself does not mean becoming an entirely different person. Ramin Sohrab’s story points to something more useful: ask better questions when success fails to feel as expected; create opportunities instead of waiting for permission; respect the cost of resilience; release identities that no longer serve you; and keep growing after you achieve the goal.

 

The version of you that built what you have deserves respect. It is simply not always the version that can take you further.

 

This article draws on a conversation with Ramin Sohrab, award-winning director, actor and consciousness explorer, on Unfiltered with Brij.

 

Watch on YouTube, or listen on Spotify and Amazon Music.

 

More conversations like this are available at brijthankey.com.

 

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