<p>Bariz Shah is a husband and father, an engineer and a community leader.&nbsp;He was named 2021 Muslim New Zealander of the Year and he is also the author of a great book called Beyond Hope.</p><br><p>But before all of this, he was a convicted criminal who was sentenced to 3 years and 2 months in jail.</p><br><p>This podcast is a small part of his story. The story of a kid who came to New Zealand as a refugee, went completely off the rails as a teenager - eventually ending up in prison at 18 - and has managed to do a full 180 and completely turn his life around. </p><br><p>Bariz opens up about growing up between Afghanistan, Pakistan and New Zealand, dealing with abuse and identity struggles, and how that led him down an incredibly negative path.</p><br><p>We talk about his self-destructive spiral which ended up with time in prison.&nbsp;And the moment he decided he was never going back.</p><p>We also get into how he rebuilt his life from scratch… studying engineering, finding his faith, and eventually launching a project to honour the victims of the Christchurch Mosque attacks.</p><br><p>There’s a lot in this one: redemption, forgiveness, discipline, faith… and some pretty confronting stories along the way.</p><p><br></p><hr><p style='color:grey; font-size:0.75em;'> Hosted on Acast. See <a style='color:grey;' target='_blank' rel='noopener noreferrer' href='https://acast.com/privacy'>acast.com/privacy</a> for more information.</p>