Idris Elba's career-changing advice: 'Categorize yourself not'
Idris Elba told Riz Ahmed 'categorize yourself not' when Riz felt stuck in the UK — advice that unlocked his path to Hollywood.
Snapshot · On Purpose with Jay Shetty
Riz Ahmed: How to Silence Your Inner Critic (And Build REAL Self Worth)
Explore episode
Jun 10, 2026
Where this was said
Riz on Final Five
At 1:16:28 · chapter starts 1:12:32
The episode closes with Jay's signature Final Five questions, brought to you by State Farm. Best advice ever received: Idris Elba's 'categorize yourself not' — stop internalising the limitations others place on you or you're doing their limiting work for them. [1] — Riz Ahmed "When Riz Ahmed hit a glass ceiling in the UK, Idris Elba told him simply: 'Categorize yourself not.' The point was devastating in its clari…" 1:16:15 Worst advice: a casting director who told the young Riz his wide, animated eyes made him look like a psychopath, leaving him stiff and self-conscious for years. Biggest lesson from his wife: devotion — to a path, a purpose, a creativity — as a form of prayer. Their love story began when she needed to borrow his laptop charger in a New York café; six years on, she still borrows it. What he prays for: health, the ability to provide with dignity (rozi roti), and for everyone he loves to be brought closer to their purpose. He also describes his first adult pilgrimage to Mecca as extraordinary — 50,000 people from every country on earth, masks stripped, walking in a circle together, a sense of oneness unlike anything he has experienced. [2] — Riz Ahmed "Riz Ahmed went to Mecca as a spiritually sceptical Muslim. What he found was something beyond religion: tens of thousands of people from ev…" 1:24:15 His one law for the world: everyone goes back to dumb phones, or at minimum, everyone agrees to put them away for stretches of the day. [3] — Riz Ahmed "Met his wife because she lost her laptop charger: Riz Ahmed met his wife (novelist Fatima Farheen Mirza) in a New York café when she needed…" 1:23:10 Time feels different without the phone. Ideas bubble up. He is a little bit closer to being obsessed with the Velcro on the shoe.
Idris Elba's Three Words That Unlocked Hollywood
When Riz Ahmed hit a glass ceiling in the UK, Idris Elba told him simply: 'Categorize yourself not.' The point was devastating in its clarity — by pigeonholing yourself, you're doing other people's limiting work for them. Riz took the advice. He went to America.
Your Difference Is Both the Obstacle and the Key
Riz Ahmed told people from marginalised backgrounds that the very thing creating resistance in their lives is also the key that unlocks something no one else can offer. He felt like an alien at Oxford. He's grateful now he stuck it out. The obstacle is the way.
The Authenticity Paradox: Be Yourself First, Then Succeed
We tell ourselves: when I'm successful, I'll finally be myself. Riz Ahmed flips it. The people who become most successful are the ones who were most unapologetically themselves first. Specificity and authenticity are what people are actually attracted to — not the polished, diluted version.
Met his wife because she lost her laptop charger
Riz Ahmed met his wife (novelist Fatima Farheen Mirza) in a New York café when she needed to borrow his laptop charger — and she still borrows it 6 years into their marriage.
Going to Mecca: Everyone's Mask Stripped Away
Riz Ahmed went to Mecca as a spiritually sceptical Muslim. What he found was something beyond religion: tens of thousands of people from every country on earth, dressed identically, walking in a circle together — every mask stripped, a profound sense of oneness. He promised himself he'd bottle the feeling. He got back on his phone on the plane home.
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