The Chris Voss Show - The Chris Voss Show Podcast – Love and Promise by Khaled Fayyad

Episode Date: February 2, 2026

Love and Promise by Khaled Fayyad https://www.amazon.com/Love-Promise-Khaled-Fayyad/dp/1532006861 Michael is a middle-aged man standing at a crossroads. Recently separated from his wife and desperate to seek a distraction from his chronic pain, the father of three begins playing an online card game with a woman living a thousand miles away. Although he has never met or seen Anna before, her presence quickly reaches the depths of his heart and begins transforming his life. Beginning from the moment they meet, Michael and Anna become nearly inseparable. Suddenly, Michael is no longer a recluse living with pain. Anna brings not only companionship, but also renewed hope and a belief in a brighter tomorrow. As they become closer and a love story unfolds, Michael embarks on a poetic journey where he takes to his pen in an attempt to understand his growing feelings and contemplate the ways love can bridge divides and heal wounds. But when the trust between Michael and Anna is eventually tested, he must face an agonizing choice whether to define their love or surrender to the abyss that has already begun to claim him. Love and Promise share a contemporary tale that begins with a chance meeting on the internet and leads a lonely man on an introspective journey through his deepest emotions.

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maximize their book's success. Today, an amazing young man on the show, we're going to be talking about his book called Love and Promise out October 25th, 2016. Caled Fayed is on the show with us today. We're going to be talking about his journey and his story, and this might be a true story wrapped as a novel. So we're going to get into what that means, and he'll tell us all the deeds, as a word. He is a storyteller whose work explores the power of love, hope, and human connection. See, I told you it was positive stuff on this show. Through his writing, including Love and Promise, he takes readers on deeply emotional journeys of healing, self-discovery, and transformation. Passion about inspiring others, he believes in the power of stories to touch hearts, uplift souls, and leave a lasting impact on the world. And I think that's the theme of the show, too. Welcome to the show, sir. How are you? I'm fine. Thank you. Thank you for having me here. Thank you for coming. We really appreciate it. It's a pleasure.

Any dot-coms or websites people can check out, social media, to learn more about you? Yes, they can go to my website, calidfayad.com. There you go. So welcome the show. Give us a 30,000 overview of what's inside this book, Love and Promise. Well, it's a story actually of transformation. It's a story of pain, suffering, longing, yearning, and the discovery that love basically is the healing element of basically all human emotions and feelings. In other words, here's what really I'm going to start from the beginning. the power of love

often people especially the last maybe 30 years or so we think of love in terms of only a personal thing in relation to what we love I love my car I love my home I love this I love that

but that's not love is love is a state of mind if you will It's not only a state of the heart because it literally enters into every single thing we do in life. Anything. Enteres into our jobs,

our relationships, whether, you know, it's a marital relationship, intimate or non-intimate. Friendship, for example, is an aspect of love. Even acquaintances, that is also an aspect of love.

Our job, for example, if you do your job with love, you will do much better than if you are only doing it to get a paycheck. Ah, yes. You know, if you are a baker and you bake your bread with love and you put your heart into it, your bread will come out much, much better, and people will like it better. Oh, yeah.

You know, the unfortunate thing is that we have gotten away from that. Now, people go do a job not because they like it, but because they need a job. And the other thing is, if we do a job even though we don't like it, but if the job is beneficial, we should learn to love it. you know but here with regard to the book it's it shows people say for example so and so fell in love there is no such thing i've stepped in it a few times kind of like you step in a poop when you're at the dog park i've stepped yeah but you see love is all good All good.

It enters into every aspect of life, and it also is the hidden thread that holds the values of life together. For example, take forgiveness. Love cannot be without forgiveness. They are synonymous. Take understanding the same thing. These elements do not exist without each other and separate from each other.

So in true love, you have forgiveness, you have understanding, you have communication, sacrifice, but it's a happy sacrifice. Yeah. Because- Doing it because you love someone, yeah.

Of course. But unfortunately, now in all societies, basically, and I traveled around the world quite a bit, I noticed that people, when they talk about love, they only talk about it in terms of their individual self. Yeah.

And this is not right, because when you take something as valuable as love and as powerful as love, apply it only to benefit your own self, whether in relationship or otherwise, that's how you fall, because it's a misuse of the most powerful very very self. value in life, actually. Now, if you reverse that and say you love someone, and that's a particular, someone is in trouble or in a disarray or in any negative state, if you truly love them, you will help them by doing whatever it takes in order to get them out of that state. even if that state

even if what you're doing is to your disliking but you still do it to help them out that's love you write about this in the book about the love and your story tell us what tell us what you're who the characters are in this book

and give us a deeper dive into the story yeah mainly they are two characters Michael and Anna the way the story started, there is a background. Michael was in a state of total disarray, if you will, emotionally that is. He was lonely, very lonely, and he lived through a couple of decades of severe pain that literally turned his life into an upheaval, daily pain that is. And there was no cure for it.

So Michael's background, Michael is a very passionate person, very loving. And it so happens that that was not the case in his life, even though he was married and all of that, there was a disconnect, a major disconnect. So anytime, for example, Michael would see two people together, he will hurt, remembering what he is going through and he would wish that he had someone by his side. So in the mental and the emotion.

sense. So there was a huge gap of loneliness in his life. And that loneliness led to a form of aloneness too. Yeah. Because even when there are certain people around him, he still felt alone. Who's the romantic partner in the story? Who's the lady? Uh-huh.

Yeah. Anna is a lady that lived in the mid-year. West and she was going through also a very bad relationship and she was suffering quite a bit. Her husband was not what you would call a nice person. Oh. Yeah. He was, we talked earlier on being an alcoholic. He was an alcoholic.

Oh, wow. Yeah. Yeah, and he even at one time or another, at one time he brought in, he was sort of a womanizer too. Oh, really? Yes. And he really mistreated his wife in that sense. You know, I mean, he would do it to her face. Wow.

Yeah. It's not very fun or cool or nice. Yeah. Yeah. But the funny thing, the way things happened, Michael, you. used to go on the internet and play a game of cards. And one time he, as he was playing the game, Anna comes and sits in, sits in on the table.

He had no, he never met her or talked to her before. So they started chatting. Usually, I mean, nothing great except Greetings, being courteous to one another, good game, you know, things like that. No more. From that moment on, Michael felt something grab him. Ah. It was really amazing.

And from that moment on, the pain Michael was going through stopped. It was no longer there So they After that they started Meeting online Playing games together And the relationship grew Now at this time is he's single and she's married

Is that the correct status? No, they are both married Oh, they're both married Yeah But he is He has gone through several years without any marital

cohabitation, if you will. Oh, so they've been kind of separated maybe? Yes. Okay. Yes, yes. And Anna was in the same position too. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So, yeah, and it grew,

the relationship grew in leaps and bounce, if you will, and they were together on daily basis. Oh, wow. Chatting an hour here and hour there. And he was healed. His life was turned up, you know, turned upside down from being in the abyss, if you will.

He suddenly felt on top of the world. And the interesting is people could see the change in him. Oh, really? Yes. I mean, people literally would ask Michael, what happened to you? How come you're so happy? and from there on all the people that he was close to

he was able to affect him in a very positive manner oh wow yeah that's what love does oh yeah that's what love does you know yeah so it's a very interesting story the other thing was there is a section in the book which is true Anna had stopped talking to her mom for the last 10 years.

Oh, wow. They had a big fallout, and so she told Michael about it one time. And Michael said to her, he encouraged her to make amends, regardless of who's at fault. And she answered Michael saying, everybody has been telling me that for several years, but I wouldn't do it. I said, I'm asking you to, you know, he said. And in that chapter he goes on in a nice way he talked to her, what have you. Lo and behold, she did make amends with her mom from there on, and everything was corrected and everything turned normal.

Oh, really? Yes. So they've got agreement on everything. Yes. It's not Michael per se. It's the power of love. The power of love can change everything. Yes, yes.

No, no, Huey News, Hughie Lewis in the news song. The Power of Love. Probably going to sue now for that. We need royalties. So you told this story, these two people are in love. Now, this is billed as a novel online, but this is really a true story. Is that correct? Correct.

Oh, the true story, you know, love is stranger, or life is stranger the fiction, as they say. Yes. How did you come across this story? How did you discover it? I discovered it. Michael, and of course I'm using fictician names here. Michael, I learned Michael's story on daily basis. Oh, so you knew when he was according to the C?

Yes. I was, I knew every single thing that happened because he was my best friend. Oh, okay. I knew his private life. I knew his outlook on life. I know what type of person he is. And he was very, very similar to me. Oh, yeah.

Yeah. So as he told me over the years, his story, I could feel his pain and I could feel what he was going through because I had gone through certain things that were almost the same like him. That's basically, then coupled with that, I could see back then. how life has been changing due to the internet and to social media. I could literally see it. And what made me see it one time it struck me as funny little things. One of my daughters had a birthday.

And they asked me if I can take him to the video store to rent a movie. So they get into the car in the backseat, my daughter and her girlfriend and I'm driving I stop at a stop sign and they are very quiet I looked in the back and they were texting each other

on the phone and they are sitting next to each other that struck me as very strange I mean why would you text somebody who's sitting right next to you because I asked them to make sure and they said yeah we're texting each other from there on I could see

how the young generation is progressing far into the future. And nowadays, this is what happens. You know, people go out to dinner, to have dinner together, and they are both on their phone. Yeah, I see that a lot when I go out. Yeah, so life has changed.

So I could foresee that. I saw that happening. And I thought that if I would write this book, Hopefully, people will see that it's not about texting, it's not about technology, it's not about material stuff. We are humans. And humans by nature, we are social creatures. And on the personal level, and even the general level, life depends on the continuity of life, for the continuum of life depends on marriages, you know, men and women.

So if we go into, if we're not careful and we go way too far into this technology, stuff texting and what have you, where everybody is in their home, chatting with somebody else, somewhere else, and we neglect our personal, or person-to-person social meetings and what have you, then we are in a heap of trouble, big trouble. Big trouble. Yeah. So that I wanted to people to foresee that love,

even though it can abridge the distance and all divides and all of that, we are still human beings and we still need the person. connection. We still need to look at each other in the eye and we still need to, you know, utilize our five senses given to us by God or my birth or whatever you want to, however you want to put it. The other thing I really wanted to emphasize is the power of love. If we understand love as it truly is, as a powerful force, actually, the most formidable force in the universe. And if we embrace it and live by it,

it will resolve, I would say, 90% of the problems we face as a human being wherever we are in the world. But we have to be faithful and true to it. It's a path in life. If we walk that path with all our, with conviction and determination, then we're fine. If we don't, we're in trouble. And with love, there is pain, sacrifice, understanding, forgiveness, caring, giving, without measure. if we do all these things and make sure that we balance our joys and our pains or sorrows,

then we are fine. We are fine. Love is a cure. It can make you feel good. Of course, of course. I do a few things once in a while when I feel down. And it's a natural thing we all go through. I go to the supermarket, a giant. And I stand at the entrance. And when I see an old lady or an old man carrying a bag of groceries, I grab it from them and I walk it to their car.

Oh, I need to be in your neighborhood. But the amazing thing, Chris, is every single time I did that, I felt so happy. It was crazy. I mean, little things, little things we do with each other. They don't have to be big or flashy or, you know, little gestures. You do them of the heart. Yeah.

Do them of the heart so that you can really enjoy that sort of thing. Now, with these two, I know with novels we can't talk about. what happens at the middle or the end yeah but uh i imagine something good happens as time goes by or you maybe don't want to disclose that in case something bad happens they get it by the bus or well i'll i'll do it in general okay the most wonderful thing about it is when there is a breakdown in the relationship most people or a lot of people tend to say oh it's there's there fault. It's his fault. It's her fault. This is very dangerous.

The reason is after it's all said and done one starts remembering the things he or she did in the past which in general they are very comparable to the mistake

that was committed but by one by Michael or by Anna. So blame is a very dangerous two-edged sword. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So the best thing to do, this is I learned through writing this story, is as I was writing,

I was discovering things about myself that I had thought of or done in the past. And I had reached a point where you would blame the others for doing a certain thing that you have done yourself 10 or 15 or 20 years ago.

But once you discover that the blame or the heart feelings immediately dissipate. So in a sense it purifies you when you discover these things.

Yeah. And it enables you to have a more loving or a caring relationship with others because you stop the blame. It's no longer about the blame. It becomes, okay, if a wrong is corrected, I don't want to hear, I'm sorry. What I want to do is I want to correct the wrong. Yeah.

That's what you've got to do in order to build a relationship. Otherwise, are those unfixed or un-fixed or resolved issues of stuff can really wreck the relationship because they just stack up, right? Yes, of course. I mean, they become like a huge trash can sitting on top of, yeah. Yeah, I told you not to describe my relationship. Oh, man. So you make this beautiful story, you document it.

You know, it sounds like this gentleman, he was going through a lot, he was lonely. You know, there's a lot of lonely guys out there today, so I'm glad you're carrying the water for the fact that, you know, you can still find love in this world, and maybe there's still hope. Maybe, I don't know, I'm just being bad. But what else do you want us to know about this story, maybe that I haven't asked you about? What I really want people to know is loneliness,

a loneliness, a pain, this is all of our own creation. Ah. I really would like to see people review their method of beliefs with regard to love. If people would think of love as a state of mind, not only of the heart. The heart is basically makes you feel things and what have you, but the mind is the supreme power. that is God given to us from birth. Whatever we do, we should let our mind lead us through love and through life. In other words, do not act basically based on emotion.

Let the mind and the heart work together as one. Not separate of each other. Yeah. If we can, do that and it can be done and I know it can be done because it has been done and I experience this on on my personal level and my Michael has too. Life will will change in a very dramatic way for the battle. And it will touch everyone you come in touch with too. That's the beauty of it. Wow. Yeah. That's extremely, extremely important. Yeah. And it's extremely important not to think of love as a,

uh, solely as an individual on the individual, on individual terms. Mm-hmm. Because that is how we fall. Yeah. As an example. Of love. Yeah. And how it works and how it rolls.

What advice we give writers to share their stories with the world? Uh, any of us that have trouble writing or, those are worried about obstacles like support or finances. What would advice would you give to other folks who have written your book? The first advice I would give is be honest. Because if you're not honest, it's fiction. And, yeah, maybe we can learn some things from fiction, but not much. The other thing is to be courageous.

Don't hide what you feel or what you, have gone through because it's not a shame to be in pain. It's not a shame to suffer. It is not, it equals, I mean, why is it when we are rejoicing and we are happy, we want the world to share with us, but when we are down and when we are in the doldrums of the emotional state, why is it, do we want to hide in a corner? Yeah. I mean, since every human being on Earth goes through these emotions and these stages once in a while,

why do we have to hide them? Why do we have to be ashamed of them? Yeah. Why? There is no reason. and if one looks closely at life in general, we will see that there is a balance between being happy and being sad,

between joy and sorrow, and what have you. Without that balance, we cannot survive. Yeah. Survival's kind of cool. I found I'm kind of into the survival thing. Excuse me?

I'm kind of into that survival thing. I like that survival thing. Yeah, I mean, Michael had gone through 28 years of pain. Wow. So he was alone for 28 years? He was in pain, not alone, but in pain. The pain made him be alone. Okay.

Feeling-wise, that is. Yeah. Yeah. So it's, and he was able to overcome it through love. Oh, wow. You know, through love. But again, love, you know, there is a very important point here, which is when we fall in love between a man and a woman, between two people, when they break up, one, both of them or one of them would become very sad and would become very lonely, et cetera, and what have you. That should not be the case.

because equal with the sadness that we feel, one must feel the joy of the person he loved going in a different path. Did I explain that? Yep. You sure did. Love's a real important thing for you. What does the future hold for you? Are there more books coming out?

Was this your first book? Yes. Actually, I have three other books. Two of them are written. And one of them is half written. Is that going to be a future book that's going to be coming out? That one is right? Yeah, the future book is going to be called The Voice Within.

Oh. Yeah, it's a story of an immigrant. It also has to deal with where he, the early stages of his arrival at the new land, he couldn't relate. He felt a great deal of a struggle within him in order to relate to the customs, habits, you know, way of life in the new land. So he travels in his mind to the land of his birth where, faces of light

start coming out in a forest of cedar trees and every face talks to him about how we should

envision each value of life such as loss and gain, such as freedom, what is freedom, what is understanding, what is the continuum of life.

These aspects, it says about nine chapters that talk about daily values that we exercise in our daily life. At the end, he comes back from his mind trouble to find himself at his fireplace, walking up by the crackling of the fire. and his life changed from that day on. Oh, wow. Yeah. I don't want to talk, say, Yeah, you don't want to give too much.

Give too much. But it's a very, it's a short, about a hundred pages book. And it, it transformed him too. Wow. Yeah. And from there on, he began feeling at the new land. as part of the new land, helped him understand the way of life in the new land. So it's a book actually that a lot of people, the majority of people can relate to,

you know, especially in the U.S., because we're all immigrants or the sons of immigrants. Yeah, it's true. I'm a great grandson of an immigrant from Germany. Ah, yeah. Yeah, I've been to Germany a few times. Yeah, I mean, if you think about all the people that have moved here. They never moved here. Technically, it would just be the Indians left here.

They probably had a good time before we got here, evidently. That's on us. We're not the best sort of people in the world, folks. But, yeah, the, you know, this speaks to, you know, I love how you really support the power of love and the journey that people go through there and why that's, you know, important to people. As we go out, give people a final pitch out, unless there's anything more you want to talk about, where people can get to know you better.

We all go through very similar things in life. I mean, the shape of them may be different, but the gist of it is basically the same. We are humans, we all have the same senses, we all have brains, et cetera, and we all need to live together. We are social. If we learn to love one another, even though we differ in outlook or in the way we think of things,

we should allow each other that space in which we, instead of turning against other, each other, no, we will stand by each other even though we are different for the betterment of the God. In other words, as Khalid, I don't want to think of myself as opposite to Chris. Even though Chris does something completely different than me and may differ in his way of thinking than I, and I am, you know, and the same for me. if we combine our strengths, if we combine our abilities together, and we start learning how to complement one another instead of being opposite to one another

or instead of competing with another. For example, can there be a king without a kingdom? No. Can there be a president without a republic? no can there be a brick layer without bricks no there can't be yeah can there be i mean we all have abilities and love should help bring our abilities together to complement one another and together we can achieve a lot yeah where everybody can benefit we can achieve a lot Yes, that's the main thing.

We need to look, okay, if take America, for example, I'm not talking about politics at all. If we work for the betterment of America as a whole, every citizen will benefit. Rising tide lifts all boats, as we like to say. Yes, you know, when your house is strong, you're fine. Everybody who lives in that house will feed them. secure. But it takes

the basis of that is we need to love one another. Oh yeah. No matter where... Yeah. More love in the world. Yeah, no matter what. And love, I mean, people think of love as two people, you know, a man and a woman, they fall in love. That's a part of love.

It's not, it's only a small part of love. very tiny part of love. Love should be in everything we do. Yeah. Love is grand. It's wonderful. So give me your dot-com's websites, anything on social media, where you want to be able to get to know you better. Okay.

My dot com is calidfayad.com. And I have an email there also on the website. It's Khaled Fayad at Khaledfayad.com. well thank you very much for coming the show we really appreciate it thank you Chris thank you for having me it's a pleasure being here thank you a pleasure to have you as well and what a great story and promise of love folks order up his book wherever fine books are sold love and promise out on October 25th 2016 thanks for honest for tuning in go to goodrease.com

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All right. That should have it in the can there.