In many Gulf homes, there is one person everyone relies on. That person handles everything, asks for very little, and is admired for being strong. Ghaleb Al Ahdab grew up as that person.
Ghaleb was born and raised in Abu Dhabi, and he is currently in senior pharmaceutical leadership. In November 2026, he opened GALA Personal Growth Institute in Dubai. To understand why, it helps to start with a prayer.
A Prayer and a Rule
His mother had a prayer: “May God never make me need someone to help me, and give me strength to do it by myself.”
As a boy, he learned to rely on himself and to do things alone, so that he would always be strong. Saying “no” to help was praised, and in time it became his rule.
Today he sees that rule clearly. It made him confident and self-reliant. He also sees something else. If he had said “yes” to help more often, he could have grown even further.
A Full Life
The boy who learned to do things by himself grew into a man with a full life.
Ghaleb earned a Bachelor of Pharmacy and an MBA from the University of Bradford, and he speaks Arabic, English and French. He is also the author of a book, The Process: Transformation Beyond the Scale.
From the outside, his life looked complete. In his own words: “A successful career. A beautiful family.”
The weight, he says, was in two places at once: “Carrying weight on my shoulders, and carrying it in my body.”
By January 2024, he weighed 135 kilograms.
One Moment That Changed the Direction
On 8 January 2024, his daughter fell. Ghaleb rushed down the stairs to reach her, and he arrived out of breath, unable to speak.
He describes that moment in one line: “With no power to ask her what was wrong.”
In that moment, he understood.
“Everything I had done to build a life for my family, to build a happy place for my children, to be there and enjoy my time with them… none of it was happening.”
Effort Took Him Far
“I took a decision. I made a choice. And I started,” he says.
The gym, the work and the effort, day after day, brought real results. He lost fifty kilograms and rebuilt his life.
And then he stopped forcing. Without realizing it, he drifted. Something quiet took him back. He regained ten kilograms.
He says: “All that effort. All that pain. More than a year of forced action. And it could not hold on its own.”
The Step Most People Leave Undone
He saw that the eating was never the problem. It was a symptom of something underneath it.
So he started looking for where the problem really came from.
And when he understood it, he took the step that most people leave undone:
“I did the work on what I had understood. I worked on the problem at its root.”
The weight came off again. Effortlessly this time. And it stayed.
What “Formation” Means
That second step, working at the level where a pattern begins, is now the center of GALA Personal Growth Institute.
Ghaleb calls this place the “Formation” level. It holds the rules, beliefs and decisions a person learned early, often before they were old enough to choose them.
His own childhood rule shows how early such things are set. He learned it as a boy, long before he could choose it.
“Understanding doesn’t remove the weight,” he says.
The People He Works With
Ghaleb works one to one with ambitious women and men across the UAE and the Gulf, as a Mentor and Guide certified by the Robert Simic Coaching Institute.
His work is for the person everyone relies on, at home and at work.
It runs through “Restore Your Powers”, the first Signature Framework of GALA Personal Growth Institute.
He knows that life well, because he lived it himself.
Ghaleb Al Ahdab Still on the Journey
Ghaleb is a husband and a father. He speaks about his own path plainly:
“I am still on this journey, living at the level I want to live at, doing what I have to do.”
And that is when he knew what he was here to do:
“To help people change their life at the root. Not the symptoms. Not the outcomes they can see. What actually caused it.”
Follow Ghaleb on Instagram at @ghaleb.alahdab and @restoreyourpowers, and discover more at restoreyourpowers.com.
And if his story feels close to your own, allow yourself to notice one moment this week when you could say “yes” to help.
Remember… The power is always yours.
Follow Ghaleb Al Ahdab on Instagram
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