Islamic Life Coach School Podcast
Islamic Life Coach School Podcast
Restorative Killing: Self-Renewal and Spiritual Growth
Imagine regenerating your life by removing damaged elements and making room for healthier growth. Sounds intriguing, right? In this captivating episode, we explore this concept of restorative killing, inspired by the teachings of Islam, and discuss how it can lead to self-renewal and self-improvement. Listen in as we dive into the importance of self-reflection and cultivating positive traits such as compassion, honesty, and gratitude during this transformational process.
Facing fears and overcoming conflicts is challenging sure, but what if you could transform fear into spiritual fuel for growth? Discover how to tap into your passion, create heart liberation, and mentally fortify yourself in this deep and insightful conversation. We also discuss connecting with Allah SWT to aid in overcoming internal struggles and releasing what no longer serves us. Don't miss this eye-opening and transformative episode!
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If this podcast has benefited you, imagine the value of a one-on-one meeting with me! Click below to schedule your FREE consultation. Discover solutions with no obligation.
https://www.islamiclifecoachschool.com/appointments
Welcome to Islamic Life Coach School Podcast. Apply tools that you learn in this podcast and your life will be unrecognisably successful. Now your host, dr Kamal Uttar. Hello, hello, hello, everyone. Peace and blessings be upon all of you.
Speaker 1:Idea of today's podcast came from a book I recently read called Regenerative Business. Dr Sam Garcia talks about the concept of regeneration that helps you renew yourself. It's a self-improvement system and I wanted to share it with you, with the hopes that it will benefit all of us, inshaallah. The main concept around which I'm developing this podcast is about the removal of damaged elements. Death of that is consuming you or draining you or killing off a part of you that is not benefiting you anymore And, when used in a medical term, is a removal of damaged or dead tissue from a wound. While it might paint a picture of removal of physical elements, how I mean it in this podcast is, in a metaphorical sense, removing something that you can't touch or see, but you know needs to be eliminated in your life. It's a process of controlled death. This is about purposefully eliminating something to promote new, healthier and more beneficial growth. Just as farmers burn off old, unproductive crops to make room for new ones, you need to take off and shed off the dead weight of your mental burdens. This is about purposefully killing off the part of you that doesn't serve you anymore. I want to take some time to create emotional safety around these terms of death and killing. Again, i mean them in a metaphorical sense. No one is actually dying. If you don't have a sense of safety around these words or something gets triggered in you, then maybe this podcast is not for you. But if you are able to listen to it from a perspective of renewal, then you will have a great strength and ease at the end.
Speaker 1:From an Islamic perspective, this concept aligns seamlessly with the teachings about self-renewal and self-improvement. This is a practice where you're encouraged to shed off your detrimental habits for a mindful, better version of yourself. And I want you to only approach this podcast if and when it feels safe for you. And if a point comes when it doesn't feel safe, you can always take a break for deep breathing exercises. But in reality, nothing dangerous is being discussed. Nothing actually fearful is going to happen. Nothing actually dangerous is going to happen during this podcast. So in that light, this podcast is also not for people who are deeply traumatized, having active suicidal ideations. Please seek help with a licensed mental health professional if that's the case. While that is my general recommendation, always, it is worth reminding ourselves of this disclaimer and this option as it relates to this podcast, in case the word death or related terms are triggering to you.
Speaker 1:So, as an introduction, take the analogy of the pharma organ. This is about the art of making room. In agriculture, farmers practice crop rotation and field resting, clearing away old or the non-productive plants to make room for new ones. There are habits in you that need clearing away as well. You have beliefs that might have served you to survive at one point, but no longer serve you. These are the old crops that you need to clear away. By doing so, you create space for the newer, healthier habits and traits to develop and flourish.
Speaker 1:Understanding that your mental habits does not mean that these habits are you. These habits are the weeds of your life, the behaviors that impede your personal growth. They also might create disconnection in your personal relationships. They might be habits of anger, dishonesty or arrogance. As the Quran says, and be moderate in your pace and lower your voice. Indeed, the most disagreeable of sounds is the voice of donkeys. Surah Luqman, ayah 19 Habit of being in a triggered state around family. Raising your voice or yelling or screaming is just that a habit. It is not your identity. These undesirable traits can be uprooted and discarded as weeds controlled killing, just so you will have room for positive change.
Speaker 1:Restorative death is a process of consistency and perseverance. There will be parts of you that will need shedding, improving, and I cannot say this enough. But this is not a moral flaw, or this is not because you're genetically or inherently damaged, but because it is the effect of our nafs as it goes through the life on earth. Prophet Muhammad peace be upon him said the best of people are those with the most excellent character. Rushing off of the excess weight through restorative killing is just like you killing off a crop just so something else can grow in its place. Cultivating this level of a good character requires patience, effort, time and perseverance, and there is great importance in self-reflection when it comes to this restorative death. It's like the gardener assesses the soil before deciding to plant something, assessing our spiritual and emotional soil. Before deciding to kill something off, before deciding to plant something new, you have to assess the situation. Self-reflection is not a self-blame exercise. Self-reflection is just like assessing the soil, looking at it, seeing what belongs and what doesn't belong anymore.
Speaker 1:The Quran encourages self-reflection. Indeed, in that are signs for a people who give thought. Isura Ar-Rad 13, part of Ayah 3. Once we have cleared away the old crops and weeds, we can now sow new seeds. These seeds represent positive traits such as compassion, honesty, gratitude or anything of the like. And again in the Quran it states Indeed, allah loves those who act justly. Quran 49, part of ayah 9. Maybe a trait you want to sow this time is that you want to act justly, having given your fair share of attention to your work, to your family, to your acts of worship.
Speaker 1:At this point, i do want to interject one other concept from this book, and that has to do with cycles of nature. Just like seasons are an example of a cycle, your energy level during the day are also examples of cycles, something that are recurrent, with highs and lows and has regular intervals, human beings have cycles inherent in them. For women, they can be their monthly hormonal cycles. With people in general, the greater cycles of the body birth, aging, death and going back to the soil Cycle of the soil, creation, witnessing of Allah, cycling through the earthly body and then returning to the celestial Cycles are ever present and so common that we don't take note of them. So when I talk about restorative killing, i don't mean kill off the part of you that gets tired at the end of the day after work. That's a cycle, natural and inherent. It is your requirement to get restful sleep, to come back to life the next day so that you can repeat the cycle again. Restorative killing is not about shedding the natural lows of the cycle. You need these lows to experience the highs.
Speaker 1:This type of debraiment process is not an invite to judge yourself for feeling sad when you lose a pet or one thing, to kill off that anxiety. When you get laid off, if you're worried about how to make the next mortgage payment, that worry does not need killing. That worry needs to be channeled into what you're going to do next. But any of that would require restorative killing, the debraiment. If you get laid off and you make it mean that you don't have the skills, the world is a horrible place. You can't keep a job because either you're neurodivergent, or because of your paths, or because of your family. If your layoff derives you to put responsibility on something that is not in your control, that calls for an immediate, restorative killing. That worry that you have about making your bill payments can be healthy if you direct it to create more opportunities for yourself. The worry as an emotion is the low of the natural cycle. That in itself does not need to be killed off.
Speaker 1:And again, i choose this strong language of death and killing because we have to first of all start developing a healthy relationship with death. It is a part of who you are, it is a part of life, and also because the lower brain of yours sometimes need strict language. If you see a toddler putting their chubby finger in an electrical outlet on the wall, if you catch them in that position, you're not going to be like oh honey, please take that finger out, can't you see? it's going to hurt you. That will leave a boo-boo. You're not going to use that language. If you catch them in a position where they can just electrocute themselves, you're going to bolt into action and yank their finger out. This language and phrasing of killing off and death is supposed to be giving you that sense of urgency, that bolt, that energy to leap into immediate creative action, because that toddler brain of yours is in a position to electrocute you in any moment. The toddler brain hurts us and we end up blaming the world. This dynamic needs immediate intervention Action like yanking the hand out of the outlet, action like restorative killing.
Speaker 1:From an Islamic perspective, this is about continuous self-improvement. It involves identifying and eliminating detrimental habits or characteristics, replacing them but positive ones, and recognizing that this process is an ongoing cycle. With patience and perseverance, we strive towards becoming better versions of ourselves. With this conscious act of burning off the excess noise, you can restore the balance, harmony and equilibrium. If you have a luxurious lifestyle because Allah swt has made that possible for you and you've worked hard for it that is a natural high A grateful embracing with grounding will be the right thing to do. But if and when you see the thirst of materialism superseding that gratitude, that's when it's time for the restorative killing A part of you that needs to be sloughed off cleanly, precisely and painlessly. Your lifestyle does not cause your gratitude, your mind does. Just like a woman living in poverty will have times in her life of spiritual connection, she will also have times when she will question why she has the hardships, that she doesn't even know where her next meal of the family is going to come from. She will have moments of gratitude and disobedience, just like you will.
Speaker 1:Gratitude and disobedience is not a function of your lifestyle. It's a function of your mind, a part of the mind that needs to be metaphorically killed off. This is the process of liberation. This is the process of restoration, heart liberation, embracing this duality of the mind to strengthen your positive identities. Identity is a thought on repeat Competing identities that will help you become closer to Allah, the teachings in his book and the sunnah of the Prophet. Peace be upon him.
Speaker 1:Muslim women in the West almost always have a dual heritage and they are competing identities. Most of us are desperately trying to incorporate elements from our ancestral culture and Western culture And sometimes internal conflict arises due to these overlapping identities. But conflict, if it disrupts your mental well-being, needs to be killed off. Your dual heritage has more than enough room to grow. The conflict is the product of your mind. Recognizing and eliminating this conflict is a form of restorative killing If living in a different culture leads your mind to create stagnation and personal growth, if it confines you to your comfort zone. Recognizing these weeds of stagnation calls for targeted killing, the abreadment, and this might look like taking up educational courses, learning a new skill or simply reading more about different cultures, philosophies and perspectives.
Speaker 1:The focus here is making room for whatever is developmentally healthy for you. In cases like this, you relinquish some to rise a lot. Your fear of failure needs to be relinquished. This fear that paralyzes you, prevents you from taking calculated risks, doesn't let you pursue your dreams. By consciously relinquishing this fear, you allow yourself to rise above your limitations. The difference between burnout or brilliance is the work of restorative killing. That's it As a workaholic. You will experience severe burnout If you don't know when to leave work at work and when to be present with the family and when to relax. That will be unsustainable. The recognition of this burnout is a signal for change. You take steps to create a healthier lifestyle, such as setting boundaries at work, prioritizing self-care, nurturing spirituality and personal relationships. Through this transformation, you move from a state of burnout to a state of brilliance and you will experience enhanced productivity and overall well-being.
Speaker 1:The difference between distrust and trust is a factor of debreement healing emotional wounds, thriving in connection, being vulnerable with people that can hold your vulnerability. It's just a matter of calculated death If the distrust comes from broken relationships, past experiences, just the understanding that the past is a part of your journey and it shapes you into a woman you are today. The difference between self-pity and self-compassion, resentment and serenity, going from fear to courage. The only difference between all of them is restorative killing. Targeted death, precise and painless removal of the unwanted Is a Quran, remind us. And whoever fears Allah, he will make for him a way out.
Speaker 1:Chapter 65, aya 2. Your fears are a part of Allah's Vanu-Tarla's plan, serving a purpose when used to direct your life of spirituality, but needs to be killed off when it's faceless, overused and pushes you to incest and worry. Find your passion under the debris of apathy, demotivation and propel your life with the right emotional fuel. Create heart liberation and mental fortification. With that I pray to Allah's Vanu-Tarla. Grant me and everyone listening the strength to overcome internal conflicts. Grants us mental fortification while we selectively kill the unwanted, the useless. Guide us to release what holds us back, allowing for space for what is developmentally healthy. Put us on the right path. Siraatul mustaqeen and O Allah, allow us to free ourselves from our mind's burdens so that our hearts are pure. Allow for this work to lift us spiritually so that we can benefit from it on the Day of Judgment. Ameen Ya Rabul Alameen, please keep me in your door as I will talk to you guys next time.