Islamic Life Coach School Podcast
Islamic Life Coach School Podcast
Why Change Feels Like a Fight
Our brains resist change as an energy-saving mechanism, defaulting to negative self-talk to prevent the resource-intensive process of neuroplasticity.
• Default brain circuitry (nafs) creates resistance by telling us we're broken or incapable
• Change requires breaking down neural pathways and rebuilding new ones, which consumes energy
• When attempting change, the brain offers frightening "truths" that aren't revelations but defense mechanisms
• Spiritual growth often feels difficult because our brains resist new interpretations, even positive ones
• Three-step solution: stop giving default thoughts special treatment, borrow a regulated nervous system through coaching, and shift in small incremental degrees
• Walking through the "panic zone" of the brain without believing its stories is key to transformation
• Small consistent changes compound over time like shifting a ship's course by one degree
Remember to ask yourself: What three things do you want to change but keep putting off? What story does your brain tell when you attempt change? Is your brain resisting because the path is wrong or because it's new?
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Welcome to Islamic Life Coach School Podcast. Apply tools that you learn in this podcast and your life will be unrecognizably successful. Now your host, dr Kamal Aftar. Hello, hello, hello everyone. Peace and blessings be upon all of you.
Speaker 1:In today's world, change is the only constant, and it does not have to feel like a bite. That is going to be the topic of today's podcast. While change is happening constantly around us, we're also constantly fighting it, and made me wonder why that is. Why are people resistant to change? Are they assuming that change is going to be for the worse? Are they assuming that there's no change that could ever be for the better? What if change is for the better? Why wouldn't people assume that? Well, the answer to all of that is because of our default brain. It's wired to assume the worst. That's the first scenario it presents.
Speaker 1:But most of the women that I coach have a logical understanding that change is inevitable. They also understand that some change might have to come from within them to be able to change their outlook on their life and their circumstances. But then universally, I see a hesitation to change, even women who are very eager to adapt all of whatever self-help industry has to offer. They're willing to ask questions, but change is always difficult for them. Willing to ask questions, but change is always difficult for them. So I'm going to give you some examples to see if what relates, and you can expand it to include other examples in your life.
Speaker 1:Let's say you've been taught certain things in your spirituality that certain scriptures only have this one strict interpretation. But you know there are other possibilities out there, but you can't get yourself to believe them. Why is that? Or you know that certain habits in your husband, your children, trigger you, but you also know that there are loving and lovable people, but you can't change your triggers. Why is that? You know that you might have a very restricted mindset around money. You know that money flows where abundance grows. Allah SWT says give charity and I will multiply and give it back to you, but yet you feel frustrated, restricted and you're very narrow in your ability to give. Why is that? And for most of these situations, there takes a different outlook for you to be able to feel differently about them, or for you to be able to feel differently about them, or for you to be able to create a different outcome from them.
Speaker 1:So first, before I move on, let me continue to lay a very simple basic understanding your thoughts create your feelings and your feelings create your action. Your feelings create the omission of your actions as well, and the cumulative effect of this action in action is a result that you're living in your life. Your restricted mindset around money creates a restricted spectrum of feelings around money, or around any topic about finance for that matter. That, in turn, creates minimal productive action towards abundance of money, and that creates lack of money as a result. You know from multiple reels on your Instagram that creating abundance around money and that creates lack of money as a result. You know from multiple reels on your Instagram that creating abundance around money creates a free flow of money towards you in your life, but yet you're unable to create that change. This is the example we're working with.
Speaker 1:Women want change. They know something's off, they're motivated to create the change. They're smart and intelligent, they ask questions, but yet. So now let's move into why that actually is. Let's move into answering all of those whys.
Speaker 1:Change costs energy, and your brain is the most efficient energy-saving machine. It does not want to spend any calories breaking down old thoughts and building new ones. That process of neuroplasticity is messy, it's slow and it's energy-consuming. So instead the brain sends out emergency sirens You're not good with money, you're a bad mom, your spirituality is fake. Not because any of that is true, but because those thoughts are well rehearsed and they keep you from making the neural upgrades, because any level of neural upgrades requires the brain to spend energy, which it hates to do. Since change is expensive to the brain, the brain panics. What is happening is, as soon as you try to upgrade your level of thinking, brain starts to tell a terrifying story, filtered only through your default circuitry, which is the nups, the unrefined version of yourself. When the brain senses a slight hint, a slightest possibility of improvement towards an upgrade, it turns into a boogeyman. It starts to tell you a horrible story about yourself, and then the subconscious fear that what if I find out some horrible truth about myself? Blocks the change even before it starts. So this is what I tell all these women the thought that there's something horribly wrong with you, this thought that the brain presents on your way to change. It's not some ultimate truth that you've discovered. It's just the first defense mechanism that your brain throws to stop you from changing. And, in all honesty, it's absolutely genius, because the brain knows how to shut all of this change down very fast. Okay, so let's keep up with the example of your relationship with money.
Speaker 1:The other very helpful explanation for this resistance to change phenomena is that once you embark on this journey of trying to figure out, okay, what exactly is it that's keeping me from financial independence, once you start asking this level of question, it will create a fundamental change in your thinking. The very first thing that the brain offers you as an answer is that because you're incapable, you're not good with money, you're not good with math, you're not smart enough to handle money affairs, you can't be trusted with money, etc. Etc. On and on it goes. So the overarching theme here is you might understand your need for change in your life. You also understand that you have to start the process by changing your outlook on life.
Speaker 1:But the very first explanation that your mind offers as to why it's not happening is that you're broken. Brain says you don't have the capacity for that level of love because of your childhood. Brain says you don't know how to be a good boss, how to be a good businesswoman, because there's nothing close to a leadership quality in you. The brain says that you're having a hard time as a parent because your kids don't trust you. All of your discipline methods have failed and your kids are glued to the screen because you're a bad mother. This is the quote-unquote proof that the brain offers to halt the change. This is the first line of self-defense in order to keep you from going down the road of neuroplasticity, of self-improvement, of changing the brain at the cellular level.
Speaker 1:But, like we discussed, the brain does not like to spend energy on changing. It does not like to spend resources on how you're going to be able to think differently. It would rather just continue to turn out the same old, stale thoughts about money, about your parenting, about your love life, about your success level and about your spirituality. So, all of the elaborate stories based on the evidence from the path or projections on the future, the creative thought patterns about your brokenness, they're not ultimate truth. This is the quality of the nafs, the primal brain.
Speaker 1:The very first explanation an unevolved brain offers as an answer to everything in life Comes through the default circuitry. This is why change feels like a fight. This is why, no matter how much you believe change is important, you are usually unable to do it by yourself. In the Quran, Allah says who is it that will lend to Allah a good loan which Allah will multiply many times over? Surah 2, ayah 245. You might know that you might believe it with every bone in your body, but when it's time to donate, to invest in yourself, to spend from a place of trust, you freeze. That is not hypocrisy. That is your default brain's neural wiring. That is your nafs saying don't move, don't change, don't let go. And this is especially true when it comes to the interpretation of the deen. You know that there are gentler, more mercy-centered interpretations of certain verses or of the teachings of the Quran and Sunnah, but you don't let yourself believe them. Why? Because then you'd have to change, and change always feels dangerous at first, even when it's divine.
Speaker 1:This very simple neurobiological explanation of resistance to change tells you that change requires breaking down of previous building blocks and using those building blocks to create new structures. This is the process of neuroplasticity. This is the process of creating new dendritic connections within the neurons of the brain, and this construction requires energy In the name of efficiency. It will avoid neuroplasticity, and the higher your processing power, the more you're able to think, the more intelligent your brain is. It will get very creative, based on all of that potential that you have, and tell you very creative stories. It will give you multiple other directions to go into, except for the one you actually need to go to to create change. But in this case, your brain, your lower brain, is just protecting you from your own greatness. Because how many times have you prayed for a better life but instead subconsciously blocked the answer? Because it came dressed as change, change that had to go through the zone of panic of your brain, the zone where you're comfortable but actually exhausted at the same time, because you're constantly fighting that internal battle.
Speaker 1:The solution and a practical way to create change without fighting is you stop giving your default thoughts special treatment. You're a bad mom is a thought. It's not divine revelation, it's not a billable diagnosis, just a sentence in your brain made up to keep you in the old loop. You don't have to fight it, you just notice it and you keep walking. That was the first step. This is when we're not giving our default thoughts more airtime than they deserve. The second step is you borrow a regulated nervous system, and this is where coaching comes in. Your brain needs a steady place and pace to rewire itself. That's why women tell me, kamal, I feel so calm around you. It's not magic, it's co-regulation and it's powerful.
Speaker 1:Step three is you shift in small degrees. You don't take full turns. Change is like turning a ship If you shift one degree at a time, you'll end up in a whole new continent, in a whole new direction. There are no battles, no breakdowns, just consistency in one different direction. Start with one thought, upgrade one feeling, upgrade one new action. And this is exactly what we do inside my coaching container, the Empowered Muslim Woman. We don't chase change like a war, we don't fight like warriors, we don't resist it and we don't fight our natural neural wiring. We just let it happen. We go through change like a prayer steady, loving and aligned.
Speaker 1:So the next time your brain says you're broken, you're incapable, you can't handle this or any of the other nonsense, any meaning you assigned to the world always comes through the default pathway. It includes the meaning you're trying to assign to the change in your life. And this default pathway, that is the nafs, is your basic out-of-the-box setting, and the purpose of every Muslim woman in the world is to evolve through this level of thinking. The purpose is not to fight it, the purpose is not to hold your nafs against you. It's not to blame your circumstances. The purpose is that when you feel like there's a constriction in your life and you want to create a change, you will walk through the panic zone of the brain, knowing full well that it's the defense mechanism, and you yourself will not panic. You yourself will not believe any of those thoughts. The panic zone will sound like the brain is telling you a whole bunch of undiscovered truths about yourself. But they're just scare tactics. They're designed to have you retreat back into your comfort zone. The panic zone, made up of all of its stories, is the function of the nafs, and moving through it makes the life on earth better for a Muslim woman and, in my opinion, it makes life so much more rewarding in the afterlife, inshallah. When the brain offers you painful truths, you say thank you, brain. I'm moving forward now, building something bigger, now different. Now you have the option to simply not believe your own brain.
Speaker 1:Most women think that their particular brain is failing them when they don't see the change that they're hoping for, when your brain is actually defending your current identity. That means every time you're avoiding change, avoiding walking through the panic zone, you're actively agreeing to stay small. And I don't mean change has to be big to stay small. And I don't mean change has to be big. I don't mean that it has to come with creating a nationwide revolution.
Speaker 1:Maybe you want to write more because that's your creative outlet. Maybe you want to do watercolors more. Maybe you want to create digital graphics, but your ego's default setting keeps telling you that no one is interested in your work. That is the panic zone truth that I'm telling you about. It will say you don't have an audience. It will say you're not creative. This is expected. These are not hard truths about your creativity. These are just thoughts. They're thrown against you as a weapon by your nafs to keep you from creating your dreams. Coming over this design is the work that we're put on this planet to do.
Speaker 1:So would you rather stay exhausted in your comfort zone because of the mind battles that you're constantly fighting, or be uncomfortable in your evolution? Answer to yourself what are the three things? You know you want to change, but keep putting it off? What's the story that your brain tells you as soon as you start to try the change? Is your brain resisting because the path is wrong or because the path is new. When you have the answer to these questions, come back to the three steps to create your change.
Speaker 1:Step one stop giving default thoughts extra special treatment. Step two borrow a regulated nervous system. Step three shift in small degrees, not in complete revolutions. With that, I pray to Allah, subhanahu wa ta'ala. Ya Allah, guide me through the noise of my thoughts when my mind tells me I'm broken. Remind me that I am your creation, still unfolding. When fear whispers that I'm not capable, anchor me in your promise that you are enough for me. Ya Allah, soften the grip of my ego on me. Give me the courage to walk through discomfort with grace. O Allah, let every resistance that my mind and my body offers be a reminder of your greatness, and let every step I take towards betterment be a step towards you. Ameen, ya Rabbul Alameen, please keep me in your du'as. I will talk to you guys next time.