Islamic Life Coach School Podcast
Islamic Life Coach School Podcast
Entitled To Feel Inspired
In this powerful exploration of action versus inspiration, we uncover why the human brain isn't designed for constant motivational highs. While society glorifies "feeling inspired" as a prerequisite for meaningful work, true success comes from showing up when you don't feel like it.
Your brain doesn't actually break under pressure, it builds. It's anti-fragile, meaning it doesn't just survive stress, it transforms and strengthens through it. When left without clear targets, your mind creates elaborate distractions, turning to judgment, excessive research, and scrolling, all sophisticated forms of avoidance that feel productive but keep you stuck.
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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:Among many topics that I coach women on, one of the most frequently visited topics is about time management and how to actually get things done. I can't count how many times I put something on my calendar with the hope to get it done, something that truly matters to me, only to wake up and not feel like doing it in the moment. It used to be about swimming lessons, or it could be about recording a podcast or launching a new part of my business. That moment that I planned on ahead of time, that I know will move the needle in my business, in my spiritual life or in my personal life. That moment always comes, but it also very frequently comes with the slump, the resistance, the ugh. Okay, I'm going to maybe do it tomorrow. Instead of waiting for a magical surge of motivation, though, I borrow gratitude from my future self. I picture her saying thank you for doing this when it was hard, thank you for not flaking, thank you for showing up, and just like that, I start moving.
Speaker 1:Consistency does not always have to be fueled by inspiration. It can be fueled by discipline, self-respect or acting when you don't feel like it. You're not entitled to feel inspiration all the time, and that is the topic of my podcast today, words and phrases that come up during coaching all the time is my motivation is lacking. I don't feel inspired to do the work. I don't feel aligned. I'm going to talk about all three of these one at a time.
Speaker 1:Inspiration is a gift. It's not a guarantee. Your brain is not designed to generate a constant stream of motivational and inspirational high. It's designed to conserve energy. That is its basic premise. Waiting to feel inspired before action is like waiting for the perfect weather before planting a seed. You will miss the entire season. The growth happens when you act without the emotional high.
Speaker 1:Motivation in itself is an emotion. It's not a plan. It rises and falls like any other emotion affected by sleep, hormones, environment, thousands of other things, but mostly motivation comes from your thought, because we know it's an emotion. When you rely on motivation to guide your behavior, it's going to be as flaky as your thoughts, unless you're masterful at controlling your mind and can generate motivation on cue. If that doesn't happen, you're handing your destiny to a chemical cocktail which you haven't mastered control over. And if you haven't, you don't need motivation. You need structure, discipline, trust in your why.
Speaker 1:And then, lastly, alignment has been mostly misunderstood. It's not supposed to feel like floating on a spiritual cloud all the time. Real alignment is like resistance, repetition, doing the hard things because that's the right thing. And sometimes that's what alignment is. It's acting in congruence with your values, not through your comfort. You may feel uncertain, bored or even afraid, and still be deeply aligned. You are not entitled to constantly feel inspired, motivated or aligned before you take action.
Speaker 1:True alignment with your values, your goals, your purpose very frequently feels uncomfortable. It's that kind of discomfort that comes with doing something new, something repetitive, something that looks like mundane but you know is going to make a difference. And it's still alignment. So if you've been waiting to feel inspired before you start doing something meaningful, let this podcast be your wake-up call. In many cases, you're not waiting for alignment, you're avoiding discomfort. And that is natural, because your brain is not wired for greatness, it's not wired for mastery, it's not even wired for consistency. It's wired only for survival and comfort. It's wired for energy conservation.
Speaker 1:When you're waiting to feel inspired and only use that very addicting emotion as a fuel of your meaningful action, the discomfort becomes a giant roadblock to those actions. In that case the brain doesn't have a target to move towards because it's still waiting for inspiration. And unfortunately, the brain does not work with voids very well. It cannot just not think. If you don't give your brain a clear mission, it will make one up. It doesn't matter if it's a constructive or a destructive mission, it will just make something up while you're waiting to feel inspired. A brain without a target to work towards is like a toddler with a crayon and no paper. It colors walls and writes on everything it gets his hand on, creating chaos just to feel busy. It cannot sit idly.
Speaker 1:When you're waiting for positive emotions like inspiration, motivation and alignment, you're making room for the brain to create its own distraction. You think you're being gentle to yourself, waiting for the right time and the resistance to lift, but really you're deep cleaning your pantry instead of writing the first page of your book. You're planning another family vacation instead of launching your business. You're researching more instead of making the call you already know you need to make. You're worrying about your child's entire future. Instead of addressing the task that's actually urgent and important today, you're doing everything but that one thing that moves the needle in your life. This is the misfiring of your survival mode. While it waits for you to find motivation, your brain will always choose the easiest dopamine hit Scrolling, snacking, fantasizing, venting, researching, overcleaning all of this over the long-term reward of deep, focused work.
Speaker 1:And the most cruel part is, the more you delay your goal, the more you start to believe that the delay is who you are. You start thinking I'm just not that disciplined. Delay is who you are. You start thinking I'm just not that disciplined. I'm someone who always needs external accountability. I can't finish things on time. But none of that is actually true. Not being able to accomplish your vision is not written in your DNA or in your personality.
Speaker 1:When you don't give your brain a target, it starts shooting at everything. It judges people to feel superior. It gets angry just to feel powerful. It obsesses over what's missing to avoid what's possible. It will start targeting judgment because tearing others down is easier than building yourself up. It will feel anger because it feels justified Rage. Feels powerful even when it's wasted energy. It starts targeting dissatisfaction because it's easier to complain about life than to change it.
Speaker 1:If you don't put your brain to work, it will make work for itself, creating problems where none exist, inventing reasons to procrastinate, manufacture self-doubt just to keep itself busy. And all of that feels productive, worry feels like planning, research feels like action, comparison feels like strategy. But none of that is true. Your brain is just trying to survive boredom, trying to hit targets that don't exist, boredom that's being generated from you, waiting to feel inspired. But all of this time you're designed to grow through challenge, the same challenge that you are so desperately subconsciously avoiding. Brain thrives under that pressure. Your brain doesn't break under pressure, it builds under pressure. Your brain is not fragile. It does not break like glass.
Speaker 1:Your brain is anti-fragile, meaning it doesn't just survive stress, it grows stronger from it. It adapts, it rewires, it expands under pressure. It is designed for challenge, for problem solving, for pushing limits. Not only can it handle discomfort, it needs discomfort to stay alive. Without it, it starts to decay. Without discomfort, it starts to create the meaningless discomfort that I mentioned. It turns against you, building an internal war of excuses, self-sabotage, instead of a fortress of discipline and resilience. All of this means that the more you challenge it, the stronger it becomes. The more resistance it faces, the more resilience it builds, the more discomfort it feels the one that comes from you, taking action without inspiration. That means the more disciplined your brain will be. And yet many of us have been trained to treat discomfort like danger. We treat struggle like it's a sign of us doing something wrong.
Speaker 1:Anti-fragility means your mind adapts when things get hard and gets better. It converts stress into strength. When you choose action over avoidance, you're making progress and you're making neurons. You're building new wiring. But you avoid pressure long enough, waiting to feel inspired. Your brain will decay in its own comfort. It gets soft, it forgets how to work, it turns against you and turns to shame, overthinking self-sabotage. And when that happens, you don't just lose time, you lose trust in yourself, and that is a precious commodity. So when a client tells me I don't know if I can handle this, I feel scared, I feel blocked. There's no time to coddle fear. I celebrate it and I teach her how to celebrate it, because it's not a weakness, it's a signal that your brain is ready to wake up. It's anti-fragility, ready to kick in.
Speaker 1:I've seen women walk into job interviews that they thought they'd never be ready for life situations that they thought they could never face. Launch businesses, write books, set clean boundaries All of that means something's working In the meanwhile. I also want to make you aware of the other side of the coin, which is there's nothing wrong with comfort. You need rest, recovery, joy, naps, trips to the beach, bubble baths, stillness, playfulness all of that is required. But then I want to also introduce you to this character.
Speaker 1:Her name is auntie cozy. She's the version of you that sounds like she's protecting your peace while waiting for comfort and inspiration, but she's actually robbing you blind. She's the auntie that's got all of the luggage for self-care but none of the self-respect To excuse your behavior. She'll say maybe you're just tired today, maybe you need a little snack now, maybe it's not the aligned time, maybe you're just not the get things done kind of person, and that's okay. She is the main character in your procrastination and your entitlement to feel inspiration. She's smooth, convincing and a professional gaslighter In her presence.
Speaker 1:You've rested for three hours, but you still feel anxious. You've scrolled through 37 videos on productivity while actually doing nothing productive. You rushed through your pair mindlessly in the name of needing to unwind. Later you told yourself that Netflix is the new therapy. Auntie Cozy will not let your rest time be restful, while you need rest, and Auntie Cozy isn't offering you rest. She's offering you avoidance dressed as leisure. She wants you to feel good now and feel like a failure later. Because what's happening is when this quote-unquote comfort time ends, your brain returns with a report card and it says that you failed at every task. This is what I call rotting in comfort. When it doesn't smell like rot, it smells like delicious cinnamon rolls, but afterwards you feel like you've constantly betrayed yourself. So the next time you hear Auntie Cozy or something similar, whispering sweet nothings in your ear, try to tell her this Thank you for your concern, auntie, but my future self is waiting for me, and right now is not the time to eat popcorn or any other snack.
Speaker 1:Your comfort zone is not your enemy, but staying trapped in it is. You don't need inspiration, you need integrity. Real alignment that puts you on the path of mastery, of greatness, of accomplishment, doesn't always feel comfortable. Sometimes it feels like pushing through friction, stepping into the unknown, wrestling with your own doubt and moving forward despite of all of these things, when every fiber of your body is screaming for comfort. Your body doesn't grow stronger without resistance. Your mind does not grow sharper without challenge, and your success arrives dragging the weight of every moment. You chose to show up when you didn't feel like it. If everything you just heard landed, if you now realize that you're not entitled to feel inspiration before you move, here's what I want you to start doing from today. Not tomorrow, not when it feels flowy, but today.
Speaker 1:Your realignment checklist is going to look something like this Pause and name the task. The thing I'm avoiding right now is fill in the blanks. Next, identify the false comfort. Instead of doing the thing I need, I'm reaching for. Fill in the blanks. Is it snacks, youtube research, more playtime with the kids?
Speaker 1:Number three ask yourself would my future self be grateful? I did this now? If the answer is yes, move forward. If the answer is no, check. If you're being hijacked by Auntie Cozy. Number four do this for the first 30 to 60 seconds only. That's it, just a small amount of awareness, and going through these questions is going to bring enough light to the matter that you will break the cycle.
Speaker 1:And the fifth and the last step is end with identity reinforcement. I am the kind of woman who moves without inspiration, I am becoming the woman who trusts herself to show up, because highest form of integrity isn't just about being honest with others, but about doing what you told yourself you would do, especially when no one's watching and no one's holding you accountable. That level of self-integrity builds empires. It raises leaders. It raises the consciousness of dharma. The mantras that I've tattooed on myself, and you can borrow too, are discipline is the new dopamine. Comfort is a nice place to visit, but not a place to build a house. Inspiration is a guest and action is ongoing. My future self is watching and she's going to be proud. So I'm going to summarize all of these in the next few lines. Which is?
Speaker 1:Motivation is not a prerequisite for action. Your brain is wired for survival, not success. If left untrained, it will always choose short-term comfort over long-term growth. Waiting to feel aligned disguises avoidance as wisdom, but real alignment feels uncomfortable, repetitive and unfamiliar. Your brain needs resistance to grow. It's anti-fragile, it thrives under pressure, and that is when you act despite fear. Just for the sake of inertia and movement, the comfort-seeking part of you, like this comical auntie cozy, will offer false rest to keep you from doing true work. While you're welcome to rest, integrity means what you promised yourself you will do when you assigned yourself to do it.
Speaker 1:Use a simple realignment checklist and remember that inspiration, while present, is welcomed, it is a guest. It is not a constant guide. Inspiration is incredible when it's there and when you can use it to fuel your action. But when it's not present, it's not going to hurt you to take action in its absence. If anything, taking action will help you because when you're busy with action, your toddler brain will not be creating distracting work for you, your brain will be getting stronger and you will be getting a life that you want to live. While you're not entitled to constant inspiration, use that to stop feeling like a victim.
Speaker 1:When you don't feel like doing things, inspiration alignment are exceptions to the rule. The rule is that the primal brain will be afraid to be seen, to fail, to be judged, and all of those things don't feel like abundance and inspiration. They feel like resistance in your body. When you do feel inspired, cherish it, soak in it, really anchor it in your body, memorize it, but don't always expect for it to be there. With that, I pray to Allah SWT. Ya Allah, grant me the strength to act when I feel nothing, the discipline to move forward when I crave comfort. Allow my rest to be peaceful and rejuvenating when the time is right. Allow me the clarity to know that Barakah lives in effort, not in ease. Make me consistent in my striving, sincere in my intention, and let my future self be grateful to the person who I'm becoming today while I use courage. Ya Allah, allow me courage and discipline and allow me inspiration when the time is right. Ameen, ya Rabbul, ameen, please keep me in your da'as. I will talk to you guys next time.