How to have More Patience when Pursuing Your Goals

FULL TRANSCRIPT

[The following is the full transcript of this episode of The QuranLifestyle Show by Halimah El-kurghali]

Assalamualaikum Halimah Here! your Quran lifestyle coach.

Today I want to talk about how we can develop more patience when we're pursuing our dreams and our goals. Because you know, a lot of us have these amazing goals that we work really hard on. Whether it's something that you work on full time or something that you do as a side hustle while you fulfill your duties- it can be equally frustrating when we are putting in all the effort; giving that blood, sweat and tears, but we're not really feeling like we are experiencing the breakthroughs that we want or we're not really seeing the progress that we expected to see. And that can take a big toll on our emotional, our mental and physical wellbeing as well. So it's really important to ask the question, what can we do about it? Because I'm sure most of us are mature enough to understand that success just doesn't happen overnight, right? That it requires us to be patient, and to have discipline. The reality is that living these things is just simply quite hard, right? And I think on top of that, what makes it even more difficult is the fact that these prerequisites to success, like having patients for example, is something that is still quite abstract, right? It's something that we might have various different definitions of, have different ideas on how to develop it and practice It etc. So today inshAllah, in this video, what I want to share with you is four quranic ideas on how we can develop our levels of patients, so that inshAllah we can really enjoy our journey and we can feel like we're making progress in our lives. 

I'm sure you've heard the saying that, we need to be careful of our thoughts because our thoughts become our words, our words become our actions, our actions become our habits and our habits become our character and our destiny. This is something that is very well known in the world of personal development. But what it’s essentially trying to teach us is that everything starts up here- in the mind. Everything starts with the way that we think and our mental perception. And this is not something, by the way, that is simply to do with personal development and is foreign to our religion because even if you look in our hadith qudsi, where Allah swt speaks of himself, He starts the Hadith qudsi with "I am as my servant thinks I am" so subhanAllah Allah swt is teaching us that even in the most integral and important of relationships and purposes- that with Allah swt, the way that we think and the way that we perceive things plays a really big role. So what you're going to see inshAllah this video, is that the first three points that I'm going to cover are to do with our mindset. So things that we need to shift in our way of thinking in order to help us to develop the levels of patients that we need when pursuing our goal inshAllah. And then the last point will be a practical tip.

Focusing more on the journey

Ok so the first quranic idea I have for you on how you can develop more patience when you're pursuing your goals inshAllah is to start focusing more on the journey rather than just fixating all the time about the goal itself, the end goal. So instead of just focusing on the goal all the time and asking yourself questions like- when am I going to achieve it? Why is it not happening in the way that I expected it to? We need to start shifting to the now in terms of- what actions can I take right now that can help me move forward towards my goal? What resources did Allah swt give me that I can use? what time can I carve out to take me closer to those goals?

And I think an amazing quranic example that really showcases for us, this difference in focus between our end goal and focusing more on our journey itself can be seen through the example of Musa a.s. and bani israel. So we're told that when they fled Egypt, they found themselves in a very difficult situation. They found themselves standing before the red sea with a mountain to their side and the oncoming army of Firown. And we're told that some people from Bani israel they naturally started to panic. They started to blame Musa a.s. For what they thought was going to be their end...which was their death. So they were focused previously on the end goal being freedom and now the end goal to them is death.

And if you look on the other hand at Musa a.s. and what he was focusing on we're told that he was actually going through the crowds of bani israel with Harun a.s. and yushabinoon looking for a practical solution. And in response to what was said to him by bani israel, we're told in the quran that he said “No! Verily, Allah swt is with me and he will guide me.” 

So we see that Musa a.s. he was somebody who understood that all results are in the hands of Allah swt. And what is within our capacity, where we come into play; is in demonstrating our ikhlas إخلاص and in demonstrating our ihsan إحسان so our sincerity and our efforts to deem ourselves worthy of Allah swt assistance. That's what Allah swt is essentially expecting from us.

Now, by the way, when you see the words that Musa a.s. said to bani israel in his response It shows the amazing levels of tawakkul تَوَكُّل that he had in Allah swt with regards to the end goal, right? And I'm sure that neither Musa a.s. nor bani israel could have imagined the way that Allah swt was going to deliver them. I'm sure neither of them could expect that Allah swt was actually going to open the sea for them to walk through, and that he would actually permanently deal with Firown by drowning him and his army in that sea. And so what we're learning here, which is an amazing lesson, is that as amazing as our goals might be, they don't necessarily always need to manifest in the way that we want or the way that we expect them to be in order for them to be as amazing and as successful. And I think that one of the most beautiful examples of this idea that things don't necessarily need to manifest in the way that we want is in the example of Ibrahim a.s. Right? So we see that Ibrahim a.s. His goal was to call people to Allah swt, And he spent many years doing so. He traveled so much, he was tested with test upon test, he sacrificed so much on that journey. But let me ask you, what were the results of all his efforts towards that goal? Did you know that Ibrahim a.s. When he died, when he passed away, he only had a small handful of followers. SubhanAllah, imagine all the places that he visited and all the people that he spoke to,yet he dies with only a handful of followers! But then let me ask you this. What was the results of all the ihklas and all the ihsan that he exerted when he was focusing on his journey? What was the end results that Allah swt delivered? Ibrahim is somebody who is one of the most revered and respected figures in history amongst various different world religions right? He is someone who Muslims- millions of Muslims every single day, at least five times a day in salah, they make dua for him when they're doing the Tashahud. This is a man who, you know, thousands and thousands of people, they name their children after him out of love and respect for him. This was a man who understood the importance of appreciating and valuing that journey- of possessing the ihklas/sincerity, exerting ihsan/excellence of effort and having tawakul/trust that Allah was going to deliver the results. And this naturally helped him to become more patient on that journey.

What you will realize, by the way, is that when you start valuing your journey a lot more, then you will also start to value and honour the struggles that you face on that journey as well- not just have patience with it. Because you'll start seeing those obstacles as milestones. You'll start seeing them as milestones for your growth and development for you to become a better person or to become more skilled or to become more experienced, more grateful etc. So essentially it's going to help you inshAllah to enjoy that journey more and to make that journey easier for you] and make you less prone to complaining and giving up as well.

Focus on including passions and your personal interests into the process

Okay, the second quranic idea I have for you to help you develop your patients when you're chasing your dreams and goals is to focus on including passions and your personal interests into the process of achieving those goals. So I'm sure you've heard of the saying, you know, time flies when you're having fun, right? And that's because when you're engaged in activities that ignite your passions and your interests, time becomes irrelevant, isn't It? Leading on from point1, when people are just completely fixated on their goal as opposed to their journey and they just want to achieve it by any means necessary, they can actually kill themselves in that process, if they haven't given up already. So that even when they do achieve those goals, they feel empty inside. You know, we have to realize that our journeys can become part of our dreams, we can experience that happiness and fulfillment that we're seeking when we start to consciously integrate dream activities into that process of achieving those goals. This is going to challenge us to be creative, but it's something that is possible and something that's going to really make a big impact on the levels of patients when pursuing our goals. So for example, if somebody wants to become a chef, they don't have to just simply work a dead end job for four or five Years to save money in order to go to culinary school and start, in order to start living their passion of cooking. I mean, that might be the process of how they obtain money and how they go to that school, but nothing is stopping them from choosing to cook for themselves in a really fun and creative way everyday, or to set aside a certain time once a week where they can invite friends and family around and they can again cook for them in a very fun and artistic way. So similarly, we need to start thinking about what our passions are and how we can start integrating these kinds of activities into our daily journey towards that goal.

And I think, again, one of the most beautiful examples of this is Ibrahim a.s. You know, he was someone who didn't wait for millions of followers in order to start being a leader. We know that Ibrahim a.s. was calling people for hajj in the Meccan desert when there was no one there to adhere to his call. He was observing and fulfilling the commands of Allah swt, out of a sincere love and passion for obeying Allah swt.  And look at the results subhanAllah- how many millions of Muslims every year respond to his call for Hajj?

Focusing and thinking about your learning and the acquisition of your skills

The third quranic idea I have for you for developing and increasing your levels of patience when pursuing your goal is to start focusing and thinking about your learning and the acquisition of your skills. A lot of people end up giving up or abandoning their dreams because they never feel qualified enough. So I'm sure you've heard them say, or maybe you yourself have asked yourself questions like: am I good enough? Am I ready for this? Am I worthy? Etc. And those thoughts come from not having in place a plan for your learning and your skills. You know some people if they want to be a writer for example, they might think that in order to be a writer, I need to be good at writing and that's all, when that's wrong! because we know that although you might be able to write your book- in order to really share it with the world, which is the purpose of writing in the first place- to share your message, you might find that it actually requires you to learn the skill of public speaking to promote it, you might need to learn a little bit of online marketing or learning about brands, etc. Because they don't have that learning in place, that expectation, when those key prerequisites come for their success, for their goal to be fulfilled, they become stuck. They become overwhelmed. They start questioning whether this really is the path for them. Why is it so difficult? So this is something where I would suggest that you start thinking of the key 5 skills for example that is going to help you inshAllah to attain your dream goals. And then start every day actually scheduling time, blocking time to start learning and developing those skills. So you feel ready when those milestones come. Because learning it gives your mind the sense of progress and growth that it needs. It gives us peace of mind as your mind knows what to expect and can prepare itself. Something really important I want you to remember with regards to this point is that Allah swt He never calls the qualified, He qualifies those that He calls. Let me repeat that for you; Allah swt He never calls the qualified, He qualifies those. You know even if we look into the quran at the prophets we see they didn't necessarily feel ready for when they were given prophethood. So you see Musa a.s. in the quran he starts expressing his fear about approaching Firown, he starts to question how he can speak when he's got this speech impediment. You see, Mohammad pbuh as another example when the quran was first revealed to him- he's bewildered, he's not sure whether he's lost his mind or not. So just to remember that you might not feel ready for whatever Allah swt calls you to do in this Dunya. But if you put in the effort to start learning and developing your skills then inshAllah a lot of things will become possible for you and you will become a lot more patient when going through the journey.

Develop your support network, social circle, your tribe and community

Okay the last, the fourth idea I have for you to be able to develop your levels of patience inshAllah when trying to achieve your goals relates to your company. So your support network, your social circle your tribe and community. This is something that is really important because a lot of people, they give up on their dreams when they feel like they're doing it by themselves.They don't have the important connections with people who are on the same journey as them or people who have achieved the same things that they want to achieve. And it's really important to us human beings to be able to be vulnerable with certain individuals about our fears and our struggles and our failures, so that those people can give us encouragement and so those people can give us some suggestions and techniques, for example, from their experience. And equally for them to be able to share in our celebration whenever we've achieved our milestones as well, because they get it. And I think if you look in those two examples I gave you in the previous point- you look at Musa a.s. and Muhammad pbuh we see that this is something that was one of the first things that they did. And it was something that tremendously helped them as well. So for example, you look at Musa a.s. when he was given prophethood, one of the first things that he did was actually asked for assistance of his brother, right?- Haroon a.s. who became a prophet as well. And if you look at Mohammad pbuh you find that when he received revelation, he ran immediately to his wife Khadija for comfort. And then she also took him to her cousin Waraka ibn Nawfal in order to get the support and understanding that he needed. 

You know, when I reflect on my own life, I realize subhanAllah that there are key figures that have been really important to my growth, to who I've become and the kind of lifestyle that I live. You know I once heard something really thought provoking that I want to share with you about this. I heard a speaker once say that you should already know in your mind who you would love to have on your mobile, on speed dial as part of your community. And this is something that when I heard that I took it literally and I actually took out my phone and started to write the names of people that I would love to build connections with and to be part of my support network. And subhanAllah it’s so true when they say that where focus goes, energy flows because I now already have some of those established connections with some of those contacts and inshAllah I hope to continue to build those I don't have contact with currently.

Now if you're the type of person that's thinking- well I'm not lucky enough to have such connections or such friends Halimah! Well the reality is that hardly ever do we build these kinds of connections with people by chance- we don’t just bump into such people, we have to consciously do research. We have to consciously make an effort to reach out to those people as well. And if you're someone who's not sure what kind of people you should be connecting with or who would be good for you and your family then I would say at least start thinking about your passions and interests and maybe go and volunteer for an organization that's in line with those things that you care about, where you will be able to meet fellow volunteers. Because people who inshAllah are kind enough to sacrifice their time and efforts to help out, without getting something in return, are good people and that community could be a good place to start establishing connections. And please never underestimate the power of dua! Ask Allah swt to grant you people and connections that are going to help you in your dean and you're dunya inshAllah. And saying that if you would love to be part of an extraordinary group of Muslims who are consistently working on bettering themselves and live their best life through the transformation of their quran relationship, then why not join the Quran Rehab community! you can subscribe to this channel, you can follow us on instagram/facebook and to find out how you can get involved go to quranrehab.com to find out more... Now,If you enjoyed this video, then please do give it a thumbs up and comment. And if you know anyone who you think is maybe feeling a bit down or disheartened on their journey, who need a bit of encouragement with regards to how they can practically develop their patience. Then why not share this video with them? Okay- I hope this video served you well in inshAllah. Until next time, take care. Assalamualaikum warahmatullahi wabarakatuh.