Al Salam Alaikum 🌱 

You spend three hours last Saturday crafting the perfect quarterly business goals. Revenue targets with precision down to the decimal. Growth projections mapped across spreadsheets. Market positioning strategies. Customer acquisition costs. Conversion rate optimization plans.

You even made it visual- printed it out, laminated it, put it on your vision board. You stare at it every morning for “manifestation” and “alignment.”

When was the last time you spent three hours- or even thirty minutes- reflecting on whether you’re becoming the kind of person Allah (SWT) would be pleased with?

Welcome to the crisis of modern goal-setting: precise about the wrong things, vagaue about what actually matters.

💸 The Spiritual Bankruptcy of Conventional Goal-Setting

Walk into any business seminar, open any productivity book, watch any entrepreneur’s morning routine video, and you’ll encounter the same mantra: SMART goals. Vision boards. 10X thinking. Revenue engineering your dream life.

It all sounds productive. Ambitious. Success-minded.

But the truth is: most goal-setting frameworks are spiritual traps designed to make you worship outcomes instead of the One who controls them.

SMART goals prioritize measurable worldly outcomes over character development. They train you to obsess over what you can count while ignoring what actually counts.

Vision boards become shrines to materialism- visual altars where you bow down daily to images of the house, the car, the lifestyle, the status you’re trying to manifest through sheer force of focus and hustle.

The ‘10X your business’ framework? They’re often just greed with a growth mindset. Ambition disconnected from purpose. A sophisticated way to chose Al-Takathur while using business jargon instead of admitting you’re just competing in worldly increase.

And the worst part? We’ve internalized all of this in Islamic language.

We say “bismillah” before writing goals that make no reference to Allah’s pleasure. We quote “tie your camel” while setting targets that assume Allah’s will is irrelevant as long as we work hard enough. We claim to want barakah while structuring our entire goal-setting process around anxiety, attachment, and control.

🎯 What the Prophet Actually Taught About Goals

Here’s what’s fascinating: the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) was the most successful human being to ever live. He transformed Arabia, established a civilization that would span continents, and created a legacy that has shaped 1,400 years of human history.

Yet he never made a vision board.

He didn’t have SMART goals written down and reviewed quarterly. He didn’t reverse-engineer his outcomes or optimize for specific KPIs.

What he had was something infinitely more powerful: crystal-clear intention (niyyah) anchored in complete surrender to Allah’s will.

The Prophetic model of goal-setting looks radically different from what’s taught in business schools:

The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) aimed for Jannah Al Fardus. He worked for Allah’s pleasure, not worldly success. And paradoxically (or not), he achieved more worldly success than people who make it their primary goal.

There’s not a coincidence. That’s a principle of the faithful.

🪞 Who Are You Becoming?

Imam Al Ghazzali said: “Knowledge without action is madness, and action without knowledge is futile.”

You’ve read this far. You now have the knowledge. The question is whether you’ll act.

Most won’t. They’ll not along, feel inspired for 48 hours, then return to the same goal-setting framework that prioritizes worldly metrics over eternal ones.

But you’re not most people.

The arrow isn’t the point. The target isn’t the point. The archer is the point.

Who you’re becoming in the pursuit matters infinitely more than what you achieve at the destination.

The Prophet (peace be upon him) aimed for Allah’s pleasure and transformed the world. You’re aiming for the world and wondering why you feel spiritually empty despite your achievements.

It’s time to reorient the bow, and follow the alternative to goal-setting.

Your goals should serve your purpose, not replace it. Your business should be a vehicle for your akhira, not a destination from it. Your success should be defined by Allah’s standards, not Instagram’s.

Stop asking “How do I achieve more” Start asking “How do I become more pleasing to Allah (SWT)?”

The result will follow. Not always in the way you expect. Not always on your timeline. But always in the way that’s best for you, because it’s orchestrated by the One who loves you more than you love yourself.

This week, I’m giving you something you can do in just 10 minutes, but it will expose everything.

Grab your current business goals- wherever they’re written.

For each goal, answer one question in writing:

“If I died the day after achieving this goal, would it benefit me in my grave, or was I chasing dust?”

That’s it. One question. 10 minutes. Brutal honesty required.

Some of your goals will survive this test. Many won’t.

The ones that don’t? Cross them out. Not someday. Today.

Life is too short and the akhira is too long to waste your precious, limited time on goals that will turn the dust the moment your soul is taken.

This is your wake-up call.

💌 I’d Love to Hear From You!

If this reflection sparked something in you, I’d love to hear it. You can reply directly to this email- I read and respond to every message. 🌱 

🤲 Closing Dua

“O Allah, we ask You for beneficial knowledge, goodly provision, and deeds that are accepted.”

Ameen