As salamu Alaykum!

Welcome to Day 4 of The Love, Money and Purpose Blueprint.

Today, we are going to talk about Mistake #4: Believing Love and a Lasting Marriage Aren’t Possible 

Specifically:

• How beliefs like ‘no good men exist,’ past heartbreaks, or fear of marriage limit what’s possible for you.
• Why these beliefs take root.
• How to shift your mindset and practice faith in a way that opens the door to love
  
  

Let’s dive in.

THE MISTAKE: BELIEVING LOVE AND A LASTING MARRIAGE AREN’T POSSIBLE 

What if I told you it’s not your fault you aren't married?

There are lots of forces that want to keep you single, the most prominent being capitalism. Under capitalism you are a better consumer when you're single in your own apartment; more households = more money. The good news is Islam has given us the tools to overcome this and the other factors.

Marriage apps which profit the longer you stay single, the men vs. women rhetoric online, glorification of individualism, are some of the other issues. These factors contribute to us unintentionally blocking ourselves from love.

Here are the most common beliefs women carry:

• "There are no good men out there"
• "I feel too traumatized from my past breakup"
• "I'm not ____ enough"

These beliefs become the lens through which you navigate love and marriage. Instead of treating them as challenges to work through, you may focus on fear and doubt rather than faith and possibility—which directly affects how you show up and what you believe is possible for you.

THE REASON THIS HAPPENS

The biggest obstacle to finding love isn't your appearance, your age, or your past.

We are surrounded by a society that enforces and reinforces negative narratives about us. It makes us fixated on what we feel we're lacking. Modern society literally runs better and makes a profit when we hate ourselves in some way. They want you to conform and be like everyone else. Making it very scary to stand out and be yourself. We’ve been trained to comply. Balancing a sense of belonging with staying true to yourself is essential, yet today’s society leans heavily toward fitting in. Society encourages you to feel weak and dependent. It pushes you to consume and produce more. 

This makes you a good employee and consumer, and it also trains you to be a poor partner. Unlearning that, and feeling confident and secure in who you are is what makes you more attractive. That’s what makes others want to be with you, work with you, be in a relationship with you. 

We are also dealing with other forces that make marriage hard, such as:

• External Negativity: Society, friends, and family unintentionally reinforce doubt about relationships. We're constantly hearing stories of failed marriages and troubled couples. The loudest examples you hear or see of marriage are usually the dysfunctional or abusive ones. That skews the numbers, making the negative ones more visible. (In my experience the happy couples are quiet and enjoying their lives.)
• Past Experiences: Difficult breakups leave emotional scars that make it hard to believe in good relationships.
• Rigid Definition of Marriage: We think marriage is rigid, with predefined rules. For e.g, if you think marriage means you can't work, must live with in-laws, or can't travel, and your desire is different, naturally you feel a resistance. 

But all of these things can be fixed with the right approach. 

HOW TO FIX IT

If you see someone with an amazing toned body, you don’t assume they just got lucky.

 You know they’ve invested in their habits; mindful of how they move, eat, and care for themselves. They created the toned body through their choices. The same is true for marriage. People who get married and are happy didn’t just stumble into it; they put in the work first. They worked on themselves, showed up with intention, and positioned themselves for the kind of relationship they wanted and built it conversation by conversation.

And once married, it doesn’t magically run on autopilot. Strong marriages are built day by day. Couples who thrive have had hard conversations, navigated challenges, and learned to honor and prioritize each other. They are made—through choices, effort, and commitment, especially when it’s hard.

It’s not that some people are destined for love while others are doomed to scroll Muzz endlessly. This dunya has natural consequences for our actions and mindset. As Allah says, “I am as My servant thinks of Me.” If you believe no good men exist or that marriage is impossible, that belief will shape your reality—just as surely as jumping off a cliff leads to a fall.

Let’s explore some tips to help you with this blessed goal.

The foundational quality you need is courage. Work on the inside, your efforts needn’t be in apps or dating strategies, they’re in cultivating the right beliefs, and courage is a key to unlock this. 

We get fixated on what we feel we're lacking instead of appreciating how interconnected our growth is. For example, if you speak up about injustice at work, you're also getting closer to marriage. Why? Because standing up for yourself helps you practice being authentically you. If you're not expressing yourself anywhere else, how can you expect a man you've never met to fully see and appreciate you?

Believe and Imagine
Even if you've never seen good relationships around you, you have imagination at your disposal. How would you be as a wife? Read about other couples. Stop trying to match what you see around you. Imagine something bigger, make dua for it, and know that Allah will support you to achieve it, even if everything around you is crumbling.

The first principle is to trust your faith over your immediate circumstances when they don't align with what you believe and desire. The best example of this is Prophet Musa (AS). When he was leading his people toward the sea with Pharaoh's army approaching from behind, his people expressed fear. But he expressed, "No, I reject your fear-based story. God is with me and He will guide me." And Allah did help him.

Allah guided and helped Musa, and Allah will help you too.

Think about it: which requires more faith- believing in a loving, merciful marriage when such examples still exist all around us, or believing you'll be saved when trapped between an ocean in front and the world's most powerful army behind you? If Allah could part the sea for Musa in that impossible situation, surely He can bless you with a good relationship. Allah's help is near and available to those who believe.

Your Environment

Most people live with self-hate and negativity, and we pick up on it and absorb it. Spend time with people who model what you want instead, and you’ll slowly gain the courage to change too. Coaching can be that space if family and friends aren’t.

Everything is hard. There’s no way around it. Choose your hard, the hard that will get you the miraculous, supportive and loving marriage or the hard of believing you must be single when you don’t want to be.

DON’T FORGET TO CHECK YOUR INBOX TOMORROW!

Phew! That was quite heavy, and frankly not easy! But it will help you and I couldn’t be more proud of you for hanging on this far. Grab a yummy drink, go walk outside, take a nice bath, you deserve it!

Stay tuned for tomorrow, we will cover Mistake #5: Labeling yourself with unhelpful identities

Specifically:

• Why you end up putting yourself in a box
• How it keeps you stuck in a life that feels unsatisfying, and you don't even know why
• The mindset shift that helps you start living without limits

With love,

Zahra

P.S. Resources aimed at providing deeper guidance on love and marriage:

 Moving Past Your Love History 

 Before "I do"