Tom Facchine – Minute with a Muslim #356 – Change Your Life

			Some people, they are under the impression that you can't change, right? They say, you can't teach
an old dog new tricks, right? Or even better, somebody just says, Well, when I get angry, I curse or
when I get angry, I yell, or that's just the way I am.
		

			And this is
		

			too convenient of an excuse. The reality is that everybody has the ability to change. There might be
two thoughts, there might be a
		

			difference in the ease with which people can change. That's true. That's true. But generally
speaking, categorically speaking, people can change.
		

			And not only can people change, but people have the duty to change. Because Allah azza wa jal gave
you urges, impulses, right? To consume, to eat, attraction, all these sorts of different things. And
they're not going to get righteous, they're not going to be used for righteousness on their own.
Right, it takes, it takes discipline, it takes control, it takes work, and bringing yourself from a
place where you're used to just acting on your urges, like whatever you want, you want a cookie, you
take a cookie, you eat a cookie, you don't think twice about it. And now we're in Ramadan, and it's
like I want but I can't have that until the sun goes down. Right? It's all about controlling the
		

			urges so that they don't control you.
		

			This is how you change. And once you start, you know, controlling these basic fundamental urges,
then you realize that, okay, actually, I can change a lot more about myself too.
		

			If I want to be a person who
		

			learns and reads and just be like, well, you know, I'm not really a person that reads.
		

			It's not my idea. We turned it into an identity, basically, not really the bookish type. Well,
that's fine. You don't have to be but if you want it to be you couldn't. And it might be harder for
you than someone else. No one's denying that, but, but if you want to learn, then there's a path to
it. There's a pathway to it. If you want to change yourself in this other way, there's a pathway to
it, but it does take work, and patience and a lot of tofield