overthinking is blocking your rizq

on yaqeen, quantum physics and receiving the rizq that was always yours

picture this: two teams, same stadium, same number of players. both of them pray to the same God before the match starts. same pre game rituals. same intentions. but only one walks away with the trophy. the other walks off with heavy hearts and teary eyes.

same God. same prayer. so what happened?

i’ve been thinking about this analogy for years. it just won’t leave me. i think it’s because it can be applied to so many real life situations. i think about it when i make dua and wonder if Allah will answer me. when i see someone else chasing the same dreams as me, working hard like me, asking Allah for the same things, but for some reason, they take off while i’m still sitting in the waiting room of life, stuck, watching, wondering what i missed.

same Lord. same longing. but the outcomes feel like they’re from different planets.

i used to think maybe the difference was in how much you ask. or how much effort you put in. or how many nights you cry into your pillow. i believed that if i just did everything right — if i begged enough, cried enough, planned enough, fasted enough, prayed tahajjud, made istighfar, wrote the perfect to do list, said the right words — then Allah would finally give me what i wanted. i really believed the formula was that simple.

but over time, i noticed that people who didn’t do half of that were still getting what they asked for. people who didn’t know all the duas or make all the detailed plans. people whose voices weren’t even raised. and they still got the things i thought only came after working yourself into spiritual exhaustion. it made me pause. and then it made me look inward.

what if it’s not about the quantity of your effort, but the quality of your state?

what if Allah doesn’t give based on how much you cry, but based on the heart you show up with? the way you hold yourself. the trust that sits inside of you. your opinion of Him. your alignment with Him. your inner atmosphere. and the most difficult of all: your ability to surrender.

because that’s what it really comes down to. not just effort. not just intention. but the energy you carry with you. the kind of trust that doesn’t shake even when everything around you is falling apart. that kind of deep, rooted, internal trust. that’s what makes the difference. just that internal posture.

there’s a beautiful story in surah maryam that always brings me back to that truth. the Quran tells us about prophet zakariya (as) — a man of taqwa, someone with every reason to feel secure in his duas. but what the Quran focuses on isn’t the eloquence of his request or the desperation of his words. it’s the softness in his approach. his posture. his plea. it says,

“he called to his Lord a call in secret. he said, my Lord, indeed my bones have weakened and my hair has turned white, but never have i been disappointed in my call to You, my Lord.” (19:3-4)

never have i been disappointed. subhanallah. that’s a statement of someone who has been through long seasons of waiting. who knows what it means to ask and not see the answer immediately. but still keeps showing up. still keeps asking with hope, not bitterness. still believes in the goodness of his Lord even when everything around him says otherwise.

and that’s exactly the message we’re not given enough. you can do everything right. you can tick every box. but if the state of your heart is heavy with fear, if your energy is rooted in scarcity, if your trust is conditional, you can block your own rizq. you can be the one standing in your own way. not because Allah doesn’t want to give, but because the cup you’re holding out is cracked and leaking, and even if the rain falls, you wouldn’t be able to hold it.

we don’t talk enough about how our internal world affects what we can receive. overthinking looks innocent on the outside. sometimes it even looks productive. but most of the time, it’s scarcity pretending to be preparation. it’s fear wearing the mask of wisdom. and it blocks more blessings than we realise.

because overthinking changes your energy, whether you realise it or not. it seeps into your dua. it tells Allah, even if you don’t say it out loud, that you’re not sure. that you’re bracing for disappointment. and when you carry that kind of doubt inside you, it’s like standing at your front door waiting for a delivery while refusing to open the door unless it comes in the exact packaging you pictured.

the thing is, Allah already wrote what’s yours. He already measured every ounce of rizq you will ever receive. the only question is whether your heart is in the condition to receive it. whether the soil of your inner world is ready for that seed. whether you’ve become the version of you that can carry the blessing with humility and gratitude. and sometimes that transformation is the point. not the thing you’re asking for. sometimes the answer is the version of you that emerges in the waiting.

and all of this reminds me of something from physics. quantum physics talks about this idea called the '“observer effect”. it’s the idea that things exist in multiple possible states until you look at them. until they’re observed. once you observe them, they collapse into a single outcome. that’s when potential becomes reality.

a video on the observer effect for those interested! (double slit experiment)

now think about that in terms of your faith. reality holds infinite paths. infinite versions of how your life could go. but the one that starts to unfold is the one you align yourself with internally. the one your heart expects. the one you believe in deep enough to walk toward, even before you see signs. your certainty doesn’t force the outcome, but it shapes your ability to receive it. your ability to perceive it when it shows up.

Allah says in a hadith qudsi,

“i am as My servant thinks of Me.”

this is mainly about perception. if you think of Him as stingy, you’ll experience life as if He’s holding out on you. if you think of Him as generous and wise and gentle, you’ll begin to see His gifts in places you never even looked. your opinion of Allah doesn’t change Him. it changes you. it changes what you see. it changes what you appreciate. it changes what your heart makes space for.

and rizq isn’t just money or opportunities. it’s the random thought that soothes your heart at the exact moment you needed it. it’s the way a verse of Quran hits differently one night and unravels your pain. it’s the healing that shows up after years of asking. it’s the shift in your thinking. the person who calls you with the exact words you needed. the insight that reframes your whole perspective. that’s rizq too. but you won’t recognise it if you’re stuck in scarcity. if you’re stuck in mental loops. if you’re always thinking about what hasn’t happened instead of receiving what is happening.

every time you overthink, you send the signal that you don’t fully believe. and sometimes it doesn’t feel like doubt. sometimes it sounds like perfectionism. like, “i need to make the right choice or Allah won’t give me what i need.” or, “what if i ruin my qadr?” that’s not trust. that’s control. and it’s exhausting. and it looks like piety. but it’s not.

i’ve learned this lesson the hard way. i’ve made duas with every fibre of my being and watched the world move in the opposite direction. i’ve overplanned myself into panic attacks. i’ve built entire life strategies off fear instead of trust. and each time, Allah gently reminded me that i don’t control the outcome. that i was never meant to. my job is to show up, ask, trust, move, and then let Him take care of the unfolding.

i remember one time i made istikhara for something i thought was going to be the turning point of my life. i was obsessed with it. attached. every breath felt like it was waiting for the outcome. and when it didn’t happen, i crumbled. i thought maybe i did something wrong. but now i see clearly. it wasn’t about whether or not i asked properly. it was about the fact that i had to lose something to grow. that in the waiting, my heart changed. my trust deepened. my priorities matured. and that was the actual gift. not the outcome i thought i needed, but the version of me that emerged on the other side.

somewhere along the journey i realised, i’d rather take messy action with trust than perfect plans rooted in anxiety. i started to say, “ya Allah, if it’s not mine, remove it even if i don’t want to let go.” and He did. and yeah, it hurt. but eventually i understood. the thing i was clinging to was standing in the way of what i really needed. of what i’d been praying for all along.

we miss so many blessings by overthinking them. by hesitating. by trying to be too strategic. i think about all the times i waited too long to send the message, to apply for the thing, to express love, to forgive, to show up. i was trying to do everything right, but i lost something even more precious — time. and time is a kind of rizq too. and once it’s gone, you don’t get it back.

there’s a hadith where the Prophet ﷺ said that if we trusted Allah the way we’re supposed to, He would provide for us the way He provides for birds. (ibn majah 4164) and i think about the birds a LOT. they leave their nests hungry in the morning and return full. and that alone is so humbling. they don’t just sit in their nests. they move. they do what they are meant to do. they go out. they act. but they don’t control what they find. they just trust that something will be there. and it always is.

something i think about almost everyday — may Allah reward my mother and shower her in all that is good <3

imagine if we did the same. just showed up. took the next step. sent the email. made the call. let ourselves dream again. trusted that if Allah wrote it for us, it would reach us. that even if we stumbled, even if we forgot a line in our dua or made a clumsy choice, He would still bring it to us in the way He knows best.

so, maybe the difference between those two teams wasn’t the strength of their prayer. maybe it was the alignment of their hearts. the ones who received were the ones who stepped into the version of themselves that could hold the outcome.

life works the same way.

you can’t ask for rain and then hold out a cracked cup.

you can’t pray for love while calling yourself unworthy in your mind.

you can’t ask for peace and then feed your soul chaos.

you can’t ask for healing and then refuse to let go of the wound.

you can’t beg for rizq and then live like you’ll never have enough.

Allah has already written your portion. but you have to prepare your heart to hold it.

this is a reminder to me before anyone else. because i know what it’s like to spiral. to feel like maybe one more self help book will fix it (trust me, i’ve read plenty). one more routine. one more “productive” task. one more perfect version of myself. but that’s not where the shift comes from.

sometimes the most spiritual thing you can do is breathe. and trust. and know that your duas were already heard. that the delivery is already en route. that your only job now is to stop blocking it with fear. to stop building walls with your anxiety. and just sit, expectantly, like a guest who knows they’ve been invited. like someone who has been promised something beautiful and simply has to stay open long enough to receive it.

that’s the real posture of faith. not frantic striving, but surrender. not trying to force the outcome, but softening your heart enough to let it arrive however Allah intends. it’s not passive, it’s active in a different way. it’s the kind of activity that begins in the soul. it’s trusting that your presence, your sincerity, your willingness to keep showing up — even bruised, even unsure — is enough.

sometimes the answer to your dua doesn’t come in a package with your name written on it, but in a detour that leads you to a better version of yourself. sometimes it’s not about what you get, but what you become while waiting. and sometimes, it’s not even about the waiting, it’s about learning how to be at peace while the door is still closed, knowing it will open when the timing is right.

that’s real tawakkul.

so maybe the prayer isn’t “Ya Allah, give me what I want.”

maybe it’s:

“Ya Allah, align me with what You’ve already written for me. make me ready to carry what’s mine. help me trust You when I can’t trace You.”

because sometimes, the only thing standing between you and your rizq is you.

love, imaan x

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