Heart & Intention

When the Nafs Uses Good Language

By Deenulhaqq Editorial Team · Published September 22, 2026

“We want everyone to feel welcome.” The planning group agrees. Then someone points out that the proposed meeting room is upstairs and has no lift. A regular attendee cannot use the stairs. The accessible room is available, but it is smaller and farther from the organizers' usual parking spaces.

Suddenly, keeping the upstairs room is described as “protecting the atmosphere.” The words sound thoughtful. They also happen to preserve the organizers' convenience.

This imagined decision gives us a concrete way to examine the nafs, the self. Self-interest can sit inside an explanation that uses admirable values. We need not abandon those values; we need to ask what they require in the decision actually before us.

Give the value a visible meaning

Welcoming people cannot mean that every event meets every possible need. Rooms have limits, costs matter, and arrangements sometimes genuinely fail. An honest decision can acknowledge those constraints.

But before treating a preference as unavoidable, ask what has actually been checked. Is the accessible room too small for the expected group, or simply less familiar? Could the chairs be arranged differently? Has anyone asked the attendee what would make participation possible?

The answer should come from the person affected, not from a conversation that speaks warmly about inclusion while leaving them outside it. They may identify an option the organizers have not considered. They may also decline an arrangement, and that decision deserves respect.

Let your words become answerable

Qur'an 61:2–3 rebukes the gap between what believers say and what they do. The verses give weight to the relationship between professed commitments and conduct. They invite serious self-examination; they are not a license to pronounce on the inner motives of everyone who disagrees with our preferred plan.

For the organizers, the practical question is whether their stated welcome has influenced the room choice at all. If every inconvenience is a reason to keep the original plan, the value may be functioning mainly as a flattering description.

A clearer explanation might be: “We prefer the upstairs room, but that preference would exclude someone who wants to attend. We will check whether the ground-floor arrangement can work.” Now the claimed value has changed what happens next.

Accept the inconvenience of being consistent

You may discover that your first explanation protected your own comfort. You can acknowledge that without staging a confession or making a sweeping declaration about your character. Revise the reason, examine the available choices, and make the decision with the affected people in view.

In this decision, welcome becomes more than a description when it influences the room choice. In this case, welcome might look like carrying chairs into the less convenient room.

This article offers a general reflection and is not a substitute for individualized guidance from a qualified scholar or other appropriate professional.