Who Sits on the Throne of Your Mind?
The Greatest Heist in History (that you never knew happened)
In 1398, Emperor Hongwu, the founder of the Ming Dynasty, died. His grandson Jianwen - the rightful heir - ascended to the throne at just 21 years old.
Jianwen was scholarly, reform-minded, and determined to centralise power. But his uncles, powerful regional princes with their own armies, had other plans.
One uncle in particular posed a threat: Zhu Di, a hardened military commander with unwavering loyalty from his troops.
Zhu Di didn't just want power, he was angered by what he felt was a snub so he wanted legitimacy, too.
So he launched a four-year civil war that would culminate in one of history's most audacious thefts.
In 1402, Zhu Di's forces finally breached the walls of Nanjing, the imperial capital. As his troops stormed the palace, a mysterious fire broke out in the imperial complex.
When the flames subsided, Emperor Jianwen had vanished without a trace.
But what happened next was the real masterstroke.
Zhu Di didn't just steal the throne. He stole history itself.
Immediately, he began erasing all records of his nephew's rule. He destroyed official histories, executed and exiled those loyal to the rightful emperor, and rewrote Chinese history to claim that he had always been the legitimate ruler.
He completely deleted Jianwen's rule as if it had never occurred.
For centuries, China's real history was buried. Zhu Di ascended as the Yongle Emperor, and his 22-year reign became one of the most celebrated in Chinese history.
Generations of Chinese citizens had no idea this usurpation had ever taken place.
It wasn’t until 1736, over 300 years later when Jianwen was unanimously and officially restored to the historical records in China.
Zhu Di had achieved the perfect crime: not just stealing power, but making everyone forget there was ever a rightful ruler to begin with.
This is an example of a throne that was completely hijacked. It was so thorough that the original ruler was forgotten, and the usurper was accepted as the legitimate authority.
Your Mind Has Undergone the Same Takeover
Throughout history, kingdoms have risen and fallen based on one crucial factor: who sits on the throne.
The same is true of your mind.
Every thought, decision, and action originates from whoever rules your inner kingdom.
This is the most important question you may ever ask yourself: "Who sits on the throne of your mind?"
Most people never ask this question. They assume they are in control, yet their actions tell a different story. Their decisions are reactive rather than sovereign, driven by programming rather than purpose.
The truth is that in every moment, one of two rulers is making your decisions:
The Sovereign vs. The False King
Your fitrah - your original, authentic nature - is the rightful ruler of your kingdom before any usurpation took place.
But the False King has been installed over decades, ruling so silently that most people never realise they've been overthrown.
Think about your last three major decisions.
Really think.
How did you come to those choices? Was it your true self making that decision, or the person you've become - programmed over years and years by forces you may not even recognise?
We need to accept a uncomfortable truth: all of us have been hijacked in some way.
We cannot reclaim the throne if we do not first recognise this takeover has taken place.
The Rightful Ruler You Once Knew
Once upon a time, we were fearless.
We could do nothing, hadn't achieved anything, kept failing - but we didn't let that stop us.
We learned how to do the hardest things and never gave up.
We loved learning. Every day was exciting with possibilities and discoveries we could make.
We expressed ourselves fully. We were unfiltered, genuine, and authentic.
Of course, I'm referring to the child we once were.
Carl Rogers wrote:
"Probably one of the reasons why most people respond to infants is that they are so completely genuine, integrated or congruent. If an infant expresses affection or anger or contentment or fear there is no doubt in our minds that he is this experience, all the way through. He is transparently fearful or loving or hungry or whatever."
Can we ever say that about ourselves now?
That we are fully transparent, fully expressive without any hidden biases?
When did we lose this ability? How? Why are we no longer as fearless, as expressive, as authentic and as inquisitive as we once were?
This is what we need to uncover.
The Great Substitution
Martin Heidegger observed:
"It is always interesting to see the original self in man being modified by a big universal idea. One has to recover the original self now."
Heidegger understood that we are thrown into a world that has its own ideas. As we grow up, there's a danger that our self will be taken by the world's ideas.
The challenge is to recover the original self.
Our fitrah is the REAL king.
Most people don't know the ideas that shape their thoughts. But we're constantly being indoctrinated, by the media, our culture, our parents, the school system, everyone around us.
They inflict their ideals of the world on us. And if their influence is stronger than our own conviction (which it probably is in childhood), it erodes the original fitrah and innate good disposition we were all born with.
The challenge for us is to recover the original self - and then take that to its highest potential.
This is the journey of life, lived properly.
Sheikh Ebrahim Schuitema explains:
"Your fitrah is a deeper place than your opinion. Your fitrah is where your ruh (soul) operates from. It is the place that you engage when your being is quiet, when you silence your internal dialogue with the dhikr that you do and the practices that you do, to the point that you see the thing as it is."
The Prophet Muhammad (saw) said: "Every child is born upon fitrah, but it is their environment that shapes them."
How the False King Took Over
There are several reasons why we are not our original selves and how the False King managed to usurp the throne:
1. Human Weakness We are naturally prone to external experiences, influences, and incidents that fundamentally shape who we become.
2. Spiritual Opposition Shaytan and his forces are always plotting against us, seeking to change our direction and take us off course.
3. Loss of Balance How you stay in fitrah is ultimately about balance. For something to stay balanced, everything must be centered correctly, consistently, and nurtured with the right inputs in the right quantities - food, worship, relationships, knowledge.
The wrong inputs or wrong quantities take us off balance and nudge us out of our fitrah.
True Islam, practiced properly, is essentially a way of life - an entire system designed to keep you centered on your fitrah.
“Fiṭrah is the pattern according to which God has created all things. It is God’s manner of creating, sunnat Allāh, and everything fits each into its pattern created for it and set in its proper place. It is the law of God. Submission to it brings harmony, for it means realisation of what is inherent in one’s true nature; opposition to it brings discord, for it means realization of what is extraneous to one’s true nature. It is cosmos as opposed to chaos; justice as opposed to injustice. When God said: “Am I not your Lord?”, and man’s true self, testifying for itself, answered: “Yes!” in acknowledgement of the truth of God’s lordship, it has sealed a covenant with God. Thus when man is manifested as man in this wordly life he will, if rightly guided, remember his covenant and act accordingly as outlined above, so that his worship, his acts of piety, his life and death is lived out for the sake of God alone.” – Syed Naquib al-Attas, Prolegomena to the Metaphysics of Islām
When we experience extremes in anything, it takes us off balance and off centre. Over time, especially if we're unaware, it takes us so far off centre that you have no idea who you originally were.
The problem in society is that we're not aware of any of these things, so we don't even think it's a problem. We think it's just our "personality" at that point. “This is just who I am” we say, as we defend our actions and statements.
Malcolm X captured this perfectly:
"Sometimes a fruit falls from a tree and rolls so far away from its roots that it's no longer of the tree. The hard fall, and long journey, bruises the fruit so much that it totally changes it. It's the same way for some of our people. This is why some can't be awakened regardless of how much truth you present to them. This journey has totally brainwashed them to such a degree that they're no longer of the original tree."
The Path Back to Your Throne
The story of Zhu Di and Jianwen teaches us something crucial however. The most effective takeovers aren't obvious, violent overthrows - they are often gradual substitutions that make you forget there was ever a rightful ruler.
But unlike Emperor Jianwen, your fitrah isn't lost forever.
Your original nature is still there, buried beneath years of conditioning, waiting to be restored to its rightful place.
Syed Naquib al-Attas said:
“The ultimate aim of religion is for man to return to the state in which he was before he existed, and this involves the quest for his identity and transcendent destiny through right conduct.
This 'returning' is what life is all about, and it involves the pursuit of true knowledge, the understanding of God's signs and symbols in the pages of the book of nature by means of the guiding light of His words and interpreted in the sacred person of His messenger.
It also involves the application of the sound senses to the experience of reality, and the application of the sound reason to the apprehension of truth."
The question isn't whether you can reclaim your throne.
The question is whether you're ready to recognise the usurper for what it is, and begin the work of restoration.
So, who sits on the throne of your mind?
And more importantly: are you ready to put the rightful ruler back in power?
The journey back to your fitrah begins with a single recognition: you are not who you think you are. You are who you were created to be - before the world told you otherwise.
The throne awaits its rightful occupant.
The question is: will you reclaim it?
If you need help with reclaiming your throne and getting back to fitrah, I can help. I currently have two slots open for coaching and a few others this month for our Know Your Purpose program. Here’s what you can do next:
1) Check out our free quiz and see how aligned you are with your life purpose:
2) If you’d like to improve your score or learn more you can apply to book in a free discovery call with me or my team.
3) If you’d like to join a community of fellow lifelong learners and those in pursuit of their purpose, you can do so here: https://www.skool.com/kn-ow/about
4) If you’re interested in learning more about the work I do, and enquire about enrolling on to the program or the coaching, you can email me “THRONE” to faisal@kn-ow.com and I’ll send you the details.
I have to read this again and again.
Very interesting story about the Emperor overtaking the throne. I could not see where you going with it and I love how you were able to tie it back to purpose!