Abdullah Oduro – How One Man Is Inspiring Black Youth Through Stem – Iman Cave
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As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuhu, may
the peace and blessings of Allah be upon
you all.
How's everyone doing?
I'm Abdullah Oduro and welcome to the Iman
Cave, where we discuss issues of male excellence
while being grounded in faith.
Community.
One of the words inside community or the
only word that you find inside of this
beautiful word is unity.
What is the responsibility of the man, the
son, the father, the grandfather, the uncle, and
the family in maintaining that unity under the
same roof, in the same neighborhood, in the
same village, in the same state, in the
same country?
Does the man particularly have a responsibility in
maintaining the unity of people, of a people
or of his people?
We're going to talk about that today.
The responsibility of unity in the community, establishing
a community and maintaining that community.
What are the pitfalls within that and how
does that help in male excellence?
We're going to do that with none other
than, mashaAllah, as you've seen before, Brother Faizan,
mashaAllah, mental health therapist, founder of Simpli Sukoon,
which translates to be simply peace.
Simply peace, mashaAllah, and that's what therapy is.
Its goal is to bring peace to the
soul and to the heart, mashaAllah, and to
the people around.
Alhamdulillah, bil-Amin.
Today we have a beautiful guest, mashaAllah, known
for a long time, Brother Amir Makin.
MashaAllah, salam alaikum.
How you doing, brother?
Amir Makin is an electrical engineer and founder
of AIC Publications.
Also, he is an entrepreneur and he is
involved in the general community here in Dallas,
mashaAllah, tibariqa Allah, and he has been involved
with a lot of work that we're going
to talk about, by the permission of Allah
subhanahu wa ta'ala.
Firstly, when you hear the word community, we'll
start with you, Faizan, what comes to your
mind?
To me, it's people coming together, generally for
a common goal.
And the hope is that they're aligned towards
that goal, but it's really about us coming
together.
Sometimes I think of culture as well, us
coming together over food, over common goals, common
insights, common ideas, common values.
That's what I think of when I think
of community.
Brother Amir?
I think of social, political, and economic independence
being established as the goal for everybody in
that community, for the men, the women, and
the children, in every capacity in terms of
intellect and economics.
So everything that is being done in that
community is leading towards that goal of establishing
that community from a social, political, and an
economic independence, so that all of their resources
are controlled and dictated within that community.
MashaAllah, you see that answer is going to
be articulated in some of the literature here,
mashaAllah, tibariqa Allah, and I think from that
answer is a segue into, we mentioned AIC
Publications, that you are the founder of AIC
Publications.
If you can tell us what AIC stands
for.
AIC stands for Attain the Knowledge, Innovate for
Success, and Command Your Future.
Mmm, attain, innovate, command.
Correct.
Mmm, I like that, mashaAllah, tibariqa Allah, mashaAllah,
tibariqa Allah.
When was this established?
I established the company in 2012, and I
did that because I wanted my own children
to be able to have representations that look
like them, of people doing exactly what I'm
talking about now, making themselves independent with their
own resources.
There had to have been some seed that
pushed you to do this type of work.
Mmm, yes.
So if we can rewind for a minute
and see where were you born and raised,
and what were the seeds that were planted
to push you to establish AIC?
I was born and raised in Illinois.
My mother and father married nearly 60 years
until the day he passed, and they were
madly in love to the day that he
died.
And every time that we would go somewhere,
my father and I, especially when I was
young, we would dress alike.
You know, until I got bigger, and you
know, dad, I want to kind of be
my own thing, and that kind of stuff,
right?
But everywhere we would go, he would always
introduce me as, this is my right-hand
man.
Even as a little boy.
And I would always say, I'm not a
man, you know, you're on your way to
be a man.
He would always remind me of that.
Whenever we would meet anybody, he would always
introduce me as, not just his right-hand
man, but you know, this is, you know,
he's going to do great things.
You know, to the point where, you know,
everyone in the Western Hemisphere is going to
know.
And I would hear him say things like
this, I'm like, okay, I don't know what
a hemisphere is, but I better figure it
out.
So, you know, go get a dictionary, and
okay, this is the hemisphere, okay, he's talking
about all this region, and all of that.
And every time that I would either go
to school, he would always want me to
do more.
If the school is wanting you to do
this, when you come home, I'm going to
want you to do this.
And in order for you to not be
bored, I'll incentivize you with whatever it is
you like.
All right?
And I was the only boy of four
girls, as old as, I'm the youngest, no,
I was not spoiled.
All right?
That's usually what people think.
But no, so the growing up, I think
my father realized him being the only boy,
he doesn't have a brother.
So let me give him, you know, more
of the manliness that I want him to
have growing up.
With growing up with your father, Mashallah, at
the Vertical Law, and him being, I guess,
you know, your hero in the example for
you of what a man should be, and
then calling you his right-hand man.
What was it that pushed you?
Because also, you're a board member of Masjid
al-Islam, which is the oldest mosque in
Dallas, and it was established in 19...
Community goes all the way back to the
1950s.
So I mean, with that, as you've seen
with the resume, Mashallah, he's established his own
publication company, electrical engineer, entrepreneur, and also board
member of Masjid, the oldest Masjid in Dallas,
Texas.
Moving on to these books, what motivates you
to write them.
But before that, Mashallah, I want to make
sure that I gift you, just to make
things clear.
Yeah, this is what is termed as Jalaf
rice.
This is Ghanian.
Oh, man.
No, we don't want no smoke.
We want smoke, no problem.
Oh, thank you.
Ghanian Jalaf rice.
Yes.
Not Senegalese, not Nigerians, Ghanian Jalaf rice.
Yes, yes, yes.
Mashallah, thank you.
This is, I mean, this is one of
the best gifts that can be given.
Thank you.
Alhamdulillah.
I didn't know I was going to get
this.
This is great.
Alhamdulillah.
And hopefully you'll go to Ghana one day,
Inshallah.
Inshallah.
As Mashallah, I'm going to join you.
The way you're speaking makes me think there's
competition between Jalaf rice.
No competition.
No competition.
You'll see in the comments, there's absolutely no
competition, Alhamdulillah.
So, now, Mashallah, I really thank you for
bringing these books, Alhamdulillah, I mean, I see
that you have here, for instance, he has
Aisha, the navigator.
Parts one, he has book three, you know,
and they're different titles.
So Aisha, the navigator, queen of the Nile,
you have Aisha, the navigator, trains a leader.
Aisha, the navigator, handles the bully, one and
handles the bully, one and two.
Ali, the inventor, Ali, the inventor, guides city
council, Ali, the inventor, saves the garden.
OK, and then we have a worthy Muslim,
Quranic tools needed to overcome oppression and imperialism
in order to institute justice.
So are these your two major characters, Ali
and Aisha?
Correct.
These are supplementary characters that I created for
a larger program, which is designed to promote
science, technology, engineering, and math.
And Ali, the inventor, uses science and math
to solve any kind of problems.
And Aisha, the navigator, uses understanding of history
and geography for community building and purposes.
OK, and the program, which is the 10
minute engineering STEM program for gifted and talented
education, is the larger program that I use
to supplement those messages through the characters.
Masha'Allah, that's beautiful, man.
And that's that's that's another company that you
own is Edustem, isn't that correct?
The is AIC Publications and yes, Edustem, correct.
And STEM standing for science, technology, engineering, engineering,
engineering, and which is manifest through these two
characters and how they're using that knowledge of
those sciences to change the world.
I mean, not to even say I mean,
for example, so when you have Aisha, the
navigator, handles the bully, I don't want to
give up the trailer, but what science does
she use in particular here to handle the
bully or what skill?
She goes back and understands the history of
Queen Nzinga.
Mm hmm.
And she uses what she learns from that
understanding of historical time to get over this
bully situation.
Wow.
OK.
Aisha, the navigator, Aisha, the navigator, and they
can find this on AIC.com, AIC Publications
dot com, AIC Publications dot com.
Masha'Allah, Masha'Allah.
May Allah bless you, man.
This is this is beautiful.
I mean, I love how you have this
a worthy Muslim Quranic tools needed to overcome
oppression and imperialism in order to institute justice.
Alhamdulillah.
So here, what was the motivation behind writing
this book?
The motivation there came from being able to
try to take the language of the Quran
and the life of Prophet Muhammad, sallallahu alayhi
wa sallam, and indigenize it where black people
in America can really understand how to implement
it in their daily lives.
Mm hmm.
If I kept running to a lot of
brothers that were having problems finding jobs, having
problems finding a way to fit inside their
community, they might be the only Muslim in
their family.
OK.
And they're trying to relate the Quran to
their family so their family could understand it.
Or they're trying to relate the Quran to
their daily life when they spend nine out
of ten of their time around non-Muslims.
So how can they go into the Quran
and deal with a boss that may.
They have to explain, I need to go
make salat.
How can I go get a prayer break?
Well, what you may want to say to
your boss is if Johnny over here is
taking multiple smoke breaks, then why can't I
take one five minute break for salat?
I literally had to do that, man.
Yeah, really?
Yeah.
I had to do that.
When I was in the hospital, I had
to tell them, you know, there's a time
that I take prayer.
Just when I was in my interview, I
said, you know, on Fridays, if there's a
possibility, you know, it's free either for me
to leave at twelve thirty, one o'clock,
depends on the time of the year, or
I'll work Saturdays because we wouldn't want to
work Saturday.
So I'll work Saturdays and Friday off.
But during the day, depending on what surgery
it is, I used to work as a
surgical tech.
So I'm going to have to pray.
And I said, well, Abdul, I said, well,
you know, just a lot of times we
see people go and take a cigarette break.
It takes longer than five minutes, doesn't it?
Right.
I said, OK.
So we need to just take a prayer
cigarette.
I mean, which one is better?
I mean, you tell me.
You know what I'm saying?
So, you know, but no, mashallah, it's really
giving those those tools.
And I like how you mentioned, and this
is very important.
Sometimes people don't like to talk about it.
And I don't fully agree with that approach,
being that they say, OK, we're all Muslims
and, you know, they say we don't see
color, right?
Islam doesn't see color, but Muslims may.
And throughout the history of Muslims implementing their
Islam or practicing Islam, there's glitches.
We're human beings.
So I notice how you have all of
your characters, you know, Aisha is an African
-American, she's African-American, young, young female with
hijab on.
Ali is an African young male, African-American
young male that's helping and getting involved in
society.
What's the main reason you did that?
In America and say probably throughout the world
for the last 500 years, the most oppressed
in terms of economically and the one that's
been denied full rights of humanity has been
black people, black Africans, black African-Americans for
the last four or 500 years.
And the methodology that was done to maintain
that system of dehumanization started with the destruction
of all our images in terms of the
way we see ourselves.
I'm not talking about idols, but the way
we saw ourselves as providers, protectors, maintainers, guardians,
independent individuals who could go into the ground
and extract the resources and build up a
community.
All of that was denied to us.
And that system was reinforced by making those
destructive images of us as caricatures, of us
as lazy or individuals who couldn't think.
OK.
All right.
In turn, it produced in a lot of
blacks an offset of inferior complex, while those
who are perpetuating this on us get more
confident in their mythological superiority complex.
OK, so getting to the point of always
seeing people who look like you that are
doing something positive, it turns something on in
your brain that says, yes, I can do
this.
And that's important.
You mentioned that because the mythological superiority complex
is not only amongst adults.
It's amongst children.
And that's why I love it when you
have a young black woman, young black girl,
you know, educating herself and then implementing her
education to help change, make a healthy social
change.
And that's what it's about.
I mean, it's bringing the theoretical readings to
life, you know, and that's very, very important.
Subhanallah.
And unfortunately, sometimes it's the adults that impose
that on the youth, like, you know, Malcolm,
you know, when he was a young when
he was a young boy and one of
the instructors told him, he said, I want
to be a lawyer.
He said, no, be realistic, work good with
your hands.
Right.
Right.
Subhanallah.
Subhanallah.
It's beautiful because, as I was telling, you
know, Faizan earlier, you know, I love you,
my Muslim brothers and sisters, but, you know,
there's a lot of times when I get
off the minbar, you know, giving the khutbah,
they say, or they say, brother, mashallah, your
voice, it reminds me of Bilal.
I'm like, you heard Bilal before?
I never knew you were Bilal.
Mashallah, you're pretty old.
Mashallah, but normalizing this for youth to where
it's not like, oh, black people too are
Muslim.
You know, it's like, no, that's always been
part of the equation.
I wanted to ask when it comes to
these publications, mashallah, there's a level of representation
for black, for black people when it comes
to these professional fields, but it's also black
Muslims in these professional fields.
So was there an intentionality behind kind of
doing this double good, not just professional fields,
but also Muslim, black Muslims in professional fields?
So I'm curious about the intentionality behind that.
Yeah, most definitely.
Most definitely.
I am unapologetically black and Muslim.
I'm unapologetically Muslim and black.
I don't try to separate the two or
to try to go out of my way
to downplay one at risk of the other.
You know, as I see in the society,
you know, people can be who they want
to be at any other way, while others,
especially black people, are sometimes made to feel
as if we have to kind of shrink
somewhat.
I'll give you an example.
I was working as an electrical engineer and
I left for Juma and I'd already prearranged
with everybody that, okay, on Fridays, I'm gone,
blah, blah.
So on this particular Friday, the president of
engineering decides that he wants to show everyone,
all the engineers, his appreciation for everything we've
been doing.
So when I come back from Juma, everybody's
got a beer, they've got some type of
alcoholic beverage that he went out and got.
Happy hour.
Right.
Turned into happy hour.
So I come back ready to work and
as soon as I come in and they're
all drinking and one looks at me and
he kind of smiles and smirks.
One engineer like, okay, well, what's he going
to do?
And then the president of engineering, he says,
oh, I'm so sorry, I forgot you don't
drink.
And I said, oh, hey, as long as
you guys stay here so that I can
get home safely and I don't have to
worry about a DUI with one of you
behind the wheel, I'm good.
And that kind of like the one that
had the smirk on his face, kind of
it turned from a smirk to, you know,
he just did not like that answer because
that was an attempt, at least on the
guy who had the smirk.
Let me bring you down a little bit.
You know, let me bring you down.
And so these kinds of instances, we have
to have a confidence that comes from our
understanding of Koran and our understanding of the
history of different people and our people that
have gone through.
Yeah.
And no one is going to give that
to you.
But you, the keys to your liberation are
not going to come from those who benefited
from your oppression.
Mm hmm.
So that's beautiful.
Right.
That's beautiful.
And I mean, that's the segue into the
establishment of the community.
I mean, even though AIC is a company
that is there to help, dare I say,
establish a type of understanding of who they
are, which will hopefully enable them to establish
communities.
But when it came to you establishing the
community, you know, within Masjid al-Islam and
partaking in that, what were some of the
challenges that you faced?
Like you just mentioned, as an electrical engineer
and as a man, you know, graduated from
college and then going to electrical engineering.
I mean, you're thinking about, OK, you have
to take care of my family, which will
be my family and establishing the community here
in Dallas.
How was that in the very beginning for
yourself?
It's very trying when you're dealing with previous
generations.
OK.
And as generations progress, technology advances and some
may want to move forward with it.
Some may want to stay stuck in what
they're comfortable with.
Right.
And you have the tasking of making the
ones that want to stay back with what
they're comfortable with of trying to make sure
that they are still included.
And the ones that are moving forward, progressing,
you still got to make a way for
them to condition themselves to leave the breadcrumbs
for the ones that are comfortable staying where
they are.
So you're serving as a liaison between the
two.
Correct.
And then at the same time, you have
to realize that both are going to get
mad at you because somebody went and picked
up the breadcrumbs that I thought were going
to be left for me.
And then the ones that want to move
forward, OK.
I'm having to pull more people.
Because these breadcrumbs are not enough for them.
All right.
So you have to be a liaison for
that.
And you got to be a sponge and
be able to absorb the hits and the
brickbacks and compartmentalize as well.
And then you got to learn how to
decompartmentalize on your own.
You have to know that people are not
going to like you when you're doing the
right thing, but they may end up loving
you later when they see the fruits of
it.
Right.
You know, you said establishing the community.
And I'm almost sure many of you young
men that are boards of massage or you've
gotten a new position to where you may
supervise over someone your father's age, that they
may not.
Like you said, some of them are in
their ways.
And they're not ready or willing to, I
don't want to use the word progress, to
be introduced to new things that will cause
a certain change that will require them to
get out of their comfort zone.
Yes.
That's good.
You know, and that is where, you know,
you as a as a man, how old
are you at that time?
Probably about forty one.
You know, realizing, OK, you know, you have
to show a level of respect to them.
Right.
But respectfully disagree.
Right.
Right.
Right.
And at the same time, you don't want
those ones that have innovative ideas to run
away.
Yeah.
That's what your answer.
The breadcrumbs come.
Right.
I think it's a beautiful point.
And masculinity, because you have to know how
to be the peacemaker even in the household.
Right.
Right.
Because if you're going to be the leader,
you've got to be the one that's a
peacemaker as well.
Right.
Because those foundations are set.
But there may be times to where the
foundations, they may kind of the ends of
it loose because they're not sticking to them.
So coming back and establishing that and also
the fact of, you know, people showing their
displeasure with you.
Right.
You know, I mean, that happened numerous times
with the Prophet, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam.
He would call people to the Deen of
Islam and there would be people that would
openly show their displeasure with him in front
of people that looked up to him and
followed him.
I mean, physical, physical abuse.
So I think that's a huge, a huge
element of rites of passage, of learning how
to deal with difficult situations from people that
you thought wouldn't bring those difficulties.
The thing about it is, you know, we
hear the Hadith that, you know, whoever builds
a house for Allah, Allah builds a house
for him in paradise.
But we never stop to really ponder on
the fact that you've got to build a
foundation in a house.
You got to, you got to build basic
building blocks, two by fours.
You need tools.
You need hammers.
You need nails.
You need men.
All right.
You need somebody that's going to be risky.
And once you're starting to build that second
story, okay, I'll climb the roof.
Okay.
So what's the safety harness so that if
something happens to you, you don't hurt yourself
if you fall off.
Right, right.
All right.
So all of these things, and that's what
we do in, in engineering as well, is
we focus on building, but now we also
have to think about the safety.
How are we going to protect someone who
does something out of not knowing from their
own self and being endangered?
So if we're building a masjid or doing
something, how do we keep information that could
be used in a bad way from someone
that may not know how to use that
information?
Okay.
All right.
And how do we transition the ones that
are comfortable where they are to this new
place that we want to be without them
thinking that my old position is going to
be compromised.
Compromised.
Yeah.
It's almost like this constant pushing for growth,
but it's also with hikmah, with control.
The ones that don't want to move, you've
got to get them to move.
With the ones that are moving, you want
to get them to kind of hold back
and temper the pace that they're moving at.
And then one other thing that you mentioned
that I really liked, the idea of while
you're doing all this, also figuring out how
to take care of yourself and decompartmentalizing.
That was, I'm curious as to how you
do that, because that sounds rough.
There are times I don't answer the phone.
Okay.
You know, I don't answer the phone.
There are times I won't go near a
computer.
There are times where I will go to
the gym and just put a towel over
myself and sit in the sauna, you know,
and that helps clear me out.
Or I'll sit inside my car and just
take some me time.
Or I'll get something indulgent, you know, whether
it's sweet treat or G day or something
like that.
I'll do that.
And there are times when, you know, my
family looks at me and they can tell,
okay, he's kind of, you know, he's, he's
upset right now.
So let me just go do something else.
You know, he'll come down off of, you
know, whatever's going on.
Those are the things that I end up
having to do.
And I learned those from watching my father.
He had a, today we call them, man
caves, you know, man caves is this, but
he had a basement, you know, and he
built his, you know, workshop in the basement
and he'd go down and build different things
and just do whatever.
My mother didn't really bother him when he
went down there.
He would have, you know, TV or something.
He'd bring himself some ice cream or had
a separate freezer, you know, and you knew
when he was sneaking ice cream, you know,
you didn't go down and ask for any,
you know, or he'd make sure it'd be
a flavor that he knew the kids didn't
like.
So, you know, so I'll do something like
this.
Right.
So I, you know, I can do something
like that, you know, you know, I think
they're going to eat this.
Well, you know, let me put this on
here.
And nobody want that.
You know?
Oh, you don't like to eat this.
Oh, wow.
Too bad.
So I'm the same way.
I have my cave.
It's my gym.
There's a refrigerator there.
I just need a little television in there,
man.
Right.
Right.
You know, like you said, I mean, it's
very, very important to decompartmentalize.
I mean, we see that in the Cave
of Hedo, in the Apostles, when we go
to the Cave of Hedo.
Having that time alone is so important for
the man and even the woman, the mother.
I mean, I'm almost sure within your therapy,
you've probably talked to them, you know, the
man has to have time for himself and
the woman as well having time because I'm
the woman.
May Allah bless our wives and our mothers,
man, because they give everything, you know, to
where they forget about themselves, you know, and
also the men, too, but in a different
way.
And I like how you mentioned, I always
tell this in my community as well, and
the older gentlemen in their 40s that have
family for a while and what they would
term as, and you can tell me if
this is accurate, the midlife crisis.
I'll never forget one of the gentlemen.
He told me, man, sometimes you're just going
to have to sit in your car, like
you said, when you come home from work,
before you go in the house, he said,
go to the coffee shop, go do something.
But you see, you say decompress because the
family doesn't deserve that.
Man, that hit me like a ton of,
I wasn't even married yet, and he said,
that hit me like a ton of bricks,
but it made so much sense.
So I can imagine when you're dealing with
the elders and the youth and you're like
this being pulled and you're about to be
torn because you have to, you know, separate,
that separation is really, really important.
So what about maintaining that?
I mean, also within maintaining, you know, we
talked about establishing it and, you know, within
the establishment, Mashallah, you just had a groundbreaking
ceremony for the Masjid.
Congratulations.
In the process of finishing that, but, you
know, the community has been established, but now
I guess it's fair to say you're at
a different phase of maintenance, right?
Because you're trying to, I mean, Mashallah, it's
a multimillion dollar project, Alhamdulillah, and you know,
shout out to those that have contributed and
those that have promised their contribution.
Alhamdulillah, Alhamdulillah.
What is it like maintaining that structure of
community with those that may ask, you know,
as in the Quran, when is the help
of Allah coming?
The help of Allah is near.
What is it like?
I mean, what are some of the pitfalls
with the actual maintenance as the days go
by?
Do you see people giving up?
Do you see people trying to move on?
I see people that love to give lip
service.
Okay.
All right.
And then when it's time to do work,
they're gone.
And I try as best I can to
remind them of Bani Israel, when Allah said,
you know, I'm going to give you the
promised land, all right?
And one thing he could have done, but
he didn't, he said, this is going to
be yours, all right?
There's people in it already, but you got
to fight them.
You got to go in there and fight.
Now, he could have said, being it is,
that's it, all right?
But he made them have to fight for
it because he knew, even after everything they
had been through, oppression, slavery, and all this
kind of dehumanization, he knew that if you
don't have to fight to establish your presence
in this land, then you won't be able
to fight to maintain your presence in this
land from somebody else who's going to want
to come and take it from you.
So I kind of try to reemphasize that
point to the community by letting them know
this is something we have to do.
Allah is not, he can say, being it
is, and there's the Masjid, there's a business,
there's this, there's everything we need.
But no, he didn't do that for Bani
Israel, and they had prophetic guidance with them
in their presence.
So who are we to think that we're
going to have it easier, even though we've
already got air conditioning, we've already got, you
know, three, four kinds of different beds, electric
beds, we've got automobiles.
We don't have to come to a camp,
you know, in a camel, we've got running
water, plumbing, you know, you know, we don't
have to go dig a hole and relieve
ourselves.
So we've already got a level of ease.
That's, that's a beautiful point.
Yeah, that's a beautiful point.
I mean, you mentioned so much of this
point that, you know, there's a point where
you're going to have to fight.
There's no way except to, you know, I
think it was Tariq Ibn Ziyad, if I'm
not mistaken, when he told his people, أين
المفرّ؟
He said, where there's nowhere else to run.
They were standing on a, he said, البحر
أمامكم والجيش وراءكم.
He said that the sea is in front
of you, and the army is behind you,
meaning that we have to turn around and
fight.
And that's what they call it, جبل الطارق,
it was on that Gibraltar, because he was
on that, on that mountain.
And I love how you mentioned that, because,
you know, with a man, there has to
be a level of risk.
And that risk brings the رزق.
Like, when you have that risk, you're relying
on something greater than yourself.
And that's where the purpose ties in, which
makes the Muslim, with his purpose in life,
much more transcendent, much more greater, much more
unstoppable.
I mean, when you're relying on Allah سبحانه
وتعالى, and you move forward, بسم الله, I
mean, who's going to, there's no way that
you can lose hope, because your hope is
in the one that created everything.
And in building a masjid, you know what
I'm saying, within that process, it's important, like
you said, you know, to kind of, you
know, and as an engineer, it's beautiful, because
as an engineer, you get to apply those
principles.
Look at the bigger picture, right?
It's much bigger than the both of us,
or this argument, or this disagreement.
The bigger picture, our grandchildren, you know, which
again, a man has to be a visionary
and be willing to take those risks.
Embracing positive discomfort.
Like, this is an aspect of it.
When you're building a community, there has to
be a level of, okay, things are going
to be a little uncomfortable.
And it's okay for that to happen.
Like, it's okay for that to be the
case.
And what you mentioned about relying on Allah,
you know, one of the things I tell
some of my clients is, when it comes
to trusting Allah and building tawakkul, I feel
like that can only be done in moments
of discomfort.
You can't do that when things are easy,
because things are easy, then alhamdulillah, everything's going
well, it's no big deal.
And it's the same for a community.
In order to build that sense of community
and the goodness that comes out of that
positive discomfort, that discomfort has to be there.
You need discomfort for growth.
And I'm seeing that in exactly what you're
mentioning.
Always doing something hard and seeking that discomfort,
because you know that it's going to be
some pleasure.
And that's what, when you were mentioning earlier,
you know, when things are given to you,
the beautiful, when they said, you know, barely,
we'll sit, we'll wait, and we'll sit and
wait, right?
You won't value it.
You won't value it at all.
If you don't go through those hardships, you
won't value it at all, to where it
was hard to establish, and I'm not going
to give this up that easy, right?
To where, you know, maintaining it is going
to take a fight for us, for anyone
to just come and take that from us.
I mean, these companies you have, Mashallah, AIC,
what are the future goals of it?
What's the vision for it?
What I really want to do, one of
the goals, is I want to train other
people to create similar companies, publishers that may
want to do that.
The second goal I want to have is,
last year, certain universities have finally come around
to the understanding that a lot of the
entry tests that they're having to colleges have
been culturally biased.
Certain colleges and universities have now said, we're
not going to accept those tests.
They've developed alternative procedures for admitting students for
different levels of majors for science and engineering.
I want to get AICpublications.com to a
point where we are one of those alternatives.
So I want to grow all of our
tutorials and guidance that we give out to
get to that point.
So that's my long-term goal.
And we established the 10 Minute Engineering GATE
program, Gifted and Talented Education program, as a
way to get folks on that track.
You know, and it's made for not just
elementary kids, but anybody that is interested in
technology, but they don't know where to start,
so that they're not intimidated by it.
Because for a lot of black kids or
just black people that come from that environment,
math is intimidating.
Science is intimidating.
It's looked at as a foreign language, you
know, and all you see is numbers with
gobbledygook presented to you by somebody who's telling
you this is important, but they never tell
you why or how it can be applied.
I was one of them, man.
I mean, I still remember, I guess since
the therapist is here, the traumatic experience that
I had for my algebra tutor.
I still do not like algebra.
I mean, I'm not going to blame her,
but she has a huge contribution to my
trauma.
You know, this reminds me of when we
were going through our master's, a lot of
the research that they teach us about or
teach us from is based off of a
specific demographic that doesn't apply to cultural minorities.
And that's problematic because the research, the way
we do things, the way we do therapy,
and I found that.
I found that when it comes to application
to a minority, to Muslims, especially minority Muslims,
the methods that they use for white people
is based off of white people.
The methods that they use for them, they
don't work.
So I have to change things and I
have to do things a little bit differently.
And there's no, there's not much research on
that.
So I'm loving this, like the direction of
AIC publications, if it gets to a point
where testing and barriers to entry into these
fields can be changed.
And I wonder if even the learning process,
can the learning process be changed to where
it's more relevant to minorities?
And maybe you would have liked algebra if
the learning process was different.
So all that is there, but it's just,
we need someone to do it.
And I love hearing this.
What have you seen with the family structure
because of the presence of the communities?
So for instance, you see, it was very
difficult to make, well, there were challenges and
opportunities when establishing the masjid, for example.
What have you seen with the, has there
been an influx of families that have come
around because of that masjid to where people
will say, wow, there's community here.
I want to, I want to join.
That is something that's increasing.
It is something that's increasing.
And there are more people that steadily say,
okay, how can I get involved?
And they're looking for a directive to be
given.
Directive with deliverables.
And that's the thing.
And you have to have that available.
So those individuals don't feel wasted on their
motivation is not just dissipated.
So you have to have something that they
can be directed to doing, no matter how
minuscules got to be something.
Okay.
So let me ask you, let's get a
little deeper then.
So when someone, a young man wants to
start his nonprofit organization, he has a vision.
He wants to start his organization clothing line,
or he wants to start a certain type
of company.
He has a couple of friends that are
going to join him.
It's fun in the beginning.
At what point would you tell him, man,
you got to have a direction that you're
going.
And when people come on, you need to
know exactly what you want to give them
or else there will leave at what phase
would you tell that young man that I
would tell them that at phase one B
one B one B and phase one a
is making sure that they understand exactly what
it is they say they want.
If they say, I want my own clothing
line, for instance, okay.
Do you know how you're going to make
the clothes?
Where are you going to make them at?
No.
Okay.
Let's get you understanding that.
Do you know whether or not you want
to be incorporated or LLC?
Let's get you understanding that.
Now, are you willing to do those kinds
of things?
You willing to get the answer to those
questions?
Yes.
Okay, cool.
Now, one B is you got to understand
you're going to end up working probably 12,
13, 14, 15, 16 hours a day.
Are you willing to do that and do
everything else that you already are responsible for?
Are you really ready to do that?
If you're really ready to do that, okay,
cool.
We can get something going.
All right.
If you're really ready to do that, you
know what, then you know what, maybe the
rent that you might have to pay here,
you know what, we can, we can cover
that a little bit.
All right.
The time that it would normally charge you
for accessing this space, you know, I'll eat
that for you.
All right.
But this is what you have to do
in complication for that complimentary for that.
You've got to make sure that your content
or whatever it is you're going to be
developing or whatever clothes you're going to be
developing when we need you to develop some
clothes for us and our fundraising initiatives.
You got it.
That's interesting because that's, that's the first, that's
the first step you mentioned.
But when he gets his employees or people
that want to work with him, just as
you get people that want to come in
the mansion and say, give me something to
do, you know, it's, it's, it's beautiful because
he has to sit and look at his
weak spots and that's going to require humility.
He says, okay, LLC, S Corp, C Corp,
I don't want to deal with none of
this, but I'm going to have to learn,
be uncomfortable to learn this because I have
a vision.
And I think that's, you know, when it
comes to establishing and maintain that community, the
vision always has to be there.
I mean, constantly reminding them of the vision
is something you probably got to do with
the ones that want to stay with that.
And the ones that want to, the ones
that want to move, move, move, move, you
know, with the establishment of that community and
the maintenance of it.
What have you seen with regards to, you
know, the family man or the son that
the communal effort and the unity within the
family, it may be kind of shaky.
What have you seen with like the sons
in these households, in these communities, even, you
know, what are some of the traits that
they face that they're, that they're affected by
negatively?
When they don't have a figure to look
up to, then that, they're lost, they're lost.
But I like to, I like to tell
them that it's not, they're not a lost
cause, maybe lost for a time being, but
they can find another figure.
And that's why I feel like there's an
importance of having that community.
Because when it comes to the family system,
you, yes, your father and mother generally should
be the role model that you have that
kind of push you forward and push you
towards doing these incredible things, inshallah.
But if that's not there, then there can
be other people that can step in from
your community.
And that's why it literally takes a village,
right?
That's why you need people around you that
are, that can be role models that are
leaders that, I mean, look like you, that
are doing these incredible things.
And they can be the ones that can
be your mentor, they can be your guide.
And then they're not so lost anymore.
Then things transition for them.
That's beautiful.
That's beautiful.
So within, within the community, establishing the masjid,
right, and then maintaining and then maintenance of
it.
What have you seen with like the mentorship
programs and how important that is kind of
what he's saying about, you know, the kids,
I mean, you know, we can say having
a hero or someone that they look to,
and I always mention, it's important to have
those uncles that are around that'll, that'll put
them in check in the corner with nobody
knowing like, bro, I saw you, man.
You know what I'm saying?
I saw you, man.
You got a job.
I remember I told him young, I was
like, you don't even have a job, man.
What are you trying to talk to her
for?
I mean, you can talk to her, but
just go talk to her father and be
ready to be asked some crucial questions.
I mean, Islam has parameters for a reason.
It's not strict.
Like, you can't look her direction.
If you're interested, there's a process, it's totally
okay.
And that's also the beauty of community, man,
is that, you know, someone can look at
a young man and say, man, I've known
you since you were so on, so you're
not, you're not suitable for her, man.
She's not going to work, man.
She's too strong for you.
You know what I'm saying?
She's too aggressive.
You know what I'm saying?
Or the opposite, you know, you know, had
the process of advising a companion, you know,
about two men.
And, you know, he gave the advice.
When you see that, when you see that
with the young men and the importance of
mentorship, is there some type of programming in
regards to that as well?
There are four principles that I stick to,
men as protectors, providers, maintainers and guardians, PPMG.
And we can do that at every phase
of our lives, whether we are boys or
young men, sons, uncles, friends, husbands.
You know, we are we protecting money?
Are we protecting physical security?
Are we protecting historical knowledge and understanding?
Are we protecting legacy of our elders?
Are we maintaining the elders connection to our
community by reminding them of what they've done?
Because as they get old, they may forget.
You know, it's because of you, uncle, that
I'm able to be here.
You know, you took the brickbacks when you
were having to sit at the back of
the bus.
And now, because of you, I'm here.
OK, so thank you, uncle, for that.
Thank you, auntie, for that.
You know, and it connects them to here
and it lets them see they're still showing
respect.
I'm at ease a little bit more.
I mean, those events at the Masjid and
the youth are playing ball and, you know,
at the end of the event, you know,
the imam or the board member gets up
on the microphone and makes the jokes just
like you did.
And it's so beautiful because now we know
Sister Sakina is not, you know, everybody knows
Sister Sakina.
But then the young man is seeing how
to appropriately deal with people.
Right.
Right.
And that's what community really, really does.
And, you know, shout out to the elders
that have helped establish the community.
And then the younger the younger generation that
helped to maintain that community.
But the maintenance and the drive that they
had was from the elders.
But individual as yourself serving as a liaison,
it really plays a huge role.
And it's all inclusive in how that strength
is.
What's your take on volunteership, like of young
men getting involved in volunteership and what effects
have you seen with that?
That has been a little bit of a
struggle because the young men have so much
pulling on themselves.
They have so much pulling them to be
in every place except the Muslim place.
So one of the things that I've seen
that's kind of worked is giving them an
opportunity to showcase what skill they have.
Because a lot of them are just they're
shy, but they don't want to be known
as being shy.
So if you kind of trick them into
talking about what it is that they like
to do, and then give them an opportunity
to showcase it, many of them will rise
to the occasion or they will be attracted
to those who are doing it on their
own.
And they'll kind of go along with that.
And this is one of the things that
I've seen.
There's a young man I know.
He's very, very quiet, very, very quiet.
And when I talk to him, I just
get loud.
Every time I see him, I'm like, hey,
what's up?
All right.
And he'll come in, he'll, you know, kind
of do this a little bit.
And then when I, hey, what's up, he'll
crack a smile and then a little bit
more smile.
Then out comes his hand, you know, and
then he's coming to embrace me.
And then he'll start talking a little bit
and letting me know what he's doing and
where he's going.
But putting him on that level of being
able to let him showcase himself like that,
to know that, hey, you're not just here,
but I'm glad you're here.
We're glad you're here.
Your presence is needed and it's valued.
He may not know the value he has,
but letting him know that.
One young man, and you were talking about
the state of Gibraltar.
I call him the general, right?
His namesake is Tarek.
And from a little boy, I would always
see him.
He's just, I mean, just a ball of
everything.
All right.
And I noticed he had a little, you
know, anger problem, you know, a little kid.
And one day I pulled him to the
side and I said, you know what, you're
a general.
And I explained to him what a general
was and I explained to him who Tarek,
General Tarek was.
And I said, yeah.
And he sailed through this small little tiny
passage and it was because of him that
the African Islamic influence ruled Spain for 800
years.
And had they continued, we'd be in very
different geopolitical circumstances around the world.
But you are General Tarek.
So if it's okay with you, when I
see you, I'm going to salute you because
you salute generals in the military.
Did you know that?
And he said, so I salute him.
So I've watched him grow up.
And every time we see each other, we
salute.
But I've watched him grow and he'll come
out of his shell a little bit.
You know, the anger is kind of subsided.
And I asked him, and it's been a
long time since I nicknamed him that.
And I asked him one time, I said,
do you know why I call you General?
He said, yeah.
I said, tell me.
And he remembered everything verbatim.
Wow.
That's it, man.
That's, that's beautiful.
And that's a message to parents is make
sure that your young men are involved in
the communities that they're giving from themselves for
something greater than themselves.
And I love how you say that.
I watched him grow.
That's part of the maintenance of the community
because we can easily give up and not
want to take risks and go back in
our homes, be with our families, but be
separated as a community.
But when we go through the hardships together,
we can only get stronger, you know, and
that's what's beautiful about the word unity and
community because the community should be, it's kind
of like an expectation of unity, which is
very important for our young men and for
our older men as well is that they
are involved in their respective communities because they
will have all that they will go through
these qualities that they need to have in
order to be a strong, solid Muslim man.
Just this idea, the story that you just
mentioned, there's, look at where you're at.
All this is happening in this community.
It requires the younger boy to be a
part of the community, but it also requires
someone from the community caring about that younger
boy as well.
So this is a message not just for
the parents to send to make their younger
children a part of the community, but also
parents be a part of that community as
well.
There are other kids over there that might
need you.
And I think that just that aspect of
it, just being there and being there for
the community and supporting them, even if it's
just giving a salute every single time you
see them, it'll make a world of difference.
It'll make a world of difference.
And I mean, there's research and research on
just the fact of how mentorship can change
kids' lives.
I love hearing stories like this.
You know, as deep as you mentioned, man,
it's because I remember one brother, he said
that a young boy came up to him
and started talking to him and asking for
advice.
The brother was like, I didn't know what
to offer.
I don't know who.
I said, yeah, but he came to you
now and he saw his face.
He's like, man, I'm valuable.
I have something to offer.
Yeah.
And take that responsibility seriously.
Yeah.
And because when he realized that it hit
him, it really hit him like, man, I
have something to give to this community by
this young child that I never would have
thought would come to who, what, when, where,
why, you know?
But it's so beautiful when you create, by
the permission of Allah, that mechanism and that
environment and atmosphere for all of this to
take place.
And it has to be essentially and ultimately
men that establish that along with, mashallah, the
women and sisters as a support system.
But part of the masculinity and embodiment of
masculinity of the man is to volunteer in
their respective communities, which helps leave a communal
legacy, which is a strong way of worshiping
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.
May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala bless all
of you for tuning in to the Iman
Cave and tune in for our next episode.
So don't forget to leave comments, any comments,
mashallah.
We read them and we try to answer
the questions directly or indirectly.
May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala bless you
all.
And don't forget to go to AICpublications.com
and to tune in and look at the
literature, mashallah, to Barakallah, and to join the
contribution in helping educate our young brothers and
sisters.
As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh.