Abdullah Oduro – Iman Cave – Focus In The Age Of Distraction
AI: Summary ©
The speakers emphasize the importance of staying focused and distractions during busy times, parenting healthy social media presence, and avoiding distractions and creating a "will" to be present. They stress the need for parenting, parenting, and maintaining family friendships, as well as privacy laws and the importance of learning about people and their behavior before making a decision. The speakers also emphasize the importance of prioritizing one's life and not missing out on opportunities, and recommend using the power to say no and focus on one's purpose.AI: Transcript ©
He was asking the imam for help with
getting married, and he wants to come and
see your phone. He opened up social media
app and went to the, you know, the
for you page, and he was like,
That stuff would've worked out.
What do you want me to recommend for
you with this? The ability for someone to
grapple with a problem or an idea or
a concept for, like, 4, 5, 6 hours
is now, like, a unique skill set. Most
people would be like, yeah. Oh, I can
I can learn anything? Everyone everyone thinks that.
Everyone thinks I can learn it because I
have access to all the information. Try to
learn something and see how long it takes
before your brain is just like, yeah. I
can't take it somewhere. I gotta work on
something else. Yeah. Imagine a kid that grew
up that was maybe 4 or 5 at
that time. They're 20 now. Every time they
come, hey, dad. Blah blah blah. And you're
like,
one second. Dad. Dad. Dad.
One second. Yeah. What do you need? Age
5, 6, 10, 15. Uh-huh. They get that.
And then at 18, 19, it's like, I
don't have a connection with my kids. They
come to youth youth director. Can you fix
this? We don't know we don't know where
we went wrong. I hear that. There was
no we never had a big fight. We
never had a big argument. We never had
a big falling out, but we just they
don't listen to me. We have no connection.
Here at KATSA. May the peace and blessings
of Allah be upon you all. I'm Abdullah
O'Drew, and welcome
to the Iman Cave where we discuss issues
of male excellence
while being grounded in faith. The prophet Muhammad,
peace and blessed be upon him, said in
a portion of a beautiful, beautiful hadith that
we should all memorize,
to be diligent on that which benefits you.
And the only way that one can be
diligent on that which benefits him or her
is particularly to stay focused,
to be on one course, the one thing,
if you will, to constantly think about that
thing, to start
hoping,
by the permission of Allah, to get to
the finish line.
We see nowadays that starting with myself, I
remember when
the letters T E E N were behind
my age, 13, 14, 15, 16,
especially later, 17, 18, 19,
I would always hear from my basketball coach,
from my mother,
bless her, is to be focused. What do
you want to do in life? You know,
this is the time. You're going to be
an adult or you are an adult. There's
going to be a time when you have
to go out and get out of the
house.
Are you looking for a job? Is this
the right job? How's school? All of these
questions, sometimes you feel
bombarded
with all of these questions and rightfully so,
But guess
what? That is a part of life.
That is a part of life, and it
is important
to stay
focused for all of you young men out
there, and even older men as well. That's
what we're going to talk about today focus,
distractions, and where does that fall in the
life of the young man? Is it even
important?
We're going to discuss that today, Inshallah, starting
with our co host,
Entrepreneur,
And, he is also someone that is very,
very involved in the community, and he has.
We didn't shout out your your Yeah. Your
initiative that is helping feeding Muslims Alhamdulillah. Starting
in Dallas, but inshallah, all around the world.
Inshallah. The name is Hamburgati's.
Yes. Hamburgati's.
It's now a food truck, but, inshallah, it's
going to have number numerous locations inshallah. Around
the world. And,
I mean, we're even gonna talk about that
and how that required a level of focus
to transition from a religious con you know,
being a youth director, but now you're a
religious consultant,
also entrepreneur,
and doing and getting it done.
And to my left, I have a dear
friend of mine.
Brother Omar Usman. He's currently a technology consultant,
and he's one of the founding members of
Column Institute here in Dallas that we know
of around the world,
in the issue of,
distractions
and focus, he's done
a lot of work, very rich, rich work,
I must say. He started out, writing the
book, the 40 Hadith
on social media, and he also has the
book, The Fiqh of Social Media. Many of
us, you've probably seen this online. If you
haven't,
type it up, please. Thick of social media.
He had to actually start out giving presentations
on this, around the US. And, it's been
a book. It's actually called the COVID book
because it was written in 2020.
And, we're kinda gonna kinda use this as
the anchor to talk about this particular issue.
Even though there's a fick of social media,
the Internet in general stay tuned. We're gonna
talk about all of this,
particularly with,
myself. I remember,
you
know, I had the the it was the
cellular phone. Right? We call it the in
Saudi, it was the Jawah. You know, the
Nokia Yes. You know, the Nokia was was
the main phone, man. Mobile. The mobile mobile.
Yeah. Yeah.
When Steve Jobs first presented the iPhone Oh,
dude.
Right. It was, like, okay. Life changing. Life
changing. Exactly. Really, as I say, change the
game.
But
is that a good or a bad thing?
You know, sometimes you hear the the scholars
talk about the usage of the Internet.
Is it something that is beneficial or harmful?
Is it something that's a case by case
basis depending on the person, their lifestyle?
There There are a couple of things I
wanna touch on in regards to
the Internet and and focus in general. But
in the in this chapter of the Internet,
and even get a little more specific on
social media in regards
to, friends,
family,
and dare we even say females, or when
men get online and they see the opposite
gender. One thing that I noticed, I walked
into I'll start with what I saw recently,
but then I'll go back to something that
happened to me as well.
You know, I walk in a restaurant. I
mean, you probably walked in a restaurant and
you see, you know, the youth that just
sitting at a table,
communicating, and they're at the same table. Yep.
I I when I first saw that, I'm
like,
wow. That's interesting.
And then I started to think, does that
assist in their communication skills? Is it a
plus or a minus? Mhmm.
You know, I remember the statement,
and I mentioned this before. It's a statement
that that talks about distraction. It says, a
wealth of information
creates a poverty
of attention.
You know, when you're scrolling on the phone
and then the mechanism of scrolling up and
down and you can just and it's different
subject matters and you don't know
where to stop, where to go, you know,
what to stay on. But you're scrolling because
you are supposed to look for something
that dealt with your homework or your project.
2 hours later, you realize,
you know, you were supposed to do that
work 2 hours ago. What's crazy about that
example?
Imagine what led up to them getting together
for dinner. They all had to message each
other and coordinate a a date Mhmm. A
time, figure out when everyone's free. They probably
read reviews for, like, half a dozen restaurants
to figure out what kind of food to
eat, where to go. Mhmm. They coordinated all
of that, and then by the time they
get there, they're not talking to each other.
Yeah.
And I guess I guess it's a good
I guess it's a good beginning. Right? Family.
Yeah.
So is that even a fam a familial
type of situation to where they'll all coordinate
together, but when they get there, they're not
they're not communicating with each other? Or is
it Yeah. I think it happens
I think it happens a lot. Like, people
come, you know, you're you're in the same
home. Right? You're in the same area,
but you might not be talking to each
other. You know, families might have everyone's on
their phone at dinner time. And it's and
that's not something new, by the way. Okay.
Right? Like, when I was growing up, it
was the TV.
It was, oh, can you sit and watch
TV while you're eating dinner? Does the family
have to eat
dinner together?
And if someone called your the land you
know, the landline at your home The landline.
Yeah. There was a it was an etiquette
issue. Like, can you go and answer the
phone during dinner? Yes. Or do you let
it ring? If your friend is calling you
while you're eating, you have to let them
know I'm eating dinner right now. I'll call
you back. Right? There there was like, there
was family rules around it. Yeah. And I
think now it's not yes. Now it's a
cell phone.
So the the gadget is different,
but the challenge is still really the same.
Interesting. I think it's just that the phone
is so pervasive
that the default is just that you use
it and look at it Because it's so
interesting, there's so much stuff going on that
we haven't stopped to actually assess like, oh
wait, should we actually set boundaries here or
not? Interesting. That's very very interesting. Even the
TV,
it united the family in the sense that,
like, you would all watch the same You're
watching the same thing. There's no options. You
be talking about the same thing, laughing about
the same stuff.
But, the phone kinda has everybody in their
own tunnel. Individualized.
So so you have a family of 7
and each one is in his own world
by himself or by yourself. And even the
TV. And you don't know. This person is
sad, this person's happy, this person's miserable, this
person's Wow. Right? And they're all sitting together
and, you know, one person could hear a
comment and be annoyed, and the other one
can find the same exact comment funny depending
on the mood and the tunnel that they're
in. But even the TV allowed for some
discussion. Right? Because the the TV would be
on for, like, 8 minutes and then it'll
go to commercial. Yeah. And then you would
you would sort of talk and, like, do
things or whatever, and then it would go
back and everyone can kind of watch. But
Exactly. Now the phone is just constant.
Like there's no break. So with the family,
I remember you were mentioning something before we
before we we got started. You're talking about
the family structure and how,
you know, if someone is is is surfing
through the social media and how that can
bring a means of separation even further. Yeah.
So, you know, you mentioned I did presentations
on this topic. So Hamza got to travel
for, I'll say, 4 or 5 years. Michelin.
Right? And so,
you know, after each one, people hear the
material, they react to it differently. They have
different types of questions, different stories.
Some things are anecdotes, but you hear an
anecdote enough times it becomes a pattern. Right.
Right? Okay. And the thing for me that
became the pattern was I would go and
I would get the same complaint. It would
either be from teenage children or from
the sisters basically saying that the husband or
the father Mhmm. The man of the house
would come home from work.
And we're like, you know, we understand he's
tired, he's been working hard, he's busy, you
know, all these things.
But he comes home, he gets down on
the couch, and he opens up WhatsApp.
And he's just chatting, forwarding videos, watching stuff,
you know, arguing back and forth, sharing memes,
whatever.
And then it's time to go to bed,
and it's like we're we're trying to be
understanding, but at the same time, like, you
come home,
and it's just WhatsApp from 5 PM to
11 PM.
And basically, like, he's there, but he's not
there.
Yeah. That's that's very important, man. You know,
and that's that's a that's a good message
too. That's a good message. For the young
men, you know, a lot of times your
mom you come home and your mom is
there. She probably prepares something for you, you
know, or your future wife, Michelle, and those
that are married, and then you come home
and then you're on the phone,
that is something that is not,
dare I say, pleasing to the mom and,
you know, even attractive to the wife because
when you're going home, you're on social media.
They wanna talk about their day, your day,
have a level of conversation,
and, subhanallah, it it really distracts you. Well,
it really is a it's a competition, Sheykh,
at the same time. Because, look, right now,
the work,
went from the workplace to home Mhmm. Through
our phones. Right? Right. So everybody is accessible
at any given time and and and place.
So,
you know, back in the day, I feel
like people used to go to work, clock
in, and then it's the grind. I wanna
be the best. Today, I wanna do the
best. I wanna excel. I wanna get promoted.
I wanna get a raise. Right? But nowadays,
you're competing with people who are working 247,
basically.
So you come home
and you don't wanna
shut your phone off and then get to
work and be like like just missed the
whole you're not in the loop. Yeah. You
missed out what happened yesterday. You're behind. You're
behind. Right? The fear of missing out. Was
it FOMO that you found? FOMO. Right? I
think, one of the ways I've been trying
to I've been trying to funnel it because
I'm guilty of that myself. Mhmm. Right? And,
you know, working with the community, it's it's
just very difficult. Everybody feels like you're always
there Mhmm. At any given moment. Any given
time, this person is free this in the
morning, this person is free at night, and
you're supposed supposedly free all the time. Right.
I just archive
all these chats and stuff like that that
I don't, you know, the cluster and I
just keep the important stuff in the front.
Before that, man, it's it's really what, you
know, when mentioning the family structure,
I like how you said because I remember
that. I don't want to say in my
day, man. I Yeah. Got a great grip,
but I You can say in my day
if you're here is gray. Yeah. Okay. In
my day. Right? My day. Teens don't run
away. Okay? Oh my god.
No. But, you know, when sitting at the
table eating together,
it it there's so much that is gained
from that because you hear about your sister's
day, you hear about mom's day, and then
everyone's talking, laughing. You know, their brother is
joking, making fun of their sister, sister making
fun of their brother. You learn about you
learn about your children, you learn about your
parents, you learn about yourself because dad may
give some really good advice because he's eating
now. You know, it's
it's really interesting how you said
the landline. And for those of you that
don't know what a landline is
The landline. It's a phone that's connected to
the wall that has a whole different service.
Well, now it's connected to the, you know,
your even your cellular phone, but The dinosaur.
Your dinosaur It's a big phone.
You know when that phone would ring at
the dinner table
You know, I remember my mother used to
say this is funny. You're so mighty. I
you know, I'm a teenager. I hear the
phone ring. I'm I'm about to get up.
She's like, stop. Who knows you?
Who knows you? Stay here for the show.
You know that, who knows you? I'm too.
Right? Stay And then the FOMO kicks in,
man. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The FOMO.
But what does that do for a young
man? Because it's like, no.
Prioritization.
What is more important?
The time we're gonna go meet up at
the football field or sitting with a Hakan
Nasr al Sabati, the one that has the
most right upon my with my companionship right
there, and I'm cutting it off.
How does that make mom feel?
Right? So it it it kind of nurtures
that level of responsibility
prioritization.
Right? I guess from responsibility
is prioritization.
Yeah. So I like how you mentioned, you
know, even if you get on the phone,
dad will say, the phone keeps ringing. They
keep calling. Right? They keep calling. Hang up.
Call let it ring 10 more times. And
then dad is gonna say, like, who is
that? And then what do you say? Tell
them
what? You're busy. You're busy. Exactly. You're having
dinner. That's it. I remember my friends, you
you know, so, let me call you back.
I I have dinner with family. And it
was both ways because if you called someone
and they answered and said, I'm eating dinner,
you knew you'd just hang up right away.
Exactly.
Exactly. You know, I think the what what
what makes it very difficult for parents nowadays,
is that there's no inherited culture
of maintaining this family bond. Like, you know,
back in the day, I felt like,
a a father would learn from his father
how dinner's supposed to go. You know, I
break bread, the father,
you know, scoops first and then everybody eats
second and, you know, it's there's a respect.
There's something that's going on there that that
was inherited.
And now with this the technology introduced,
I think some
parents
failed to
create a new culture.
Right. You know? Right. That that's compatible with
today and and the challenges of today. Yeah.
Yeah. Like, I'm Palestinian.
You'd go to every Palestinian family, you'd you'd
find almost a uniform level of of respect.
You know, like, okay, this is how it
goes in the family. You know, we do
this first and this second, and that's this
is the the job of the kids and
this is the job of the the the
the the women. This is the job of
the men. Right?
Now it's like, okay.
How are we gonna deal? Yeah. I I
just let my kids use the phone, you
know. Yeah. They can answer a call. And
you go to another family, no. No. They
gotta leave their phones in the room. It's
it's dinner time. I mean, what do you
think about this? I mean, I think that
there's
static standards. Like, there's universal standards that shouldn't
change. Right? Like, you know, I hear and
sometimes in my house, you know, the tape
the phones, there's no there's the table, there's
no phones there at all, and there is
an intentional dinner time. Oh, okay. Right? There's
time where we come together, we eat. That's
at least time we're gonna get together. I'm
gonna ask questions about it, but dinner time
is a it's a special moment, and I
think it needs to be like a tradition.
Allah, universally.
And especially to the young men out there
where, you know, sometimes, you know, the parents
got divorced, and it happens. It's from the
of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. But
taking part when mom says it's time for
dinner and you're out playing with your friends,
you're on your computer, get off the phone,
man. Get off the computer and go and
be with your mom, you know, and and
because it's important.
You never know what kind of emotional connection
will take place with her and serenity and
and and succina. That's what I mean by
particularly for a young man that he has
to step up and take that level of
responsibility, even though it may mean separating from
his friends,
and being with with his family. But what
if, Shaikh? What if what if the kids
are learning this from the parents?
What if the parents are the ones distracted
during dinner time? Kids don't want a lot
of times, it's not the parents always blame,
like, oh, my kid doesn't he's on his
screens all the time. Uh-huh. You know, because
all it's like, well, so are you.
Yeah. You know, and it and the the
kids are just watching. I mean, you see
all you see all these videos that go
viral, like, the baby, like, pretending things to
his phone or, like, trying to swipe even
though it's like a mag like a paper
magazine to try to swipe it and stuff
like that. It's like see it. They're mimicking
what they see. And so if the parents
are constantly on,
then no matter what you tell them, like,
oh, this is bad for you. You shouldn't
be on your phone.
They copy the actions. Yeah. And it's tricky
because someone could be
focused
on the phone. Yeah. It might be really
important. It might be an important word email
or message or whatever, but all they see
is is the phone. Yeah. Yeah. And that's
where and that's where the prioritization
comes in because, you know, I tell a
couple of my brothers and my brothers, one
of my mentors, he told me, look, before
you get when you're on your when you're
on your way home,
stop at a at a at a coffee
shop, stop at a garage, something, and just
recalibrate because your family doesn't deserve you coming
home and being on the phone and continuing
what you didn't finish at work or whatever
it is. Stop, recalibrate, realize that you're going
into another world, which is all of that
outside is for them. You mentioned, like Yeah.
You know, the the importance of, like, your
mom is there, like, go and spend time
with her and things like that. I'll share
with you the other side of the example
too though as you think how long ago
did the iPhone come out? Was it, like,
2009?
Roughly. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Imagine a kid that
grew up that was maybe 4 or 5
at that time. They're 20 now. Every time
they come, hey, dad, blah blah blah, and
you're like,
one second. Yeah. Dad, dad, dad. One second.
Yeah. What do you need? Mhmm. What's important?
But age 5, 6, 10, 15 That's not
a lot. Surprise. They get that. And then
at 18, 19, it's like, I don't have
a connection with my kids. They come to
youth youth director. Can you fix this? We
don't know we don't know where we went
wrong. I hear that. There was no we
never had a big fight. We never had
a big argument. We never had a big
falling out, but we just they don't listen
to me, we have no connection. Beautiful, man.
And that you know, actually, that
exactly that happens to me so much.
Happens to me so much. And I tell
I tell the father oftentimes, I'm like, when's
the last time
you spent quality time with your your son?
Mhmm. Mhmm. He's like, what do you mean
quality time? Like like, I talked to him
on my way, you know, dropping him off
to school and come back. And
I'm like, no no. Did you did you
ever go out to a restaurant camping, traveled
somewhere, just just you and him? Or like
just, you know, pick his brain on like
how he feels about school, his hobbies.
Basically, just just
spending time with him. Mhmm. He's like, oh,
yeah. I don't know, man. I never felt
like I I ever did that. Yeah. Yeah.
And and it's that point that that he
realizes sometimes they start crying, SubhanAllah. Yeah. Yeah.
Like, man, you know, I I really don't
do that. The dunya man. The dunya that
this worldly life, it could it could It
sucks it. Really distract us, you know, and
that's a subhanallah. You and Mitch, you have
a you have a chapter in your book
to Kathor.
Right?
Can you expound on that? You know, because
that's a chapter in the Quran, but what
does that have to do with
fiqh of social media?
Does it have to do with distractions at
all?
So the idea is currency.
Okay. Currency
in this life is wealth.
Right? If if I wanna show that I'm
successful, I show that I have more money.
Right? The the car that I drive, the
house that I buy, whatever, you know, that
demonstrates that I have
kind of won at this game somehow. Mhmm.
Currency is also used to enact justice. Right?
So if Okay. If I wronged you, if
I libel you, you can go and sue
me.
And in exchange, I have to give you
a financial penalty. Okay. Right? If I get
caught speeding, there's a financial currency is how
we kind of make things even. In the
hereafter, we know that the currency is deeds.
Right? If I wrong someone, I have to
give them my good deeds, they give me
their bad deeds, etcetera.
Online, the and and the go through is
that you're competing over this currency. Okay. And
you're gonna keep competing over it until you
enter your grave. At this point, I'm talking.
Right?
Online, the the same competition exists, but it's
not a competition over money. It's a competition
over attention. Attention.
Attention. It's how much how much likes
and validation can I get?
How many views can I get on my
thing? How many minutes of watch time did
I get on my thing? How many
people like my selfie? How many people left
a comment on the picture I posted of
my kid? It's that attention thing of, like,
oh, I posted this thing, and I got
so many engagements, so many whatever.
Mhmm. And that's
the competition. And so people who are successful
online right? Just like we say, okay, so
and so is successful because he's built a
business empire. You were talking earlier about someone
that owns, like, a chain of fast food
restaurants, and you said this is a successful
person. Mhmm. Right? Because they've amassed a certain
amount of wealth. Mhmm. Well, online, that person
wouldn't necessarily be a success
unless they had a 1000000 followers There we
go. Or 5,000,000 followers. Now, everyone says, oh,
that person is successful.
And the problem with that is that
in in terms of currency, what do we
do? We emulate.
So, oh, okay. These these people are successful.
Let me copy their habits.
What books are these business people reading? Right.
Right. What what is what is this business
person's morning routine? Mhmm. You know, how how
do they make decisions? Mhmm. How do they
manage people? And so when it comes online,
it's like, well, okay, here's this person with
10,000,000 followers. What did they do to get
popular?
And sometimes it's not Whatever it takes. Whatever.
And so, yeah. Sometimes it's not the greatest
thing or the most admirable thing, but they're
popular. Let's transition over to Friends now.
Okay? I think I can't remember which stat
it was, I mean, what
the source of it, but it was talking
about
it asked youth
what if they had an opportunity to be
a certain have a certain career, what would
be their number one choice? Influencer. Influencer.
Influencer. Is that is that
Yeah.
Alarming to you? Yes and no. Okay.
No, because I think there is a legitimate
business there. Mhmm. And there are people who
do it. And I I think it's like
anything else. Anything can be done well. It
can be it can be done unwell or
in a bad way. Right? And so there
may be an influencer, and I and I
can think of a couple of examples in
my head, but let's say a tech influencer
Okay. Who's built up a huge following, and
what they do is they review tech products.
And people oh, because of their views, they've
built a level of trust. And now when
this person says, hey. I bought this electric
car, and it's a piece of trash. People
will be like, yep. I trust that opinion.
I'm not gonna get it. Mhmm. But they
say, oh, I, you know, I got this
phone and this is the best phone that
came out this year. People will probably buy
it because they trust that person's opinion.
So from that perspective, I think is good.
I think where it can be,
detrimental or maybe there's, you know, a challenge
in terms of, like, Islamic spirituality
is
when sort of viewing yourself for the product,
or you're having to make compromises
yourself
about the thing that you're selling.
And I think that's where it starts to
become problematic. What if you're not even selling
anything like vlogs and pranks and and and
and things like that?
You're getting millions of views to go in
them all and to,
you know, to raise or to to prank
people. Prank people and Right. Right. Right. How
does that, like,
is that is that would that be the
good, bad, or the ugly in your in
your interview? I don't know. I think it
depends on a person's intention. Right? Like,
is if if you're building a business out
of it and something, then maybe, but also
I it's just
it's that Islamic question of, like, are you
doing something productive? Uh-huh. You know, something something
could be, let's say, permissible from a technical
perspective. But, like, did you add value to
someone's life? Adding value. And I'm not and
I'm not saying that entertainment doesn't because entertainment
does have its place and does have value.
Definitely. I think the problem with the let's
say let's use the prank example. Okay. Right?
So like someone has built a channel based
on pranking. The the problem is that it's
it's not entertainment. It sort of becomes an
obsession, sort of an extreme. Mhmm. Because the
way that online works, like, you would do
something now in order to get more views,
more followers, you have to you gotta dial
it up a notch. Yeah. So it's not
like, you know, it's not like a candid
camera show where, like, the shtick is the
same Mhmm. And you get a couple of
laughs and move on. But it's like, okay,
this video got a 1000000 views.
How can I amp it up? Right. And
so, it goes from just being a prank
to, like, I gotta keep pushing it and
pushing it and pushing it and pushing it.
Yeah. Yeah. And it's like, okay, pushing it,
I understand.
But to what end and for what purpose?
To what end and for purpose. And what
and what,
and what detriment of the one that is
being pranked on. Right? And that's where And
I I've seen that with certain people. It's
like they started off it was just a
humble, you know, some slight of entertainment to
make the viewer laugh and to bring forth
happiness to the viewer. For those of you
that are sat out there, so and so.
But then it came to
sometimes lying that you're doing something to the
other person. Now the issues of morality can
be Yeah. And there's and there's, like,
Muslim kids that are, like, they'll do this
prank video and, like, literally lie, and, like,
the mom starts crying because she thinks it's
for real. Oh. And it's, like, okay, you
just kinda did that to your mom to
get views. Like, there should be a line
there. Right. Right. Exactly. And that's important because
the youth may say, no. I just wanted
to make the people happy and it's fun.
But then, you know, like you mentioned, learning
more than What expense? At what expense? Yeah.
At what expense? And and this is the
the the Godfather thing. Right? Because if,
you know, in business, if you say I
gotta I gotta make money at all costs,
what happens is you transgress boundaries. Yeah. Right?
Mhmm. So I'm if I need to make
money out, I'm I'm more willing to cheat.
Cheat. The more desperate I am to make
money Okay. The more willing I become to
cheat someone. Mhmm. The more obsessed I become
with making money, the more I might say,
you know what? This thing is haram, but
it But You know? Yeah. But I kind
of need it. Yes. Right? And so when
the currency shifts to attention,
well, now you're going to be making compromises
again. Wow. But the compromises are gonna be
on, like, your hayah, your family, and and
those kind of things. I like the hayah.
Even even
even if the intention is to make a
video,
and a person hurts someone else,
lies to them or, you know, emotionally scars
them, they still are left with the sin
even if it's fake.
Even if you go and tell the person,
oh, no. It's just a prank. I just
did it for the video. Yeah. Because the
prophet, you know, he he forbid us from
scaring the believer, for example. And lying while
joking. And lying you while joking. Right. And
lying lying while joking.
Right?
So so the sin stays there. The sin
stays there,
and now it's public. It's documented. Yeah. It's
documented. And and it's a recurring sin. It's
not a private sin. It's a compound sin.
Yeah. Because, like, every time Every time someone
views it. Someone views it, and every time
someone's inspired by it
and does it to
them.
You know? So they they started a bad
sunnah. And how many people, like, watch these
pranks and go do them to their own
families in front of them? And they see
that they see, oh, this person is successful
doing it. Let me emulate them. Success again.
Yeah. Let me copy. Let me copy. That's
the formula. So, it's So, we need to
define success now, you know. Exactly.
Let's define a Sheik. Exactly. What is success
like in in our time? Like, how does
a person
successfully
engage with technology?
Mhmm. Right? Isn't that a question? Yeah. Like,
you know what I mean? That's it.
That's social media. Wait. Do you wanna cut
this part, man? You wanna cut. You're gonna
get it and have it at the very
end smile.
I need that picture. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly.
No. Just Marcello. There's something I read in
it. So there's a quote that I got
from there that I like to repeat.
The people you follow
is the company you keep.
When you when you wrote that, what what
what does that mean to you? So what
it means is, like, you think
you think about growing up before
before technology. Right? The company that you kept
was who? It was the friends you ate
lunch with at school.
It was probably like, I'll give you my
exam my my experience. Right? So growing up
suburbs of Houston,
public school. So it's the it's the friends
that you eat with that lunch. It's probably,
like, the kids on your street. Right? You
ride the bus to school together. It's the
kids in your parents' social circle,
and it's like the kids in your Sunday
school class with the mushrooms or your grand
class. Right? That that's sort of the company
that you keep. You choose some of it,
you don't choose some of it. Mhmm. But
that that's sort of your circle. And
you had a relationship
with celebrities,
you know, famous people, so to speak, in
the sense of, like, oh,
Hakim Lashon is my favorite player.
I have the Sports Illustrated where he's on
the cover. You know, I have his basketball
card.
I watch the games, but, like,
that's kinda it.
Right? Or, like, oh, this is my favorite
actor. I've seen all their movies. That's kind
of about it. But now, it's like, okay.
If I follow this person online,
it's a parasocial relationship.
They don't know that I exist,
but I see everything that they do every
day.
And is this especially like a fam like
family vloggers. Right? Okay. I I know what
the inside of their home looks like. I
know their kids, how old they are, their
ages. I know what kind of food they
eat. I know what kind of stuff they
make. I know where they go on vacation.
I know their likes, their dislikes. I'm keeping
company with them, but they have no idea
who I am or that I exist. But
I'm immersing myself in learning as much as
I can about them. Mhmm. And so before
it was you would get like an interview
in a magazine would be like the extent
of it. Or you'd have to go and
get like the biography of the person and
read about it. You have to read. Right?
And and that would be the extent of
the knowledge that you got. But that was
also a one time thing. Right? Like, you
go and you went and you read a
biography of
Michael Jordan or whatever.
And that was it.
But, like, now, if you're a fan of
LeBron James,
like, you could be consuming
hours of his content on a daily basis.
Every day you could be seeing everything that
he tweets, everything he posts on Instagram.
You could be, you know, if he releases
a new, he's got a new podcast, you
watch his new video that he puts on.
If it's not that, you look up his
highlights on YouTube. You know, you just constantly,
you can immerse yourself in that one person
to like
the, you know, it's almost unlimited. Yeah. How
much content you can get from that person.
But
to that point, you're now,
if I'm spending so much time
following that person's content,
that becomes the company that I keep. And
from this, because,
like, for example, LeBron James, for example. I
don't I don't I don't like it when
a lot of the young basketball players, particularly,
we can make this with any sport or
any profession.
They look at the NBA because they try
to emulate NBA moves and practices, and you
don't have the basics down. Right? But one
thing I tell him is like, especially with
this new podcast, this is JJ Redick, I
think it is. Right? It's like, okay. What
are the moral practices and the mentality
of a winner
that we can extract from that? Like, when
you watch him play, okay, you see a
certain move that he does. Okay? You practice
that move over and over again and you
get what somebody that kind of knows basketball
says, look, before you wanna do a turnaround
fade away, first get your footwork right. Okay?
Which side of the ball do you dribble?
So kind of
Tell like you're mad at someone for doing
step back threes on. Yes. I'm mad at
my 9 year old for doing step back
threes. It's like, I'm asking the 3 point
line. A 3 point line. Come on, man.
And so is it and I'm gonna use
this word.
Is it realistic
to say
just totally cut off
social media
for for our young men. No. It's hard.
Mhmm. Right?
Because now this is where this is, like,
this is the public space.
Okay. When when you were in high school
and you wanted to hang out with your
friends, where did you go? High school, hanging
out with my friends, the gym, or
Go out to restaurants. Restaurant. Yeah. Restaurants. Yeah.
Yeah. Movie theater? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah.
The theater? Come on. The mall. The theater.
The mall? The mall. Okay. The mall was
the big one. Right? You would get dropped
off. You'd walk around with your friends and
hang out. You'd probably eat something but food
court. Yeah. Flashback
gaming room. I'm a little closer to high
school, but
yeah. But,
but that was the public space. That's where
you went to hang out. Mhmm. Now, you
ask you ask like a 16, 17 year
old kid, well, especially a boy, where where
do you hang out with your friends?
My my kid's not asking me to drop
them off at the mall.
They they might sometimes go to the movie
theater, but really not all that much, especially
in comparison to what we did when we
were kids. Oh, yeah. But this yeah. What
they're doing is they got the headset on,
and they're playing games together. Or Netflix. Or
or or anything. But even but even when
they're talking to each other, right, it's it's
online.
It's not in person. Sometimes they're texting each
other when they're with each other, like we
Yeah. Mentioned in the beginning. Okay. Yeah. You're
watching the Super Bowl and everyone's on their
phone because you're sending each other the memes
Exactly. For the game related to the game.
Yeah. Yeah. What does that do
to the interaction
element of a man?
A young man.
Yeah. I think it I think it hurts
it because there are certain social skills, excuse
me, that you don't develop.
Okay.
Yeah. And I see it. I see it,
and I hate I hate to be because
my kids do the okay boomer thing to
me. I hate to be the boomer, but,
like, I see it at work with,
like, the really young kids.
They don't have
the social skills of knowing how to conduct
themselves sometimes. Okay. Like, just, you know, how
to shake hands and, like, talk to someone
and
may maybe have to make small talk. And
I'm not saying like not being able to
make small talk is like the end of
the world or something Right. But like there
is a level of sort sort of social
awkwardness that enters into the picture when you're
just not used to meeting people. What were
you telling me about? Meetings.
Like when there are meetings in the text?
Yeah. Even at work, right, when people are
in meetings, they're constantly on their phone. Like,
if you're working from home, like, that's one
thing. Right? You're not in the same room
as other people, So the way that you
behave is gonna be differently. Mhmm. Right? You're
on you're on Zoom.
Okay. You know, I'm not gonna lie. Like,
I have it down. Or if I'm on
Zoom,
I know how I can use my phone
without it showing on the camera. Like, I
still maintain eye contact with the camera. Like,
everyone everyone come on. Everyone's got that. Right?
But but people you know, sometimes you go
off camera Mhmm. And you're just playing games
on your phone, you're scrolling social media,
You're working from home, you got Netflix playing
on on one screen while you're working on
the other. Like, there's just this super distraction
mode where you're not really
connected to anyone or anything. Right. Right. SubhanAllah.
That's the that's the distraction. But you said
that even some supervisor, when they go to
look for a job or or when they
get their evaluation.
Yeah. And people like, I think I think
it can hinder it can hinder someone's growth.
Right? We were we talked about focus and
stuff earlier before starting.
And I think
the ability to focus and keep yourself free
of distraction is a skill. Right? And so
in in the professional world, especially,
once you're in like the 5th, 6th, 7th
year of your career,
you know, probably you've got a degree, you've
got some kind of certification, you're doing some
kind of job, whatever, you know, whether it's
accounting or finance or technology or whatever, project
management, this, that. At a certain point, people's,
like, raw skills of the thing that they
have to do for their job sort of
level off. Mhmm. Right? Okay. You know, like,
I I used to ask because my dad
was a my dad was a pharmacist.
And so I used to ask him in
the hospital, I'm like, well, what, you know,
what makes someone good versus not good? Because
I worked as a tech for a while.
And he was like, well, you gotta understand.
He goes, everyone's replaceable because everyone's skill set
is the same.
Everyone's got the exact same PharmD degree.
All these people were at the top of
their class and did really well, and they're
all super qualified,
but now it just comes down to who
people wanna work with. Mhmm. Who knows how
to actually run the pharmacy, manage people, and
and talk to people, and all of that.
And I think what happens at work is
that people, like, they don't realize because especially
it happens, and I'll say kind of the
unique Muslim thing.
You know, humdulillah, a lot of us grow
up going to good schools, getting good educations,
and things like that. So we kind of
enter into the workforce thinking like, okay, I've
been above average my whole life.
There's no reason for me to think that's
not gonna continue. Right. Except that everyone else
is also sort of above average. Mhmm. And
so now all these things I'm good at,
like, well, everyone else is good at them
too. Right. And all these things that I
thought that I was really awesome at and
could figure out, well, like,
other people kinda do it a little bit
better. Right. Right. Yeah. And so now I
need to figure out how to move ahead,
how to get ahead, how to develop new
skills.
And if someone has been spending the last
5 years working,
and and I know COVID was what, it
was 4 years ago. Mhmm. Right? That's a
lot. If you spent the last 4 years
not deliberately working to increase your skill set
or work on yourself, and you've just been
doing this cruise control, like, yeah, I get
my stuff done and I'm distracted and I
watch Netflix and I do this and I
do 20,000,000 things and, yeah, I can work
while I watch Instagram, blah blah blah.
Like, people notice. Yeah. People can notice how
engaged you are at work, how checked in
you are at work, and and also that
people notice your level of progress.
Someone can look and say, like, you're exactly
the same
today as you were 4 years ago. Wow.
And unless you've put in some effort to,
like, actually grow and develop yourself,
it's not gonna happen. And to be able
to do that, you to be able
to put the distractions aside and actually like
kind of get that exercise of like study
and development and work on things. You you
commented and you spoke about one of the
books we talked about earlier, Deep Work by
Yeah. Cam Newport. Would you advise that for
I think it's a great book, and I
and I think I think the thing that
he points out is that the ability for
someone to
grapple with a problem,
or an idea or a concept for like
4, 5, 6 hours Mhmm.
Is now, like,
a unique skill set. Mhmm.
Because somewhat most people would be like, yeah,
I can I can learn anything? Everyone everyone
thinks that. Everyone thinks I can learn anything
because I have access to all the information.
Resource. Everyone thinks I can learn anything.
But, like,
try to learn something
and see how long it takes before your
brain is just like, yeah, I can't take
it somewhere. I gotta work on something else.
Yeah. Right? Like, you can you can probably
go like 20 minutes max.
And you're like, yeah, I need a break.
And you start scrolling social media, blah blah
blah. And then you come back and like
give another 15 minute chomp. It's like a
choppy WiFi. Ex exactly. That's a perfect example.
It's like It's your your
your entire process is gonna be laggy. The
whole development process is lagging exactly like that.
And so someone that can actually sit and
maintain focus for that long
is unique
and is gonna be valuable then in the
marketplace. Let me find a look. Chef, there's
one thing I was thinking of when we
were talking when we were talking about friends
and and relationship building and whatnot.
So you mentioned there's a skill set
that's required to develop relationship.
But there's something
specific to men
that, you know, we read about in a
lot of the, like, the classical works, you
know, the Islamic works and history and whatnot,
called Farasa. Mhmm. Right? How a man is
supposed to be able to to sit with
another man and kinda just kinda size him
up. Know what kind of what kind of
guy he is. And that's something big for
men because, you know, inshallah, when you when
you
make relationships, you're supposed to be able to
to know what type of dude this is
just by comments or ways they talk, ways
they act, where they've been, who they chill
with, and stuff like that. And when you
become a father Mhmm. You're supposed to rate
somebody that comes to ask for your daughter's
hand. Exactly. Right? You're just supposed to sit
with somebody and kinda like know off the
bat, like, yeah, yeah, I know what kind
of dude this is. Right? And I feel
like with social media, that's like almost disappearing.
Right? Yeah. Yeah. It's almost disappearing. Yeah. Like,
oh, oh, yeah. It's been rep I would
say it's been substituted.
Substitute. Yeah. Like substitutes. It's been substituted. Or,
like, I you know, I remember,
a relative in our family was getting married.
Okay. Right? And so my my dad was
kind of the the point person. And so,
you know, like, oh, so and so has
offered their hand for so and so. My
dad was like, okay.
And he was like, you know, tell him
to go meet us at this restaurant for
dinner.
Alright.
Cool. And so we go and we sit
there
and, you know, it's my dad's role. I'm
just kinda taking a backseat. I'm like, alright.
I don't I don't gotta for the fun
part. I don't gotta worry about it. Watch.
And so
the whole time, he said, my dad's just
making small talk with the guy.
Right? He and I'm thinking, like, okay. We're
vetting this guy from marriage, asking him, like,
this this this this this, you know, how
do you how was you know, he was
just making small talk the whole time, and
then when we finished Mhmm. I'm like, you
didn't ask him anything. He's like, I got
I got what I needed to know. Boom.
Listen, man. That is And he's like, you
just That is so golden. He's just like,
you just gotta there's a certain things about
how they talk, how they conduct themselves,
what kinds of things they say. They're he's
just like, I got what I needed. Oh,
that's that's just Yeah. That is the value
with sitting with your elders right there. That's
rites of passage.
That's it. Because exactly what you said
when you didn't talk to him about the
the juicy issues or, you know no. He's
like, no. I got because the body language
that he says something. How did he respond?
What was his, you know, his facial? You
know, all of that, subhanahu, takes place. And
I think that's depleted with the social media.
It's it's it's reduced to an emoji. Pretty
emoji. Yeah. Emoji. So, his LinkedIn page? Yeah.
And he seems pretty good. Well, and that's
the thing. Like, I remember someone asked me
to vet someone. And what I did is
I looked them up online. I'm like, oh,
here's all the pictures of this person here.
And this is the stuff they posted. I'm
like, this is how I sized them up.
And I was just like, okay. Ashraf, I'm
I'm playing the wrong game. You told me
this about Niemab. You said Niemab asked when
when a young man came for He he
came, and the imam he was asking the
imam for help with getting married. And he
was like, let me see your phone.
He opened up social media app and went
to the, you know, the for you page,
and he was like,
it's a stuff with a lot of kids.
What what do you want what do you
want who do you want me to recommend
for you with this? You know? And it's,
Yeah. I don't understand. So so, I mean,
when talking about family,
you know, it kind of separates the interaction
or has a potentiality to separate the interaction.
Friends, we kinda seek to be validated to
increase the interaction, or
the number of interactions that we have kinda
validates us, making us more popular and, you
know, would be termed as success.
Well, now, going into this chapter, you kind
of alluded to it, you know, having the
firasa, having the insight of being able to
decipher, and you gave the beautiful, beautiful story
of your father, may Allah,
preserve him,
of of of being able to decipher and
see if this is the right person or
not, and how that's to kind of taken
away with the social media element. When looking
at and this is a reality, when looking
at the females
and the young men, they go on to
social media,
and they look at the opposite gender. Right?
And allowing that to distract them, even even
offline. You know, to be honest, I mean,
we've we've all dealt with youth,
all of us. We all were youth in
this country, in in any country in actuality.
But, you know, especially for, like, those that
are in late high school, early college, and,
you know, they're told, okay, you can't until
you graduate, don't even think about it. And
some of them are mufftoon.
Some of them are heavily,
heavily, heavily distracted,
by the opposite gender.
What would you all advise in regards to,
you know, especially online, especially on the online
sector,
when getting on social media and
you know, we can even talk about notifications,
how one needs to deal with the notification
aspect.
How to properly navigate
through that? I think it it just everything
changes so rapidly Mhmm. With, like, how people
talk to another. Right? Like,
when I started doing Pick A Social Media
Project,
it was like adding each other as friends
on Facebook. Okay.
Now it's like
you're sending each other disappearing messages on Snapchat.
Disappearing messages on snap. Can you break that
down? So basically, it's, you know, you send
there's no chat history. Right? Like, if you
on WhatsApp, WhatsApp will prompt you, like, do
you wanna download your whole history? Mhmm. Right?
So, you've got all the messages there. Mhmm.
But disappearing just means that like there's no
trace, there's no track record.
So you you see it once and it
goes away? You see it once and it
goes away. Isn't that a snap didn't Snapchat
start out with that? Exactly.
And I think other apps have it now
too, but like I was saying is the
landscape is changing so rapidly all the time.
Mhmm. I don't know a good answer other
than, like, someone just really has to be
disciplined. Mhmm. And,
you know, just know what your pitfalls are.
And if it means you gotta delete the
apps, delete the apps. If it means you
gotta do something else, do something else. But
also it's,
you know, I've and I think there's a
and I I think there's a general theme
Mhmm. In terms of with the social media
stuff. Right? Which is
whatever you eliminate, you have to replace.
Mhmm. Right? And so if I'm saying, like,
okay. Right now,
friendships. If if my only interaction with friends
is with the headset playing multiplayer games online
Mhmm. Or only talking to each other on
the group chat. And I'm saying, okay. This
whatever. That thing might be good, but it's
opening me up to a lot of other
bad things. So I wanna cut it down.
If I'm going to cut it down, I
need to replace it with something else. Right.
Right. So, if I'm, you know,
the group chat, we start getting dinner together.
If I'm not going to the mushroom and
meeting people, I mean, I start going to
the mushroom and meeting people. If I'm not
involved in any sports, maybe I get into
a guys' basketball group. You know? But whatever
the thing is, if you're eliminating, you gotta
replace it with something else. Right. And, like,
find some other way to fill your time.
Everyone's gonna be different. Everyone's got different ways
of doing it, but, like,
this is, I think, the true taqwa, mujaheda
Yeah. No. Of the time. That's the word.
Yeah. All of its all of the words.
Right? I mean, you said mujaheda, and I
think that's the I think, you know, I
I wanted to mention this earlier. There's that
real it's a good book called Indistractable
by Nir Eyal, e y a l. Okay.
And the the thing that I learned the
most from it is he says that distractions
like, we'll say, okay. This video game is
a distraction. He says, no. Those are what
he would term as proximal,
distractions. But the actual element of distraction
is a feeling. It's the he calls it
the he terms it as the, or defines
it as the inability
to deal with emotional discomfort.
Right? You don't wanna go through those uncomfortable
moments of studying of of deep work.
So what you do?
Right. You just scroll and go through other
people's worlds and see what they're doing. Everyone
knows you shouldn't text and drive.
Right?
Really?
Okay. Really? I didn't know that.
Okay. But but tell me what what happens.
Okay. Even if you're let's say you're you're
you're being good about it. Yeah. I'm not
using my phone while I'm driving. Okay. But
you get to a red light.
What happens? You scratch the itch, man. You
scratch the itch. You scratch the itch. Okay.
Going to sleep and waking up in the
morning. What what's the sunnah of going to
sleep? You gotta recite certain avkar. When you
wake up, you gotta recite certain avkar. Mhmm.
A lot of people don't. And I would
say it's not because they don't wanna follow
the sunnah, but I think a lot of
people are cognitively depleted.
Cognitively depleted. Because what happens is when you're
when you're going to sleep, this is what
happens to people. Right? You're
you're in bed, you got the alarm set,
everything lights are off,
watching Netflix,
watching YouTube, up until when?
The sweet spot. You know what the sweet
spot is?
The sweet spot is when you're watching something
and you're so tired that your eyes are
closing and
you momentarily fall asleep and the phone falls
on your chest, and you pick it back
up and keep watching.
And now, you know that if I turn
my phone off at this instant,
I'll be able to fall asleep right away.
Wow. And it's because and a lot of
people have commented that it's because there's this
inability
to be alone with our own thoughts. And
and and I'll take it one step further,
which is this,
and a lot of people have written about
this idea of white space.
Like, white space in our lives has disappeared.
Right? And that's just the downtime.
So if you're, you know, if you're at
work and you're walking from
you're walking from the 3rd floor to the
1st floor to get some food,
you're on your phone now. But before, there
was some there was just some quiet time.
Right. You're at a red light, there's some
quiet time. You're sitting in the waiting room
at the dentist. You're waiting in line at
the grocery store. Yes. Right? There's white space.
There's nothing for you to do. You're just
standing there waiting on the cashier. Now that
space is all gone. It's
taken up with the phone.
And
what I think,
and I think very strongly about this is
that the major impact that it's had is
it's traded off with Dua.
Because Dua is supposed to be that time
where your mind is calm,
Mhmm. And it's just a personal conversation with
Allah. Yeah. Right? Exactly. Yes. There's the ritualistic
duas, like, you read the morning supplications and
all that. Like, yeah, there's the ritualistic aspect
of Dua, but there's, like, the sincere Dua
that you just sit
and pour your heart out to Allah. Right.
And I think the thing that we have
now is because we're not able to be
alone with our own thoughts,
means we also can't be alone with Allah.
Right. And so now every spare moment is
filled up with a screen. Yes. SubhanAllah. And
and that's so beautiful because the process is
like, it reminds me of the verse, you
know, when Allah says,
a very, very good creation of the heavens
and the earth and the alteration in the
night and the day are signs from an
understanding.
Those that ponder
that they no. Other than that, those that,
mention Allah's, standing, sitting in line on his
sides. We have to. They think. They ponder.
So it it's the process of the.
Like, when you're sitting in, you know, you're
sitting in a a grocery line, and you're
sitting in traffic coming home from school,
and there's so many things that happen in
school,
and you just turn off and you just
you just quiet and you just think of
you you ponder, you you review your day,
you review your actions. And then from that,
it's a and then what do they what
do they
do? So, they thought they had the mental
process,
they went through it, and then they came
out and said something that acknowledges
the thinking.
Because they looked at the creation. I can't
create this.
What if there's no time to do?
Well, that's that's what the that's where we're
that's what we're talking about. That's why you
know what you know what's popular online? Yeah.
Shower thoughts.
Shower thoughts. These are like epiphanies people have
while they're in the shower. So, Bahar,
which is like what? And it's and, you
know, and it's because that's the only time
you're not on your phone. No. You're not
here. And so your Wow. Your mind your
mind, you know, when you consume stuff, your
mind it's like exercising. Right? You need you
need a rest day. Your mind needs time
to rest to, like, make the pathways and
make connections and for ideas to kind of
cultivate.
But if you never let it do that,
all of a sudden when you're in the
shower for 10 minutes, it's like your mind
is like make doing all this overdrive.
Yeah. That's kinda sad, especially for a young
man because he has to know how to
separate and detach. Like, Sola is is supposed,
you know, is to detach from all of
these things and to ponder, but even outside
of it in the white spaces like you
mentioned. And even talk about that, you know,
within one of the workshops I do is
talking about boredom, how boredom is so beneficial
for people, but having to use it in
the right way. I think there was some
survey that was done at, a lot of
people that that are would would fall into
or
be bored,
they would be more altruistic.
They would go out and donate blood. They
would go out and, you know, if they
were active
within that boredom. But And that would be
So, Pana, the problem is boredom, especially amongst
our youth, is looked at as a negative
thing. Yeah. I mean, all human beings. I
don't wanna blame the youth here, but
used to look that as a negative thing
to where if we're bored something must be
wrong. I have to do something and if
unless I'm jailed
under a shower,
then, you know, that's what I'll be forced
to think, but it's really voluntarily
detaching. I think it's so
important
for a young man in particular because You
know, even growing up, Sheikh, like, sometimes we
have the funnest times
when we were bored. Like, with our friends,
with our siblings. You make a game. Creativity
comes out like, oh, you remember that game
we played? And, you remember when we decided
to do x y and z? Don't touch
the floor until the first Don't touch the
floor. Yeah. Yeah. Some crazy stuff. And I
think we make the most memorable moments with
that boredom. And today and something with parents
too. Yeah.
Parents are scared to leave their kid to
let their kids be bored. Yeah. It's like,
oh, the poor thing, man. Just give him
an iPad. You know? Why why is he
just sitting there? It's like there's nothing for
them to do. Like, you know what? That's
because the parents are on the phone.
Yeah. Oh, okay. The kid's worried because the
parent doesn't have time for them. The the
parent's on the phone. I know. I'm a
kabab. You know my Sheikh, I remember when
I went to when I studied fiqh in
Medina, I started with Sheikh Aymer Bajid.
Mhmm. I mean, he's a young he's a
young Sheikh and he's not he's not he's
not too old, maybe in his forties and
whatnot. Yeah. And he's very energetic.
When we started
our
course, the first thing is just like he's
like, alright guys, just leave leave social media,
leave all the, like, your phones, all that
stuff. If it's important enough, it's gonna get
to you. They'll find a way to you.
100%. And they're like, Sheikh, what about the
news? The ummah, and what's going on?
He's like, even the news. Doesn't
read the news. I felt I felt so
bad, you know, because I'm I'm like, Sheikh,
how can
be disconnected
from the news? He's like, look,
most of the news you're gonna end up
reading or watching
is irrelevant to you and just adding, you
know, distracting you from something better. He's like,
if it's important enough,
you're gonna hear about it
and you're gonna go and read more about
it and that's it and just leave. Make
a pleasant exit. And that's it. He's like,
if it's not important,
why do you need it in your life?
You're not gonna be a student of knowledge
until
you leave it. You leave everything.
And I think that was my like,
it was that moment where I just felt
I felt sovereign, you know. Sovereign. Yeah. Like,
you had control of your life. I had
I had control
Yeah. Over my life. You know, people would
call me. I'd find, like,
you know,
like a few missed calls. Mhmm. And they're
like, yeah. If not, I don't wanna get
back to them. Yeah. I don't want Yeah.
Yeah. Oh, let me call this person back.
Right. Right. Right. And I'll call them like,
okay. And this is goes back to the
hadith.
Mhmm. Right? Like, I'm not gonna okay. This
person is just gonna take an hour of
my time talking about hello, Adam, what Right.
You know, the the the Sahab and the
Salaf,
they used to be they used to count
their minutes.
And I remember reading
reading a quote from one of the salaf.
He said,
between the time difference between
chewing bread and drinking soup,
and dipping the bread inside the soup and
eating it together
is the recitation of 50 verses. That's all.
Right?
So he they actually calculated that
that time
difference. So they used to maximize their time
to that extent. That's how that's and, you
know, I forget, it's dealing with lots of
fajr.
Oh. They say, other than they say the
time frame
it slipped in my mind, but they they
they they measured it by the amount of
verses that were read.
Yeah. I can't remember what exactly was that
slipped my mind, but they'll say the amount
of reading this amount of verses. So it
shows you how connected they were. They use
that as a as a measurement.
How much they read Quran, first of all?
To know what an average verse takes. Right.
SubhanAllah. SubhanAllah. But again, you know, subhanAllah. I
think,
you know, it's just important to to to
know to voluntarily detach and and ultimately have
control over your life.
And I think that's very, very important, you
know, for the man to have a level
of control over his life and say, okay.
I know when to stop, you know, with
with the whether it's with the family and
staying at the dinner table, whether it's with
friends and knowing when to because Because some
of those friends, you may have beneficial conversation
for an hour, but you've got to prioritize.
I got homework or I'm studying for this
course, this online course. Can't talk to them
now. And having enough courage
to even say, Yeah, I was just busy
at the moment. Or, I don't feel like
talking right now. Right? And that, you know,
takes courage. The Power to Say No. There's
a really good book. It's, I think it's
called The Power to Say No, knowing when
to say no. Right? You know, for yourself
and on social media. And that's why, you
know, you mentioning Mujahid, it's enough fighting the
self for the betterment
of yourself. One person that I really admire.
Yeah. I remember I was visiting city that
this guy was in. I was like, hey,
let's, you know, get together for dinner. Yeah.
And then I I'm like, this is the
time that I'm free, whatever. It was a
business trip. And he was like, oh, no.
I can't come. And I was kind of
pushed him and then finally he was just
like, I'm sorry. I can't. This is the
time that I memorized Grom. Mhmm. And I
was just like, wow. Wow. I was like,
alright. Yeah. What are you gonna say? What
are you gonna say? And I was just
like that stuck with me. It's like, in
order in order to accomplish and this is
an adult. Right? So he's not a kid
going to mother's house, an adult with a
job and everything.
But this idea of, like, if you want
to actually accomplish something or do something or,
you know, kind of build the confidence of,
like, yes, I I did this thing then
it's gonna require
control. You have to be, like, intentional with
your effort. Yeah. And on top of things,
you can't be letting, like, the device control
you Mhmm. Or your actions. Right? Like, it
takes
intentionality and purpose to be, like, no. This
is the time that I memorize we're on,
and this is not negotiable.
So, I I mean, in the month of
fasting, what would you say about the fasting
from electronics? Is that a a healthy means
or what would you what's your thoughts on
that? I'm not a fan of people who
do the announcement of, like, I'm fasting for
30 days from social media, and, like, they
make a big hoopla about it. It's, like,
just shut shut it off. You're gonna do
it. Yeah. You know? Like, you're sort of
you're you're drawing all this attention to yourself
unnecessarily, like, again, for what? Like Yeah. You
know, it's
Well, Are you worried that people aren't gonna
miss you so you have to let them
know, like, please let me know that you
missed you while I'm gone? In. They're like,
need to hear. It's it's very desperately seeking
some validation. It's open and do it again.
But, you know, I I hesitate to, like,
turn fasting into a Lent type of thing
of, like, oh, I'm giving up this thing
for Ramadan or whatever.
And I think it's more important to focus
on, like, first look, first and foremost is
the the purpose of fasting, which is,
you know, your taqwa,
forgiveness, and Quran.
Like, focus on that,
the social media, let it be. But, like,
if there's sustainable habits you can build through
the course of fasting,
then, yeah, one thing that I would recommend
is, like, instead of just taking the 30
day break and then going back to exactly
what you had before,
maybe if Ramadan, like, last 10 nights presents
an opportunity, like, maybe make it an audit.
Right? Okay.
You know, what
what apps have notifications? I'll need to turn
those off. Let's start there. What apps do
I have on my phone that maybe I
can delete? Do I really need Facebook and
LinkedIn and Snapchat and Instagram and Twitter and
this other whatever? Do I need all of
these things?
Or can I maybe delete a couple of
them? Maybe I delete it off my phone,
I leave it on the on the laptop.
So I I don't think that I'm missing
out, but, like, it's not there all the
time. Maybe I need to go through who
are all the people that I'm following. Mhmm.
What pages have I liked? What what accounts
do I need to unfollow?
Evaluation. You know, what what's that group chats
do I need to leave? Filter. You know,
filter. Make maybe make this an audit time
so that what you're doing now doesn't it's
not that you gave it a break for
30 days and you're right back at it,
but maybe something that's sustainable and carries some
momentum after the month is
Mhmm.
Evaluation, holding yourself accountable,
being responsible. And I think that's very, very
important in regards to what we're talking about
today.
I think that's the overarching message is be
responsible,
be focused, and know when to say no.
Know what's mostly important, prioritizing.
This is a beautiful, beautiful gathering. I learned
a lot from both of the illustrious brothers
here. We ask Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala to
make you an individual of focus and purpose.
May Allah bless you all.
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