Q&A Session Recording
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Channel: Fatima Barkatulla
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AI Generated Summary ©
The importance of learning about Islamic education for children is beneficial for parents, as it requires focus and requires guidance. The speakers emphasize the need for parents to encourage children to be a Muslim and reinforces their belief in paraphrasing words. The challenges of learning Arabic and privacy laws in the media industry are discussed, along with upcoming online studies and plans to promote their channel.AI Generated Transcript ©
Bismillah Alhamdulillah wa salatu salam ala Rasulillah Dear brothers and sisters As Salam alaykum Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh. I'm your sister Fatima baraka to Allah. This is my YouTube 6000 sub 6000 subscriber
q&a session, as you can tell, is the first time I'm doing a live q&a session on YouTube. And so I'm a little bit nervous, I'll have to admit that because I've got all these things in front of me, I've got this camera, this new camera, I've got this laptop, I've got microphone, I'm just hoping, in sha Allah that everything is going to go smoothly. Because I don't have a producer or anything in the studio, like I usually do with film feed podcast Hamdulillah.
And so I'm hoping we're not going to have any glitches.
Well, Inshallah, in this session, what I want you to do is give people the opportunity to ask any questions that they've got, especially those of you who have been, you know, kindly who've subscribed to the YouTube channel, and who've been following our talks, and some of the other things that we've been posting online.
I've got quite a lot of questions, actually. But I've already, you know, they've already been submitted to me. But if you're here live, and you're a subscriber, you can easily type in any questions that you've got, and it can be on anything really, you know, this is just me, reaching out to you, I guess, all 6000 of you. I know that not all of you are going to be attending live, but at least those of you who can. And by the way, I know there's like at least 6000 people who
watch my channel but haven't subscribed, at least double the amount of subscribers actually haven't subscribed, but they're, they're just regularly watching. So if you're one of those people, please subscribe because that's how channels like this can grow. Right. That's how we can start to spread the message and especially, you know, positive messages about Islam, our deen. So I'm going to go straight into the questions.
And as I said,
you can write any comments and questions that you want in the chat. Yes, Salam aleikum. People are saying so when it comes to healthcare, and thank you for joining me today.
And without further ado, I'm going to go straight into the first question that was submitted to me. Okay, the first question from sister or mama.
She says a Salam o aleikum? Did you take a break from pursuing your own studies to just focus on your kids and their Islamic education?
Was there a structure or curriculum you followed with them? Okay. So that's a very good question.
And I guess what she's alluding to is the fact that, you know, I, myself before I had children, I was a student in Egypt,
studying the DEA and studying Arabic language, especially Quran, and lots of other subjects that allows her to her college of Atlanta University, and at various centers in Cairo. And then I basically got married and,
you know, I had a child, about a year or so afterwards or two years afterwards, actually.
And then, you know, since then Alhamdulillah, I've had four, four children,
and Hamdulillah. Most of them are, well, all of them are actually Islamically adults. So, time has flown.
But as system I'm asked, Did I take a break from pursuing my own studies to focus on the kids and their Islamic education? You know, because I had begun studying before I had children. And because I see studying the deen as a lifelong thing, you know, it's an ongoing, lifelong process. I actually didn't stop because actually, at the time when I got married cetera, I will when I had children, I mean, I wasn't in a formal institution or anything like that, at that time. And so what I did is
when it became possible, and when you know, things settled down, et cetera, first of all, even even while I was like, no
Seeing my children, my first child,
the learning never stopped. Okay, I was still listening to a lot of lectures and these were like lectures in Arabic.
In those days, it was cassettes, okay, or CDs, right that I had. So I was still still listening to those lectures in Arabic and continuously improving my Arabic My, my Islamic knowledge, right?
Even while I was breastfeeding, believe it or not, okay, so I would be up at night, obviously, nursing a newborn child, you know, those of you who are mothers in that will know exactly what that's like. And one of the ways I kind of got through it, you know, got through the sleepless nights and the, and the toughness of like, the early years was by keeping my mind busy with positive messages, you know, and seeking knowledge, whether it was knowledge of Arabic, or, you know, any aspect of Islam, any of the Islamic sciences, I was keeping myself busy by listening, right? Because obviously, you can breastfeed, and you can listen to something at the same time.
So that's what I was doing.
Whenever I could.
And then as my children got a little bit older,
you know, I enrolled into Islamic programs, courses, sometimes ones that were intensive, sometimes those that were online,
because that's what fitted around my children's lives better.
But, you know, I never actually stopped. And
that's because what I saw my Islamic education is actually beneficial to my children.
So for example, if I was attending a course about the Sierra, right, and if I had, the more I was learning about the Sierra, for example, and I'm talking about like, an advanced level, then I could bring that home, and I would bring that home. And I would be telling my children those stories at night, right? Bedtime Stories. So, for me, if I was excited about knowledge, and if I was absorbing that knowledge, my children could only benefit from that, you know, they were getting to soak that up as well. Right? Even when my son was a baby, I was memorizing Surah Baqarah that time, I remember. And you see, I saw that as immensely beneficial for my son, because as I was reciting, and
repeating, you know, he was on my lap, he will be absorbing that. No doubt. In fact, even in pregnancy, I think, you know, children absorb something of their mother, whatever the mother is doing, right.
So, yeah, it never really stopped. But it did change in its
in its mode, you know, the mode of study changed. And then as they got older, and they went into school, or you know, sometimes I even hired a sister to like a
child minder, system sister to come with me to courses, okay, so sometimes they were like, these intensive weekend courses, and the sister would come with me, and because there was like a break room.
She would be in the break room with my daughter. And
I would in the breaks, I would breastfeed.
Also, I would spend as much time as I could with my daughter in between, but during the actual class times, the sister would look after my daughter right next to me in a row, right.
So yeah, it was interesting, like the way I guess I tried to manage things.
I didn't do that when they weren't absolutely newborns. You know, this is like when they're a bit older.
Because I do think that you know, motherhood requires a lot of focus, and it does deserve our attention, right, undivided attention.
But I didn't see seeking knowledge as something that would
have anything but a positive impact on my family, and on my children especially.
And then you asked did
was there a structural curriculum I followed with my own with my children's Islamic education? Well,
I think look,
again, you know, seeking knowledge and children learning about Islam is supposed to be a lived thing. It's like your whole lifestyle your whole every day is supposed to be
The educational fold them right in that regard, it's not something that you just like, separate from everyday life. Right? That's the difference between us and secularists, isn't it that we don't separate religion from everyday life.
And from this public space, so when I'm teaching my child, it's through osmosis, you know, my child is learning through being in an Islamic environment, looking at and feeling the way their parent is thinking and acting and behaving, right, all of that adds to the knowledge and the absorption of what it is to be a Muslim. But of course, like, at some point, you, you do start formally teaching them as well. For me, it was a very gradual process is something that they
that I really did, quite intuitively, I would say, right, so it starts off with stories at nighttime. I think that's where you've got to start, you know, bedtime stories are an recitation, memorizing the short sutras.
And you know, that that's really a lot of Islamic knowledge that right there, you know, our children will absorb.
So the Stories of the Prophets, you know, I really wanted my children to absorb all of those. And then even the Sierra and incidents from the Sierra, sometimes it was me, telling them those things. Sometimes it was actually through, you know, audio books or lectures of scholars that my children as they got older started to really like listening to so,
you know, I was just making sure that they were absorbing
all of the important stories that they need to know.
Also, from a young age, I was teaching them Arabic as a language. Okay.
I was actually myself talking to them in Arabic, when well, for some of them anyway, when they were very little. And then eventually, what I did was get a tutor, an online tutor. And so there's like, in Egypt, right. There's two Institute's that I personally recommend. One is Ortho Institute kotoba.net, I believe, and the Bucha Institute. I'm afraid I don't have the link off the top of my head, but you can just look up Bucha Institute, Egypt, I'm sure it will come up.
And essentially, my children had like weekly lessons with an Arabic teacher, where they could actually learn Arabic as a language because I felt that was important alongside learning Quran. So that, you know, they're not just seeing the Quran as something that they are learning by rote. It's not just parrot parroting, you know, they're actually understanding the weight of these words, the weight of the words of a lot, right.
In terms of curriculum, I think I've always really emphasized the five pillars, you know, the five pillars of Islam, and the six pillars of Eman, I think those, every parent needs to kind of explicitly and
quite deliberately go through those with their children, and, you know, explain what our beliefs are, you know, the essential beliefs of a Muslim.
Because that really helps shape their whole understanding of the world, right? Their whole worldview. Right? And it's, it's the most appropriate way to teach children up either, right?
You know, we don't need to teach them a list of, okay, the points, the way that maybe a student of knowledge would learn them, right? Children are different, they're in different mode. So instead, we need to make it a lived reality for them. Right? So when, for example, you know,
you keep your house smelling nice, right? You keep your house, a place of Quran, and you say to your children, and we want the angels to come, we want the angels to be in our house. So through that, they learn about the angels.
And just all of the pillars right when something bad happens, you say, you know, God, that Allah or even when something good happens, right, you attribute it to Allah. And so they're learning about other
when somebody passes away, or when they hear about somebody passing away, you talk about the hereafter. So obviously, like an attorney in an age appropriate way, you're teaching them the Six Pillars of Iman and you're teaching them the five pillars of Islam as they get on
there as well. So the first one is, of course, Shahada. I mean, they don't need to take their shadow and, you know, we should be teaching them La ilaha illallah, Muhammad Rasul Allah from a young age anyway. Okay.
But in terms of what it means, you know, we can teach them that we can teach them about the prophets, Allah, we can teach them about Allah subhanaw taala. And, you know, take them out in nature, let them see Allah Subhana Allah, Allah's creation, and then let them really feel and appreciate Allah. And his existence is oneness, right? And the fact that he deserves to be worshipped, let them really feel it. And any child because of their FitPro, because of the, like, innate, positive disposition that they have, that last month Allah has given them, they will naturally love Allah. Right, they will naturally believe they will naturally love, you don't need
to, like, you know, make a big deal out of it even right, you just need to introduce them to these things in a very deliberate way. Because in our times, people, young people are so addicted to these devices, and parents are introducing their children to devices at such a young age, that our children are not connected with nature anymore. Right. They're not connected with Allah's creation.
So if they're not connected, the last creation, how can they feel? Or how can they feel, you know, that sense of all that you need to feel in order to, to appreciate Allah and love Allah and know Allah. So I think it's really important, you know, unplug and get them out there, get them out, looking at the world, understanding the world, the real world.
And so I think, you know, for every parent, the five pillars, and the six pillars of human are very, very important, the most important to impart. You're teaching them the basics of Quran, and then when they get to a certain age, you're deliberately teaching them everything they're going to need to know, to at least be able to pray, right, to at least be able to pray the one salah, right? So all the doors and things that they need to know, you know, to hear that and what is the root Ibrahim right Allahumma, Salli, ALA, Muhammad, all of those
and short sword as at the very least, you know, if they're not memorizing Quran, at the very least shortsword and Surah, Fatiha, et cetera, you want them to know everything that they're going to need to know, for the salah.
My children also went to a Muslim school at Hamdulillah, right here in the UK,
in London.
And so I would say going to a Muslim school meant they had that I had backup, you know, in terms of Islamic education, it wasn't a substitute for me, teaching them, you know, it really was not a substitute. I feel like I'm really it was from the home that they learned Arabic properly, even though they did have some Arabic at school.
It was from the home that they learned to read the Quran properly. It was from the home that they even learnt quite a lot of the detailed aspects of Islam. Right. But I think being in that Islamic or Muslim environment, right being amongst other Muslims, of course, that has a positive effect. Because what that does is it reinforces what they're being taught at home. Right, and vice versa.
So I think and that was very deliberate as well, you know, like, we could have put our children into different types of schools. It wasn't easy for us to send our children to a Muslim school, you know,
especially secondary school, because it was not, it was private, costs money. And we couldn't afford it to be quite frank with you, you know, right at the beginning.
But Alhamdulillah we felt very strongly
about it, you know, together we, we discussed it,
when our children got places in those schools, we, you know, said Bismillah and we started that journey, hoping that Allah Subhana Allah would make it easy and would help us to be able to afford it. Eventually, you know,
initially, one of my sons did get a scholarship, I believe, yes, partial scholarship.
But then eventually Alhamdulillah you know, Allah Subhana Allah, he, he really, you know, when you take a step towards him and when you tell Allah Subhana Allah, what, what your intention is, he opens the doors and he makes it easy. And that's one of the advices that one of our Sheoak actually gave us
I remember, you know, when we were considering putting our son into Muslim secondary school and thinking we can't afford this, you know,
I remember chef, it was actually chef Achmed BBQ. Those of you some of you might know him, you know, he's a chef in, in UK
who was associated with our children's primary school at the time. And he said to he said, You know, when I put my son into a Muslim school, I couldn't afford it either. He said,
he said, Look, you've made the intention, you've got in,
just take the first step, just start. And Allah subhana, Allah will provide for you cut down on some things, you know, he said, cut down on holidays, you don't need to go on holiday, you can, you know, you can cut some of the unnecessary costs in order to be able to facilitate this. And you'll see that Allah will open the doors slowly but surely. And indeed, that is what happened. That is what happened. And hamdulillah all of our children went, went through that awesome secondary school.
So I think that was also definitely a support and a backup, you know, to that Islamic education. And of course, the school would have had a particular curriculum that they were following to.
And I think, although it wasn't particularly advanced, it was definitely
a good foundation, a firm foundation. And that's really what you want, don't you as a parent, right, you want a firm foundation being reinforced through discussions and through peers, through mentors, and Hamdulillah. That's what they were getting from that.
As well as that my children went to a health class after school. Okay.
And I think that really was a really good thing for them. You know, it gave them discipline.
It gave them a group of people who they, you know, all focused on Quran gave the mentors in the teachers, and it was just like, a different environment from school, of course.
So, yeah, those are really all of the kinds of different means that in a nutshell, I took, we took myself and my husband to help reinforce, you know, in Islamic education for our children.
As well as that, I would say, sometimes for on holidays, you know, we would go
to Muslim countries, or we would go to Islamic family retreats.
As a family, and I think all of that was very helpful. I took my children to Egypt a number of times
during the summer to attend
Islamic, like classes, or Arabic classes, so that they would be really immersed in that environment.
So yeah, I, you know, one of the phrases that I often use is make family your finest project. And as you can probably tell, I was treating it like a project. You know, literally every year I was planning, you know, what would be the most appropriate thing for each child.
It was flexible, it wasn't like rigid, but it was definitely
deliberate, was definitely deliberate. And I think, in our times, we can't afford to not be deliberate. Right? As parents, we've got to be deliberate, we can't just assume that they're going to learn the fundamentals. But if we focus on
establishing the Salah,
establishing the five pillars in our homes,
right. So as they get closer to the age of seven, you start teaching them the Salah, when they're seven, you start telling them to pray,
doesn't mean that you have to force them just you just tell them, Oh, it's so our time, come pray, teach them how to pray from beginning to end. And you do have to do that quite deliberately. And you have to literally go through the entire Salah with them, beginning to end, and then get them to do it in front of you. Right.
And then just be a little bit relaxed about it. When they're seven, you know, just start telling them by the time they're the age of 10, you start showing them that serious, you know, you really need to
interrupt what you're doing in order to pray. And you show that when you're when you go out, you're praying in public when you have to. You don't, you know, it's really through your own actions as parents, right that children then absorb your attitude. If you have an attitude where you're living your life around the Salah, they're going to do the same. You know, as you're leaving, you're saying, oh, have we prayed? Do we need to pray? Where are we going to pray? You know, those types of things. That attitude gets then inculcated in your child. You
If you're a person who's completely ignoring this haha, until, you know, you're panicking, and you're like, Oh, my God, we didn't factor in Salah.
You know, that's also going to be probably going to be absorbed by our children. So I think children are learning from what we do more than from what we say,
we've got to be the role models at the end of the day, right? Got to create the environment, the best environment we can for them,
to stack the deck in our favor, in order for them to be in sha Allah believers to be raised as believers Charlo I've got a course coming out soon, called Raising believers, so look out for it. Well, we are actually going to go through all of those types of things, all of those kinds of details, you know, like, how do you establish the Salah in your home.
And for those of you who are interested in HIV, in raising a half of
I've actually got a course where the my Muslim family if you look up my Muslim family.com, I believe
I've got a course with them, called you can raise a half of and if you you know, registered with them, Inshallah, you can attend that, that course and in it, I'm going to I share my framework for raising a half of in a holistic way. So I hope that helps.
Okay, that was quite a long answer. I need to maybe keep the answers a bit shorter. Let me see if any questions are in the chat.
Okay, how can I convince my spouse to wear niqab? She's a hijab. I have the love, but I want to her to wear niqab as well. Okay.
Well, I would say that
hopefully you've got a good relationship. And it's, you know, you can discuss things together.
I think
anything that's just a general thing, right? general statement, anything that one spouse would like the other spouse to do. Of course, if it's the husband, you know, we do have in Islam, we believe in a B, obedience to the husband, right. So if your husband would like you to do something, then as a wife, you should comply with that.
But just out of wisdom, I'm saying, you know, for the husband, that, of course, you want to do things with hikma, you want to do things with wisdom,
especially if somebody is maybe not used to something, or they're resisting the resistance to something, it's worth having a very loving, positive conversation with them write about why, but why it is that this thing is important to you. And
I would say, you know, reinforcing for your wife that you
think that she's beautiful, you know, you think that she's attractive, and, you know, giving her the reasons that you that you have, for whatever it is that you you want her to do.
I think, you know, that's the best way. And just as anyone who's trying to do therapy of their family, or trying to influence their family, the sledgehammer approach, so like, being really hard on it, and, you know, forcing people,
it's probably going to be counterproductive, you know,
definitely, as a husband, you know, husband has the right to say to his wife, you know, I'd like you to do this. And then she should comply. Right? That's like,
that's
not always what happens though, is it so that's why I'm kind of telling you that if you want if you want to be successful, and you don't want there to be resentment, and you don't want, you know, then to really understand your, your wife's psychology and then,
you know, be her best friend.
Take her in your confidence, and explain to her, you know, why it's important to you.
And, you know, have a two way conversation about it. I would recommend that as the better approach, you know, to any of these kinds of things. Because when somebody is convinced of the why and when they love to do something, okay? Or at least when they're just intellectually convinced, right? Then obviously, they're going to do it with more conviction, and they're going to do it with love. So, you know, that that is more that that will mean that they will do it properly.
Right. And they won't start hiding things. You know, this goes for anyone, really anyone you're trying to influence.
So, I hope that kind of answers your question.
Just off the top of my head, you know,
trying to think, you know, what is the HC my way of doing things, you know, brothers and sisters, sometimes when you listen to people online, and when you hear that she you're being asked a question.
You know, the easy answer is to say, well, just commander, you know, just give her the command and tell her she has to obey her husband. And you know, that's the easy answer, right? If I give you that answer, it might satisfy you as a man, you know, but is it actually going to have the positive result that you want?
Is it going to be conducive to building a loving relationship with your wife?
Probably not. Probably not. So that's why I'm giving you you know, the, not the letter of the law. But the spirit, the kind of the hikma way of doing things right using Hekmati using wisdom.
And wisdom is the best approach in sha Allah.
So, for example, you can give her the proofs, you know, the reasons why, from the Quran and Sunnah, that you want her to do this, it might not even just be from the ground. Instead, it might be something just personal that you prefer, right. And as a husband, you have the right to have a Libra, you have Libra and you have the right to have a Libra a Libra is like the protective jealousy that our husband has over his wife. Right, and vice versa. So, you know, you want to explain and express that in loving in a loving way to your spouse inshallah. You know, may Allah make it easy for you.
And I hope you you know, I wish you a wonderful marriage.
So question number two,
sister has a very long question here. Um, okay, let me just go for this one.
So it's just saying, I saw multicam, I was divorced with five children. And my children stay with their father.
I'm married to another person now.
Is it except it is exceptionally difficult for me to complete my obligation towards them. Staying under another man and taking care of my first husband's kids, please advise. Okay.
Well,
a question like, that is quite hard, because I don't have much information, right. Like, how old are the kids? What, what exactly is the context? How far do you live from from your ex husband? Right. But yeah, I do sympathize. You know, that's
must be difficult must be a difficult situation to be in.
You know, to be remarried, and then to have five children who are living with their, with with their father, with your ex husband.
And, of course, trying to juggle the needs of the two households, right?
Well, I guess, the way I would look at it is that your husband, your know, your husband has, right? You know, he has the greatest right over you. In fact,
Islamically speaking,
okay. And your children have rights. Okay? Well, they also have their father looking out for them. Right, and he has his responsibility towards them.
So, really, just as, like most things in life, it's a case of finding the balance, right? It's a case of trying to
be as fair as you can, and uphold the rights of, of each household, or of your children and your spouse
without
upsetting and causing any kind of imbalance, right? Because I think it's when there's an imbalance that problems can't right. So if you're completely ignoring your children and you're fully focused on your husband, then that's probably going to that is definitely not going to be a good thing right for your children in the long term. And hence not for you either.
And if you're
completely, you know, involved with your children and
your husband is feeling neglected or your new husband is feeling neglected.
Of course, that's also going to be have a negative effect for him as well as for you for your new life right for your for your marriage. So, I would actually recommend in a situation like that, that
that you have, you know, you meet you have a proper family meeting.
Perhaps with your ex husband there, with your new husband,
you know, have some kind of family meeting could be a phone call where you're all present, but you're fully present. And you really discuss, you know how you're gonna manage this. Now, I know a lot of families don't like having meetings, okay? They don't like having these explicit discussions.
Because we'd rather just, you know, just kind of just go along, go with the flow, and see how things happen. But, you know, I think that's too, that's too kind of trial and error, you know, and, it's probably not going to have a very positive result, if you just go with the flow,
I think it's really important when, when so much is at stake, right, so much is at stake, you've got these kids, their lives, you know, already, they've gone through their parents being divorced, you know, which is a big thing for children, right? That's a big thing for them. And, you know, I don't want to like highlight the negative statistics. But statistically, you know,
children who are from divorced families, there are certain things that they're going to experience or that they're more likely to experience. And you want to mitigate that, right, you want to mitigate the negative effects of that divorce, right? While at the same time, you want to nurture your new marriage, and you know, the whole situation in a positive way. And I don't think you can do that without having a family meeting with your ex spouse, with your husband, and yourself present, where all of you talk about what your needs are, you know, but each of you go into that meeting with, with with, with real sincerity, for wanting the best outcome for each of you, as well as for
the child for the children, you know, because so many lives are at stake here, those children are going to be the human beings of the parents of the future. You don't want them to have traumas in their lives, you know, more than is necessary, you know, all human beings are going to have ups and downs. But you don't you want to, like minimize the negative effect of the setup, right.
And so in order to do that, you've got to have a family meeting, you know, your husband, also, you know, understand what his needs are, where he feels, there might be an imbalance, where you think there might be an unbalanced where your ex husband might think, you know, the things could be done better, and try to find a win win solution. You know, what more can you do? Really, that's really the best approach that I would say you could have, right? Like, each of you, you know, be willing to compromise a little, be willing to think about what would be the best outcome, especially for the children, but for each of you, as well.
And do that with the spirit of, you know, being considerate, wanting the best for your fellow brother and sister in Islam, as well as for the children. And I think anything that you explicitly discuss and you come to an agreement about is more likely to succeed, right, it's more likely to be to have a positive impact for people to have to feel heard. Right, to feel that their their needs were listened to.
I think, you know, that's probably going to be the best approach. And then, maybe every year, you want to adjust that. Because as children get older, the needs change, etcetera, etcetera. So maybe every year, you want to do a little appraisal and just think, you know, is it going okay, can we adjust this a little bit?
Yeah. So
I don't think you can get away with just going with the flow, and just letting things happen haphazardly, and,
you know,
improvising, I really don't think so. I think it needs to be done properly. The adults need to get in a room, need to discuss it and need to come to some conclusions come to some agreement with a positive spirit positive intentions.
There's a really good book that I would recommend that you read. It's called the boy crisis by Warren Farrell. Okay. And in that book, he talks about like,
if a couple of divorced, what, you know, how can they kind of minimize the negative effect of that divorce on their children? And four of the things he mentioned, so I'll just tell you, of course, there's there's a lot more in the book. So I recommend you you have a look at the book because it's based on research.
One of the things he mentions is,
you know, having as much time with each parent as
possible, you know, is beneficial for the child. So it's not like too imbalanced in one direction or the other. Right?
Also, he says that the father and mother, the actual father and mother of the children living close together close to each other.
That really helps, you know, so if you're like, in completely different cities, completely different countries, that's going to be like, really hard. If you can live,
like 20 minutes away from each other Max, or something like that, you know, something that's
you can actually travel to each other easily, then, you know, he's he actually recommends that that's, that has a positive effect for the children, because then it's not like,
you know, when they would one parent, their whole life has to shift to that household, and then when they're with the other parent, their entire life has to shift.
So if it's possible for you to live not too far away, that will be good.
He also says that the spouses shouldn't badmouth each other,
you know, like, Don't criticize your husband, your ex husband in front of your children. And he should not criticize you in front of them. You know, because
that has a negative effect on children, when
husband and wife or ex husband and ex wife criticize each other in front of their children. Well, what happens is, because the child sees themselves in their parents, right,
they feel they take it very personally.
They take it very personally. And of course, it's going to harm the relationship with the other with the other parent, right. So don't do that. avoid that. Don't use your kids as a as a space for venting about your ex spouse. And the last thing he says is to have really good communication between the ex husband and ex wife.
He says, if you need it, get counseling, in order to get really good communication. So that you can see that each other you know, you each have the best, the best intention there for the child. And that you can come to a conclusion that will produce the best results for each other and for the child, right for the children. So those are just four things that he mentioned, in order to minimize the negative effects of divorce.
Okay.
So yeah, my recommendation is have a family meeting everyone talk about what their needs are, what the what needs to be done for the kids what the kids needs are.
And as your kids get older, you want to include them as well, you know, like, have a session where you actually hear them out as well, what their needs are, what's working and what's not working for them. Right.
But yeah, I think meetings are always a good idea. Let me see if there are any questions I can answer from the chat
sorry, my chair, because of the problem with going live, that if your check is funny, you're gonna have to do
fix it live. Okay.
So I'm Alikum to everyone who's saying Salam
o
can we praise the horror several times for the same matter?
Yes, in sha Allah, you can.
Like
if you're doing it because you have like whispering of shaitan, right? You're being constantly thought, Oh, yours thought I wasn't good enough. If you've got that voice in your head, you know, my heart. I wasn't good enough. So I'm going to repeat it and repeat it. I'm not like that. But yeah, of course you can. Because it's the hardest seeking. Hire, right? You can see fair, as much as you want.
But it's not required. Right. The way that these Hubbard did it, they they did they prayed Estacada form
of matter.
So that's, that's what you really need to do. Right? Just do it once, properly. And,
and then leave it to Allah. And in sha Allah, Allah will allow the best thing to happen for you, going forward. So for those people who don't know it's the holidays present, well, we pray to God and we do we make a DUA to our office the Hara.
And it's for whenever you
are trying to for example, make a decision or there's something that you are not sure about or something that you have already decided and you and you just want hate on it you know you want a las Panatela to intervene and to and to put you on the right direction put you on the right course then you pray Salah and to to unit prayer and then you make the divers the harder afterwards
and so, in sha Allah the result of that will be that if that thing is good for you, you mentioned that thing in the door. So, that thing is good for you then Allah will facilitate it and it will become easier and it will become an alarm hiding it if that thing was not good for you then it will probably go away something will happen that will divert you away from it or you know won't turn out and so you you know the main thing is that you know that because you did your Salah took this to heart and you made the the you know the result is going to be good no matter what, in sha Allah
the result will be good no matter what in sha Allah
how often will these Q and A's be?
Okay,
well, as you can see, I had actually planned a
five 5000 subscriber q&a, which I wasn't able to do at the time. So then it became a 6000 subscriber q&a And now we've nearly hit 7000 subscribers so I guess
what I was thinking is to have it like 10,000 subscribers. Okay,
the next one, but if it's something that you think is really beneficial, and you are liking these you know a q&a session like this regularly.
I might consider doing it monthly. Okay.
At the moment my My aim was after this q&a to have 110 k subscribers so get all your friends to subscribe right? This is my my little plug get everyone to subscribe for get to 10k I'll definitely inshallah do another q&a and at every milestone I'll try to do it you know.
Let's see how it goes.
But definitely every every milestone. Okay.
What Alec was salam to everyone who's saying salaam
what advice do you have for someone struggling with procrastination?
Just do it. That's my advice.
Just get up and do it.
No, that's easy to say right.
Okay, my advice for not procrastinating. I actually got a list somewhere of my own, like, tips for myself for not procrastinating.
But I think
I've actually got it right there. Let me just get it okay. Because then I can share with you my wonderful tips for not procrastinating. I'm actually I think procrastination is a problem that everyone has, right.
And so
right, the first tip that I have for
overcoming procrastination. So So for example, you want to do a particular project, you want to write something or you've got some chore to do, or you've got some. For me, it's usually you know,
writing, right, like, I need to write a chapter I need to write something important.
And I'm procrastinating. So one of the things I do is, if I'm if I really feel that I can't get into it, I'll go for a walk.
A quick five minute walk,
clear your brain, clear your mind, you know,
and make sure that your phone is in another room. When you come back, put your phone in another room, make sure you know because a lot of the time it's the distraction right from the phone.
One of the ways also that I prevent procrastination is not to look at my phone first thing in the morning.
You know, if you start your day looking at your phone, looking at emails, blah, blah, blah. What happens? You get into this reactive mode, right? You're in reaction mode. So you're not instead of like setting the agenda for your own day. You're allowing others to set the agenda. You know, you might read something
It upsets you, or you might see something someone said, and it upsets you or, or it excites you, or it distracts you or it makes you think, oh, you know, it makes you have FOMO, right fear, fear of missing out. All of those kinds of emotions are really unhelpful when you want to avoid procrastination. And when you've got stuff to do, there's, there's things you want to do. And that you've got to do that you've already committed to right that you need to get done. So what you want to do is start your day, setting your own agenda, have a piece of paper, you literally on your phone, if you must write down your agenda for the day, right? Do that the night before, if you can,
or at least that morning.
And then you want to
not allow these other distractions, so So but if I'm actually sitting down and I'm procrastinating, like, when I've sat down to do something, right, I'll think of either going for a walk five minute walk, stretch, you know, like just change your physical situation, your physical position, and that kind of sometimes brings you back fresh and ready to work. The other thing I might do is to write down the task that I've got to do for the next hour, write, just write it down
in like a Sharpie, using a sharpie pen, you know, one of those big Sharpie pens and just write it on a post it note and you stick it there. And when you stick it, then it's like your brain focuses. And you think, Alright, that is the one thing I've got to do in the next hour. And that kind of helps, you know, instead of having like a big to do list, you have one thing written in front of you that this is what I'm going to be working on in the next hour.
Another thing that really helps is to clear my desk, clear the space that you're going to be working in.
Because when you clear that your, your mind feels clear as well, right? You feel suddenly like ready to work. So if every night before you go to bed, you can clear your desk or your space that you're working in to neutral. And that includes if you're like cooking, right? Like it includes anything really, you can clear the space to neutral. When you approach that space, the next day, you feel more fresh and ready to
ready to use it. Right? You feel more excited and ready to use that space.
And the fourth thing is,
yeah, I really like this one.
To do the easy version of something, right? So for example, if I have to write a chapter of a book, right?
The perfect version of that chapter is gonna take ages, you know, because writing is basically you write something and then you refine it, and you improve it, and you add to it, and you take away from it. And now it's like a such a,
such an ongoing process. It's such an ongoing process.
And sometimes the thought of that, I think, is what makes you procrastinate. Because you're thinking, this is such a huge thing I have to do I have to get done.
But what if you were to do the lowest most basic version of that task? Right? So instead of saying, you know, I'm gonna write this perfect chapter, I'm sitting down, like,
I'm just gonna write the bullet points for what this chapter has to contain.
It's like the lowest resolution is called a low effort hack, right? So do the easy version of something, just the most basic bullet point version of the chapter. Right? Or just off the top of my head, I'm just gonna write this chapter the way I would write it, like without thinking much. Okay. Because a lot of the time,
and this is specifically for writing, I think it's really the, excuse me, excuse me, it's really the blank page. That's your enemy. Right? When you have a blank screen, you're like, just just getting started can be the hard thing, right? But once you're in the flow, things get easier. And you just so actually, that's actually the fifth.
The fifth thing, which is
sometimes we procrastinate, not, basically to get started, she's just getting started that we're procrastinating about.
So if you get started, if you say to yourself, you know what, I'm going to do this for five minutes.
And you literally set a timer, and you start doing that task for five minutes.
Once you're into it, you'll carry on, but it's that resistance you're kind of brain has to starting. That's the problem. So sometimes just start just say I'm going to do five minutes. So if you for example, have decided you're going to do a workout and
The morning, right?
Sometimes when the morning comes and you're at the point, when you've got to do the workout, you're like, your brain is thinking of every excuse, like, oh, but it would be better if you just went shopping it would be better if you just spent your time doing this or doing that, right.
But if you just say to yourself, you know what, I'm going to do it for five minutes, I'm going to get started. Five minutes.
Once you start, you'll be able to do it. It's just the Getting Started that
is what we really procrastinate about, I think a lot of the time.
But of course there's also the diet that you can do right?
I love my knee oh the becoming an HMI alum, me will add Z, well Castlereagh. If you look up the DA
you ask Allah subhanaw taala to
protect you from laziness and inability in capacity, and procrastination, basically, right.
So I think that's also very, very important. starting your day with the of god of the morning, right? Just look up, I've gone over the morning and start off by doing at least one of them every morning. And then add another add another
you know, when we say us by now so Homolka Lillahi Rabbil Alameen hamdulillah they are here and about Adama tena what you learn in short, and you know, the other doors, you're like setting yourself up for the day, right? You're asking Allah Subhana Allah to help you to make the most of the day, you're showing gratitude that you've been given another day. All of those things, I think, put you in the right mindset for
seizing the day. Because that's what it's really about. Right? Seize every hour, seize every day. Because you can't get it back. I
hope that helps.
Sisters asking how do you stay on top of everything?
The answer to that is I don't?
That's the honest answer. I am not on top of everything
at all, you know, I have lost hundreds that help all of us. You know, we're all we all struggling with.
Keeping the balance making sure we're not overdoing something or under doing something, making sure everyone's rights fulfilled, that your responsibilities are fulfilled, you know, you, we just do our best. I think that's the truth of it. You know, sometimes you look at somebody, maybe you're looking at me and you're thinking, sister, Fatima, you know, she's got it all sorted.
You might think that, it might look like that.
I might make it look like that, you know, to be perfectly honest, because you know, a lot of the time when we're posting things online, etc, we're only posting the best bits, right, or some of the best bits of our lives. So
the truth is,
I'm not on top of everything. It's something that I work on and struggle with. And I'm constantly trying to improve, you know, and adapt to. So I'm literally every single year doing it. I'm thinking, you know, what went well, this year? What was not good this year? What did I get the balance wrong on. So one year, for example, I realized, you know, one of my key habits that I really need to fix is my sleep.
I cannot do without X hours of sleep, the more hours I have, the better it will be. And
so I found my sweet spot, which was like, six to seven hours, I think for me.
And what I found is if I go under five hours,
it's just not worth it. It's just not worth it. It's gonna ruin my day, it's gonna affect my mood, it's gonna. So I'm just giving you a little insight into like, how I sometimes
how I sometimes assess, you know, what needs adjusting, really, in my own day, in my own life. And so,
every year, I think, pretty much I'm looking at, you know, what went well, what's not going well, what needs to be fixed. I have a family meeting with my family every year,
at least every year, you know, to talk about, you know, what, what did we achieve this year? What did everyone do? What does everyone need to do in the next year? You know, just get your kids into that goal setting mode.
And I literally ask my kids and my family members, my husband in other words
what
What what are you not liking in the way we're doing things and what's going well, and what's not going well, and we, we just have it out, we have that discussion openly. And sometimes you hear stuff that you don't want to hear.
But you see, I'd rather, I'd rather my children told me What's upsetting them or what's not working for them or what they think
we're getting wrong. Now, I'd rather they tell me now and we try to fix it.
Rather than them kind of suffering or having some, some difficult thing happen and some traumatic, long term experience that then they as adults are suffering from. And, you know, it's something that if we had talked about as children, when they were children, and when they were younger, we could have worked on or fixed, you know, so I really don't believe in
brushing things under the carpet.
I believe in
facing up to whatever challenges your family's having.
And as I said, Make family your finest project, your family is a project, if you're running any other project, what would you do? You have annual appraisals, you know, you have key performance indicators, right. And you have goals, you have debriefs after every kind of milestone, you know, like, what went well, what didn't go, well? Whose responsibility was it? Et cetera, et cetera? If you do that, for a company, what is a company, a company is a collection of people, right?
That's what a family is. Even even more important than a company, right? So
I do actually, I know that for some people that might sound very corporate.
But I just believe that, you know,
a failure to plan is a plan to fail as they say, you know, if you don't, if you're not deliberate about these things, if you're just winging it, if you're just always trying to like,
wing it, basically,
you're more likely to, to miss important things, you know,
at the end of the day, even if you do this, even if you do treat your family as your project, you might fall short. And that's where the art comes in. That's where constantly asking Allah Subhana Allah to guide and protect and help you and keep you on the straight path. Keep your family on the straight path to help you to not neglect anyone.
That's why all of that is important, right?
But yeah,
I don't have it figured out. It's something that I'm constantly figuring out.
But some good books, I think they're really helped me out things like
atomic habits. Everyone talks about that book, there's a very good book, atomic habits. Also, the one thing there's a book called The one thing that really helped
think attending some kind of leadership programs also helped me you know, to help me get the balance right to because I think anytime you're thinking about these things, you're thinking about all the various roles that you have. You can become more deliberate about each of those roles, right? It's when you become single minded about something and that you start neglecting
neglecting other areas right?
Okay.
What are the
thank you for your nice messages. I'm not going to answer everything you know, because
I also have to be a little bit picky because there might be some questions that
I might have a reason why I'm not answering Okay, so please don't get upset
give Please can you give advice for sisters who find it difficult to keep the house clean and tidy when things pile up like clothes and dishes and can't keep on top of everything in the house becomes too messy and too much?
It's a good thing you're not so good. Thank you can't see this room.
If you could see
the floor in this room
Hamdulillah.
I think that
you have to factor in time for cleaning
Just as you would any other thing, you know
and, you know, I have a confession to make, which is that I do actually have a cleaner. Okay, personally, I do have a cleaner,
who comes in, like,
certain intervals
to help me keep on top of things, right. And
that's something that
I feel is was really worth it for our family. And it works for our family. There was a time when I used to feel guilty about having a cleaner, right, because, you know, we've grown up, our mothers never had cleaners for most of us, right? Our moms didn't have cleaners.
The idea of having a cleaner is like, such a luxury, right? For most of us.
But
I think, as the number of my children grew, and as the
responsibilities in the house increased, we, and Hamdulillah, you know, we, we felt it was an investment worth making we, we hired cleaners, you know,
on and off, and then now it's like regular.
And I think
it's just been a lifesaver, you know,
because, of course, it doesn't mean you don't clean, like, I'm still doing the cleaning, right? Like, all of us, every member of the family has daily cleaning jobs and daily chores that everyone has to do. Okay, because, you know, we'd have a cleaner every day or anything like that, right? It's like, everyday cleaning, we have to do, but just to have that one, clean it every, at every interval every two weeks, every one week, even.
It really helps because it means that the level of
mess basically doesn't get over a certain amount, you know, it's always under control.
So
I hope you don't think that's the
that's the cop out answer. Okay. But I think what it does do is give you an insight into the fact that look, if you're a very busy person, and
if you're earning money, like as a as a woman, if you're earning money, or even if you're not earning money, but you know, you're you're spending your time in worthwhile things. You can have a discussion with your spouse, and you could consider getting help.
You know, so just as for example, in my work,
I might hire an assistant to do certain tasks for me right like online, to manage my mail or mail it manage my bookings.
For me, my cleaner is, is like an assistant. She's like
a key person who helps me and my family keep on top of things.
And
the way I guess I assess it is one hour of her time, is it worth it is one is saving one hour of my time or X hours of my time, however many hours she does the cleaning.
And is it worth it? You know, the return on investment? You got to think about that? Like is the return on investment worth it? And that's really only an answer that you can give, right? Having experienced it. For me the answer is yes. It's 100% worth it, you know, from for my family.
But like I said, it doesn't mean that you're not still doing the cleaning every evening every day. You know, there's things to do, there's laundry, cleaning, there's resetting spaces to you know, tidy again, has even hoovering right regularly even with a cleaner. So yeah, I would consider getting help if you can, if it's really that, you know, overwhelming otherwise. I think having a system or even a day,
a day a week that you that you're focused on the house, you know, fully like to the point where everything gets done properly.
Also helps.
I hope that my answer was not
to tone deaf
Sharla
Looking at the questions
can you recommend any good YouTube programs for children to watch Islamic channels?
That's a difficult one because
my children are all adults now. And it's been quite a long time since I was looking for children's programs online. So I'm really not the best person to ask about that, I think. Because like my children grew up on things like Adam's world, you know, which was like available on video. And we still had videos of VCRs at that time, so
and CDs.
YouTube wasn't really a thing when they were really young. Obviously, it has become a thing as they've gotten older.
But
I'm afraid that I really off the top of my head couldn't tell you but I hope that somebody who's listening could post you know, something beneficial that you think good children's programs. I know that my slightly older children did.
I did actually allow them to watch
the Omar series you must have heard of the Omar series on MCB is NBC or MCB, NBC NBC? Oh MCV is the Muslim Council of Britain No, not the MCB the NBC the channel, right?
I think they produced a,
a 30 part series on the life of Omar bin al Khattab on the line who and it's like actors and acted out.
But I felt, especially for my children who were a little bit older.
Secondary school age,
and they learning Arabic.
We watched the entire series, and I think that was for multiple benefits. You know, one was
the acting isn't amazing, by the way, you know, I would say the acting isn't really that. All that. But
it does the job. You know, it brings the kind of aura of that time alive, I think.
And it I think it helps young people, you know, to be able to picture certain things. But the main thing for me was that they learned Arabic from it, you know, because there's certain phrases repeated a lot.
Yeah, you their ears just got used to the Arabic the Arabic the different Arabic phrases, etc, as they were learning Arabic as a language themselves.
So yeah.
For slightly older children, I think the Amara series is is not a bad
option.
But in terms of cartoons and Islamic cartoon type channels, I'm sure somebody who's listening to right now
will be able to give some suggestions, or just post it in the comments after this.
After this session, I'm going to go on until so we've gone for over an hour and 13 minutes. I'm gonna go on until one hour and a half okay.
What
is an interesting question about?
Okay, somebody's asking.
Basically, like, I think the the point of the question is, like, if there's a female cleaner, then isn't that problematic for when?
When your sons and your husband is around, right?
Well,
I have certain certain requirements of my cleaner. So I choose my cleaner very carefully, right. So for example, I will ask that the cleaner be middle aged, or above, okay.
It's usually somebody who's mature, older than me even Right.
Or similar age and somebody who's like,
parent themselves. Somebody who dresses modestly. Like I literally tell them, you know, there's certain requirements for dress in my house. Basic requirements, you know, obviously, if it's a non Muslim, I'm not going to tell her to wear the hijab or anything but
certainly
Basic requirements of modesty. Yes. And basically my my son's keep out of the way. It's quite simple. I time it in such a way that she, first of all, you don't want a lot of people in the house anyway. Right? So
hope that answers that
can you breastfeed a child over two and a half years?
Now you shouldn't do that you should breastfeed them up to two years.
And then you should really stop. Do your best to stop as soon as possible after that, or at that point.
The two years is the maximum really.
Can you give advice for parents and children taking part in Quran competitions? How to prepare children for getting through or not getting through rounds? And how to practice time management areas to work on?
Okay, I think
look, when it comes to
grant competitions, I think, look, the benefit of Quran competitions is not winning, you know, winning is not, I mean, it'd be nice to win, right? But I think the purpose of grand competitions is
to revise and prepare and get,
you know, to that level, you know, get good enough.
And if you do that regularly, then obviously, it's going to help you to retain your memorization, right?
So, I think if you go into a Quran competition with that, in that spirit, you know, we're doing this we're going to do our best, of course, we want to win. But regardless of if we win or not, it's actually going to be beneficial. It's a beneficial exercise in and of itself. Just preparing for it.
I think that probably gives the right attitude
and the way to prepare for it Well,
I would always get a teacher to help prepare, you know,
and tell if you're if your children have a health teacher, you tell the hits teacher, you know, my child's preparing for a competition, can you please focus on that for the next few weeks? Right, because it's obviously going to be something beneficial for the next few weeks.
Or if you're doing it yourself, just, you know, have that the portion that needs to be memorized, divide it be very, like methodical about it,
get them to revise it in the morning, the evening
to listen to it as well.
Some people prefer actually writing it, I've never tried that, but you know, apparently writing it, it helps them retain it better.
Okay, so we've got about 10 minutes left, I'm going to just go back to my own questions that people have submitted over time.
I can probably manage one or two more that let me see if there are any
okay says the same please suggest a good country to go for Islamic Studies. Also, can you please tell me which was the university in which you did your anomia
Okay, um
I mean, there are lots of countries you can go to, you know, for Islamic Studies, even in Western countries. Now, there are some institutions which are pretty good, you know, that you can consider, okay, there is something unique about going to the Muslim world. You know, most of the scholars of Islam and in the past they will travel right, right Allah they will do Rahila to for seeking knowledge. And so there's obviously benefit in traveling. It's not that
in a staying in your own homeland, sometimes it stagnates you right. Mama Shafi said in his He has a beautiful poem about this, you know that travel you should travel because traveling kind of stops you from being stagnant and it helps you broaden your mind and you want to message so many things. That Siri by the way,
our friend who's always with us, Siri
okay.
But from my own personal experience, I
I really only properly explain
as Egypt, you know, as a place to study, but I know that places like Qatar places like
even
Jordan,
I have family members who went to Syria.
Each of those places also have quite a lot of good institutes and places to study, you know. So I think really, it's a case of
asking people you really know, in real life, who have been sit down with them, tell them what the ask them what the pros and cons were, what their experience was like. And, you know, maybe do that with two or three people and then
and then make a decision on which one you would choose. Because I think the place where you go is not as important in terms of like country, I mean,
as
the commitment that you go with, you know, a lot of Western students, they're known for going for having these wonderful dreams of going abroad.
And then when they go abroad,
they get disenchanted. Because the class isn't perfect, you know, there's something some shortcoming or the environment is too difficult, or, you know, they're just used to certain creature comforts and luxuries, which just don't exist, or, you know, they, they want things to be perfect, and a certain way and a certain standard, and, as soon as they get disappointed, they're like, they start losing motivation, I think it's more important than the country that you go to is the attitude that you go with, you've got to be in it for the long term. So you've got to say to someone, I'm going to stay here for the year, or I'm going to stay here for the whole summer, I'm going to see this
through.
But I think if you're considering somewhere like Egypt, it's quite a nice place to go for even just for the summer, you know, so go to the Institute, for example, quotable.net. And as he's the head, of course, he is one of my
teachers, and, you know, he's, he's a family friend of ours,
thought I can know him, he's a bonus. Of course, the Institute, he has like a summer retreat. It's like a retreat, it's more like a summer intensive, that's what it is summer intensive, Arabic course. And so
that's a great way to get a taste of of a country, you know, it's gonna be really hot, right, because it's like the summer, literally the summer in Egypt. But if you go there, this is like three weeks, I believe. And you'll get a really good intensive Arabic course. Plus, you will
get to see what it's like to live there. Look at who's there, you know, what kind of environment is with that area is nice for you to live in, et cetera. Plus, they'll take you on trips, they'll take you on loads of little trips and excursions will be like a holiday as well. Where is intensive, like, literally, I think Monday to Friday morning, till a certain time you're studying, you're definitely going to come back with a really good
really good basic taster of Arabic. And the great thing is they teach Arabic in Arabic,
which is the only way to learn really, you know, if you think about it, when people come to Britain or America, and they want to learn English, we don't teach them English in their language.
We teach them in English in English, right? You get native speakers and native speakers teach them English in English.
But for some reason, when we want to learn Arabic, we're like, oh, we want to translate everything into our original language and our mother tongue and we, we want lists of vocabulary with translations, and we want you know, everything to be explained to us in English. There is benefit in that as well, like having it explained in your own language. There is a benefit in that and I have benefited from that as well, later. But I think the fact that I went to Egypt, and I was at an institute like Cordoba was actually the federal center at the time, I think the federal center still exists. So that's another one to check out in Cairo.
The fact that I went to those institutes and they had an only Arabic environment. So they literally said as soon as you walk into the building, you can't speak even colloquial, Egyptian Arabic. You literally were only allowed to speak first heart which is the classical Quranic Arabic, right?
As soon as you walk in,
and what that did was again through osmosis Osmosis is like basically how children learn the language.
Right, children, you don't sit there translating everything to them Do they absorb a language. And in the context, they start understanding it over time they, through repetition and stuff, they start understanding what it means. And they feel and understand the language fully like as if it's part of the, it's in them, right? They're thinking in that language, they're dreaming in that language. If you want to be like that, you got to learn Arabic through osmosis, which is literally being immersed in the environment, being forced to speak in that language. And now it seems like you won't be able to do it, but believe me, within days you will be you will start speaking because just like a child,
you'll just try it and you'll stumble and you'll adjust and you'll get better and better and better. That's how it works.
So yeah, I would really recommend if you're going to if you want to learn Arabic, especially to learn it through osmosis, and Arabic and Tajweed.
So that's reciting the Quran properly reading the Quran properly, with its rules. Those are like the bedrock of Islamic studies, you know, you've got to, you've got to study those two things.
Really.
If you know obviously, it's not obligatory to learn Arabic, right? A certain amount is you know, to be able to fulfill your Salah etcetera. But I'm not talking about what's obligatory. I'm talking about what's what would be good you know, if you if you want to learn about the deen properly
learning Arabic and learning to judo important.
learning the fundamentals of Islam, the fit of the fundamentals of Islam is important.
I think studying Aikido is very important like, I know not everyone agrees with that nowadays. But
definitely for me, I studied sorrel, Eman, the principles of Eman which really went into a Fida, but also
counteracting, you know, secularism and some of the modern isms that exist and how they go against our
our Imam, you know, in what way Exactly? That was very, very beneficial to study because then it kind of prepares you and protects you from the ideological attacks and ideological onslaught that we're, we're exposed to right? In our times. So
I hope that helps. Which universities did I go to? Well, at first, I began at Alice, her college of Allah's, her university, as well as Arabic institutes within Egypt. And I had really intended to stay in Egypt and continue my studies, but for various reasons I returned, I got married, and
I also was, my husband was trying to help me to find to go abroad again, to get into one of the Muslim universities abroad. But it didn't work out for us that way. I also had children. And so I used to continuously make dua, that Allah subhanaw taala would help me to find a way of studying. And then right here in the UK Hamdulillah, you know, some of the some Institute's began to open up. I did some courses abroad, through online learning initially, once I had completed a certain number of those, I attended classes here in the UK. And then eventually, after studying with various scholars,
I also enrolled into Ibrahim College, which had an alchemy program which is like the traditional curriculum for the Islamic sciences, you know, the shadow Arabic and Sharia studies
with various subjects, all of the you know, the full verse Nizami type
system, right.
And they had some additional things as well like, for example, leadership,
some more advanced level topics as well, like
the heritage of Hadith and things like that. And
and they had university professors as well teaching there. And so it was like a degree, but it was an adapted
traditional curriculum, classical Islamic curriculum.
At Abraham College, which took usually takes five years for the average student because there's like the Arabic intensive that they do and then they, they have for years.
I didn't need to do the Arabic intensive because I'd already studied Arabic to a certain level
And I'd also done at a level Arabic and, you know, in the UK, just as a backup as well.
And I've done more than that, you know, having studied in Egypt and continued my study online, through tutors
in Egypt.
And so I went straight into the anomia program. And I studied the LMA program, part time, I negotiated to study at part time and I completed it, I think in seven years.
It took seven years, because, you know, I was doing it well with children.
And I just negotiated to be able to study at part time, because there was no way I could go from 9am to 5pm. Every single day, you know, for for four years, I would not have been able to do that. So I think it took me seven to eight years.
And I also studied in Cambridge and
in London with a Salam Institute.
So with a chrome basically, I attended a criminal Dewey's classes for a number of years. And I enrolled onto his island meow program as well. He has an ultimate program. And
I believe I studied with him for four years. And then I completed the Olympia program. That was a weekend, a weekend,
of course, designed for like intensive weekend study. So those are the two. And then since then, I've gone on to postgraduate study at
a university in the UK, studying Islamic law,
which is more like a modern,
I would say like the modern application of Sharia in our times, you know, how it's being applied in different legal systems? What is the state of the Sharia in our times, like in different countries? And how is it embedded or not embedded in countries and what do their constitutions say? And so it's really like, bringing the FIP, the classical folk and all of that,
to the modern day and seeing in a how's it being applied. And that's it. So as University of London, the School of Oriental and African Studies,
here in London,
which is part of the University of London. And my professor, he's actually he's basically a share, but
Professor, muscled brother in, he's Nigerian, and he completed his Island area, as well as studying law.
And so he was a lawyer, who studied charity as well. And he basically worked for
for the UN for a time, you know, he was a un inspector for Sudan, I believe, for a time and he's written a lot, you know, on the topic of Islamic law in modern times, and you know,
I'm really glad I found somebody like him, mashallah, because he,
you know, he, he has an orthodox understanding, and he brings that to academia, which is,
which is great, which is great. Mashallah. So, my time is up.
My time is up, and I've got to be balanced. Remember, we talked about balance, and when children are hungry, so I better go now? Just Aquila, Karen Brennan says this was my first live q&a. So I'm really excited that it kind of went well. Did would you say it went well? Was the sound okay? It was all of that. Okay, if you just give me a little heads up on that.
Because I'm literally doing this myself, you know, like setting this all up with a new camera and everything. So just want to make sure that
it all went well.
So let me know in the comments.
I hope I'm gonna have another one of these
perhaps at 10k subscribers, but if you
keep a lookout on the channel, make sure you subscribe. I'm gonna sound like one of those typical YouTubers. Now make sure you subscribe, press the like button, subscribe and share right? I really don't like doing all of that. But you know, obviously we want want the channel to grow. We want people to benefit we want
I would love to bring other guests on, et cetera. And you know, the more we can grow the channel, the better. Programming we can do, right?
I love this ability to kind of directly interact you know the song
thing. Great about that. I've got loads of questions left. So either I'll do another q&a next month in Charlotte January, or,
and it would be lovely if we could do both.
If we reach 10k subscribers, I'll definitely in Sharla doo, doo do a q&a. So helped me get to 10k subscribers and at every milestone, I'll be doing a q&a session, Inshallah, and you can continue to send me questions. And what I tend to do, because basically a lot of these questions people have been sending me for weeks, and generally, you know, not for this q&a Even right, and I just gathered them up, because there's no way I can reply to everybody. So I'd rather have a session like this where I can just, you know, like, have prepared and, and come forward and answer some of the questions.
In sha Allah. Hopefully next time, we cannot some more,
there's quite a lot of questions left, so I might do another one in January. Keep a lookout.
But like I said, if you're watching this and you haven't subscribed, make sure you subscribe. Because from the analytics and the background of this YouTube channel, I can see that 50% of the people who watch this channel, have not subscribed.
And you see if you subscribe, that's how you get
channels and programming sin, the you know, the, the more subscribers you have, the more it will be seen. And then sha Allah will gain momentum.
Please make dua for me, that Allah subhanaw taala
guides me
to do the right thing. You know, I understand it's a huge responsibility, you know,
we live in a time when people think that
speaking and, you know, basically being public is a good thing per se, I don't necessarily think that I think that there might be some certain Messiah has, you know, some Messiah left that I need to be fulfilled, and that's why
I'm willing to do this.
And I think in our times, there's a lack of role models out there, you know, especially amongst sisters, you know, there's a lot of confusion, there's,
there's a lot of messaging that is being targeted at Sisters. And so we need to counteract some of that. And so I hope that loss of Hannah dollar uses me as a,
as a tool for good, you know, I can do some good with this, and that allow us to have that a protects me from causing any harm. And also that,
you know, I'm going to do my best to be careful, you know, in these interactions, and only answer questions that I'm sure about, or that I've researched, or that I've asked other people about more knowledgeable than me.
If there's any questions, I'm going to avoid it. There's always a reason why I'm avoiding it, you know, either because I don't think it's wise to answer it publicly. Or because I don't know the answer. Could be I don't know the answer. You know, believe it or not.
Or it's because, you know, I don't want to discuss that in this forum. So
does that come alive? Heron, I'm going to leave you with that.
Subhanak Allahumma Byham dig a shadow Allah, Allah inlanta us stuff Yukawa to be like, Salam alaykum Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh