Haleh Banani – Break The Shackles

			Alright, so I'm at a con.
		

			I'm seriously considering moving to Canada Mashallah have an amazing community amazing country and
it was I want to give a round of applause to all the organizers for doing an amazing job with this
conference and for bringing all the dignitaries Mashallah.
		

			Bismillah R Rahman r Rahim in 900 ala mother who are staying you know who when I start federal when
I was a Billahi min shooter, dm phocoena women say Dr. Medina maniac dilla who follow mother Lila,
one minute left follow her the Allah pasado en la ilaha illa Allah, Masha Allah Mohammed and up to
who were a pseudo Ummah bad.
		

			In order to leave a legacy, you have got to be psychologically healthy, emotionally healthy, and
mentally healthy. We need to strive to actually be self actualized. self actualization is what
Abraham Maslow describes as the highest level of needs, there's a hierarchy of needs. And I'm going
to tell them to at the base, there's the physiological needs, okay, physiological needs, that's the
need to eat. That's the need to sleep. That's the need all those needs. And it makes sense that if a
person let's take a refugee, if they don't have a place to sleep, if they don't have anything to
eat, they're not going to be worried about making friendships, they're not going to be worried about
		

			getting a higher education. So you have to fill that need first, before going to the next level. The
next level is the need for safety. If someone is worried about being attacked, if someone is worried
about being bombed, they're not going to be concerned about anything else. So the next level is
about seeking shelter and feeling safe. So if you have your physiological needs met, then you have
your safety needs met, then that's when you're going to be ready to have that love and belonging,
you're going to want to create relationships, you're going to want to have a bond you're going to
want to make friends. The next level is self esteem. And that's when you aspire to educate yourself.
		

			That's when you want to learn more on you want to get an education get a degree, and at the highest
level is self actualization, self actualization, that is when you have reached the height of
psychological well being. And you have reached all your potentials, where you now want to overflow
and you want to give back you want to contribute you want to help the society you want to be a
useful member, a citizen and you want to help the oma grow and and flourish. There's no way to add
value to a community if you are suffering from emotional distress. If you're wallowing in self pity,
if you are drowning in depression, or overwhelmed and anxiety, there's no way that you can
		

			contribute, you will be they each psychological issue acts as a shackle. It's a shackle that
prevents you from moving ahead. And there are two things to set you free. If you want to be set free
from the shackle there are two things one is awareness, you need to become aware. And that's
hopefully my goal for today is to bring that awareness to you. And second is to take action and
that's going to be your responsibility. I'm going to share with you what could set you free, but
it's a matter of taking that and applying it. And that's the key, right? Whenever we learn, we need
to apply it because that knowledge is either going to count for us or against us. So inshallah all
		

			of us here today are going to take this beneficial knowledge that we have learned from all the
speakers and apply it so it will be a witness for us in sha Allah say Amin.
		

			Okay, I recall a client that came to me completely devastated. Her heart was shattered into a
million pieces. The man of her dreams, the one that they were planning on getting married to called
off the wedding. And this is after she had picked out her beautiful gown. She had picked out the
hall all the details she was counting down towards her wedding. And he called it off because her
personality because she was very bossy and demanding. And he felt that he can't take this and she
felt like life was not worth living. When she came to me. She was suicidal. She made statements of
kafir. She said things like how could Allah Allah
		

			this to happen. Why did this happen to me, I can't take this My life is over, she was ready to end
it.
		

			And she felt she even had these. She was anorexic, she had an eating disorder, where she felt that
maybe she wasn't thin enough, she wasn't pretty enough. So she had so many issues. And
unfortunately, she had given up all hope in life, she was in the biggest pity party of her life.
		

			I had a lot of work to do, right, I had to state I had to address the belief in Allah, right, we
have to address faith, we have to address God, I had to tell her that if this didn't happen, if you
didn't marry him, it was not meant to be right if and I reminded her of the hygiene, that if the
whole world was to come together, and to make something happen for you and a londonwill, for it to
happen, it's not going to happen. And if the whole world came to plot against you, and Allah didn't
allow it to happen, it's not going to happen. So I reassured her, I said, Allah has someone better
in mind for you just trust in Allah. And she said, no one could be like, athma, I might as the one I
		

			want him, and that he's the only one for me, then we have to also address self worth. And that's so
important sisters, you have to realize that your self worth is so much more than your weight, your
the scale your size, right, we need to value ourselves, we have a purpose much higher than simply
getting married, we have a purpose to contribute to this community to our own my inshallah. And we
had to also address that the past problems, okay, that put her problems into perspective, right? A
lot of times when we look at our problems, it looks like this magnanimous mountain, and it's like
about to crumble on us. But then when we step outside, when we start helping, when we get involved
		

			with organizations like Islamic Relief when we go and we see orphanages, and we see people who are
suffering, and we see refugees, we realize our problems are so trivial. I had this issue with one of
my, one of my kids, we went out she couldn't find the clothes she needed for school. And it was it
was drama, right? And then we came home are watching the news. And we started seeing refugees
getting on a boat trying to get into Greece, and they're being rejected. I looked at her, I said,
this is masiva. This is a problem, right? What we face our problems. My son did a poem on first
world problems versus third world problems. And it was so telling Cipolla, that the things we
		

			complain about the lines being too long, gaining too much weight, it's so trivial in comparison to
what they face on a daily basis. So I had to put all of that into perspective.
		

			Now, what I'm about to share with you today, are the things that let her free from bondage and
hamdulillah. She freed herself from all of these shackles. And I will tell you at the end of my
lecture, inshallah, what happened to her. So please stay tuned. And remember the story about the
sister, I'm going to cover three different areas. First of all, it's going to be how to be
psychologically healthy, how to be psychologically healthy, and that combines two things, being
mindful, and I'll go right, I'll go into depth about that, being mindful. And we're going to do an
exercise, how to be mindful, and also being able to forgive. The second thing we're going to talk
		

			about is emotional health. So first was, how to be psychologically healthy, right? Then we're going
to talk about being emotionally healthy. And that's about controlling your emotions, that's really,
really important for us how to control that anger, the sadness, the anxiety, the depression, we're
going to learn how to control that. And then by having gratitude, I know several speakers keep
mentioning the idea of gratitude when you're grateful, it does amazing things. The last thing I'm
going to talk to you about being mentally healthy, being mentally healthy, and that's about self
talk, and to live in love with a higher purpose, and that's going to be the spiritual connection.
		

			Okay, so everyone's with me. So the first thing we're going to talk about is being psychologically
healthy. One of the measures of seeing who is psychologically healthy, is finding out about
mindfulness, if you're mindful, mindful means being in the present being in the here and now. What
do people usually think about and worry about? They're either regretting the past
		

			Right. They're regretting the past or they are anxious about the future. Very few people are living
in the present. And right now I need all of you to be in the present. Okay? We're going to practice
being mindful right now in this lecture, where you're here with me in this lecture, not thinking
about what happened last night, the conversation you had not thinking about the food you ate, or the
food you're going to eat, we're going to be right here. And when you're in the present, it's really
amazing how neurologically, your mind starts to change. When you are mindful. Our first speaker
today was talking about how we are affected by our thoughts, right? And so we're going to learn how
		

			to use our mind in order to create that peace, so that we can leave a legacy inshallah. So what I
get amazed about is how much psychology is embedded in Islam and in we're on. Now, Allah teaches and
trains us to be mindful how three things, three things that he does, and he teaches us in order for
us to be mindful. First of all, it's all the car, all the doors, right? The chef was telling us that
entering the house, there's a special dog going to the master, there's a special dog when you're
about to eat. All of this does what it makes us be mindful of the present. So you're not on
autopilot. You know, when you're an autopilot, when you just go through the motions, but your mind
		

			is not present. That is not a good state to be in, we need to be present.
		

			And the car, and also we're taught not to say what if, right? Because if opens up the door of the
shaytaan, right? So you don't want to get into remorseful thoughts of If only I had married bachelor
number two, right? If only I had taken if I had only listened to my parents and had become a doctor,
right? You don't want to regret what happened in the past.
		

			And it's also about having tobacco so the first thing is doing the doors and not questioning what
has happened and the second thing is about putting your trust in Allah.
		

			And Allah says in the Quran,
		

			alphabet name and a phone or a team spend a lot of time where Allah Allah He finally Ottawa, Kal el
momento and upon Allah let the believers rely, okay. And it's so easy to say it's so easy to say
tobacco lalala right. When someone is having marital problems, you just tell them tobacco. lalala
sister, Tahlequah, lalala you're having financial problems. So I call on a law, but how many people
really internalize that and live it? I'll tell you I have a friend of mine that has amazing tobacco
Mashallah, and I've learned so much from her. She was a twin. She had a twin, a identical twin and
they were so amazingly close. I don't think I've ever seen any relationship of siblings being
		

			closer, Mashallah, to the point that they were living in separate countries. And when her sister was
going into labor, she started having contractions. She told her mom, mom, I'm feeling that Yes, me
and is about to go into labor. She called and you guessed that she was in labor. There is this very
amazing connection that they had. Now sapana law. A few years ago, she was diagnosed with breast
cancer. Her sister yes mean was diagnosed with breast cancer.
		

			And, unfortunately, she wasn't able to fight uh, she died at the age of 2828 with a young six year
old daughter. I was so concerned about this friend of mine. She's actually a sister in law that I
flew over to her I was in Egypt, I flew over to Oman because I thought, Oh my gosh, is going to be
devastated. She needs emotional support. I need to be there for her. And I was floored when I saw
how well she had it together. She trusted Allah in such an amazing way Mashallah. She was not
broken. She was not devastated. She accepted a loss plan in a very amazing way. Now, a year ago, she
herself was diagnosed with the same illness with breast cancer. And again, she proved her tawakkol
		

			without questioning without. I was I was in tears when I found out that she has breast cancer and
she was comforting me telling me that Alice plan is perfect. There is nothing that he will do. That
is bad for me. Whatever.
		

			is doing it's perfect. That's called tawakkol. That is putting your trust in a low 100%. And not
being sad, not questioning, not complaining.
		

			And so
		

			the tawakkol is so critical for us to have. And it's about being
		

			being mindful. Right. It's about being mindful. And also,
		

			when you know there's a surveillance camera, right, is that the amount of time I have left?
		

			Wow, all right. Okay.
		

			So it is about the being very mindful, and we need to forgive. We need to realize that this
forgiveness when we don't forgive when we don't forgive people in our lives, then we are putting
shackles upon ourselves. So make it a practice, to let go and to forgive the people. And for ask for
forgiveness from Allah because we all fall into air. And we need to ask Allah for that forgiveness,
woman's hub when I'm in la sala
		

			de la la Hinata. And he who repents and does righteousness does indeed turn to Allah with
repentance. Okay? We need to ask forgiveness from the people in our lives, please, right now, in
your mind. If there is someone that has hurt you, betrayed, you cheated on you. I'm sure all of you
have experienced that right now. Close your eyes, okay? That's just beautiful exercise. Close your
eyes, forgive them. It takes no movement. It takes no amount of giving. You don't have to give away
money. You don't have to exert yourself. It is mental and in your heart, forgive that person. Very
powerful thing to do right now, inshallah. And you never know how long you have to live. What if you
		

			had a fight with your spouse and something happens to them, they get in a car crash and you never
asked for forgiveness. So seize the opportunity to ask for forgiveness. And forgive yourself you may
have done. You may have done some horrible things you may have fallen into sin, you may have done
some mistakes, but at forgive yourself. Because if you make Toba and you follow up a bad deed with a
good deed, you can correct yourself inshallah, let's get into emotional stability. emotional
stability is about controlling your emotions. It's about not surrendering to that urge to yell the
urge to hit the urge to blow up at someone, when you can control your emotion that takes strength.
		

			So I really I urge all of us to set our standard really high to try to strive to be an adult in the
relationship because what age do we regress to when we're angry? Honestly, what age I've done
workshops across the US and I hear things like five or two regressing to a toddler year, right. So
we want to make sure that we live as an adult and we control our emotions. And that if we can do
that, then we can have that peace of mind and it takes practice. But if you're consistent with it,
you will achieve it inshallah, then gratitude is the best attitude. I love that saying, when you
wake up in the morning, and you start reflecting on all the things you're grateful for, on all the
		

			amazing blessings you have, you are going to be overflowing with happiness. So instead of waking up
and thinking, what I don't have, and what I don't, what I haven't achieved, start reflecting on all
the wonderful things that Allah has blessed you with. And that will start making you feel so
incredibly happy. And the way to be mentally, mentally stable and mentally healthy is your self
talk, you need to regulate what is going on in your mind. We speak 500 words a minute and 85% of
what we're saying is negative. So we've got to stop those negative self talk because that is what's
going to really bind us that's what's going to make us feel depressed and feel anxious. Because
		

			we're sitting there saying things to ourselves, and it's a self fulfilling prophecy and we're
programming ourselves for failure. So we really have to be aware of our self talk. And we need to be
aware of that. The to live and love for a higher purpose. That is my motto is that our life needs to
be dedicated in the service of Allah, we need to definitely do everything in our life to please last
so those relationships we have the marriage that we have the kids that we're raising, if you do it
for the sake of making your your
		

			Records higher, you're getting more adger you're building that connection with Allah. So it's more
about your vertical, your vertical relationship you and a lot, not necessarily just the horizontal
relationship. So many people focus on taking, keeping track of what my spouse did and what I have
done. Just let go of all that and do it for the sake of Allah, it will transform your marriage,
it'll transform every relationship. inshallah going back, I know I'm out of time, but I'm very
quickly going to tell you the story of the sister saponify. Remember the story of the sister at the
beginning that I said she was suicidal, her fiance had broken off the marriage and hamdulillah
		

			through therapy. through understanding this. she overcame her depression and her anxiety. The Cofer
turned into conviction. She had a purpose in life, she started contributing to orphanages and
helping others. And she changed her whole personality. You know what her reward was? Allah rewarded
her. But the most amazing way I got a call from her about a month ago, and she said, You know what,
you were right. I said, Okay, I know I was right. But what about what exactly what specifically was
I write about? And she said, You were right. Allah gave me someone much better than athma. I met
someone and he is amazing. And she sent me her wedding pictures, and I was so happy for her and
		

			Sopot Allah, I pray that we can all rid ourselves of the shackles that bind us that we put our trust
in Allah, true tilaka and that we free ourselves, we free ourselves enough to be able to receive
Allah's amazing blessings. And so that we're psychologically emotionally and mentally ready to leave
a legacy just like a locker