Mindful Ramadan 2024 – Transform your Character with Wadud Hassan

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Salah Morley Kumar Matala?

Yeah

I like was Salam wa Rahmatullah How are you brother would do it hamdulillah Hamdulillah we are entering our Is this the 11th day of Ramadan here in Dallas 11th I believe so. Yeah. 11 first 10 days Wow Ma sha Allah it really just flew by the neck.

Where? Where are y'all tuning in from? Let us know where you're tuning in from so that my leikam Suzanne glad you made it sister Halima. Wonderful to have you.

Yo Bearcats. Mashallah, all right. So Bismillah salat wa salam ala Rasulillah. Today is going to be powerful. Yes. Yes. How are you doing? How are you doing? Okay, you're doing good. I'm doing amazing. Yes. Alhamdulillah really good. And I was lovely to get our families to meet Alhamdulillah that was that was a pleasure Salah so experienced your your Persian cooking. Mashallah. Alhamdulillah Alhamdulillah. It was a pleasure to have

you too. You too. Mashallah. So what we're going to talk about today. So last time, we talked about our worship and transforming our worship. And this time, it's about transforming our character doing the transformation of our character. And you know, how I like to use analogies to make things clearer. I wanted, I want us to look at renovating our character, right, like the way we would renovate a house.

Okay, so it's about self improvement. And just like we would assess, so what would we do if we're renovating a house? First, when we look at the assessment phase, right? We look at our what's broken, what is outdated, what needs to be improved, right? And we need to do that about ourself and kind of look and see what aspects of ourself do we do we really need to change? Correct.

And then there's the planning phase, which is, you know, before you renovate the house, you kind of you have to create a blueprint, and detailing what kind of changes do you want for your personal growth? So

as you well know, Imam Ghazali encourages us to like set intentions aligned with spiritual growth. So we have to kind of have that mentality of I'm in this Ramadan, not just to do the worship, but to really change myself. Right. Now, any points you want to make on these before I go on, because it the the analogy is quite expansive. Yes, yes. No, I'm excited to hear analogy. I love your analogies. May Allah bless you. And in terms of this, yeah, really kind of thinking about our intention and the impact it has on us. And this is why we've been talking about becoming more and thinking about who do we emerge beyond Ramadan? What does my post Ramadan version look like? So

yeah, excited to hear the analogy. Sure. Sure. So we have the assessment phase to see what what needs to be changed, then the planning stage right.

And make you know, we need to make our heart the most beautiful aspect of ourselves. Then there's demolition, right? This is the phase where we got to, you know, tear down the old cabinets, you know, pull out the carpet, maybe there's, you know, old carpeting, and if we look at ourself and see, you know, is there something about myself that I need to just completely do away with is there like maybe I have limiting beliefs, maybe I'm in toxic relationships, maybe I have self doubt or maybe I have too big of an eagle right? And then we just

Need to purify ourself from that? So that's the demolition phase. Any comments on the demolition?

It's, yeah, that's, that's work, right? That

feels like I'm tearing things down. And sometimes, you know, like when, when things get a little messy as you're trying to be aware and get into your, like, you never got in touch with that part of the cell that was, like, distracting you. And when you do, it makes your heart soften, and it makes you humble. And you, you know, potentially, hopefully, you're crying and you're letting go and you're, so it takes a little bit of inner work, right. And that allows is a little bit it's liberating, but it's scary in the beginning. So you're right, it's kind of like that, you know, like that, getting into that sense of going beyond your comfort zone. Like they say the learning happens

between comfort zone and the panic zone in like, you have to stretch a little bit and, and go with your even though you might feel a little bit that okay, that holding back. But yeah, going along, I mean, just moving forward, even though you might have you might be scared, and that will help you open things up and shelf. Yeah, made such an important point about about it being maybe overwhelming, that it might be scary, and it's not a pleasant part of the process. And trusting that this is the part that's going to really be the most impactful. It's I I guess I can, you know, make that connection to being at the gym. And when it's really painful when you're really feeling it,

that's when most of the changes happening. So we need to I love that I love to live in my

What is it live outside of my comfort zone? That's what I do live outside of that comfort zone. And then we go into the construction phase, right? So as you're constructing you've done away with the things you don't like about yourself, and then you're building yourself up, right? You have to you choose your favorite things, right? You choose material and design elements that that will capture your vision. And we need to really look at ourselves and see what positive traits do I need to cultivate and and what kind of habits do I need to I need to form and then it's about the finishing touches? Right? You have to have the finishing touches. And it's like what what can I refine in my

personality? What have I heard maybe through loved ones maybe through broken relationships? What have I heard that I may be like guilty of and that I can improve? And then it's about maintenance right just knowing that we have to regularly kind of assess our progress Yeah, seeing mashallah people joining in on Zillow. I see one of them our alumni mashallah Alma Dora joining from Nigeria someone Oh, nice.

Loki, welcome, everybody. Welcome. Welcome. And says, I think they say the comfort zone is a graveyard for dreams and goals. Good one, Suzanne was.

Yeah, God, that is that is Yeah, and you know, subhanAllah just thinking about this whole Ramadan and how it can the relationship we have about training ourselves physically. And it's such a struggle for some of us, you know, that didn't grow up in that bro, like gym culture to go back and get out of your comfort zone to like, work and get into like a zone of discomfort to grow. Like the gym analogy gave us such an important analogy. That other analogy about, like, just this ability to, like, face some of these challenges that are deep down and, and really adulting. Right? Yeah. And it's such an important thing that we sometimes we it's easier to just go ahead and put the blame

game on somebody else and say, Oh, it's because of her, it's because of him. It's because of my parents because of this because of that. I mean, it's okay for you to be aware of where it might be coming from the history, you know, things behind it. But I feel that it's like a lazy way to live, you know, unless it's like a disorder and you need help and all of that. That's, of course you need you need to go through the work that needs to do in terms of counseling, but generally, I see a lot of people quickly without doing the inner work putting the blame on somebody else, then it's pretty lazy like okay, I blame somebody else I don't really have to change I don't really have to face

anything, you know, and I can just live as we are I can just keep showing up with the with the less than ideal character and myself, but you know, my not my best version of myself. And I feel that's such a disservice to ourselves. It really is. And I love this expression that says it's not your fault, but it is your responsibility. It's not your fault that you had maybe abusive parents or you were neglected or you were mistreated or you were cheated on

On, it's all your fault, but it is your responsibility to do the inner work. And we both focus on doing the inner work and we help others do that internal work which is so critical, because unless we do it, we're not really going to as you said, the adulting not everyone is an adult, not everyone is mature, they could be 5060 years old, and they are still as immature as they were when they were eight or 10 or 15

Subhan Allah Subhan Allah and this is why it's so important to teach these you know, qualities like the character is so deeply connected to how we process the world like a cognitive frame and this is why you know the beautiful qualities like forgiveness and letting go and cleansing our heart before we enter short and mid, you know, mid Shaban before we enter Ramadan, like you know, the you know, like I think I was looking at was it in a bus I'll have to look look it up one of the Sahaba saying that we would be like scared to enter Ramadan with anything, you know, hard against anyone. And this this way to the way that we are able to forgive and let go. It is such a big part of our deen our

spiritual growth like our teachers mentioned that without that has not done in Houston has not been beloved for four people even that has not done for Allah and His question about others, your heart is not able to progress because it's always kind of stuck. It's stuck on those blockers and those negative thinking that takes you, you know, spirals you back into other things that don't let you get to your your best potential. Yes. And Hustla then is translated as assuming that best assume the best of Allah and assume the best of others. And this is so liberating. I know within counseling, I find this to be extremely liberating for my clients. Because when you assume the best of ALLAH, so

no matter what your circumstances are right now, if you believe that Allah is choosing this for you, because this is the remedy to whatever issues you're going through your internal turmoil needs to be cured. And your difficulties are is like that injection. And so when we trust Allah's plan, we don't stress we don't have anxiety, we're not getting overwhelmed, and then what's not done of other people when we assume the best of others, then then we really have we cultivate good relationships.

Yeah, so yes.

And I was just saying, sister Khalid, that recently I was, you know, as you and I both talked about Rico's work, and I was basically looking at it to try to think about this, the Quranic emotions, all the all the emotions that are mentioned in the Quran. And the reason that we, when we, when we thought about getting into this, this space of character transformation and character development work, and that's how I started my journey, you know, after being ahead of school for about couple of decades, I was, you know, going in and out of this work, where I was starting to create a team that could develop a character development project, and I said, how do we teach kids about character

beyond the surface level? And we realized that we really needed to go into their emotions, because if they're not able to emotionally connect to like, what does sugar mean? Or what does Sobor mean? Or emotionally, what do I feel when I'm losing my sobor, emotionally, what happens to my brain, then they're not able to connect to it at a deeper level, you know, so that's where we started getting into this, like work. And we realize, emotions are such an important part of training ourselves, and learning to understand where those emotions are coming from regulating those emotions, according to the prophetic way, but also understanding the psychology of those emotions are so important in

showing up with our best care. Absolutely. And many times people see emotions, it's just something that happens to them. And they're kind of like a leaf that is flowing from one emotion to another, they don't think that they have any control over it. And when you don't understand your emotions, and when you don't know how to manage your emotion, then you are at the mercy of others, you're at the mercy of your circumstances. And so one of the important work I do with the our mentorship program is teaching women specifically how to get in touch with their emotions, how to understand that, how to manage it, and how to bring it off. So what you've mentioned with Rico's work, there

are the five A's of loving, right? There are five A's that are so critical. And if we cultivate these A's into our relationships and to ourselves, then it will change everything. And, and so like one one is the attention, right? Being able to give attention to to the people that we love, and this is and maybe we would be able to expand on this

actually greater when next week we're talking about relationships relationship. Yeah, yes. But it is very important to, you know, to recognize that when we, when we're in tune with our own emotions, like what you said that being able to understand it and to manage it, where that is where a lot of people fall apart. Yeah, yeah. And may Allah bless you that we this renovation, this whole analogy that you're giving about how you plan the renovation, and this is, this is that investment you're making, you're, you're investing yours in yourself, to let go of that old self, that lower self and build this higher self and build his best self. And it takes those processes that you mentioned. But

this renovation is something that process and also alluded to, in terms of perfecting the human character, I think it's beautiful that you're bringing up like building and rebuilding. And the person said, you know, my example, this, this essence of the Hadees is that this this beautiful home is getting built by all the messengers and what Allah revealed to them, but somebody goes around and sees that it's not complete there is like that. There's that corner that's not done. And the process of that I am that last brick, right? That the bronze system is like he completes that, that message, that mission, that perfection of the deen and the perfection of human character that was not sent

except to perfect human character. Yes, and it's thank you for sharing that that is really profound that all of the messages came and they all are interconnected. And then the Prophet sallallahu Sallam came to complete our character. And he said that the heaviest thing on the scale is our good character. So we need to really emphasize this because many times the emphasis is on the ritual. Many times the emphasis is on whether it's the prayer whether it

is reading of the Quran, which all of those are definitely critical and important, but it doesn't change our character if we're reading you know, if 10 days have passed, and you've been doing your prayers and you have been doing the you know, the pm and the reading of the Quran, but nothing has changed then then we have a problem Houston we have a problem right?

Yeah, we were just talking about the trance transforming your worship, right our salah or our Quran our DUA and in your Salah if you're if you're continuously thinking about others, and in your if you're thinking about others in your Quran, if you're thinking about others in your DUA, you're thinking about others, that's a good time to kind of look deep in yourself and say that Why am I always thinking about my my, you know, other people? Is it because I, I want something from them? Or is it me? Or is it that actually going to rectify my relationship with people who is going to rectify, who's validation I'm looking for. And always thinking about that connecting with Allah and

the one that will help me transform myself transform my sustenance, my risks, any need that I have, I want to have that deeper relationship with him and really being present in that moment in your Salah and your Quran in your

it really will help you get that fuel that you need that fuel of humility, the fuel of gratitude, your love, you know, there's different qualities we talked about, about mindful salah. We talked about different emotions like that deep respect and presence of Allah is having the Heba that all alone you're standing in front of him with a deep sense of Raja or hope and that higher modesty when you have these qualities that you you cultivate in yourself then how do you take these out when you leave salah? How do you keep thinking that now I will show up and turn my relationship my character my everything I do in a way that is also pleasing to Allah with those same qualities. Yeah, and that

is the missing link right? I think a lot of times people know about having those characteristics in the worship, but then they don't carry it on over to their character so this is what we're hoping that all of you tuning in can really reflect on this Ramadan that we're going to look at our characters and be very honest with ourselves and I would love for those of you who are attending right now to see when we talked about the demolition is there like what what needs to be demolished? What is there that you have noticed that you said you know what, maybe maybe I need to do away with this maybe I can improve and if you don't want to talk about yourself you could just you know talk

generally about what is it that most people because it's really easy to pinpoint maybe your your spouse's shortcomings or your children's shortcoming, but it's tough when you have

Look within yourself. So I would love for you all to be engaged and to share some of the things that we could work on.

Yeah, all of us.

So

as far as, uh, what else was it that you were bringing up? So it was about the prayer and the worship, taking the things that we are cultivating in those moments and then bringing it to our own characteristics. Right. Right. Right. And that and that and the character, you know, it is it attracts the baraka and blessings of Allah subhanaw taala, a lot of times, we're really, we lose our character, because we're just so busy. You know, we're just so after those pursuits that we have the different goals and tasks and jobs and different things that we are after. And we end up not showing up with our best character, because we're just busy and those things but we have to remember that

the risk comes from Allah subhanaw taala. When you show up with good character, good character brings borrow. Yes, yes. So bringing the bad are kind of one of the sisters stuff it just saying anger issues. And that was one of the things that we wanted to actually talk about, because we all are challenged with anger, and we all regress when we're angry, right? We just don't really regret this one as this one is saying, I need to improve on how I react to others when I'm upset. So anger is a big one. As far as that is a it is a part of a person's personality that can really destroy their good deeds. What would you like to say about that? Yeah, so this is it's unbelievable that you

know, that's the prophesy Selim. He never got angry for a personal reason. You know, just like if you think about, like, a human being is created with his emotions and the emotions are completely okay. It's okay to be angry. And anger is created for a reason, right? The last month has given us the anger and even anger could be a gift at times, where you're using your anger for, like that sense of dignity to protect yourself from harm, like I'm, I'm angry about this evil or this bad or this injustice. And you can fight against your knifes or you can fight against, you know, like, for example, the social justice scene, right? That you you're able to use that anger produces courage,

righteous anger produces courage to show up with. But what happened is that a lot of times in our communities in our homes, anger is not expressed righteously like the prophesy Salem, you know, it would not be it would not be a calm, contain righteous anger, it's more about drama, you don't let anger become

right thing that anger by itself is wrong, or it's it's bad. But it's not about the emotions of anger, but it's all about how do you contain and how do you regulate it? How do you create space to understand? Is it coming from my lower self, my nerves? Or is it coming from a place of God centeredness, and then channeling it in a way that does not no yelling, no screaming, no abusing. But you know, Holding, holding on to the goodness protecting the goodness staying farm on goodness, that's what Anger should be used for? Right. And it's such an important point you're bringing up is that the Prophet sallallahu Sallam did not get angry for his own personal it wasn't his eagle,

right. And we really have to keep our ego in check. Because that is the downfall of human beings. It's just having that sense of ego. And

and when we regulate it and recognize and I remember the story of Ali read the law and that he was in the battlefield and he was about to take out the enemy, and the enemy spat in his face. And he walked away because he's like, he didn't want to contaminate his intention that this is it's not about like, let me get even with you let me get revenge. No, it was he stepped away. So how many times have we reacted because of our ego? And, and we really have to keep that in check. And, you know, one of the, let's see, let's see what some of the sisters are saying thinking good things of ourselves, self doubt and not being good enough. Okay. We'll talk about that in sha Allah, and

blaming people and our environments. So it is it's very easy to blame. And that's the easy way out, right? It's, a lot of times, I will tell I'm doing marriage counseling, I would say you know, we could probably sit here and talk about your spouse and how horrible they are for the next you know, year. And some counselors do that. It's just, yeah, oh, they're so horrible. Not so bad. But it really it's, you know, we have to think about in Allah's infinite wisdom, he has put us

with this person for a reason, and what is it that we're supposed to learn from this? And so if we look at the situations and see how can we, how can we learn this person is triggering me. But what is it saying about myself? And what do I need to work on?

And this thing about anger, this space that we have the prophetic silence we talk about in our mindfulness, that the prophetic silence, how do we cultivate it? What does it mean? Like one of the narration of the prophesy said, he made the other Allah make even my silence, a source of contemplation, make my silence, even contemplation. So even he was he was speaking, he was more silent than he was speaking. And when he spoke, it came out of the wisdom that he had, through the reflection, that he engaged silence, and understanding that, that prophetic silence of the prophets have said that when you're angry, do not speak, do not speak when you're angry, right? This Hadees

by itself creates that space between the stimuli, we talk about creating the space between the trigger and our reaction from reaction to response, and how to craft that response. And, you know, something happens, somebody say something, somebody does something, and we let them control us, and how do we let go? And how do we act like, we have the space and like Victor Frankel's word, you know, we mentioned about this between the stimuli, and the and the reaction and the response, there is a space and

fog and that space lies, your, your ability to grow. Yes. And you're in that space lies your freedom in in your ability to grow. So we can if we can expand that space, just just by practicing prophetic silence, yes. What a profound, what a profound statement that it is the Prophetic silence, and being able to allow another person to be silent. So a lot of times what happens is when, when, maybe a couple, they're angry with one another, and it's this, this desire to want to react, and then forcing the other person to, you know, you need to talk now.

And that person is trying to keep it together. So we have to really be aware that sometimes, the best thing you can do, the way to put out the fire is simply by staying silent. So that is definitely one of the things that we can improve about our character is managing our anger. And, you know, the work we do on the mindful Hearts Academy is really about recognizing, you know, what is it what's making us so angry to begin with, and understanding that anger, so you're not taking it out on others, because sometimes, there's this unresolved issue from childhood from your own life with your own insecurities, and then you're lashing out at the people that you love the most. And you

don't recognize that, Oh, my God, I got to do some of this internal work, right? So that that's going to be very critical. And to learn how to how to manage it. And another characteristic, yeah, move into awareness. Sometimes we feel like we want to, we want to have to react instead of reacting. If we can just move into mindfulness and awareness of how does this make me feel? You know, what am I experiencing? And we talk about going from existential like, we make the anger about our whole self. And we go into this existential crisis of like, oh my god, I'm angry, like, the anger has taken me over. And anger, like any other emotions are things that are showing up in our

body in our physiological response to triggers and stimuli. And just like we feel pain, you know, we don't want we don't describe our we have a different way of describing our physical ailments. So if we have for pain, we don't say that I am pain or I have become pain. I say I'm experiencing pain. So the same way, going from existential to experiential. Like I'm experiencing anger in my body. Where does it show up? Does it show up in my back to the show up in my neck? Maybe my muscles? Maybe there? What are the what are the signs? How do you show the wear?

Yeah, and that's muscles, some people's the years wringing hands or palms are getting sweaty. So you have different ways to understand, Okay, it looks like I'm getting angry. And just get into that awareness. How does it feel in the body and staying with that awareness? And eventually, if you're able to pick up the pen, we talked about the power of the pen is writing that down. And Where's that coming from? Is there history behind that? Is there something that you have in terms of your own, you know, ways of looking at yourself, maybe a self perceived inadequacy about yourself or

helps you know, like where it might be coming from just having that awareness. And just staying with awareness before you even craft a response can really help. It really does mashallah seeing where it is where it is in your body becoming aware. And I always say, tell people very quick steps that I teach us that say alphabet, Lima, shaytani, R rajim. As soon as you feel anger, because the shaytaan wants to take you down, then it's doing the deep breathing, you know, taking into deep breath, holding it and then breathing out for five times, and then saying calming words, so I'm in control, everything's going to be fine. And then doing some thicker stuff for a loss, or a loss, or a loss.

And maybe giving yourself a timeout, you know, take time out for yourself and say, you know, I am right now I'm feeling really angry. And I don't want to say or do anything disrespectful. So I'm going to give myself a little break, I'm going to go I don't know, take a shower, take a nap, do prayers, whatever it is, and then get back. So that is a great way to regulate ourselves. It's another thing that many people fall and we're all guilty of it is gossiping, right? One of the characteristics that we need to improve and,

and the Prophet alayhi salam, he held his tongue and said, incarcerate the tongue, right? That we need to really become aware of how this is how this is affecting us and our and our religion, our all our good deeds.

Yeah. And, you know, this is where I think this

living in a very people centered way can can get us to a place where welcome salaam or so. So this living in a very always about like about what people think. And the validation for people and living in a very people centered way versus living in a God centered way and showing up with a god centeredness with people there is a little bit of that difference, that shift that can really help because some people you know, to them,

you know what other people think of me? What other people give me, what do I expect from people and how I get that from people? That's always that's their focus. And so we have to move away from that to, you know, what can I do to be closer to Allah subhanaw taala. And this really shifts us and that helps us to understand that it's not really important, why should i When do I have time to even talk about people, because Allah has greatness is so beautiful, that if you take the seven oceans and you turn them into Ng and you keep writing the names of Allah, or the greatness of Allah, you want to thank Allah, you'll not be able to finish the why why can I talk about less Panatela? You know, so

talking about something that instead brings me back to my better self, you know, we know that we are going to have human human life and our interactions and our conversations and so on. But how do we, how do we shift away from gossiping, and worrying about what other people might be doing to focusing on our own cells. So you're saying to shift the focus from being getting that validation from others, and wanting that connection to just being maybe more God centric. And some of the most valuable lessons I've learned, I think, especially this past decade, is that sometimes Allah disconnects you with certain people, or maybe kicks people out of your lives, right? Whether it is

through loss, whether it's through death, whether it's through for whatever reason, distance, and and that actually makes you connect more to Allah. So for those of you who are going through those difficulties, and, and we see that time and time again, people generally tend to be disappointing in one way or another, just to be realistic. I remember, when I was in college, I was just, you know, complete, optimistic thought everyone is good, right? I'm still an optimist. But now Alhamdulillah 53, and the life experiences I've had, I can see that there is there's a lot of disappointment in the world, there's a lot of times that people do not match your expectations and, and a lot of times

that you are hurt by the people closest to you. And recognize and so going back to that story, one, one friend who was like, you know, she was a senior, she goes, people are so disappointing, and or most people are disappointed, and I just thought, oh my gosh, like such a pessimist, like, how could you say that? And years decades later, recognizing that there's so much truth to that, and we shouldn't put our hopes in other people. We put our hopes in the law. And and when we disconnect from that expectation, that's when it's very

Be free, which is not an easy thing to do. No, no. And but that's, that's crucial in your character transformation that if you really want to transform your character you have to stop expecting from people. Don't expect anything from people but give for the sake of Allah and don't ask ADGER like the prophecies to say, you know, they were the highest of character because that's what that was their model that we don't expect anything. No, I heard from people on the Agile on your word,

masha Allah, so we were we will work on that this Ramadan, we're working on getting rid of the angry habits not being reactionary, but you know, actually responding mindfully, we're not going to get in, get ourselves into the gossip and try to disconnect from having those expectations. And there are some people who are in it. They're chronic complainers, right, there's a lot of negativity, what are what are your thoughts about the negativity and how that affects our character?

Subhan Allah? Yeah. So this is something that is such an important understanding of who we are and how we show up and a lot of times we don't even realize it sometimes a chronic complainers don't know, you know, they're not even aware, they might have been mindful of how they're showing up. And this negativity and this scarcity, focus thinking, you know, all those things are not enough. And, you know, people are not enough for me, people don't do enough for me, you know, nobody's there for me, you know, so we forget that how much like right when we're saying that, we forget that right at that moment, Allah subhanaw taala is making a billion neurons work in our brain just fine, you know.

And so we forget about a billion things to be thankful for. Right at that moment, you're focusing on one thing and whatever we focus on becomes big in our brain, right? So we focus on this one issue, one challenge and we forget about 1000 other good things. And this is where that Gaza thing is connected as well that you know, our teachers and scholars you know, Skia they normally say this, you know a lot about Hawaii, Allah gave you two eyes, one of my teachers used to say, Allah give me one eye, one eye Allah gave you to look at the good are other people. And Allah gave me the other eye to look at your own false. Oh, interesting.

You the people on on that pesky around, but you know, are thinking how do I always focus on myself and cultivate mice, and about others just look at their good overlook their bad. What a fool was for who just some overlooked, overlooked. Allah is asking us in the Quran to overlook. So this oversight, just oversight because you can build a good expectation of people without, you know, focusing on their good always think about what is one good that I have with this person? What is that one good that this person does that makes them

or makes them for me? And it all has to do with your focus again, and I've mentioned this before your reticular activating system, RAs in the brain, it's filters, what you focus on. So if your focus is this person is so annoying, or I can't stand this person, that's all you're going to see. And asking yourself what is good about them is very critical. Sister Khadija saying the chronic complainers not only affect their own lives, but also the lives of those around them. Absolutely. So very quickly, let's make a little commitment here. What are you committed to changing from what we've talked about? How many of you are going to let's say focus on the anger, managing your anger?

Who's going to manage their? What was it making sure that we don't do any kind of gossip? And then who's going to focus on what was the last thing we taught? Not complaining, right? I want to just stop, I don't want to complain at all, we have nothing to complain about, right. And when you really reflect on how blessed we are, like you were saying just the number of neurons in our brains.

It just makes you be such a happier person. So if you could really quickly write down in the comment section, what things that you are committed to changing, right? There's also the fact that like people, both before actually we move on, I'd like to hear about your work. I mean, we both

this is our passion, and we help others through the work that we do. And I'd love to hear more about your Monaca they see sponsored by mindful Hearts Academy and MODOK Baba and they're probably like, what are those? So I think it's important for us to share. Thank you. That was a good time. Good timing. So please share with us some of you know your some of the work I know you do heart centered work and what is maraca because I'm sure a lot of people are inspired and they would want

Want to improve themselves even like after Ramadan in sha Allah?

Hamdulillah. So yeah, thank you so much. So I think this question, may Allah bless you for the beautiful work that you do sister Holly, you are actually a pioneer in this mindfulness and Muslim psychologist space. And we are working on transforming ourselves with that understanding that if we learn to be mindful, and God centered, there is a way to cultivate a prophetic card there is a there are tools that we can use their practices that we can do, and the master class that we teach. It's on a heart centered model of the prophetic mindfulness. So we call it heal in the mindfulness of God first and foremost. That's a beautiful title. Beautiful. Yeah, and the E stands for engage with

purpose showing up with everything with your God given purpose and identity, and that deeps intentionality, and the A stands for achieve with gratitude. How do you grow because we're talking about chronic complaining, our brain literally strings, chronic complainers brains, there's a study that literally shrinks, you know, literally, gray matters from the hip.

Did everyone hear that you are losing gray matter when you're complaining?

Your brain is shrinking as Ethan nakoma line when you end with that, and then you immediately see the effect and impact. But A stands for achieved with gratitude. And then the R stands for rise with patience and humility.

Drive with compassion, these, these are the qualities that we talked about the science of these qualities and neuroscience of these qualities in our brain in our body. And then we talk deeply about a prophetic model. We do a lot of work from non Buzzelli we bring a lot of work from our ally Mahasi and other scholars that you know those pioneers in Islamic psychology, how do we bring some of those tools and what they teach but into a coachable format? That's our masterclass, we're turning some of the mindfulness practices meditations, you know, into this app, the maraca app that the masses can, you know, have in their palms of their hand Inshallah, we'd love to have you there

as well. We'd love to have you on the app inshallah. We

all are beautiful teachers and you know, our teachers and our psychologists, counselors from around the world. And hamdulillah we're in beta we're so excited. Our team is testing it now. It's in beta, okay. We've been meaning to release it for the last few months, but they're, you know, with tech development, it takes time. Sure. So inshallah welcome everybody that's watching on and thank you for Mr. Holland team for

partnering with you sharing our work here that Shala you know, if you're able to pre subscribe it this Ramadan, it will be a great way for you to boost our work and finish the rest of the tech development we need to release it inshallah right after another we're already testing it.

That's exciting. scribers end of Ramadan. And then right after everybody, mashallah, I think that's, that's wonderful work that you're doing as far as, you know, the your masterclass and going in depth about how to change yourself. And I love what the heart stands for beautiful concepts. And then the maraca app, which can, you know, can be like a daily reminder. So, you know, we want to definitely make sure that you are supported and that all of you who are tuning in, it doesn't have to end with Ramadan, right, because we, we love this, this energy and being together and sharing and showing up live, but you can continue to benefit from the services that both brother would do them myself to,

throughout the year in sha Allah. And we're working on something amazing, too, that we will be revealing soon, but you want to tell talk about a little bit about your mindful hearts? Absolutely. So this is this is my baby or the mindful Hearts Academy. It's, it is a program, it's a self development program for women. And it's all within the Islamic framework because I've I have spent 1000s and 1000s on myself and invested in myself to to learn and all the self development programs, there was no mention of Allah, there's no mention of you know, how the connection I always felt like it was kind of sometimes even contrary to our Islamic beliefs. And I always had to Yeah, and I

always had to kind of remind myself so I wanted everyone to be relaxed to be able to improve themselves within an Islamic framework. And I believe I have actually sister

Jessica, she was a member Suzanne who is on there. And just she you know, if you're able to give like a little bit of like how you were able to benefit, but it's really based on the

Making women the best versions of themselves overcoming the emotional struggle. I want to see how I can. How I can share here, I haven't shared. Let's see the plus sign is right. Is that correct? Or no?

I'm not sure if I can. But anyway, it's about like, oh, present, right? You said that. You clicked on the present. And then we go to video file or slide, let's share screen. And then All right, so something that let's see, is that

okay, Bismillah. We're almost there. Guys. Let me show it to you. And

all right. Sure.

Okay, can you see it? The core confidence? Yes. Okay. So this is something that I, that I've been working on at Hamdulillah. And we've been instilling the core confidence method. It's about like, you're having the right mindset about about yourself, the self confident your image, how you feel about yourself, and how do you present yourself to others, and then having the mental strength, you know, it's, it's all about what you see you're capable of, and the emotional strength. So there's different phases that, that teach you how to overcome any of your negative qualities, and then reinforce that behavior to strengthen it. So within Alhamdulillah Let me see. And this I'm going to

just show you, can you see this as well, brother would do? Yeah, I can see it. Okay, so this is the website. And I just wanted to know, right? I don't see that. Sorry. No, you can't see that.

On that core continents method? Yeah. Ah, amazing. Beautiful. I love it.

And then let's see.

Stop the screen. That's okay. Is it possible to show the website or No, no, that's okay. All right. So and Hamdulillah? Let's see, we have what Sister Olivia saying My son can't control his emotional temper, he gets angry very quickly, how can we help them, okay, we'll address that in sha Allah, and count our blessings and be grateful. So the, the thing that I just like to focus on is helping helping women be actually like the best version of themselves. And when you do that, then all your relationships improve. And that is actually it improves your connection with Allah as well. Because when you have a better character, everything improves on 100 law. Yeah, and what you're saying that

there's not a lot of there's a lot of, like, beautiful trainings and programs out there. But sometimes, you know, there I say in my master class that we, the world of psychology sometimes gets pretty lonely. You have to do all that work by yourself without Allah with you, you know, and it's difficult. It's tough. I mean, think about how beautiful it is. When you're in the presence of a lawyer making the care you're thinking and feeling supported. You have the NOR and the blessing of Allah's Rama and it just brings so much baraka to everything you do. And you don't have to cultivate and do all this hard work by yourself.

Ah, yes, and it's the, you know, the community is the sisterhood, which I it helped me to grow when I first was in a halacha. And I was just, you know, newly practicing, and the sisters, you know, just really nourished me. And I wanted to create that same environment for sisters a calm place of no judgement, putting down your guards, being yourself. And you know, a lot of people can afford counselling. So I actually made this very affordable so that everyone can, you know, can benefit from the self development. So Allah bless your work mail, increase it and

like sip from us now, Alexa from our mean. So those of you who want to improve yourself as the, the mindful hearts with an s.com, we'd love to have you there with us. But now, moving on to some of the other characteristics that we want to overcome. What else did we talk about some of the negative qualities that we need to improve? Yeah, and before we do, I just wanted to kind of answer a couple of the questions here. Sure. I see that there's a question here about, about self doubt. And there's a question here about

you know, the 10 year old not able to control emotions and temper

and also controlling negative thoughts about myself. So in terms of self

doubt you know it is something that we have to remember that Allah Smith has created us for a purpose. And my existence at this very moment in this time, age plays family wherever it is, Allah sent me for for a reason, you know quintuple haoma digit leanness, you're sent, you're the best all the nations. And the process was going to be proud of this Oma. And we are sent for that, at that time after the final messenger to the point that some of the newbies some of the MBS wanted to come back at this time to witness this. Because when Allah's father told one of the prophets that there will be, there'll be a messenger, there'll be people, that this messenger will have this final

messenger, that they will, they will actually do the work of the prophets, and they will not have any rain, and they will not have any help, they will not have any knowledge, they will not have any forbearance. And the Prophet was like, amazed, like, What do you mean? Like how can somebody have do the work of the prophets without having patience and knowledge. And Allah's Prophet said that I will give them knowledge from my knowledge, and I will give them forbearance from my, from my from yours. And this is something that we know from the Hadith that after the Sahaba, when we have we're far removed from the Prophet, when we do a little bit of love multiplies. It's so much more like Allah

told the Sahaba that people will come after you. And when they will do anything, they will get 50 times the reward. And the Sahaba were like so surprised. They're like 50 times the reward 50 times of their people, or 50 times of hours. And the person said 50 times of yours. And they said how's that for why and then the process and answer to them that they did not see me the profit, they didn't see the revelation coming down, they didn't experience and in that time and age when they do a little bit alone multiplied so much more. So it is you know, some people think that if we're at the time of the Prophet, if we came at the time of the Sahaba, right, then we would be the best we

would do everything. That's right, and why do they have to come at this time? What did they have, you know, so? So this is something that we have to understand that you're here for a purpose. Allah loves you 70 times more than your mom loves you, Allah send you as Khalifa as his representative, Allah send you as a messenger of the final messenger Allah sent you as the inheritor of the Quran. I mean, how what where else do we drive our confidence from like, we show up with that confidence that I am carrying the Quran, I am here to represent God right. So just wanted to mention that a little bit about how to go back and claim that confidence from our divine identity. Ah, that's incredible,

very, very profound masala in your reflection and recognizing the fact that the rewards are so much more now. And reminding ourselves of how precious What a precious gift we have and reminding ourselves to have the prophetic character such as like a love hate and for that Masha, Allah. My dear friend Suzanne has written I have, I've been a part of MHA for four years, and it has been so transformative. Michelle live worked on myself for decades. But MHA took me deeper, more mindful and intentional levels as like a Lohit. And and Hamdulillah. She's always very active on the group and it's a blessing. What question was it was it about the 10 year old that you're you wanted to

address. The other one was about,

you know, while you're doing some work on yourself, before we get to the 10 year old, write down things, write down things, write down talents, write down resources, write down the blessings that Allah has given you. And that you're proud, you're happy and content about these blessings and above this talent, resources, and how you can use them for the sake of us parents, Allah, so you have a sense of self compassion to yourself, that compassion is really important. Because if you judge yourself and beat yourself down every time you make a mistake, then you're going to get spiraled into this whole negativity and scarcity that's going to be difficult to come out of. Instead, if you

come back to Allah and say, What do I need to focus on at this moment, and this is what our teachers teach us as well, that if you lose your shoe and Salah and your mind is gone somewhere else, if you start saying, oh my god, I'm never gonna remember how many orchids, I'm never going to be able to, you know, be mindful, I'm never going to do this properly. If you get into this mindset, you're not going to be able to focus on Salah either that's going to take you even further away from Salah. So instead, the teach our teachers and scholars they mentioned that as soon as your mind, you know, moves away and this is something that modern neuroscience and mindfulness work is teaching us that

if you want to train your mind, just be gentle and kind to yourself as soon as you notice that meta attention the ability to pay attention to your attention. When you have this meta attention and you training your attention. You just kindly and

gently bring your attention back instead of self judgment, or, instead have a sense of gentleness and kindness to yourself. Yeah, and this is important because the Sahaba came and said, My sins, my sins, and the prophets and say Allahumma McPhee Allah took our Psalm in June will be Allah, my, your forgiveness is so much vaster so much, it's more expensive than my sins wahama Toka jar in the mail, and I have so much more hope in your Rama than my good deeds, say three times. And he said it two times. And the person said that all your sins are forgiven, now get no go, go.

Going doesn't happen. Sometimes we get stuck in our sins, and we don't get go, we gotta get up and go into the Mercy of Allah and say, Allah has forgiven me let go, don't move forward. Right? Don't be debilitated by your mistakes. See it as a point of, you know, just getting back on track. And the self compassion is very critical. I, you know, always emphasize that, and especially in your journey of becoming a better version of yourself, because it's hard, it's hard to change, it is possible, but it takes a lot of effort. And when you are compassionate to yourself, first and foremost, then that compassion spills over to others. Because those who are the hardest on themselves, they are

pretty hard on others. And so start with yourself have that sense of okay, give yourself space, and what are the characteristics that I really wanted us to emphasize on this Ramadan is not to be judgmental of others, because that judgmental pneus is really detrimental to our spiritual growth. And what I have seen is that the more a person becomes religious, let's say they start doing they're thicker and they're start doing the Sunnah. And they start finishing the Quran, and they do extra fasting, the more they do that, it's almost like the, it becomes synonymous with being judgmental of others. And it's really a shame that that happens. Because I feel you know, we have a Persian

proverb that says, the tree you know, that that bears the most fruits hangs his head low, right? Meaning that the more you have, the more humble you should be, and, and never to look at another person and think that you are better than them because you're doing more worship so that that's a really, you know, important point to keep in mind and sha Allah. And that's beautiful, that humility, even when Allah is making you the people of Fidel, you know, that story of Abu Bakr retana When he wanted to cut off the stipend that used to give to his his relative that, you know, started the rumor, gossip that I suffer about I shouldn't be allowed on her. And Allah revealed the person

said that it doesn't suit the people of Fidel the people that Allah has blessed Allah is on are elevated to, to not give. Yeah, and sometimes we feel like why do we have to give they don't give? He doesn't Yeah, she doesn't give you know, my this relative doesn't give this friend doesn't give and we get stuck in that instead, if we completely forget about all that and just hold them in our compassion or make dua for them and just give because Allah is giving me I'm not asking anything back from them. And where that beautiful Hadith comes in that the good character is not when someone does good to you to get back to them. Yeah, character is Salman cotta. If somebody cuts out their

relationship, you build a relationship with them. Ya know what Muhammad if somebody you know deprives you you give them what for mandala muck and if somebody you know oppresses you, then you forgive them overlook them. Well, I Scintilla I saw it like somebody does bad to you, and you show up with them with sandalwood character that has good character. And character shows up when you have a conflict with a person. It's so easy to be nice, you're nice to me, I'm nice to you. But when a conflict occurs, and you can have beautiful character that is when true character shines. And it reminds me that the verse of the Quran that says and I'm summarizing that when someone does bad to

you, you return it with kindness, then they will go from being your enemy to being your friend and I have seen this, I've seen this happen. And just a quick reminder, you know, reflecting back on the amazing interviews that we've had with our guests, and all of them were transformed by witnessing or reading about the transformation of, of someone's character, right? It was it was another Muslims beautiful character that made them say how I want to be a Muslim. And I just asked us what are we doing? How are we presenting ourselves? How are we dealing with others on a daily

He bases to inspire others and are they learning about Islam through our characters? Or are they actually becoming disappointed by by our character so that's that's something to reflect on in sha Allah. Last night Sheikh Abdullah duro was speaking at our Masjid here and Capelle and Michelle beautiful, beautiful, you know, share about his own conversion, and where he would be without Islam and how to be proud. Like he feels like he said something beautiful. He said that my heart hurts for our youth when they don't show up with pride for their faith. Because I converted to this faith and faith this faith saved me say I would not be here in front of you, I didn't have this fear, I'll be

somewhere, you know, in a dark place somewhere else. And so such a beautiful, you know, understanding of people that find this light and this pride in the faith.

And then he said to, to make sure you cultivate this pride in your kids in our youth. And one of the ways that I'm going to ask everybody that's watching is one of the ways to activate and cultivate this pride is when they're proud to call you, their their mom or their dad, when they're proud to call you, their spouse, when they're allowed to call in their sister or your brother. They're proud to call you their parent or their child. This is how you bring the pride because people feel that Islam and Dean has beautified our dealings and our character. When we show up with that character, then the pride comes back. Beautiful, beautiful and this is healthy, halaal pride. Because we

usually have a negative association to the word pride.

Not arrogance, it's this feeling of like, you know, oh my god, I love this religion and

sugar, contentment and confidence, you know, yes, mixture of sugar, contentment and confidence. Yes, just like a locker. And next week, our live is going to be fascinating. So we're, we're working, we started with internal right, we worked, we talked about transformation through worship, then it was about transforming our character. And next week is going to be about transforming our relationships. So that's next week, and then we're going to share with you Yes, and we have we have an exciting announcement next week as well for what to do like for after Ramadan. So I hope that all of you can join us. So it's just like a located to Yes. And saw Allah and saw me and I realized that we didn't

answer that question about the Tarot. Okay, you want to share something really fast before we wrap this up today? Sure. So it was about first you need to, you need to see, where's this anger stemming from? Right? So if there are outbursts, you have to see what is at the root of it? Is he being overlooked? Is he being compared? Is he being bullied? Find out what is you know, what is the cause of this? And then I ask all the parents who bring in their children, and they are, you know, complaining about them? And I really direct the question at the parent and saying, how do you handle anger? What is your demonstration of anger? Because we have to, we have to basically model the

correct behavior, we have to model the correct behavior. And, you know, I had this one, I had one client who was a lawyer, very intelligent, very successful man. And his son got in trouble at school for hitting another child, right? And then he, he, he was telling me when I grabbed them, I brought him home. And I started spanking him and saying we don't hit people when we're angry. And I'm like, Okay, can you pause right there, like just just put this on a movie screen? I want you to look at this and tell me what is wrong with this, right? And many times we do that, and we're kind of we're not really mindful of what it is that we're doing. So make sure that in your home,

you and your spouse are getting along that if there is underlying anger and frustration, how do you treat your kids when they've done something wrong? And if you model the correct behavior, I guarantee that your son is going to start you know, toning it down in sha Allah. Yeah, this is what our scholar has mentioned also that the other like kids lose their other job when they see their parents arguing in front of them so never argue in public you know, in cancer really. But also, you know, there are times that if you have done everything of course, you know, reach out to sister Holly or other counselors, colleges that might be able to give you their behavior interventionist

and others that can kind of assess and see if there's anything else they need any other skills in need. But a lot of times it comes back to parents learning these two

Rules, correcting the environment and looking back to where it might be coming from. And that can help. Food Nutrition. You know, like if you're giving a lot of sugar, some of them a lot of gluten. Food can really aggravate kids behaviors Allahu Akbar Yes. We're all about nutrition and health and that's something else we'll inshallah share with you later but no, that's that's so true. We got to just look at their environment and see how we can improve it so just like a love hate and for all of you who tuned in please share it with your your friends and family so that each one can improve their character and and I pray that Allah improves us every single day so that by the end of

Ramadan, we can be really a much better version of ourselves and sha Allah. Amin Amin May Allah grant us though fig to practice more than we have said spoken or revert allowing me was beautiful, though fake inshallah. Could you do it to offer us maybe?

Yes. Reality the no Mohammed Allama scileanna seething Um hum Allahumma salli ala Sayyidina Muhammad, Allah please alumna sadaqa Illman Feola Manasa Iman and Camila Yochanan saw the call risk and Boissier Holman Harsha listen and Kira and Shakira sorbitan Suha sohbet and problem moto Hatton in the north fossa beetle Jana Naja Tomita na Allahumma. Yeah. Hey, yo, yo, yo, yo Rama cheekiness, the GIS as their Helena Sharon Aquila, Willa to kill nylon for Sonata for terrain, Allah. We ask you over living ever sustaining. We seek refuge This is a beautiful prayer of the prophesy Salam, we seek refuge in Your mercy. We do not know how to train ourselves how to achieve our best self. Allah

we ask your refuge and we come back into your shelter of Rama or Stefan ash and Aquila, rectify all our affairs rectify our behavior or character relationships or worship. Allah Tiki night and for Senator Fatah and do not leave us to our ego even for a blink of an eye can see my side of a liberal Kulu Amin Hamdulillah I mean beautiful, very comprehensive May Allah bless you bless your family, and inshallah we'll see you again next week. Salah Nikhil La Casa La what's on there, you're better cutters, Salaam Alaikum everyone