Hosai Mojaddidi – Virtual Sisterhood Community Halaqa (Week 2)
AI: Summary ©
The speakers stress the importance of showing acceptance of the decree of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala and avoiding complaining. They also emphasize the need for individualism and faith in oneself, as well as protecting one's pride and being willing to be honest. The importance of guidance and structure for spiritual paths, one-stop shops, and a universal journey for guidance and a focus on meaningful conversations with teenagers is emphasized. The speakers also suggest seeking guidance and one-stop shops for guidance, and emphasize the importance of providing guidance and structure for spiritual Paths and one-stop shops for guidance.
AI: Summary ©
So
welcome
to the second meeting. We, you know, we've
just started these with the quarantine.
Typically, I do once a month meetings with
sisters at MCC,
but because of the quarantine and the fact
that people are having, you know, still some
a difficult time with,
adjusting to this, very, very different world that
we've all kind of found ourselves in.
We thought these would be helpful to do
these sessions inshallah.
So,
basically, I wanted to talk about this. You
know, how are we struggling? How are we
dealing with this?
A few days ago, I actually wrote a
post,
and it was called I called it the
10 Stages of Quarantine Life
and How to Stay Afloat.
So I just wanted to start off kinda
talking about that because,
you know, it's really important,
you know, someone who talks about at length
and that you probably hear me all the
time talking about about emotional intelligence, you know,
it's one of my favorite topics.
One of the the first point of emotional
intelligence is self awareness. Right? So we have
to be very aware of what we're feeling
in order to know how to respond to
those feelings. And so, for some people,
as I've mentioned in previous discussions that I've
had over the past couple of weeks,
there's different, you know,
reactions to all of this. I have many
friends who are very,
you know, everything is going well.
I'm enjoying the time with my family.
I'm having a really, you know, positive time
just sort of catching up on things and
projects and calling family and, you know, I'm
reconnecting
with my spouse, my kids.
So, there's some people who are really
having a, an exceptional time almost and are
very
grateful for
the time that they've been given because before,
things were just so disjointed.
And then you have other people who I
think are really struggling because maybe their home
life didn't have balance before.
And now that they have no escape, they're
having to confront
a lot of the issues that they weren't
confronting before. Maybe marital problems,
issues with their children, issues with their, you
know, themselves. You know, sometimes we
we escape,
ourselves because we're, you know, we're not happy
with maybe where we are in life. We
feel like we could be doing more,
professionally,
you know, in our personal relationships,
spiritually.
So, people can, you know, have different experiences
based on what's going on. And people are
having different experiences.
But the most important thing to do in
order to know how to react
is to have those honest conversations with yourself.
Right? Like, where am I
as a forget everybody else. I need to
kinda figure out where I am. So this,
you know, these stages that I put together
kind of help
to pinpoint where you are because you, you
know, we're all gonna be experiencing different things.
But and there's they're not necessarily any type
of chronology. So I'll just kind of go
down them, and you can, you know, listen
and try to figure out where,
you know, what resonates with you, where you
stand right now. Because I mean, and again,
I I had to do this
thinking about all the variant
types of reactions people are having based on
experience, based on what I'm being told, based
on what I'm seeing and witnessing and reading
from people. You know, I like to try
to keep a pulse
on what's going on. And so that's where
this came from. It's trying to, you know,
look at this from so many different angles,
but kind of give people
a structured, I guess, view of of what
where they might be. Right?
So the first,
stage is shock, awe. Right?
Many of us were shocked and, you know,
stunned at at how rapidly this
transformed our lives. And so some people might
still be.
And I feel like, you know, that feeling
for some people is still existing. Like, they'll
send articles, like, oh my god. Check this
out. And there's this kind of, you know,
this thing that they're feeding, that that feeds
that sense of of just shock and, like,
surprise that this is happening. What does this
all mean? When is it gonna end? So
they're kind of still lingering maybe in that
phase.
But, eventually, some people, you know, will come
out inshallah, or our hope is
that we react with submission. Right? That we,
that we understand
that this is all from Allah
Good or bad,
whether or not it's gonna, you know,
cause any direct harm, inshaAllah. We ask, obviously,
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala for protection from that
Or even,
you know, harm to to anyone that we
may know. That's all
the decree of Allah, and He's the only
one who has knowledge of that. So that's
what submission is. It's just, like, surrendering, like,
you know what? I just really can't do
anything about it. I have to ride this
out, and that can be months from now.
Initially, I think many people were thinking this
is gonna be maybe a week or 2,
and then, you know, inconvenience, little bump in
the road. And now schools are shutting down
until end of May. Some places they're, you
know, not,
the end of the school year, like, which
goes into June for some people. They've already,
I think the state of California announced, right,
that there will be no school
school for the rest of the school year.
So there's a lot of, you know, uncertainty
still. And that's where the the response of
of just submission makes the most sense because
you cannot
fight and resist something that has so much
uncertainty hanging over it. And it's a lot
easier to just say, I gotta you know,
instead of driving myself crazy with all of
these thoughts and and,
you know, like resisting and pushing and being
frustrated and resentful and angry at why this
is happening.
That needs to change and I just have
to submit and surrender.
And then when you do that, inshaAllah, before
the sake of Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta A'la.
Right? That's the whole purpose of why we
do it. It's because we're trying to,
in our actions
show
that we
accept the decree of Allah, even if it
displeases us, right? Even if it's not what
we want,
we still recognize that Allah has wisdoms. I
mean, he his wisdom far obviously exceeds our
own.
So if he decrees this, then then there
has to be a wisdom in it, and
I don't know what that is yet. But
at some point, I'll know inshallah either in
this world or the next, so I'm just
gonna
accept it. And that's what Sabrul Jameel is.
You're actually now putting
all of that faith into action by holding
your tongue. Right?
It's very important that we watch what we're
saying right now because there's a lot of
people who don't realize
that in your reaction,
because, you know, you're displeased with what's happening,
that
you, may inadvertently,
unknowingly,
say something
against Allah
because he's the one who decreed it. Right?
This isn't Trump.
Trump is just a you know, he's a
player in this big production of life, but
he's not
the one that is the fall guy for
this. Neither
is China or,
you know, that's from a material lens. Sure.
We can sit there and distribute plenty of
blame across the board to everybody who let
things get as bad as it's gotten. But,
ultimately, ultimately,
again, this is the metaphysical lens,
everything that is decreed is decreed by Allah.
So when you submit and surrender, you get
to, you know, show, display to Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala that you
have sabr in his decree. And this is
Ibadah. It is Ibadah
to hold your tongue
and just be patient and to not complain.
Because the complaining
that we do in in the face of
these, situations,
again,
is even if we have no intention to
do that,
indirectly it is a complaint against Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala.
So the better response is to just say,
You know, I surrender. Alhamdulillah.
I believe in Allah. You know? And and
that's it. And then
because that, you know, this whole situation we
can't control it and you acknowledge that Allah
is the only one who can control it.
Now that you've surrendered and you've let go
of trying to,
you know, focus so much attention on it,
now you put your attention back on yourself,
which is really the purpose of tribulations in
the first place. So the next phase or
stage would be rumination. And rumination is thoughts.
It's it's it's, sort of cyclical
thoughts that keep coming. Right? And they can
be negative or positive. It's usually used in
a to refer to negative sort of thoughts,
but not necessarily always. So if you have
rumination, it's just kind of you're thinking a
lot. You know, you're reflecting a lot. So
that's the next natural stage. Now that you've
submitted, right, you accept that this is Allah's
decree, the next natural stage should be rumination
or analysis. Right? Assessment,
which is why. Right? Asking that question, there's
nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with
saying why did Allah
you know, decree this at this time? You
know, new year relatively speaking. Right? February, end
of February, March
of 2020. We're just into this new year.
And already we've had, you know, some quite
shocking things happen. Right? We had Kobe
Bryant, which is, you know, a huge,
you know, news
thing that happened. Right? His passing. It affected
a lot of people. Right? And then a
few weeks later, a month later, this news
of this virus starts spreading, and then, boom,
our lives kinda shut down. So we have
to kinda zoom out and ask why.
Right? Why is Allah
you know, putting the world, the entire world,
under
sort of a house arrest in a way,
you know. And that's kind of how you
have to look at it. Like, you know,
when people,
come out of prison and they're on parole,
some people have,
you know, those ankle bracelets or some tracking
device, but they generally
are under house arrest. They can't really they
have limited mobility. Right? They can't really move
as freely as someone who is a free
citizen. Right?
But if you look at the whole world
in a sense, you know, there's many people
who might not be, as impacted because they
live in remote areas and they're clueless or,
you know, they're innocent. They're maybe, I just
imagine Aboriginal tribes, you know, in the middle
of the rainforest or the desert who are
completely in fitra.
They're innocent. They're not really involved in all
of the chaos of the world. You know,
they're not involved with the politics and the,
you know, financial sort of,
you know, negligence or or liability that that
cause that wreaks so much havoc in the
world. You know, a lot of us, we
don't we don't really think about that. Like,
what
how we contribute. Right? We we we, you
know, we all,
the consumption we have, for example. I mean,
how much consumption do we all do individually,
especially if we live in the
west? We we consume a lot, you know,
and then we're we're contributing, right, to the,
to the disease of of this earth, of
this planet. We're seeing, you know, pollution. We're
seeing all of these, air pollution, just actual
landfills
being, you know, like so
over over,
used that we're having to actually send garbage
into the oceans. We're depleting resources,
coral reefs are disappearing,
we're, you know, fishing like crazy. There's just
so much,
and then and then of course the fossil,
you know, all the fuels and and all
the stuff that's that is polluting the air
that that's, you know, destroying the planet in
so many ways. We could go on and
on about all of our individual
contribution to that. Right? But you have people
in the world that are,
like I said, in fitra, and they're innocent
of those things because they're not doing any
of that stuff. They don't have cars. They
don't have homes. They don't have to have
garbage. I mean, can you imagine
a life that you live with such simplicity
that you don't actually have garbage?
Like, to
me, that is unbelievable. Like, it really is.
And that's why when you watch certain, you
know, like, National Geographic or,
Discovery Channel,
documentaries and you see these people who live,
with such minimal,
you know, and and such minimal minimal
lives. But this pala, they're all so happy,
you know. They don't have they have huts
for homes and they wear very limited clothing,
yes. But they don't produce garbage. Like, just
think about that for a moment.
That they don't have like a garbage can
because
everything is used. Right? If they if they
kill an animal for food,
every part of that animal is used in
some way or another.
So the idea that there's human beings that
exist like that, Subhanallah should, of course, you
know, increase our, you know, just marvel at
at the creation of Allah We
have in existence right now in 2020,
All you know those types of people they
still exist.
And of course we believe that they will
be judged you know
by Allah's we don't we don't have any
say about about them, you know.
But, you know, again, thinking about this, thinking
about these things, like
the majority of the world, the developed world
anyway,
that does contribute to all the world's problems
where there is so much,
you know, just
so many issues. Gosh.
Aside from, you know, pollution and all of
those things that we contribute to, as we
said, think of the
negligence of of, you know, of of human
beings. I mean, how many,
poor people? How many impoverished people? How many
starving people, how many orphans, how many elderly.
Right? How many sick people are there in
the world that are not being looked after?
How many you know, how much wastage,
of of food and and goods that could
be distributed to people is done everywhere. And
it and it's and the Muslim world is
certainly
not free from these things. You know, we
see a lot of what we call israaf.
Right?
Which is which is waste.
In in our own communities, We have to
be honest about this. We can have bleeding
hearts for maybe, you know, the plight of,
of war torn countries and victims of war
or orphans
from
afar. Right? We're here in our
very,
privileged lifestyles and we might feel like compelled
to, to help certain causes.
But if we're doing that, we're writing checks,
you know, to to different relief organizations to
support,
people all over the world. But in our
own homes, in our own backyards, in our
own communities,
we are wasting a lot of food and
we're just not really in a state of,
gratitude to Allah
where we appreciate every single thing that he's
given us and really are reflective of that.
We are in a way contributing, right, to
to the to the global crisis that we
find ourselves in. So this is where the
the rumination analysis process takes you. It's it
takes you through these thoughts where you're actually
starting to
connect the dots that nothing happens by Allah's
decree in vain. We know that. This is
certainly not a game,
or just, you know, oh, coincidence,
or just a matter of,
you know, a virus kind of,
you know, acting independently. Of course, we don't
believe that. It's it's all from Allah
So that, you know, process of thinking about
things on a very deep level, right, is
where many of us should be.
That's the appropriate reaction to something like this,
assessing things. And then, again, because your eye
is inward. Right? We can look at the
global issue and,
you know, look at it from,
you know, or or the actual pandemic
and realize we have no power to change
it. But the change has to come from
this internal, you know, process of really self
reflection and thinking about things on a deep
level. So we first, you know, we analyze
things, we assess things, we kinda try to
piece it all together.
And this is also where looking historically is
helpful because there's precedent.
We have precedent in the world of natural
disasters, calamities, plagues,
diseases where millions of people are wiped out,
you know, in a in a matter of
very relatively short time.
So this is not the first time, right,
that these things have happened. And each time
there was a similar, you know,
dynamic where,
again, people,
are going in a certain direction,
and then perhaps that direction is distant. It's
far from where they should be. Right? We
are here for a reason. We're here to
worship our creator. But if we veer away
from that path and we start
doing things that we shouldn't be doing and
we start,
forgetting Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala. And it sounds,
you know, it's it's it's horrible to say,
but the reality is
the world is so distracting right now that
it is easy to forget Allah Subhanahu Wa
Ta'ala.
If you're not constantly
realigning yourself, you know. If you're not constantly
remembering.
It's very easy. And there's a lot of
people who
who, you know, they they don't remember Allah
They eat food, they don't say Bismillah.
They finish their meals, they don't say Alhamdulillah.
They don't pray. I mean, there's people in
our community
who are good people, you know.
And that's the thing is that
there's people who are very committed to their
culture,
their families, their careers, their, you know, their
their educational path.
They have good values.
They have good hearts. They might even be
giving in some way philanthropically,
volunteering.
But they
can do all of that in the absence
of,
having a faith identity
that compels them to actually worship their creator.
And so
they do a lot of good, but then
there's this huge, you know, gap there or
this disconnect where they don't have
any real reflection of their lord. And And
this is if you really think about
our world in the direction it's going
for a while now, we've been kind of
headed in that direction, right, where people are
completely,
just losing the value of faith and the
appreciation
of what faith gives them. A lot of
people think it's no big it's not, you
know, that they, they don't need organized religion.
Organized religion causes so many problems in the
world, and they start going on off on
all these little rants about, you know,
the holocaust
and terrorism
and, you know,
the inquisition and just all these things throughout
history that, you know, the crusades that
the religions have contributed to. Right? And so
that gives them this justification
to not really identify
with a with an organized faith or a
faith. To not really have a faith identity.
So what comes in place of that? If
you don't,
say that you're a Christian or a Jew
or a Muslim, if you don't establish your
identity
with a faith that is very firm in
its practice and its belief systems. Right? Then
it gives you this totally open,
you know, identity to be whoever you want
to be. And you can start to tailor
your faith to your own whims and desires.
This
anytime
human beings do that, they may, again, not
be aware of it. But that,
you know,
oblige or or giving into your own wounds
and desires is exactly what Shaytan
who who who he is. Right? That's what
that's his way is to just do what
he feels
is good and right,
even if it goes against, right, Allah
So this is what, unfortunately,
you see now in much of the world.
This kind of mindset is being adopted that
I don't need a faith. Because, again, as
soon as you say that,
you are absolved
of any responsibility
to act in accordance with that faith.
Right? If you're if you're like and you
see even Muslims saying this, you know, like,
I don't like labels. You know, you'll see
people
who,
who clearly are Muslim, but they'll try to
distance themselves
from even saying that they're Muslim.
I know. But why? Because
I can if I don't have to be
firm on that label,
then I can, like I said, tailor,
you know, things my way and do things
my way. So this whole individualistic,
you know, idea mindset has just taken over
our world, and our community is affected by
that as well because it's everywhere.
That's why it's so important to pay attention
to the messages that we're receiving, you know.
And they come. They're subliminal oftentimes.
They're in songs.
They're in
slogans,
they're in, you know, advertisements,
they're in,
films, they're in commercials, they're in social media.
You know, influencers.
They're in
everything.
These messages
that are,
again, trying to break down
our faith identity
so that we adopt a very, you know,
relaxed
it's no big deal. Just be a good
person. Be spiritual.
Right? These terms are hijacked and, you know,
co opted to mean certain things,
for for certain people.
But all of that is to distance,
really,
people from god.
Because what is it saying? It's because you
have atheists. You have people who don't even
believe in god, who are, you know, humanists
and they have, you know, these really,
strong values about, you know, bringing people together
and doing good works. So it's basically saying
that in order to be a good person,
you don't really necessarily need to have a
belief in a a higher power.
And
that chips away again at a person's notion
of the relevance and the value of of
religion and God, and they just start
kind of taking on their own,
views as as as being because they're inherently
good and you really, like, you know, logically
or philosophically can't really argue against many sometimes
some of their viewpoints
that they feel, you know, a sense of
pride in in who they are. And that
means, hey. I can be a good person.
I can do good. I can check on
my neighbor. I can serve my parents and
my in laws and my community.
But I don't need to really,
you know, pray 5 times a day.
There's Muslims who and the thing is we
have to accept this. This is a reality.
There are people who are donors, let's say,
to the masjid.
They will. They because they, you know, they
maybe like the youth programming or the community
programs the masjid offers, or they like to
show up, you know, for the Eid prayers.
And there's certain times of the year maybe
they feel, like, religiously inclined or just to
come around the community.
So they'll support, you know, the masjid,
but they will not,
like I said, pray or fast.
You know, for them,
Ramadan is optional.
You know, so there's a lot of,
just
the the way that again, people are viewing,
the the relevance,
of faith and God has just kind of
been diluted.
And that contributes to why we're seeing
so much in our world
where people have have just forgotten that, why
are you here? What, how did you get
here in the 1st place?
You know, consciousness,
awareness, thought, language,
all of these incredible faculties that have we've
been given
are if you really just sit and think
about language, for example. I mean, I'm sometimes
on because, you know, I teach my kids.
And when you're teaching grammar or you're teaching,
you know,
parts of speech and different, like, aspects of
language,
it's really fascinating when you actually just stop
and think about how language is even created.
You know, like the idea
that I can make certain sounds
by combining certain sounds. Because what letters are,
right? You're combining certain letters.
And then in those combinations of letters,
I can describe,
you know, because language is is is a
tool, right? It's that you can,
that's the function of language is that you're
describing things. Right? For other people. You're communicating
things. Right? But the the fact that Allah
gave us this gift to be able to
move our tongues
and project this voice
and then
say certain things that another human being
can understand and comprehend. And when when if
if you're a parent, you know what I'm
talking about. When you're teaching
your infants language, isn't it fascinating? It's like,
how do they even know what I'm saying?
Like, when would they start picking up new
words,
and then their vocabulary is built over time,
and it's like, woah.
This newborn that uttered nothing and had no
no concept of language within a relatively short
amount of time
is forming words and then understands the meanings
of those words, understands,
you know, how to put those words together
and, you know, all of that. We don't
reflect on what a incredible gift that is
from Allah subhata.
So this is, you know, how a person
who's actually
thinking on a deep level
about this, you know, the whole just everything,
existence,
arrives to the conclusion that this is not
by any
means an accident, you know.
Like, the idea of that is just so
crazy. Right?
But it can only again come from,
from the heart or the the mind of
a of a person who's who's blinded by
their own arrogance to be able to see
that you didn't just end up here by
accident. This was this is deliberate. You're here
for a reason. And the one who created
you out of nothing
and gave you life in existence,
he gave it to you for a reason.
You're here only to worship him. So when
you start thinking that you're,
you know, self sufficient and you don't need
him
and that you can still be good without
him, you're clearly deluded. Right? You're clearly off,
you know, you're just you're you're off the
the path. And so how do how do
you get back on? Well, maybe if you,
you know, your life gets shaken up a
little bit, you know, kinda like a snowball.
What happens? You know, you just shake up
the snowball a little bit and things start
to fall into place.
Right? And then you start seeing,
you know, things clearly
once everything settles down. So I think that's
how we have to look at all of
this. Right? That this is
we're just in a situation where Allah
is,
is really reminding us of who we are
and why we're here. But all of that,
you know, thought process cannot come if you're
not even,
you know, submitting,
first of all. So it's the first order
is to decree, I mean, to submit to
his decree and surrender,
then start reflecting on that big question why.
And then the third stage is to go
back even more inwardly. So we've kind of
addressed the collective why of why we may
all be here. But what about, you know,
the in individual
why? And this is where regret,
remorse, and repentance comes in. This is the
3rd stage.
We have to, at this point of this
whole,
you know, pandemic, if we haven't been making
toba,
we are really missing out. Like, if you're
baking cookies all day
and watching YouTube videos
and Netflixing,
but you haven't sat down with yourself and
really made genuine tawba to Allah
you are clearly missing the point.
So that's where we should be. We should
be in a state of
real regret
and remorse for our previous sins that we've
done.
And when you think of sins, you know,
you can I think it's natural because we
have selective memory
that we immediately go to the big sins?
Right?
So whatever big sin you've ever done, because
it kind of is like that monkey on
your back that it's like a shadow that
seems to never go away if you have
that conscience, right, where it's always following you.
So those sins are are kind of glaring
and you can't really ignore them.
You know, focus on those sins, but also
think about the little things that we do.
We do a lot of sins. We're sinning
every single day. And that's why the habit
of making this is so important because we're
so sinful that we don't even realize we're
sinning half the time.
And and so it's so important that we
recognize that we are sinful
to such a degree that if we actually
sat
and took a count of our sins, like
had a calculator,
we probably or like a, you know, in
those olden days when they'd have, like,
a receipt. Right?
And they would would have, like, a piece
of little piece of paper that would be
printed at the end. Right? So you would
be, you know, calculating, calculating, calculating. All of
a sudden, you get this long ledger of,
like, whatever it was that you were adding
up.
I really think if we sat and we
were like, if we could see what the
angels on our shoulders were writing about us,
the scrolls would be, like, super long every
day. We'd probably have, like, these long strips.
Like, at the end of the day, here's
your scroll.
You know, look at what you did all
day. And we'd be probably blown away
because we're not counting half the stuff we
do as sins. We seem to only we
have these kind of black and white, you
know, understanding or or very limited understanding of,
sin where we only think the of the,
like, the big sin. Why I didn't kill
anybody? I didn't steal anything.
You know, those are yeah. Those are huge
sins. But what about the little sins? Right?
What about the eye roll? Like, people don't
think about eye rolling.
When you eye roll,
that is a total act of reba.
It is a sin. It's a sin if
someone's talking to you and you do this.
It's a total sin. It's a sin even
to do it about, like, a celebrity or
someone you don't even know.
Because it is, you know, the and this
is why it's so important to know that
reba,
by the way,
is not just an action of the tongue,
which a lot of people, again, assume. They
assume that you only
are can make reba about someone by by
speaking ill of them. That's not true. There's
there's
in the heart,
where you actually think a negative thought about
someone in the absence,
you know, of evidence. Like, you have no
reason to think a negative thought of someone
just because
you dislike them, that you have
a bad negative thought. And that is actually
sinful.
So we are sinning on a day to
day basis a lot.
And the purpose of accounting for your sin,
and this is where I think a lot
of people get stuck, is not to make
you feel bad.
Because
that's you know, self loathing and despair is
not a part of our faith. We're not
the pea the people that just sit and,
you know, wanna like, try to make people
feel horrible about themselves.
The reason why you take account of your
sins
is that the
in in reflecting on how sinful you are,
you're more appreciative
of the mercy of your lord.
That your lord,
despite your sins,
is still with you, is still giving to
you, is still
generous with you. So take account of your
sins, be humble, but then make that recognition
that, Alhamdulillah,
I have this lord that even though I
am so sinful and even though I can
be so, you know,
just negative and nasty
because of his mercy and his generosity,
right,
that he's still he hasn't turned away from
me,
that I'm still a believer. We
have to make so much gratitude
for our iman,
like, every day. Because there are people that
are outside
of this faith
that are they don't know what's going on.
And they're I mean, I don't even know
how to how I would process this. May
God never,
let me know that because I you know,
as a as a non Muslim, I never
wanna ever have that,
understanding.
Right? But if you actually think about my
god, to not have a faith that would
help you
cope with things that happened to you, loss,
grief,
what was what's going on now
is so devastating. But there's a lot of
people who are out there like that. So
the point of accounting for sins is that
we
are reminded
that we remind ourselves of the mercy and
the infinite mercy of our Lord.
And that in turn, see, everything has a
response. So I recognize my sinfulness. Right? And
I I feel,
like, guilty because you should. Shame before Allah
is a good thing. Is there nothing wrong
with that? To feel, like, shame. Your your
eyes are cast down. You don't feel good
about yourself.
And then that increases your,
you know, awe and and just
appreciation for the rahma of Allah
It makes you more grateful. It makes you
just more, like, you know, in awe and
in love, right, with your lord. But then
what does that do? That feeling can't just
end there.
Then it makes you what? Want to work
more to please him.
So everything is, you know, connected.
Recognize your sinfulness. Recognize the mercy of your
lord that even though you're sinful, he's still
with you. Now do something about it to
show your gratitude. Don't just sit there and,
you know, praise,
him and think that's it. Because he doesn't
need our praise. Right? It's kind of empty
in in the big scheme of things. It's
not like it's, it's adding anything to him
when we praise him. We praise him for
our own selves. Right?
So
we praise him, but then the follow-up
is we act in accordance with what pleases
him. So now I'm looking for opportunities. Well,
You Allah, you're so merciful. I'm not worthy.
What do I need to do
to get closer to you and to show
you how appreciative I am? Because I'll never
be good enough, but at least I'm trying.
At least I'm I have the wants. At
least I I have the desire to put
your pleasure before my own.
I do. And even though I'll never it'll
never be enough. Right? Like, the hadith. Right?
The hadith of the man who who, on
the day of judgement,
the angels, you know,
they they told him that he he he
was granted Jannah. And they said, you know,
when they told him to go to Jannah,
they said, by the mercy
of your lord, enter Jannah.
And I mean, this is going to happen.
The thing is these hadith that we're told,
of course, because Allah is outside of the
realm of time. Right? He created time. That's
why we have, you know, hadith, that kind
of foretell us of what's going to happen.
So this man, he actually,
you know, in before he goes, he kind
of questions, like, well, why is it by
the mercy of God? Why did he say
that? Because he was a man who Allah
granted to him a long life. He worshiped
for 500 years
perfectly, pretty much. He was just a worshiper.
So he felt
that he was
owed Jannah. Like I did all of this,
you know, so I should just get to
it because of merit. Like I deserve it.
Right? I deserve
to be in Jannah. Why is it by
his mercy?
So the angels communicated back to him, okay.
You know, that that of for those 500
years that you worshiped as perfectly as you
did, all of that was good enough
just for the blessing of eyesight. Like, it
was it was enough of of a gratitude,
a show of gratitude just for the blessing
of eyesight.
So what are we doing if we think
that, you know, we don't need
to to show our,
appreciation to Allah
We've completely lost,
you know, again, sight of of of our
purpose here.
Everything is about gratitude to Allah Subhanahu wa
Ta'ala. Everything we do. So that's where these
this this regret, remorse, and, you know,
repentance takes you to. It takes you to
that realization
that I
as sinful as I am on a regular,
you know, I'm not talking about just big
sins. Regularly speaking, we are sinful.
Allah's
still so generous with me. I need to
increase my acts of worship to him. I
need to increase my good deeds. Right? And
then, you know, another stage, and I'm just
kind of going off the list, for those
of you who are entering,
about the 10 stages that people may find
themselves in during this quarantine, and I'm kind
of breaking it down.
Now for some people, you know, I kind
of, you know, expedited this process of regret,
remorse, repentance, and went straight to wanting action.
For some people, they need a little bit
more time,
because maybe they have committed some big sins.
You know, maybe they have
committed things that are weighing very heavy on
their souls.
And they, I know for example,
a sister
who,
you know, she's she's actually an older woman,
but she had, you know and and confiding
in me, she had told me that there
are 2 things that really weigh heavy on
her when she thinks about her life,
and they are
abortion. That she had
a a certain period during her marriage because
she had multiple children,
and she just couldn't even think about having
more kids,
that she went to, you know, one of
these planned,
parenthood,
clinics.
This was many years ago, and she ended
up aborting her pregnancy.
I think she said she did it more
than once.
So, you know, that's gonna weigh for a
lot of people who've done things like that.
It's likely gonna weigh on their soul until
they die. Right?
So there might be some people who are
grappling with sorrow and intense sadness, lamenting
for things that they do feel
still guilty for.
And even that is okay when it's between
them and Allah
Right? Because such a person, she should, you
know, or he they should never,
you know, feel shamed by a human being
over what they did. Like, I don't you
know, I would never shame this person to
go, yeah. You felt you should feel horrible.
How could you do something like that? All
the blah blah. It's so wrong to do
that. Right?
But for an individual
to
hold on to sadness over
maybe some bigger sins that they've done
is not a bad thing. As long as
they're not falling in despair, it's more about
just truly,
recognizing
their infraction. You know? Like, it's like I
I overstepped,
and I I feel bad about it. And
it was a serious enough thing where I
don't just write it off and forget about
it. Even though, again, in the,
accounting of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala because he's
so Raheem,
you know, he tells us when you sin,
follow it up with a good deed,
Make sincere toba. Right? Which is
repent, acknowledge what you did was wrong.
Promise to never do it again and never
do it again. Never act on that same
sin. That's what that's the formula for sincere
repentance. Right? And Allah swaddled it promises that
if we do that, it's a it's as
if the slate has been completely wiped. Like,
it's all gone. And that's out of his
rahma. But on our in our own conscience,
even if we know that to be true,
because our Lord is so merciful,
having humility
about our bad actions is not a bad
thing. As long as it connects our heart
back to the point we we made earlier,
which is
as sinful as we are, our lord is
so merciful. And that's why he's he's so
deserving of our praise and our worship.
That's the final,
thought that we should end with when we're
accounting for our deeds. It's not to hate
ourselves and to be disgusted with ourselves. No.
That's that's waswasa.
It's to arrive at this place
that of such deep humility that the only
conclusion you come out of all of that
is that Allahu Akbar. Truly, Allahu Akbar. And
he deserves
my,
my worship and my sincerity.
So,
from that feeling, right, from whether, you know,
when you're feeling,
again,
poised and ready to now act because you've
assessed, you've accounted for, you've made Tawba for
sincerely, you've really truly,
are filled with regret,
then we get into redressing the wrongs, right,
and restitution.
So redressing wrongs is if you've done something
to hurt another person.
This is a very good opportunity right now,
and and people should know this. Like,
if you're not talking to someone because of
some fallout that you had,
or there's a relative that you've lost contact
with for whatever reason,
or a friend. It doesn't matter. If there's
someone
that you have just sort of broken ties
with, or maybe they wronged you or you
wronged them, and there's just been this, you
know, divide between you 2,
This is the opportunity
now to say, you know, maybe
whatever happened, we can, again, clear the air,
and we can redress the wrongs. You know?
So if you yourself know that maybe you
were responsible for the fallout, maybe you spoke
ill of someone behind their back or betrayed
their trust,
or something, you know, that you you truly
do recognize you did. And again, we can't
hide with Allah
what we've done. So you gotta be honest
enough. You don't have to make admissions to
anybody about your sins, by the way. You
know, you don't need to do that. As
Muslims, we don't have this idea, right, of
having to go with an intermediary
and confess our sins and, you know, and
then we're good. No. We go directly to
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. So you don't ever
have share what you've done with people. But
in your heart of hearts, in your conscience,
you have to be willing to be honest
enough to say,
I was responsible.
I did,
betray this so and so's trust, and I
did hurt this person.
And I need to redress that.
And that can be done. If it's at
done at the cost of your pride,
oh, well. Like, really, at a at a
certain day, you kinda have to weigh the
the scales and say, you know what?
Either I let my pride lead in this
and,
you know, try to save face and,
you know, refuse to ever engage with this
person and, oh, they cut me off and
whatever. I had my problems with them too.
And, you know, you can sit here and
justify all of that stuff. But it's all
really to
to save your pride. At the end of
the day, that's what you're doing. Right? Or
you can say,
when we hear the hadith of a person
who will not be entered with an Adam's
grain
weight of pride in Jannah.
Right? What is isn't it worth it to
say,
I'm going to show Allah
again that he is greater, you know, than
than my pride. He is his pleasure is
more important than than my ego.
So I'm going to
push my pride aside
and actually do this. And it can be
done very,
you know, you don't have to do this
elaborate thing, but, you know, just extending a
phone call,
you know, an email if you really have
a hard time with confrontation,
a text message,
something that says,
I'm sorry.
And I'll tell you a personal story.
You know, and a lot of the stuff
that
that I talk about, by the way,
I hope it's clear. I don't you know,
I I'm sharing a lot of stuff that
I've done myself. So I don't like to
I I'm not that type that just is
telling you guys stuff where, you know, for
whatever reason. It's actually because I've lived it
and I know the benefits of it. A
while ago, a few years ago,
I,
was feeling very heavy hearted because
in high school and I was, you know,
I was still of age, I'm still accountable,
but I wasn't practicing in terms of my
faith. I had a very cultural religious identity.
But I had an altercation, and it was
a physical, like, fight in high school
with a a girl, and that did not
end well for her.
And I'm not you know, it's not about
who won the fight. You know,
But the point is is
the way that her life spiraled after that
fight because it was kind of a big
deal at the school, and she,
she kind of got, you know, torn apart
for it for for, you know, her,
for not doing very well in the fight.
And the opposite happened for me, you know,
kind of got popular and nicknames and all
this stuff. It's just trivial.
But I realized that
I, in many ways, affected her life because
she was a cheerleader. She was quite popular.
Everything was going well for her. And then
we have this fight
and things just ended up kinda going south
for her in terms of her social status
at school. She started gaining weight. I think
she got she left the cheerleading squad. There
was just a lot of things that
stuff well, didn't go well for her. But,
you know, this was 20 plus years later
where I
I'd always thought of her over the years
and wondered what had happened to her, but
Facebook sort of opened up, you know, an
opportunity
to, track her down.
And I saw pictures of her and she
was, you know,
she had a family.
And so I reached out to her, and
I emailed her just saying, I'm really sorry.
I'm sorry for the fight that we had.
I'm a totally different person now.
I acknowledge my mistake. I know it's been
20 plus years later. I'm sorry that this
apology came so late, But I've thought of
you many times over the years. And so
I just kind of, you know, tried to
put my heart on my,
sleeve as they say, and just be as
open as I can,
as I could with her. And
I didn't hear from her,
for a while. Okay? I think it was
almost
had to have been more than 2 or
3 years. So I never got a reply,
and I don't know if back then
the feature
on, you know, Facebook messages,
you know, could tell you if it was
read or not. So I don't even know
if she read it. I didn't know if
she got it, but I just knew that
she didn't respond. So I was like, man,
you you know, but,
like, I I tried. You know, I tried
to make it
right. When she eventually
responded,
wow. It came years later, and she admitted
that she, you know, needed time
to, like, respond to me.
But that was so liberating. That doesn't mean
I don't feel still bad for everything that
happened. I do. But I do feel that
it was a a mercy from Allah
that he put it in her heart
to,
you know, to forgive me. And she did.
She forgave me. And, alhamdulillah, it's not like
we're best friends and or anything like that.
It just was,
you know, a a a decent exchange between
2 adults who had, after a
long time, addressed something that was painful, you
know.
And, alhamdulillah, it worked out.
So there's a lot to be said about
the value of
going back and trying to redress wrongs. It
can actually free you of a lot of
burdens of the heart. So if you have
someone
that you may have hurt in the past,
this would be a really good opportunity to
try to do that and to restore whatever
there was, if possible. If not, to at
least show your humanity, show your decency, and
show your,
again,
desire to please Allah
That you're trying your hardest to do, you
know, clean in house. Like, whatever's going on
internally,
You Allah, I'm trying to clean that out
because I recognize this pandemic is not for,
you know, for for no reason. There's a
reason why this happened,
and I'm gonna do my job to focus
on me. And so this is how I
do it.
And then, you know, as you do that
more, as you start to redress your wrongs
in whatever capacity you can,
again, I'm just gonna share anecdotes from my,
you know, side. But, like, you know, if
you've ever,
taken things that you've that you shouldn't have
taken,
you know, do something about it. When I
was a little girl, I remember I was
at a 7:11,
and I was probably, like,
maybe 7
or 8 or 6. I don't know. Somewhere
in that range.
They used to sell little
chocolates covered in foil.
They were like very little flimsy,
small chocolates.
There are ones that came in the form
of a football.
Okay? And I'm, like, sharing a lot of
funny stories with you guys, but I loved
these little football
chocolates, and I think each of them was
a nickel. Okay? They're, like, cost a nickel.
You had to buy them, obviously.
So I remember we would always, because it
was across from the street from the apartments
that we lived in, we'd always kinda, like,
make our way over to 711.
But one day, we went there, and I
didn't have enough money
to buy as many as I wanted. And
I think, obviously, you know, the greed monster,
which affects the child,
affects adults too.
It, it got me. And so I had
this little purse with me,
and I stuffed
an extra I don't know. I I don't
know if it was like, oh, just do
it just to do it, or if it
was really greed. Like, I wanted the I
don't know. I can't remember. But I just
know that I took a chocolate. It was
5¢,
and I put it in my purse. And
then the owner,
you know, he kind of was watching me,
and I think he saw me take it.
And
he tried to, you know, call me out,
and I don't know what I did. I
hid it from him somehow.
That for a very long time into my,
like as an adult weighed on me. I
was like, oh my god. I stole candy
as a kid. And I always thought, y'all
love, if I ever go back to this
was in the Washington
DC Virginia area.
If I ever get a chance to go
back to this 7:11,
I am going to go to that 7:11
and drop, like, you know, a nickel and
more and then some, you know, just to
clear my conscience.
It's I know. It might sound silly to
people, but, like, if you've done something where
you know it's inherently wrong,
and you're aware of that, that's the kind
of, I think,
you know, conscience that we should build around
our ourselves or our sins that we really
wanna make it right. And I know I
was a child and I wasn't even held
accountable.
But and I'm not saying that I'm, you
know, that type of person where I'm, like,
you know, so,
aware of my every deed that I, you
know, wanna
I I I we all need help. So
there's some times where if I'm aware of
something, obviously, I wanna make it right. When
that's where that hadith makes it easy because
Allah
is showing us
that we can redress wrongs, if not directly.
Right? Like, you know, going and paying
someone if you've taken something from them.
Or
you can do it by replacing,
you know, or or or following up the
sin with a good deed.
So if you, for example, made rebah,
it's hard to take something like that back.
Right? You you spoke ill of someone.
It it's difficult. Right? How can you take
it back, especially in their absence?
Well, then, if you go to a dinner
party and you spoke ill of someone and
it wasn't right, then have the conscience to
say,
man, Astaghfirullah,
I'm so sorry. I I slipped, you know.
I failed. I I ate the dead flesh
of my brother or sister. I am
I'm I'm a terrible person right now. I
feel really terrible.
But
I know that your mercy is greater than
mine, and you said to follow-up a bad
deed with a good deed.
And so I'm going to go make wudu,
pray some extra dakah, or maybe give sadaqah
on behalf of the person that you spoke
ill to. InshaAllah, things that's how you level
the scales. Right? You just spoke ill of
them. They already have your good deeds. Right?
But to go beyond that and say, I
need to redress that wrong. Let me give
Sadaka in their name.
You know? You're now showing that you understand
the way this system works.
You mess up. You fall out of line.
You correct yourself. You don't just
ignore it or act like it's not it's
irrelevant and it's not a big deal. That's
not right.
So redressing wrongs and restitution is a really
important thing. And the more we do that,
the more we
understand
how
this, again, process works
of holding yourself accountable, following it up with
the right deed.
We are,
allowing ourselves or increasing our
remembrance of Allah
Right?
And we're realizing our dependence and reliance on
him. It's continuously
being presented to us because we falter,
we make tawba, we return to him, and
we just now see that I am weak.
Allah Subhana, you said it in the Quran.
You created us weak. And I need you.
And the proof that I need you is
I keep slipping,
and I keep returning to you. So it's
just kind of this, you know, affirming
process of our dependence on him.
And then from that,
we realize, inshallah, when we do that enough,
that you have to stay on course, and
you have to,
you know, resist, start to really now strengthen
yourself. Right? If you,
keep slipping and keep slipping and keep slipping,
you know, the first maybe 50, 60 times,
you, you know, your human nature is keep
falling. But at a certain point, I think
everybody has a threshold. Right? When you hit
that wall and it's like, enough is enough.
I can't do this anymore. I'm rock bottoming
it, whatever you wanna call it. At that
point,
now you realize I need to better myself.
I need to start working to prevent this
from happening. So that's where,
restraint, right, self regulation,
resisting,
makes us more steadfast
so that we
prevent
all of that. Right? And so this is,
again, this is all sort of this natural
sort of way that things are are happening.
Right? You just move
from one phase, one mindset into another mindset,
following it up with a certain set of
actions. It's kind of this progression. Right? Well,
guess, if you keep doing this enough,
you know, as human beings, as weak people,
there is a fatigue component. Right?
And so
and some of us are probably already feeling
that. Maybe there are people who are doing
a lot of what we're talking about, but
there's this restlessness. Like, okay. I've been doing
extra prayers.
I've been reading more Quran. I'm giving to
charity. I'm following the rules of quarantine. I'm
trying to spend more time with my family.
I'm being nicer to my spouse. Like, you
know, that you're kind of, alhamdulillah, on it.
Right? And but there's this, you know, sort
of,
like, fatigue. Right?
Restlessness.
This all is natural. And this is where
your humanity
comes through. We're not robots. We're not designed
to, you know, just like like angels, for
example. I mean, they worship perfectly,
and they never, you know, do anything else.
Right?
But we're human beings. We have weakness. We
have,
distractions. We have things that make things difficult
for us.
So it's important to recognize that and to
validate your humanity and not to think that
you're necessarily
the worst or that you're, you know,
regressing and you're you're actually,
you know, now you know what I mean?
Like, you're you're suddenly going back and oh
my god and and getting all,
paranoid about that. No. Just accept that you're
human and that you need a break. And
then sometimes,
you know, we're gonna go into plateaus with
our spirituality.
But as long as you kinda wanna look
at it like a staircase, you know. You're
going up,
and then you kind of flatten out a
little bit sometimes. And these are all perfectly
acceptable, things from happening in terms of our
iman sort of getting weaker and stronger. It's
just natural. And there's hadith that that actually,
address
that. And so to be again,
in that accepting mindset
brings you back to that place of reflection.
Like, this is just the nature of the
dunya. It's the nature of the world. It's
how Allah
made us.
And that puts you in a in in
in that continuous state of tawakkal,
and it brings you back to resignation and
surrender. So
we start with shock, awe, submission, sabr and
jamil. We go through all of these different
phases,
but we come right back to surrender.
That at the end of the day,
we can't control outcomes.
But what we can control is how we
react to them,
and what we can control is or what
we can choose
to do is to use opportunities like pandemics
and plagues and tribulations
as a way to shine spiritually before our
Lord to show
him that we've been paying attention. That when
we read verses of the Quran or Hadith,
that we know what, you know, we're being
called to action, and that we want to
rise to the occasion
to show
our,
dependence, our love, our humility,
our
need of of our creator.
And that's what's called that's what's expected right
now. So that's what we should be doing
Insha'Allah.
So those are the 10
different stages. You can check it out if
you wanna read it. I,
just have it on,
on Instagram. If you're if you're on Instagram,
it's one of the top posts that I
recently posted.
It's on Facebook. I posted it a few
days ago. You can check it out. But
let me quickly go over to the comments,
and see if there's any questions here.
And all of you are very kind. Thank
you for your, kind words. I'm reading,
Sahar John. Thank you, sweetheart.
Ibrahim.
That's a beautiful I'm so glad you shared
that. May Allah bless you and protect you.
Alhamdulillah, Sister Negla JazakAllah Khairan and and Sister
Lizette Barakala. Fikom to both of you, if
you're still here.
Universal journey. Let me read your comments here.
I'm worthy of all the happiness in the
world. I don't feel guilty for living my
desires in a blissful life. Why should I
be depressed and keep negative energy and vibration?
I don't if God loves me, that God
would want to see me sad.
Since we love someone, let's be happy and
positive.
Alhamdulillah. Thank you. You know,
I don't really disagree with you.
Guilt and despair
are not, places that we should stay for
too long. You know, it's not it's not
a good, state to be in. We actually
despair, not at all, because we have hope.
We have hope in, our lord.
So we should be happy and in a
state of gratitude. And I covered this, I
think, last week. But, you know, there's people
are in different states.
And so if you're in a state of
namal, which inshallah, it sounds like you are,
and may Allah continue to keep you in
that state of of gratitude
and, you know, and and and being happy.
Then the best and most appropriate response is
exactly like you said, To be in a
state of gratitude. Like, you're really grateful for
the life he's given you,
and you're in that state of just appreciation.
Alhamdulillah. That's a perfect response.
And you go, you know, gratitude is is
also action. You know, it's not just a
feeling. It's it's it's, it's also something we
demonstrate by our actions.
So, you know, giving,
being, generous and kind to the creation of
Allah's father, serving the creation of Allah's father,
serving Allah's father. Those are all ways that
we,
enact our gratitude. Right? So,
I I thank you for your for your,
response there.
Minutes of life. How to deal with a
16 year old who takes credit card?
I can't afford he belongs money so that
you should so that we what should parents
he does not ask
more. Yeah. You know, Minutes of Life parenting
questions like that are difficult to answer because
I have so many follow-up questions.
But if there are,
expenses,
you know, I I'm I'm not that well
versed in terms of what options parents have,
with regards to credit cards for youth or,
maybe,
a limited
instead of a credit card, I don't know
if there's an option for, maybe
having,
an account with your bank that has a
limited balance. Right? So that they can't really
go past
a certain amount per month,
and and work that out. Maybe there is
an option. I'm I'm really sorry. I'm not
very well versed in terms of
financially what options there are.
I understand. I think what you're saying is
that you can't afford to give actual allowance
money, so you rely on credit cards. But
I'm just wondering if those credit cards can
be lowered in terms of
the amount that they allow to be charged.
So
maybe there are ones that are designed for
teens. I'm I can't imagine you're the only
parent with,
with someone, with with this situation. I I
I assume there's probably many teen or parents
of teens who have to regulate their spending
one way or another.
So,
may Allah make it easy for you. Inshallah.
Let's see here.
We have
English literature.
JazakAllah Khaled. Thank you.
I am not a revert to Islam. I
was born,
in a Muslim family, but I did come
to my practice of Islam
later in life in in college. I always
had a Muslim identity, but it was very
cultural. But thank you
for asking.
Alhamdulillah. JazakAllah Khaira again,
sister oh, I'm sorry. Let me scroll up
again.
It's a debt card from a checking account.
I see. Yeah. Sister or brother, I'm sorry.
Again, I don't know,
what options there are, but I'm wondering if
maybe this is something that
you can,
you you know, you can look into with
your bank or search some
some credit card companies to see if they
offer options to you. I I apologize again
for not being able to help you in
that.
Sister Madiha.
Thank you so much, sweetheart. And, you know,
I know I know some of the sisters
on,
the chat personally, and it's always a pleasure
and an honor to see them even if
virtually your names
are enough to bring a smile,
to my to my face and my heart.
So thank you for being here.
Alhamdulillah.
Sister Lizette.
Alhamdulillah.
You know, this is a very good question.
Finding a teacher is, I understand,
not easy
at all, in this day and age because,
you know, there was a time where I
think our,
spiritual centers were really flourishing with with teachers,
and we had more access to knowledgeable people.
It's not that there aren't in existence. There's
still people who are study studying.
But I think the, you know,
the, just the options of of
having those one on ones is is a
little harder considering a lifestyle that many people
live now where it's, you know, usually double
income.
Everybody's working.
We have traffic and all these, you know,
barriers to to making it easy for people.
But I do think there are online programs
that are
really dedicated to trying to provide
people with mentorship, with leadership.
For women specifically, I would really recommend,
you know, I know the founders
of the Rahmah Foundation
that's, situated in the Bay Area, but they
operate nationally.
There's programs that they have that are continuous
in terms
of classes and really giving guidance on how
to structure
one's spiritual path. They have ample amount of,
very qualified, highly qualified teachers that teach regularly.
I know pretty much all of them, so
I can vouch for all of them.
And then there's also,
Rabata, which is based, I think in
the East Coast, Minnesota, I wanna say,
somewhere out in that area. But but they
also operate nationally, and they also have a
lot of wonderful classes
that are tailored for,
sisters and and young girls. And it's it's
to provide,
guidance on how to structure your spiritual path,
which which is I think really important.
We need
because otherwise, what happens is, like, it becomes
like this buffet. Right? You go to
this, you know, like, you kind of, like,
start picking options of of different classes and
courses and, you know, seminars and workshops, And
it just seems it's kinda scattered. Right? So
we need, I think, to streamline,
a lot of that. And it's just helpful
to go to one
stop shop sort of that says, here, if
you want to you know, this is the
foundational
sciences you can work on. Fipp,
Aqidah,
you know, Quran,
and then move from this to this. You
know, it's kind of gives you structure. And
so I do think those are valuable if
you're looking for guidance.
But having, you know, the more,
rapport with someone where it's just you're their
primary student, I feel like we it's really
difficult to do that in this day and
age.
Thank you, sister Sahar.
I love you as well. Thank you, my
dear.
And then
excellent universal journey. I am so grateful to
people like you who have positive energy, who
are coaching
other people to see
the best,
in the world.
May Allah increase you and reward you. Sher
Khan,
my name is all over the flyers for
this event, but I will write them, it's
down. It's Josai Mujedidi.
That's my full
name. I don't know if you're from our
community or international or from another,
place. But, you can check out the MCC
East Bay
for more content. There's many qualified teachers.
Bless our community centers.
And,
and all of you for supporting our community
centers. May Allah increase all of you, protect
you, your families, your homes Inshallah.
I thank you. I don't think there's any
other questions, and I've kept you about 10
minutes or 11 minutes past the hour. I
apologize.
But I do, hope to see you next
week, same time Inshallah.
And if you have any follow-up questions, please,
you can direct them to the MCC East
Bay Insha'Allah, and I will get them. But
thank you again for your time. Brother Shad
or sister, I don't know.
I have left my name for you a
couple of times.
I hope you saw that comment. I'm definitely
not ignoring you. I just wanna make sure
everybody,
received
a response to their question.
So thank you again. May Allah bless all
of you. We will end in
Wanted
to use more than that front.
Yeah.
Minutes of life. That question again,
I have so many,
follow-up questions to that. We have to be
very careful with the people that our teens
are interacting with. I mean, if you ever
have if your kids are attending public school,
I know it's virtually impossible to know exactly
who they're, you know,
who they're with at all times, but I
think it's very important to have,
meaningful conversations
and ask them, like, who are their friends?
Who are the people that they're
spending time with? Because the the peer,
you know, that that age is is when
they're the influencers
change. Up until preadolescent
and adolescence,
parents have a lot of influence over their
children.
But teen years are when things change, and
the peer group actually has more influence.
So it's imperative
that you know who your children are talking
to, who their friends are, who they spend
the most of their time with, who they're
chatting with,
on their phones if they have phones, which
I have a whole, you know, viewpoint on
that. But,
you know, it's really important to be very,
very connected
with, the people that your your,
your teens are talking to. Otherwise, you risk,
them being influenced into doing things that are
outside the bounds of our faith. May Allah
protect and guide our children and our teens.
Let's see.
He's a girlfriend. He wants to marry.
You know what, sister or brother? Check out.
We did a panel on,
on it's called the parents don't understand.
Myself,
I was on it as well as doctor
Asad Tari Tarsin,
and sister Hannah Mokhtar.
Check that out. It's on the MCC,
playlist of different videos.
We address this entire issue of boyfriend and
girlfriend and actually sister Hannah Han, who's an
amazing asset. I highly encourage all of you
to follow her who have teens.
She's a wonderful resource for just parenting,
advice in general, but she gave an excellent
answer on this particular issue. I invite you
to please
watch
her explanation. It's one of the most watched
videos or possibly the most watched video,
produced by MCC East Bay. Check it out.
Inshallah. I hope that's,
helpful to you. If not, again, you can
come back next week and and maybe we
can, address your questions when we have more
time.
And again, everybody, may Allah reward all of
you. Have a wonderful evening, and we'll see
you in a week.