Mirza Yawar Baig – Advice to students #2
AI: Summary ©
The speakers stress the importance of gratitude and offer advice on how to do so. They also discuss the difficulty of standing on knees when older people are not yet 70 or 80 and the importance of forgiveness in helping older people through their lives. The speakers emphasize the importance of being a good friend to avoid wasting one's time and encourage people to be kind and be liked.
AI: Summary ©
From my wado, my brothers and sisters, second
thing, advice is to be thankful, is to
express gratitude.
How many people here, when you go home,
you know that there is going to be
a good tasty hot meal ready for you?
Yes?
Who cooks the meal?
You, your dad or your mom, fantastic.
Who cooks the meal for you?
Your mom, alright.
The older ones, who cooks the meal?
Your wife.
Now let me ask you a question, how
many of you thank your mom and say
thank you very much for this food?
How many of you thank your wife?
You thank your wife?
You understand what I'm saying?
It's very important to thank.
And that is why Rasulullah s.a.w.
said, The one who has not thanked Allah,
who has not thanked the people.
The one who does not thank the people,
does not thank Allah.
Sometimes we feel, oh but why do I
have to say thank you, thank you, thank
you all the time, don't they know?
Allah s.a.w. said in Surah Ibrahim,
Allah s.a.w. said, the announcement was
made and said to them that, the one
who thanks me, I will increase my blessing.
So if you say about your wife or
about your mother, why do I need to
thank, why do I need to thank my
dad?
Doesn't he know?
But doesn't Allah know?
Allah s.a.w. said, So why is
he saying the one who thanks me, I
will?
Why?
Because he doesn't know?
Allah is showing us that to thank Allah,
to thank is our job.
It's not because they know or they don't
know.
To thank is my position as the recipient
of the blessing, that I must thank.
Whether the other person knows or does not
know is not my concern.
My concern is I must thank.
So make this an absolute wonderful thing for
yourself and say, I will thank.
Gratitude is a fantastic thing.
They did a study in the University of
California, with people, patients of chronic depression.
So these are people on antidepressant medicine, and
they are like suicidal almost.
They are so deep into depression.
The experiment they did was, the control group,
they gave them what they call the gratitude
diary.
They gave them a book, a notebook, and
they said, every morning when you wake up,
write down ten things that you are grateful
for.
Ten things.
And they said you can write the same
ten things every day, it doesn't matter, but
write ten things.
So for example, I am grateful that I
have eyesight.
Do we think about this sometimes?
Did you thank Allah and say, Alhamdulillah, I
have eyesight?
Did you say, Alhamdulillah, when I get up
from my bed and I go to the
bathroom, I can walk steadily, I don't fall
down.
We don't even think about that because Alhamdulillah,
Allah has made us strong.
But do you know this is a major
problem?
Do you know this is a problem which
if you live long enough, when you get
older, this is one of the first things
that happens to you, you lose balance.
Doctors who do geriatric care, doctors who care
for elderly people, you know what they tell
them?
They say do whatever you want, but don't
fall.
Make sure you don't fall.
So don't try and, when you put on
your trousers, don't stand and sit down.
Sit down and then put your trousers on.
Don't stand.
You say, I did it all my life.
Yes, all your life you did that, but
all your life you were not 70, you
were not 80.
Now you are 70 and 80.
Sit down.
Do not fall.
Don't stand and wear your shoes.
Sit down and wear your shoes.
Yes?
So when you are now in a stage
where you are not 70 and 80, Abdullah,
you are strong, you can stand on one
leg and do stuff.
Should we not thank Allah for this?
We race up and down stairs because the
knees are good.
You live long enough, a day will come
when arthritis will come.
And with arthritis, the cartilage in the joint
will go.
And then you have bone on bone.
Should we not thank Allah?
Alhamdulillah, ya Allah, my knees are okay.
Alhamdulillah, my hands are okay, my knuckles are
not painful.
I can hold, I can catch, I can
write.
I was once in the post office in
Massachusetts and a very old woman came in.
She was walking with a walker.
And her hands were like this.
These fingers were bent backwards almost like this.
With arthritis.
Severe arthritis, like this.
She can't hold anything.
With great difficulty, she's walking like this.
And she came into the post office with
a bag which had very badly wrapped packages.
And these were cards and packages she was
sending Christmas gifts to her children.
So I helped her to wrap it and
to post it.
And I said, where are your children?
She said, in different places in America.
I said, where do you live?
He said, I live in an old people's
home.
She lives in the home.
But still, she's a mother.
So even though the children dumped her into
an old people's home and they are living
somewhere, she comes to send them gifts.
Right?
Should we not thank Allah that our fingers,
hands, everything is fine?
Thank.
Consciously do that.
Thank people.
The people who help us, our parents help
us.
Why should the parent help you?
Why should a parent help you?
We take things for granted.
I've got a fancy phone, right?
I mean, I see a whole bunch of
these kids.
Who gave you the phone?
Your mother.
Your mother.
I remember just seeing an interview with Ronaldo.
You know Ronaldo?
The football player, right?
Soccer player.
Ronaldo says that my son is prohibited.
He doesn't have a phone.
We do not give him a phone.
We don't give him any screen.
And we have prohibited him from being on
social media.
He said, one day, I discovered that he
took somebody else's phone and he secretly created
an Instagram account.
And in literally 24 hours, he had 1
million viewers.
He said, I forced him to delete that
account.
They asked him why.
He said, because he is getting 1 million
viewers because of me, not because of him.
Nobody cares for that kid.
Who is that kid?
They are saying, that kid is Ronaldo's son.
Therefore, he has value.
He said, he must stand on his own
feet.
He has to know what it means to
become a celebrity.
He has to go through the mill.
If he does not do the hard work,
he is going to fail.
He said, I'm afraid for my son because
my son has, at his age, so much
wealth and so much luxury that he has
no value for it.
He said, I lived in a room, my
mother and me, with one mattress on the
floor.
There was not even any chair and table
in that room in Portugal.
We came up through life like that.
We struggled.
So now, when you have parents who are
helping you through that, should you not thank
them?
Should you not serve them?
Be thankful.
Third piece of advice, forgiveness.
Forgive each other because forgiveness heals.
Don't forget, but forgive.
If you forget, then you will lose the
lesson.
You know, the example I give is, for
example, if you are driving, say you have
a lovely Harley and you're driving this Harley
on the highway and somehow you get behind
a garbage truck.
A piece of garbage flies off the truck
and hits you on your shirt, on your
jacket.
It's a stinky piece of garbage.
What will you do?
Yeah?
You'd throw it off, right?
You'd pull up at the nearest convenient place
where you can safely stop and you would
wash it off immediately, yes?
You'd pull over, right?
And then you would wash it off.
How about this?
Instead of that, how about you rub it
in nicely into your jacket and you're still
driving, it's stinking, and every once in a
while you bend down, you smell it, if
you do that, what will happen?
What does it say?
You'll say you're crazy.
Why are you doing that?
Yes?
Because you're thankful for the garbageman for picking
up your trash.
So you don't ever smell this thing, no,
on your shirt?
It is crazy.
You would never do that.
You would never keep the dirt on your
shirt.
You won't rub the dirt in.
You won't keep on smelling the dirt again
and again.
Then why do you do that with what
people do?
Why do you do that when somebody said
something bad to me?
Now I feel bad about that and I'm
feeling bad about that one year later and
ten years later and I'm thinking that constantly.
You know what that man told me?
You know what that woman told me?
How could she do that?
How could he do that?
Why?
It's garbage.
Get rid of it.
Learn the lesson.
Don't ride behind a garbage truck again.
That's the lesson to learn.
If you forget it, you'll get behind a
garbage truck again.
So don't do that.
Make sure you learn the lesson, but forgive.
Clean it.
And that's why I say forgiveness eliminates enemies.
Not forgiving eliminates friends.
So decide who you want to eliminate.
Never compromise your legacy.
That's why I began with our purpose.
Anytime you have a doubt, ask yourself, Why
am I here?
I'm here to obey Allah.
I'm here to establish and demonstrate the beauty
of Islam.
So how can I do something which goes
contrary to that?
So write down your purpose.
What is my purpose in life?
Write it down.
Nice big thing on a poster.
Stick it to the wall.
Look at it every morning.
Ask yourself, What do I want to be
remembered for?
If I die today, and you are thinking
about me next week, following week, year later,
what do I want you to be thinking?
Do that.
I remind myself when you that people remember
us not by what we consumed, but by
what we contributed.
Finally, everybody needs friends, right?
Friends are important.
So who are good friends?
This is the meaning of a hadith.
Rasulullah s.a.w. mentioned this.
He said a good friend is one who
reminds you of Allah, and he reminds you
to obey Allah.
So a good friend is one that you
can look up to, that you admire, and
you want to be like them, and you
want to learn something from them.
A good friend is one who challenges you
to be your best.
And a good friend is one who tells
you what you need to know, what you
need to hear.
Not only what you want to hear.
A good friend is one, if you are
doing something wrong, he tells you, don't do
this.
Not someone who constantly only praises you.
And that's why I say nobody walks alone.
Everyone is a reflection of their family, their
community, of the Ummah.
And that's why I always remember that.
So if you do something wrong, for example,
if you go and park your car across
somebody's driveway, or illegally park it in somebody's
place, even I'm not going to say this
car, see this is how Muslims are.
These Muslims are like this.
You owe somebody something you don't pay, they
will say Muslims don't pay their bills.
Yes?
So by my action, I am bringing a
good name or a bad name to Rasulullah
Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam.
So ask, remind yourself and say, is that
what I want?
If I bring a good name, Alhamdulillah.
But if I bring a bad name to
Rasulullah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, is that what I
want to do?
Character is the tree, and fame is its
shadow.
Only the tree is real.
So don't worry about how many followers you
have on Facebook, or how many YouTube videos
you have, or how many, you know, tics
on Twitter or Instagram or whatever.
It doesn't matter.
How many people are clapping for you makes
no difference.
You know your reality.
Focus on that, and try and make sure
that that is always better.
And that's why they say the golden rule
is do unto others what you want them
to do unto you, right?
And I say the platinum rule, that's the
rule of Islam is do to others better
than what you have them, than what you
would have them do to you.
Rasulullah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam said, do good to
the one who harms you.
Not only to the one who does you
good.
Do good, he said, give people who deny
your rights, give them their rights.
This is Islam.
This is Islam.
It's not easy.
Jannah is not easy.
But Jannah is Jannah.
If it is worth getting it, then we
have to do that.
And that's why I say people listen with
their eyes.
They don't care what you say until they
see what you do.
That is why every time people tell me,
you know, we need to inculcate this and
that in our youth, I say no.
We need to inculcate that same this and
that in ourselves.
Your children are a reflection of you.
If you have well-behaved children with adab,
that is who you are.
That is because you have adab.
If your children are behaving without adab, it
means that you have no adab.
The child is learning from you.
Who else will he learn from?
You might say, you know, the child goes
to school, public school.
No, no, no, he doesn't learn from you.
He learns from you.
Because he goes to public school, he learns
something there, he comes back home and compares
it mentally with what he is seeing in
the house.
If what he is seeing in the house
is the same thing, then he will go
that way.
But if he sees something in the school
and he comes home and he sees the
opposite of that, he will stop.
He says, no, something is wrong.
This is not how my father behaves.
This is not how my mother behaves.
I am seeing here people are using foul
language and profanity and cursing and so on.
But in my house, people don't curse.
My parents talk to me respectfully.
So I should be respectful.
You don't have to say anything.
Children learn with their eyes.
They listen with their eyes.
Today we live in a world where we
are told that popularity is everything.
You should be popular.
Giving two examples.
How many of you heard this name, Dr.
Rene Favarolo?
Nobody, right?
This is the guy who invented bypass surgery.
How many of you don't know what is
bypass surgery?
Anyone in this room who had bypass surgery?
No?
Alhamdulillah, good for you.
Once again, these are things which happen.
Michael Jackson, everybody heard of him, right?
Between the two of Rene Favarolo and Michael
Jackson, who is more popular?
Michael Jackson.
But who is more useful to mankind, to
humankind, to people, to the world?
So it's not a question of how popular
you are.
The question is how valuable is your contribution
to life, to the world.
And that's why I say it's not how
much you know, but how much you do
that makes the critical difference.
Finally, be kind because the Prophet said, Kindness
and gentleness adds beauty to whatever it is
found in.
Kind language, kind speaking, kind behavior, gentle behavior
adds value wherever it is.
Kindness is the field in which you have
the least competition, opportunity in this world.
You will become hugely influential if you are
kind.
If you are nice to people, people will
love you.
And they will listen to you.
And that is power.
I think that's the last slide.
In the end, it's not about them.
It's about us.