Mirza Yawar Baig – Signs of guidance
AI: Summary ©
The speakers emphasize the importance of staying grounded in reality and measuring success on social media platforms. They also stress the benefits of algorithm engagement and finding guidance from Allah to achieve good deeds. The speakers emphasize the need to change one's lifestyle to achieve success and finding one's true value. They also emphasize the importance of avoiding giving money to others to]]
AI: Summary ©
In the name of Allah, Most Gracious, Most
Merciful, All praise is due to Allah, Lord
of the worlds, and peace and blessings be
upon the honour of the prophets and messengers,
Muhammad, the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings
be upon him and his family and his
companions, peace and blessings be upon him, and
many, many more.
My brothers and sisters, in today's world, it
is very easy to get distracted and to
start believing things about yourself which have no
grounding and no roots in reality.
For example, you might feel that you are
extremely popular and very influential and that you
are a great strategic leader and all kinds
of things that I hear people saying about
themselves or other people saying about them.
May Allah have mercy on us and teach
us to remain grounded in reality.
And that's why I always quote and remember
one of the wise sayings of Imam Shafi,
he said that when somebody praises you, remember
that he is praising the cloak that Allah
covered you with.
He does not know you, he has not
seen you, your real you, he has not
seen your reality.
He is reacting to or responding to what
he is seeing and what he is seeing
is the cloak that Allah has covered you
with, meaning Allah has covered your weaknesses, Allah
has covered your evil with his cloak and
therefore the person thinks very highly of you,
don't start believing that, just thank Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala alhamdulillah and ask Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala never to remove that cloak.
So that if people see your actual reality,
then that landing can be very rough.
So it is very important, having said that,
it's important for us to remain grounded as
I said and let me therefore teach you
some ways of how to remain grounded.
So whatever you are, however high you might
be flying, ask yourself some questions, some very
simple questions and the first of that question
is, no matter who you think listens to
you, no matter who comes to you for
advice, ask the question, are they willing to
pay you for that advice and what's the
evidence?
It's not a question of just saying I'm
willing to pay, have they paid?
Can you look at and can you show
for yourself, I don't say show me, you
don't need to show me, but do you
have invoices and bills to show that people
come to you for advice and that they
are willing to pay you good money for
that advice, number one.
Number two, how many people follow your advice?
Who follows your advice?
Have you tracked anybody to see that you
gave some advice and the person followed that
advice and then what happened to them?
After all, our advice is not coming from
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, nobody is receiving
Wahi, so no matter what, no matter how
good you think your advice is, it's a
good idea to track it to see what
happened to the person who was wise enough
or foolish enough to follow your advice.
Now today, we are conditioned and we measure
success on the basis of false numbers, followers
on social media.
There is a joke somebody sent me once
and they said that this guy died and
there were three people in his funeral and
his mother said, oh, how is this possible?
Because he had 3000 followers on Facebook.
Now that is the unfortunate reality.
The whole reality is that we live in
a make-believe world and we measure our
success and we feel good on the basis
of these false numbers.
We think people are listening to us.
It's a mutual, you scratch my back, I
scratch yours kind of thing.
So if one is it's of course also
promoted by the algorithm, whatever you like, you
see more of that.
And secondly, if you like something, somebody's comment,
then that person likes your comment and so
on, actually has no meaning.
So therefore, false numbers.
Now, just analyze that on the basis of
engagement and the number will get reduced to
single digits.
For example, if you are looking at the
number of views on your channel, you might
have 10,000 views, but then look at
the engagement.
For example, if you had a 30 minute
lecture, how many people listened to that lecture
for 30 minutes?
Because as far as the algorithm is concerned,
as far as the machine is concerned, as
long as the person clicks on that link,
even if they were there for one second,
it will still count it as one view.
But if you are talking about something and
it took you, that lecture was half an
hour.
How many people stayed for half an hour?
Literally, it will get reduced.
Your number will get reduced to single digits.
As I said, social media caters to the
LCD, the lowest common denominator of humanity.
People without focus, without goals, with the attention
spans of monkeys, who cannot concentrate on anything,
who have no staying power, who are looking
for constant external stimulation to which they react
exactly as their handlers want them to.
Having a large number of them as followers
means that what you are creating pleases them.
Now what does that tell you about how
you are spending your time?
Because if you are spending your time creating
content for people like that, with the attention
span of monkeys and goldfish, couple of seconds,
couple of minutes, then what does it say
about the value of your time?
So therefore ask yourself a very good question,
which is, if you want to see the
direction in which your life is going, and
if you want to assess that and say
is it a good direction or not, ask
yourself this question and say, am I getting
Tawfiq, am I getting guidance from Allah to
do good deeds or not?
Am I getting the guidance of Allah to
do good deeds or not?
The Sahaba asked Rasulullah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, how
do I know if my Salah is accepted?
And he said if your Salah is accepted,
Allah will give you the Tawfiq to do
the next Salah.
So if I pray Salatul Fajr and I
want to know whether my Salatul Fajr is
accepted, then inshallah if you then pray Salatul
Zuhr and you find that, then it means
that inshallah your Salatul Fajr was accepted because
Allah gave you the Tawfiq to pray the
next Salah.
And similarly for other things, if I have
given money, if I have spent in charity,
am I getting the Tawfiq to do more,
do I feel happy doing that, or do
I see it as a burden and so
on?
Allah said whoever Allah wishes to guide, He
opens their heart to Islam.
So if Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta-A
'la wishes good for us, Allah will open
our heart to Islam.
But whoever Allah wills to leave astray, He
makes their chest tight and constricted as if
they had been climbing up into the sky,
flying up into the sky.
This is how Allah dooms those who disbelieve.
This is how Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta
-A'la punishes those who disbelieve.
Now think about this, on a side note,
this ayat came in the 7th century where
whatever else people may have been doing, they
certainly weren't flying.
So no one had any clue what happens
to you when you go up in the
air.
And going up in the air and chest
being tight and constricted, breathing being constricted doesn't
even happen when you just fly a couple
of hundred feet up in the air.
You have to go some serious heights for
that to happen.
So think about this, this is one of
the many places for those who are looking
for proofs of the divine nature of the
Quran, this is one of the many places
which shows that.
Only Allah knows.
So Allah here says, whoever Allah wishes to
guide, he opens his heart to Islam.
So first question ask yourself, is my lifestyle
such that I'm doing more and more of
obedience to Allah or disobedience to Allah?
If Allah has given me money and I'm
spending that money doing haram or if I'm
earning that money in haram, then the answer
is very simple.
My life, Allah is not taking me towards
himself and I need to change myself otherwise
I'm likely to be left with those who
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala pushes away from
himself because they have chosen that for themselves.
So if we are getting tawfeeq to do
more and more good deeds, alhamdulillah we are
on the right path, we ask Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala for istiqamat, we ask Allah
for steadfastness.
If we find that in our lives we
are disobeying Allah more, Allah has given us
resources and those resources we use to disobey
Allah.
Think about that, how much of, that's the
reason why Rasulullah s.a.w. said every
ummah has a test and he said the
test of my ummah is wealth.
And subhanallah, if you look at the Muslims,
whether it is at the individual level, whether
it's at the collective level, whether it's at
the level of people who are earning two
-digit and three-digit salaries or people who
are earning ten-digit salaries or ten-digit
incomes every minute, the millionaires, the billionaires, see
where their life takes them, see what kind
of decisions they are making.
And then look at yourself, don't worry about
what the king of this or that country
is doing, look at yourself and say what
am I doing?
So if Allah has given me money and
I'm using that money to disobey Allah, I'm
using that money for haram, believe me, Allah
also told us what happens.
Allah said, same Surah Al-An'am, Allah
said, فَلَمَّ نَسُوا مَا ذُكِّرُوا بِهِ فَتَاحَنَا عَلَيْهِمْ
أَبْوَابَ كُلِّ شَيْءٍ حَتَّىٰ إِذَا فَرِحُوا بِمَا أُتُوا
أَخَذْنَاهُمْ بَغْدَةً فَإِذَا هُمْ مُبْلِسُونَ Allah said when
they became oblivious to warnings, you are doing
haram, people are warning you, people are telling
you, you pay no attention, you say I
don't care, please go ahead, no problem, it's
your life.
Allah says when they became oblivious to warnings,
We showered them with everything they desired, فَتَحْنَا
عَلَيْهِمْ أَبْوَابَ كُلِّ شَيْءٍ Allah said we opened
on them the doors of everything.
But just as they became engrossed in that,
فَرِحُوا بِمَا They were delighted in indulging in
all that Allah had opened the doors for
them.
So they wanted to disobey, Allah said go
ahead, disobey some more.
Allah said we seized them by surprise.
أَخَذْنَاهُمْ بَغْدَةً Suddenly by surprise.
فَإِذَا هُمْ مُبْلِسُونَ And they instantly fell into
despair.
They fell into despair because now they realized
that we have to go before Allah.
Now what happens?
And this is where we need to ask
ourselves.
Because the whole point is, it's not a
question of what I believe or don't believe.
As I said yesterday, you can believe anything
you like.
You can believe the truth or you can
believe falsehood.
You can believe whatever you want.
But only the truth will happen.
Falsehood will not happen.
Falsehood will not happen.
Only the truth will happen.
And if you want to believe something which
is not true, of course you are free.
Everybody is free.
But it is not going to happen.
And what is the truth will happen.
Then what do you do?
So it's very important.
Very simple way.
Look at yourself.
Let me look at my life.
You look at your life.
And ask yourself.
And ask myself.
Am I disobeying Allah?
If the answer is yes, then that must
stop.
Instantly, immediately, right now.
Because I may die right now.
And once we see Malakul Maut.
Once we see the signs of Allah.
Once we see our life.
Once we see the Akhirah.
Then the door of Tawbah will be shut.
We ask Allah to open our eyes.
Before our eyes are opened for us by
Malakul Maut.
Wa min Allah at-tawfiq, Al Fatiha.