Naima B. Robert – Advice for Muslim Women Be intentional to Be the Hero of Your Life Story!
AI: Summary ©
The speaker discusses the importance of finding one's inner awesome in worship, rather than just being mindful of actions. They explain that actions can be transformed into intentions and that one's intentions can be purified through regular expiration. The speaker also emphasizes the importance of knowing one's intentions and finding one's own value in life.
AI: Summary ©
Bismillah.
One of the most amazing things about the
religion of Islam
is
the holistic nature
of worship, of Ibadah.
In many religions,
worship is quite specific.
It's
praying or charity or maybe even fasting,
doing holy related things.
And one of the amazing things about Islam
is that
it's like the whole world's a stage for
Ibadah. The whole world can be a musalla.
You know, every action that is halal
can be transformed
to a bada
with the right intention.
And that's why step 1
of finding your inner awesome is being intentional.
It's so important.
And I mentioned this and Allah knows it's
a reminder to myself first.
We as sisters
so often
fall into
a routine
that is a routine based on good. Don't
get me wrong. It's a routine based on
good. You know, we're observing the rules of
the religion.
We're taking care of our duties. We're praying.
You know, we're we're looking after our families.
We're being good our neighbors. We're we're we're
doing what we're supposed to do. Alhamdulillah.
But
many of us
lose the sense of intention.
We stop being mindful of what we're doing
and it becomes
part of our daily life. It becomes simply
routine.
Now
there's 2 issues with,
doing all this fantastic stuff, and it just
being part of your routine. There's 2 issues.
1,
you could cease to earn the rewards of
a better with that thing because your intention
is no longer for a better.
It could be that you haven't renewed your
intention or purified your intention for years possibly.
So Allah knows best will that relation will
that action action be accepted by Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala. We hope so. But there's a
chance that it could be just become part
of your normal, and it's not actually something
you are doing to worship Allah subhanahu wa
ta'ala. So that's one issue.
And the second issue is that
it doesn't affect us anymore.
It doesn't reaffirm us anymore. It doesn't strengthen
our faith anymore. It doesn't give us that
sense of satisfaction
anymore
because we're not intentional about it. We're not
mindful.
We're mindless, actually. We're just doing what we're
supposed to do, what we've always done, what
our moms did, what we know we have
to do. It's just duty, basically.
And the thing about that is
you lose the sense of the specialness of
what you're doing.
Think about this.
If you are cooking for your family every
day, for example,
it's part of your routine. It's something that
you know you do,
Yanny. You do it every day without question.
Okay?
It's a good thing. It's a nice thing.
And your family I'm sure will be very
grateful for it. Or maybe not considering
the fact that you do it every day.
They might not be that grateful.
But the point is it's something that you
do. It doesn't make you feel great. It
doesn't make you feel bad. It's just a
thing. Okay?
So that's
neutral on the scale.
Now imagine if,
before you cooked,
you reminded yourself of your intention.
You said bismillah
and your intention was
to feed your family
with good wholesome food that was halal and
tayyib
for them to become stronger so that they
can worship Allah, so that they can be
healthy, so that they can look after themselves
and also learn good habits for their children
and their families in the future.
What does that intention give you?
Well, firstly,
it becomes an act of worship. So inshallah,
it goes down as an act of worship
on your book of deeds.
But the second thing that you get from
it is that sense of purpose.
There's a higher purpose.
It's not just routine.
It's not just something you have to do
or something you've always done or it's just
taken for granted.
You have a sense of purpose.
A higher,
more noble
purpose
with that particular mundane act of cooking for
your family.
Now if you imagine
renewing that on a regular basis so that
your actions, even to yourself, are no longer
just ordinary actions.
These are actions that are investments in akhira,
that are investments in your family,
investments in your own sense of self, in
your own sense of well-being and accomplishment,
that elevates that.
It knocks it It elevates it
beyond anything
because now you're intentional about it and you're
mindful
of what it really means. It has meaning,
and I think that is the key.
We want a life of meaning.
We want to live meaningful
fulfilling
lives.
And my sisters, what I'm saying to you
right now is most of us are already
living the life.
We're walking the walk.
We just don't see it.
We just don't recognize it.
We don't feel it.
And the first step towards
feeling the meaning in our lives
is purifying our intention.
And so this
exercise
invites you to reflect on the hadith of
Rasool Allah sallallahu alaihi wa sallam
about actions being but by intention.
And then
we talk about
actions in our lives that can do double
duty. Chedre in this life and chedre in
the next. And to write a list of
those things.
And so when you're thinking of that list,
I want you to think of that example
of cooking for your family.
If your life
because at the end of the day, life
is is is life. It's it's pretty much
ordinary most of the time. Okay? There's things
that you're going to do that you may
end up doing for the next 20 years.
You might as well get barakah from them.
You might as well make them count in
the akhira
and you might as well make them work
for you.
To give you a better sense of meaning,
a better sense of confidence and fulfillment.
And the way to do that is by
purifying,
regularly purifying your intention
and clarifying
really the true meaning of this that this
deed that you're doing. And it literally applies
to everything that we do.
Every act that is halal
can be transformed
into ibadah
by intention.
And if we were constantly and if we
are constantly and allah knows this is a
reminder to myself first,
if we are constantly
mindful of what we're doing,
renewing our intention,
imagine the sense of fulfillment we will have
at the end of each
day. So when we write in our journal
or we write in our gratitude papers or
whatever it is that we do, we truly
understand
the barakah that we have been, you know,
that we've been blessed with throughout that day.
We truly feel fulfilled that today,
I invested in my.
Today
I put force for the afterlife.
Today I invested in my relationships.
I invested in my children. Today I walked
in my power.
Today I lived.
My mean my life had meaning today,
and I thank Allah for that. And of
course,
once we've written that list,
we purify our intention.
And next time you do that thing,
remember
this little talk.
Remember the intention.
Remember
how important it is for you to have
a better sense of satisfaction about the way
you spend your days, the way you are
living your life.
Because the key is not what you do,
the key is your intention
and how you take from that to feed
yourself inshallah.
I hope that serves you.