Naima B. Robert – Muslim Women Discuss What is a Woman Umm Talha
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Bismillah
Salam Alaikum everyone and welcome, welcome, welcome back
to the womanhood conversation.
I'm your host, Naima B. Robert. And today,
I have a special guest for you who
should be familiar to you if you know
my channel. If you don't, then please help
me to welcome Umu Talha
from marital arts
and Hayat Coaching. Sis,
I'm so glad to have you back on
the channel.
We've had 2 amazing discussions before, and I
think we're gonna have another one today. But
I will link, to your previous talks in
the description of this video guys so that
you can catch them. They are some of
the best performing videos on this channel. They
are that popular, popular, Marshall, and they are
that full of goodness.
But today,
what we're going to be talking about, Umtala,
is the
the idea and the concept of womanhood.
Right? Which is what this series is about.
But in light of faith.
What can you what can you give us,
on the topic of womanhood
in light of our faith?
Okay.
Well,
I would like to say firstly and,
most importantly that
we
know about
things from the one who created us,
and the one who created us knows us
better and knows
what is best for us. So that's very
important point to note
because
often, we get
wrapped up into ideas of what's happening now,
what the trend is, or what the popular
culture is. But then we have to bear
in mind, as a woman of faith,
as a Muslim woman,
we have to see what does Allah subhanahu
wa ta'ala say about
this topic or this issue
so that we can have a
clear perspective on this matter.
So when we talk about womanhood,
let's see. What does Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala
say? Because Allah created the man and the
woman. And Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala clearly says,
that man
is not like the woman. So from the
onset, we know that Allah has created the
man, and Allah has created the woman.
And man and woman, they're not the same.
They're biologically different. They're psychologically different, and they're
emotionally different.
This is heresy,
sis. This is not allowed to be said
in today's day and age. Are you sure
about this?
Do we really know what is a woman?
What is a man? How can we know
these things?
Well, think about it like this. When you
buy
a product,
what do
you rely on to know about the product,
the manufacturers or the maker of the product?
Mhmm. And then you would look at the,
guide. Say, for example maybe I'm I'm I'm
thinking of this example because I'm thinking of
replacing my vacuum cleaner.
So say if you're thinking of buying a
vacuum cleaner,
whether you go for Dyson, Shark, or Vax,
when you buy it,
you would look at the manual
to see how do you best operate this
vacuum cleaner.
Yeah. I mean, with Alola's best of example,
I'm just thinking about an example that's in
my mind at the moment. It makes a
lot of sense. It's a good example,
I love me a good metaphor.
So you would look at the the the
manual that comes with the product,
and you would depend on the manual because
you trust
it's from the one who put it together.
So the maker of Dyson, makers of back
Vax
and Sharp, what have you. So
you you have that trust.
Why? Because it's from the person who manufactured,
designed, and created it.
SubhanAllah.
So why is it different
when we think about the creator of man,
the creator of woman, the creator of the
whole universe? And that is Allah Subhanahu Wa
Ta'ala.
So we as women of faith we look
to our creator. What does Allah Subhanahu Wa
Ta'ala say? And that should be the central
point of our discussion. That is our home
base. Yes. With anything
because as women of God
we have to be mindful that
before we look at anything,
we have to see what does our tradition
say, what does our text say, because these
are our blueprint.
Because it's it's a it's a consistent
thing in our life. So we have to
depend on this. So from there we see
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says,
that
man is not like the woman.
So rather than fighting it,
rather than having a battle with it, we
we embrace because this is what it means
as Muslim women to say, sami ana.
Mhmm.
So we hear and we obey. So then
we understand.
Okay.
So
as a woman,
what are
our nature
from the creator? And Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala,
he he tells us that Allah has created
us in a certain way. We have certain
strength, and we have certain weaknesses
just like the man. The man has certain
strength,
and the man has certain weaknesses.
And together, we try to understand, okay. This
is how I can
support my men, like, you know, men of
the family,
and this is how the men can support
the women of the family. So we we
are an ally. We're not battling with each
other, but rather we are a a a
force united as a team.
So
we see what is our intrinsic nature that
we can play to the full advantage
to get the best out of the situation
and each other.
So as a daughter,
how to be supportive as a daughter
and the father to be supportive
as the male guardian of the daughter. So
it's always playing
to each other's strengths.
Complementary roles. That's right. That's right. And and
as a woman,
you're first a daughter,
then you are
a wife, inshallah, if Allah blesses you to
be married. Then if Allah blesses you, you'll
be a mother. Mhmm. And then if Allah
blesses you, you'll be nieces,
nephew nieces, aunties,
grandpa grandmother, and so on. So each stage
of our life, we are playing
different
role as supporting or being supported.
That's very important.
That's very important.
We play a role as a supporter, and,
also, sometime, we play,
a role where we are being supported.
Yes. And that's fine because sometime you give,
sometime you take. And this is like a
fine partnership in all different relationship that we
have in our life.
Yeah? Mhmm. Yeah. So that's one thing that
we need to bear in mind. Another thing
is that
we have certain qualities about us
that we should not
run away from or we shouldn't deny,
but embrace it. Like, for example, one quality
that I think is a great strength
because it makes us more
emotionally intelligent,
is that we we can sense emotions around
us very easily.
Mhmm. So that's very good when it comes
down to rearing or, you know, nurturing
little children because we are connected with
the child's emotion. So we know what what
what they need. Yeah. Perhaps
this is one of the thing that Allah
has instilled in us so that we are
better at nurturing
future generation.
Whereas man may be quite,
what's that word? Not absent mind, but he
may not be in tune as much as
the woman.
Mhmm. Yeah. Because this is where woman has
that maternal instinct.
SubhanAllah.
Mhmm. And Allah made her so that she
is likely so that she is better
in tune with her
children.
Yeah. Yeah.
But whereas the man, masha'Allah,
he is very courageous when he comes down
to certain
areas of play you know like he likes
to play rough and this is needed for
the child to to explore boundaries,
to be challenged.
Whereas we might feel, oh my god. The
child's gonna get hurt. Whereas the father or
the man or the uncle, whoever the male
guardian is, they are more,
wild when it comes down to being physical.
Yeah. Allah created
the man like this. Mhmm. So that quality
is also needed. So you can see both
of masculinity,
femininity,
it's good, and it should be encouraged.
But I find
nowadays,
from my observation,
there's a lot of push in women
discarding their femininity and trying to adopt their
masculinity.
And men and men being told to discard
their masculinity
and embrace their feminine side. Right? Yes. The
I think the two things are happening at
the same time. Yes. Simultaneously.
Simultaneously, it's happening.
But why? What why why should we
be coerced into discarding our femininity when that
is the thing that makes us a woman?
A feminine
quality is to be embraced, not to be
shying away from
Mhmm. Because that is part and pass parcel
of our makeup.
So one
this is a bit like when somebody says
to you, oh, you're very good at public
speaking. And when you say, no. No. I'm
not good at public speaking and you just,
you know, denying your natural qualities to be
a public speaker,
you're not living to your full potential.
What would be a better thing to do
is say, yes, I am, alhamdulillah, good at
public speaking. So therefore, do you know what
I'm going to do? I'm going to embrace
it and I'm going to thrive with it
because not everyone has this
quality to be a public speaker. Mhmm. Mhmm.
It's a quality Allah has blessed you with.
So therefore, why deny it?
Thrive with it. Mhmm. Embrace it and celebrate
it. So similarly,
Allah has blessed women with certain qualities,
femininity,
emotional intelligence,
being in tune with people's needs around you.
Mhmm. Embrace it and be a better person
in your life in serving and being around
for other people.
And this whole idea of, well, I don't
want to be serving others.
Why not? Service is the best act you
can give to other human beings around you.
Mhmm. And
any quality, when we look at it,
if it's done with
faith in mind, then it Even if it's
transcends. Yeah. The intention,
it's key to whatever we do. But the
main point I'm trying to make is that
every topic, every
discussion
needs to be led by
what the creator has said about it. And
the point about womanhood in this day and
age, we need to see, okay, there's a
lot of discussion about what is a woman,
what does it mean to be a woman,
even questioning, you know,
does that actually make Act actual biology. Biology.
Questioning biology. Yeah. So there are certain things
where you don't question because if you question,
then you destabilize
everything in your life.
Yeah? So I think this is key for
us women,
women in Islam, women of faith to think
about that. Allah has said himself that
man is not like the woman. So okay,
let's see. There's a difference because
man and woman,
biologically they're different, psychologically they're different, emotionally they're
different.
And it's important to embrace
those differences
rather
than battling with the idea, oh, is there
a difference? No, man. Look, man
Well, it's a stereotype. It's a stereotype. These
are gender stereotypes.
You know, not that it's natural, but that
it's, you know, kind of created by the
environment. But you know, Wontala, I have a
question for you because I know our section
today is not going to be very long.
What do you think
mothers and fathers can do? But let's talk,
let, I know, let's keep it tight. I
wanna talk about girls today.
What do you think parents should be doing
to encourage
their daughters to embrace their womanhood as they
grow up? Because I know that with our
latest generations, there's a trend
to push our girls to be more masculine.
It's a pendulum swinging. Right? If in your
family, the girls were too docile, passive, maybe
got walked all over, they became people pleasers
and all of that,
This pendulum swings so that now we push
the girls to be loud and to be
kind of sassy and,
you know, stand their ground and just more
masculine, basically. Right? Or we kind of praise
that type of behavior or allow that type
of behavior. Right? And maybe downplay other areas
or
And maybe downplay
other areas or don't even emphasize them at
all. In your mind, is there anything that
parents can do,
mothers or fathers, to encourage their daughters to
embrace their their femininity as they grow?
That's a very good question because we have
to be mindful how our daughters grow up
in this society where there's a lot of
push Yeah. Towards being loud and proud and
just saying it as it is. Yeah. The
thing is we we mustn't confuse between
raising our daughters with higher and confidence.
Those these are 2 different things. Thank you
for mentioning that.
Thank you. They can grow up with with
Haya.
So they know, okay, this is a way
to speak, you know, taking all the ideas
of how Allah wants a woman to be.
So speaking the truth
as and when it needs to be spoken,
that's
good. That should be encouraged.
Sorry, sis. Before we continue, just for those
who are listening and watching and don't know
what you mean when you say Haya, could
you just explain that before we continue?
So Haya is,
bashfulness,
shyness,
modesty,
and having,
a certain,
like, ladylike traits where you're not, you know,
very,
upfront and abrupt. In your face. Yeah. Yeah.
That's right. So what needs to be distinguished
is that having confidence to speak the truth.
And, of course, there's a way in which
we speak. So there is etiquettes and manners
and morals to be,
taken care of.
And at the same time, having this sense
of bashfulness
and, you know, modesty in the way you
speak
has to be taken care of so that
the girl
or well, we're talking about girl in particular.
She knows that she is able to express
what she feels she needs to express. At
the same time,
as Muslims,
we adhere to etiquettes.
There's a moral. There's there's manners that we
need to abide by. So from from the
early on, if you encourage that where, say,
at the dinner table,
your son and your daughter, they get the
chance to express themselves. It's not like, okay.
What does the son want? I mean, they're
not gonna listen to what the daughter wants.
No. This is a comfortable space. Giving them
that space to be able to express themselves
in a non combative environment, I guess, because
that's that helps if you are allowed to
express. If you grow up expressing yourself in
a safe environment,
then you're not on the defense all the
time or on the attack all the time
because I was never heard or I was
never given chance to speak. Now I'm gonna
speak. You know?
Maybe. Absolutely.
So in that situation, you're encouraging
the girl to have her say and express
herself
and be heard and also,
be able to say what's on her mind.
So she's able to see that, you know,
I am able to
say what I think and also have
a area where I can fully express myself.
And be taken seriously. I think I think
that makes a big difference to your confidence.
Exactly.
So that's about
having her say. Similarly,
when we talk about, you
know, responsibility,
of course,
the the girl has certain share of responsibility.
So if you think about the dinner table,
so if she's also
encouraged
to take part, you know, do the thing
that she, you know, is seeing her mom
do
Mhmm. And the boy is also taking part
in doing the thing that he's seeing his
father's father's do. It's not a case where
the girl does everything and the boy doesn't
do nothing. Not everyone contributes because it's not
a, like, a lodgers stay. It's it's a
home. It's a family stay where everyone should
pull together as a as a unit. So
the man has a role and the woman
has a role, and that should be taken
care of simultaneously
so that both parties
are engaged in,
you know, like, you know, the training process
of, you know, adulthood, isn't it? Yeah. So
and it's not a thing where the girl
does everything or she doesn't do anything. You
know? It's it's in the middle. We can
have a balance. Right? Because I think what
we we need to wrap up, but we
talked about it in our last, podcast where
we were saying how, you know, at one
point in time,
girls did do everything. Right? Girls were expected
to do everything to help their mom and
boys were not expected to do anything in
the home at all, touch anything in the
home.
And then like I said, we swung the
pendulum all the way to the other side
so that girls now,
don't do anything and don't know how to
do anything. And their mom who if even
if the mother was doing what you know,
her share in the house or taking care
of the home,
she purposefully did not train her daughter to
do that. She purposefully
would do it herself rather than getting her
daughter involved.
I think that there's this idea that, no,
my daughter will do better than me. My
daughter is going to be educated. My daughter
is going to have a degree. She's not
going to live the way that I
live. And do you think that, I mean,
that's my analysis. Do you think that that's
a fair analysis of what's happened maybe especially
in a lot of Asian families
and intergenerationally
where moms have not passed down
housewifely,
motherly skills to their daughters because they've been
pushing them to get educated and, and focus
on that. I don't know. What are your
thoughts?
I think in every generation, there there's, obviously
going to 2 extremes. You know? Mhmm. And
the best place to stay is in the
middle Yeah. Because that's a balance, and balance
is needed in all aspect of our life.
So, yeah, maybe in the past, you know,
mothers were wearing their daughters to be, you
know, homemakers and, you know, have skills to,
you know, manage life. Life And constantly talking
about getting them married as well. If you
see the old films, they're always talking about
from when the from when they're, like, 13,
14, and you must marry well. And you
must marry well. You know? And you will
marry well. And, oh, she's got curls. She'll
find the husband easily. So there was that.
And now we're the opposite. Opposite. And, you
know,
the good thing about that generation
was that
the idea of marriage was planted from early
on. Yes. And, therefore,
there wasn't a
very,
like, long delay in marriage that we're facing
nowadays. Exactly. We're on the opposite end now.
Opposite end now. Now, you know, mother's not
even thinking about marriage, and the girl's, like,
21 and, you know, she's not even ready
by the age of 25. Then I'm thinking,
when is she going to be ready? Because
you have to be bear in mind them
a biological clock as well. Yep. Yeah. So
anyway so
there there is one extreme to another. So
nowadays, there's a lot of focus on education,
career,
which is fine. Girls should be educated. Girls
should think about what she wants to do
in her life other than x, y, and
zed. However,
we are missing the point of
training them to have
basic
life skills.
Yep. And these life skills are essential. Why?
Because it enables you to cope with the
demands of life because you gotta eat, you
gotta
clean, you gotta, you know, look after your
space. Yeah. And that needs certain
basic life skills like tiding, cleaning Yeah. You
know, rustling up a meal for for for
yourself. You know? Because, obviously, as you know,
nowadays, you know, the cost of living recession,
all of that. You know? So it's always
better to eat home cooked meal because it's
cheaper,
wholesome, healthy, and so on. So we are
not thinking about the life skills because maybe
the mother had a different type of, you
know, experience growing up. So we're just so
into education and career, and we're not thinking
about how to survive as a human being.
So the basic life skills,
you know, boiling an
egg, doing cup of tea. I mean, these
are these are things that we, we, we
used to just just do because we were
expected to do when we were growing up.
You know? Like, the guests have come, put
the ketchup on, make the tea.
I wanna say this as a as a
a parting
point to everybody who's listening. And this is
something I've shared with my, my, my girlfriends,
my sisters as well. I've noticed in, in
our generation,
we love hosting and Alhamdulillah, we're probably like
maybe the last generation
that have the skills to be able to
actually, you know, throw down, like cook nice
food, you know, entertain guests, etcetera.
And what I noticed with my friends is
that they don't involve their daughters. They do
it all themselves.
And that's something tangible that everybody, if you
believe that it's important for your daughter to
be able to have exactly, as you said,
the basic skills
Involve her
in meal prep. Involve her when you're hosting.
Right? Let her see it from the inside.
Don't let her be like a guest. I've
seen my my daughters and their friends, you
know, will go to a friend's house,
and the young girls, they all run off
to the bedroom to go and talk about
Harry Styles or something. You know? Sorry. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. You know? Instead of actually, you
know, hosting.
You know? Can I get you a drink,
auntie? You know, would you like this? Or,
you know, I made this salad. You know,
and laying the table, being part of that
hosting experience, which
is, you know, these are some of the
lost feminine arts. Right? Yeah. These are these
are some of the things that, you know,
generations would pass down faithfully,
and there's been a break in that passing
down.
Absolutely.
I clearly agree with you more, Naima, because
I think, you know, children, you know, learn
through
participation. There's nothing like when you get involved
and be part of the whole process.
And when we encourage girls
and even boys, you know, when they go
to shopping with their father thinking, okay, what
am I going to get? You know, being
part of the, you know, collection of this
item in the, you know, aisle of the
supermarket,
it gives them basic skills to be able
to do a shop. You know? Yeah. So
I think with regards to the girls, you
know, it's the responsibility
of the mother to train and to nurture
the girl in a way that she's actually
acquiring these life skills essential life skills.
And I think, you know, this is something
that we can really,
start to to,
develop the feminine side of the girl in
our homes.
100%
agreed and definitely over the course of this
year,
we will be sharing more on, you know,
breaking down these things. Right? Because one of
my goals is not to just have these
high level discussions,
but actually on the back of these discussions,
some real
lessons, master classes, workshops to teach what it
is that we need to learn in order
for us to try to correct what's happened
with us as, as a, as a, as
a society, really, when it comes to, you
know, our womanhood, our personhood.
So I want to thank you, Ruzi Khattoon
Talha, for coming and gracing us with your
presence. Masha'Allah. You always bring, you know, such
a fresh take on things and so much
wisdom. And
I pray Allah
blesses you and your family in all your
affairs. And my last question is, well, not
my last question. I have one question, and
then I'm gonna ask you to let everybody
know where they can find you. But my
my question
is, will you come again?
Inshallah, you've asked me so nicely. Why wouldn't
I?
Okay. How can people find you, sis, and
how can they, interact with you and and
work with you?
So,
you can find me on, Instagram,
underscore umthalha,
and also on Hyatt Coaching,
Instagram.
So,
DM me if you're interested to, you know,
find out more.
Every Saturday in East London, I've been running
a halakka. So, you're welcome to attend if
you're in London East London.
So that's every Saturday from 10:30
to 12:30.
So come along if you're free with your
daughters. Inshallah.
Yes.
And that's another thing as well. When you
see sisters going to sisters events and they
don't bring their daughters,
you know, and the sisters event could be
a really beautiful event. It could be like
a charity dinner. It could be, you know,
there's so many sisters events, especially in places
like London. And it's such a missed opportunity
when we're not bringing our daughters along to
bring them into this space of sisterhood
because it's all she's not gonna enjoy it.
Oh, you know, it's not really her thing.
Bring the giyan man.
You know, I'm a I have to say,
you know, the circle that I hold every
Saturday is actually for mothers, but I'm surprised
by so many young girls, they come along
with their mothers. Masha'allah.
And we told them that, look, there are
other halakas that young girls can go, but
they love coming with their moms because they
like to be part of the, like, in
a sisterhood and women's group. Yes. So, yeah,
it's it's it's wonderful. And what is interesting,
many mothers tell me that actually that journey
that they take with their daughters to come
to the halakhic, it's like a bonding time
for them as well. Yes. Yes. Yes. And
then they go and get milkshake or coffee
afterwards. I'm sure.
Yeah. All right, guys, you heard it here
first. All links will be in the Insha'Allah.
Thank you so much for tuning in. JazakAllah
Khayr Umta Allah for taking time out of
your day.
We'll see you again Insha'Allah on this channel.
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Please make dua for my guests as always,
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your host, Inshallah. Naima B. Roberts signing out.