Omar Suleiman – Invisible Wounds & Visible Flaws

			I want to sit I want to live with a counselor, de la salatu salam I honestly low on it. And he was
like the heat woman, why not. So there's been a lot of discussion in the wake of the death of
Chadwick boseman, who was hiding his cancer diagnosis for four years, about what people are really
struggling with, and how we need to be more sensitive about how we treat people in the public space,
how we treat people, not just in the public space, but people that we interact with, and may not be
paying close enough attention to. And it was very interesting to see, for example, some of the
commentary, you know, I saw some of those pictures from earlier this year, where, you know, he was a
		

			lot skinnier. And there were people that were mocking him in certain online spaces, for his
appearance, you know, people calling him a crack user, and all sorts of unkind things, and, you
know, provoked a discussion about wounds about invisible wounds, and what people are dealing with
what people are struggling with. And the reality is, is that everyone's going through something. And
we often don't pay attention to what people are going through, in fact, we often cause some of the
pain that they then live with, unknowingly, unintentionally. And this idea of just being more
sensitive towards others being more careful about our words, being more inquisitive about how people
		

			are doing, but not just by way of, you know, conversational courtesy, but actually like doing check
ins, with people that we know, to make sure that they're doing okay, to let them know that we're
there for them. And obviously, it's a time you know, it's a global pandemic. And much has been
happening this year, to where a lot of people are really struggling. And a lot of people that were
struggling before the pandemic are struggling even more now. But I wanted to talk about this from a
spiritual perspective, and tie it to another concept in the religion, which is to overlook people's
visible flaws. And this is a, you know, an interesting tie in because the same eye, from a Tesco
		

			perspective, the same eye that is supposed to overlook the visible flaws of people, is to look for
the invisible wounds of people. And sometimes we do the opposite, right, the common thing is to
pounce on people's visible flaws, and actually cause them some of the invisible wounds that they
will then carry as a result of that interaction, especially in the world of social media, where it's
so easy to bruise someone else. But, you know, from a Tesco perspective, from a spiritual
perspective, this is an extremely beautiful concept because it speaks to where the eye sees from, it
speaks to the condition of the heart, that the eye sees with, when a person looks to people's
		

			visible flaws, and bounces or writes them off or causes them injury as a result of that, as opposed
to looking to better that person looking to help that person looking to inquire about that person.
And even see sometimes when they have, you know, very visible flaws. What it is that might be
causing them to act in those certain ways and takes the time to pray for them takes the time to
sincerely advise them takes the time to care for them, and in the process could move them away from
some of those very visible flaws and also help rectify their situation internally. And so, you know,
you find for example, the narration of Abdullah and Mr. Little the long title I know which is a very
		

			beautiful narration that a man was brought to him and it was said that his beard was was still wet
from wine. It was dripping from some of the alcohol that he had drunk and I'd love to mushroom
there'll be a lot of time I know this great companion and jurist and scholar, he said that we have
been prohibited from to justice from spying. And you know, it's he basically still gave the man the
benefit of the doubt, because we did not see him drinking the alcohol. So even to that extent of her
son of one and a person of expecting you know, assuming well of a person and making as many excuses
as possible. You find the Hadith of the Prophet, slice element attempt Baron. Whoever seeks out the
		

			faults of his brother to Tibet, Allah Allah subhanaw taala will seek out that person's faults. And
if a loss seeks out your faults, then Allah subhanaw taala will humiliate you even if you are in
your home. Even if you are hidden away from all means of exposure, Allah subhanaw taala will
certainly humiliate the one who seeks to humiliate others and find and seek out the flaws or expose
the flaws of the one who seeks to expose the flaws of others. So that's a person who looks to the
world to cause injury for the sake of growing self, for the sake of their own ego for the sake of
their own lowly pleasures. And the other side of that is to look to people that are struggling and
		

			to from a place of empathy from a place of wanting good for that person. Seek to Ask and inquire not
to spy, but to say hey, is everything okay?
		

			And to give them that love to give them that advice to give them that shoulder that they need at
times, and in the process, they will better themselves and a person will humble themselves
naturally, when you're doing a check in with someone, you're naturally humbling yourself right to
that person because by virtue of your check in you are prioritizing them over yourself. Whereas when
you pounce on the visible flaws of someone the visible faults of someone, you are even worse when
you seek out the faults of someone that aren't so visible, and you seek to make them visible.
		

			You know, that's from a place of neffs that's from a place of making yourself prioritizing your own
happiness to there is prioritizing your own pleasure to theirs. Prioritizing everything that has to
do with your gifts to the detriment of them that you know, prioritizing yourself over over them. So
it's the opposite source. When you're doing that with someone who is exhibiting something that's
very visible that lends itself to a potential flaw. Now, at no point in Islam do we compromise the
status of sin? But at every point in our own spiritual pursuit of Allah's pleasure? Do we challenge
ourselves to do better to help people get away from sin, because sin causes pain in the hereafter
		

			and at the same time, demonstrate empathy to move people away from pain in this life. In both of
those situations, a person is seeking to do right by their brother right by their sister to help
them through a difficult situation. So how are you fine with the Prophet? sallallahu alayhi
wasallam. You know, he paid close attention to people when he inquired if someone was missing from
the masjid. If someone hadn't shown up to the wizard and the Prophet place on inquired about them,
he didn't inquire about them from a place of suspicion, he inquired about them from a place of
concern. Where's that woman? Where's that woman that used to clean the masjid? Where's that man that
		

			used to show up and then the profit slice on finds out that his son passed away? Why is this person
acting differently? So there's a you know, there's this place of concern that the Prophet slicin had
oftentimes when we see someone missing from our religious basis, we say, Oh, where's that person,
then someone throws in a suspicion cast some wide, broad suspicion, you know, I heard that they're
doing this. Now. They're doing that now. So the profit slice I'm asked about people from a place of
concern, the profit slice, and I'm also when he saw someone that was hiding their suffering, through
acting normal by asking, you know, questions that were related to their suffering, the prophets lie,
		

			some paid attention to their faces, he paid attention to their body language, the famous hadith of
who the longtime Robredo was hungry, but he didn't, you know, he didn't want to ask for food. So he
asked abubaker Well, the Allahu anhu, a question about the poor? And knowing the answer to it,
hoping that Rebecca will the law and who would notice his hunger, he has to all model the alongside
and hold the same question, hoping Ahmad would would notice his hunger and right away when he saw
the profit slice along the profit slice on recognize his hunger before he could even ask. So some
people, you know, are not going to ask for help. And it's important for us to make them comfortable
		

			with asking for help by by making it a point to let them know that we're there for them, and that
we're paying attention. And so it's kind of like, again, it's this connection between the two that I
was just reflecting on, you know, how the eye of the believer does not look to the faults, the
visible faults of the person to pounce on them. But rather, they look even deeper to where those
faults might be emanating from, which are often you know, some of those invisible wounds, that, you
know, people don't make it a point to pay attention to. And if I'm able to look at my brother or
sister with that, then perhaps I can rectify what is causing the visible fall, what is causing the
		

			visible floss that they would overcome that sin and at the same time, I could help them with what is
on the inside, so that they could overcome their difficulty in this life. And that's the connection
between the two. Because the eye of the believer looks to help their brother or sister, you are a
mirror to your brother or sister. And just like when you look at yourself in the mirror, you might
look a little bit more carefully. You look more carefully to others, not to scorn them, but to
beautify them. That's the intention. When you look at a mirror, you look at a mirror so that you can
so that you can catch something that you otherwise would not see so that you could fix something
		

			right of your appearance. When you see your brother or sister. You want to be their mirror you want
to be their reflection you want to help them so at no point do you compromise the status of sin? At
no point do you compromise the status of a flaw? But at every juncture, you pay attention and you
show that person that you want to help them overcome both their flaw and their source of that flaw
which is often a pain that has been on remedied. So we ask Allah subhana wa tada to purify us into
purify through us We ask Allah subhana wa tada to help us overcome what ails us in this life and the
next and to enable us to help others overcome what ails them in this life and the next and we ask
		

			Allah subhana wa
		

			To to make us bearers of His mercy of his environment towards people. We ask Allah subhanaw taala to
help all of our brothers and sisters that are struggling in silence that are suffering in silence
May Allah Subhana Allah make it easy for all of you to overcome whatever it is that ails you may
have lost some how to how to help all of us to help one another. What's also been happy what's also
such that we may enjoy one another in patience and enjoying one another in truth and in patience
alone. I mean, does that mean lol Hayden was set out
		

			to cancel