Safi Khan – Soul Food for College Students Am I Making the Right Choice
AI: Summary ©
The speakers emphasize the importance of consistency in harvesting from fruits, vegetables, and plants, as well as the importance of staying true to oneself and reflecting. They also mention the importance of setting intentions and reflecting, as well as the reality of one's actions. The story of Karun is also discussed, along with their personal experience with eating out and not thinking about other things beyond just the now. They end with a mention of a food bar in Charlotte.
AI: Summary ©
Okay. So now we're good here. Uh-huh. Yeah.
Yeah.
So are we,
so I've moved the speakers and stayed with
the argument change.
Mhmm.
No. Everyone's gonna We're gonna sit here. We're
gonna rotate. So you're gonna yeah.
So is your laptop charged? It discharged. Can
I send my notes to me? Yeah. Absolutely.
Yeah.
Just,
do you
mind if we delete it? Use it here,
by the way. Oh, yeah. Actually, no. You
can use it here. I'll just pull up
and configure it. Yeah. So that's what I
do. Sorry. Yeah.
Pushing that won't go out.
Yeah. That's not happening. I just do side
by side usually.
Alrighty.
Shall we get started?
Okay.
Alright.
Good.
Alrighty.
Everybody.
Welcome
to our temporary
indoor space for now.
Everyone's first time here, probably. Right? I don't
I don't know if you've ever been to
this location or around this area before, but,
we're really first and foremost happy that,
we see everybody. We can see your emotions
through your masks. We're pretty good at that
after 7, 8 months now. And,
we're honestly, you know, very blessed to be
able to do something like this. We're really
fortunate to be able to host this consistently
now. You know, we started with Monday night
here. This past Monday,
started with Monday night here,
this past Monday, and time transitioning soul food
here indoors now that the weather is gonna
be starting to transition into a little bit
of a colder,
climate.
So, Hamdul, we're really happy that you're here.
So this place right now, by the way,
was graciously
offered by one of our community members. So
before you guys leave tonight, I just want
everyone to kinda just take a quick second
and just make a quick du'a
for the person who has so
amazingly offered us to use this facility,
to, you know, reflect over Allah, reflect over
the example of the prophet, s salam,
and just kind of reflect together as as
as believers. And so, it's an amazing thing
that's going on here from the law.
So tonight, we actually have a really special
treat.
So soul food, we are going to be,
doing something really cool where every week, we're
going to be involving a new teacher, a
new instructor, a new mentor,
to kind of guide our conversations, share reflections,
go through the topic, and really shed some
light and insight from different perspectives.
And so if you all saw the, the
post, the post, for this Thursday,
the topic for today is about how you
make the right decisions,
which is ironic
because of the week that we're in right
now. I think everyone so before we start,
I need everyone to take, like, a giant
breath.
I need everyone to breathe. Okay?
And not breathe out. Now you're all breathing,
like, you're saying the same air that you
just emitted.
It's, like, that was not a nice experience
at all.
But, you know, I just want everyone to
take a deep breath. Okay? Because this week
was extremely overwhelming. How many of y'all feel
that this week was extremely
overwhelming
in terms of your thoughts? Right? I mean,
me me and Madoff, right, there, we're just
talking, like, we memorized the number 264 in
our heads right now. Right? Everyone's,
like, when when is it gonna happen?
When are they gonna get it? Like, when
is when is everything gonna be decided? You
know, like, it's very overwhelming sometimes. Right? And
it almost ironically leads us into our conversation
about how
to make decisions in our faith and what's
the process of making the correct decision. There's
a lot of people in here, including myself,
who've gone through questioning themselves about what when
do I know when I'm doing something right
or when I'm doing something wrong? Is there
doing something right and doing something wrong when
it comes to decision making? Is there an
an example that the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam
left for us? These are the questions, inshallah,
that we'll be reflecting over and sharing some
thoughts and wisdoms from. 1st and foremost, we're
gonna introduce, Sadaf Fatima, and then inshallah after
Sadaf Fatima, we're gonna introduce Seth Murphy, who
both will share some reflections on this topic.
So Sadaf Fatima, shall we?
Sorry, everybody. How are you guys doing?
Good.
I
I was just talking to a couple of
people about the topic today on decision making
and how do you know that you've made
the best or good decision,
or what does it mean to make a
bad decision?
And when I was talking,
like, just kinda thinking about it,
it's probably one of my very, very favorite
topics
similar
simply because
of the fact that it's something that you
have to go through every single day. Right?
So every day, you have to make a
decision
about something.
And last night, I was talking to one
of my friends,
and we've been kind of on this
interesting
journey. We like to go on journeys together.
So we're on this interesting journey of, like,
you know, I wanna eat healthier. I wanna
do this. I wanna do that. And I
was telling her every day I have to
make a cautious decision
that this is the particular way that I
want to live my life. Like, every day
I have to wake up and say, Fatima,
you are going to do this today and
you're going to be like this today, and
you're gonna reply to this person in this
way today. So every day, I will I
try I'm trying to. That's why it's a
journey,
to live my life with a purpose, and
part of that purpose is choosing
to do those things when I wake up
every single morning.
So decision making is something that is a
part of our everyday life. There are some
decisions that are big. You know, they're they
weigh heavy. They have very big, you would
say,
consequences
to, you know, I make the best decision,
you know, I make the wrong decision. And
there are some decisions that are so tiny,
you don't even think about them. You know,
there are things that you just kind of
automatically do every single day.
We know that the prophet
serves as our our prophet. He also serves
us as our role model. You know,
Allah says that he's.
That he is the perfect role model for
us. And the prophet
he had to make a lot of difficult
decisions
in his lifetime.
And so him serving as a role model
for us going through his life story,
and being able to pick out these different
situations at different times in his life that
he made these decisions help us in understanding
what does it mean
to make good decisions, and what does it
mean to make bad decisions, and what does
it mean to, you know, what does it
mean to have to go through this?
So one story in particular
that I truly really enjoy in my soul
is the story of the battle of or
the battle of. I enjoyed the battle of
too, but the battle
of. And the battle of because there's so
many parts to it. We're not gonna cover
all of them because then you can be
here for, like, 10 years. And I'm sure
you guys know when we hear me talk
for the next 10 years. So
but there are some good parts that especially
when it comes to decision making,
that we're gonna talk about when it comes
to the battle of war.
So you have that the prophet now the
the Muslims, the believers.
You know? They're finally in Medina.
And Medina is, like, basically,
for them, it is
the ability to take a deep breath and
just, like,
the hard part's kinda over. You know what
I'm saying?
Not really. But it's like a good moment
of at least I have my own home,
I have my own this, I have my
own that, I have my own space, I
have the ability to just kinda be Muslim.
I can be my Muslim self, my best
Muslim self.
Then boom, the battle of other happens. And
battle happens and the Muslims win, and it
puts the Muslims on a map. A part
of being on a map means now you
have haters.
And so they have all of these people
who are now like, well, we thought this
was a small group of people that we
didn't have to worry about, but it seems
like they have a lot of power because
they won this huge battle
against the Meccans.
So what transpires is now the battle of
Uhud. And the battle of Uhud comes into
play where the Meccans are now like the.
They're like, you know what? We're gonna avenge
the deaths of those that we lost in
the battle of. And the thing about the
Battle of Uhud was that some people were
considered were taken in Battle of Guha as
prisoners of war. So those people taken as
prisoners of war, obviously, now they've seen the
inside of Madina.
They know the layout of Madina. They know
how the Muslims think. They know strategy. They
have all these different things that they were
able to take back to Mecca.
So when the prophet
gets word that, you know what, the Mexicans
are on their way to fight again as
if they didn't they weren't.
As if they didn't get whooped the first
time they're waiting for another woman, basically. So
the
gets work. And the very first thing that
the has to decide
is are we gonna fight from our homes?
Are we gonna go meet them out into
a different battlefield?
So will we fight them from inside of
Medina,
or are we gonna meet them out in
a different battlefield?
So what the prophet does is that he
himself is thinking that, you know, it's probably
best to, like, fight from inside of Medina.
Mainly because they can not necessarily inside of
their homes particularly, but, like, right on the
outskirts, right there, you know, right on the
border of Medina, it's probably best to fight
from here. So that is what the process
on this day. But the process on this
day, that is something that is very important
in our lives, and that is called shulah,
that you go and you con consult with
other people. You just don't make decisions by
yourself. You know, you go, you gather your
community, you gather your friends, you gather people
you know, that know you well, that know
the situation,
and you sit down and you have a
conversation.
So the prophet has a conversation with them
with their companions,
and he's giving Shura. He's doing the consultation.
He's asking,
where should we go and fight?
And what happens is that
you have a group of companions that say,
we should fight from inside. We should fight
from inside of Marina.
And these are classified as what you will
say the older companions. K? Then you have
the younger companions.
And these younger companions, they're not just any
regular, diverse, regular younger companions. There are people
who wanted to fight in the battle of
love. But the told them, no. You're too
young. If another battle comes, then maybe we'll
consider it. So now they're old enough to
fight. So what do they what do they
wanna do? They said we're gonna get into
their face.
I wanna meet them where they're at. We
don't wanna fight from inside our home. We
don't wanna wait for them to come to
us. We're gonna go to them.
So they're they're making their case, and they're
not backing down in the least bit.
So after everything is said and done, the
prophet says, you know what?
We will go out and we will fight
them. And where we will go out and
and and meet the army is at the
battle the place of Uhud, which is like
a big mountain, and we'll talk about that.
So once the makes this decision,
there is a guy by the name of
Abdullah bin Ubaid bin Salud, and he was
later confirmed to be a hypocrite. But he
was amongst the senior companions who
also were amongst the opinion that we should
fight from inside
of Medina. Okay?
And then you have these younger companions. So
So the older companions kinda go to the
young companions, and they're like, why do I
pressure the prophet to make this decision? Like,
what's wrong with you? You're, like, yelling and
screaming, talking about something you're gonna fight, you're
gonna get in their face, you're gonna do
all this, da da da. Why are you
so, like, you know, when older people talk
to you about how you you're not supposed
to act like that. Why are you acting
like you don't have no home training, basically?
So now these younger companions, they feel bad.
So they go to the Pakistan
and they tell him,
we feel like we pressured you into making
this decision, and we're sorry. And if this
is the case that you think is best
for us to fight from inside of our
homes inside of Medina, we can fight from
inside of Medina.
And the prophet he says something
that is so beautiful at that time that
is so beautiful
about, you know, when a difficult thing arises
and how you deal with it. The prophet
he says
that it's not befitting for a prophet
that when he has put on his armor,
he should take it off unless Allah has
decided between him and the enemy. Meaning, we
already we already made the decision.
I came.
I did consultation.
And from that, sure, this is the decision
that was made, and we're gonna go with
it.
We're gonna go with it. I understand that
you think you pressured me into this. No.
We're gonna do this because at the end
of the day,
this is the decision that we've made as
a community,
and we're gonna get out there and we're
gonna fight.
So they go now on their way to
the battlefield, to the battlefield, the place of.
And when they get there, it was very
interesting. He's now Abdul Abdul Abidu Salud. He
decides that this is the moment when he
wants to look up, so so no. He
doesn't agree.
He could've said it back at the house,
but later he was confirmed to be a
hypocrite. So he raises his voice to the
prophet, and he talks to the prophet in
a very disrespectful manner. And he wants to
know. He's like, you following these little kids.
I'm not gonna do this. I'm grown.
I don't even know how Modena is. We
could've won. We're not gonna win with them
fighting from outside,
this and that. So I'm taking my boys
and them out. So he takes 300 of
his men, and they leave.
Now at that moment,
what could have happened?
At that moment, the prophet could have been
like, you know what? He's right. We've lost
300 men. Now we need to go back
and fight from inside of Medina because we
lost 300 men. Like, that's not that's not
a small number.
You know what I'm saying? That's not a
small number. We lost 300 of the people
who are gonna fight with us to help
us in this battle.
So if possible someone could have been like,
you know what? I'm gonna plead with you,
beg with you, da da da. Please don't
go. Please don't leave. No. Instead of possible
someone says, okay. See you later.
But there's another thing about this particular situation
is that at the end of the day,
the didn't get along on many things. Let's
start with Akida first because Abdullah bin Laden
Salud was a hypocrite.
He was someone who claimed belief by tongue,
but did but did not believe in his
heart and in his action.
That constantly throughout the history
of Abdul Abid bin Sallouz Islam,
he constantly
acted in,
complete opposite
of what Islam called for him. So him
and the prophet did not agree on many
things.
But you see here in this particular situation,
the prophetess actually did agree with him.
He did actually agree with him in fighting
from the inside of Medina.
Sometimes for us,
we may have a decision that we wanna
make
or we may be in a conundrum.
I don't know if I should do this
or this. I don't know if I should
get this or this. I don't know if
I should apply here or here or if
I should take this major or that major.
And you may have an aunt or an
uncle who's always talking to you,
and it's, like, really annoying, and this person's
always has something to say
all the time. Every time they see you,
they're like, well, what are you doing with
your life? Aren't you gonna do this? Well,
why did you pursue that degree? How come
aren't you smarter than that? Blah blah blah.
This and that. And then you come and
you're in this predicament and you wanna make
a decision,
and maybe you're leaning towards becoming, like, a
journalist, for example.
And then that same uncle comes, and they're
like, yeah. You should become a journalist, and
you're like, no. I'm not doing that. This
crazy guy is the one who's telling me
to do it clearly. This is the wrong
decision.
No.
That's not how decision making works.
Part of true or part of decision making,
part of these things is about humbling yourself,
that you recognize that it's not only you
who has to it's not only you who's
able to make the best decision.
Now sometimes you do have you do have
to go outside of yourself
to get that extra information that you need
or get that extra support to get that
extra information, that extra support
to be able to make the right decision.
And it may come from the people you
don't want it to come from.
And that's where you have to look deep
in yourself and say, you know what? Am
I being arrogant?
Am I being arrogant? Am I not your
opinion simply because of who you are and
the fact that you annoy me and you
always have something to say?
Or am I actually thinking about what this
person said objectively?
Now you're objectively thinking about it, and you're
like, yeah. Nah. Straight. K. Fine.
But the moment that person opens their mouth,
you're like, absolutely not. Can't believe you even
tried to give me advice. Who do you
think you are?
That's what goes on inside. Like, inside, you're
like livid.
Oh, just because you're not, you think you
could tell me what to do?
Be objective about it. Think about it.
So you have now that the battle the
battle happens, and we're not gonna go through
the whole battle because, again, we'll be here
for a long time. Especially because it's like
a really good story, and so you don't
you don't you don't just rush the battle
with the hood, guys. You go through every
single person's, like, part that they played in
the battle.
But before the battle is about to occur,
one of the biggest
strengths that the Muslim Muslims had were their
arch the archers. And the archers, basically, you
can think of them as, like, assassins. I
don't know if you guys ever never mind.
You can think of them as like snipers,
people who are like snipers. So they basically
never miss a shot. Alright? So if they're
shooting, it's
hitting the target.
And so the prophet, salsam, sets them on
this hill, and he lets them know that
you are not to leave this position.
K? You do not leave this position
even if you see, like, dead bodies on
the battlefield
and you see that there's no one there.
You do not leave until I come to
you and I relieve you of your position.
So they all agreed. It's about 60 outros.
What happens now is that the entire battle
occurs.
And because the way the position that the
archers are, say, like, the archers are right
here, the mezzanines are approaching
this way, they're They're, like, just firing arrows
at them. Just firing shots again. They're snipers,
so they're shooting and they're hitting. Shooting, hitting,
shooting, hitting. So the Mexicans are like, oh,
no. We didn't we didn't sign up for
this.
So they start to retreat. You know what
I'm saying? They're like, we didn't sign up
for this. You have another companion by the
name of Abu Dujana who was known to
be able to fight with both of his
hands. So he had a sword in each
of his hand that he would just be
walking through the battlefield like, running on on
his horse to the battlefield. Everybody that's on
both sides of him will be falling down.
They're just all, like, falling like flies. So
the Mexicans are like, this is not the
same people.
I don't know what kind of steroids these
people are on. This is not the same
people we were fighting before. We're about to
go home. So they start to retreat from
the battlefield, and they were retreating. But what
happens is that there's a group of basically,
one group of the Americans who led the
who are on the side, and they're just
kinda watching
everything kinda, you know, play out.
So the Meccans, they all retreat from the
battlefield. Once they retreat, you see that the
the archers, they see, alright. Seems like that
was done.
And so some of them are like, what
should we do? So a group of them,
10 of them say, we should stay here
because the prophet said for us to stay.
The rest of them say, you know what?
But the battle is done. And since the
battle is done, we should leave.
And so they made the decision to leave.
Once they left, Halib and Walid saw that
as his opportunity
to lead his cavalry
from behind that hill
and now approach the the Muslims
from the defend the side of, the defensive
side. So the fact that the Muslims now
their back is basically to the battlefield. And
what that means is that this is basically
now a massacre,
meaning that the Muslims now have lost the
battle.
Now when this occurs, when this happens,
something very interesting
transpires.
And what transpires is that one, he
gets hurt in this time. This is the
time when Hamza
bin Abu Talib also he he also,
also passes away at this time. And then
you have that so many other companions
that he also loses his life. So there's
so many things that happened,
and it was this decision.
Now
the Allah gives the prophet
a very, very, very important thing an important
thing to remember. He says this in Surat
Alimmar.
This is after the whole battle is done.
Allah
says, will be my Rahmati
he says that
that it is out of the mercy of
Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala that you are lenient
to them, that the these are true that
watch their pulse.
Imagine your mom told you, for example,
when our parents tell us to take out
the chicken
and my momma's on the way home, My
mom's visiting right now, so it's real funny.
Your mom's on the way home, and she's
like, do you take out the chicken? How
does your heart feel?
It's like you you feel like, you know
what? I'd rather just go bury myself.
Like, you don't even have to do it.
I'll do it for myself.
You know, when your parents tell you to
do something, they're very clear. Or your mom
or your dad's like, go find this thing,
and you come back and you're like, I
didn't find it. They're like, if I get
up
and I find it, I'm gonna kill you.
And we have one less child.
And you go and you frantically search to
make sure that it's there, and then they
get up and they find it in the
same exact place that they told you it
was, but you could swear it wasn't there
before.
How how does your heart feel?
So you have these companions
who they're companions.
They're not strangers.
They're not disbelievers.
They're companions. We say we say,
may Allah be pleased with them.
They're companions.
They were given a direct order
by the prophet.
And though they perceived a situation
a certain way and then made the decision
to leave,
they have to answer for that decision.
And so Allah says that it's out of
my mercy, out of the mercy of Allah
that you were lenient with them. Because if
you weren't lenient with them, they would have
dispersed. Like, you would have shattered them. Like,
their hearts would have broken.
Like, sometimes
the disappointment for your from your parents
or from someone in authority that you really
admire, that you really care about, that you
really love, that you really you know, you
really look up to,
that disappointment, you'd much rather they slap you
than be disappointed in you.
And so Allah says that they would have
crumbled
if you were if you weren't lenient with
them. And then
he he says something afterwards. He says that
the what you should do is that
you should forgive
What stuck in the home and seek forgiveness
on their behalf.
Forgive them. They made a mistake.
This decision wasn't the best decision.
But was their decision something that only affected
them?
No.
It affected
so many other people.
It affected so many other people.
But Allah says
seek forgiveness for them. And then Allah
says,
and
integrate them back into society.
Bring them back into the cold circle. They
made a bad decision. They made a mistake.
So consult them on what should what should
we do next. Consult them on the matter.
Consult them on what we should do next.
They don't come back to them for shulah.
And then Allah says,
When you've made a decision, then you put
your trust in law.
Allah says, when you've made a decision, when
you've decided on something,
when you've decided on something,
then you put your trust in Allah. And
then Allah ends up his eye, he says,
that indeed Allah loves
he loves those who put their trust in
him.
And we learn a lot of things from
this particular
situation in the life of the process. We
learned what it means to make good decisions,
what it means to make bad decisions.
And the very third thing is that
sometimes we think that we're living in this
world
alone,
and this is my life, and I can
do with what whatever I want with my
life.
And if Fatima makes a bad decision, then
that's just on Fatima.
You know? Fatima's brothers, Fatima's sister, Fatima's mom,
Fatima's dad, they don't have any anything to
do with this. If I make a bad
decision, it's just about me. I have to
deal with the consequences.
That's not true.
The decisions that you make
have an effect on the people who are
around you.
The decisions that you make
have an effect on those who are around
you.
If you decide,
you know what? I wanna drive recklessly.
I'm gonna wear my seat belt.
Speed limit is 50. I'm doing 95.
No. It's not that bad.
You decide to drive recklessly.
God forbid something happens.
Yeah. You have your own problems, but who
else is dealing with the effects of what
happened?
Your mom, your dad, your siblings, your friends.
I was talking
to, one of the girl some this one
girl the other day, and we're talking about,
you know, people and, like, you know, friends,
and she wants to advise her friend about
a certain situation.
And sometimes we think that, you know what?
If I make this decision, I do this,
then it's just my decision.
And I was telling her that a lot
of times,
social media and stuff like that, like social
media and music, all these things
kinda fools you. It makes you think like
you know what I'm saying? Like,
independent,
this is an individualistic
society, whatever the case may be. And And
so it makes you feel like things like
trapping and all that stuff is, like, fun
and cool and cute. Right?
But when somebody gets shot,
who calls the parents?
Your friend.
The friend has to go and sit with
your mom and let her know that you
were doing something that you shouldn't have been
doing and you got
caught up in class fire. Now who's affected
there?
Everybody. So when you're making a decision to
do something,
don't just think about yourself at that time.
Also think about how it affect those around
you.
And the last thing is that
if you make a decision that's not so
great,
it's a bad decision
objectively,
that doesn't make you a bad person. Just
make sure you're a person that made a
very bad decision.
Because these companions, they weren't bad people. They
just made a bad decision.
And that's why Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala says,
forgive them,
seek forgiveness on their behalf,
and let them know, listen, we're still brothers.
We're still cool. Yes. This was a big
mistake,
but it's okay.
We're still cool.
We can still have conversations. We can still
talk about important things.
Because at the end of the day, we're
all human.
And so says,
when when you make a decision,
put your trust in the law. You're gonna
put are you gonna try to make a
bad decision in that case then? You're like,
oh, please help me make this bad decision.
No.
Then you're gonna start to think more objectively
and better about the decision that you're making.
So these are the things that I wanted
to share today, InshaAllah. He's
gonna come in. He's gonna share about how
do we go about making how do we
know that we made the the right decision,
or how do we go about making good
decisions?
Did you guys see the tweet where it
said that, like, when you take off your
mask after you leave the store, you act
like a surgeon who just did a 12
hour surgery.
It's, like, ripped off your face. That's what
I felt like right now.
So
this
topic is a topic that
it never ages. It never gets old. It's
something that I'm 32.
I know that there's people here in the
what's it, bro? K. In the college audience,
I'm 32 years old. This is something that
we have to think about constantly,
and this is something that
some great scholars in our tradition, they even
mentioned themselves that when they were passing away
on their deathbed,
you know, they thought about this moment or
these moments
that they regretted.
Right? Making bad choices,
it does something very interesting to you. It
kind of simmers within a person,
and that simmering, it eventually causes a person
to feel a certain kind of weight or
heaviness
that in the beginning, maybe they can ignore,
but once there's substantial amount, it's it's unignorable.
And so the first thing that Allah tells
us, and we learn this in sort of
the mulk and other chapters in Quran,
is that life is quite literally if you
wanna think about, like, what is life, this
existential question that people ask or struggle with.
The Quran answers this question for us really
clearly.
That Allah
created life and death. Why are we here?
Why are we on this earth? Why during
a pandemic, during this, during that?
This question's probably been brought to a lot
of people's minds this year with all of
the
strange happenings.
Why?
Allah answers that very clearly that you're here
for one reason,
and that is to see how you handle
things,
to test how you handle things, to test
whether or not your faith will be able
to inform your decision making.
In moments
where
you simulated in your head one way that
you would act,
but now you're there.
Right? And that's the crazy part is that
your intellect, we've become so intellectually confident
that we think that we know exactly how
we'll respond, but then when the moment occurs,
we have a completely different response. Anyone ever
had that before?
Like, you you you completely believe that you
would answer a certain way, but then you
answer a different way. And they're not always
in, like, crazy moments. Sometimes it's in, like,
you know,
for if you got into an argument with
somebody.
You know, and you heard a story about
how somebody lost their temper, and in your
head, you say, I I would never do
that.
I would never do that.
That's your that's your intellect. That's your your
mind is now
presenting this answer.
But the other part of you or there's
3 that we're gonna talk about tonight. One
of the other parts of you, your nuffs,
when the when when the moment happens,
when you're there, it takes over takes over
the steering wheel, and it makes that decision
for you.
Right?
And
and some other scholars, they said that, like,
the nafs is like a trained
animal.
That's
why all year long, we act a certain
way,
and we blame it on shaitan. And Ramadan
comes,
and the hadith says that Shaytan is locked
up, but we still make some of the
same mistakes.
We still make some of the same mistakes.
The scholar said, how do you know whether
or not
your decision
is a chaphonic
whisper?
Right? The one who whispers into the chest
of humans or whether, you know, it's like
a nepsicle thing, like something that's built inside
of you.
And they said if it's something really fleeting,
like a really fleeting idea, just kinda comes
and goes,
and you're kinda like, that was weird, and
you kinda get back to your senses quickly,
they say that's probably a whisper of Sheyvan.
But they said if it's something that you
struggle with, that you're battling, that's like it's
like a it's like a debate.
It's like the first presidential debate. It's ugly.
Right?
You against yourself.
They say that's probably from your nuffs,
and it's been trained.
It knows where things are.
Our cat recently, we changed the location of
our cat's food.
Still, I mean, we're not playing games. We
did it for a proper reason. You guys
are, like, you're torturing your animal. That's not
nice. No. No. We just moved it because
the kids kept knocking it over.
So the next morning, we put the food
there. It's all the same area, guys. It's
all in the kitchen. Okay? And cats aren't
stupid.
My cat walks over, looks at the food
bowl,
and then looks at where it used to
be, and goes and plops his, like, 32
pound body
onto the area where the food used to
be.
And I have a picture of it. I'll
put it up on Instagram tonight just for
you.
Of literally I'm not joking.
The food Safi seen it. He knows my
brother-in-law. He's been.
The the the food next to an area,
it's all within sight and the cat
plopped over.
Right? Just
like Jabba the Hutt. Just right there in
our kitchen.
You guys watch Star Wars? Okay. That was
a really good joke. You missed it. I
really fat cat Jabba the okay.
I'm just took that a little personally. So
so he's just plopped there, and he's refusing
to go eat. He's just meowing at us.
And his meow, it kills me. It's like
nails on chalkboards.
And we're looking at him. We're like, are
you serious?
Right? Are you serious? Dude, the food is
right there. Use your
use your mind. Come on.
We didn't have the kids. The kids are
going, like, cheering them on at the end
of a marathon. Come on. Go. Go. Right?
Like, handing cups of water. Like, go. Go.
And he's just looking at us like, no.
I want my food here. Why? Because the
nest is like an untrained animal.
When it's used to something, it's used to
something. And that's why the idea that
was finished on, which is like, well, I'm
just gonna do this and it's just for
me and the famous line, I can stop
when I want to.
It's not about wanting to or not wanting
to. It's about what your nest is used
to.
Right?
That's why there are some people who wake
up for FEDRA with no alarm.
How? How is that possible? You're in such
deep sleep.
Because they
have they have
they have the that's been trained with virtue.
So that way when there's an opportunity for
good, it runs towards it.
But the nafs nafs alamara bisut, the nafs
that commands us to evil, that's the one
that we struggle with. And it's ups and
downs, some days are better than others, right?
But that's the that's the crux of your
existence.
You have this canvas and you called the
naps. How are you gonna paint it?
Is it gonna be beautiful or is it
gonna be ugly?
What's it going to look like at the
end of your life? That's pretty much it.
It's crazy.
Your choices that you make the strokes that
you paint with this brush on your nafs
are the result of 3 things. Number 1,
we already mentioned
is your asthba, your intellect.
Allah he described people who make bad decisions
he says. They don't know. A lot of
them they don't realize.
Right? They don't know.
And they have no idea.
They're not they're not using their god given
blessing
of intellect to figure things out.
You guys ever made a mistake and you're
like, that was stupid. You ever done it
before?
You made a decision. You were like, that
was dumb.
Right? Like, talking back to your mom?
The minute the words have left your lips,
you're already convinced that what a moron you
are because you know there's no good that's
coming from this.
If you're right, it's even worse actually.
If you're right,
so there's a there's a point when you're
young, you're always wrong. Just accept it. Okay?
Just say yes. Say no. Okay? You're wrong.
When you get older, you're actually kinda right
sometimes.
Sometimes. When I say something, it's like 1
out of 10.
1 out of a 100, probably.
And when you're right, it's actually even worse.
My mom was so funny. Recently, we were
talking about something, and I'm pretty she's watching
right now, so I'm busted. But
I'm pretty sure I was right, and the
reason why I know I was right is
because she told me, okay. Be quiet.
You know, that's her response.
So you have the ACL. Right? The ACL
allows you to make good decisions based on
risk assessment.
Okay. I'm gonna do this. Okay. What's the
reality? What do I know about this?
What's the impact spiritually upon me for this?
What does Allah say about this? What does
the Messenger say about this? It's it's informed
by knowledge.
Okay?
The second
realm
is the jama'ah, the social
communal aspect. Who are you with?
The prophet
the person is
is upon
the way of life of their very close
friend, their very close companion.
The prophet
taught us that, you know, your friends are
either like blacksmiths or perfume sellers. Even if
you don't do what they're doing, you're gonna
be impacted by them.
The word jama'a Allah constantly
in the Quran references this plurality that you
are with other people. You're not alone.
Right? You're alone on the day of judgment
but here you get to use
it's a group effort.
Right? On the day of judgment,
Allah
says,
that on that day you're all gonna be
running away from everybody.
Right? Brothers are here together,
You roll together here now on the Day
of Judgment, you're gone. Safi and I, brothers
in law, we're gone. We don't even know
each other on that day.
Children and parents, kids are gonna be begging,
mom, please help me. I can't. I'm sorry.
It's just about me today. The only one
that will help you be who? The prophet.
Right? And that's why you love him more
than anybody because he's the one who's gonna
be there for you today nobody else will.
So the social impact,
Allah blessed us with
relationships in this life to help us on
on on on the day where you have
no relationships.
It's just
you. So pick your friends wisely.
Be a good friend and be around good
friends.
Right? You can't be a bad friend and
be around good people. You have to be
a good person and you will all automatically
your goodness
will start to attract the beauty in everybody.
But if I fall short, then whatever my
deficiency is is gonna attract deficiencies in other
people. We're magnetic
creatures. Right? We attract.
The third is the spiritual or the inner,
the nafs.
And there's 3 kinds that we mentioned. Number
1, I'm out of a suit, the one
that tells you to do something wrong. Number
2, a lawama. That's the one that is
is called the self reproaching. That's the one
that corrects you. And how many of you
have had that before? I wanna do this.
No. Don't do it. I want to, though.
No. Don't. I want to. No. Don't.
Right? It's like those nights where I have
dinner with friends and then I come home
and
there's dinner at home. And I'm like, hey,
you know, you have dinner, you have it
again, and there's dessert. And you're like,
Allah loves wither, right? We gotta keep things
odd, can't just have 2 meals.
Right? Like you know, like you're you know
that it's not a good decision, but you're
nafs. Ahmad Basu just commands you to do
the wrong thing. But nafs al lawama is
the one that along the way, kind of
every stop of the way is like, don't
do it. Don't do it.
I like to call it, like, the siren
of the heart.
Right? And the stronger one's faith, the louder
that siren. You can't sleep through it.
You can't ignore it.
But the weaker one's faith, the more dull
that siren is. You can barely hear it
until eventually there's no noise. It's just maybe
a flashing light, and then eventually it's nothing.
Eventually, it's like that that that alarm, that
change battery light on your smoke detector that
you haven't looked at in 2 years.
Right? I see a couple people laughing. You're
living in a very dangerous situation. I need
to change your batteries. Right?
Okay.
So the choices that we make are from
those three realms,
our intellect, our social, and our spiritual.
The first two are massive in their impact.
There's no doubt.
What you know, who you're around,
that can change everything. I mean, some of
us in here right now are you know,
I could say very confidently that I am
who I am because the people who all
up with my life.
Right? I'm nothing without Sheikh Abdul Nasr. I'm
nothing without my friends from college. I'm nothing
1st and foremost, my family. Right? Goes without
saying.
But my people in college who pulled me
from the depths of stupidity
and of and of ignorance and arrogance
and literally came and picked me up
from parties that I was at and took
me to the masjid literally.
Like, without exaggeration.
I can name them to you. I can
tell you the car they were driving, red
Toyota Corolla.
Right?
Having that in your life,
invaluable.
Huge impacts, but there's an even greater one,
And that is
the the organ or the thing that's inside
of you.
The prophet
said
That there is a piece,
a little morsel, like a piece inside of
each person.
And he says that if that thing is
is good, everything else will be fine.
And if it's rotten, if it's corrupt, everything
else will be corrupt. Doesn't matter how hard
you're doesn't matter how good you are with
people. Doesn't matter how smart you are. If
this piece is gone, everything else is gone.
It's
the heart.
It's very tricky, man.
It's very tricky, subhanallah, because no one can
see it.
No one can tell you. No one can
look at your external and say, okay.
Yeah. You're good. You're okay. You have some
work to do. And you? Yeah. I don't
know about you. Right? No one can do
that.
The only one who can do that is
you.
The only one who can ask yourself
or confirm
is my heart good or bad is you.
It's it's really hard to be honest with
yourself.
Right? But there is a way. Allah
gave us some some help, some tips
about how we can know by our actions
because you can't just open up your heart.
Right? You can't just look inside.
You can't just see it. There's no exam
that you take. Right? But you can look
at your trends for following stocks,
which I don't I don't do, but I
have friends who do. Right? And
you can follow the trends, and you can
kinda see, okay, this is how things are
going.
Right?
How are my prayers?
Am I praying? Am I praying? That's number
1.
Do I believe that prayer is even, like,
important?
Important enough to try?
Do I get 1?
Do I get 1, maybe 2, maybe 3,
4 or 5 insha'Allah?
How am I treating the people around me?
What's my relationship like with Quran? Do I
ever even listen to it?
That's the one problem with this room is
that everything echoes.
Like a cricket could fart in the corner
and it's like boom. It sounds like an
atomic bomb. Just like,
you know.
So that's number 1. Number 2, what's my
status with the Quran?
How's my relationship with the Quran? Do I
ever listen to it? Or am I is
is, you know, is music the only thing?
And by the way, Spotify has some pretty
amazing recitals.
I'm not joking.
I get embarrassed. People are like, where are
you listening to that recital? Where can I
find them? Like, Spotify. They're like, why do
you have Spotify account? I'm like,
don't ask if you don't wanna know. You
know, like,
do what's my level with that? What's my
level with the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam?
Do I know more
about x y z celebrity than I know
about my messenger?
These are all questions you can ask yourself,
but Allah also gave us an aya that
I wanna share with you guys tonight and
we'll conclude inshallah.
How do you know you're making good choices?
It's all about what you prioritize.
You know, one of my teachers told me
he's not really, like, an a Muslim. Like,
he's not really Islamic studies teacher. He's more
like a life teacher. He says something really
cool. He said,
what you value
is where you put your time.
And one of my professors in college, she
straight up owned me one day
when I was always late to her class.
It was, like, a weird time, like, 8:20.
It was, like, such an odd time.
And I was always late. I have a
really I'm a really sincere person in terms
of trying to make it on time. I
really want to.
I really wanna make it on time. I
promise you I want to,
but the problem is it's not my fault.
Whenever anyone says that, it's definitely gonna be
their fault. The problem is
that I
always underestimate how long it takes to get
somewhere.
So I'm, like, driving, I'm, like, it's only
take 5 minutes. 30 minutes? Why is it
even 30 minutes?
Now sometimes there's traffic, sometimes whatever, but at
the end of the day, it's just poor
planning. So I was late to this class,
this poor I was late probably.
It was a Tuesday Thursday class. I was
late probably
probably half the semester.
Okay? And I was good in the class.
It was writing, so I was fine. But
it was, like,
attendance was a huge part of the grade.
I don't know why.
That's it's pretty dumb when they make a
10th for anyways,
so at the end of the semester, what
do I do? I go up to run.
I'm like,
you know, doctor so and so, I really,
really enjoyed your class. You're so funny. You're
so funny. Right?
And I was like, I really enjoyed it.
I'm really sorry that I was late a
few times, and I tried to explain why.
She was really nice. She kinda, like, smiled
the whole time. She's like, yeah. Yeah. And
I thought I was gonna get through. I
really thought I had some. I was like,
I got this. You know when you you
know when you know you've tricked, like, a
teacher?
You're like, I got it.
And then she was, she listened the whole
thing. And at the end, she goes,
I'm sorry. I can't I I want I
I'd love to, but I can't change your
grade. Like, your attendance grade is what it
is.
And I was like, yeah. But I I
just gave you all the excuses. I just
told you that, you know, it's because of
this and because I share a car, which
is true. I share a car with my
brother and I have to drop them off
first and then do this and a ton.
And she said,
she said, mister Murphy? I said, yes. She
was, everyone has something.
If I asked everyone in class, what's your
excuse? I'm sure everyone could tell me something,
but there was only a few of you
that didn't make it on time.
And so she's like, you'll you'll make it
if you if you care about it.
And really,
man, this woman wasn't even
a Muslim, and she taught me such a
very valuable lesson about my faith.
When it comes to your salah, you'll make
it if you if you care about it.
When it comes to your faith, you'll do
it if you care if you care about
it.
So what does Allah tell us?
He uses the word
Whoever
intensely
desires,
deeply wants something.
Alright?
Sets an alarm for 6 in the morning
to order the iPhone first.
You know?
Tries to get every sneaker drop they can
even though they keep getting l's.
You know? Waiting for PS 5 preorders.
Like waiting. You know what I mean?
Whoever deeply desires
haraf al akhira to that level
you want the harvest.
Interesting word, haraf, because it's like there's so
many things that are tied into that.
You wanna harvest from the
akhira?
Allah says,
we'll give you more. We'll give you so
much you won't even realize how much you
Whoever wants from this life,
they'll get some from it.
Minha doesn't mean you won't get all of
it, right, which is kinda tricky because the
dunya, you always want all of it.
He says,
we'll give them from it.
But they will have given up their share
of the next life.
Interesting.
So number 1 is priority.
Every choice we make,
it's either for here or for there. This
dunya or the akhara. Every choice we make.
I I I know it sounds really too
simple, but that's pretty much it. Right?
What am I doing?
You know, it's either for here or for
there. If it's for there, then Allah says
you're gonna get so much you won't even
know what to do with it.
He
says, we'll provide for you in places you
never thought possible,
you never imagined.
But if you want it here, if you
want good here, you'll get it but just
don't expect anything on the other side.
Okay?
And there's a couple characteristics that Allah Ta'ala
here in this verse tells us
how to do good things because it's not
that it's simple to understand. It's hard to
do. Yes?
It's hard to make the right decision.
Number 1, Allah says his consistency.
How consistent
are you?
It's easy to do something once.
There was a narration that I read. I
forget where I read it, but he said
that a miracle you know, some people think
praying 40
hours in a row would be a miracle.
Like, oh, I'm gonna pray 40 hours of
salah.
Some of you are all like, yeah. That's
Ramadan, man. So I'll wait 40 hours. That's
not 40, my friend. It's like 2.
Alright?
40 hours. I mean, that's miraculous. Oh my
goodness. He stood up. She stood up for
40 hours and prayed, and the narration or
the statement it wasn't narration. It was a
statement of a scholar. He said,
praying on time, 5 daily prayers for 40
years
with no sunnah, no nothing,
and your prayers are a few minutes long
each. Fajr is 4 minutes. Bhavod is 5
minutes. Sir, 5 minutes. Muddab, 3, 4 minutes,
I shot 5 minutes.
He said that's more of a miracle than
praying for 40 hours in a row,
praying on time for 40 years. There was
a person who didn't miss the single
Takbir of the salah
for 40 years in the masjid,
and they said this person must be like
a
person must be a saint.
Can you imagine? People try to do so
much
for the sake of trying to be pious
or
if just praying on time for 40 years
was it.
Right? Such a simple task but so difficult
because why? Consistency.
The entire 5 daily prayers every day takes
a few minutes.
Each one takes a few minutes,
but consistency is what's tough. Number 2, Allah
Ta'ala uses the word harf,
which means to harvest something. What do you
harvest, guys?
What do you harvest?
Yeah. Crops, plants, fruits, and vegetables. And how
does that process go? Is it fast or
slow?
It's super slow. It's ridiculously slow, and there's
a long portion of it which is completely
unseen.
You know where this is going. Right?
When you do good deeds,
you have to be get used to doing
it and not being recognized for it. In
the era of filming everything we do,
in the era of showing everyone what we're
doing, in the era of sharing everything,
how much do we do that nobody knows
about?
See, we are really good with that with
our sins.
With the mistakes we make, we're like perfect.
No one knows.
But, Ahmed Al Khattab, he said something really
powerful. He said you should hide your good
deeds just with the same with the same
effort that you hide your sins.
There was a guy I met who went
to
Yale Medical School and I asked him, you
know, what do you do for for for
a living? Before I knew he was a
doctor, and he said, I work in health
care.
I I said, okay. He was yeah. I
work at a hospital. He was making it
sound like he was, like, the cafeteria guy.
I was, like, what do you do there?
He's, like, I work in health care. I'm,
like, what do you do? Do you see
patients? He's, like, yeah. I do some clinical
stuff. Are you a doctor? Yes. Why did
you say I'm a doctor, man? Like,
you just added, like because he's just so
humble. And then I was like, okay. So,
like, where do you do your training? He's
like, in America. Duh. Okay. Wait. I'm asking
where.
Somewhere in the East Coast.
Where in the East Coast? Florida?
Maine? Where?
He's like, somewhere in the northeast. I'm like,
I'm certain names. Well, I'm not joking. This
is how the conversation went.
He must've felt really awkward, but I'm just
that kind of person. I was like, where?
He's at Connecticut. I was like, do you
go to Yale? He's like, yeah. Why don't
you say Yale? It took 7 minutes, dude.
Like, because he's just so humble.
He's just so humble. Someone that Saki knows
actually that we both know. I ran into
him at a Target, and I was like,
where are you going school, man? He's out
of nowhere somewhere northeast. I found out later
it's Harvard. I'm like, who does that? What
kind of person
actively
hides the good things?
Just like we would all actively hide the
embarrassing things.
Right?
Powerful.
Because you why? Because when you have a
close friend, you just wanna keep between you
and them. So if you and Allah are
close, you wanna have some things that are
just between you 2. You don't want anyone
else to know.
Right? So that's number 2. How the farmer,
when they plant, when they when they put
the the seed or the the root into
the ground, it's unseen for so long. And
then what blossoms from that when it's down
in the dirt,
it blossoms what the crops. Takes a lot
of patience, so you gotta wait. So that's
number 3.
So number 1, to be virtuous is you
have to be consistent. Don't just do good
deed once and give up. Oh, it's not
working.
I prayed and Allah told me that he
would you know, if I prayed, he would
answer me. You know there's a hadith that
says that Allah will answer the prayer of
a person as long as they don't say,
I prayed. Where is it?
Everyone's like, dang. Seriously?
Oh, the hadith says, Allah will answer the
du'a of a person
except for the one who says I made
du'a. Where is my answer?
Because why? It was shown from that statement
that the person never really cared in the
first place, treating Allah like a waiter. I
ordered my food. Where is it?
Instead of like a friend.
Right? Someone that you trusted. Someone that you
relied upon. I trust in a lot. You
trust in a lot. Trust in his timing.
I asked him. I'm gonna wait.
So be consistent in that.
Some scholars say I prayed and made dua
for the same thing for 8, 9, 10
years
until I got it.
That's consistency. That's powerful.
Number 2,
be sincere about it. Don't show it off.
Keep it between you and Allah
because the minute people disappear your good deeds
will disappear too.
If you only pray for your parents, guess
what happens when you move out?
Guess what happens?
Prayer is gone too.
If you only do good deeds and your
friends are wrong, guess what happens if you're
alone? You're not doing those good deeds.
So you have to work on having a
portfolio of good things that are just for
you. You see how loud it is? Super
loud. It's okay.
And the third thing
is what?
Is that after that long while,
you have to have patience, and you'll eventually
harvest the beautiful
fruit that you've planted. We ask
Allah to grant us this and more, to
allow us to know that we're making good
choices, good decisions, and to give us the
ability, especially at this age, oh, Allah, I
ask you, oh, Allah,
especially at this age, the age
of being in college and university setting to
be able to have our hearts be purified
to make the right choices.
It's a very difficult
age, very difficult time to make good choices,
but the choices you make now, you'll be
very happy that you did. God help guide
us. I mean, no. But I mean, bad
of love to everybody.
Inshallah, I'll hand it over now to Safi,
and we'll do some questions if you guys
have any. Inshallah. Definitely.
So so,
if anybody has any questions,
this would be the time to roll. We're
gonna definitely
allot at least 5 to 10 minutes for
anyone who have any sort of questions generally.
Anyone?
Yeah. Really good.
Really good. And I'll I'll let all of
us kinda chime in on that, you know,
following myself. The one thing I would say
is, you know, the famous haditha actions are
by their intentions. It's probably on some hipster
Muslim T shirt company somewhere.
That was another joke.
So actions
are
right?
So the the the the one thing I'll
say is that
all of our actions
the intention is the common thing between every
action we do,
whether it's work or whether it's prayer,
whether it's sleeping or whether it's waking up
for Cedric, whether it's eating or fasting. There's
always an intention.
And I know this sounds way too easy,
but quite literally,
the answer
is
you're doing something that seems like there's really
no benefit for your afterno.
But if you think creatively and hard enough,
and honestly, it should come to you in
probably 10 seconds,
there's always a connection to the next life.
Think about the dua that you make for
eating.
What dua do you make for eating, guys?
What do I should you make? The short
ones is a yes.
But there's a little bit longer one. Do
you guys know it?
Beautiful. Right?
Oh, Allah bless for us.
And what you have given us.
I know all y'all laugh in the movies
when they're like, let's pray. Like we do
that too. Don't don't fall into the trap
of laughing and spirituality. Right? We may be
different, but we don't laugh at it. I
was just I know it's different. Right? We
don't worship Jesus, but
it's kinda cool that people pray before they
eat.
Take a minute. Realize where it came from.
There's a reason Allah uses
crops in the Quran so much.
Right?
Let Allah literally says in the Quran, let
people look at their food.
Why? Because food is an evidence that you
don't control things.
You don't control things.
It came from what? It came from the
rain which you don't control.
The rain that came down that allowed
the earth to be fertilized and allowed the
crops to grow and the animals to eat
from that grass that you could then eat
them
and the vegetables and the fruit. That's all
from Allah.
So you're eating
and you're about to go in on a
delicious meal,
and which one of us stops and makes
that dua? Takes 10 seconds. And then after
you're done,
Praise be to the one who fed us
and gave us drink
and made us Muslims.
Alright. So in the first one, you're saying,
oh, Allah, bless this meal and save us
from the fire.
And then and the last and the on
the after side, you're saying, thank you for
this meal,
and thank you for making me Muslim so
I can remember where this meal even came
from.
Eating just went from being something you do
for gains, bro,
to something you do for Allah.
It's that simple. Right?
Going to work, putting on clothes. There's literally
duas for everything.
So if a person wants to learn, okay,
how can I make my day more spiritually
active?
There are, you know, duas for that. So
how do you how how do you differentiate
between the 2? You set your intention
with those reminders and trauma. Saf, do you
wanna share?
There was a really one of the most
my one of the most
favorite narrations from the life of the prophet
is actually this narration from when he was
on his miraculous night journey.
And Jabril, I guess, gave him, like, this
tour of heaven.
And it does just like an incredible abstract
narration to begin with. Right? Just like kind
of witnessing somebody towards agenda and see Jahannam
from a distance, like, the reality of it
all. And so one time the father was
passing by and he asked him to grill,
Jahannam, what's this?
And he saw a bunch of people who
literally, when they were there it was almost
like really he had to, like, vividly imagine
this. These people were literally planting the seed,
and as soon as they planted the seed
on the ground, the seed sprout immediately
and became, like, this plant.
And immediately, the plant grew into, like, this
beautiful tree, and the tree accumulated fruits, and
the people were eating from those fruits.
And the prophet said, he asked her to
go, what is that? That's incredible. It's something
you don't even see. And you anywhere in
this world even if you wanted to. And
Jabiru Alim's son, he says, well, those are
the people
that
whatever resources they had in this life, whatever
money they made, whatever time they had, whatever
energy they expended,
they did something easily done.
And and I think that's incredibly beautiful.
That, you know, it's almost like remember your
roots. Right?
Like, remember, like, where like, remember why you
have what you have. Right? I think a
lot of times we forget
where we came from. You know, I always
remember this whenever I think of stories with
my family when we were younger. I still
will love it. I still remember
every day
when my mom and my dad moved to
the US. I remember I used to, like
imagine this. I used to be, like, on
the bus going home from school when I
was in, like, 2nd grade, and I used
to see my mom walking to Walgreens.
That was where she worked.
That's where she worked.
And after the law, after years of, like,
you know, making du'a and praying and staying
sincere to Allah,
she has
a very beautiful job that she really loves.
But one thing my my mother and I
always talked about personally from son from mother
and son, she said I will always give
back because I knew where we all came
from.
You know? And and and I think, you
know,
doing things like giving and doing things like
remembering and reflecting
is probably one of the most beautiful things
that a person can do. It's an easy
way to beautify
the the mundane needs like some of the
French dimension.
It it doesn't have to be, like, you
know, immediately worshiping. You know, Imam Suhaid actually
talks about this a lot. Idada is not
just
salah, siam,
zakah, haj.
That's not what Ibadah is always. Ibadah can
be just walking down the street and remembering
Allah for something random.
Right? So those are small, beautiful kind of
thoughts that that that I think will prove
really virtuous for us moving forward.
Interesting. Let me have next question.
It's crazy.
So,
one thing that I would like to share
is kinda going back to detect that the
reality of intention
behind,
everything.
And, also, you know, the story of Karun
comes to my mind because Karun,
you know, he is,
basically, he was a part of a ministerial.
He had a lot of money, all this
stuff. And the thing with him is that
he was very arrogant about his risk. Right?
So he was, like basically, they asked him,
like, where did you get this? And he
said, it came from my own knowledge. It
came from my own knowledge. It came from
my own doing kitchen desk and came back.
And the advice of the people who literally,
I must have got classifieds these people as
the people who they wanted the life they're
here after.
Right? These people, they strive and they work
so hard in this juncture
for the hereafter.
And so this is how they're classified with
their lesson. They give him is that they
say to him, you know what?
You can strive and and you can, you
know, take part in the dunya,
but the whole point is you don't forget
about that.
That when it becomes problematic
is when you're constantly
going out and you're like, yeah. I'm gonna
work. I wanna make this much money. I'm
doing this, doing that to set up your
beautiful world here,
but you have no intention
of, like, thinking about, okay. When I die,
what will happen?
Then you don't you're not thinking about ever
giving from there, you're not thinking about ever
giving it to charity. You're not thinking about,
you know, ever being kind to somebody. You're
not thinking about so many other things that
are far beyond just the now. And so
that's something to keep in mind that
it is a part of us being people
to live in this world.
You know? Saying like, oh, I don't wanna
any part of doing this. I'm just gonna
not make any money. It doesn't really
fly because what are you gonna do? Like,
drum off with somebody. I don't know. Like,
that's also not right. So I I was
trying to put that in nicest way possible.
That's the best way that could be done.
So it's so important to recognize that part
of that is that's why I love some
of that says,
that they spin from what we have given
them. Like, it's a part of you of
you existing in this world to go out
and pursue these things and get this. But
keep in mind the the aftermath.
Because keeping in mind the accurate, keeping in
mind that we have to stand for a
lot gives you the parameters and the boundaries
in what you're pursuing.
Any other questions?
Ladies?
No?
Alright. We'll we'll wrap up because it is
8:46.
So we do have food. Right? Yeah. Okay.
We got pizza for everybody, Inshallah. So the
way that we do food,
these go ahead and grab your phones. Oh
my god, mister Aaron.
Sorry. It's different.
So the way in which we,
we do food for the temporary space, we
don't eat inside
just because we're not, we're not there yet.
We'll figure out system in Charlotte or maybe
once it gets super cold and we have
to, we will. But for now, there's a
really nice patio outside.
And so because we should be keeping our
masks on or have giant flexi blasting in
front of us,
indoors, we're just gonna eat outside, Inshallah, so
you guys can go to the,
where's the food located?
It's right out there. It's right out there.
So you can grab it on the way
out, and you guys can feel free to
chill in the patio
area in Charlotte. Okay? But well, if you
can guys, and we'll see everyone here next
Thursday in Charlotte.