Yasmin Mogahed – Your Journey Towards Healing and Happiness
AI: Summary ©
The speakers discuss the importance of understanding emotions and managing them in an Islamic way. They emphasize the need to focus on blessings and laughter, while acknowledging the danger of suffering and anxiety. The conversation also touches on the concept of " pest ap credits," which refers to a belief that one is always going to be strong and strong, and the importance of healing and processing in healing. The speakers also emphasize the need to manage emotions and avoid overwhelming emotions, and to strive for excellence within humanity.
AI: Summary ©
We have this mentality,
I'm strong.
I'm strong. I can handle it. That's absolutely
wrong and it sets you up for a
lot of stress,
a lot of anxiety,
and in the end you break
because you're only human.
When it comes to the question, are you
okay?
Why are there so many possible answers? Is
it really as simple as yes or no?
Well, emotions are a spectrum, and you're not
always going to be either happy or sad,
but that's life. A journey of understanding your
heart and learning this art of managing your
emotions in an Islamic way. And who better
to ask than Usdaday Yasmin Mujahid, a world
renowned international
speaker, author, and graduate of psychology
to unpack the emotions of anger, sadness, joy,
and pain. We had a heart to heart
conversation with her. So stay tuned and keep
watching. Make sure to like and subscribe to
get the latest updates of our content.
How are you?
I'm very well.
How has Sydney been so far for you?
I love it.
It's one of my favorite places. I love
visiting Australia, and,
Sydney is a beautiful place. The people are
beautiful. It's it's one of the highlights of
my year.
How do you find the community here in
Sydney?
Amazing. Honestly, I I I feel like,
there's a there's just so much life here.
So much happening in the, in the community,
is always very welcoming, very warm. I,
I, I feel like there's a lot of
you know, when people ask me, like, where
do you live?
I feel like I have a lot of
different homes in different parts of the world,
and this is one of them.
Thank you. It's it's wonderful to be here.
I I see the content, and I really
appreciate the work that you are doing as
well.
That is a compliment in and of itself.
So I think let's start at the heart
of the discussion today.
We're in the heart of Sydney. You know,
there's something really big about the heart and
its presence in our life.
But before we get too dramatic,
we wanna play a quick game with you,
and that game is called This or That.
Okay. And it's basically a bunch of rapid
fire questions.
So our first question is going to be
Mecca or Medina?
That's hard. No. You gotta you gotta answer
this super fast.
Mecca.
Mecca. What about idealist or realist?
Idealist.
Listening or talking?
Talking.
Poems or stories?
Poems. Okay. Reading or writing? Writing.
And what about extrovert or introvert?
Extrovert.
Okay. Sweet or savoury?
Savoury.
And for the final one, happiness or sadness?
Happiness.
I mean, it seems like the straightforward answer,
and I agree.
But today, we're gonna unpack that question even
deeper because
there is a bit of a perspective on
these two extremes. Right? And and life is
a perspective. It's all about perspective, how we
see the world.
And I mean, I think we would both
agree, we would all agree on this panel
that
we are here in this life aiming to
go to Jannah.
But there is a bit of an opposition
force, and that is Shaytan who seeks us
to fail in this mission.
Now one of the weapons of shaitan and
something you mentioned in your new book Healing
the Emptiness is that shaitan weaponizes
despair against the believer.
Can you tell us maybe what is despair?
So,
I'll say this. I'll begin by this, by
saying this. All the questions you asked ironically,
I'm almost literally down the middle. So, like,
you guys picked
every question you picked, I'm
like literally in the middle. So
very good, good questions. But,
when it comes to despair, and it's interesting
because you asked happiness or sadness, and I
think,
had you asked me that question 10 years
ago, I wouldn't have answered the same.
But,
there is a difference between despair and sadness,
just like there's a difference between pain and
suffering.
And what I would say about that is
that sadness is a normal part of the
human existence, and
everyone experiences some level of sadness,
if they are healthy, in fact. Because if
we don't experience any sadness ever in our
life, it would mean that we are actually
suppressing or we've numbed,
and it's actually not healthy.
So some level of sadness is normal. It's
something that prophets experienced.
We know that the prophet Muhammad sallallahu
alaihi wasallam experienced
the year of sadness. We know that Yaqub
Alaihi Wasallam who had beautiful patience
experienced sadness, where he turns to Allah in
that, with that.
I complain of my pain and my sadness
to Allah. So at some level, you know,
sadness is very normal and it actually can
be healthy,
but despair is a little different. Mhmm. Despaired
is when we no longer see,
we we no longer see any light at
the end of the tunnel, if you put
it that way.
I would I would sort of
summarize
the believer in sadness with the dua of
Ayuba, alayhi salam,
where, you know,
after going through
so many years of tests
and trials,
he turns to Allah and he says,
And if we really unpack that dua, we
we understand the difference between sadness and despair
because he was sad. Obviously, he was in
a lot of pain. You know, he had
been tested with with all, like, loss of
his wealth, his health, his family,
and, you know, even his wife was was
was on her way out, and it was
just so much. And he calls out to
Allah that
difficulty has befallen me. So he's acknowledging his
sadness at that point. But in the same
moment, he's saying,
and you are the most merciful of the
merciful. So he is not in despair.
He is sad, but he is not in
despair. Meaning, he is saying that I'm in
pain right now, but I still have hope
in your mercy.
And you are the most merciful of the
merciful. So,
the analogy I would give for that is
that you when you step outside and it's
dark, you can acknowledge the darkness, but you
can have full certainty that the sun will
rise again. And that's the difference between
despair and sadness. SubhanAllah. And to think that
the shaitan, he is trying to
you know,
causing grief to the believers.
What damage can despair have to a believing
person?
Well, the damage is really has to do
with the concept of Allah
Allah because when you fall into despair,
it's
a sort of, despairing in Allah, you know?
And that's
where that's the difference between the sadness that
the prophets experienced.
They never fell into despair no matter what
they experienced.
You know, when you when you look at
when you look at the dua that, you
know, of Ayub, alayhi salaam,
where he is in the depth of his
trial.
Like, it's the belly of the whale moment.
Right? It's so dark at that point. But
he still has hope in Allah. He says,
so he knows he's dealing with the most
merciful. So, he cannot he's how can he
despair when he knows that he's dealing with
the most merciful?
So this was This is really where it
can become very,
dangerous
is that if I despair in Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala
that I might acknowledge what I'm going through
is very, very painful and very hard and
and grief is a part of the human
experience
but that I never lose hope in Allah.
I never think that Allah has left me.
I never think that Allah hates me. You
know, that is where it becomes very dangerous.
You reflected on the duas of the prophet
the prophet
and all the other prophets who went through
difficulty, and I'm just thinking and reflecting back
on those duas. And all of them end
in calling upon Allah
with one of his beautiful names Yeah. With
the name of Mercy, with the name of
Rahma.
And I think that's so beautiful because it
it really puts into perspective
how they thought of Allah and the power
that they gave to Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala
and they kind of, I guess let things
go and that gave ease to them. But
I guess someone who's going through that process
of despair, how
how do they not necessarily get to that
level, but how do they come to a
realization that, hey, like, Allah
is there and Allah
is All Merciful. Right.
So
a few things. One is there's a principle,
that I always try to remind myself and
others is that whatever you focus on will
grow.
Okay? So, in any situation that we experience,
there will always be things that we don't
like, but there will also be things that
we like. And Allah
never only gives us hardship. Allah says,
which means that indeed with the difficulty is
ease.
So what that means is no matter what
level of test a person is experiencing,
there will also be ease
at the same time.
Allah never ever only gives difficulty. He gives
them both at the same time and the
ease is even more. Okay? So what we
have to do sometimes is shift our focus
from the difficulty to the ease that is
happening at the same time. And then, of
course, we see this even in psychological research,
the power of gratitude.
Gratitude is about shifting the focus
to the blessings.
And when you do that, that's where abundance
comes and that's where expansion comes. And and
we have this principle in our deen because
Allah says,
So, if you are thankful,
I'll increase you. This is a principle. So,
it's one of the one of the aspects
of when you especially when you're in in
that belly of the whale. Right? When the
things are really, really hard and it feels
overwhelming
is actually shifting the focus, and you know
what's very interesting? Because even the
ayah,
if you go and you look at the
context of the ayah,
of when that was said,
it was being said
to Bani Israel.
This was a people
whose children were being killed,
and they're being told about gratitude.
It seems
counterintuitive.
How are you gonna talk to me about
gratitude
and even recognizing any blessing
when I am going through so much trial.
But that's actually when it's most powerful.
So it's about shifting
the focus. And then the other thing is,
there's a lot of,
there's so much power and
and and empowerment that we can get from
studying the stories of those who came before
us. Allah tells us stories in the Quran
not to entertain us or to be bedtime
stories, but actually as inspiration for us. So
when we look at what they've been through,
what prophets have been through, what the people
who are nearest to Allah went through, and
we look at their stories. It empowers us
when we go through our own trials.
Yeah.
And it really does help to reflect on
those stories as I mean, a lot of
us, you know, have memorized these stories of
the prophets. But when it comes to our
day to day life, we think, oh, I'm
the only one going through this test.
But let's talk about trauma for a second
because I feel almost, and maybe you would
agree, that it's kind of loosely used in
this society.
What's your perspective on that?
So trauma
as a general term,
is basically a situation
where you you are put in a situation
that is beyond the capacity
of your nervous system to deal with. Yeah.
Okay?
And and so that situation might differ for
2 different people. Something that is, considered,
some one situation could be this same situation
for 2 people. But for one person,
they they do not have the capacity to
deal with it, and, therefore, it is traumatizing.
Whereas another person who does have the capacity
and let me add there
that if a person experiences a situation and
they have the support
and the tools to deal with it, it
does not become
trauma or as traumatizing as it is for
another person who doesn't have the support and
doesn't have the tools to deal with it.
So trauma is not a black and white
thing. It's not this it's not like there's
a you know it's not like this situation
is trauma
and this situation is not trauma.
It has to do with the capacity
and the tools and the support.
And this is why support is also very
important,
including social support. Yeah. That that even, you
know, they've done studies and I talk about
in my in my book, the new book
Healing the Emptiness,
studies of women
who had, cancer,
specifically breast cancer, and they looked at,
you know, stressful
stressful situations along with social support
and it actually affected whether or not that
cancer turned out to be benign.
So, it's social support is actually very important.
So, when we talk about what is trauma,
it really has to do with
what capacity
and what tools do I have
to process what is happening. And if I
don't have those tools and I don't have
that support, then it can become a trauma
for me, for for my nervous system.
And then and then once that happens, then
we need to talk about
processing and healing.
Yeah. It's so deep, SubhanAllah. And I was
actually reflecting on this, piece of Freudian psychology
Mhmm. And feel free to correct me,
but that certain behaviors that we see in
people, they often blame their trauma for it.
Mhmm. How do you feel about that? Like,
can we often use these things as an
excuse almost?
Well, it depends. You know? And I think
so many of us are products of our
trauma. Yeah.
And and sometimes things have happened to us
in our life. We don't even realize that
it was traumatizing.
One other thing that a lot of times
we don't realize is that trauma can be
something that happened to you.
Trauma can also be something that you needed
that you didn't get. Okay. So that's also
a trauma.
It can be a trauma if somebody hits
you, but it can also be a trauma
if someone starves you. So presence or absence
of Correct. Correct. So what what a lot
of people don't realize is, like, oh, I
wasn't hit as a child, so I wasn't
traumatized. Yeah. But sometimes people were traumatized in
a different way where there was the they
were starved of certain,
human needs. Mhmm. That's powerful. You know, the
need to to to feel acceptance, the need
to feel validation, the need to feel loved,
the need for connection. These are also very
essential human needs. And so if someone is
starved of those things, that's also a a
type of trauma.
So this is,
it is a very, broad word, but a
lot of times we don't recognize
how we can become a product of trauma
that we don't even necessarily,
realize as trauma. We don't we don't label
it as such. I
mean, honestly, right now, I'm probably thinking and
a lot of the viewers might be thinking,
is patience the only solution to trauma?
Good question.
So one of the themes that I discuss
in my books and in my seminars a
lot is this,
broad misunderstanding
of the concept of sob, okay, patience.
A lot of times, in a nutshell, to
summarize,
we we have 2 general misconceptions about Sabr,
and I talk about this in Healing the
Emptiness
as becoming
barriers to healing. Okay? One of the the
broad misconceptions
about the meaning of is that means to
not feel emotion,
to suppress
emotion,
to not cry, you know, have and it
and it and it means usually it's said
either to a person who is grieving Mhmm.
And it means don't cry, it means don't
grieve, it means don't feel sadness, which is
all very false because we know prophets cried.
We know prophets grieved and they felt their
sadness. Okay. So, that's not the proper
meaning of,
you know, the most obvious example is,
the example of and
this was a prophet alaihis salam. He had
beautiful patience and he also cried until he
went blind. Yes. And he turned to Allah
in his sadness and his and his grief.
So we know that that is not correct,
but this is by and large one of
the misconceptions
about sub, which is not,
it's not innocuous. It's actually a very harmful,
you
know, a very harmful myth. It becomes a
barrier for a lot of people in their
own
process of grieving
and healing.
So, you actually cannot process
your grief
properly
unless you allow it to unless you actually
feel it and you get into it. And
and if you instead suppress it, it actually
gets stuck,
you know, and it and you get stuck
in that grief. And then it and it
and then it actually turns toxic. It turns
poisonous and usually turns into rage and anger,
which is, of course, completely,
you know, opposite of of sab. So, you're
actually thinking that I'm gonna have sab by
suppressing
but in fact you are sabotaging
the any opportunity to have sub because then
you end up getting angry and that grief
turns into anger and that anger sometimes gets
directed at Allah. Why did you do this
to me? How could you do this to
me? And you and these individuals who did
not properly grieve
end up becoming angry at God,
angry at Allah. And that's the exact
opposite of sub. Yeah. So
in the misconception
about sabr,
meaning don't grieve, don't cry, we are actually
blocking the opportunity to have sabr. And that's
very profound because the prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam
said this when he lost his son,
he says, the eyes shed tears
and the heart feels grief, but the tongue
does not utter except what is pleasing to
Allah. He is defining for us, and he's
also giving us a roadmap to and it
involves grief. It involves
the eyes shedding tears
and the heart feeling sadness and grief. So
it's very profound that this is something that
we have in our culture, but it is
not Islam. This idea of meaning suppress,
shut down,
don't cry.
But the second misconception about is to be
passive about
miss,
mistreatment,
abuse, oppression,
and that is also false. Yeah. This is
also goes against our deen and and the
words of the prophet
who said, if you see something wrong, try
to change it with your hand. Yep. And
if you cannot, then try to change it
with your tongue. And if you cannot hating
it in your heart, this is the weakest
of faith. So, again, this is a toxic
misunderstanding of sub, which is, you know, turn
the other cheek. If you're being mistreated, just
swallow it.
Drink the poison, keep a smile on your
face.
Absolutely
not
what sabr is.
So, you know, I think we really need
to unlearn
as we're learning, but also unlearn a lot
of the concepts that we have that are
false,
when it comes to what is because it's
actually keeping us,
stuck in our own suffering.
Yeah. I think what I just took from
what you said was
is
involves processing emotion and communication.
Like, you're not supposed to be closing yourself
off in any scenario where you are going
through grief or you are going through difficulty,
but Sabra should be
the avenue to allow you to process that
emotion. Absolutely. Absolutely. And it's again, the process
of of of having
involves
feeling the emotion
without complaining against Allah. And this is really
what we see in prophets, peace be upon
them, all. They They experienced
sadness. They experienced grief,
but they never complained against Allah.
Even when you look at the hardest time
in the prophet
life was at at Taif. Right? And you
look and you study the dua of Taif.
This is something I I actually I looked
at this dua and I was like how
much we can learn from this dua?
And if you look at what he does
in Ta'if, and he, by the way, later
on says this was the hardest. When he
was asked by Aisha,
he's, he, he said this was the hardest
time in his life. So when you look
at what did they do at the hardest
time in their life, that's our example. Right?
And how does he call out to Allah?
He begins
by complaining
to Allah, not about Allah.
He says, yeah, like he he's complaining. He
says
and it's the same word that's used by
Yaqub alayhi salam.
Oh, yeah.
And the dua of Ta'afs, same thing. He
says,
which means I complain.
But they're not complaining about God. They're complaining
about their own inability to do it on
their own, their own incapacity, their own weakness.
And that's completely different.
So we get confused, and we think like
we think like sabr means I have to
depend on myself. Yeah. I gotta be tough.
I gotta be strong. I got this. That's
not gonna work, And that's not what Sabra
means. And that's not what prophets did. They
never ever depended on themself.
They always turned to Allah
and asked Allah for help
and recognized their own
inability to do it on their own. Like,
if anyone's gonna do it on their own,
it's gonna be prophets. Right? But look at
the dua of Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wa sallam.
He says
He says, do not leave me to myself
for the blink of an eye.
Like if anyone could be left to themselves,
it would be him. Right? But he's he's
saying, don't leave me to myself. So this
is another concept that we you know, when
someone's trying to be really really good and
really righteous and really religious, and then they're
being tested and they're like, I have to
be patient.
And I have to be patient means
I have to suppress my pain. I have
to suppress my tears, and I have to
depend on myself.
Mhmm. All wrong answers. All wrong answers. No.
You have to turn to Allah, and the
more you turn to Allah, the more he
strengthens you.
Take a moment to just think about that.
Like,
I guess
I'm thinking
dependence on Allah, but also strength in yourself.
How does that balance?
Like, how do you say, hey, I'm strong
in myself,
but then I'm also depending on a lot
of the sports. Again, like you mentioned earlier,
it seems a little bit counterintuitive.
You know what? It's very good that you
say that. You never say I'm strong in
myself.
You never say that. That's very dangerous.
You're never strong in yourself. You're only strong
by Allah.
No one is strong in themself, and if
they think they're strong in themself, they'll break.
Yeah. You're never strong in yourself. How can
you be strong in it? What's yourself? Yourself
is is nothing. It's weak
by by definition.
Allah created human beings weak. So if we
think that we're strong in ourselves, we've already
set ourselves up for failure. We never depend
on ourself and we never think the strength
comes from ourself. The strength only comes from
Allah.
What does that mean? We say these things,
but we don't realize what they mean.
Like literally means
nothing will ever change. There will be no
change in state and there will be no
power or strength
except by Allah. You know when you say
la, la is like definite. Absolute negation. Mhmm.
Means absolutely nothing. Like, you can't say, well,
there's a little strength in myself
and then some that comes from Allah. Right?
Meaning
Like you're saying again.
You know?
There is no change in state.
You repeat. It's like, you know, it's very
specific and it's an emphasis on another la
before kua.
Yeah. And there is no
strength.
Mhmm. Illah and then Illah is the exception.
Like, if you look at dramatically the statement,
it's like negation,
negation again,
and then exception.
Break down the statement. You know this statement's
so powerful. This statement, the prophet
said, is one of the treasures of Jannah.
And it's also he also says that that
this statement is a cure for 99
ailments.
The least of them is stress.
You can understand why because you're always gonna
be stressed if you depend on yourself and
you're always gonna be stressed if you think
you are the source of the strength
and the power and the change. Look at
it. It's
no change. You know, we we think think
like I'm gonna make things happen. I'm gonna
fix it. I'm the savior. Right? We have
this mentality.
I'm strong.
I'm strong. I can handle it. That's absolutely
wrong. And it it sets you up for
a lot of stress,
a lot of anxiety,
and in the end, you break because you're
only human.
Just that statement. You study it. You get
the answer. Wow.
So
profound. That that's the yeah. Who knew?
I had a follow-up question.
If
we were talking so you talked about this
statement,
I guess and not being dependent on yourself,
like, you know, not saying that I'm strong,
for example.
Is that how
I don't know if I'm wrong in the
saying this, but is that how, I guess,
an Islamic perspective on psychology differs from
secular practice of psychology? Absolutely. Yes. Actually, you
hit the nail on the head.
And that is actually one of the most,
I think problematic
parts of the whole self help,
industry is it's all about you got this.
Yeah. And that's actually
wrong.
And it puts so much stress on the
human being,
that it actually harms the human being more.
You know, I was listening to this, podcast
about the concept of whatever doesn't break you
makes you stronger. Mhmm. And there's, like, a
lot of this concept, right, put out there.
And it's in our deen, by the way.
Right? What Like like the idea that you
go through hardships and you come out stronger,
this is very, very Islamic concept. But this
podcast was talking about how this concept has
actually put so much pressure on people that
it makes them worse. Yeah. I was thinking
about that, and I was like, why does
that happen? And the answer is because they're
depending on themselves.
That's the reason. Because if I'm
traumatized,
if I have just come through,
like how can I, a person who can
barely get out of bed because of the
trauma that I've been through,
and now you're expecting me to come out
stronger,
Like, that's a lot of pressure?
Right? But you know what it is. It's
because I'm depending on me.
Like, I can't heal myself.
And if I put the pressure on myself
to heal myself and then not just
survive,
but then come out stronger To grow.
How can anyone hold that when you're already
broken
and then now someone is expecting you to
come out a superhero
and you can't even get out of bed?
That's too much pressure and I can understand
why that would end up making people worse.
But that's the key problem. The key problem
is who's healing you?
Who's making use? What's your source of strength?
Is it you? Is it you? Because if
it's you then that's not gonna work. No
way.
This is a bit of a funny tangent,
but I was thinking about the words impossible
Uh-huh. And I realized that it has I'm
possible. So everything impossible is possible Yeah. With
the help of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. Exactly.
Exactly. Yeah. You know, I will say something.
There's another du'a that I feel is so
important for us to internalize,
and that
is
So I'll just translate this because it's a
very important concept. Oh, Allah. Nothing is easy
except what you make easy.
Okay? First first concept.
That ease
and hardship doesn't come from me and it
doesn't come from the external circumstance.
It's not actually about my my
my strength, my but it's actually about Allah's
help. And it's also not to do with
the circumstance itself. This is why you'll see
people who are in unbelievable
circumstances
that we couldn't even, I mean, we're watching
it. We're watching it in Gaza, that you
can't even wrap your mind around and yet
they are given the patience to deal with
it.
And they can still say Alhamdulillah
and they can still say Allahu Akbar.
That is God given. That's not from oneself.
That can't be. You know? And I've seen
stories.
I've witnessed this in people where they go
through circumstances that we couldn't even think about
and yet they come out and they're able
to,
thrive.
At the same time or on the other
hand, you see people who break
under,
you know, something that you might not consider
is that big of a trial in comparison
to the other. And the and the reason
for that is
that actually things are never easy unless Allah
makes them easy.
And you can make what is difficult
feel easy, if you will.
That's the concept we have to have going
into life and going into our storms and
going into our hardships is that things are
not easy because I'm strong.
Things are not easy even because they're easy.
Mhmm. Things are easy if Allah makes them
easy, and it's it's all dependent on the
help of Allah.
I read that dua in the morning. Did
you? Yeah. Yeah. But it's it's a different
You you you gotta actually experience what the
dua means. And kind of you need to
think and we might make it like a
mundane routine kind of thing where you're reading
your morning adhaqat. Mhmm. You've included duas like
this one that you've just mentioned.
But to actually think about what it means
and how it actually applies to your life,
like, I don't think the count like, the
countless amount of times you've made this du'a
and Allah has made something easy for you
Yep. But you just haven't thought about it?
You just haven't, like, you haven't, you know,
reflected on it? You haven't thought about it?
You know, I'll tell you an interesting story,
a personal thing. I I met
individuals who had been imprisoned
wrongfully
for over a decade. Alright? Wrongfully imprisoned for
over a decade.
And I was so fascinated,
to find out their story. Like, how did
you survive this and how did you get
Like their mindset.
And one of the things that blew my
mind was that
the fact that they were carried through that
was only
by the will of Allah, only by the
help of Allah,
and that these people came out of this.
And one of them actually said to me
that if I had a choice, I wouldn't
even change it.
Now, to say something like that,
about a trial like that,
like 15 years,
and and and how does that happen? That's
a phenomenon. That's a that's a miracle.
And the answer is because Allah carried them
through.
That's it. That's the only thing that got
them through it. And then I also thought
this was funny, but,
he also mentioned that these these prisoners that
were wrongfully imprisoned,
and Allah gave them the ability to withstand
and the and everything.
But then when it came to,
there was this one incident, he was laughing
about it, is that there was a certain
type of cake
that this prisoner
wanted, and one time they gave him the
wrong flavor, and he was so angry. And
I was just thinking, like, subhanallah,
this is in and of itself a sign.
It's a little bit deep, but basically,
in the things that Allah carries you through,
right, like Allah's carrying you. You're not going
you're not withstanding by your own self. You
can handle like a tsunami.
But when it's yourself, like, this is an
FC thing. Like, this is an FCANY thing.
Like, I like raspberry. I don't want vanilla.
Don't get me vanilla. You better get me
my raspberry cake. And it literally is what
happened. And I was
just reflecting on that. But he said that
he said it was the end of the
world. This man who was withstanding
literally torture,
literally torture.
And they were tortured.
And, and, and this wrongful imprisonment. And he
was patient about that, but don't get his
flavor wrong on his cake. It was, I'm
so Panalized.
Yeah. He's like, give me the raspberry. Don't
don't mess with me with the vanilla.
And I just thought that was so profound.
Yeah.
I mean, there you go. When you're left
to yourself Yep. Yeah. Now this is what
we are. This is the level that we
can withstand. Mhmm. You know, like, but when
Allah carries you, you can withstand
unbelievable things. Same person.
We've talked about going through difficulty,
but what is, like, the the healing process?
Like, what should a
I know it's it's a really broad, like,
everyone has It's actually an entire book called
Healing the Emptiness.
Make sure to buy it. People
say that
time heals all.
Is that true? No.
No. It's not true. I'll tell you why
it's not true.
Imagine that,
someone gets a gunshot wound.
Right? And they say, you know what? I'm
gonna cover it up. Not gonna treat it.
I'm not gonna go to the doctor. I'm
just gonna cover it up, and time's gonna
heal it. Is time gonna heal it?
No. In fact, it's gonna get infected,
and it can actually kill you.
So
time only heals the wounds that you treat,
that you address.
If you're not addressing it, time is not
gonna heal it on its own if you
haven't addressed it. You have to address the
wound. You have to you have to heat
you have to you have to do what
is necessary
to allow the healing
over time. But if you don't and you
just cover it, which is what a lot
of us do with our emotional, psychological
wounds,
is that it doesn't you're not addressing the
actual wound and you're not giving it the
treatment that it requires.
Because after you give it the treatment that
it requires and you process it and you
you do what's necessary to clean it out,
you know, go to the doctor. And in
this case, if it's a psychological wound or
it's a trauma, this would maybe involve therapy.
Yep. It would involve the processing of it
in, you know, in whatever capacity is necessary.
And then you can say, give it time.
Yeah. Then you can say time will heal
it. But time does not heal all wounds
if the wound is not addressed and not
treated properly. Yeah.
And I I would just add that there
are a lot of people who are dealing
with old wounds,
that they were not that were not addressed
and were not, treated
as such and they're suffering because of it.
Because,
you can cover up a gunshot wound with
lots and lots of layers of Band Aids,
but the effect of that
infection will be seen all over the body.
Yeah.
You're gonna see it. You're gonna see it
as fever. You're gonna see it as inflammation.
You're gonna see it as swelling.
And similarly, when you have a psychological
or emotional wound from, for example, trauma,
again, trauma can be something that happened to
you or things that were neglected,
things that were, you were you were, you
know, you were,
not given that you needed. Right?
Then what can what will happen is that
later on in life,
you will see the symptoms of that even
if you covered it up.
You know, for example, you'll see those symptoms
sometimes in,
trust issues. Mhmm. You'll see those symptoms in
panic attacks. You'll see those symptoms as,
anxiety. You'll see those symptoms as depression.
Mhmm. That's actually the symptoms
of the old wound that wasn't addressed Yeah.
That wasn't treated.
And you wonder, like, why am I having
problems in my relationship?
That stuff's old. Yeah. But it affects you.
And and and even if you covered it
because you didn't address it and you didn't
treat it, it will affect you,
you know, later for the rest of your
life potentially until you address it and you
and you treat it.
What does healing look like in light of
the Quran and sunnah?
So one of the things that I do
in in my book in Healing the Emptiness
is I talk about healing from,
more than one perspective.
And the reason I do that is because
the human being is not only one thing.
Mhmm. So, Allah created us as spiritual beings.
He created our soul. He created our but
he also created our mind.
He also created our body and the physical
reality of our body and he also created
us as social beings and and and products
of our environment.
So, the way I break it down in
the book is I talk about the 4.
I talk about the biological
that essentially the biological needs to be healthy
for us to thrive.
Then I talk about the psychological that our
thinking needs to be healthy in order for
us to thrive. I talk about the environmental.
The environment needs to be healthy for us
to thrive. And this is one thing a
lot of people don't recognize, and especially with
the whole have subler sister
type of
narrative,
yeah, which is that a woman could be,
or a man, could be in a very
toxic environment,
even an abusive relationship, an abusive home, And
the answer that's given to her is have
sabr. Right? Go back,
keep drinking the poison.
She's her house is literally on fire,
and the and the advice that she's being
given is go back and, and stay in
that burning house, you and your children,
for the sake of your children. Mhmm. Right?
So let me repeat that. Stay in the
burning house
with your children
for the sake of your children, which makes
no sense. Right? If a house is on
fire,
well, the first thing you need to do
is try to stop the fire. Right? You
know, call the fire department, get, get a
fire extinguisher, get help maybe to, to stop
the fire. But if the fire is continuing,
how can we possibly tell someone to go
back into a burning house and then keep
their children in there? That is
That is injustice.
And that's one of the things that we're
seeing too much
is this abuse of the religion,
abuse of the concept of sabr and to
to oppress people and to harm children and
as well as as parents.
So this is really the idea that it's
like
if there is a a fire in the
house, yes, we try to first stop the
fire.
Try to intervene,
try to get the abuse to stop,
but if the abuse does not stop, we
cannot. It's gonna collapse. Cannot tell a family
to go back and live in a burning
house. You know, if the fire continues. Mhmm.
So
environment's very, very important in terms of we
can't tell someone
go back to the burning house, but just
read a lot of Quran inside of the
burning house and everything's gonna be fine.
Main fashion.
Main fashion. Main fashion. Right? It's not gonna
work out. Yeah. You you have to also
be in a healthy environment to thrive. Mhmm.
And then finally and most importantly, I talk
about the spiritual aspect. And this is the,
I would argue, the most important,
aspect of healing and the most important aspect
of well-being
overall. However, we can't discount the other aspects.
The biological,
the psychological,
you know, having healthy thinking. And this is
where therapy comes in as well. Mhmm. And
the and the the environmental
and the spiritual.
Subhanallah. We've talked so much about, you know,
healing, and I think it's time to reflect
on the positive.
You know, maybe from all the pain that
we see in society, we've actually seen that,
you know, great things have happened such as,
you know, less taboo around therapy.
You've got the increase in Islamic psychology
and I guess just better awareness of mental
health. So maybe good things do
come from from, you know, perceived bad things.
And maybe that's my question to you.
Do you think success is born from struggle?
Yes. I do. At some level. So the
I am all about analogies. It's funny. Yeah.
I I love it. So the analogy I
use, in in talking about this concept
is going to the gym. Right? So when
you go to the gym,
you're going there to become stronger. You're going
there to build your endurance.
You're going there to
build your resilience.
Okay? But that process
involves struggle.
Like you are not going to go to
the gym and sit on the couch and
eat potato chips, and then you've done your
work and you're going to come out stronger.
It doesn't work that way.
In fact, you go to the gym to
become quite uncomfortable
and to struggle
because no pain, no gain, as they say.
Right?
So the idea here is that, yes, there
is struggle involved in growth,
there is struggle involved in building resilience and
endurance,
and there is a level of pain
just like lifting and
resistance training involves some pain. In fact, you're
actually tearing your muscles
in order to build them back stronger and
bigger, right? Yep. So that is very true.
And even if you look at the physical
body, when a bone breaks,
it heals back stronger. Mhmm. That's the physical
reality.
You're where the break happened is stronger than
the rest of the bone.
This is how Allah designed
the human being.
However, however, and this is where,
we have to understand the difference between pain
and suffering.
Pain is something where, yes, we will experience
struggle in life and we will experience challenges
and that's part of healthy growth.
But what happens when you go to the
gym
and
you lift too heavy
or you're using a technique that's not safe
can actually break your back. You can actually
become paralyzed.
And so the key here is
that, yes, struggle
and pain and trials
is a natural and healthy part of life,
but Allah does not want us to suffer.
Allah is not trying to break our back.
Allah is not trying to paralyze us through
our trials.
And that's where really
the concept of healing the emptiness is about
understanding
why am I suffering
and the fact that I'm not my trials
were not meant to destroy me. My trials
were meant to strengthen me.
And so what happens when I feel that
I am being destroyed by my trials?
I am getting overwhelmed. I do feel that
I am paralyzed.
So then that's where we have to dig
deep and figure out what is it that
I need to change or what is it
that I need to heal because that wasn't
the intent.
The personal trainer at the gym Is not
trying to. Is not trying to paralyze you,
is not trying to break your back, and
Allah is high above any analogy, but he's
our trainer
and
he gives us things in the gym of
life,
right,
to strengthen us
and to build our endurance and to build
our resilience,
but not to paralyze us and not to
break our back.
And that's where we have to start to
really reflect on our own lives.
If we feel as though we are being
drowned by our trials or we feel as
though we are being overwhelmed.
Allah never puts a burden
or a responsibility
on anyone or an obligation on anyone beyond
what they can bear.
So this is where we have to really
reflect. If I feel that I cannot bear
it, it means there's something I need to
change. It means there's something either in my
bi in my biology,
in my psychology,
in my environment, or in my spirituality
that I need to change or that I
need to heal.
Is the absence of sadness
really what true happiness is?
Absolutely not.
Sometimes the absence of sadness is just numbness.
Mhmm.
And this is also one of the So
going back to the analogy of the house
on fire. Right? So the way that I
explain pain is like a smoke alarm.
So the smoke alarm's job is to wake
us up, to shake us up, to alert
us to what? A fire in the house.
Right?
But the sound of the smoke alarm is
quite obnoxious and it makes us uncomfortable. And
we would rather go back to sleep.
And so what a lot of people do,
and so the way I explain it is
our pain
is like a smoke alarm.
It's an alarm. Yeah. So depression is actually
an alarm.
Anxiety is an alarm.
Panic attacks is an alarm. Trust issues is
an alarm.
These things are actually telling us that there's
a fire somewhere in our life
and so we should figure out what it
is and address it.
But what happens is a lot of people
who likes the sound of a smoke alarm?
Right? It's not nice.
It's not comfortable.
Similarly, pain is not comfortable.
Pain, no one likes it. And so what
a lot of us do is that
we just take out the batteries from the
smoke alarm,
meaning, meaning
that I want to numb my pain.
I don't wanna feel it.
Okay. So I'm experiencing
anxiety, for example. Let me numb the anxiety.
Let me look for sedatives.
Sometimes people go to drugs for this reason.
Yeah. Right? Let me let me numb the
pain. I'm depressed. I'm anxious.
And so what people do is they go
to addictions for this reason.
People go to addictions to numb the pain,
to take out the batteries, but they're not
addressing the source of the fire.
And so the fact that someone is not
sad doesn't necessarily mean they're happy. It might
just be that they took out the batteries
and they're numb.
So what would you say is true happiness,
like, from an Islamic perspective?
Good question.
I think true happiness is
essentially, which is contentment.
In the Quran, we have this concept,
rida, rida.
So basically,
it doesn't mean that you're always going to
be thrilled. It doesn't mean that you're never
gonna experience pain. It doesn't mean that you're
never gonna experience sadness. In fact, Allah created
all these emotions for a purpose.
Even anger has a purpose. You know, even
people, I'll tell you something interesting.
They found that there is a link between
autoimmune disease and suppressing
healthy anger.
Interesting. Oh. Yeah.
Yeah. Deep, right? Yeah. Because even anger serves
a purpose.
Allah created everything with a purpose.
When we suppress it rather than listening to
the message that it's giving us, we get
sick. Yeah. We actually get sick. And so
in this case, even anger is an alarm.
It's telling you there's an injustice.
There's something that you need to work on.
There's something you need to address.
But if we just suppress it, again, take
out the batteries.
Right? But the house is still on fire.
And so when we just suppress healthy anger,
if you're being oppressed,
anger is quite naturally,
quite healthy actually.
If you see oppression, should we not be
angry about what's happening in Gaza? Yeah. You
know? But if but if if I'm just
suppressing that anger, I'm looking for a way
to,
to distract myself.
Then I'm actually
I'm not I'm not I'm not actually doing
what is intended.
You know, the anger is there to motivate
me to make a change.
But instead of making the change, I
suppress. So, in this case,
the alarm is saying, you know, address the
fire or get out of the house. Mhmm.
Okay?
But if instead I'm just taking out the
battery, so I'm suppressing the anger.
The anger was put in me to protect
me. It has it serves a purpose.
The problem is when we don't manage the
emotions and the emotions manage us. Right?
Take over.
So so again, every emotion
actually
serves a purpose and when it is when
you respond to the emotion in the right
way, then it's very healthy.
Okay? And as long as you don't allow
the emotion to take over. Yeah. Right? You
don't allow the anger to take over. You
don't allow the sadness to take over. You
don't allow
even even joy. I mean, everything has to
have,
you have to have control and and and
and you have to be able to manage
all your emotions, and that's actually
part of emotional intelligence. Yeah. That is what
emotional intelligence is. It's the ability to manage
your emotions,
not to suppress and not to allow them
to go wild. Yep. Right?
The example I give, the analogy I give
in the book is like when you're driving,
you have,
the accelerator and you have the brakes.
Okay? Mhmm. The accelerator
is the emotion.
It motivates you. Emotions are motivators. Yep. When
you feel anger, it's supposed to be a
motivator to do something,
to stop the fire or the injustice.
Right?
Now the breaks are the
which literally means,
something that ties, like
means tie it and and put your trust
in Allah. So the aqal is actually intended
to be the thing that manages the emotion
or manages the whim or or whatever the
emotional side is. But can you imagine a
person who only always presses the brakes? Yeah.
They're going nowhere. Meaning, suppression of all emotion.
Just feel nothing. Well, you don't go anywhere.
Yeah. You're right.
The car does not move. So there's no
actual forward motion.
That's not healthy. Mhmm. So this this suppression
of everything,
of all emotion,
is like a car that only uses the
brakes. Yeah. It doesn't move anywhere.
Similarly, imagine you have an accelerator with no
brakes. Yeah.
What's that gonna what's gonna happen? You just
have you just have a bunch of emotions.
Yeah. That's just out of control. And no
and no breaks and no management of the
emotion, well, you're gonna crash.
You just got forward motion with no
actual management of it, so that's also unhealthy.
Both are unhealthy.
Brakes with no accelerator, meaning
suppression of all emotion without actually allowing the
emotion to do what it's meant to do,
which is to motivate
for good but manage it with the bricks,
or you have
you just have emotion with, you know, no
no no
management, so that's also unhealthy.
I'm just reflecting on, like,
the the advice we get from the prophet
regarding the management of emotions. Mhmm. Like, you
know, we have the sunnah of what to
do when you get angry. Exactly. We have
the sunnah of how to react in a
moment of grief. Like, each of these emotions,
we have an example of how to respond
in a way that is good for us
and also accepting, like, accepting that emotion and
also showing gratitude to Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala,
but at the same time not suppressing it,
but just allowing it to process in its
natural way. Exactly.
And that's where I go back to that
beautiful statement where the prophet was
in so much
grief at the loss of his child,
but he says the eyes shed tears
and the heart feels grief.
So he is not suppressing,
He's not, you
know, just tying he's just putting it it's
not just breaks,
but he's expressing
within And then the last part, and the
tongue does not utter except what is pleasing
to Allah. That's the management of it. Yep.
Right? So it's it's that beautiful
combination of of accelerator and brakes. Mhmm. We
have the emotion put in us by Allah
for a reason, but he also gave us
the capacity
to have a, which is that which ties,
manages, controls
the emotion.
And that's what makes us different than animals.
Yeah. Animals don't have
They just have the emotion. You know? They
feel a desire. They obey it. And this
also comes back to why
the culture of
just
follow and worship your Hawa is so dangerous.
Mhmm. Yeah. This is this is also another,
this is the extreme that we're dealing with.
You know, I feel like, you know, it's
like extremes dealing, it's like extremes reacting to
extremes. Yeah. Right? We have on the one
hand a culture that we live in by
and large,
western culture in general, which tells you just
worship your hoha.
Worship your desires.
Worship your inclinations
and affiliations
and inclinations and identifications.
Right? That's your
your. Yeah. And there's no breaks. It's like
if today you feel this way, then that's
why. Today you think you're a cat, you're
a cat.
I identify
as whatever and that becomes reality. That's the
reality. Well, that's very dangerous.
That's very dangerous because we can't just let
the accelerator go without any management. Mhmm. We
have to have something managing it. You know?
So that's also obviously very, very dangerous.
But again, the other side, the other extreme
is also very unhealthy.
I think yeah. There are a few, like,
contradictions, I think, in the modern world in
terms of Yeah. I guess, how we as
Muslims look at
how to process emotions, how to Mhmm. Do
different things, how to go about our life,
and then, I guess, how the secular, the
Western world kind of Right. Just and you
got these two extremes. And I think a
lot of our,
in a lot of our cultures,
there's very much an emphasis on the suppression
of emotion.
I mean, I have seen it to the
extent of even suppressed positive emotion. I was
I was actually just, at Ramadan, and I
saw just just a small example. I saw
this little girl,
and she was, like, in a stroller, and
she was just laughing. She was so happy.
She was probably like 2 years old and
she was just laughing. And at least 3
different adults around her kept telling her to
be quiet. And And I was just thinking,
I mean, it's a small example, but why
are they telling her to be quiet?
Like, she's 2 years old and she's just
happy.
Honestly, I couldn't understand it. I couldn't understand.
That's
strange. Okay, if you wanna say, oh, she's
disruptive in the Masjid, it wasn't even in
the Masjid. It wasn't even in the Masjid.
It was outside.
And the idea, and again, this is a
small example, but I do see this,
this idea, like don't look too happy on
your wedding.
This is a cultural thing. Like don't smile
too
much. Anyways,
the idea is it's like the suppression, and
I've heard this from other cultures as well
where one girl, she told me, one sister,
she told me,
that they have a saying in their culture
where if you smile too much, it means
that you're stupid or crazy or something like
that in their language,
that even positive emotion is suppressed.
So just be a robot.
And we've absorbed a lot of
that culture
where it's like emotion is bad.
Don't have too much of it. Don't express.
Don't express because that makes you, you know,
weak.
It makes you, you know, stupid. It makes
you, you know, it makes you look like
a fool that you're actually expressing emotion.
And I think that's just it's just very
toxic
and it is not from Islam. But, yes,
we have to manage the emotion. There's obviously
the other extreme, which is whatever I feel
I do. And that's the worship
of Hawa, which is also very unhealthy. So
So I think to answer your question,
full circle here,
that true contentment and happiness is to actually
embrace
all of the parts of being human
while at the same time
trying to do your best to,
of of.
You know what's?
Is basically,
it doesn't mean to be perfect,
but it's to strive for excellence
within our humanity.
Alright? So we're gonna make mistakes,
but to get back up and repent.
It we're gonna feel emotion
to to actually not suppress,
but also manage. So I think it's really
happiness is about
embracing your humanity
and depending on Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala, not
hating yourself for being human. There's a lot
of hatred
for what makes us human. I don't wanna
be flawed.
I hate myself for being flawed. I beat
myself up when I make a mistake.
That's not
healthy because Allah made you human and Allah
made you fallible. You're gonna fall.
You're gonna make mistakes.
But to embrace the best of what it
means to be human, which is get back
up, go back to Allah, recalculate. It's like
I use the example of the GPS.
Whenever you make a wrong turn,
the GPS doesn't shame you and say, You
worthless driver. You
don't even know why you're trying to drive.
Just park up over there. Stop trying to
get to your destination. You've made about 10
wrong turns already.
The GPS never does. You can make a
1,000 wrong turns and it never judges you.
It'll always find a way back. Exactly. You
need to go. The GPS has only one
job, not to judge you. It's like non
judgment zone in there. Right? And and and
the GPS has only one job which is
to recalculate
every time you make a wrong turn.
And this is one thing I say to
parents and teachers, we need to be more
like the GPS. Mhmm. We need to stop
judging,
stop shaming,
and focus on rerouting
instead.
And that's what Islam is and that's what
Tawba is. Tawba means to return. So you
made a wrong turn. Here's how you turn
around. Here's how you make a U-turn.
Istighfar.
That's, that's it. We're not supposed to be
perfect, but we're just doing our best within
our humanity
to be the best that we can.
And that's what Hassan is. That's what Hassan
is. I guess coming back to
our rapid fire, happiness or sadness, it's it's
so deep. That's why I said all the
questions you ask, I'm like right in the
middle,
but I had to pick something.
But literally every single one, subhanAllah. SubhanAllah. Yeah.
Shows you're a balanced person. Well, I hope.
I mean, I think, well, I wasn't always.
I think I try, I've been through a
lot of different phases in my life and
I'm really I mean, obviously, we're I'm still
in that, you know, struggle. Mhmm. But I
think that
because I've gone through different extremes,
I definitely went through a long period of
sadness. You know, reclaim your heart came out
of a lot of sadness, a lot of
time of very
intense sadness, and then a lot of shame
associated with that sadness. And I think one
of the things that I try to do
for others is what was not done for
me, which was giving that healthy understanding of
you're not a bad Muslim just because you
feel sadness. It doesn't mean that you don't
have enough iman. It means you're a human
being. And that sadness is actually an alarm
telling you there's something that you need to
address.
And
so I think for me, I experienced a
lot of
shaming,
that was associated with my own sadness. You
know, a believer should never feel sad. That's
absolutely untrue. So what A believer should never
feel sad. That's absolutely untrue. So what do
we say about prophets? What do we say
about Yaqoo Balis?
What What do we say about the prophet
SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam?
You know? And I think there's that. That
is very dangerous. That shaming that goes along
with the mental health struggles and the sadness,
even just normal human sadness. You know, there's
so much shame,
and and, oh, you you know, if you
had more iman, you wouldn't feel sad. Well,
that's that that's not true. It Allah created
us human, and along with being human is
is emotion. But I think, again, and that's
why I really emphasize the difference between despair
and sadness.
And I will say that iman definitely gives
you the tools
to protect you from despair,
but not being human and feeling sadness. Mhmm.
It's completely natural. Yeah. So And healthy and
healthy, in fact.
They're not your enemy. Yeah. So emotions aren't
the enemy. Feelings are your friends. Feelings can
be your friends. Absolutely.
They serve a purpose, but you just can't
let them take over. Yep. That's what it
is. Same control. You have to be yeah.
The the the accelerator and the brakes. Accelerator
and the brakes. It's and you can't shut
one down. Yeah. Subhanallah, actually, it was reflecting
a bit too hard on the car analogy,
and I sat there and I thought,
emotion has the word motion in it. That's
true. There you go.
That's true. So inshallah, we'll leave it there.
JazakAllah Khair. Thank you so much for your
time and enlightening our responses.
And until next time, assalamu alaykum.