Zohra Sarwari – Raising Resilient Children

			Welcome back. How do we empower children so that they can go out and be whatever they want to be
without compromising their identities and maintain their vibrant personalities? Despite all that's
going on in the world today? We asked a status O'Hara savari. These very questions that are visit at
the being me conference was that as O'Hara is a Muslim author, business coach, entrepreneur, and an
international speaker living in Sacramento, USA. She has a bachelor's degree in psychology and
Business Administration and is currently pursuing a master's in Islamic Studies. She has also
homeschooled her four children. Let's hear what she has to say about raising resilient children.
		

			Welcome to the shows our does that. Go ahead. And thank you for having me. So, you know, you deal
with a lot of educational related issues, you homeschool, you've homeschooled your children as well.
How is the political social climate that we're living in today impacted your ability to be able to
do that? And how has it, I guess changed in some ways as well, right? Absolutely. I think seeing
what's out there, seeing the options we have, and seeing the issues we have in the school systems
has really
		

			made me take the direction of homeschooling, because not only the bullying, but the hatred,
Islamophobia, the jaw pulling and lots of issues I don't think kids need to deal with at their age
have made me give them an were their goal should be education has made me decide to homeschool and
give them a safe haven, where they're learning, they're growing, they're changing, building their
self confidence to be able to be the best humans they can be. And that was one of the biggest
reasons I decided to homeschool. Now I know someone like you, you know, you have the ability and
you're able to homeschool, but a lot of parents aren't able to do that. So I want to walk through
		

			some of the issues that you talked about the first one being how, what are some strategies that we
can give that parents can give rather for our kids to develop a strong Islamic identity, in light of
issues like Islamophobia, which is also evident. You know, we have the same issues here in Canada,
that self confidence and self esteem we can give as Muslims is the foundation of them dealing with
every problem that is going to come at them, whether that's bullying, whether that's you know, peer
pressure, alcohol, I mean anything that can come to our kids. So for me, the way I look at it is,
the more knowledge they have of the faith of Islam, the more knowledge they have, and the more they
		

			understand the lives of the messengers of Allah peace of blessings be upon them. And the Sahaba the
companions of the profits, peace and blessings upon the more they can see not only their struggles,
and what are the some of the stuff they went through, but the more they can see, wait a second, it's
upon Allah, they've been through some of this already. So I can handle this as well, inshallah.
		

			So what are some examples? So the really honestly, I'd say,
		

			one of the best examples would be, you know, when, you know, right now, I guess a lot of families
have divorced, that happened between them. And so the parents get separated. And, you know, the kids
are in two different homes. And a lot of kids feel like that is a lot of stress. And so it comes
back down to when they look at the life of the Prophet Muhammad, peace and blessings be upon him.
And they realized that his father died when he wasn't even born. His mother died when he was six
years old spine, so he had so many people raising him, you know, from his grandfather, and that his
grandfather passed away. And then his uncle raised them. So from all these things taking place, yet
		

			Marshall, the medical, he was resilient, strong, and, you know, it's just an excuse of what we're
going through. And when they can see all of this happening, that's upon Allah, they have a different
view of like, oh, it could always be worse. And that's something we always say, my house, it can
always be worse, you know, you always look at your situation, and you can, it can always be worse.
And then again, even, you know, taking verses from the Koran and saying, you know, there's verse
obviously, chapter number 14. So we have Rahim, where Elijah Adel God, the greatest says that, if
you are grateful, I'll give you more, and reminding ourselves of many of these things that we don't
		

			do. And so, you know, are we just being complaining and negative, or, you know, but again, those
identity or seeing, or you buy some, you know, job easy upon, but with him, you know, all the
illnesses, he went through losing all his money. And so when our kids see, maybe they're going
through that maybe their family just lost their family business, you know, they're in bankruptcy,
and they don't have a certain things but and they get sick, maybe their kids have cancer or
something. And they know that, look, this is how the Messenger of God present wasn't dealt with upon
it. So how can I deal with it? So these are all examples of, you know, the difficulties or, you
		

			know, Jesus piece of upon all of the issues that he dealt with, I mean, it was very difficult, or
his mother, Mary PC upon all the issues she dealt with as a single mother, you know, and not having
even been with a man. And so it's so many things that we can learn from all these stories that build
our self esteem, our confidence. So when the difficulties arrive, and they come at us, Arise, and
they come, we're not at a loss for like, oh, what should I do? I'm depressed. I don't know, where we
stand back up. This is how they dealt with this is how we need to deal with addiction. So when you
talk about building that foundation, right, so take an example of a child goes to a public school,
		

			you know, they deal with these issues. What's the way to build this foundation
		

			Is it sending them because I, you know, my husband is a teacher, and he tells me a lot about the
kids that they go to Islamic school. And so the parents think, okay, they're getting everything
there are like, you know, kids in public schools, I have friends who used to go to Sunday Islamic
school, and they don't really have that foundation. So how do you build that foundation, this is
when the parents really need to get focused and get involved in their kids life, the parents need
to, you know, take time, every day, every single day, if I can give any advice to all the parents
that you need 20 minutes a day to sit with your kids and do this, whether that's reading the stories
		

			with them, and talking it over and helping each other understand it, getting the lessons out of it,
whether it's taking them out, I mean, we need a lot more family time. Because you know, a sister
said earlier, you know, the kids are stuck on gadgets, and I'll be honest with you, my kids don't
have gadgets, they don't have phones. My oldest was 17. And she's in her third year of university,
Mashallah. She has a tablet, which she uses for her studying and stuff. But my boys both got tablets
as gifts, as you know, because one did a competition for the Quran, memorization, and he got one to
one God for something else. And I don't give it to them. And they're like, well, Mom, when do you
		

			think I'll get it? I said, when you become mature? And they said, When do you think that it will
according to American statistics, it's 41 years
		

			of spare. So they don't have we don't have a TV in the house. They don't have an Xbox. Really, it's
I want them to be outside. I want them to be playing, I want them to enjoy life. And not just
addicted to tablets and phones and, you know, computers, I mean, they do use computers for their
studying. But beyond that, it's you know, so how do you get away from that? So you have a family
situation where Mashallah, you know, you may have been able to do that, but I know a lot of young
moms as well. And parents, yeah, who it's come to a point where kids are addicted to their phones.
And I think I would say even adults sometimes, right? Yeah, how do you break away from that cycle to
		

			rebuild a strong time at night, let's say seven to 737, to 730, all of us, Daddy, Mommy all and
whoever has it, all of us, I could put it all in one room, no one's gonna look at this look, close
the door, and everyone's gonna have finally time. And we're gonna, in that 30 minutes, we're going
to read this book, and we're going to discuss it and I'm going to listen to all of your
perspectives. So one person may have one idea another may have another, another may get another and
it'll be amazing what the parents will learn from the children at that time. And it'll be amazing
where the kids will learn from the parents, cuz it'll be different perspectives and different
		

			generations. But making that time, including the parents, I always say, lead by example. So if I'm
going to tell my child to memorize the Quran shall either be memorizing it as well, if I'm going to
tell my child, it's time to pray, then I better be ready for Salah. And we better do it in
congregation. So all of this is very important as a family, we need to have that time where we
connect. And we need to lead by example. So if I'm going to tell them, no phone time, or no game
time, then why am I on it. So and I tell this to my kids all the time, like I, you know, these
things are a waste of time, when you're playing games all day, you know, I don't know all the games
		

			they have. But on my phone, there is no games, there is no games. And because I don't agree with
anyone, I'm not going to sit and waste my time play games. If I have a few minutes, it's either my
Quran or my app, gods or something important, and I teach that all the time. So what we do with our
time is valuable. And I think if we lead by that example, inshallah, then again, our kids aren't
always listening to us, but they're watching us. A lot of times we're sitting there telling them,
but we're not doing it. We need to become examples of doing it. And don't say it so much. We don't
need to tell them, just do it. And they're gonna learn from that as well. And I think you've given
		

			us some good foundations, how do we deal with issues, for example, like cyber bullying or bullying
that, you know, kids are experiencing it cyber bullying is a new area, right? How do you deal with
that? First of all, I don't think kids should be on social media the way they are, I really don't, I
don't think they're ready for they're not mentally mature, they're not physically mature, they're
not, there's a lot of garbage that goes on, I think limiting their time on that would be great. That
would be my best thing for cyber bullying, they don't need to because if they're not on it, they're
not going to get bullied, number one, get rid of that stuff as much as you can. Number two, is, you
		

			know, as far as bullying itself goes, if they have their self esteem, their confidence and their
awareness, that Subhanallah you know, they, they need to be able to have a relation with the parents
that they come and tell them I'm being bullied. And if that's the case, then obviously that they
need to address that with the school and, and a lot of times, you may need to relocate your child to
another school to a better area. If that needs to be because bullying has become a big issue,
including cyberbullying, where kids are not committing suicide by the masses. It's not a joke
anymore. I even I mean, I get messages from kids who want to commit suicide Muslim kids all the
		

			time. On Facebook, I'll get you know, people like I'm 16 I'm at the end of my rope. I have nothing
to live for. I'm going to commit suicide. And I'm like, are you like playing a prank on me? Are you
serious? Like, you know, at that moment, I don't know what to expect. And so I'm trying to connect
with these kids and I'm trying to talk to them on Skype because they're in different parts of the
world.
		

			But when I get on that phone, and they're crying to me, and they need that help and family's not
listening, then we've done something wrong, done something wrong. So I think that relationship that
parents need to build is let the kids come to you with anything. I mean, so there, that's, let's
say, I may or may not protect our kids. But let's say they're addicted to drugs, or smoking or
alcohol, or whatever, they need to be able to come to mom and dad and say, I have a problem. You
know, I have a problem, and I need help. And mom and dad need to listen, and be open minded and help
their child before their child do the worst, which is I will either commit suicide, or even go
		

			farther than where they're at, versus closing them down. We need to open those doors, let them in
and let us help them. What would you say to someone because we talked about the importance of
building a strong identity. And you said sometimes bullying is to the extreme, yes, that they should
actually move. I'm just playing I'm not saying I don't know, I'm just playing devil's advocate and
asking you, what would you say to someone who says, Yeah, well, isn't that them running away from
the situation? And Shouldn't we be leveraging a strong Islamic identity? What would you say to that?
Absolutely. If your child is strong enough, and they have the confidence and the ability, don't run
		

			away from it, let them be able to defend themselves and say it.
		

			But if they're not, and they're weak, and they're you It's hurting them more, and it's gonna affect
them more emotion, they can't handle it, then you have to change the situation. There's obviously
much more we can talk about, but I'm going to save our discussion for another segment. Thank you so
much to her. She's like,
		

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