[SPEAKER_00]: Park, it's heavy, sometimes you keep trying to do something and it doesn't happen.
[SPEAKER_00]: So in those moments, you start losing hope.
[SPEAKER_00]: But then when you read the Quran through this lens, you see that it's nothing but hope.
[SPEAKER_00]: When you read the Ahadith of those who were lost at Allahahu alaihi wa sallam, you carefully study these anecdotes, all you find is hope.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you have two external powers that are weighing in on the heart on one side.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's shafan with his influence of weighing the human being down and sucking the hope out of them.
[SPEAKER_00]: A person that's back pain loses hope, a person with migraines loses hope, person with a struggling child, they lose hope.
[SPEAKER_00]: On the other hand, Allah Subhanahu Wa'Tanah saying, don't give up.
[SPEAKER_00]: Whatever the outcome is, it'll be in your favor, you just can't give up.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because through every challenge we have, we adopt some form of a coping mechanism.
[SPEAKER_00]: someone picks up smoking something, someone picks up drinking something.
[SPEAKER_00]: A lot of the world that's out there intoxicated is trying to cope with a messy life they're dealing with.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're trying to deal with a mess of the nefs, the mess of Shethan, the mess of their environment.
[SPEAKER_00]: For a Muslim, a lot of kind of what that invites us to cope with our pains in his remembrance.
[SPEAKER_00]: That come to me in your moments of difficulty is the annual vissovadi.
[SPEAKER_00]: Wassovadi.
[SPEAKER_00]: be patient and in the remembrance of Allah SWT is with the patient.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if you study the Qur'an, you'll find these stories of individuals that have been entered into actually the greatest al-Fayn, the Qur'an.
[SPEAKER_00]: They were mentioned by Allah, the Wajjal in a book that is eternal.
[SPEAKER_00]: that will remain till the end of time, that millions of people, billions of people across the world have and will continue to recite.
[SPEAKER_00]: And all of those ambiance on them think of these verses where they are mentioned as their unique Kodak moments.
[SPEAKER_00]: The summary of those stories, there was a person who the world piled up against.
[SPEAKER_00]: There was a person that was losing in the world of usbab and means.
[SPEAKER_00]: And when everything was supposed to come crumbling down and the world was fracturing around them, this one in Sam, some of them were beloved friends of Allah, some of them were the ambia, they who was sadam, they remained firm and committed to Allah.
[SPEAKER_00]: So then Allah subhanahu wa tada, finishes off their stories by saying, inna fiyadadeq alaiyah, the here is a sign and symbol in the story of these ambiaims sadam.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the world that we live in, the challenge is that there is no focus.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's no presence because we're constantly distracted.
[SPEAKER_00]: We think of Maracaba.
[SPEAKER_00]: And
[SPEAKER_00]: For those of you that are not familiar with this term, the word Murakaba simply means to just reflect to be in deep thought.
[SPEAKER_00]: To be in the presence, Mammu Qushedid Al-Qulanyale while defining Murakaba, he says that Murakaba is for the servant to be aware of the presence of Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
[SPEAKER_00]: to know that Allah Subhanahu Wa'Ta'ala is always with you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then Imam Qazali Rahatul al-Atiq said a little further.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he pushes it and says that there's one aspect of Muraq about that is related to the illi.
[SPEAKER_00]: Illi meaning that the person knows, as Muslims we read the Qur'an, we know that Allah Subhanahu Wa'Ta'ala is a routine.
[SPEAKER_00]: Allah Subhanahu Wa'Tara is watching over us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Raqqaba means to be vigilant to observe, to watch here for me.
[SPEAKER_00]: So Allah Subhanahu Wa'Tara is a reprieve over the servant he's watching over us.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we have the knowledge and know that Allah Subhanahu Wa'Tara is watching, he's hearing, he sees, Allah Subhanahu Wa'Tara knows everything about the human being.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then beyond that, there is a second state that he calls like a hal, a hal is when that knowledge transfers from the intellectual realm of the human being to now the heart, where you start feeling a state that overcomes you, you feel closeness to Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala, while you're doing dikka, or when you're praying your Salah, because you feel that closeness to Allah.
[SPEAKER_00]: You feel that presence of Allah.
[SPEAKER_00]: One of my teachers, he actually said this in class once.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was a small little point, but for some reason, it's stuck.
[SPEAKER_00]: Shea Huzavanklaia, they mentioned that if a person really understood the Aya and Ahaditha was sort of lost on a lot of some of the tell us about the closeness of Allah, they would even feel shame of extending their legs when they read the Quran.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, this amount of legal ruling, let me be very clear here.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was just advice, a teacher gave to students, and we were there in the classroom, and that our advice was directed to us, students who have been studying for many years, and but that image stuck, because I related to it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Growing up, we were, you know, raising the house up was very cultured.
[SPEAKER_00]: So when you sat with your parents, there was a way you sat.
[SPEAKER_00]: When you came to the living room, wearing shorts was unimaginable.
[SPEAKER_00]: I remember I tried it once.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, mid to early 90s, you know, the Orlando was doing really good.
[SPEAKER_00]: Penny Hardaway was killing it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I was like, you know, I had the jersey, had the shorts, came down.
[SPEAKER_00]: My dad looked at me, he said to my mom, my mom, is this kid lost his mind?
[SPEAKER_00]: Him just like that I walked into the room, did a U-turn I walked back up.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was a culture of environments.
[SPEAKER_00]: I related to this, that when you sat in front of your parents, there was a way you spoke.
[SPEAKER_00]: So why didn't that apply to the insan when interacting with Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala?
[SPEAKER_00]: And this is where Junaid Baghdad, Rahim Allah Hata'ala, when defining the word Hayat, he said something fascinating.
[SPEAKER_00]: O'royatul ala, wa royatul taksim.
[SPEAKER_00]: Fayata, Wanda Dubeino, Huma, Sifat, and Yusana al Hayat.
[SPEAKER_00]: He defines Hayah by saying, Guru Yatul ala, for a person to be observant very carefully of all of the boundaries and favors of Allah.
[SPEAKER_00]: On one side, you're thinking of everything that Allah has given you.
[SPEAKER_00]: What are you to talk seek?
[SPEAKER_00]: On the other hand, you're also equally aware of how deficient you have been in reciprocating the favor of Allah.
[SPEAKER_00]: A lot of the time Allah has been giving, giving, giving.
[SPEAKER_00]: And here I am, I haven't done anything to show that appreciation to Allah.
[SPEAKER_00]: But Allah wills you to talk to see.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, when a person continues to do these two things and keep thinking of the fairies of Allah and their deficiency, Fayat al-Wallad al-Bayna al-Masifah, between these two is born a state.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that state is called halah.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is what modesty is.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is what modesty means with your Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because Ali Muhammad Allah wa Ta'ala said, that Hayah is for a person to never be present in a place where Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala prohibited them from being.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like a parent that says their child never go to this pantry, for example, where you can't go to the basement alone, or you can't go to that corner of the backyard because whatever safety reason, and they see their child there.
[SPEAKER_00]: They see their child sitting at a friend's house that they were told clearly never to visit.
[SPEAKER_00]: So in that moment there is guilt, a person feels shame that man, how did I get caught here?
[SPEAKER_00]: Murataba is that it's taking these, these Osof, these traits, these characteristics that are taught to us to wrap up Oran and Sunnah and coming to the reality that Allah Az'a'ajana is watching over me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Therefore, when the al-Aman discussed this concept of Murataba, the most commonly cited verse is al-Miyah al-Miyah al-Miyah al-Miyah al-Miyah al-Miyah al-Miyah al-Miyah al-Miyah al-Miyah
[SPEAKER_00]: and does he not know that Allah SWT serves him, Allah SWT sees him.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now we should dedicate time every day, ideally before we go to sleep, where we just take account of the full day.
[SPEAKER_00]: We take account of ourselves.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not to feel overwhelmed or to doubt ourselves with, you know, a Catholic guilt.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it's rather to feel the presence of Allah and hold your relationship
[SPEAKER_00]: that where has my reader favorite me and where did I appreciate that favorite of a Muslim Hanuman dog?
[SPEAKER_00]: For some reason, the moments before a person sleeps are quite blessed.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yep.
[SPEAKER_00]: Most people have these images built into their mind from childhood of the final moments before their day ended.
[SPEAKER_00]: something about your relax, your days over, and your mother reads a lot to you before you go to sleep.
[SPEAKER_00]: When you grow up, you always remember that.
[SPEAKER_00]: You might not remember the morning, do all you remember the night one.
[SPEAKER_00]: When a mother or father sits with their child and reads a hoodie through them before putting them to sleep, there's just something about that moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: that when they grow up, they remember that, that when we would go to sleep, our mother and father would read a few ayat, they would read a few ayat, they would read a few ayat.
[SPEAKER_00]: So as they're closing out the day, spend a little time reflecting on your own life.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you can be more productive the next day in building a relationship with Allah.
[SPEAKER_00]: being a more loyal servant to Allah.
[SPEAKER_00]: We all want it, we all desire it, I'm telling you, there was one brother who once clearly said to me, he said, if I could give a million dollars right now to attain the love of Allah, I would give all of my wealth.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's the only thing I really desire.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everything else is a means to that, because once you cut through the story and jumped to the last line of every individual's life, it's mother could vote and you're lying there surrounded by people who could do nothing for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's time to transition to the grave.
[SPEAKER_00]: And there are hard questions there that await.
[SPEAKER_00]: And there is a really serious outcome that awaits the other side.
[SPEAKER_00]: But how could we have moments of reflection before we steep when our minds are scattered?
[SPEAKER_00]: We're all in line, this strolling away, doom strolling hours and hours and hours, just spent like this, and none of that is consequential.
[SPEAKER_00]: None of that has any real meaning in our life at all, but we're addicted, just like this.
[SPEAKER_00]: And somewhere in that scrolling, we get caught in love for the worldly material possessions.
[SPEAKER_00]: Somewhere in that doom scrolling, we become envious of other people.
[SPEAKER_00]: Somewhere in that scrolling, we feel be little, and we start comparing ourselves to other human beings.
[SPEAKER_00]: And somewhere in that scrolling, there's a little bit of kufra and mockery of the theme.
[SPEAKER_00]: And somewhere in that scrolling, there's glorification of disobedience to Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala.
[SPEAKER_00]: What happens to a heart in mind?
[SPEAKER_00]: That spends hours every day doing that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Even if you were a fort, those walls would come down.
[SPEAKER_00]: Even if you are a fort, even if you believe in yourself, I'm telling you those walls will come down.
[SPEAKER_00]: it messes with you.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you're wondering where all this anxiety and depression comes from, if you're wondering where all these scattered thoughts come from, if you're wondering why do we struggle so much with attention?
[SPEAKER_00]: I understand that the people struggle with focus, but in our world, we're in a place where, you know, people can't even focus for one such that.
[SPEAKER_00]: A set of those duration is maybe five seconds.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a five seconds, a ten second moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: And those said to us that we're just to be just meant to be between us and Allah have now also been taken away.
[SPEAKER_00]: When you close your eyes and you're sleeping, it's that very same doom strolling that appears again.
[SPEAKER_00]: These are hard barriers of raffla, heedlessness, forgetfulness, distractions from Allah.
[SPEAKER_00]: In order for us to be in a better state with Allah, we need to be in a better state in our heart and in our minds.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the first step to all of this is silent singing and noise.
[SPEAKER_00]: We need to turn the volume down.
[SPEAKER_00]: We need to turn the volume down from,
[SPEAKER_00]: all the music, and all the rage bait.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm just gonna, you guys understand the music that I'm talking about, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: All those reels and videos and movies and YouTube videos.
[SPEAKER_00]: They all have this loud sensational, you know, instigation that's happening.
[SPEAKER_00]: You need to turn it down.
[SPEAKER_00]: deal with, and then I was talking about the rage beat, right, put it away, get rid of all that brain rot.
[SPEAKER_00]: These things are not good for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Generation Alpha is destroyed.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're in very bad trouble.
[SPEAKER_00]: They don't realize it.
[SPEAKER_00]: We don't realize it.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're letting our kids do this thinking that it's innocent.
[SPEAKER_00]: None of the stuff is innocent.
[SPEAKER_00]: Wait 20 years and let me know what weights on the other side, what's on the other side.
[SPEAKER_00]: We saw what happened with narcissism.
[SPEAKER_00]: When social media first came out on an Instagram, first started and TikTok started putting out filters, people thought it was innocent.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now we're stuck with the generation of people that are not content with the way they look.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because they realize that one swap, one swipe left or right, they can have an image that's more desirable and we're pleasing to them.
[SPEAKER_00]: These things all have consequences.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because human beings rarely do things that actually genuinely benefit other human beings, most of it has to do with economics.
[SPEAKER_00]: What brings in the most value?
[SPEAKER_00]: Where do people profit the most?
[SPEAKER_00]: We are in need of acting upon that Haditha, but through the last set of long-awaiting, instead of where you go into retreat.
[SPEAKER_00]: You go to your goats and you find a peak somewhere.
[SPEAKER_00]: And at least for now, I'm not referencing this literally, but I surely made it from a place where we cut back on these things.
[SPEAKER_00]: Before you go to sleep, have some discipline.
[SPEAKER_00]: Put your phone away.
[SPEAKER_00]: My life's not gonna decrease, and if you can't put it away, then at least admit to yourself that there's an addiction here.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because if you can't accept its addiction, if you think that it's just, you know, casual play, it's something I do control, then you're being fooled.
[SPEAKER_00]: We have to accept there's addiction here.
[SPEAKER_00]: There was on one side, a company, a multi-billion trillion dollar company whose goal was to give me addicted so they can show me ads and they can make money.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they were victorious.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's no harm in that.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's no shame in that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just accept it, though.
[SPEAKER_00]: They cleared the hired multiple PhDs who were masters in addiction psychology and they were victorious how was I going to stand a chance?
[SPEAKER_00]: How was my six-year-old child ever going to succeed?
[SPEAKER_00]: They weren't going to succeed.
[SPEAKER_00]: The algorithm is a masterpiece.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's wild, it's crazy.
[SPEAKER_00]: Collectively I don't know if we could actually beat the algorithm and I don't mean this as a defeatist.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just want to be real for a moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: So in moments like this, man, when something's that dangerous, just put it away.
[SPEAKER_00]: just put it on the side, and come back to what actually matters, the vicar of a lost prime amount of data.
[SPEAKER_00]: It'll take time, slowly it'll wash that gunk and junk and dirt up, try to find meaning in your soul up again, connect with the lost prime of a data.
[SPEAKER_00]: Throughout your soul, Allah Azza wa Jalla gave you a statement a chant, a call, a shiaar, a symbol
[SPEAKER_00]: centralizes you again with every movement, Allah Allah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Such a powerful statement.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you just anchor in your Allah Allah, I quote from now on your Salah will be changed.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just anchor yourself there.
[SPEAKER_00]: Allah Allah is a reset to the human being.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not just
[SPEAKER_00]: Her remembrance of Allah, not only a ritual, not only a source of reward from Allah, Subhanahu wa Ta'adam, Allah wa Akbar is a mindset, it's a lifestyle, it's a claim of love.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's an open-ended statement, Allah wa Akbar, for those of you that are familiar with the Arabic language, means Allah is greater than it.
[SPEAKER_00]: anyone that speaks English or Arabic, but no, that's an incomplete statement.
[SPEAKER_00]: Akhabar is simply how saying, alt one, who's saying this taller than you would say taller than who?
[SPEAKER_00]: What?
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's open-ended because it could be anything.
[SPEAKER_00]: Allah, Akhabar, Man, Koolishing, Allah is greater than your algorithm, Allah is greater than your social media, Allah is greater than 24-hour news cycle.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like knowing what's happening in the world is important.
[SPEAKER_00]: This 24-hour news cycle is affordable for the human psyche.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not good for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: We weren't made for this.
[SPEAKER_00]: Allah, Akbar, Minkun, Mishim.
[SPEAKER_00]: Allah, Az'a'a'uj'el is greater than effort, think.
[SPEAKER_00]: Imam Ghazali Ghatulahi Ali, I'll conclude in two or three weeks in Shala'a.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is what you have time to check.
[SPEAKER_00]: Imam Ghazali Ghatulahi Ali, in his chapter of Salah in the Ahiyah, and with the saying, he says the reason why people struggle with focus is because there are distractions and distractions are of two types.
[SPEAKER_00]: They are the external ones, which we spend a lot of time talking about.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then there are the internal ones of thoughts that are buried in your mind and your heart that pop up even when you do commit to remembering Allah.
[SPEAKER_00]: So when you're doing your faith, you have there's a thought that pops in.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then when you're in the court, there's another thought that arrives.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says the reason is that somewhere deep in your heart subconsciously possibly also.
[SPEAKER_00]: Your heart has prioritized this thing in a touch, joy, and pleasure to it that is superior to what you're experiencing at that moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because if you believed, truly, that this moment, what I'm doing is the most valuable thing nothing else would make its way there.
[SPEAKER_00]: You wouldn't allow it, and if it did, you would get rid of it immediately.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like a person who's playing soccer.
[SPEAKER_00]: If they were in the World Cup penalty shoot out in the final, do you think they'd be thinking about, I don't know, the keys they lost last week?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes or no?
[SPEAKER_00]: No, I'm not thinking about that.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're locked in because they know in that moment at this time right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: You guys saw that the Argentine final?
[SPEAKER_00]: Argentine versus France.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, no, we'll cut people here.
[SPEAKER_00]: No.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Martinez, that was a goalkeeper's name, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: So the final, there was a penalty shoot out.
[SPEAKER_00]: Martinez, he got him to the penalty takers heads.
[SPEAKER_00]: They banned it after that because his antics were too heavy.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he saved a penalty by sticking his leg out.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he used the part of his calf.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's just above the ankle.
[SPEAKER_00]: He uses butter kick it to save it and he saved the penalty in it that led to the team Argentina winning the welcome and Messy being turned into chef Messy which is big.
[SPEAKER_00]: What do they call it?
[SPEAKER_00]: Abish the foot of fish for him.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the reason why I share that is because Martinez then went on to He he put he he had a tattoo there.
[SPEAKER_00]: He had a tattoo right there where he saved the ball.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he said through you, something like, along the lines, you can read the exact translation.
[SPEAKER_00]: He said, is it right here, history was made, right here.
[SPEAKER_00]: Honor came through here.
[SPEAKER_00]: A nation was honored through this, but a tattoo there.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because for him, he was chewed in that moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: That was everything.
[SPEAKER_00]: And for a Muslim, this is everything.
[SPEAKER_00]: Standing in front of Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ara, think of it as a blessing to us where Allah'sa wa Ta'ara is pulling us out of a noisy market and giving us those noise canceling headphones and saying, man, rest up a little bit.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just a little bit.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is not the how you need this body.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you stay out there all day, you're gonna get exhausted.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're running a lot, you need a little break.
[SPEAKER_00]: Slow this mind down.
[SPEAKER_00]: The world won't come to an end.
[SPEAKER_00]: Give five minutes to your creator.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you keep doing that every day and you stay focused in your thoughts, in your mind, prioritizing, viewing it as self-care, alongside obedience to Allah Subhanahu Wa'Tada, great things will come.
[SPEAKER_00]: Allah Subhanahu Wa'Tada allows us to use our Salah as the means of Muhammad.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, Allah is able to allow us to dedicate time every day to that remembrance of our Creator, and He protect us in our children and our progeny from the difficulties of the world.
[SPEAKER_00]: We'll set Allah on us in Muhammad.
[SPEAKER_00]: Peace and blessings be upon you.