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Fajr Reminders - Mahmood Habib Masjid and Islamic Center

Fajr Reminders - Mahmood Habib Masjid and Islamic Center

By: Fajr Reminders - Mahmood Habib Masjid and Islamic Center
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 We came to give, not to take. Islam Spirituality
Episodes
  • Live a life of purpose

    Live a life of purpose
    Dec 28 2025
    Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. All praise is due to Allah, Lord of the worlds, and peace and blessings be upon the honour of the prophets and messengers, and praise be to the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, and upon his family and companions, and peace and blessings be upon them. My brothers and sisters, the most important thing, we are talking about happiness, and we were talking about what I mentioned in the last khatira, the issue of happiness and how do you become happy, what makes you happy. So it's not just a question of saying be happy, be happy doing what. Now, it's very important to understand this because, as I mentioned yesterday, people can be happy in some very negative ways, and therefore happiness is not a reliable meter to judge whether one's life is going on track or not. Now, therefore, what is the right track? How do you measure happiness? And what should you do? Well, I believe... that the correct and the most reliable way of trying to be happy is to live a life of purpose, not just randomly live. To live is not merely to breathe. To live is not merely to draw breath. To live is to achieve something worthwhile, to create a legacy, to do something and create some results which carry on after you, to spread goodness wherever you might be. That to me is the true description of happiness. So live a life of purpose. If you... One of the most valuable and useful things to do is to read biographies. It doesn't matter whose biography you read, but read biographies. The best biography to read, of course, is that of Rasulullah ﷺ, because Allah ﷻ presented His Nabi ﷺ as the best of examples for all people and of all time. The best example for you is the life of my Nabi ﷺ. The best example for you is the life of my Nabi ﷺ, and this is for the person who believes in Allah ﷻ, who believes in the Last Day, Day of Judgement, and looks forward to the meeting with Allah ﷻ. So any person of Iman, the best biography to read must be available for you, and must be available for you, absolutely required reading is the biography of Rasulullah to study the seerah Mubarak of the Rasul because Allah put this forward as the best thing to do so that's the first thing second thing is as I said read any biography right anyone because no matter whose biography you read whether you read the biography of a good person or a bad person he teaches you something and the reason I'm saying biographies is because to the extent possible they are as true as any story might be and though biography is like all histories are colored by the people who write them and no matter how objective a author might say he is or she is or no matter how for how objective they think they are there will be some bias and some leaning towards whatever the author considers to be worthwhile but leave that aside that doesn't matter now that is perfectly okay majority of what you're going to read will be fact will be something which actually occurred which happened I love reading biographies and one of the authors I strongly recommend is a man by the name of John Mann he's written a biography of Sultan Salahuddin by Yubi Rahatul Ali it's called Saladin and he's written another one of Genghis Khan if you read both it's called Genghis if you read these you it's a good way to read these as well as a comparison between two of the most powerful leaders the world has ever seen and who had an amazing impact, but two extremely different people, two totally different people. And it is a good thing to read this and to then reflect and say, well, what is it that makes them different? Quite apart from asking yourself the question and saying, well, who do I want to be like? But even if you don't go there, say, what is it that makes them different? So read biographies. Now, when you do that, you will realize that anyone in this world who has had an impact, irrespective of the kind of impact, anyone who had an impact was able to do that only because they wanted to do that. They were clear in their minds. They had a purpose. They were living with a purpose. They were living for a purpose, to achieve something. And they were able to achieve it to whatever extent. But they were able to achieve it. And the reason they were able to achieve it is because they were clear in their minds as to what they wanted to do. So I remind myself and you, let us learn to live a life of purpose. Live consciously. Live deliberately. Live thoughtfully. Exercise your mind and exercise your thought. Exercise your choices. All of us, no matter who we are, no matter where we find ourselves placed in the story of life, we have choices. I want to give you a measure of comparison. We have choices. But we must convert those choices into options. The way I differentiate that is that if you walk into a store, say you walk into TJ Maxx, what are the choices you have? The choices you have are everything that ...
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  • What makes you happy

    What makes you happy
    Dec 28 2025
    Auto-generated transcript:My brothers and sisters, there is a general feeling, a false feeling, that there is a false feeling in the world that somehow as long as you are happy, all is right with your world. As long as you are happy. So people say, as long as we are happy. People say about their children, for example, that, you know, what are they doing? How are they? Oh, no, no, no. As long as they are happy, it's fine. You know, whatever they are doing. Now, this is, I say this is a fallacy because if you think about it, there are people in the world who are happy doing things which are in themselves ranging from a waste of time to something which, things which are actually evil. The finest example of that is social media. Today, one of the biggest, if not the biggest calamity, the biggest pandemic, the biggest epidemic that is completely, you know, destroying generations, not even one generation. is social media addiction, screen addiction. Imagine we are living in a world where we have managed to turn it upside down. For example, things that we should keep private, things that we kept private, we meaning as human beings, we kept private for centuries, for millennia, generation after generation. Things which we guarded jealously, things which we did not reveal to anyone, many times even to people we should have revealed them to. We didn't share them with anyone except with our very closest, nearest and dearest. People we completely trusted. All that information today, we voluntarily, without being forced to, and without seeking or getting a single cent in compensation, we put it out there for the entire world and his wife to see. On Instagram, on Facebook, on Snapchat and God knows what. Our most private information, starting from something as mundane and apparently, harmless as what you eat, pictures of your food, pictures of your plates, to things which are potentially dangerous, which we should never ever reveal. Everything is out there. And we know very well that those who we are giving this to voluntarily, whether it's these companies who, run these social media, who own the social media, or whether it is people who use information they get from social media, to do other things with it. We know that many of these things, many of these kinds of people, take our information and use it for their purposes. The most benign result of that is that they make humongous amounts of money, while we get nothing. They make a lot of money, while we get nothing. They make humongous amounts of money using our material, our life stories, and we get nothing in return. That's the most benign form of it. Two, some very malevolent and evil things that happen with information that is freely given on the internet. Now, we are happy doing it. And the people who are using this information for their own nefarious, reasons are happy using it. Right? This is the most benign thing and the most common thing. And we get our children addicted to it from, literally from the time they open their eyes. And we have all kinds of excuses, and all kinds of reasons why we do it. Oh, it keeps the child occupied. Otherwise, the child is a nuisance. Otherwise, the child makes a lot of noise. If I didn't do this, what would I do? A simple question is, what did your mother do? What did your grandmother do? Before the social media, they came into the picture. Right? Children were still there. Right? They were still having babies. How did they keep them occupied? Think about this. You know, I remember, and I don't have to go back always into my childhood. I'm saying it right now. If you go into the villages, for example, in India, you will see this anywhere. You have a little kid. All he has is a shoebox, or the equivalent of a shoebox. Something like a shoebox. And he has, he has, he has, he has, he has, he has, some bottle caps, small or big bottle caps. And he has a string. Now this child, first of all, he accesses all of these materials. And then he creates a wheeled vehicle. So he makes axles, he fixes those bottle caps as wheels to that box that he has, the shoe box or its equivalent. He ties the string and then he puts something in it and he drags it around and he calls it his car, he calls it his bus, he calls it his train, he calls it whatever he wants to call it. And in the whole process he is learning to be dexterous, he is learning to use his intelligence, his reasoning powers, he is learning to create something. That thing which he creates is successful part of the time, sometimes it fails. And each time it is successful or fails, he is learning some other lesson. And he is having a hell of a lot of fun. He is having great fun doing all this. And most of the time he is doing this outside. He is getting some sunlight, he is getting some vitamin D, he is breathing fresh air hopefully depending on which place he is living in. All of this is happening. Even in America, I remember seeing exactly this happening in an Amish village in ...
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  • FR… Three aspects of health

    FR… Three aspects of health
    Dec 27 2025
    https://youtu.be/HoSt3sN4jDM Auto-generated transcript:Alhamdulillah Rabbil Alameen. Wa Salatu Wa Salamu Alai Sharafi Al-Anbiya Wa Al-Mursaleen. Muhammadur Rasulullah Sallallahu Alaihi Wa Alaihi Wa Sallam. Tasleeman Kaseeran Kaseera. Famaa Baadu. I'm in KBR Park, where I come every day to walk five miles. And this is a young peacock. He's just molted his tail. He's waiting to get his full feathers. Beautiful bird, as you can see. I want to remind myself and you that the reason I do this walk is because I'm concerned about my physical health. And when I'm concerned, it's not because I'm worried or something, but because... It is important to be concerned about your physical health. And as you grow older, you don't grow stronger. You... It's the opposite. You grow weaker. And if you don't take care of yourself, then the price to pay is very painful and severe. So I do my best to take care of myself. The best way to do that, hands down, is to walk... five miles a day. And that is what I try to do. Now, the point I want to make here, as far as Khatera is concerned, as far as Fathir Bantar is concerned, is that just as we are concerned about our physical health, which we should be, we should also be concerned about two other things. One is our mental health. And the third is our spiritual health. These two are equally, if not more important than physical health alone. Mental and spiritual health. So the question I want to ask myself and ask you to ask yourself is, what is our plan for that? For better mental health? And better spiritual health? So just as walking five miles a day is a great exercise and the best exercise for physical health, then reading one book a month is the best exercise for mental health. It doesn't matter which book you read. It doesn't matter whether you enjoy... book or you don't enjoy the book. It doesn't even matter whether you understand it or not. As a matter of fact, ironically, a book that you don't understand, a concept you don't understand, but which you struggle to understand. So, say, for example, if you are not a, or if your knowledge of mathematics is like mine, then reading a book on mathematics I would consider it to be, for example, a refined method of torture. But that is better for me, for my mental health, than reading something, you know, a children's, a book of stories for children or comics or something. Because the struggle, the mental struggle that you have to undergo to understand something you don't understand is what generates brain cells. It is what creates new neurons. So, even though it's painful, or rather maybe because it's painful, because the same thing applies for physical health. Any exercise we do, whether it's in a gym or whether it's this walking and so on, the first sensation is pain. Without exception, the first sensation is pain. And it's only when you go through that pain barrier, when you can break through the pain barrier, that you reach a stage where you get what I call a state of grace, where now you enjoy the exercise. Not that you enjoy the pain, because the pain goes away. Then there's no pain. Then you're just enjoying it for the sake of enjoying it, and it's wonderful. But to get to that state of grace, you have to go through a state of grace. You have to go through the barrier of pain. There's no other way to do that. Similarly, as far as spiritual health is concerned, once again the same thing, which is, we have to go through the barrier of pain. And the barrier of pain happens primarily because we don't understand the value of spiritual health. In the words of the philosopher Jiddu Krishnamoorthy, he said, it's not a sign of health to be profoundly adjusted to a sick society. It's not a sign of health to be profoundly adjusted to a sick society. And one thing for sure, we today, globally speaking, are a very sick society. We are not just sick, we are very, very sick. And the pressure on us, always from everywhere, is to get adjusted to that sick society. So, this is the problem. This is something that we have to come to terms with and say, that I will not adjust to the sick society. And the fact that I am not adjusted is not a bad thing. It is a sign that my heart is still alive. It is a sign that my spiritual health is still worth salvaging. It is a sign that I have not yet been corrupted to the point where I just accept whatever is happening in society. And may Allah forgive us, you know, maybe I fall into the group of people who not just accept it, but who contribute to it. They make the society sicker. Take, for example, the issue of ostentatious spending or luxuries. It's not just a matter of saying, I have the money so I can spend it. No. The question is, if you have the money, what are the choices that you are making? People like to blame God, blame Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for the misery that we find ourselves surrounded with in this world. And we ask this question and we say, if there is a God, why is this happening? If...
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