Episodes

  • Parenting skills #7

    Parenting skills #7
    Dec 11 2025
    Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful, and the Most Gracious is Allah, Lord of the worlds. And peace and blessings be upon the Prophet, the Messenger of Allah, and upon all of his family and friends. Peace and blessings be upon him. We look at the rules of Islamic parenting. I call them the six rules. We ask Allah to help us to understand the responsibility of parenting and to fulfill it. And the last and most important, Akhlaq and Mahamirat. You know, I used to live in the US. I live again there now, but I used to live in the US in 1990. 1997, 2000. So, 2000, I came back to India. My father was not well, so I came back to be with him. Then I stayed for 20 years. I went back in 2019. Anyway, so I came back, and we had a flat, which we were renovating when we came to move into that flat. So, we were renovating the flat. And as part of the renovation, we wanted to put a water tank on top of the roof. So, the plan was, The guy who came and did the plumbing work and quite extensive plumbing work was a guy with big beard like this. And he said, I'm Hafiz Paran and so on and so on. So, I was very happy. Alhamdulillah, he's a Muslim guy. I'm very happy to give him this job. And he's happy to go to Paran and so on. So, he finished all the work. And I told him, get me a 1000 liter syntax tank, plastic tank for the roof. And install it. He brought the tank. Then the building people, you know, the committee, they said, we have a rule here. You cannot put a 1000 liter tank. You have to put only 500. I said, okay. I told the guy, take this back. Get a 500 liter tank. He did that also. He brought the tank, gave it. Now, I had given him the money for the 1000 liter tank. So, the 500 liter tank, the money was some 3000 rupees. Less. He did the work. He owes me 3000 rupees. He disappeared. Obviously, 3000 rupees won't kill me. But I thought to myself that, you know, at least I owe it to him that I should give him the opportunity to return the money. Right. Maybe I'll give it to him for free. But I don't want him to be a thief. So, I called him up. Once, I called him twice. I called him three times. I felt stupid calling him 3000 rupees. I said, what the hell. I mean, I can afford that. It's nothing. But I called him. Finally, I thought to myself, okay, one last call. By then, it was Ramadan. So, when I call him now, his wife picks up the phone. She says, he is in Etta Gap. He cannot talk. Huh? So, you steal somebody's money and you go into Etta Gap. And you cannot talk. This is our akhlaq. These are our mawila. We must be... The point is, you know, people watch. A job that is given to a Muslim must be super quality. By default. By default. Because you are a Muslim. Because you are the only one in the market who works or should work for the pleasure of Allah. Who works or should work with the knowledge that everything I do, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is watching that. He knows that 24-7. I have to answer him. Because that is your akhila. That's not the akhila of anybody else. Our akhila, your my akhila is what? Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, he is watching us 24-7. And I have to answer to Allah no matter what. Rasulullah s.a.w. said, if you take away somebody's rights, Allah will not forgive you until that person forgives you. And this is irrespective of whether the person is a Muslim or not Muslim. It doesn't matter. Muslims are not allowed to be unjust to non-Muslims. You can't say, no, I am stealing only from the Christians. No. You are not supposed to steal, period. No matter who. Right? Very important. Muammar al-Assad is, this is where, may Allah forgive us, this is where we Muslims, we get into trouble all the time. Because of our dealings. We must change that. Because remember, see something. We are having this gathering here. How many non-Muslims are here? Nobody. But when you drive on the road, I mean, in Kuwait, there are not that many, but still there are quite a number. But if you go to any other country, almost everybody else is non-Muslim. But they are seeing you there. Alhamdulillah, mashallah, you look like a Muslim, right? Your appearance and all that, they can recognize you as a Muslim. They say, ah, ah, there you go. This is how Muslims drive. I know it's an unfair statement. What else do you expect them to say? Okay. What else do you expect them to say? So, this is a great opportunity for us, that we live in pluralistic societies, we live in multicultural societies, it's a brilliant opportunity for us to showcase Islam, to show that this Islam, you want someone to behave responsibility, ask a Muslim. You want someone to give more than what they take, ask a Muslim. You want someone to give you quality work, ask a Muslim. You want someone to come and help you in the middle of the night, call a Muslim. This is the message that we should give. This is the message that we should give. With ordinary people on a daily basis. We are not talking about rituals of ...
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  • Parenting skills #6

    Parenting skills #6
    Dec 10 2025
    Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful, and the All-Merciful. May the Lord of the worlds be with you. May the peace and blessings of Allah be upon you. May the peace and blessings of Allah be upon you. May the peace and blessings of Allah be upon you. May the peace and blessings of Allah be upon you. May the peace and blessings of Allah be upon you. May the peace and blessings of Allah be upon you. May the peace and blessings of Allah be upon you. We look at the rules of Islamic parenting. I call them the six rules. We ask Allah to help us to understand the responsibility of parenting and to fulfill it. We are talking about life skills and as I mentioned to you, these are some life skills. One of the most important ones, encourage volunteering. It is very, very important. It is something which I tell you as Muslims, it is something we really must make an effort. You must see the number of committees, committees and number of volunteering work that is done. As I am saying, I live in America. I give an example. One of my friends is a Rabbi. He runs an organization called the Jewish Family Services in West Springfield. They bring in refugees from other countries and they settle them in the US. Guess which religious group is their largest customers? Muslims, right? And they do it all for free. They get funding from the government, they do it for free. Anyway, so his name is James. So I asked James one day, I said, you know, he was talking about his family. So he said, we have two daughters and we have two foster sons. So I said, you are doing fostering? He said, yes. He said, my wife and I were registered as foster sons. So people, orphans and people like that, refugee children, they govern, they send them to us. They live with us as our children in our home. He says, we have two foster children and both of them are boys and both of them are, they have problems. So one has a drug problem, the other one has a stealing problem. Tertuvian. Tertuvian. Tertuvian. Now I am thinking to myself, what is wrong with this guy? Why on earth would you become a foster parent? And on top of that, you take some druggy kid or something to look after. Why? You are mad or something, you are insane? He is not insane. He is a very sensible human being. He is concerned. Then he tells me, one day, and this whole conversation started because he had a pager in his pocket. We were going for a walk. He had a pager beeped. So he looked at it and said, no, it's not my car. So I asked him, what is this? And that's how the whole conversation started. So he tells me this. He said, then one day, this kid who was, I mean, this kid means that he is about maybe 17 or 16 or 17, about under 18. So he is still a foster parent. So this kid, he said, he broke into our safe. Right? He stole some money and he stole some stuff which is in the safe. So he said, we had to call the police. We called the police. And he says, to my surprise, when the police and the first responders, they came, he said, they were all my neighbors. So then I realized that in our town, the fire service and the police service is volunteers, which is our own people who live in the town. They volunteer so many hours a week for the police force. So then they put on a police uniform. They are trained. They are certified as police officers. They put on police uniform. And then they are driving cruise, cruising cruise cars. And then doing police work. Or they are driving, they are on ambulances. Or they are on fire engines. Right? He said, that is when I decided to do that also. So this guy is a rabbi. He has his whole synagogue to run. He has Jewish family services to run. Plus now he volunteers to be on the first responders team. So he is done. He is riding on an ambulance. He got trained. He did a whole course for a year and a half. He passed this whole course and so on. He is doing this work, all of it for nothing. Volunteering. No salary. No monetary compensation. Now imagine the goodwill that gets you. That's my point. Somebody's house is burning down. Some disaster is happening. Who lands up there? This guy. Imagine the goodwill he gets. Right? So people associate help with this person. But believe me, you have to hunt high and low to find a Muslim who can go there. Almost zero. I am saying almost. So maybe there is somebody. I don't know. But at least I don't even know it. He won't volunteer. He will not volunteer. He will not get out of our comfort zones. He will not even volunteer for Muslim children. Refugee children come who are orphans and they go into foster homes with other people of other religions. Now having said that, I have never seen a kid who is a Muslim. I have never seen a case where those people have converted that Muslim kid. They are not. They make it a point. They bring them to the masjid. I get called. They say, Chef, we have Imam Beg. They say, Imam Beg. I say, we have got only four Imams. So you see, but ...
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  • Parenting skills #5

    Parenting skills #5
    Dec 9 2025
    Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful, and the All-Merciful, and the All-Merciful. May the peace and blessings of Allah be upon you, and upon your family and friends, and upon your family and friends. Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, and upon his family and friends. Peace be upon you all. We look at the rules of Islamic parenting. I call them the six rules. We ask Allah to help us to understand the responsibility of parenting and to fulfill it. So, we are talking about life skills and as I mentioned to you, these are some life skills. One of the most important ones, reading inculcates this habit every single day. I say to people, you must read at least one book. I say one book per week, but okay, so let me be… So, let me be… Kind on you. One book per month at least. Minimum. I don't care what book you read, read any book you like, but one book per month, make this an absolute rule for yourself. Then increase it, two books, three books, four books, at least one. And inculcate it in the children. My father, again, I'm sorry, I keep on coming back to my father, but this is a parenting thing, so I shouldn't be. He used to read three books at a time. I do the same thing. Three different plots. One will be a history book, one will be something else. I can run those same, those things in my head simultaneously. Have the lunch. Very good for the brain. He did that. What he would do is, he would bring the books to me. He would give me a book. And then he would come the next day. Or maybe give me a day, the third day. And he would say, oh, pade, did you read the book? I say, you just give it to me. He said, two days have passed. What did you just give? Sign in the book. So he then tells me, what do you think? So I start telling him, the author is saying, no, I'm not asking you what the author is saying. I know what the author is saying. I read the book before I give it to you. I want to know what you are saying. So don't regurgitate the stuff to me. The author said, forget the author. What are you saying? You read the book. What is your take on this? So I routinely read books. I do an analysis of the book. I write it down. I write down key points that I need to remember. And that helps me in my understanding of life and so on and so forth. And in my own writing, which I do. Right? And then, respect for law and order. Respect for duty. I don't know, some of you may have seen this thing of people saying, my 10-year-old drives a car beautifully. Why does your 10-year-old drive a car? Beautifully or otherwise? You're breaking a law. You're teaching a child to break the law. And parents do this very proudly. You're teaching a child to break the law. You know, in Islam, some of our ulama have said that if you break a law of a country which is for the benefit of all the people, you have exited Islam. You are a murtad. Even if you don't want to go that far, definitely in Islam, it is a crime. It is a very major sin. So for example, you go through a red light. Nowadays, of course, there are cameras everywhere. We fear the camera. We don't fear Allah swt seeing us. We fear the camera. Because then they'll send you a very expensive photograph. Right? Going through a red light. This is, in Islam, this is haram. Because you are, potentially, you can cause an accident. The law, you might say, where is the law in the sharia to say, red light? No, the draw doesn't have to be there. The sharia allows laws to be made for the benefit of all people. Traffic laws are such laws. And others. So teach them respect for law. And give responsibility. It's very, very important to give children responsibility. Give them daily chores. Each person has a role to do. Your job is to wash the dishes. Your job is to do this, do that. Whatever. And don't say, no, no, no, why should my child wash dishes? We have suffered. No. Teach them the, teach them dignity of labor. Once again, back to my father. Every Sunday, we used to, we had a ritual in our house. And that was, all the shoes would be brought. We brought, sit in the line. Brown shoes, black shoes and those days, you, all these sneakers and stuff, you could have. You wore canvas shoes. And the canvas shoes had to be white. So with, for white, you had that lime, which you rubbed on it. So black shoe with black polish, black polish application brush, and then black polish shining brush. Then brown polish and this. And my father used to sit there, and we all used to sit, each one with their shoes. And we would polish our own shoes. And we told you, we had servants. No. You do your own job. So you apply the polish with the brush. Brush it with that. Then you hold the shoe between your knees. And you take a polishing cloth. And you rub it like this. You would have seen the film, or those of you who are from Mumbai, you see the Mumbai railway stations. How do, I know how to do that. That whole ritual. You shine ...
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  • Parenting skills #4

    Parenting skills #4
    Dec 8 2025
    Auto-generated transcript:In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful, and the All-Merciful, and the All-Merciful. Peace and blessings of Allah be upon you, O Shafi'i al-Mursaleen, Muhammad Rasool Allah, peace and blessings of Allah be upon him, and upon all of you. Peace and blessings of Allah be upon you, too. We look at the rules of Islamic parenting, and I call them the six rules. We ask Allah to help us to understand the responsibility of parenting and to fulfill it. So, we're talking about life skills, and as I mentioned to you, these are some life skills. One of the most important ones, number three, is the daily account, the mahasibah, and the learning journal. Learning journal is an interesting… tool that I teach people, which is, what you do is, take again your notebook. You do it in this sequence. First of all, what you do is, in the notebook, you write down three goals for tomorrow. Every night, you write down three goals for tomorrow in order of priority. And the priority has to be in keeping with your life goal. You are achieving these three… You're working on these three goals to achieve the overall goal, your life goal. So, first, you have to begin with writing down the life goal, and then going from there, writing every day three goals in order of priority, which will help you to achieve your life goal. Then, you… The following day, your day unfolds or unravels, whichever way you want to get it. So, you write down your three goals. And then, at the end of the day, you sit down, you open the book, and the book are the three goals you had written for the day. Now, you analyze these three goals and say, did I achieve it, did I not achieve it, what helped me to achieve, what hindered my achievement, and what am I learning lessons from that. Therefore, what did I learn with regard to achieving the goals? So, that you write down in a… In a… In a… You look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those and look at those happen, what are my learnings? Three columns. That is called the learning journal. This is very important and I strongly recommend that you start writing this. It's not a diary. It's not like every day in the morning I woke up at 8 o'clock I had breakfast, I ate this thing for breakfast and I don't know. This is only focusing on your learning. What are my learnings? This is what I experienced. This is my reflection on my experience and this is what I take away from it. Believe me, you start writing this, you will learn a hell of a lot. Because all of us go through life, we have experience after experience after experience but we all don't benefit the same from those experiences. Some benefit more, some benefit less. That has to do with the quality of the learning. And the quality of the learning to improve it, this is the way. It's to write a learning journal. I spoke to you already about friends, so I won't repeat that. This is a very nice quote. It's not one of mine, somebody has said it, but beautiful. It says that we must all suffer from one of two things. The pain of discipline or the pain of regret. We must all suffer from one of two things. The pain of discipline or the pain of regret. And the truth of it is that excuses don't change reality. So if you did not do something which you are supposed to do or you did something which you are not supposed to do and you make an excuse, it does not change the fact that you did something wrong. Right? If I lose something, for example, one of the amazing things that we give up, the biggest asset that we have, the only non-creatable, non-replaceable asset, which is called what? Time. We give it up for nothing. We give it up for nothing and the people who take it from us are making humongous amounts of money because we are giving up our life. Right? They have access to your most private parts of your life and you can't sue them because you gave them that access. If they got that, if they had got that access without your permission, you could have actually sued them for invasion of privacy. But you cannot sue them because you are putting it out there. Who is posting on Instagram? You or Zuckerberg...
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  • Parenting skills #3

    Parenting skills #3
    Dec 7 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 kind and the kind of messengers and messengers. Muhammad and the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him and his family. Peace and blessings be upon him and his family. After that, my brothers and sisters, we talked about the overall background, the reason why parenting, conscious and thoughtful parenting is absolutely critical. Parenting is not something that will happen by default. It's not something that will happen because you want it. It is something you have to work on. And it starts with having a dream for your child, which is a shared dream. Please think about these things. This whole issue of raising children is a vast subject. Second one. Introduce, connect, and make. Connection with Rasulullah . First and foremost, the Seerah of the Nabi . Essential reading, essential learning. As I told you, do not let tomorrow morning come on you without at least starting. I don't expect you to finish the whole book. But start. Read two pages at least before you go to bed. Any Seerah book. There are so many Seerah books. Alhamdulillah. Plenty of them. Whichever language. Alhamdulillah. Allah is the most Merciful. People have translated every kind of language. Whichever language. Read about Rasulullah . Then read about his rights. What is the right of the Rasul on us? Because we will be questioned about rights. The right of the Rasul on us is that we follow a Sunnah. That we follow a Sunnah. Very important. In every aspect of our lives. In our appearance, in our actions, in our dealings, in our manners, in how we pray. The finest example, the finest proof and evidence of somebody who says give me proof that following the Sunnah is critical. I will tell you the proof is your Salah. Salah is proof. How is it proof? Because Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala said, Aqibu Salah. Allah gave a command. Establish Salah. Establish Salah. Establish Salah. Fa'an Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa Fa do it did allah tell us in the quran is there any ayat or ayat or ayat of how to pray never nothing so how do you know how to pray because rasul taught us allah inspired him and he taught us that what did he say sallu kamara he said pray as you have seen me pray and that's a beautiful hadith about how this whole thing happened i won't go into it now pray as you have seen me pray so when we are praying here when we just prayed now salatul maghrib three rakat we prayed on the tariqa we prayed on the way of muhammad sallallahu alaihi salam now instead of three rakat if i say no i want to pray for god is my salah valid no i can have the best it oh no i i mean i i love allah so much three is not enough i want to pray 300 no no no sarathul maghrib is three rakat why because rasul allah sallallahu alaihi salam taught us there is no other answer because allah commanded him he taught us sallu kamara this is the foundation of proof evidence that the sunnah of of rosh is far from the believer the word sunna is used to distinguish between what allah made further so on and so on it say is terahi terah it does not mean the sunna is not important the sunna of the rasool is different from the hakum of allah that just to differentiate but to follow the sunna is further on the muslim and the evidence is salah itself and allah has predicted this itself so this is the meaning of sunna so this is the meaning of sunna itself so this is the meaning of sunna itself so this is the meaning of sunna itself I made this for all the five Harkans. How do you enter Islam? Allah does not tell us that. How do you pray? Allah does not tell us that. Allah told us to fast in Ramadan. What breaks the fast? What must I do if the fast is broken? What does not break the fast? All of this, not in the Quran. Allah made Zakat for us. How much Zakat on what? Who must pay Zakat to whom? Can you pay Zakat to your wife? Can your wife pay Zakat to you? Where do you find all this? In the Sunnah. Hajj. He said, take the Harkan of Hajj from me. Take the Manas. Take the rituals of Hajj from me. Imagine the Quran says very clearly, So on the 9th of Dhul Hijjah, what are you doing in Arafat? Did you think of this? Allah said, Hajjila Baitillah. To the house of Allah. House of Allah is in Makkah. But on the day of Hajj, where are you? Supposing somebody says, look, this whole issue of going to Arafat and what not is too much...
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  • Parenting skills #2 – Connect to Allahﷻ

    Parenting skills #2 – Connect to Allahﷻ
    Dec 6 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 Prophet and the messengers. And peace and blessings be upon the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, and upon his family and his companions. After that, my brothers and sisters, we talked about the overall background, the reason why parenting, conscious and thoughtful parenting is absolutely critical. Parenting is not something that will happen by default, it's not something that will happen because you want it. It is something you have to work on. And it starts with having a dream for your child, which is a shared dream. So it has to be a three-way conversation, the father, the mother and the child together. So the first one, connect to Allah . The training of connecting to Allah begins with tahajjud. Make tahajjud fardh on yourself. Right? If you want to raise good children, make tahajjud fardh on yourself. Don't let a single day pass starting from tonight. That you have not prayed at least two rakats of time. No matter what, whether you are well, you are sick or whatever, you are travelling, not travelling, doesn't matter. I'm not talking fiqh, I'm talking here the hope of Allah . Make tahajjud fardh on yourself. This is what will give your children, that's the connection. I mentioned this story many times before. And I'm mentioning it now again because I see a lot of new faces. You might not have heard this story from me. My earliest memory of my father, Anandul Ali. These were the days before plastics. There were no plastics. Chairs were made of wood. Glasses were made of glass, not of plastic. And so on. So we lived in, where we lived in India. In a big house. But this was the day, this was the days before. I'm talking about the late 50s. So it's the days before hot and cold running water. There were no geysers and so forth. Water used to be heated outside. Then brought inside. But tahajjud time there is no one to heat the water and bring it. So cold water. Every day around 2.30 or something, I would hear the sound of the metal bucket in the bathroom. You had bucket of GI, galvanized iron. It had a handle. So my father would put it on the floor, would tank. Then he would drop the handle, it would blank. So that was my father getting ready to make wudu. Then he would make wudu. Then he would pray tahajjud. And we could hear him. When he was, he would pray in the other room. Where we were sleeping. The main room. But he would, we could hear his recitation. And when he finished and his duas. Yeah. To this day I live by those duas. And then he would finish that. Then he would sit and read Quran. So he would hear him reciting Quran. Then at the time of salatul fajr, when the time comes to fajr, he would come inside. Turn on the lights and say, salatul khairu minna naum. And he would pull out blankets off. You're a little kid, you hated that. But that's how we, there's no option. There's no option of not getting up for salatul fajr. Whether you are five years old or you are eight years old or you are ten years old, makes no difference. You get up for salatul fajr and you play salatul fajr by jama'at. We lived very far from masjid. So my father would do the imamat. I would call the adhan. And the children would pray. Behind that, my mother and our sisters. No option. There's no question of, oh, chota bachcha hai sora. No, no, no, no. No chota bachcha. You are going to wake up for salatul fajr and you will pray by jama'at khalas. It's not a matter open for any discussion. This is how you raise children. You want someone. You want your child to cry in the night. Cry in the night for you when you are in your grave. Raise them like this. Teach them to take from the treasure of the parna. And another, give them memories. Give your children memories. When they think about things, good things, let them think of you. Another one of these. My father again. My brother and I, you know, we travel a lot and so on. Sometimes you have some problems, some issue. So, you would phone him. And tell him, papa, this thing matters here. This thing we have to do. Some issue we need. He would say, theek hai. Mai pakad leta unku. Diyen hai tak chhoda nahi. Huh? You say, okay. I will hold on to him. I will not leave him until he gives you. Who is this? Who will you hold on? Huh? You call me. You call me. You call me. You call me. You call me. You call me. You call me. You call me. You call me. to give medicines to people. He would treat them. He would not take the fees. Then he would also give the money to buy medicines. So, I told him, how is this? What kind of? It's supposed to be a business. All your colleagues and all your contemporaries, they've got big nursing homes and they're making money and so on. And you know, alhamdulillah, his diagnosis, Allah had given him so much. I've never seen clinical diagnosis like my father's. ...
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  • Parenting skills #1

    Parenting skills #1
    Dec 5 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 kind and the kind of messengers and messengers. Muhammad and the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him and his family. Peace and blessings be upon him and his family. After that, my brothers and sisters, we talked about the overall background, the reason why parenting, conscious and thoughtful parenting is absolutely critical. Parenting is not something that will happen by default. It's not something that will happen because you want it. It is something you have to work on. And it starts with having a dream for your child, which is a shared dream. So, it has to be a three-way conversation. The father, the mother and the child together. Have the conversation with regard to what you want this child to become and why. And the child must be... the prime mover behind that. The child should want it. And you as a parent must support that. And if you feel that the child wants something which is inappropriate or which you think is not the right thing, then it is your job, with love and with understanding to guide the child to where you think the child should be. And again, be very careful and clear in this. It is not always that you have the right answers. You may not have the right answers. But you can try to find ways to help them. And so, having that level of humility to know that the child also has an understanding… And at the end of the day, the child… If you really want the child to exceed… and excel… then that will happen only if the child… is herself or himself completely committed to that goal. And that commitment cannot be forced. So, that's a very important thing to understand. Commitment cannot be forced. Commitment has to come from inside. If you want the commitment to come, then you have to spend the time and the energy behind it. Now, let me talk about what I call the six rules of Islamic parenting, because we are talking about parenting from an Islamic context. And as I mentioned before, these are important because this is something that we will be questioned about by Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala when we meet Allah. As I said before, to be a parent, to have a child is not a blessing. Allah never used the word niyamah for children. Allah used the word fitrah, which means test. So a child is a test. And if you pass the test, then it becomes a niyamah. But by itself, it's not a niyamah. If the child, if you fail in that test, then may Allah have mercy on us, the children can become the opposite of niyamah. So they can be a sadaqah jariyat, they can be a niyamah for you, or they can be the opposite of that. And that is, that depends on what we choose to do. Illa mashallah. So these are the six, what I call my rules. The first and foremost is to introduce Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to the child. The child must know who Allah is. And the child must have a relationship with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. It's not just a matter of intellectually knowing somewhere, this is Allah, this is a description, no. So what? Why is that important? How does that relate to me as a human being, as a Muslim? So knowing Allah, introducing Allah is these two things. One is, who is Allah, His glory, His majesty, His power, His authority, His generosity, what He has blessed us with and so on, and answering it when we go back to Him, inshaAllah. And what is my relationship with that? Because, only when I understand my relationship with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, then it comes to the actual action which is, therefore, what should I do? Therefore, what do I need to do? Right? It's not a, as I said before, it's not an intellectual exercise. This is a very personal relationship, which is closer and more personal than any other relationship, or the face of the earth, including our relationship with our own parents. Because all relationships of this world end with our death. The only relationship which remains is our relationship with our Creator, with our Khalif-e-Malik, with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. This remains with us even after we die. Second one is to introduce Rasulullah, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, to your child. And then you can come back to this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of this discussion of ...
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  • Kuwait Parenting Workshop #2

    Kuwait Parenting Workshop #2
    Dec 4 2025
    Auto-generated transcript:I want to remind myself and you that as far as children are concerned, the only thing that parents will be questioned about before Allah is how those children were raised, about their tarbiyah. Right? You will not be asked whether your child was a doctor or an engineer or a pilot or an architect and so on. None of which are bad things to have. All good things, I am telling you. But you will not be questioned about that. You will be questioned only about the tarbiyah of the child. What is it that the child did with respect to his beliefs? And with respect to his akhlaq, his dealings? So when you are talking about what is my dream for my child, okay, that's your dream for the child. But you are not the child. At the end of the day, he is the one who is going to or she is the one who is going to have to do what you have dreamt. So where is their commitment in that? So that is very important for you to understand. Okay? So the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the goal and the commitment for the dream comes from within the child, it's not going to happen. It will not happen. So, you have to guide the child to have a kind of dream which also aligns with your own dream. If you don't do that, and it is only your dream, it won't work. And then obviously when I say you, I mean both the mother and the father. So, it has to be a three-way conversation. Sit, three of you sit together and talk about this dream. What is it that motivates you? How will you do this? And so on. So, the dream, your dream for the child really should be the child's dream for herself or himself supported by you. It's not a question, I want my child to be this or that. You may want. You may want. Won't happen. Unless you put the effort. And unless the child also wants that to happen. So, have those conversations. I don't know if you have them yet, but you should have them. Now, parenting as I say is a contact sport. It's not a armchair dialogue. You can't sit and, you know, I want this, I want that. No, it has to be your involvement. And your involvement includes your time. It includes your talent. It includes money. But much more important than money is your time. So, how much time? How much time do you give to your child? And the usual answer we get from people is, Oh, but you see, I'm very busy. I have this job. I have to travel. You're making the choices. It is your child. You have to make the choices. And if you say, I have to do all of this. That's the choice you're making. Then don't expect magic to happen because magic won't happen. Right? Right? Andre Agassi, tennis player, who had the most powerful serve of any tennis player in history. He started, literally, his father started him playing tennis, literally, when he was the highest. He was the height of an adult tennis racket. So, how old is that? Maybe two years old. He just taught us the racket. And his father designed a ball throwing machine. In those days, they didn't have these machines. Nowadays, you can buy them. But in those days, he designed a ball throwing machine which used to throw the ball at a speed of, if I'm not mistaken, about a hundred kilometers an hour. So, like a bullet. And Andre Agassi's father had this rule that he had to, again, if I'm not mistaken with the figures, he had to face one thousand serves. This ball is being fired. He has to face that serve and hit it back one thousand times a day. So, by the time Andre Agassi was like ten or twelve years old, he had already faced a million serves, which no competition, no competitor of his ever did. So, the key is the dream of the father, starting early enough, and then consistent effort on that. Not a day was missed. There was no way, as long as I was not sick in bed, I was not sick. Whether it's Christmas, whether it is this, whether it is that, it doesn't matter. You are going to fire one thousand serves in a day. And there are many such stories about, I'm giving you examples from athletics and sports because they're easy to find. Many such examples. Great sports people don't become great sports people by wishing for it. There is a lot of energy, there is a lot of effort that goes into it. And the same rule applies. So, your commitment as a parent, how committed are ...
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