Bearer of Musk

Bismillah AlRahman AlRahim

I was sent the video below from  DiscoverU Coach Megan Wyatt and it was a great reminder that there are those in life who limit their goals and what they can achieve based upon their circumstances growing up and spend the rest of their lives saying “Poor me…it’s not fair.”   And there are those who make a different decision, and despite whatever hardship they are going through, “pour the challenge into themselves” as extra fuel to get to greater heights.

There are also those like now imprisoned/former NFL quarterback Michael Vick with all the right ingredients in their life to be “successful” but they end up destroying their lives.

Both situations, two people but two very different lives…what does it come down to? The ability to make better decisions.

If you happen to live in Southern California, I want to share with you an exciting upcoming event. Coach Megan Wyatt has put together awesome material for a live workshop called

5 Essentials for Sharp Decision Making:
How to Make Decisions You Can’t Regret.

Click here for more information.

Bismillah AlRahman AlRahim

I’m going to talk today about one of the most feared subjects on planet Earth: “I made a mistake…”

As people we attach so much pain to making mistakes that we will do whatever we can to avoid making them.

As kids we all learned how to ride a bike or how to walk, and we accepted that we had to fall down and get back up again, fall down and get back up again until we mastered it. Yet as adults we seem to have lost that resilience to do the same thing with our ambitions and instead design our goals within the comfort circle of our fears.

What we tend to do is punish people that make mistakes and here are just a few scenarios to how we are conditioned as a society to attaching pain to mistakes…

How many of you know someone who had a Quran teacher when they were younger that hit them when they made mistakes in recitation? How many of you know someone very personally who went through that? One of my challenges that I had overcome this summer with my Quran memorization goals was that I realized I was still controlled by that fear of a **WHAM** on my hands as soon as I made a mistake in recitation.

What about in sports? Any of you play tennis? One of the things I realized about my tennis game is that I will be playing a match and will be getting ahead in the set and then slowly but surely my opponent starts catching up to me, and goes out to beat me. So on the onset, I was telling myself that I was being overconfident and relaxed at the end…but was it really? Deep down it’s under-confidence knowing at some point that my opponent could come back strong and beat me, so the fear of making mistakes that would lead to failure…

Mistakes are a necessary process of success

What it comes down to is mistakes is how we learn and embracing that as a necessary process for success. If we can’t accept that for ourselves yet, why deny others from learning opportunities by either giving them space to grow or offering them words of wisdom gently?  And truly the best guidance is that of our Prophet Muhammad sala Allahu alayhi wa sallam…

Al-Bukhari and others narrated that Abu Hurayrah said that a Bedouin stood up and urinated in the masjid so the people grabbed him and the Prophet said: “Leave him alone and clean his urine by pouring a bucket of water over it, for you have been sent to make things easy, not to make things difficult.”

To the point that this Bedouin man was so happy with the manners of our Prophet sala Allahu alayhi wa sallam and not so happy with the companionshe made a du’a where he said, “O Allah! Give mercy to me and to Muhammad, but don’t give anyone else with us.” The Prophet said to him, “You have already tightened what should be wide open.

I’m going to share with you a little secret about making mistakes…ready?

Every single time I have made a mistake I have felt terrible. I’ve never made a mistake that I have felt good about it immediately. How many have gone home and beat themselves up? That’s a natural human trait, but after you are done beating yourself up, just pause and I mean really pause…and ask, “What’s really great in all of this? What is a valuable gem that I can learn from this?”

I know…I know it may feel like there is nothing great, and your mistake is making you feel like trash, but if there was something what could you see? And that is where you will find that wisdom that will help you make a better decision the next time around.

The Prophet Muhammad sal Allahu alayhi wa sallam said, “The believer is not stung from the same hole twice.”

Making mistakes is how we learn and those who are afraid of making mistakes learn the least. Don’t deny that you made the mistake and in the process deny yourself the learning opportunity to grow.

One of my largest challenges in my own personal growth was accepting that I had to embrace my mistakes as part of the process to get to where I want to be. Sure you might be thinking, this is common sense knowledge. But let me ask you a question, do you have any beliefs about yourself in regards to feeling like you are a failure in an area of your life or in one area of your life no matter what you have tried to do, still can’t make it?

One of my biggest personal gems that I learned was that I can’t expect to see outstanding results in my life if I repeat the same steps over and over. Basic logic, eh? I took action and decided to work closely with a Coach who can help me consistently refine my action plan until I see the results I want to see insha Allah.

And this exactly is what we are prescribed to do as Muslims, to strive in your life with ihsan and what are the fruits of that? Allahs swt says, “Is there any reward for excellence other than excellence?” [Surah AlRahman, 60]

A Personal Challenge to You

For those of you out there curious about the types of mini changes that can make the difference in your life and are ready to challenge yourself, click here to setup a 30 minute session where we brainstorm and explore together what you can start doing in your life to get you closer to achieving your goals in sha Allah.

The Prophet (peace be upon him) said: “The strong man is not the one who can throw another down. The strong man is the one who can keep hold of himself when he is angry.” [ Sahîh al-Bukhârî and Sahîh Muslim ]

Have you ever gotten so angry before that you wanted to break what was in front of you in two? (Fine three pieces…) The veins in your neck begin to bulge, your heart rate goes up, the muscles in your face tighten up, and you probably do something you regret later on like barking at the top of your lungs in your siblings face, or exceeding the boundaries that Allah swt has set upon us in the way we deal with our parents which is not to even say so much as uff to them…

What do you usually do to get yourself really angry? More importantly, what do you do to chill out?

The Messenger of Allah (peace be upon him) said: “If any of you becomes angry and he is standing, let him sit down, so his anger will go away; if it does not go away, let him lie down.”

Our beloved Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) gave us an excellent tool to manage one of our intense emotional states by changing our physiology.  Physiology has to do with how we perceive situations with what we do with our body, namely how heavy you are breathing, the tonality of your voice, your facial expressions, how tense your muscles are, and your posture. If you change an aspect of your physiology it automatically shifts your focus and how you are feeling about a certain situation.

Depression

Now what do you do, when it is time to get really depressed? You can spot a depressed person from a mile away:

• head and eye sight facing down
• frowning, sitting in slumped position
• talking in a low volume and slow paced voice
• breathing is shallow
• list goes on…

You get the point! Now what if the next time you came to feel depressed about something instead of doing what you’re accustomed to try to feel really upset with a huge goofy grin on your face and your standing up straight head tilted back.

Sounds pretty difficult to be depressed in that position huh?

Build Unstoppable Confidence

Using your physiology isn’t only to get yourself out of a rut, or put out an angry fire, you can also use it to get yourself into your most confident state.

Here’s an exercise you can practice with a friend or just do in front of a mirror. Pick a topic that you are completely passionate about and have your partner note the following:

- How you are moving

- Your breathing

- How you look, i.e is it a particular look or expression on your face

- Do you make any particular gestures?

Experiment with a couple of different emotional states, and next time you have that interview or presentation, or you find yourself just wanting to feel great for no particular reason tap into your power of physiology. Mastering your physiology is the true measure of strength!

Let me know of what you tried out and observed. Comment away!

Bismillah AlRahman AlRahim

I was discussing with my Quran teacher about the strengths of the various Islamic universities out there and he made one comment to me that really struck me and froze me in my spot, “Remember it’s not how good the Shuyukh are or how strong the reputation of the school is, it comes down to how dedicated and hard working is the student of knowledge going to be…” Golden words of advice subhanAllah…

Do you know anyone personally that has ever gotten in the mode of “waiting for the perfect opportunity” to change something or to take action? It could be waiting to seriously start memorizing Quran when you finish school…oh wait after school you start working and you start a family. Hmm…so that means having to delay it after the kids are out of college and married themselves and you start receiving your retirement checks…

This could be about wanting to be financially independent, waiting to start your wealth mastery habits when you are earning a 6-figure salary because only people with 6 or 7 figure salaries can really have financial independence.

Also a common one Muslims put out there about why they’re not participating in Dawah, “Brother, I do not have enough knowledge to give people a better understanding of Islam.” Look at the example of Abu Bakr radiyaAllahu anhu who in his early stages of Islam with the tawfeeq of Allah invited seven of the ten promised Jannah into Islam.

My friend was telling me about a misunderstanding of the ayah in Surat Al-Ahfaq, “And We have enjoined upon man, to his parents, good treatment. His mother carried him with hardship and gave birth to him with hardship, and his gestation and weaning [period] is thirty months. [He grows] until, when he reaches maturity and reaches [the age of] forty years, he says, “My Lord, enable me to be grateful for Your favor which You have bestowed upon me and upon my parents and to work righteousness of which You will approve and make righteous for me my offspring. Indeed, I have repented to You, and indeed, I am of the Muslims.”

Does this mean that we can wal iyadhu billah disobey Allah all we want until we reach the age of forty and then turn to Him for tawbah?

Wait a minute …who guaranteed that we would be living that long after all?

What it comes down to is changing perspective a bit and instead of asking yourself, “When will the perfect opportunity arrive?” ask yourself the following, “How can I make the best of my opportunity NOW?” and “What type of person must I commit to becoming to see this really happen?” When you do that you are changing a weak preference into something you are fully committed to achieving. This power of decision making we all have and we can immediately put into action.

So what decisions have you been postponing in your life? Share your thoughts inshaAllah, and how you plan to put some things you’ve been putting off into action.