 So this is a lecture that I was requested to do by Muhsin, thank you so much to the whole Muhsin team for allowing me to do this, and the subject is a Muslim or caregiver's Ramadan. So this was a planning for Ramadan exercise that I had done in the previous session, but it took us about two hours to go through, and I know this is more specific about a caregiver's Ramadan, but I feel that it would also, it would help anybody, especially somebody who's in giving care to somebody else to help in their planning. The recording is available online, so it's, again, it's about a two-hour workshop, but you could go through it, but just very basically that first page, page two, you just write down the optimum Ramadan experience and what it would look like, and write it down the way you want it. If there's no constraints, and there's actually some pens here, you can do that as well, if there's no constraints, and actually, you know what, why don't we just do that really quick? I'll rush through the other ones, but don't read through everything else, but just write down, just take, we're going to take five minutes. For your Ramadan, this is called the magic wand experiment. If we could, I know we know Muslims aren't supposed to practice magic, this is metaphorically speaking, if you could wave a magic wand and have your Ramadan exactly the way you want it. Everything you want to happen, nothing's holding you back, write it out. What would it look like? In our current situation, or in your current situation? In your current situation, well, actually, not even in the current situation. This is, you have no constraints, zero constraints. Like if the world was made available to you in all its sources, what would that Ramadan look like? You can continue writing out things, but if you finished some of it, how does that feel? Feel better? Yeah? What about it makes it feel better? Well, then now is the next stage of the planning, which is to start, well, there's a couple of things. And again, I don't want to go through the whole entire thing, but then the next stage would be, one of the things is with the magic wand, is that's the way like you're dreaming about it. But it's showing what you want in your heart. And the feelings of resentment or frustration that happened is because we're not getting some of this. But then the next stage would be then say, okay, now let me, let's move into some of the practicality and to take each one of those things. And on the next page, to write down what's going to take one or two hours a day, on the next page, there's a square. Now of those things, just identify, what's one to two hours daily? What's 30 to 45 minutes daily? What's 10 to 15 minutes? And what's three to five minutes? And as no planning journal, planning template is perfect. But this is just to kind of get our brain moving in terms of fun. So then you start, you can take some of those things and put them into those categories. So in filling out those goals, are you finding that they're clumped in one area more than another? Where is yours? One to two hours or more. One to two hours or more. And I was really struggling with moving a few points and other boxes. Okay, are you finding the same thing? Yeah, mine too. One to two hours? Okay, now even if somebody's not a caregiver, are multiple one to two hour goals daily during Ramadan, is that going to be achievable? Most likely, it's not. So we want to try to get more into that, the 10 to 15 minutes and definitely the three to five minutes, especially for the people who are involved in giving care to another person. You want the three to five minutes because two things, you don't have that much time and then you need to be able to pivot quickly. So if you go in and say I want to do 20 rakahs, that's you're not going to be able to carve out an hour or an hour and a half. But what if you change that and you said, my tarawir, what's some people that are like, okay, I'm going to pray 20, I'm going to pray eight, are there any other options? Any others? Umar Ibn Abdul-Aziz, who's considered to be the fifth Khalifa. So after the four Khalifas, then there's Umar Ibn Abdul-Aziz. He used to pray 36 in Medina during his time. And then they would pray three for Sheffar and Wittlis, so they prayed 39. There's no definite amount in terms of tarawih because it's a nafil prayer or a sunnah prayer, you can do extra. You can even do two and you can do it in the home and it's tarawih. Tarawih is any prayer after Isha and before Fajr, any extra prayer, actually before Sheffar and Wittl. Now, how long does it take to pray two? And then you don't have to recite the entire Quran. You can just read. So can you get two rakahs? And even if you have to do it quick, I know it's not the best to do quick, but you can do two and you can do it in the home. You can do four, you can do eight. They also don't have to be right after each other. So sometimes what happens is that we see certain practices developed and then they become cemented. And then we think that's the only way that it can be practiced. But if we say, well, it doesn't have to be just 20 and it doesn't have to be just in the masjid and it doesn't have to be with the entire recitation of Quran. I can do two in my home by myself with Qulhu Allahu A'had. And that's tarawih. And so if you get two rakah prayer, and I mean, if you get five minutes, is that enough time for a two rakah prayer? Or even three minutes? So you can put that in the three or five minute. So we can think of some other short wins for that. Instead of, like if somebody were to say, I'm going to read the entire Quran. That's gonna take about a juzah a day or a little bit more, which is gonna take about how much time? Is that the one to two hours or 30 to 45 minutes? It's one of those, right? Depending on the speed of the reader and how much they want to. Well, how can we bring something down to the three to five minute win? From the Quran, a page. And then recognize, if I get that, that's a win. That is a win. I'll tell you a story, my teacher, Murad al-Hajj Rahimullah in West African Mauritania, somebody came to him and he complained. He said, I don't want to be a lazy Muslim. How many of us feel that? How many feel we like we're lazy, right? And so he said to him something very profound. He said, do the fard and you're not lazy. Do the fard and you are not lazy. So sometimes we put the bar way too high. We just, you know, we want to do every fard and every sunnah and every nephel and every dhikr and every this and every that. And we feel if we're not hitting that, we're not reaching our potential. So we have the baseline and we have to realize that, yes, we want to build on the baseline, but even if we just got the baseline, we're winners. So that's something to remind us as well, that even if you just do your five fard prayers and for caregivers, sometimes that's difficult. Not only getting the prayer, but to get the prayer and to not, and to have the focus. Because what happens when your caregiver and somebody else is dependent on you, your senses become heightened. So the slightest sound from the other side of the house becomes like for you, it's the crisis response mode, right? Then you're like, okay, I gotta go because somebody else is another human being is depending on you. And so you're actually hiding, somebody else might be like, and I've had that experience where I come down. And then sometimes it's almost like a sixth sense as well. Something like, oh, I need to go over there or come around and somebody's like, did you hear that? I was like, no, I just felt like something he needed to be checked on and I came over and and so you're never really able to be in a place where I'll give you an example. Have you ever seen the people who come to the masjid? They're in prayer, especially for Taraweer and they're just so focused into it. They're just like into it, but their kids are running around the masjid. There's some people who and causing problems running around the masjid, that's not an issue. I'm talking about causing problems. So I always wondered, how are you able to maintain so much focus when your kids are not only running around, but they're actually causing problems in the masjid? So there's a disconnect there, because that person hasn't developed in their ability to say, okay, my privilege to worship, my privilege to worship is not completely, is not disconnected from providing care to somebody else. As a parent, I have a duty to watch for my child, even if they don't have special needs and they don't need extra care and attention. And so what's happening in that person that allows them to completely cut off and focus on their ibadah while their kids are causing problems in the masjid? I'm just using that as like an extreme example, but the opposite of that is where a person can't even get into the focus of their ibadah because they're always on heightened awareness mode. I got to be, I got, you know, I'm, and the slightest sound, the slightest this, you know, just could have been like, like a whimper, I got, I have to turn. And so you're never able to, to fully get into a calm mode. I'll give you, oh, I'm glad you mentioned that. And I wish we actually, when I saw it was a smaller group, I preferred rather than have the platform that we could just make, maybe make a circle. Well, I mean, it's already kind of, and my son is actually sick at home. So in this period of caregiving, I have to stop right at two and head home, what's that? No, no, it's fine. I just know, I feel that this is more in line with the spirit of like this, the back and forth, and that's what I want. So you bring up an excellent point about, you know, thinking about your kids. So one thing is, remember that when you read any hadith or any Quran, there's a general meaning, there's a specific meaning, and there's also an application. And sometimes we take general principles that have, and then we try to apply them very objectively into our situation. So like in that, you know, the Quran says, المَرُوَ الْبَنُونَ زِنَةُ الْحَيَاتِ الدُّنْيَةُ Riches and children are the decorations of this world. And you shouldn't be thinking about that. Then we hear about the Sahabi who thought about his date palm grove while he was in the prayer, and what did he do after the prayer? He gave it in Sadaqah, right? Because he's like, we shouldn't. That's true. The level of the Sahaba though, in their prayer, is not what we're expected to be. And this is why the Prophet, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, told us, he said, he told his companions, he said, you are a people that if you left one tenth of what you're doing, you would be ruined. He's telling the Sahaba, if you go below 90%, you're done, you're ruined. He says, but there will come a time where people, if they do 10%, they will be saved. Now the scholars say, he's not talking about the farbh. He's talking about the extra things. So the farbh, everybody has to do the farbh, right? But in the sense of all of those extra acts that we do, if we can get 10%, we're doing great. And this is something that we can also allow ourselves to feel better about ourselves, that you read all these du'as about, do this du'a here, do this sunnah here, you can do this, you can do that, and you wanna do everything. Now, even if a person tried to do every single sunnah, are they gonna have time for anything else? They're not. So one of the things the scholars said is that when the Prophet SallAllahu Alaihi Wasallam said all of those things, it didn't mean do it all. Just do whatever you can. Just figure out whatever it is that you can do from those things. And as you're trying to figure out what to do from those things, you also look at what you already have a natural inclination towards. So if some people are really inclined towards reading the Quran, do a lot of that and run with it. Some people can get up at Tahajjud every single night. Some people can't. All right, for you Tahajjud people, Allah's giving you a gift and a skill and hone it and build on it. But maybe for that Tahajjud person, fasting is hard. And for the fasting person, Tahajjud is hard. And for the person who's really good with their parents, fasting or praying is hard, extra prayer. Everybody has like a gift. So your challenge is to find out what is that thing that I already have a natural inclination towards and then build on that. Build on that thing. I kind of digress from your question, but that was one thing that I wanted to point out that we have to remember that when we're trying to develop our Ramadan or even our Ibad in general, it's what are those things that's already easy for me and then build on that? And some people, I mean being a caregiver, one of the skills you hone is multitasking. And so somebody else might be able to sit off in a corner by themselves, quiet, and read their Quran. Well, you can do it while you're cooking and watching somebody else, right? And so being able to have the Quran in one hand and read through it, don't think that you're not giving justice to the Quran. You're doing with what you can. And then in terms of your question, Sister Ruqi was very good about thinking about the children. That's thinking about, that I is talking about thinking about the, well, dunya in general, if it's distracting you from doing what you should, what Allah wants you, that's a distraction. The dunya and children, if it's distracting you from what Allah wants you to do, that's what he's talking about. But if you have to, if you're sometimes thinking about things in the back of your mind, oh my kid or whatever, that's completely normal. In fact, even Umar, radiAllahu anhu, during his prayer, he would be thinking about the matters of the Muslims. Well, Umar was a caregiver, right? And so he said, once I became the Khalifa, my prayer was no longer, he no longer had that experience. That was like a time in his life where he didn't have to worry about the matters of the Muslims. But now he's the Khalifa. Now he's a caregiver for the entire ummah. And so he said, I'm thinking about their matters in my prayer. It happens. But nobody would say that Umar is thinking about the dunya. So if your Umar's care of other people is for the sake of Allah, your care of another human being who's dependent on your care, that's for the sake of Allah. And this is another thing that I want to share and remind myself as well that let's go to the sunnah of caring for another, which is called a, it's not in the packet, but ayadat al-mariyad, caring for a person who needs help. Everybody, you know, knows that visiting the sick is from the sunnah, right? Well, caring for those who are in need is also from the sunnah, but it's at an even higher level. What's the ruling of caring for another person? What is the hukum? Well, let's start, let's back up. There's five rulings. Everything in this world is one of five rulings. It's either an obligation, it's fardh, it's sunnah, it's recommended, it's permissible, it's makruh, disliked or it's haram. That's it. Everything's one of those five things. Obligation, sunnah, permissible, disliked, haram. Caring for another person, what is the hukum? It's an obligation. It's an obligation. If it is, I like to do this, if they're under our care. If they're under your care. It's a fardh. Now, before I ask that question, have you thought about it like that? It's a fardh. Which has more reward? A fardh or a sunnah? A fardh. So now, if our job, if our Ramadan, if our Ibada throughout the world is looking for reward, then we want to go for the most bang for our buck, right? If we're looking for investments, that's why everybody went into crypto and everything, right? I want to work the less that I get and get the most reward. We're mentioning Omar again, radiallahu anhum. He said that if you leave one dirham, that is haram, one dirham is equivalent to about two dollars in today's silver. So when they talk about Dara'him, dirham, the silver coins were dirhams and the gold were dinars. And so the silver dirham is worth about two dollars. And I think it's about, how many grams? I think it's like five points something. It's about five to six grams of silver, two dirhams. He said, one dirham, that's haram, you leave that for the sake of Allah. And we've all been in situations where either we could have taken somebody's money, there was money that was dropped, there was an opportunity, there was a business money and something stopped us, we're like, that's haram or it's doubtful, we left it. Omar said, leaving that one dirham, that's haram, is better than taking it and giving 70,000 dirhams in Sadaqah. Now a lot of people might think, I'll just take this one and I'll give 70,000 out. What's the harm? Because of the benefit. He says this, you'll get more reward in leaving the one dirham that's haram than the 70,000 that are Sadaqah. Why? Because this is a fard. You have to leave this one and it's recommended to those other ones. So now when we think about that, I'm like, okay. So now even when I give care to another person, I'm actually fulfilling a fard. And if I'm always on call, I'm in a constant state of obligation. So when you're in your prayer or when you're reading Quran, you're not fully able to cut off from being present there. It's because you're there, you're on call to fulfill your obligation. And that's a constant state of a bad of reward. Now it might not feel like it because then you see, it's like the Sahabi'at who, or the Sahabi'ah, Ennis's mother, she was not financially privileged. And she saw all of the Sahabi'ah giving to all of the Sadaqah and she looked at them. She said, wow, I don't have anything to give. But then she put her son, Ennis, to serve the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam and he served him for 10 years. The reason I'm mentioning the story, there's a lot that we can unpack from that story. But one of it is that she's like, I don't have that money to give, but I have something else. And so when you hear of people going to the masjid and being able to do all 20 raka'ahs,