 In our discussion today, the topic I was asked to address by this wonderful group and congregation is the discussion on the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ himself and his approach to mental health. And you might think, SubhanAllah, what is this connection? Is there something from the Prophet ﷺ himself that talks about mental health? Is this term even found at the time of the Prophet ﷺ? What is this? How do you translate this word into Arabic exactly? And do they have something like mental health or psychology or psychiatry in that time? And SubhanAllah, this is a long discussion and I'll give you the nutshell, kind of, you know, in a nutshell kind of explanation to say that the Prophet himself, SubhanAllah ﷺ, inspired an entire generation of people and generations after them, including ourselves, this many centuries later to really take care of all aspects of health. This concept of health or sahab is something that actually that Islam, right, directly from within Islam says that there should be no distinguishing or discrimination between any one of the sorts of, or the facets of health, not physical health, not mental health, not emotional health, not spiritual health, all of which are equally important. And so for anybody who's thinking still, hmm, I don't know. I don't know, Dr. Ania, mental health seems to be kind of like this new age thing, or are you sure it seems kind of a, I don't know, maybe a kind of more of a modern construct? Was it really something part of Islam? Is it really something part of the Prophet himself, SubhanAllah, in his sunnah, his blessed sunnah? Well, let's explore this together, inshaAllah, ta'ala. So this is where I'd like to begin. You know, some of you know that I love to speak about history, but I'm not going to bore you about history today, inshaAllah. Although I find it very exciting, alhamdulillah. But what I will tell you about is directly about him, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. One of the most important things that we understand about the reason Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala sent prophets. Let's listen closely to this, okay? Think about this. If Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala has a message to humanity, it is very easy for Allah Azza wa Jal to send down that message directly to us. It could have been in the form of a book. It could have been in the form of tablets. It could have been in the form of any sort of scripture that comes. But he brought his message with a messenger, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. And he could have said, maybe that's sufficient. We will learn the Qur'an, literally the scripture, the living example of the Qur'an through the Prophet himself, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, a walking Qur'an, as we say. But in addition to that, he also sends a community, sahaba and sahabiats, men and women around the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, to live life, everyday life, so that whatever happens with them, good and bad, whatever good happens and whatever mistakes happen, he sallallahu alayhi wa sallam can explain to us what is appropriate according to the Qur'an and what isn't. You see? Because he himself, as the most perfect of all human beings, the most blessed of all human beings, the best of them, he's not going to make the kind of mistakes that ordinary individuals will, but the companions, men and women may. And so we'll learn through his sunnah, through his sayings, through his actions, or what is accurate and what isn't. You take all of this together, the Qur'an, the sunnah and the examples of the righteous that were all there at the time of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, that then inspire their next generations and you start to understand the story of mental health. Let me tell you how. Let's start with the Prophet himself, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. Many times when people think about mental health, they think about difficulties. They think about words like depression or anxiety. They think about trauma. They think about diagnoses. They think about maybe even medications or maybe they think about a label that someone puts on them, or their children, let's say. How did the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam himself deal with his difficulties? That's the question. Because he is the best of all of creation and human. Human, meaning there were times that things were rough. There were times that he cried and grieved. There were times that he was frustrated and things were difficult. There were times where things did not go his way, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. And through his example, and later I'll get to the next layer out, the example of the companions, we learn quite a bit about how you deal with trials and tribulations and your mental health, your mental well-being. The Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam had a year that was very difficult for him. So much so and so prolonged that the scholars of Sira, those who kind of captured everything related to his life, called it what? Does anyone remember? عام and حزن, literally عام, a year of sorrow, a year of grief, a year of prolonged sadness. Why is this important? When I tell people sometimes that are going through something difficult and I say this is rather human, but it doesn't just sort of mean that you twiddle your thumbs and sit around and say, you know, if Allah sent it to me then it shall pass. Of course it will because Allah has also said that if He sent you difficulty, He will send you ease. إنما عال عصري يصرأ and it's repeated a second time. إنما عال عصري يصرأ and whenever Allah ﷻ repeats something twice in the Qur'an, it means pay attention. This is important and therefore I'm repeating it. And when we talk about difficulty, people think, well, how is ease with difficulty? Because it's not after difficulty comes ease, it's literally what? مَعَ, it's with. Literally tucked into the difficulty is your ease. But sometimes you can't see it right away. And sometimes that ease isn't the thing itself, but rather circumstances around it. People, individuals, resources, just the ability to deal with something heavy emotionally. All of these are forms of يصرأ, right? And so look at the Prophet ﷺ in this year of prolonged sadness and difficulty. Let's count together what happens. Who knows the Seerah well? How does it start? What's the first thing? There's a series of losses that happen. What's the first loss? Hmm? I'm hearing different things. So I'm hearing his wife. His wife, Sayyeda Khadija, right? This is his wife of so many years, the mother of all of his children up until this point. And right, his blessed companion. His anchor, beautiful description. Wallahi, beautiful description. In-home, internally, this is his anchor. We would call her his internal support. And when you're terrified and you're running off the mountain and you're literally trembling, as it's described in the Qur'an. And she is there to hold you, to support you and to remind you that Allah does not want bad for you. After all these years of support, who's given you all of this, what? Emotional sustenance and support and has literally given all of her wealth for the Dawah, right? For Islam and has given all of her support to you. She passes away. It's heavy. It's heavy. And soon after, what happens? The next loss. Yes, Mashallah, we have some Sida experts here. The loss of his uncle. What's his name? Abu Talib. Why is he important? Why is he important? What is the role that Abu Talib plays for the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam and for Islam? And you say for Islam? We don't know him to be Muslim. There's some Khilaf. But let's just say that there's, we don't know him publicly. Visibly to be Muslim. So why is he so important? Yes. Exactly. While his uncle was alive, the people of Quraish, the enemies, could not touch the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. He was protected. So you have an internal protection and anchor from Sayyid al-Qadija. Sayyid al-Qadija and you have an external protection from his uncle, both of whom pass away in a very short span of time. Tell me, there's another loss that happens after that. Yes, in the backdrop, there is a sanction. There is an economic boycott against the Muslims, meaning no trade, no in, no out. So much so that they're literally starving. In this period of time, the Sahaba would talk about how they were eating leaves. One of them said, I took in the darkness, I picked up something mushy. I didn't know what it was. It was dark. And I picked it up and I put it on my mouth and it was chewed and I just chewed it. Ya'ani, to this level of starvation. And then there's another loss. What else happens in this year? All within weeks of each other. Hmm? Hmm. Before that, there's something. And then, we're missing something. Ah, very good. All I know about Aliki, very good. What happens after the death of the uncle and in the backdrop of this economic boycott, the Prophet Sallaladio said him, says, well, I have distant family that's in thought of. I no longer have protection of Quraish. And they're not going to be listening to me. They're the people that are, you know, the important people of Quraish are no longer listening to me. So why don't I try another set of distant family members and another tribe altogether? Maybe they'll listen. So he literally walks. Has anyone been to Tlaif, by the way? Has anyone visited Tlaif? Yeah? Can you describe Tlaif? What's it like? It's 50-some miles, right? And what does it look like? It's so much beautiful. What about Tlaif? It's very different than the other cities. It's different than Mecca. It's different than Medina. It's very luscious. Yanni, yes, you're still in the Arabian Peninsula, but it's very green. It's very lush. It has orchards and orchards. It's so interesting. A different place, SubhanAllah. And here you have the prophets of Allah, head over there and he starts his da'wah. He starts to call people to Islam. And he's got very specific, the heads of the tribe that he wants to reach, one by one. And he goes to them, one by one. You know what they say to him? One person says to him, what? Your Allah couldn't find someone better than you to send us. Someone else says, if you really are the prophet, then I'll be cursed. The next person says, don't even try to talk to me. Basically, each one of them kicks him out. Each one of them in turn kicks him out. And so he decides, despite all of this pain of people being very humiliating him, he decides to stay in thought for a little bit longer. Why? He says, well, let me give the da'wah to the common people. They're leaders that want to listen. Maybe the commoners will listen. And then they started to actually be interested in, what is this message of Islam? Do you know what happens next? The leaders get wind of the fact that the people are getting interested in Islam. So what do they do to him? They literally drive him out of, thought if, and tell me what they do, because it's very humiliating what they do. You know this part of the story. What do they do? They gather the who? The children. And they literally pick up stones and pelt him with this, so much so that literally he starts to bleed, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. It's said that his heels were so bloody from this incident of so many stones hitting him that his foot is sticking into his sandal because of the blood, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. And you know when you're targeted like this, you're so humiliated like this, he said, I lost track of where I was. Can you imagine? You're being driven out and being pelted and pelted with stones and you're bleeding and you're kind of a little bit confused where you are. He said, I did not even know where I was until he got to a specific orchard. Sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. Do you know whose orchard it was? Yes, that's his who's with him. It was the person, the servant, their servant. Subhanallah. And he sits in this orchard on a rock and he makes a very special du'a to Allah Subhanahu wa ta'ala, powerful du'a. I encourage us all to learn it and even memorize it because in this du'a, he literally says to Allah, if I've done something wrong and this is some sort of punishment for me, then forgive me and I accept it. But if you are happy with me or pleased with me and this is basically like a test or a tribulation that I'm going through, then I accept. And he sees at that point what, who? Who does he see? The angel. The angel? What angel? Sayed Najibri, what does Sayed Najibri mean? Coming with a message. What does he tell him? See, you said hills earlier and there were mountains there. And he says to him, if you want, I will take these mountains and basically destroy this group of people that have humiliated you so much. And what does the Prophet say, Sayed Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam? You said Rahma, mercy. He says maybe it could be that from their progeny, from their next generations, they'll be believers. So keep them. Look how merciful he is, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, despite the agony, despite the agony. And there's a beautiful next part of the story and I didn't mean to go all the way into the story of thought if I love the story of thought. But there's a next part of the story which I'll just share very quickly. SubhanAllah, where is the Yusra tucked into the usr here? He's sitting in an orchard and the orchard belongs to people who are technically enemies, right? But he's sitting there and the people see him and he's bleeding and it's a very difficult, it's like they had some shakka for him, right? They had some empathy for him. And so they sent their servant to him and they said, give him some grapes from the orchard. I remember I told you orchards, right? So when he see, when he's offered these grapes, he says, Bismillah. And the servant who listens to this, he says, who taught you to say this? And he says, I'm a prophet of God. I'm taught this the way Allah has taught the prophets. And so he says, the servant says, I haven't heard anyone in these lands say these words. And he says, well, where are you from? Do you guys know where he was from? From your city? Masha'Allah, Masha'Allah, how beautiful. Alhamdulillah, Alhamdulillah. And he said, I too, I'm a descendant of which prophet? Sayyidina Yunus. And I'm a prophet just like the prophet Yunus. And we're both given a message from the same God. Do you know that that servant right there took a Shahada and became a Muslim? People don't know some of the little finer details. But that was, he hoped for Ta'if to become Muslim, but he had this one person. And he said, with this one person, it was the weight of that entire current city that later, Alhamdulillah, I had a chance to visit Ta'if, sounds like you did too, Masha'Allah. They are the most generous, beautiful people you'll meet, SubhanAllah. And they are core, like very proud believers of Muslims today. And generous, generous, they still have the orchards and they're very generous, SubhanAllah. And you think about, had that whole city been annihilated, there wouldn't have been those believers today. But let's go back to our story. Here's the prophet, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. He's had what? Multiple losses, one after another, after another in his life. And you're right. You mentioned something that happens right after this in the Seerah. What is that? Al-Israat wal-Mauraj. This is the night journey, right? And the ascension happens right after this incident. Allah is giving him relief after these difficult moments and things that he's been through, SubhanAllah. As he goes through these difficulties, he Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, we learned from him and from all of the stories that he grieved, that he cried, that he felt a sense of even being in that confusion and almost like everyone is against you. And he physically bled and hurt. Why do I share this? Because when you think about the discussion on mental health and you think about person's well-being and mental wellness, we turn first to the prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. What is it that we don't see? We don't see somebody turning after some difficulty, turning against Allah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. We don't see somebody saying, why me? We don't see somebody saying, I can do this completely on my own. That last point is very important because we talked about how the prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam had his internal anchor, his external anchor, and he had his community. And he went and tried to seek out support from the leaders who wouldn't listen to him, but he was trying because he knew that you don't do this alone. See, today we have a little bit of a trouble with this. A lot of us believe that we can do things completely on our own. We think that we need to be self-sufficient. We need to be able to wipe away our own tears, and in fact, we maybe shouldn't even have tears in the first place. And that's just simply not the message of our prophet or the prophets of the Qur'an. Do you know my best example of this? You must know my best example of this. Who am I referring to? In the Qur'an. Sayyidna Yaqub. What about Sayyidna Yaqub in the Qur'an? Allah, Subhanahu wa Ta'ala, described very eloquently and specifically the crying and the tears of Sayyidna Yaqub. What did he say? What's the verse? He did say that? Tamaam? And how does he say his crying specifically? It's amazing. The fact that the description of the crying of Sayyidna Yaqub, the father of Yusuf, on the loss of his son. His loss of his son, right? This is the part of the story early on in the surah. The whole surah reads like a story, SubhanAllah. And early on, we see that the loss of Sayyidna Yusuf, the brothers are jealous of him. They put him in, they can't get themselves to kill him, although they think about murder, SubhanAllah. What jealousy can do to you. And instead, they put him in the well. They come back and complain to their, or they report to their father as though he was dead. Sayyidna Yaqub has a sense, a feeling that something's not right, but never the less, even as a prophet of God who's receiving revelation from God, he's what? He cries. I want to ask you something. Would we ever say, would we ever say that Sayyidna Yaqub is any less of a prophet because he cried? No. Would we say that he's any less of a man because he cried? Would we say that he's any less of a believer because he cried? Hasha, you can't, there's no way. And not only does he cry, I don't mean just some tears. I'm talking about the kind of tears and crying that's described in the Quran as, his eyes went white with grief. And the scholars debate, was this blindness or was this more like a haziness the way cataracts might do to you? Whatever it is, the point is the word in Arabic is, well, biyabat ayna. His eyes went white with grief. Yanni so much crying in a prolonged period of time. Do you know from the time Sayyidna Yusuf was lost until he was found, or reunited Yanni with his father, how many years was that, does anyone know? How many years? It's a few decades. Some say between 20 to 30 years before he's reunited with his son. That many years of crying. It'll do it to you. What do I want to say? We would never say here's a prophet of God after the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ, our understanding of who are the best humans are the prophets, the most closest to Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala. And here is a prophet of God who is crying so much. Why do I really emphasize this? Because forgive me, but I'm going to put something there that you may not be happy with me. But especially our boys and our men. What do we say to them? Be a man, don't be a girl. Men don't cry. Man up. Would you say that's a prophet? Yaqub. I'm not trying to say, and let everybody start crying, but what I am trying to say is, tears have a purpose and tears have a place. And tears are something that is not considered to be the opposite of a believer. This point is very important. Because for so many people, when we talk about mental health, the immediate thing is, well, if they just had a better e-man, they wouldn't have mental health problems. Would you say that about Prophet Yaqub or the Prophet Muhammad, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, you have a whole entire year of sadness, of grief, of sorrow. Would we say this to them? That their e-man wasn't strong enough? No. So what do we mean then? It means that there's possible that a person can have very strong belief in Allah and be an immense pillar of belief. But Mike sometimes don't like me. That's okay. They are going to start crying in two, three seconds. And here's my proof for you. The Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam says about believers, right? He says about believers that if Allah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam wanted good for you, he's going to test you. Because the best of all people are the prophets and they are the most tested. And after them are the people who are the closest to Allah, Subhanahu wa ta'ala, and they are the most tested after the prophets and so on and so forth. And people have a really hard time with this, but it is part of our tradition. It's part of our Islamic concept. For example, the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam says من يرد الله بيخيرا يصب منه What does that translate to? Whoever Allah intends good for, he sends them affliction that benefits them. Sometimes these difficulties are a purification. Sometimes these difficulties are a reminder. Sometimes it's a prick that kind of says, okay, what is this? Or maybe it's a humiliating and humbling experience to say, I need to get help. I shouldn't and can't do this completely on my own. And I think that's really important because so many times I talk to individuals who they themselves have gotten to a point where they realize I need help. And they'll say to members of their family and their community, their friends, and they'll say, I think I need some help. But often they're met with resistance. No, you don't. Just pray more. No, you don't. Don't be so lazy. No, get up, get up. No, you don't. If you just did X, Y, or Z, you'd be fine. But this isn't the message of our deen. And it's not the message of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. In fact, do you want to know what is the message? I'll tell you. There were times in the Prophet's life himself, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, that he wanted so much to spread Islam, to give this message of da'wah, that he wanted everyone to be part of the fold of Islam. But there were some who were resistant and they just weren't going to listen. Subhanallah. And Allah, Subhanahu wa ta'ala, talked to him or addressed him directly in the Quran. And he says to him, as an ayah that you all know and probably recite weekly, but let's think of the context in which it's revealed. Are you familiar with this verse? You recite it, you know it. What is it that we translate it to you? It says, now perhaps I'll profit. You will grieve yourself to death. Okay, listen to me. Grieve yourself to death. Over their denial, if they continue to disbelieve in this message. Allah is saying to him, there is a limit of what you can do and of convincing other people about this message. Even if they don't listen, you can't basically put yourself in a situation where you will grieve so heavily and so deeply that it'll start to affect you psychologically and physically. So Allah puts a limit in place of how far you can go before you have to address this. Do you see what I'm saying? And Allah SWT told him, فَلَا تُذْهِبْ نَفْسَكَ عَلَى فَلَا تُذْهِبْ نَفْسُكَ عَلَى نَفْسُكَ عَلَيْهِمْ حَصَرَاتَ Do not grieve yourself to death over him or profit. Remember that even the Prophet, as a human, yes, the best of all humans, was prone to going into a state of grieving so extensively that it could be problematic. So Allah is telling him, don't go that far. Right? So I have five messages for you or five main aspects of what people want to know. What is the Prophet, Muhammad SAW's approach himself to mental health? Let's say all five. Number one. The first and foremost that suffering can be that blessing from Allah SWT. And for somebody who does not believe in Allah and doesn't understand the concept of a God-centered kind of concepts with worldview where you realize that you are not the one in charge. There is Allah's divine wisdom really orchestrating everything. It's hard to understand this concept. Why would you have somebody who's going to have a suffering via blessing? But here's my proof for you. There's a hadith for the Prophet, Muhammad SAW says, that the wondrous, it's wondrous the believer. All that happens to the believer is good. All that happens is good. And he emphasizes that this is not for anybody except for the believer. That if Allah gives them good, Alhamdulillah, it's good for them. But if he gives them difficulty, then what? Also Alhamdulillah. Exactly. But if the good, the gratitude, the prosperity comes to them, then they have shukr. They're in gratitude to Allah SWT. And if the difficulty comes to them, the adversity falls them, they endure patiently. And this is also good for them. Only a believer can understand this. And only a believer can have the kind of patience to kind of push them through or pull them through this difficulty when it comes to them. Number two, to embrace this knowledge of your emotions in balance. Like the message I was saying earlier about the Prophet SAW, even Allah SWT put limits to the dawah that he was doing. That it can't be a point where it drives him into the ground, essentially, right? Even the dawah of Islam. And so here, this idea of balance, the Prophet SAW taught us the importance of acknowledging our own emotions. And people think this is so interesting that this is really the Prophet told us about our emotions, yes. Not only did he, SAW, acknowledge his own emotions, but he acknowledged the emotions of the people of his community. And there are many examples of this. But let me tell you the story, which is a difficult story, but an important story. And it comes later in the Prophet's life and now he has the youngest of his children, a son, by the name of Ibrahim. And Ibrahim was not to live. He was not going to live very long. And as he's literally taking his very last breaths, he's sitting on the lap of his father, the Prophet SAW. And this little child is taking the very last breaths and the Prophet SAW begins to cry. Visible tears coming down his cheeks. So much so that the companions see that he's curious. And so they ask him, because they're curious. They want to know everything the Prophet does, everything he says, everything he does, everything they have to understand, is this okay? Is this not okay? What do we do? What does this mean? So they ask him about the tears. And this is what he says. Indeed, the eyes shed tears. And the heart feels sorrow. But we do not say that except which is pleasing to Allah, Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala. Surely your departure, O Ibrahim, leaves us all deeply saddened. And he explains to the companions, tears are normal. They're normative. This is what Allah has given us to grieve with. It's different. Crying is different than wailing and screaming and carrying on. The tears and being overcome by emotion and the feeling of sorrow and grief in your heart is human. And if you don't have this, then you're a robot. And he shows through his own blessed example, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, that not only is it okay to cry, but a believer cries. But what they don't do is push against or say something that Allah would not be okay with. Does that make sense? It's so important when he says, and we do not say except that pleasing to Allah means I don't complain about what Allah has given me. I don't push. I don't have i'atira. I don't push against the fate that God has given me. He's taken my young son away. Some might say, why me? How come? Why not him? Why not her? I understand that this has come to me until I accept it. But it does not negate that I can be tearful and sad. Does that make sense? This is important. This is balance. This is what I mean by balance of emotion. Recognizing emotion. See sometimes as modern humans what we do is we start to label emotions. We say sadness and tear is bad. Happiness and joy good. We don't realize that the entire spectrum of emotions is something Allah created. He created sadness just like he created happiness. And therefore all of which are at the creation of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. So you can't label some of them good and some of them bad. Does that make sense? And this balance is part of his prophetic example towards mental health. Number three, to regulate our emotions. The prophetic example on mental health here is a regulation of emotions. Think about a hadith that you know, I know you know this one, about anger. What does the Prophet say? Anger is an emotional law has created. And put in the right direction it could actually lead to good. Put in the wrong and to an extreme situation it can definitely lead to bad. What is the hadith that you know about anger? La taradu. Tell me more, what else do you know about anger? What happens if you're angry? What is the prophetic sunnah to do? Good. Excellent, excellent. You're saying all different parts of the hadith, excellent. But if a person is standing, they sit. And if they're very, they feel that heat, right? What is this? This is another narration of what? That anger is from? Shaitan. Shaitan is made from fire. So how do you put this out? Water. So go make wudu. Right? There is a behavior. This is in psychology. We would call this a behavioral modification to an emotion that you're feeling. Literally you are regulating the emotions by putting, again, limits around them. You're not cancelling them out and saying, nope, canceled. You're actually modulating them. Modifying them. Helping them to be the best version of you. Insha'Allah ta'ala. Number four, to take time to take care of yourself. And you were saying, really? Self-care is part of the surah of the Prophet, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam? Absolutely. Sometimes people hear this word self-care and they think I'm saying selfish. I'm not telling us to be selfish. But when I'm saying self-care, it's the same kind of care that we give to anything that we're doing. When we say self-care, I don't just mean spa days, ladies. When I mean self-care, I mean everything, all aspects of care. So if it's physical, then it's taking care of our physical bodies. Whatever form of exercise that allows you to do that. When I say emotional self-care, it's regulating and working on our emotions. And if there's something that is just like physical, by the way, some people are very motivated. They say, oh, I can go run a mile, no problem. Other people, they literally need like a running group to do anything. Some people are like, I can have the run of the machine, the treadmill in my own house, and I'll have the self-discipline to get up on it and to do something with it. Others, they'll have every machine created. What's missing is them getting onto the machine. So then what do they need? They need encouragement. They need a group. Sometimes they need a trainer, right? I have this excellent trainer. And Muslim lady, she was really excellent. And I've noticed the difference of having a trainer versus not having a trainer. It's something about there is accountability. I knew that I was accountable. I was going to show up and she was going to ask, right? And I had to be there. And there were certain times and certain days that I had to be on time, Subhanallah. And that level of accountability was very useful. If we do that for physical health, what about for emotional health? Okay, you're not ready to hear about emotional health. What about spiritual health? And I'll come back to emotional health. What do you do for your spiritual health? You're here, here on a Friday night. You could be at the movie theaters. You could be at the mall. I don't know, the who? The gym. To an extent, the gym might be okay. But it's a Friday night. You could really be literally anywhere, Subhanallah. What are you doing for your spiritual health and well-being? You're here with the Imam, masha'Allah. You're here in a circle of knowledge, ahlaka. You're here in a bonds of sisterhood and brotherhood that kind of uplift you and keep you going spiritually. Do you find that other many programs that you're attending? This is helping you, spiritual health. If you completely cut out all aspects of a Muslim community and a place in which you're learning Islam, you'll find this is deficient. It's just like the treadmill that can't get the person on it. Same thing with spiritual health. Now are we ready to get to emotional health? What happens with emotional mental health? If we find ourselves unable to do this completely on our own. Some people can. They may have the resources or the family or the friends or the support and maybe what they're dealing with is what we would call mild. Mild. On the grand scheme of things. Mild. But maybe for some people their tribulation in life comes in that mental health or emotional health aspect. And maybe it's a moderate or even a severe. Even then people say, you can do this on your own. Why? We're not super women and super men. We're not. That's not how God created us. He didn't create us to fly. He didn't create us with special superpower. He really didn't. He created us humans. And he gave us examples of people close to him who also told us to get help. You want my proof? The companions went to the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam and they said to him, if we get sick, should we go get treatment? What are they implying in this question? They're asking the Prophet of God. It says though, even though it's not said, it says though it's implied, Ya Rasulullah isn't prayer enough or the kid enough. They didn't say this, but it's essentially implied. Should we go get treatment? They're asking the Prophet who, if you go to the average Muslim today and you told him, I'm depressed. He would say, A believer does not get depressed. Go pray. This is the typical answer. What was the Prophet's answer? Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. Seek out treatments or servants of God. I'll translate. The companions asked the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, if we get sick, should we go get treatment? And he Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam answered and said, Seek out treatments or servants of God. For God does not send down illnesses. He does not create illnesses unless he creates its cure or in some narrations, its treatment. And this is what modern medicine will tell you today. There are some illnesses that have cures and some illnesses that have only treatments. They're chronic. They won't go away, but you can treat them. And this is powerful. You know, when the pandemic happened and nobody understood what was happening with COVID-19, especially in those first few months, think about March 2020, right? For the first few months, can you put yourself back there? It's not that long ago. Yeah, put yourself back there. I don't know. None of us want to be back there. Because it's so recent history, right? I can't believe we're saying history. But anyway, it's so recent that you can put yourself back into the feeling of English, of just angst, of like not knowing what is this thing and people are dying and they're telling us to isolate and to drop everything we're doing and to stay at home. Do you remember that feeling? This tiny little microscopic little virus that you can't see that brings the entire world to a standstill. And I was so wonderful to hear believers say that if a law created an illness, he's also created its cure or treatment. And Sopranola would only be within a matter of months, given to modern medicine, Sopranola, and the work of people, some of whom are Muslim, by the way, right? Who figured out the vaccine for COVID. Who put, right? Because the cure doesn't just fall from the sky. You have to actually take active work to make it happen. Science and lab work and kind of research and so on. Anyway, the point is, the belief of knowing that if a law sent an illness, even a brand new one we've never seen before, he's also going to send its cure or treatment. There is no discrimination in Islam between physical illness and mental illness. And if you want my proof to this, the proof are the institutions that the Muslims created. We actually named our non-profit organization, Madison, after these institutions. For those of you who know Farsi or Urdu, you know the word bimad, illness, stan, location. Bimadistan is the hospitals of the Muslims. The Arabic of this is dar-as-shifa. Interestingly, in the Arab lands, they have the bimad-as-stans. That's what they call them. And in the non-Arab lands, they call them the dar-as-shifa. Anyway, they're the same kind of institution. They're a hospital. And the hospital was run by physicians. And you know it was so beautiful by it. We're writing a book at this moment. Make du'a, inshallah, we're almost done with it, inshallah. That we can't find proof of other civilizations parallel or before the Muslims that put psychiatric rewards in their hospitals before the Muslims. And you tell me that there's something in Islam that discriminates between mental health and physical health. There isn't. Yani, they had the wherewithal to say if Allah says there's an illness, there must be a treatment, that I'm going to whatever illness I see in front of me in society, I'm going to work hard to make sure we provide health and care for that person. So their hospitals are literally like this. A section for surgery, a section for obstetrics, a section for internal medicine, a section for ear, nose, and throat, a section for ophthalmology, a section for psychiatry. There are papers written by non-Muslims that say that that blueprint of the Muslim hospitals is the blueprint of the modern hospital system. They took it from the Muslims. Because you know what the alternatives were that were available at the time? Send them to the nuns or priests to pray on them. Or in Europe, at the same exact time, burn them as witches at the stake. Because this is a supernatural possession that's happening to them. Do you see what I'm saying? This is not what the Muslims understood. And where are they getting it from? Tadaww ya'ibadallah. Seek out treatments and observance of God. And lastly, number five, to seek help. This is part of the Prophet's sunnah, sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, it's himself. You already heard the hadith. But I'll tell you something very beautiful about the seerah. Now, sit-in-a'isha, I get to finally say a talk about her. That sit-in-a'isha radiallahu anha years and years after the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam passed away. She lived him for many, many years. And for years afterwards, people would come to her specifically for many things, one of which is medicine. And people were always so amazed by this. They would say, o'a'isha, we know that you are really good with your fiqh, your Islamic laws and legislation, because you lived with the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. You are an immense narrator of the hadith of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. So that makes sense. We know you're really good with lineages, which was very important at the time for the Arabs until today. It's one of our maqasid actually to the preservation of the lineage. And they would say, we know that that's the case because your father is Abu Bakr and he was very good at this, knowledge. So he passed it down to his daughter. But how is it that you're so good at medicine? And she would say, because when I would get sick, when the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam would get sick, all of the tribes of Arabia would try to send him different types of medicine. They all want to make sure that he's okay. So everyone is giving him, can you imagine, try this, try this, try this treatment, try this thing. So she was a witness to all of this. She said, I learned all of the different kinds of treatments that were available at her time. And so she learned medicine. And she learned from the Prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam himself to give people treatment when they were ill, not just simply to make du'at for them or pray for them. You do that, plus you take the medicine. And that's really important. And one such example that I'll give you is a special kind of soup or kind of a meal. You call it maybe a comfort food called talbina. The people know talbina. Some people still make it till today. Do you know what talbina is? It's barley. Yes, exactly. It's a you take barley flour and milk and honey and they would make it and they would give it to anybody who's feeling down. Having some anxiety or some down, you know, sadness. And when the people asked her about this why do you give talbina to these people? Because this was something she was doing. She said, I heard the Prophet Muhammad sallallahu wa alayhi wa sallam say, talbina helps the ailing heart cope and find rest. And it also relieves some sorrow and grief. SubhanAllah. Now to me, the talbina itself is an interesting thing. But what's more interesting is the fact that she actually learned from the Prophet to treat depression and anxiety and sorrow and difficulty with a physical substance. Not just merely prayer. Does that make sense? Does that make sense? It's really important to understand that they took things to help them as well. And in the generations after them, because in the book that we're writing we're looking at how do the in that hospital that I'm telling about the matastans what did they treat? They have the psychiatric wards. How did they treat those who were mentally ill? They had actual treatments for them including treatments that were medication based including treatments that were talk therapy. Yep, you just heard me right. Talk therapy. I'm not saying the Muslims created it. We still have to do more research to see if they were the first ever. But they were definitely some of the very first to work and to really help understand the benefit of something like talk therapy. That it's not just talking, talking, talking but it's actually learning techniques and tools to help you in healing. And the Muslims did this. And thirdly spiritual help. When you combine the three together, medications plus the therapy, plus the spiritual upliftment, you get a recipe for care and concern. Alhamdulillah, I can go into many, many more examples from our traditions subhanAllah in which the types of treatments that were used and the types of certain scholars and certain leaders of our historical past that actually were really at the forefront of all of this discussion on mental illness and I'm happy to share some of those things. I do want to give some time for the Q&A but Alhamdulillah, I'll conclude with this. We had our five kind of main examples of how the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam dealt with mental health. And in addition we'll say this in this, my closing kind of remark here is a call to action really for our community. And what is our call to action? That we have a tradition that literally teaches us that in addition to making du'a and making sure that we don't lose that connection with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and continuing with strong iman despite whatever difficulties and tribulations come our way, it is also a tradition that says get help when you need it. Please don't stand in the way of those who do need that help. And here I bear with a lot of humility say to our community please parents don't stand in the way of the children that need the help. Please husbands don't stand in the way of the wives that need the help. Please wives don't stand in the way of the husbands that need help. Please young people don't stand in the way of the elders that need the help. SubhanAllah at every level and I meet so many people that come and talk to me and afterwards and they approach and they say I know I need help or I know someone so needs help but I can't seem to move the needle and I ask why and they say shame or if they're young they'll say my parent is worried that I'm not going to get married or they'll say they don't want it on their insurance record or they'll say is it going to go on some other academic or job record or they'll say I'm not sure that I actually need this help in the first place my concern with all of these things is all of them have a solution none of them are you're not making any of them up all of them are real important things to consider but ultimately my concern is a decade later two decades later after you see the young people become older people you see what happens is the cycle perpetuates it just continues to perpetuate I know people from my generation that grew up when I was growing up here right and now they're my age and they have children Mashallah our children are teenagers now Subhanallah and as we see the cycles continue to perpetuate it's sad and you think Subhanallah had there been intervention earlier on what could have happened and we don't go back and say no because now we have to have a shaitan right the word if opens the door of shaitan so we're not going to say you know what if we got that help earlier but what we will say is today from today moving forward let's make sure that that help can happen that the healing can happen that we can break cycles of difficulty and cycles that will will perpetuate that unnecessarily don't need to perpetuate themselves and I say this to people and they're not always happy when I say it but I say I don't want your child or your family member 10 years from now to sit in my office and complain about you not because you did something but maybe it's the lack of doing something the lack of getting help when they needed the help the lack of being there when they needed it and more importantly than that is to stand in front of a law subhanallah and to be asked and be said I put you in a community and in a place in a situation where you had resources and you didn't take up the resources to get the help when needed are you upset with me that I said this some might be so forgive me subhanallah but it's really a year it's because of literally now Alhamdulillah I've been doing this work for a number of years and it's like a number of years worth of seeing kind of a pile up of what could be avoided by actually doing the thing that we're taught to do by our own prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam and our own tradition of getting the help clearly their matastans weren't empty they clearly would fill the people that needed the help and so they created the institutions they created the programming they created the treatments my friends, my sisters, my brothers they created this the earliest of these happened right after the time of the prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam he ordered the very first of them to be created and the standalone institutions actual brick and mortar institutions from as early as the 8th century psychiatric wards as early as the 8th century so are we somewhat convinced now inshallah I'll end with this let's remember inshallah that all of the prophets were sent to us as role models and examples and the prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam himself was the best example of holistic well-being balanced well-being balanced whether it's emotional mental, spiritual, intellectual, physical it is very much balanced together this is the tradition of our sunnah sallallahu alayhi wa sallam the prophets sallallahu alayhi wa sallam and that our muslim pioneers, our noble predecessors really pioneered in this field that we today call mental health and we hope inshallah that we'll have many from our communities going forward many of you inshallah who are in this pipeline of really contributing to something that I believe the muslims had a beautiful tradition and heritage of but somewhere along the way we seem to have lost the sense of that and it's time to revive it inshallah in the best way bridging of course the best of modern medicine but also understanding that we have a holistic methodology that differs than just the straight way you see psychiatry today it needs some fixing as well that holistic fixing that can come and lend from Islam so the two together I think can be something very powerful and I hope inshallah that prophetic example continues to live forward and that we're able to benefit not only the muslims but even all of humanity this is my dua all of humanity and I'll clarify thank you for much of the question I'll just repeat it so that everyone can hear it as well the question is what happens if the person who needs the help may be the head of the family the person who is leading the family if you will and and so are you saying they're not willing or you're worried about their ego it is I agree with you about the challenge part anytime we don't acknowledge in fact SubhanAllah in therapy one in this field one of the first things we tell people is in order to be able to start to move the needle one of the very first steps is acknowledgement and you can't really go anywhere without it if a person isn't willing to acknowledge that there is a problem or that there is help that's needed then you're right it's very hard to do so so what do you do first there's two points to this one has to do with the ego and what has to do with getting the help for someone who doesn't want to get the help I'll address the not getting the help first and then I'll talk about the ego part often I tell people look there's different approaches you can take for somebody who probably needs that help you can see the help is they need the help but they're not willing maybe they're not willing to listen to you but there may be somebody else that they're willing to listen to so I often say whose support can you leverage do they have a brother do they have a father and uncle even the imam somebody who that they respect and maybe that person when they say it to them they hear it differently they're saying the same things but they hear it differently from somebody else that they respect that they honor that they are able to leverage their support sometimes the issue is knowledge right they don't realize that there's actually something related even from within our dean that gives full permissibility for this and encourages this in fact right so maybe it's knowledge sometimes the issue has to do as you said with ego and this often is much more cultural than it is anything else but it's also the communities that we build because we cause that as in to say if they were communities that it's much more normative and you see this now in fact so many of the fellow people who are people who speak you know the sheikh and the sheikhs and the people who are Ustadh and Ustadh say to them I know that many of them are in therapy because we have private conversations but I say to them if you're willing and when you're willing and you feel it's the right time when you're on the microphone say even in the middle of the middle of a class you might say and when I'm in therapy because I people are like oh sheikh so and so is in therapy and what does it do it normalizes the conversation why it makes sense that they would be so much stress and burden so panel that carrying an entire community on their shoulders it makes sense they would be but somehow normalizing the conversation now you'll see especially for those who are on social media you'll see this you're talking about athletes, actors, entertainers whoever if everyone's talking about mental health and therapy it's like the new buzzword out there and for better or for worse it's starting to normalize the conversation a little bit so when a person does say a big shot person says and I go to therapy it's all like oh it's like oh yeah that makes sense they have a lot that they're dealing with it makes sense right so when we start to normalize this you start to break away some of the ego issues so it's really about a community we're in a community I'll tell you this much where I normally am on a Friday night is my own home community my own home nested where I live in California subhanallah and the rahmah foundation salamu alaykum to the sisters a lot of my halaka sisters are actually online because I normally am with them on a Friday night doing our halakas and this is in California and within the nested Hint hint to unity within the nested we literally have a therapy office and the reason and it's interesting people are like why because in the years that we've done this what I have found is that about half of our community literally will not send their children or themselves to go to therapy unless it's within somewhere they trust so they wouldn't go they wouldn't let their child go anywhere else unless it was literally inside of the nested because this is a safe space the other half of our community wanted nothing to do with the nested they wanted anything mental related to the nested they wanted it to be like an actual medical building so we have a medical clinic that's actually in an actual separate building and we needed that we needed the two pronged approach we were starting to utilize services by having these two different or multiple different kinds of models of service why do I say this the community that we created became one of mental health language you go into the MCC today which is my home message and you'll see that the conversations on mental health is very common yes okay maybe because I give halakas every week there but the reality is people started to talk the language of mental health and then you started to see the husbands, the fathers, the breadwinners start to come through and if they weren't willing at first you know what I do very often in therapy I do most of my work is with women with women a young and old they'll say my husband isn't willing my father isn't willing etc and I'll say how about we do one family session one family session and I don't mean to trick anybody it's actually very helpful for me to understand what's happening to the husband I need you to come to this one session because it helps me you get to complain you get to tell me what's happening from your point of view they're like oh I can complain about my wife excellent I'll be there but anyhow they'll come and they'll come to the session and what it does it gives me a sense of what's happening in the background but more importantly and maybe as equally importantly it breaks the ice you fear the unknown what's happening is but when they're there they're kind of like oh is this it this is okay actually I think I could benefit from this I have so many husbands after that session say I think I can benefit from this that we refer them for their own session as well hopefully one of these aspects work inshallah there's a brother here then we can come back inshallah thank you for that courageousness inshallah yeah that's a great question I think it does in ahead of time okay yes yes this is true and I also agree with the idea that we wait sometimes until it's I don't want to say too late but it's late in the game right so a couple of ideas I do know that there is a group in Michigan or there's a group of mental health providers that are together I don't have anyone's here from that group in Michigan anyone here from our Michigan Muslim mental health group there is a group inshallah they're the resources that are part of the Michigan community so basically Metro Detroit or just all of Michigan who are the therapists who are the resources and I'm leaving here some information both the pens for you guys and the bookmarks but on Madison's website this is the nonprofit that I've helped found on the resources tab of our website we actually have listed the different directories that have on it we don't know everybody there but we know that they're all Muslims so we've gathered together as many Muslim professionals across the U.S. as we could find and so you'll find actually a list specifically from Michigan on there and I hope inshallah that's useful so that's providers and then in addition to that there's also the kind of resources that are just how do you keep up with mental well-being so one of the things I'd like to actually invite you all to do is if you're part of our mailing list one of the things you'll find is we do every month a mental wellness healing circle or learning circle and there are about topics on mental health so this month for example is actually yesterday or the day before we actually had one on men's mental health Muslim men's mental health it was actually specifically for that June is related to men's mental health so that was the topic but you can find the reporting on our YouTube channel and then sometimes when there's a crisis that happens like across the ummah we'll actually do a healing circle and so those are helpful too because it's just the moment of like being able to tap into we've done one just recently for Sudan prior to that to the earthquakes in Turkey and Syria and so on and so forth whenever there's a crisis in the ummah and there's many of those that happen as well so hopefully those resources can just jump start being able to tap into something consistently that helps with some of the mental health and well-being of course still good we're done we're done inshallah because of maghrib