 So, um, I wanted to give a little bit of history about how this talk came about, titled Raising Children with Being in Dunya. And the way it came about is when I had my first son in 1997. So I have three boys, masha'Allah. My eldest was born in 1997, my middle one in 1999, and my youngest who's here with me today, sitting here in the front row, masha'Allah, was born in 2004. At that time I felt really overwhelmed with the idea of raising Muslim children at the, you know, end of the 20th century in Southern, in Northern California, and I wanted guidance. And I was looking, I do what I always do when I'm looking for guidance. I go to the library. I start looking up books. I start researching where I can find material to read to teach me what I need to know. And I actually found I couldn't find much material about raising Muslim children. There were some classical Arabic texts that had been translated that relied on a lot of Hadith and ayahs from the Quran. But nothing really about raising children in the West in the time period that we're living in. So what I started doing was I started asking parents that really, really impressed me, parents who seem to have very good relationships with their children. And then young people who I was really impressed with the way they had grown up to be, I would just stop them and ask them and just give, do these little on-the-spot interviews, like, tell me what you did. Tell me what your parents did with you. Give me some tips. If you had one piece of advice to give a young mom, what would you give? What's the biggest thing you learned? What's a mistake you made that you, you know, want to warn others about what's something you found to be the most helpful? So I would ask aunties. I would ask uncles. I would ask young people. So over time, what happened was as I was gathering this information organically, I started noticing that there were 10 themes that began emerging. Like there was a whole spectrum of advice that was being given, but for the most part, consistently 10 of the same tips or pieces of advice, if you will, kept coming up again and again. And then at one point, a family friend of ours who was an editor of a Muslim newspaper for one of the largest mosques in Southern California, asked me if I would be willing to write a parenting article. And I thought, you know what, this is a perfect opportunity for me to get down all that advice that I've been gathering over the years and put it in an article form. And so it took me around six months to write that article. It got published in our, that Muslim youth letter. And then Chef Faraz Rabani from Seekers Guidance, he saw it. He asked me if he could post it on his website. And of course, I was very honored and flattered. And I said, yes. But Alhamdulillah, from there, that article went viral. It's gone all over the world. It's been translated into Dutch. It's been translated into Arabic. It was written back in 2010. And much like even now, every month, I have people reaching out from someplace in the world. In the world, I had somebody write to me from the Maldives. I had somebody write to me from Portugal. Mashallah, some parents everywhere saying that Alhamdulillah, Alhamdulillah, they found benefit in it. So I'm praying that Allah SWT accepts this work from us. And that, inshallah, we can all continue to benefit. I'm still learning every single day. And it's an honor to be able to share with you what I've learned in this journey. So going right to it. So the 10 tips that I wrote up, it's, I put them in order of what was the most common piece of advice that was given, and then going all the way down to what was as less frequent, but still keep in mind these were the top 10 pieces of advice that were given. So the number one thing that these parents told me that you need to raise, oh, and by the way, just backing up a little bit. What was it that impressed me about these kids that made me want to know how to raise my own children to be like them? So when I talk about raising children with Deen and Dunya, I don't want anyone to be confused in thinking that somehow Deen and Dunya are the same level. They're absolutely not. Deen is primary importance. It's our top priority. But when I say raising children with Deen and Dunya, what I meant was I used to think that it was binary, that either you were going to be religious and practicing and completely into your Deen, but Dunya was kind of on the back burner. Maybe we weren't really excelling in school or excelling in the workforce, or I would see people who were doing really well in the Dunya, earning tons of money, going to the top schools. But Deen was on the back burner. Prayer was hit or miss. It wasn't a big priority for people's lives. So I thought that that's kind of how you have to choose which way you're going to go. But with these people, what I saw is that not only were they unapologetic Muslims and proud of who they were and had complete faith in their religion, but also they were excelling in school and sports, in the workforce, in their careers. So keeping that in mind, that was the whole model that I used to think of. So the number one piece of advice these people gave me is Dua, Dua, Dua. Every single parent said that none of this is from us. This is from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. We have nothing to do with this. It's a mercy and we're grateful and we just pray for Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to guide our children and we are very, very fortunate that he blessed us by answering our Duas. Now, it's very natural for a lot of people, including myself, when we hear that advice to be like, okay, okay, fine, yeah, Dua. Yeah, we all know we need to do Dua, but really give me the real meat and potatoes. What actually do I need to be doing? If that's our reaction, we really need to pause and kind of step back and self-reflect and realize that if we think there's anything we can do to grant our children success in being in dunya from ourselves, that we're actually misguided in believing that. And so first we have to completely reorient ourselves and realize that this parenting journey is just an opportunity for us to grow closer to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. When we say that parenting is a jihad, that's what it means. It's a struggle and we're constantly calling upon Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and it's just a blessing in that it's an opportunity to constantly be talking to him and growing in our own relationship. So Dua. And so what does that entail? So these parents told me that any time there was something they needed for their children, something they wanted, they would pray salatul haja, a prayer of need. They would get up in the middle of the night and whether it was wanting a clear health report or whether it was wanting their children to get into universities or whether it was wanting their children to find the right spouse praying for them by doing salatul haja to our gods. And the Dua, you can find that online, the prayer of need. Anytime they had to make a big decision about their children, they would do salatul astaghada, the prayer of guidance. Anytime they saw a blessing emerge in their children's lives, their Dua's being answered, they would be quick to do salatul shukr, the prayer of gratitude. And keep in mind their children saw this. Their children saw that the way the parents respond is by constantly turning to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. Something good happens, salatul shukr. Need something? Salatul haja. Not sure what to do is salatul astaghada. That's what the kids grew up seeing their parents doing and then by default, that's what they came back to when it was their time to live their lives and make their decisions and call on Allah for what they needed. These parents told me that they had tried to have a vision for what kind of Muslim adult they wanted their children to eventually grow up to be. So they tried to have like a plan, a roadmap, and then they would look at what they needed to bring into their children's lives to facilitate that success and what they needed to remove from their lives that was holding them back. They prayed for their children to have khusmal khadima, a beautiful ending. They prayed for their children to always have halal incomes to not be falling into the haram by mistake. They prayed for their children's protection. From a very young age, they prayed for their children to grow up to have pious, loving, beautiful spouses who would be their partners in this life and the next. So just constantly calling on Allah swt and praying for everything that they had. Okay, so the second tip these parents told me is that sohbah, your sohbah, your companionship will make you or break you. So who your friends are, who your community is, who you choose to surround yourself with. And so they would do dua for their children to have really good friends who would be a good influence on them. But what was interesting about these parents is it's very natural for us to think that when we're being told to worry about who our sohbah is for our children that we automatically think, oh, we have to have good friends for our kids. But that's not the only thing these parents were talking about. They were also talking about who their friends were, who their community was. And so many of these parents told me that they changed their friends if they realized that their friends were not necessarily the type of adults they wanted their kids to grow up to be. Or they noticed that, yeah, my friends are really fun to party with and have fun with, but they're not necessarily reinforcing the values and the morals that we want to teach our children. Then parents decided that they had to change their own social circles. It's really easy to think that we can tell our kids, don't do what auntie and uncle does, don't do what their kids do. We're different. But my mom always told us that don't assume that you're better than your friends. You are who your friends are. And so keep that in mind. It'll keep you humble and it'll inshallah keep you from becoming arrogant because it's really easy to think that we can rise above everything that's going on around us. But the truth is our friends have the ability to elevate us or they have the ability to drag us down. And so pray for good friends. Pray for like-minded people who will be relatable, will be relevant to your children. And your kids inshallah will be able to hear things and hear advice from other elders in their lives that they may not necessarily be able to hear from you. So these parents also told us that they didn't just let peers raise peers. It's really easy to think that our kids just need to hang around with kids their own ages. But one thing I realized, I wrote this article in 2010, at the time my own children were still pretty young. Some things I've learned since then that are not included in the article, so I share it in the talks. One thing that I realized as I was raising my sons is the importance of mentorship. Do not underestimate the value of good mentorship. So these people are there in your communities. You have to keep your radars up for them. You have to keep your eyes out for them. So we're talking for young men. There'll be, so if you're raising teenage boys, there'll be young men in the community. Maybe young dads. Maybe newlyweds or in their 20s. Maybe college graduates. People who are a few years ahead of your sons who you see at the Masjid. You see that they have a good family life. You see that they have their priorities in order. They're getting married young. They're family oriented. So these are people that you want to, maybe they lead Halakas in your community and they play sports with the boys. So you encourage your sons to hang around with them, spend time with them, go out for coffee with them, go to amusement parks, play sports. For the girls, you look at Bajis, right? Older sisters or young aunties in the community who lead Halakas are involved in the community. You have to facilitate these friendships. Kids should not just be hanging out with kids only their own ages. They should have people of different ages in their lives. Young people that they can, inshallah, be mentoring and then older people who are mentoring them as well. One thing that we always told our children is don't think that, no, one thing we told our children is that in every relationship, you're either influencing the other person or the other person is influencing you. That's it. There's no third option. It's never neutral. You're either influencing the other person or the other person is influencing you. And so we have to kind of take stock of our situation and look at ourselves and think, okay, is the effect of this person on me positive? Is it bringing me closer to Allah, or is it me taking farther away? Right? And I always quoted of this. I heard this, but I've heard later from other people that it's based on a hadith. I haven't found the hadith myself, so I'm not quoting it directly, but I definitely want to give credit if it is a hadith, inshallah, that on the day of judgment, you'll be standing with those who you love to choose your friends wisely. Right? So that's something we always talk to our kids about, that inshallah, these friendships that we're making, they're not just for this world. Inshallah, we want to be friends with these people in the next life as well. And we want to have each other's company. One thing I saw in many homes that I was very impressed with the young people, it was the presence of grandparents. Having grandparents in the home also, as long as inshallah, the relationship and the family between the parents and the elders and the young people was functional, it wasn't toxic, like if there weren't really horrible toxic in law issues going on, if it was a functional, healthy relationship in the home where people respected their elders, the elders respected the young people's boundaries and space. Mashallah, kids grew up to have beautiful others. And I think that comes from having to care about somebody else's needs other than your own, because living here in the West, in America, we get to focus on ourselves so much. We don't really have to worry about other people in the home. It's all about my schedule, what I need to do, my goals, my priorities. But the moment you have grandparents in the home, you have somebody else to think about, right? Whether it's helping an elder to the restroom or helping them to the dining table or making sure they get served first. Or when your friends come over, making sure you're introducing them to your grandparents, you automatically start learning good at them. And my father is one of 10 children, Mashallah. And for a long time, it was just our family and my dad's younger brother's family in Southern California. Now Mashallah, pretty much all my aunts and uncles and their families from Pakistan have moved to America. But for the longest time, it was just the two of us. And to this day, in my entire family, Mashallah, we're 37 cousins. I see that the cousins who grew up with my grandparents, their level of adab and their level of service is off the charts compared to those of us who grew up in Southern California without grandparents around. And it came from having elders that they had to look out for and serve. So there is a sheikh in Northern California. I'm a sheikh on Aoudin, but he said something that always stayed with me. He said there's three people. They're sorry, there's three areas where your children are constantly being influenced. Three areas. They're being influenced in the street. So that means their social life, wherever their friends are. So they're being influenced in the street. They're being influenced in the school. And they're being influenced in the home. Street, school and home. And he said, you have to be winning in two out of three of those areas. So two out of three, you should be the primary influence. And a great book that I want to recommend to parents that they consider getting from the library or ordering from Amazon or getting from a bookstore is a book called Hold On to Your Kids. Why parents need to matter more than peers. Hold on to your kids. Why parents need to matter more than peers. It's written by a man named Gabor Mate. His last name is spelled mate, M-A-T-E. Excellent, excellent book. It changed the way my sister and I parented our kids. And many people who read that book said it changed the way they parented their kids and they've only seen benefit from it. So, inshallah, I hope everyone finds benefit in that book. So that book will teach you how to be the primary influence in your kids' lives, inshallah. Okay, and then the one quote that always stayed with me is a Sheikh Nuhamin Keller said that there's nothing worse than a stingy Muslim. But the one thing you should be stingy with is your time. You shouldn't be giving your time to everybody. So that was something that we told our kids as they were growing up, is to be mindful who they're giving their time to and how much of them they're giving away. Because time is something that is constantly decreasing, right? But it's increasing in value. So, all right. So, du'in du'a, and then du'in du'a for really good sahbah, really good companionship. So the third tip. Who could possibly be the best companion? So these parents told us that the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, was a living, breathing reality in their children's lives. The Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, was somebody who was relevant and he was somebody who was real to their children. He wasn't somebody just relegated to the Sunday school or took to the history books or to Friday hookahs. He was somebody that was constantly referenced and mentioned and the kids grew up knowing who the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam was. It's kind of like if you have a grandparent, like for example, my mother's father, he passed away before my parents even got married. So I never knew my Nana, my maternal grandfather. However, growing up, my mom always talked about him and she always quoted him and mentioned him and referenced him. And when we would get good grades, she would tell us, you know, Baba, if he was alive, your Nana would be so proud of you. Baba loved children who used to study hard. And so we would get excited and happy thinking that if our Nana was alive, he'd be proud of our accomplishments. So just like you talk about a grandparent who may not be around, you talk about the Prophet, salallahu alayhi wa sallam, the same way. You remind the children that it's only a temporary separation, that inshallah they are going to see him one day and they are going to meet him. And he had goals for us and he had advice for us and that's what we're trying to follow in our lives. And my sister, when her son was seven years old, Mashallah, he's an 18, 19 year old, half is now Mashallah, the exceptional young man. Mashallah, I remember one time when I was visiting her, I saw a book sitting next to Mustafa's bed. It was a yellow cover and it said shema'il on it, S-H-A-M-A-I-L, it's still available. It's on, you can get it on Amazon. It's called shema'il, the life of perfection. Shema'il, the life of perfection. It's a yellow cover. And I think there's other shema'il books out there now, but this was the one that she had at that time and it was sitting next to Mustafa's bed and I asked my sister, I go, what's this? And she said, oh, that, oh, that's just a collection of hadith describing the characteristics of the Prophet, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. And every night before Mustafa goes to bed, his father, my brother-in-law Masud, she said, every night before Mustafa goes to bed, Masud reads him just one hadith, just one. No big lecture, no long discussion. Just before Mustafa goes to sleep, he reads him one hadith, a description of the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. And she said, for Mustafa, knowing that the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam liked to eat cucumbers and dates together makes him feel like he knows the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. And you can't love somebody until you know them. So it's important that our children know who the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam was and what he wanted for us. And so, parents can sometimes get overwhelmed thinking, well, how do I teach about the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam? Well, that's how you do it. You do it organically. You drop in the teaching moments every opportunity they come. So for example, I knew of a mom who, on Fridays, she would tell the children, you know, it's Juma. And the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, his favorite color was green. Let's wear green clothes today. Which green clothes do you want to wear? Or she would tell them, you know, the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, he loved squash. So after Juma, let's make pumpkin muffins because the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam loves squash. Or if a three-year-old or a four-year-old is having tantrum, oh, you're upset right now? You know what the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam told us to do when we're upset? He told us to drink water. So let me give you a glass of water to help you feel better. Or you're still upset? Well, guess what? The Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam said to sit down when we're angry. Still feeling angry? Well, then guess what he told us to do? He said to lie down. Why don't you lie down and see if that helps you feel better? So bringing up his advice and making it relevant and showing how we can actually apply it in today's day and age. These parents studied the Sita regularly with their children. Mashallah, we're very fortunate. There's many different Sita books out there now. At our homeschooling co-op entry, every single year, the children went through a different Sita book. They learned about the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam's life and the key events that happened. They learned about what he went through at Thayeef and how he turned to Allah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. They learned about his beautiful Dua when he was at the lowest point in his life, when everything seemed to be going wrong, quote unquote. And he turned to Allah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. He said, as long as you're not upset with me, I can take it, paraphrasing, of course. But he basically said, as long as you're not upset with me, I will take anything that you're sending my way. I just want to make sure you're not angry with me. And so the children learned that when things are going wrong in their lives, how are they supposed to respond to that? And so you learned that from studying his Sita. By the way, that book, Shema'il, The Life of Perfection, that's a ninth century text by Imam Thermini, which has been translated into English. And the one that I told you, The Life of Perfection, that was done specifically for children. It was done by Iqraboqs out of Chicago. May Allah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam reward the Ghazi family. They produced a lot of wonderful literature for children in America in the West. So when our children were little, when they were like preschool, four years old, five years old, that age, we asked Imam Zaid Shaker, what should we be teaching our children? And Imam Zaid said very quickly, without even hesitating, he said, teach your children Sita and teach them Nashid. Teach them Sita and teach them Nashid. Sita is biography of the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam and teach them Nashid. Nashids are songs that are sung in praise of the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. When children are little, that is how they learn. They learn through stories. They learn through singing, right? And a Nashid artist that I want to share with you that many people may not know about. When my children were little, we had the O'Dwarn's VLE and we had Yusuf Islam. Mashallah, may Allah Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam reward them for the material they provided to the Imam and the benefit they brought to us. Now, Mashallah, there are many, many Nashid artists on the scene. And this is one Nashid artist. You can find his videos on YouTube. He sings acapella, meaning without musical instruments. He was part of a choir in England. So when he was a young boy, so he's professionally trained. He has a beautiful voice and he's also an Alem. So he's a scholar, Mashallah. His name, he sings under the name Talib Al Habib. Talib Al Habib. T-A-L-I-B. Space. A-L. Space. H-A-B-I-B. Talib Al Habib. And he has a song called Articles of Faith, which I didn't even realize. My kids used to listen to it. They used to sing it. And then one day in Islamic studies, when they were being taught the Articles of Faith, they just started singing this Nashid. They already knew what the Articles of Faith were, the six things that every Muslim needs to believe in order to be a Muslim, right? They already knew it because of the song and we have no idea. He has a song called Songs of Innocence, which I love. It's his song to his children. It's all the du'as that a father would have for his child. It's kind of like a lullaby. It's beautiful. So, yeah, so you can find him on YouTube. Now, it's really important to teach our children to fear Allah swt and also to love him. But first in the early years, the entire focus should be teaching on teaching our children to love Allah swt. And there's nobody who loved Allah swt more than the prophets. Many of us, we get it reversed and we think that we need to teach our children to do things because they're scared, right? If you don't do that, Allah is going to be mad at you. If you don't do that, Allah is going to punish you. If you don't do that, the angels are going to write down all your bad deeds. Or if you do do that bad thing, the angels are going to write down all your bad deeds. So we're constantly kind of coming down in a heavy way down on our children. But actually what really, inshallah, tends to work from what I've seen is teaching our children to come to Allah swt purely out of love because they love him and they want to please him. And they want to please the prophets and Allah swt. And an example I'll give you is about an eight-year-old boy who actually, I actually happened to witness this. The mother got up for fudger prayer and she was late. She overslept and she only had a few minutes left for fudger prayer. And so when she got up, she decided, I'm just going to take care of my own fudger prayer. I'm not going to wake up my son because it takes a little bit of effort to get an eight-year-old out of bed. And so she prayed her fudger. And later, when the eight-year-old woke up and he realized that he had slept through fudger, that he missed fudger prayer, he burst into tears. He was really upset. Eight years old, crying that he missed fudger. And the people who were present at that time, her in-laws were visiting, they were horrified. They were like, what have you been teaching this boy? Like, does he think Allah's going to punish him? Does he think he's going to burn in hell? Why is an eight-year-old crying because he missed fudger? Like, they didn't see it as a positive thing. They thought like this kid's being traumatized, right? And so they asked the boy, they asked him, why are you crying? And it turned out, when he explained, he was crying because he knew it was the last thing that the Prophet Salaam spoke about before he passed away. But the last thing he emphasized was the importance of prayer. And so this boy had internalized that message, that if it was that important that the Prophet Salaam was talking about it right before he passed away, then prayer is very important. And he was really upset that he had missed it. Obviously he was consoled and he was reassured that it was okay and Allah will forgive him, inshallah. But that's what love does, right? That's what love produces, is wanting to do things because you love somebody. And I had a sheikh once tell us, because so many of us are like, I'll just do the bare minimum, right? Like whatever I have to do is what I'll do because that's what's required. But he said something beautiful. He said, if you've got two people sitting in front of a king and you've got one person sitting in front of the king because the king decided to forgive him, right? This guy's a criminal, but the king has decided to forgive him. And the king has one person sitting next to him because he's his best friend, because he loves him. What a difference between both of them, right? They're in the presence of the king. We all want to be in the presence of the king. But what a difference between the one who's just forgiven because the king had mercy and one who's sitting with the king because the king actually loves him. So teaching the children that, that we want to be with Allah, inshallah, yes, because we're forgiven, but ideally because Allah actually really loves us. So these parents told me they did not minimize any sunnah. One father told me that he put up cards all around the house. So he had a card on the table that had the du'a written in English for starting the meal and ending the meal. He had the card on the bathroom door for entering the bathroom and leaving the bathroom written in English because we don't want to disrespect Arabic, especially in the restroom. He had a card by the entrance door to the house for leaving the house, entering the house. Three-year-olds, while getting strapped into their car seats, were able to recite the du'a for traveling. So these parents didn't minimize any sunnah. They made it a habit for these children to get into of doing du'a for every act that the Prophet ﷺ recommended that they do a du'a for. Um, let's see if there's anything else under. Yeah, so that's tip number three. Okay, tip number four. By the way, if anybody wants to read the article, it is on the seeker's guidance website. It's also on my website. If anybody want all of my articles are there, the my website is pina.km.com. H-I-N-A, which is my name, and then K-M for Khan Mughlar. So hina.km.com. All the articles are there, and this one is there as well. So the fourth tip is I wrote it up in the article as having fun wasn't haram in our home, but we made the home environment as halal as possible, which if you were going to shrink that down to a much shorter sentence, basically it's beware of the dangers of don't. Always telling your children don't. Don't do this, don't do that. We're not allowed to do this. We're not allowed to do that. That's haram, that's haram, that's haram. Beware of teaching your children Islam that way by constantly telling them what they can't do. We need to be creative and actually flip it and make it about what we can do. So we have a female scholar, so we have a female scholar, one piece of advice she gave that really, I found a lot of benefit in it, is she said for every haram that you stop your children from, give them two halals that they can enjoy. For every haram that you stop your children from, give them two halals that they can enjoy. So that requires parents to be very creative. We have to be very creative. We can't just be on autopilot, especially in the younger years. When the kids are teenagers and they're getting older, yeah, they just need to not do things because Allah says no. And that's it. They need to know that and accept it and inshallah they will. But in the younger years, when kids really don't understand the nuances and all they know is that they're being kept from fun, quote unquote, then it's important that we create fun for them. So for example, I, in my community where we raised our children, we took the position that we don't celebrate Halloween. That was what our community did. We did not celebrate Halloween. We taught our children, we taught our children not to judge other kids and other families who do celebrate Halloween, but we as a community did not. But what we did do is we had a really fun festival called November's Eve that we did every October 31st. And I have a friend who was a ranch. And on her ranch, we used to do a bonfire. We used to hire a storyteller who didn't tell scary stories. We used to sing the sheets. We had people play the duff. We had treats. We had hot chocolate. We had face painting, but we didn't do any kind of morbid, you know, foolish face painting. We had pony rides. We did not call it Halloween. We and when my son was older, we homeschooled our children up until eighth grade. My eldest son, when he was in public high school, I asked him because, you know, now he had friends who celebrated Halloween. And I asked him, do you ever feel like you missed out? Do you ever feel like you missed out on a big part of like American culture or a big right of childhood that we didn't allow you to do by not having Halloween? And I remember he stopped and he thought about it and he said, you know, if we didn't have November's Eve, then yeah, maybe I would have felt that way. But because I always had somewhere to go on October 31st and I always had something fun to look forward to in that evening, it never really bothered me. When kids in the neighborhood would say, what are you going to do? What are you dressing up as? Where are you going to trick or treat? I would just say, oh, I have a party that I'm going to, a big festival I'm going to on a ranch. And so, you know, when kids are younger, they're not looking to proselytize. They're not looking to teach people about their religion. They're not looking to lecture or to explain. They just want to fit in. And if they can just say, yeah, I'm doing something cool too, that's good enough. But to put young children in the position of always having to explain why they can't do X, Y, and Z, it's a lot, it's a lot task of kids. And for some children, it can cause them to be bitter. And it can cause them to do the opposite when they're older with their own children. Like I know parents who let their kids do everything. Now as adults, these people allow their children to do everything because they feel their parents were too strict with them when they were younger. So you don't want to have that opposite effect, right? You want something that, inshallah, when your children grow up, they can recreate and do with their own children, inshallah. Okay, I personally have no opinion on birthday parties. So I'm not passing a fucklun or do I have any right to do that? But I'm just letting you know there's some people who don't celebrate birthdays, totally fine. I know a mom who did not celebrate birthdays. However, she threw the most elaborate parties every time her kids took on or accomplished something in the Dean. So when her kids memorized jazama, the 30th chapter of the Quran, she threw this lavish party in the park. She had twin children. She had two different cakes. She had entertainment as party favors. We all got bookbarks with a quote on there about the importance of memorizing Quran. To this day, my kids remember that party, right? And then when her kids memorized the 29th jaz, they came home from school and found that their bedrooms had been decorated while they were gone. And there were balloons and streamers and they had all piles of gifts on their beds. So no, they didn't have birthday parties, but they did have these kinds of parties. So the kids didn't feel like they missed out, right? And they felt like they were actually celebrating real accomplishments. I know moms who know they don't do annual birthday parties, but on their children's 7th birthday party, they would have a Salah party. So they did have a birthday party, but the whole focus was, now this child is seven years old and is going to be taking on prayer. This is so exciting. And I have a whole article that I wrote about that, about how to get children, inshallah, into prayer. So I won't go into the details of it, but the details of the party are in that article if anyone wants to read about how to throw a Salah party. I know moms who've thrown really great hijab parties when their daughters hit puberty and started their menstrual cycle. They threw a party where everybody gifted the daughter a hijab and they had hijab tutorials and the girls were given modest clothing. And it was a rite of passage into womanhood, a rite of passage into womanhood that the young girls remember. So, yeah, so having fun wasn't hadam in our home, but we made the environment as halal as possible. So they didn't say no to fun. They were just creative in what kind of fun they had. And under the category of making the home environment as halal as possible, one thing I do want to emphasize, I'm not going to go into the details of it. This is a whole other lecture that can be given. I'm just one thing. If parents don't take anything from this talk, other than the importance of dua and this, it will have been more than enough. And this thing that I want to emphasize is these parents never left their children alone with the internet. Never left their children alone with the internet. They treated the internet like it was a loaded weapon. How do you treat a loaded weapon? You keep it under lock and key. You never leave children alone with it. You always know where it is. You always know who has access to it. You educate your children how to use it so that if they are with it alone, they know exactly what to deal. How to deal. Not going to go into the details, but I will say that they never left their children alone with the internet. So we're talking up to like age 13 and it can be done. You may be the crazy parent, but it can be done. So children should not have internet-enabled devices in their bedrooms. They should not be charging their phones in their rooms next to their bed. They should not be using their phones as their alarm clocks. Again, I'm talking about young ages. And yeah, that's all I'll say about that right now. Okay. All right. The fifth tip these parents gave me is is our parents didn't just talk the talk, they walked the walk. Our parents didn't just talk the talk, they walked the walk. What does that mean? That means they practiced what they preached. That means they weren't hypocrites. Nobody sniffs out hypocrisy quicker than a child. Telling your child that we don't tell lies and then they hear you on the phone lying to a friend about why you can't come to their dinner party. Kids notice that. Even if they don't say anything, they notice that. And kids are like sponges. They soak in everything around them and then when they're squeezed, whatever's in them is what comes out. So I know of a young man who told me that he remembers his father once weeping when he missed a prayer by mistake. Something happened and the prayer time went out and the father realized he missed prayer and his father wept. He said that did more for me about the importance of prayer than all the lectures of the world. Spirituality has to be modeled. It's not lectured. It's modeled and the kids see it in us in Sheldon. I know of a young person who told me that their father would take them to Disneyland but he would stop and pray in the middle of Disneyland when prayer time came in. He would find a spot and he would do his prayer. And so the kids saw the importance of prayer, that yes, you can have fun in the dunya. You can enjoy the dunya but you don't give up the real priorities in the dunya which is working towards our achara. How you pray is just as important as teaching the children to pray. So yeah, we can teach our kids how to pray and what the rules are, the thick rules are, the timings are, all that. We can teach our kids that. But do we rush through our prayers? Do we take our time with our soju, our prostrations? Do we drag our feet when it's time to pray? Do we worry if we ever miss a prayer or prayer time's about to go out? That teaches our children a lot about prayer as well, not just teaching them to pray. Really important to show your children that Islam worked. Islam worked in the home. If kids grow up learning that they're Muslims and that Islam's the only way and that our religion is the correct religion, but they see that Islam did nothing to benefit them in their whole lives, they see that their parents... So I'm going to flip it and make it positive. So children should see that Islam is the reason the parents speak to each other with respect. They should see that Islam is the reason that the home is nice and tidy and kept clean. They should see that Islam is the reason that parents, even when they're upset with their relatives for bad behavior, still don't break off relations, still maintain ties with their siblings and their relatives. They should see that Islam is the reason we don't litter. Islam is the reason we smell good. Islam is the reason we're good citizens. Islam is the reason we obey laws. Islam is the reason we pay our bills on time and we make sure we don't cheat anyone. So when children see that Islam gives you a dignified life, they're going to want to hold on to it because they're going to see that it works. But if they see that Islam didn't benefit, then it's very easy that when your children leave your home, that Islam leaves with them. So God forbid. These parents who talk the talk, didn't just walk the walk, they also, their children tell me that these parents were willing to acknowledge their mistakes. They were willing to apologize. There's so many parents out there who won't apologize to their kids when they make a mistake because they think it shows weakness. No, when you apologize to your children, you're modeling for them how to attain forgiveness, not only from each other, but from Allah SWT as well. And no child should be going to sleep crying, wetting their pillows with tears at night, thinking their parents are upset with them at the end of the day, no matter how badly things have gone. Reassure your children that they are loved. Reassure them that tomorrow is a fresh start and that we all have second chances and that we all have an opportunity to attain forgiveness, not only from each other, but from Allah SWT as well. These parents didn't assume that they were perfect. They didn't assume that their children didn't notice them making mistakes. So even if a parent drove through a red light by mistake or on purpose, whatever, if they drove through a red light, they would turn to their children and say that was wrong. I shouldn't have done that. I pray for me never to do that again and we need to thank Allah that nobody got hurt because I broke the law. And as Muslims we follow the laws. Talking to the children without lecturing them and using ourselves as examples. Ansid Tamar Gray, who's a female scholar, she said something really interesting. She said that in Islam, you're supposed to give charity with your right hand in a way that your left hand doesn't find out. But she said, but when it comes to your children, you give with your right hand, but with your left hand, you pull your child forward and say, look, look at what I'm doing. You want your children to learn, right? From what you're doing. So we're about to go on vacation. We want to listen to Allah to protect us. We're going to give charity. Look, I'm giving charity to this organization because asking Allah to protect us while we're on vacation. Or we're so grateful for this blessing that came in our lives. Okay, let's give a donation to have a well-built dug in Africa or wherever, letting our children know that what we're doing. So that they can one day know that that's what they're supposed to do. Insha'Allah. And how we talk about things also has a big impact on our children. So when my children were little, I remember a friend and I were working on a project once. And we were busy working and Makhrib time was coming in. And without really thinking about how I was saying it, I said to her, Oh, you know what? I need to go get Makhrib out of the way. Let me go get Makhrib out of the way. And she looked a little startled. And she just stopped. And then she smiled at me. She said, Oh, that's interesting. She said, In our family, we say we have to go get Makhrib in the way. What a difference one word makes. I have to go get Makhrib out of the way. I have to go get Makhrib in the way. So different. The attitude is so different towards prayer. And that's what the kids are here when we talk, right? And or do we say, Oh man, Namas and Namar Jal, right? Namas and Namar Jal. No, that's not the way to talk about prayer. Like, I want to go talk to my Lord. Let me go spend time with him. So keep that in mind. All right. The sixth tip these parents gave me, they said, I wasn't afraid to be the bad guy, but I didn't behave badly. I wasn't afraid to be the bad guy, but I didn't behave badly. That means that these parents were not afraid to set limits. They were not afraid to say no when no needed to be said, but they did it kindly and they did it with love and they did it with compassion, you know, trying to understand where their kids are coming from, why their kids might be wanting something that's important to them. But if you as a parent have decided this is not the right thing for X, Y and Z reasons, explaining it with compassion. And so there's three different types of parenting out there. There's permissive parenting, which is also called jellyfish parenting, which is where you don't have a spine where you'll hear like parents will be like, honey, don't do that. Please don't do that. If you do that one more time, we're going to leave. We're going to leave. We're not going to stay here. You're having fun, but we're going to leave. If you keep doing that, you did it. What do I do with this child? Not getting up and leaving, right? What you've been telling the child you're going to do, just being like, oh, what do I do? This kid never listens to me. That's permissive parenting, jellyfish parenting. The second type of parenting is authoritarian parenting, which is also called brick wall parenting, which is it's my way or the highway. If you don't do what I say, you're going to see back in my hand, you're going to get smacked. Nobody's feelings or opinions matter, except for mine. Only my rules count, right? That's authoritarian parenting, just like why? Because I said so. That's it all the time. That's all the kids here, right? I'm not even going to hear what you have to say on the matter. And then the third type of parenting which is considered to be the best type of parenting is called authoritative parenting, and that's called backbone parenting. So we've got jellyfish parenting which is spineless. We've got brick wall parenting which is just stubborn and obstinate. And then we've got backbone parenting, authoritative parenting. And that's where you say what you mean and you mean what you say. And the children respect you even if they don't understand all the time why you've made the decisions you've made. They respect you and your judgment. And a great book that can teach you about authoritative parenting is a book I recommend every single book by this author. His name is Leonard Sacks, S-A-X. Just go through all his books, inshallah, he's excellent. Leonard Sacks, S-A-X. And if the Muslim ever wants to invite him to give talks here, I highly recommend you get him. His book is now a New York Times bestselling book. So he's a little pricier than he used to be. I think the charges may be 5,000 to come out. But we've had him come out in Northern California. He's really worth listening to. Dr. Leonard Sacks, this book is called The Collapse of Parenting. The Collapse of Parenting. If you have boys, I highly recommend you read a book called, by him, called Boys Adrift. Boys Adrift. My husband and I found that book to be very eye-opening. He has a book about girls called Girls on the Edge, which is very frightening to read, but Girls on the Edge. And he has a book called White Gender Matters, which argues for all girls' education, all boys' education. He is so, inshallah, he's so impressive. So I highly recommend his books. The Collapse of Parenting. So an example I think about parents who aren't afraid to be the bad guy but didn't behave badly. I remember once when our children were little, the children, they were around 10 years old. When it was time to pray, they would pray in Jamath and these different gatherings that we would have. But when the children would pray, I always noticed one girl, one 10-year-old girl, who never joined the prayer ever. She would like, all of her friends would get up and go pray and she would go and get a book and start reading or she would get her toys or she would just sit on the sofa and wait for all of her friends to finish. And I was a young mom at the time and I didn't know what was the right way to teach prayer or the wrong way to teach prayer. But one day I asked the mom, I said, oh, I noticed that so-and-so, the young girl, I said, I noticed that so-and-so never joins the prayer when all the kids pray in Jamath. Why not? I was just, you know, because I admired the mother and I thought maybe she knew something I didn't know. And the mom said, oh, you know, I've never told her that she has to pray because she's still young, she's not of age, I want to be easy on her. Pretty soon she's going to have to pray all five prayers, so. And she sees that I pray, I do all my prayers, so she knows prayer is important. And when the time comes, she'll pray. I was like, oh, okay. I didn't know if that was right or wrong. I was just like, oh, all right, that's a perspective. But then later, a few days later, that same mom called me and she said, you know, I was thinking about your question and what you asked me and I realized that maybe I need to start talking to her about prayer. And so I sat her down and this was a single mom, by the way. She said, I sat her down and I said, you know, honey, you're coming of age you're 10 years old now and pretty soon you're going to have to start praying. And it's really important that you start giving prayer prior, you know, importance. And I think you should start thinking about it, like joining the prayer. So she said her daughter listened to her very attentively and she said the next day her daughter was the one who came and woke her up for fudger and she laid out her prayer mat and extorted her mom. She said she listened her very eagerly and then the next day was praying with her with the mom. So what the mom said to me was, you know, you know what I realized is she wasn't just going to start doing it on her own. She was waiting for me to tell her that it was required of her and it's it's that's just so interesting that, you know, Islam is work. Islam is not compared to other religions, especially if our kids have choices. Islam requires something of us, right? And we're learning even with fasting, like there's stuff we have to give up there's stuff we have to do. It's a constant exercise in like suppressing our nafus our egos and doing the hard work, right? And so a lot there are kids out there who if they can get away with not having to do it, they're not going to do it. So it's important for parents to realize that you're going to have to push your kids out of their comfort zones because kids are going to many kids are going to want to stay comfortable for as long as possible. So we're the ones who are going to have to raise the bar for them. All of these parents told me none of them hit, none of them hit their children. They didn't meet them, they didn't. The most they would do is maybe the occasional ear twist. If they ever did give a smack, like a whack on the bottom or something, it was not done in rage. It was not done in when the parent was losing it, you know, didn't know how to handle the situation. One mom told me that she did spank one of her daughters at one point and it was because her daughter was not getting it and it was a matter of danger. And so the example she gave me is that when her daughter was little, like four years old, she would wash her daughter on the toilet. She was three or four. She would wash her daughter on the toilet and then her daughter would run off without putting on her underwear. And the mom would tell her, you can't do that. You can't run around without your underwear on. And the daughter didn't listen. The mom told her once, the mom told her twice. The third time the mom gave her a good spanking. And after that, the daughter never forgot her underwear again. So sometimes, obviously, for our children's own safety, you might have to kind of lay down the law with corporal punishment, but it's very rare and it should be rare. It should be very rare. And the kids should know that it's hurting you as much as it's hurting them to have to do it. These parents told me that Sharia was honored in their family. Vic was honored. It was everything stopped at Sharia. So I know a mom who, she's a single mom. She's raised four amazing daughters. We always ask her, what's her secret? How did she do it? I'll show one of her daughters on Alema now. She told us that, you know, her daughters went through rebellious phases as well. And, but she always, she always allowed them to rebel within the confines of Sharia. So she had a daughter who wanted to dye her hair purple, like hot pink. The mom was like, okay, you wear hijab. Fine, you can dye your hair whatever color you want as long as you're still wearing your hijab. So that was an exception she made. They were strict Shafis. They follow the Shafi month up so they used to always cover their feet. You know, it's the Hanafi month of women can show their feet. But one daughter was like, I want to wear open-toed sandals. And the mom's like, okay, Hanafi exception. We're going to do it. You know, we're going to take the Hanafi month of exception. So one daughter wanted to get a piercing, I think an eyebrow piercing or something. The mom was like, okay, I guess she looked into the fit of it. Maybe I guess it was allowed. Whatever it was, but it was always, the daughters saw that they looked at fit and they looked at Sharia and they always did everything within the confines of that. Okay, seventh tip that these parents told me is they told me I always kept my children close by. I always kept my children close. Now, many people think that because like we homeschooled our children, or I was in a community where many people homeschooled their children, that that's what I'm talking about, that you have to homeschool your kids. That's how what I'm saying. These families did everything. There was a whole spectrum, their children who went to private school, children who went to Catholic school, children who went to Islamic school, children who went to public school, children who were homeschooled. But what these parents were saying is that, well, one thing they did say, which I'm sorry if this hurts anybody, because I know people have different situations. But this was something, this is the data that I collected. All of these parents told me they did not put their children in daycare. They didn't put their children in daycare. Their children were not with non-Muslim child care providers from like six, seven in the morning to like five in the evening. You know, they, some of these families had nannies in the home. Some of these families had a grandparent who helped with raising the children. Some of these parents had Muslim babysitters. But the primary therbia, the upbringing of the children, was done by a parent or a loved one, like a grandparent. It was not outsourced. And these kids were not sent off to boarding school in tender ages. For me, it was very difficult when my son said, when he was 11 or 12, he said he wanted to go hives, but he wanted to go hives 400 miles away from us at this institute. And my husband, and I actually told him, no, we were like, we're not sending a young boy away from us. But alhamdulillah, people came together to help us do it. Where my, my parents were there. My brother was there. He lived with my brother. So in that kind of situation, we were able to make it work because he was with people we trusted. And so we were able to send him away at a young age for three years. But I would not recommend, and I have been told by parents that I respect and trust that you don't send your children away to strangers to raise. And I know of parents. I know of mothers who have moved with their children across the country and lived near them while they hissed at a school. And then moved back to me with the family after when it was done. But they didn't leave their kids alone. Okay, so most of these families told me they didn't do sleepovers. However, there were some exceptions. And this was not a very popular thing with children. A lot of the kids wish their parents would ease up on this rule. Sleepovers are a really big, fun part of childhood and many kids want to experience it. So here was some of the exceptions. Moms would let their girls go to a sleepover at another girl's house if there were no men in the home. So if there were no dads, no brothers, it was guaranteed that there were going to be no men. They were allowed to go. Sometimes parents allowed sleepovers if the parents were allowed to go as well. So the parents would hang out with the parents and the kids could have fun. What were some other? I know of one girl in our community. The mom never allowed her to go to sleepover, but she was allowed to go to sleepovers. But then she would be picked up at midnight. So at midnight, the parents would come and get her. And it was just understood that she could... Parents said, I want to know what bed my kid is sleeping in and I want to be able to check on that bed at any time. So that was the rule. Too many weird things happen in other people's homes when you're not around. And you can't watch them all the time, but you want to be in proximity, especially children are very vulnerable. So I think that's good advice. Some of these families, the dads were stay-at-home dads. The moms worked. So you know, there's no one way of doing yet, but the point is the parents kept their kids close by. Okay, the eighth tip. We didn't spoil our children, nor did we praise them too much. We didn't spoil our children, nor did we praise them too much. So an example I'll give you from my own life. So in northern California, there's a school there, an Islamic school called North Star. Every year North Star in the month of Rabi'u-Lawah, there's a poetry competition called In Praise of the Prophet, Salah al-Islam. And children all over the country, including here, submit poems that they've written in praise of the Prophet, Salah al-Islam. And then the judges look at all these poems that have come over from all over the country and they judge the poems and then the winners are announced at their annual fundraiser. And it's a big deal. Hundreds of people are there. The children are called up on stage. They're given a trophy. Their poem is read aloud. It's a big deal and it's a big honor. So one year, one of the girls from our co-op won to win first place for her poem. And we were really proud of her. We were really excited. And I happen to be organizing an event at our Masjid in Rabi al-Lawal in honor of the Prophet, Salah al-Islam. And so I asked her mom. I said, Ken, yeah, I don't think they'll mind if I use her name. Her name's Zora. So I was like, Ken, Zora, come recite her poem at the Masjid. And her mom thought about it. And she said, you know, Zora has been receiving a lot of praise for that poem. And she, this week, she happened to be in a science program at Tilden Park. And KQED, one of the news programs was visiting with their camera crew. They're filming some documentary or some program. And they interviewed her for that science program. And she said, and that is going to air on television like in a week. And she said, I just, I don't think it's good for her enough to be in the spotlight so much. I don't think it's good for her ego. So if you don't mind, we're going to say no. And I remember being so shocked because who out of us would say no to our child reciting a poem about the Prophet Samadism that they had written at Masjid? Right? But this mom was concerned about something much deeper than that. She was concerned about her daughter's spiritual development and making sure that it stays in check and that she doesn't become arrogant. She doesn't become bigheaded. And Mashallah, she's now married and she's an amazing young woman. Mashallah. But this is part of her therapy on that I witnessed when she was younger. And her mom is one of my role models when it comes to raising children. So being careful about how much we praise our children, how much we spoil them. So being worried about their physical education and their academic education and their religious education, but also their spiritual education. How they're spiritually developing. Okay. And the ninth tip that these parents told me is they said, talk to your children with love. Talk to your children with love. So I know of a young woman who she comes from a very specific era of culture and she told me, this is not an observation of mine or something I'm making up. She told me herself that in her particular era of culture, it's very common for mothers to curse their children when they're angry. And she gave me examples. Like in Arabic, she said, like moms would say things like when they're upset with their children, they would say things like may Allah burn down your home. May Allah destroy you. I mean, astaghurullah, like stuff like that. But that's, it was just part of the culture and that's what the kids would grow up hearing. But she said her mother, when her mother would get upset with her and her siblings, she would scream duas at them. So she would scream things like, may Allah guide you. May Allah have mercy on you. May Allah have mercy on me. May Allah forgive you. You know, I'm so like, so just duas are coming out of her mouth. So then this friend of mine, she grew up and she had twins of her own who drove her crazy. And she said that when she would get upset, that's what would come out of her well. Duas for her children. And you never know when Duas are going to be accepted. And we had a little girl at our homeschooling co-op. Her mom told me this story. It was, I was laughing so hard. She said that, she said that anytime her child did something bad or naughty, she would say to her daughter in Arabic, may Allah guide you. May Allah guide you. That's every time her daughter did something wrong, she would say to her, may Allah guide you. One day, her daughter did something really great. I think she got a really good score on an exam or did something really wonderful. And the mom found out and they showed it to the mom and the mom was really happy. And she said to her daughter, may Allah guide you. And the daughter said, no, I don't want to let it guide me. I want you to say something else. Because to her, she associated it with whatever she got in trouble. But she was little. She was little at the time. Now she knows, obviously. So it's a beautiful thing, right? To scream Duas at your children. When my kids were little, I remember one time we, it was raining. And I was singing with my boys, rain, rain, go away, come again another day. Sean and Amin want to play. Rain, rain, go away. Right? It's a common song. We'll hear it again. And my brother overheard me. And he said, Hina, don't teach them that. Don't teach them to reject Allah's blessings. Rain is a blessing, especially in California where we're going through a drought. But he said, and what does the song teach the children? It teaches them that only what I want matters. What my nuts wants. Like I want to play. So stop the blessings. It's about me. It's about Sean and Amin. We want to play. So stop the rain. He's like, that's not a good message. And I was like, oh, wow. I never really thought of it that deeply. But okay. So then we played around with the words. And we came up with our own song that we still sing. And the song we came up with was rain, rain. Come on down. Come and fall upon the ground. Rain, rain. Come down fast. Come and make some green grass. Rain, rain. Poor, poor, poor. You're a mercy from our Lord. Rain, rain. Fall on me. I turn to Allah. Grateful to you. So that's what we would sing, right? And this is what my voice were a little. So one day we had a picnic planned. And the kids were really excited. We were going to go to this picnic. And it rained. And because of the rain, the picnic got canceled. And I know Sean and Amin were very disappointed. There was no doubt about it. And I still remember the image is so clear in my head. I remember seeing Sean standing at the window, looking out at the rain coming down. And Amin, little Amin standing next to him. Both of them are sad. And I hear Sean turn to Amin and say, it's okay. Amin, Allah's being kind to us. California needs the rain. We'll go another day. And it was such a heartwarming moment for me because I know that that attitude that he had was only because of that song we had been singing every time it rained. Like it was brainwashing, basically. I brainwashed him thinking of rain as a blessing. But if I had continued singing to him, rain, rain, go away, we want to play, come again another day, then the attitude would have been like, yeah, why? Why is this happening? Why now? Why to me? This isn't fair, right? That's the attitude that they would have learned. So it was totally a fluke. It's not like I'm some genius who came up with that. I mean, it literally was from Allah. But it was a major learning moment for me that I like to share with people. Because every moment can be a teaching moment and we don't even realize, right? Okay. One dad that I really respect and admire told me that he wants his children to look at the world around them with the eye of discernment. Meaning he wants them to look at things at a deeper level. And it's important to do that with our children without killing their spirit, without killing their joy, and without killing their fun. So for example, this dad told me that he could not stand the movie Frozen. He didn't like it. Frozen was one of the most popular Disney movies that came out. One of the most popular songs was Let It Go, right? I've only seen the movie once. I don't remember all the details of it. But the dad did not forbid his kids from watching Frozen. He watched it with them and he enjoyed it with them. But then later he discussed it with them. He was like, so what does this mean? The song Let It Go. Like let's look at the lyrics. The lyrics literally say let go of the rules, right? But the rules don't matter. The whole song is about letting go of all the rules that you've been following and living life on your own terms. So it's fun for you. So then he was like, so what does that look like? Like what would it look like if we didn't follow rules? What if we decided to let go of our rules? What are some of the rules we follow? What happens in the world when you stop following rules? And then also the storyline for those of you who have not seen Frozen. The story starts out with the sister having to take care of a younger sister. And the younger sister has a condition and the older sister is always worried about her. And she's got a very, she's very uptight. She's really stressed out. She's very serious, very sober. And she dresses very conservatively. But then at some point in the story of Frozen, the older sister decides to abandon the younger sister. She decides to let it go, right? And she decides to go off. She lives in an ice castle. She's now wearing a sleeveless gown. Her clothes are no longer very conservative. And then the rest of the movie is about the younger sister trying to get back to her older sister. So the dad talked to the kids about that. Like why does she look so miserable when she's taking care of her sister? Is that a burden? Is it a burden to take care of loved ones? Is it a burden to serve people? Is true freedom, true happiness in leaving our responsibilities and doing what we want? So, you know, just, but the kids were like, whatever, we love the movie. The dad's like, fine, let's just talk about these things, right? So that's it. Let the kids have fun. Let them enjoy it as long as it's halal. But also get them to think about things at a deeper level. Okay. Oh, one of the parents told me that if your kid messes up, messes up, screws up, does something wrong and you're upset with them. And then later, you guys have talked about it. The kids apologize. The kids learned the lesson. It's not going to do it again. And you still continue to be mad at your kid. Still continue to give them the silent treatment, the cold treatment. Be, show them that you're angry. He said, that's the equivalent of an adult tantrum. That's an adult having a tantrum. So just be aware of that. Like if your kids have apologized and they realize they made a mistake and each fellow, you're hoping they won't do it again, let it go. Okay, 10th tip. This is the last tip. This is the tip that causes the most tears. And, and I'm apologizing in advance because this is not to hurt anybody or to make anybody despair. Nobody should ever despair because everything is first and foremost from Allah SWT. But every time I've given this talk afterwards, there's usually like a line of women waiting to talk to me saying, I don't have this blessing. So what does this mean? Like, does this mean my children are doomed? Absolutely not. It does not mean your children are doomed. Everything is from Allah. We pray for our kids Akhira. But this is just what the data has shown me. This is what all these parents told me. This is what all these kids told me. Majority of them told me that these children had a pious father who engaged them. That's the key part. Being pious is not enough. Engaging your children is just as important. I know a friend of mine witnessed this with her own eyes. She was at a big mass ISNA, IKNA, RIS, one of those type of conventions. She was at one of those. And there was a famous person on the stage who served the community for decades, Mashallah. And he was on the stage and it was Q&A time. And somebody in the audience was asking him a parenting question for advice. And he was about to answer when somebody else in the audience stood up and said, how can you answer that question? You were never around when you were growing up. She said it was heartbreaking to witness. And it's a story you often see repeated. Like you'll see men, especially in the community, scholars and leaders and activists who've given so much to the community and then you'll see that with their own children, there's all kinds of struggles. And that obviously is written by Alas panadallah, Alas panadallah will bless them for all the hard work they've done. But a key lesson to take from that is you cannot ignore what's going on in your own home. You cannot ignore giving time to your own children. It has to be a priority. Engaging your children has to be a priority. Now, for the longest time, I used to say, I don't have science to back me up. This is just data I've gathered. But now I cannot just say I have science to back me up. There's a man named Byrne Bangston who wrote a book. He did this landmark study over the course of a little over 30 years. I believe he started in 1972. He ended in 2004. So for like 30 plus years, he followed 2,000 people, Christians and Jews. And he met up with them every few years and the whole goal of the study was to see what is it that causes the next generation to practice the religion of the parent's generation. That's what he wanted to find out. And he wrote a book called, I don't recommend this book, by the way, because the book itself is actually very dry. So I don't think people will enjoy reading it. But this is a key thing to take from it. It's called Families and Faith, How Religion Is Passed Down Across the Generations. Families and Faith, How Religion Is Passed Down Across the Generations. He found that there was all sorts of factors, but the overwhelming factor that caused the next generation to practice the religion, Christianity or Judaism of the parents was if they had a pious father who engaged them. So mothers who took their kids to church every Sunday while the dad stayed home and watched football, not much success rate. But dads who were going to church with their kids, dads who were going to the synagogue with their kids, their children, a majority of them did practice the religion in the next generation. And I once had a little boy and his brother, they came and stayed with us when the parents were on hudge, but the parents were gone for two weeks. So during the two weeks, these kids stayed with a number of our friends. They stayed four days with one friend, four days with another friend like that. So one night we were having dinner and I was saying to the boy, I'm like, it must be so nice to see, you know, all the different ways parents are raising their children, because they're all really good families. And I said, you know, everybody has a goal of raising good Muslim children. So it must be fun for you to see all the different ways people raise their kids. And his name's Taj. And Taj said, yeah, people do have different ways. Like for example, in Rahm's house, our house, he said in Rahm's house, Rahm prays Fajr with his dad, Jamal. He's like, but in Ali's house, Ali's dad comes into the room and he says, Ali, Fajr, and Ali jumps out of bed and he and his dad go to the mosque for Fajr, like together, right? And I was like, oh, wow, that's pretty impressive. And I said, that's not easy. In those days it was cold. So I said, it's not easy for a little boy to jump out of bed and go out in the cold and go to Fajr prayer with his dad and to not have to be asked more than once to get out of bed. And he said, yeah, but you know, after Fajr prayer, Ali's dad always takes him to Starbucks for breakfast. So I think that's why Ali's jumping out of bed. It was so cute. And I was like, you know, I don't know. We don't know. We don't know what's making Ali jump out of bed at that age. But the point was the dad made that a priority. He made it part of his budget. It's not cheap. But he decided, you know, that that was a priority for him to spend that much $5, $6, whatever every day and take his kid to Fajr prayer and then take him to get a fun little breakfast treat at Starbucks. And but it was time and it was effort and it was money that this dad was investing into his child. And Mashallah Ali is now an adult. And Mashallah, he's an exceptional government. And so, yeah, and I know of a young woman, a mom, actually, who she grew up in a small town where there were not many Muslims. And her dad was a very pious man. Every town her dad lived in, he built a mosque in Mashallah. But in where she primarily grew up, there were not many Muslims. And but she and her siblings have grown up to be exceptional Muslims, Mashallah. So I was asking her, I go, how did you guys turn out the way you did considering you didn't really have that many Muslims around you? How did you not let like the siren call of the pure culture around you like pull you? And she said, you know, when you feel love in the home, you don't look for it anywhere else. When you feel love in the home, you don't look for it anywhere else. And that's what she had a very strong relationship with her father. And her father was very loving and very pious and engaged them. So Mashallah, they were, Alhamdulillah, they were protected. Okay. All right. I'm wrapping it up. Okay. And so that is okay. So the last thing I want to say is in conclusion, I love to do lists. I love like when somebody just gives me a recipe or a list and says, do A, B, C, D and you're going to get this result. Right. But that's not how parenting works. It isn't. This is, it's all from Allah. We can, it behooves us to learn from the people who came before us and to learn from other people's mistakes and to learn from other people's successes. But there's no guarantees. Like first and foremost, we saw the prophets were tested with their own children, right? Prophet Nuh, alaihi salam, prophet Adam, alaihi salam. They were tested with their children. And these were the most pious men, prophet Yaqub. Alaihi salam. And these were people who are in direct communication with Allah swt, yet they were tested with children who rebelled against them. And so we, that takes us back to the first tip, which is just the law. That's it. At the end of the day, you know, we do our part, we do our effort, but we call on Allah. We ask him to put success in our efforts. And if we are seeing that despite our best efforts and despite our sincerest du'as, we're seeing that we're not getting the results that we wanted or that we hoped for, you have to remember that the wheel is always turning. We can't despair. The person who's on the top today can be on the bottom tomorrow. And the person who's on the bottom today can be on the top tomorrow. All we know is that we want to get out of this world in safety, right? We want to get out of this life with la ilaha illallah, alayhi salam, in our hearts, on our tongues, in our minds. That's the ultimate success. And so that's what we pray for until the end. And I know a mom who she was a really big role model to me, is a big role model to me. And she has many children, mashallah. And I just, whatever she did, I did. Like just tell me how to raise my kids. I'm going to just copy you. One day her son called her from college and said, I'm not praying anymore. He said, I'm not feeling the theme. That's those were his words. I'm not feeling the theme. And when she told me this, she told me very, very calmly. Like, yeah, my son called. He said, it's not fine. It's not feeling the theme. And I was very insensitive. I was a young mom and I just blurted out. I was like, why are you not freaking out? Why are you not freaking out? How can you tell me so calmly that you're a child after everything you guys have taught him and done for him that he's not praying? Why are you not freaking out? And I'll never forget what she said. She said, because I have a high opinion of my Lord. She said, from day one, I've been praying for my children. I've been praying for their Akhara. I've been praying for their Iman. She said, and I don't believe that those prayers just disappeared into thin air. I believe those prayers were heard and those prayers are going to be answered. But those prayers are going to be answered in Allah's time. They're not going to be answered in my time. So I have to be patient. And I have to know that, insha'Allah, insha'Allah on the day of judgment, I can stand in front of Allah and I can say, I did everything that was asked of me. I taught my child everything that I was supposed to teach him. The end was up to you and I'm praying for a good ending. And insha'Allah, my heart is clear. And she and her husband kept an open door. They kept loving their son. They kept inviting him. They kept welcoming him. They didn't lecture him. They didn't judge him. But they continued practicing the religion. They kept moving forward. The rest of the children kept moving forward. The parents showed their son that you're welcome to join us, but with or without you, we are moving forward. This is everybody has their own journey and you're welcome to join us. But you're not going to stop us. We're still continuing. So the son, for whatever amount of time, had his own opinions, his own thoughts. But I'm happy to report that alhamdulillah, he came back. He came back to the religion. He's practicing now. He's praying now. He's even doing makeup prayers now. So just like the mom said, it was Allah's schedule, not hers. So I'm just going to end with the du'a in English. It's from the Holy Qur'an. It's the 14th ayah 40. I'm going to say it in English. This is not my name. O my Lord, make me one who establishes regular prayer and also raise such among my offspring. O our Lord, and accept thou my prayer. O our Lord, cover us with thy forgiveness. Me, my parents, and all believers on the day that the reckoning will be established. Thank you so much, Sister Hina. I just want to thank her for that really wonderful presentation. I know my head is overflowing with all the points you gave. I know many of us were taking notes and I think that so many of us are eager to go home and talk to our kids if you want to share some of your pointers. So before we move on to the moderated discussion on the Q&A, I just wanted to thank everybody for coming today. Families and supporting our children in our community is so important for NCGP. I would just want to encourage all of you to please think about donating to the masjid today. There is a box at the back, so if you can, inshallah. All of our donations help us continue to hold programings like this at the masjid. So please think about doing that before you head out. So I'm going to introduce our moderator, Summer Mullick, who is a beloved member of our community and a good friend. Summer has studied holistic and prophetic healing methods. The professional background has largely been in teaching and tutoring children of various ages. The work she is most passionate about, however, is her writings on the life of Prophet Muhammad Sallallah, so much of which could be viewed on her blog at mercytotalmankind.blog, mercy to all mankind on the blog. Summer is also actively involved with the remarkable work produced by Celebrate Mercy, where she has played a key role in increasing their exposure in the UAE, California, and New Jersey. Summer's inspiring work on the Prophet Sallallah as Sallam has yielded accolades and encouragement from people all over the world. Summer is a childhood friend of Hina Khan Mokhtar. They have known each other since high school, and alhamdulillah they are loved for the sake of Allah finds them. So Summer, thank you so much for introducing us to Hina. I'll hand over to my team. Sister Rasha sent me a bunch of things. Let me just get my glasses on. Salam alaikum everybody. Thank you for having my best friend come and talk. It's an honor for me to have her. We literally grew up together since the age of 15 onwards, so it's really special for me to be with her here on like the blessed day of Ramadan. So there's a bunch of questions that came in that Sister Rasha said to me. So here's one. How to have a conversation without an argument? I guess with kids, you know. How to have a conversation without an argument. I guess it would be important to know what age group we're talking about. Or do you want me to look for a different question? Oh no, no, that's fine. How to have a conversation without an argument. So what I've learned, and this is through trial and errors, is to... Okay, yeah, it's a general question. So I'm just thinking about like, if there's something that you notice in your child that you're not happy about, and that's what you want to talk about, and you're afraid that that's going to turn into an argument. What I would suggest what's worked for us is to pick your time and place. So many of us, we feel like the second we notice something or we see something, that's when we have to address it, and that's when we have to talk about it. And a lot of times our kids, including ourselves, are not ready to have really deep, heavy discussions on the go. And so it's good to let your kids know that I have some things I want to discuss with you. Can we make some time? And make it something like either you're sitting down, having coffee together, if they're older, going out to brunch, or going for a walk, making sure that you sit down. And then also how not to have an argument. The key thing is be willing to listen, be willing to listen. So many times we just talk at our kids, and it's important to be willing to listen to their point of view as well, even if we don't understand it or don't agree with it. And be respectful, don't label their feelings, don't diminish their feelings or minimize them. If your child is feeling angry or hurt or confused, and you don't think they should be feeling angry or hurt or confused, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if you don't think they should be feeling it. If that's what they're feeling, you have to acknowledge that's what they're feeling and allow them to feel what they're feeling and then present your point of view. And yeah, so I would say avoiding arguments, the best thing is to pick the right time and place, to be respectful of the other person's feelings, to be willing to hear what they have to say, and also before any heavy discussion, do the du'a. Do the du'a that it goes well. I like to do the du'a of Musa al-Islam from the Quran, which is about speech specifically, asking Allah to give you the strength to say what's correct and give the other person the ability to hear what you're actually trying to say. Okay, Masha'Allah. That was great, you know. So there's another one. Is there a right age to start to teach our kids our perspective of gender and therefore marriage, sexual relations given the current environment? Yeah, this is honestly the whole gender thing. It feels like it just came out of the blue and it came recently, and it's not what I had to grapple with when my kids were little, so my heart goes out too. I think this is probably going to be the biggest issue of the next generation of parents are going to be doing, and we need to know how to be addressing these issues with our kids. We can't skirt them. We can't avoid it. We definitely can't rely on the schools to teach our kids the right perspective. So I recommend a young man. He's a scholar and a writer. He is writing really great material on this topic. Very respectfully, but very unapologetically and very intelligently with a lot of logic. His name is Mobeen Vaid, V-A-I-D. His first name is Mobeen, M-O-B-E-E-N, Mobeen Vaid. If you're on Facebook, if you'll accept your follower request, follow him. He posts really good material. He's given some really good talks. I think they're on YouTube on this topic and it gave me some talking points on how to address gender issues. I don't think it's ever too early. They start very early in the schools here, so we have to start even earlier, right? And yeah, so it's never too soon. So there's a follow-up question from a different person related to this topic. What would you advise if one's child thinks he or she might be gay? You come across this issue, I mean, you can decline the thing that you don't. Okay, so if your child thinks he or she is gay, one of the things that I've always told my students and my own children is that it absolutely is possible to be gay. We're no longer in that period where we're just like, no, no, that doesn't exist and it's in your head. It's actually very, very possible for people to be gay. And one of the things somebody once told me, a scholar that I thought was really interesting is that Christian scholars or Christian lecturers or speakers, they often will say homosexuality is an unnatural desire, right? That's how they talk about it. Homosexuality is an unnatural desire. But the interesting thing that I was told is that Muslim theologians and teachers have never said homosexuality is an unnatural desire. That's not how they talk about it. They actually recognize it as a very natural desire. Homosexuality can happen very easily. That's why even two brothers or two sisters are not supposed to sleep under the same blanket, right? It's only husband and wife who sleep under the same blanket. What homosexuality is, it's a prohibited desire. That's what it is. It's very possible for us to desire somebody of the same gender. It's possible to desire somebody who you're related to, so to have an incestuous desire. It's possible for me to be married to my husband and to desire another man. Even that's possible, but it's prohibited. That's what we have to teach our children is the fit and the sharia of it. And so then the question comes like, but then isn't that unfair, right? Isn't it unfair that I have this desire that I can't act on? What about a woman who can't ever get married? I know women who haven't gotten married, they're 50 plus now and haven't, for whatever reason, we're not able to get married. Does it mean that they can now go sleep with any man they want because they want to know what it feels like, right? None of us would say it's okay, right? We all recognize that sexual relations happen within the confines of marriage. So we recognize it as a test and we recognize that the reward for it is huge. So that's how I would talk to my kids about it. Obviously it's not a test we would wish on anyone. We have to recognize it as a test. We have to have compassion. We have to have sympathy, but ultimately what we have to teach our children is that Allah's rights supersede our own rights, right? What Allah wants from us supersedes what we want from us. So I may desire someone other than your father. I don't get to act on it. And it's not even because of your father. It's because of Allah. It's because I recognize that Allah has prohibited it. So it's very sure. It's a much deeper conversation. We're just barely scratching the surface. And I know I didn't do the topic justice. I don't need to like just dismiss it, but that's where I would start with. Starting with first and foremost, pleasing Allah, putting Allah at the top of the pyramid. Okay, thank you so much. That was really well said. And I think I actually learned something from that too. So we're going to wrap it in a little bit because actually we didn't have to leave so in 10 minutes. But there's a question that's a good one. How should we handle lack of interest in worship from young children who are not yet obligated to pray? For example, a child asked to participate in group family prayers and they say no or that it is boring. Yeah, I would never force a child to join the prayer before the age of puberty. I've never like I on my own kids used to say, I don't want to pray. Okay, fine, don't pray. But then, so there's a hadith of Hazrat Ali, radi allahu anhu that is completely in line with child psychology that everyone should keep in mind. Hazrat Ali, radi allahu anhu said, play with your children for the first seven years. Teach your children for the second seven years and be their friend for the third seven years. So what does that mean? That means zero to seven. You just play with them. You have no expectations of them. You role model for them what you want, but you yourself have no expectations of them. Seven to 14, you teach them. That is the time people to get it all in. Start teaching the fix, start teaching the cedas, start teaching the rules, start teaching what Allah expects of us. I myself have found whatever routines we established up to the age of 14, that's kind of what the kids stuck with after the age of 14. Introducing something new after the age of 14 was very difficult. And if the kids decided to take on something new, it was because they wanted it, because they were inspired to take it on, not because we as a parent have said, okay, now you need to start doing this. So those of you who have kids under the age of 14, recognize it's a very, very precious time and take full advantage of it. So seven to 14, you teach them. 14 to 21, 14 to 21, you're their friend. Law, white, metal, law, white, metal.