 So, welcome to the second annual MCC World Hajjab Day Celebration. My name is Sister Huda Biltaji. Some of you know me from MCC Sunday School or from the Fall Fest, some familiar faces. So nice to see you guys, Alhamdulillah. I thank Allah for this opportunity for us to be gathered here today to strengthen our ties of sisterhood and seek support and positivity through our gathering today, insha'Allah. So before we begin, I wanted to give you guys a little bit of a background on what World Hajjab Day is, because if you're anything like me, you may have never heard it. This is only the second year that I had heard about it. So it was actually started by Sister Nazima Khan. She was in school in New York, post 9-11, I believe in Brooklyn, and she experienced a lot of bullying and Islamophobia as you can imagine as a young girl in Hajjab in New York at that time. So like many of us do, we turned to social media for support, and at that time, she turned to Facebook for support. And she started reaching out to sisters from all walks of life and encouraging them to experience what it's like to wear Hajjab in an effort to combat Islamophobia and raise awareness. So she called it the World Hajjab Day, and that takes place February 1st annually. So inshallah, next February 1st, I know what all of you guys will be doing, inviting your friends, colleagues, someone you might know to experience wearing Hajjab with you, and to see what it's like to be a Muslim and walk in our shoes. So why does this matter, right? Why does it matter that we talk about Hajjab, that we discuss Hajjab, that we gather together inshallah? Why should it matter to us? Well, as we all know, subhanallah, in an age where ourselves and especially the youth are more than ever encouraged to just indulge their nefs, right? YOLO, live your life, be you subhanallah. And to really indulge in our whims, where each day our minds and our hearts are, you know, bombarded with maybe negative images from across the globe or negative portrayals of Muslims and Islam. Where the beauty industry is on a daily basis. Just scroll through anyone's feed subhanallah, whether you want to see it or not, our images, our minds are bombarded with images of hyper-sexuality and morality and modesty, right? Making us feel like covering is something that's not beautiful enough. So unfortunately, as a result of that, oftentimes, whether it's publicly or privately on social media or within our families, we hear about sisters struggling to wear Hajjab, struggling with that identity of Hajjab. And we even hear about sisters publicly removing their Hajjab. So, inshallah, with this event, we hope to combat that, right? To counteract that empowerment through sisterhood and knowing that you're not alone. Even if you're in a public institution and you may not have an MSA or you might not have someone that you can lean on. You know that there's always sisters around you to support you. To raise awareness and challenge stereotypes. I believe that the best way to do that is through personal interactions. When someone meets you, they know you, then how can they dislike you, right? And of course, celebrating the gift of Hajjab, because this is a gift from Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for us. And to encourage in an age of immodesty, to encourage modesty and haya in our dress, as well as in our demeanor, right? And then of course, nurturing Hajjabi confidence and Hajjab pride. We wear it proudfully. We are of the people of Fahir of pride and proud because of our Hajjab and what Allah has given us. So in addition to these objectives, today is really just a celebration of us. Of you individually to put your courage rather to put Allah first. To put your deen first. To recognize, acknowledge, and uplift every one of you powerhouse. I like to call myself a powerhouse even though sometimes I don't feel that way. But we're all powerhouse sisters, inshallah, engaging silently in a jihad of our nafs on a daily basis. We're struggling to make sure that we stay on our path with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala our Islamic identity and walk in the footsteps of our great mothers. Particularly again, our youth who are in public institutions and might not have that support that they need, right? Who each morning stand in front of their closets and choose between wearing what Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala encourages me to wear and to cover my beauty or to follow what they say if you got it flaunted, right? So there's always that subhanallah battle. Knowing that if you choose hijab, you might get those silly questions. Like, aren't you hot in that? It's summer. Why are you, do you shower in that? Can you swim? You know, we've all experienced these kinds of questions. Subhanallah. So today we're saying, no, we're not hot in that. And we're celebrating this gift of Allah, this gift of hijab and the gift of modesty, right? That we love and are so honored and take pride in wearing. Because subhanallah, everything of great value is protected. So no matter where you are along your journey of hijab, because it is a process, it is a journey. So no matter where you are along that journey, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala wrote and had for us, maqtub, to be here together today. To encourage one another collectively in seeking his pleasure and encouraging one another to stay on this path. So always know, insha'Allah, that he is with you wherever you are. He sees you. He is proud of you, guiding you and supporting you. So don't give up and keep struggling. Fi sabilillah, insha'Allah. The good struggle, the beautiful struggle, bi-iznillah. Now it's my pleasure, insha'Allah, to introduce Sister Sana'a, who has dedicated herself, insha'Allah, to uplifting others. Sana'a is the CEO and founder of Wasila Connections. She holds a master's in social work and a bachelor's in human development. She has served in the mental health field since 2007. And she holds multiple roles from residential counselor for emotionally disturbed girls. She's activity coordinator for developmentally disabled adults. Recovery counselor for substance abuse recovery home. ABA therapist, medical social worker, to currently a clinical case manager and crisis specialist. Her internships consist of working with low income homeless population in a single resident occupancy home and a clinical therapist for a school with behavioral and emotionally challenged population. Jazakallah, sister Sana'a, for being with us here today. We're so honored to have you. We salamu alaykum sisters. Man, did y'all not have breakfast? As-salamu alaykum. There we go, there's the voices. Jazakallah, clients, sister Hoda for introducing me. And that's a laundry list of things. I promise you I don't do all of that right now, but those are over the years. But yes, as sister Hoda said, my name is Sana'a. I am the director of Wasila Connections. Wasila Connections is an organization that I founded in 2020. And it's to help support those that are going through challenges and more specifically those that are divorced in the community. So breaking stigma and help supporting those that are impacted by that challenge. But aside from that, this talk, I want it to be a little interactive. And I'm gonna be sharing my story after that. But when I say interactive, that means I wanna hear your answers to my questions. And I wanna hear you guys share a little bit about this. I know sometimes it could be a little bit daunting to say something. But before I do that, how many moms are in here? Man, masha'Allah. How many moms have their daughters in here with them? Okay, all right. Well, here's a message to moms. I'm a mom too. Don't get mad at your daughters if they answer something today that you don't want to hear, that you don't like, all right? Let's not do that. And daughters, please be open. Don't worry, your mom's not gonna say nothing, all right? So how many of you guys are, you know, I know they said 12. So how many of you guys are under 16? Oh, masha'Allah, that's one, okay. Enjoy your youth. How many of you guys are 16 to 19? Okay, all right. How many are in the 20s? Okay, all right. 30s? Okay, 40s. Hey, you guys could pass for 20s. Masha'Allah, 50s? Okay, all right. All right, should I go on 60s? Yeah, mama, 60s? All right, alhamdulillah. If you wear hijab, what age did you start wearing hijab? And you can shoot out your answers. 12, 11, 10, 15, seven. Oh, who said seven? Oh, okay. What other ages? Forever. So you was a baby and then you put that hijab. Alhamdulillah, okay. 30 plus, masha'Allah, masha'Allah. 27, okay, all right. Okay, alhamdulillah. What's that? That's backwards. What is that, 25? 52? Seven, eight? Okay, all right, okay. What does the word hijab mean to you? You can say whatever one, two words that you feel it means. Shout it out. Modesty, okay. Identity, okay. Marrier? Oh, barrier. Good one, okay. Faith, okay. Safety. Unity, did I hear that? Beauty, okay. Pride. You know what? I know I'm in my 30s, but I really can't hear. So you're gonna have to speak up. Easy. Okay, okay, easy, all right. Dawa, okay. Freedom, precious. Okay, all right. Love. Struggle, okay, yeah. Gift, okay. Respect, mashallah. Love. Yes, yes. Friends, strength, okay. Mashallah, mashallah, that's good. Oh, sorry, I think I didn't hear the last one. Submission, okay. All heavy words, all good words, all positive words. Okay, hangala. All right. What feelings, well, I guess it sounds like a lot of those were feelings as well, but what feelings or thoughts come to mind when you think of hijab? So I heard struggle. Any other thoughts? Remind you to put a love first. Okay, what thoughts come up? Confliction, okay, yeah. Confliction. Responsibility, okay. Yeah, don't be shy. I wanna hear from the daughters. Come on, y'all. Don't worry, mama not gonna say nothing. Okay, all right. It's okay, all right. So I wanna show a hands. How many of you guys have had negative experiences with your hijab? Yeah, majority. How many of you have had positive experiences with your hijab? Okay, almost everyone. I should have asked you guys to look around, but majority, everyone raised their hand for positivity and majority of you guys raised your hand for negativity as well because hijab is not just, I'm not here gonna share a positive, you know, great story about hijab and my journey, but I'm gonna share a real story with you guys, a real life story that includes not only positivity but also negative experiences. It will include the struggles that oftentimes are not spoken of and so I actually started wearing hijab at the age of seven and maybe seven, eight, nine, my memory's not serving me right, but I started wearing it and when I started wearing the hijab, I could say it was forced, right? It was forced, I was told to wear it and so I wore it without any understanding of it. Now, I grew up in the Bay Area, I grew up in Richmond and at that time I was one of the three Muslims in the schools and the only one wearing hijab and one of the three South Asians that were in the school so I was double whammy, just all sorts of minority in there and when I wore it, when I came to school that day, including my Muslim best friend asked me, why am I wearing it, what is that? And I was bombarded with questions that I didn't really understand how to answer that and from there on, I felt like I was ostracized, I felt like I no longer carried friends or people I thought I knew were my friends. I didn't have anyone to play with anymore, everyone just kind of looked at me and were like, ugh, like who is she? And at that time I didn't understand but I started to feel like, okay, why am I being singled out and I didn't know why I was being singled out. Even with peers, even with teachers, I felt like I was being singled out. Whatever I said, it was like, no, not considered. So much so that one day I was walking up and a girl came and slapped me just because I don't even know why. I was looked at, I'm like, what did I do? And I went to the teacher to explain and the teacher's like, just dismissed me. And I was like, okay, and this happened all throughout my elementary school. And up until when I was in fifth grade, I officially knew in fifth grade when I was 11 years old that I officially don't have any friends. I don't have anyone. And it just, I felt lonely. I felt like just there was, I felt unlovable. I actually felt unlovable. I felt like I didn't belong. I felt like I was just someone that didn't need to exist there. And it was hard. So fast forward in middle school, I get to middle school and I have an all girls PE class. And at this time, everyone that I went to elementary school came to middle school with me so everyone knew me. And PE lockers are changing and I have my hijab off. And oh my God, the hijab came off. Oh my God, you have hair. Oh my God, look at law. And I had hair. I forgot this was live streamed. But you know, and people were just touching my hair and they were like, you look so different. This and that. Like as if I was an alien. Like, you know, it's just a hijab. Like obviously, of course I have hair, but I got attention. People started to like me. And I felt like I was wanted again. I felt like, oh, I'm gonna have friends. And so, you know, of course I, you know, during that time and process, I felt like maybe I shouldn't have it on. Maybe this is, you know, I feel like with it on, it's just gonna be too hard. I'm not gonna have friends. I'm not gonna have people to like me. I'm not gonna look pretty. I'm not going to, you know, I'm not gonna be able to do anything. And you know, I slowly rebelled a little bit. I rebelled a bit and I continued to do that. But, you know, every once in a while when I would put my hijab on or take it off, like I would notice the difference in how people treated me versus how people treated me without it. Now fast forward to high school, you know, I just constantly felt like I had to conform. I had to do something to be liked. I just couldn't be me. And then I thought to myself, you know, this is hard, why, like why? But then I stopped. I stopped and I said, okay, it's been a long time. It's been a long time I've been thinking like this. I've been feeling like this. Why am I wearing it? And I had to stop myself from thinking so much about, you know, being liked or what have you. And I asked myself, what is the reason for me to wear this? And at that time I had some friends, you know, I was progressing, okay, socially. So I said, you know, okay, I wear this because Allah has asked me to wear this. Allah has told me to wear this. So you know what, Bismillah, I will now wear it not because it was a choice of somebody else, but because I choose to wear this because it is my choice now to put this on. And SubhanAllah, that is when I felt like I liberated myself because I made a decision. I made a decision to wear something. When I struggled with wearing the hijab, I felt as though it was too difficult and almost a burden upon me. But if you can recall my story, everything up until the point of me asking myself why I'm wearing it, I was worried about why wear it consisted of peers, my friends. It consisted of friends, society, definitions, what I am liked, disliked, whether I am disliked, whether I fit in, whether I don't fit in, how do I look? Am I good enough for everybody here? And we often equate hijab to be a burden or difficult not because the hijab itself is negative, but the experiences we share or that we go through that make it negative. It's the emotions that we attach, that we are attached to that create that negativity feeling. And so that entire time, all of that negativity I was associating with, oh, I put hijab on so this is why I'm having it. But no, that was coming from people, people's perceptions, people's actions, people's behaviors. And I thought, oh, who's my hijab? Some common thoughts and feelings that I've spoken to a lot of people, people I've shared their stories and something I've heard of throughout my life is when people wear the hijab, they fear of being harmed by people when they're walking down the street. I mean, there was a time back in 2013 or 14 that in the Bay Area, we had people being, hijab is being targeted. People would look at them up and down. I mean, I don't know if anybody remembers that, but that was happening and people were afraid. They were afraid to walk outside of their home and go to the store. There is fear of not having friends. That's a lot. I mean, I know there's a lot of young girls here and friends are important. Our social life is important. And so we recognize that and not fearing, not having a friend or being social or having that social life can really be debilitating really because that's as teams, that's what we think about. That's what's important for us. But also fear of not looking pretty. A lot of times we look at hijab as a way of stopping our beauty, but somehow I did hear some of the crowd here saying that it reminds them of beauty, love. I'm glad to hear that, but there are a lot of people that feel that way. I mean, I just recently asked my own daughters, I'm a single mom of four daughters and my older ones officially started wearing hijab on their own and I asked them, I'm like, okay. So what's, why do you wear it? And one of them felt it was a struggle and she's like, because maybe I'm not gonna be light. Maybe I'm not pretty. And those are real thoughts. Those are real thoughts that at some point maybe all of us felt a certain way. From the love for others, it's easy and for some it's, there's a struggle. So, and even I've also heard people feel, people say that, okay, I'm not married, maybe I should take my hijab off. So maybe I'll get married quicker, you know. And these are real life thoughts. Now our perception of hijab is tainted by all of these negative thoughts, all of these negative experiences. But where does all of this come from? Too often the word hijab is mentioned and then oppression follows. And we have a society pouring this narrative down us that, oh, look, she's a hijabi, she must be oppressed. Oh man, I feel so sorry for you. You have to wear that. Your parents force you to wear that. And it's just, it's just a constant, constant restriction that they're pouring down us. And you know what ends up happening? We start to believe in that. We start to take the narrative that our society tells us and we make it our narrative. And thus we fall into that trap that has, it must be oppression for us. But do you know why we fall into that? Because we have removed Allah from the equation. If you recall all my entire story, I didn't think about Allah up until the point where I asked myself, why, why did I wear it? Why am I wearing it? It's because we removed the one who commands us. And who is Allah? Who is the one? Now when Allah commands us to do something, the first thing that opposes those commands is our desires. Just like Sister Hado is talking about our enoughs, our desires get in the way. We are a society that, what we want, we want it now. And what we want, we just wanna have it. But the desires itself gives us the immediate pleasure. It gives us the immediate reaction that we want. And that's why we crave it. That's why our desires pushes us in that direction because, man, I want that. Oh, that looks so pretty, I don't wanna go get that. I don't got money, but I'm gonna go get that. Or the TikTok trends that are happening, oh, this is happening, so I'm gonna go do this. I'm gonna go, I'm gonna have that, I'm gonna do this. And we've become a society that just is constantly bombarded, just like Sister Hado said, with all of this, the glitter, it's really glitter. It's all glitter. But what happens when we get it? What happens if you go after, if you guys ever felt like, okay, you know what? My weakness is boba teas. I'm like, oh, I really want boba teas, I'm gonna go get it. Then I drink it and I'm done. I'm done, my desire is fulfilled and I'm done. I really don't want it anymore now. It was just a split second of pleasure. But that's what this world is. It's a split second of pleasure. It's a split second of getting what you want and then that's it, the feeling is gone, the feeling is done. We no longer feel that and now we're craving for the next feeling. And this is what that temporary life is. So do we want to have that feeling just for a split second or do we wanna have it forever? Do we wanna have things just for a moment or do we wanna have that to last forever? That's the difference between the pleasures of this world and the pleasures of the next. This is our temporary, we're just passing through. Now, every one of us wants to belong and have a sense of identity that is fulfilling. We naturally want to be part of a greater force. We wanna be part of something good. We wanna be part of something great. We wanna be part of something that contributes really good and we're like, yeah, that's us. That's who we are, that's us. But unfortunately, the way our society has projected Muslims, the things that are happening to us makes people feel like we're just going through so much. Why do we wanna be a part of this? Why do I wanna continue with this? We're being persecuted left to right. We're being told what to do. We're being put down. We are being striked in places. We don't have freedom. So it feels nerve-wracking to be a part of that society. But Allah tells us, to God we belong and to God we return. Who do we belong to? We belong to Allah. We belong to Him and that is who we are gonna go back to. That is our belonging. That is our sense of confidence. That is our sense of being. We are part of an ummah that is great. We are part of an ummah that is going to have everlasting peace. That's who we belong to. A lot of us are searching for belonging with our friends, our career, our people, our society. But Allah is here. Allah is here with us. He's telling you He loves you. He wants you to be with Him. And that He is our end destination. He is our end goal. He is our purpose. And our purpose in this world is to worship Him. He is our destination. So there are many paths that attain this destination, right, which is Allah. But we are unable to attain it by not following His directives. Yasmeem Mahatmajad had actually had wrote this quite some years ago and she said, Hijab isn't a destination we get to or a crown that you wear once you reach that destination. Hijab is a part of a path. It is a fuel to the end goal, which is Allah. It's a journey, ladies. It's always going to be a journey. It's a path that's a means to Allah. And a means when we are on that path to Allah, the obedience to Him requires sacrificing our desires and sacrificing our desires comes with struggles and struggling and training ourselves. And when we struggle that end goal, when we get there, it's much sweeter than when we attain it. How many of you guys, when you guys have a test, what do you guys have to do when you guys have a test? It's coming up. Study, yeah. You have to work hard for that test, right? Because if you don't pass that test, you might not pass the grade, you might not pass the class, you might not go forward. Just like that, this is our life. This is our test. We have to study it. How do we study it? We learn what we have to do and we strive. We strive ourselves to get there. I looked at Hijab as freedom. Freedom from the shackles of my desires. Freedom from the shackles of worrying about people's perceptions about me. Liberation from being tied down to what others wanted of me. I was so worried about people that what they thought, what they said, what would happen so much so that I was conforming myself to their definitions of me. I gave them power over me. Why did I give that power away? Why do we give power away to people who do not deserve that? We deserve our own power. So we have to gather that strength. Once I wore the Hijab for the sake of Allah, Allah gave me friends that had my back. I went from zero friends, zero-like ability to being able to have so many beautiful friends, so many people, so much so that my friends now say, man, who doesn't know you? I'm like, I don't know about that. I don't know. But Allah gave me what I desired because he is Arrozah. He is our giver of sustenance. We think about sustenance and risk as just money. No, sustenance comes in the forms of friendship, love, understanding, people, everything that you can think of. That's what risk means. That's what Allah is. Allah wants to give us. All he asks is your obedience to him. You know, one time, you know, Hijab, kind of, you know, we think about Hijab as just kind of you put a scarf on and what have you, but Hijab is a continuous process, a continuous struggle and a continuous growth. When I was in college, you know, I started wearing Hijab. You know, how many times do we hear someone say, you know, you're wearing a hijab, but look at the clothes that you're wearing. How many of you guys experienced that? Yeah, yeah. Man. And then, you know, then you try to wear that and then someone tells you, look at what you just did. Like, you're a hijabi. How are you a hijabi and you're doing this? How many of you guys experienced that? Yeah, yeah, oh man. How disheartening is that? Does that give you courage to continue the Hijab? No. Does that, does that discourage you from the Hijab? Yeah, yeah, absolutely it does. So when I was in college, you know, as I grew up in Richmond, I was kind of coined the ghetto hijabi. You know, it took some time to get rid of that, that perception, but I had a friend. I had a friend and Subhanallah, Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala is so merciful. This friend, this friend said to me one day, yeah, of course I didn't, you know, I was, I was still wearing my hijabi. I mean, I used to tie it from the back and I used to put it like Tupak style, put a hoodie on and walk out and, you know, sometimes I was wearing all sorts of different types of clothes. So one day I was wearing clothes that I probably shouldn't, you know, be wearing and this friend looks at me and this friend actually, you know, for a while, you know, we had a mutual respect and they used to help me out in a lot of things. And this friend one day looked at me and said, isn't your mom so clothes? My mom's a tailor, she sewed only clothes. And I was like, yeah, and they said, ask her to sew you some more. And I, yeah, for a second I know, I know, I got a little look so you're like, oh man, that's messed up. But you know what, nobody told me anything about my clothes, about what I was doing, whether it was right or wrong. Only this person had the guts to come to me and tell me something. And it hit me to my core, not that I was offended, but I said, yikes, hey, you are right. What am I wearing? And that takes effort, that takes a way to say it. So if you're in here that you, you know, try to tell your friends, oh, you're not wearing, no, you have to build trust. You have to build understanding. And maybe, you know, I had friends that probably looked at me and said, man, she gonna beat me up if I tell her anything. So maybe people didn't come to me, but you know what, I valued, I valued that. And that's been etched in my memory because from that day on I started striving. I strove, I strived, I actively worked on progressing my hijab, progressing my attire. And eventually I am here today. We oppress our souls by not progressively working on ourselves to be better each day. We oppress our souls by denying our souls comfort of where and to whom we belong to. It's hard, it's hard being a hijabi. It is very, very hard. And for some it's easy and for some it's hard. And maybe for some it's a fluctuation that maybe some days are easier than the next. And maybe some days are harder, but pushed through because the greater the struggle, the greater the reward. People are gonna come on the Day of Judgment sisters and they're gonna see people that struggled a lot on this day, on this earth. And Allah is going to give them something that the people are gonna be like, man, I wanna go back to this world and I wanna struggle just like them. But the ease that's gonna come there, that's waiting, it's waiting for you. So what I wanna share with you guys is that there are a few tips and tools. I know sometimes we hear things and we think that, okay, great, that's cool. Like I got some power back in me and that's it. But there are some things that have helped me along the way to continue to wear the hijab, to continue to deal with my struggles because hijab is not only the struggles that we deal with, there's a lot of things that we deal with internally. But there are things that have helped. And I just wanna share that one, one tipper tool that has been very, very helpful for me is one that I was listening to a lecture by Sheikh Masleh from RIS and he was actually addressing the youth and he said, he gave an example and a story and I apologize, I don't remember the surah that when the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam lost his wife, Khadija R.A. and lost his biggest supporter, his uncle. And he was at ta'if being pelted, thrown rocks at, covered with blood. He didn't have, and he, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam didn't have even what he, a revelation coming down to him for a while. Can you imagine what he, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, felt and went through? And at that time, Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam said, we know the condition of your heart. Now I wanna pause right there. Think about this. You can tell your friend next to you how you feel and maybe you can understand how your friend feels but can you actually understand the intricacies of how they actually feel? No, the depth of that feeling is only to you. You are the only one who know how hard that is in that moment. But Allah is saying, we know the condition of your heart. I know exactly how you feel, how much of a depth of a pain that you are going through right now. Only I know. I know that feeling. And so then the shaykh goes on and says that, Allah says, remember me. Now I wanna pause there. We hear this a lot, right? Remember Allah, make Likr start thinking about him but I had heard another scholar speak about this recently that there was a world of souls. Our souls were there and Allah swt manifested himself as he saw fit and we submitted to Allah. Our soul said, yes, we believe. There was a connection between your soul and Allah. And so Allah is saying, is reminding us, remember that connection you have with me. Remember me. And then Allah says the next step is be like the people of Sajda. Now Allah could have said, go make wudu, go pray, go pray turqat, put your hijab on, go face the qabla and pray your turqat. No, he just said, be like the people of Sajda. So sisters, you don't even have to be, you could be in your menstrual cycle. You don't even have to be wearing hijab but if you're feeling so broken and so hurt and pained, all you have to do is get your head on the floor. You get down in that Sajda because guess what? Allah is right there next to you, so close to you that you don't even have to say what it is that you are feeling. You could even just say Allah and start crying and he knows exactly what he's going to give you, what exactly you're gonna need at that moment. And so sisters, when I heard this, I was going through a lot of struggles at that time. And I remember there was, there's a couple of stories I wanna share with you because this is tried and tested, it's not just something that I heard and said, okay, cool. There was one moment that I came and I was struggling with something and I needed to cry. I couldn't figure out what to do when I was so constricted and I remember I slipped away in my parents' garage and nobody knew I was there, it was that nighttime. And as a Muslim or a South Asian, we learned the art of crying silently, or at least I did, and I went into that garage and it was dark and I just put my head on the floor and I started crying because the only thing that I needed at that moment was a hug of Allah and I didn't know, I was like Allah, I don't know what I need, I need your love, I need your love, I need you to hug me. I just, everything that was coming out of me was just that and I cried for 15 minutes on the floor in the dark. Now, 15 minutes later, my brother comes down and just a disclaimer, you know, we're not much of an affectionate family. I'm kind of changing that with my mama forcing her hugs. And my brother comes down, turns on the light, looks at me. Then he looks away and calls my mom, he's like, Mom, come down here, she comes downstairs, he's like, go give her a hug. Those 15 minutes were not heard by nobody but Allah. My head was on that floor crying and asking him for hug and who Allah knew that I needed my mother's hug at that moment and he gave it to me and the peace that came over me at that moment. And the very next day, the troubles that I was going through, I didn't even get to ask him what the trouble I was going through and he solved my problem the next day. Share another story with you. As a single mom, there are a lot of struggles and a lot of challenges, you know, and I was going through that and, you know, I remember I was dropping my children off to school and, you know, and someone had said something to me that really hurt me and takes a lot for me to be hurt. And I felt like, okay, I'm going through this struggle, you understand this, you know this, but why, okay, all right. And I was so shocked hearing that and it shook me, it shook me to my core but then I said to myself, okay, all right, what do I need to change in this? Oh, Allah, I know you said this for a reason for me so you know what, I'm gonna take this and I'm gonna do something about it, I'm gonna change. You know what, that still hurts. That really hurts, that entire day I cried. That entire day I cried and cried and cried and at that night I was still crying by myself. And I said, Allah, I know I'm gonna take this and I'm gonna take this as an opportunity and a lesson to change because I know I need to change. So I'm gonna change. But Allah, that really hurt and I don't know what I need, I'm sorry. And I cried all night. The very next day as I was dropping my child to school, that same individual saw me and started walking towards me and raised their hands out and said, I am so sorry. I thought of you all night, how could I have said this to you? I broke down crying because guess what, I didn't tell this individual anything and I cried all night. Allah is the one who hurt me, I was hurt. And here I was crying all night and here she was thinking about me all night. And not only that, Allah swt turned her into a resource for me. So this is something that I take in my life when I am struggling. A struggle is no big or small, there's no measurement of struggle. Anything that you feel hardship about, just talk to him, tell him, Allah, I'm hurt, I'm hurt, I'm hurt. If you don't have words, Allah, just say Allah, there are many times where I would be driving and I just, all I am doing is saying Allah and crying because I don't have the words. And SubhanAllah, another tip that I do, and I'm sorry, I think I'm taking more time, but another tip that I do is that sometimes when I'm crying to Allah and I'm just crying, there was this one moment recently that I kept saying, oh Allah, I need you, I need you, I need you. I didn't know what else to say. Again, I felt like I need you, I don't know what to do. I need you and I'm here, can you hear me? And right after that, something I like to do is I have books of 99 names of Allah. I like to just close my eyes, take the book and just open it and see what name do I come up with. And that day when I was crying, I cried for almost an hour at night silently. And I opened the book and the attribute for the name that came up as I opened it was, Al-Qarib, Al-Mujib, the one that is near and the one that answers. And all I was doing was crying and asking him to be next to me, to listen to me. And Allah reminded me that I am here. Just as he reminds me that he is near and here, he is here for all of you. He is always going to be here. So seek him. JazakAllah al-Qarim. As-salaamu alaikum. JazakAllah al-Qarim, that's such a beautiful reminder Masha'Allah. And I loved how you put Sejda in that way as a hug of Allah, Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala and to know that he's always with us, you know, no matter what we're going through and to know that as long as we're close to him, insha'Allah that he will resolve and fix matters for us no matter what we're going through. And I'm going to go out of limb here on a limb and say that I don't think that you had zero likeability Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala. I think it was Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala saving you and protecting you for the right friends, people that are actually worth your time. So I want to take a moment here and do a question and answer session. Okay, my question is the day to day the day to day when you struggle, reminding yourself that it's for Allah Subh'anaHu Wa Ta'ala because I'm the one who struggles with hijab because the inner doll wants to just always be there. So how do you keep that momentum when in the morning you wake up and you just don't want to put it on and you're just like, ah, my hair looks good. Really don't want to put it on. Then you just remind yourself that it's for Allah and not resent the whole day. The sun is shining, the sun is there and I can't feel it. How do you progress and keep that solid grounding? This is for Allah all the time because it does come, faith comes and it goes and then you're just like, man, I just really I'm gonna stay home today because I just don't have it in me to go out and cover. Yeah, jazakla, okay, and for sharing that. You know, you said it right. Faith comes in and out in so many different levels. Eman comes in and out. We're not expected to have this equilibrium of Eman. Nobody, if that was it, we're gonna be in jannah, man. You know, that's not this world. It happens and there are going to be days that you have that. Those are the days that you push through just a little bit harder. It's not just about reminding yourself, okay, this is for the sake of Allah. Sit with yourself. Sit with yourself that, yes, today this is hard for me. Yes, today I don't feel like wearing it Allah. It's so hard for me to wear it today. I really don't want to wear it. It's okay to feel that way. It's okay to tell yourself that. Acknowledge that because what you're doing is you're fighting your soul. You're fighting yourself and your emotions and trying to be like, no, no, no, don't come, don't come. It's okay, let it come. Sit with that emotion. And reminder, so that, okay, today was harder. What was easier for me the other day? What made it easier? Okay, maybe the sun wasn't out. That made it easier, right? It was cold. Yeah, it was cold. There's snow on the mountains. Yeah, I know, there's snow on the mountains. But it's okay. Continue to, there are gonna be daily things that you have to do to replenish your soul, right? Every single day, you know, we go out there in the world. If we don't do things to recharge our battery, it's going to be so much more harder to continue to do that. Just like a bank ATM, right? You need to put in money to take out money. If you keep putting, if you keep taking out from that bank of yours without replenishing that bank of yours of soul and recharging yourself and giving you that self-care that you need, it's gonna be harder to do. So for that, start to, you know, some things that I've done that have helped me is that I read the salat-e-salam on the Prophet's salat-e-salam every single day. I read the astaghfar every single day. This helps, this helps me in going through, because one salam on the Prophet's salat-e-salam gives you 10 mercies from Allah. And perhaps one of those mercies is gonna be that strength to plow through. So may Allah make it easy on you. I have one more question to add. So I feel like there's a little bit of disconnect between our generation, like 30s and younger, is like, we understand, it was like post-9-11 and everything, but we don't understand what the sahabi'at really struggled with, because all we ever hear is, they tore their clothes and they put it on their hijab and they were like, that bad, you know, they were like so hardcore. And then we're over here like, ugh, so bad. So like what examples do we have of them struggling or them going through their lives and what hijab was like for them back then, so that we can be like, oh, they've been there, they've done that, you know, on top of replenishing our iman bank, you know, keeping that flow, but how do we also connect that our sisters in Islam went through this? They did it, it's written, you know. How do we connect that? Yeah, so I don't have any particular stories at the top of my head, but what I can share is when the command, how Allah swt brings down a command, it wasn't just, he brought it down just like this. There were years in between, one example would be, there was, when the command came down to pray, the muck and period, there was a lot of struggle that happened in the muck and period. And on one particular one, I remember hearing a sheikh talk about this that, about alcohol specifically, that alcohol wasn't said to, okay, that's it, can't do it. First was, okay, don't be intoxicated while coming near prayer. Then it was another step, then it was another step. When the migrated to the Medinan period, there was 10 years of that, then came the commandment down to now, no more alcohol. It was baby steps. We today think like, okay, you know, especially for our converts, our reverts, you know, that okay, now you're Muslim, you gotta do this, you gotta do this, you gotta do this, no. Start slowly, start slowly and work on it. Just like the progression piece is that, you put your hijab on, may not wear your clothes properly today, that's okay. Maybe that act of yours is going to give you the strength later to conform and change to that. Maybe Allah loves an act of yours that He will give you that strength and guide you to that, right? We try to see, okay, they did it, but they struggled. They struggled a lot before they were able to do it. And this is our struggle. This is, and you shouldn't look at it as, oh, this is just a very little struggle compared to what they did. No, this is your struggle, own your struggle. It's okay to have this struggle. So, you know, it's essentially, you know, kind of working towards that. And I'm sorry, I think I lost track of the question that you had. I don't know if I, for the previous, the past, yeah. So, there are probably a lot more stories. I unfortunately don't have that on the top of my head, I apologize. Salaamu Alaykum. My question revolves around the hyper acceptance in our current society and the standards that neoliberalism has in terms of clumping us with other agendas and then having those neoliberals start talking about things like Mehta Amini and Iran and them using hijab and saying it's basically like a weaponization and it's a form of oppression. So, how do our young ones kind of reconcile the fact that these neoliberals want them to feel like they're welcomed but then they have to welcome everybody but then all of a sudden are blackballed because of things that are happening in other parts of the world that have nothing to do with the commandment of hijab in our faith. So, I probably am not the best person to address this. I am, you know, but in terms of, I think the question was how do we help our youth recognize? It to reconcile the fact that, you know, there's the far left, right? And how they want to welcome everybody and everyone's welcome and you see those posters everywhere. Gotcha. Except for women wearing hijab because of things like Mehta Amini who unfortunately was, you know, executed or killed because she was not wearing hijab and then the far left saying, let's burn all the hijabs and then you see the thing that you're wearing as like a form of oppression even though you yourself are not participating in whatever their outcries are about. So, you know, there's a lot of extremism in our community, right, in our cultures, right? We go from one end to another end very quickly. And part of the issue is learning and understanding what our own extremisms are within us. What, how do we reconcile with, okay, if we see this happen, is it logical asking ourselves these questions, gaining insight into, okay, if one person was persecuted because of this, does that mean that the entire, you know, symbol needs to be persecuted? This is, you know, unfortunately media news, they don't share the entirety of the story. They don't share all of that. It's based off of people's feelings and emotions and thoughts and desires. It comes right back to how we are interpreting that, how much do we know of it and how much are we giving into it? How much are we giving into that? And part of the, you know, part of the struggle in today's generation of youth is to recognize what our desires are. Recognize what is it that we want and how is it being projected onto the community, projected out into the society and how they are using that against our youth. This idea that we have to be free, what's the definition of freedom? That's what everybody has to ask themselves. What is your definition of freedom? Is it this? Is it going to this extreme because somebody was persecuted unlawfully that you're gonna go ahead and just do this? Is that what we are teaching ourselves? Or do we look at it from a different point of view that, hey, okay, something bad happened here. This is wrong. But why are we labeling everything with it? So that's sort of my thoughts about it. I apologize. I may not have answered that as justly as possible, but I think we do need to, as parents, really talk about these with our youth. I mean, it's not just, all right, you gotta do this and this is how it's done or this is wrong. We have to explain. And we have to start talking about who Allah is and what this religion is about. We come from generations that we had told certain definitions of our deen and we don't really understand the depths of it, but there's so much in it. So if we don't share that with our youth, if we don't guide them that way, if we don't get them to start thinking critically, then we are already behind. So if you don't do that now, do it today, open up, talk about it. Listen, listen to our youth and what they're thinking and what they're feeling, because yes, it's about, sometimes it's about validating your own daughters struggles. It's about validating all of that. And if you can, and I'm sure daughters, if moms just said, okay, baby, I understand, or I'm here to listen to you, I'm sure you'd open up a little bit more to your mamas as well. So inshallah, may Allah make it easy on you. That was really good, thank you. Yeah, you're gonna live worse than that. Okay, so one of the things that comes to mind first is that it sounds like you know that, okay, this is what I'm going to do it. You've made a plan, so you've made a plan. And now it sounds like you're testing out that plan with others, maybe it's your family. Maybe you're telling them, so either you're wanting to see either approval or disapproval from it. And the first thing is to ask yourself, okay, is my plan something I want to do? Am I just saying it because I'm being told I have to do this? Am I just throwing it out that I'm gonna do this? Or am I stalling? Am I doing this? What am I doing? What am I saying this for? Why am I making this plan? Right, and so I know it's hard sometimes, as I'm a parent now, right, and I come from both sides of wanting to not wear it to wanting to wear it and to having daughters who wear it. And I know it's discouraging when you hear like you're not gonna live, yes, that's correct. I don't know whether I'm going to live tomorrow, that I have made an intention that this is when I am going to start. And I ask Allah to help me with this. That is a response that you can start with because it is about intention. Make your intention first, make your resolve. Make sure that you've made that resolve with Allah, that oh Allah, please help me with this. I've made a plan because we plan that Allah plans. And perhaps that simple, sincere intention of yours, Allah might even put it in your heart and make it easy. And maybe tomorrow you wear it. Maybe you don't, maybe you wear it on the 11th grade, but maybe when you wear it, you are solid when you wear it. And for the people that tell this young woman that you're gonna live the next day, yes, that's right, you may not live, but her intention is what's going to count here. We don't know if that intention is what's going to get her to solidify. Maybe she wears it tomorrow and takes it off the next day because she wasn't ready. Or maybe she wears it when she gets into 11th grade and she puts it on and she goes full force with it and she is strong and confident because she chose that time to wear it. She chose herself to build herself to get to that point. It's a building process. It's not a do it and do it now. So that's my thoughts on that. No question. I think the sister there wanted to say something to you. So I became Punjabi in sixth grade and it was like my choice. And since I was in middle school, I've had a lot of people say stuff to me. I'm still in eighth grade. I'm still in middle school. And I've had several situations, especially with boys. And I've been touched. They touch my Punjab and they send messages around about me. And the school does nothing about it. And I've gone multiple times and I don't know what to do. First, Mayola, make this easy on you and grant you justice in all the injustice that you are going through. My advice, number one, is to get your family involved. It is absolutely not okay for that to happen. I have seen with my own eyes when I was in those grades of the hijabs being snatched off the hairs of girls. And it is absolutely not okay to have that. And you should not have to deal with this alone. Get your support system in there. Talk to your family, get your family in there. There are advocates out there. And specifically if this is happening and nothing is happening, get care involved. Care is a very good resource. So if the school isn't doing anything, get them involved. Get more people involved. Mayola, make it easy on you. I know it is not easy at all. I've seen it. I've been in that situation. And just keep standing tall and keep asking Allah. Allah is Al-Adal, the most just. He will surely find a way. I have a question too. I'm start working at high school. I'm working at high school. There are all like teenagers over there. Since I start working, there is like the kids telling me, like, you know, not like face to me, but behind me like, oh, she looks ugly. She looks scary because she wore hijab. And the teacher and principal doesn't tell me anything. And I talk with my family and they said, you can remove your hijab because in Quran, they didn't like exactly say that you have to wear it. But I said the principal and the teachers didn't tell me anything about my hijab. But they said, if they're not telling you anything, they will make something like small thing that they can fire you. But yeah, some like a lot of jobs, I didn't hire because I wear hijab. And in the free month, it's good. A lot of people wear hijab, but I'm living in San Jose. So over there, a lot of people didn't wear hijab. And when you wear hijab, they, everyone's like staring you or talking about you. I'm just like confused. Like, I don't know about a lot of like, search a little bit of Quran, but they exactly didn't tell that you have to wear. But I don't know what to say. So, you know, I'm not a scholar. So I'm not gonna comment on the commandment. And I would encourage you to speak to a scholar for that portion of it. But in terms of the other things, right? I'm just gonna remind that, yes, that's hard. That's really hard to do. And I understand how difficult it is. Sometimes, and as I was mentioning earlier, that the negativity around us really makes it difficult for us to continue wearing what we wear. And it's hard to do that. But my sincere and humble advice is to look at the names of Allah. And one of the names of Allah is Ar-Razaq, the risk giver. He is the one who is already written for you where your risk is gonna come, how much it's gonna come and where and when that's gonna happen. So whether you have your hijab or whether you don't have your hijab, that is written for you. And maybe perhaps there is a bigger wisdom in you going through this and perhaps the struggle that you go and the steadfastness that you show. And maybe perhaps within that, Allah SWT gives you something much greater than that. So my advice to you is keep your faith in Allah. Talk to people. Ask scholars what to do in this instance and share your experience about it. I know you're saying that the administration isn't doing anything about it, but maybe perhaps suggesting to the administration how to teach children how to be tolerable, tolerant of other people's religion. The staff need to come together and provide workshops. I mean, that's essentially the issue in today's schooling, public schools is that there's no character development happening. These kids are saying whatever, doing whatever, and it's running wild and there's no development like that happening. So it really takes a bigger effort. And maybe perhaps through you, Allah uses you to gather that and inform others. Maybe there's other people that are going through this, but maybe through you, Allah uses to guide others and help others. So I would encourage you, inshallah, to continue to seek out that help. I think we have one question here and one last question. Sometimes I ask Allah to help me with my struggles, but then I feel zero connection with him and the issue doesn't pass. This has happened before with my feelings about hijab, me asking Allah to support me and help me through it from the deepest depths of my heart, but the help never came, any advice. This is a heavy one, right? And I will say that I sometimes have these thoughts. It's like, okay, do I feel the connection right now? Do I feel it? But what does that feeling feel like? Do we have a particular feeling that we're supposed to have when we have that connection? So you have to ask yourself, and this is something that I've asked myself is that, do I only feel connected when I'm sad about something and I'm talking to Allah? Is that when I feel connected? How come I don't feel connected now? It reminds me of the companions who came to the Prophet so I said hello and said, oh Prophet, so Allah, I said hello. When we are with you, we cry and we cry about it. We think about Allah, we think about the afterlife where we're so much into it, but when we go back to our families, we laugh and we forget. The Prophet, so Allah said hello and please forgive me if I'm saying this wrong but just paraphrasing here that, that if you were always like that, then you'd be angels. Hello, Allah, and may Allah forgive me. I don't remember the last part of it, but we're not meant to always be like that. We're not meant to always be in this constant state of, I'm connected. Those connections come in many different forms. Maybe perhaps you feel that there's a particular expectation on how that feeling or how that connection is supposed to look like or supposed to feel like and you're waiting for that to happen. But maybe perhaps think about it. Is there any other things happening in your life that Allah swt is doing for you? Are there any other things that Allah is bringing for you that maybe perhaps might somewhat help you in that moment? Maybe perhaps it's sitting here and listening to others going through that struggle. Help comes, help always comes but it doesn't come in the form that we wanted to come. It doesn't come in the form that we think it's going to come. And maybe perhaps that du'a that you're reading, remember there's three things that happens when you read du'as. One is that it gets accepted right away or that it is delayed for you and given to you later. Two, instead of what you asked, Allah gives you something much better than that or three, that Allah avert a calamity from you. And just maybe, and Allah w'alum, just maybe just a thought out there that if you feel like, okay, if the last is true, if the last is true for you, maybe perhaps something else was supposed to come for you and take you away from this deen and Allah swt is stopping that from happening and that you are still doing it. You are still there and you're still asking Allah. You are still connected to Him. The fact that you are asking Allah is your connection to Allah because Allah has inspired you to make that du'a and Allah is continuing to expire you to make that du'a and call on to Him. That is connection. I think that's... Subhanallah, speaking of help, it reminds me of the story of Siddh-e-Hajar where she was left. I was just doing the story of Prophet Rahim and he left his son Ismail and Hajar in the desert and he told them, Allah swt will assist you, Allah will be there. But Subhanallah, Siddh-e-Hajar didn't wait. What did she do? She went and sought help for herself, right? She's seeking support. And same with Maryam, the mother of Aisa. She had to shake the palm day. So there's an element of effort from ourselves. Yes, of course, always make du'a but seek help and seek support. And Subhanallah, that segues into our next slide here. We're trying to start a sisterhood for young girls, high school, college age, just a social group, girls that want to wear hijab but maybe don't wanna wear it alone in public. So these are just social outings. You can scan the QR code and it links to our Instagram page where if you wanna go out with a group of sisters for the young girl, I would say for what should she do, right? Insulate yourself, find people that support you, find like-minded sisters, engage with them and surround yourself with those. So this is a perfect opportunity for high school, college-aged girls that are interested in hijab, maybe or already wear hijab but these are hijab wearing outings. So if you don't wanna wear it on your own, I know for me growing up when I was with my sisters, I always felt more confident and safe in my hijab. So if you're in ninth, 11th, 10th grade and you're kind of on that cusp, whether you do or you don't, going to these types of events with other sisters outside of the masjid, right? Experiencing it in public can really be transformative, inshallah. So I'll leave that up for another moment. And then for our sisters who maybe don't wear hijab yet at all with Ramadan coming up, we wanted to start a support group to take the challenge of wearing hijab during Ramadan. This is a personal journey but this is just a WhatsApp group of support. So if you're feeling like you need someone to talk to, another sister can be there for you and support you so you don't feel alone. So you don't feel like you're doing it without any support and help, inshallah. So with that, we will move into our activities, our age-based activities. We'll have middle school grade, ages 12 to 14 in the conference room. The one that's here, the closer side. On the opposite end of that, we'll do the high school. The college aged plus 19 to 26 will be in the back. We've got some activities back there for you. And then in this main hall, we'll stay the age 27 plus and I've heard that there's an exciting game that they will be playing, which I'm excited to partake in. And sisters, if you would like, with the organization that I have, we do multiple events also for women and we've done socials and what have you, please take a look at us. It's called Wasila Connections. You can always come up to me and I can share that with you. Please share our organization, spread it, and if you can donate, inshallah, and make the offer it. Jazakulah al-Qa'idin. Jazakumullah al-Qa'id, and Jazakumullah al-Qa'id. Jazakumullah al-Qa'id to all the sisters who volunteered to put this event together. For weeks and weeks, mashallah, they were so dedicated and committed to this program.