00:00Just a reminder for myself that we were talking on the way coming here that the
00:14tariqah the spiritual path and spiritual teachers come to teach the ways of the
00:21heaven and heavens is not the same as the way of the material world and the
00:31material world now is in a great deceit and that deceit is propagated by all
00:39their social media and everything that now available of technologies it spreads
00:45that deceit in such a speed that now everybody becomes confused the way of
00:53the material world and then what is the way of the heavens. And a reminder for myself
01:00I'm by the grace of Allah that I'm still alive I'm not claiming to be anything and that we took a
01:20path in which to be nothing and Allah's greatness that our life is the struggle is ours and
01:30victory is with God. We own the struggle and victory is with God. The material world shows
01:40everything what we say. Everything now on social media is about how people are
01:46victorious. They conquered this, they got five cars in the driveway, got piles of cash
01:52stacked up, they going here, going there, eating this, eating that and what shaitan
01:59wants what we call shaitan, what we call evilness, bad character, whatever we want to label it,
02:04everyone has their own version they feel comfortable with. The negativity wants to
02:10show that's the norm for this world and that's what God wants. As a matter of fact he doesn't even
02:17teach of anything from what God wants. So everything is about the victory and that you must be victorious on
02:25this earth, you must have conquered this earth, that you must have achieved everything and it makes
02:32everyone to be confused. And heavenly people come and teach don't know the struggle is what you own,
02:39victory is only in God's hands. So it's just a simple quote that we should live by. The struggle is mine
02:48and the victory is Allah's, is God's, is the Creator, that's it. I'm not here to become victorious.
02:58Victory is only when God determines it's going to be victorious and his version of victory may be
03:04something completely different than mine. That's what is a reminder of my life every day and we only
03:12talk to ourselves. Anyone likes to listen, Alhamdulillah if they don't like to listen, Alhamdulillah too.
03:19The struggle is mine. Awliya come into our lives and teach, you must be struggling for something.
03:25If God loves you and He's kissed you with His love, your struggle has begun. You struggle and your life is
03:33about struggling and don't think ever about the victory. The victory is not ours. So then all my life and
03:42all my difficulties, then I'm continuously in a state of struggling. If I think my life should be based on
03:51ease, this is not the way of the heavens. People like it, they don't like it, at least they give an explanation
03:58and an understanding. Because you look to the right of you and say that guy looks like he's in a happy condition.
04:04And this one, they look like they're a really happy condition. That one looked like they're in a very happy
04:09condition. You know, that was the deceit of negativity and bad character. When Allah loves you, when God loves
04:19you, He puts you on a path of struggle. What they call an Arabic jihad, which is a thing, all the
04:31secret microphones are going. But the jihad that they're talking about is a fight against yourself.
04:37The greatest fight is not beating other people, but beating yourself. Conquering yourself, your own
04:44enemies and all your bad characteristics. And my understanding for myself was, I had to conquer
04:52all my bad characteristics. And then my life was about the struggle. And Allah wanted to see the
05:00good character. He says, I want to give you a degree in my paradises. And my school is this abode.
05:08If you want the degree here to achieve your paradise rank, begin your struggle. So every time there's a
05:17difficulty at home, every time there's a difficulty at work, every time there's a difficulty in relationships,
05:23every time there's a difficulty with my sustenance, with everything we can imagine. And you think that
05:30I must be doing something wrong and I'm going to begin to complain about all of these difficulties.
05:36Awliyaullah come into our life and say, no, no, no, no, be careful. This is the struggle. This is the
05:42imtihan. These are the tests that God is sending. If it makes a runway straight into your grave,
05:51there's not a single difficulty. Everything came with ease. You achieved nothing in this world.
05:58And there was no rank in your paradise. Because you started, you grabbed your football,
06:04and you ran to the touchdown. There was no difficulty. That's not a soul in which God has blessed.
06:11That's a different understanding of what's going to happen. So we don't look left and we don't look
06:16right that all these people who are look like they're achieving so much that they're going all
06:20over the world. They seem to be at peace and everything seems to be fantastic. No, as a matter of
06:25fact, it's not. There's a deal with the devil that hasn't been described. But for the paradise reality,
06:32the paradise reality is as soon as there's a stretch that looks like it's clear, Allah will
06:39inspire the angels to begin to put obstacles. Because I want to see this servant of mine,
06:46how they interact with each obstacle. Do they lose their faith as soon as their check is cut?
06:54Do they lose their character as soon as somebody argues and yells with them?
07:00Do they lose everything about what God wanted to grant to that soul of his heavenly kingdom? Not the
07:07barn. It's not the heavenly barn. That's a different class. This class is about the heavenly kingdom.
07:15Kings and queens and majesty, I want to give you all of these realities of paradise.
07:22I began to test you in this world. Every difficulty that comes, God's watching to see the good character.
07:30Why do you lose faith? You struggle, struggle. Victory is coming your way. So with their teaching,
07:37they're reminding us, don't focus on the ringing doorbell.
07:43That was a sign. See, he's right, he's right. Don't focus on the victory. Don't look at everything as
07:57hard, everything is wrong, everything is bad. It's meant to be that way if God loves you. It meant to be
08:04everything to be testing if God loves you. Everything to be an obstacle in your path if God loves you. We said
08:11on the way driving here, we have a character in our understanding and in our history,
08:18the victorious lion of Allah , Imam Ali , victorious lion of Allah but he never saw
08:25anything but difficulty. Victory wasn't that all the world's riches were dumped onto his presence and in
08:32his feet. But he lived a life of continuous difficulty. His children lived the life of difficulty.
08:40Allah's title for Imam Ali , was the victorious lion. So they come to inspire within our lives
08:48that this life is about the struggle. How are you going to act? What your character is going to be?
08:55What type of your typical fragrance will be released or sour and bitter flavor that comes from people?
09:01Because you really know somebody until you squeeze them. One little test from the sheikh will squeeze you a little bit.
09:08Oh so much bad character comes out that the smell that the seven heavens can't take you.
09:15From the what's coming from the heart. That's why it's a school of manners to remind if you wanted something
09:22from the heavens, especially if you came in contact with these sheikhs, immediately you're enrolled in a
09:28school. Whether you knew it or not so you can't even run out now. Because God already inspired you to be in that
09:36school. You're just not here by any coincidence. You've been enrolled. You wanted it or not. Whatever
09:43cleverness was inspired within your heart was sitting with them. Even I'm coming just to investigate the
09:48food. I'm a food critic tonight. You're in it too. And then the teaching comes to teach on your life path.
09:58Because you may be just passing by for one day on your caravan and going on your journey. The teaching
10:05for this one day today was this life was about the struggle. This life is not about your ease. If you
10:12found them and all of a sudden you found everything in your life is a struggle, your own.
10:21Allah describes Surah Al-Asr, Tawassib Al-Haq. Your way of Haq is based on sabr. Why Allah would
10:28say that your way of truth is based on sabr? If you're going to be on a path of truth, you better
10:35believe that path is up and rocks are flying in every direction. And God says, be patient as sabr.
10:45Because if you're patient, you exhibit all good characteristics. Impatient, you become angry.
10:51Impatient, you become yelling. Impatient, you think I'm going to leave. I'll run and get on some other
10:59boat. I don't need this boat. And what's it in the Eunice happened when he jumped off his boat? Allah
11:06sent a whale to eat him. He said, not only you're not going to have a boat anymore, I'm going to bring
11:10a fish to eat you. And now do your seclusion inside the fish where you could have done it on the land
11:17amongst the people. Means there's no escaping God's will. It's only understanding God's will that gives us
11:24clarity in life. That this path is going to be based on patience. Then they come and say, sit with them
11:31because they're going to teach you how to have patience. By good character. By good character.
11:37Okay, I'm convinced things are difficult and they're all coming around me in my life.
11:44I'm accepting Shaykh what you're saying. I want to have good character on my testing.
11:49I want to be as patient and tolerant as possible through all these difficulties. Then they begin
11:54to teach. If you're accepting this way of hak is based on, this way of truth is based on patience,
12:03then learn the good manners from them. So this first step in good manners is that my children
12:10can walk into this room and find everything wrong with it. It doesn't require a brain to do that.
12:22Not that my children don't have brains. Very smart.
12:25Not that my children don't have a brain to do that.
12:35Coming into a room, coming into an event in life, coming into a situation in life,
12:39sitting with somebody, anything we're doing to find the problem is a no-brainer.
12:48It's not that you're zaraing and that you're smart you find problems.
12:52It's actually you have very bad character and you always find a problem in everything.
12:58And that's what takes away your sabr and you have no patience.
13:03The teaching now, the trick, there's a manual in which Allah wrote everything.
13:07Says you want to be and achieve sabr because if Allah dress you from sabr,
13:12He dresses you from all His names and all His beatific names. They dress the soul
13:17of the sabreen, of the servant who achieves sabr. And then He becomes from the Muhammad,
13:23Andras Mustafa, beautiful and fragrant, from sabr. So then the teaching, you want sabr,
13:31then train with them in good character. That they train their whole life, don't find something wrong,
13:38but find something good in everything. Anyone can point out the bad. Anyone can find everything wrong
13:45with their life, with their family, their condition, their situation, their job, their boss, everything.
13:53It wasn't about that. It was about identifying what was good in it.
13:59What was good? What was the benefit? I came into the room, the food was late,
14:03they started late, the speaker was too loud. Okay, my kids can do that. That's not a genius.
14:10But to come in and you, because these sheikhs will intentionally agitate and aggravate you.
14:16They know all your buttons. They know exactly what's going to agitate you and they may even say it.
14:22Not aggressive and hostile. They may say a word that you didn't want to hear.
14:27They hit it and they hit the button, not to see, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, like the jack in the box,
14:33the toy we used to have.
14:34Haaaah!
14:35Haaaah!
14:36They don't want to attack you.
14:39So they want to see what the characteristic is.
14:42They want to train in the level of, don't identify problems. Anyone can do that.
14:48But try to identify something good that I went through. It was so beautiful.
14:53The faces were so diverse. Who cares? The food wasn't on time. I'm not starving. It's not a food
14:59shelter. Outside you can get something else. Yeah, it means find the beauty in everything.
15:07When you can begin to train yourself to overlook the bad and only see the beautiful, then you are
15:14being raised by Allah . And Allah find good character in that servant. Look at Allah . He says,
15:22I feed the mu'mineen wal kafiri. I feed those who worship me and those who come against me. And I feed
15:30them all equally. I love my creation equally. I made them all. So have that characteristic in which
15:39we try to find the good in every situation. Find the beauty in every situation. And every condition
15:47in which my Lord put me in, there must be a wisdom and a hikmah of why I'm in that situation. And to
15:54find its patience and its resolution through that difficulty. And awliyaullah come and teach,
15:59if you are patient through your testing and you exhibit good character, this dress of sabr begins
16:05to move towards the servant. Dress their light, bless their light, and Allah , dress them to become
16:12from sabrin. The dress of sabrin, come up with their soul. All ism al-husna begin to dress them.
16:18Because that's the key, key name of Allah that opened every manifestation. That's why
16:26all pious people are extremely tested. They don't live a life of ease. The whole understanding was
16:34they are continuously bombarded, continuously bombarded, continuously backbidden, continuous
16:41in difficulty. It wasn't about you see them on Facebook, you know, 50,000 people sitting under
16:47them and they're just waving to everybody. Oh, my people, oh, my people, they love you. Awliyaullah
16:54read their lives. They were tortured, they were abused. Abu Hassan al-Khargani was so horribly
17:00tortured, they had hurt his family and put it at the door of his hanaqah. And he went straight in and did
17:08his sikr. Their lives were a symbol of a struggle for Allah . And the
17:15shaykh students are to accompany him on his struggle. And that's why they're accompanied.
17:22Every type of difficulty, you go somewhere the door is locked, you go somewhere somebody backbidden,
17:26you go somewhere somebody cursing you, you go here, you go there. So that Allah can give you a
17:31darajah. You accompany them, you're with them, the difficulties come. Then they begin to teach you
17:36all the good characteristics so that the emtahan comes, we pass the test and get the grade. We pray
17:43that God give us that grade, a good grade, and inspire us with goodness and good character.
17:48InshaAllah, forgive all our badness and bad character.
17:50InshaAllah, forgive all our badness and badness and badness and badness.
17:57Amen.
17:59Amen.
18:06Amen.
