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In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful. All praise is due to Allah, Lord of the worlds. And peace and blessings be upon the most honorable of the prophets and messengers, Muhammad and the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him and his family and his companions.
Tasliman kathiran kathiran. And after that, my brothers and sisters, we are in the 27th day of Ramadan. All praise is due to Allah.
So it is very important for us to take stock of what we have gained until now. I’m assuming that, especially the people in Ithakaf, I’m assuming that you had your goals for the Ithakaf. What are you going to do in this time? If you didn’t have goals, at least do it now. But you should have had goals. When you come into the Ithakaf, I had sent out a reminder in the beginning itself. So the goals have to do with my activities during Ithakaf. I will read so much of Quran and so much of Namafil and so much of Dhikr and so much of Salat and Salam on Rasulullahﷺ and so on and so on. Whatever you had as your goals for Ithakaf. So I suggest that today, sit down and assess that and say, how did I achieve? Did I complete what I had expected to do? What whatever is, did I exceed that? If I’m falling short, make some plans. And those who did not have goals, make goals now. We have another maybe two, three days. Make goals now to say, what do you want to achieve in these two or three days?
And then you can start to think about it. Matrix is very important. Matrix is measurement, ways of measurement, right? Matrix is the most critically important thing for success in life itself. And this period of Ithakaf is a microcosm of life itself. Has a beginning, has an ending. And it has periods in it. So treat it like a simulation for your life. And say from the beginning to the end, what am I going to achieve in my life? What are the stages? What do I need to do? How do I need to prepare? How do I need to pace myself? How much sleep? How much time in doing other than goal work?
Right? And so on and so on. Do that. Pace yourself and see what are you going to achieve. Create those metrics and monitor those metrics. This is the most important thing. This is how you succeed in life. If you want to do something in life, this is what you do. You create a goal and then from today to the goal. And you have a timeline and you have a strategy to achieve that goal. And then you have metrics to measure yourself. Am I on target? Am I going in the right direction? Am I achieving what I need to achieve? And so on.
Many of us get bogged down by external opinions. What people will say or don’t say. Most of that is imaginary. Because we… You think you are so interesting. I mean, let me break the good news for you. You are not interesting. Except maybe for your mother. Right? The most uninteresting person in the world. Nobody will even remember your name. Take it from me. So forget people. In any case, people’s opinion… I usually… I keep my language to the boundaries of the masjid. But the point is that, you know, people are not interested. You think people are talking about you? No, they don’t. Even if they are, what difference does it make?
Just look at the wonderful global leaders today. And see the amount of invective and the amount of insults and the amount of cursing that people are doing for each of those people. Does it make a difference to them? Nothing. They still do what they do. So why do you think some random public opinion makes a difference to you? It makes no difference to you. Forget people. Put yourself first. You are first. Focus on that. And say what is your goal? By when do you need to achieve it? What is your strategy? What is the roadmap for that strategy? The different stages? And then what are the metrics? How do you measure how you are doing? And this Ethaka period is a very… very good way to practice that to bring it into your life.
So what were your goals when you came into Ethaka? As I said again, I am repeating it. You didn’t have goals. Make them now. And then create metrics and say, what do I need to do? And become granular about that. What time do I need to wake up? How many hours am I going to sleep?
The whole thing is about the goals. The whole purpose of Ramadan is to create life change. It’s an opportunity every year that Allah gives us that we are alive. Allah mentioned in the Quran, He said, where are you going? Do you know where you are going? And if you don’t know where you are going, then you are not going to be able to do anything. Then that’s a sad way of living your life. Because what you are spending in this life is a non-renewable asset called time. Every breath you take, it’s not coming back. Every minute spent is not coming back. It’s spent. Like I gave you the example the other day of the ice block seller. The ice is melting. If that man wants to make a profit, he has to sell that ice before it all melts. So think about that. This is our life. Our life is a block of ice. It’s melting. We don’t know how much more we have left. We have no idea.
So the intelligent person is the one who will maximize what he has. What we have is today. Don’t get bogged down in the past. The past is not the present. The past, your history, whether it’s yesterday, whether it is in your childhood, your youth or whatever, is only good to learn lessons from. So use the history to say, what is it that I learned from my own life? What decisions did I make? What options did I have at that time that I made the decision? I would have had several options. I chose this one. Why that one? Was that the best option?
So do that kind of analysis. Sit down with the pen and paper. Document it. And take your major decisions in your life and say that, I took this decision at that time. You know exactly what the circumstances were. Don’t fool yourself. Face it. Was that the best decision? And if it was the best decision, Alhamdulillah, thank Allah Subh’anaHu Wa Ta-A’la for it. If it is not the best decision, what other options did I have at that time? And then analyze each of them and say, I had three options. I chose option number two. But option number one was there. And the reason I did not choose that was XYZ. Now, were they good reasons? So that’s the only use of the past. The past is to learn lessons from. And learning lessons from the past means to reflect on it and to document that and to conceptualize from that and say, therefore, what is the lesson. All the rest of it is data. What happened actually. But the lesson is an extraction from that data. And after that, park your past, put it away safely somewhere. Don’t go and visit and revisit and sit there and go on and grow. No. That’s over. Whatever you did, no matter how glorious your past was, or no matter how useless your past was, it’s not coming back. So don’t waste your time in that. Get the lesson, get out.
The future is not here yet. What we have is the present. And the present is important because it helps us to create the future that we want. This present is a gift from Allah every morning when you wake up. That’s why it’s called a present. Gift. Every morning. You are getting that gift every morning when you wake up. So value that gift. And say, how can I spend my day today in a way that will have a good effect for me, for my future? And that’s the reason why Rasool Allah said, if two days are the same, then it’s a mark on your intelligence. It means you are not intelligent. No two days should be the same for a Muslim. Every day should be better than the previous day. And that won’t happen unless we have metrics. We don’t know. Is it better? We have no idea what is better. Must have a standard. Then you can say, yes better, no better, was good, was not good. But if there is no measurement, how do you know?
So set goals for yourself. And even in life, going out of this, set goals now for the time of your life after Ramadan ends in the next 3-4 days. What are those goals? For example, one goal which I strongly, strongly recommend for all of you is a goal on reading. Minimum one book per month. I don’t care what you read. Read but read. One book per month. That is minimum. You do more, that’s better. Minimum one book per month. Then reading as far as the Quran is concerned. Then make a goal with regard to memorization. It’s not okay to just know three surahs that you learnt when you were a little kid and you went to Maktab or something and that’s all you know. It’s very embarrassing. If somebody pushes you forward and says, please read Salatul Fajr, you are in a panic because you don’t know what to read. All you know is Khurwala Wahad. You do not have enough Quran to be able to read two rakat of Salah. Is this acceptable? What kind of thing is this?
So make goals. And say, I will memorize. Recitation of the Quran. Sit with somebody who can teach you Tajweed proper recitation and recite. Pronunciation. The Quran al-Garim is not a tune for you to sing. Rasulullah cursed those who read the Quran like a song. So learn to recite properly. The pronunciation. Tajweed. And then reading of. My recommendation is read one Juz every day. One Sipara every day. So then in one month you complete the Quran. So in, keep Ramadan aside. So in 11 months you have come, in one year you have done 11 daur. 11 times you complete the Quran. In Ramadan, maximize that. So maybe in one month in Ramadan instead of doing one daur, you do two, you do three, you do four, as much as Allah gives you tawfiq. So in the whole year you would have completed the Quran 12 times, 15 times, wallahala.
And remember this. Rasulullah said, Allah will give you 10 Hasanat for every letter in the Quran. Letter, not word. Letter. Letter. 10 Hasanat for every letter. And he said, I do not say that Alif, laam, meem is one letter. He said, Alif is one letter. Laam is one letter. Meem is one letter. So if you just recited Alif, laam, meem, you got 30 Hasanat. What is the value of a Hasanat? One Hasanat is the difference between Jannah and Jahannah. One Juz, we did the calculations the other day. How much was it? Around 10 lakhs Hasanat. Because it is 9 lakh something. 800 something, whatever. So one Juz is around 10 lakh 1 million Hasanat. 30 Juz is 30 million Hasanat. Can you imagine this? Just think about that. 30 million Hasanat, which is one dollar of the Quran. Now, multiply that by, just take for the sake of it, just take 10. So 30 million multiplied by 10 is what? 300 million. And you still have 2 months left. And in Ramadan, InshaAllah, you do more.
Just think about that. This is your earnings. And all it takes when you, InshaAllah, Allah gives you the fluency of reading. Reading one Juz will not take you more than 30 minutes. People read also in 15 minutes. I do not recommend that. Read the Quran properly. There is no need to rush through it. But 30 to 45 minutes max. The best thing is to set a particular time. What I recommend is, wake up one hour before the time for Fajr starts. Just like you are doing now. You are waking up for Suhoor. So Fajr is at 5.25. You are waking up at say maybe 4 o’clock or something. Or 4.15, 4.30. And you got one hour before Salatul Fajr time starts. So that, now you are doing Suhoor and so on. After Ramadan, you will not have that Suhoor. So that period of time, pray Tahajjud. Two rakat, four rakat, whatever Allah gives you. And after that, sit and read one Juz of Quran. InshaAllah you will be able to complete that. And then go to the Masjid for Salatul Fajr by Jumaan. Now if you are not able to complete the full Juz, maybe couple of pages are left. Take it with you in the Masjid. Waiting for Salatul Fajr to start. And immediately if something is left back after Salatul Fajr, sit there, complete it, go home.
So before the day, think about that. Before your day has even started, your working day has even started, you have accumulated one million Hazarat. What are we doing? One million Hazarat. Before the day even starts. I am not counting the reward of praying Salatul Fajr by Jumaan because you would have InshaAllah prayed Salatul Isha by Jumaan. Allah has given you the reward for worshipping Allah, worshipping Him the whole night. The one who prays Salatul Isha by Jumaan, Allah gives him the reward of praying half the night. And the person who follows up by doing Salatul Fajr by Jumaan, Allah gives him the reward of worshipping Him the rest of the night. So you would have prayed Salatul Isha by Jumaan. And then you are doing this. You have prayed Tahajjud. You have done one Juz of Quran. Then you come to the Masjid, pray Salatul Fajr by Jumaan. Imagine, your day hasn’t even started. The sun hasn’t even properly risen. You already have in your mind, your account with Allah. One million Hasanat of this. Tahajjud, Allah said, I will give you something which will really make you happy. I have kept it hidden so we won’t even go there. That is the glory of Allah. Plus, the reward for worshipping Allah the entire night.
See how simple it is and how beautiful it is. How easy it is. So, make it easy. Make these goals for yourself. Set these goals for yourself, InshaAllah. And we ask Allah to make it easy for all of us to change our lives and bring them in line with the Ahkam of Allah and the Sunnah of Rasulullah.