[0:00]بسم الله والحمد لله والصلاة والسلام على عبد الله ورسوله محمد وعلى آله وأصحابه أجمعين My beloved brothers and dearest sisters, if you look at the teachings of Islam, every time there is something Allah has instructed you to do, he asks you to do it more than just once besides the Hajj, wherein he says, ولله على الناس حج البيت من استطاع إليه سبيلا Indeed Allah has made it incumbent upon the people to fulfill the Hajj whosoever is able and capable to do it and the explanation of it teaches us that the compulsion is only once in a lifetime, if you want to do it more than that and you are able and permitted, then it's okay. But the compulsory nature of it would only be once for those who can manage. However, if you look at prayer five times a day, every single day, you need a lot of discipline to fulfill that. So there must be a reason why Allah wants us to be disciplined and fulfill it every day. Similarly, when Allah created the night and the day, he made it rotate. يكوّر الليل على النهار ويكوّر النهار على الليل Allah causes the night to go into the day, and the day to go into the night. When the night is long the day becomes short, and when the day is long, the night becomes short and so on. These are part of the creatures of Allah moving and rotating in a way that will help us as humankind to be disciplined. There is a night that will come this evening, and Allah says, he created night in order for you to recline and rest, and day in order for you to work. So during the daylight you can see more clearly, you are you are more well equipped to actually work hard, and at night the bulk of us are resting, besides those who have a night shift, or those who are guards sometimes, or those who are perhaps taking care of something important at the time. The Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam says if you don't have something important to do, go to bed, recline, it's better for you. Medicine will tell you that the sleep of the first few hours of the night is far more enriching than the sleep later on. And this is why we do believe in the notion early to bed early to rise etc etc etc. It makes you healthy. I don't know about wealthy, but I do know wise. Wealthy too, my brothers and sisters, if you get up early in the morning and you're keen on going to work and working hard with that dedication, you become wealthy, meaning you will not be a lazy person, my brothers, my sisters. Think about it for a moment, when you give your charities, you are told to give them regularly. The Zaka is compulsory once a year, every year you have to calculate what you're worth on a regular basis. You are told to give out a daily Sadaqa, how is that? This is something Allah wants from you, discipline. Allah wants you to do it every day. You get up in the morning, you make sure you are up, because if you are not, then it's only you to blame. Do you know that man's body is that it becomes used to certain things that it has made itself used to. Subhan Allah. It might sound strange, but that's exactly how it is. If you got yourself used to something, chances are, you're not going to be able to quit it in a long time. You will need power, you will need conviction. You will need to be really strong to get rid of something that you want to get rid of, that you got yourself used to. People say if he's clocked 40 and he still has the bad habit, chances are he's not going to give it up. I want to tell you that that's not true, if you have the willpower, you can give it up now. If you have the strength, you can give it up now. No matter what the bad habit is, you can give it up, you need the willpower, you need the help of Allah, you need to replace it with something that is going to occupy you in a better way. Fulfilling those who are alcoholics, for example, you can cut it now, that's what it is. You don't need to say, oh, you know I'm addicted, but you will have to change your habits. You will have to change so much. You might have to change your circle of friends. You will have to perhaps your phone number. You might even have to shift out of if you're living in an area that is causing the problem. Sometimes you must identify the bad habit I have, is it because of the friends I have? Then you've got to change them. Is it because of where I live, then you've got to move out of there? Is it because my usage of the Internet? Then cut it out. Or make sure that you let someone in whom you are whom you look up to. You let them in to what? To your usage of the net. They can go in at any time and tell you my brother, my sister, don't do this. Similarly, when we talk of company, do you know that sometimes your bad habits are there because those around you cheer you on. No, we can do it. No, let's just go. It's just fun. We'll just sit around. Don't worry, you can come and sit. We'll do all the she sharing and whatever else it ising. And you know what, you can just sit around. Subhanallah. But if you take a careful look, my brothers, my sisters, it starts off with sitting around and you tell yourself and your parents and whoever else that you know what? I'm just sitting around and relaxing. But you don't realize, subhanallah, it's the beginning. When Shaitan wants to trap you, he has to use the similar concept that you use when you want to trap a rat. What do you do? You put cheese. Is cheese a good thing or a bad thing? It's a good thing, masha Allah. And the innocent rat is coming close to the cheese. Isn't the rat innocent? Subhanallah. You might say no, man, it's been nibbling at my ceiling all these years. Masha Allah, but to be honest, then when it comes to bite, it has to bite a little bit more. It's not yet trapped. Then when it gets greedy and takes a bigger chunk and suddenly boom, it's gone. What happens? Trapped and out. That's what Shaitan does to us. You go the first time with your friends, you've gone to the club, or you've gone to the pub, or you've gone to the casino, or you've gone to whatever it might be in a bad way, wasting time and so on. And they tell you, don't worry, you don't have to, you can remain in your hijab, or you can remain in whatever, and you don't have to, you just come and sit around, that's it. We know that you are a little bit different and we know you're strict and masha Allah we admire you. Wow. We admire you. Now that you're admired, you're gone in and what do you do? You sit and you take, do you know that a passive smoker is worse than the active one? Do you know that the person who's just lounging around sometimes is affected even more than those who are engaging in the crime itself? Subhan Allah. And then what happens the next time you go by the time you enter a third time, it's a puff. Same concept as the cheese, small little nibble. And then the puff starts feeling, oh, that wasn't too bad. Something tells you in you that it's okay, let me try a little bit more, it might give me a kick. Brothers and sisters, it will give you a boot, that's what it will do. will be booted out of your family, your marriage and everything else. Your job and so much more. So forget about getting kicked, you'll be booted. لا حول ولا قوة الا بالله It's important for us to be strong, nip it in the bud, don't go and that's it. Change your friends, they're encouraging you in the wrong way. You need to make sure you have friends who take you to the masjid. We have COVID, and Alhamdulillah, restrictions have been lifted to a great degree, we must encourage everyone to come back to the Masjid. We have to because people have now developed a habit. What did I tell you at the beginning, when you get yourself used to something, there comes a time when you're going to have to use that power and be convinced and use your energy and force yourself to do the right thing for a while. And then it will be second nature, Masha Allah. Ask those who get up for Salatul Fajr, if you used to getting up for Salatul Fajr, with your alarm clock, the day you didn't set it for some reason, you'll still be up five minutes before the alarm, and then there comes a time when even when you set that alarm, five minutes before the alarm, you're up and you got to turn it off so it doesn't disturb everybody else. I see some of the brothers are smiling here because you know what I'm saying? That's a plan of Allah. Your body is more sophisticated than any computer. Forget about 5G, it's about 20G, I think, Subhanallah. May Allah grant us goodness. It's so complicated. Allah Almighty knows that's the reason why he makes you do things every day. He says, get up before the sun rises. Next day, get up before the sun rises. Next day, get up before the sun rises. A week later, get up before the sun rises. A month later, get up before the sun rises. When you're 50 years old, get up before the sun rises. When you're about to die, get up before the sun rises. Why did Allah say that? Discipline. He wants you to do certain things. You may know some reasons and you may never know the other reasons. But when you discipline yourself for the sake of Allah, you will lead a very content life, very, very happy. You will be the happiest person, yet you've never touched a drug, yet you don't smoke or drink, yet you don't have bad habits, but you are a happy content person. Do you know why? You are focused on the right things in life. I'm focused on a job day in day out, I will do that and I will enjoy it. And I will make sure when I get my money, the salary, I don't just blow it, but I plan, I budget. And I make sure that first I pay my rental, then I I pay for the food and drink and so on and my family members, and then I save a little bit if I can and Alhamdulillah. Rather than, oh, today I got my first paycheck. So what are you doing with it? Oh, what did I do with it, you mean? لا حول ولا قوة الا بالله It's gone already. You haven't even told me about it and it's out. That is bad. You might have started that way, but don't let it be a habit. A habit is something you got yourself into. I promise you, don't blame someone else for your bad habits. They are yours. You will have to work on your bad habits. No one else is going to be able to eradicate it, but they will either prod you towards it or away from it. May Allah give us good friends so that we are prodded away from our bad habits. Work hard. Replace it with something else. Occupy your time by coming to the Masjid. By learning some lessons, be it online or elsewhere. When you waste your time, do you know a lot of us spend so much time nowadays on social media, simply because of the Coronavirus that made us stay indoors. Now you've got your phone and you just scrolling, and scrolling, and scrolling. It becomes a disease. It's a disease. You keep scrolling because there's so much on there. Remember, there are billions of people on Earth. If half of them are online, or half of them have posted online on the social media, you're going to be occupied for a lifetime watching, watching, watching. Then what happens? You sleep late every day, and every day you say to yourself, I'm going to sleep early, tomorrow. Tomorrow doesn't come. When you're in your grave, you can sleep forever. Subhanallah. Every night, if you're a person who says I'm going to sleep early, and the next day you're saying the same thing, you have a problem. You have an addiction to something. It is wrong. You must be disciplined, turn off that phone at 8:00 o'clock, 9:00 o'clock, no matter what the world says, it's okay. Switch it off, and you can turn it on at 8:00 in the morning or 7. Are you prepared to do that? I see people giving me the looks, just as well you're wearing masks, otherwise you might even give me your tongues. May Allah forgive us. But it's a fact. We scroll every night, and then we want to get up early morning for Fajr, and suddenly you're running and rushing. You've either missed your Fajr or you're very late for it or you couldn't be bothered. لا حول ولا قوة الا بالله Discipline, get rid of your bad habits. Your life is very, very short. You might live for a few days, a few more days only. You can count those days, 300 days, 500 days, 1000 days, 5000 days, not more than that. And in these little days I've got on Earth, few days that I've got here in this world, I must waste them in this type of thing, with bad habits. I'm going to go back to meet with Allah, what did I do? Occupy your weekends with something good. Join the club of people who are going the poor, the widows, the orphans, perhaps the homeless, those who are going to feed others, look after the sick, those who are going to reach out community affairs, clean up perhaps, whatever else it may be. Join them to do something constructive and see how you feel. When you have a whole lot of friends who think similar, you will really enjoy yourself, especially when you're doing good things. So be careful who you mix with from a young age we have bad friends. Those who are only interested in partying all day, every day. What is that? Do you really think that is discipline? Do you really think that that's what Allah requires of us? Do you really think that partying and drinking yourself drunk is actually going to bring you goodness and happiness and success in this world and the next? Not at all. If anything, go and study the people who are partying in that way, they're all somehow unhappy. And I'm just wording it respectfully. They all have a problem. That's not the way to success. Discipline yourself for the sake of Allah and watch your doors opening. Replace something bad with recitation of the Quran, with the Zikr of Allah. Repeat the names of Allah, repeat some of the words taught by the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam of praise of Allah. Of praise of the messenger Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam, send blessings and salutations upon him and see what it does to you. Sit down, think about it. Say, oh Allah, I'm going to read this Quran for 10 minutes, then I'm going to engage in Salawat for another 10 minutes, and I'm going to do this for another 10 minutes, and then I'm going to make Dua for another 10 minutes, and that's how I'm going to spend my day. What's wrong with that? That is actually spending it in the right direction. But if you don't set yourself a timetable, and you're not disciplined, and you don't have a routine, how do you expect to pass in life or succeed in life? Let's deal with our bad habits, my brothers, my sisters. Again, look at anything, when it comes to the Quran, خير الناس الحال المرتحل. You look at what the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam says, the best of the people are those whom they recite the Quran regularly, and when they finish, they start again. When they finish, they start again. When they finish, they start again. Subhan Allah. Look at the Sunnah fasting, every Monday, every Thursday. So you're very focused on the week, and you're very aware of what day of the week it is. Because you know, it's a Monday. I'm going to be fasting. It's a Thursday. I'm going to be fasting. And it comes back the following week, and the following week, and the following week. Notice how it repeats because it once Allah wants you to tune yourself. You will know. Many of us don't even know it's a Friday. We've lost track of the days of the week. But those who are here for Salatul Juma, very early, every Friday, ask them. They already know. They already know. Friday is coming, Juma. They are up early. They are looking for the small piece of that they put a little bit of on and slam it in their ears. Have you seen that happening? Allah grant us goodness. I see the older people are smiling. That's what used to happen way back. That's not a Sunnah by the way. It's just the action of some of the older people that we witnessed when we were growing up. Do you remember those little pieces of cottonwood? Masha Allah. But those were the uncles who really took it serious. How many of us, my beloved youth, you need to take over. Those younger than you need to see you what you used to do, and they need to learn from you. Come to the Masjid and come and sit in the front and come early every day. Then you find all these little ones saying, eh, see that Toppy there. See that uncle there. See that that side there. Subhanallah. That's what you're going to be called very soon, they'll call you that. When I heard my when I heard someone call me that old man, I said, oh, now we're old, subhanallah. Now we're old, but that's that's how it is. What goodness do you have that people can take from you? Come on, you have to have it, because you are part of the people on the Earth who have to leave a legacy, the good habits. Come on, you can do it. How much Quran, how much Zikr, how much of Salawat Al Nabi do you do? Subhanallah. Or do you just pay lip service to it? Another thing, my brothers and sisters, one of the worst habits is the way we talk to each other. Cut out slang, I promise you, cut out slang. Try to avoid cheap language, speak properly, masha Allah. Yes, maybe perhaps a few words here and there of laughter. It's okay, no problem. But remember, carry yourself respectfully. Swear words, abusive words, that is a very bad habit. And you know what, it goes down to your children and those whom you mix with. You swear F's and B's, they will come up with swear words you won't even know what these words mean. But these will be swear words of the new generation. Subhanallah. Don't use bad words, not at all. Replace them with good words. That is the tongue that of the Shahada. Don't use it for something evil. Don't hurt people's feelings with it. Today we swear, we lie, we deceive, we cheat, we're abusive, and we think we're good Muslims just because of one or two things. No, I'm a good man, Subhanallah. You're a good man, masha Allah. We're all good, but we all need to work on our habits, myself included. Another bad habit that people have is temper. People get angry for small things. You're getting upset to mask or not to mask, vaccine or no vaccine. Relax. There are two opinions, it's okay. Follow the one you believe is right, and love those who follow the other opinion, what's the big deal? Your brother also, your sister also, it's okay. It's just an opinion, the world won't come to an end because of your opinion, please. Nor will it come to an end because of the opinion of another. It's okay. Relax, you're not the only person on Earth. They also have a brain, they were created by Allah. You can disagree and disagree strongly with them, like I do, subhanallah. And I'm not an anti-vaxxer by the way. But we love them, we respect them. It's okay. It's one of those things. I disagree very strongly, but my brother, I won't disrespect you. I won't abuse you. I won't harm you. That's a bad habit. That is dropping yourself lower and cheaper than you can imagine. Don't do that. It's okay. Continue to talk about what you believe is right in a positive way and you will see the change. You will see people's lives changing. Continue to do good. That's why the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam says, the best of deeds are those that are done regularly, even if they're a little. When you do something regularly, you know we learnt erosion when we were kids in geography at school. And they show you how a huge rock, a boulder, has a hole going straight through the center because of a certain because of water that's dripping every year, throughout most of the year from a certain point onto that rock. What happens? A dropload of water, because it comes regularly and because it's there every day, and because it's you know, constant. What happened? It made a hole through the rock. If a droplet of water falling on a rock constantly can make a hole through the rock, trust me, consistency in your will grant you entry into the door of Jannah Firdaus and paradise. Small things, but every day your door to paradise will open. The Hadith says the best deeds are those that are regular, even if it's a little. That's why I tell you read a page a day. Read a verse a day. That verse is more powerful than a droplet of water on rock for you and your Iman. And your existence and your connection with Allah, and it's very little, no excuse. You want to cut out a bad habit, well, you can chop it off now, like I said. Or you can decide, right, I'm actively going to cut down, like I have a lot of friends who smoke, for example. The friend part is not the smoking part, but the rest of it is my friend, right? So, subhanallah, sometimes from 30 a brother will come and say, you know what, because I'm so encouraged by what you've said, I'm down to five a day, three a day. I say, oh, masha Allah, that's really, really good. Masha Allah, what amazing progress. So you mean I can stay with those three, it's okay? I did not comment about what you can stay with. I'm only acknowledging there was amazing progress. And if there is amazing progress, you know and Allah knows where you stand. So masha Allah, have you progressed? Now I want to end off by telling you something very interesting. In fact, I still have a little bit of time. When you have a bad habit, say pornography, say adultery, extremely bad. In the case of adultery, major sin, in the case of pornography, minor sin, but it's still a sin. And I want to tell you something, when you have a bad habit of this nature and you want to eradicate it, and you have told yourself, no more. A day will come when you might slip up again, right? You might drop again because you know what, you're a human. On that day, don't think, ah, I blew it, that's it. Now I'm back to my old ways. You're not. You're not back to your old ways. No, if you blew it one day, at least you did better. You used to do it every day before. Now it happened today, but you're going to turn back to Allah immediately and say you you seek forgiveness once again, and you're not going to do it again. And you stop it. So the gap between your falling would be bigger and bigger until a day will come when you will totally stop it. You get the point? Shaitan makes you lose hope. So if you said right from today I'm not going to commit the sin anymore, and a month later you dropped, Shaitan says you see you back to where you were. So then you can Shaitan might make you say, well, it's okay, now I'm just going to go back because you know what, I'm too weak and I I just can't do this. No, you can. You can, you will, you shall, and you must. If you fell a month later, get up, seek the forgiveness of Allah. You might fall six months later. How's the gap? Bigger. Is that an improvement? It's like smoking three cigarettes from 30. You see big improvement. After that you might fall a year later. What happened? You must get up immediately and promise Allah that you're going to stop it and you're not going to do it again. That's the condition. Then you can eradicate that bad habit. Otherwise, if you're going to give up every time you fall, we all fall. We all fall, myself included, we are human beings. We will fall. Allah wants you to be dedicated. If you missed one Salah, does it mean you must stop all your Salahs? No. You might miss it even if you're regular with your Salah. You're a human being. The Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam says you may sleep a little bit sometimes, much and you might not realize that the time of Salah has crossed. As soon as you get up, fulfill your Salah.
[24:16]That's a Hadith of Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam. من نام عن صلاة أو نسيها فليصلها إذا ذكرها Whosoever sleeps over a prayer or forgets a prayer should fulfill it or should do the Qada as soon as they remember, as soon as they can.
[24:32]It's a simple Hadith. He didn't say that's a bad person, because you're a human. But the point I'm raising is, in the same way, when you are trying to get rid of a bad habit, you might falter somewhere down the line, don't let that be a means of you giving up, but rather get up and continue for longer without that bad habit. In the same way that if you were to miss a Salah, you won't just throw in the towel and say no more Salah for me because I missed one. But rather, you will make sure you do the Qada, you seek Allah's forgiveness, you continue further and you try your best not to miss a Salah. Perhaps years will pass and you wouldn't have missed Salah. May Allah may Allah keep us all strong. So these are some ways of eradicating your bad habits. And remember, your body gets tuned to something that you tune it to. So tune it towards Allah, not away from Allah. If you have a habit of anything, be it weed or whatever, you need to convert it to something good. Start developing a habit of Tajweed, and inshallah you'll be okay. Right? You need to change it with something. The Quran. I sit and sometimes I listen to recitals that people send me online or on YouTube or elsewhere, of amazing boys and girls from across the globe whose recitation is so beautiful that you can listen all night and you'll still be, masha Allah, masha Allah, amazing, beautiful. What about us? When you hear a good recital, pause it for a moment and try to repeat it. No matter who you are, you can be an old person. Only problem is if you smoke too much, your throat might be a bit croaky. But that's okay. You can read beautifully, masha Allah, beautifully. Try and imitate it. Allah will be pleased with you. Imagine you're trying to read the Quran and doing a good thing. It's okay. Have you tried it? Read the Quran in a melodious voice. Try it. Because on the day of Qiyama, Allah is going to ask you to read. You can't just look up and say, hey, you know what? I can't. You can. Have you memorized the portion of the Quran? The answer is yes, we all know Suratul Fatiha. We know a few other Suras and so on. So on the day of Qiyama, you may be asked to read that. What are you going to do? Start reciting, practicing from now in a melodious voice, because that Hadith says you will only be able to read the way you used to read on Earth. Some of us don't even read Quran. Come on, you can change that habit. You know, if you were to know what's going on, and I'm sure many of you do. If I know, then I'm sure a lot of us here do. The amount of effort that our boys and girls and adults are putting into learning moves of your foot and your hands and your head and the movement of your body just for TikTok. The amount of effort that is being made to learn those moves in order to create a 30 second clips. You need 1% of the effort in order to become the most powerful reciter of Quran in the whole world. Did you hear what I just said? And I'm not joking. If you know anyone of your relatives, or you, or anyone else who makes an effort to shake your body and to learn the moves of your legs according to a certain sound of those who can believe they can fly and whatever else. You must remember one thing. That effort, you only need 1% of it to be one of the top reciters in the whole world of the Quran. Because the Quran is different from all of that. With the Quran, when you come towards it, it will come towards you even faster. When you make an effort towards the word of Allah, it will make an effort towards you. Do you know why? Because that's Allah's Kalam. That's Allah's word. And Allah tells us, if you want to come towards me, I'll rush towards you. You come towards me a foot, I come towards you more. You come towards me walking, I come towards you rushing. That's Allah. Make an effort with it. Imagine the amount of effort. And I promise you, whenever I hear of it, or even see it in passing, I tell myself, oh Allah, guide this Ummah, and guide all of us to channel our efforts in the right direction. Every day we create videos to put on TikTok and to put on here in order to let people look at something and in order for it to be liked and viewed in a way that it's negative. I think we can do the positive ones, insha Allah, all of us. You can use your social media in order to earn paradise, not in order to go the other way. So may Allah Subhan Allah make it easy. I think I've covered a lot of bad habits, and I think I've also tried to mention how best we could eradicate these habits and get ourselves used to the right things. Allah's created us in a way that you'll just keep on going and be happy with it, and be excited and remember you won't become famous overnight. We're not doing things to become famous. The fame and the true fame is when the angels carry your deeds every day into the heavens. And then you're famous up there, whose deeds are these? Well, this man or this woman, or whoever it may be, then you're truly famous. Even if you are unknown on Earth, you're a successful person. May Allah subhanho wa Ta'ala grant us the goodness of this world and the next. May Allah protect myself from bad habits and help me to eradicate my own bad habits and help me to focus on the right things and strengthen me in order to do the right things and with me all of us. أقول قولي هذا وصلى الله وسلم وبارك على نبينا محمد
