Everyone is obsessed with the pursuit of happiness. There are movies and magazines, articles, and hundreds of books about how to become happy. And usually the message is, if you have wealth, good looks and fame, then you will have the ultimate happiness. We will talk about each one of these subjects.
As far as wealth is concerned, well most people think that if acquire their house, their car, their designer clothes, their yacht, all the possessions then they will attain true happiness. But in reality, wealth is something that fluctuates. It fluctuates. And the more you have, the more you want to acquire. It is like the hadith of the Prophet (Sallallahu ‘Alaihi Wasallam) that says, “If the son of Adam was to have a whole valley of gold, it wouldn’t be enough. He would still want another valley”. So the more you have, the more you want to acquire. And there is also the stress of protecting the things that you have. Now, as each person pursues wealth in moderation, there’s no problem with this. But when it becomes your whole focus in life, when men become workaholic just to acquire more and more wealth, this is what the problem is.
Now we are going to talk about good looks. Good looks are something that many women are obsessed about. They will compare themselves to the models and the supermodels and the actresses, and they will start feeling very inadequate. And in trying to become better looking, they take some extreme measures. There are times when people become so obsessed with their looks, that they take extreme measures. They will do extreme makeovers, and have reconstruct their whole bodies in order to reach this idea, which is very unhealthy. There are also times when women have psychological disorders because they are so obsessed their looks, and they will suffer from anorexia and bulimia. These two psychological disorders are something that plagues our youth. It plagues our youth and you will see women who are so beautiful and so young and yet they are starving themselves in trying to attain something that is unattainable. I have worked with individuals in therapy, individuals who are lovely, beautiful and a size zero, and they still feel like they are fat. And so they starve themselves. And there are individuals who will eat and regurgitate what they have eaten. And so this becomes a real issue, and you find that with looks, it is also very fleeting. It comes and goes. This is a result of low self-esteem. When an individual feels good about themselves and feels that they have a lot to offer, then they will be so obsessed with their looks.
Something that I want to stress, it’s that, any of this done in moderation, looking good and wanting to present yourself nicely, this is all fine. But the problem is when someone becomes obsessed with it. So taking care of ourselves, exercising, eating well, there is no problem with that. It is actually encouraged. But when someone becomes completely focused on this and is obsessed with it, this is where the problem comes in.
Now we are going to talk about fame. And fame, many people think that once they are well-known and everyone knows them that is when they are going to be truly happy. And you see that those individuals who do have fame, they are living in a fishbowl. Everyone is looking into their life and they have no peace. And if you think that wealth, good looks and fame are the ingredients for happiness, then the actors and actresses should be like the happiest people in the world. And you see that in reality, they are not. They are very much, many of them are depressed, they are suicidal, and some of them are on drugs, because in reality they have been disillusioned. They thought that by acquiring these things, they will be truly happy. They have it all, but yet they are still very very unhappy.
Now I am going to talk to you about real lasting happiness. In order to attain real lasting happiness is to develop four critical relationships. That is your relationship with Allah, your relationship with yourself, your relationship with others, and your relationship with the community.
Now I am going to tell you about the relationship with Allah, because this is the most important relationship and it is a relationship based on submission and trust. We have to fully submit ourselves, and we have to put trust, Al-Tawakkul A’lal-Allah. We are made out of body and soul, and these are two vessels that we need to fill. Now we do very well with filling the body, we fill it with pizza, and hamburger, and kofta, and mulukhiyah and we don’t have a problem in this department, but it is with filling the soul that’s the problem that many times people have malnourished souls. And it is like an empty vessel that can only be filled with the love and devotion to Allah. I’d like to use the analogy of a gas tank. A gas tank can only be filled with gasoline, and if you put gasoline in it, the car goes. However, if you try to fill it with cappuccino, or with other drinks, you see that the car does not move. And our soul is the same way. Many times people feel this void and they try to fill it with wealth and good looks and fame and women and drugs and whatever it is to try to fill this void, and yet they still feel the emptiness. And so this is what we need to work on, it’s to nourish our soul.
I want to give you the example of when our soul is really nourished, and that is during Ramadan. Our soul is so content because we are reading Quran, we are fasting, we are praying taraweeh reading Quran, and this is when we are feeling ecstasy. We are just feeling so content and peaceful, even though we have not been sleeping, we have not been eating, but there’s true contentment. The next way that we can to establish this relationship with Allah is through obedience. Actually, when you love Allah, then you show it by being obedience. Love is equal to obedience. If you have a relationship where your spouse is telling you all day long, “I love you… I love you… I love you… I love you…”, but they don’t listen to you, they don’t do anything that you say, and then this would be completely worthless. So, if we love Allah, then we have to show it. And we have to show it by doing the things that he asks us to do.
I’d like to give you another example. If you are a parent and you’re doing so many special things for your child, and you are getting them gifts. Is it ever enough for them just to say, “Thank you!”, but they don’t listen to you and they are completely disobedient? Of course not! We expect our kids to show their love by being obedient, and so when we do special things for them, the ultimate form of appreciation would be that if they just listen.
Another way to work on this relationship with Allah is through righteous deeds. Because if you know it is in the Quran, it always says Amanu Wa Amilu As-Salihati, you don’t see the Amanu just by itself, because it is never enough to just say “I believe” and not take action. The belief and the actions need to go hand-in-hand. And there has to be a congruency. A congruency between what you feel, what you believe, and your actions. In Surat An-Nahl, Ayat 97, Allah says, “Auzu -bi Llahi Mina Shaitan al-Rajim Bismillah Ar Rahman Al Rahim, Man AAamila salihan min thakarinaw ontha wahuwa mu/minun falanuhyiyannahu hayatantayyibatan walanajziyannahum ajrahum bi-ahsani makanoo yaAAmaloon”. Which says, whoever works righteousness, whether male or female, while he is a true believer, we will verily give him a good life and we shall pay them a reward in proportion to the best of what they used to do. So this is a promise from Allah, that if you’re a believer and you do good deeds, then you will be fully rewarded.
The next way to establish this relationship with Allah, is through the remembrance of Allah, Dhikrullah, and that means by mentioning him, mentioning God’s name by glorifying him. And this is what gives us the peace and serenity. Because Allah says in the Quran, “Auzu -bi Llahi Mina Shaitan al-Rajim Bismillah Ar Rahman Al Rahim, Huwa allathee anzala assakeenatafee quloobi almu/mineena”. So that it is he, Allah that puts the serenity into the hearts of the believers. So there we go, if we want happiness, if we want serenity, then we can get it from Allah and by establishing this relationship with Allah.
Allah says in the Quran, in Surat Ar-Ra`d, Ayat number 28, “ala bithikriAllahi tatma-innu alquloob”, that verily in the remembrance of Allah do hearts find rest. And this (speaks Arabic), it’s not only remembering Allah, but it is mentioning his name, its glorifying him and the way to be aware of this is by thinking that there’s always a surveillance camera, and that you are being watched. That everything that we do, everything that we say, everything single, even thought that we have is being reported. And when we are aware of this, then it makes us be much more careful with our actions. And you see that, sometimes if there’s a surveillance camera and someone is working, they’ll be on their best behaviour, they will be tidying up and they will be very very focused at work. But if there’s no camera, they might be lounging, and having a cup of tea, staying on the phone. So this reminding ourselves that everything is being recorded will make us be much more cautious of our actions.
Another thing that we need to do is to remember that there is going to be accountability. When we think about the day of judgement and standing in the court of Allah, and having to account for every single thing that we have done, this is what will make us be very cautious and careful in our actions.
The next way to establish this relationship with Allah is through being grateful. Gratefulness is such a critical aspect of having this relationship with Allah. Actually when I have clients that come in, and they are suffering from depression, one of the first things I tell them to do is to make a list of all the things that they are grateful for. Basically having a grateful journal, and I ask for specifics. Not just saying, I am grateful for my health, but basically going into details about, I am grateful for my eyes for being able to see. I am grateful for my hearing because I can hear the voices of my loved ones. I am grateful to be able to eat, and to swallow, and to walk, and to do so many things. And when you start numerating all the things that you are, all the blessings that you have, and all the things that you are grateful for, you start feeling such deep appreciation and such happiness. When you go and you visit the less fortunate and you see the conditions that they live in, then you are grateful for every little thing that you have. So we need to increase our ibadah, we need to increase our visiting these individuals. Not only to help them up, but to help ourselves to feel more grateful for everything that we have.
I’d like to mention a hadith of the Prophet (Sallallahu ‘Alaihi Wasallam), which says that, Amazing is the matter of the believer, for all his affairs are good for him. If a bounty was bestowed on him, he thanks Allah for it and he is rewarded. If an affliction touches him, he observes patience, and he is rewarded. Meaning that, whatever happens, good or bad, he is rewarded. Because, if a good thing happens, let’s say they get married, they you say Alhamdulillah! If you have a baby, you say Alhamdulillah. If you lose your job, you still Alhamdulillah and you’re still patient because you know that this is all from Allah. And Allah is Al-Hakeem, he is the most wise and so when you know that he is the most wise, you’re much more accepting of everything that happens. And so every circumstance can be a way of acquiring rewards.
Another way that we can improve our relationship with Allah is by making new commitments to him. And these commitments could be in reading the Quran more, praying more regularly, maybe praying the Sunnah, possible dressing more modestly, lowering our gaze, these are all ways that we can make new commitments to Allah. The example I’d like to use is like a person going to the gym to sculpt their body. When you go to the gym, there has to a, the same goes, no pain, no gain. So there has to be some effort, some striving in order to see results. And that’s the same thing with our acts of worship that if we are making new commitments then we will see the results. Imagine a big, strong guy going into the gym and picking up a 3-pound weight. And they just do this all day. And this is not going to affect them; they are not going to see any results. And that is what has happened to our ibadah. Sometimes the way we pray, it’s so fast, we are not paying attention, we are not focusing, and it’s just like that 3-pound dumbbell. So just like in the gym, you have to either increase the weight or the repetition in order to see results; we have to do something similar in our ibadah, in our worship. And that is to do more things, make new commitments and this way you’ll always revive your iman.
Please stay tuned, and we’ll be right back after these messages, when we’ll be talking about your relationship with yourself.

Welcome back, now we are going to talk about the relationship with yourself. One of the first things that we need to do in establishing this relationship with ourselves is living a purposeful life. And that is finding your God-given gift and using that to find purpose and then to reach the ultimate purpose of worshiping Allah. So for example, you need to see what do you excel in? is it writing? It is, are you artistic? Are you a good speaker? Whatever it is that you excel in naturally, take that and make it a purpose in your life, and use it as a way to get closer to Allah, and make it as a way of worshiping Allah.
An important aspect of the relationship with yourself is being able to control yourself, and controlling your desires. So when we talk about how do you we gain control over our desires? We need to basically think about the reward and the punishment. There is so much psychology embedded into the Quran, and you see that Allah is always encouraging us that those who fight off their desires, those who are able to control themselves, they will be rewarded. And those who fall into temptation, there will be consequences for their action. And in Surat An-Nāzi`āt, Ayat number 40-41, “Auzu -bi Llahi Mina Shaitan al-Rajim Bismillah Ar Rahman Al Rahim, Waama man khafa maqamarabbihi wanaha annafsa AAani alhawa. Fa-inna aljannata hiya alma/wa”. And this says that as for him who feared standing before his lord and restrained himself from impure, evil desires and lust, rarely paradise will be his abode. So the next time you are faced with some kind of temptation, to look at thing that you’re not supposed to look at or pursue things you’re not supposed to do, think about this first. Think about the promise that Allah has made for those who control their desires.
Now, I’d like to talk about a principle that guides us. Everything that we do is basically to gain pleasure, or to avoid pain. Everything from the mooring we wake up, till when we go to sleep, it’s all based on these two principles. So if you want to acquire a certain behavior or you want to stop that behavior, this is what we need to do. I’ll give you the example, I’ve had clients, who were smoking for maybe fifteen years, and they wanted to stop. And this is what I did with them, it’s that, you take the desired behavior, for instance, you want to stop smoking. So you have to link a lot of pleasure to this and associate a lot of pleasure to the fact of wanting to stop smoking. And so I would talk with them about how good their health will be, how they will live a longer life and how they will not smell, and the pictures of their lungs and how it would look like. So this created a lot of positive association. And even the confidence and happiness of being able to overcome their vice. Then you link a lot of pain into the behavior that you want to change. So for instance, you link pain to the fact of smoking, you could have lung cancer, you could die young and you will not feel as happy and confident about yourself. And by doing this and Alhamdulillah, many clients were able to stop smoking. Even though they were chain-smokers. And so we can do this for every behavior that we want to improve within ourselves, is link a lot of pleasure to what you want to attain and then link a lot of pain to thing you want to stop.
Another way that we control ourselves, it’s by controlling our anger. Our anger is something that causes us to hurt people and commit a lot of sins. So by controlling it, we become a much more balanced individual. I am reminded of the hadith of the Prophet (Sallallahu ‘Alaihi Wasallam), that when an individual came up to him and asked for his advice, he said, “Ya Rasool Allah please give me some advice”, and he said: don’t get angry! And again he said, “ok, I want another advice. Give me advice”, and he said: do not get angry! And again, for the third time he asked, “give me yet another advice”, and he repeated do not get angry!
So this is telling us that it is so critical and so important for us to control ourselves not to blurt out, because what happens is that we destroy a lot of relationships when we do get angry, with our husbands, with our wives, with our children, and sometimes it even sabotages our success at work. So we need to learn, how can we control our anger. The Prophet (Sallallahu ‘Alaihi Wasallam) has given us many tips on how to control our anger. Basically he says, changing positions will be way to control our anger. If you are standing, sit down. If you are sitting, lay down. And just to relax and to change your mode. And this is called pattern interruption in psychology. If you interrupt your pattern, so if you’re going down this path of getting angry and losing your temper, you have to pause. Say Auzu -bi Llahi Mina Shaitan al-Rajim! Seek refuge from Allah from the shaitan. And then to just calm yourself down and basically deep breathing is a way to be able to control your anger. When you take these deep breaths, and you hold it, and you do that maybe 4-5 times, even up to 10 times, you’ll find that you become a lot calmer and you’ll not react. The Prophet (Sallallahu ‘Alaihi Wasallam) encouraged us not to argue. And he asked, would you like to have lofty palaces in jannah? If someone was to ask you, would you want a brand new villa for you in Katameya* Heights? Would you want a villa in Beverly hills? Who would say no to that? Everyone would want it! And so here’s what you have to do, just change one aspect of your behavior, and that is stop arguing. Stop arguing even when you know that you’re right. And this is what the Prophet (Sallallahu ‘Alaihi Wasallam) promised us, that those people who give up arguing and even though they know that they are right, they will be promised lofty palaces in jannah.
Another aspect of self-control is controlling our reaction to events. How do you act when something happens, when something tragic happens? What is your first reaction? If you are laid =-off, what is your first reaction? And this is very important, because when we have the acceptance of (speaks Arabic) and this is the destiny, if we accept it then we need to submit. So if someone tells you that, for instance, you have some kind of illness, our first reaction should be Alhamdulillah, because this is coming from the hikmah of Allah. And if someone, for instance loses their job, you just say Alhamdulillah. Maybe there is another job waiting for you that is much better for you. And so, it’s so important to have this acceptance. And our reaction to an event is very important. So there is the 90:10 principle, which talk about that only 10% is the circumstance and 90% is our reaction to the circumstance. So I will give you an example, for instance, if someone is late to work, or someone has coffee spilled on very important documents. What do you do? Now, if someone has self-control, they will just see it as, this is not such a big deal, and they reprint the document and they move on. Now other people who don’t have self-control, and they lose it, and you see that they get all flustered, they may yell at the people around them, they ruin their day just because of an incident. So keep this in mind that 90% is your reaction. So don’t blame the events in your life.
So we talked about the different aspects of our relationship with ourselves, we talked about living with purpose, we talked about self-control. Now we are going to talk about being mindful. Being mindful means being in the present, in the here and now! And that is actually the definition of a psychologically healthy person, is a person who lives in the present. And you find that many people are either regretting the past, or they are anxious about the future. They will be thinking, why did I do this? I wish I hadn’t done that! Or they will be anxious about, Oh my God, what if I never get married? What if I don’t have kids? What am I going to do when my kids are in the university? So they are always being pulled in these two different directions. But what we need to focus on is the present. This is the only time that we have, and this is how we can impact our life. The Prophet (Sallallahu ‘Alaihi Wasallam) said that, if affliction strikes, never say if I had done so and so… because this opens up the door of the Shaitan to do his work. So never think to yourself, if I had just married bachelor number 2, if I had just gotten this degree, if I had just moved to this place, because this will make you completely, being in a state of anxiety, regretting the past or being anxious about the future.
Another aspect of building this relationship with yourself is acceptance! Accept yourself, accept your past, accept your family, and accept your looks. And I know that this is very hard for many of the females out there, and I challenge you to, for instance look in the mirror and see something and say Alhamdulillah, and like what you see. Many times, women focus on my thighs are too fat, or my skin is too wrinkled. So I want you to get into the mode of accepting. And accepting, let’s say your family members, that these are people that Allah has chosen in your life, and accept the things that have happened in your life. Because when we attain acceptance, that’s when we can truly be happy.
We have talked about living with purpose, about controlling your anger, controlling your desires, being mindful and having acceptance for everything that happens in your life, and now we are going to talk about belief system. And the saying is, whatever your mind can perceive, it can achieve. Your mind will always support you and you are always right. So whatever that you are thinking and believing, then that is what’s going to happen. So that is why, it is like a computer that you program, so you have to program yourself for success. You have to tell yourself that you are capable and you need to build yourself up for every single success. What happens a lot of times is that, people do not utilize this and they have limiting beliefs. So this limiting belief could be that, Oh, I am not smart enough, I am not pretty enough, I am not this… and I am not that! And these are all limiting beliefs that prevents you from reaching your full potential. So we need to become very aware of what our belief systems are, and to make changes. Because many times these belief systems, they kind of develop haphazardly. We never sit down and think, ok now I am going to develop my belief system. You have an incident, maybe you’ll get up and you talk in front of people, and you really mess up, so your belief system now is that you are a bad speaker. But you could work on this and you can develop it. Maybe you have a belief system that you didn’t do very well at school. But it doesn’t mean that you are not smart. So just have to look at your belief system and try to modify it. And what’s amazing is that, the mind cannot distinguish between what is real and what is not real! So the power of visualization really has a profound impact. They actually did a study on Olympic gold medalist, and they found that individuals who are very successful, what they did, they were working out 12 hours a day, they were practicing. Whether it was skiing, or ice-skating, whatever it was, they were doing that. So you do have to put in the work and the effort and the sweat, but what they also did, is they spent time closing their eyes and visualizing their success. And they saw that this was a very key element in achieving their goals. So we can use the power of visualization. We can do this for whatever we want to attain, that you can see before your eyes, the success, and the achievements that you want to acquire.
The last thing I would like to talk about in your relationship with yourself is self-talk. Self-talk is the dialogue that we have with ourselves. We actually talk 600 words a minute to ourselves! And usually 85% of what we say is negative. So what is this doing to us? All this negativity is causing us not to reach our full potential. To maybe fail our exams, maybe not do as well! So we need to become aware of this and try to change our self-talk and try to make it all positive. Only make statements about yourself that are positive. For instance, never say things like, Oh, I am so stupid! Oh, I can’t believe I did that! Oh that was so dumb! And because what we say, our mind starts believing. So we need to make statements that will help us to reach our full potential. We could say things like, I can do it! This is possible! I am strong enough, smart enough! and these things will give us the boost that we need to achieve our success.
What I’d like to mention is that Dhikr, which is the remembrance, the mentioning and glorifying of Allah is also a form of positive self-talk. Because when we are doing this, we are reflecting it on our blessings and it makes us so much more grateful. So this is a way of reminding ourselves of our blessings.
So in summary, we discussed the two relationships in attaining happiness. And that was the relationship with Allah and the relationship with yourself. It was a pleasure to be here with you today.

Everyone is obsessed with the pursuit of happiness. There are movies and magazines, articles, and hundreds of books about how to become happy. And usually the message is, if you have wealth, good looks and fame, then you will have the ultimate happiness. We will talk about each one of these subjects.
As far as wealth is concerned, well most people think that if acquire their house, their car, their designer clothes, their yacht, all the possessions then they will attain true happiness. But in reality, wealth is something that fluctuates. It fluctuates. And the more you have, the more you want to acquire. It is like the hadith of the Prophet (Sallallahu ‘Alaihi Wasallam) that says, “If the son of Adam was to have a whole valley of gold, it wouldn’t be enough. He would still want another valley”. So the more you have, the more you want to acquire. And there is also the stress of protecting the things that you have. Now, as each person pursues wealth in moderation, there’s no problem with this. But when it becomes your whole focus in life, when men become workaholic just to acquire more and more wealth, this is what the problem is.
Now we are going to talk about good looks. Good looks are something that many women are obsessed about. They will compare themselves to the models and the supermodels and the actresses, and they will start feeling very inadequate. And in trying to become better looking, they take some extreme measures. There are times when people become so obsessed with their looks, that they take extreme measures. They will do extreme makeovers, and have reconstruct their whole bodies in order to reach this idea, which is very unhealthy. There are also times when women have psychological disorders because they are so obsessed their looks, and they will suffer from anorexia and bulimia. These two psychological disorders are something that plagues our youth. It plagues our youth and you will see women who are so beautiful and so young and yet they are starving themselves in trying to attain something that is unattainable. I have worked with individuals in therapy, individuals who are lovely, beautiful and a size zero, and they still feel like they are fat. And so they starve themselves. And there are individuals who will eat and regurgitate what they have eaten. And so this becomes a real issue, and you find that with looks, it is also very fleeting. It comes and goes. This is a result of low self-esteem. When an individual feels good about themselves and feels that they have a lot to offer, then they will be so obsessed with their looks.
Something that I want to stress, it’s that, any of this done in moderation, looking good and wanting to present yourself nicely, this is all fine. But the problem is when someone becomes obsessed with it. So taking care of ourselves, exercising, eating well, there is no problem with that. It is actually encouraged. But when someone becomes completely focused on this and is obsessed with it, this is where the problem comes in.
Now we are going to talk about fame. And fame, many people think that once they are well-known and everyone knows them that is when they are going to be truly happy. And you see that those individuals who do have fame, they are living in a fishbowl. Everyone is looking into their life and they have no peace. And if you think that wealth, good looks and fame are the ingredients for happiness, then the actors and actresses should be like the happiest people in the world. And you see that in reality, they are not. They are very much, many of them are depressed, they are suicidal, and some of them are on drugs, because in reality they have been disillusioned. They thought that by acquiring these things, they will be truly happy. They have it all, but yet they are still very very unhappy.
Now I am going to talk to you about real lasting happiness. In order to attain real lasting happiness is to develop four critical relationships. That is your relationship with Allah, your relationship with yourself, your relationship with others, and your relationship with the community.
Now I am going to tell you about the relationship with Allah, because this is the most important relationship and it is a relationship based on submission and trust. We have to fully submit ourselves, and we have to put trust, Al-Tawakkul A’lal-Allah. We are made out of body and soul, and these are two vessels that we need to fill. Now we do very well with filling the body, we fill it with pizza, and hamburger, and kofta, and mulukhiyah and we don’t have a problem in this department, but it is with filling the soul that’s the problem that many times people have malnourished souls. And it is like an empty vessel that can only be filled with the love and devotion to Allah. I’d like to use the analogy of a gas tank. A gas tank can only be filled with gasoline, and if you put gasoline in it, the car goes. However, if you try to fill it with cappuccino, or with other drinks, you see that the car does not move. And our soul is the same way. Many times people feel this void and they try to fill it with wealth and good looks and fame and women and drugs and whatever it is to try to fill this void, and yet they still feel the emptiness. And so this is what we need to work on, it’s to nourish our soul.
I want to give you the example of when our soul is really nourished, and that is during Ramadan. Our soul is so content because we are reading Quran, we are fasting, we are praying taraweeh reading Quran, and this is when we are feeling ecstasy. We are just feeling so content and peaceful, even though we have not been sleeping, we have not been eating, but there’s true contentment. The next way that we can to establish this relationship with Allah is through obedience. Actually, when you love Allah, then you show it by being obedience. Love is equal to obedience. If you have a relationship where your spouse is telling you all day long, “I love you… I love you… I love you… I love you…”, but they don’t listen to you, they don’t do anything that you say, and then this would be completely worthless. So, if we love Allah, then we have to show it. And we have to show it by doing the things that he asks us to do.
I’d like to give you another example. If you are a parent and you’re doing so many special things for your child, and you are getting them gifts. Is it ever enough for them just to say, “Thank you!”, but they don’t listen to you and they are completely disobedient? Of course not! We expect our kids to show their love by being obedient, and so when we do special things for them, the ultimate form of appreciation would be that if they just listen.
Another way to work on this relationship with Allah is through righteous deeds. Because if you know it is in the Quran, it always says Amanu Wa Amilu As-Salihati, you don’t see the Amanu just by itself, because it is never enough to just say “I believe” and not take action. The belief and the actions need to go hand-in-hand. And there has to be a congruency. A congruency between what you feel, what you believe, and your actions. In Surat An-Nahl, Ayat 97, Allah says, “Auzu -bi Llahi Mina Shaitan al-Rajim Bismillah Ar Rahman Al Rahim, Man AAamila salihan min thakarinaw ontha wahuwa mu/minun falanuhyiyannahu hayatantayyibatan walanajziyannahum ajrahum bi-ahsani makanoo yaAAmaloon”. Which says, whoever works righteousness, whether male or female, while he is a true believer, we will verily give him a good life and we shall pay them a reward in proportion to the best of what they used to do. So this is a promise from Allah, that if you’re a believer and you do good deeds, then you will be fully rewarded.
The next way to establish this relationship with Allah, is through the remembrance of Allah, Dhikrullah, and that means by mentioning him, mentioning God’s name by glorifying him. And this is what gives us the peace and serenity. Because Allah says in the Quran, “Auzu -bi Llahi Mina Shaitan al-Rajim Bismillah Ar Rahman Al Rahim, Huwa allathee anzala assakeenatafee quloobi almu/mineena”. So that it is he, Allah that puts the serenity into the hearts of the believers. So there we go, if we want happiness, if we want serenity, then we can get it from Allah and by establishing this relationship with Allah.
Allah says in the Quran, in Surat Ar-Ra`d, Ayat number 28, “ala bithikriAllahi tatma-innu alquloob”, that verily in the remembrance of Allah do hearts find rest. And this (speaks Arabic), it’s not only remembering Allah, but it is mentioning his name, its glorifying him and the way to be aware of this is by thinking that there’s always a surveillance camera, and that you are being watched. That everything that we do, everything that we say, everything single, even thought that we have is being reported. And when we are aware of this, then it makes us be much more careful with our actions. And you see that, sometimes if there’s a surveillance camera and someone is working, they’ll be on their best behaviour, they will be tidying up and they will be very very focused at work. But if there’s no camera, they might be lounging, and having a cup of tea, staying on the phone. So this reminding ourselves that everything is being recorded will make us be much more cautious of our actions.
Another thing that we need to do is to remember that there is going to be accountability. When we think about the day of judgement and standing in the court of Allah, and having to account for every single thing that we have done, this is what will make us be very cautious and careful in our actions.
The next way to establish this relationship with Allah is through being grateful. Gratefulness is such a critical aspect of having this relationship with Allah. Actually when I have clients that come in, and they are suffering from depression, one of the first things I tell them to do is to make a list of all the things that they are grateful for. Basically having a grateful journal, and I ask for specifics. Not just saying, I am grateful for my health, but basically going into details about, I am grateful for my eyes for being able to see. I am grateful for my hearing because I can hear the voices of my loved ones. I am grateful to be able to eat, and to swallow, and to walk, and to do so many things. And when you start numerating all the things that you are, all the blessings that you have, and all the things that you are grateful for, you start feeling such deep appreciation and such happiness. When you go and you visit the less fortunate and you see the conditions that they live in, then you are grateful for every little thing that you have. So we need to increase our ibadah, we need to increase our visiting these individuals. Not only to help them up, but to help ourselves to feel more grateful for everything that we have.
I’d like to mention a hadith of the Prophet (Sallallahu ‘Alaihi Wasallam), which says that, Amazing is the matter of the believer, for all his affairs are good for him. If a bounty was bestowed on him, he thanks Allah for it and he is rewarded. If an affliction touches him, he observes patience, and he is rewarded. Meaning that, whatever happens, good or bad, he is rewarded. Because, if a good thing happens, let’s say they get married, they you say Alhamdulillah! If you have a baby, you say Alhamdulillah. If you lose your job, you still Alhamdulillah and you’re still patient because you know that this is all from Allah. And Allah is Al-Hakeem, he is the most wise and so when you know that he is the most wise, you’re much more accepting of everything that happens. And so every circumstance can be a way of acquiring rewards.
Another way that we can improve our relationship with Allah is by making new commitments to him. And these commitments could be in reading the Quran more, praying more regularly, maybe praying the Sunnah, possible dressing more modestly, lowering our gaze, these are all ways that we can make new commitments to Allah. The example I’d like to use is like a person going to the gym to sculpt their body. When you go to the gym, there has to a, the same goes, no pain, no gain. So there has to be some effort, some striving in order to see results. And that’s the same thing with our acts of worship that if we are making new commitments then we will see the results. Imagine a big, strong guy going into the gym and picking up a 3-pound weight. And they just do this all day. And this is not going to affect them; they are not going to see any results. And that is what has happened to our ibadah. Sometimes the way we pray, it’s so fast, we are not paying attention, we are not focusing, and it’s just like that 3-pound dumbbell. So just like in the gym, you have to either increase the weight or the repetition in order to see results; we have to do something similar in our ibadah, in our worship. And that is to do more things, make new commitments and this way you’ll always revive your iman.
Please stay tuned, and we’ll be right back after these messages, when we’ll be talking about your relationship with yourself.

Now we are going to talk about the relationship with yourself. One of the first things that we need to do in establishing this relationship with ourselves is living a purposeful life. And that is finding your God-given gift and using that to find purpose and then to reach the ultimate purpose of worshiping Allah. So for example, you need to see what do you excel in? is it writing? It is, are you artistic? Are you a good speaker? Whatever it is that you excel in naturally, take that and make it a purpose in your life, and use it as a way to get closer to Allah, and make it as a way of worshiping Allah.
An important aspect of the relationship with yourself is being able to control yourself, and controlling your desires. So when we talk about how do you we gain control over our desires? We need to basically think about the reward and the punishment. There is so much psychology embedded into the Quran, and you see that Allah is always encouraging us that those who fight off their desires, those who are able to control themselves, they will be rewarded. And those who fall into temptation, there will be consequences for their action. And in Surat An-Nāzi`āt, Ayat number 40-41, “Auzu -bi Llahi Mina Shaitan al-Rajim Bismillah Ar Rahman Al Rahim, Waama man khafa maqamarabbihi wanaha annafsa AAani alhawa. Fa-inna aljannata hiya alma/wa”. And this says that as for him who feared standing before his lord and restrained himself from impure, evil desires and lust, rarely paradise will be his abode. So the next time you are faced with some kind of temptation, to look at thing that you’re not supposed to look at or pursue things you’re not supposed to do, think about this first. Think about the promise that Allah has made for those who control their desires.
Now, I’d like to talk about a principle that guides us. Everything that we do is basically to gain pleasure, or to avoid pain. Everything from the mooring we wake up, till when we go to sleep, it’s all based on these two principles. So if you want to acquire a certain behavior or you want to stop that behavior, this is what we need to do. I’ll give you the example, I’ve had clients, who were smoking for maybe fifteen years, and they wanted to stop. And this is what I did with them, it’s that, you take the desired behavior, for instance, you want to stop smoking. So you have to link a lot of pleasure to this and associate a lot of pleasure to the fact of wanting to stop smoking. And so I would talk with them about how good their health will be, how they will live a longer life and how they will not smell, and the pictures of their lungs and how it would look like. So this created a lot of positive association. And even the confidence and happiness of being able to overcome their vice. Then you link a lot of pain into the behavior that you want to change. So for instance, you link pain to the fact of smoking, you could have lung cancer, you could die young and you will not feel as happy and confident about yourself. And by doing this and Alhamdulillah, many clients were able to stop smoking. Even though they were chain-smokers. And so we can do this for every behavior that we want to improve within ourselves, is link a lot of pleasure to what you want to attain and then link a lot of pain to thing you want to stop.
Another way that we control ourselves, it’s by controlling our anger. Our anger is something that causes us to hurt people and commit a lot of sins. So by controlling it, we become a much more balanced individual. I am reminded of the hadith of the Prophet (Sallallahu ‘Alaihi Wasallam), that when an individual came up to him and asked for his advice, he said, “Ya Rasool Allah please give me some advice”, and he said: don’t get angry! And again he said, “ok, I want another advice. Give me advice”, and he said: do not get angry! And again, for the third time he asked, “give me yet another advice”, and he repeated do not get angry!
So this is telling us that it is so critical and so important for us to control ourselves not to blurt out, because what happens is that we destroy a lot of relationships when we do get angry, with our husbands, with our wives, with our children, and sometimes it even sabotages our success at work. So we need to learn, how can we control our anger. The Prophet (Sallallahu ‘Alaihi Wasallam) has given us many tips on how to control our anger. Basically he says, changing positions will be way to control our anger. If you are standing, sit down. If you are sitting, lay down. And just to relax and to change your mode. And this is called pattern interruption in psychology. If you interrupt your pattern, so if you’re going down this path of getting angry and losing your temper, you have to pause. Say Auzu -bi Llahi Mina Shaitan al-Rajim! Seek refuge from Allah from the shaitan. And then to just calm yourself down and basically deep breathing is a way to be able to control your anger. When you take these deep breaths, and you hold it, and you do that maybe 4-5 times, even up to 10 times, you’ll find that you become a lot calmer and you’ll not react. The Prophet (Sallallahu ‘Alaihi Wasallam) encouraged us not to argue. And he asked, would you like to have lofty palaces in jannah? If someone was to ask you, would you want a brand new villa for you in Katameya* Heights? Would you want a villa in Beverly hills? Who would say no to that? Everyone would want it! And so here’s what you have to do, just change one aspect of your behavior, and that is stop arguing. Stop arguing even when you know that you’re right. And this is what the Prophet (Sallallahu ‘Alaihi Wasallam) promised us, that those people who give up arguing and even though they know that they are right, they will be promised lofty palaces in jannah.
Another aspect of self-control is controlling our reaction to events. How do you act when something happens, when something tragic happens? What is your first reaction? If you are laid =-off, what is your first reaction? And this is very important, because when we have the acceptance of (speaks Arabic) and this is the destiny, if we accept it then we need to submit. So if someone tells you that, for instance, you have some kind of illness, our first reaction should be Alhamdulillah, because this is coming from the hikmah of Allah. And if someone, for instance loses their job, you just say Alhamdulillah. Maybe there is another job waiting for you that is much better for you. And so, it’s so important to have this acceptance. And our reaction to an event is very important. So there is the 90:10 principle, which talk about that only 10% is the circumstance and 90% is our reaction to the circumstance. So I will give you an example, for instance, if someone is late to work, or someone has coffee spilled on very important documents. What do you do? Now, if someone has self-control, they will just see it as, this is not such a big deal, and they reprint the document and they move on. Now other people who don’t have self-control, and they lose it, and you see that they get all flustered, they may yell at the people around them, they ruin their day just because of an incident. So keep this in mind that 90% is your reaction. So don’t blame the events in your life.
So we talked about the different aspects of our relationship with ourselves, we talked about living with purpose, we talked about self-control. Now we are going to talk about being mindful. Being mindful means being in the present, in the here and now! And that is actually the definition of a psychologically healthy person, is a person who lives in the present. And you find that many people are either regretting the past, or they are anxious about the future. They will be thinking, why did I do this? I wish I hadn’t done that! Or they will be anxious about, Oh my God, what if I never get married? What if I don’t have kids? What am I going to do when my kids are in the university? So they are always being pulled in these two different directions. But what we need to focus on is the present. This is the only time that we have, and this is how we can impact our life. The Prophet (Sallallahu ‘Alaihi Wasallam) said that, if affliction strikes, never say if I had done so and so… because this opens up the door of the shaitan to do his work. So never think to yourself, if I had just married bachelor number 2, if I had just gotten this degree, if I had just moved to this place, because this will make you completely, being in a state of anxiety, regretting the past or being anxious about the future.
Another aspect of building this relationship with yourself is acceptance! Accept yourself, accept your past, accept your family, and accept your looks. And I know that this is very hard for many of the females out there, and I challenge you to, for instance look in the mirror and see something and say Alhamdulillah, and like what you see. Many times, women focus on my thighs are too fat, or my skin is too wrinkled. So I want you to get into the mode of accepting. And accepting, let’s say your family members, that these are people that Allah has chosen in your life, and accept the things that have happened in your life. Because when we attain acceptance, that’s when we can truly be happy.
We have talked about living with purpose, about controlling your anger, controlling your desires, being mindful and having acceptance for everything that happens in your life, and now we are going to talk about belief system. And the saying is, whatever your mind can perceive, it can achieve. Your mind will always support you and you are always right. So whatever that you are thinking and believing, then that is what’s going to happen. So that is why, it is like a computer that you program, so you have to program yourself for success. You have to tell yourself that you are capable and you need to build yourself up for every single success. What happens a lot of times is that, people do not utilize this and they have limiting beliefs. So this limiting belief could be that, Oh, I am not smart enough, I am not pretty enough, I am not this… and I am not that! And these are all limiting beliefs that prevents you from reaching your full potential. So we need to become very aware of what our belief systems are, and to make changes. Because many times these belief systems, they kind of develop haphazardly. We never sit down and think, OK now I am going to develop my belief system. You have an incident, maybe you’ll get up and you talk in front of people, and you really mess up, so your belief system now is that you are a bad speaker. But you could work on this and you can develop it. Maybe you have a belief system that you didn’t do very well at school. But it doesn’t mean that you are not smart. So just have to look at your belief system and try to modify it. And what’s amazing is that, the mind cannot distinguish between what is real and what is not real! So the power of visualization really has a profound impact. They actually did a study on Olympic gold medalist, and they found that individuals who are very successful, what they did, they were working out 12 hours a day, they were practicing. Whether it was skiing, or ice-skating, whatever it was, they were doing that. So you do have to put in the work and the effort and the sweat, but what they also did, is they spent time closing their eyes and visualizing their success. And they saw that this was a very key element in achieving their goals. So we can use the power of visualization. We can do this for whatever we want to attain, that you can see before your eyes, the success, and the achievements that you want to acquire.
The last thing I would like to talk about in your relationship with yourself is self-talk. Self-talk is the dialogue that we have with ourselves. We actually talk 600 words a minute to ourselves! And usually 85% of what we say is negative. So what is this doing to us? All this negativity is causing us not to reach our full potential. To maybe fail our exams, maybe not do as well! So we need to become aware of this and try to change our self-talk and try to make it all positive. Only make statements about yourself that are positive. For instance, never say things like, Oh, I am so stupid! Oh, I can’t believe I did that! Oh that was so dumb! And because what we say, our mind starts believing. So we need to make statements that will help us to reach our full potential. We could say things like, I can do it! This is possible! I am strong enough, smart enough! and these things will give us the boost that we need to achieve our success.
What I’d like to mention is that Dhikr, which is the remembrance, the mentioning and glorifying of Allah is also a form of positive self-talk. Because when we are doing this, we are reflecting it on our blessings and it makes us so much more grateful. So this is a way of reminding ourselves of our blessings.
So in summary, we discussed the two relationships in attaining happiness. And that was the relationship with Allah and the relationship with yourself. It was a pleasure to be here with you today. I hope that you will join me on the next episode, when I will discuss with you relationship with others, and relationship with the community to attain complete happiness.
Thank you and As-salamu alaykum!