Dont make this mistake Religious vs Good Character

As we do before commencing any of our lectures, we make dua for our brothers and sisters in we ask Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala in all his glorious names and attributes in all his names which he knows or he has taught us or has kept hidden to himself or toward any of his servants to give victory to our brothers and sisters in Gaza and to bring for them support from around the world those whom Allahh is pleased with and they are pleased with him and Allah Make us among them. ask Allah to have mercy upon their martyrs and make their children awaiting for them. Allah, compensate them for their loss and bring and avenge them for their the terror which has been brought to them although they stand firm. Allah, keep them firm on and value. Allah, unite them with the righteous and return this ummah good return to the path of strength and the path of respect as it once was before. Allah, forgive our shortcomings and help us and guide us in what is best. Alhamdulillah. Tonight, brothers and sisters, we're going to talk I'm going to give an introduction just an introduction about character. character of Muslim and then afterwards in the next lectures to come I'm going to grab topic about character and speak about it in detail specifically one by one. So tonight is general introduction with few important points that would like to raise and we walk away with some benefit inshallah. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has referred us to the best of creation from where we can seek our understanding of what true and good character which pleases Allah comes from. We can't do it by ourselves and character is very difficult yet very rewarding and not an impossible feat to increase in and excel in. Allah subhana wa ta'ala mentioned who? He mentioned our prophet Muhammad sallall.aii wasallam as our best role model when it comes to the best of character. In the Quran Allah says you, Muhammad, you are upon most tremendous character. Allah Allah never uses the word tremendous except for something which is truly phenomenally tremendous and he only said it about the prophet Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wasallam because the prophet Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wasallam endured every type of hardship, calamity and challenge that every other prophet and messenger endured and even more. Even till today the prophet sallallah.aii alaihi wasallam is shining and his name is everywhere and people who hate Islam and hate the prophet peace be upon him or they are ignorant of Islam they continue to talk badly about the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam but through all what he endured he had the best and the most perfect character in all the different changing circumstances so we have so much information about prophet Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wasallam's life even inside his home and outside so so much detail more than any other prophet and messenger in fact more than any other human being in history to down to the letter down to how he moved his lips sallallahu alaihi wasallam and we can find an example for each and every one of us in the character of the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam which we can relate to whether you have an anger problem or you have hatred problem or you have jealousy problem or whether you have an issue with dealing with challenges and people's hate towards you or with people's hardship towards you or whether you have problems with money or health or anything that you name it. There is an area and an aspect of our prophet Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wasallam that you can read about in the Quran or in the Sunnah through hadith authentic hadiths from which you can relate to. And remember when used to be 14, 15 years old back in Lebanon, every that would come along, I'd go to the and don't know if this happens to you, there was something that I'd have challenge with during that week and subhan Allah coincidentally or maybe believe that it is from Allah subhana wa ta'ala, not really coincidentally, the would be about it. Have you ever noticed that? Have you experienced that sometimes the comes and addresses something that's been on your mind? So believe that that is guidance from Allahh doesn't have to be through the can be through any other means but that was something still remember and when Allahh brings that to you there is an aspect of the dean or an aspect of the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam that you can really relate to and then it becomes your strength and your motivator and your inspiration to help you change your character and improve it. Allah also says in the Quran giving an example about high character Allah says and he praises he praises those who are able to restrain their anger when they feel intense anger. Obviously this is very natural to feel. Allah praises those who can overcome it and control it and direct it and channel it in the right direction. They do things and they learn how to adapt to that anger and how to channel it and manipulate it. Whether it be for some people to get out of the situation they're in or they learn how to regulate that emotion or whether they channel it somewhere else. Those people who can learn how to channel their anger and take control of it, Allah praises them. There is higher level than controlling and channel channeling your anger and that is those who are able to pardon people because anger usually comes from outside or from situations that we don't have control over and often it comes from people around us. So Allah then says those who are able to reach point of regulating their emotions so much so that they can actually find it in their heart to pardon people. Pardoning doesn't mean that you totally forgive, not necessarily, but it is the best and highest virtue if you can for your own sanity. But pardoning means don't take action in most of the cases and let it go. Move on and focus on yourself. We always say to people, if you cannot control someone else's behavior, so long as you're not in danger or your or your your wealth and property or your life or dignity or something is in danger, which you need to defend as Muslim, so long as it will go away, find way to just pardon it. meaning don't take action and focus on what benefits you. That's higher degree. Not everybody can reach it and that is why the reward is equal to the strength of person's ability to reach that. Not everybody can reach and that's why the reward is higher. Then Allah mentions in an even higher degree than both of them is not only to be able to pardon the people who are angered you but also to continue to do good towards them but they don't deserve it. They say yes you don't have to but this see this is higher degree of wisdom and intelligence where person knows when to continue to do goodness in the right place and whenever they can they still do it and you know most people who hurt you and anger you lot of people who deliberately do that if you know if they continuously do that to you and you've done nothing wrong with them there's something about them that they don't like about you that you're competition to them that there's something about you which they want to control but they can't control whatever the reason is when they see you doing good Even after that it burns them even more. lot of people misunder don't get that. It burns them even more. And to see you rage and to see you become like them is very tasteful to them. They like seeing that. So sometimes no response is the best response and even doing good and say this guy this person's not even getting affected by what I'm doing. Usually see it as teachers you know that was teacher and can see it in students whenever someone bullies another. One of the best strategies if they obviously if they to defend themselves they do but the best strategy is to act like they don't even exist their words cannot affect them most of the time it works and other times they need to learn martial arts so I'm not saying that you know we just turn the other cheek don't go around bashing people at school brothers and sisters use other means as much as you can to avoid fighting the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam was described The companions used to say and his wife wives used to say the messenger of Allah was the best of all people around us in character. Anyone you saw he had better character. In fact, one day the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam said to by the one who possesses my soul, you will never reach true piety of the highest degree until you can love and can you can love me the messenger of Allah not me as person but as messenger of God you know then more than anything else. So he said wallah love you more than anything else except than myself. He was straight out. The prophet peace be upon him said no even until it's more than yourself truly. So he thought about it for few moments and then he said now Allah truly love you even more than myself. He said how did you get to that? He said thought about my character and your character. thought about my shortcomings and your shortcomings. thought about my value and your value and found that in every area you were superior and would love to have that character in me but because it's in you found myself loving you even more than myself could not find anything hate about you so loved you more than myself and this is how we work towards it my brothers and sisters I'll just enumerate few more hadiths about character and then inshallah bit more detail the prophet peace be upon him said the hadith is ini he said there is nothing that is heavier in the scale for believer on the day of judgment than the goodness of their character. And Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala hates and dislikes Allah dislikes the person who is foul-mouthed indecent words and the one who insults and swears. Another hadith in the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam said the closest people to me in status on the day of judgment or in paradise are the ones who have excellent character. The best of them who have the more they excel in character the closer they'll be to me on the day of judgment. He also said they also said about the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam the messenger of Allah was not the type that used indecent foul language and actions nor did he abuse and insult and he used to say the best among you is the one who is best in character. In another hadith he says the ones who used to be best in character in jah meaning before the Quran was sent before the prophet peace be upon him came out as messenger they were still non-Muslims then after they became Muslims you will find they have better character and it continuously they would be the best of character the ones who meaning that good character is trait and I'm going to come to something very important for you to know that religion to be religious Eman and religion and good character are actually separate. But iman eman and knowledge of your dean and knowing what how what Allah rewards you with and what he punishes you with. That's motivator for your character to be improved. Every person who has great character does not necessarily have good religion, good dean. But every person who has de you'll find among them who has amazing character. We'll get to that inshallah in minute. He also said sallallah.aii wasallam true piety and closeness to Allah involves ex excellence in character. And to know what sin really is other than Allah and his messenger telling us about it is whatever scratches at your conscience and you would hate people to know that about you. Not everybody has that conscience. Some people have lost their conscience. The prophet's not talking about people who no longer have conscience who just got used to inappropriate bad character and and corruption in their life and they lost their soul. We're talking about people who still have what we call the fra who are still in the natural innocence as Allah created us. You will naturally feel that something is wrong. Even animals feel it. You see cat for example, if you give it food, it will eat it in peace. But if it has to snatch the food, it runs away. That's an instinct. Isn't that correct? And also you see baby or child when they snatch dummy off the other child, right? they know that they've done something wrong. So it's instinctive in us when we feel that something's wrong. This is you know something's wrong with that sin. It's sin inshallah most likely. The prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam was asked about those who mostly enter paradise. What are they made up of? Who are the ones who mostly enter paradise? He said two things the god consciousness and godfearance. So and with it accompanied high good character. You have these both you'll be the most abundant in the high places of paradise. And then he was asked who are the ones who most abundantly enter hellfire. And then he said as result of what do they enter? And he said as result of what their tongues say and what their private parts are used for. So those two are the worst to be followed by our desires. We have to control them. Our mouth and the private part. meaning the tendency to want to do haram, indecent sexual acts and the mouth because it keeps running, gossip, backbiting, insulting, putting people down, constantly constantly abusing the mouth just keeps going and going and going. So the prophet peace be upon him used to say, "Whoever believes in Allah and the hereafter then should train themselves in brackets to say something good or be silent. Of course, we're not all perfect, but to work towards it and to guard their chastity, right? Which means adultery, fornication, chatting up, leading towards going out in haram way and meeting up and online and sending photos and and forgive me for the word sexing and things like that. You know what I'm talking about. All of that. He said this is the main this is one of the the greatest reasons that people end up in hellfire. And he's talking about the believers, by the way. He's not talking about we haven't even gone to talk about those who don't even believe in Allah. He's talking about from among the Muslims. May Allah not make us among them and forgive our sins. He also said sallallahu alaihi wasallam guarantee house palace house in the mediocre parts of paradise. Mediocre parts of paradise. But it's still in paradise in the gardens. For who? For whoever is able to whoever is able to disengage from nonsensical non-beneficial argumentation even if he is in the right in Islam we are discouraged strongly from entering into arguments even debates which don't lead to any good except just harm, wasting of time. And that's when you talk to someone and you see that they're just like brick. All they do is insult. You're only wasting your time. So you just say what needs to be said and cut the argument short. You don't. And he said, "Even if you know you're right, even while you're right." And that's actually strong character, by the way. When you are able to say the right words and then disengage, you've won. But we're not there to win. We're there to guard our character. Turn away from those who are ignorant. And ignorant doesn't just mean someone who doesn't know something. Ignorant also means people who do know it but they're manipulative. They want to fight. They just want to cause trouble. Turn away from them. Go and focus on where your time is better spent. the prophet peace be upon him said mediocre place for those who disengage from nonsensical nonbeneficial argumentation even if they are right. And guarantee palace or house in the heart of paradise. For whoever avoids all forms of lying even if they are joking. And what does that mean? Doesn't mean any type of joke. So you might say joke to make people laugh or to say lesson out of it. The joking here means joke that causes harm. joke that is inappropriate. joke it like lying. lying with your joke to hurt people or to put down people. we're just joking. Sallallahu alaihi wasallam said, guarantee in the heart of Paradise. And then he said, "And guarantee place in paradise." In the highest place of paradise for who? For the ones who have excelled in their character. So character is an allrounder thing. The hadith is so brothers and sisters as you can see there are lot of ayat in the Quran and hadiths that talk about high character. Okay, we move on. Now the level of good character from person to person varies. Some people excel. Some people are halfway. Some people are doing their best and then there are some people who just give in to their bad character and personalities knowingly and they just say that's what am. you like it like it don't like it and they swear at you stuff you no and they vary right the whole idea brothers and sisters that Islam has come with the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam said in the hadith which is authenticated through other hadiths have only been as matter of fact have been sent to help you complete the virtues of your character this is what we work towards so people vary in character for two reasons number One, you are born already psychologically imprinted in your genetics with certain personality, psychology and behavioral tendencies. Did you know that? That is established in scientific research and it's also supported in the hadith of the prophet peace be upon him in our sunnah. The prophet peace be upon him said the hadith is Muslim he said People are like different metals and we talked about this another time. Meaning some people are like gold, some people like silver, some people are in between. Some people like metal, some like steel, some are like iron, some are like this or that. So people are like different types of metals. Their value is different based on their character, their personalities. Some have tendency to get angry very quickly if they are challenged or put in place where it's their automatic reflex and response. Other people get sad very quick. Other people are more emotionally driven. Other people are bit more kinder. Other people little bit more rougher and so on. That that does not mean that you should settle for that. All it means is that that is your test in life and you got to try to work on calibrating that and improving. We call this in genetics epigenetics. And what it means is that it's your it's predisposition. you're born with it inherently, but it means that you're susceptible to certain reactions in certain given conditions. You need to recognize that. Write it down in your journal and start saying, "How can improve on that?" And I'll give you some strategies at the end. The second way that person's character varies and their behavior, of course, it shows in their behavior as well, is it's when it's acquired. It's your upbringing. It's the environment that you were born in, the family that you were raised in, the friends that you hung around with growing up, the influences that you allowed yourself to be exposed to, the experiences in your life. These things affect your behavior. We need to recognize them and see where our weaks and strengths are and work on it, inshallah. For example, who used to have an inherited trait of anger and when he was in his non-Islamic years, he would get angry at the wrong people. When he became Muslim, he channeled his anger against the people who deserve it for the sake of Allah. such as in battles, such as when he became the leader and before that, such as in truth when it means the people's rights. So he employed that strong emotion in the right place. Can you do that? That'll be great feat and great reward. My brothers and sisters, some people you cannot control their behavior. So what do you do? Don't try to change it. You control yours. The prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam once exited the masid and saw man. He was raging. Raging. Everyone's trying to calm him down. They couldn't instead of the prophet peace be upon him going towards him he went the other way why he said that man if he says one word seek refuge in Allah from Satan the outcast his anger would go away it seems like thean had good hold of him but he didn't go towards him why because he was not in place to listen it was going to get worse and he might say something to the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam in which he earns Allah's anger so the prophet moved away and gave him time when he calmed down then he talks to them and that's way of treating People who are close to you like your children, your spouse, your parents, yourself, your siblings, cousins, relatives is to try and approach them in times when things are calm and to approach in the most lenient way and most careful way that you can. Otherwise, you control your behavior if you cannot control other people's behavior. And this is what Allah will ask you about. Brothers and sisters, now come to misconception which would really love to share with you. We said before that iman religion to be religious and to have faith and to have strong belief is one thing. That's one strength and the other strength is good character. There is misconception where people think that every religious person means that they must have excellent character. But that is wrong. Religious and character are actually separate. However, having faith, piety, and god-fearing iman and knowledge of your deed well and looking at how the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam was as role model and his companions and being around people who have high character, who remind you of Allah, sorry. And you read the Quran and take it seriously to try and apply it. All these actions of eman of religio of religious pursuit and eman and practice they rem they serve as reminder and motivator to improve your character. So you have more of chance for your character to excel. The evidence is in the Quran. Allah says, you who have believed, do not let group of you insult and abuse another group. They may be better than you, but he still called them what? Believers. you who have believed." So there is trait of believers who could probably insult. So Allah says, "You're believers. Now you need to work on his character." Allah also says, you who have believed faith full of faith full of iman religious avoid much of your suspicions there's too much speculation happening and suspicions so now religious work on your suspicion two different things don't spy on one another religious people may spy you got to work on that Don't backbite one another. And he's who's he addressing? The religious people. Allah also says, you who have believed again religious people, faithful people, if someone who is untrustworthy or news that is corrupt that can cause problems and trouble and fitna comes to you, verify, clarify, find out and see if you do have to take action. If you do, find out, verify, seek so that you do not attack people ignorantly and hastily and then you will be regretful over what you did. Again, he's addressing the faithful ones. But can they have bad character and just believing everything that comes their way and attacking people and backbiting people and assuming bad about people? Yes. So, these are separate. And remember what said before, the prophet peace be upon him said that the most reasons for that that would that makes people enter paradise are two things. Fearing Allah having god consciousness most of the time in your life or throughout your life and coupled with excellent character. Again the prophet's talking about tawa god consciousness and eman one thing another. Otherwise the prophet would have just said sallallahu alaihi wasallam just fearing Allah having being religious he wouldn't have mentioned and Allah wouldn't have mentioned it separately and we all know the hadith which is weak in its narration but correct in its meaning and you'll probably be bit shocked when say this hadith because we use it and it's very popular when it comes to marriage for people want to get married. The prophet peace be upon him said to the fathers and to the women to the girls and the ladies and you know families if man with good religion and good character approaches you for marriage or for your daughters for marriage then give your daughters to them or you accept them in marriage if you do not do so there will be much corruption on earth That second part, much corruption on earth is not correct. Also does not fit with the meanings of the Quran and Sunnah. Just because you know you didn't accept someone who didn't have high character and good religion doesn't mean that there's going to be corruption because you know also you got to be attracted for example physically right you got to be attracted personalities. mean there's lot of companions who had amazing character like and Zanab who were married. They were both promised paradise but their marriage didn't work out. So we can't say everyone who's on the dean. That's tick tock term on the deen. They don't they really don't know what it means. wish they did. On the dean and good character what does it mean? So also there are other factors compatibility personality family and the rest. Anyway we we we wanted to emphasize from that hadith anyway the first part that the prophet peace be upon him said their religion and their character. So just because somebody seems like they're praying in mosque or they're reading Quran or the Hfield or they've studied or whatever it is and from head to toe mashallah the man or the woman look like they've just hopped out of paradise. we cannot just take that for granted because we also have to study the the character side. You can have religious people who've got very nasty character. So and you can have people who've got excellent character but their religion is corrupt. So don't take one without the other. Yeah. And don't make blanket rule. So person can be sinful with high character and can be worshipper and avoid sin but has terrible character. In fact, they may use verses of the Quran to manipulate you and to take control. Why? Because of their bad character. Some people who got religion in their life, the shaitan may make them forget to be humble and then they start thinking they are superior to others because they pray bit more or they fast bit more, they give sodaka bit more because they read the Quran bit more, they grow their beards or they wear their hijab better and then suddenly they forget that the character comes hand inhand with iman and that is they start looking down on others and judging others and using the words versus oppressing others and vice versa people who who are not religious. They start to hate on all religious people and give them blanket collective judgment to everybody and say all religious people are bad. Stay away from them. And in fact, they love it when they hear bad things about religious people and say yeah it's those religious people. Both of them are in the wrong. You can't make blanket rule and that is severe oppression. There is great predecessor named who said, "Sorry, not The meaning of that is quite interesting. He said, "For person who is irreligious were to accompany me, but has excellent character would be more favored to me to walk with than to walk with person who recites and reads, meaning he is man of of religion, but has very bad character. For person who is corrupt in their religiosity, if they have good character, he treats you with decency and he's not burden on people and people love will like that person because of their treatment to him. And person who's constantly worshiping but has very bad character will be burden on people and people will start to despise him. Now of course this does not mean that we should favor person who has good character and neglect everyone who is religious. What he is saying is that in worldly life to have good character you feel safer around that person you feel better around that person but don't imitate that person with his religion because obviously they're not going to be good influence in piety but they're good influence in character. What he's saying is if you can get both that would be the amazing thing. Somebody who fears Allah and with excellent character wall know many many many of them growing up and they never escaped my mind. learned so much from them. Some of them are my teachers and my sheh growing up. Some of them were friends. used to wake up in the morning in Lebanon. remember it's all started and used to say Allah today bring to me someone accompany whom you love and is of great character. And subhan Allah it always worked. I'd get the bad character, but then the good character would calm me down. remember once walking with my friend, we were 16 years old and leaving school and and you know, we're talking about Dean and he's got really good character and he doesn't look like sheh or an imam, but he has so not everybody has to be up on the pulpit by the way or the mimba or an imam to know that they have, right? Everybody's an individual. And remember saying to him, subhan Allah, don't know why ask Allah to always bring to me people that are God-fearing and of high character. And when you have people who are god-fearing, they don't sit there judging you and everything. Wah, they're actually so easy with you. They smile to you. They just help you very tenderly. Those are the people of Allah. These are the people you love to be around and find them. My brothers and sisters, there is another misconception. Listen carefully. When those who think that religious religiosity person being religious necessarily means high character may fall into judging religious people collectively or even judge the religion itself. That's why it's not good way of looking at it. Start judging the religion itself. Some people say if their religion was right or that they wouldn't be like that. But you've judged the religion or you punish everyone collectively. I've heard some brothers and sisters, they say, "You know what? I'm not even going to marry anyone who is religious because I've seen this and I've seen that. might as well go marry someone who, you know, he drinks alcohol and and whatever. At least they they treat me better." Yeah. You can find people, alhamdulillah, who are god-fearing. But the thing is, you know, the ones who are bad character are always louder. They're always louder. We know some of my students are here. We remember in class, you go into class, there's three or four who ruin it for the rest of the students. They're just the loudest. Then we say, that class, you know, 10 10g, they're the worst." It's only really three or four, right? So, we can't collectively punish everyone and say everyone's the same. So, inshallah, and vice versa is true. Those who attribute themselves to religiosity, meaning they count themselves as religious and practicing, may fall into the error of judging those who are tested with apparent sinful behavior or they look sinful right on the outside. Meaning meaning people who who who attribute themselves to religion can fall into the practice or the assumption of looking at everyone who doesn't look religious non-practicing and then they collectively punish them and say anyone who dresses like anyone who's like that anyone who's not praying or anyone who's not doing this they have degenerate character in them just collectively assuming about everyone they must be degenerate in their character and their morals. I've seen people who've come out of families who are the worst of the worst when it came to religion, but they've never had the opportunity or the chance of anybody coming to teach them the dean. And when they did, they became 10 times better than me and you. And vice versa, I've seen people come out of really religious families and subhan Allah, they become the lowest of the low with their behavior. May Allah make us among those whom he loves. person may be lacking in one area of character but excels in another area of character. And say to both of these people, the ones who are non-practicing who judge all religious people with the and paint them with the same brush and those who are religious who paint all non-practicing people with the same brush. say to you remind you of the hadith of the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam which is in Bkari Muslim. Beware of constant assumptions and judgment for assumptions and judgments are the most lying forms of whispers in the head. And remember that in the Quran, people, be concerned with yourself. Meaning be concerned with improving yourself. Those who are misguided will not guide you if you are guided. This doesn't mean that you don't advise people. This doesn't mean that you don't command good and prohibit evil when when you should do it and where you can do it with wisdom and goodness. All it means is that don't let you know few bad character or few bad experiences make you make blanket rule of just giving up altogether. Brothers and sisters, however, person who loves their religion and wants to be true believer and raise higher in the closeness of Allah would be lacking in his or her faith if their religion is neglected. So person with low character means that the iman is low. But if person who has good character and iman, it's sign also of their iman. So religious person must make their character their priority and improve in areas where they are weak in. Wallah brothers and sisters as told you I've seen many amazing people who fear Allah of the most impeccable character that you will think that is there hidden paradise on earth with paradise people there most amazing wallah and in saying that in today's time there are some people who appear religious even though would expect that they are only minority but with growing social media They pop up lot, but you know, you've got 7 billion people around the world or so. You're going to see lot of them popping up because we live in hub now in social media, right? Sometimes any talk you see or any place they go or anyone who posts something, they just pop up out of their cave and they start going only because they can. And you know, we say that whoever doesn't hold accountability for their actions, that's where you really know their character. What will you do? if you have access to something and you can do whatever you want. How how would you act if you're not accountable? so these types of people and I'm going to talk about both by the way those who are religious and those who are not they both have something to learn inshallah and we learn for ourselves. So in this day and age even though assume they are minority minority some of those who act religious on the outside have unfortunately given wrong image of Islam and the wrong image of the honest practicing people to the general public and to the masses by their practices that have become you know known such as you might find religious person who is just constantly lying manipulating evading, breaking appointments. These are common in some religious people who are not monitoring their character, misappropriating funds, and corrupt portfolio management, sneaky in financial dealings, competitive with money, and they ask questions about other people's income. Why? To judge them or to compete with them. How much does the sheh earn? how much does the this charity or so and so is pocketing money so and so using religion to make money Allah find that you'll find most often it's them it's them who are doing that but to just jump to these conclusions with no evidence and just talk about everyone like that this is something that some people should not some people should really really monitor themselves and judge themselves little bit more is their iman really in the right And then they call it calling. You got to call it out. Call it out with what? You haven't even It's not even substantiated. You're just going on. You've seen couple You've seen couple of clips. You've heard couple of things. You don't even know the person. You've just gone out to to call them corrupted, dirty person. Many, many times we get it wrong. But you see people and then they say, "Religion tells us we have to command good and prohibit evil." Do you even know what you're talking about? 99% you're just attacking people oppressively. some religious people with their bad character will have malt bad treatment of their spouses and family, inappropriate conduct online, and other misconduct in dealing with people. Some will appear like they are championing and passionately using the voice of truth and justice only when it benefits them or does not harm their interest. But when it is against themselves or their wealth or personal benefit or interest or their family or their group that they belong to, they go silent in voicing the truth. And then some of them even twist and manipulate religious text or use verses and hadiths that suit him or her or even speak false. some take know their knowledge and their position or their reputation as form of superiority above others and entitlement rather than it being for the sake of Allah first and in accordance with Allah's guidance. Some of them will get involved in religious or beneficial work only if he or she sees benefit of them for themselves otherwise they never take part. Some of them will have will be bad to their family and children, stingy while having lot of money, looking for tiniest religious faults and jumping into reprimanding and opposing this person with the worst of manners and character and painting all non-practicing people with the same brush. This is double standards and the vice versa is true. minority among non-practising Muslims as well also have the double standards. They carry secret dislike for religious people whether these religious people are honest or not and then they follow and look for any kind of slip that religious person does or posts and they jump on it says we told you why to justify their own wrongdoing and continue what they're doing. they get happy when some of them get happy when religious person does something wrong. Some of them get happy when someone posts something bad about religious person what they did. Some of them love to paint all religious people with the same brush and make fun of religious looks and those who practice the sunnah. Worse even some of them start to justify remaining non-practicing and being around irreligious lifestyles and relationships because they say, "Well, I'd rather be here than with these religious people." But really, they're just really fooling themselves and making up stuff. But when non-religious person does the same mistake or sins, they find every excuse for them and say, "Don't judge." We really who who knows, you know, I'm not judging anybody myself. I'm talking in general. Those who get upset now with this what just said, it means they're judging themselves. So I'm not pointing to any I'd point to myself before anyone, brothers and sisters. Wall, it's good. It's important to push the red buttons and to really analyze ourselves before the time that we meet Allah comes and it's really for our own benefit. Allah says in the Quran, "Verily, those who love that indecency should spread among the believers deserve painful chastisement in the world and the hereafter. Allah knows but you do not know." One more misconception. just to remind you, you should not judge person's good character as the ultimate sign of being religious while knowing they are publicly sinful and display religious shortcomings. And vice versa, we should not judge person's outward religiosity as definite sign of their good character or high expectations. When you want to get to know someone, especially for relationship and marriage, brothers and sisters, please do your due diligence in studying and asking and seeking advice. even doing marriage course. Learn what we're supposed to be looking for. It's not enough just to say, mashallah, he's got that that beard to die for." Or that you know, hijab to make me melt or mashallah his voice in the Quran is just mesmerizing. You know, they think they're going to go into the marriage and that's all he's going to be doing. They memor reciting Quran day and night and she's just mesmerizing. That's not going to happen like that. Or sister who mashallah, you know, she's going to take me to Jenna. It doesn't work like that, my brothers and sisters. Yes, spouses help each other. But you got to do your due diligence that you got religion which is good character. Alhamdulillah. It means that person who fears Allah when you remind them of Allah when they do something wrong, they're more likely to say and obey. Alhamdulillah. And they don't get pride if their wife reminds them or their husband reminds them. That's more likely. But you also got to study their upbringing, their character, their childhood, the family they come from, what kind of environment they are. Look at their social media page. see what kind of ask about them, their friends, and take your time, you know, because when you interview someone, when you sit down and talk to that one person, you're not really going to know enough about them. Many people fall into that mistake. But once you get into the family business and family research and then they help you and investigate and you start getting to the serious things, lot of things start popping up. mah self- entitlement what we call now don't like calling it throwing it around you know narcissism and all that traits of all that stuff or traits of some irregulated emotions these all start popping up so religion doesn't itself fix necessarily mean that it's fixed everything unless you work towards it so my final and conclusion is how to improve our character I'll give you just eight simple guidelines and you can work on them number The first place to start is to find way to increase your knowledge on about the rewards and the consequences of bad character that can be motivator. What are the rewards in having good character in certain things that you want and what are the consequences? Learn about them because then fearing the outcome can help you focus and anticipating the rewards even the rewards in worldly gain. inshallah or the consequence in worldly again can be motivator. Number two, mindfulness. What does mindfulness means? It means when you sit down by yourself and you reflect on yourself, you really think about what you did in the day and how you interacted and what you did. Identify and reflect daily on your actions and ask yourself why did act the way that acted? Really talk to yourself. Maybe even journal like just just even if it's few sentences, just say today did this. want to work on that. The mind starts to re- channel to think in that direction. Even if you just read it and look at it. Number three, talk to yourself. Like really just move your mouth. Even if you look crazy, but nowadays everybody's got their earpods in. Everyone looks crazy. So you're okay. Just go in and just talk to yourself. You're in the car, you're in whatever. Say to yourself, will be doing that. No, you should not do give yourself mo like preach to yourself. Do you know it works to certain extent? It has an effect. Number four, make an intentional deliberate goal to work on that bad character that you have. Choose one. Choose one and make an intentional goal to work on that particular character. Number five, be easy on yourself and try again. Repetition will help. Sometimes it's very hard to change it overnight. It takes sometimes weeks, months. some people even years but work on one by one inshallah the idea is to get better even if you can't be perfect number six apologize and make it up to people that you've wronged if it involved wronging people just humble yourself learn how to be humble and learn how to just let go and going up to the person and just say do apologize man didn't know wah that helps number seven learn from your mistakes which means take responsibility It's so liberating to take responsibility. Number eight, try to be around good influence. Observe them, learn from them. said eight, didn't So, it's nine. Nine, allow yourself to try humbleness. See what's the worst like what's the worst that can happen if you just humbled yourself. If spoke about you, let's say online, and somehow Allah directed you to see that comment and you go, "What? That's my neighbor why that dirty whatever and then find out can either get arrogant say don't care or can go and say man got caught but you know what got to make it up to them cuz Allah is going to judge me maybe this is lesson for me maybe this is what Allah is showing me go humble myself even if the guy had go at me I'll say you know what deserve it try humbleness for change but you when you truly are in the wrong, it helps you lot. Inshallah, ask Allahh to make us among those of high character. May Allah make us aware of ourselves. May Allah guide us to that which is best in this dunya and in the hereafter. May Allah make us among those who are included in the of the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam in this world and in paradise and make us among the dwellers of Jenna. Alhamdulillah.