Are We Our Own Worst Enemy? Dangerous Times for Spiritual Self-Sabotage Q&A

From the Realities of Mawlana (Q) as taught by Shaykh Nurjan Mirahmadi

أَعُوذُ بِاللَّهِ مِنَ الشَّيْطَانِ ٱلْرَّجِيمِ
بِسْمِ ٱللَّهِ ٱلرَّحْمَٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ 

A’uzu Billahi Minash Shaitanir Rajeem
Bismillahir Rahmanir Raheem

I seek refuge in Allah (AJ) from the accursed Satan
In the Name of Allah, the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful

Alhamdulillahi Rabbil ‘aalameen, was salaatu was salaamu ‘alaa Ashrafil Mursaleen, Sayyidina wa Mawlana Muhammadul Mustafa ﷺ. Madad ya Sayyidi ya Rasulul Kareem, Ya Habibul ‘Azeem, unzur halana wa ishfa’lana, ‘abidona bi madadikum wa nazarekum.

Atiullah wa atiur Rasul wa Ulil amre minkum. Always a reminder for myself, ana abdukal ‘ajeez, wa dayeef, wa miskin, wa zhalim, wa jahl, and but for the grace of Allah (AJ) that we’re still in existence. 

أَطِيعُوا اللَّهَ وَأَطِيعُوا الرَّسُولَ وَأُولِي الْأَمْرِ مِنكُم… ﴿٥٩﴾‏ …

4:59 – “…Atiullaha wa atiur Rasula wa Ulil amre minkum…” (Surat an-Nisa)

“…Obey Allah, obey the Messenger, and those in authority among you…” (The Women, 4:59)

Question 1: With reference to your discussion yesterday about anchor, how will a person know which anchor to leave alone and which one to pray to be released?

Shaykh Nurjan Mirahmadi: The anchor best is for meditation. Allah (AJ) give to us, ‘I don’t change condition of a person until they change what’s within themselves.’ 

…إِنَّ اللَّـهَ لَا يُغَيِّرُ مَا بِقَوْمٍ حَتَّىٰ يُغَيِّرُوا مَا بِأَنفُسِهِمْ ﴿١١﴾

13:11 – “…Inna Allaha la yughayyiru ma bi qawmin hatta yughayyiro ma bi anfusihim…” (Surat Ar-Ra’d)                        

“Indeed Allah will not change the condition of a people until they change what is in themselves.” (The Thunder, 13:11)

The people of tafakkur (contemplation) their whole life should be like a chess game. That when you play a chess game, keep your hand on the piece because if you release your hand, that was your move. You can’t take it back. What you say, what you do, you can’t take back. So it means you keep your hand on the move. You think if I do like this or if I want this, what really going to happen for me? So everybody is praying for job job job job job job job, more money. If you think to yourself that how much more money do you need to keep your tariqah (spiritual path) life? Because if the Lotto comes, oh all these things you have to buy and ‘Now I’m dressed so nice, my clothes are too tight, I can’t sit on the carpet with these people. I’m busy Friday, Saturday. I have appointments man. I’m not somebody who can do these things,’ and they go.

In 30 years of doing this, this is what we’ve seen. People who get it, they’re gone and they think this is what they needed in life, they needed in life, they needed in life and they were chewing at their anchor. Because every time you’re praying, are you really praying against what Allah (AJ) has put you in and the condition Allah (AJ) put you in? So what shaitan (satan) has you really doing is biting your anchor, biting your rope. That’s why really in a better level of faith, ‘Ya Rabbi I’m not praying for anything. You know best what I’m in need of and what I definitely don’t need.’ Every time I inject myself into the prayer, I don’t know which direction this is going.

So there is a contentment in, ‘Ya Rabbi whatever You think is best for me, alhamdulillah. That Your love for me is greater than my love for You. I’m providing all these actions and good deeds but I know that Your love is guiding me.’ So they begin to pray less and ask less. Because they realize that everything is an anchor but you have to meditate.

Some people could be harmful to their children and if you contemplate and they say, ‘We don’t know why, why I’m aggressive with the child.’ Sit and meditate and contemplate, maybe you think that if you didn’t have that child, you would be freer to do other things. But Allah (AJ) anchored you. As a result of that child, you now need to seek a sustenance so you’re emailing us. You need to seek now health and protection, now you’re emailing us.

So every condition of people that Allah (AJ) puts them in is an immense anchor. But shaitan‘s job is to make you chew at the rope so you don’t know what you’re asking for. But you’re chewing, chewing, chewing until one day the rope breaks, you get your job, you’re gone. That they need you to change who you look like. Take off your head cover, put your makeup on, go out here, go do this.

So the things that people pray for, don’t necessarily make them tighter and stronger into the tariqah. Especially now we’re in a tufan – we’re in big storms. They are coming from every direction, they’re coming. Tariqah becomes harder and harder to follow. So, you know we are our worst enemy. But the problem is that you trust yourself too much. So when we meditate. Not you, me, all of us – we trust ourselves too much but we are the worst enemy. So, the key is in the meditation and finding content in the condition that Allah (AJ) has put us in. If He wanted it different, He would change it. So, I build myself, do my zikr (Divine remembrance), keep my love for Prophet ﷺ, there should be nothing bad.

So, whatever Allah’s (AJ) condition is, it is something necessary for me. Everybody has a handicap and some sort of a difficulty to keep them grounded. Every medicine you take, every condition you have, it is the way Allah (AJ) wants it. Had it been something else, you may have been something else. So Allah (AJ) has immense wisdom in everything. Just try to get out of the way. But it is the people because shaitan plays with people and then tells them what they should want. Where they should be, what they should do and they begin to inflict harm upon people. Why they argue with somebody? Why are they mean to somebody?

So something subconscious is making a problem so that they can cut their anchor. They can be thrown from the center. All sorts of things that people are doing. When somebody was making problems we kept talking to them, ‘Don’t make problems here, don’t make problems here. Because the problems you’re making at the center, you’re going to be thrown out,’ and this is all that shaitan is trying to do with you. To make problems so that you can break that anchor.

Oh when they got thrown out, they said, ‘Oh we’re so free now, we’re so free.’ You’re not free at all. You cut a tremendous anchor in your life that was grounding you. Now your boat just floating around all over the place. This is not the condition that people admire to be in. Nobody works for something like that. So it means that shaitan is becoming immense, immensely more aggressive against people especially the boats that are anchored into tariqahs. Because they’re receiving so much blessings from Allah (AJ).

Before the game begins and these boats become ships and become powerful vehicles for Allah (AJ), he wants to set them ablaze. Watch like a viking movie and there are all these ships ready for battle. The enemy comes in late at night, throws gas on all the ships, cut all the anchors and they’re all at sea. Now they have no fleet. So people think they’re clever, ‘Oh it is so good, I don’t have to listen anymore.’ Your ship is in the ocean just drifting and with your family and you’ve all now just sort of drifted. For what? InshaAllah. 

Question 2: Why does it feel like defending ourselves and becoming angry are the same feeling?

Shaykh Nurjan Mirahmadi: Because probably that’s what you’re doing. Every time you defend yourself, you become angry, yeah. So people try to catch themselves so you have to try not to defend yourself. [First person:] ‘If you did like this, you this like this…’ [Second person:] ‘Oh astaghfirullah (I seek forgiveness from Allah (AJ).’

But people want to say, ‘No, no, I didn’t do. I was like this…’ they justify themselves. Because they’re very happy with themselves. But to enter into a state in which not to give any credibility to the self – that becomes a practice. So when somebody says something, say: ‘Oh astaghfirullah.’ ‘You did like that.’ ‘Oh astaghfirullah, inshaAllah Allah (AJ) make me a better person.’ Try not to come quickly to your own defense. Let Allah (AJ) defend the servant, inshaAllah. 

Question 3: Sayyidi what are the signs that let us know in any type of situation that we use our heart instead of our head? Thank you Sayyidi

Shaykh Nurjan Mirahmadi: As soon as you meditate. Use your head when you talk too fast, quickly responding – that couldn’t have been a meditation. You moved your checker piece, your chess piece too fast. So that becomes one of the signs.

People whom respond quickly, get angered quickly, they’re not people who contemplate and not calculate it. They say things and then say, ‘I’m sorry,’ but what sorry going to do? Throw your sorry away. You keep your finger on the thing before you talk. Think, think what you’re about to say, what you’re about to do. Be very calculated in your moves. As you grow older, your calculation can be in your mind. That before you say anything you just stay quiet and then you begin to calculate that you’re holding the piece and which direction will this response go. But people whom talk quickly then generally they have a quick temper and spark emotions very fast. Where we have to try to slow down the situation and inshaAllah we can show patience, inshaAllah. 

Question 4: Please forgive my ignorance. I’m still confused on the name Hashem attributed to God by the other cousin and the name Bani Hashim.

Shaykh Nurjan Mirahmadi: No relationship. Bani Hashim spelled differently – are the tribes of Madina. In which Prophet ﷺ is from the tribe of Hashemite Kingdom. Hashem is the word for God in the cousin’s language. What’s there to be confused about? This is their language spelled differently and Hashemite kingdom is something completely different, inshaAllah. 

Question 5: From all the powers granted to the Prophets (as) from our Prophet ﷺ that are mentioned in the Qur’an are showing us that one can unlock these powers when he follows a tariqah?

Shaykh Nurjan Mirahmadi: I didn’t understand that. The Qur’an describes all the Prophets (as) and all the Prophets (as) actually are sign of Prophet ﷺ. Because Prophet ﷺ didn’t show many signs. So the Qur’an doesn’t describe miraculous signs of Prophet ﷺ. But all the stories of the Prophets (as) of Allah (AJ), their secret resides within the reality and the risalat (prophecy) of Sayyidina Muhammad ﷺ.

The miracle of the Qur’an which is Prophet’s ﷺ greatest and complete miracle – is created to speak for Allah’s (AJ) Divinely Speech that’s not created. So that fire that’s not created and Allah’s (AJ) Speech that’s not created resides within the heart of Sayyidina Muhammad ﷺ. That all the Prophets (as) are a description of a reality from Prophet ﷺ and this becomes the knowledge of awliya (saints), inshaAllah.

Subhana rabbika rabbal ‘izzati ‘amma yasifoon, wa salaamun ‘alal mursaleen, walhamdulillahi rabbil ‘aalameen. Bi hurmati Muhammad al-Mustafa ﷺ wa bi siri Surat al-Fatiha.

Special thanks to our transcribers for their help with transcribing this suhbah.

Original Date of Suhbah: October 6, 2023

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