How I came to islam ｜｜ Ali Dawah
Episode Stats
Summary
Brother Ali Dawah speaks about his journey into Islam and the things that changed the course of his life to the extent where he now lives a completely different life as a Muslim. He speaks about the factors that played a major role in his life and how they changed his outlook on life and beliefs as a person which now reflect him in a massive way.
Transcript
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As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuhu
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Inshallah all of you guys are in the best of health and iman
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And of course we're going to be discussing some of the things
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That changed the course of his life very dramatically
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Changed what he used to do into what he does now
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Clearly certain things did happen to Brother Ali
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To the extent where he lives a completely different life
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Hopefully you guys can benefit from some sort of insights
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We are brainwashed to think that happiness is about having money
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And I basically saw a lot of people within my surroundings
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questions that I'd like to know and a lot of people would like to know out there is
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obviously you come from a Alawi family background family's not that practicing anything what was
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your family's reaction and what is the reaction of your culture as a whole to you becoming a
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practicing Muslim well regarding my family my family really have this perception of Islam
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which is not really good you know because of the current situations like the current and
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situations before that they've been through so they have this hate against Islam they don't like
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they just think Islam is barbaric it's all about killing all these kind of misconceptions that
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today as in our dawah field that we kind of address so that's the background that I come from and it
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was really hard because my dad hated it my dad hated the fact that that that sometimes he would
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say like the to me like the thing that I most hate has been born in my family you know so this
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is what he would say to me sometimes you know because he didn't like it and I don't blame him
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because he obviously has misconceptions you get what I'm trying to say he doesn't do it because
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he hates me so he really hated it and it was really hard because at the end of the day I can
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remember a point where I was at my grandma's house and I would have this um this pressure with them
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always you know saying you know why would you why do you want to marry a woman that's in a hijab or
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why do you want to practice why do you want to do this why do you want to do that with Islam
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they're always questioning questioning me so I came to a point where I exploded and I said you
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know what I said I don't care do you get it was wrong of me it was the wrong way of doing what
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I was doing but basically I just exploded and I said you know I don't care I don't care what
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you guys say I am like I am going to marry a woman that practices the deen that wears a hijab
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I am going to practice it I am going to do this I'm going to do that so I just had to lash out
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at all of them and there was a lot of my aunties everyone was at my grandma's house so the next day
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I went home my dad was angry I could see from his face and what I did was wrong the the night
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before because obviously for rivers that come to Islam don't give an excuse for your family to
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attack you and say okay this is what Islam teaches you so that was wrong of me you know attacked by
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flies so that was wrong of me but obviously I got into a bit of an argument with my dad he slapped
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me I just left the house and always I came I can remember coming staying at this I mean this was
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later on I'm not sure I stayed at your house for a couple of weeks so yeah that's what happened
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yeah and even today I go through the struggles you know because like praying you know I would be
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very discreet you know and I mean I remember it to the specific detail as well because
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guys I don't think Ali will obviously tell you to the detail but I can tell you without looking at
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him because it will distract me but I can tell you very directly that obviously he did go through a
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very tough time and if I was to go through that time it would really disturb me as well psychologically
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physically in all ways and you know I remember he would he would come to my house he would stay
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stay there obviously the doors were always open for him and alhamdulillah you know this is why another
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lesson that I want to derive from this is you need to keep your doors open and everything open for
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river it's out there because they go through stuff like this imagine bro if you know obviously if my family
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weren't there Imran's family weren't there it would have been very difficult for you to even live you know
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to go to sleep at night yeah so this is why it's really really important you know to show support for the
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reverts and everything very true and I remember the kind of stuff you would go through you would come
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you would say certain stuff to me and even when I would go through personal things with my father yeah and
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you know obviously it's normal to have some sort of disagreement sometime you would say you know bro don't worry you
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know it's normal all of these people watching this yeah but that's what you mean you know this story's
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gonna continue yeah but yeah it's true this is the kind of things you went through and obviously now
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coming to where you are now you've completely changed as a person uh your family are not aware of your
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work yet yeah yeah yeah what sort of reaction do you think they would have if you were if they were to
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find out I think they'll just see it as a bit extreme they'll think I'm going a bit more extreme
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in that context um but you know like even now because usually I've been I've been hiding it for
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a long period of time and even though once I think my mom came across one of my videos
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and obviously she doesn't know youtube innit she was like oh I saw you on tv and I was like tv I was
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like what tv it's like on bbc and she said it with this and I'm like what when it was on bbc yeah
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yeah you get that because you know family uh I think someone told her about it I'm not sure
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obviously I tried to hide it from them because I don't want it and regarding my community they
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will mock me they will literally mock me they'll just be like you know what the hell you're doing
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you're like weird that guy you're confused even when I was doing it some people in my community
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would be like oh did you have a near-death experience that you're going to islam religious
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and I was like no I don't need to you get what I'm trying to say so if they found out I just have
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this it's not embarrassing I'm not embarrassed of what I'm doing I'm proud but in their eyes
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because they don't understand it they're just going to be like this guy's lost the plot like
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what am I going to youtube doing videos of I don't know relationships or dawah they will
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totally think I've lost the plot to be honest but recently yeah my cousins my little cousins
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have been finding out and what's more shocking is I was expecting probably they'll be like oh
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what are you doing but instead they seem very keen when they're watching videos they're like
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wow mashallah I'm like wow I wasn't expecting that from you guys so it's quite shocking actually
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and a couple of them it's really shocking but one of them is kind of going jummah prayer and I was
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like wow I can't give his name because you know he might get it but it's very surprising
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for me so yeah alhamdulillah so obviously the whole purpose of this is to be an insight for
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all of the people watching one of the main things and issues that you went through as a
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revert I was the direct cause of it oh yeah and obviously can I take it out it's on my chest
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it's been there for a long time go for it we agreed that we're going to talk about this yeah
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obviously I think you should start this one off yes this is well when I came to the deen
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I went through a lot of torture and suffering because of Musa admin no I'm joking not that bad
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obviously what it is now it was a bit of a clash because Musa obviously mashallah he's on the
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deen like even though he's 18 he's been 18 for the past four years like he's had this
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cause obviously I don't think he's come across someone that is living in his house together with
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him who's a reaver who's new so for him it was like a new thing and to me it's a new
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thing because I'm coming and certain things I don't get do you get it and I'm not basically
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taking really importance of which is important in the deen so Musa was trying to advise me
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but sometimes what happens is when you advise someone you expect immediate changes and when
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that person doesn't do immediate changes you're like what's wrong with this guy is he taking
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the mic you know I'm telling him to do it do you get it so it wasn't his he wasn't to
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blame it's just cause he cared about me he was like look I can do this and when I didn't
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we go into a clash with Musa you know we came to a point where I was like you know I
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don't want to take nothing from you you know cause that's it I've had enough cause it was
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building up but what I didn't see is because he cares for me as a brother that he's advising
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me on certain things which are mandatory so that's why we had this little clash with
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Musa but alhamdulillah it was a good phase that we went through you know cause it could
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the bond that we have now is quite strong actually so that's why it kind of
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but just to obviously add to that like obviously what happened is I would advise you and I
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would expect as you mentioned immediate changes and when I didn't see the immediate changes
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I'll be honest with you guys I thought is this guy literally taking a pee with me or something
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is he intentionally like ignoring me and when I would push it on him and at one point I
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remember we were at a specific brother's house and subhanallah like I'm sure it got extremely
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heated and I don't I don't we wouldn't we would never have got violent yeah how can
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I hit another believer bro but we both all like knocking each other out it was just like
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that yeah and subhanallah like obviously we spoke over it and then Ali told me that bro
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I don't want to take nothing from you meaning like what he meant by that what you meant by
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that is in terms of the deen like advice or anything because you don't know how to advise
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me and subhanallah like this is something that he had to go through there's something that
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I had to go through because it affected our dawah and shaped us up in a massive way you
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guys wouldn't understand bro imagine we done the Adam Saleh videos the video that Simon
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smiles like having not gone through that yeah he would have gone ham yeah we would have
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literally said what's wrong with you guys is that no you see going through that made
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us both realize that the way I think it made me a bit more like taking the deen a little
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bit more serious with you the advice was like I need to use another method exactly yeah the
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advice was give the advice take it easy a bit give them time take it easy on the hijabi
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system like the youtubers but yeah you get me so it was just like that and that was something
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personal that we both went through and it really molded us as people yeah you know and me and Ali
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always talk about it you know normally when you clash with a person the way we clashed it's
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never the same yeah it's never the same you know like yeah it's just that barriers there
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there's a barrier you know when you're with the brother you're like this guy's here there's
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always a barrier yeah now it made us even stronger subhanallah and it was something that we had
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to go through and this is something we actually meant we actually meant to make a specific video
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on this yeah but we chose to release it in this video because it was something powerful that
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also molded as i mentioned like for the third time both of us yeah so alhamdulillah now we've
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come to a stage where we're both giving dawah you're giving dawah you've met the brothers
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alhamdulillah like before you met myself imran obviously the dawah team like how was it for
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you as a person because to be honest bro it's very inspirational that that you're doing things
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on your wants yeah like very often we say oh always stick to the river because they could
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easily float away bro you you had no one to stick to so like i said i'll um i'll start going
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speaker's corner every sunday and in that meantime because i was really passionate about the dawah
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and i really love engaging people and learning about new stuff so i would go through that stage
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and that's when i start to meet you guys because imran would come to speaker's corner the brothers
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from ira will come to speaker's corner so eventually i started to get to know them um then obviously i
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went to imran's house one day he invited me and uh then basically he just said to me you know you
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should start your own facebook page etc and then he got into like you guys uh both together so you
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know do youtube videos i can remember once uh i think it was walking the walking station he was
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there he was like what are you planning on doing i can remember talking to you and obviously you guys
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encouraged me to do the youtube videos and um that's how it kicked off but before that it was i don't
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know i was just i don't know i was so used to being alone that i was just i was just used to it to be
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honest that's why i was like you know what because i'm the kind of person i have the mentality
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of like being grateful for everything yeah everything so when i like i had this last
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station life expectation of like expect the least make dua for the best do you get it yeah so
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that's the approach that i had so it worked really well with me and obviously i made dua and stuff
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like that and i've got beautiful friends like you guys don't get too good stuff one of the most
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common questions people are asking is um your experience after islam like what was one of the biggest
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things that you found difficult to change biggest thing that because i didn't do drugs alcohol them
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kind of stuff i would go clubbing but when it came to like for example these relationships
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it was something really hard for me i've got to be honest you get it and i had a point in my life
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where you know i was with someone and i said you know what look that's it do you get i'm trying to
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say i don't i don't i don't i don't want to go there anymore i just said you know what that's it i
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cut it off i had a point where in my life you know i feel guilty of doing what i'm doing but then i
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just had that point where i said you know what that's it you know and that was one of the hardest
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things because in this society that we live it's all sexual everything's you forget what i'm trying
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to say and it's so that's why i just had that moment of time where i said you know what that's
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it i ain't going back there that was one of the hardest things but obviously alhamdulillah when you
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give up something for the sake of allah allah will give you much more and like i said i made
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du'a specific du'a and i'm telling you allah helped me and i'm here today
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so brothers and sisters that's pretty much it i mean that's the story from the beginning
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you know where you were looking into islam to alhamdulillah when you became a muslim started
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giving du'a now we have some additional questions that some of you guys have asked in and inshallah
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we're going to try to answer them uh let's just get cracking no no they won't be too personal of
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course uh where are you from originally bro nothing to do with you mate i'm joking i come from a turkish
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i'm kurdish but from turkey basically it's turkish kurdistan in a country yeah
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yeah so i come from that background yeah okay cool and how old were you when you came to islam
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23 how old are you now 25 25 yeah so you've been muslim for two years it's going to be two years in
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december okay okay cool cool so okay so it'll be two years in december that's that's a pretty big jump
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okay um it's so cold you look like you're in malawi or something me bro another question is
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your relationship with your parents yeah now i know obviously like subhanAllah your dad you know
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he's a raggo guy like oh so he'll go ham on you if you if you found out you know to what extent
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you know the stuff you're doing but looking before and after because i know your situation has
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improved now yeah you know to much better now yeah alhamdulillah when you reverted but before
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islam and after islam how is your parents relationship uh like your relationship with
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your parents not your parents your relationship with your parents um with my parents i'll be
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straight up and i would disrespect my mother like this i would just disrespect i would not listen to
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her i'll do whatever i like you know at times i would shout at her yeah my dad i wasn't that brave
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you know because you get knocked out straight yeah yeah sometimes you know your dad give you
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uppercut yeah i used to get that a lot as well so it was like that but what happened is so basically
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when i came to islam my whole behavior everything changed because in islam with we're taught that
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um paradise is under your mother's feet you get it so our mothers are very important even there's a
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hadith that says uh somebody came to the prophet sallallahu alaihi wasallam and said who is um
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uh that i should respect more he said your mother and then he said you next then your mother and he said
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you next and your mother then he said your father so this principle was in my head so i would go home
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and i would say i would regret the stuff that i would do before so i would change as a person i
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would respect my family even when my dad would swear at me hit me i would kiss him and i say i love
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you for the sake of like i love you do you get what i'm trying to say i would say for the sake of
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allah don't be like you're the mad one so me having that behavior kind of made them realize wow okay
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we are having a gotten for being like a muslim but this has really changed him in a good way
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you mentioned that you improved with your mother after islam yes because of the respect
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how does your mother like treat you now as to before like not treat you like how does she behave
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towards you like does she appreciate she i can say 100 yes because she's like wow like how you was
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before yeah and sometimes my dad will put pressure on her to have a go at me for being like how i am
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yeah but then she will sometimes think and say to him like what do you want to have a go at him
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he's changed he's like he's such a better person now he respects me he does everything for me
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he's like how can i have a go at him so he worked like in a reverse way where my dad doesn't say
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anything to me because he's like look man this guy's not doing nothing bad he respects us i swear
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right man comes and kisses me bro do you get it so he's like right so he had a really positive one
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of the things that your mom did mention to you uh it's about your clothing you know like why did
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you go so downhill like um to be honest because you know what happened like back in the days it's all
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about materialistic you get it like i was always it's good to look nice yeah but i had that moment
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where i thought you know when you come to the deen you're like you know just leave yourself like
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i don't need nothing you know i can just walk in my pajamas so i did kind of like slack in that moment
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but you know i've fixed up today inshallah but i mean that's pretty much it from the questions to
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be honest we've answered a lot of the questions that the people have asked just by going through
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the river story alhamdulillah if there was anything that you could say just to conclude
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to any muslim or non-muslim that's looking into this video what would you say to them and also
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before you answer that question what are your future plans uh basically um to the ones that
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are non-muslim all i would say is look into the quran with an open mind if you come with prejudice
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and say look i want to find mistakes if you're looking for trouble you'll find it around the corner
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how because you're looking for mistakes if you're really looking for the truth
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i would say to you look read the quran with an open mind anybody that reads the quran with an
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open mind that's looking for the truth and asks god almighty to say guide me which how i did it
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you will be guided anybody that doesn't ask for guidance is looking for mistakes in a religion
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you'll find it so what i would say is look at other religions you will see it and believe me
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christianity judaism these kind of religions they they showed me the directions to islam so that's how i
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see it and i would uh to non-muslims that look into islam i would say be strong because i've been
00:36:12.780
through a lot of things and i know reverts that they go through mad stuff so we need to understand
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allah swt says in the quran do you think that you're going to say la ilaha illallah and that's it
00:36:21.640
you're not going to be tested no no no no you will be tested you have to be strong believe me i went
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through that stage make dua make prayers and i'm telling you you will come out of it insha allah you
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will come out of it i guarantee you with the permission of allah and for the muslims i would say is like
00:36:36.720
yeah most of what we went through to be a bit more gentle to them when you're talking to them
00:36:40.580
you need to understand that they are not on your level of imania don't look down upon them drop
00:36:44.640
and see their worldview how it's happening for them and be a bit easy uh regarding my future
00:36:49.820
stuff obviously we're working on new projects together uh we've got a lot of stuff we're doing
00:36:53.380
a tour around the uk so that's one of the main projects i want to work on because talking with
00:36:57.740
the youth face to face and advising them um in context and matters that we know nothing that's above
00:37:03.000
our head that we don't go to so that's happening we've got new uh videos coming out uh alhamdulillah
00:37:08.420
working with different brothers from uh merciful servant and different um brothers from youtube
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with imran ibn mansur um aki films so working on new projects new stuff are coming up we're going
00:37:17.940
to brazil um we've been to brazil we're going to africa again yeah well carried so basically we have
00:37:24.620
these projects and we're planning to go in holland as well but inshallah really good stuff are going
00:37:28.920
to be coming out soon you know inshallah make dua for us please i need that dua you know you know
00:37:34.220
make dua for us you know we're doing it and make sure that our intentions are always right and for
00:37:38.540
the sake of allah and that's what i can say and like i said all praises belong to allah seriously
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not in a million years would i ever think that i'll be here talking about my revert story or do what
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i'm doing in the dawah scene so that's it brothers and sisters jazakallah khir for watching this amazing
00:37:51.300
inspirational revert story mashallah you know it was hard for me to come to islam but alhamdulillah i made it
00:37:56.560
you know i'm joking but yeah alhamdulillah it was it was very inspirational look at the scenario it's
00:38:02.160
beautiful man alhamdulillah it's beautiful the beauty of allah i think we came to gambia just to
00:38:05.160
record this nah gee we're in the nitty-gritty streets of london where gunshots go down but
00:38:13.460
that's before we start saying some next level stuff that's pretty much it guys jazakallah for
00:38:18.300
watching obviously you can follow our work uh on the social networks any shards bro i want to give a
00:38:23.720
shout out to ali dawah uh he's been a uh aki films uh moves adnan um young jeezy and trickle from back
00:38:33.280
in the day yeah that's about it yeah that's it brothers and sisters jazakallah khir for watching