2022 October 22 – MK 14 female

This is my 3rd week of Greenstairs leadership program. We started class with meditation, except we focused on the ending of our salahs. During the meditation, we moved our heads as we heard the recitation of quranic verses. After a while, we moved on to our lessons.

Our first lesson was called Big apple chew and small apple bite. The metaphoric meaning of big apple chew is a person wanting to do more than they can “chew” or process. The meaning of small apple bite is a person that takes their time to “bite” or process something. The main point is that there are two different types of people, a person that wants to do more than they can handle and a person that does much or little than they can do. As future generations, we should aim to be in the middle so that we aren’t overworking ourselves and aren’t being lazy. 

Next lesson was about 5 pillars and an extra one. This lesson talked about the “6th pillar of Islam”. The “6th pillar” is meant to be an extra pillar because it is about hygiene. The reason why it is an extra pillar is because you can’t do the rest of the pillars without hygiene. For example, take the salah, it is not permissible to pray salah while avoiding hygiene. Hygiene is an important part of life because it makes a person clean and presentable. 

Another lesson is limitation. LG related this topic to his kids. He said that when his kids went to the beach one day, they were racing in 40 degree weather. They ran so much and later on they found out that what they ran in 40 degree weather is difficult for a regular person to be able to do. This is because there is a limitation set on people, however we should never limit ourselves to fit a certain standard. If we keep limiting ourselves, then how would we ever know how much better we can be or do. 

Next lesson was about Wudu. Although wudu relates to the topic of hygiene, there is another big reason for wudu. When a person does wudu, they are technically preparing to be in front of Allah SWT. For example, if a person goes to a job interview, they would want to look good and be clean. The same way, we as muslims, do wudu to present ourselves in front of Allah SWT. So it is clearly important to do wudu before praying. 

We learned about the 3 P’s. The three p’s stand for: Power, passion, and poverty. There is a separate meaning for each of these three words which are not literal. First, Power as we know is mostly used for abusing human nature. Second, passion is like being in love and forgetting about everything else. Lastly, poverty in this case means the wealth we have, needs to be shared. Something more about poverty is that the happiest people are the poorest people, because they don’t spend money like a thrift. They mostly spend time with their family, not their pockets. 

Another lesson we learned is the 20% rule. The 20% rule is about how we do not get to choose where we are born or how much wealth our family will have. Therefore, no matter what we must always be grateful for everything we have. This is because there is always someone who has a more difficult situation than another person. If a person stays grateful for everything they have, Allah SWT guarantees them more in Jannah. 

Next lesson was about Sadaqah. When we think about the word Sadaqah, we think of righteousness. There are many different ways to do Sadaqah. For example, we could give charity, volunteer for a good cause, and more. Historically the best way to give sadaqah is to feed a person’s stomach. However, the best way to actually give sadaqah is to feed a person’s brain. This is because we as humans have the ability to reason, which is something that not all living things have. Our knowledge is clearly a very important aspect to having the ability to reason. Therefore, to give sadaqah, it is best to give someone a bit of your own knowledge. 

Then, we moved on to the lesson of the 7 habits. The first habit is to be proactive. This is important because a person should be productive instead of being lazy and doing nothing. The second habit is to know where a person goes. This is important because a person should have an idea of where they want to go onwards with their future otherwise they will be stuck. The third habit is to have time management. The fourth habit is to listen. This is important because to understand someone else a person needs to listen. The fifth habit is to speak. This is important because we have our own opinions and we need to speak out about them. The sixth habit is to synergize. This is important because it is about working together and having cooperation is an important skill a person needs to carry on in their life. The seventh habit is to sharpen the soul. This is important because a person should make their soul strong. 

After that, we talked about DNA. In this topic of DNA, we can all agree that we all have DNA in us. This DNA that we are talking about actually means: Devil, Nafs, and Accountability. For the start, the devil is shaytan, he whispers into the hearts of mankind, trying to make them fall into the wrong path. Nafs means self, mostly relating to two things, one is the physical self and the other is the spiritual self. It is clearly important to know the spiritual self because it is what will face Allah SWT on the day of Judgment. Lastly, Accountability is related to the things that a person has done in this world will be accountable on the day he/she will face Allah SWT.  

Lastly, we talked about looking good on paper. This is about colleges. LG told us about what we, as high schoolers, should focus on at this time. We are in the time where we are developing ourselves to present ourselves to the world. So we need to get the best of everything to get the good we want. For that, we need to get into a good college and then do well in college. After studying, we will look for jobs to support our family and ourselves. The main point LG wanted to point out is that if a person is trying to get into a good college they should not be too worried about the money. This is because if a person presents himself/herself as a great student then the college will help support them no matter what. 

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