TIME MANAGEMENT FOR A MUSLIM

The humming bird: focused, fast and efficient

How to pass the time in dunya (‘Waqt guzar jae ga (New year resolutions) ‘ translated from a lecture by Dr. Farhat Hashmi)

GOAL: GETTING TO JANNAH AND BE AWARE OF AKHIRAH
GUIDELINES TO MANAGE YOUR DAY TO GET CLOSER TO JANNAH:
1.    Complete your obligations
2.   Organize your day
3.    Attach one item/action to each salaat
4.    Guard each moment
a.    Remove waste of time
b.    Upgrade the use of your each moment
c.    Enhance each moment with preparing for Akhirah
d.    Ideal investment of time is for jannah
5.    Dhikr, verbal, or quiet at every moment with action or without. Take a simple act and take it into an ibadah by performing that action with Dhikr.
6.    Earn Ilm (knowledge of Deen)
7.    Actualize the ilm we have (live it, act on it)
8.   Make our goals and attach them to our action
9.    Execute our actions
10.    Examine our roles (eg mine)
a.    Muslim Woman
b.    Wife
c.    Mother’
d.    Physician
e.    Blogger
f.    Friend
11.    Review my ibadaat, plan the time for each, evaluate what is the closest method of doing it according to Sunnah, examine the act and finesse it according to the Sunnah.
Salaat: develop skills, tips and talent so that it is as close to the Sunnah as possible.
12.    Many a time we have so many elaborate plans based on our fertile ideas, our desires for goodness. Examine the reason why we cannot bring these to fruition.
13.    For every dua we do we have to make the endeavor to fulfill it.

WHAT IS THE REASON FOR THE DICHOTOMY BETWEEN THOUGHT, KNOWLEDGE AND ACTION?
1.    Lack of priorities
2.    Lack of Planning
3.    Procrastination
4.    Lack of support systems and skills
5.    Lack of confidence
6.    Waiting to do it some day when we are better and more qualified
7.    Following inspirations without planning
8.    Not respecting time: Watawasu bil Haqq (surah Asr)
9.    We need to involve those that we live with and interact with everyday

WHAT SHOULD WE DO AND HOW SHOULD WE DO IT?

1.How should we do it depends on the problem
Solution: Check out the Hadith and ascertain how did Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) did each action, how did he solve problems, how did he tackle procrastination, lack of confidence and lack of support systems and more (i.e. study the Sunnah on a continuous basis)
2.    What ever we do in Deen, we should check how did RasoolAllah (PBUH) with all his time and place and people constraints tackle this? How did he do it? What was the basis of his planning and execution? (i.e. study the Sunnah in detail)
LEARNING FROM PROPHET MUHAMMAD’S (PBUH) HIKMAH……HIS TIME MANAGEMENT
He had many roles:
Nabi
General
Judge
Ruler
Father
Husband
Slave to Allah

3,  Organize and follow through, and seek (Ham & huzn se panha), protection from sadness and depression)
The challenges are :Ajaz, kasal, bukhal, kahar rejaal (family and society pressure), maal ke mushkelaat (difficulties related to money and material goods).

Goal: Quran as a Guide & Dhikr as protection

THE GOAL: Develop yourself into: Al mumin Qawi (A strong/impregnable Momin).

How to do that?
Strengthen all aspects in ourselves
Education
Technology
Make Goals for strengthening us in:
Iradah (commitment
Ilm’ (Knowledge of Deen)
Imaan (faith)
Control Nafs (Purification of the Heart)
Resulting in:
Sabr, ibadah, istiqamah, consistent ibadah

An Example:

Ibn Jawzi wrote one thousand books.
He did not waste one minute. His pencil shavings were enough to make a small hill.

It s a pity those who waste time and sit and watch people in the bazaar (or watch people in TV) and discuss politics of the rise and fall of the political leaders, Each moment of the life of a momin is valuable.

What are some of the Time wasters?
*Telephone calls (15-20 min)
*Personal reasons, our personal problems our psychological make up to worry about trifles, desires, worries, boredom, moody, nafs
*Wasting other people’s time, we involve other people and may interrupt their time and waste their time or leave our obligations and cry about our desires.
*Lack of self-restraint
*New experiments flitting from one thing to another, looking into other peoples work and activities.
* Desire for Popularity (her dil aziz)
* Perfectionist (desire to be) spend more time than is needed on a project or action. Superfluous and excess use of time for one thing and other things fall by the way side
*Insisting on doing it my way:
*Thinking that I am indispensable
*Delay, procrastination, susti (laziness)
Wise people do not put things off for tomorrow and do not have “tomorrow “ in their dictionary
* Cultural limitations: time wasters: weddings are late; visiting is late, going to a funeral sitting and talking about wasteful topics

Time should be used usefully ….Ask yourself: How? How is this waiting time getting me closer to Jannah?

At a wedding or other get togethers after asking about the family, then do Dhikr quietly to fill the “gossip “ time.

LIST YOUR PRIORITIES
Which acts I must do, which are obligations which will be useful for me in my Akhirah
Aims and objectives….tie them to a time and deadlines.
Your 24-hour planning Guide
8 hrs: sleep, eat and meet
8 hrs:  ibadah
8hrs: work
Make a timetable for actions, acts to be done weekly, monthly, and yearly.
Evaluate your outcome
Planning action and evaluation

Sometimes when things are difficult and tough we drop our focus, we must ask for Allah’s help.

Make Dua for removing fikr (worries) and loan
(Huzn ki dua)

Don’t go for perfection, do your best but do not obsess.

Force yourself to do what is important prepare your mind (nose to the grind for tough subjects)
Leave the business of “look busy do nothing” i.e. spinning your wheels
Be moderate in action; do not swing from fast to famine.
What ever we are doing focus on it!
For some quality works Concentrate and Continue with unbroken attention (salaat)
Do not take peoples words very seriously do not obsess on others words
Do not look for hidden meanings, take words at face value.
Smile and overlook unpleasant words, do not repeat or obsess about them.
In Summary:
1.    Make a plan,
2.    Learn how our Prophet (PBUH) juggled all his roles in the same number of hours that we have.
3.    Act on your plan.

End lecture

Dua: May Allah’s help be only as far away as the dua on your lips.

How do you pass the time?