What happens when we are the diminishers and don’t realize it? What if we don’t realize it because we are acting with sincerity and the intention of being multipliers? And to take it one step further, what if we’re following the advice we commonly find in management books?

This is accidental diminisher territory and it’s a dangerous place to be.

The whole point of having a decision-making process is to minimize biases and negative outcomes. It is to hash out something and make sure you have uncovered as many blindspots as possible. It is impossible for this to happen when everyone on the board is essentially the same.

Can you actually change someone’s life with a brief interaction? 

We have millions upon millions of interactions and experiences, and yet, there only a few that are truly memorable or life-changing. 

The Prophet Muhammad (saw) not only changed lives and created lasting memories for people with small and brief interactions - he gave us the blueprint for doing the same. 

Doing this goes far beyond merely speaking the language of the people. It means truly understanding the psychology and emotions of the people. The khateeb must remove any barriers that will keep his words from penetrating the hearts of the congregation.

Anyone involved in delivering an address to the community by way of khutbah, halaqah, or even teaching Sunday School is practicing the craft of public speaking.

One way to improve your speaking skills is by studying what others do well that resonates and connects with audiences. With that in mind, I am sharing 3 videos of first place winners from the Toastmasters Public Speaking World Championship along with a few brief things to look for in each video.

How do you read books to develop your own niche of expertise? How do you pick what books to read aside from going off the average customer review on Amazon? How do you critically read a book and think about the material? How do you filter what you read through the worldview of iman (faith)? And what’s the point, what is all this reading building toward?

I don't really care about grit. 

Persevering and persisting through difficulties to achieve a higher goal is awesome. High-five. We should all develop that. No one disagrees that resilience is an essential characteristic to have. 

Somehow, this simple concept has ballooned into what feels like a self-help cottage industry of sorts. It has a Ted talk with tens of millions of views, podcasts, keynote speeches, a New York Times best-selling book, and finding ways to teach this in schools and workplaces. 

What I do care about is critically analyzing if it is all that it's cracked up to be (spoiler alert: I don't think so), why the self-help industry aggressively promotes it, and how we understand it from an Islamic perspective. For me, this is about much more than just grit - it's about understanding character development from a (mostly Americanized) secular perspective vis-a-vis the Islamic one.