Becoming a leader, protecting your flock….
Salam, There is none worthy of worship except Allah and Prophet Muhammad is his last messenger…
As a youth growing up in such a corrupt society, with my fluctuating iman, sometimes being a product of my environment, then gradually becoming a more practicing Muslim, and analyzing my surroundings and trying my best to absorb only the positive, I can say that without coming across certain Muslim brothers who I consider leaders i wouldn’t be able to mold myself to the way I think today, or even survive in the coldest times like a penguin, Alhumduillah.
Anyways, what im trying to say is that we all have to eventually think of ourselves as leaders, and you know behind every great leader are many great followers, of course the best leader of all time is our beloved Prophet Muhammad …and we should try our best to follow him and revive the sunnah in every aspect of our life.
Back in the jahiliyah days, when I wasn’t on point with my iman, I wasn’t a leader! Just floating on the haraam boat and not reviving the sunnah, eventually Alhumduillah after realizing I wasn’t happy, I had to make some power moves, since a wise brother told me the lesson is in the struggle. So now it’s a constant effort till this day and inshallah till the end to develop a stronger relationship with Allah
Well the main point is as humans, we make mistakes and it’s our natural inclination to forget, and we should always thank Allah that he let us live after making them and repenting for them and being able to build ourselves stronger, physically and spiritually. As our beloved prophet said “the one, who repents for his sins, is like the one who never did it at all” so we can see the mercy of Allah in the hadith.
Usually when you come across Muslim brothers in this society who are slipping like penguins on ice, you will notice they become most weak when they get with a certain group that lacks remembrance of Allah and im speaking from experience, im sure anyone reading this can relate also, and as Mufti Abdul Rehman said once ” don’t ever try to justify your mistakes, because then you’ll never change”, what we need brothers and sisters to do, is take a step back and just internalize criticism, including myself, the thing is if we become leaders of ourselves, then people will see we are being real with ourselves, and a lot of times I realized that we tend to act one way with one group and another character with another group, when in reality we just have to be open strong Muslims wherever we are, because just because our surroundings change doesn’t mean our beliefs change, and Allah knows best…
The five leadership traits are to be:
Honest
Forward-Looking
Competent
Inspiring
Intelligent
Sayyiduna Abd Alla Umar narrates that the Messenger of Allah blesses him and grant him peace said: “All of you are shepherds. Each of you is responsible for his flock. An amir is a shepherd. A man is a shepherd in respect of his family. The woman is a shepherd in respect of her husband’s house and children. All of you are shepherds and each of you is responsible for his flock.” (Sahih al-Bukhari & Sahih Muslim)..
Inshallah we got to step up our leadership skills, and become leaders of our flocks, it’s now or never, we got to lower our gaze, and say we have happy feet. Get it! So yea inshallah Allah guide us all and help us in increasing our iman…Ameen!