in the name of Allah the most beneficent
the most merciful
the hardest thing for me was
friends
partying things of that nature um I came
from a strong knit family alhamdulillah
my family when they first generation to
this country so everybody kind of always
was together
spent spending time together things that
his nature so I always spent a lot of
time with all of my cousins grew up with
them and we always put a lot of time
with them and then the extended friends
from there but when I realized that I
needed to change I realized that I
needed to change the atmosphere that I
was in and that included getting rid of
the people that I was around so I had to
step away from friends and family
who were a bad influence for me and when
I did that and then my life began to
change into a more positive direction
my family in the beginning weren't
accepting at all my parents they weren't
very religious at that point my mother
had began looking for faith so when I
became Muslim I also lacked wisdom I
came home and I was like I have the
truth and that's it if you don't listen
you're going to go to hell I'm going to
paradise and I was on a rampage and that
kind of threw them off as well so
basically I got kicked out of my home I
went to live with my father for a while
I burnt the bridge there and then I'd
move out of there and it took some time
to repair those relationships
hamdulillah now years later everything
is great they're actually happy that I'm
a Muslim my father than one time and I
always tell the story he was buying a
hot dog at her at a hot dog stand and
the guy was praying he was Muslim so he
was waiting for him to finish when the
guy finished the guy said you know I
apologize i was praying a muslim he said
no i understand my son is muslim as well
he's a warning from he's a nun from
porto rico he said his sons muslim he
said yeah he said what do you think
about islam but father said i can sleep
at night now so hungry la my parents
have accepted it fully hamdulillah
a piece of advice that I would give to
anybody seeking the truth is one take
your time to have an open mind it's hard
to reach the truth when your mind is
closed you have to have an open mind
when searching for the truth the third
thing that I would tell them is look at
the foundations the fundamentals of the
religions that you're looking into
search and look at every religion and
look at the fundamentals and see what
that religions Core teaching is who they
worship what they worship and how they
worship it and when you see that then
you will come to see that there may be
deficiencies in some of the religious
teachings within those religions
for purses celebrating the first Ramadan
I would advise them to be patient
don't lose hope it's difficult in the
beginning I remember my first Ramadan um
the day was going by it was like two
o'clock in the afternoon I was starving
I went to the cookie jar and I'm looking
at the cookies and I'm like ah and I
think by three o'clock I attacked the
cookies and I began eating all the
cookies it was a difficult process but
hamdulillah we know that these can be
made up you take it step by step your
new into faith take it easy in sha allah
allah be sincere and a lot will make it
easy also with ramadan um with fasting
also at night with the prayer the other
advice I would give is sometimes it may
seem like wow this is a long time you're
standing up and praying for our two
hours I also remember my first night of
prayer night he shot the night for the
last night President with me the fifth
one was finished and then I got up to
leave and I see everybody stand back up
again to pray again I'm like okay I
guess this is something else that goes
on here so I got up to pray and the Imam
is reciting and reciting and reciting
and then their tests came out and then
they'll stand back up to pray again and
there is reciting every setting I think
like 45 minutes went by and my feet were
burning and hurting and I was like man I
hope this guy stops reciting the Quran
already I can't take it anymore I even
remember crying because I thought that
if I left I would be punished so I
stayed for the whole thing going through
the pain so just remember you know your
brand new take it easy ma'sha'allah
don't be hard on yourself and the sha
allah in time it will become easier for
you