As Muslims, we cannot underestimate the importance of reading, especially when the first word revealed to our Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) was “Read!” Yet, whenever the topic of reading comes up, although we recognize its importance we always excuse ourselves with reminders of how busy we are, or assume that reading is a waste of time compared to the other chores we need to perform during the day. I was recently reminded about the importance of reading in a self-development book

In my last article, I went through the many factors that lower the quality of your sleep and deprive you of sound restful sleep, leading to insomnia, possibly stress, depression, suppressed immunity and cancer. When sleep is less than optimal, you wake up groggy, unrefreshed, depleted of energy, irritable, grouchy and unwilling to get out of bed or start the day. You don’t even know that your slowed mental responses and physical reflexes could result in miscalculations and accidents while you

If we were to look for an Islamic definition of Productivity, it can probably be summarised in the word “barakah” or Blessing. Being able to achieve more with few resources, doing much in little time, and generating a lot with little effort is surely a blessing from Allah (Subahanahu Wa Ta’ala). Yet Barakah has somehow become a lost treasure these days; everyone’s looking for it, but no one seems to find it! You always hear people complaining that there’s no barakah in their time, no barak

If you’ve started waking up early and working in those early hours of the day as we recommend at ProductiveMuslim.com, you’ll find that it’s pretty hard to be consistent each and every day with this routine. And when you search for the reasons for this inconsistency, you’ll realise that it’s mainly because it’s hard to regulate your sleep; one day you sleep well, so you wake up early and can work hard. Other days, you don’t sleep so well and those early hours are pretty difficult to maintain.

In the first part of this series, we decided to journey into Surat Al A’raf to explore the precious gems and productivity lessons this beautiful surah contains and went through the first two lessons. In this part, we aim to discover 5 more productivity lessons from this surah, in sha Allah. While going further into Surat Al A’raf, some thoughts breeze into my mind. My childhood memories of mangoes are made up of a few things; the absolutely yummy taste, heat of the summer, going to t

Background The number of ways children today can go online and interact with others is staggering. New social media services pop up like weeds and there are an ever-increasing number of apps and games that connect online. In addition, many schools are migrating to services such as Google Drive and require work to be completed and submitted online. Kids are literally growing up “connected.” While this has many benefits, these opportunities also come with risks. In this newsletter, we explor

I used to think that In sha Allah I will go to paradise, but as I delve deeper into the Qur’an, I worry: what if I am not even among the people of Al-A’raf? I did not notice the silent footsteps of this surah that made its way into my heart and settled there, in the process of reviewing the Qur’an a few Ramadans back. Four years fast forward, as I started studying Surat Al-A’raf again, they rose up and nudged me. I was surprised to see them there and looked in the direction they were

Following are Online Risks To Your Children Strangers / Criminals: These are individuals who establish online relationships with your children in order to take advantage of them. Once they gain the trust of a child, they may ask for pictures, information or even to meet in person. Friends: These are people your children already know, and are often other kids at school. Friends can pose a serious threat as online bullies. Remember that bullying no longer means just physical confrontation. Cyb

Whenever you hear of the Prophet’s (peace be upon him) life, you become amazed at his productivity. He (peace be upon him) was a Prophet, a Messenger, a teacher, a governor, a father, a husband, a friend and human. He (peace be upon him) had multiple roles in his life, and excelled at each one of them without exception. It made me wonder, did Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) uni-task or multi-task? Most of us grew up in the age of multi-tasking, where you can’t call yourself product

WASHINGTON: A new model that uses a patient's blood samples can predict what side effects they might experience from a drug, scientists have found. The proof of concept study is aimed at determining how different individuals will respond to a drug treatment and could help assess whether a drug is suitable for a particular patient based on measurements taken from the patient's blood. "We're not just interested in predicting the efficacy of a drug, but its side effects as well," said Bernhar

Bint, beti, anak perempuan, fille.2  Do these words ring a bell? They are all words used to describe people like you and me. So, who am I? I may be a mother, a wife, a professional or a student. But before all of these roles, I was a daughter; you and I have been one all of our lives. This is an insignia that I was born with. The others – wife, mother, friend, student – are fairly new. I sailed through life, as we all do, cocooned in the warmth of my mother’s love and prote

A few quick lessons from the Bihar results: It's a victory for development. The decisive triumph of the Mahagathbandhan (Grand Alliance), with Nitish Kumar re-elected to serve a third term as Chief Minister, is clearly a vote for his strong message of "vikas" (development). It was Nitish, in his earlier stints as Chief Minister,who brought "bijli, sadak, pani" (good roads, electricity and safe drinking water) to large areas of that had been deprived of those basic amenities, as well as pro

What does it take to stay Muslim, married and extremely happy today? As oxymoronic as that just sounded, believe it or not, it’s absolutely possible! Marriage, especially for Muslims, is a lot more than having someone to call a husband or wife. The marital relationship is an incredible blessing and divine sign, as Allah  says in the Qur’an: “And of His signs is that He created for you from yourselves mates that you may find tranquility in them; and He placed between you affection and m

LONDON: Drinking just two glasses of sweetened drinks every day is linked to a higher risk of heart failure in men, a new study has found. Regular consumption of sweetened drinks has been associated with changes in blood pressure, insulin levels, and inflammatory markers, as well as weight gain - factors implicated in metabolic syndrome, diabetes, coronary heart disease and stroke. In a bid to assess whether there might be a link between heightened heart failure risk and sweetened drink co

Are you worried that your child spends more time on their devices than with you? Do you think they’re obsessed with their (or your) smartphones: your little one’s watching YouTube cartoons or playing games non-stop, and the older one is looking at it every few minutes, texting friends all the time, checking to see how many “likes” they’ve got after they’ve posted on social media, refusing to put their phones to one side round the dinner table? Well, I share your concerns – and so do many other p

We all try to avoid the dreaded “S” word, but sometimes it just creeps up on us and our loved ones. Yes, we all want to lead productive lives and accomplish many honorable things, but we do not want to develop high blood pressure, sleep problems, or reduced immunity in the process. We all know from all the medical research that has been done that stress can do all of that and more.So how do we strike a balance? Is there even such a thing as balance anymore? Here are my thoughts on how t

In the previous post Productivity Lessons from the Hijrah (Part 1), we explained how the Hijrah of the Prophet Muhammad (Peace be upon him) from Makkah to Medina was a productive act by the Prophet since he didn’t just sit in Makkah and give up after all the hardship he faced in spreading the message to the people, rather he was proactive to find avenues where his message could flourish and transform the world. In this post, I want to pick up from where we left off and take snippets fro

10th of Muharram (the day of Ashura / Ashoora) is observed as an important day by both Sunni and Shia Muslims – however, for differentreasons. Most scholars believe that Ahsura is named as such because of “tenth” of Muharram (ten is translated as “Ashara” in the Arabic language) Sunni Muslims look at Ashura as a day of “respect and gratitude” (for Prophet Moosa and his nation), while Shia Muslims believe that day to be a day of mourning and sorrow. The following is an explanation of