A Message for Adolescents
Wagdi Ghoneim
Translated by daralislamlive.com
This is the stage where you develop your personality. When you become rebellious and avoid listening to your parents. May Allah help your parents because they suffer in this period. But hopefully you will pass it without any major problems.
The Prophet( peace and blessings be upon him) said on the Day of Judgement there will be seven types of people who will be shaded in God’s shade, one of them is the young boy who obeyed God and feared Him.
You have to be extra careful when developing your independence. You want to feel independent without your parents. You want to do everything by yourself without the advice or opinions of your parents. You want to experience everything. This is a very tough stage. Remember, where will you get your morals and values from while developing your independence? Will it be from the devil or from Allah?
If my house is religious then my values should be from my parents and I should ask them for advice. Communication between parents and their children is very important. If you put your roots in an Islamic foundation then you will be fine. So always return to the Qur’an and the Sunnah of the Prophet( peace and blessings be upon him). The Prophet( peace and blessings be upon him) said in Sahih Muslim, you must listen and follow the Qur’an and Sunnah. Because this stage is the stage of rebellion.
The second importance is the values you develop. You have an idea and you carried it out. But Allah says in the Qur’an, before you do something, believe and then perform the deeds. For example, Allah forbid, you started to smoke; your parents love you and want what is best for you. That is why when you grow up you will blame your parents for not stopping you, and while they are advising you, you’ll hate it, but you’ll appreciate it in the coming years, because they were looking out for you.
Why do you smoke ? You’ll say, because celebrities smoke and I want to be like them, because they are role models. Or you’ll say, I need to smoke because the one who doesn’t smoke is not a man, so I want to be man. So the thought is that to be a man I need to smoke.
Who is a man? You might say…, a man is the one who smokes and goes out with girls. The man is the one who curses, even the religion. He doesn’t even care about Allah.
What you need to do….is to have a shower and purify yourself from these thoughts and actions. Come to the Qur’an, in Surah Qasas: there came a man from a far village and advised Prophet Musa( peace be upon him) to go on with his mission or they would kill him. I wish you could be like him, a man who feels the heavy responsibility and wants to support the mission. In Surah Yasin, there came from a far village a man who told the people to follow the messengers. See, this is the man! See how brave he was! See the manhood? If you want to be a man, it has to be from belief of Allah and performing good deeds.
If you listened to the azaan and went to pray, you are a man. If you respected your parents and had a good relationship with them, then you are a man. Who said being a man is to go out with girls and smoke? You have to correct your morals and values. When you grow up you will laugh at yourself and how you were!
So be careful. Who is your role model? The footballer who has a pony tail and looks like a horse while he hops around the stadium? Or the pop star who has funky hair? Or the actor who wears the tightest jeans?
No you have to change your perception of what a man is. These aren’t role models. Who told you to wear a necklace around your neck? This is shameful! The ones who wear necklaces are women, not men. These aren’t role models, you shouldn’t follow them. Do you know who your role model is? The Prophet Muhammad( peace and blessings be upon him)! If you listen to him, you are obeying Allah! But if you are following the wrong crowd, then you have put a wrong belief in your head and you are doing something wrong.
If you did this, you will go astray. You think you’re not a child anymore and you hate it when your parents ask you where you are going and who your friends are and you keep your personal life a secret and don’t involve them in anything, when you lock yourself in your room and ignore your family and say ‘I’m allowed to do whatever I please, I’m a man’. See the ignorance?
If you have friends who will teach you something wrong and then you commit bad sins, you will grow up with these sins on your conscience. That is why we are advising you from now, although you are telling us to leave you alone because you’re a man and you have to experience things for yourself. You hate advice from us because you think you are a man who does not need advice, because you know it all.
If you did that you might not pass this stage! You might get stuck in a rut! It’s not shameful to ask for advice! The best of people are those who seek good advice! You could be a drug addict and struggle in life, all because of this stubbornness.
You are still young, so do not be stubborn. Don’t shout at your mother or your father! Don’t disrespect them. If you are persistent with these actions, you will grow up with this attitude and you won’t be able to get out of it. The devil will encourage you even more. What if you fall into fornication? You’ll get used to this attitude, it will develop as your personality and it will be too hard for you to change.
So be careful. Make sure you have a good foundation of good values and morals, seek advice from your parents and remember what a man is really supposed to be. Don’t follow these fools who think a man is someone who smokes and goes out with girls. If anything, that is childishness.
We pray that you come out of the adolescent stage as a good, pious young man.
Wagdi Ghoneim
Translated by daralislamlive.com
Courtesy: www.everymuslim.co.za ?
