Old me? Why did I change? | Mufti Abu Layth

right so speaking since I'm speaking about myself right and this aren't people this one this one people have asked me some people have watched my clip now I'm going to speak about what my a bit about few words of my development some people have come across my clip in the past I've this a clip around somewhere online of when I'd come back and they saw this what the hell and they've been absolutely shocked in is saying Musti someone said I'm a hippie

Muslim because of you a happy Muslim because of me right so so what they've done is they come across this and it kind of shocked them that they thought well you know how can it be that let me just one momento momento let me bring this over here people right so you can see they saw this picture of me right that you're gonna see across the screen

now and it kind of shocked the hell out of them that what the hell they saw that and they thought well how did he go from that that thing over there to this thing over here so it really kind of surprised them and they said well you know a lot of people on this talk that I'm doing over over here that you can see this talk is it's a bit of a kind of morbid poke as it is so I'm speaking about

things like I think it was about death and about kind of benefiting and seeking knowledge and things like that so it's had a few people kind flabbergasted over it like what the hell happened and people have thrown up the theories what happened how did you change why did you loose this Iman this faith of yours why did you I know and you felt you lost out in life and they trying to

psychoanalyze me and they want a kinda they want to fit me in some kind of standard that they've got in their minds so a lot of several people and you've got the haters but you've got several people who've legitimately asked me that look what is going on what happened so okay let me just shed a bit of light on that you see when you see that picture of me this where I've I'm speaking at this conference and I've got the Hat on and I had come back from my travels abroad I believe it was that year that

that was more or less very soon after I'd kind of come back from traveling abroad so there's two things to focus on here one is my look my appearance and two is the personality so my attitude how I kind of behave okay so the outlook the apparent sorry the actual look in terms of my heart and wearing a hat and having a beard let's say around the sides and things like this this was not something that I suddenly changed he was

not like one day I woke up and I just kind of just took a blade and shaved my beard and I took off the Hat and change my clothes and it wasn't like that at all that what you're looking at this kind of picture it is if I can write if I show you this right just to bring this back right this what you're looking at right

here this is something this is in 2005 yeah it is 15 years ago from today it's something you know almost a lifetime ago now the change people are saying well musty how did you change what what happened was it an event was in an incident was it this a midlife crisis was it something a a lack of fulfillment a lack of desires a lack of I don't know what was it it was nothing like this

it was simply life life is what it was do you understand it's not look you you have to understand these things that life is what happened these things did not happen overnight I it took years in the development my furthering my knowledge consolidating my learning battling grappling with concepts discussing dialogues debates months

years of dealing with ideas dealing broadening my horizons I've read so much more since I came back I obviously I used to read there as well when I studied I studied for something like seven years abroad I was out of this country for more or less like seven or eight years I was out of this country with very few visits back maybe I only visited it I only visited twice while I was away and and other than that I just stayed abroad I was in Damascus for you know couple a couple of years and I was in Pakistan I was in Damascus I think a year and a half and then in Pakistan the

rest of the time in different places Islamabad and Karachi now you are restricted and you a person grows with their environment now you will grow to certain Heights depending on where you are as you can as you your horizons change so will your conceptual horizons when I was back here I pursued further academic learning I pursued a degree in psychology I once again came across a broad range of people I pursued a degree in a teaching degree

I taught philosophy at a level I had to study philosophy Western philosophy in western Institute's at university I had to I did a master's I you know spoke with my professor my kind of had discussions back for thought about things I pondered over a lot of this psychology that I was learning and I met different people and there was a gradual conceptual metamorphosis over those years I mean it wasn't something it wasn't like one day I woke up and this

happened this took years I I mean probably I would say arguably probably about initially for years for maybe something like that for years for at least between three to four years to some change that you saw it wasn't necessarily like this but it was more than probably 60% that probably took about three four years when I was back all those that kind of thinking a lot of a lot of thought went into these kind of things about what does this actually

mean confidence as well about confidence about ideas this was incredibly important because you know when you're in the motherís are the issue was this that you see I I was always by the way when it comes to personality when it comes to personality no it wasn't bad influence actually you know a lot of the Muslim friends I had here they were actually very traditional like they had you know long beards many of them are still got very long beards till now you know a lot of my close friends still have much longer beards than me they still

casually dress in Jabbar's shalwar kameez do things like that they still very see this is the thing about my circle of friends they're not actually you know somebody I'm not like a you know like some kind of beer sob for them you understand like they live their own lives they do their own thing their own kind of spiritual girls they're not dependent on me in any way so yeah at that time I I kind of like I thought about concept this thing I wanted to say

about confidence in ideas you see it hinges on your outlook now you see people who've watched this video clip of me speaking about death and seeking knowledge I'm very serious in that so they assume they assume that that's how I used to be you see that this is is they that they are mistaken I was nothing that was not my persona I used to as much my persona was very similar to how it is now I used to crack jokes all the time I used to have a crazy sense of humor I

used to have like different opinions all the time I was a vertical as a maverick in my opinions I was very these things were still me but you are watching a clip where I wasn't quite one the topic was quite morbid and very serious about seeking knowledge - I was still finding myself in how to develop how to give speeches because at that stage I was very young and I was told that if you give a speech you can't be cracking too many jokes in a speech this is what I was told

yeah now like I gave speeches in Pakistan I gave speeches in my Institute I gave speeches in Arabic I gave speeches that were televised on Pakistan TV at certain points I remember they the Home Secretary of Pakistan visited our mother so I gave the speech in English now I I gave the graduation speech in our year when we graduated in DotA 2 hadith and there were at least 3,000 people present I was one of the people I gave the speech so you see I was kind of molded and told off that don't crack jokes when you're speaking so okay so I kind of inhibited that side

doing speech during speech delivery because this is how I was told in the mother I said no you're not allowed to do this when you when you give a speech you have to play play a particular part you have to put on a mask when you give a speech you have to be serious so I did so when I gave that speech I was still in that mode what happened in the years that followed and another thing about motherís eyes you know when you have your fifty opinions I used to have a lot

of Maverick opinions the the a lot of the people around you were absolutely kind of like they were people who they were absolute joy kills when he came to independent thought they hated people having their critical thought the teachers the students they used to I mean people will tell you that even now that knew me from the motherís a days that he used to even then always have these kind of strange opinions it's not

something I developed when I came back and even then I was very kind of out of the mold by their standards not by the UK standards but by Pakistan motherís are standards but the problem was there was so much of a knock back every time you disagreed people hated on you everybody hated on you now you see you live there you don't have some way to go back to you live in that Institute your teachers of the New York you know use the fellow classmates of the your friends are this is life this is the world now whether you like it or not and

you're still young you see you haven't actually found yourself entirely in adulthood yet you know you're still searching your path now facing constant criticism is harsh it's difficult you know you people always telling you what the hell's wrong with you you know you're not allowed to think like that this is wrong this is you know what you're doing is all model combi rahi you're going becoming misled misguided and constantly getting this knock back so you have to kind of use you're not 100% confident in always promoting these

views that you have or these kind of thought because you're still you haven't fully matured in them now when I came back here and I then had a different circle I had my circle of friends who I used to discuss religious friends non-muslims universities taught in colleges I taught in schools I taught I gave private classes I started to mix with different orlimar I started to read things I started to discuss with professors I started to develop like

there there was a maturity in the in the confidence in promoting these views in being true to yourself now and that journey of being true to yourself you know to thine own self be true this probably took me something like from that point me may have began probably the year off that maybe like in 2006 2007 it began properly and it would have lasted for at least a decade I feel that

at least till about 2017 maybe it was a very long process you know these things it wasn't something overnight and gaining a lot of you know trust and you know do you need validation from other scholars don't you need validation do you need this don't you need this yeah so it wasn't something about oh you never got to oh you came back and your parents you know as a kid your parents never let you if parents forced you to go to madrasah my parents never forced me to godmother sir my parents flipped when I told him I want to go to Madras sir they they were really anti auntie this

whole me going to study they they weren't they weren't from this kind of scene and they don't like that as a so I actually had to fight I I had to put up a huge resistance to study it wasn't something easy and I was never my family were never religious anyway and I never went to mother ass as a kid I went to normal I'm into a secondary school I went to a college we just chilled out there are normal stars so it isn't sold with this video in terms of personality yes it's developed to some extent like everybody but it hasn't actually changed it's just in that video you can't tell because I was

taught that this is how you give speeches you don't crack jokes the other thing is in terms of how I looked yes that has changed but it didn't change overnight it changed with my views over many years spanning over a decade but I wanted to kind of put this out there because a lot of people have asked me and I thought fair enough this is you know it's something very you know it is it's I'm sure it's interesting to some people that and especially in letting them know that look it's okay honestly what kind of a life would I be living if I was exactly the same as I was in if my

thought processes were like in 2005 if you think today if your knowledge and your awareness and your critical skills and your the information you have and you or exactly how you were I don't mean you've aged but not mentally since and not conceptually since 2005 or since ten years ago or even five years ago then what is the point of your existence are you just trying to contribute carbon dioxide to the plants I mean what is the point

of you yeah so cool I hope that you know it helps because I would say look do not succumb to peer pressure No