Transcript
This transcript was auto-generated using AI and may contain misspellings. Asalamualaikum warahmatullah. As Muslims we believe that one of the weapons at Satan's disposal is his whispering. But what does that actually mean? What does it mean for Satan to whisper to us? How do we draw the line between his whisperings and our own thoughts? What is the relationship between these whisperings and OCD? Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Today I spoke with Double Take veteran Sister Najwa Awad, author of the Yaqeen paper, Clinicians, Imams and the Whisperings of Satan. Welcome to Double Take, a podcast by Yaqeen Institute about the questions and ideas around Islam and Muslims that give us pause. Remember to subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Spotify or wherever you get your favourite podcasts. Check out the links in the show notes if you want to share feedback with the team or if you'd like to join our new email newsletter. Our guest today, Sister Najwa Awad is a psychotherapist, certified perinatal mental health specialist and organizational mental health consultant. She has provided services to individuals and families in the Baltimore Washington metropolitan area for over 15 years at her practice, Amanah Family Counseling. She has a bachelor's degree in psychology and a master's in social work, specializing in the clinical treatment of individuals and families. In addition, Sister Najwa has postgraduate certification in advanced trauma treatment and is an EMDR provider. She's also a fellow at Yaqeen Institute. Enjoy the episode. Salam Alaikum Sister Najwa and welcome back to Double Take. Wa Alaikum Assalam wa Rahmatullah wa Barakatuh. Thank you so much for having me. Thanks for joining us again. In Surah Taha, when Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala describes how Satan misguided Prophet Adam into disobeying Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala, he says, Fawaswasa ilayhi shaytaan, meaning, Then Satan whispered to him.
When I was growing up, I often heard about how shaytan whispers and tries to influence us to move away from the path that is pleasing to Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala. These whispers are called waswasa. And Sister Najwa, you have a long history of working with mental health cases and you have a specific interest in this topic of waswasa. So I'm going to ask you point blank, what is waswasa? That's a great question and something I really enjoy talking about. Waswasa is essentially whisperings. And I think a lot of times when people think of waswasa, they think that waswasa only comes from shaytan. It does come from shaytan. And we see that in ayat in the Quran with Prophet Adam. And Allah said, Then Satan whispered to him, he said, O Adam, shall I direct you to the tree of eternity and possession that will not deteriorate? So we know that waswasa can come from shaytan. We also know that waswasa can come from our nafs. It can come from internally. And we see that in the ayah. And we have already created man and know what his soul whispers to him. And we are closer to him than his jugular vein. And so we know that the waswasa can also come from within. And then lastly, we know that waswasa can come from humankind and from the jinn. We see that in Surah An-Nas. So waswasa can also come from the people in our surroundings, but also from the jinn. So subhanAllah, as human beings, we really have a lot of input from many different sources. But essentially, waswasa is whispering. As a mental health counselor and someone who focuses on mental health cases, if you put the Islamic concept of waswasa aside, if you don't mind, does waswasa rear its head in the general world beyond kind of the Islamic discourse? Does this thing happen just in
general mental health cases? It happens generally and it happens in mental health cases. Really, everybody, almost everybody has waswasa. Everybody has intrusive thoughts. Studies, I think, show that 94% of people have intrusive thoughts. Intrusive thoughts are when we get these thoughts that are really distressing to us. And really, one of the major differences between what is just a normal part of life, what we're going to expect, and the clinical type of waswasa is the intensity of it. So a good example is prayer. The average person, every once in a while, maybe they will make a mistake or maybe they'll be like, I can't remember if I'm in my first rakah or if I'm in my second rakah. Happens to everyone every once in a while, right? In the clinical situation, this happens all the time. And it happens so frequently that the person loses joy for praying. They are not able to connect to Allah. It causes them a lot of distress. And has a lot of other impairments in their day-to-day life. So really, you can have the same kind of thing, whether it's salah or something that you shouldn't be doing. It's the intensity and the distress that it causes to the person that really differentiates between normal waswasa and the clinical type of waswasa. I know you mentioned something about our own whisperings as well, within ourselves and from the jinn. But do you mind just describing that a bit more? Sure. So oftentimes when it comes to waswasa from our nafs, it's things that we want for our nafs, things that we want. In psychology, there's something called egocentronic, meaning it's, you know, I really want this cookie. And so I'm going to keep thinking about this
cookie, although I shouldn't have this cookie for dinner. That usually comes from the nafs. When it comes to shaitan, usually it's the things that are not good for your nafs, that your nafs would not want for your nafs. So for example, it might be that someone leaves money on the table and, you know, I get this thought of, you should take that money. No, I don't want to take this money. No, no, you should take it. You can use it for this and you can use it for that. And so that is more likely to be from shaitan. So Sister Najwa, before we move on, I just want to make sure I understand this fully. Are you saying that everyone experiences waswasa? Is that a very common thing? Yes, everybody experiences waswasa. It's part of the human experience. And it started with Adam, and it's going to happen to all of us. It's just how much does it happen to all of us that determines if it's normal or if it's abnormal. Okay. And then when you say abnormal, you're talking about like excessive waswasa. And so when someone kind of comes to your clinic and you realize that actually they have excessive waswasa, do you define that as like a spiritual illness? Is that something that they need to fix religiously? Or is it something that is a clinical issue? When people come to me, most of the time it's because they're extremely distressed by the waswasa. And most of the time it has absolutely nothing to do with their... that it's not from a spiritual perspective. It's more from a clinical perspective, meaning that the thoughts that they're getting or the compulsions really are just kind of a manifestation of OCD. It's obsessive compulsive disorder, meaning that they are thinking about their waswasa for
an excessive amount of time, and it causes more distress than the average person would have. It's not just normal worries. And a good threshold that I like to tell people about, it's about one hour, meaning everybody gets waswasa throughout the day. It's totally normal. But when you're spending one hour or more, oftentimes, especially if the person has distress and it's impairing certain aspects of their life, it means that it's reached a clinical threshold. Meaning that if you add all the parts of the day that they were thinking about their waswasa, that it would reach an hour. So maybe they're like sitting there thinking, is my wudu valid? And they're sitting there an hour, two hours, three hours. Whereas the average person, when they pray and they're not so sure, they assume the least amount of rakahs and then they kind of move on. The person that suffers from excessive waswasa, they cannot pull themselves away from stopping to think about it or trying to neutralize it, which is the compulsions, trying to have certain mental acts or do certain things to neutralize the excessive thoughts that they're getting. So someone who suffers from excessive waswasa, are you defining that as OCD by and large? So therapists, psychiatrists, there is a criteria. There's something called the DSM. And so there is a criteria for OCD. So is it possible for someone to have excessive waswasa and not meet the threshold of OCD? It's possible, but it's not very likely. Most of the people who have excessive waswasa will very likely fall under OCD. And it's actually a specific kind of OCD. It's called scrupulosity. And it's not just within Islam, it's across all
of the religions. It means that the OCD, the waswasa, it has a religious, it's about religious content, whether it being tahara or ibadah. All of their waswasa is related to something spiritual, spiritually related, although they are not necessarily spiritually deficient themselves. And so these people get into this cycle of doubting themselves regarding a certain religious aspect of their life. Is that what it is? Is that how it manifests itself in a day to day? Yeah, a lot of people who seek out therapists, it's because they have doubts about their tahara, about their wudu. I did wudu once. I'm not sure if I missed the part. I have to do it again. I think I missed it again. I'm going to do it again. Or salah, right? Am I saying everything correctly? I have to repeat ayat again. I can't tell if it's one rakah or two rakahs. Sometimes you will see it in relationships. Did I say, did I utter for men, did I utter divorce? I think I did, or maybe I didn't. And it's really, yes, it's this excessive doubt. Sometimes the doubt can be about Allah. The person in that situation, it's not that they doubt Allah, but the whispers come to it. And again, the key is that it's ego dystonic, meaning that it causes them a tremendous amount of distress. I'm questioning if Allah exists, right? But I know Allah exists, but I keep getting this waswas that He doesn't exist and it causes me a lot of distress. So it's different than the person maybe who's agnostic and, oh, does Allah exist or not? No, the person, Allah exists, but the waswas that keeps coming otherwise. So it can affect a person religiously in a lot of different ways.
Yeah. I mean, I'm actually interested very much as to how it manifests itself. Would you say it's a big portion of our community that falls in this category? Like out of 10 people that come into your clinic or that you hear of that suffer from waswasa, excessive waswasa, how many of them fall in the category of this, like really excessive to the extent that it hinders their ability to move forward spiritually? You know, a lot of times when people come to counseling, they do have waswasa and they're varying degrees, right? I mean, you have some that's mild, you have a fair amount that is severe. The severe cases are less common, but to tell you how prevalent it is, if you just Google waswasa, you will get hundreds, if not thousands of results. It astounds me every time I see it. And it's always, you know, I find it so interesting that it's not limited to a certain type of person and not a woman, not a man, not a certain socioeconomic status. I get, you know, people from all over the world. So it's really, it's something that affects a lot of Muslims and something that it's very difficult for them to talk about because a lot of times it's misunderstood when they talk to like family members or imams, you know, when they talk to family friends, a lot of the times people just like, oh, maybe you're an extremist, you need to get over this. And of course the person doesn't even like that they have waswasa to begin with, but then they begin to kind of withdraw, like who do I talk to about this? And hamdallah, like a lot of imams are trained. Unfortunately, some might not be. So like in a situation where someone is repeating a certain ayat over and over again, they might go to an imam and say, well, you know, this is happening. They're like, you know, you need to have more khushuwa or it sounds like, you know, you don't know how to do the fatiha properly. You need to get better at that. When this
person's fluent in Arabic and they've been praying for like 15, 20 years. So sometimes it's misunderstood. And even within therapists, especially the therapists who might not be practicing Islam, there's so many misconceptions and problems that can come from not understanding this and providing these people the support that they really need. I want to take a step back away from those who are suffering excessive waswasa because clearly that's a very specific case and it's a certain portion of our community that face it and it's treated a certain way. How about the other group in our community who just, you know, a general Muslim who doesn't suffer from the excessiveness of waswasa, but just has waswasa nonetheless. Does waswasa affect me negatively, generally speaking? I'm talking about general waswasa. Yes, it can. I mean, you see it a lot in relationships, you know, where maybe, yeah, the person is not obsessing about it or not thinking about it all the time. But maybe, you know, you have a problem assuming good about other people. Right. So oftentimes you get these thoughts, you know, people are out to get me. Nobody wants good for me. You know, I might as well end relationships before like the other person does. So it can come up that way. It can be another common thing, like with money, like a scarcity mindset. You need to make more money. You don't have enough. Something bad is going to happen to you, you know. So really it can affect almost anything. I mean, the most common one that people joke about is diets, right, where you want to be healthy, you want to exercise. And that's a very good and almost benign example of where like, oh, I want to eat healthy, but I'm getting these, like, I want to go to the fridge. I want to eat this. I want to eat that. So waswasa can really affect almost anything. It's just how
much does it affect that one thing. Now, even when I'm joking about that one example of like thinking, oh, I really want this cookie or I want a diet, but I really want this food. With the extreme case, what would that be? It would be when you go to the clinical side, there might be some of that OCD, but then now we're talking about the extreme cases of like anorexia, for example, right? So everything is kind of on a spectrum in terms of the catalyst that initiates the waswasa. Is it fair to say, I'm going to probably go slightly off script here, but is it fair to say that waswasa is necessary to improve? Because for me, having those doubts challenge my thinking and force me to question whether or not I'm doing something correctly or properly. And so having that challenge in my mind and constantly questioning whether or not I'm doing something good forces me to improve. Like, wouldn't it lead me to say perfectionism or wouldn't it lead me to doing something properly? Well, I think that's being reflective and having good insight and kind of wanting to improve yourself. But, you know, there is a difference between like ihsan and perfectionism. Like ihsan, for example, is I want to get better, especially when we're talking about Allah. You know, I want to recite more Quran because I want to get to Jannah because I think it's an important goal to have. I might not have the best tijwi, but I want to keep getting better at it. You know, it's something that I'm lacking in. Whereas the person with waswasa or the person who goes after perfectionism, usually it's not rooted in wanting to get better. It's rooted in fear and it's rooted in avoiding punishment. So while you have
the person with ihsan who is like, I want to memorize more Quran, I want to recite more Quran, I want to do it to get closer to Allah because it's something that's good for me. The person who suffers from waswasa or even like perfectionism is, I need to perfect this because if I don't, something bad is going to happen. Allah might punish me or I am not good enough. And the really interesting thing is you have both people striving for the same thing, but one actually gets closer to their goal. And with perfectionism, usually you see actually, especially when you're talking about like acts of worship, they're not meeting their goal at all. So while they're reading Quran to kind of get to that goal to, I want to perfect this, I want to, you know, I want to have this exactly right. They might not have khushuwa or they're missing the forest for the trees. It's not even, you know, they walk away not even feeling closer to Allah because they were so invested in like, I have to do every single little thing right. Otherwise something bad is going to happen. Can you describe that to me sister Najwa? Like, can you give me a clear example of what that would look like? Let's just say prayer. What does seeking perfectionism look like? And how does it affect me in my prayer? So in terms of seeking ihsan, you know, you have proper wudu, you come with a free mind, you know, you decide to recite Quran after your first and second rak'ah, like you're really trying to connect to Allah and you know, one, you're directly benefiting. I mean, you're enjoying the salah, you're connecting to Allah, you know, inshallah, Allah will reward you because you are praying as though you see him. It's spiritually fulfilling. It's a good experience and you hope and you pray that Allah will accept it, but you walk away like, I really enjoyed that. Like I connected with Allah and may he accept. The person with
waswasa might go to the same salah and they're like finicking around, is my awra covered? Is my awra covered? Okay. You know, they spent like three or four minutes. Okay. Now like they might, you know, start the salah, did I do takbir correctly? Maybe I didn't do that. Maybe I should start over. Right? And everything is, they're not even focused on the salah. They are so, it's like, you know, like I said, they miss the forest for the trees. They are so focused on maybe like pronunciation. Now, of course the person with the pronunciation is going to be good. Right? And they're going to enjoy reciting the Quran. The person with OCD, maybe with the ayah I didn't say correctly. Let me go back and repeat it. They walk away from the salah, doubtful. Okay. I don't even know if I did that right, but so spiritually disconnected because it was fear-based. It wasn't to, because they were looking and seeking to Allah's mercy. It was, I have to make sure I do everything right. So this prayer counts because if this prayer doesn't count, then I'm going to be held on the day of judgment. And what if on the day of judgment, then I'm going to, if it didn't count, then maybe I'll go to hell. It's a completely different, same act of worship, completely different mindset. Would you say for this excessive form of waswasa, is the source always waswasa from the shaitan? So it could be from shaitan. It could be from the nafs too. We also know that a lot of people who have OCD, there are physiological components to it. And that is tied into the nafs, right? The nafs is composed of who we are and our dispositions and our preferences and our weaknesses and all of that. But there is a medical component to it oftentimes too. For the person with the average brain, there's a part in the brain that when they sense danger,
then they act accordingly. Oh, there is a fire. Okay, let me go and leave. Let me get a fire extinguisher, right? The person with OCD, that same part of the brain is almost like it's a faulty lever. So they see danger in situations that are not really dangerous. And so it's hard for them, as hard as they try to distinguish between this is something dangerous, this is not. And so the danger shows up in, not just like with literally dangerous things, but it can show up with salah. The person with waswasa, even when we're talking about the topic of salah, to them, when they feel like they might have missed a part of the salah, that feels catastrophic. It feels catastrophic. It's not like the average person, oh, I messed up. Let me do sujood al sahar. Let me... The amount of distress it causes is on an extremely high level. What would you say for someone who is dealing with waswasa, not the excessive form, we'll get to the excessive form in a few moments, but this is the general population who faces waswasa in a day-to-day environment. What should they be doing and how do they overcome it? There's a lot of overlap between general and, you know, the clinical. But yes, I mean, saying audhu billahi minash shaitanir rajim, seeking refuge in Allah, because ultimately nobody's going to be able to protect you in the same way that Allah is going to protect you. Your dhikr, inshallah, is a great way, you know, doing the morning and the evening adhkar, are ways to protect yourself from shaitan. You know, saying audhu billahi minash shaitanir rajim and spitting, you know, and doing that three times for the average person and for the person who has the clinical waswasa as well. Another really good one that I think it's not talked about enough is fasting,
especially for people who might have waswasa about relationships, right? Like maybe they're unable to get married, right? And they're always thinking about this person who they want to marry or with other certain desires. Fasting is an amazing way to curtail that waswasa. I've heard, you know, from people who have had waswasa, even like borderlines on excessive. When they fast, that waswasa diminishes remarkably. And by fast, you mean like the Islamic fast, right? I can't get away with intermittent fasting with my coffees and I can't do that, right? Yeah, well, because it's not just fasting from coffee, it's fasting from desires too. So ideally, say for example, like there is a brother who sees this girl in a college, right? And he's very interested in marrying her, but he can't. But while he's not approaching her, he can't stop thinking about her, right? So when he's fasting, it's not just from the food and the water. Ideally, he should be fasting from that too. And there's something about this, you know, fasting, especially for the sake of Allah, that it just extinguishes some of those desires. Okay, and then how about the excessive group, those who are facing OCD or excessive waswasa or the clinical waswasa as we're talking about it? Someone knocks on your door and you figure out that they have clinical waswasa. What is their path to kind of overcoming it? Because clearly it's hindering their ability to move forward in a relationship or in their relationship with Allah, for example. Yes, so I mean, there's so many different things that they can do and the people who have regular waswasa can also use some of these things. One of the best things that they can do is start out with their cognitions. And this is like falling back on the Islamic principles and Islamic concepts,
especially when people are extremely fearful of Allah in a way that it's debilitating. We need to fear Allah, right? But when it's paralyzing and it's getting in the way of their acts of worship, starting to reflect on some of those cognitions. What are some of those thoughts that I have? You know, when I am so fearful that I do the smallest thing that I'm going to go to Jahannam, where is Allah's mercy in that picture? In terms of getting into Jannah, am I going to get into Jannah only on my deeds? Because of my deeds? No, the answer is no. So also, you know, taking apart some of those thoughts and sometimes it takes a therapist to be able to deconstruct what are the thought processes that are contributing to the waswasa. So you can kind of take them apart and ideally when you change your thoughts, it changes your feelings, but it also changes your behaviors. The other thing about people with excessive waswasa is that the rulings are actually different for them. And this is something that each person with extreme waswasa should talk to an imam about. This is not like a general fatwa. But going back to the salah example, the average person who every once in a while they get distracted in their salah, what do they do? Like if they're not sure if it's the first rakah or the second rakah, they assume, they go by what they are certain of and so they go, they default to that I only prayed one rakah. I'm not sure, so they default to the middle. The person with excessive waswasa, they actually have different rulings where they assume that they did it. So meaning that I'm not sure if it's the first rakah or the second rakah, you go with the second. So this is something that individually they should talk to an imam about. But the default is that they did it correctly. Whereas the average person who every once in a while has doubts,
did I complete my fast? Maybe I invalidated by accident. You know, whereas the person with waswasa all the time, maybe I swallowed dust, maybe I did this to break my fast. That's very interesting actually. Let's say someone's not sure if they have wudu. The general public would say they know that they're certain that they made wudu, but they're uncertain that they broke their wudu. So they just stick to the certain. And so they have wudu. Whereas the person who's diagnosed with excessive waswasa, if they're in that camp where they know they made wudu, but they're not sure if they broke the wudu, what would happen to them? So say like the average person, they're making wudu and they are like, I don't know if I washed my left hand, right? So they would go back and wash their left hand. The person with excessive waswasa would, they would assume, I think I did, I'm not really sure if I did, they would not go back and wash it. They assume that it's done. In both of those cases, unless you have some kind of evidence, you wouldn't make your wudu anyhow. But with the person with excessive waswasa, they default that they did complete their fast, that they made wudu correctly and they move on with the lesser amount. So the assumption is that it's already done. That the assumption is done. Yes. Yeah. Okay. Would you say there are any other kind of standout actions or methodologies that someone with excessive waswasa should be doing? Yes, lots of them. One thing that I do recommend is having a journal. The thing about waswasa, especially extreme waswasa,
people will be reaching out to imams or other people a lot because they're seeking reassurance. And so they might call the imam, I don't know if I prayed right, did I pray right? And then like the next day, I think I, you know, I did it again or I'm not sure if my wudu is valid. What ends up happening in the OCD cycle is that you have your obsession, the compulsion, like I mentioned earlier, because it's kind of weird, it's to neutralize it, right? So sometimes seeking reassurance over and over becomes part of the OCD process. So what we want to do is when you have the trigger of like, oh, I don't know if I prayed correctly or whatever, then the compulsion would be let me go ask somebody to find out or let me repeat it. What you want to do is you want to break the cycle. And that's why the scholars over and over will tell you if you have extreme waswasa, ignore it, ignore it, ignore it, always ignore it. So I recommend a journal. And so for the person who is struggling with salah, for example, instead of I might have messed up, let me go ask a shiur or let me repeat it, under no circumstances should you repeat the salah, write it down in your journal. And then, you know, something I recommend in my paper is like maybe after a week have a standing appointment with the imam. Then after a week, bring back your journal and be like, these are some of the examples that I wanted to talk with you. One, what's really good about it is you're delaying gratification, right? Because I have this really intense distress, I have to neutralize it. You're taking that apart. And it actually gives you more clarity to instead of automatically engaging in it, it gives you more clarity so that you should not, that you have the space to not do it, not engage in the compulsion. Two, you start to in working with a trained person,
whether it's a therapist or imam, you start to get certain principles too, right? And that would be good to write in the journal. And then three, something that you notice with excessive waswasa, it's usually the same problem over and over again. So you end up having 10 incidents, but really it's maybe one or two questions that you're asking. So I recommend do not engage in the compulsion, just like the scholars say, do not just ignore it. That's really hard, right? Especially if you feel like it's so catastrophic. Write it down and that way you feel like, okay, I'm accountable, like inshallah, like nothing bad's going to happen. I'm writing it down because I have the intention of fixing it. And then go back or when you have the appointment or when out with your therapist or with imam, then you can go back and ask your question. And let's say I don't have access to an imam, a trained imam in this area or even a clinician. What would you say I would need to do? Are there certain resources online or certain hotlines? How does that work? You would default to pretty much what the scholars say over and over, just ignore it, which it's painful for me to say because I know, you know, these Muslims, it's so hard for them to ignore it. But the default is ignore, ignore, ignore, change your environment. You are much less likely to have the waswasa if you change the environment. So for example, like if you keep repeating salah, get out of that room, go somewhere else. If you keep repeating your wudu, get out of the bathroom. If you're getting waswasa about Allah when you're in your room, you know, the minute you get out of the room, go talk to other people. Changing the environment can be very instrumental in, you know, stopping that, the thought process.
Another thing that people can do is you can schedule worry time. It's not the most desirable thing, but if you can't help but stop, you know, but if you can't help but think about something, you can say, okay, you know what, I'm not going to think about it for the rest of the day, but every day I'll have a standing appointment with myself, maybe for 10 minutes, and I will only think about it during that time. And if it comes up later, then I will default to, no, I have an appointment with myself at this time, and I'm not going to think about it during that time. Another thing is called containment, and so with containment, what you want to do is you're not suppressing a certain feeling or a certain thought, but you want to put it away for a certain time. So say, for example, you can't help but think about a particular worry, right? And it keeps coming up over and over in your head. What you can visualize is a container. I know this sounds really silly, and even when I tell people first about it, they're just like, what is this, but they come back and they tell me it works, and I'm like, I know it works because it's a very good intervention. So you imagine a container, and you imagine putting that worry in the container, and then putting it off to the side. It's saying that the worry, it's not that I'm trying to get rid of the worry, it's just it's not serving me well in this moment, and so I'm going to put it away for a time period, and when it's more appropriate, I will go ahead and bring the thought out, and think about it, and then put it back. Other things, if you can get your hands on real Zim Zim water, Zim Zim water, it'll cure for whatever you drink it for. So Zim Zim water, if you drink it to cure your waswasa, that is if you don't have access to them, that will help. Black human, there's a lot of research on black seed,
and that it has good mental health benefits and reducing anxiety. You can take black seed, and then dua more than anything, keeping that alliance with Allah, you know, in the middle of the waswasa, it feels like, almost like, how do I explain it? Like, almost like this imaginary battle with Allah, although it's not, it's with shaitan, right? Like, shaitan wants to create that barrier between you two, and so, you know, beseeching Allah, it's like, Allah, you know my struggles, please heal me, please cure me, and just continuing to make dua with the resources that you have, and having that tawakul of like, when I'm ignoring my waswasa, it's not because I'm lazy, it's not because I don't want to do it, but that's because that's where the cure lies. Very few people have focused on this topic in the level of depth that you have, so we really appreciate it. And I'm going to put you on the spot on behalf of my nine-year-old niece. She says to you, I heard somewhere that shaitan whispers in everyone's ears. Can you help me understand what that means, and how do I break that cycle? Yes, you know, shaitan did that to our great-great-grandfather, Adam alayhis-salam, and that's how he got him out of Jannah. And shaitan wants to take as many people as he wants with him to Jahannam. I'm not saying this in a way to scare you, but to know that our goal is to get to Jannah. And sometimes we are going to get thoughts that aren't really good for us, about things that we should do that are not really good for us.
And in those situations, we know that Allah's power and our love for him is much more than those thoughts. And so in those situations, we say, أعوذ بالله من الشيطان الرجيم And we try to not pay attention to those thoughts, and we try to follow them up with dhikr or good deeds, and we keep on our way. And this is part of human life. It doesn't have to be scary. It's something that we all have to deal with. But inshallah, when we all go to Jannah, it's not something we have to deal with anymore. Sister Najwa, Jazakallah khair. Thank you so much for your time, especially on a tough topic like an interesting topic such as waswasa. We're going to put you on the spot for our vintage double-take rapid-fire questions. You only have a few seconds to answer them. And I will stop you if you take longer than three seconds. Question number one. What's the last book you were reading? I'm more of an audio listener. I just started Gifts of Imperfection by Brene Brown. And so far, it's really good. If you could sit two people, any two people in the room, and be fly on the wall just to hear their conversation, who would they be? I would probably say, oh man, I would probably say the Prophet ﷺ and Aisha. I would love to see them interacting with each other. And I mean, I don't know if it can go this far, but I would love to hear the commentary about how the world is today. What's one piece of advice that Sister Najwa Awad would give a younger Najwa Awad who's in high school? I would probably say not to take things so seriously that most of the people that you are interacting with, you're not going to see often. And that a lot of times,
a lot of our fears in life are really based on what other people think of us. And high school is an excellent example because you're not going to see most of those people again. And same throughout the rest of your life. Like ultimately, you know, do what's best for you and don't have fear about doing it. Yeah, I reread your bio this morning and I saw four letters come up a couple of times. EDMR, you're an EDMR provider. Help me understand what that is. Oh boy, EMDR. So it is a kind of psychotherapy. It's really fascinating actually. There was a researcher in the 18 or 90s. Anyway, Dr. Shapiro, what she found was that when clients bring trauma in session and they do bilateral stimulation, meaning, this is going to be really weird, when you go like this. Or when you go like this. When you bring the trauma and you do the bilateral stimulation, it decreases the trauma in a way that talk therapy doesn't. So like one EMDR session is equivalent to about five talk therapy sessions in terms of how much you can process. I just did it like actually before our call. It's very effective. It's very awesome. And it's a really amazing way to heal trauma. And it's evidence-based. It's not like some weird like Buddhist, like it's based in science. I trust you. I trust you. I was hoping to understand that more after asking the question, but I'll leave it to you. Oh, sorry. What's one hadith or verse that you think about often during your clinical sessions? That I am just as my slave thinks I am.
Meaning that really our relationship with Allah depends so much on how we see him. And that really, as someone who practices a lot of cognitive behavioral therapy, like looking at people's thoughts, that resonates very much with me because perception of how we see things is everything. And so when we have negative perceptions or faulty perceptions, that's going to affect our relationships, our quality of life. But when we assume good about others, when we seek out good things and we turn to gratefulness and we look to the good in things, we assume the best about Allah and everybody around, it has such an amazing impact, regardless of why someone comes to see me. I mean, they can come for completely different reasons. But that perspective, that cognitive shift is so powerful in our mental health. Final question. You're from Virginia. What's the most underrated thing about Virginia? Virginia sounds so, I don't know, it doesn't sound too good. But one of the things that I love about Virginia, especially Northern Virginia, where I'm from, is the food. The food is amazing. Any type of cuisine that you can think of, like Yemeni, Thai, it's a complete mix of all different kinds of cuisines. It's such a wonderful place. And people are so welcoming. It's a beautiful place to be. Sister Najwa Awad, Jazakallah Khair for your time this morning. Really appreciate it. And inshallah, we'll see you in the next season of Double Take as well. Thank you. Thank you, Jazakallah Khair.
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