Assalamualaikum. Warahmatullahi wabarakatuh. Doctor Rothman. Thank you for joining us. Walaykumsalam It's good to be here. So we're going through a few things. And my first question is for the viewers that don't, possibly know you. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself? what oftentimes people are interested in my background is obviously that I converted to Islam. I, embraced Islam. I, embraced Islam. And my path to embracing Islam is simultaneously how I came into Islamic psychology. my work in psychology, that's the career that I have, is also how I embraced Islam. So my background is, in psychology. in psychology. I have a master's degree in psychology as well as a PhD. But before I did the PhD, I, I had an entire career just as a clinician. And leading up to that, what inspired me to become a therapist or a counseling psychologist is that I was always driven to understand the nature of humanity, the nature of human beings, and specifically from a standpoint of understanding the development of the human being. so before coming to Islam, we know that your journey was quite wide and you spent a lot of time with different groups. coming to your truth. can you speak to that journey a little bit? before before college, I used to used to travel, and I used to read a lot. mostly still within the US. I would, sort of explore sort of explore other communities, cultural, different cultural communities, and read on lots of different religious traditions. religious traditions. and then when I went to college, I started to, study, lots of different religious traditions. I started to study psychology. And the only ones that the only classes that interested me were psychology and religion. And I took some classes on Buddhism and and so I spent some time in college where I was actually finding a, a teacher named Baba Hari Dass, and he was, a Hindu and he was, a Hindu who taught yoga. But not just like hatha yoga, the sort of the spiritual tradition and also pranayama breathing practices. So I used to go up and he had like an ashram, and I used to and I used to study with him, study with him, and he had taken a vow of silence for, at that point, 40 years. And so he used to teach me on a on a chalkboard. Wow. And, we would do both And, we would do both physical practices of of yoga, but also, meditation and breathing practices. So, learning learning to control the breath. I had friends at the time in college. All my friends sort of had grown up with this, in this community and did things like, power pranayama where they would they would like, put, rebar in the soft part of their throat and bend it just without their hands going forward. They would, they would rip, phone books in half and they would do all of these, like, impressive things, but showing what you can do with the power of breath. so that's something that I, that I, I really resonated with and incorporated into my, my path or my understanding of myself and, and spirituality and this development of my understanding of psychology. But then I moved on because it didn't really resonate with me, the sort of, theological aspects of this within Hinduism. of this within Hinduism. I really liked the, the practical aspects and some of the, the philosophies of, of breath and self and building up your, capacity. capacity. But then I moved on. I would study other traditions. I practiced meditation for a long time, then Buddhism, and then I began traveling So I lived in Thailand for a while, and I studied in the jungle with a Buddhist monk, and we would fish out of rivers and, and just live very simple life. I lived in Jamaica, in the hills of Jamaica, with a Rastafarian, elder, and learned about the sort of deeper spiritual tradition of rastafarianism. I had dreadlocks at the time, Some of these aspects come from Christianity, but there understood in a way that is aligned with sort of the the notion of human beings that isn't, influenced by a colonialist narrative. So in the case of rastafarianism you are looking at the connection with the original human beings starting in Africa and there being this line of, of, of lineage of kings from Africa. And there was a that was a big part of my, my, path of understanding is that I was looking for this ancient human connection beyond all of these sort of socio political, post-colonial layers that we understand tradition and culture through if you're trying to find the heart of things. And so that was one of the things that that led me to that path. And again, as I'm in each one of these places, I'm taking and absorbing things that really made sense to me, that I would say it's almost like I felt like I had a barometer in me that was able to determine or sense what was true and what was perhaps a little bit off. I also spent time, as a shepherd in Palestine. in Palestine. like, I lived in, in a barn. in, in a barn. I slept on a bale of hay, and I and I had sheep and goats, and I used to be out in the field. I played a flute and, you know, just so I was, I was really connecting with these ancient ways of being and sort of these lines of lines of prophetic teachings and prophetic ways of being as well, and really fully taking on those that life, you know. So when I would live with people, I would submit to their way of life and act within those frameworks. But I was still But I was still trying to assess where I felt was the alignment with truth, to me, it wasn't about taking on a religion or not. It was. I always believed there was only one God, and therefore there was only one path to the true reality, and that everybody's really trying to get to that. And most people are pretty close. And so I would take And so I would take what I felt was aligned with that reality for myself and then move on because I felt like maybe they had 80% or 85% was was actually ‘Sah’ was correct. And then there was like this bit that was usually was didn't feel right to me. but it was primarily but it was primarily what, what I felt was off with what I now know as Aqeedah. What was off with the theological reality. And the irony is that And the irony is that I didn't yet know. I didn't yet have that whole theological reality presented to me in a way that I could see it as, okay, this is this is it. I just was going based on my own sense, and I wouldn't and I wouldn't even say intuition. more just like a deep seated feeling or knowing that there must be a truth. There must be a path. And I and I had a sense of being able to, sense whether it was on or off. And so I just kept moving on, traveling to other places and living with different communities and trying to find this true path. One path, I guess, And so, I kind of got to the point, after collecting all these gems from each one of these places that I had stopped on my journey, and these people that I learned from you know, beautiful people doing amazing things. But then there was something I just couldn't submit to, right? And so then I would keep going, and I kind of got to the point where I felt like, well, I'm going to have to put all these things together. the gems that I've collected from each one of these places and, I don't know, create my own path, perhaps, you know, not my own religion, but I didn't yet see that it was intact somewhere. And then, that was what set me up to find Islam Alhamdulilah. What was it that in the end, took you to Islam? What was the point that you thought this is the truth? the actual answer to that is Allah turned my heart. And I'm very clear on that, because for me, it wasn't a cognitive, rational decision based on something that I read. You know, just like what I'm explaining when I'm going to each one of these places, I'm really going based on a feeling, a knowing. I would say in my heart and in my heart and the point that I that it became clear was literally a just a knowing just, oh, it all came together. But but how I the ‘Sabab’ for me to the the vehicle for which for for which for that for Allah to finally you know, finally you know, illuminate that in my heart was when I, I was blessed enough to engage with Muslims that I feel like were holding Islam in, in a beautiful way, I would say in a, in a proper way. And what I mean by that is when I was traveling to each one of these places and staying with these communities, one of the things that put me off was the sense of tribalism, the sense of you. You have to be one of us to be righteous or saved or a believer. Right. And that that definition of one of us, they were determining they had determinations of whether if you do this or you have this bloodline or you're doing these behavioral actions, then you're saved, right? right? and and to me, that just felt like, well, how can you know what the reality of my soul is that that only, only God can assess that. and so and so and that was just another thing that I just knew had to be part of a true path, of a true path, that there would be a recognition that only Allah can know, that only Allah can know, only Allah can judge, and so upon that. When I was with this community of Muslims, which by the way, was with, with, was with a Sheikh Mohammed Jamal from Philistine. He was the caretaker of Al-Aqsa mosque. I met him through his students in the US. So I traveled all around the world. But it was in the US, ironically, in California, that I and I sort of first encountered Islam and the people the people who showed me Islam or who I came in contact with, they were Muslims, they were practicing Muslims. They prayed five times a day. They did the religion of Islam, and yet they treated me as if even though I wasn't Muslim and I wasn't praying, I wasn't doing all these things. They treated me as if I could potentially be on a higher level with them and, and, and still have a close relationship with Allah or potentially even a closer relationship with Allah. Right. And that didn't impact or affect their belief that this was the right path. They didn't need me to believe what they believe and they allowed for my state of my soul to actually be determined by Allah. and to me, that was, mind blowing, that that's exactly the heart of what I had been seeking all of this time. Is that It's not about a bloodline. It's not about a social identity. It's not about joining a club that makes you righteous or that makes you a believer, or that makes you somebody who is, a person of God. It's about your inner state, your intention and your the relative striving for getting close to Allah. That that is an unseen process internally that nobody can really understand except for Allah And nobody can judge that. And so, you know, we say in Islam, action is by intentions. But oftentimes people are really judging actions. I was drawn to this community because the Sheikh was teaching them Islam, but he was teaching them Islam through what he understood that, you know, Western people have a difficult time with religion. They think it's constricting. And, you know, people who didn't grow up with religion, or perhaps they're just in the secular space. And so a lot of people want of people want the healing and the love and the mercy, and they want the they want the light without the heat, like oftentimes people want the Haqiqah (reality) without the Sharia (the law). And so And so the Sheikh was completely teaching Sharia, teaching Sharia, but he was but he was he was front loading the Haqiqah with saying like, look, there's all of this beautiful, wisdom wisdom to access in the Islamic tradition that can heal people actually fundamentally heal not only spiritual diseases, but physical diseases. but physical diseases. and so he was offering that as a, as a net for, to catch people, essentially, or, you know, to, to, to say, look, look, this is, there's this beautiful things Islam has to offer. And then a lot of people were embracing Islam, realizing the full picture of it. actually ironically, it wasn't really a continuation of my quest in looking at different religions. it was more my quest for seeking this, path of healing this, path of healing the soul. And and then immediately it took very short time, as soon as I saw what we were doing and what he was teaching and what this was all about, it, it all just snapped. And that's when my heart completely shifted and I was like, this is this is what I had been seeking all along. Because now, as I started to look at it, because actually, I had already delved into all of the different depths of the soul as it's taught through all these different traditions. What I was looking for was the Silsilah Or that was the the thread that holds it all together, which really what I was lacking was the Sharia. I was lacking the thing that the path right, the way to understand it, make it, make it make sense, keep it all together. And so I, it all just clicked. And everything that I have collected from all these different, these gems that I talked about collecting from all these different places, they were all there within Islam. And then to me, it felt like that was just the beginning of the door had opened to this entire other depth that I hadn't even yet realized or discovered. And so it was just it was very immediate and very clear that that whole journey was my journey to Islam. and, and so I, I embraced Islam and, embraced Islam and, this simultaneously became my, my approach to psychology, my approach to understanding in psychology was was at that point completely informed by, by Islam.
