This week's DMH meeting started off with a debate. The statement was "Fear is an effective motivator in changing people's behavior." The two positions were to strongly agree and to strongly disagree. Everybody had stood on the strongly agreeing side (Shais had a little misunderstanding of the topic, so he went from disagreeing side to the agreeing.) The reason why I believed fear was an effective motivator that can change people's behavior is because fear causes a person to act out in a different way than they normally would just because of fear. The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines fear as an unpleasant often strong emotion caused by anticipation or awareness of danger. This expectance of trouble makes a person want to take different steps to protect himself and his loved ones. Then the statement was changed from "Fear is an effective motivator in changing people's behavior" to ""Fear being the most effective motivator in changing people's behavior." Now, everyone switched to the strongly disagreeing side. The reason why I believed that fear cannot be the most effective motivator was because there are many other positive factors that can implement a change in a person's behavior, such as courage and faith, and Ali's fact from a Psych study proves it in which positive reinforcements is a greater motivator in changing a person's behavior than negative reinforcements. All in all, there not much debating but much more of everyone agreeing to why they all took the same position.
The topic of the day was "How can you turn belief into action?" We were asked to reflect upon how we can turn belief into action with a factual example. If you can carry out the belief with confidence that can bring about a positive impact for you and your environment is one way to bring about action, like the Arab Spring. The people had enough and their strong belief in bringing down the government caused them to take action and bring about a revolution to not only their country, but to put hope and confidence around surrounding countries.
We then compared two historical figures, Malcom X and Omar Ibn Al-Khattab (RA), on how they used the same principle to bring about change in their own personal lives. Malcolm X took the time to bring about change from his pimped out, drug addicted lifestyle to becoming one of the most prominent and intellectual figurehead in American history. His course was to learn and understand the words in a dictionary because he believed that words had power, and the more words you learned, the more influence you will have over the reader or listener. Omar Ibn Al Khattab was an atrocious enemy of Islam before he converted, but when his own family member had turned to Islam for guidance, he thought he might as well understand what everyone was raving about. As soon as he read the verses from Surah Taha, he was struck and converted to Islam that day. His strong belief made him one of the most feared and just figurehead of Islam, and he was also the Second Khalifa, after Abu Bakr As- SIdeeq (RA). The Caliphate was the series of rulers who were the leaders of Islam after the death of the Prophet (SAW).
The day went on with more discussion on these two leaders, and we also did a little collage by using random pictures from magazines to represent their background and the accomplishments they did in their lifetime. In conclusion, having strong belief in something and taking the initiative to put that belief into movement can bring about great change, and it proved highly beneficial for Omar Ibn Al- Khattab and Malcom X.
The topic of the day was "How can you turn belief into action?" We were asked to reflect upon how we can turn belief into action with a factual example. If you can carry out the belief with confidence that can bring about a positive impact for you and your environment is one way to bring about action, like the Arab Spring. The people had enough and their strong belief in bringing down the government caused them to take action and bring about a revolution to not only their country, but to put hope and confidence around surrounding countries.
We then compared two historical figures, Malcom X and Omar Ibn Al-Khattab (RA), on how they used the same principle to bring about change in their own personal lives. Malcolm X took the time to bring about change from his pimped out, drug addicted lifestyle to becoming one of the most prominent and intellectual figurehead in American history. His course was to learn and understand the words in a dictionary because he believed that words had power, and the more words you learned, the more influence you will have over the reader or listener. Omar Ibn Al Khattab was an atrocious enemy of Islam before he converted, but when his own family member had turned to Islam for guidance, he thought he might as well understand what everyone was raving about. As soon as he read the verses from Surah Taha, he was struck and converted to Islam that day. His strong belief made him one of the most feared and just figurehead of Islam, and he was also the Second Khalifa, after Abu Bakr As- SIdeeq (RA). The Caliphate was the series of rulers who were the leaders of Islam after the death of the Prophet (SAW).
The day went on with more discussion on these two leaders, and we also did a little collage by using random pictures from magazines to represent their background and the accomplishments they did in their lifetime. In conclusion, having strong belief in something and taking the initiative to put that belief into movement can bring about great change, and it proved highly beneficial for Omar Ibn Al- Khattab and Malcom X.