Doom scrolling and brain rot Doom scrolling and brain rot Doom scrolling and brain rot Doom scrolling and brain rot Doom [Applause] scrolling the Tik Tock dance the viral Tik Tock dance the idea that people will just make a video of themselves dancing to something and then put it up for everybody in the world to see that's a relatively new phenomenon you think that it's just a window out you think that it is just you accessing the world you're accessing other people you're accessing news information but every window out is also a window in to you
and once it becomes normalized then it's a possibility for you for the people around you it becomes a very very subtle form of peer pressure and we recognize this with children we know that with children there's some certain things that you don't expose them to like nobody would want children to be exposed to really gruesome things or explicit things when they're four 5 6 years old why why do we have that exception for children but we think that us as adults aren't affected well we realize that children are impressionable we realize that if you see
a six-year-old walking around with a cigarette it's disturbing because you expect them to be more innocent than that you expect them to be more pure than that you're surprised that that would seem like a possibility and that young child had to learn it had to see it from somewhere in order for it to become a possibility and then in order for him or her to actually enact that reality but we're not that different from children in the sense that we are impressionable we're very impressionable whether it's even words you know everybody makes uh fun of
the genz lingo or the different internet lingo or anything else and this is one of the amazing things about Islam that Islam calls us to be intentional and to bring a level of intentionality to everything that we do so you're intentional not just with the the food that you eat or not just in your prayers or your acts of worship but every single thing that you do every single thing that comes across your eyes every single thing that you're going to be listening to every single word that you speak every friendship that you strike up
it's not just because oh I like this person or I get along with this person this person makes me laugh no you actually have a responsibility to be intentional how is this going to affect my afterlife how is this going to affect my soul if I make this person a companion of mine or a friend of mine is it going to affect me positively or negatively is it going to normalize certain behaviors whether it's curse words or whether it's lying or going out to certain places places where sin happens or is this person going to
actually add value to my life and normalize and create a subtle kind of peer pressure that's going to force me to be better so we have to bring that level of intention and intentionality to everything that we do and especially in the days of social media and the internet you have to be super careful the algorithm is going to try to throw you it's going to try to take you down you've got targeted advertising you've got dangers everywhere it's a Minefield but as Allah said in the Quran that you've got to take responsibility there's no
neutrality this is a moving train you either have to decide to bring that level of intentionality to the things that you do and strive to be even if it's just a little bit every single day 1% better 1% better 1% better or you're going to just operate in cruise control you're going to let yourself be open to every influence out there and then without even realizing it perhaps you're going to be taken down down down to a worse and worse place
