Ep 12: Breaking Bread and Building Bridges with Saadia Ahmed

In Episode #12, I am honored to share this enlightening conversation with Saadia Ahmed, who I reached out to after the recent executive order on immigration to find out how I could become an ally to the Muslim community.

Saadia and her husband live in Los Gatos, California with their two children. She is a talented Financial Advisor serving high-level women professionals and entrepreneurs, couples and families. She is actively engaged in her local community, is a member of Watermark, and is passionate about issues and opportunities in the areas of education and empowerment of women.

She is also a bridge builder, and in this episode, she shares that after 9/11, she became heavily involved in outreach for her community and proactively pursued inter-faith dialogue as a way to find common ground with others.

We talk about some of the stereotypes held about Muslim women, how she has stepped into and developed leadership among the women in her community, and our mutual desire to reach out beyond our bubble, with curiosity, to better understand people with different beliefs.

Saadia and I have decided to become partners in this effort and plan to “break bread” together with other women to build understanding. This is the challenge we offer to you as well. I hope you leave this conversation, as I did, inspired to learn more about the people around us, and the shared values that we all hold dear, no matter how different we may seem.

Topics discussed in this episode:

• The importance of building bridges of communication with our children and with those who are different from us.
• Saadia’s move to the U.S. because of religious persecution in Pakistan.
• The recent executive order on travel and immigration and how to become an ally to the Muslim community
• Celebrating diversity through faith and reaching out to build bridges through “breaking bread.”
• The importance of the examples we set for our children and of honoring our children’s individuality and views

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• The Awakened Family by Shefali Tsabary
• The True Islam Campaign - where you can explore eleven truths about Islam and sign up to become a Muslim Ally
• My blog post “Focus on Our Goodness” where I reflected on moving from negativity into action after the immigration ban
• Unbubble to get connected online to people with differing viewpoints

A big THANK YOU to our "patrons" for helping to bring these conversations to myself and other mothers through financial support:

• Caren and Debbie Lieberman who dedicated this week’s episode to our mother Fran Lieberman
• Cameron Miranda
• Fran and David Lieberman
• Debbie and Alan Goore
• Jenise and Marianne of the Sustainable Living Podcast

Announcements:

This episode #12 marks an important milestone. It is the number of episodes I set out to complete in my first season. I didn’t know what to expect when I started out on this podcasting path, but it has been all I hoped for and more.

So much more that I did decide to extend the first season another 6 episodes to take us through to April. The next episode will be another solocast and an opportunity for me to reflect on common themes from the first twelve episodes and some of the ways in which these interviews have enriched my life. And, I will give you a preview of the interviews ahead, so make sure to listen in on that episode for all the details.

And, if you would be open to spreading the news of my extended season, stay tuned for a link to my ThunderClap campaign. With your help, the day the extended season launches, there can be a thunderous announcement on social media to help reach more moms with these conversations.

Finally, I heard from so many of you that you loved last week’s episode with Kristina Kuzmik, the Truth Bomb Mom and that you, like me, are up for her positivity challenge. I created the Live Your E.P.I.C. Life Planning and Reflection Sheets to help us record our weekly intentions using the EPIC Framework and reflect at the end of each day on that one positive thing we want to focus on. You can get the free download at mothersquest.com/reflectionsheets.

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