Hello everybody, we're gonna start in a couple of minutes But I did want to make an announcement that our beloved colleagues from UIUC cannot be here today They got trapped in champagne Urbana. So if you're here to hear their talk You might want to think about another session. We'll be talking about We won't be insulted. So so the only presentation today will be on the the bib flow project at UC Davis And Tim and his colleagues and their deep regrets, but they were I think it was Freezing fog or something and they they just couldn't even get to Chicago. So they sent their apologies Okay, it's five past the hour, so I think we're safe to start now I'm sure people will trickle in from lunch, but I want to keep us on time We have a luxury of time since there's only one presentation But that's good because it's a big project So we'll have ample time to talk about it and leave some time for discussion at the end So my name is Mackenzie Smith, and I'm the University Librarian at the University of California Davis campus and the PI on this project And I'm gonna just give you a little bit of context for it for those of you who have not heard presentations on this before And then I'm gonna turn it over to the person who's really doing all the work and introduce him in a minute so the flow is a project funded by the IMLS and It was the culmination of many years of observation on my part that we in the library world when it comes to Operations technical services were living in the 1970s We have Mark and other standards that were developed many many decades ago We have Technologies integrated library systems that were architected and written many many decades ago and they have evolved But in some really fundamental ways both the infrastructure that we're using and the workflows have not really kept up with the modern world and in particular the web and link data so In previous institutions, I worked on projects to try to integrate all this great library data that we have Across many different silos. So you've got mark. You've got ea defining aids. You've got GIS data You've got DDI data. You've got many many buckets of data and Very poor ways to integrate and navigate and exploit that data To support the library's activities. So We decided to take on the challenge of thinking about what it would look like if the whole library operation Flipped to link data from the ground up, you know And then how would we get from here to there and that's really what the bib flow project is about it's about developing a roadmap to help the library community and our Technical services operations get from where we are today, which is kind of the 1970s with a little lipstick on it to 2020 which is where we're going to be very soon. So This has been a very long and arduous project and there are lots of other people here in this room working on various other Aspects of link data, but this one was really focused on that back-end operation that as a library director I'm spending a lot of money on and could be done much much more efficiently So that's the context of the project and to kind of we're just wrapping it up now after two and a half years or so And so this is kind of the final findings of the project that we'll be sharing with you today And to do that I'll introduce my colleague Carl Stamer Who is the head of our data and digital scholarship department at the UC Davis library and Formerly the director of digital scholarship and has a long and storied background in linked data ontologies and kind of the future of data Standard, so he's the perfect person to lead you through this work. Thanks Carl All right, so What I'm going to do is give a this is a high altitude view of what is in the road map itself So that road map will come out within will deliver it to IMLS by the 29th. It has to be there It will definitely be available then but hopefully within a week from now actually we'll start Publishing it online so that people can get to it and it has a lot more detail behind the things that I'm going to talk about today One of the sort of premise there is that we actually have a dual access of transformation has to happen here We have to transform our data But we also have to transform all of the systems that surround that data and that's both human and machine So workflows that are in place and also a software We have a lot of different software systems and sort of machine systems in the library that also Communicate with that data. So it's a large-scale effort to try to as Mackenzie said actually from the ground up Change everything I'm not going to this isn't a technical talk So I'm going to try really hard not to get down on the weeds of like what linked data is and how it works But a just a couple key concepts. I want to touch on quickly Because if you don't just have these key concepts the rest of the talk is not going to make much sense So the one thing first thing I want to talk about is something that you'll hear me say probably quite a bit Which is a linked data ecosystem when I talk about a linked data ecosystem What I mean is a fully functioning linked data library where everything we're doing is now in a linked data space You see in the visualization that that has these four Discrete areas that are that we've identified one is our cataloging We need our cataloging to actually happen to take advantage of linked data Not just have the same records be produced and converted to linked data We've got linked data exchange So instead of exchanging mark records with other libraries that we would actually be exchanging data as linked data as triples I'm working my way around counterclockwise. We've got linked data discovery So now we spent a lot of time Making the our data as linked data. How does that going to affect our discovery universe, right? Hopefully a lot actually because there's a lot of new cool things we can do and then finally the shaded out block that you see there is linked data storage storing our data as a triple store natively and The plan that I'm going to outline is designed to get to that but I do feel obligated to say that that's not Really one could operate fully in a linked data ecosystem without doing that Because the data layer is often not based on whatever your real standard is the way you think of it so a lot of people think that Real quick here if I look at it's a this is where I get a little technical But I'm going to do it if you think about the way software gets architected this model view controller is something that came out quite a while people that do software development and most of the ILS is that you are using work this way Where your model is your data store and it lives separate like it has its own universe And then you have these two other components that interact with it You have your view is your user interface That's how you interact with your universe with the data universe and you have a controller Which you know like does the math two times two is four convert this string You know it all uppercase so the functionality is happening there But all the data lives in this data layer in the model and already in your current ILS that model is not a mark record And it is not mark-based. So this is just a snippet of a small thing from the qualiola ILS system, which I'll call even though it's not technically an ILS, but it's easier to say You know it there's some like 450 tables like several thousands of fields You know that drive that product if you look around you can find mark in it, but it is definitively not a mark Record, you know behind the product. That's the same for all your ILS is so You know and yet they deliver mark when people catalog their view looks like mark we exchange mark So it's not Imperative that your data store become a native triple store But I'm going to talk about reasons why I actually think you should do that so The other key concept that you have to have is the concept of a URI and I'm again I'm going to try not to go into the weeds of link data, but a URI is a unique identifier It's a it's a fancy name for a unique identifier Just like we already have IDs that are unique in a lot of different databases The key difference being that we would in link data land share those right in the same way that we share a particularly Formatted string now, but that URI is designed to be machine readable The computer knows how to do something with it and so in the example I put up here We see a sort of human statement, which would be that Shakespeare William 1564 to whatever his data 1616 Right and that's the properly formatted string, you know He authored this work Hamlet in the bottom example. You see how that would be configured in link data We have the URI for Shakespeare that unique identifier and then the label of the name But the label it's just that the name is a label now It's not the thing and then we have another URI which is a markry later code that we've used from Library Congress that if this was authored and Then we have an OCLC work ID for Hamlet, right? So these URIs are really The key to what makes link data work, right? So this graph you're looking at right here is something I just threw up really quickly It's one of my favorite examples where I looked in Wikipedia Wikipedia exposes as wiki data All the stuff there as linked data And so I'm able to traverse various sources and just quickly create this graph, but that graph only works because we have a The URIs there it keys on those URIs if they weren't all using the same URI if a bunch of people weren't using the same URI for Quentin Tarantino none of these connections would work and you end up with what I call linkless open data Right if we all just minted different URIs none of them talked there'd be no advantage here So the URI really is the heart and soul of linked data RDF matters triple stores matter all of that, but what really matters is that we're sharing URIs Without that your link data is not worth much even though I could formulate it as triples So what we have that's the end of my tech drill down now. We're gonna get back to the the process So the process we've identified is a two-phase process that's designed to move a library from their complete mark universe up to total native link data operations and it Importantly though the reason it's two phases is because is I'll go through and describe each step if phase one is Not that expensive there aren't that many barriers to doing that and if you move through phase one you could actually be Minimally functioning in a linked data universe You won't be able to capitalize on everything but you will you could actually put out RDF exchange RDF with people and You'd be working functionally in a linked data universe phase two takes you past that to really your full workflows and back End supporting that and so the key to that phase one is having your mark and eating it too Which is that you could you can still and this is the reason why it's cheap and there's not a big barrier for entry the whole concept behind phase one is that Almost entirely you don't have to change your workflow at all your catalogers can still work in their mark land Right, but we're doing just a few crucial things to set ourselves up for that linked data transformation So the in the first thing we're doing the first step of this is Getting URIs inserted in our mark data right, so The theory being that if we catalog in mark But every place there was a name or a subject or those things that we already pivot on we were also getting a URI into that universe Then we'd be setting our data up for good transformation to link data because we now have a map between the label that we use and the URI and Happily, it's pretty easy to do this actually so this is Again a screenshot from qualiola. They're described universe where we were able to go in and in and I mean this seriously About 45 minutes that it took to code in an auto lookup to Library of Congress using their linked data gateway Right so that when you the person starts typing it types ahead Everything feels exactly the same to our cataloger, but when they select that name This is the name that I'm talking about it's grabbing the name and the URI and It's saving that into the mark right saving both those things in the mark. It's effectively invisible to the cataloger They haven't they don't have to know anything about linked data. They don't have to do anything different here. We modified our qualiolae But also I've seen demonstrations we use Alma so ex Libris and I'm familiar with they have a linked data pilot going on And I've already seen demonstrations of the Alma interface that will do this right work for you So the barrier of entry here is for step one a phase one you have to have a Modified cataloging interface a workbench that does this URI grab that instead of talking to your local authority file Either talks to a new kind of authority local authority that has the URIs there or Better yet just goes out and hits the gateways that are out there because that's what linked data is all about right And there's every reason to expect that this will happen in the very near future Like I said, we know commercial ILS providers are working on this and so especially if you're in a cloud-based ILS system You know, there's virtually no tech overhead in implementing this I mean it just happens your catalogers don't have to do much You just sort of can roll into this universe with very little pain no retraining of your cataloging staff The next thing you have to do though this one gets a little bit harder is You have to do some batch URI insertion because once we have that cataloging interface is that takes care of everything I do from this day forward, but I got a whole ton of legacy data that doesn't have URIs in it, right? So about two years ago the PCC formed a task group that was testing URI insertion and mark and It did a couple of things number one I just wanted to see would it break it like where would you put things would it fry? So they spent a significant amount of time just Toying with mark finding places that were appropriate and then seeing okay if we stick those in there Does it break the current ILS right because it's not expecting to find that there turns out no They were actually able to find places where you can put the mark that Seem appropriate from mark point of view and that don't break your current ILS. So, you know We're copacetic. Everything's good. The next phase was figuring out. Okay. How would we do that? And I'm not going to go into the details of that I would invite you to really go online look at the reports that come from this task group Jackie Shay at George Washington University. They did a tremendous amount of work. They basically did their entire catalog They worked out systems for doing this that cover a lot of it automatically where the the computer can really know like with a very high degree of Confidence that this is good and no human even has to touch it then it falls into your other pile of Stuff that needs a human touch right so Realistically on this part you have to have some IT technical staff because you have to run the various scripts that they have And you have to devote a cataloger To this process to be the human touch right it took them you'd have to look at the report But I think they spent about six months Converting their catalog to that it was fast for a test. My guess is it would take you longer than that to really go into production Right. So this is the costly the most cost-heavy part of this phase one When you finish that now, let's say you finished it now You actually have all of your mark is set up for linked data. You've got your eyes for all the pivot points Every new thing you do is capturing them. So even though you're still working a mark You're totally set up for conversion The last thing you would need to do to actually function in that environment is to set up some important export APIs that work with Link data right so I can keep my mark remembering that my model Can be different my model doesn't have to be a triple store a set of API's That know how to receive link data and know what to send out can translate that it can use either if they're baked in API's to your ILS which again several little ILS's are already experimenting with and doing Or the other thing that we've played with and this really works Although it seems very inefficient is an API to an API Right if your ILS doesn't have that it's gonna it's designed to receive a call and send it to you You know a certain amount of data all you do it has to have another process that calls that right and then reformulates It is triples and sends it out So if the conclusion of this Process you really will be functioning in a linked data universe, but at a very low level right you have sort of minimally viable RDF That you're communicating with the rest of the world your catalogers are working in mark But they're capturing some linked data stuff But you haven't there's no net gain here in terms of the quality of your records or efficiency to cataloging You're doing everything the same way The only gain is you could talk to other libraries who are also moving in that direction to a big frame world, right? So that's and that's not nothing. It's important But it's only to us. It's only an iterative step, but if you're a very small library, you don't have a lot of resources You know this may be where you stop for some period of time actually and you could function with the universe That is really moving to full-blown linked data Phase two is designed to really move into that complete complete linked data ecosystem, right? So it's where we move from phase one to phase two and Completion of phase one is crucial to this step because we need the URIs already in the mark To start the transition the way this plan roadmap works so the first transition here the step one of this phase two is to iteratively translate to completely linked data native cataloging and When I say iterative what really is the crucial part here is we we looked at this from various directions But like on Tuesday the 24th at 3 p.m Switching your entire entire cataloging effort over to linked data is very painful and prone to error It's difficult to pull off at a training level because you basically have to be training everybody at the same time or in iterations And then you throw a switch and you hope your process is nailed and you've got it, right? There's no real chance for learning and either works or doesn't and then you're in a bad spot, right? Because in that in-between time Not a lot of work is getting done. So a much better approach to this. However, you have your metadata services Organized is you can in this world. We can move in chunks. We can move and I'm gonna talk about the technology in a second I can just take a group of four or five catalogers one cataloger who's worked doing a particular kind of work And I can say okay I'm gonna transition them first and the other people can stay in their mark universe with the interface that they're used to And that allows us to walk in It's way less disruptive and it also allows you when the first iteration goes bad And you learn what you learn to then apply that to the next iteration it gets more efficient with each small incremental move When we so we're as we're moving oh people over what we're doing then is moving them to a whole new interface a whole new view For cataloging that is really designed for linked data, right? And so it opens up a lot of different possibilities So the one I'm showing right here is the Library of Congress Bib Frame editor It has a a lot of things in it that are really modeled around this new Bib Frame universe The new data model, right? So like a first thing you see I'll just the very first thing is is this an instance of a work, right? It has baked into it this work instance model It and it but what it does in this case this approach is in order to You know ease the transition and I would say actually ease the anxiety Personally in a lot of ways it uses those labels the RDA labels that people are familiar with Catalogers see this that it's not so jarring and so different and it makes for an easy transition and it will pump out Based perfect bib frame, right? I mean it's good and it's there this version is the online version There is a according to the website a next big frame 2.0 version that will actually be downloadable software Yes, okay Sally's giving me the nod. Yes, so that is still happening And that will make it much more efficient, right? It would be hard and it would probably get a denial of service if you tried to like, you know Ping this with your whole catalog, but when you can bring it down run as your own software It's a great interface Another one I'll show we've been experimenting with it looks very similar this bib frame scribe that was developed by Zafira one of our partners and It is very similar, but takes a slightly different user interface approach and that it doesn't use any of the already labels It just says jump into this new world, right? A title is a title. I don't care What kind of title it is because I'm going to go out You know and pull variants of the title at Infanitem as they show up out of the link data web, right? So it tries to basically get you as a cataloger to throw away a lot of your assumptions that may or may not be necessary in this New world. I like it. It's cool, but it admittedly it's jarring to catalogers, right? So Realistically we're probably in a migration space. I predict ultimately we get to this other kind of world but starting with that Library of Congress interface that looks very familiar is It's a good idea. We also experimented experimented with some barcoding sort of really trying to improve efficiency So for copy cataloging we built this little phone app that you just start score you scan an ISBN and It talks goes out to OCLC You know says what work is this and through a series of pings between OCLC Library of Congress We're actually able to build the entire record on the fly a lot of the times without any human intervention If it gets to a point where it needs disambiguation and just ask you which one of these is it boom You hit a button and it keeps going But it's really easy really efficient and more of these kinds of new tools really will lead to efficiencies in cataloging Now the one thing I talked about that I mentioned is in order to make this work to iteratively walk through We have to synchronize this has to synchronize with your current ILS. That's the complicated part of this issue, right? So setting up one of these work benches not a lot of time involved works well This is the part that's expensive for a phase two So the model that we have and I'm not going to talk about the whole thing And my laser pointer doesn't work on these screens So I can't it's hard for me to really walk you through but basically here my mouse You see there's a series of connectors basically so when we're working in a linked data Catalogging interface we're pushing to a triple store and then we have processes that watch that triple store And they will push a mark version of that into the regular ILS With an API by the same token we built things that are watching the ILS and they're pushing Triples back to the triple store which we can do because we're putting mark We're putting you our eyes and our mark, right? They're thin records, but it works and it keeps the two things in sync And that's how we can just move one thing at a time move it over everything's cool There's no disruption of service on that model The last thing we have to do here or the second thing is we have to batch convert same as in the last thing right We have to run processes to convert. What's my time looking like? I'm good So I'm going to talk about a couple different tools to do the batch again key factor here is the We have the things we need to do a basic batch convert because we have our URIs We're there we can start moving legacy stuff over into our triples again Library of Congress transformation tool it will right now like The cataloger it is online version right now You can test also is coming out as a standalone version for bib frame 2.0 that you can run locally, right? And so you can use this service to transform your existing records It will not surprisingly give you really good bib frame And so it's it's a very good option if that's your complete linked data universe I haven't had a chance to play around with it and enough to know what would happen if I wanted to try to throw in other Namespaces like let's say I had cdoxerm that I wanted to use to describe a different kind of physicality about things right So this is one option Second option is mark edit which most people are familiar with if you work in in cataloging It's mark next capability. It has a very cool ability to do transformations so it'll read in the mark and Then it uses XSLT for those people that know what that is So you have these standalone files that you write you don't have to touch the program in any way Basically says take this put it there and convert the record how you want it to be It's very flexible because of that because you can just write multiple transformations like this XSLT turns it in to bib frame This one turns it in to whatever You know, you could have a thousand of them and keep doing it and Terry Reese has set up a communal Git for all those transformations so they can be shared right so there can be community work on those I don't have to build a specific transformation on my own if somebody else already has I can just use yours And we can share those so it highly flexible It's conducive to community Working together the downside for this is that it really is you have to be in a Windows universe for it to work Well, I use it all the time and I do use there are versions for other platforms I use it on my Mac, but it is buggy and and I don't blame the product for that You know, it's Terry's building this and you know Windows This is world and so why you know, it's fair enough, but you should know that right if you're gonna go in a Similar product, but that isn't bound to an operating system is this extensible catalog and Extensible catalog works as a web service. So it runs under Servlet container you can run under Tomcat jetty and it it runs as a web So you set it up and you it has an admin interface. That's a web page You go in and you point it to an existing catalog It'll do an OII PMH connection to your ILS or it will read mark XML And you set up this call and you tell it I want you to pull this every day I want you to pull it every month whatever that is and then it uses separate JavaScript files Just like the XSL T and my mark edit where you define your transformations And what you do is you say, okay check this every day Anytime there's something new that you see or a change then you run the transformation and kick out The triples on the other side It would transform it to anything but in my case we use it to transform triples What's nice about it is it does synchronize in that way because it's continuously polling on your schedule So it handles updates and changes that might happen on the other end So that the downside to this product is it's in terms of disk space. It's very Takes a lot of disk space It basically you end up with at least three separate versions of your catalog You've got your original version in the ILS The way it works when it does it's pulling through a IPMH or mark XML It saves a whole separate version in in sequel and that's how it does its transactional processing Let's change what hasn't and then you have your triples version you put out and that can turn into a lot of data For a full library catalog. You also have to have a much higher level of technical expertise in-house to run this It's you know, it takes a server administrator to put this in place and make it work But you kind of set it up and then you can walk away and the flexibility is cool. You also could write homegrown scripts My opinion there are very very very few libraries for whom this would be a good option number one barrier you have to have people that can write them and you're essentially starting from scratch for all your transformations but if you have in-house expertise and you are in a situation where you wanted to pump out data a Lot of different ways. You wanted to do different kinds of cleaning while it was on its way out You know this that's the time that I would implement this is if you really have some souped-up custom stuff you want to do otherwise we have tools and I wouldn't want to spend a lot of time building your own going your own road here Vendor services. I want to talk about Where have all the vendors gone not really that they've left because we're new to this space But this seems to me like a ripe area for a vendor service, right? We already share how we get through WorldCat how we get catalog records and OCLC in general and you know We so there's already a system set up where someone else has a record and we we get that copy of that That seems to me that we could do the same thing here, right? And so we're not all converting the same bibliographic record 3,000 times Or also Someone to literally just handle the batch conversion as a service so Zafira has done that for several libraries where they just go in and they handle the process of just doing the entire batch conversion and so there's a service model there also and I I hope I on this one. I don't want to say I predict I hope there are vendor people in the audience and I hope you see the value of the business model of this service Because it would help us immensely in terms of bringing the whole Community over and not just those of us that have in-house tech departments that can handle the you know more complicated stuff on our own Step three for the conversion is another iterative loop And this is the iteration where we deal with all of the systems that talked to our cataloging data So we get to this point. This could run simultaneously with iterating through your catalogers Also, but the idea here. This is UC Davis We drew this up that some 40 different systems that in some form or another touch our catalog and that data Right that they have to know what's there. That's a lot of stuff to move over and Again, if you just tried to do this all at one time, it would be disastrous It also wouldn't be cost-effective because what you'd have to do is bring in a whole bunch of short-term staff To try to get everything done and move it over so it doesn't make any sense So again with our iterative model This this hybrid where we're talking to both universes. You can just do this one system at a time Right and then when that one if you have a problem if it doesn't work as you've built new connectors for it to talk It's very you know, you haven't lost a lot You can roll back that one much easier than you could roll back another you know 39 or 40 And you can learn something from that first one that you can apply to the next one you get better or more efficient with each one So this iterative plan really is the way to go Again here because lots of these systems we share in common other people are using them we have an opportunity to Publish the transformation services that we come up with many of which will initially just be connectors, right? This thing's expecting to get data this way now my data looks like that So I just have to create a go-between a little API that that delivers what's it want what it wants and vice versa we can share those there's no need for us all to build those and So I'm hoping we will do that Timing wise let me go to the next slide.   That final what used to be or could be a terrifying step is not so terrifying because you actually Know you've got several months probably a year of time Working in this other environment, so you can feel safe and good about turning that off and it's not a major point of disruption Now this phase two Obviously relies on a lot of things that have to get written technologies that don't exist so much, right? This is the part where again I put in a pitch But I really do have faith and confidence enough people working in this area even at Davis I mean it were two years from phase two best-case scenario, right at getting and we're highly motivated Maybe one year, you know depends on how motivated I can get McKenzie, but You know we have a limited budget, right? So we can only move so fast with stuff, right? But you know there's there is time and as we're involved in phase one and we're functioning There's every reason to expect that you know a variety both open source and commercial systems To support phase two will come online You know I really if you build it they will come if we're all now operating in a data level there I really do have a high level of faith that that will happen The couple of the things I'm going to talk about what's my time? Okay, yeah Just because they are the kind of pain points in this that everybody asks about I'm not going to get into big details about them other than to acknowledge that they're there and that there are Potentials and solutions so the one of the big ones is discovery layer You know we keep seeing these kinds of graphs however they get developed But that's not a full-fledged linked data discovery layer and there was a panel earlier today on Moving into new types of discovery and I think a lot of work still needs to be done there, right? How do we really formulate a discovery layer that? Capitalizes on this but again, I think there's time we've got multi years before we really got to that point to build things and test right now your options are You know blacklight on Lucene and solar which will index that the triples is a good option a lot of people that do do link data use that There's also a close cousin the blacklight product called colex That's a was a melon funded project for many years and we actually just last night at about three in the morning rolled out The the working latest iteration that that melons been funding that is total triple store base And it brings a lot of different faceted kinds of browsing and just it's it's different than blacklight It's really not better. It's a different sort of approach to the information universe. So But that's open-source software. It's available. You could use the so I think we'll get there on discovery The last thing I'm going to mention is the big authority control question right which comes up regularly and it comes up for a good reason Because it has to change the way we do authority control now just doesn't work in an environment where People are minting triples. They're riding triples. They're minting their own URIs potentially as part of that process So what what happens here just as the example? So this is our link data Workbench that I showed before and let's say so here. I'm typing Shakespeare in I find it It's in Library of Congress. That's great and I select it and I've got a URI. The problem is when you get this Right, there's nothing. There's nothing there. I have two choices. One is just stop cataloging and put that on shelf We don't want to do that. It's very inefficient. It doesn't let us capitalize on this link data universe So what most people agree is that we will mint your local URIs Some people think they will mint a local URI no matter what for every entity and then just connect it with a Library of Congress Or a buy-off or wherever it comes from so we need systems to manage this authority control process and One of the models that's coming out of here is some point whether it were commercial or whatever Some reconciliation process and that's my third party in the middle so if we're all minting our own URIs different sources, but we're contributing to a aggregation of reconciliation Process somewhere and we already this is what buy-off already does and it you know It says there's this version of the name this one those people have said it's this and these are all the same thing, right? We're just doing the same thing where we're doing it with URIs Cornell University right now has an IMLS grant that's looking specifically at this project or at this problem There's a lot of really smart people working on that and I this is this is a very much a solvable problem And out of that will come a solution so it's not as scary as People think it is and the good news is like a lot of linked data that solution will happen mostly behind the scenes So it's not something your catalogers are really gonna have to to deal with unless they actually are a reconciliation cataloger Which could happen as a whole job, but so it is being handled. It's there So last that's gonna pretty much close. I would encourage you to keep track of the bib flow blog We will put the entire roadmap up It'll probably because I have to convert it from its printed form to you know bloggy form So around the new year that it will come up there and at least from my perspective our IMLS funding is ending on this But I definitely consider this roadmap, you know a living roadmap as we march down this road and implementation We will continue to update as needed so that other people can learn from, you know, what we're doing So with that I'm gonna go ahead and say thank you and we'll take questions if there are any Before I turn it over. Thank you Carl. That was great Before I turn it over to questions I just want to make a few closing remarks one is a lot of people say well, you know So what we can do this But why would we bother and I have to remind you that a lot of libraries are investing a lot of money in the systems That we have today the workflows and the staff and again We're not achieving the real benefit of the value of that data that we're creating so Expensively this is a way out. It's a way to inform the vendor community about what we need Going forward. It's a way to enable next-generation discovery systems that you've been hearing about And it's a way to become much more efficient and effective so that we can free up resources to do new things like catalog data sets and Stuff that we're just unable to get to now because of these pretty antiquated workflows. So What is inspiring to me is that there is now this way we can kind of see of how over a few years You can get from A to B So even though we're down in the weeds talking about technology that we all find very boring because it's really old in a crusty like mark This is really important.  We're in now and Work with the vendor community and with each other to move forward So we would love to hear your questions about this and encourage you to Approach us about how we can work together as a community to make this happen. Thank you


So when you've entered that building, you've all started getting confused of which way you were going.


Assalamu alaikum warahmatullahi warahmatullahi wabarakatuhu. So in 2018 I was blessed, my husband and I were blessed in that we got to celebrate 25 years of marriage and as of this past August it's been 30 years now, masha'Allah. At the time Seeker's guidance, Shefra Zirrani asked me if I would be willing to write an article in which I detailed the tips and pieces of advice and the dos and don'ts of what I had learned over the past two and a half decades in married life. And so I sat down and wrote this piece called 25 years worth of marriage advice and that article then developed into a talk and this talk is one that I give at various Lua parties. So that article then developed into a talk that I've been giving at various, they're called now Dua parties. We didn't have them back when I got married in 1993 but masha'Allah it's a beautiful tradition that many families have started now where along with the bridal shower and the mendhi and the dolki and the little dance parties that young women have before their wedding celebrations they'll also have an event called a Dua party where they'll have somebody come and speak and give marriage advice and the elders will give advice to the young bride and her friends. And so this talk developed from that and so primarily most of the advice in this article is geared towards women and for today's talk I've tweaked it a little bit so that it addresses men as well as women but what I want people to resist doing is I want women, the sisters to resist thinking when they hear the advice in this discussion today, well what about the men? What about him? Why are you just talking to us? And for the brothers I'd like to encourage that you refrain from hearing some of this advice and thinking aha are you listening to the wives and to any other women in their lives. So this whatever you feel benefits you take from it insha'Allah whatever you feel doesn't apply to you feel free to ignore. I will say however that everything I listed in this article has worked for me and has worked in the lives of women that I respect and admire whom I've been blessed to be able to observe and so I'm only sharing that which I feel actually benefits insha'Allah. But I do want you to keep in mind that everything I'm sharing is it is for those people who are in healthy marriages and by healthy marriages I mean that both spouses are God-fearing they're not emotionally or physically abusive they know how to give their partners their rights they don't have any debilitating addictions vices personality disorders or mental health struggles so I wanted to say that from the get-go because a lot of these tips only work if you're in the right frame of mind insha'Allah. So the first big overarching umbrella piece of advice that my mother shared with us and many women senior women in our community shared is make Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala your number one love and a scholar once told us that we should be looking at our orders of priorities in our lives like a pyramid so you look at it like a pyramid and you and your partner on the bottom and Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala is at the top and the understanding is that as you and your partner grow closer to Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala you also grow closer to each other and one of the other scholars said to us that you want to marry somebody who's going to drag you to Jannah and upon first hearing that the reaction is drag you to Jannah that doesn't sound very nice like sounds kind of violent and forceful what does that mean but what it actually is indicating is that getting to Jannah isn't easy and there's going to be times that you're going to feel discouraged there's going to be times you're going to want to give up there's going to be times when you're going to be lazy and you're going to want a partner who's going to encourage you and motivate you until you know we can do this we're going to do this together insha'Allah so each partner wants to be that for the other somebody who's going to drag drag the other to Jannah and so we want to look at our lives like a pyramid where we and our partner are down here on the bottom and Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala is at the top and we also want to look at our circles of concern in the core of our circles of concern in the core is Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala always making sure that his rights are met and then after Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala we women we look at our husbands and men we look at our men look at their wives and their parents who are also their responsibility and then after that our children after that our teachers and our scholars and our neighbors and after that the greater community and what happens sometimes is that people get the order of priorities mixed up and that's when you see the baraka leaving the marriage where maybe we end up spending all our time giving it to the community and we're not looking at what our children need or maybe we're giving all our time to our best friends and we're not looking at what our husband needs so it's important to make sure that we look at our circles of concern and we make sure that Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala is the one who is in the center of it all you want to pray together and for one another supplicating every step of the way so anytime there's any major decisions to be made in the marriage praying Salat al-Staghada together anytime you have a major need praying Salat al-Hajja Salat al-Hajja is the prayer of need Salat al-Staghada is the prayer of guidance I know somebody who before they even buy a refrigerator they will first even if they've decided this is the refrigerator we want to get they'll still pray al-Staghada in order to put baraka in the decision so again showing that Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala is the top priority first and foremost like Hussai said earlier that you want to make your marriage a means of drawing closer to Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala so your marriage is just another act of Ibada and so you don't look at it as how much is he doing for me versus how much am I doing for him you look at it more as what am I doing that's going to be pleasing to Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala you want to have big intentions and you're not when you make big intentions and have big intentions you're not keeping score when you keep score that is what brings bitterness and resentment into the marriage so seeking Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala's pleasure and his approval is what's going to get inshallah all of us on the right track okay so the first section was make Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala your number one love the second section is work on increasing your love and affection men should know that women need affection it's a primary need for women and so we want to follow the example of the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam there was a reason that he encouraged spouses to hold hands and to feed one another from the same plate just like any other blessing marriage can start to feel stale we can start to feel old you can start to take it for granted but these types of intimate gestures help reinvigorate the marriage you want to take note of the five languages of love there's a book out there that you can find that discusses the five languages of love but a quick synopsis is that there's five ways that men and women show love to one another five ways all human beings show love to one another and the way people show love is by providing service by giving your time by giving verbal phrase and affirmation by giving physical affection and by giving gifts these are the five languages of love and you want to see which language of love your spouse is utilizing on you if you have a different language of love your spouse may not notice your language of love because they can't hear it because you're speaking a different language I'll give you a case in point my love language is verbal affirmation big surprise I'm big about talking right and telling people how much I appreciate them writing about how much I appreciate them and love them my husband's language of love is service he doesn't talk much about how much he loves you he's just quietly doing what needs to be done and the times that my husband and I butt heads or we have a conflict it's usually when we're speaking different languages of love and we're not hearing each other so mine might be you know I made an effort to look nice and you didn't say anything about how pretty I look or you didn't say anything about how delicious my food is that I made for you today and an example of a time when he was frustrated with me was when I borrowed his car and I came back and the and the gas tank was on empty because that's something he would never do he would never leave me with an empty tank of gas and so to him it was a sign of inconsideration for me to overlook the fact that I was leaving him with an empty gas tank because he's all about service so for me in order to make sure that my husband feels loved I have to get out of my comfort zone and do what I know my husband would do to show his love to me and he gets out of his comfort zone inshallah and tries to make more of an effort of talking about things that I might want to hear from him another big need for women is the need for intimate conversation they say that men fall in love with their eyes and women fall in love with their ears and there's truth to that that there's a reason women love poetry and there's a reason women love deep and intimate conversations and why they like to get on the phone with their friends and talk to them for a long time whereas husbands are just fine you know hearing the basic details of what's going on the basic points and not going into too many details so that's something for men to keep in mind that women need intimate conversation and they need undivided attention when you are talking to them so you want to establish a routine or a tradition that nobody else is allowed to get in the way of so not work not your parents not your children for some couples it might be Sunday morning brunch for others it might be after dinner tea others may choose to go on an evening walk or read aloud to one another when they're in bed there are many who've established a designated date night in their weekly schedule the point is you want to have something special just for you to and then you want to jealously guard it it should be something that you both will miss if it ever gets taken away by the way something I actually meant to bring up in the beginning which I forgot to the title of my talk is actually about failing marriages and I'm actually an optimist and I'm somebody who tends to look at the glasses half full and so I wanted to flip the script instead of talking about failing marriages inshallah I'd rather talk about what makes a marriage successful and then people can look at that and see what is it that I need to be doing more of and what is it that I need to inshallah maybe stop so date nights and special time for what another something very important to bring into your schedule you want to hold on to your passions and your interests you may not be into each other's pet projects and that's okay but you should be each other's biggest cheerleaders you want to ask sincere questions about whatever hobby the other person is into I am not into football I don't understand the game I don't get why my son and my sons and my husband are so excited about football but you know I try to support them when they have their Super Bowl parties I try to occasionally ask questions about what's going on but I don't poo poo it I don't put it down I don't make fun of them I don't dismiss it as if it's something you know dumb my husband jokes that he's a coffee and doughnut guy married to a tea and scone girl we're very different about the things we like and that we enjoy but we do try to take a healthy interest in what the other person enjoys and without being condescending about it men need recreational companions they need somebody they need their spouses to be interested in what they're doing and to make time to accompany them for things that are of interest to them I was very touched recently over Thanksgiving break my husband went out of his way to take me to visit the birthplace of William Shakespeare in England and he is not into English literature he has no curiosity about curiosity about William Shakespeare but he followed me around while I went around you know checking out the room that William Shakespeare was born in and the classroom that he studied in he was a good sport about it the truth is if he made me go to a football game I don't think I'd last but Alhamdulillah it was a sign of him you know which I'll be taking an interest in that which I'm interested in Khidma or service the Arabic word for service wins hearts so filling his gas tank that you realize is almost unempty helping him complete the dreaded tax warms sewing on his button that you noticed came loose are all signs that you care about him and are looking out for him for some spouses actions speak louder than words so there should be a difference ladies between you being present in his life and you being absent Hussai touched on this in her talk and I'm just going to quickly skim over it but it's a very important point among the most important duties of husbands and wives in the Islamic context is the fulfillment of one another's sexual needs this is not something to be taken lightly spouses who insist on rejecting their partners advances cannot be surprised to then witness the relationship disintegrate there are situations when a husband is forbidden to approach his wife for intercourse during her menstrual cycle during her postpartum bleeding and during the fasts in Ramadan but outside of these cases it is imperative for both spouses to do their utmost to make sure that they are partners in every way not least of which physically always always pray to alas panathala great and glorified is he that he maintains the love in your heart for your spouse and that he preserves the love in your partner's heart for you alas panathala is the one who put the love in our hearts for one another and he's the one who can take it out just like that just like that if tomorrow your spouse decides that they no longer love you and no longer want to be with you there is nothing you can do about it it is completely a gift from alas panathala that out of the billions of people in the world there's one person who's choosing to love you and you are choosing to love that person so you have to recognize it as a blessing and you need to be doing slothal sugar prayer of gratitude for that blessing okay the next section your grandmothers were right all men want respect ladies men need admiration they need to feel appreciated and they need to feel that their women are proud of them the wife may be the one to instigate most of the major changes in life she might be the one who brings home the thicker paycheck in some cases she may even be older however the husband should be given the respect of having the clear role of being the amir or the leader of the family he should be honored by the wife and the children as the guardian of the household and he in turn should recognize that alas panathala is the guardian of his and his wife's household now of course acknowledging that your husband is the amir doesn't mean that you aren't vocal in sharing your opinions one grandmother joked the husband is the head of the family but the wife is the neck that turns the head you don't want to contradict or correct your husband in public and same same with husbands you want to give each other the dignity that your partner deserves you don't want to ever demean your spouse to your children if you don't honor your children's parent your children will not honor their parent either and remember it's still riba or backbiting to talk about your spouse in a way that he or she wouldn't like even if you're only discussing your partner with people who will always love him or her you don't want to let down your guard when it comes to your partner's rights ladies if your husband ever buys you a gift that you don't love love it anyway try to see the heart of the gift giver behind the gift there are always gentle and cheerful ways of honestly communicating your preferences at a later time and this is an important one for young people these days regardless of whether you had a social media presence before your marriage or not once you're married be aware of your partner's views on how much you post about your love yourself and your life with your partner you want to respect each other's limits put your cell phone your book and yes even your prayer beads away when your partner is trying to talk to you about their day give your undivided attention and teach your children who are old enough to understand that they are not to interrupt their parents time together laugh with your partner but never at your partner never laugh at your partner's expense okay the next section make your home a haven and ladies make yourself his hoodie and men make yourself her hero now i realize that there are many women today who are uncomfortable with the word hoodie but hoodies are real creations of alas upon a dollar and they are described in the holy Quran as the companions in paradise and i believe that it's time that we reclaim this word and own it for what it is there's no reason why our homes cannot be little pieces of paradise inshallah and there's no reason why we cannot be heavenly companions for our husbands within our own homes so when you see your beloved for the first time after he returns home or after she returns home make sure to greet your partner and kiss him or her or hug him or her practicing muslim men and women who have takwa god consciousness will avoid all physical contact contact with men and women who are not their blood relatives and many of them are surrounded at work by other men and women who make a real effort to look attractive and to smell good you are the reward your husband gets at the end of a long dry day and you want to be soft and affectionate and fragrant men especially need to be physically attracted to their wives and men want domestic bliss what does domestic bliss look like everybody wants domestic bliss so this is a an umbrella definition of domestic bliss but men especially are looking forward to escaping the world and finding that domestic bliss and support in their home what it looks like is peace and quiet and not and no nagging and it it's a world that smells good that's clean and organized and it's not chaotic and where a person feels welcome and a person feels supported and so we want to make a real effort to make sure that our homes are the eye of the storm right the whole world is in turmoil right now that there's a big storm raging around us but every storm that Allah swt has created has an eye of the storm where everything is peaceful and calm and quiet and things are not whirling around our homes can be the eye of the storm inshallah if both husband and wife work at it when you know that life has been stressful and busy this goes for the men as well as the women wait until your partner has had a chance to relax before asking them to do anything or breaking any bad news to them everything about you from your clothes to your hair to your skin to your breath should smell clean and fresh for yourself yes but especially so for your partner you want to be kind and welcoming to one another's friends but you don't ever want to be in solitude with the opposite gender and that includes not being alone with another with a person of the opposite gender on social media either it's very easy to think that you're safe because there isn't any physical contact but it's very easy to start to become emotionally attached to somebody else if they're showing you kindness and friendliness even if it's just through texting or on social media the next section is called conflict is inevitable learn how to manage it in a healthy manner so the first two years of marriage often end up being the most exciting as well as the most challenging even if you were to go on a fun best friends trip you know the men with their buddies and the women with their girlfriends if you were to go on a trip you're bound to rub each other the long way after being in each other's space for you know periods of time and traveling together so of course that's going to happen even with your spouse especially with your spouse and so in the first couple of years you're learning how to live with another nuts with another ego while your partner is also having to do the same but what it comes down to is that marriage isn't so much about struggling against another nuffs another ego as much as it is about struggling against your own nuffs against your own ego so expect to be challenged intend to grow it's perfectly okay to have different personalities and to have different interests variety is a spice of life but what you want to make sure is that both of you have the same goals for your marriage and for your future family and that you're both on the same page about how you're going to achieve those goals inshallah so one of my cousins caused a bit of consternation in our family when we were having a group discussion about marriage we were giving advice to a cousin of mine who was getting married and he said i don't believe in the word compromise when it comes to marriage and my mother she was like what are you saying marriage is compromise but then he went on to explain if you think of everything as a compromise you're going to keep score and you're eventually going to become bitter once you decide to do something try to embrace it fully and believe in it don't think of it as a compromise anymore and we all agreed that there was wisdom in that you want to self reflect and you don't want to be too proud to apologize the relief on your partner's face and the peace that comes in the home after suffering the sting of stepping on your own nuffs on your own ego in order to say i'm sorry i was wrong is so so worth it it's worth it it's a given that all of us are going to get angry at some point or another but it's when tempers are flared that people's true natures are revealed you want to be mindful of who you always want to be try even if it's a struggle to maintain your other your manners your etiquettes when you're upset being angry is never an excuse to break or throw things to scream to curse to use foul language to slam doors to pull hair to scratch to spit to raise an arm or to throw punches these are all things that happen in dysfunctional marriages there's no excuse for them ever don't casually toss around the d word divorce every time you feel overwhelmed in regards to our interpersonal conduct when we're feeling frustrated it's important to always remember Allah subhanAllah is watching don't ever be disrespectful to your partner what does disrespect look like what is disrespect very simple rule of thumb if your partner thinks you're being disrespectful you are that's it if your partner says i feel disrespected you're being disrespectful when you're this is a really big one that my mom always told us and and it's a golden rule when your spouse is angry or visibly agitated stay quiet in the heat of the moment you can always make your point at a later time there's always time later it doesn't have to be said right then and there when addressing your disagreements avoid using absolutes like always and never it's not fair to forget the positives in your spouse by saying you always do this bad thing or you never do that good thing it's rare that issues are black and white there are always shades of gray i just said always they're most of the time there are shades of gray so we shouldn't be so quick to condemn one another don't expect your partner to be a mind reader if something is bothering you discuss it set yourself up for success by beginning your conversation with an i statement instead of a you statement for example instead of saying you left your clothes all over the bedroom again that was so thoughtless of you instead try to turn it around and say i feel frustrated when i find clothes all over the bedroom at the end of a long day try to avoid getting personal and don't assume that your partner knows exactly how their actions are affecting you give your partner the benefit of the doubt you want to learn to distinguish between a criticism and a complaint a complaint is an expression of a problem that you'd like to solve for example it's really frustrating for me to find a messy bedroom at the end of a long day that's a complaint a criticism adds disrespect to the complaint it is so frustrating for me to know that you're a slob why are you such a slob how are you raised that's a criticism okay don't go to sleep angry stay up and fight instead no i'm just kidding i'm kidding contrary to the age-old advice to resolve all conflicts before going to bed sometimes it actually helps to sleep on a problem but first you have to calm yourself down by reminding yourself to have the what go or trust in Allah once you've had a full night's rest you can tackle your problems with a fresh attitude the next day what you want to make sure to avoid is sleeping in separate beds you'll be surprised how many problems can eventually get solved just by snuggling under the covers together it's shaytan who wants to separate you too always remember that avoid arguing in front of your children but if they ever do witness a loud disagreement between you and your spouse make sure to make up and apologize in front of your children as well show them that marital conflict is not the end of the world and that there are healthy ways to resolve issues let them witness you apologizing and hugging it out holding grudges breeds toxicity and dysfunction once issues are resolved don't keep up bringing past mistakes learn to forgive and then forgive every single day have a sense of humor about each other's flaws and foibles for example i am always losing my eyeglasses always i have i think 10 pairs lying around the house more my husband is always collecting them and putting them in a safe place for me but i'm still always losing them i wish eyeglasses have the feature that the iphone did where you say siri where are you then your eyeglasses say here i am but they don't but my husband never gets mad at me about it he's alhamdulillah always got a sense of humor about me being annoying honestly i'm being very annoying by always searching for my glasses as i'm going out the door but alhamdulillah just have to have a sense of humor about each other's flaws go with the flow and for other words just let it go just let it go all right the next section is called be a uniter and not a divider when you get to know you're in laws you're going to see that not every family does everything the way your family does and that's not necessarily a bad thing you want to take the good that you see in your new family and you want to adopt it and you want to ignore the bad and you want to resolve with your husband however not to allow either of your family's poor habits and poor choices to continue in the next generation that you're hoping to raise together inshallah you don't want to complain about or criticize your spouse to your own family you're eventually going to get over whatever was bothering you but you're going it's going to be difficult for your parents and your siblings to forgive and forget so easily you want them to respect your partner so you want to be a veil for your husband brothers you want to be a veil for your wife physical abuse however is a non-negotiable deal breaker god forbid if that line is ever crossed you want to sound the alarm and you want to get help immediately if you want your partner to respect your family you're going to have to show respect for your family first your partner will follow your lead if your partner sees that your family is always causing you to feel stressed out and annoyed then they're eventually going to start to resent your family for bringing stress into their own household so you want to protect and nurture that special yet fragile relationship between your spouse and their in-laws even if it's not a priority for your spouse you want to take the time to buy your partner's parents and siblings presents remember their significant days just because the prophet sallallahu alaihi wa sallam said give gifts to each other and you will love one another so go ahead and buy your in-laws love it's sin after all if your husband or your wife is ever upset with their own parents or siblings or extended family don't jump in and encourage your partner in their negative opinions you want to defend your in-laws and make excuses for them and encourage your partner to see the good in them be their advocate if you have nothing nice to say just stay silent your partner may not admit it then but may not admit it then but he or she will be grateful for your attitude later and will thank you even if only in their hearts because the truth is nobody wants to hear anybody else bad-mouthing their own family so remember when we talked earlier about the service about service being one of the five languages of love well here is an opportunity for one of the highest forms of service you want to be someone who helps mend hearts and helps bring relations together don't be a cause for discord in the family this next section is called don't try to keep up with the joneses you want to avoid debt like the plague a large fancy expensive house may do nothing towards keeping you happy making you happy however a small clean cozy simple peaceful home in a safe neighborhood filled with people who are hopefully trying to please a lesbian at all can very well feel like a palace in heaven inshallah responsibly managing the family budget will avoid a lot of stress in your marriage paying ribba or usury brings about all kinds of problems in one's life and it destroys the baraka or the blessing in the home don't ever pay interest even if it means you never get to own your own home or your own car in this life keep your akhira glasses on as they say make do with what you have and only complain to alas panathala for your wants and needs make your husband feel like a hero make your wife feel like a hoodie having said that don't hesitate to schedule time to have honest conversations with your spouse about anything that needs to be improved the key is not to become an irritating nag who is constantly whining and complaining complaining and issuing orders you want to talk to your spouse when he or she is in the headspace to listen be grateful be grateful be grateful alas panathala says in the holy quran if you are grateful i will surely increase you and alas panathala always keeps his promises remember you're not going to have it all not in this life at least so don't compare your life to others and at the same time you might not want to brag to the world about how happy you are or how perfect your life is i'm the evil eye and has said malicious jealousy are two realities that alas panathala in his wisdom has allowed to exist in this world so you want to protect your marriage from them besides who wants to be the cause for pain or sadness in the lives of those who are struggling with their own love lives right they're going to be little things that are going to irritate you about your spouse and sometimes those causes for irritation might start to feel like big things even when they're not at those times you want to remind yourself that perfection is only for alas panathala and you want to try to think about what your life would be like without your partner and you want to be grateful for a spouse who is choosing to somehow still accept you despite your shortcomings and if somebody else's husband or wife seems perfect to you remember that everyone has flaws and good spouses hide their spouse's shortcomings so you're probably not getting the full picture nor should you expect to this is a big one and i heard uh babali touch on this earlier instead of chasing happiness try aiming for contentment instead aim for ridah for contentment don't take one another for granted your spouse is a duniawi or worldly blessing that can be taken away at any moment and believe it or not somewhere out there is somebody who would be more than happy to trade places with you so appreciate what and whom alas panathala has given to you the next section is called have a mentor in marriage avoid getting marital advice from people who you know are having their own relationship problems similarly stay away from getting advice from newbies who are still learning the ropes themselves i tell this to young people all the time don't get advice from your best friend who got married last year look to someone who has a long term successful marriage of his or her own to find out how to make it work try to find one wise discrete person to consult don't tell everybody your problems if somebody you respect says that you need therapy you probably do don't be ashamed to do whatever it takes to save your marriage give it your all if you do pay for mental for marital therapy only seek out trained professionals who understand and respect the parameters and priorities of your religion you'll be surprised at how often well-meaning but spiritually clueless therapists will prescribe the haram or divinely prohibited as medicine for a troubled marriage i know the young couple who were having bedroom issues and their non-muslim marital therapist told them to watch pornography together that was what they were advised so we're very grateful for organizations like wasila wasila and muslim marital therapists in our community who we can turn to inshallah okay and the last section is called set yourself up to soar spiritually your spouse may be your best friend or maybe he or she is not your best friend that's okay either way you don't want to neglect your good friends that you do have in your life you want to take time to nurture those bonds that help you be a better person there's going to come a day when you're going to need the women you're going to need the support of your sisters and there's going to be a time when brothers you're going to need the support of your brothers but don't let falling in love make you fall out of friendship with your tribe you want to consider connection with your friends as part of your self-care but remember that your spouse and your spouse's needs always take precedence if after being married people routinely mistake you for being single you're definitely doing something wrong you want to attend religious classes together religious workshops together either in person or online the point is to keep growing together spiritually you may not grow at the same pace and that's okay you're two separate souls after all but at least you'll respect the same teachers and you'll understand each other's motivations and end goals inshallah instead of listening to those people who advise don't let marriage change you amend their words to marriage should only change you for the better inshallah take an occasional break and travel even if you can only afford to do so locally we're very fortunate here in northern california lots of beautiful places to explore take so get out there and get out of your you know neighborhood and explore together but like hosai said earlier make alas upon atallah your ultimate destination that's it thank you