Monem Salam:
Assalamu alaikum and welcome back to Halal Money Matters, sponsored by Saturna Capital. Today I'm actually joined by Hamna Zaheer from Lushed Up Finance. It's a company where she helps Muslims in the US and Canada build halal wealth with more clarity and confidence. Through her educational content and community, she focuses on making investing feel practical, accessible and aligned with Islamic values, drawing in part on her own journey of building $200,000 portfolio while raising three kids. Really excited to get into this with Hamna. Hamna, I'm glad you were able to make it on the show.

Hamna Zaheer:
Yeah, I'm so excited to be here.

Monem Salam:
Yeah. It's really I mean, I think you have a pretty unique journey, so I want to start off and really just ask, you know, tell us a little bit about who you are, what you do and what Lushed Up Finance is all about.

Hamna Zaheer:
Yeah. Of course, like you mentioned, I'm Hamna. I founded Lushed Up Finance and I wasn't woman how to build a money management system as well as halal investing system that allows them to grow generational wealth. And the reason I do this is because there is a growing demographic of Muslim women who are they're crushing it professionally. They're making a good income, $75,000, even six figures. Right? And yet they feel completely financially stuck and confused. They're making stable high income, but they are still living paycheck to paycheck despite their good incomes. They're watching their real goals like early retirement, financial freedom, going for Hajj, trying to save for their kids college, or even buying a house slip further and further away every single year. And that is who I serve because I was her. Like you mentioned, I personally went from, you know, living paycheck to paycheck to building a more than 200,000. Now, it's actually now $250,000, Hamdullah, halal portfolio, in three years while raising three kids under three. So I have twins, I have twin boys, identical twin boys. So I had three kids at the time, all under three. And I now teach other Muslim women to do the same through my program called the Halal Wealth Autopilot Academy. I have 25 women in my current cohort and Inshallah, we opened the doors again in June.

Monem Salam:
That's awesome. So tell me a little bit, you know, so you mentioned just earlier about women who are making, you know, a good strong income, but they're still ending up living to paycheck to paycheck. I mean, that's something that happens to a lot of people if you're a male or a woman. But I mean, either way, you can talk about it. Why does that happen? What is the psychology behind that?

Hamna Zaheer:
Yeah. So that is a great question. And that's something I see happening a lot. This is what I call you know, you're making a really good income. And it's that's what I call like a leaky bucket problem. So there's actually there was a recent study done by Goldman Sachs that talked about how two groups that are most likely to say they're living paycheck to paycheck are people either under making $50,000 or people making over $300,000, which is really surprising, right, because the people making more than $300,000, you would think that they have financial security. But no, even those folks are living paycheck to paycheck. And there was another 2025 study that found that more than half of Americans earning $100,000 or more are living paycheck to paycheck. So these are all people with six figure incomes, and more than half of them say they're living paycheck to paycheck. And I mean, I can speak from my own self, a lot of us from immigrant background, especially for base experience. I can talk to that. Our parents always said, oh, go become a doctor or engineer and you'll be, you know, set for life. You'll have a good income. But we never learned that wealth is not equal to the income you make. It is what you do with that income, right? And wealth. Nobody taught us that income and wealth are two completely different things, right? More money coming in just means more money going out. Unless you have an actual system. Sure. So let me actually explain what is actually happening to the money. So like I said, I call this the leaky bucket problem. Imagine you have a bucket with holes in it, and you're desperately trying to fill it with water when it comes to money. What do most people do, they were more water in. They work harder. They try to earn more, they hustle more. They think that if I just make a little more money, that will just solve all of my money problems. But here is the thing if your bucket has holes. Putting more water does not fill the bucket. What actually happens is just it just leaks out faster.

Monem Salam:
It's a habitual thing, right? It's a habitual thing. I mean, I've told people and you know, when you start off in your life, even younger people have said, you know, come begin your life with a habit of saving, you know, pay yourself first, because if you don't do that and you live, I mean, like you mentioned, you live paycheck to paycheck, you're just going to be chasing after that money and you'll never be able to catch up, or you'll never have that nest egg to be able to do so. Yeah. So, so regarding that, then what do you think is the biggest emotional block or let's say even a religious block that keeps Muslims from, you know, investing first and then not having that leaky bucket that you mentioned.

Hamna Zaheer:
So, I mean, for leaky bucket, I think that's more about, like we said, like paying yourself first. Right. People tend to spend money more reactively rather than having a proactive plan on how they want to spend that money. And a lot of that problem actually comes from not having an actual plan. One of the main things that happens is the lifestyle creep, right? Your salary increases and then your actual lifestyle expands to match that. Now you have a bigger car, you have a bigger house, you have nicer things, and now you need that level, income level just to maintain your life. And you're still on that treadmill. You're still in the same place. You're still living paycheck to paycheck. That's something that happens when it comes to managing wealth. And another one I see a lot is financial avoidance. So like just keeping your eyes closed and hoping that things will eventually work out and you'll eventually reach financial freedom, hoping it will magically happen and just completely avoiding it. And in terms of money blocks that happen related to that is that money is like water, right? It needs direction or it will find its own way out. You cannot just hold it in your hands and expect it to stay there. So if you don't give your money a job proactively, you're using your conscious mind. It is going to be spent reactively by your subconscious, right?

Monem Salam:
Yeah. I mean, I was going to say that I've done a previous podcast where we had a guest on and, and she had mentioned that the fact that, you know, there's, the way you're brought up actually has a lot to do with how you're going to be reacting to money. And so some people, you know, no matter how much money they have, they're always going to be miserly, other people, no matter how little money they have, they're always going to be spent thrift. And so it's more about how you actually brought up and those type of things. So let me let me ask you this question. You know, how did you go? How did you personally go from feeling financially stuck to being able to kind of, you know, with your three kids, build a portfolio and now it's, Hamdullah, on its way to becoming bigger and bigger?

Hamna Zaheer:
Yeah, yeah. No, I grew up in Pakistan, so I have my own story. You know, I grew up in Pakistan in, you know, what I thought was a comfortable life. We were, you know, not super rich, but we were not poor either. We, you know, dressed well, we ate well, we had a very stable and good life. And then when I was in seventh grade, my family moved to the United States to join my dad. My dad actually came to the US when I was a little baby. And I will never forget walking into the house he had set up for us. We opened the door and my siblings and I just like, looked at each other. There were mattresses on the floor, no furniture. I think this is a story that a lot of immigrant families can relate to, right? We had gone from this upper middle class in Pakistan to starting from zero overnight. And what you said about like, you know, a lot of times or childhood and our memories create that relationship with money, right? So that experience shaped my relationship with money. And I was like, financial stability can disappear overnight, right? One decision, one country changed, and everything you thought was secure is not anymore. And I decided in that moment that I was never letting that happen to me. And I worked hard. I became a computer scientist. I chased that, you know, six secret salary that I was promised, you know, would give me that American dream, you know, promise. And, you know, fast forward, I find myself married. I have three kids under three, including twins, like I said, and I have all these specific goals swirling around in my head. I want to go for umrah with my family. I want to send my kids to Islamic school. I want to save for their college, even buying a house, right? And I'm sitting there with what everyone would call a really good income, still living paycheck to paycheck and looking at what all of these things would actually cost, and thinking, what happened to that American dream I was promised? And I remember sitting at my kitchen table at one night calculator in my hand, and I realized that, you know, with my current saving rate, I'll be working until I was at least 75, or even until I dropped dead, and I would still not have achieved all of my financial goals. And that's when I knew something had to change. There has to be a better way. So that's when I started researching. I went deep into, you know, personal finance. How about it's actually built and what the people who achieve these kind of goals and build that generational wealth actually do differently. And that's eventually it became super clear that investing with a system, consistent, long term halal investing, paired with intentional money management, is how ordinary income becomes extraordinary outcomes. High income does not necessarily equal wealth. Learning to build a complete financial system, which includes managing your money and investing it in a halal way, is what bridges that gap. So, you know, at that time, I got excited. I logged into my 401(k) and I was like, you know what? I'm ready to do this thing. And that's when I got stuck again, because I discovered that I had been defaulted into a target date fund the whole time without realizing it. And for those of you who might not know target date funds, as convenient as they sound, as you get closer to your time and age, it starts shifting heavily into bonds and bonds or interest rates instruments, which is riba. And that's haram, right? And this is when that second wave hit me that wait, I'm so excited to invest. But is that even halal? And the thing is, Western finance does not account for Islamic principles. And at that time, Islamic finance world wasn't talking about, you know, 401(k) or, you know, funds or halal ETFs or how to make your Roth IRAs halal. And I was stuck with me in these two worlds, neither of which had a complete answer for me. And that's when I went down that second research path learning Islamic finance. Understanding what scholars say about equity ownership versus riba. Finding out what halal options actually exist in the market like Amana funds. So I was able to bridge those two worlds that were not talking to each other. It obviously took real time and effort, and I shared this specific part because this is something this is the double layer of financial overwhelm, which is one of the biggest reasons I think this was one of the question you were asked me before, is one of the hidden reasons why Muslim families, especially, stay stuck and don't take that action because there's already so much financial jargon out there, there is so much noise. And then on top of it, you have that added responsibility of making sure it is halal and that extra layer for someone who genuinely cares about their din, it can be completely paralyzing. They're like, I'm not even touching it. If there is, you know, even a chance this could be haram, like might as well, since I don't understand it, since their sounds confusing, I'm just not going to do it.

Monem Salam:
Yeah. So when you were looking at your 401(k), probably now’s a good time that we’ve actually have had some, some, some 401(k) episodes on 401(k)s where you can open up a brokerage account or you can open up something where you can access more products than what the menu offered. Is that what you found as well, or were you stuck in that f401(k)? And what did you decide to do? Did you decide to continue to invest there or did you say, no, I'm going to go do something else?

Hamna Zaheer: 
Yeah. So I mean, I think I was lucky enough that when I opened my 401(k), when I had some halal options right away, but in terms of when I worked with my students, I have 25 students right now to and we work through, you know, everybody's situation and what's what, what's happening. So we end up going different routes depending on their specific situation. So either they have some sort of halal option already available that they can invest in. And then we also go to that route that okay let's try to advocate for ourselves. Let's go to HR. Let's ask for that halal option. You know either first try a self-directed brokerage account if they offer that or try to go for like a brokerage link that they can offer. And what I see is that a lot of HR departments said like, oh, I don't even know that you had this specific way of investing. And most of you know, are and it's just so empowering, like people, even if they're not able to actually come back with a positive response. But the fact that we're able to raise that voice the next time, hopefully they make that plan of like how they're going to improve their benefits and stuff such they can think about those options because someone raise their voice and tell them, hey, you know, this is something religiously you're supposed to do, so can you make an option? And that actually paves a path for a future generation as well as we advocate for those things. And, you know, for now, for the time being, a lot of people just end up going for the most halal option, you know, trying to avoid bonds and stuff like that if they're not able to find like a completely halal option. But yeah, it’s a work in progress, obviously

Monem Salam:
That's great. No, I totally agree with you. Now let's go back to what you were saying. So you're sitting there and you kind of realizing you've got to be able to do this. Now, many people I wouldn't say most, but many women who are married will turn around and say, well, I'll just stop my husband handle everything. And so, you know, so what, when you have that, you know, let's talk about that mindset and why that's a dangerous place to be even if you're very happily married. Like, why? Why it's not somewhere you want to be. So maybe you can talk a little bit about that.

Hamna Zaheer:
Yeah. And I hear this all the time. Right. Especially because I work closely with Muslim women. And I want to speak to both the women listening and their any husbands who might be tuned in about this, because this is for everyone. Right? I actually had a student who came to me after her husband passed away suddenly from cancer. She was left as a single mother of three children with no idea what they own, what they own, what account existed for them, what even the passwords were for anything, right? She told me, Hamna, I lived a fairytale life for 18 years, right? We had a great partnership. He handled all the finances and I was completely at peace with that. But I did not know what I did not know. Right. I want a plan now. The reason she came to me was actually that I want a plan so that, you know, God forbid, if something happens to me tomorrow, my children will be secured. I'll have a plan for them. And you know, I do not tell this story to scare anyone. It is important to hope for the best. But it is also very important to have healthy systems in place in case things do not go the way we hoped. Right? So to every husband who might be listening to this, the most loving thing you can do for your wife is make sure she has financial literacy to stand on her own if she ever needs to, because the reality is that 90% of women will manage finances alone at some point in their lifetime. It could be either because of divorce, because of, you know, widowhood or any other reason, right, that can come up. Woman also tend to live longer than men, right? So if your wife does not work outside the home, for example, and her retirements needs still need to be specifically planned for it, right? And this is not about distress. This about this is about this is actually an act of care. Right. And what's surprises me actually, for the students who do build that financial literacy, it actually strengthens their marriages. Right? They tell me every cohort that we run the program that, you know, me learning financial literacy has done more for a relationship than anything we tried. And a lot of money conversations. They go from feeling like a personal attack, like, oh, why did you spend money on this thing? We were trying to save for that, it feels like a personal attack. Unless you have like a shared language and a vision.

Monem Salam:
So let me ask you this in regards to the same thing, which is, you know, and I hear this from a lot of people, it's like, you know, when I sit down with my wife and I start talking about the finances, her eyes glaze over and there's not really understanding. t's like they really don't want to hear it. So in that in that situation, when you do, when you have the husband says, yes, I'm going to sit down with my wife, I'm going to explain everything that's going on. And then the minute you do that, you see the wife's eyes glaze over and you're like, I have no idea what's doing. So what would you say? And that's what's the first step that somebody can take?

Hamna Zaheer:
I think a husband sitting down with their wife without any sort of context on what they're trying to do a lot of times does not lead to a healthy conversation. Like I said, it goes through that like, personally, they feel like it's like a personal attack when they have that understanding of, okay, this is what we're trying to build today. This is our future vision. This is what we're working towards. And then what do we need to do today to make sure we reach that vision? Obviously every situation is different. So I will use that, that I'm not talking about abusive marriages here because there are financially abusive marriages. And that's a completely different topic. But in terms of healthy marriages, I think just sitting down and just laying out, okay, this is where we are because you cannot reach somewhere that you do not plan for and obviously you cannot reach. You cannot be like, okay, I'm going to Disney World, but I don't know where I am right now. Right? You need to know where you are, what your starting point is and what you're building towards. And then you want to figure out, okay, what's the map, what's the route we need to take to get there, how fast we want to get there. So it doesn't become a conversation of we need you need to stop spending so much on grocery so we can buy a house in two years. And because that doesn't help anyone, right? It does not helpful. And that's that does sound like a personal attack because and I think a lot of times what I see is that there is sometimes some value misalignment as well. At some it's communication that happens too because I see that woman have like a tent. I'm not going to generalize, but a lot of times since women are more focused on okay, what do my what does my kid needs today? Okay. What do I need to do to like nurture that environment? What does the house need today? There was actually a study done that a man can survive on a mattress and called it a home, and that's enough for them. But for a woman to feel like that, this place is a home that. Like this declaration you see behind me, this is not just decor. This. I need this as a woman to feel like this place is home. So there is difference in how the value is perceived on the money spent too. So I think there is some autonomy that's needed on both end as well. So maybe like having some money that both of you can spend on your own that the other person doesn't question on. And then there is a specific pool of money that you're like, okay, this is for or vision. This is for our future. And we decide together what to do with that money. And then we stuck to those buckets that are for our self, for our own autonomy, and then some buckets that are for our future. And then we are always contributing to that and moving towards that fusion.

Monem Salam:
So now when you're sitting down and you’re either the was husband or the wife or actually thinking about, oh, I need to have this conversation to be able to start saving and those type of things really, if you think about it, time is not on your side. The earlier you start, the better off you're going to be. So you know what? What does that delay actually cost you? What does it look like in real terms?

Hamna Zaheer:
Yeah, no, that's a good question. And I think that's something that people don't understand when they do not realize when they say that, oh, you know, I'll figure this out later. Like what is that actually costing them? And I do hear this a lot. And I'm just going to actually explain this with numbers. I think it's just easier to understand it that way. So let's say if you have $500 a month to invest and you start investing today averaging at about 8% annual returns, which is pretty average for stock market. Right. And you let that grow for 30 years, you end up roughly $700,000. Right now, let's say you decide to wait ten years. You're like ten years down the road. You start investing that same $500 a month at same 8% return. You with that lost decade of compounding, you end up with about $300,000. So that ten year delay can cause people almost a half $1 million for just saying I'll figure it out later. And that is what waiting actually costs.

Monem Salam:
Yeah, I mean, that's a that's a good point because a lot of times, I mean, and people have busy lives, right? I want to sit down and talk about the finances and the baby starts crying or something will always come up where you might not be able to have that conversation, but it's really important to do that. But the other way to do it is say, you know what? I have no idea why I'm saving. I'm just going to put the money away in the product and just forget about it like that and forget it with no plan in place. So what are the consequences of that? Is that is that a good thing to do or not.

Hamna Zaheer:
You know, that's a that's a great point. What usually happens because I always have because I have an Instagram and you know, I have people following me. And I always get this question like, can you just tell me, like a halal fund or ETF to invest in. And the reason that's not like a complete strategy or even a good strategy is because a lot of times what people do is they're like, oh, okay, I'm just going to start investing this money and then market dips, right. And what happens when you do not have that financial knowledge or understanding is that then people panic. They're like, oh, the world is ending. The stock market is going to crash. What happened recently with Iran, the crisis and everything happening and market stock market dipping down is people then panic sell because you don't have that foundation built up. They're like, oh, never mind, I'm not investing. I'd rather just keep this safe in my checking account or at home than to invest. Right. So because they do not have they do not understand what long term investing means and they have or, or they might have been they're like, you know what, I'm going to buy a house in five years, and I'm going to use the most risky option to invest that money in. And they do not. And I see this a lot happening in, you know, Muslim groups. Right? Someone would be like, I have $30,000 sitting around. What should I do with that money? And then they're people responding with, oh, you should put that in gold. You should buy real estate with that. Oh, you should do that. And what all of those answers are missing is the context. You don't know if that person has an emergency fund or not. And if they end up investing in like a fund, what happens with that money. So it's just about like being able to figure out what that foundation level looks like before you just start throwing money and, you know, just not know what to do with it.

Monem Salam:
That turbulence that you're talking about is so really important. I know one of our regional managers her name is Samar. She loves this story and I really love to tell it. And that is that like, for example, you know, when you get on a plane, you have a destination that you have in mind. Ehen the plane takes off in the turbulence happens, you don't go to the pilot, say, let me jump out of the plane, right? You basically have confidence in the pilot to be able to direct you to, to where you're trying to go, which is. And in the financial world, it's the same thing when you start investing, there should be a goal in mind. I want to get to X, Y, and Z, and a little turbulence along the way doesn't mean you're going to drop a parachute and jump out of the plane, it just means you're going to write it through, maybe invest more money, kind of keep with your plan. And as long as you're on your plan, then you should be able to get to your destination. So the really beautiful story and I always, always like to tell it because it's, it's a, it's something that that kind of kind of rings. Yep yep yep okay. So now you know. So now okay we have this conversation with husband and wife have this conversation. But there really with all this information that's out there or they don't know where to start, they might be beginning to feel a little bit overwhelmed. So very practically. Right. Tell me three things that they that a couple can do the first week that they're really sitting down and saying, we really need to talk about this and we really need to get something started.

Hamna Zaheer:
No, that's a great question. So the first thing I'd say is know your numbers. I sort of touched on this before that you cannot build toward a destination that you have not even defined yet, and you cannot get to a destination if you do not know your starting point. Right. So you want to get very clear on how much money is coming in, how much money is going out, what is that leftover amount, and then what are we doing with that amount? Right. And then you want to get super clear on your goals, which is your destination, right. What is your financial independence number. Right. What would what would it actually cost you to cover your lifestyle without working? When does when does that? Like is that going to be at 55 years of it? Are we are you going to be able to cover your expenses when that actually happens? What are your actual other goals? Like if you want to go for Hajj, you want to save for your kids education, or even buy a car for your kid down the line and you want to save for that, right? So what are the timelines for all of those goals as well? There's a real difference between, you know, like just having a wish or having like a real goal. It's one thing to just be like, oh, I wish I could just be financially free. Or you could be like, I have a goal that I need a $2.3 million portfolio invested by the time I turn 55, for example. Now that's a concrete goal. You can build a plan around and the number two is I sort of touched on this before. Like you want to find your leaks, try to sit down and track your expenses for 30 days. Right. See, this is not to judge yourself or punish yourself. This is just to see what is clearly happening. Because you cannot fix what you do not see and you cannot improve what you do measure. Right? So for number three is automating your investments. So even if it's like something small like a $50 a month, the amount at this stage does not really actually matter. It's the habit, because nobody walks into a gym for the first time and starts lifting that 200 pounds, right? You start with somewhere and you build that muscle. Investing works the same way. It's a muscle you build over time. You can start with a small amount and build to like a larger amount over time.

Monem Salam:
You know, I like to think because I'm a financial guy, I like to think of it as an income statement and then a balance sheet. Right. Income statement is, you know, you maybe you're a single earner. Double earner. What are you taking in as that's your that's your revenue. Right. And then what are you spending. That's your expenses. And what you want to make sure is that, that number either equals or your money coming in is more than what's going out. So that's one thing. The second thing is your balance sheet. Balance sheet is these are the assets that I have. And this is the money that I owe. This is my liabilities. And obviously what you want to do is have your liabilities be as small as possible. And the assets that you have is large as possible. And that's, that's a goal that you can have over time. But one of the things that people might find, and that's the question I'm going to be asking you, is, is that what they'll find is that they'll realize, oh my God, I have this huge amount of credit card debt that I didn't we didn't even know about.  It just keeps, you know, compounding because I just keep making the minimum statement payments as possible. So can you talk a little bit about maybe a situation that you've had where, you know, somebody wanted to save, but they also had this credit card debt. And then where do you start?

Hamna Zaheer:
No, that's a great question. I actually had a student who she bought furniture. She ran into the furniture shop, she bought the friend. She actually had the cash to buy it, but they were like, oh, you could go on a monthly plan to pay this off. She was like, okay, I guess I'll do it. And the manager set up her monthly payments. Two years later. That was supposed to be for one year, by the way. Two years later, she finds that her, you know, the monthly installment is still going out of her account. Like, wait, I thought I was supposed to play this off in one year. Why am I still paying for that? And she finally opened two years later, opened her account, and she was making very minimal payment. And it was actually she was actually only making the interest payment. She was not even paying off the couch that she bought. And I do see those kind of circumstances happening. It's unfortunate, especially when it comes to credit card debt, because the interest is huge on that. And obviously that is the piece that it's obviously haram and also how much it costs you if you don't pay it off quickly and people don't realize when they're making minimal payments, the  amount of interest they pay over time is so much more.

Monem Salam:
That $1,000 couch might cost you like $10,000 if you only pay the pay the minimum balance.

Hamna Zaheer:
So a lot of times, especially with high and high interest debt I definitely recommend paying that off, making that like a super priority.

Monem Salam:
If I have the choice between paying off my debts with the credit card, that's where the others or starting to save your answer is pay off the debts first, because not only is it beneficial for you, but also in the bakarah going to be beneficial for you as well. And then start saving safe saving for for whatever goal that you have in life.

Hamna Zaheer:
Exactly.

Monem Salam:
And what you'll find, what I find with what the people is, you know, sometimes that that, that, that, that barakah that you get from paying off that interest alone, you see it in other ways than just the financially. You'll see it with maybe better marriage or better family or whatever it is. There are other ways that the benefit can come.

Hamna Zaheer:
When you make that niyyah, I have seen things happen super fast. I had a student who was, I want to say $150,000 in student loan. She was a pharmacist, so she had that huge loan and when we talked and she was so excited to join for investing, but I was like, oh, you have this huge loan that you had to first pay off. What they did was her husband and her, she went on one income to survive for their expenses and the other income they started to really accelerate that that pay off. And within 18 months, Mashallah, mashallah, I think they only have like $8,000 that they have to. That's great. Yeah. That's great. It's just have to you have to put intentionally. And now they're at a point they're like, you know what. Now we have a young baby. And now that we have learned to live under means with one salary, we can. They're even thinking about that. You know, the vibe goes part time so she can take care of the baby more. So it just opens up more opportunities they wouldn't have had if they had stayed in that space. So.

Monem Salam:
That's great. Now, coming back to you a little bit, because we were talking about your story in the very beginning as well. Share a little bit, a little bit, a little bit about like what was one thing you had to unlearn so that you can start building your wealth in a halal way?

Hamna Zaheer:
I actually have a funny story about this. So when I was in, in high school, I actually was one of those students, very few students who actually took the personal finance class, but unfortunately, so my, my high school, who always used to say time is money, time is money. And he was like, you know, you if you start investing today, you could, you know, this is how you earn more your money grows for you. You can start earning passive income and all of that. I was like, oh, this sounds fun. And then he's like, this concept is known as compound interest. And I was like, oh, interest, never mind. That's haram. And I just turned him out completely. And I always like joke about this. And if I actually listened to that man man's advice, I would have been a millionaire by now. But that was something I feel like a lot of, at least in my community, a lot of women just come with thinking that compound interest means riba. When compound interest basically refers to your money making more money and that whole thing snowballing and your money working more, and then it's like gaining more and more money over time. And for me, that concept felt like just because it has the word interest in it, that's haram. That's one thing I had to unlearn when I was going through my investing journey.

Monem Salam:
Oh that's great. Now, before we wrap up, tell us a little bit more. Where can people find you? Where can they follow your work and what's the best place for them to start if they want to learn more?

Hamna Zaheer:
Yeah. So the best place to find me is on Instagram @lushedupbyhamna. I post a lot of practical halal wealth content that every week, tips on investing, money management. And this is where a lot of my community lives. If you want a free starting point, I'm always doing some sort of halal investing workshop, and if you go to my Instagram, you'll most likely find the link to register for that in my Instagram bio. And it walks you through implementing the exact first step to talked about today right in your number, finding your league, setting up your first halal investment. And yeah, I also have a newsletter you can again sign up for that on my Instagram as well.

Monem Salam:
So I really appreciate your time and hopefully we'll have you on another show later on.

Hamna Zaheer:
Yeah. It was a pleasure being here. Thank you for having me.

Monem Salam:
Thank you for listening to Halal Money Matters. If you like what you hear, please do rate us on the app stores and also leave us a review. It helps other people find us a lot easier.

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