For the first time, I cannot think of a post title. Oh well, what does it matter

All praise is due to Allah SWT, and may His infinite peace and blessings be upon the Prophet Muhammad (SAW). May Allah SWT be pleased with his (SAW) family and companions, ameen.

Asalaamu ‘aleykum

This ummah is so beautiful in the way that so many of us strive to make dawah, strive to make a change. I love that, it’s exactly what we need. We all need advice and need to check ourselves every once in a while.

But why doesn’t anyone talk about their struggles without feeling the need to insert a list of solutions? There are millions of videos,and articles and blog posts and Q&A’s that have covered thousands and thousands of questions.

But why doesn’t anyone talk publicly about what bothers them? What they have difficulties with? We don’t need to be crude here, but maybe someone had a day where they were really tempted to listen to music. They didn’t, but it sucked and they want to share that it sucked. People then read it and relate, maybe some even think “Oh alhamdulillah, I’m not alone in this”.

Why don’t people like to talk about what bothers them? Is it because it hurts? Is it because it’s embarrassing, it hurts their pride? I know that if I’m not allowed to talk about what bothers and hurts me, I’ll go insane. I’ll probably jump off a building.

Everyone has these concrete walls up. It’s tiring to hack through them. I want to feel apart of an ummah, but it’s so hard to do when everyone pretends they’ve got it it together, when we don’t. We’re all messed up, some more than others, but we are. And it’s okay.

I am in love with Nouman Ali Khan (for the sake of Allah)

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

All praise is due to Allah SWT, and may His infinite peace and blessings be upon the Prophet Muhammad (SAW). May Allah SWT be pleased with his (SAW) family and companions, ameen.

Asalaamu ‘aleykum!

I hope he never finds this blog post because I just learned that you’re not supposed to praise someone to their face, and it makes sense because it can lead to arrogance. Also the title is kind of a joke but if one were to see that out of context, it would just be excruciatingly embarrassing. I’d want to hide under a rock and come out maybe the next decade. But I have to gush over this guy. 

Nouman Ali Khan. This man. Like. Naw. I never understood the meaning of loving someone for the sake of Allah SWT until I was introduced to him. Prior to that, I thought it just meant you needed to put up with annoying people that were your brother and sister in Islam. But I swear I look at this guy and my heart just gushes forth a SEA of love, and it is all because he changed my perception of the Qur’an. Also he makes me laugh like nothing else. 

I remember I linked his tafisr (simply put, analysis of the verses and chapters in the Qur’an) on surah Ar-Rahman when I first started this blog and labeled him as a genius because I had no idea what tafsir was and thought he came up with the stuff on his own *cough*. 

Why do I bring him up? Because not only did Nouman Ali Khan change the way I viewed Qur’an. His tafsir changed the way I pray, the way I read Qur’an, the way I think about the world and what’s in it because of the Qur’an, because of his tafsir. 

A lot of people give tafsir but what struck the core for me though was how good of a teacher he was. When he speaks, even if speaking to a crowd of thousands, he still attempts to engage with them in conversation by asking questions. He may not be the genius I thought he was but he’s definitely a genius at entertaining a crowd. He’s engaging, passionate, and  really funny. 

I mean, look at this. 1.08 – 1.46

(The rest of the lecture is really good fyi)

It was so unexpected that  I  wound up laughing like a donkey. Thank Allah I have my own room. 

Not only is he funny, his explanations are in depth but really simple. I love analysis, I used to attempt to analyze  movies and shows and novels, just to gain a better understanding but never quite mastered the art (I’m an English student too. I know, good luck, Muslimah ¬_¬). NAK doesn’t make it too complicated but he doesn’t let you miss out on the complex meaning and structure of the Qur’an. Even if it’s just a glimpse of it, as full comprehension can never be established until we all learn classical Arabic. 

Because of internet I have ADD. I cannot focus on one thing without jumping to another tab, and googling something, at the same time I’m sending a friend a whatsapp message. But with his lectures, I focus because he makes me focus. 

I just want to share this gift with everyone else, because I benefited GREATLY from his lectures and Qur’an Weekly vids (I strongly recommend these for anyone that doesn’t want to sit through 1 hour, 2 hour lectures) and would love it if you guys could benefit from it also.

Awesome Qur’an Weekly vid now that I mentioned it: 

But yeah. May Allah SWT bless him and his family with the best of this world and the hereafter, ameen. 

Depression

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

All praise is due to Allah SWT, and may His infinite peace and blessings be upon the Prophet Muhammad (SAW). May Allah SWT be pleased with his (SAW) family and companions, ameen.

Asalaamu ‘aleykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuhu

Ooo two blog posts in one day? I’m on fire, people. AND IT’S ABOUT ME AGAN 😀

It’s funny, as a Muslim it sometimes feels that being miserable, hurting inside or feeling very low is deemed to be illegal almost by other Muslims. It’s as if you’re not allowed to ever feel bad and if you do, you’re a horrible Muslim. I think this type of thinking stems from the belief that everything that happens to a Muslim is good. When you are blessed, alhamdulillah! When you’re inflicted with pains and trials, alhamdulillah, Allah SWT has removed your sins and may even have elevated your status in Jannah. Which of course I believe in; I don’t want anyone to get any funny ideas that I’m refuting that belief. But even so, when people are in pain and they have problems, it seems weird to tell them they cannot feel sad, ever. It’s impossible in fact; it’s a human emotion. You can be grateful for the countless favors and blessings of Allah SWT, but you can still feel sad.

I’m going to take myself as an example, and I will be honest; lately I haven’t felt very close to Allah SWT and my imaan has been slipping. Just like a roller coaster, I’ve come off my high and I can feel myself plummeting. I’m also super lonely at the moment. I mean, all my life I’ve always wanted a best friend, someone to rely on, to love, and care for and as I hit puberty that someone turned into an attractive tall man that I want to marry. So the lack of a companion, the lack of close friends (did I seriously just out myself as a loser?) has really put me down.

The problem with me though is that I don’t ask anyone for help, especially my family. I can’t, because it’s embarrassing.  It’s difficult enough to explain to people that you’re lonely, never mind that you feel detached from Allah SWT. The latter itself is like a huge failure and that you deserve to almost die or be abandoned for it. I don’t know, maybe I’m being a bit melodramatic (that is my speciality, I must admit). I refuse to admit to any type of weakness and would rather just keep it bottled up until it eats me up and I burst into tears in my lonesome. I know. I’m so much fun,

So it’s kind of difficult, and I wind up relying on the judgemental voice in my head that my problems is because I’m detached and that reading Qur’an is all I need and nothing else. I’m just too horrible to not completely rely on the Qur’an to help me.

Now, I’m not saying the Qur’an doesn’t help me. When I feel at my worst and I listen to Qur’an, my heart is at peace. I’m still hurting but my heart is at peace, it’s like I can breathe when I was suffocated before. But I don’t know how to not feel lonely. I don’t know how to maintain an okay level of piety. I’m either super pious, or I’m really low. And it’s like I desperately want help, but I reject the help of my family, or anyone I know.

Also the Prophet (SAW) gave people advice, he (SAW) never told anyone to go read the Qur’an if they were going through difficulties, so why should we act like that.

So I do silly things like abandoning my diet and exercise and eat ridiculous food at ridiculous time at night (form of self destruction, if I can’t harm myself, I will make myself fat. Which…doesn’t really work out too well), I sometimes send questions to people that do naseeha in the minor hope that they might help me but then of course feel super depressed when I realize that my questions are probably never going to be answered ever because they get 50000000x questions a day.

And then I wind up feeling even more lonely and even more of a failure. So I wind up wishing I had someone to love me, to care for me, to help me. But I refuse to ask anyone for help.

But what’s even better is that I also realize that I am so clearly not in the right head-space for a husband at the moment. Before I said it was because I was immature, which I sort of disagree with now. Not that I have immature tendencies but that it’s a reason for me not to get married because Aisha (RA) was 9 when she got married and at 9, even though Aisha (RA) was a special type of woman, couldn’t have been super mature at that age.

What I mean is that because I feel detached from Allah SWT, I don’t want to get married to anyone, and I want to fix that aspect before anything. Yet I’m beating myself up for having lows, and not being able to maintain an okay level of piety. So I don’t know, I don’t know what to do.

I absolutely refuse to talk to a local 500 year old imam because that’s just embarrassing. “Yes, asalaam aleykum sheikh, I’m going through difficulties because I’m super lonely because I want a hubby but can’t have one because I’m really far away from Allah SWT, and the latter issue itself is a huge problem enough to make me super depressed. What should I do?” SERIOUSLY. I would rather break my leg. 

JazakAllahu khairan 🙂