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  • Being kind to yourself is often the most difficult thing you can do. 

  • My Struggle Continues

    It tires me just thinking about how futile some struggles can be. Many of my struggles fit this description quite well. Seeing all the posts about Muharram, about special occasions, about noted personalities, and scholarly quotes, and admirable leaders…all this sometimes inspires me, but most times it tires me. 

    It reminds me of how much people focus their lives around special occasions and forget to live in between. It reminds me about how so many become cult followers of notable personalities and inadvertently create sects within the Ummah. I see people arguing about who should have been the leader of the Muslims after the demise of our beloved Prophet (pbuh) as if that would influence their imaan or standing in Allah’s eyes as individuals…and they forget how many transgressions they commit in the process of such useless debate. 

    We’ve become historians about Islam more than we are believers…we need so badly to be right about whose view is correct and whose is kufr that we’ve lost sight of the essence of Islam. We focus on who practices which rituals and compartmentalise them so that it’s easy to define where they fit in the hierarchy of believers, as if we’re even capable of gauging the true worth of anyone. And all this leaves me feeling quite disillusioned about life and this Ummah that I so desperately want to feel a part of…but I don’t.

    I feel like I’m on the outside looking in, despite sharing the same articles of faith, and the same passion for peace and tranquility of the soul in finding serenity in the remembrance of Allah. But…sigh…it doesn’t seem to matter. Presentation is much more important than substance these days. The embellishment of the facade determines our worth in the eyes of others…reminds me of something someone posted recently that struck a chord with me…despite your best intentions, society will judge you by your appearance, but despite your best appearance, Allah will judge you by your intentions. Still, we focus on appearance…we focus on appearance…and social circles…and prestige…and social standing…and outward religiosity…and when this becomes the preoccupation of my mind, I remind myself that a prostitute was granted Jannah for a single sincere act of kindness to a dog…that same prostitute would have been openly declared by many a scholar as being a kaafir because of her chosen line of work…or her dress code…or her social standing…yet she was a Jannati…but STILL, we judge by appearance…and have useless debates that never strengthens our imaan but only strengthens our pride or arrogance because of our skill at debating and nothing more…it’s so tiring…utterly exhausting…

  • I understand your viewpoint more clearly now, thanks to your detailed explanation. Thank you for being calm about the matter. I do agree with a lot of what you had said, and that yes smiling can make a difference in I would assume less serious cases. I would never condone the abuse of any medication with other illicit drugs or alcohol as well, but I do wonder what you would think about somebody taking medication because of a genetic illness? I myself do not wish to rely on medicine all my life.

    Sorry that it’s taken me so long to respond to this. Genetic illnesses (specifically within the context of mental states) is a complex one. I’ve been thinking of the best way to present my views on this so that it makes sense, but I’m not quite getting there, so here goes nothing. 🙂

    I believe that we have hereditary traits that we’re born with. Some are physically manifested whilst others are more subtle and only become fully evident later in life. From personal experiences, environment doesn’t always influence these, so I’m inclined to believe that it is in fact passed down through genes and not just something adopted because of being exposed to the ways of the adults that conceived us. In this context, my point about environment is relevant where the child is not necessarily raised in the same home by its biological parents, but still grows up to exhibit some common traits with its biological parents despite never having spent time with them.

    However, I believe that all things being equal, we all progress to a point in our lives where we are able to make conscious decisions about whether or not we choose to maintain or nurture specific habits and traits that we have. Those who succumb to their state usually never even attempt to break bad habits that may have been inherited because they are so accepting of it. If this works for them, then so be it. But it doesn’t necessarily prove that we’re unable to change the cycle that our genetics may have started.

    I’m obviously a big believer in the power of thought, but not in the corny cliched way that most like to generalise about everything being mind over matter. But more substantially in that through a concerted effort, we are able to resist bad habits to the point where it becomes second nature for us not to have those habits at all. The same, I believe, is true about mental states.

    If we inherit a genetic make-up that comprises a chemical imbalance (within the context of mental illnesses), and we are raised in an environment provided and maintained by the very same adults that we inherited it from, we would be in a perfect situation to ensure the preservation of such a mental state because it’s in fact a vicious cycle. What I mean is, given my assertion that our thoughts and emotions define our physical state, then by the same logic, the chemical make-up that the adults spawn that is passed on to the unborn child is actually a result of the circumstances that the adults were in. When the child is born, it is raised in the very same environment that gave rise to the state of the adults’ mind-set and therefore nurtures the very same traits in the child.

    Given that most of our behaviours are learned through observation rather than instruction, the impact of this learning process is easily under estimated. But to me, the saving grace for the child is when they reach an age of being self-aware, and they develop the faculties to observe, question and act independently, they become capable of choosing to change the pattern, or to nurture it. It is when this important decision is made at every point of pain or struggle that these changes are triggered within us. When we’re successful at breaking that cycle through conscious effort, our deeply ingrained defence mechanisms as well as memories of our previous state and what helped us to cope with stress can cause us to relapse. But it’s important to remember that such relapses are most probably from habit rather than an independently formed chemical imbalance.

    This post is getting too long and probably tedious, so I’ll leave it at that. I’m not even sure if I managed to convey my thoughts in a lucid manner. Happy to hear alternate views or comments on this. So long as it’s presented rationally and not scornfully.

  • saraharaha:

    CURRENTLY ON THE DRAWBOARD:

    “How great a companion your money is, that it only benefits you once it leaves you.”  —-Imam Hassan Ibn Ali. (AS).

  • Random Thoughts

    I read an interesting post this evening about many interesting things…what struck me the most about it was the references to random events or occurrences, and also the basis of scientific theories as opposed to the use of the word ‘theory’ as a colloquial term. So I started wondering about randomness and if it really does exist…I mean, can something really be random in the true sense of the word, or do we just use the term ‘random’ to describe something that either has no discernible pattern, or just isn’t important enough for us to want to figure out the order that exists within it?

    I think it’s both, and I also think that in its truest form, randomness does not exist. If it did, it would mean that the laws of cause and effect are fluid and not fixed. So I think that everything has a predictable and fixed pattern, but when the variables are either unknown, or too numerous to compute, we refer to it as random. 

    Another random thought I had was about evolution, origins of creation and all that interesting stuff that I seem to get myself caught debating so often recently. Just like evolution is a scientific theory, and if I understood the post correctly, it would appear to be a significantly misunderstood theory as well. I could then also through a similar approach theorise that my view on creationism is in fact as scientifically grounded as evolutionary theory. For me, within the context of creationism, it is entirely logical to believe that all the species in their current form were created that way with the similarities and differences exactly as it is in order to be a model for us to realise how minor differences in parameters of creation can cause such significant differences in existence and being. 

    This makes more sense in my head than it does in words…so I’ll stop before I get a headache…

  • Often, after a tedious debate about atheism versus theism, the residual thought that keeps floating in my head is the last verse of Surah Kaafirun. And then I wonder why I had the debate to begin with. But I always get sucked into the debate anyway. It all feels so futile sometimes. But I guess I could never sum it up better than this Surah does…It confirms that unless there is a willingness to consider the alternative, we’ll always be locked in our own views of faith and belief. So instead of continuing the insane pattern of reblogging and debating, this is my reminder to myself, and anyone else that I may have been engaging in any discussion (meaningful or not) about issues of faith.

    Lakum, deenukum, wa liyadeen…to you is your way and to me is mine. 

    I’ll try to restrain myself to the point of only establishing understanding, but not to go as far as trying to convince. 

    (Source: http://www.youtube.com/)

  • You can’t wake a person who is pretending to be asleep.

    Native Proverb   (via thelittlephilosopher)

  • My Greatest Fear

    I fear hypocrisy more than I fear disbelief. Determining, subjectively or objectively, whether one is on the path of Imaan or Kufr is relatively easy, with the most daunting obstacle in this path possibly being arrogance or pride. And both arrogance and pride quickly subsides in the face of overwhelming odds. So at such a point, it would be quite easy to determine whether I’m a believer or not.

    Hypocrisy is so much more difficult to identify, both within ourselves and in others. Blatant hypocrisy is easy. Seeing someone visibly making statements about their beliefs and then deliberately or equally blatantly acting in contradiction to those beliefs is a litmus test of hypocrisy that anyone can apply, regardless of education, intelligence or upbringing.

    But hypocrisy can be easily disguised through the conscious application of our intelligence, especially if we’re naturally self aware. I can easily observe my own actions relative to my statements in front of others, and through conscious thought, ensure that they are always aligned. But if my motivation to do so is to appear to be sincere and consistent to others to save myself from criticism or ridicule, then this is when I believe I’ll be standing on the edge of hypocrisy and potentially not even realising it because at that point, if practiced for long enough, I would possibly succumb to internal debates that justify my actions to myself because my actions are beyond reproach by others. But…this internal debate is what I fear most as the potential seat for hypocrisy.