Revival.

 2:52am, 31st March 

The last time I was on here life looked very different. The cynicism I wore like armor is no longer a weight I'm familiar with. The grief of existence is no longer as heavy a burden. Not much has changed, but everything has. 

Nearly six months ago, I wrote about turning 23. The travesty of being, the uncertainty that comes with moving from one era in life to another. I wrote because I was bitter and confused. Frustrated even, about the direction my life was taking, completely unaware that everything would change a day later. 

Every Ramadan since Ramadan of 2020 has looked violently different from those before. I spent so much time studying the deen in 2020 that I may have overdone it. In 2021, I experienced the longest after-effects of grief. 2022 and 2023 are a blur of supplications I don't remember making and lots of reading. This Ramadan feels peaceful, in a way that befuddles me. I don't think I'm at a place of spiritual ease, but I no longer consider myself unforgivable. 

This Ramadan, I see myself living inside answered prayers. I find myself silent and reflective, but not pessimistic. The fear still exists, that I haven't been the best of people to some and I haven't done the best I could. But the fear has become part of the surrounding buzz. This Ramadan, I am practicing gratitude for the things I've blindly overlooked during the prime of my grief. 

I find myself reluctant to speak on anything if I don't know the complete truth, and because it's humanely impossible to know the complete truth about anything I speak even less. What I know for certain is that the divine decree is in play and it works in the strangest yet most wonderful ways. 

My marriage is something of great speculation, which flatters and intrigues me. It hasn't changed me and yet it has. I am not who I was before and this is a change I struggled to welcome. It scared me, how easily I was unlearning and relearning what it means to exist as an individual while in a commitment that transcends this life. But you see, the thing about change that I often forget is how relentless it is and how necessary it can be. It's not up to us to decide what goes away and what remains. 

We're all afraid, I've realized, of looking behind the curtain. We all want to understand the greater picture, the reasoning as to why we were created, and what good could come of our existence. We all want to do and be better. We are all desperate to be considered kind and worthy in the long run. But we're all so afraid. Some of us are afraid of judgment from those around us. Some of us are afraid of the commitment that comes with change. Some of us are perpetually terrified of falling back into who we were. 

But shouldn't our fear, and love, of Allah trump all that?

Ideally, it should. In an ideal world, nothing matters except for the pleasure of the One who created us. For Allah to be pleased with us is the end goal, no matter how much of this world's deceptions we cling to. 

In my experience, the fluctuation of my faith is directly linked to my inability to stand my ground and stay firm in the decisions I make. My indecisiveness has stood in the way of my growth for so long that now as I work on becoming more decisive I see how much I've lost in the process. Still, where I am now is only a glimpse of where I could be if I stay rooted in the decisions I make, in sha Allah. 

The goal, I'm realizing, isn't perfection. It isn't an end-all-be-all as I once feared. I don't have to turn a new leaf overnight. But I have to try. 

In the six months since I last wrote on here, I grew out of my tendency to fret about things out of my control. I learned that the present is all I have. Ruminating about the past dampens my mood and strips me of my ability to appreciate the present. Fretting about the future drains me of the energy I need to ensure what I fret about doesn't happen. In the end, all I have is now, and there is so much in my 'now' that I can, and should, be grateful for. 

In recent times I've stopped sharing my thoughts on the devastation surrounding us. I've stopped hyper-fixing on the injustices committed against our people. Instead, I'm choosing to learn from their resilience, to practice gratitude and patience, to understand the depth of their belief and how it contributes to their hereafter. The grief of the Palestenians is familiar to me, in a way that I can't quite explain. Yet, their faith makes me question the stability of my own. Their gratitude for the little they have caused me great shame. I sit with these feelings often and in those moments of reflection, I find myself more affirmed in my belief. 

The shortness of this life has dawned on me upon realizing the encounters we have are predestined. Every person we meet has been through a series of events that has changed them in ways beyond our comprehension. We owe each other kindness and acceptance. We owe ourselves a little reprieve and what better place to find it than in Islam. 

I don't know if any of my words matter much but I wanted to share them with you. Someday soon I will have better words, and more well-rounded wisdom to share, but today all I have is a prayer:

May we find ourselves in the presence of those who remind us of how temporary this life is yet how bountifully blessed we are to be here. May we outlive our grief and accept the love of those who see us as we are and for who we've always been. May we learn to move past what hurt us and appreciate what they taught us. May we reflect on our wrongdoings and find it in us to forgive ourselves, and seek forgiveness from the Ever-forgiving. May the time you spend reading this aid you in the best of ways, and May my words resonate only if they are beneficial.