As we keep sailing on this boat together through this journey toward our Rabb we sometimes stop and ask ourselves, why are we not progressing in His nearness and why aren’t we having more barakah.

Our akaabir, may Allah swt bless them and preserve them, of the deen tell us that there are a few reasons for lack of progression, which are due to heedlessness and due to sins. If a moment comes in our heart where we sit alone and simply can’t bear that we live however we do and we wish to make a true change, the one we dream about and keep desire about in the depths of our hearts….then insha’Allah that is a sign that perhaps we will be successful in overcoming our obstacles.  At least this is the bear minimum feeling we should have in our heart to initiate action.

One thing we learn from our teachers is that in order to be able to stop sinning, we have to make sins more detestable in our heart than the pleasure we derive from them. So long as something doesn’t look detestable enough, we’ll struggle to leave it for good.    And when the moment comes when we are tempted to sin, if we just pause for a moment and make true, sincere dua for help to not do this sin, to be saved from this sin, and then we just simply walk away from that place of sin insha’Allah, we will be saved. And the next time, it will be even easier insha’Allah. Every time subsequently will become easier to avoid the times and places of sins. And particularly if we were to in the place of that act we left we inserted something of value and substance such as….perhaps we listened to a talk or read the Qur’aan or something like this. Insha’Allah, one may feel a greater difference and greater strength .. and insha’Allah by the grace and fazl of our Rabb…perhaps much more taufeeq and will.

The other reason for lack of barakah and progress in our journey to our Rabb is due to ghaflah, heedlessness. So what we want to try to do is fight this. This is sometimes such a challenge. The only way to fight this is to buckle up and take off.  We have to just get up and do amal. We have to feel that our time is valuable and every moment that passes is a another moment lost, another opportunity lost, another less deed than perhaps we could have had if we had been at a better spiritual condition.

Sometimes we are mesmerized by the good deeds being done around us. We are astonished by how much others accomplish. We wish to be like them, but those conditions which enable them to be like that don’t come for free. We have to make efforts. Sometimes we have to put ourselves in extreme measures until we break ourselves. We want to break that ego or that base desire in us that is holding us back from being the true mumin we wish to be.   We have to focus and center our lives around Allah swt and change our own selves. We have to start valuing our time because without this value we will only be in loss. And there is no way to gain the Qurb of Allah swt when we sit in the kind of loss ghaflah makes.  Ghaflah is like the worst kind of quicksand.  And this loss will be a source of regret and grief, particularly particularly if a time does come in our lives when we realize what we have done our whole life.But even then it’s a beautiful blessing that it came at all in our lives, because so long as we are alive we have at least some opportunity left if Allah swt gives us that taufeeq then or ever. We ourselves can’t just decide we will be something great at any point in our lives and then it shall be.  We might not ever even realize how deficient we were or that we even lead that life of ghaflah and sins to begin with…and then to die in that state as our sealing state would be awful.   So right when the moment comes in our hearts that we are not living right, we should take immediate action. Don’t let it slip away. Hold onto it tight. Grab on to that rope that Allah swt is giving.

So, we must value our time and prioritize our lives in such a way that shows we value our time. Then we must act right away. If we do not act right away, we are risking losing the taufeeq to do it at all.  It’s just like when the athaan comes for Salah, if we go and pray right away it’s much easier than if we delay. The delay of it can cause the loss of it. Allahu Akbar Kabeera…We must feel the weight of this. How good and satisfying is it when we’ve said all of our prayers on time at the early time?  It is a source of sakoon in the heart and helps us to do other amaal, thereby increasing upon the increased.

So to help us refocus ourselves, to help us gain more barakah and hold on to what little amal we have like our Faraid, we have the blessed Sunnah of the Nabi Kareem (صلى الله عليه وآله وصحبه وسلم ).   Insha’Allah working towards implementing Sunnah in our lives will help us hold on to our faraidh. And after establishing Faraidh and establishing Sunnan, we can think about establishing nawaafil ibadah, which will help protect our Sunnan.

 

We should aim to:

Change our hearts and conditions so that we can make progress toward this journey to Allah swt.     A good place to start is with the few points below:

 

1. We want to leave sin.

2. We want to leave this state of ghaflah.

3. We want to establish our faraidh and implement sunnan.

 

Aisha Chowdhury, Zaynab Academy Online student.