To document my life previously is not for here, this is not about my past this is about now. What is happening now. It is sufficient to admit that I've partaken of the fruits the little red eyed monster laid before me. I've resisted the most difficult of temptations for some time, but I had begun to wain. Being single, you can glean without my having to spell it out...or do I have to. A B C...
It's difficult to admit but in all honesty, I enjoyed myself, why lie to myself, it was fun...when bogged down with the daily grind, the stresses of life, the rat race, we compromise ourselves, we seek comfort, we seek solace, some in the arms of a woman, some in a bottle, some in a needle, pill or roll up...or all. Thankfully it was not all!
I'd pretty much staved off almost all the temptations bar one. It was a habitual refuge from me and circumstance. It didn't provide me with any alternate place where I hid from reality, i didn't do it to escape from reality, it was to relax. Being frank, I could've joined the gym but there are other temptations at the gym, it's all too easy to fall from one into the other, then end up doing both or more...
I'm being really honest with myself, but to be a real muslim in the west is very very tough. Your presented with temptation everywhere you look. That's why it's advisable to marry young.
But being young, I was foolish, an idealist, with grand ideas, honourable intention but never the less they were questioned. I wasn't equipped, emotionally or intellectually to elucidate my thoughts and or plans.
I was a young man in a place of limbo, with no safe harbour, my friends were the same, we found each other out at sea, trying to navigate the stormy weather in our most formative years. The teenage years. I wouldn't change it for nothing. An ideal set of circumstances maybe, but who gets an ideal set of circumstances, certainly not me. To use an analogy that is not an Islamic one but it's apt, I played the cards I was dealt. I could've shouted bum deal but nope I played on. I didn't know any better.
There are some life circumstances that your busy living to concern yourself with what it could be like. Your just living what it is like. You don't have a choice, it is what it is. When you do start having choices, that's when and where Islamic teaching will come to your aide.
I'm so fortunate of this fact, I had Islamic teaching from a child. That is the most powerful and grateful asset I had given to me. Without that I'd be bereft of all that is within me in that regard. It's been my beacon of light even in the darkest of times, it may have been a glimmer but it was still there. I'm so so so grateful for that.
I never quit on the idea of having a wife and children within that framework. It's a moral compass, it's a guide to fair weather and smoother seas. It takes you to the tropics instead of the Ice laden extremes. There is bounty in the extremes but you need a sturdy vessel to handle it. That vessel is you.
Young fish congregate in the shallows, or in rivers before they hit the open seas. Turtles born on land then never see the land for many a year, notice the mortality rate, it's very high. Something like 70% or more are food for other predators. They're an endangered species. I don't need to spell it out more, or do I...
Back to me, back to who I want to be, there is no point in me being a father without Islam being the bedrock of my family. I held on to that notion throughout everything.
We can be lost, but it's a relief to have it and when the time is right, you will come to rely on it. I always have. I would've sired a few rug rats by now. Just like Tom, Dick or Harinder!
Basically you can decide for yourself , it's yours to make, this is about me, my choices, and my experience of this particular choice.
I'm not here to judge you, or be judged by you, you can judge what you like, it doesn't bother me. You can think what you like, it doesn't bother me. You can say what you like, it doesn't bother me. I'm not concerned with you, I'm concerned with me. I'm doing this for me. I'm sharing my thoughts not for you but for me.
I don't judge anyone for the choices they've made. I stuck to my choices and I drifted, that's part of learning. We've all got our own roads to travel, we all have got choices to make, we all will be in the grave waiting for the day. You do what you do and ill do what I do. No harm no foul. I don't put myself above anyone. I wish you all a continued, peaceful, successful Ramadan and beyond. Ameen!
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