There is a concept that one of my teachers iterates again and again in her lessons. The past weeks, it has been on my mind more than ever. It is: كل فراغ فراغ لله Every free time you have is time that Allāh has freed for Himself. If your friends have moved away from you, if you are done with your studies, if you have not found a job, if you have been let go from a job, if are…
One concern that often crops up in the lives of those who want to achieve but cannot because of an inability to translate their desires and motivation into action is, how does one get out of this rut. A sister recently, may Allāh bless her, penned it so eloquently. I saw myself in her words, as I’m sure many others do so as well. She wrote about her desire to commit the Qurʾān to memory. She has the intelligence, she…
A high īmān gets you through the small every day as much as it gets you through the bigger and unexpected circumstances. It is usually the small every day that is a good gauge of where your īmān is. If you find yourself easily frustrated and quick to anger, chances are whatever aroused it was not warranted, rather it is a low īmān that is the culprit. Consider a person driving home from work, for example. When a person who…
“The treadmill is, in fact, an appropriate metaphor. By some estimates, about 40 percent of people who buy home exercise equipment later say they ended up using it less than they’d expected. How hard we push ourselves in a given workout matters, of course, but I think the bigger impediment to progress is that sometimes we stop working it altogether. As any coach or athlete will tell you, consistency of effort over the long run is everything. How often do…