The Voice in My Head & The Void in My Heart

Asalam Aleykom everyone,

     The article that I am about to share with you, is one of my SuperMuslims articles. Links to the full magazine are at the bottom. The theme for that month was honesty. I share with you this story because I know that sometimes its hard to be honest with ourselves, I know that its a struggle. But trust me when you are honest with yourself, you become a much happier person.

                             The Voice in My Head & The Void in My Heart

                                                  By: Habiba Ghanem

“You are happy. You are happy. Everything is great minus a few bumps in the road, you are still happy,” the voice in my head assured me.

But as time passed by the voice in my head, started asking questions, “Are you happy? Is this worth it?”

“Yes, yes, shhh,” I would say.

“But what about the signs? Don’t they say something? Why are you overlooking them?” The voice kept asking.

“Those signs are just a few bumps, don’t worry. I’ll just keep making duaa. This is a chance for me to get closer to Allah (SWT),” I assured the voice in my head.

                                                               ---

At least I was right about one thing, Allah (SWT) was testing me, but for awhile I was going about this test in the wrong way. Instead of moving towards Allah (SWT) I was moving away.

The more that I lied to myself and the more that I purposely overlooked signs, the bigger that my ignorance got. In other words, I had allowed shaytan (satan) to play with my head and the more that, that happened the more that my nafs (ego) was affected.

Now that I look back, I see how selfish I was. I had seen the confusion and sometimes pain in the eyes of those around me but I ignored it. I was hurt too. Confusion and frustration became my close friends.

Despite what I was going through I still prayed to Allah. At first I used to ask Him to make things work out the way that I wanted. But as my inner struggle grew I started asking Allah to present what was best for me. I think that, that was the starting point of me being honest with myself, not fully honest but there was progress nonetheless.

Throughout the tough time that I was facing, Allah (SWT) sent a few gifts. Indeed, “So verily with every difficulty there is ease 94:6” 

 

The first gift that was sent to me was the “Help Club” (A club at my university.) My first group of Al Sohba Al Saleha entered my life. Suddenly, people with great hearts surrounded me. They were people who loved each other for the sake of Allah (SWT). It was just the kind of environment that I needed. They taught me so much and their presence eased my struggle.

Then out of nowhere there was something inside of me that was encouraging me to be a better person. I knew that I was on a path but I had no idea where it was taking me. The more that I wanted to improve myself; and the more that I worked on improving myself, the louder that the compressed voice became. My stubborn self wouldn’t go down without a fight though.

Slowly but surely, I started listening to the voice inside my head. I could no longer ignore the hole in my heart. My struggle was stopping me from becoming the person that I truly and deeply wanted to become. It took awhile for me to admit that but once I did, I got passed my problem and I haven’t looked back ever since.

You see, the more that I became honest with myself the more that I opened my heart to Allah (SWT) I put my trust in Him, and He never let me down. I left everything up to His will, as I should have from the beginning. I hated to admit it at the time, but deep down I knew I was miserable and my heart was never at ease. As soon as I started leaving things up to Allah; believing with all my heart that this was for the best, I got a taste of the state of tranquility and happiness that I was in need of.

Even though I had gotten passed my struggle (with Allah’s help of course), He sent me more blessings. I was introduced and given the opportunity to join two other organizations; Serenity Society; (a new club that started at my university) and SuperMuslims. Both of those groups work to remind others of the reason of our existence.  The people that Allah sent to me throughout everything that I was going through, were a sign from Him. He wanted me to continue on my path and He provided people to help me and inshAllah will continue to help me and I can’t thank Him enough for his blessings.

You can’t fight what Allah has planned for you, be sure that his plan is better. Take it from someone who has been there. Lying to yourself won’t make things better on the contrary it makes things worse. Don’t let shaytan (satan) get the best of you. No matter how hard something seems know that Allah (SWT) will be there to guide you, just turn to Him. 

SuperMuslims: 

SuperMuslims Magazine Issue:

http://issuu.com/supermuslims/docs/supermuslims_honesty

Facebook Group: 

 http://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/supermuslims/

Twitter: 
 http://twitter.com/#!/supermuslims6    

Website: 
http://supermuslims.tumblr.com/ 

Facebook Page: 
http://www.facebook.com/SuperMuslims


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