Because it's love

In the name of the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful

Alhamdulillah, it has been three days since the finish of my CA (Continuous Assessment) for Biochemistry and alhamdulillah that the coming dusk will be Awal Muharram. Galway is getting colder and currently we're all trying to adjust with the weather here which rains for 15 minutes, stops for 5 and then continues to rain. Surely is a challenge but insyaAllah bearable.

Three days ago - to be exact, it started a week ago - I had been questioning myself as to why it has been so 'dry' living. I'm not saying dry that is as though I'm having trouble with food and that I'm shrivelling into some kind of dried vegetable, but more like losing meaning to life. Questions like,

"Why am I doing this in the first place?"

"Why do I care so much about what is going to happen to other people?"

"Why must I trouble myself to decide on which to attend?"

"Why must I care about people's thoughts?"

Don't get me wrong, it's not that I'm rebelling towards anything nor am I saying that the community here are being pushy or trying to pressurize us. The people here are good, remarkably kind and generous but sometimes not even that is good enough of a reason to go through so much just for their cause is it? You can be nice to your friends, but everyone has a limit. One's patience is like the limiting reagent to one's action. You can be as nice as you can but in the end, you don't have the patience of Nabi Ayoub, what more the patience of Rasulullah to withstand all the tiredness.

So I asked myself this question,

"What does Allah want me to gain in the end?"

And I remembered what my murabbi gave to me during the first time I had a sleepover at her house,

Love. That was the reason all along.

It was because of love that Rasulullah did spread Islam. It was because of love that the sahabahs fought for the sake of upholding the rightful place of Islam. It was because of love that the sisters go through days and nights thinking about their mutarabbis.

And it was because of love that Allah granted me life and understanding on this path.

I soon started to look at everything in a better perspective as I acknowledge all the hardships were given because of love. Not just because of the cliche 'Allah misses you and wants to here your prayers and plea' but instead because of Allah's love, I am given the opportunity to learn a valuable gift behind the dark clouds of trials and misery.

Due to that love, it is only logic that I spread love as well. Love that Allah has bestowed to me is a love that is bestowed to the whole universe. And this is the same love that flows in the blood of the Anbiya', in the sahabahs, in the tabi'-tabi'in and in the Muslims around the whole world.

So next time I'll know why I'm going through all of this,

It's because of love. Pure love.

Eiduladha

Takbir raya bersama mereka
Di dalam ruang yg tiada batas
Di bawah langit ciptaanNya

Seakan sayu suara mereka
Berada di bumi asing
Namun kelompok kecil ini
Masih segar
Masih bersemangat
Masih gagah
Meneruskan perjuangan
Melaksanakan tanggungjawab

Aku sampaikan salam
Untuk yang jauh
Untuk yang dekat
Untuk yang sntiasa ada dalam doa

Moga dikekalkan dalam kelompok mulia ini
Sehingga nafas akhir
Di bumi Ilahi

Thinking of others

Bismillahirrahmanirrahim..

Alhamdulillah it has been nearly a month after my arrival to Ireland. After three weeks of class, we're finally ending the fourth week of lectures, dissections and PhysioEx labs tomorrow (no classes on Friday due to the university's open day). Alhamdulillah for surviving, for climbing the Cliffs of Moher, for usrah, for the cold wind of happiness and for the love of my family; near and far, together with every small bit of blessings that I've never acknowledged before.

Anatomy is extremely splendid.

You'll start to appreciate all the smallest cells when you see how the skeletal muscles group up together to form us- humans and how they originated from the muscle fibres to the constituents of nerve fibres, axons, neurotransmitter and what not.

Physiology brings up a lot of sense especially when making logic of all the diseases that is occuring inside our human biology. Yesterdays's haematology lab is truly amazing (although we just used a simulation to undergo this) and we calculated our own hematocrit. Science is so cool, mashaAllah.

*sengih sensorang*

Biochemistry is quite tough especially when the lectures are super fast. It's like all those two week lectures in KMB compacted into an hour- even possible to half an hour. Gladly, Teacher Mira did me some justice instilling all the basics of organic chemistry and food chem in my brain. This subject is probably like Physiology only that it takes most of my energy to digest what is being told in front of the lecture hall resulting me to either fall asleep (drainage of energy) or wide awake (non-stop writing in my notebook).

And who says the medical course is boring?

*angkat-angkat kening*

**********************************

Looking up at what I have been talking about beforehand, it seems that the stories basically revolve about my personal being. This has got me thinking,

What about my friends? What about their lives?

And this is not about the friends that are far from me, this is about those who are living across my room, just a few stairs below and across the road. Friends who are near, whom I see everyday. It's sad how much I have been so focused on my own personal state, I forget that there are people around me that I need to look after as well. 

True enough, that we should focus on ourselves first before putting others in the picure. However, until when will the so-called 'personal-space' ever end if we never try to insert in the picture, the lives of everybody else? Without us realising it, selfishness will soon overwhelm us and in the end, nothing will we gain in helping others other than envy and jealousy towards those around us.

I remember quotes from Muntalaq about how a Da'ie should behave- trying the best to instill in the people correct understanding of being a Muslim, a devotee to all of what Allah dictates. I remember one of the aspects in the 10 Muwossofat Tarbiyyah that we should be useful to others. Being useful doesn't really mean to only help out with house chores and the sorts, tarbiyyah-wise, who is to cater those around you if you do not start first?

Sure it's hard

Sure it'll take your time

Sure you'll need to have patience

(People don't change overnight, I'm a proof of it)

Sure it'll consume all the feelings that you have

And you'll have to sacrifice every bit of yourself in order to get this done

However,

"Allah hath purchased of the believers their persons and their goods; for theirs (in return) is the garden (of Paradise): they fight in His cause, and slay and are slain: a promise binding on Him in trth, through the Law, the Gospel, and the Quran: and who is more faithful to his covenant than Allah? Then rejoice in the bargain which ye have concluded: that is the achievement supreme."

(At-Taubah,9:111)

It will take more than just words or a one-day attempt in thiso. It'll take weeks, months, years, blood, sweat, tears and probably that person will not even turn-out to be what we want them to be. But keep reminding yourself - I should be reminding myself too, that all of this is done for Allah. Nor for the results, not for the name, not for other people to remember our deeds. If it doesn't work out, it means that Allah is trying to teach us a far more valuable lesson of patience and preserverance. If Rasulullah gave up after the people of Taif threw rocks at him, we would never experience Islam to what it is today. If Abu Bakr and Umar gave up after Rasulullah passed away, Islam would never be spread to where it did today. 

A much closer to heart example, 

Zainab had to sacrifice her undying love for her husband as she made her hijrah to Madeena, having to leave her husband behind because he as a musyrik. It was such a sad experience but she did what she had to for Allah. Soon after, she was rejoined back with her husband, a Muslim then and they continued to live happily for only a short span of time before her husband was finally granted syaheed which after that she followed suite.

*smiles*

Truly everything that is sacrificed in the sake of Allah, remains with Him. And He will give it back, either in Dunya or in the hereafter. In a much greater and better condition. That definitely will be the greatest reward after all the pain we had to endure.

Let's have faith and keep the pace

Let's open the heart to many doors ahead

And take fragments of people along the way

InshaAllah, we will learn so much more

And obtain even more when we return back to Him

May this benefit us, Biiznillah.