A Ramadan season miracle

 Last Ramadan started like no other Ramadan in my whole life…

Every Ramadan, I expect blessings, I expect Fethe (enlightment) at the end of the way. It’s something I long for and work on, that is why my Ramadans are generally made of strict schedules; especially my bedtime schedule, it’s the only way I can find time to read Quran extensively and do night prayer while still being fit to do my job.

This Ramadan Alhamdulillah there has been hardly any reading of Quran and the minimum of night prayer instead I had: a hundred phone calls, a hundred e-mails, late hours at the office and last but not least an overwhelming feeling of gratitude that made me tear up more than once…

Some of you might wonder? What happened? Had I suddenly turned into a crazy masochistic workaholic at the opening of Ramadan?

Allow me to go back in time:

A few months ago, my friends Ahmed & Zeinab came up with this incredible idea of feeding 20 families every day for the whole month of Ramadan, they prepared a list of the content of the daily food parcel, went to a shop, agreed on the prices and started preparing for the feeding.

When I was told the cost of feeding twenty families for 30 days of Ramadan, I was surprised by how low it was and felt that it was almost Fard (obligatory) on me to do so as it would be if accepted by Allah, an atonement for my sinful soul and the best investment for my afterlife...

“O son of Adam, I asked food from you but you did not feed Me”

“My Lord, how could I feed Thee whereas Thou are the Lord of the Worlds?”

“Didn’t you Know that such & such servant of Mine asked food from you but you did not feed him, and were you not aware that if you had fed him you would have found him by My side?.......

 YA ALLAH!

Getting back to the idea of the Iftar, the thing was that I was still in the midst of renovating my house so it clearly wasn’t possible for me to finance a whole iftar on my own money, I’m not a Rothschild heir but for some reason the idea would not leave me…I became gradually obsessed about the population of a certain sector of Nouakchott called Tarheel. This name just wouldn’t leave me, especially after a dear friend, Mariem told me something deep: "Tarheel is a typical case of what we call in Arabic “the weak leaning on the weak”, as it’s a neighbourhood for relocated families –who lived in the slums- unlike other neighborhoods, the poor of Tarheel cannot rely on solidarity to feed themselves because all their neighbors are poor…

Meeting Elizabeth after I had this conversation with Mariem, was the least I can say inspiring …Elizabeth is a researcher studying precarious habitat who’s so passionate that she takes 3 different taxis to go to Tarhil  in the worst heat peeks … What’s incredible is that she has overcome the barriers of language, extreme heat and nationality for the sake of doing something meaningful…  I told myself I should summon up the courage to do this; I don’t have half the obstacles Elizabeth has had to overcome but seriously where am I supposed to get the funding? How to handle the logistics of delivering the parcels & distributing them? (I work 9 hours a day)

The opening came, 4 days before Ramadan when I happened to speak to Mona about my wish of feeding the people of Tarheel, super Mona (Allah Yahfadha) said; “Don’t worry, I’ll do the fundraising and she gave me a large amount of her own money to start with…After Ahmed, Zeinab and Elizabeth had inspired me: Mona gave me the courage I needed. May Allah reward them all.

From that moment, things just accelerated : Ahmed called me to tell that incidentally he had found a reliable person in Tarheel to take care of the distribution. He was talking to someone about my project when this person told him : “Don’t you know that Elhajj the son of .... is an Imam in Tarheel?

I called Elhajj and he happened to be an incredible asset for the feeding with his dynamism and his acute sense of Amana.  This acute sense of Amana is what helped reach out to the poorest of the poor. He began by identifying 20 of the poorest families in his sector; he knew all the names of the women and men and their children’s names, their situation… mashallah! At only twenty five years old he was acting like some old parish priest mothering his flock! Lol

Fundraising too was another miracle; I sent an e-mail to one of my closest buddies, Mohamed Lemine, with pictures of me with some of the most vulnerable families met in Tarheel to send to our friends working in mining companies… Guess what? The crazy dude sent my picture and message to the whole mailing list of Mauritania’s biggest mining company and their contractors……When I saw what he had done, I must say I had mixed feelings : should I strangle him or should I thank him??????For God's sake, all my friends know that my motto in life is “Live hidden, Live happy!”- I finally chose to not physically harm him and instead to thank him profusely J

I did right. Thanks to that crazy e-mail and to a few other e-mails and phone calls we fundraised approximately 18 000 USD and helped 160 families.

The parcels distributed everyday

 

Mohamed Lemine & one of the cute kids in Tarheel

 

 

Believe me, it was a miracle... until now, the ease of how the money was obtained still leaves me speechless. Apparently the Ramadan season miracle is experienced every year by people active in charity works. This Ramadan,  I had the pleasure to have ftour with sisters who do charity work all year long. Beautiful women, heart and soul, radiant women, who only want God.

Not only did they tell me that they experience this Baraka every year but actually it seems like most great social initiatives start up in Ramadan!

Finally, as usual Shaykh Hamza Yusuf, my Shaykh, my mentor emphasized in one of his lectures, what was for me one of the greatest teachings of this whole Iftar project: “The group with it flaws is better than sectarianism with its purity”(NB “flaws” might not be the exact word he used)

Indeed, it's the Baraka of having a group working solely for the sake of God that has made this project possible. These past months & for the first time in my life (remember guys, my motto was "live hidden, live happy"), I have felt embraced and supported by a sisterhood and brotherhood  who accept to disagree & be different but at the same time are bonded by the Love of Allah & Muhammad (SAW) the Chosen One.

I LOVE THE UMMAH

This project wouldn’t have been possible without : Ahmed, Zeinab, ElHajj (the two El Hajjs :-), Mohamed Lemine, Olga, Mona, Elizabeth, Hafsa, Mariem,  Nathalie, Gueye, Junior, Mohamed Cheikh and the wonderful private donators may Allah reward them.

                             Some of the volunteers : Med Lemine, El Hajj (n°1); El Hajj (n°2)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fulfilling your dreams and transcending this material world

Lately I haven’t been able to write…

Although I have been asked repeatedly by a reader to get back to writing asap ;-) I just couldn’t because I was overcome by emotions which if expressed, would tell a lot more about my private life than I was willing to say.

However, I am no longer concerned about saying a little bit more than I had originally intended to… I realize that this blog allows a much needed catharsis to take place. It  helps me organize the happy turmoil in my soul. When I write, I am never detached, I’m either deeply troubled, giggling or laughing out loud when I'm about to crack up a joke!

For this specific post, let’s say that the words were gushing from a feeling of overwhelming, tear-jerking, gratitude! You know how you can have a dream very unlikely to happen and that you kind of got used to the idea that it never would happen. Well, guess what my friends? I had such a dream,  and it’s just about to be fulfilled, praise be to God Almighty.

Don’t try to guess what it is for you will exhaust yourself without finding out what it is ... “No, my hubby and I aren’t reproductively challenged (God forbid) and about to have a baby...”, “No, no it’s not that we’re going to Mecca either… that Alhamdulillah, has already been planned”. If you really want to know, you’ll have to start working harder to become my BFF, best friend forever ;-)

More seriously, when I add the imminent (insh.) fulfillment of my dream to various other strong positive changes in my life, I cannot but come to the conclusion that it’s all related to the fact that I joined the path of Istighfar and Salat ala Nabi. For me, no need to do the math here, all these positive changes originate from this. Since the Burda, and Qasidah Muhammadiya have been read several times in my house things have happened…. I don’t believe in the Qasidah Burda per se (it’s not magic!) but I believe that if you put in motion a process of expressing the love you have for the Prophet, through outward manifestations such as qasida recitation and salawats, if you are blessed with the chance to organize a Mawlid in your home, if you start focusing on the love so much that the longing would make you gladly welcome death…Nur, Light, will undoubtedly come.

I won’t lie to you and tell you that the struggle to keep the spirit of this Love strong and alive every day is easy, for most of the time I’m alone. Some days are easier than others but sometimes Dunya gets the upper hand and so I get frantic because I feel heedless, I feel WE are heedless. But regularly, God in his Mercy sends me sisters and brothers to help me feel I am not alone in my quest for Truth and so I pick up my weakened resolve and hit for the top of the mountain... once again :-)
I cannot fathom going back...How could I ever stand to go back, when now the reality of angels has become palpable and that I feel connected to those people for whom the Prophet is still alive?
I also cannot go back because I have had this strong, growing feeling that there are no limits to the Horizon, that the Faqir standing in front of his Lord can achieve anything and anything can happen to him, if it be God's will. Discovering this was incredibly liberating, I feel like I’ve been set free. I know I have already spoken about this, in one of my older posts but kindly indulge me for I would like to expand on this.

Take the time to reflect on this. Take a step back and think for your whole world can change the day you realize (profoundly) that : God willing there is nothing you cannot achieve with the power of your soul.Shaykh Hamza Yusuf in his lecture “BE GREAT PEOPLE” quotes “Take care of your soul, perfect it, give it virtuous qualities because it is by the soul that you are a human being, not by your body.” You can therefore, rise above that body, reach out for your dreams and for that glorious future of yours. It can be either that of a person of great patience, that of a nurturer, that of  leader of a nation, that of a scholar, that of a student of sacred knowledge, that of a loving parent, the possibilities are endless.

Here is a very short extract of a lecture of Hamza Yusuf that has been very important to me in this regards. I must say that I will never look at Shaykh Umar Farruq Abdallah in the same way anymore... Here is a man who applies what he believes in... May God increase him and give him Jennat El Firdows.
 

 

 

Let me share another inspiring story on how having certainty can change the course of things. This story happened to one of my sister's closest friends.

Mona and her  younger brother were studying abroad, the least we can say is that they had a hard time, their life wasn't easy. Muna was a med'school student and her younger brother was studying to become an engineer. One day, the boy had what seemed to be a sore throat and was asked by the doctors to run some tests. He complied and his older sister went to the lab the next day, to pick up the results. When she opened the envelope, she saw:  "Malignant..." We all know what "malignant" refers to :   The cancer, The C word,  etc…

When Mona read the results, instead of falling apart and despairing, the chronically stressed & overwhelmed med'school student said "And I know from Allah which ye know not" (which is what the prophet Jacob (RA) the very resilient, used to say, verse 86 of Sura 12, Quran) and prayed to God that these results be false, with the certainty that even though this diagnosis was from the most preeminent lab in the country, Allah's decree could make it all come to nothing.

She announced the news to her parents who flew with their son to France, where they were asked to run more tests..... The end of the story is that after undergoing various tests, the boy turned out not to have cancer! Alhamdulillah.

I ask all the people who read this, to raise their hands, now, in this moment to make Dua3 for this sister and her family and that they be blessed with good health and even stronger Iman.

(Continuation.)

Being certain that with Allah’s Mercy there is nothing you cannot achieve & relying only on Almighty Allah  is what will actually make you achieve your dreams.

If you arm yourself with certainty and reliance on God the Most Merciful and the Most Compassionate, and quit relying on your spouse, your network, the community or even your own strength and skills (because these are all things by nature limited), you will gradually see your mental barriers falling down, crumbling down.

One day, you will realize that you have left behind you a lot of the petty things of human life that were the foundation of your self-imposed servitude & that you are now reaching out for something that has no limit:  Allah’s Mercy.
And when he sets his Mercy on you… that day, if the odds were against you, if the Djins & the people of this world united to stand in your way, you would get what you had aimed for, because He has decreed it!

So rejoice my friend, you can be the dirtiest, ugliest, poorest forsaken soul on this earth if God blesses you with certainty and tawfiq the limit is the sky! J or more accurately there is no limit!

However, the problem is that if you don’t achieve the goals you’ve set for yourself, you can no longer blame it on the context (your age, your wild progeny, your parents, your neighbor, the heat, the President, the opposition…) if it doesn’t happen it’s just that you didn’t want it hard enough so you didn’t try enough or simply…. that you did try hard but that Allah Subhanahou Wataala hasn’t allowed it because he has something so much better in store for you J

For instance, I know that if I set my mind to it, I can be a Hafiza, a Fikiha, regardless of my age and my french secular educational background...but do I really want it? Of course, I love the idea but do I want it enough to put up with a little bit of hard work?

I have no doubt at all that God willing, if I put a good intention in it and work, one day there will be an opening (see what Hamza Yusuf says about this in the "Be great people" lecture)

 

 

Finally guys, after experiencing what I just told you about,  do you know what the real mind boggling discovery was? Now that I'm achieving plenty of my earthly projects,  surprisingly they don’t seem that important anymore in comparison to the bliss I felt when I was still out there, working hard on my projects and hoping for God’s Mercy.. I'm more and more aware that : the true bliss or blessing lies not in the achievement but in the prayer and longing that preceed it..

 

Wassalamu Aleykum



 

 

 

“Ask your heart, righteousness is what the heart feels tranquil with {…} “ Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him

I have never been as concerned about the state of my heart as since I’ve been listening to Shaykh Hamza Yusuf’s lectures.

Sometimes I joke about it, saying that now I try to go through life with a stethoscope on my chest to follow all the moves of my heart ;-) Indeed, Hamza Yusuf has highlighted the importance of putting oneself to work on one’s heart before comes the Day:

“In which neither wealth nor children shall be of any benefit [to anyone], except one who comes to God with a sound heart “(Quran, 26:88-89)

But before that day comes, purification of the heart is really the way to make the world a better place, for every act of cruelty, hate, racism, violence, pollution, stems from a disease in the heart and will disappear when it is cured. The disease can be either envy, cruelty, arrogance, rancor, ostentation, fear of poverty ...

The million dollar question is therefore, how to cure these diseases?

Fortunately, there exists a self-purification book (poem) known as Matharat al-Qulub (literally, Purification of the Hearts), which offers a means by which purification can be achieved. It is a treatise on the alchemy of the hearts, a manual on how to transform the heart. It was written by a great scholar, Shaykh Muhammad Mawlud al-Yaqubi al-Musawi al-Mauritani (Yuppie! He’s a compatriot of mine) and commented on by Hamza Yusuf.

By the way guys, if you ever have the chance of having this book in your hands, you must absolutely read the dedication written by Shaykh Hamza Yusuf. He says something like: “I dedicate this book to my wife, who has a heart so pure she doesn’t need it”. WOW!

Mashallah, what a beautiful thing to say about one’s spouse… it really makes you want to meet the woman! And it also taught me to try look at my own “better half ;-) with as much indulgence as Shaykh Hamza views his wife! Lol, Thank God my hubby is still learning English and can’t read my blog!

The book helped me identify some of my own diseases (of the heart) I wasn’t even aware of! Honestly, when I read the book I felt discouraged (I had a heart ache throughout it) but now that I know a tiny winy bit more than I used to at the time, I am super happy because now I know that :

-          Diseases can be cured (I have experienced it!)

-          Aching when you read about a disease is actually a good sign, it means that contrary to some hearts, your heart is still alive. For instance, if you read about miserliness and that your heart aches it certainly means you’re stingy ;-) but the good news is that your disease can be treated and eventually cured!

Once you’ve identified most of your diseases of the heart  this is how I have nearly cured some of mine:

1. Treat the heart with the things you KNOW deep down inside of you, are good for you.

For me, two simples changes were : reading Quran regularly and quitting listening to that depressing band that invariably made me want to throw myself from the top of a cliff! (pessimism is a disease of the heart).

2.Purify your life with Takwa, get away from those acts and people that drag you down.

As derived from the teachings of the Prophet (SAW), an act can take the appearance of good, or be banalized by society but if, even a tiny voice in your heart expresses unease because of it, quit it.  Don't shun that voice and silence it like Dorian Gray did, until you're so deep down into corruption, that you can no longer be guided by your heart.

In that regards, something happened to me that was pretty eloquent…

Living in the west, I have never had a problem with people who drink, if you don’t believe me just ask my friends down at the pub ;-)

Jokes aside, my reasoning was the following : I shouldn't have an issue about entering in non-alcohol free places (in the West) because I know who I am, a practicing muslim who would order a coke with her my meal.

After embarking on the purification of the heart journey, I no longer could enter places selling alcohol; the mere idea of entering a restaurant/café selling alcohol made me physically sick (I wanted to throw up).

In French the expression for having nausea “avoir mal au coeur” means literally “to have a heart ache”! It's clearly what happened to me : my heart ached so badly I was sick.

No matter what people told me, no matter how my brain tried to dismiss it with rational arguments, I decided to follow my heart.

3. Salawats on the prophet Muhammad (SAW)

I have not doubt  this is the practice that has helped me the most.

“Prayers on me are light in the heart, light in the grave and light on the Sirat " (sirat is the bridge every soul will have to cross to enter the heavens) 

While I am saying Salawats on the prophet SAW I always try to remember how much he loved us; the women, the children, the poor and all of God’s creation.  Until his last breath, he prayed that God have mercy on his Ummah. He died saying : Ummati… Ummati… Ummati… (my followers).

When I think of how he much he loved us, I can’t but strive harder to follow his way.

I noticed that as my love for the greatest of creation increased, I started to change, my heart softened, I couldn’t curse as much as I used to, even jokingly.  I have also never been a cry baby; each time I used to cry it was mostly out of anger and frustration! Gosh,I’ve changed so much; the hard headed woman has slowly given place to a meek person who weeps at spiritual stories... Lol

If some cleansing of the heart hasn’t taken place there, God only knows what happened!

Even my better half ;-) has noticed the changes in me, I have become nicer with him, actually when I laze about doing Dhikr after Maghrib, he urges me to do it even though he seldom does! lol

As a friend says, lectures are great, they serve as a reminder but “it is in Dhikr that our real growth lies”. I cannot but totally agree J

4. Remembering death

Reading about death, helps you have more detachment towards material things and accept that this life is imperfect and that the true success lies in being a good person. For it is that sound heart of yours, that will get (with God’s Mercy) you through the gates of Heaven and not your career as CEO of some big corporation.

5. Hang out with good people who try to better themselves and not the people who have given up the fight

Shaykh Hamza says that a sick heart needs good company in order to "inhale the fragrances of sincerity".

Finally,

 

By trying to cure your own diseases of the heart, you’re embodying the change you want to see in the world! You might not think that you're doing anything grand, because you’re not a world renown peace activist and you’re far from having Mother Teresa’s dedication but you never know…

One day after working hard on your heart you might wake up to find that you have become a clone of Mother Theresa without your knowledge!

Or, you might never become the next  Mother Teresa, but you will certainly bring up your children to be non racist, open-minded loving, compassionate people (sound hearts!) who will greatly contribute to making the world a better and safer place to be! And that my friend, will undoubtedly be a major achievement.

Please pray for me so I can have both blessings!

Mauritania: beyond the dirt and the takhaluf Heaven- Haven

When I was young, I dreamed of being a student of mahdara and my dear friend Roisin admitted to me that she had once dreams of becoming a nun.

These fantasies, these dreams are very common in young people around the world and leave as they grow older (even though seldom entirely). I think it’s because the younger we are, the closer we are to the original state of Fitra so we tend to long for something pure and perfect and what can be purer than wayfaring to God?

In my opinion, Mauritania is a good place to embark on such a journey.

“Withdraw the heart into the arena of reflection

Nothing helps the heart more than that!”

From Hikam Ibn Ata Illah

A french brother, some of you might know, called Ian Mansour, told me that when he was seventeen he decided to leave Britany for good for he had come to the conclusion that Europe because of rampant materialism was no longer a  favorable  context  for soul-searching, introspection. His exact words were that it no longer allowed “retour sur soi” which literally means “to return on oneself”.

But why is introspection, soul-searching, “retour sur soi” or whatever one calls it so necessary?

Introspection is the prerequisite for any conscious decision, spiritual improvement and great achievement.

Hamza Yusuf had to live in the Tagant desert to become Shaykh Hamza Yusuf.

                                                                                Hamza, the student of knowledge in Tagant, Mauritania (Peter Sanders)



And most of you know better than me the story of the withdrawal of the great Ghazali from the world.  El Ghazali recommended that seekers of knowledge travel to a place where they know no one.

Is it the proximity of the desert? Is it the feet of so many God-fearing, God-loving Ulama and Awliyas that tread upon its ground that makes Mauritania a blessed place for introspection and reflection?

Or is it the frugality one finds in Mauritanian villages, the heat, the mosquitoes for they are a school in themselves...They teach Sabr (patience) and we well know the special place that's reserved for the patient.

But give good tidings to the patient who, when disaster strikes them, say, “Indeed we belong to Allaah, and indeed to Him we will return.” [Quran 2:155-156]

To give you an idea of the place (at least its capital city), here is a description i found on a blog, it’s pretty eloquent:

“It was almost mid-night but it looked like morning to me. I was feeling like being home again […] I prayed and had a good sleep with wonderful, sweet mosquito bites. In the morning, I looked at the mosquitoes in my net, singing their irritating music in their pregnant state, moving around with my sucked blood.

I took to the city to use the internet and pray in the saudi masjid. How nice it feels like to be back! Looking the streets, you see men and women urinating openly by the sides of cars, walls, etc, dirty streets, and in the mosques, hearing the Mauritanian style of loud Shouting of TAKBIR at the opening of Solah(not Maalilki style to shout too loud). From all of these, I said to myself, welcome back to Mauritania!” 

 So if you can go beyond the dirt, the pissing on the streets, the spitting, the burping arghhh  -I am voluntarily crude- you will find a hidden gem. If you open your heart to people, you will notice the imperceptible things that make them special ; some are always doing dhikr, some do incredible sadakats (charity), some spend their nights in prayer, some just have incredible smiles in weather beaten, sunburnt faces.

Mauritania is a country where foreigners weep twice: First from dismay that they are sent to such a forsaken land and when they leave, because it has become a place they love.

Shaykh Hamza Yusuf encourages the love of poetry so here is just for you, my friends, one the English poems I love the most :

Heaven-Haven 

A nun takes the veil

I have desired to go

Where springs not fail,

To fields where flies no sharp and sided hail

And a few lilies blow.

And I asked to be

Where no storms come,

Where the green swell is in the havens dumb,

And out of the swing of the sea.

Gerald Manley Hopkins

"The way out is in the book of God"

I remember precisely the day I heard these words pronounced by Shaykh Hamza Yusuf… I felt like I had been struck by lightning. In my life I have 3 or 4 of these defining moments, these epiphanies, when just by hearing or reading something I come to an incredible realization, that if implemented will impact my whole life….

At the time, I was going through a whole life change. I left a life of constant movement, of tight schedules for a life where the job was intense but where the evenings just stretched out… The speed of the hamster’s wheel, conjuring my fellow mates and my own existential anguish was no longer, I had just stepped off. I came to a life where in the evening you are alone and there is silence… you are faced with yourself… No one to call you to go out for a drink, dinner or just for some random girl talk.

I remember that one of my brothers told me at my wedding party (by the way, I must say it was the greatest batch of the decade! ;-) that my biggest success in life were my friends, I do have very special, loving endearing friends and a special bond unites me to with each one of them.

One evening, I felt so nostalgic of my buddies that I recall sitting on the top of the garage and repeating their names like I was counting the beads of a rosary ; Huiyi… Roisin…Rime…Alex…Selma…Andrew…Miriam…Lucia… Bonnie…Stephane…Christophe…They were always a family, when no one of the family was around… 11 years… It was a long time to leave behind. ..

Anyways, the whole week I had been feeling low and I was wondering when will this cycle of unhappiness or more accurately of dissatisfaction end? When I was in Paris, I dreamt of sand dunes and when I came home to the sand dunes here I was, dreaming of my former life in Paris! Seriously, was I dysfunctional? When would constant and sustainable happiness be? Don’t get me wrong I was and still am a pretty cheerful person, I love joking and laughing and at that time of my life I had already had deep profound moments of gratitude and happiness but it always seemed like; I was waiting for a cycle to lead to the other in order to allow myself to be happier and I must admit that ends of cycles were always painful because of the uncertainty that followed the departure from something I had grown accustomed to and deeply fond of.

It was while in that mood (a MEGA funk..) that I distractedly turned on one of Hamza Yusuf’s lectures (I think it was "The poor man’s book of assistance") and I heard this incredibly simple yet life changing answer: “THE WAY OUT IS IN THE BOOK OF GOD.”

The shock was so strong it awoke from my daydream and I stood up with the resolve to explore this solution that was offered to me. I did wudu and read a few chapters of the Quran, and decided I would read Kuran everyday for as long as I could (I am not a very disciplined person J )

I read the Quran this way for 2 whole months, during my lunch break, after work, between Duhr prayer and Asr on Fridays). The effects were immediate; I regained my laughter, my joie de vivre and acquired a whole new deep new sense of confidence.

Yes dear friend, you got me right: an increased level of confidence (Wow!). I believe it was the Baraka of reading the Quran for those 2 months that made me come to another important realization:

Life is a play where those who decide aren’t those that seemingly decide… God sole and only decides.

It became super clear to me that I shouldn't expect anything from people, even the ones who want me good), I must pray God for it.

It does seem obvious but it’s very liberating when you’re sitting in a meeting with very important people (some humble but some very full of themselves I must say…) or being interviewed or negotiating a raise ;-) and that you remind yourself: “these people have no power on the outcome, it’s God who decides”.

This realization helps you stay grounded and breaks your ego, There is no risk of you falling into hubris for you know that you are nothing without God’s mercy, you can only count on His Mercy (and your Asbabs) to make things happen. The great thing is that with time you will see that God willing, the things you pray for always happen when the intention you put in them is good!

To all my sisters and brothers who lately have shared with me some of their doubts and worries, befriend your Kuran, make it your daily life buoy. When you are in a funk, read Quran everyday, it will elevate you and purify your heart.

The other thing : don’t take life too seriously, believe in leaving things in the hands of the Lord, it helps you stay detached while putting in your best effort.

If you feel you’re not hanging out with the right bunch, pray God to send you your people

Like you all know, being the new kid on the block is never easy. I suddenly became that kid when 4 and a half years ago I came back to Mauritania after spending 11 years in Paris.

Don’t get me wrong, people here are super friendly, especially the ones in the company I was lucky enough to work with. We laughed all the time and they taught me that it's never the end of the world, even the day the team missed the deadline of a call for tender we'd been working on for a whole week!

They used to say with a big smile : "when it’s not meant to be it’s just meant to be :-)" Coming from a Parisian environment, where missing the metro is viewed as a tragedy, this attitude was sooo refreshing!

But outside the office, I just couldn’t find a circle that was willing to have me and that resembled me..

Looking back, it was a good thing I didn’t find my bunch immediately, I had a lot of time on my own, to reflect, which was exactly what I needed after so many years in the rat’s race.

But after two years in Mauritania, I wanted friends to share thoughts and experiences.That’s when I started hanging out with the American girls, they were sweet and had this great thing about them : permanent good mood. At the question ; How are you? They invariably answered “GREAT!”

WOW… in Paris,no one ever gave me that answer expect Marie a friend who was bi-polar and therefore was afflicted with incredible highs but also incredible lows!

So there I was hanging out with the American chicks, but never feeling quite at ease ; it was considered uncouth to speak about politics, religion and they hardly ever spoke about private matters so after a while it just wasn’t enough for me… I felt no progress, we didn’t get closer and I didn’t learn anything, sometimes it was even so shallow my heart sunk…

So I started hanging out less and less with them and praying Allah Almighty to send me the right people.

So one day, I went with the girls to a neighborhood I had never set a foot in and never would have set foot in, on an expedition to buy fabric. I remember we were joking and laughing, but I was distracted.. You know, one of these moments where outwardly you’re laughing but in reality you’re just not in it? It’s like your body is there but your soul isn’t because it longs to be somewhere else.

I was in that state when I walked out of the store with one of the girls, Sarah, a very beautiful girl.

A guy wearing a jellaba came up to me and said "EssalamuAleykum sister, my name is Ahmed, I come from South-Africa…"

We struck up a conversation and surprisingly during all the conversation; he did not give my friend a glimpse, not a single one… It’s incredible when you know that my friend is a tall, superb Puertorican- American and that men, women and children cannot but look at her!

Now that I know him well, I put this on the account of his natural adab (modesty) but also on the fact that this encounter was predestined, I was the one meant to meet Ahmed and his lovely wife and children.

Little did I know at the time that this encounter was the answer to my prayers… I actually had some prejudice when I met Ahmed, I thought someone who had come to Mauritania to study would have a wife wearing a burka… For me that's the sure sign that at the time, I still had some serious cleansing even scrubbing of the heart to do!

If she had chosen to wear a burka, it was none of my business and was not for me to judge.

When I finally met her, my dear dear Zeinab did not wear a burka and turned out to be the most cultured Muslim woman I had ever met, how humbling! I will also always remember the first time I saw jumping out the taxi, those little gremlins I have come to love soooooo much, Amina and Jaber, they were sooo cute mashallah.  

Not long after we first met, I was with Ahmed, Zeinab and the kiddos (that's how I call them;-) at Sheherazade a play ground and we were discussing our favorite topics, spirituality, islam etc.. when we happened to talk about the command from Allah that the Prophet (SAW) be dearer to the believer that himself.

I remember worrying whether it was case with me and asking Ahmed what could I do to ensure it was, he answered that one the Shaykhs said that saying many Salats ala Nabi (Blessings on the Prophet (SAW), increased his love in one’s heart.

So I came back that day and said 1000 Salats on the prophet (SAW) and decided to started cultivating his love in my heart.

Listening over and over to “His character was the Qur'an” a CD lecture by Shaykh Abdullah Binbayyah helped enormously;  in it Hamza Yusuf who's the translator, is overcome (several times) by emotion when recalling how much the Prophet (SAW) loved all of God's creation.

Cultivating the love of the prophet has softened my heart and has made me discover so many things, I discovered that following the sunna is the surest way to free ourselves from the boundaries, limits and limitations set up by this materialistic world, to know about this you should watch this incredible lecture "Breaking the two desires" of Shaykh Abdel Hakim Murad.

 

Before meeting my friends, as a learned arab, I sensed the 3ijaz of the Qur'an but sometimes failed to grasp the miracle of the character of the Prophet (SAW). Ahmed told me something very interesting in this regards, he said that most non Arab muslims couldn’t realize 3ijaz el Kuran, because they simply did not speak the language but fully grasped the miracle of the character of the Prophet (SAW). Many of these people's ancestors became muslim after hearing the stories about this incredible man and have passed this immense love on to their descendants.

I am glad to say today that I LOVE THE PROPHET more than my life, my entire family and I pray that Allah resurrects me on the Day of Judgment in his company, this is truly my dearest dream.