The Big Contradictor

[victoris]

:sl:

Everyone, I gather these words to introduce myself first in this forum. My name is Mohamed and I live in the United States. I am 20, and I belong to a North African family. I knew Islam the first time when I learned some of its customs and teachings through my family.

As I walked into the beach today I realized something about God. It seemed to me that God is an artist forming everything that exists together in a complex working pattern. Everything seemed to work too well together, from the sand that was produced from rocks and the wavy water that helped through all these years make that happen. I took a moment to realize that this inspiration can be found not only in the oceans and beaches, but everywhere I can heed.

I enjoyed the summer beach walks that I permitted myself to attend like a special appointment I have with God. I rarely pray the traditional way, but memories such these leave me be thankful to the sublime creator. I have very deep thoughts when God is involved in a conversation or a moment of inspiration yet I find myself in conflict all the time with Islam.

Much like the dog that bites the hand of its feeder, I find myself that way with God. I have very sincere thoughts and I give a high importance to the inspiration i receive through this time I spent living but sometimes I feel I am more self-concerned to achieve and to survive to become the high life king of the world. My ego is majestic. Since I was a boy I dreamed of dominating the world and be a king. I want to be rich and highly respectable also expecting everything that I desire to be accessible. I find it hard to cooperate with myself especially my worst enemy is my own shadow. I have very high expectations from everything as I familiarize myself into a situation and when the present seems so against my desires I feel weakened. I bring myself too high or too low depending on my motivations and I typically just loose.

I tried that many times with Islam. I tried being the best Muslim of myself to being the worst punk i can be. I lived two realities in the United States and back home. People are very different wherever I went and I function based on what I experience. I came here and I was exposed to things we Muslims consider haram at an early age and in an accelerated mode that it become my own normal lifestyle. I stand today in a better shape then it will be tomorrow as I feel the more I live the worse it gets. I was born in the middle of highly contradicting societies. It is very hard to choose a side and it is scary to be idle this way. I have these nagging thoughts that tell me the source of my misery is the lack of faith in God while an other though also tells me that I don't know any better. After all I am just too young and I've been exposed to too much to decide.

I just don't know what to believe in. I respect God in my own multitude that I set regardless what other's might want me to think. My problem is that the world and I don't cooperate. I want it to spin around me while it wants me to spin around it. I hate to loose and seeing everything I didn't have make me think that God is punishing me.

I am sure some people went through the same experience or even worse, and I would like to know few tips to follow. When my faith is low or high I screw up one way or the other and I am in search for the middle way.

:w:

[Medina83]

Hi Victoris

Salam aleikum

I understood your post really well and I have to say I went through living in a similar limbo state before I reverted to islam.

Ultimately one side of you wants this world and can't reconcile itself to the sacrifices you will need to make if you want to live an islamic life

On the other hand the islamic life presents an different kind of attraction to you and your soul feels inclined to it.

Its this battle that makes you feel guilty within yourself because you want to do the right thing but at the same time find it hard to let go of the wants of this world. You feel guilty for not following the islamic life and at the same time guilty for wanting a life of success here.

Ultimately this battle continues for your whole life, making a decision doesn't end the battle between your soul and your nefs (your own desires).

However for me, I was also living in this limbo wanting to please God and at the same time not wanting to accept some practises within Islam (this was the battle within me) and not being sure I could live this life happily as a muslim.

In the end though, for me, what happened was I realised that religion is not about picking and choosing what you want. Religion is not about what you want. Its about what Allah wants. And if I believe that his book IS HIS book, and that within it there is the TRUTH then I have no choice but to accept all that is within it. And that includes things that I may not like but hopefully as my understanding of the whole religion grows I see the wisdom behind things.

And that is exactly what happened. Before I reverted I wanted to be a muslim but didnt want to wear hijab, didnt want to stop wearing make up, didnt want to feel not beautiful in front of others. But in the end I realised I believe in this Quran the fundamentals of Tawheed (that God is ONE) and that Muhammad saw was His messenger, then its not really my choice to say 'no i wont do this'. And as I adopted the laws and practises set by Allah i slowly grew to understand and appreciate why they are as they are. There are still some which I find hard to see the wisdom of, but I am aware that the wisdom is there, I just can't see it right now. And I know that the wisdom is there because I know the Quran is from Allah.

Once you put Allah swt before yourself, everything becomes a lot clearer.

i hope that made sense :sunny:

[anonymous]

Assalam u Alaykum,
i posted a similar situation that i was in, as i was giving everything my all and waas loosing and falling in life in general, and the best advice i could give to you is that whatever dilemma the world throws at you approach it with a thoughtful clever way. For instance you have exams, and you're really stressed that you won't have time to yourself, be wise and balance your revision time sensibly around your sociol life so that you are succesful.
Keep praying your five daily prayers, you'd be suprised how many of your difficulties Allah takes away from you when you pray Salah, your life will be at ease and you too as a person will feel relaxed and at peace. And when you pray, there is blessing in everything you do so there is no chance you can screw up with whatever you intend to do.
We will all at some point in our lives come across trials, worries and tribulations - it's a part of life, but as long as you are a practicing Muslim, make duaa to Allah and approach your crisis in a smart way, I am sure you will overcome it.
Set realistic goals for yourself, these goals are SMART goals, which are:
Specific
Measurable
Accurate
Realistic
Timerelated
So whenever you come across something which you need 2 do, set these kind of goals to help you acheive it.
May Allah the Almighty guide you along the straiht path. Ameen. Reply and let me know how you feel now.

[sshuraimno1fan]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROMmh...elated&search=

watch the above video, listen to the beautiful story Alhamdiulillah about how the Prophet (saw) dealt with a situation

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[IbnAbdulHakim]

when you recognize the perfect harmony of God and you truelly allow it to seep in (and from your post it seems you have) then how is it you dont wish to become the king of the life which is next? knowing that its far greater..