September 2, 2021
Self-Care
7 Things To Remember If You Want To Be Free From The Shackles Of This World
بِسْمِ اللهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيْمِ
When you get married, you’ll quickly realize that your husband will not make you happy 24 hours a day and he will not magically make your life better to help you fall in love with your life again.
If you have these kinds of unrealistic expectations about your man and about marriage in general, it will come crashing down on you like an avalanche. I’m sorry to burst your bubble, love.
But it’s better to be realistic and level-headed when choosing your man so that you won’t fall for the traps of disappointment down the line. Too many girls have gone into marriage with high hopes only to find out that reality is totally different from their expectations, and by that point, they have no choice but to endure it because they’ve chosen their man.
I don’t want that to happen to you.
Of course, you can dream of marrying a great man, one that will treat you right, help you get closer to the deen every day and become your best friend, but in order to have this, you need to first take control of your life and truly be fulfilled with who you are in order to attract an equally great man to tango with. 😉
So what is the number one thing that will help you strengthen your identity as a Muslimah?
The answer is – to make Allah No.1 in your life.
It means to prioritize Allah and His preferences above yours and everyone else’s in your life when making decisions and taking any actions.
Allah said in the Quran,
Say, “Allah is enough for me: there is no god but Him; I put my trust in Him; He is the Lord of the Mighty Throne.” (Surah At-Tawbah 9:129)
When you put Allah No.1, you will not be swayed by people’s opinions, personal whimsy desires and syaitan’s tricks because you’ll hold on to the teachings of the Quran and Sunnah to navigate your life.
When it comes to marriage, this will translate to you choosing a partner that will help you get closer to the deen, someone who is a practicing Muslim, respects His parents and has a beautiful character. Even if he may not be the most handsome man on earth to you, as long as he’s decent-looking and has the right means to provide for you, you’d be willing to marry him if it means Allah would be pleased with you.
So how do you start putting Allah as No.1 in your life?
Here are 7 mindsets I would recommend you adopt and hold on to in every life situation.
1. I live for Allah alone
In life, it’s very easy to let everything, everyone and every event distract us from prioritizing Allah. Some people can forget Allah so quickly the moment they’re on top of the world. When they get that promotion, have a new child, business is going well etc, they don’t think to prioritize Allah because everything seems to be going just fine without Him, right?
Why bother to wake up at night for Tahajjud when we already have everything we want?
But for a slave who lives for Allah alone and not the luxuries of dunya or the people in it, no matter what revolves around her life, she is devoted to her Creator and only yearns to meet Him on the day of judgment.
The Prophet (ﷺ) said,
2. Allah knows best
How many of us actually believe that Allah knows what is best for us?
Sometimes, we keep saying Allah knows best but we don’t want to let Allah plan what is best for us. Instead of focusing our efforts on pleasing Allah, we engage in the haram or things that don’t bring us to benefit thinking it will get us what we want.
If we truly believe that Allah alone is enough for us and that He knows what is best for us, we should be able to rely on Him to unfold our lives, even if it seems to go against our wishes sometimes.
Allah says in the Quran,
When Allah knows best, he gives us only the best, our job is to only please Him and avoid ruining His plans for us by not engaging in the haram and non-beneficial things.
3. Only Allah can meet all my needs
Allah alone is our One true Sustainer, no one else has the power to maintain us, keep us alive, keep us healthy and give us a good life.
But sometimes we forget this, we work hard in our jobs, but we don’t perform Salah or maybe not on time. We try to meet everyone’s needs thinking it will fulfill us and make our lives meaningful but we don’t stop to think about how to increase our connection with the Creator.
Honestly, if we live on like this, do we truly believe that Allah alone is enough for us and that He is the only Sustainer who can meet all our needs?
There are those who would even go to the extent of turning to the Syaitan and black magic for refuge (Nauzubillah). Syirk (associating partners with Allah) is out of the question.
Allah says in the Quran,
Satan only makes them false promises and deludes them with empty hopes. Truly Satan promises them nothing but delusion. It is they who will have Hell as their home, and they will find no escape from it! (Surah An-Nisa 4:120-121)
If we truly believe that Allah is powerful over all things, while putting in our best efforts, we would prioritize Him and not rely on anything other than Him.
4. As long as Allah is pleased with me, I’m happy
As human beings, it is normal to have desires. Allah put that in our hearts, to yearn for things and to have dreams and aspirations. There is nothing wrong with having them. But if we let these things determine our level of happiness, that can be a problem.
As devoted slaves of Allah, our happiness should only really come from the pleasure of Allah. Therefore, we should be vigilant in determining the strength of our relationship with our Maker. It’s like working for a boss that we truly love and admire, we naturally want to give our best to them, make sure we’re in their good books and have a good relationship with them.
Why isn’t it any different with Allah?
When Allah The Al-Mighty is pleased with us, we should be set, right? There should be no reason for us to be upset over anything. Sure, we can have the normal emotions of loss, distress and pain, but it will always be diminished once we turn to Allah and realize that having Him as our Creator alone is enough reason to be content and happy all our lives.
Allah says in the Quran,
But then how do we determine whether Allah is pleased with us? If we are doing good deeds sincerely to gain His pleasure every day and avoiding the deeds that would result in his displeasure, then there’s no reason to doubt that He’s pleased with us insyaAllah. 🙂
5. Everything in my life is from Allah
Who you are and everything you go through in life – the good, the bad and the ugly – is from Allah. When we acknowledge this, we must also accept that it is what’s best for us.
Sometimes, we may not see the blessing behind it, but if we continue to trust Allah and let Him be enough for us, we can open our hearts and become more grateful for everything that He has given us.
6. My true home is Jannah
How often do you remember Allah’s promise?
His particular promise to put you in an eternal garden where there will be nothing displeasing to the soul, only endless pleasure and infinite luxury even the mind could not comprehend in this lifetime.
Keep striving for Jannah and you’ll know that every good you’re doing right now will be worth it insyaAllah, love. 🙂
7. I will return to Allah
Ultimately, everything we ever worked for is to meet the One who made us. So don’t let your pain and sufferings deter you from your longing to meet your Creator. He is waiting for us and guiding us every step of the way until we meet Him in Jannah InsyaAllah.
You and I have only one job to worry about, and that is to make sure that “Allah is always enough for us”.
Allah says in the Quran,
Final words to love your life as a Muslim woman
Just remember that life is short and that Prophet Muhammad (ﷺ) reminded us to walk through life as a traveler passing through.
“Be in this world as if you were a stranger or a traveler along a path.”
(Sahih Bukhari)
To love your life is to live a life full of worship to your Creator until you meet Him again in Jannah InsyaAllah.
Allah says in the Quran,
I did not create jinn and humans except to worship Me. (Surah Adh-Dhariyat 51:56)
May we all be accepted into Jannah InsyaAllah. Ameen.
Love and Salam.
Any good from this article is from Allah and any evil is from the shaytaan and me. May Allah forgive our shortcomings in practicing His deen.
Wa billahi tawfeeq wa hidayah
(All successes come from Allah and His guidance).
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