Sins are forgiven through Hajj. But so are sins forgiven in through fasting, in the last ten nights of Ramadan, on Fridays, first ten days of Dhul Hijjah, in the last one third of any night and pretty much whenever one asks for it sincerely enough. The key is in sincerity, a desperate willingness to be sin-free. If the sincerity and desperation is missing from Hajj then one will return with not an ounce of his sins reduced. Yet it is just so easy to get caught up with the flow of the events and not have time to purify the sincerity, intensify the desperation. Last one third of the night goes by every night, I cannot wake up, because I know there is a Friday at the end of the week when sins are forgiven. Fridays go by, I do not ask desperately enough because Ramadan is coming. Ramadan goes by, in the hope of the last ten nights. I let go of the last ten nights lightly, because I know more opportunities to have the sins wiped up, to have the barriers between me and my Lord lifted, to purify myself inside out is coming. I know there are still great opportunities left to have the prayers accepted.

My only fear is, what if I let go of that chance too?!

words that touch - 2

"There is a reason why you have been given two ears and one mouth--to listen more and say less".

Breaking the cycle of procrastination

More often then not, confessions about procrastination sounds cool. With every day approaching the mid-year exam period, I see more and more facebook status updates about endless procrastination and people joining in funny groups like 'If you should be studying right now, then join this group'.

I have always been a chronic procrastinator but somehow (read: with the blessing of the Most Merciful) I have always managed to escape, however narrowly. This narrow escape over and over again has been the positive reinforcement I did not need -- I learnt that I will be okay even if I procrastinate... just need to pray harder when I am about to suffocate under my self-created piles of work.

Being a chronic procrastinator I am very familiar with feelings of massive sense of relief, associated with narrow escapes. I don't remember a time when I felt that I have given my best effort in anything... starting from preparing for HSC to a month of Ramadan. It has always been one of relief with a tinge of (sometimes overwhelming) guilt and regret, at the lost opportunity of doing better 'had I given my best effort'.

I know procrastination is a learned habit. If I was given the opportunity of totally undoing any of learnings, learning to procrastination would be first in line. I want to stop procrastinating!

Last year, when I was preparing for the final months of Honours, I remember feeling the same. It was then that I came across this dua in the Fortress of the Muslims: "O Allah I seek refuge to you from helplessness, laziness, lethargy, cowardliness, niggardliness and burden of debts and from being overpowered by men".

As usual, I forgot all about the dua as soon as my Honours finished.

But, like now, every now and then I feel over and over again, that I need the acceptance of that dua now and always.

Islamonline.net has some nice advices on ways to overcome procrastination. Starts off with the reminder of a very scary Quranic ayah: "Is he - who was once dead and then We revived him (through the True knowledge) and thus We appointed for him a light whereby he walks among people - comparable to one who is steeped in darkness, never able to come out of it?" (Al - An'am: 122)

The procrastinators will recognise this feelings right away: "steeped in darkness, never able to come out of it".

I do end up doing the work at the end, but the inability to start the task when I should is something I have never overcome!

The advices from Islamonline that I hope to turn to action:

1. Best way to fight procrastination is to take immediate steps to do the thing one is postponing. By repeating it over and over again, one learns to break the habit. This process must continue until one has learned the new habit and thus it becomes a second nature.

2. Start the morning by praying to Allah to grant you a successful day full of blessings.
Hadith: "Shaytan puts three knots at the back of the head of any of you if he is asleep. On every knot he reads and exhales the following words, 'The night is long, so stay asleep'. When one wakes up and remembers Allah, one knot is undone; and when one performs ablution, the second knot is undone, and when one prays the third knot is undone and one gets up energetic with a good heart in the morning; otherwise one gets up lazy and with a mischievous heart'. [Bukhari]

3. Try to start your work after Fajr for the Prophet prayed to Allah, "O Allah bless my Ummah in their early morning endeavors."

Three easy steps, apparently.

Okay no one promised that. Most of the time when I try to fix my faltering Iman and deficient practices, I focus on too many things at once. But with a long hard look at my failings over the years, I know procrastination plays a major role. So, now I want to focus on this and just this. I see so many other girls around me with the same problem. Would've been nice if we could somehow help each other. But, alas, a procrastinator can only make another procrastinator feel good about herself!

So let me start the journey by myself. Most of the time I take plans but they become forgotten soon afterwards because they go out of sight in a hidden away onenote file. Now that I documented my expressed desire of breaking out of the habit of procrastination, hopefully it will keep motivating me to break out of the cycle of chronic procrastination.

Wish me luck.

Afterthought upon reading this article: Thankfully Islamic Culture (according to the Traditional Islamic Texts) is surprisingly open and frank about our 'leaky bodies'.

It was nice having the experienced aunties and apus giving me insights into marriage in the long run, but what disappointed me was the tone of warning of some of them (not all)--
-- enjoy your life, now that there is no children in sight
-- wait till a few more years have passed, he will stop pretending to be so nice
-- compromise and be patient, this life shouldn't be all about enjoyment, your reward will be in the life after death.
It disappointed me to hear those warnings and seeing the attitude of 'I know what horrible things lie ahead, you don't". At the same time my heart filled with hope and respect as some of aunties were so gracious about being married, so grateful that they are married, so happy that they are with their husbands, so appreciative of their husbands despite of years of life together (without being blind to their faults). I don't know how will I change in the next ten years or so (if I am still alive), but I never want to get tired of being married, never want to be wistful about the life before marriage, never want to get a big blow by a 'previously-unknown-horrible-side' of my husband. I always want to feel as I feel now, grateful that my husband is constantly bringing out the best of me, and I want to keep doing the same to him. I think it becomes easier to think that way if one comes out of the typical bangali attitude: marriage is the be all and end all. I see marriage as Allah's way of putting two random human beings together, giving an unaccounted for amount of love and mercy between them and testing them in the process. A believer is another believer's mirror, and the closest mirror is one's spouse. I think if one tries to remember that, then one is sure to stop complaining about their husbands to random people and seeking only Allah's help in loving and respecting their husbands, and asking only Allah to remove the faults that they dislike, along with timely reminders... and building a partnership that will benefit them both.
I only ask Allah that my husband's faults appear insignificant to my eyes and my faults to his.

Having been back from the first day of an intense weekend course on Akhirah, I am quite shaken. I do want to stay this shaken for as long as can (in other words, forever), because I find it really hard to stay constant in my actions, words and motivation. One of the things that really shook me was the supplication of the Prophet (S) for a dead person he would come across, so that the departed soul is granted 'a better family' than his current one, and 'a better home' than his current home.

In other words, when there are some people in the family that are disproportionately less true in faith, then they can be forgotten and not missed at all, rather Allah will grant the rest of the more believing family members with another family that they much prefer over their previous family.

I shudder to think about that...

Or the humiliation after a life full of wrong deeds and disobedience, the humiliation that starts right from death. First the soul refuses to leave the body, then once its harshly torn out of the body, then it starts smelling bad and is cursed by angels. "When a person dies, then either the person is in comfort or other people who he departed are comforted by his departure". Dear God, do not make me one whose departure comforts a single innocent soul or creation.

And the life in the grave... simple things in life can make so much difference: firm steady faith and practice, recitation of Surah Mulk every night, speaking the truth, having a good character... all of these simple, consistent, daily efforts. Efforts that are so hard to make, but the consequence of not making which are so very severe...

Dear God, never let me lose the Akhirah, 'the other choice', from its right perspective...

words that touch: 1

"When they rise to prayer, they rise reluctantly and only to be seen by people. They remember Allah but little". (Surah Nisa: 142)

How very scary...

I came across something that I think wonderfully summarises my own thoughts on marriage:

Human potential is shaped by human interaction.
Relationships are a tool designed by God to refine us.
Marriage, used properly, is a people growing machine.

graffiti in Bangladesh

bitter lessons of life 3
Originally uploaded by shondhabati

I love reading Graffiti in Bangladesh. They lack colour, but they never fail to tell you of the sincere pain that prompted such production.

I found that on the wall of an old building on top of a hill in 'himchori'.

It says: "Expected love has been pain today".
Poor guy , poor Romeo!
Is that really a Romeo case or is the 'expected love' the source of all pain?
Did he get the girl and discover she isn't at all what he expected?
Or was it the girl who refused to become his love and fulfill his expectations?

I discovered myself making up stories of the person behind the graffito. I assumed it was written by a guy because more often then not, in Bangladeshi context, they are written by guys.

bitter lessons of life 3
Originally uploaded by shondhabati

This one says "Troy will destroy ur life".
I will leave the interpretation to the discretion of the reader. I found this one on a seat in a local bus.

bitter lessons of life 2
Originally uploaded by shondhabati

This one says "Vondo" or "traitor/hypocrite/betrayer". I found it in the National Park in Gazipur.

craving love
Originally uploaded by shondhabati

I found this one particularly funny. Some dude named 'Farhad' left his mobile number with a small inscription "lack of love".
I hope some soft heart listened to the pining of his lonely heart and made a good use of the number!

wall
Originally uploaded by shondhabati

I don't think I should call it graffiti, wall painting sounds more appropriate. I found it on the wall of the Art college. Loved the intricate work.

Rants

It was so coming but I still feel so sad!
House went to a mental health hospital last night, after having episodes of mixing up hallucination and reality and making a real mess--an ultimate outcome of his long history of drug abuse.
There was a big hole in my heart as he looked at Cuddy with bewildered eyes. The hole got even bigger as he quietly took off his watch and phone and handed them over to Wilson, then limped away towards the psychiatric hospital.
I got too attached with this fictional character. I would find myself hurrying home on Wednesday nights, lest I missed House. On more than one occasion, I begged Mr R to let me watch House instead of talking to him. Of course he would allow me, but I think he got a tad bit jealous--putting a fictional Doctor over the real Doctor of my life! How dare I! (Men... *sigh*) Now that House is off to a psychiatric hospital, he must be immensely relieved. It became apparent last night, as I was pouting and telling him how sad I was for House. He neither offered any consolation nor showed any sign of remorse. Heartless man! *sniff sniff*.

I am planning for revenge. I WILL make him fall for House and feel as sad I am feeling! All I need is a carefully woven plan *evil smile*. I tried that before leaving BD, but when we went to buy the DVDs of the first season and started previewing the DVDs, there appeared girls in swimming costume and a few other not-so-ideal scenes. He looked at me and smirked--"is this really what you want me to see?"
I had to back out. I need to screen the episodes first before recommending him any :(.

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

My dad is gifted with an extraordinary ability--being able to sleep anywhere and anytime. All of us would be watching TV on high volume, including my dad, but before long he would doze off, still sitting in upright position. He has records of sleeping off in prayers, even while standing. I have seen him sleeping with books open in front of him or while working on the computer. He sleeps with room full of people chattering away, even if some conversations are directed towards him. He would sleep for seven full hours, but still wake up with red eyes, in dire need of more sleep.

I have seen my parents going through some pretty harsh times but my dad never had trouble sleeping.

My mum is the complete opposite. Just a hint of trouble and she can't sleep. Before I got married, as my parents were discussing proposals, my mum would pass night after night, sleepless, turning and tossing restlessly in the bed.

Just around this time last year, I was having trouble sleeping. I haven't slept any more than four hours nightly while I was in Malaysia and Singapore, no matter how hard I tried to make the conditions favourable for sleeping. My future was about to take a turn I didn't anticipate before, I wasn't even sure if it really was going to take that turn. I wanted so badly to know, to be sure, just so that I could be more focused on that tasks at hand and plan ahead, but there was nothing else I could do... after all I did more than what I should've done! No matter how hard I tried to ward off the thoughts, they were always there, leaving me sleepless and restless.

I had similar troubles after my final exams last semester (of course not before that. traditionally my sleep is the deepest around exam time), right when I thought I would sleep uninterrupted for hours and days. That kept on happening right through my days in Bangladesh, to the night before I got married. Even amongst crisis for space due to a large influx of relatives, I got a room on my own, with soft prepared bed, mossy nets and windows tightly closed. I would go to bed making sure I was really really tired, still I could not bring myself to sleep. Even if I succeeded in sleeping, I would have a horrible dream and wake up with a start, feeling forlorn and confused.

I was so sure I was taking after my mother! I never failed to blame her for passing off the genes full of insomniac tendency.

But only till I got married...

Then Mr R would work for 20 hours, while I blissfully slept every now and then, only to find myself having difficulty keeping my eyes open when Mr R finally got back home to his newly-wed-wife. I remember once falling asleep while my mother-in-law was speaking to me, another time while one of his cousin was speaking to me (for the first time too). I even slept through the night before leaving BD *sigh*.

Now I always seem to suffer from sleep debt. Missed fajr twice this month. Always wake up with dark circles under my eyes and a jammed head. I frequently fall asleep while talking to Mr R (and suddenly wake up to find him holding his breath and smiling cheekily at the computer screen). I sleep on my way to and from uni... even in the middle of conversations with Emu (that WAS embarrassing)!

I can only blame my dad for passing off the sleepy genes.

Or must it be Mr R, for having an unaccountable effect on my sleeping pattern/circadian rhythm/pineal gland?