So I guess this post requires a brief note about where I am spiritually right now.

I started praying five times a day about three months ago; I sorta learned how to do it online (thanks islamicity.com!) but really only got it right after having a friend teach me.

From the very beginning... I felt deep down in my heart and soul that this was right, but my mind quite reasonably held me back through a combination of skepticism and unwillingness to accept that such a dramatic change could happen so suddenly and without any real warning. I think it was right to wait and give my mind time to catch up. Two years ago, when I first arrived in Palestine for half a year of volunteer work, I visited Jerusalem, and in that city sacred to the three monotheistic religions, I concluded this about faith:

"The intellect demands exactitude through questioning, but can never achieve certitude. The heart leaps to certitude but cannot provide precision or explanation. Somewhere in between, I think, is the human soul where faith of all kinds resides, be it religious or secular, neither or both."

And now, suddenly, I realize I'm ready, because while my understanding of Islam and my personal relationship with the Islamic tradition, its texts, and practice still require work, they will always require work, and there's no turning away from the Path laid before me now, save by hypocrisy or willful disbelief.

So, I'm going to pray istikhaara and ask God if I am right to feel that... it's time this week to go back home and say the shahaada with my closest muslim friends.


So, there's the part I find funny: someone making istikhaara to ask God if he should convert or not.

prayer; prayer is so nice, it helps me with everything

and in the part of me that catalogues and analyzes experience, I know that it's because prayer gives me time and ritual to contemplate God and his works in creation, and to be grateful for miracles big and small, of the sort that happen daily and the sort that happen once in a lifetime.

but in the quieter part of me, the part that's learning to just be and to accept, I do not like to think so much about the deeper mechanics of prayer--instead, let's just say in simpler, larger truths: prayer is nice, so nice, it helps me with everything

not funny, actually not really a post, i just wanted to jot down two ayahs i like particularly for future record keeping

وما من دابة في الأرض ولا طائر يطير بجناحيه إلا أمم أمثالكم ما فرّطنا في الكتاب من شيء ثم إلى ربهم يحشرون
[6:38]
[6

فلما تسول ما ذكروا به فتحنا عليهم أبواب كل شيء حتى إذا فرحوا بما أُوتوا أخذهم بغتة فإذا هم مبلسون
[6:44]
ج

When I first go to masjid

everyone will think I'm a spy.

heck, I would too.

My friend Lala almost taught me to pray like a girl.

I'd been looking for someone I felt comfortable with to teach me to pray so I could be sure I was doing it right, and the nearest such ppl were a 45 minute drive away. So I visited old friends: a family whose oldest son and daughter I've been friends with for what seems like forever. Lala's older brother was out of town and not going to be around until after I left, and I figured, well, I guess Lala can just teach me.

Luckily she had to take a phone call from a mutual friend beforehand, and he told her "you know... guys and girls pray a little differently."

We had no idea. I still dunno what the difference is. We just got Lala's little brother, whom I've known for like... 8 years... to teach me.

alhamdulillah

cause like, otherwise I might have prayed like a girl for weeks--whatever that means. I'm sure God doesn't care, but even in the privacy of one's personal relationship with God...., how embarrassing would that be?

now when I make fun of Christians I feel sorta bad, like I'm not in the club, not even a member in poor-standing anymore, so I've lost my right to make fun of the club.

On the plus side, I can make fun of Muslims forever.

first attempt at a Muslim joke:
"You know how normal people check themselves out when they see themselves in a mirror? Well Ahmed's so religious that when he sees himself in a mirror he lowers his gaze."


(well, it's gonna take some practice)

when transitioning from agnosticism to any religion, fundamental changes in worldview oblige one to make parallel reassessments of lexicon and speech.

Like, now if I say to someone "I hate you, go to hell", I'll stop and think and then say "Oh, wait, but not literally, no, I wouldn't wish that on anyone"

geez.

yeah, I'm moving to D.C. soon and may be living with people I don't know.

I've always known that... it could be difficult being Muslim in America particularly in the current climate, and I mean, I'm not saying that in my two months of moving towards conversion I've experienced any of that yet, but...

Suddenly I think... would I have to tell the people I'd be living with before I move in? It'd feel almost like an apology: "Hey, I'm muslim, sorry, do you hate me now?"


well..... maybe I need a new title for this blog---that's not a funny entry at all.

twice now I have been up so late that I just pray Fajr before going to sleep.

you remember when you pulled your first all nighter and it felt so unnatural you thought maybe the Universe in its order and logic might not permit you to start a fresh day without having slept first?

Yeah, it felt unnatural sort of in that way. Like "well... it is sort of like I've prayed six required prayers today..." which somehow just feels wrong.

but on the other hand, I've concluded that there's nothing "natural" about getting up to pray at 6am to pray neways, and while I do love seeing sunrise after prayer... (ahem) on the few occasions that i have managed to get up for fajr (oh please, like you do it every day)... generally at that hour i prefer closed eyelids and a sleeping brain. Still it is a nice thing to do.

I'm not sure how people go from the Sajda position to the Qiyam position without falling over. Every time I do it I feel like I'm gonna fall backwards.

This may have something to do with the fact that most of the time I pray with my eyes closed..... it helps me concentrate.

well, except for during said transition from Sajda to Qiyam
then it doesn't really help with anything except maybe falling over backwards

I prayed Asr in the same park another day. A nice grassy area off to the side beneath a tree.

There were a buncha ants in the grass, but I didn't mind, and after praying I was just sort of chilling on the grass and was like "the ants are my friends" so I let them crawl all over me.

This goes back to the 8th grade when my friend Morgan Cisaer had a surgery, and while bedridden for over a week during his recovery, his room was invaded by ants. When i went to visit Morgan, he just lay there in his ant infested bed and said that they were his friends---I was very impressed.

Neways, the ants were cool until they got into my underwear.

I guess this has less to do with Islam and more just to do with me and ants

Walking around with grass and dirt on my forehead for like fifteen minutes after praying Zuhr outdoors.

The only reason I noticed was because I'm allergic to grass and I had to itch my forehead.