"In a year's time"

What a pleasant surprise. 

I was casually checking my mailbox when I read this email. 

I totally forgot that I have written a letter for my future self approximately a year ago. 

It is quite scary how time passes by so quickly

like, this can't possibly be a year ago? 

Only if I could turn back and tell my past self not to worry so much :) 

It could have saved my sanity from overthinking 

The future may seem so much scarier than it actually is. 

It is only normal to feel scared, to feel like you are under prepared

but you can't feel these without doing anything

the key question is what are you doing when you feel inadequate?

You can worry but you also have to work on preparing yourself

you have to balance between feeling scared and also feeling hopeful 

when your attempt to balance them doesn't work, 

remember that you are not alone and you can always seek help :) 

When I wrote this letter, I didn't know what to expect in my post-uni life

although technically i didn't really have any options

I constantly wonder whether this is the best for me 

But you know what? 

the key to most of your worries is just to confront them

take the first step; admit that you are inadequate, 

lower your ego and seek help to improve yourself

your teachers could be your books, the people around you

or even your life story that's meant to teach you lessons

you just have to realise that there is only so much to learn

"when student is ready, the teacher appears". 

A year can do a lot to a person

It is both exciting and scary to think about it

May He always land us at a blessed landing place insyaAllah

Apart from receiving this letter, I've also turned 24. And it's 1st Syawal today :) 

I've few things on my mind to reflect on these two events but first, lets get some sleep. 

Eid Mubarak! 

P/s: Preparing for raya is an extreme sport. May God bless our mothers for all of their effort and unconditional love :'(  i certainly can't imagine living without you. 

Something awakening

"I have some concerns on XX. I'm writing a referral letter for you to follow up, okay?"

Suddenly, I feel like my life flashes before my eyes (dramatic)
and everything else starts to matter less except the answer to this question:
have I actually done enough?

Tried to hold back my tears
but I can feel the warmth of it as it rolled down my cheeks
maybe it's full of words that I'll never speak
breath, cry, let it go

Strength isn't defined as someone who doesn't cry
or as someone who can defy their own feelings
but it's when you can finally admit your weakness and fear
when you're better, get back up again, smile like you always do
make yourself and other people happy, because it makes you forget your own sadness

At this moment, praying to Him never felt more real

Even in this emotional chaos, the heart is at peace knowing that He's there for me
and I know, no love can ever beat His eternal love

I'm grateful for this little experience
it certainly knocks me down
but maybe He knows what I needed when I'm a bit lost
to re-evaluate my life, my decisions and everything in between
to always live my life with a purpose even if sometimes it feels rather empty
I need to take charge and fill it with goodness, with reasons
so I won't regret when I look back at my actions and even inactions.

Because we are living on borrowed time
so what's your reflection?

p/s: funny how the thought of having a little sickness made me ponder upon all these things because with or without this sickness (or any other sickness), my time here is always limited. It's not like I wasn't aware of it, right. Just being forgetful (as always =/ )

Happiness is making other people smile,
Happiness is also knowing that people wouldn't mind going the extra mile to make you smile.
(pls note, it rhymes ok :D)

and for that, I should be really grateful. 

maturity

Kematangan itu
apabila kita mempunyai 1001 sebab untuk marah
tetapi kita masih mampu bersuara secara rasional

Kematangan itu
apabila kita mampu mengetepikan kepentingan diri
demi satu kebaikan yang lebih besar

Kematangan itu
apabila kita benar-benar mampu berlapang dada
ketika diuji untuk menerima sisi kelemahan manusia lain

By all means, 

please validate your feelings- after all, the feelings are created to be felt

but we have to be smart to draw the lines 

between acknowledging your feelings and acting upon it. 

Umrah- Reflection 1.0

As I was looking through the notes I have written on my phone, I stumbled on the prayer list I made for my umrah last year. I had this urge to check whether they have been answered (ngada sangat).

But then, I feel like, "Wow, is it that simple?" Just make a very long list of the things that you want, and sometime in the future, you can recheck it and cross out the things you have now? So is it just merely your bucket list?

I know I should not rush things, but I think that's human nature. Semua nak cepat. Study malam ni, kalau boleh esok nak tengok terus result cemerlang. Such eagerness. I keep on having to tell myself, it's not the same with Him. Yes, of course, we can ask but, we need to acknowledge the fact that the results depend ultimately on Him. 

"Kenapa kita selalu diburu- buru terhadap hasil? Sudah jelas hasil adalah hak Tuhan. Dan terserah bila waktuNya, itu pasti yang terbaik. Mungkin, ini soal keyakinan kamu terhadap percaturanNya" 

Well, on my side, I have indeed not met the all the promises I made to Him. Just wondering, if only He demands and checks on me as I did to Him with my prayer list T.T

There's this one moment that was very... humbling I would say. (learned this in hindsight and some mature thoughts that I gained after umrah, ceh)

You know people always say, try to open the Quran randomly, sometimes the things that you read will be the most relevant to you at that particular moment. So there was I, having such intention- I kinda tell myself  "Ok I wanna try that and read whatever I find first."

I still remember I was sitting in front of the Kaabah, closed my eyes, selected the page in the Quran randomly and when I opened my eyes.. 

I was not happy,

It was not something that I expected

and I even refused to read it initially.

Tadi kau yang nak sangat. Now memilih pula kan

Why? Because I know that ayat. It was our hafazan SPM 

I was hoping to find something novel (applying some trademark law here) 

I wanna experience some "light bulb" moments

I feel like, well there's nothing new to learn from this page, sbb mcm dah tahu (i know, such attitude T.T)

I even thought of skipping that page, "maybe kat page sebelah kot", still trying to comfort myself.

But then, after some time of consideration

I managed to force myself to read it

Maybe it is something He wants to tell me

No harm reading it, really.

24:31

Hits me like a bullet

It's about lowering your gaze & dress code for women

And there I was, feeling way too confident about it

With my limited understanding of how His mysterious plan works

I get to learn that His signs are always there

It's up to us to take it or leave it

Say, "O My servants who have transgressed against themselves [by sinning], do not despair of the mercy of Allah. Indeed, Allah forgives all sins. Indeed, it is He who is the Forgiving, the Merciful." (Az Zumar:53) 

Menumpang kasih

Kita, manusia
yang sering lupa
yang selalu rasa kita berkuasa
hakikatnya lemah, tak terdaya

Kita, hamba
tak punya apa
selain nikmat yang diberiNya
dan aib yang tak jemu ditutupNya.

Beruntungnya kita punya Dia
yang memuliakan diri yang hina
yang memimpin dari gelap ke cahaya
yang sentiasa menemani di mana kita berada.

Namun makin lama
makin banyak yang dipinta
making kurang kita beri padaNya
hakikatnya, Dia tak diberi tak mengapa
tapi itu kan tanda kita serius mahukan syurga?

Lalu, soalku pada diri
apa yang kau banggakan
bila semua yang ada, punya Dia
bila semua yang terlihat, bukanlah nyata
dan soalku lagi,
layakkah kau bertepuk tangan berpuas hati?

Kan ada masanya
diri seolah kehilangan kepijakan
mungkin Dia tahu kita alpa
dalam ujian, suka dan duka
pantas Dia terus menyapa

Dan mungkin, Dia tahu kita rindu
seolah olah memberitahu
"Aku ada untukmu,
selalu"

Lalu, di kejauhan malam
dalam pejam dan diam
harapan baru digenggam
tak mahu lagi dihinakan
setelah dimuliakan
tak mahu lagi ke kegelapan
setelah ditemukan cahaya harapan

Bisikku pada diri
tak mengapa kau tak punya apa
tak mengapa kau sering alpa
because He is okay with you stumbling and falling, 
as long as you're trying 

This, she believes, is not a mere fantasy 
but a real struggle that she could foresee 
towards a place where she longs to be
and above all, towards the Almighty

For a flawed person like me
sometimes she finds it tiring and even demanding
but she knows she cant give in
just be the best version that she can be 

And finally, please, make doa for me. 
and may Jannah be the place where we finally meet :) 

Happy-ness?

So the other day i wanted to post something here but failed because I was using my phone and Google gave me gajilions of security questions and decided to turn me down. 

My futile attempt has made me realise that i wasn't able to let go of this blog... yet. Although so many posts have been reverted to draft, it has secured a really special place in my heart. Looking back at my first post dated back in 2011, from updating my life trasition from Wangsa Maju to Bangi,  high school stuffs, artsy and college (not to mention 70% used to be football related lols). Funny how people (read: me) can change. 

"We have been bent and broken, hopefully, into better shapes" 

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Having a lot of me-time these days has helped me to think about this concept of attaining happiness in life. In hindsight, when I reflect back on my journey 3-5 years ago, I realised that a lot of my decisions were affected by this one thing- I have always wanted to be happy. Happy by my own definition (as I claim but it’s often shaped by the society’s ._.)

Well, who doesn’t, right? Everyone wants a worry-free life, not being bothered by too many problems and more often than not, a happy life is equated with a perfect life. However, my past (rather few) experiences taught me that there are “things” that will jeopardise my ideal, happy life especially when they decide to give me a little surprise and come in the most unexpected way. 

Hence, I guess the real question that I should be asking myself is- how long do I actually want to be happy? In my opinion, there’s only two kind of happiness- short run and long run. 

Short run happiness, as how I believe, requires little effort- such as staring at the beautiful sunrise in the morning and bumping into your old friends back in primary school (I mean the “close friend” category and not the ones that make you feel awkward )

As opposed to that, long run happiness requires more effort and time in order for you to gain it. Also, the process of attaining it might not be as enjoyable but you do it anyway. A simple example would be students sitting for their exams; the process ain’t fun in its entirety, demands a lot from us but we still find our way around it as we have this end goal in our mind that we want to try our best and achieve that good results. 

When I asked myself earlier- for how long do you actually want to be happy- I didn’t mean that these two categories are mutually exclusive. That means I do not have to choose one over the other- sometimes they might even overlap. What I intended to do was to widen the scope of happiness that I was aiming for. What i wanted to do was to SHIFT my focus- from short term to long term. 

So, for how long do you actually want to be happy, dear self? 

1 day, 1 month, 1 year, 3 years and so on? And how do you even distinguish short & long term? How long does a period need to be to qualify into the latter category? 

Since I cant answer this question, I’m just gonna re-define the category and make them simpler- short term is any period in this wordly life (Dunya) and long term is the period of time in the Hereafter. Sorry for the sudden conclusion but my train of thoughts can’t provide me with any better transition, really. 

Back to the real issue- being happy. When I think about the primary aim of being happy in this life (Dunya), it leads me to another question; Why does our God create a spectrum of feelings, if we were only to experience a sole emotion of happiness? I also have no absolute answer for this, but I believe that all the other feelings- sad, angry, disappointed, fear etc are created for us for specific reasons and it could be necessary for our growth as a human being. 

“We cry, to heal. We feel, to stay human” -Yasmin Mogahed

I don’t know where is this leading- it is an impromptu writing and I have not really thought about it thoroughly- im sorry people if you have read this long 

So maybe, having a mindset to be happy is fine (and we should), but let’s not restrict it to only this world- i think this idea applies better best in the Hereafter.

Hence for the time being, let’s slowly invest our time and effort into this long run happiness “route” where Eternal happiness is promised ❤️

“And the life of this world is nothing but play and amusement. But far better is the house in the hereafter for those who are Al-Muttaqun (the pious). Will you not then understand?” (Quran, Al-An’aam: 32)