The Hayaa Oasis

From ‘The Private Journal’ of Umm Idris.
A personal reflection on 1109025, 12:00pm.

We live our lives wondering when we will finally achieve our goals and when we will finally overcome our challenges. At the age of twenty-one, I set myself on a path to attain my bachelor’s degree and reach beyond what my siblings hadn’t through the conventional means (the typical route I mean, though I have to proudly admit that they are incredible in their pursuits today – far beyond where I landed career-wise). And so, I took on the student loans at a minimal wage job that had me working six days at eight hours a week while I head to school on selected evenings with a little over an hour gap from the end of my shift to not only eat dinner but make the hour-long train ride to night school.

Those months were brutal. I spent much of it in a routine, counting every dollar whilst simultaneously telling myself to enjoy life when I could. I would shop for groceries to meal prep lunch and snacks and label them in the refrigerator so that I could stretch it out as much as I could. With only around USD$600 in hand at the end of each month, I was rationing every dollar to save up to pay just 10% of the semester’s fees (90% was covered by loans that was due upon my graduation). It was brutal and yet, I was insistently told it was possible because I only had to cover my fees, my food, my insurance, my transportation, my phone bill, and well… everything short of the housing bills because I was still living at home with family. When I fell short or had to count pennies, I was told that I was careless with money and that I didn’t plan my finances properly. For a long time, I was going through the motions with the threat of worrying that my failure would cost my loan guarantor to pay the price and the dues of the loans I took.

In the years of trying to find a higher paying job later on and having no confidence to assert that I deserve an increase in my current pay, all I found were insecurities that plagued me so much, so I didn’t believe I was qualified for anything. There was nothing building me up, and there was nothing reaffirming me in my own skills and knowledge either. I tried my hand in the media industry only to be beat down by a superior who blamed me for a mistake her previous employee made that I had to quietly fix only for her to screech and yell at me, humiliating me publicly and without the forethought to clarify with me what had transpired. I tried to dive into food and beverage, but all I experienced was an onslaught of sexual harassment from both customers and colleagues, and when I spoke up and got loud about it, I was made to look the fool. Because when a woman doesn’t take it quietly, we are problematic and troublemaking team members who cannot work with others. That… on top of lodging a complain regarding mistreatment that highlighted racial differences, I find out much later that privacy was not applicable to me when relations made it permissible for higher ups to use it against me and share it outside the company’s circle. It was then that I realised how working there poisoned my character and made me a target even in my own workplace (when colleagues snooped on my phone and discovered about my then fiancé-to-be, they began to get really hostile and intrusive and strange too.

It was hard back then trying to see the blessings that I had, despite the challenges that came with the early years of taking on independence. In the face of difficulties and restrictions, what you end up seeing was what you felt you deserve: I work hard for hours at a time, and so I deserve a higher pay or an increment. Shouldn’t nepotism benefit everyone, including me? Why was it that I had to work and earn and pay for my studies when I had a parent who was obligated to provide for me so that I didn’t have to? How is it that I had to work in such places and still not have enough in a month?

It felt like I was working paycheck to paycheck. But in those years money is not the only barakah that counts. I was blessed with the flexibility to take days off if needed to prioritise my studies. I was blessed with food I could still afford, and accessibility to cheaper options and affordable transport regardless of where I needed to travel. I was blessed with the opportunity to study to begin with. I was blessed with being able to get a job to begin with. So why did my barakah still felt blocked?

Almost ten years down that road was what it took to help me realise the truth. In the midst of frantically trying to achieve and trying to overcome the difficulties life threw at me whilst whining and complaining over every tiny little thing (and still sounding like I am right now)… The problem wasn’t what I expected. It was the simple sole fact that there were sins so normalized where I lived that it didn’t occur to me just how much has been blocking my rizq. Working with non-mahrams in close quarters, not adhering to the correct conditions of the hijab, not having the best of niyyah in everything I chose to do.

You see, it is irrelevant what was making things difficult for me. Rizq and barakah comes from Allah (subhana wa ta’ala). Our job is to follow His commandments first, then relax knowing that we are not defying our Creator in the midst of raising our hands and asking for more. Shifting my niyyah started to crack the dam blocking the goodness that was being withheld from me. I went from “I need to work to earn money” to “I want to earn to pay off my debt so I can pursue a career that could impact society in the best of ways.” When the time came and He sent me a man right for my deen, he brought forward the influence of hayaa and reminders through him and my closest friend who spend over a decade being a silent model for me to follow and ground myself to. And then one day I remembered that the dam shattered the instant I put on a headscarf, took off my make-up, and shielded my body from the eyes of men.

From that moment on, suddenly I found the bravery to address the reality of fighting against the delays of marriage. And in that period, I was promised the rights of a woman that I never knew were my own. To study without worrying about costs. To be fully provided for without thinking of my wallet. To be protected from non-mahrams and to be loved and cherished like a diamond coveted by kings. I cried at the disappearance of my loans, and the great relief of how the stresses of survival in this dunya was bravely taken on by my husband who took his responsibilities over me calmly and bravely as any Muslim man who marries should. Here’s the thing. What I am sharing is not about wallowing in my woes of past singlehood or flaunting the marital life I was gifted. It is about showing you… and anyone who will listen to truly pause in life and look around you. Despite our sins, Allah (subhana wa ta’ala) continues to bless us even at our worst, and even when we disobey him. Perhaps some people will consider it punishment because in those moments of sinning we are either unaware or undisturbed by it and our ignorance is punishment that will strip us of our bliss in akhirah. But the fact is, they were still ease that we could have otherwise not have received. In an instant, when we stop sinning (in my case, when I began the correct hijab journey), the mercy and love from Allah (subhana wa ta’ala) came flooding into my world. Coupled with making halal relations, and shifting one’s niyyah in even things we do for dunya, it makes great impact in the blessings that come from pleasing Allah (subhana wa ta’ala).

Of course, my little anecdote doesn’t cover the intricate details of my story and even paints the murky view of what truly transpired (all for the sake of privacy and protecting my aib/hayaa). But what little I shared; I do not do so lightly. I saw firsthand in my own experience and reality what simply correcting ONE sin did to bring me back into the loving grace of my Creator. How one little hidayah of wearing the hijab the right way and at all in fact – one I can only wish came earlier – did to bless me with great ease in an instant. And sharing it… I can only hope that it would trigger you to want to finally commit to banishing that one sin that has plagued you permanently too. When was the last time any of us every paused to reflect on the mercy of Allah (subhana wa ta’ala) and how it shifted your life’s trajectory?

Let us say allahumma barik for the goodness, mercy and blessings we read today and let the angels make dua for it to be yours too. Amin.