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we stop doing our practices, our faith weakens.
there is no shortcut to becoming spiritually strong.
When you understand that it is your deficiency that creates the space to experience God’s generosity, you come to see that God calls you to Him through your humanity and fallibility.
Sometimes we have to fall on our backs before we face the heavens. Sometimes we have to be broken before we seek God to mend our hearts. Sometimes we have to become sick before we call upon the Healer.
Lord is calling you, through your pain and struggle, to rely on ...
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implying that faith anchors one in the safety and protection of God.
Without islam, iman cannot be contained, and without iman, islam is like a body without a soul; it is lifeless and inflexible.
Outer obedience and active inner faith strengthen one another like threads joining to create a braid.
ihsan is “to make something beautiful,” for when we are truly aware of God’s all-encompassing goodness we cannot help but reflect the beauty of His presence.
we manifest “spiritual excellence”—not from the ego or in order to be praised, but out of being in love with God.
It is only when we worship the Divine out of love that our worship transforms our entire being. This is the station of ihsan.
Whereas islam focuses on outer actions, and iman focuses on inner certainty, ihsan is the world of intention, where all that we do is for the sake of God alone.
the station of ihsan the seeker has surrendered their will before the will of God and fully trusted Him,
we are terrified by the flames of the truth are the places where our ego refuses to relinquish control and rely on God.
We only know the truth to the extent that we surrender our separations and limits to become consumed by the truth of God.
When we surrender our will, mind, heart, and soul in this way, we don’t lose ourselves, but instead become receptive to all that God seeks to create through
Anything can be an act of worship if you make the intention of getting closer to Allah through that act.
repentance turns our inner gaze from a place of ego-consciousness to God-consciousness, returning our hearts from this mortal world and its fleeting desires to Allah and His eternal peace.
“Our Lord, perfect for us our light and forgive us. Indeed, You have power over all things” (66:8).
istighfar not only covers our sins with the mercy of God, but it also protects us from the harm that we inflict on our own souls.
The act of seeking God’s forgiveness is itself a protection from the consequences of our own actions.
Istighfar is not just about seeking forgiveness from our sins, it is also about seeking forgiveness for not doing enough.
When Allah makes us aware of a sin we committed, He is not punishing us, but rather inviting us toward His presence.
Someone asked the great eighth-century mystic Rabia Al-Adawiyya, “I have sinned much; if I repent, will Allah forgive me?” She profoundly replied, “It is the opposite; if Allah forgives you, you are capable of repentance.”
It is not our repentance that leads to forgiveness, but Allah’s infinite mercy and forgiving nature that acts as a divine force of gravity, returning us to who we have always been beneath the dust of forgetfulness and sin.
in every moment we have everything we need to walk toward Allah.
The practice of tawba is a means of spiritual course correction, in which we realign our hearts and intention toward Allah.
No matter how much we stumble off the straight path, we can still reach the destination of divine eternal love, so long as we keep striving to return.
The difference between someone close to God and someone turned away from God is not in whether or not they are tempted, but rather in where they are focusing their attention.
The more we turn to God’s light, the brighter the skies of our mind become and the dimmer the stars of the ego and Devil appear in comparison.
Instead of looking to self-reliance to overcome temptation, we are ca...
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“Those who are aware of God when a passing impulse from the Devil touches them, they bring God to remembrance and at once they see things clearly.” QUR’AN 7:201
instead of fighting the temptation or trying to figure out a way around it, go to Allah first.
respond to every temptation with a prayer.
if the Devil tempts you with lust, ask Allah for help in turning your desires toward Him.
When you become aware that the Devil attacks the places in your faith that are the weakest, his whispers of temptation actually become doorways into how to strengthen your faith and become closer to God.
we fall into a state of spiritual darkness, not because Allah punished us but because out of our free will we chose to turn our awareness away from the light of truth.
When we return to face Allah through repentance, Allah not only forgives our sins, but the sins themselves become reminders of Allah’s mercy and forgiveness.
Allah blesses us beyond what we deserve and gives to us without accounting from the storehouses of His grace.
It is important to always ask God for help, but we must also strive to live by the principles that Allah has called us to foster within ourselves.
“Allah loves those who repent and those who purify themselves”
Through repentance and good deeds, God gives us the ability to open the blinds created by sin, allowing the light of God’s love to come inside our hearts, bringing with it endless waves of peace and contentment.
As Rumi says, “The wound is where the light enters,” because it is in our weaknesses that we taste God’s strength, it is in our shortcomings that we experience God’s perfection, and it is in our brokenness that we feel God’s mercy.
Change happens when we make the path easy for people, when we inspire them toward their greatest potential through hope and love.
Our calling is not to judge people, but through love to inspire them toward their greatest potential.
When you forgive others, it is like pointing a flashlight into the mirror: you get back the grace you gave.
“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”
“Holding onto anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.”
“Whoever gives up his right as charity, it is an act of atonement for himself” (5:45).
Would you not love for Allah to forgive you? Allah is Forgiving and Merciful” (24:22).
