The month of Ramadan has flown by. Today, Muslims will bid farewell to this beautiful time and yet set our sights on another meeting next year, inshaAllah. In the meantime, we hope we have reaped plenty of rewards during the month; we also hope the lessons learned will carry us through to the rest of the year.
I liken the passing of Ramadan to the change in season from summer to autumn. Whilst I endeavour to keep my heart in deep connection to my Creator, where my efforts are in full bloom, when the month leaves, those good habits begin to come undone somewhat and the bloom begins to wither. Just as the leaves wilt and eventually fall off the trees.
Of course, the challenge is to keep the momentum going and even though I know I will falter and fail on many occasions, I hope the unravelling process is an extremely slow one.
Aside from the reward I hope to have gained from Ramadan itself through worship of Allah, I have found that the month has brought with it countless precious moments of peace. Even to have had a few minutes to sit with my sons and reflect on our day, or to sit in silence on many nights and track the course of the waxing and waning moon, all these simple things have brought immense serenity and joy within. I understand that, at times, wonderful moments are to be found in the most routine things. I don’t necessarily have to be jetsetting across the world looking for them. Perhaps that’s also a sign of mellowing out in my latter life. Who knows?
I pray the lessons learnt in Ramadan will not be lost on me in time to come. I have seen how this year, for some reason, the last thing I have concerned myself with during fasting is food and any elaborate preparation of it. I’d like to think that’s a good sign. A sign of maturity; a realisation that Ramadan is not about hunger per se but something so much deeper. The month has shown me the excesses of life and how little we in fact need to get by. Decluttering in the material, physical and emotional senses, has inevitably made more room for the things that really matter – my connection to Allah and the understanding of my ultimate purpose in this life.
The truth is, the lifestyle we adopt as Muslims in Ramadan is something we should be aspiring to throughout the year. But being the arrogant mere mortals that we are, we often fall far short of that lofty ideal. My hope is that even having had the chance to experience it for a short time, should at least leave me yearning to return to it again and aspiring to hold onto whatever good I have managed to establish in this time.
So, I bid farewell to this annual visitor but believe the friendship is one that will sustain me for the rest of the year and till we meet again, inshaAllah.
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