My heart hurts. I thought I would wait until I felt more whole to write. Instead, I want to write in a way that mirrors my heart. This week, I offer my thoughts in pieces. Though I am at a loss as to how to stitch together my current brokenness, I know I am still worthy, still powerful, and still have something to offer. A broken mirror still reflects.
I’ve recently begun a new life chapter. After seven years away, I have returned to a city I love that has old friendships to rekindle and new friends to find. After a long search, a perfect job crystallized and now I have a reason to set roots. I am grateful that after a long nomadic period of uncertainty, I’ve found a place and purpose to settle into. I feel pangs of guilt as I write about settling into a home; I’m reminded of the violent displacement of my friends in Gaza, some who are enduring horrific conditions in Rafah, and others who have managed to leave Gaza but are now beginning a life of exile. I remind myself that there’s no use in being guilty about privilege. Guilt should be an impetus towards actionable compassion. I ask myself – how might I channel my newfound grounding to those who are uprooted? How might I use the stability of home to realize my most embodied, most purposeful, most powerful self?
One week into Ramadan, and I have completed eight fasts so far. One year ago, I was visiting Gaza, breaking fast with my friends at our favorite seaside cafe that has been reduced to ruins.
I felt nervous about this Ramadan. It’s much harder to fast in the West where life does not bend to the contours of this ritual, where work does not slow down, where restaurants and coffee shops stay open during daylight hours. Where it can feel isolating and uncomfortable to explain to non-Muslims why I am refusing food and drink. It’s not out of religious dogmatism that I fast, but out of a spiritual yearning to be challenged to grow. I am curious about the transformative properties of fasting; I wonder who I will be at the end of each fast, at the end of the month.
This past weekend, I hosted a fundraiser for Gaza at a restaurant. I was on my feet all day among the restaurant’s patrons, moving from table to table and speaking about my experience in Gaza. I was hungry and thirsty. I wanted to give up on my fast, and came close to doing so, but I didn’t. I pushed through the weakness and temptation, and had my first sip of water and a bite of a date at sunset. It was the most gratifying fast yet because I was tested.
It’s said in Islam that our prayers are answered through tests. If we ask for more patience, we’re not magically zapped with patience. Instead, we’re delivered opportunities to practice and build patience. It’s only through overcoming challenges that we grow into higher versions of ourselves.
Within one week, I can already tell that this is the most profound Ramadan of my life. It cannot be explained, only experienced, but fasting with sincerity in our hearts is a portal for personal transformation. There is clarity in restraint.
It feels important to me to openly identify as Muslim, especially now. When 30,000+ of my kin are being livestream slaughtered with impunity, we cannot ignore the obvious anti-Muslim bigotry on display. When I openly say I am fasting, openly refer to myself as Muslim, I affirm myself and I affirm other Muslims, who make up the majority of oppressed and incarcerated people in this world. I am not too proud to say that the devastation of this moment brings me to my knees in prayer, searching for answers to questions I am too devastated to form. If all I relied on was our physical reality, I don’t know how I’d survive.
I keep beating the drum that to truly show up in these times, we must be investing in our personal growth as a means of personal liberation. Only then can we fully step into our power and purpose to realize collective liberation. We can’t adequately protest the unjust shortcomings of our status quo if we’re not internally protesting our own shortcomings, the injustices we level toward ourselves and others. How can we realize a new world if our day-to-day lives and relationships are still bound to our patterns of the old world?
It’s a blessing to see my words resonate in these times, to be seen as a teacher. I take my cues from Gaza itself, from the place and people who raised me, who saw me through the entire latter half of my twenties and made me who I am today. I encourage everyone to look to Gaza, to witness its pain and glory, to study the ways of its people and glean clues on how we might rise to meet this moment. The people of Gaza are more than victims, they are beacons who will lead us to a world beyond this paradigm. The sooner we treat them as such, the more likely we are to see liberation within this lifetime.
My life is changing everyday. I feel it most potently in my relationships. Some friends have distanced themselves from me. Often silently, other times by directly informing me. Many friends have stepped towards me in amazing ways. My inner circle has changed, tightened, grown more meaningful. I have been thinking a lot about the qualities that underpin true friendship. Mutual respect and admiration come to mind. But these qualities are the floor, not the ceiling, of true friendship. It’s how we let respect and admiration shape our words and actions that define what it means to love and care for another.
I think often of the teachings of bell hooks in All About Love. She reminds us that love is a choice. It’s a misuse of language to say we fall in love, as if it’s by lightning strike that love enters our life. We build in love, intentionally and consistently. To love someone is to make a choice to be present, understanding, active, and caring in their lives. I know my people by those I have chosen and those choose me back in return. It’s an unmistakable feeling to know when we are chosen, be it platonically or romantically. I am learning to be more discerning with the ones who hide or run from me, who receive without giving. I am finding the courage to release those connections to make space for the relationships that affirm and uplift me. A new friend recently reminded me, It’s okay to put yourself first sometimes.
After much resistance, I restarted therapy last week. I know, rationally, that I am in a deep state of grief, but I can’t feel it. Most of the time I am numb, floating through my days in a dream-like state. Would you believe me if I said that I’ve barely cried since October 7th? I throw my despair into my writing and organizing for Gaza. I told my therapist that I don’t know how to “unproductively grieve.” I told her that I can’t even define what it is that I’m grieving. You are shrouded in so many layers of loss, more than the brain can handle, she explained to me. If I were to distill what it is you’re grieving, it’s more than a place and people. It’s your identity that was shaped because of Gaza. You’re grieving a part of yourself that is being assaulted, that is being forced to change under the most violent circumstances.
She framed our forthcoming work together as a necessary part of my solidarity and action for Gaza. A soldier's break, she called it. I know by break she meant rest. But somewhere deep down, I heard it as a soldier who broke.
I am collecting funds to help my friends evacuate Gaza and reach safety in Egypt. If you’d like to contribute, you can do so here.
So much of this resonates. The Ramadans in isolation (which was most of my life’s experience), the feeling that grief is too much even to feel sometimes, the pleasure in breaking fast after a challenging day. As always I look to Gazans to see what it means to keep the faith in the most terrifying and horrific trials…praying this is the one that breaks the back of imperialism at last.
I've been sitting with "There is clarity in restraint." Thank you for writing out your feelings and all the work you do because of and in spite of them.