Thirty Days of Peacefulness

Assalāmu'alaykum ☺

Depiction of how I feel for getting the chance to be alive on Ramadan 1434H

Ramadan this year is like a whole new experience for me. I've never been either so religiously-concerned or been into a religious society in my whole life. Ramadan this year is like a refreshing start for me, a month that is undoubtedly listed as my second first-love on 2013—yeah, you've experienced yourself that kind of first love, right? you will go buoyant, readily accept any kind of challenge whatever in front of you as long as we can be 'near' with what we love—It's just that I've never experienced Ramadan like this before.

The key is started with awareness. Being aware that Ramadan is about to enter is a helpful way for me to prepare what I'm going to do. Well, actually the religious society in my definition is still limited to the people I found virtually—like the islamic accounts on facebook, twitter, or even instagram—Alhamdulillāh, some of those people are actually encourage me with their beneficial posts. So then, I am triggered to open my eyes widely about the value of this beloved month.

I start off by attending tabligh, or islamic events; and preparing my own Ramadan journal which can be seen below. I also subscribed to Productive Muslim's mailing list, and I found it really helpful to plan how am I going to draw on these thirty days beautifully. In my whole life, I hardly either attending the tarawih prayer at mosque or at home by myself. But this year, I knew I can not miss this big chance. I've been slowly getting the idea of becoming a muslimah. Here I went. I walked myself to the mosque nearby my parent's house to attend the isya and tarawih prayer in congregation.    

Alhamdulillāh, I am so much grateful for the chance you've given me, ya Rabb. Although, I know that my plan didn't go as smooth as I have planned. Along the way, my spirit went up and down—especially on the last days of Ramadan. I didn't read the Qur'an regularly and didn't write down my journal properly. But I surely believe that...

The point of the straight path isn't the path, nor even going straight itself. These are means. The point, purpose & aim is Allah. —Islamic Thoughts 

So, don't you ever lose hope while you're still living in this dunya. Because, I've also read in Al-Hikam book that His forgiveness comes as much as the breath we take. Subhanallāh! Then, I also found an inspiring post from kak Fitri Aulia of KIVITZ which says this:

Aku tak mampu meniru bagaimana Rasulullah saw dan sahabat memuliakan Ramadhan. Rasa sedihku tak mampu bersaing dengan kesedihan generasi terbaik yang penuh berurai air mata di akhir Ramadhan. Sore ini adalah dimulainya hitungan sampai 11 bulan ke depan. Saat Allah akan menilai, apakah aku hambanya yang shiddiq (penuh kejujuran) atau aku hamba yang kadzib (penuh kebohongan).

I was not able to replicate how the Messenger of Allah and his friend glorified Ramadan. My sense of woe can not compete with the woe of the best generation which full of tears at the end of Ramadan. This afternoon is the start of the counting up to the next 11 months. When Allāh will judge, whether I was his servant who is Siddiq (full of honesty) or I was a kadzib (full of lies) servant.

Such a slapping statement, indeed.