Finding Peace in My Journey

While being on my partial social media detox, I have had the opportunity to reflect upon the things that I do. I'm not sure if this makes sense to anyone, but for me at least, I love being able to reflect instead of just doing things without realizing the time that goes by and being in a rush. I don't want to just do. I want to understand what I do, value each of them, and learn throughout it all. I don't want to just do - I want to feel them.

I remember a while ago when I was on the verge of leaving a corporate job, I was all hyped up about being this busy business lady. While I am still very much learning now and always will be, and will never ever actually be 'right', I am just thinking - who was that girl?

Why did I actually want to be...busy?

I'm not saying we should strive to sleep all day and be unproductive. I'm ALL for productivity, which is why I've slowly learned that there isn't much value to being 'busy'. See, while I was on that 'let's-get-busy' phase, I was practically trying to do everything, saying 'yes' to every opportunity, running around and then running myself thin. I thought I could do it all, and even worse - I believed I MUST do it all in order to become successful. While it made my ventures appear fancy with all the projects up our sleeves, I pretty much also never took a deep breath in between jobs, doing things in a haste, and along the way, not knowing what I was focusing on. I was trying to do too much.

I have to thank Allah SWT for He opened up my eyes and allowed me to understand 'success' from a different perspective. It all began in Ramadan alhamdulillah, which just makes me fall in love more and more again with that beautiful month. It was in that month that I slowed down and reminded myself to concentrate on my relationship with Allah SWT. And in that period, I read many articles and books about being productive Muslims. I found a peace I just can't quite comprehend, but it made me realize that all our goals are eventually to be closer to Allah SWT, to be better servants to Allah SWT, and to strive for Jannah. Those goals might seem common sense or basic knowledge, but when felt truly from the heart - everything just falls into place. 'Success' means being a good servant to Allah SWT, and whatever I do that works toward that final goal will be a form of success.

So it definitely doesn't have to be trying to be a busy business lady who does too much with little time to reflect or think about Allah SWT.

I guess it works different ways for different people in the way we find best to be successful in most aspects of our lives while putting Allah at the centre.

For the time being, I have found an 'arrangement' I love and value, alhamdulillah. I have limited my jobs to only certain specific days taking note of what I can manage, while the remaining days are used for reading, learning, reflecting, being present with my family, and inshaaAllah, trying to be a better servant to Allah SWT. And these are among my main reasons of taking a partial social media detox. The time away from social media has allowed me to be more present with my family, while finding peace in doing things that I love and can benefit from, like reading. All that, and not having this need to update what I do for the world to see.

And I have never been happier and more at ease with my journey.

But then again, these might be just my phase. Who knows what I'll learn next. And I don't mind, really, as long as I don't stop learning.