Everything declines approaching its end. That is the natural way of the world. Not even a blessed month is immune from this principle. The systems of inertia you hoped would carry for the entire ramadhan are quickly hijacked by an onset of laziness you had from before, and suddenly you missed your first jamaa, or you notice your daily qur’anic wird reducing, or you notice tarawih finishing quickly with your heart totally absent from it. This encroachment of heedlessness and fatigue sets in.
But Ramadhan is a month that is meant to offset everything. The month when we refuse to accept these habitual loops that we fall back into. The battle for the nafs comes into play and the purpose has always been to transcend ourselves. Ramadhan overhauls everything we deemed constant, from meal times we couldn’t negotiate to our nightly routines. Allah breaks this natural circuitry, enforcing in place these acts of refrain; the days of swabr through fasting and nights of gratitude through prayer where we really extend ourselves.
But despite our good intentions, the dip always happens, right after day 7 to the middle of the month, where we find ourselves having to drag our souls again. Suddenly, this heart that had been longing for its Lord becomes clouded again. You don’t say your dua with the same enthusiasm, the same conviction, repetition, the tarawihs are a bleep without contemplation; not just contemplation of the meaning, sometimes you don’t have the Arabic, but contemplation that these are the words of my Lord, my source of guidance, and yet I do not understand them, and that should sting your heart. And yet it’s reduced to the physical motions.
If you want to know where you stand before Allah, pay attention to where He’s made you stand. Allah makes easy for everyone what he created them for. One must worry when the ibaadah becomes a tad bit straining on them, because it confirms something about the state of their hearts. We embody the physicality of everything, but most often than not, we forget our hearts, the powerhouse of our actions. That is an illness in need of urgent attention.
There’s a lesser-known story of Umar ibn Abdulaziz, and he was who he was, which usually recalibrates everything for me. It’s found in the Hilya. One day after fajr, he went out, arriving at the riverside where, in that waned darkness, he sees Mujaahid ibn Jabr, the famous exegete whose name appears all over the tafsir. Mujahid sat there remembering Allah, weeping, and Umar observed him. Then Umar said to himself, ‘Woe to you, oh Mujahid, how am I supposed to stand before Allah on the same day that you stand before Him!’
Not a week goes by without me thinking about that. The day we will face account before a Benevolent Lord, presenting our deeds on the same day with Abu Bakr, and Umar, and Umar ibn Abdulaziz, and Mujahid. And like Umar ibn Abdulaziz, the thought of that inspires me to do better. And yet the heedlessness, the lack of foresight, the Hereafter being made a minutia in our eyes. 50, 000 years, Allah asks you about a couple of years of existence. A life when you talk about it yourself, you encompass it in a few minutes, and yet, 50,000 years; what do you think Allah will ask you about?
Everything? Then you must worry about everything. You must not make your Lord the least of those who see you. You must take chances and strive in the seasons He gave you as lifelines, to elevate yourself, and that is the purpose Ramadhan serves. The doors of hell are closed, those of paradise open, and a caller calls forth for your approach each night. Will you heed that caller and work against your instincts to slack and give it your all?
Years after years in regret, why not make this one the one you regret less? Allah loves the loftiest of ideals, why not make this Ramadhan the one you outdo everything. The life of the spirit is the real life despite our neglect of it, and Allah, the nurturer of our spirits, makes this month about that. How Generous! The boost acquired in it is supposed to last you the entire year, a practice to last you a lifetime. Are you going to take it?
Here we sit approaching the last 10. In it are the 10 best nights of the year, and of those is a night worth a thousand months. If your strategy was the inertia you hoped would carry you through the month, your resolve is most likely to be broken. The world seeps in as we prepare psychologically to transition to Eid and the days after. Society is working against you, and it’s not without intentionality that you will acquire the benefits of the 10 nights. Before you are days of striving, dear Muslim, which should always begin with interrogating the state of your heart. Where is it in this month? On what day did you leave it?
Before you were people who reserved these days for their Lord. They busied themselves remembering nothing else, and though that may seem impractical in a time when the world demands our constant presence, it’s only the recalibration of our hearts to some semblance of that that can ashore you to a ramadhan resembling the one of those who came before. Oh Muslim who was excited as this month entered, one should not become fully beat down approaching its most important days. Approach them not only as if this is the last time you’re approaching them, but also as if this is the first time you’re approaching them, wanting to really get them right, afraid of getting something wrong.
Study how the Salaf regarded them and pick a leaf from them, growing your deeds exponentially. We could never attain the levels of their piety, but effort must be exerted, for they are our examples. The taabi’in, some of them used to exert themselves, and when their bodies became weary, they would say, ‘Do the companions of the Prophet think they would beat us before our Lord?’ It was motivation for them, that awareness that they would stand before Allah and present their deeds on the same day with the Sahaba, and that would prompt them to stand up and exert themselves even more.
The opportunity presents itself now to go the unnatural way, because transcendence is the way of our religion. But more than anything, it’s to be reminded not to forget the most important thing, Ramadhan like every season of worship, is all about the relationship between a servant and His Lord. It’s about the state of your heart as you present yourself to Him. What is the state of your heart?
