Get ready to turn up the heat - and the stickiness. Environment Canada has said that this weekend will bring extremely humid weather to  many cities in Southwestern Ontario starting tomorrow (Sunday). Temperature levels may rise up to and beyond 30  degrees Celsius.

While getting ready for the hot, wet weather, it's important to keep a couple of things in mind in order to stay healthy. Humidity causes a lot of sweating. Because of this, the body tends to lose a lot of water and salts, so it's important to make sure you're making up for the loss. Try carrying a bottle of water around with you if you intend to go out, but it is best to stay indoors and stay cool. A cold shower also doesn't hurt in bringing your body temperature down. If you're staying home, try opening doors within the house to increase ventilation. Also, keep areas such as the bathroom extra dry by turning on vent fans for a little while to avoid excessive moisture.

Hope you have a great weekend!

The weather is an awesome force. It has no sense of responsibility, no consideration for what anyone wants, and no amount of accountability. It cannot be tamed or controlled. More often than not, it can't even be predicted.

Despite our manmade labels, we can see all kinds of weather at all times of the year. It can snow in the summer, and it can be plus 10 in the winter. The weather is not a conformist.

So sublime are the qualities of nature. No one can deny that the winds and rains of the universe are much beyond any human  being's control. We can spend decades building skyscrapers and light- at- night cities, but these have no impression upon hurricanes and tsunamis. They will carry on as they please.

Toronto is a magnificent showcase of nature's glory. With four seasons and still much variation within those, one can truly witness the beauty of the changing weather. Each day is a new story, and weather is a perfectly apathetic backdrop, unshaken by the human sphere. As we stand in admiration of the glowing sun, or in fear of the striking lightning, we must wonder... If we're not controlling them, who is?

Praise be to God, the Creator, the Maker, the Shaper, the Sustainer of all things.

I'll do it later.

I don't have enough time.

I'm hungry.

I'm always tired.

Sound like you? Coz it sounds like me. Many of us struggle with these problems regularly and don't know why. Here are a few steps to get you on your way to taking control of your precious life:

1) Keep track. Spend a day or two doing what you always do, your routine, if you will, and see where your time is going. Use real numbers. Make a 24-hour pie chart if you have to. This might reveal some not-so-shocking trends like, "I didn't sleep til 2 am" or "I spent 5 hours on Facebook". Keep track of everything, meaning, if you're doing your assignment while you're on Facebook, write that down. Chances are your 4 hours doing homework would have been 1 hour if you had turned your computer off.

2) Identify your problems. Are you sleeping late? Are you watching TV when you ought to be reading? Are you multi-tasking too much? (Actually, multi-tasking in general is not a good thing. Focusing on one thing at a time allows you to do things better and in fact, it saves time.) Write down all your biggest time/energy wasters.

3) Find the reasons. So, you say you're sleeping late. Well, find out why that is. Is it because you had too much caffeine? Is it because you're exercising right before bed? Maybe you just have too much work to do? All of these can be stopped with a little effort, but first, write it down.

4) Solve it! Decide how you're going to change these habits. WARNING: BE REALISTIC. Don't say you're going to sleep on time, stay off sugar and caffeine and exercise earlier in the day all at once. Focus on getting rid of one or two bad habits at a time. Write down your goal, and this time, share it with someone you respect who can keep track of your progress. Make sure it's someone you hold in high regard because if it isn't, you might not care too much if they find out you aren't keeping your word. Motivate yourself.

A few side reminders follow. Be patient with yourself - it's not happening overnight. Habits take at least a month or so to build and much longer to drop. Be consistent. If you slip one day or two, take a hold of the situation immediately; don't give in. Be positive. You can't do anything until you believe it's possible. You're a strong human being, and you can do it! Lastly, focus. From finding the problems to applying the solutions, focus is the key to all successes.

All the best!

Today is my birthday.

A year ago, I was out with friends eating cake and opening presents like any other ‘normal’ kid.

I recall a time when a friend of mine asked an elder sister why it was that Muslims were told to stay away from celebrating birthdays. Is it not harmless to cut a cake, light some candles and enjoy the wonderful being that is you?

Her response shook me then, and does so now as I finally gained the courage to adhere to her advice.

She said, let’s look at it in a very logical manner. What is a birthday a sign of? It means you’re getting older. So what are you celebrating? Would it not be better to spend that day reflecting on how you spent your last year and making goals for the next one? Does it make sense that you are joyous about growing older, probably weaker, and definitely closer to death? This day should be one where you think about where you are in life. This day should be a day when you praise Allah Ta’ala for giving you more time to please Him.

Perhaps needless to say, my friend and I did not take this too well. It is not a matter of what you could be doing instead, for must of us we just want an excuse to get gifts and hear how great we are. How silly is that, though? As Muslims, we should shy away from flattery. The only human beings that come even close to deserving that kind of treatment were the prophets, peace be upon them, and they would not dare come near something as self-loving and pointless as a birthday celebration.

All that scrutiny aside, though, the fact of the matter is that birthdays, just like Hallowe’en and Valentine’s Day, and all that other commercial bologna are a pagan holiday. Allah Ta’ala warns us severely against imitating the disbelievers and surely adopting their holidays is doing just that.

Lastly, a note on sincerity. The only thing that really drove these points home this year, alhamdulilah, was the fact that if Allah Ta’ala wanted us to join in birthday festivities, if there was any benefit to be reaped here whatsoever,  He would have told us to. So the question really comes down to, how sincerely do we believe in His Wisdom? If He is All-Knowing, All-Wise, why the hesitation in following His rules?

Today is my birthday. A day like any other, alhamdulilah.

                            Who knew gratitude better than the one who had nothing at all?

I was a long way into my life before I learned that the more I had, the more I wanted. Like a drink from salty seas,  the desires of this world leave us parched and unfulfilled, always wanting more, and more, and more.

The paradox of this condition is that besides being in constant 'want' of the world, I was also never content with what I had at present.Then, I learned that the issue really lies in this concept of attributing happiness to the wrong stuff.

We've all heard the cliches; happiness is: witnessing a child's laughter; happiness is: a warm hug from a loved one; happiness is: watching the sun rise with a cup of hot cocoa and a flat screen TV. Er, maybe not the last one. Actually, though, maybe not any of them. Because while meaningful relationships and human experiences do make our hearts smile, happiness is an emotion to be nurtured and felt in independence. In it's truest form, it comes only from the inside and does not rely upon other people and events to survive.  This is what is so hard to master because other things do make us happy temporarily. No doubt, time spent with a special friend is something to be glad about. But that friend will leave, and likely your gladness will, too. This is true of all things. All things must end.

So how does one get it? How does one rid themselves of petty thoughts and gloomy days? Through gratitude. It's funny. Most of us who are able to read this probably have a roof over our heads, sufficient food to eat and even internet-access. Yet few can say they take a conscious second to say thanks for all of that. So what of our breaths? Our eyes? Our hands? Is there any one that can say they really have nothing to be grateful for, if even being alive is a blessing?

Training oneself to be happy is much like losing weight. It takes self-control. One must exercise their mouth and mind with constant 'thank-yous' and not binge on complaining. Also, the diet of a happy person is filled with optimism and forward-thinking. Looking at the downside of things and wallowing on past losses is a strict prohibition. Best part of this diet: overeat all you want! You can never be grateful enough.

An old Eastern philosophy goes that the root of suffering is desire, so to eliminate suffering, one must first eliminate desire. Why? Because desires are timely, and so are the things that fulfill them. So if you want something, you'll either get it and be happy for a while or not get it and be miserable. If you get it, you'll eventually stop wanting it or it'll come to an end. It is necessary to   want less, in order to be happy with less. To want less,  learn to love what you have. Love and appreciate every last thing you can think of, for a grateful heart is a happy heart.

In the words of Leo Tolstoy, "If you want to be happy, be."

“My youth was gone before I realized it; young manhood carried me away; but a mature age brought me to my sense and taught me by experience the truth I had read in books long before: that youth and pleasure are vain- the lesson of that Author of all times and ages, Who permits wretched mortals, puffed with emptiness, to wander for a time until at last, becoming mindful of their sins, they learn to know themselves.” (Francesca Petrarca, Letter to Posterity)

Youth

What can be said of young age that we will understand while we’re still young? Not very much. There really are some things that only time can teach us, and, in the words of a great man (my dad, actually) every generation has to touch the stove themselves to see if it’s hot. But while all that is true, Allah Ta’ala does us endless favours in the Glorious Qur’an. Parables upon parables reveal the trips and traps of people passed so we can, if we reflect, save ourselves from falling into those same mistakes. The trick to it all is to do it while we’re young. We shouldn’t wait for time to teach us, we should get up and do some preventative learning ourselves.

Time

There are hours of which human beings can have no knowledge, namely the hour of death for each individual and the Final Hour for all of creation. The result of this is that really, we have no knowledge of any hour to come at all. So limited is our perception that we can plot and plan for days, months and even years, but it is only by Allah’s will that anything actually happens. He can bring death upon us whenever He wills.  It is Allah, the Eternal, who has control of time. So what does it mean to be late? Or early?  If you are anywhere at anytime, that is a part of Divine Decree and therefore, isn’t everything “on time”? Everything is exactly as He willed it to be. (That doesn’t mean we should purposely delay things or be late, though!)

Death

Live this life as a wayfarer journeying, like a stranger on his way back home. This is the wisdom taught by our Beloved Prophet, salAllahu ‘alayhi wasalam. In one interpretation of this hadith, it is said that this leaves two options for the believer, to live either as a wayfarer or as a stranger, the former being superior to the latter. The wayfarer, he travels around, finding homes here and there but never quite until he reaches his final home in the akhirah. The superiority of the stranger is that he has no home! Everywhere he goes and everything he does, then, is tied only to the abode of the akhirah. SubhanAllah!

Maybe it was a Friday.

Or a Saturday, or a Sunday… Definitely not a Monday. Tuesday seems too boring and Wednesday too long but Thursday is not possible, it just isn’t romantic enough.

It was definitely a Friday.

I didn’t really know what was going on, it seemed to me to be like any other morning except, it was not morning, not yet. It was night, sort of. I couldn’t see the clock properly, my eyes were blurry from the strain of a night’s flood of tears. Yes, that was usual in those years.

Something tempted me to pray, to say all those forgotten truths that I once held true to and admit that God had changed in my mind. From a time when He came first, now He was last. From Eternal to Past. God: The source of Peace -used to mean belief and now? It meant relief.

But I maintained in my despair a hair, an inkling, a finest grain of sand of hope in His infinite mercy.

Surely if I couldn’t stop myself I could… Ask for help?

Aid. So I prayed.

In my heart I still hear those words, maybe the sincerest I’ve ever said, later lying in my bed, fever through the roof and a frightening realization that this really was the truth. Had I fallen this low?

O Allah, the Turner of Hearts, turn my heart to your obedience.  If tomorrow is for me a day worse than today, if I will fall beneath myself, then take me in my sleep. I have lived to shame and now I am ashamed to live, and though I know that only You have the power to forgive, I fear a day when my heart will be so hard and full of stain that even repenting will be in vain.

I had conviction, at least. Constant in my understanding and firm in my faith that this would be it, this was my last day – a Friday? I didn’t deserve it, but, as it happened, Thursday wasn’t romantic enough – to fall in love.

I woke up. Unfortunate, I thought. Maybe I was just destined for flames. Who was I to complain? Yet I felt a weight upon my heart that said something big was going to happen, though I couldn’t have seen this coming. For the next few months I waited – and I say waited not because I was patient but because I had no other choice. That cloud hung over me, confusing my thoughts and causing me to lose sleep. I couldn’t eat. Sickness overcame me and all I could do was weep but it was an investment, I thought, into the wells of Paradise, if my Creator should so will.

The cloud cleared and that big thing? Now, as I ponder upon the heavens freely and tremble when I hear His name, now when I see, with light, the darkness from which I came, now when I long for nothing but His Face – feelings I can’t replace- I see that I’m enslaved; to peace.

It was definitely a Friday, when I fell in love. 

    The Messenger of Allah salAllahu ‘alayhi wasallam said:"Our Lord descends to the lowest heaven during the last third of the night,inquiring, "Who will call on me so that I may respond to him? Who is asking something of me so I may Give it to him? Who is asking for my forgiveness so I may forgive him?"

    The Messenger of Allah salAllahu ‘alayhi wasallam said: "There is in Paradise an apartment, the exterior of which can be seen from the interior, and the interior of which can be seen from the exterior. Such apartments have been prepared for those who are polite in their talk, provide food to the needy, fast frequently and observe the tahajjud prayer when people are asleep.” (mishkat)


    The Messenger of Allah salAllahu ‘alayhi wasallam said: "Make it a point to observe tahajjud prayer, for it was the practice of the pious gone before you and it is a means by which you can find nearness to your Lord and seek expiation of your sins and find prevention from evil.” (mishkat)

The secret's out! Well, it wasn't much of a secret I guess, but now it's being viewed from a whole new perspective: from goatskin.

A parchment containing information on the treatment of insurgents in the 1837 Rebellion of Upper Canada has recently been found. It was hiding in the drawer of a collector who inherited it years prior. The document contains the 'truth' of the events that made up and concluded the 1837 rebellion. Much like protests today, 'rebels' were first arrested (under the guilty- until -someone cares- enough -to -prove- innocent pretense) and then later sorted out into the 'goodies' and the 'bad-ies'. The parchment is made of goatskin.

The Rebellion was due to the elite of society raising taxes and the overall feeling that the government wasn't democratic. I guess some things never change.

The artifact is going up for grabs on December 2nd this year with an expected value of at least 2,000 to 3,000 dollars. That must have been one fine looking goat.

KIH is on the move to settle  this matter once and for all. If we can prove that Parchment Goat was a forefather of  our beloved Fuego, maybe we will be the rightful inheritors of his remnants...








Just kidding.

We begin by praising Allah Ta'ala, to Whom belongs all that is in the heavens and the earth, and Who does not tire, nor is He seized by slumber or sleep; and by sending blessings upon His beloved messenger, his family and companions, and those righteous Followers who succeeded them - may Allah Subhanahu wa Ta'ala be pleased with them.

Rare is the student that has not had to lose sleep in order to get things done. University, college, high school - you name it - probably everyone has faced a time in their life when deadlines are tight and so meeting them means saying goodbye to extra pilow time. The extreme of this is of course the all-nighter, whereby stressed individual X decides to spend "all night" working away at some given assignment Y.

Some people might tell you that its only those who are unprepared, who procrastinate and delay, that end up  in this mess. Undoubtedly, it is perhaps those who have to do it more often, but the point of the matter is that we can plan and manage our time to the best of our ability and still not finish everything because life - happens. As the adage goes, man proposes, God disposes.

As such, I think it's important for everyone to reflect on the nature of these busy periods of our lives. What one may find is interesting is how they represent possibly the highest degree of human discipline. When we're running short on time, we become able to focus all of our energies on whatever task we have at hand and work efficiently to complete it. We'll rid ourselves of unnecessary distractions, prioritize our doings and facilitate our time meaningfully. Why? Because we know that in some hours, we have to hand in an assignment or write  a test- opportunities that can only be had once because often, handing it in late or writing a make-up is not an option. Moreover, we know it will pay off once we have done it, and that lost rest will have been worth it. 

In fact, life as a whole is much like this, isn't it? We are given some short hours in this world to scurry about and get things done, to develop and grow as human beings and then, we expire.

Imagine, then, a world in which we lived by these same principles all the time. Where sleeping and eating less was a regular habit that we formed so that we could increase productivity. Where our deadlines were not tonight and tomorrow, but those unknown deadlines of old age and death, after which there are no make-ups or late penalties. Imagine what we could accomplish!

I'm not in any way endorsing all-nighters or suggesting that we dramatically change our schedules so that we leave no time to socialize or relax. That's not a healthy, maintainable lifestyle in my humble opinion. What I am saying is that it might be worth our while to take the most productive times of our lives- meaning any kind of productivity - academic, work-related, spiritual or otherwise-and use them as reminders of what we are capable of doing when we remember how close our deadlines really are. Perhaps this way, laziness and procrastination will seem unreasonable all together :D

Wa billahi tawfiq

  

Possessions. The world around us teaches us that we each have our own money and our own houses within which we have our own rooms, and please no one enter without our own permission to do so. Here we sleep in our own bed and when we awake, we use our own bathroom and pray Fajr on our own prayer mat. Next, we will eat our own cereal and watch our own TV for the weather, get dressed accordingly in our own clothes and exit home into our own cars.  Maybe we’re students, so apply all of the above except that we might be taking public transport believing it's our own system and walking into class like that’s ours, too. Here things start to get tricky.

Now we spend our own days in our own minds with our own thoughts, sunken in our own dispositions and proudly standing by our own values. Who are we, you ask? Out pour our own identities.

I am a short, hijab-wearing Pakistani, Kashmiri girl, born in Saudi Arabia, raised in Canada, student of the Toronto District School Board, youngest child of a  family of five, currently attending the University of Toronto (repreSENT!), studying Russian, Italian and Linguistics who loves to laugh, eat in good company and spend time with the family.

By the way, I am Muslim. Maybe you guessed that from my hijab, or my cultural background. Well, now you know.

Possessions. The world around us is a constant reminder of everything we really do not own, and never can own, because the world around us is here only for a brief moment in time.  All those things that we cherish and take pride in, indeed everything, actually belongs to Allah Subhanahu wa Ta’ala and to Him we shall all return. Our money, cultures, and all that we bear in this life will avail us nothing when we meet death, for surely, there is no room for all of this in our graves. Surely, we will be left with nothing but the metaphysical; nothing but our book of deeds.  

Yet somehow, someplace, this message got lost in translation so that now we inherit the pointless, vain things of life and take second-hand ownership of the only thing that will bring eternal bliss- our Deen. We defend our soccer teams and cultural affiliations like nobody’s business, and what of our Islam? It’s an extracurricular activity. I am part of the MSA, what else do you want?

The Sunnah of the Prophet Muhammad salAllahu alayhi wasalam is the most detailed documentation of any person in history, something even non-Muslims stand in awe of. For a mu’min, this is a tremendous glad tiding. We have, in our teachings, the ways and word of that being who Allah Ta’ala calls His Beloved. That man, whose flawless character turned hearts of stone into the best Muslims there will ever be. That Prophet, from whom billions of men and women have received wisdom beyond all age, race and social class. What we do with these teachings is something we will all be called to answer for.  Have no doubt about it. Whether we were born Muslim or guided thereafter, we have a covenant with Allah Ta’ala that will lead either to  our salvation or to our destruction. Here, the choice is ours.

Really, Islam is one thing we should want to put our names aaall over. For one thing, I believe, that most Muslims appreciate the importance of da’wah. Everything from comic depictions of the Prophet salAllahu Alayhi wasalam to poor representation on the interfaith grounds is a cause of distress to anyone with even an ounce of iman. The issues of our ummah are many, but we cannot reasonably expect to fight for our right to practice Islam, if we do not actually practice Islam. We cannot ask for truth and justice, if we are not truthful and just. In short, we cannot ask others to take Islam seriously, if we do not take it seriously ourselves. If we start to take ownership of our religion, we will earn back the respect that our predecessors, our Prophets (peace be upon them), and our religion itself, deserve. If we do not, we will continue to see the same troubles that face us now, and we will see much greater troubles in the hereafter.

So when we do decide what we are going to take full ownership of, it is my humble opinion that we choose our Deen. The same way we have been taught to be so protective, so possessive, so cautious of our ‘stuff’, we should be guarding our imaan. That means learning to leave sin no matter how great or small, because we can never know what our hearts will testify on the Day of Judgment. That means finding out how the Prophet alayhis salam lived and adhering to it with the conviction that there is no better way to live. That means taking on the pursuit of Islamic knowledge so that we know what is expected of us, so that we can say we truly took it upon ourselves to be Muslim and lived Islam.