Why I pray

Because God will be increased if I do?
Because God will be diminished if I don't?
For the world around me to be changed?
That's not why I pray!

Because it's my challenge.
Because it's my joy.
For the strength to be that change.
That's why I pray.

The prayer for guidance

Guide us to the straight path
the Muslim's oft-repeated prayer
leaves no doubt

guidance is not binary
rather
a force to be fuelled

strengthened
in opposing one's self,
in the want to be led.

Congratulations resistant soul...

Congratulations for the one who never found pleasure praying,
never throughout his life,
yet he persisted
in obedience to God's command.

Congratulations on him who continued praying
through compulsion and heaviness,
finding no enjoyment,
of an increased reward.

Congratulations
for enthusiasm was never demanded,
nor a condition for the acceptance of deeds,
only sincerity.

O Allah, accept from us our deeds. Indeed You are the All-Hearing, All-Knowing.

Add a forehead to those knees

"The greater reformer Martin Luther King is quoted as saying, 'I have so much to do today, I'll need to spend another hour on my knees.' To him, prayer was not a mechanical duty but rather a source of power in releasing and multiplying his energies."

('The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People')

"If you take a child and you throw the child up, there's a point where they go into this state of complete panic. And then when they come back to your arms they're laughing. THAT is Dunya. I guarantee you. That moment, that is your life. You came from God and you're going back to God. And there's just a moment where you're in complete state of panic. But just relax, you're in good hands. You're in good hands."

(Attributed to Hamza Yusuf by the person who sent it to me)

Target this Ramadhan: Sunnah Prayers

My target this Ramadhan (and beyond insha-Allah) is to become mega unflinchingly consistent in my Sunnah prayers, that is:
(1) 2 Raka'ats before Fajr prayer.
(2) 4 Raka'ats before Dhuhr prayer.
(3) 2 Raka'ats after Dhuhr prayer.
(4) 2 Raka'ats after Maghrib prayer.
(5) 2 Raka'ats after Eisha prayer.

In addition, to adopt the highly recommended 4 Raka'ats before Asr and Eisha prayers, more often than not.

And lots of optional prayers besides, insha-Allah.

Indeed this is dearer to me than the whole world and everything temporary that it contains.

The mind in prayer

A couple of quotes about the mind in prayer:

(1) "... When the mind is not present in prayer, it does not remain idle and is concentrated to the thoughts of the worldly affairs with which it is immediately concerned. So there must be firm belief that prayer is a stepping stone to the next world which is everlasting..."

(2) "... The medicine of removing various thoughts that come to mind in prayers is to cut the root or to remove the reasons which cause different thoughts. He who loves a thing remembers that thing. For this reason, he who loves things other than God is not free from diverse thoughts in prayer."

(Source: Imam Ghazzali's Ihya Ulum-id-Din, The Book of Worship)

Intoxication and Prayer

"God says, 'Don't come near prayer when you are intoxicated until you understand what you say'. Some say that intoxication means a great anxiety. Some say that it means attachment to the world. There are many worshippers who do not drink wine but they do not know what they say in prayer..."

(Source: Imam Ghazzali's Ihya Ulum-id-Din)

Vintage Ghazzali maa sha Allah;
digging beneath the surface.