Losing My Religion

I've been struggling for a long time and it's a relief to say it outloud. While the vocabulary of Islam remains in large part the language of my spirituality, it is no longer the structure in which I reside. How did I come to this? I guess the same way I came to Islam. I didn't come to this religion being focused on who was going to Hell, what kind of clothes a woman was wearing, or as a reaction to anything. I came because Allah touched my heart and I cried in prayer. I had spent years living my Mother's fantasy of an unmarried, woman with no children and had a good job that paid good money. She was right--the world loves young black women who are "smart" and can earn money. I enjoyed it, she enjoyed it. One day I found myself unable to dance. Really, I was unable to dance and move or even keep a beat.

I had become a cold "Bitch Goddess" people love. The problem with being a truly unfeeling person (not the pretend kind) is you are engaged in killing your own heart. After much chaos I came to Islam. It was the harmony of the approach to spirituality that touched me and my heart that had been frozen began to melt and I got in touch with my heart.

There are a lot of regulations in Islam, particularly for women. I saw those restrictions to be part of a larger effort to bring harmony to the social community. The modest clothing is feminist in intent--view me as a person not parts you want to have sex with. (BTW, men have similar sartorial restraints, but most do not adhere to them.) It took years to "master" the regulations and my feelings about them, but I felt I was serving a "greater good" and submitted.

The problem with doctrine is that it really struggles with real life and real people. For me, it was the death of my first son. Siddique lived four days and I grieved alone. The Muslims I knew gave me three days (Traditions say more than this is excessive). My Christian family was aloof. I searched within Islam for the heart I knew was there, is still there, but it all seemed very separate from the practice of people around me. I found Sufism and became reanimated, but ultimately it seemed to me to be a worship of an aloof teacher. I sought refuge in salat (prayer), but my suffering had made it little more than exercise.

I have finally come to Mindfulness. It is practice. It deals with suffering. I am a practical woman and I need what works. My life is not abstract and I am a community person. My path at this time is mainly Practice through service. While the ability to sit is where I've come to nourish myself, I seek nourishment in order to love and to "sit with pain" unblinking for both myself and my community. My community has a lot of pain and the anger coming out of that pain has the power to destroy us. I am particularly focused on the many children of my heart. Already my neighborhood 12yo boys are falling to the streets. While my son has a falanx of love and support he is not immune to the forces of anger.

My world is one of great heart and great anger. My neighbors are giving and caring and sometimes very violent. The solutions to all of our problems is love, Inshallah, as I develop my Practice, I will become a piece of the solution. I am losing my religion, but growing in my heart, I hope. I think Allah is pleased.