My father used to say to me, I loved to daydream a lot. “Kuat berangan”, was how he used to tease me. To tell you the truth, yes I dreamt a lot. I used to have a lot of fantasies of the future I want to live in.
Fast forward, 10 years later, I no longer that dreamer-girl. My fantasies were crushed, and I fell into depression few years ago. I was heart broken, but not willing to move forward.
I once asked my father, how not to feel disturbed by all the strange thoughts – that’s the danger of strange thoughts, they come together with loneliness and emptiness that are not there from the start. And my father answered simply, fill your thoughts with dhikr. It’s cliché, I know, the same cliché as when people always tell us to make ourselves busy in order to forget the past.
Although it is cliched, but the word of wisdom is correct. If you fill your heart with the thoughts of Allah, your heart is full – darkness can never fill in the place where it is full of brightness, isn’t it? You don’t have to force on yourself to forget that someone, you just need to put in a lot of thoughts of Allah and trust me, the thoughts of Allah will take place instead of that someone you loved. You also don’t have to force yourself to remember Allah all the time, take it slowly. Today you say Allah’s name 50 times, tomorrow you’ll double it. The next day you’d want to add another dhikr, because you know you gained peace when you remember him 😊
I also learnt it the hard way how to overcome my depression. In my situation, depression came in when I tried to defy the reality – I wanted so much for Allah to make my dream came true. As long as the dream won’t come true, I’d keep wailing and torture myself by believing one day the dream will come true. Unfortunately, it did not. If I were to accept the truth before I sunk myself deep into depression, I could have save me, right? That was when I learnt to really have faith in Qada' & Qadar (the divine destiny) - that in order to have faith in them, I have to redha/wholeheartedly accept whatever happened to me in the past. (it is Allah's way in shaping me to be a better person, to which I realized this only recently.)
Once, I heard over the radio, an ustaaz prayed a du’aa where he asked forgiveness from Allah, “to the One who stayed no matter how we servants have strayed, to the One who always love us from the beginning till the end when we servants always think no one has loved us.” It is true, isn’t it? That we always think that no one loves us, no one ever think of us, and because of that we feel like we don’t deserve to be loved – but did it ever occur to us that Allah has never left our sides? Not even once! It is us who have always leave His side, astaghfirullah..
Last year my family was shaken by a news of my mother which was diagnosed with breast cancer (stage 3). Throughout her treatment and until now, I keep my faith so high and I surrender every hope I have with Allah the Almighty. Even some people might have said that we are fighting against a lost battle, but this is a fight which we hang our hopes onto Allah swt. Tell me, which battle is a lost battle when you rely on Allah? This hope – it is a magical feeling, to which I feel ashamed to Allah when I doubted His power during my depression day. Believe me, during that period of time, although I knew Allah is the only one that can help me to get through depression, I had my doubts.
What if... one day I failed the battle, I gave up... and ended up with death?
What if... I lose all interests to live. Like life didn't matter anymore and I surrendered myself?
Who would've helped me?
I know people will keep saying, "keep praying. Don't lose hope in Allah."
But what if I did? What if I didn't want to help myself?
Would anyone even care?
~circa 2016~
But now? I would shake my head in disbelief and if I could, I would say to my old self, “how could you doubt Allah? How could you not want to help yourself when Allah never once leave your side?”
In the end, I always remind myself. Allah has created a life for us to live in. He has given us a mother, a father, siblings, a family, friends and other things connected to all of us. A disturbance to the cycle – let’s say a missing of a soul, could have change the whole cycle.
That is why we can’t say we are alone, as we are, in fact, a piece of the whole cycle/puzzle. A missing of one piece could disturb the whole system. And that is why we can’t be selfish by thinking that our disappearance to the society won’t affect anything. No, don’t ever say that to yourself. You are an important being. If you don’t see it today, you’ll see it perhaps in another 5 years’ time. Like I did. Now I believe Allah has better plan than mine, that everything happened in the past has made me into the human I am today - I am proud to say that I survived all the predicaments and have learn to love myself again.
To all the girls out there (or anyone battling depression because you cannot move on), tell this to yourself: Don’t beat yourself so hard, and never once lose hope in Allah. Don’t let the depression eat you alive and let you live as the dead. Those who lose you are not worth fighting for, you are better off with yourself. Focus on self- enrichment and please please please if for once you feel like going back into the black cave, grab on your tasbih and keep counting Allah's name.
disclaimer: I know depression does not really have anything to do with religion, but what's a better option (to keep yourself occupied) than remembering Him?
No comments:
Post a Comment