After the storm

The truth is, there's not going to be a starter whistle that tells us that now is the time to start putting our house in order. It's not going to work that way. We're going to have to realise that we need to take action and make a real effort. It's going to be hard, but it's the only way (the "we", by the way, is just me). We're just going to have to stop and then really work on persevering. We've slipped a lot and we have a lot to do to get back on track.

I guess this all dawned on me a couple of hours after I got it off my chest in the Obstacles post. It wasn't immediate. There was another trip-up before I got there. But at last I took myself away and did some dhikr for a couple of hours in the garden. I took that little purple pocket book with me and repeated everything that was relevant. With it came some ease and some resolve. I just need strength and perseverence now, for I've been down this path before. There's not going to be some great fanfare - we just have to get going and try our best. It is up to us to make the effort - nobody is going to live our lives for us.

Obstacle

My biggest obstacle to progress is me. I am talking about spiritual progress. Laziness comes into it, but it is not only that. There are addictions, desires and distractions that taunt me, keeping me from realising any lofty goals. Some weeks back I wrote to a friend with some thoughts that were pressing on me just then. “I fear I am regressing spiritually. I am torn between chasing after my deen and other matters, but more and more it is the other matters that dominate. I feel I really need help to get back on track because I cannot sustain anything on my own. I can bow down one evening in sincere repentance, only to slip again two days later. It is like I am falling.” There were times in the past when such realisation would drive me to instant reform, but these days I find myself with a kind of dispassionate resignation, which troubles me. Yes, the lack of emotion worries me. Emotion can drive change, creating an energy and impetus. Instead I have this quiet realisation – I know what I need to do, but don’t have the great drive. I have a problem: it is me.