MY LAST POST AND MY STORY (ALLAH OPENED IT FOR ME NOW TO SEE)

Dear Allah**,**

You made me realize this in the stillness of ramadan. This is the best gift you have given me:)

This is my life story guys. I will call it: My life in my own prison. Please read everything as it will be deleted today at 5 pm.

 

It has been almost 10–12 years with this illness. I don’t know how it came to be, but today it affects many people around the world—my brothers and sisters included. This monster, this darkness, has manipulated us into believing that it is a part of us. During the last 5 years, I have actively tried to get rid of this habit. Only You know how many nights of tears and prayers, how many times I have sworn by everything I have and everything I am to end this. It has been ruining my time and life quality, but my life is beautiful and good, Allah. You have always been there for me, and given me what I need, and You will always be there for me. I believe that today I need to be there for myself. For the person I left many years ago. To pull him up out of the darkness, and into the light that he deserves to be in with your guidance.

 

I have always believed that certain factors caused me to return to this misery. Hormones, eating habits, exercise, goals, meaning in life, friends, or my īmān (faith). All of that was wrong. Because in Ramadan, when everything has gone quiet and we have plenty of time to reflect, and time to ourselves, I have realized that I have never attacked the main problem. The symptom or the false solution is what we have tried to dampen, reduce, shut down, end, cure. Yet the real monster is inside ourselves. So, what was my monster? Today I will tell you. Maybe your monster resembles mine a little.

 

I am in my 5th year of medical school in Norway, have good grades, and good friends. Even though I wish I had more friends, and I have lost several friends along the way, I know that the best friend I ever got was Allah. It was in 2022 when I found my way to the prayer mat, with a heavy, broken heart, that I found Allah. Since then, I have always liked to pray, read the Qur’an, do dhikr, speak about Islam and speak to Allah. It was always good to have something to look forward to after this life. In addition, it gave me a light inside myself in everyday life, and that was good to have. Then we got a job, and now You gave me a new job in the last month at the hospital, which I don’t even know at all how I got it, but Allah, You decide my rizq (provision) regardless  . I remember I was very happy that day. I told friends and family and was proud.

 

Over these years, I got into the habit of working out at the gym, sometimes playing football or swimming. In addition, I got rid of music for good. I wanted to become a rapper, but after I understood that Qur’an and music cannot live in the same heart, I left music and all artists as role models. They do not represent in their lyrics what I stand for in life either. Then I got to know friends who are in the process of doing ḥifdh (memorizing the Qur’an), and that inspired me too. I have come far in juz’ 30, and in shā’ Allāh will continue with this.

 

Then the problem grew, and I felt a lot of guilt for trying to strengthen my relationship with Allah and at the same time doing this misery from time to time—even in the months of fasting. Hiding, feeling disturbed, low confidence, isolation, anger, and hopelessness. Then several years followed with promises, less TV time, cutting down some contact with friends, isolation, reflection, reading books, khuṭbahs, etc but the same cycle has continued. Now I will get to what the main problem really was and how this is to be corrected. Because it can be corrected. Allah gave me this life and this problem, and He knew a solution was possible for me to find. I am not hopeless. Allah knew that this day would come.

 

 

So what was the main problem? I noticed now in Ramadan 2026 that even though I am trying to give myself a new identity as a stronger muslim, removed all possible triggers (film, TV, series, drama, music, lowering my gaze, phone use, YouTube scrolling, social media), the problem was still there. To a much lesser degree, but it was still present. It appeared and made me fall. What could it be now? The family prayed together, we ate less, I had very weak urges, I spent the nights in the mosque with tarāwīḥ, had good habits in Ramadan with a bit of exercise and walking in nature outside, and also tried to increase my knowledge of Islam and do ḥifdh, it gave me a feeling of achievement, so how could it be that I would fall again? I even worked 3-4 days a week at hospital and had little free time left.

 

Here comes the truth. The truth that has been hidden all these years. The truth is that I don’t know how to handle the feeling of loneliness, emptiness, and boredom when I am alone. It feels overwhelming and disturbs me. It is not because I haven’t had exciting experiences during the day, or had a productive day, or had good healthy habits like training or even traveling to a new place. The brain does not think about what has happened, and only puts up this now picture of you in front of you, in the moment you are in now. You think in this moment that it’s not true—you have done all your tasks, you have had productive days before this too—but that voice screams at you and says that your life is useless, look now, you have nothing you can do. You let the monster scream at you; “you are alone now, you are bored, you must find something that gives you pleasure right now, then you will get rid of me, then you will feel good” says the voice in your head, “then you will get rid of this feeling of dissatisfaction and heaviness.”

 

 

What do you do then? You listen to it. You go and play PS5 games, try to talk to friends, chat on your phone, watch YouTube videos that seem interesting, try to continue reading, schoolwork, or whatever you were doing. Whatever you do now no longer feels good, and you need something more. You want more stimulation, and you know how you can get it. This is what you have learned. You need a shot, a boost. The brain gets that, but it is fake, and this false monster gives you false joy and pleasure. After a while you are left again in the same darkness and feeling of emptiness. You pull yourself together for the week, have productive days, read Qur’an, do school work, practice your goals, have good workouts, but then comes a moment of emptiness, loneliness, or boredom, maybe sometimes it is because you think others are having more joy than you, or it can come in the morning before you have started the day, and you think that it is a symptom because of your life—that something is extremely wrong and must be fixed now. No one likes this feeling. You are left with that feeling throughout the day, or it can come in the moment when you are less present, alone, preferably a little tired as well, and you fall. Around 95% of the cases for me it happened at home in bedroom, especially at night, or early morning, and when I am tired or abit “bored”.

 

This is how I have fallen every single day. Yes, the days have been different, I have used different tools to fall—sometimes TV, phone, PC, romantic books, or even my fantasy—but in the end I have fallen. Sometimes falling once is not enough, so I try again and again, until shamelessness settles in me. Then I stop and then I feel disgust and hate. I get my reason back, but again the main problem is hidden. The monster hides behind the curtain. This has continued for almost 2 years, where I have tried my best to avoid it, listened to many different khuṭbahs, even asked the imam, read books on this topic, I know medicine myself too, but still, it strikes me every time. What is it that can fix this problem?

Everything can be fixed. You must believe that. You have had a toothache and received the right treatment for it. You have not been able to get your dream job before, but you have had to work for it. You have had problems earlier, and you got rid of them in one go. Especially those people you discovered had a negative effect on your life, toxic friends—you got rid of them that very day. You respect your life. You are trying to replace the symptom with something else, or get rid of the symptom, but the main problem will always be there. You can replace the falling with a video game addiction, but the illness will still be present in you and after a while it will give symptoms again.

 

So tell me, now that we have discovered the main problem, how can this thought/feeling/discomfort be fixed? The answer is that it cannot be fixed, but it must be learned to live with. You are a human being and you must say to yourself: “It is completely okay for me to feel that my life right now is boring, is dry, is standing still, that I don’t have anything exciting to do.” It does not mean that something is wrong with you or your life. For most of us, we have good habits in life: we exercise, go to school, work, learn the Qur’an, go to the mosque, are with family, go on holidays, and sometimes hang out with friends, and sometimes we do certain hobbies like video games, reading crime novels, designing, or whatever it may be. It is completely normal. You are productive, you have a good life, you are the best version of yourself, generally you enjoy life, but that does not mean that you will never feel bad. There will be days when you are tired and exhausted, don’t have the energy for much, and that is completely normal. You are not a loser because of that. So what should I do?

 

You do not need stimulation. Just sit on the couch with that feeling and let it pass by you like a dark cloud. Think about what you have done during the day, and what you can do. If it is late, then it is good to sleep earlier; then the body will feel more refreshed for tomorrow, and tomorrow is a completely new state of the heart and the brain. My friend told me that the word insān comes from nasiya, which in Arabic means “forgetful.” You are simply forgetful, and your brain forgets what you have spent your day on. You may have been at an amusement park, a water park, gone on a safari, eaten a good dinner, read all your prayers, and completed all your daily goals—imagine, all on the same day—and then comes a small moment where you are left with yourself alone. Even then, the brain will scream at you that your life is boring, find something fun, something stimulating, something that helps your mood. It resists this baseline, this drop. Even if you feel satisfied and content, your brain will sometimes not feel that way. It’s about neurotransmitters and such, but just remember that in that moment you can refuse to let the negative thoughts and feelings take hold, by simply remembering what you have done during the day and that you are satisfied with everything you have managed, and maybe also tell yourself what you are planning to do soon, or tomorrow. Just this short reflection will reduce a lot of the uncertainty and the emptiness and give you optimism again. So don’t forget that you are forgetful. :D  Do not try to stimulate yourself with something in that moment—do not use the internet, any screens, any hobbies. Acknowledge that the feeling is there, reflect, and continue with your life. If you are still left with that feeling and try to deny it, the brain will reinforce the signals and you will feel an urge to do something “stimulating,” and today you know where that path leads to. A spiral that leads back to the darkness again.

 

I believe that during my youth I have felt some social anxiety, pressure from grades, stress, thoughts about life, loneliness, loss, but I have never tried to acknowledge these feelings. I have always believed that something was wrong with me, and that I had to remove these feelings as quickly as possible. Today I know that I don’t need that. I just need to be present when my “I”-person, my inner self, needs it. Rise up now, my Muslim, now you know what you must do. Welcome to a free life. You were in prison. But today you are free. You never needed more willpower, īmān, or good habits. You only needed yourself. When you know acknowledge this feeling, then just remember that your mind is telling you a false lie, but your life and how you have spent your time is what really matters. This feeling can come at any moment, even when you are doing something like watching TV like documentary, listening to a khutbah, doing school work, or just came back from a trip, from school, from gym. Use that time to reflect on yourself. If negative feelings and thoughts arise then let them arise and fade away. If you don’t feed the monster it will starve to death. Now when you are able to handle the emotions that have created the loop and urge for so many years, that is when you will realize you never needed this monster in your life, and it was never a part of you. Embark on this journey and let every day heal you. Let Allah heal you. This is my story. The last page has been written.

 

- Ziq