My high school friends told me about Facebook. Since all of them
had an account, I decided to create one myself although I was very
nonchalant about my account. I had never displayed my pictures on social
sites and told myself that I would not display my pictures on
Facebook and that it can also be for the sake of dawah. But then everybody I knew had their pictures on. So, I
started uploading pictures, and before I knew it, I had a million
pictures of mine there.
What happened next was that
brothers I knew started adding me. I was
reluctant in the beginning, but a voice inside me told me to grow up
and that it was no big deal, they are just your Muslim brothers and
they might be in need of dawah. The first comment I got was from a
brother
I studied with – “Nice picture, Maryam.” What did he mean by that? I
asked myself. Was he being chummy? Honestly speaking, I felt so bad
when he wrote that comment on my wall, but then a voice inside my heart
told me not to overreact and to show some manners so I thanked him.
I don’t know what happened next, but I started following the dunya, my dawah reduced and socializing increased.
The values I stood up for and walked with became obsolete to me. My
compromises turned into huge sacrifices. I became so desensitized and
immune to the haram that was happening. I forgot that there was a God
out there watching me, and I forgot that I was supposed to emulate the
best of mankind - Prophet (pbuh). Random people
would message me asking me for friend requests; they said I was
“pretty” and they wanted to be friends with me. I even got some
proposals on Facebook - can you believe it! And there were lists of
stalkers who kept sending me stupid messages and songs on YouTube
through fake accounts in my inbox.
I did not create the jinn and mankind except to worship Me. [51:56]
When I woke up from my stupor, I realized that I had become some
other Maryam I never wanted to be. I had so many friends, but I was
never happy because none of them reminded me of Allah. None
of them ever told me that displaying my pictures like that
or chatting with random people, even if I personally knew some
brothers, they were still my non mahram and that this was all wrong and
haram.
Shaytan loves spreading promiscuity and hates modesty, and somehow I
had chosen to follow him instead of following Allah.
Prophet Muhammed (pbuh) said:
Modesty is part of faith and faith is in paradise, but obscenity is part of hardness of heart and hardness of heart is in hell. (Ahmad, Tirmidhi)
I had faith, and I was a monotheist. But where was my hayaa, and
where were my priorities? I had become a slave of my desires. Islam came
to guide man, and here I was in the shackles of my own desires, other
people and the media. Allah has said:
“Have you seen him who takes his own lust (vain desires) as his ilah (god)?” [45:23]
In light of this verse, Imam Al-Ghazali said:
“Those who follow their own passions do not conform to monotheism, because anyone who follows his own passions makes them the object of his worship. The monotheist is he who sees nothing but the One God and only turns his face to Him.”
I removed all my pictures and changed the privacy settings of my
account, but I still felt that my soul was filthy. My heart was hard.
Even the Quran failed to penetrate my heart and didn’t make me cry
anymore, I felt the weakness in my Imaan. I had everything I wanted, but something inside me was dying.
It was my Imaan. My Imaan was suffocating.
I realized that the only way to purify my nafs was to leave things
that distracted me. I noticed Facebooks detriment was greater than its benefit. So I
decided to give it up for the sake of Allah. For
months I struggled with my decision. It was hard saying goodbye to
everyone, but I told them that I would be available by email if they
needed me for anything important, and I requested them to remove, crop, or blur my pictures
from Facebook because a voice inside me said, Maryam your face is
precious and only for your hubby to see. Yes, I struggled, and it was
hard: I gave up so many things which I feared would not benefit me in
the Hereafter. I am still in the process of purifying my heart and
always will be insha'Allah because it’s a life long struggle. Sometimes,
things we do seem good to us, but they slowly poison our Imaan.
Sheikh Reda Bedier said: “Watch the little things; a small leak will sink a great ship.”
You see, sometimes, we have our feet in two separate boats, one which
has the flag of our desires on it and the other which says, “I love
you, Allah.” It’s sad how we juggle between what’s
necessary and what’s not and is waste of time and prefer what our heart desires over what
our Khaliq wants us to do.
Ustaad Khurram Murad said:Allah has said:“Your Qalb (heart) cannot be compartmentalized. You cannot dedicate one piece of it to Allah and another to some other god, like wealth, status, career, spouse, children and so on. Allah is One, Indivisible and wants the human being to be undivided in service to Him. So long as our heart lies in a hundred places, so long as our eyes are set in a hundred directions, so long as we have many loyalties, we shall never be able to achieve that condition of ‘holding onto Allah tightly.”
“O you who believe! Enter into Islam whole heartedly without any reservation.” [2: 208]
I want you to know, that if I can do it, then you can too. If you
have anything in your heart that perturbs you greatly and it gives you
sleepless nights, ask yourself one question: “Am I prepared for my
death, my akhirah?” Truth is, nothing in life is guaranteed but death.
After deleting my Facebook account and saying goodbye to it for good
insha'Allah, I have so much faith in Allah that He
will give me a better platform to do dawah, one that will not distract
me and take most of my time socializing insha'Allah.
I pray that each and every one of us succeeds in becoming a
believing, steadfast servant for Allah’s sake. May Allah, enable us to be amongst those who purify themselves and help us
differentiate between right and wrong - Ameen.
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