| View post |
Newsletter 49
Soulful Serenity Community
As-salamu alaykum, dear beautiful soul,
Bismillah.
There was a lesson that stayed with me this week.
One of those lessons that seems simple on the surface, but the more you sit with it, the more it reveals about ourselves and the way we move through the world.
Someone was sharing an experience they had with a homeless man, and as they spoke, it reminded me of something from my own childhood.
When I was a young girl, there was a homeless man who lived close to where we stayed. Like most children, I saw what was obvious. I saw someone who had no home, no possessions, no visible signs of success. I saw what everyone else saw.
But then, one day, I heard his story.
I learned that there was a life before this. There was a family. There were dreams. There were circumstances. There was loss. There was pain.
And suddenly, he was no longer "the homeless man."
He was a human being.
A soul.
Someone's son, someone's father...
Someone who had experienced life in ways I could never fully understand.
And what I remember most is not his hardship.
It was his generosity.
Sometimes, if I gave him food or something small, he would insist on giving something back. A sweet. A chocolate. Sometimes even money.
Even in a place of apparent lack, he wanted to give.
Even as a child, that stayed with me.
And today, all these years later, I realise how much that experience taught me.
Because the truth is, we judge far more than we realise.
We judge people because of how they look.
We judge them because of where they come from.
We judge them because of their race, their culture, their beliefs, their social status, their appearance, their choices.
Sometimes we judge without even speaking a single word.
And what I've come to understand is that judgment blinds us.
It stops us from seeing the person behind the story.
It stops us from seeing the humanity behind the behaviour.
It stops us from recognising that every person we meet is carrying a story we know nothing about.
Every single person was born pure.
Every single person entered this world as a soul.
Whole.
Worthy.
Infinite in potential.
And then life happened.
Some people were nurtured.
Some people were wounded.
Some people were protected.
Some people were abandoned.
Some people had opportunities.
Others faced hardships that most of us could never imagine.
And if we're honest, many of the things we judge others for could easily have been our own story had our circumstances been different.
That thought alone humbles me.
Because there is far less separating us from one another than we think.
And perhaps this is one of the reasons our world feels so disconnected.
We are becoming increasingly focused on doing, acquiring, achieving, and accumulating.
More success.
More possessions.
More status.
More productivity.
Yet somewhere along the way, many of us have lost touch with something deeply important.
Our humanity.
The ability to see ourselves in one another.
The ability to sit with another person's pain.
The ability to feel compassion without immediately judging.
The ability to recognise that behind every face is a soul trying to navigate this journey called life.
And maybe this doesn't only apply to how we see others.
Maybe it applies to how we see ourselves too.
Because many of us judge ourselves just as harshly.
We criticise our emotions.
We suppress our feelings.
We try to push through our pain.
We tell ourselves to "get over it."
To "move on."
To "be strong."
And in doing so, we disconnect from our own humanity.
But feeling is part of being human.
Sadness.
Grief.
Joy.
Fear.
Hope.
Love.
These are not weaknesses.
They are part of the human experience.
We were never meant to become robots.
We were created with hearts that feel.
And perhaps true strength is not found in suppressing those feelings, but in allowing ourselves to acknowledge them with honesty and compassion.
This is one of the reasons emotional healing matters so deeply.
Because healing is not about becoming someone else.
It is about returning to yourself.
Returning to the parts of you that learned to hide.
Returning to the parts of you that learned to suppress.
Returning to the humanity that has always been there beneath the coping mechanisms and survival patterns.
And if this is a journey you feel called towards, know that support is available.
Whether through emotional healing sessions, workshops, courses, or resources, you do not have to navigate it alone.
You can explore the available offerings at:
A Closing Reflection
Perhaps the next person you meet is carrying a story you know nothing about.
Perhaps the person you are judging today is fighting a battle you cannot see.
Perhaps the greatest act of compassion is not trying to understand everything about someone...
but simply remembering that they are human.
Just like you.
A soul navigating life.
A soul carrying hopes, fears, dreams, disappointments, and struggles.
And maybe, if we can learn to see that humanity in others...
we can begin to see it in ourselves too.
With sincerity and du'a,
Nazia