Hello...
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Salaam Kaylee
welcomeThank you for sharing your story with us
I am sure you will learn a lot from this forum, and we hope to read your participation. It's as it says free minds, yet with discipline ;DPlease read the rules
http//free-minds.org/forum/index.php?topic=8177.0 -
Peace,
Respectfully.welcome welcome to the forum and may THe Exalted God The Most High Guide You and reward you with Paradise, your path is surely a struggle and i hope that you will be patient, God willing as more tests are coming only to the Real and True Believers, i speak from experience.
Keep up the prayers and think positive.
Read The Quran and always glorify God.
Peace. -
Assalam Alaikum everyone...
Well I cant really give my story of how I came to God alone, in the sense that the posters here would agree with, but I hate jumping into a forum without making an introduction, as I feel I am interrupting someones conversation
I am fairly new to Islam (the religion itself) as I came to finally find something that was more on the lines of what I already believed about a year ago.
My life in a very short, appropriate and non personal version, is >
I did not grow up with religion, but with parents who were and are very spiritual, I guess something along the lines of "new age Christians". My Mom Catholic, my Dad baptized in the Baptist church, and my brothers and I were baptized in the Unity Church. We moved from that state to the family ranch whiles my brothers and I were still very young so we didnt get much of a chance to continue at the Unity church. Where I was raised was mostly Catholics and a few other denominations, but nothing that fit too well with my parents beliefs so there wasnt much "religion" due to that. My parents taught me to pray to God and God only... they are Christians who dont believe in the Trinity nor that the Bible is without man made mistakes. Anyway so growing up I talked to God all the time, all the thoughts I had I included God in on them and felt very close to Him. Things started to go terribly wrong in my life at a young age, and I then started directing my anger to God since He was in a sense like the only one I could confide in. I eventually became an "agnostic" because of that. I studied into a few other religions, but nothing too much, and I didnt like Church because the Trinity idea confused me too much, I didnt have a lot of respect for the Bible, people at Church were too judgemental and contradicting the teachings of Christianity, and I really just didnt like organized religion or having to follow rules with God.
Anyway the religion I found happened to be drugs, among many other vices, that quickly tore my already broken world completely apart. The first time I connected with God after a period time was after having a near death experience, that left for a miracle to make me breathe again, and when I did after my fathers endless prayers I found a little faith in God again, and had some hope. Not enough to get me clean though and I continued to drag myself down a black hole of nothing but pure self destruction, until I hit a bottom again. After much prayer and desperation in a hospital having myself weened off the drugs I had a bit of a "spiritual awakening". I would have to get more personal than Im comfortable to describe it, but it was what I needed to regain all the faith in God that I had once had, and to go on with my life. From there on I took it one day at a time asking for help from God in the morning and thanking Him at night. I managed to build my life again on my own and stay away from drugs and alcohol. I was happy for quite some time, always struggling, but happy. 3 years late my life took a turn and more bad things happened. I lost faith without realizing it, hit a bottom and became desperate again. At this same time I met a guy who was in the Iraq war, and who had come back with PTSD. He was very smart but had a passionate hatred for Muslims and Islam, and did not hold back on any of it. I eventually became curious about how he could hold so much hatred to such a large group of people. I didnt know anything about Islam at the time except for some confusing stereotypes, but not enough to even know the difference between Muslims and Islam. My curiousity drove me to study the religion. The more I studied the more I was attracted to it, especially since it was in a way similar to my previous beliefs. Anyway after studying for quite some time, one terrible night, where only Gods mercy helped me to make it through, in tears I said my shahada, and felt once again like my heart had been released from a prison, having another "spiritual awakening". Thanks to God I was doing wonderful after that, and am still quite happy and thankful for everything in my life.Im here on this site, because first of all Im not a terribly big fan of hadiths. After converting I was pointed in the direction of use my right hand, throw out your music, get rid of your dog, etc... And it wasnt as much that I had a problem with the hadiths themselves although some are quite absurd to me, but that I felt like I was dealing with the Bible again with the fact that they were passed from so many different mouths. Anyway I dont think religion should be hard. I dont think it should feel hard to be close to God, and so for the most part I ignore what I dont like or feel in my own heart that it has anything to do with my personal relationship with God. I also dont like the idea of adapting someone else culture. I was told everything from wear an abaya to change my name to eat with your hands? Im sorry but I would never give up the name my family gave to me, in which doing so would be greatly disrespecting them, and I think that is a more important issue. Nor do I want to wear clothes that people in other cultures wear. I can dress very modestly in American clothes. And I most certainly dont want to give up my silverware I love and cherish my music. I was raised in a family who made and listened to all kind of music. I played piano all my life along with singing, and if it makes me purely and truly happy I dont see how God would want to take it from me. In sum if I come across a hadith that feels fine in my heart , I dont disregard it but I do not accept the ones I feel like contradict the Quran. The few Muslims that I know think I am crazy for even studying into this site and the views here, but I personally think God likes us to study everything and anything out there especially with religion because in the end Truth stand out from all else.
Also I would like to learn more from the Quran, and not just hadith and what scholars say. I feel very very irritated when a scholar makes a ruling on something and it not even in Quran or hadith, its just frustrating for me, but yet I keep going back and reading it, so my point is my goal is to learn things from the Quran only more.
I have to depend on the internet in these matters as I live in the middle of nowhere in the midwest where Muslims are nowhere to be found.So sorry for the extremely long post, this was supposed to just be an introduction but I got a little carried away in getting things off my chest.
I hope to learn alot here and get to know the people of this forum.
God bless you all.
Kayleewelcome to the forum.
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welcome to the forum! peace
