First Steps towards Success Beyond the Comfort Zone

Running out of juice on your phone when that’s the only tool you have to find your way around a new city, late at night, sucks. I eventually managed to reach my hotel past midnight when all I’d gone out for was a few minutes to drive around and get a feel of the area, and the Mosques nearby.

Being around here in a new city made me realize how lucky I had been in the last few years, surrounded by an active, strong community that wasn’t very different from me – culturally, socially, and religiously. I thought if I get to go back again, I would attend every class that I had missed all these years, and every prayer in the local Mosque that I wasn’t attending, in congregation.
It’s a very small community – in fact, when I went to a supposedly big local Mosque which was obviously a converted church with Gothic architecture, I found that there is no Imam or five regular prayers. Anyone with an access code could walk in and pray when they want to. Everyone knows each other, and they have potlucks every once in a while. I made myself known to everyone and hung out. Someone mentioned that I had a Noor on my face, and that my presence makes people around happy. I could only attribute that to all the Qur’an I was reading.   

There are very few Halal or Indian restaurants nearby, and that was disappointing even though I know it wouldn’t stop me from driving anyway.  
I was diversifying my social circle in a big way too, so it helped to have very different kind of friends and cuisines  from what I have been used to, over the last few years. After all, this project was about rebuilding myself, anyway. 

All along, I had to keep hiding really why I moved here. Of course, I have a better job here but that’s not what prompted me to do this.  Before moving, I spent an entire day with my brother-in-law who was nearby for work, and he did the equivalent of slapping me on the face when I explained to him the immediate reason. It was during a miserable three weeks when I isolated myself from friends that I decided to move out. I perhaps wouldn’t have made the same decision later, but it was a good one, in the end. I got better work.

I had a dispute with a couple of friends while working on a volunteering project. I made some mistakes and so did my friends. I acknowledged and apologized right away, but after that, everything I did – my support, encouragement, help, not counting my time and effort was completely whitewashed away, unacknowledged, and reversed. Only a dead conscience or huge ego could stop them from feeling guilty about what happened or at least from some of what they did. All of it stopped bothering me, and so did the fact that my relationship with a couple of people had gone sour.

But there was a partial exception with one person. When I look back and would look back in future on why I moved, it would be because of just one person who decided to move away from me over our differences. I fight everyday trying not to forget the person as I catch myself forgetting them.  I came to know first hand how easy it is for a guy to forget someone when you get busy with other people, some of whom relish your attention and give back more. I still fight with myself everyday to convince myself it wasn’t a friendship only because they wanted attention as some of my other friends had wanted me to believe.  Acquaintances always continue being friendly acquaintances but friends, when things get sour, get to a degree even lower than acquaintances – they cut off or become enemies. I wished we had simply stayed as acquaintances so things would have always remained cordial.

It is as though I force myself to miss the friend, because I want to, even if I tend not to. I miss them.  In reality, in the end,  I didn’t care what anyone would say of me or treat me. I wouldn’t have cared if 99% of the world had turned against me, as long as I had this one friend, with all their great and not so great attributes, and with all our differences. I was under no illusion that we’d be such good friends forever for personal reasons, but after a birthday greeting last year, I thought our friendship was so mature and respectful that we would never slide down the wrong route again; that we’d be cordial, regardless, forever. But that was not to be.

Until people stop asking me why I moved, I would keep responding with half-truths. My career has progressed, of course. I wanted a change, and I’m excited about it, but I know it’s tainted by what drove the change. And it’s tainted until perhaps, my fight against forgetting my friend ends. I don’t want to lose it. But I’m not sure how long my memory will hold out. 

A Search after Time At Home and Time with My Besties

Less than an hour after I got back home Sunday night from my regular weekly trip to the place I called home until last year, I realized why I missed my friends so much and why moving was hard last year.

Common spaces in my house I share with a roommate were a mess, there was alcohol in the refrigerator which I don’t like, and I only had the bare essential small-talk with the room-mate. He is a cool guy, but he’s just not a good friend.

This was what I came home to after a wild weekend and Friday night of back to back partying and endless fun with my besties – my friends from before I moved. We ate out several times, we had a wonderful barbecue party outside, we went to the movies…we had insane but hilarious conversations. I could barely control bursting out with laughter when another Desi Uncle snapped a picture of me right in front of the shoe stand as I was wearing my shoes – yet another uncle wanted to get me married now that I have a job and what not. It was such a wonderful time except that I couldn’t complete my Quran studying goals.

When you have live by yourself, you would think it’s way easier to find housing because you have only yourself to think of. False. I’m still searching.

After my experience last year of living with a room-mate I didn’t enjoy living with, I have changed parameters that are making my apartment search for my next move very hard and time-consuming.  Is it close to a community center? Are there apartments on short lease even if with a higher rent  so I could live alone in a small apartment rather than in a shared house on lower rent with someone I don’t know?  Good Halal restaurants nearby?

It’s not easy at all. And oh, my current roommate still doesn’t know I’m moving. I found him and my current house the first day I came to see the area – that part was easy. No wonder I didn’t enjoy being at home.

 

My Laptop Loved Indian Curry, so a New One for a New Place

 The joke on How I Met Your Mother may have been too funny, and I may have moved my hands around too wildly while laughing. But it caused much distress when I managed to spill piping hot Indian curry on to my laptop, a few months ago.

Having moved recently, I had few friends, and I was used to catching up on old TV shows on my laptop on the dinner table.

I panicked, and I had a couple of friends tweeting and texting me with help and support. I freaked out as I saw it die in my hands.

It’s another matter that a ladies’ hair dryer I bought the next day managed to dry and revive the computer enough that I could use it with an external keyboard.

As I begin packing up before I move again, I was pleased when my gracious new clients shipped me an impressive, fast and flashy new laptop for work today. It is hopefully the end to hauling around my heavy old one with the keyboard all the time. It was like carrying around a desktop computer.
They have also been gracious enough that if I don’t end up going back to school, I expect to breach the six figure salary mark in two and a half to three years.

 Unlike the last time I moved, I am pretty excited and nervous for my new move and experiment in a new place. I am really looking forward to it, this time.

The only thing I would miss around here is the Mosque I used to attend – it was among the most happening ones in the entire country, and had wonderful teachers and classes to learn from.
I certainly wouldn’t miss the extremely high cost of living.

Full of Wisdom

I was studying the chapter of the Romans in the Qur’an early this morning.
You only have to pick up a Qur’an and flip through randomly, reading even the translation to realize how much it speaks to you, directly.
It addresses questions in your mind, and the concerns you deal with, with such wisdom that it always feels like an eye-opener. It leaves you with a feeling of contentment and satisfaction. It answers you.
It is as though the Qur’an was sent just for you. Understanding some of the beauty in the language from the little rudimentary Arabic that I know only served to add further pleasure.

In this context, it struck me when I recalled how this nature of the Quran is pointed out in the Qur’an itself.

Allah swears an oath by many things in the Qur’an just before making a declaration, and we know that any declaration after an oath is very important. The things Allah swears by shows their importance or significance.
In the second verse of Surah Yaseen, Allah swore by the Qur’an itself. What was the declaration made after this oath? That it is Al-Hakeem, full of wisdom.

“By the Qur’an, full of wisdom!”

Wisdom because the Author of this book is the One who Created us and is responsible for us, and consequently,  knows better than anything else, what is best for us. It is according to human nature, or Fitrah, and what man needs for his own good.

I could attest to the wisdom as I read this chapter again.

I signed off, finishing with the chapter, nodding in agreement, with the last verse:

“So endure patiently; surely the promise of Allah is true; and do not let the ones who have no certainty make you impatient.”

Diametric Options

I was out on lunch with a colleague, discussing smartphones, when he said, to my embarrassment, that I was way too polite, and that if I don’t toughen up, he would take advantage of me.

It’s not the first time that I have had acquaintances say that to me, but it had an effect on me because it came at the same time when there were a few others who had issues with me.

When someone does have issues with you, you have two choices. You either (1) don’t give a fuck  or (2) try to repair relations with them.

My brother and I were different. My brother would say what he had to say, and rarely ever held back. He certainly never held back  out of fear of offending others.
He would often leave behind a trail of bruised egos. No wonder, he had plenty of people who had issues with him, but he couldn’t care less. He was successful and he had his way.

In contrast, I have been on good terms with almost everyone. I come across as mild and polite.  But on those rare occasions when I have misgivings with someone, I try to repair it. Apologize myself, and try to make it right. Redefine expectations for the future if need be, often at my cost.

My closest friends would often berate me for reaching out to those who in their opinion, cared little about me or were only interested in what they were getting out of me. And that I need to get rid of them. I ignored their advice.

You can’t please everyone, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t try, I said.

While the approach gave me a sense of satisfaction, it also came with its punishments.  Sometimes, the friends who advised me turned out to be right. And sometimes, it gets humiliating. Sometimes, it gets perceived as a weakness. Off late, in response, I have had a strong urge to become rude and nonchalant about others as I go about my business, but I have tried to reign myself in.

I am still learning how to strike the right balance between not giving a fuck and trying to make it right.

Uncollecting Things

My mom jokes that I’m a hoarder. My mom and I obviously disagree on the semantics.
I like to preserve things. Too many things, she says.

I have saved bills from restaurants, movie tickets, grocery bills, screenshots of phone calls, autographs, newspaper cuttings, old fliers,  Q-cards from events, coins from other countries,  hand-written notes and letters. You get the idea.

Hand-written notes and letters. I have a special thing for them. I still carry around a handwritten letter my dad sent me in 2009 in my wallet.

It reminds me of what I shared here in 2011.

Oh, my wallet. My sister gifted that to me more than ten years ago on my birthday.
Everything I preserve has a history behind it that I cherish, such as this wallet.

Ironically, tidy and organized that she is, the same sister is quite the opposite of me in this regard –  she had made me get rid of my notes from a class in middle school to clear the “trash.” I’m sure they would have been a fond addition to my collection.

We’re different. We’re wonderful and distinct in our own ways.
But I understood why she was more efficient than I was at organization after I spent hours together sorting through my belongings and cleaning my room the past weekend. It’s only been months since I moved.  Given how much money changes hands for every hour I spend working, it wasn’t a feeling of success.
I raised the threshold of the importance occasions or people would need to have to preserve  memories associated with them. Needless to say, I can travel much lighter now that I got rid of so much stuff.

Intentions and Volunteering

I often volunteer and help organize community projects and events. It has meant I have had the opportunity of working with different kinds of people.

There are the resourceful kind, who seem to know all the right people and have the right leads. There are natural leaders who are proactive, take charge and give projects direction. There are the arm-chair critics, who criticize what others work on, but do little themselves. There are the cynical, who constantly vote for lower scale and ambitions, and pull others down. There are others who put in a lot of work, but only when they are given tasks to perform. Some people accept responsibilities but don’t complete them.
And then there are others who are most concerned about achieving fame, getting popular and have their name out through collective projects. This may or may not be a problem depending on the nature of the event, but it gets problematic when the project is of selfless service or religious in nature, where the intention needs to be serving the needy  and also please the Almighty.

I had a negative experience with this kind, when working on a project. One of the people involved insisted on removing older advertisements, created because of a confusion about what “It’s fine” meant,  because it didn’t have their name on it. The person, by virtue of being the first to come up with the project idea, wanted only one name – their name in advertisements when not listing any names or listing  names of all involved were not feasible options.
In a situation borne out of a communication gap, this was understandable, but asking to remove older advertisements gave rise to a suspicion that  having one’s name attached was being given undue importance.
But it eventually turned ridiculous and confirmed the suspicions when the same person asked one of their friends to name and praise them publicly, for being behind the project and for working hard on it.

Maintaining clear communication is essential to any successful group project. There would always be people who would be a weak link in the chain, but reminding ourselves of the goal and repeatedly clarifying our intentions helps to overcome such challenges to success.