.بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

It’s okay to not be ‘liked’ by everyone. [Not even chocolate is ‘liked’ by everyone, okay?]

‘Democratic popularity’ is not from whence we can locate and extract our real value. Nor: from making ourselves ‘smaller’ so as to be more… ‘accepted’. ‘Palatable’. ‘Amenable’. Doing just as certain people want you to do, and say, and ‘be’. More… enabling, and less of an obstacle, to what you have perceived to be unsavoury habits and norms and behaviours. So:

‘Less religious’, ‘less sure’, less… And, therefore:

‘More… pliable’, more… belittled concept, puppet, silent ‘doll’. More… accepting of what does not sit well with your conscience, your heart. More… easy for other people to manipulate, and to exert and exercise ‘power’ over you. Is that worth it?! Just so that these people… end up smiling at you?

It’s okay to not be so… immediately comprehensible, you know?

It’s okay to be looked at disapprovingly, from time to time. The goal, ‘pleasant’ though it may seem, from far away, here: to be ‘liked, liked, liked’ by the people…

How much must one lose, in truth, so as to come to ‘cater to everybody’? To be so afraid of ‘rejection’ that we try to really alter parts of ourselves, gradually decline into becoming increasingly unrecognisable to our own selves.

As uncomfortable as it can feel, at times, I like the idea of being okay with being disliked, or simply… not liked. Not feeling all that… easily ‘acceptable’. Some may even look upon aspects of you with looks of derision, and scorn. But: what is the actual value, if anything, of what a smile from them would represent?!

I love the idea of us carving out our own places, in various and specific places. We’re not supposed to get completely ‘absorbed’ in things outside of ourselves that we end up losing ourselves. We are a meaningful, and real, part of things: not mere furniture that ought to seek to be ‘exactly the same’ as everyone and everything around us. [To organically learn, and to teach. Affect, and be affected. In conversation with different places and people.]

There are parts of us that are… parts of us, and they deserve to be honoured too.

What about when people… ‘say’ things? Words, as we know, can be like daggers. They: can cut, cause hurt.

The antithesis of darkness, however, is: light, light, light. Warmth, illumination, knowledge, truth, and everything else that ‘light’ means. And:

Daggers can be protected against with: adequate armour. Shields. Honouring ourselves with time and space adequate to, internally, heal.

فَلَا يَحۡزُنۡكَ قَوۡلُهُمۡ​ۘ اِنَّا نَـعۡلَمُ مَا يُسِرُّوۡنَ وَمَا يُعۡلِنُوۡنَ‏

So let not their words grieve you. Surely We know all things about them, what they conceal and what they reveal.

— Qur’an (36:76).

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At times, I think, throughout my life, I’ve wanted to be ‘more liked’. More… widely ‘palatable’, and less… certain aspects of whomever I am. Yet, in truth, I know that the ‘approvals’ of everyone in the entire world… Nothing could possibly substitute the value, the weighty spirit, of honouring oneself, and being real, (and accidentally getting into trickier, stickier, situations at times…) and loving a good thing even if everybody around you, at a given time, in a given place, ‘disagrees’.

Psssst…. You are more-than allowed to ‘disagree’ with them, too…

[You know…

Personally, I quite love what swords look like, and they inspire me so. They’re elegantly kind of scary, you know? Pretty-ful, especially when designed with, say, flowers. Exquisite.

Super sharp, forged in fire, and they… are also known to reflect the sunlight, you know?]

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Allah Smiles upon you, a beloved creation of His, with so much of Mercy, Lovingkindness, Nurture, and Care. In actuality, billions of fleeting smiles from fellow human beings… is nothing in contrast to the Approval and Love of the One Who Created your very body, mind, heart, soul. He Made you. He Loves you.

Woah.

How lucky we are… to be Loved by Al-Malik, Al-Azīz. Lord, King, of all that exists. The only Origin of Power and Might and Knowledge and Goodness and Legitimacy:

Allah.