Giving Up (Again)

As salaam alaikum,

A couple of days ago, after walking home from my shift at midnight thirty to sleep in my bed, I had a sad epiphany. I'd been struggling to remember something about my past, about the Muslimah I had wanted to be, and I wasn't quite getting it. Things got derailed when I started dating B so I couldn't remember. Then suddenly, as I was walking home from the emergency room, I remembered.

As a Muslimah, my goal was to live Islam  for the betterment of my life on this earth and the life of the Hereafter. By living Islam, I wanted to be in a state in which I was not only ready for tomorrow on this earth, but ready at any time to die, to stand sure that the life that I lived in this life was what God wanted. That's the state that I strived so hard for and was derailed by disillusionment shortly after I graduated from college, and have been losing it little by little every since until...by now, while I can say I'm ready for tomorrow, I am not ready to die...

...and it's not because of unfinished business or that I love life, it's just that I don't feel like I'm spiritually in a the state I want to be to die. I don't feel worthy of God's intention for me on this earth, I don't feel like I'm reaching the equilibrium that is possible...

And it all really unraveled when I allowed myself to date Obi. I thought I had to try something different in order to get what I wanted, ultimately marriage. I realize that I am different in a lot of ways and that I cannot seek out marriage like many of my Muslimah friends have. I thought that maybe B would be the type of man I'd have to go for. I sacrificed some of my standards to nurture him in a relationship, and then he backed out, in the height of dysfunction, because he doesn't know what he wants for his life.

I cried as I walked home as I remembered the Muslimah I once was, in my favorite pink khimar or my rusty orange shayla, walking up and down campus with God on my mind, in the trees, with the birds and the squirrels, the blue of the sky and the people below, God in everything. Scurrying home in time for salat, scurrying back to the lab, being productive, making sure to expand in my learning about Islam, at least comfortable to know that if I were to die tomorrow, at least I would die striving in the way of Allah (swt).

And here I am now, in a spiritual disequilibrium, status post mistakes and missteps that I may repeat if I'm nto careful, still seeing God everywhere, still ever conscious of God...

I guess the answer was not that I'd have to do things differently in my relationships. The fact of the matter is...I'm still not over B, I don't want another man in my life, and it feels like I never will, and I just want to give up on ever relating to a man. I want to give up on marriage. Children, no, but marriage, yes, and relationships with men in general, yes. The hope for what was clearly not my portion all this time, though I failed to accept it, and the attempts at pursuing this, have brought me little joy and mostly nights upon nights of crying, tears that have not benefited me in the least.

It's time for a new way to be. I need to go back to being like the wax exhibit in a museum. I will be untouchable, inaccessible, unavailable. I will be as good as the prop in the party, the person who is a fixture in life who know one really knows or cares to know any further. I will be as good as a shadow, a character that dissipates when I'm no longer important for the scene. I do not want to relate to men, it's done nothing but hurt me and distract me from the path. I don't want to be "meant" for anyone, meant to be anyone's love, meant to be anyone's wife. I'm going to stop thinking of myself that way.

From now on, I am meant to live in this world, meant to be someone's physician. I will continue to write books and stories that I like that no one else will read. I will continue to dance and sing to myself. I will continue to dream alone. Because God has made it manifest to me that I am actually meant to live alone, after I've prayed for this for so long...I don't know why I didn't understand before. I will be dry, sterile, cold, cardboard, cut out, prop me up and carry me away...

No more. I'm done. I'm giving up, hopefully now for the last time.