In the name of Allah, the Most Compassionate, the Merciful. We praise Allah who sent down to us the Reminder, the Holy Qur’an, and peace and blessing be upon His Messenger who showed us how to remember by embodying the Qur’an and living amongst his family and companions, peace be upon them all.
I have always lived on another planet. At least, that is what my parents thought. Lost in thought, I would blithely walk into doors, out in front of buses, once even into the path of a speeding Intercity train going at over 100 miles an hour, from which I had to be saved by being pulled back – one second before it passed in front of my eyes. It’s amazing that I am still here today!
However, since I started trying to pay the Sunnah, I have noticed how it is a training course in mindfulness and being conscious and alert. Firstly, one is supposed to make intention before doing each thing. That helps you to think through what your plans and your motives, and if you do this properly then it will definitely be harder to keep justifying eating a family pack of nachos whilst watching TV shows back-to-back. Then there are the dua. Start anything new, say bismillah. Finish eating, say alhamdulillah. Get up after sitting, say a dua. Then there are the entering with left foot/right foot or picking things up with the left foot/right hand, depending on whether it is something clean or not. To choose the correct foot or hand, you need to know what you are doing or you will use the wrong one. Don’t be distracted – remember Allah in each moment – that is mindfulness with a much wider field of awareness than simply noticing what is going on around you. Don’t waste your life saying “if only” because it opens the door for Shaitan. Don’t waste your life worrying about the ends of things, because they rest with Allah. Don’t waste your life in vain hopes. Do the best you can in each moment. Respect other people – that means you need to actually see them! Respect things (don’t keep knocking them over!) So on and so forth. Then, in the evening, there is the recommendation to take oneself into account and reflect upon whether you have acted in the best way during the day, and make intention to improve if you haven’t. As for the idea of a gratitude journal – isn’t the Muslim supposed to remember Allah’s blessings and thank Him?
In fact, this is an example of how the Muslim tradition, if we understand it correctly, has what the human psyche needs to heal itself, without needing to adopt to practices from outside the Muslim world view. Of course, there is no harm in most of them, but Muslims need to be aware that they are from a paradigm moreover which has a much less narrower picture of the nature of the human being.
The Muslim conception of the self is religious, and this has a number of implications: Awareness is not just awareness of the material existence, (reality) but awareness of the spiritual world as well and of God. (Reality) Happiness is also not just related to what we wish for as individuals, but is tied up in the meaning of life and the purpose of existence, which Allah tells is to test us to see which of us are best in action. (Surah Al Mulk)
Happiness has both a religious and an ethical dimension: happiness comes from remembering God and doing the right thing. Greek philosophers Aristotle and Plato also believed happiness had an ethical dimension, calling it eudaemonia (right action). The linking of mental health to ethics and to spirituality is rarely found in modern mental health advice. See for example this advice from the NHS on How to be Happier:
In addition, Islam teaches that there is a struggle within the self between the desires and the higher impulses. There is a need to struggle against one’s lower impulses. This is touched on by the NHS advice, “Try to avoid things that seem enjoyable at the time but make you feel worse afterwards, such as drinking too much alcohol or eating junk food.” But these examples tend to be narrowly focused upon things which are bad for the physical body, whereas Islam clearly explains that our actions and experiences have a positive and negative effect on the very soul and our long-term happiness.
A major way that the Muslim paradigm can have a broader and more holistic understanding from modern mental health advice is that mental health tends to naturally focus upon the mental – the mind and the thoughts. The Islamic tradition emphasises the heart. The “mindfulness” which we have been discussing in the Muslim conception takes place in the heart – not just in the mind.
The Prophet ﷺ told us, “Listen from your heart. Goodness (birr) is whatever your heart feels ease at doing, and badness (ithm) is whatever brings discomfort to the heart even if people counsel you otherwise.”
Do they have hearts that they reason with?” (Qur’an 22:46)
“Indeed with the remembrance of Allah do hearts find rest. (Qur’an 13:28)
We can see from this the the heart is connected to thoughts and feelings, to one’s conscience and to the hearts of others but most importantly, to Allah. Really, it is heartfulness.
There is one other aspect which Muslims should reflect upon, because it is something so widespread in our times that we never really question it, and that is the promotion of the idea of “self-confidence. Modern psychology tends to emphasise confidence building and belief in the self’s abilities. So people are told that they need to believe in themselves, and that they should boost their confidence, even to the point of using affirmations to reinforce positive thinking. For example, saying “I am kind” to reinforce the idea of kindness within the conception of the self. Positive thinking is a part of Islam, (zhann ul khair), and our Prophet, peace be upon him, told us that we should cheer people up. However, affirmations seem not to be in keeping with the Muslim ethos – especially when we may be saying things which are not true.
For a start, Allah says in the Qur’an, “Do not call yourselves pure, it is I who know best who is purified.” (53:32) . So should we really be encouraged to say affirmations that may not be honest, albeit with good intentions? The Qur’an tells us that “the human was created weak” (4:28). The practice of the prophets and Muslims is to be humble before God, which is why some Muslims called themselves “Faqir” (which means poor) in the hope that Allah would bless them. Even the Caliph Umar, who is acknowledged by all as a strong person, may Allah be pleased with him, when he lay dying, his son wished to raise him up off the ground, but he told him to leave him there saying that perhaps Allah might take pity on him, if seeing him in that state. In any case, what does it matter if we are weak, if Allah is strong, and it is upon Him that believers rely? The person can be supported by relying upon the support of Allah, who promised in the same ayat that He wanted to lighten our burdens.
Instead of affirmations, traditionally, Muslims would benefit from calling on, repeating and meditating upon the the 99 names of Allah. Show these names respect, because I was once repeating the name of Allah meaning “The Opener,” and I got locked in somewhere and someone had to come and open the door for me!
If you are interested to learn more about the Islamic conception of the human being and Islamic psychology, then these links explain more:
Dr Abdallah Rothman on Islamic Psychology
Conceptualizing an Islamic Psychotherapy
