On The Voyage

Have you ever be in so much misery that you just wanted to give up to work up on your life and leave everything to Allah? To the point that you feel so numb you couldn't see what's next coming for you. That even if you feel happy, you have this heavy feelings that the happiness would simply go away? You lost entire hope for living. You count your days, till the end of your time. Feeling empty.

Maybe, sometimes you will feel that you are okay. 

Or maybe, sometimes you will feel as if nothing can break you anymore.

You feel that you are broken beyond repair.  Nothing can safe you. 

You are simply a mended soul, nothing can change you. 

You place everything to Allah, you submit yourself in total to Allah. You don't want to feel the worldly happiness anymore. Or simply, you don't believe in worldly happiness anymore. 

There even one time you decided, that if pain is what only what bring you close to Allah, let you just be in pain. You cry everyday, you cry all the times. Your eyes in fact never dry away from tears. You don't want to believe anything anymore. 

But somehow one day, you found the meaning of life. You found your purpose.

You are convince that this is the reason Allah give you another day, another hour, another second.

To be a good human. To give, without expecting anything in return.

And you did. 

You found your purpose. You think you know what you are supposed to do next. You don't care about anything anymore, you just want to chase for His Blessings. And you started your way to it. 

However, there's a catch. 

All of sudden, you find yourself enjoying a worldly happiness all over again. You found another distraction, another reason to continue living. 

In big smile, you tell yourself;

"Oh actually there's another happiness Allah prepared for me. This might be it. After all, in happiness comes ease."

And you think you finally found the lost soul. The soul that you searching for, in a very long.

And all of sudden you strayed away from your initial purpose. Slowly you went so far away from what your heart decided to do in the beginning, what your soul actually searching. You are drowned in that happiness. You become hopeful again. You think this one is the right one. You will be fine you think. But all of sudden you remember that happiness to you, never last for long. And you think this might be the same too.

And in fact, it is. 

It didn't last. In the blink of an eye, it goes away.

The funny part is you know its coming. You prepared yourself for it. You got a good hunch for it. Your gut feelings always warn you about it. But this time it really happened.

And you feel as if you are lost all over again.

You question again, and again, again.

Of why only misery creeps into your life. Of why you can't even experience happiness all over again.

One song got into your mind;

'I think I've seen this film before,

And I didn't like the ending,

You're not my homeland anymore, 

So what am I defending now?

You were my town,

Now I'm in exile, seeing you out."

You don't want to believe on anything. You had life enough.

The same cycle happened.

You cry everyday, you cry all the times. Your eyes in fact never dry away from tears. You don't want to believe anything anymore. 

The worst part, you messed up your works. You can no longer divide yourself between works and your emotions. You tumbled. You being scolded by your superiors every day. 

Day come and day gone. 

You feels nothing. Emptiness linger your mind, your heart, your soul.

You simply find a way to continue on living. You forgot everything, the initial reason why you decide to continue on living. To not let yourself die. 

There are reasons why Allah destined for you to still breathing.

And you crack your head for it.

WHY?!

And one day it occurred to you.

You never properly healed at the first place. 

When you fell down deep into the valley at the first place, you got yourself injured by many things that appeared in front you while you just continue on falling.

At those times, you reach out your hands to the nearest place to hold on. So you don't reach the lowermost point and losing your life.

And you realised that you actually holding on to a small, fragile branch of a big sturdy tree. Realising that, you know yourself that you have be careful making way to the main branch. But you know its far, and the small fragile tree won't be able to hold your weight for long, so you didn't take a break. You ignored the injuries that hurting you. You stop crying. Carefully, crawling. At the same time you think you need to make sure the small fragile branch not break with your weight. You tried to tie it to the main branch, painfully. So both you would make it safely.

You are too naive. You got distracted, in making sure the fragile small branch keep standing. 

You are helping by doing something that doesn't bring any goodness at all. Just buying time so you both can get stronger. Every time a piece of wood fall down from that branch, you hold it. You try to tie it back. To make it attached together.

You forget, the branch needs a better nourishment, sunlight, or actually the branch is just too old, you actually just need to temporarily hold to it and continue your way to the main trunk, and get down the tree, and heal.

It does never occurred to you. Because you want to help something that actually help you when you in need. 

All of sudden, the fragile small branch broke into small pieces, and you fell down again. Add up to you injuries that you never bother to clean at the first place. You got distracted.

And this time the pain is much more severe, as this time you fell straight to the ground. Thankfully, the distance isn't as great as the last time. You found yourself still able to stand, but you are lost in the middle of nowhere. You lie down, in silence, and look up to the sky. But your vision blocked by the so many trees.

Where is the vast sky, you wonder.

And suddenly you heard the sound of wave so close to you. And you look at yourself. Bruises, deep and superficial wounds. All dirty. Some already got infected. Getting big and bigger. And you realised how painful they have been. How you never give focus to yourself. You keep yourself busy to cater others, thinking that way will help you to feel better.

It's your kind heart, but injuries can't be treated with a kind heart at all. They need particular attention.

You get up. You walked a bit to that sound of the waves, and the next thing you know, in front of you is vast ocean. You are actually standing at a beach. Alone. You become anxious. This world is actually big, but you only think of yourself and that fragile small branch all of these times. You look at the sky, at the cloud. So bright. 

You take a rest. Figuring out ways to help yourself. You clean yourself a bit. You collect on small woods, trying to make a campfire. And the day turns into night, and the stars appeared in the middle of darkness. Beautiful. 

You pray, and pray, asking for help, asking for a miracle. And you take a lot of rest. Cover your wound so they won't get worse. Many times the thought of dying in solitude keep coming to you, considering how silent that beach. 

However the next day, there was a ship, filled with good people, filled with kindhearted people. And the captain take you in. The doctor on board tend to your injuries.

And you learnt that the sea is massive as if there's no ending to it. But you know the people on that ship have their own destination. They simply stop to stock up foods, fruits, or even wild animals. Then they continue their journey to their destinations.

You noticed that your wound starting to heal. You enjoy of what you experienced on board of those kind people. You be thankful that you actually found by nice people. 

You understand same goes to life.

But you know its a very long journey. Here and there, you will get hurt somehow. But the baseline is, the wounds need to be cleaned, to be disinfected, and to allow it to close up. By any means. And surround yourself with trusted people who you can depend on to heal you. The strong people, spend time with them, to be as strong as them.

You are still in journey of healing, of searching a lost soul.

And you on a voyage.

The ocean not guaranteed to offer you only happiness. You will never know what will surface up from the deep sea. You don't know what object will destroy the ship. You don't know if you will meet up marine or pirates.

But you are not alone, and you have a place to take refuge. You have people who always reminds you towards kindness, to always bowing prostrating to the Creator.

But focus on yourself. 

Set yourself free. 

One day you will arrive your destination, permanently or temporarily before you continue your voyage. But by that time arrived, you already in your best condition. You already in the best version of yourself. Because of the focus you give to yourself.

And you walk down the aisle, healthily. To explore what's next.

And that time, you will look back you realise it won't happened if you didn't take courage to go to that solitude beach. 

Take that first step. Its going to be painful. It may makes you cry non stop.

But I want to believe it will worth it.

To start the voyage.