Growing up in an openly Agnostic family, I was rather shocked when my mother announced to me that she was converting to Islam. I had just turned 13 at the time and I was skeptical of the whole conversion. After all, my mother had always seen the hijab and niqab as rather strange and wished that people would dress in a more western style. However, 6 months after my mother’s conversion, I converted to Islam myself. This blog outlines why I converted.
The Start of My Journey (Pre- My Mum’s Conversion)
My journey towards Islam started with a gap between how I believed society should be and the way society was. Before my conversion I had spent years being exposed to Barbie dolls, bratz, America’s Next Top Model, Beauty and the Geek, and playboy bunnies. When I reached my adolescent years, I suddenly felt uneasy with this constant bombardment of sexualised images in society. There became a gap between how I imagined the world should be and how it was. I started seeking another way to be that wasn’t so consumed by immodesty.
I started to ask for God’s guidance on how I should navigate my adolescence and society. I started to build my bond with God and question why my society lived in such a spiritual void, absent of God and spirituality. People seemed to be living without asking questions. Why did the sky not collapse on them? Why was it that the boats could sail the sea? Who sent down rain from the sky and bought the dead plants back to life? Why was man here on this earth? What is life’s true purpose? People seemed to be living without truly reflecting on the world around them. I began to ask questions, reflect and think. These questions all led me back to God being the creator and the sustainer.
Shortly after I had these thoughts, I started to feel discontent with my peers’ obsessions with wealth and material things. There must be more to life than acquiring extreme wealth I thought. There must be more to life than achieving the perfect body or the perfect G.P.A. All of the extremes being chased by the masses seemed so meaningless and superficial. The context behind this being that I was studying at a private school in England where the aspiration to achieve wealth well above the necessity.
First Exposure to Islam
Then, my mum converted to Islam and I started to attend Islamic lectures and read the Qu’ran in the English language. I connected with the Quran to a much greater extent than I ever thought was possible. It filled my my intellectual needs as well as my spiritual needs. The Quran began to open up my heart and I felt something internally that I had never felt before: peace and tranquility. Over my time reading the Quran, the hard parts of heart started to soften and I felt at peace with the universe. I felt a connection with God. I knew, from the feeling in my heart, that this book must be the Truth from God.
Over the months that followed I read the whole English Quran start to finish and I began to attend more and more Islamic classes. I met people who embodied what it means to be a good Muslim. They were kind, humble, helpful, grateful and modest; and they had shiny and soft eyes. They taught me that one of the element of being a good Muslim is to treat other people well. The actions that these people demonstrated caused my heart to soften even more and become even more humble and in love with Islam, and closer to conversion.
These Muslims taught me basic rites of Islam like how to pray, how to fast, and how to pay Zakat. Whilst I was learning these rites I was falling deeper and deeper in love with Islam. One rite in particular caused my heart to feel an intense connection was the prayer of salat. Before I converted to Islam, I spent time significant amounts of time learning to pray Salat (although the Arabic I use in my salat is still not fully correct 10 years later). I spent time in the mosque praying with others and I spend time listening to the Quran being recited in prayer. Every time I came upon prayer, my heart opened and I felt the presence of God enter it.
My Conversion
In the months leading up to my conversion, I saw God’s touch everywhere; from the rain falling from the sky to the human eye, I saw God’s creation. Everything and anything was a reminder of God. Then, after several months of building my faith – in December 2013 – I converted to Islam. Alllahu Akbar.
The changes to my heart, in addition to all the rational and reason, is what caused me to convert to Islam. Once I converted, my heart become open to God and all the hard parts continued to be removed. Now I am Muslim convert of 9 years, I see this life as short and merely a passageway to the next life. My heart has softened and I am kinder, more grateful, humbled, and my heart is more at peace. I converted not in a rushed frenzy, but over a slow gradual process. I may be isolated from society, but I am at peace with myself and the world. And that’s all I can ask for of this life.
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Crescent Days 
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