Heaven is Where the Heart is

Salamualaykum (Peace Be Upon You All). I know I'm late, but I would like to wish you all a Happy New Year! This is my first post of 2012 and with a new year, I bring to you a new theme and a new blog title!! This isn't spur of the moment but a change I have been meaning to make for a while. There is another blog also with the title The Beauty of Islam so I felt I needed to make a change. After much thinking I finally found the perfect name to give to my blog. Heaven is Where the Heart is, is now the title of this blog as an extension to the Beauty of Islam. My email and URL address will remain the same to make it easier on you and me.

I was inspired to name my blog Heaven is Where the Heart is through the following quote-- "My home is in heaven. I'm just traveling through this world." This quote really spoke to me and I felt it defined exactly how I felt. Me and my friends have this phrase we always say when things go wrong. If we're upset or feeling down, we say "This Stinkin' Duniya!" It always seems to make us feel better for some reason haha. Seriously though...this life is just a test and it will be over in a blink of an eye. In the Noble Quran, Allah swt puts into perspective how short this life really is.

“Allah will say: “What number of years did you stay on earth?”
They will say: “We stayed a day or part of a day.
Ask of those who keep account.”
Allah will say: “You stayed not but a little, if you had only known!
Did you think that We had created you in play (without any purpose),
and that you would not be brought back to Us?”
— (Quran, Surah Al-Mu’minun, 23:112-115)

Reminders such as these really make me long for Jannah (Heaven). While this world can be beautiful at times, I'm constantly reminded that it's beauty doesn't and won't last forever. I see it in my everyday life and all around me. In my personal life, I see that one moment I'm happy..then a few hours later I'm sad. When I turn on the news, one moment they're discussing politics and the next moment they're broadcasting devastation from an enormous Earthquake. This life is so unpredictable and we're not guaranteed anything. Why would we want to choose this world over a life in the Akirah (The Afterlife) where we are promised  eternal happiness? We shouldn't want to choose this world but sadly we do. It's in our nature as humans to become so distracted with what's in front of us that we don't think about what awaits us in the future. As Believers, we can counteract this trait by reading the Quran and remembering death often. These are two cures to increasing our imaan (faith) and maintaining our focus and our hearts on the end goal which is Jannah inshAllah.