Thursday, April 18, 2024
A Stressfull Week
Sunday, March 31, 2024
We Really Don't Know Things
Monday, February 26, 2024
Keon Listen to: Podcasts for Woman
This year, one of my resolutions is to reduce my hours listening to music and increase both listening hours to Quranic recitation, Dhikr & Salawat and podcasts with good content. I have been listening to many podcasts and I wanted to document some of those that I love. For below list, mainly for the ladies.
The Aida Azlin Show
Unswtnd + Unfltrd
Voice Hug
The Sumi Show
Head Over Heels
Sunday, February 18, 2024
My Eyes Turned Green
My favorite part of both has to be when the hosts contemplate where their jealousy comes from because when they talked about that, it made me investigate where mine is coming from. While they were discussing this, they discussed a few factors.
There’s jealousy or worse, envy that comes from our own ingratitude. When we failed to be grateful to Allah for all the blessings that He has bestowed upon us. And that’s why when we see what He has given to others, the envy comes. If there’s a cure that I can think of is to do a lot of tasbih and tahmid. Say Subhanallah, say Alhamdulillah. And we also need to realize that Allah’s ‘package’ for everyone of His servants is different and every ‘item’ in the ‘package’ is for what’s best for us. We need to have a thankful heart that is always saying tahmid to him for all of the bounty that He has provided us with. I felt this creeping up way too much when I scrolled through Instagram, I felt jealous seeing other people's lives that look good in my life especially when they got something that I wished for. But I forgot that Allah has given me so much improvement in mine compared to previously and I failed to be grateful for His present for me. Ya Allah forgive my ingratitude. It is a bit drastic, but I end up uninstalling Instagram altogether because of this (also it’s because I mindlessly scroll way too much so I need to cut my social media time). Alhamdulillah, it has made my heart more at peace and more focused on the goodness of my own life that He has given to me.
You know when we feel like we are better than someone but they got better things? And they are happier? That’s when our heart is really ‘sick’. Arrogance is the sickness of the heart that is dangerous because with it, we will not enter Jannah.
وعن عبد الله بن مسعود رضي الله عنه عن النبى صلى الله عليه وسلم قال: “لا يدخل الجنة من كان في قلبه مثقال ذرة من كبر” فقال رجل” إن الرجل يحب أن يكون ثوبه حسناً ونعله حسناً؟ قال: “إن الله جميل يحب الجمال الكبر بطر الحق وغمط الناس” ((رواه مسلم)).
'Abdullah bin Mas'ud (May Allah be pleased with him) reported: The Prophet (ﷺ) said, "He who has, in his heart, an ant's weight of arrogance will not enter Jannah." Someone said: "A man likes to wear beautiful clothes and shoes?" Messenger of Allah (ﷺ) said, "Allah is Beautiful, He loves beauty. Arrogance means ridiculing and rejecting the Truth and despising people." [Muslim].
Riyad as-Salihin 611
Honestly, I am so afraid of this. I don't know how did I let my heart to grow sick from this but whenever I realize this sickness is in me, I can only turn to Him and seek for His forgiveness and for Him to remove ANY of this wretched feeling in my heart. I am no better than anyone else, I sinned a lot and without Allah veiling it, I'll be looking and smelling rotten from it. And I also realized that, when we have arrogance, we will have this sense of entitlement that when we see what other people achieve, we get the sense of "Eh hey, I deserved that too" when you don't really know what the the other people had to go through to be where they are now. For this one, I seek refuge with Allah from the arrogance of my own filthy heart, ya Allah, please remove this sickness from my heart.
Jealousy that come from low self esteem
Friday, January 26, 2024
Why Am I Excited to Finally Turn 30
First decade of my life, I have the best years of getting scars over failing off the bike cause I was riding it a tad bit too fast. Got my knee scraped over falling while running, playing catch with friends. Played in the rain countless times and sometimes got a fever from it. Make my own roundest bat from random wood that we found, make my own kite from old newspaper and fly them high up the sky (and get mom angry sometimes because her thread has gone MIA). Used my body to the max to play; badminton, roundest, galah panjang, zero point, lubang tikus, cop tiang and many others. Sang my heart out in the playground, competing to see who sounded the best. On a slow day, we played paper planes, osom, enjet-enjet semut, batu seremban, tutup tin and 5 perkataan. Wow, the list is really endless and I spent so much time outside. We will only come back to the house when it’s getting dark or until Mak be like “BALIKKKK”. My favorite memories from childhood gotta be when my dad and I sneak out for errands. Because I was the only child at that time that could converse a bit in English, whenever my dad wanted to bring me out alone, he would whisper-talk to me in English haha. My parents also brings us to the waterfalls/streams a lot when it’s not the rainy season. We would be like “Abah nak pergi Salu” and if he was not working, he would make time to bring us to play. In short, I have the best childhood one can ever ask for. Alhamdulillah.
The second decade, the adolescence, the entahlah period. I have always been the child who kept things from her parents. There’s one time when I scraped my knees from falling down. And it actually got infected to the point the pus is actually covering my knee cap. I can’t even bend my leg from it, but I did not say a word to my parents until they actually noticed that I was walking funny and brought me to the clinic and I still have a scar from this. Well, this became worse in my adolescence. I was in the boarding school so you can imagine how little I talk to my parents. Aku bukanlah jenis budak yang akan bergayut dekat public phone tu everyday. Entahlah now that I try to remember what I actually did in those year at Igop, I’ll be like okay what? I wouldn't say I didn't learn anything from school. Tarbiyyah aku kebanyakannya bermula daripada Igop. Cuma it didn't stick until after I left. And since I sucks at being friends, I don't really have high school friends that I can still call close friends now (it's totally me btw). So bila aku recall the years in Igop now, I always ask myself like what did I do wrong? I did great in term of grades, I had fun during schools doing some silly stuff. It is a defining moment of sealing off my character building time tho, and it sealed me off as a withdrawn and unpassionate one.
Came the third decade, my chaotic 20s haha. Which I wrote a whole blogpost for, my 20s.
And now, it’s time to cruise the 4th decade and being in the 30s. To some, turning 30 is dreadful. While for some, it is an excitement. And I am in the “Excited 30” camp. Since last year, I was already like, I CAN’T WAIT TO BE IN MY 30s! The reason are honestly nothing grand but first and foremost, insyaAllah, God’s willing, I will finish paying off my debt in 2026. Both my car and MARA eduloan. So I’ll be left with only my medical card and hibah as my monthly financial commitment. With this, I can finally carry on my plan to make a big career shift to something that is more skill based. I am now fixed on hairdressing but this might change. In any case, I don’t want to do white collar job anymore. Penat jaga orang, penat perah otak. I rather perah otak doing writing. Which brings me to my second goal to achieve in my 30s.
I want to write. Me updating my blogs after being dormant for a long time got to do with this plan. I want to get used to write again. I want to pour my heart into words. I want to turn the scenarios in my head, my imagination and even the dreams in my sleep into paragraph after paragraph, scene after scene. I have always loved writing but I have been keeping it at bay because I sucks at time management before and I keep giving excuses, so yeah, no more of that and more of executing. I have learnt in my past decades that if I want something, I have to keep it going.
Since I will be having significantly lower financial commitment, I can finally save more for travelling insyaAllah. For this, I am planning to move back to Ipoh after I finish paying off my debts so that I don’t have to spend money to pay rent anymore.(Let’s stay with the parents haha). InsyaAlah, it will be a way for me to be closer to my parents and help them when needed as well, may I become a child that has the patience to deal with my ageing parents. So the plan is travel and parents. GAHHHHH I AM SOOO EXCITED!!!
And the most important focus in my 30s is finding peace and accepting who I am as a person and striving to improve myself as a Muslim. I definitely goof around a lot in my 20s and it is time for me to now turn back to Him, running to Allah and seeking His blessing. I want to fall in love with Rasulullah, I want to submit to Allah and be steadfast on His path. I want to read the Quran, do tadabbur and understand the tafseer. And so I have a lot of lessons to listen to, a lot of readings to do. And I want to use my 30s focusing on these instead of using my time to watch entertainment. I won’t be able to cut it off fully but I want to use significant 80% of my time to ‘reach’ Him and let it be 20% of time for the duniawi stuff. I want to taste the halawatul iman and I have to strive for it and from what I have learnt in the past 3 decades, in this 4th, insyaAllah I wil use all of the lesson, be it good or bad, to be better in this 4th. I want to be 30 and close to Him. I want to be 30 and finally be free. Free of fear of judgement, free of FOMO, free of anything that’s been holding me off to be freer and better.
I might not know everything about life, but I know better than before and I hope with all the knowledge, life lessons and experiences I’ve gained, this decade, my 30s will be the best time of life, yet. If my 20s is all about me searching for fun and finding a footing in adulthood, insyaAllah in this 30s, I will use my time to be myself. Ease for me ya Allah, allow me to be the best of me.
Wednesday, January 17, 2024
Deactivating My Another Life, @yuni_ryuni
Tuesday, January 16, 2024
"What would you do if you are not afraid?"
I came across this question while reading a book “What would you do if you are not afraid?”. And it instantly made me think, really introspective thoughts. It was almost a deep dive into my deepest desire, my wildest dreams (Well, not so wild, but wild in a sense that it is so bewildering to think because my drawback to achieve all that I ever wanted has always been my laziness and my lack of consistency. And these two stemmed from the most important, my fear of commitment and new things). I guess, it is time for me to lay this all down into writings so that it will become my commitment that I put out there for not only me to see. Not sure if there’s anyone reading this to be honest but if you did, leave a comment and hold me accountable for my dreams please!
So what would I do if I am not afraid?
If I am not afraid, I will quit my current job and find a remote job that will give me more flexibility and go for that 3 month trip that I have always dreamt of.
I still remember when I was in my first company where the employees were really given the autonomy over their own career choices, I planned to take a 3 months unpaid leave after completion of my MT program. I even hinted to my superior at that time and she was totally cool with the idea. But yeah, Covid happened and the company closed down so the idea has long gone being shoved to the backburner. But has it left my mind? Absolute-fcking-not. Although I do have to wait for this, I want to pay off my debt first and work another 1 year after to save money for the trip. By rough calculation, I can achieve this when I reach 34. So the trip will be when I am 35! I might be unable to do this on a whim but I want to ensure that I am taking the little steps that lead to it.
Steps include; monthly savings for travel funds, paying off car and education loan in 3 years (so I’ll have to pay double the scheduled payment for education loan starting next year).
And to quench my thirst for travel before I go for this 3 month trip in 2029, I will travel to 1 - 2 destinations a year. 2024 Vietnam, Bali, 2025 Sri Lanka, 2026 Umrah, Kazakhstan, 2027 Inner Mongolia, 2028 Zaragoza. Hopefully, this will come true, amin! Destinations can be different but at least 1 trip per year, amin!
If I am not afraid, I will realize the dream of being a writer.
I will write on my blog consistently, updating at least 2 posts per month. It has been a long time since this blog served a dust collector. To say that I am ashamed will be an exaggeration, especially because Blogger has pretty much gone out of style. But I do feel like it’s such a shame that I stopped writing altogether. The easiest place to write was a blog since my postings aren’t even serious stuff… like btch, pull yourself together and write! So I made it a point for me to start writing on blog again and make at least 2 posts per month (I want to do 2 per week but boy I will definitely fail that one so cancel and 2 per month it is). Until when will this last? Until I am done sending my novel draft to the publisher. How is it related? I don’t know but I just think that I won’t actually be able to commit to so many writing assignments at one time.
I will publish that story on Wattpad that I have in my draft and then start to consistently write to update it. This is supposed to be a secret so come here, I’ll whisper to you “I have a Wattpad account and I have 1 story on it that I have already written 6 chapters but it stays in my draft. Shhh. Remember this is a secret”. So yeah, this for me is quite a big step because putting my story out there is scary. And I don’t know whether I’ll actually get people reading it and if they did, will they even like it? But anyway, I think it is time and I need to get over this and publish whatever I have in hand so that I can actually keep working on it. The longer it stays in my draft, the longer that the story will get nowhere.
I will continue to write (Back)Space, Nobody Like(s) You, and Aku Tak Biasa and send it to book publishers. I can’t get into details for this one truly because if I get into details, it will mean I have to spill stories. So nope nope. Anyway, I have 3 books of which I have ideas and I even already have an outline for one of them but somehow whenever I have a block, I just close it and stash it away instead of keep trying to write. So, in these 10 years of my 30s, I am to complete these 3 stories.
If I am not afraid, I will enroll in GiatMara hairdressing class, be a hairdresser and
open "Your Neighborhood Salon"
Back to dream 1; quitting my current job and going for a 3 month trip. This is what I want to do next when I come back from the trip. I have been cutting my own hair since I was 12. Over the years, I’ve been honing my skill, wahh begitu hyperbola. But really tho, I can definitely cut ‘em hairs. So I’ve been wanting to learn hairdressing for quite some time. So my plan after I quit my current line of work, I want to become a hairdresser. After learning, I want to open a mini salon (at home kinda salon). Rather than a big, serious one, I want to be the neighbourhood hairdresser. But for Muslimah. You know how guys always go to their favourite barber for their cut? I want to be just that for my neighbourhood ladies.
If I am not afraid, I will learn pole dancing
Now, this is wild. Blame it on the variety show that I watch where one of the cast has a pole in her own house for her pole dancing routine. And I’m like I WANT THAT TOO! It’s not like I want to do it outside ke apa but I want to have a pole in my room and be able to do pole dancing when I want. I can’t really do this right now because I am staying in room rental so yeah… cannot. But to even get there, I need to work on my core and hand strength. So, steps that I have to take now is to do daily exercise to build my core and hand strength. And if I still cannot find ways to install the pole in my own room, I guess I’ll find a dancing studio that has it after I sort out my core and hand strength part! Second, I need to learn how to use my body and move to beats so let’s learn normal-on-the-floor dancing first.
If I am not afraid, I will take that leap of faith and get married
But first, where’s the calon? Lol. Okay kidding.
The core of this is way too deep and to get into details is hard but the keyword is motae solo and fear of commitments. I have been single for as long as I have lived and I love the freedom that comes with it. I don’t have to worry about what and how another person might think or feel about whatever I do. Is there loneliness? I would be lying if I say I have never felt it, especially when I see my friends with their partners but I have found the art of finding solitude in being alone. When I think of suddenly having to let another person “in”, I dread it. So much. And when I think about having to consider someone else whenever I’m making any decision, oh boy, I hate it. Don’t get me started on the commitment part… When I think about the commitment that I have to put on putting together a family and building a home around it… You know what, count me out. And being a forever solo girl, I have long realised that I am not an attractive person, beauty part memang sah-sah out. So this is another reason why I never really get into a relationship. All in all, dah la nak cari calon susah, memikirkan perkahwinan tu sendiri nak maintain tu payah, aku resigned to the fact that, let’s not do this. But to the core of it, it’s all fear… fear of commitment and relationship. Also fearing vulnerability. So for this one, let me think about it. It’s not a dream that I want to achieve for now, but rather to KIV. Haha.
Andddddd I’m done with this post! Pray for me if you’re reading this! May all Khairunnisa’s dream comes true!
Saturday, January 13, 2024
Looking Back at the Past 10 Years of Being in the 20s.
2014 - 2016
Friendship, Responsibilities, Internship, First Taste of Travelling, & Finally Graduating
If there's something that I am so bad at, it's keeping a friendship alive. And if I didn't meet Husna, Micha, MZ, Icha & Fatin back then, I'll be the pathetic who didn't have a single long-time friend until now. Masih banyak yang aku perlu belajar tentang keeping a friendship alive. Especially now that it's not the same anymore, we can't meet each other often as before but somehow, along the way, I feel that each of us learn the new way to be each other's rock even if we aren't necessary be talking to each other every time anymore. I'm glad that they came in my little room, when I have no roommate and disrupt what I once called as "peace" but now what I realize it's me alienating myself from the world, because I suck, big time at friendship. Friendship is still hard for me, somehow I still suck at it until now, but if without them, I'll be a total loser at it.
Talking about responsibility, it's none other than MEDTECH. Lol. My life in UTP revolve so much around the club. From juggling with club responsibilities, to spending a lot of time having so much fun with the club members. I was so involved and I felt like I need to give 110% every time, without fail. Of course, I was happy to do so, because I enjoyed every thing that I experienced. And when I finally let go of club position, I faced another reality of being a responsible student. It took me years to realize and the result ain't so pretty. I have some sort of regret before but really, looking back, I know that everything that I have experienced, shaped who am I today. And for that, I own up everything that I have done and decisions that I have taken at that time.
I had difficulties scoring an internship placement. I still remember feeling so hopeless when one by one, my classmates get their offer letter but nothing came in to my Inbox. But indeed, Allah's plan is the most profound. I might got the offer late, but when it did came, I got a placement nearby. Stayed at Atok & Opah house in Kampar and travel to work to Simpang Pulai everyday. At the start of it, I remember Atok being so anxious and insist to send me to and fro everyday but his old age couldn't have handled it. Allah made it easy for me again, there's a neighbour that travel to Ipoh everyday so I got a lift. But the best of it is definitely the daily bus ride to go back to Kampar. Seeing familiar faces, never talked but we somehow shared something in our life. Oh, not to forget, my internship is the start of me getting acquainted with Dr Jose as my supervisor, whom I still keep in contact with until today.
I have a lot excursions in these 3 years, made many trips with friends but the special one got to be; Singapore for SEA Games 2015 opening (first overseas trip!) and Korea trip before entering final year will be the most memorable. I remember the excitement of making a passport for the Singapore trip. It was nothing fancy honestly, we went for SEA Games opening, stroll around the Garden By The Bay. A humble trip because Husna and I were two broke students haha. Off to our second travel, it was after our internship. Our destination? Korea, specifically Seoul, Busan and Jeju. The best memory is none other than meeting Kyuri unnie at the guesthouse we stayed in. She brought us around, kept saying that we're "Lucky Girls" because somehow, we don't have to wait long for bus, every time. The wind tho.... they're violent. I also remembered the funny scene of the ahjussi getting drunk while we're having the supper. It's not even strong drink but he turned red and got so tipsy that he became funnier than he originally was.
Phew, I finally finished reflecting the past 10 years. This wasn't easy too write, especially the part where I have to relive the moment in time when I almost fell into depression, but writing this has also made me realize how far I've come and how I have so much to be grateful for. How beautiful is Allah's plan for each of us? Here's to the next decade of my life, the decade that I am so excited for!
I am now 30!