I’ve let go of my old self… and having Covid helped

When people ask me to explain reiki to them, I usually tell them that it works by healing your aura, which affects your emotion body and then affects your physical state. It’s kinda weird because I actually saw this play out in catching Covid-19 last week.

The start of 2022 was really interesting and not like other years. Ever since 2018, I’ve been doing yearly vision boards to mark what my year would look like. This year, I felt uninspired by my little tradition and decided not to do it. Instead, I did some releasing by clearing out my whole room, my car and burning a piece of paper of all of the stuff I want to let go of. My reiki master Chetna Halai also did a release and calling in ceremony for the end of 2021 and the start of 2022.

So, yeah it was a very deep start to 2022, which uncoincidentally (we don’t believe in coincidences on this blog) is the year I turn 30.

I’ve had a few of my friends turn 30 before me and there was a lot of panic around the idea of entering this new decade. When I responded with calm, I was told to wait until I’m counting down the final weeks of being in my 20s. Here I am and not only am I calm, but I’m actually excited to turn 30. Really, it seems like a new way to let go.

Without realising I was doing it, 2021 became the year I let go of a lot of things. A crazy amount! I didn’t really set a full intention make it the year of letting go, it just happened by doing lots of energy work and finding myself in situations where I had to say bye to a lot of places, people, habits, thoughts and hobbies.

I will say that I set the intention to call in new things, so maybe I had to take out the old first 😉.

This time last year, I was doing some hypnotherapy sessions with my babe Sotoda Saifi and in one session, she noticed that I’ve been carrying a lot of ego connotations with my Palestinian identity, so she challenged me to do a session to let go of my Palestinian self. I was nervous because does this mean I would be obnoxious and forget my roots or stop being active? Regardless, I trusted her and I still cleared out the generational mess that naturally comes with being from one of the most volatile places in the world. It didn’t make me ashamed of who I was at all, but it cleared out some of the root chakra issues that come up when you or your ancestors have experienced different types of trauma such as war, siege, colonialism, slavery, etc.

Months later, when the massacre on Gaza happened and when my own neighbourhood, Silwan, was (and still is) being under threat of demolition, I didn’t feel distanced because I had let go of what I thought I had to hold on to be Palestinian. I still did everything that I do in my activism and journalism and felt all of the raw feelings that came with such a tragic situation, but I was able to manage the emotional effects of watching all of this unfold in a much more healthy way, which made me of more service.

In other words, my subconscious mind and aura were decolonised.

Then, I just spent lots of time doing other classes, sessions and courses with other modalities just for fun. At that point, it was less about achieving something and more to pass time and feel good. In that way, I let go of the outcome of the purpose behind doing all of this stuff and did it all because it’s fun… most of the time.

Fast-forward to January 2022 and I was having a very busy month, until I caught Covid-19 and had to cancel all of my plans and slow down to recover. Because I got rid of so much stuff around me, but most importantly, because I was already clearing out my subconscious mind, having coronavirus allowed the “letting go” process to continue.

On Tuesday, I spoke to Chetna about having Covid and she told me that it came to clear me out. At that point, the virus in me was at its peak and even though I felt weak, I did feel like I was doing a vibrational clearout. Now that I’m coming towards the end of my time in isolation, I really do feel like so much has energetically shifted and I am finally ready to be the next stage of who I am meant to be.

Treating every cough or sneeze as a physical release of trapped energy really sped things up. When your body releases through coughing, sweating, yawning, crying and other natural functions, you’re naturally releasing energy. This release is magnified in ways we can’t imagine when we note that our body is releasing energy and intending for such functions to be a release.

I look back at my 20s and I realise while I became a full-fledged adult, on an energetic level, my 20s were at times an extension of my teens in that I was purging all that did not resonate with me. I’ve chosen to release all of that now. I’ve chosen to stop identifying with everything that I used to identify with, but that doesn’t mean forgetting who I am.

Think of a certain identity that you may have. It could be ethnic, religious, social, political, etc. You’ve had experiences surrounding them. For example, you may have experienced racism. Letting go of your ethnic identity doesn’t mean no longer being what you are, it means you’re not identifying with the experiences you’ve had and connotations your ego creates.

Everyone jokes about the restrictions many Arab girls live with because parents tend to be more restrictive towards their daughters, whilst babying their sons. Letting go of being Arab doesn’t mean you’re no longer an Arab woman, it just means you’ve let go of limiting beliefs surrounding your personal freedom that has been fed to you by the story of coming from a certain ethnicity. By doing this, you’re becoming an energetic match to the vibration of freedom that you’ve always wanted but thought you could never have. As you keep this up and purge from years of being restricted by unrealistic cultural ideals, your reality will change.

Sometimes it’s not about keeping your vibration high. It’s about letting it sink when it needs to and using it as a chance to release and purge. Don’t hide from these low states, become curious about what they’re trying to tell you. What is your inner child saying to you? The secrets to healing and climbing up the vibrational ladder are actually in these low moments.

Without burning bridges, I’ve energetically tapped out of communities that no longer serve me and hold me back. Everyone is on their path and that’s okay. Not resonating with something doesn’t mean you need to demonise it.

By letting these identities and communities go through viewing them with neutrality and love instead of zapping them with emotional charge, you’ve put yourself in a powerful position because it means they don’t own you anymore. Anger and resentment will come up that will stop you from viewing things through unconditional love. Own that anger and work with it to heal it and rise above it. If you fight your negative patterns and feelings, they’ll fight you back, so just be neutral about an emotion and allow it to pass.

For me, everything is now starting to add up and make sense. Now that I’m looking back at the last few years of my life, I realise that nothing was a coincidence. I was meant to meet who I met, go through what I went through, read what I was meant to read, all of this to take me to this point. When? Just before I turn 30 years old. That doesn’t mean I won’t have more layers to unlock; life is beautiful that way.

I am in awe. My ego tells me I was supposed to achieve so many things I haven’t at this age and so does my community. I remember my dad telling me to hurry up and start my PhD so I don’t have to finish it into my 30s. Here I am without even a proposal and I honestly don’t mind because I realised that the PhD dream wasn’t even mine to begin with. It was just something that came with the reputation I had of being academic.

The most hilarious part of this is that even my old gym where I started my fitness journey closed down. This was the Virgin Active in Cricklewood which was right next to my old school. I remember going there feeling very nervous and intimidated when I first got my membership there as a teen when they had some special offer for us and I just wanted to leave. Minus the times I was working with a trainer or doing a class, that branch of Virgin Active was always the one where I had my worst workouts, even just days before it closed. While I miss the convenience of it, along with the reformer pilates and spin classes, I’m so glad it’s gone because I subconsciously still identified with the earliest memories I had of my fitness journey every time I walked in there.

The bottom line is that nothing can control you if you don’t identify with it. I have a vision for my future and a lot of it goes against all of these “identities” that I had to release. I think about this vision and I am at peace, in a state of joy, having so much fun and not tied down to anything that doesn’t serve me. And because I’ve let go of so much, there isn’t much weight holding me down to stop me from flying.

Here’s to 2022, here’s to turning 30, here’s to letting go and here’s to life. I’m so grateful.

And in the words of the amazing film that is 13 Going on 30, here’s to being thirty, flirty and FABULOUS!

Life is a mirror, but there are seven of them: The Seven Essene Mirrors

My loves,

Today, I want to talk to you about something from mystical Judaism that blew my mind. The Essenes are a mystical sect who flourished between 2nd century BC to 1st century AD. It is said that they resided in Khirbet Qumran, which is south of Jericho in Palestine.

Their lifestyle hailed spirituality and God consciousness and they believed in communalism as a way of life. They (like Muslims) believe the soul is eternal and death is just a channel to the higher self.

They were a very tight-knit community and forbade marrying those outside of their sect. Those who wanted to be an Essene had to enter a three-year conversion introductory period.

They had many teachings, but one of them that blew my mind is the concept of the Seven Essene Mirrors.

When I started my spiritual journey, I remember reading that life is merely a reflection of who you are. Being low on consciousness and high on anxiety, I couldn’t rationally fathom it, nor could I quieten my mind enough to realise how everything truly is a reflection of the self.

As I expanded my awareness, I saw myself in others and I saw oneness in individual acts and circumstances. If there are infinite ways to look at a circumstance or a person and if no two people interpret a situation in the exact same way, that means much of our interpretations come from within.

The Seven Essene Mirrors teach just this, but with seven different levels. My mind immediately went to the seven main chakras, the seven levels of heaven and seven gates of hell in Islam, having to circulate the Ka’abah seven times, throwing seven stones at the devil, etc etc. My mind is running away from typing right now as it starts to lose control of what is coming out of my fingertips, but I think we should just sit and appreciate the significance of the number seven and all of the mysteries that come with it.

If we look at the seven mirrors, we see that each of them have their own guide to see how something may be a reflection of what is happening in your subconscious mind. You use these to unlock your thought patterns to let them go and achieve God consciousness (taqwa) and ego death (fana). In other words, the deeper you know your ego self, the faster you will be able to peel its layers to discover the true higher self that has unconditional connection to the Divine.

Even if you aren’t a believer, you can still benefit by coming to your higher self and releasing the limiting beliefs that hold you down. The less weighed down you are with attachment, the more you ascend.

Use these as a guide to figure yourself out when you have questions, or when you want to figure out the clutter of your mind.

The first mirror reflects what you are at the present moment

If you’re finding it difficult to gage who you are at a specific moment, look around you. How do things feel right now, at this very moment? You can be in the same situation twice, but notice different things based on your present mood. Are you more likely to notice the birds flying together, or their droppings on the floor?

The second mirror reflects what you judge

There’s an old saying of when you point one finger, three fingers point back at you. When you find yourself judging someone or something, there is something you haven’t forgiven within yourself or your past experiences. For example, if you’re judging someone for going out too much, you’re resenting a feeling of restriction either within or around you.

In order to manifest better for yourself, release the judgement by releasing the resistance.

The third mirror reflects what was taken away from you

When we see a quality in another person that we want for ourselves, that means we lost it. It could be a sense of femininity, masculinity, joy, confidence, self love, abundance, etc. At our essence, we are whole, but as we go through life, we lose our sense of complete self because of traumas that created limiting beliefs.

When you admire or envy something within someone, that means you need to go on a journey to find it within yourself. We need to enter a space of neutrality and release the limiting beliefs that stop you from remembering that you are one with your desire. The Qur’an does say that we were created from a single being after all (39:6).

The fourth mirror reflects patterns of a lost love

You know that feeling when you’re in a new situation and you keep comparing it to the old? Whether you’re comparing every new person you meet to your ex, or that feeling when you start a new job and you’re trying to draw parallels to your new colleagues and old ones? This is it!

When we look at ourselves through this mirror, we’re able to see our patterns of addiction. This gives us great spiritual power because recognising such compulsions give us an instant trigger into the shadow self when we foster a sense of curiosity about our patterns. When did this pattern start? Why do we feel the need to do what we need to do? Which relationship do we need to make peace with?

Keep in mind that when it comes to relationships, you can get closure without contact through meditation, understanding the deeper meanings and lessons, therapy, journaling, reframing, prayer and cord cutting. Please don’t text your exes or put yourself in a dangerous position with anyone else to clean up your fourth essene mirror!

The fifth mirror reflects your relationship with your parents

Our parents are our first window to the world and are the vessel of our soul’s incarnation to the earthly realm. This is the first relationship we have. As we grow, we find ourselves seeing the world through their eyes. This is why generational healing is so important, because much of the traumas they have are passed down to us.

This can range from our beliefs on money, God, our self identity and self worth, the environment and even politics. If we look deeply and access our subconscious mind, we can even see how our relationship with our parents manifests into relationships we have with others as adults.

How did you feel when you interacted with your parents as a child? Get to know the good and the bad aspects and this will give you a very deep an insight. Just as we’re human, so are our parents. We all view things from very limited scopes, even if we’re spiritual.

Then, you can practice some inner child healing and reparenting and rise above what may be limiting you.

The sixth mirror reflects your dark night of the soul moments

Our darkest moments, our most traumatic experiences, our struggles with mental health and the cloud over our head. When do we view the world through the sadness that lives within us?

Here, we’re talking about trauma. By definition, trauma is an experience that causes shock to the system. This manifests in physical, emotional and spiritual pain and leaves our fight or flight mechanism on. When we become aware of how we see the world through our traumatic experiences, we’re able to use discernment and question if things are the way they are because they truly are this way, or if it’s our trauma that’s talking.

When we become aware of how our trauma affects our perception, we unlock a new level of power — if we’re willing to overcome. Go easy on yourself because healing is nowhere near linear and we can get triggered at random moments. When this happens, we just need to ask ourselves what this moment is trying to teach us.

The seventh mirror reflects our ultimate self perception

So, this mirror is different to the first mirror because the first one talks about our state of being at any particular moment. You could be feeling happy and see roses and butterflies one moment, and then see fire in a few hours if something changes your mood.

Despite our shifting moods, we have a basal vibration, which is what this mirror talks about. Rather than asking what your mood is, you ask how you view yourself in the ever changing circumstances around you.

Using money as an example, a mood is feeling incredibly abundant after a payment. This can shift based on your current financial circumstances. Your self perception, however, is your ultimate relationship with money. Do you believe money flows through into your bank account easily? Or do you believe you’re a poor person?

The latter two are part of your self perception because they come from subconscious beliefs that you identify with.

This mirror is where we do the most exploration when we’re trying to manifest using the Law of Attraction. We can script, visualise, etc about being abundant, but if we don’t try to work on this mirror and understand the deep imprints of our subconscious mind, we won’t be able to rewrite and manifest.

I love this philosophy because it really breaks down how life can be a mirror to you. During your healing journey, you can use these mirrors as a reference point. What I like to do is write one aspect of my life down and pick a mirror that I feel relates the most. Then, I just speed write everything that comes into my mind, without even thinking about what I’m writing. When you’re writing very fast, you access your subconscious mind. Then I move to the next mirror.

Each mirror gets deeper, so if you want to do it with all of the mirrors, do it in the order that was written by the Khirbet Qumran.

I love you all so much,

Di xox

Here’s why spirituality is activism

Hello my lovelies!

Join me in welcoming a world where Palestine will be free. Take a deep breath and feel the peace of achieving freedom and justice for all and feel gratitude that just as how systems of oppression are all interconnected, so are liberation movements; as we work for the freedom of one, we’re working for the freedom of all.

Before dedicating the last few years to my spiritual journey after a very sudden awakening, I was committed to political activism. I knew that there was more to the world, but I saw it as something that is outside of my personal scope. Then as I became spiritual and immersed myself in seeking knowledge of the divine, it became separate to my passion for freedom and justice and all — almost like a break from the emotionally charged space of activism.

Until I realised there is no separation.

The material world has a lot to do with unity — for example, trying to be an ethical consume. However, in the spiritual world, there is a plane of activism that we can tap into through our own connection to ourselves and the Divine. You can even embrace the two as one: what earthly hobbies feed your soul? How can you use your talents to serve?

Don’t underestimate your gifts and passions as vehicles for change. When you create, you balance your energy centres, bookmarking your energy on your product. This is why art, poetry, music, etc are so impactful in activism. Creating with love transfers love to others, which collectively energises the cause.

Sure, it’s not all roses. There will be tears, anxiety and a loss of inspiration. You’re human and dealing with some very heavy work. But when you do find that creative force within you, know you’re creating a better world with your world by expressing yourself from your deepest passions and God-given gifts.

A karmic cycle of love

The concept of self-care and spirituality being separate from radical politics is actually a very modern phenomenon. If we look at the theories, philosophies and religions that have inspired New Age thought, we see that humanity is a collective. We are able to manifest our personal desires because we are not separate from them. We just need to tap into that specific vibration to attract the reality in which we wish to live.

Just as we are not separate from our desires for ourselves, we aren’t separate from our desires for others. This includes justice, freedom and liberation. Just as how we are connected in a way in which we can sense when someone is about to call us, we are connected in a way through our spiritual energies to aspire for better for each other.

Call it dua, quantum theory, higher self, or even the belief that we are all one soul, material separation is an illusion and our individual energies mix with each other. Because of this, we are able to influence spaces that are not materialistically ours.

This is why I try to feel love and compassion for people whose situation I want to see improve, as opposed to sympathy. I do what I can to help when I have the means, but I do it coming from a place gratitude that they are getting help they need. With gratitude comes more abundance for ourselves and others. Sympathy reinforces whereas gratitude catalyses.

I’ve spoken to a plethora of Palestinians inside Palestine and in the diaspora, along with non-Palestinian pro-Palestine activists. Every single one of us have felt a shift in the mood. There’s hope, there’s love, there’s still anger (justifiably), but it’s coming with an emergence of calling for freedom from a space of conviction that it’s near.

Because of the power of social media, people are using their creativity to partake in activism and they are getting shared far and wide. From music, to poetry, to infographics, to blog posts. This isn’t only the tangible production of awareness and activism material, but the creative energy that comes out of this, which is through a domino effect, creating more and more. This is all happening on a subconscious level.

When we raise our vibration with the intention of coming from a space for pure love, we are sending this love out to the rest of the world. So when we take care of ourselves, we’re taking care of the rest of the world.

Minus the encounter of an energy vampire, have you noticed how your positive or negative energy rubs off on others? When you feel good, everything else feels good. Inconveniences matter less. This isn’t because your head is in the clouds and you’re ignoring things, but because your energy is affecting others around you.

This is exactly why energy vampires are able to make you feel bad when you feel good, even without speaking to you. Without a healthy energetic boundary (let me know in my DMs or comments if you want me to write a post on establishing this), certain places and people can suck the life out of you by being in the same room as you, or even when you think about them.

Taking the same principle and relating it back to yourself, when you fill your cup with remembrance of the Divine and come from a space fo connection, your cup naturally overflows to whoever you intend to send such good energy to. As you take care of yourself, you take care of others. This happens very subtly and subconsciously.

But just because we can’t see the immediate material side of this, it doesn’t mean we should dismiss it as a form of activism.

I’ve been lacking with protesting, but I’ve been praying over the protests. There was even a global tajjahud for Palestine that took place. Many souls coming and praying together for Palestine before the sun rises — one of the most blessed times in Islam.

In order to be able to operate on this level, self care is needed. Audre Lorde, the woman who coined the term self care, describes it as “not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.” Do not be ashamed to fill your cup and relax.

Burnout is the opposite of productivity, which means self care is the champion of productivity. If the illusion of separation keeps us disconnected (note the divide and conquer tactic of the British empire), connection creates a better world for ourselves and everyone else.

Just as how all systems of oppression feed off each other, all systems of liberation are connected to each other. When you fight for one cause, you’re fighting for others.

When we start from self, we foster a healthy connection with every other atom that God has created. We fill our cups and end up communicating through the higher/more spiritual self via each other’s electromagnetic energy fields. And even if you don’t believe in all of this, taking care of yourself makes you more productive.

Choose freedom, choose creativity and choose love. Set these standards for yourself and trust that you are raising the collective vibration for others to choose the same standard for themselves and the liberation movements they are working towards.

Our souls were once one soul and when God created Adam, he breathed his spirit into him — meaning we all have the spirit of God within us. There is no separation.

“Allah created you from one soul. Then He made from it its mate, and He produced for you from the grazing livestock eight mates. He creates you in the wombs of your mothers, creation after creation, within three darknesses. That is Allah , your Lord; to Him belongs dominion. There is no deity except Him, so how are you averted?” — (39:6).

I love you all.

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