يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا اسْتَعِينُوا بِالصَّبْرِ وَالصَّلاةِ إِنَّ اللَّهَ مَعَ الصَّابِرِينَ (سورة البقرة: ١٥٣)

Translation: [O you who have believed, seek help through patience and prayer. Indeed, Allah is with those who patiently persevere.] (Al-Baqarah: 153)

Patience is hard.

To have patience with the loss. To continue having patience through the heartbreaks. To remember to stay patient with the unknowns, and the very long hardships, too. To have patience with people. And patience with one’s self likewise. To be patient enough while learning or trying to master a skill. To hold onto patience despite all what life keeps promising but hardly fulfills. To let patience sink in, while witnessing a virus taking over the entire world, with no signs of when it’s ever going to end.

It’s so freaking hard to stay patient through all this. To remember these are only meant to be phases, no matter how much time and space they take. To literally feel like you’re bleeding pain, and still try to dig inside for something that can temporarily help keep it together for one’s own sake. And to accept that patience and prayers can be all what we’re able to do during similar times, because they’re all that can truly soothe the pain.

And He knows. He knows it’s not easy. He never made it sound effortless. In fact, I find it heartwarming that patience and its derivatives are mentioned around a hundred times in His Book. He could have mentioned it once, twice, even 10 times. But no, he chose to repeat it over and over all through, in all the possible shapes and forms. Requests. Reminders. Rewards. Reliefs. Remedies. Reflections. Reassurances. No matter what, patience always has to beautifully come up between His lines. And He specifically makes sure to highlight the fact that He literally is ‘with’ those who exercise that. How extremely supportive does this all sound? : )

May He continue blessing our hearts with the warmth of His company and remembrance through all the tough times, and may we never forget the importance of patience no matter how intolerable some days can really get.

March 21, 2020