Nayu's News #86 Ramadan 2013 Post 2

"Hi!"

As ever, all pictures are taken from internet searches and not drawn by me, Nayu. 

Wow, it's hard to believe that we're already 8 days into Ramadan. I talked about it in my Ramadan 2013 Post 1, including what Ramadan is. This week I'm totally making it up as I go along. 

"Heehee!"

What? I hadn't planned this post! Think of it as first drafting only this is the only draft I'm going to write, so it's a draft and the final thing. I suppose waking at 4am might have something to do with this post being a bit strange...or maybe that's just me...

"Getting back on track..."

*ahem* One think I think is really important about Ramadan, or any other occasion when you are taking a spiritual overhaul is to be flexible and realistic. Yes it is good to have goals, but events may happen and you have less time than you thought you would to do meaningful thinking/scripture reading/meditating/zoning out etc. It's not nice when that happens, especially if you're like me and like to have at minimum a rough time-schedule of when you'll do tasks each day. Having less time can cause a major freak-out. 

Your nearest and dearest may suffer during a freak-out - this includes pets!

It might be that a task takes longer than expected, which is what happened to me with my Quran listening. 

Listening to the Quran followed by an English translation is more time-consuming than just listening to the Quran on it's own. Note, the Quran is only the Arabic version. Anything else is a translation and can't actually be called the Quran. That's my little fact of knowledge for today! 

"Happy sigh."

Back to what I was saying, I'd hoped to listen to 1 section of the Quran a day, and get in some other reading about the lives of the Prophets, may God bless them all. You may have heard of a few of them: (May God forgive me if I've put down the wrong event for the wrong person - some are similar to the Christian version so possibly got muddled in my head)

Adam - called, would you believe it, Adam - had a wife called Eve, lived in paradise for a while

Noah - called Nuh in Arabic - the one who built an ark, and who endured a very big flood 

Moses - called Musa in Arabic: baby in the basket, evil Pharoah killed people's sons

Joseph - called Yusef in Arabic: - the one with the dreams, put down a well by his brothers 

Job - called Ayub in Arabic - the one who was extremely sick and was misfortunate in every way possible

Jesus - called Isa in Arabic -  born under a date palm, not in a manger, 

Zachariah - called Zakariyah in Arabic - I named my zebra finch Zach after him. His wife, thanks to God, had a child after being barren for years and being old, I think. 

In that particular book the Prophet Muhammed (peace and blessings be upon him) isn't included. Not because he's not important, he was the final prophet who spread God's word on Earth, but perhaps in the same series of books they did one or two volumes for the Prophet Muhammed alone. I've got 1 individual book on him, then a 2 volume set (which I haven't quite read yet). I have to confess that there are parts of books like these which I skip because my eyes glaze over when I'm met with a long list of dates (maybe because I don't have to learn anything anymore my brain automatically goes 'nooooo!' and switches off on the mere sight on them) and also with a long list of ancestors. I know this is extremely important, especially when tracing lineage, but to me it's just a list of names and I don't read it. 

"So I skip dates & names...I prefer reading the juicy parts!"

I like chilling to the melodious Quran verses.

The point I'm trying to say in a roundabout way is that making sure I'm listening to as much of the Quran as I need to each day (It is handily split into 30 parts, 1 part per day (and a bit extra in case it is 29 days long) is ideal for Ramadan), takes up most of my free time (the time I don't have to rest and can actually concentrate on things). 

Balancing life is a fine art

I hadn't foreseen how frazzled my brain would be after the listening, so I've adjusted by currently not reading anything else. I'm hoping to do some extra reading on the weekend, so I do read some extra information - knowledge is power!

Read lots of non-fiction & fiction.

If you want to know more about any of the people mentioned please look up the info online, or in books (you know those things with paper that are wonderful in their original form (nearly as wonderful in digital versions). You'll be able to have the full story behind them, rather then the heavily summarised Nayu version.

"I hope you liked my version..."

That will be it for today's post - I've hoped you've found it interesting. If there is anything you'd like me to discuss in next week's Ramadan post, please do get in touch by either commenting or emailing me. Next week I've actually planned the topic of the post - nope, I'm not telling what it is! It'll be a surprise. Have a great week until then. 

"Bye!"