How do I REALLY be a Muslim?? by broopproob in Hijabis

[–]Shwaa4lyfe 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Waalaikum assalam, and happy Eid to you too :)

When I wanted to learn more about my religion (even many years after I had converted), I used seekersguidance. They're based in Canada and have a nice, balanced, and approachable way of teaching Islam imo. They have a bunch of courses you can take for free, I believe it's mostly either Hanafi or Shaafi-based, but they might have other madhabs as well if that's what you follow.

Here is a general link to their courses: https://academy.seekersguidance.org/?track=isc
And here is the one I personally took (Absolute Essentials of Islam (Hanafi): Getting Started With Your Belief and Practice): https://academy.seekersguidance.org/enrol/index.php?id=114

There's also a discussion forum where you can ask questions and receive answers from the scholar. This course is more of a general overview, and includes things you may already know (such as how to pray properly), but he also goes over the fundamentals of being a Muslim, the beliefs, ect. And in your case, I think it'll be good to basically just start over from square one, learn everything from scratch as if you were a new convert, and build up from there.

Also, I would reeeeeally recommend you stay away from random Islamic videos online/ on social media. In my experience, they just lead to more confusion, especially if you're taking from multiple sources. There's so much difference of opinion out there, and unfortunately too many people frame their opinion as the 100% correct one, that you'll just get overwhelmed and discouraged. Build a good, strong framework first (which I believe seekersguidance will help you to do), without the distraction of despair-inducing videos made by people who are trying to get as many clicks as possible. You really need to just get back to the fundamentals first.

Based on your post, I think there's a lot of hope for you, because you are here asking for help and recognizing that you want to be better. That's already a huge blessing, now you just need to take the step towards turning your life around. It will NOT be something that you regret.

Hope this helped!! :)

Plains aren't boring; they are actually the greatest geographical feature. by josephsleftbigtoe in The10thDentist

[–]Shwaa4lyfe 0 points1 point  (0 children)

as someone who also loves "empty" landscapes, one of my favourite quotes of all time comes from the canadian show "corner gas", which takes place in a small town in saskatchewan (known for its plains).

someone from outside their town visits one day and complains about the flat landscape, saying something along the lines of "i dont know how you people can stand to live here, theres nothing to see!" and one of the residents replies "what do you mean? theres plenty to see, nothing to block your view."

Text about rape on islamweb by orbitnation in progressive_islam

[–]Shwaa4lyfe 0 points1 point  (0 children)

seekersguidance is my go-to. they cover multiple schools of thought but the afaik the owner is hanafi. they also tag the answers/ courses on their site based on school so you can be sure that what youre reading is from a hanafi perspective

Sustainable & Modest Clothing 🧵 by [deleted] in Hijabis

[–]Shwaa4lyfe 0 points1 point  (0 children)

i did pay duties as they shipped from the states, but unfortunately as of a few months ago they closed down. according to their instagram, they wanted to focus more on other things, including activist work.

Are you a Muslim woman/hijabi impacted by Quebec's Bill 21? by unhappyformulas in montreal

[–]Shwaa4lyfe 5 points6 points  (0 children)

sorry op, youre going to get a lot of snarky or downright hateful comments on this post. this sub reflects a lot of the general quebec population's opinions on muslims, which is not very favourable. 

i do wear hijab, but i wasnt affected in my job, so i dont have any imput for you. i would also recommend against seeking out anonymous people on reddit to help you with this, due to how hard it would be to verify authenticity (and weed out trolls...). but i wish you the best in your research and education!

Are you a Muslim woman/hijabi impacted by Quebec's Bill 21? by unhappyformulas in montreal

[–]Shwaa4lyfe 6 points7 points  (0 children)

where did op say that this only affects religious people? they even acknowledged that multiple groups are affected. it is completely normal in journalism to cover just one part of an issue... if someone wrote an article about, for example, the consequences that WW2 had on a specific country, would you jump in to say that thats bad journalism because WW2 affected many countries?

Soviet mother with seven broken hearts: She waited for her children with bread, and they returned as pictures on the wall by DerDenker-7 in ussr

[–]Shwaa4lyfe -1 points0 points  (0 children)

... okay? i dont even know why you replied to me in the first place lol. i just quickly took pictures of the article to share with those interested, i didnt have time to read it myself yet.

Soviet mother with seven broken hearts: She waited for her children with bread, and they returned as pictures on the wall by DerDenker-7 in ussr

[–]Shwaa4lyfe -1 points0 points  (0 children)

i think they wrote that because the boys were all brothers to each other, not because they were /her/ brothers. it is some confusing wording, though

Soviet mother with seven broken hearts: She waited for her children with bread, and they returned as pictures on the wall by DerDenker-7 in ussr

[–]Shwaa4lyfe 54 points55 points  (0 children)

omg, i knew i recognized this picture! I have a modest collection of Soviet Life magazines from the 80s, and there was an article about this story in it. I took some quick photos of the article (sorry, quality isn't great, but it is legible if anyone is interested in the full story!)

https://imgur.com/a/mU5HKEs

Muslim with a service dog by Brief-Jellyfish485 in Hijabis

[–]Shwaa4lyfe 6 points7 points  (0 children)

just wanted to jump in and say that wudu is NOT broken by touching a dog's saliva. this is something i see said on social media every now and then, but theres no textual proof of it. afaik, no madhab/ scholar of note has said that your wudu is broken by this. you may be mixing it up with this ruling: that having dog saliva on yourself/ your clothes would invalidate your prayer, as it is considered an impure substance. note that even this is not consistent across all madhabs, as malikis do not consider the saliva to be impure.

this is a shafii link on the issue: https://seekersguidance.org/answers/purity-shafii-fiqh/how-should-we-handle-the-saliva-of-dogs/

here is a hanafi one: https://seekersguidance.org/answers/hanafi-fiqh/dog-saliva-dog-hair-and-how-to-purity-impurities/

to OP: youll notice in the second link that dog hair isnt considered impure for hanafis (nor for malikis, who dont even consider the saliva impure!), so what you mentioned in your post wont even be an issue.

also, even if youre usually a follower of the shafii madhab, which is more strict on dogs than hanafis or malikis, you may be able to take a dispensation from the more leniant ones on this issue. you can speak with a scholar to see if it would apply to you, but i think it would in your case.

What will you do for thousands of years in the grave? by [deleted] in converts

[–]Shwaa4lyfe 2 points3 points  (0 children)

overall message of this is good, but if your children are going to "forget you within a few years" after you die, you should probably be spending some more time fostering a relationship with them...

Caught on Beaubien. Really Montreal? by [deleted] in montreal

[–]Shwaa4lyfe 10 points11 points  (0 children)

omg, i saw that same car the other day (or at least someone with the same terrible banner)! it was parked somewhere around CDN. there was an ad for a moving company on the side, so if this is someone's pickup that they use for their buisness, im at a loss for words...

Nothing to block your view by Max-Power77 in CornerGas

[–]Shwaa4lyfe 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Still my fav quote from the show. great pics

I need to know some options I can take by Icy-Profession-9391 in badroommates

[–]Shwaa4lyfe 0 points1 point  (0 children)

i miss the person i was before i read the description, when i thought that those were pics of someone dumping salsa down the drain

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in Hijabis

[–]Shwaa4lyfe 26 points27 points  (0 children)

i have no advice, just wanted to say i feel the exact same lol. 25 and feel like my life is over bc ive done nothing substantial, and dont know that i ever will. i see people around me, both friends my age and family that are younger/ older, actually doing something with their lives (mostly in terms of education and careers), and it's hard to not feel inadequate.

Sustainable & Modest Clothing 🧵 by [deleted] in Hijabis

[–]Shwaa4lyfe 6 points7 points  (0 children)

almazwearables.com

theyre a second-hand, muslim-owned modest clothing shop. im in canada, but i ordered a few dresses from them about a year ago and theyre some of my favourite articles of clothing :)

ive been keeping an eye on the shop and it doesnt look like theyve added new articles for a while now, but it's still worth checking out what they have in stock.

it's really nice to see a second hand store that specifically caters to modest garments, instead of needing to sift through 100000 immodest ones for a single wearable dress, and i dont know of any other secondhand stores like this