Podcast: 786 Samosas – Balancing Home and Worship in Ramadan | Shaykh Mikaeel Ahmed Smith

It’s Ramadan, and you really want to be praying tarawih, but you’re trying to get your children in bed. You’d rather be reading Qur’an, but you’re frying stuff. You’d rather be in the masjid, but you have to go to work. How do we balance this, and prevent a sense of resentment for our responsibilities? In this episode, Shaykh Mikaeel Ahmed Smith and Zeba Khan have a discussion on life, culture, goals, and the frying of 786 samosas in the limited days of Ramadan. 

“I’m a father of three young children. They’re not quite toddlers anymore, they just got out of being toddlers, the last one. When it comes to scheduling, I can’t even get them to go to sleep on time let alone have a hard-core schedule, but that’s life, that’s how it is.” 

Let’s say I set my goal and I think ok, I’m going to read this much Qur’an, but then my son comes and says Baba, can you come see this? For one month am I going to be ignoring my son? We achieve balance by giving everything its right.

“They say shoot for the moon and at least you’ll land on the stars, but there are times when thoughts like this can just demotivate you because you feel like you are so behind, even if there are other times when those thoughts can push you to finish one more juz.”

“I think that sense of resentment comes from a false sense of not being where we’re supposed to be. But wherever you’re at, that’s where you’re supposed to be. Whatever situation you’re in, that’s what Allah wants from you. I know we talk about reading a lot of Qur’an and making a lot of zhikr and doing lots of worship, but you know what? If we just fast our fasts, pray our prayers, and stay away from sins, is that not a successful Ramadan?” 

I feel that sometimes, Ramadan becomes too much about food and not about being together and not about worship. Of course we’ve been fasting all day and we need to break our fast, but we spend so much energy cooking fresh meals every day as if we can’t eat leftovers? Like how dare we eat leftovers, Astaghfirullah! That’s not what it’s about. You’ve lost the meaning. Yeah, there’s a level of community and coming together, but we’re burdening a part of the family and normally that burden goes on to one member of the family. I can’t justify that. I can’t justify your not being able to eat leftovers for this sister not being able to read some extra Qur’an.