It’s a Ramadaan like no other, with lockdown confining most of us to our homes. In these strange circumstances, we’ll have more time to reflect on our relationship with our Creator, our inner states, and our behaviours – both alone and with others.
In this time of global crisis and personal restriction, what are you learning about yourself? And, once lockdown and the crisis passes, what kind of person do you want to be?
This year, the AccidentalMuslims.com Ramadaan Development Plan once again takes you deeper within. We’ll help you focus on specific, personal areas that you can develop so that, insha-Allah, when this month ends, you’ll be in far better position to share your best self with the new world we’ll walk into.
How does it work?
You may have already done some personal self-development work (such as last year’s programme). Or perhaps the current lockdown and global crisis has highlighted specific areas within that you feel you should work on.
For this programme, there will be three steps:
1. Identify your personal focus areas:
· List four of your strengths – qualities, practices, habits, etc – that you’d like to maintain and even improve on.
· List four of your weaknesses – qualities, practices, habits, etc – that you want to reduce or even eliminate from your life.
2. Set a schedule: For each week of Ramadaan, choose one strength and one weakness you’ll work on, and set goals for the changes you want to make. Here, you’ll decide on what you want to change…not how.
3. Do the work: For each item, plot out steps you can take to achieve your goals. Remember to keep your steps small and consistent. If you can achieve the goals by the end of Ramadaan, that’s great. But do not pressure yourself with so tight a deadline. Long-term changes take time – and 30 days may be far too short a period to effect real, lasting change.
Possible focus areas
This will depend on the strengths and weaknesses you identify yourself. To help get your thinking process started, consider some of these areas you may want to focus on:
· Relationship with Allah and your levels of worship (consistency; quality; depth; etc)
· Your closest relationships with others – especially with those in your household.
· Habits and how you spend your free time.
· Diet and eating habits.
· Sleeping habits.
· Work and productive tasks (including responsibilities at home).
· Finance.
· Physical fitness.
· Mental & emotional well-being.
Any other guidance?
Unlike last year, we won’t give you daily tasks, and we won’t give you formal structures to filter your efforts into. Instead, you will undertake this extremely personal effort in whatever format works best for you.
Whether you want to write it all on paper; do it electronically via a written, audio, or video journal; or any other platform you find most effective…do whatever suits you best.
To stay motivated and moving forward, you could find a development buddy who will hold you accountable (and vice versa). Or you could simply hold yourself to specific timelines or action steps. The choice is entirely yours.
You can draw on any resources you find helpful – such as the many online programmes and courses running during the COVID 19 crisis; online resources; and even reaching out to others who can help – such as life coaches and other professionals.
From our side, AccidentalMuslims.com will publish a list of resources on this page. We’ll update this continuously throughout the month, so please check back here as the month progresses.
Daily salaah times
For the month of Ramadaan 1441, we’ll publish the daily salaah times for Cape Town, Durban, and Johannesburg via a graphic. You can find the graphics on our Facebook page, or sign up for the WhatsApp broadcast list to get it sent directly to you.
(Note: If the broadcast list is full when you try to sign up, please let us know so that we can get you onto an alternate list.)
Get involved
AccidentalMuslims.com is a community-based platform, so we’d love for you to get involved and inspire others.
- Tell us how you’re implementing the programme. Whether in written, audio, or video form, send us your reflections, successes, struggles, etc.
- We’d like to hear about any resources you feel could benefit the community in this programme. Send us your resources and we’ll review them and add them to the list if appropriate.
Resources
Here are some resources we hope will help you as you work through the development tasks of the month. Remember that this is a growing list, so come back often to find new content:
- Last year’s Ramadaan Development Plan focussing on Salaah, Dua, Quran, and Speech.
- Journey through the Quran: a live online course by Shaykh Sharif H. Banna.
- Quran Journey: an app to help you build a closer relationship with the Quran.
- A lecture covering the importance of sleep in light of the sunnah.
- A series of lectures on the sunnah and wellness – including simplicity & decluttering, gratitude, and finance.
- A step by step exercise to analyse and improve your habits.
- Islamic Self Help courses on time management, self-confidence, public speaking, social media productivity, and more.
- Courses to develop career-related skills, soft skills, and much more: Udemy, Coursera, FutureLearn, EdX, Class Central, GetSmarter, and LinkedIn Learning.
Ramadaan 1441 series and content
When Ramadaan arrives, we’re blessed with a flood of daily / nightly series from scholars all over the world – giving us regular content to help boost our spirituality.
Below, we’ve listed some of the content we hope will benefit you this month:
- Mufti Ismail Menk: Comfort in times of crisis series
- Sheikh Riyadh Walls: Nightly taraweeh talks at 8.30 pm (South African time), Jumuah and other lectures.
- Darun Na’im Institute: The Quran cover to cover in 30 days (Translation by Ml Allie Goder, Ml Irshaad Sedick, Ml Zakarriya Harnekar, and many more.)
- Moulana Irshaad Sedick: The stories of the Prophets
- Imam Omar Suleiman: Angels in your presence series
- Dr Yasir Qadhi: The message of the Quran in 30 lessons series
- Ustadh Nouman Ali Khan: Surah Yusuf tafseer series
