Often, you meet people and instantly like them, there’s a connection, you vibe, and then sometimes, with others, there’s just animosity and discomfort. You either really like people or you genuinely don’t and you cannot fathom why. With the first, it’s easy, you tell yourself you were meant to meet this person, the feeling had always been fated. With others though, the ones you don’t get along with so easily, the ones you struggle to tolerate, they’re the difficult beings and, perhaps, this makes you dislike them even more. It’s a cycle, you love that you love certain people and you hate that you hate others.
I read somewhere, once, ages ago, that there’s a reason behind the way we feel when we meet people. You see, before we’re born, we existed in this place called Alim-e-arwah. From what I remember, this translates to Realm of Souls. I don’t know much about it but what I do know is that we existed and that’s where we met these people and so the feelings thats we feel, they’ve lasted between us all for a time span that is longer than that of just our time on Earth. The feeling is otherworldly and what’s even more beautiful is that it actually makes sense.
Recently, I found myself thinking about this again and I realised something else.
It has something to do with the story of Adam and Eve. Something that I have always found fascinating about their story is that it is common to all of mankind. You don’t need to have faith to know their story. It’s something that is shared universally, by all of us. It’s a story about temptation, about regret, about mistakes. The notion of loss dominates, and truly so. But that’s not just what the story is. They were real and they existed and in addition to all the other human sentiments of loss and regret and mistaken beliefs, they also shared one common emotion between them both and that is of love. They loved each other and as with everything else they felt, they were the first to feel that too. And so it goes. But before that happened, they were just two beings, in heaven. Together.
Adam was created first and existed alongside the angels in heaven. The natural reaction is to think he ought not to have any grievances. He had no worldly struggles. What he had was much greater. He felt it from within, this bizarre sense of emptiness and restlessness and I suppose what was more frustrating than the feeling itself was not actually knowing why he felt that way.
He went to bed one night and as we often still do, he spoke to God. He explained the feeling and asked for relief. What’s important to realise here is that he did not try to seek to fill the void with anything or anyone that surrounded him - he went straight to his Lord. He didn’t even know what he was asking for, he just trusted God to cure the feeling.
The next morning, he woke and there she was. Eve. Never having met another human before, he questioned her existence and identity. She replied and answered that she was a creation of God’s and how He created her so that Adam may find peace and tranquility in her.
They were together and they were content and then as happens, they were separated. When God sent them both down to Earth after the devil misguided them, God did so separately. There’s no consensus on where exactly, but what is agreed is that they were dropped countries apart. Lost, alone, confused. They wandered the Earth day and night in search of one another. Eventually they found each another and alongside one another, they found clarity. As they found each other, they found a greater sense of inner peace. They found the missing pieces of themselves.
This story has and perhaps will always be one of my favourites. But more importantly, it’s also one of my biggest reminders. It’s the story I retell myself every time I find myself lacking Sabr. It’s the story I tell myself every time I start feeling restless. I remind myself, this is the path of Adam a.s., and as the feeling did for him, it too shall for you. I just need to trust God.
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