Prison in the air.
The Long Flight.
Travel has its joys. And it has its troubles.
The long flight some thousands of miles away taught me five lessons:
Have Gratitude.
Be grateful. Be grateful for life. Be grateful for the opportunity to embark on this journey. Alhamdulillah for the resources.
Alhamdulillah for life.
Alhamdulillah for food, for health, wealth, shelter, family, friends, work and safety.
Alhamdulillah for luxury, for struggle, for happiness, for grief, for joy and for pain.
Alhamdulillah for everthing. For indeed, it is all from The One, Allah. And we can never thank Him enough.
Alhamdulillah for this long journey, and alhamdulillah for the wonderful journeys in life, and alhamdulillah for the journey back to You.
Patience.
Travelling requires patience. You have to put up with things you may not be used to. Roomates you didn’t choose. A shared public toilet. Limited food options. Whatever the case, the journey may be long and you might need to reroute, but we’ll get where were destined to be eventually.
Patience is required while in prison of the air. The cabin is limited. You have to share the same air, the same room, the same floors, the same ceilings.
Some 40 thousand feet above land is manageable only for so long. As the hours go by, you start wondering, how long? How long till we land?
Sometimes, life is like this. We’re in the air, and we don’t know exactly when we’ll land. But we have to be patience and put our trust in Allah, because only He can bring us to safety.
He is Allah, The One, He is Al-Salam… The Source of Peace, The Flawless…
He is Allah—there is no god except Him: the King, the Most Holy, the All-Perfect, the Source of Serenity, the Watcher ˹of all˺, the Almighty, the Supreme in Might,1 the Majestic. Glorified is Allah far above what they associate with Him ˹in worship˺!
Resourcesfulness.
Make do with what you got.
There might not be a lot.
But you can make it count.
Need some leg space? Find some empty rows.
Savour food. When you get your meal, eat what you can and try not to waste anything. Save the biscuits and the bread for later. Maybe the jam too. And the sugar and salt. Never know when it might come in handy.
Solutions for purification… get creative. Cups. Bottles. Do what you have to in order to purify yourself and perform the prayers on time. Long flights mean potentially passing different time zones and thus, having to pray on board.
Value time.
Don’t just pass it with entertainment. Do something useful. What if these were my last moments, would I be ready to meet Allah?
Revise Qur’an if you have memorised.
Read the translations of Qur’an.
Listen to the Qur’an.
Read the seerah.
Learn some ahadith.
Read a useful book.
Scan the maps. Brush up your geography.
Learn a language.
Take a stroll down the aisles to evade DVT.
Do dhikr. Do istighfar.
Read kalimah.
Always think, whether I land or not, let me be in a state pleasing to My Lord, Allah.
Purpose.
Marvel at the beauty beyond the skies.
Not without a purpose. It has all been perfectly designed. Signs. Everywhere.
˹They are˺ those who remember Allah while standing, sitting, and lying on their sides, and reflect on the creation of the heavens and the earth ˹and pray˺, “Our Lord! You have not created ˹all of˺ this without purpose. Glory be to You! Protect us from the torment of the Fire.
I’m only here for Allah. And some things in life take long to acquire. The journey is just as important as the destination.
So do it right.
Only For The One.
- The Long Flight.
- Was It An Angel In Disguise?
- Background Noise
- Leaving The Country…For Good
- Suicide.
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The long flight had me thinking, thanking, dreaming and doing…the journey is long but worth it…