Psychology

Either at work or in daily life, car horns for no reason. someone dragging their feet without lifting them. cutting a public service queue. leaving clothes in the gym changing room instead of the locker. a bank agent typing five words per minute. an uber driver talking on the phone. someone playing a video on the metro without headphones.

Wren’s heart is deeply faithful. when we lived in the same building, I never once saw him miss a prayer at the mosque. not even Fajr. no matter the hour, he was always there.

I met him when I was around eighteen, and we remained friends from that point on. he has one of the most beautiful voices I have ever heard in Quran recitation. our conversations were light. he was gentle, considerate, quiet. a pure soul. he did not have many people around him, at least that is how it felt to me.

If you were to ask me what the worst feeling is, I would not choose one single emotion. it is not anger alone. not grief alone. not sadness or longing by themselves. the worst feeling is when they all gather at once. tension born from emotional suppression. confusion layered over alienation. longing mixed with hopelessness. pressure sitting beside grief. anger tangled with sadness. it is not one storm. it is many storms colliding in the same sky.

The most important of these skills, and power’s crucial foundation, is the ability to master your emotions. An emotional response to a situation is the single greatest barrier to power,

“What you can’t say owns you. what you hide controls you.” — something my brother Mustafa kept as a bio, somewhere around 2016

I do not complain about the life I am living.
I do not point fingers at the surroundings anymore.
I used to do that, a lot, but I stopped. now I look inward and stay there. and sometimes a quiet question rises.
what if I never stopped blaming the world and allowed it to carry my pain for me.
what if naming the environment was easier than naming myself.