You know there are really two ways of being in the world. There is the way or you can describe the way of competition and then there is the way or you can describe the way of cooperation.

Nothing Else Matters - Poetry by Shahbano Aliani.

We are very fortunate, very blessed to be among people who have had to claim the Deen, because those people who have had to claim the Deen also are those people who have in a sense had to reinvent the Deen.

Every person is deeply untrustworthy. Not because you’re deliberately untrustworthy, but try the best you can, and understand that you will fail.

Destination - Poetry by Shahbano Aliani.

As we’ve understood nafs in our tradition, nafs is your individual identity. The sense that you have that you exist as a discrete, separate being. But the root condition of our individual existence – for all human beings is exactly the same.