Why I finally decided to document life as a French Muslim
Unlike my other publication "Trésors anthropologiques", this one wasn't suppose to exist. Here's why.
This publication, unlike Trésors anthropologiques, wasn't suppose to exist. I love writing, but at the beginning, I found journaling and diaries a bit boring to read and also very personal to be shared.
1. History and stories
However, during the last years, I studied and read a few historical documents. I was so amazed by the fact that people or cultures that had documented things by using words on multiple surfaces gave us so much information about how they lived at their times. It is a big ressource of information as well of a big source of inspiration, especially when its your ancestors. Look at Greek culture : those people wrote a lot and now, thousands of years later, people still identify as being stoïcist or hedonist, and still read Socrates.
1. Why this, why now
It’s been now a few years since I think that I should write and document this. I often think about it when I take my shower, and then completely forget about it. Because I’m always struggling with time managing, I’m saying “whatever, you don’t have time for it”. But who else will ?
Each event, “hot” news, and so-called big controversies that ignited the country week after week, month after month, year after year, made apparent all the injustices that exists more and more. When reading and hearing about international as well as France’s news, while studying part of History (especially linked with Muslims), I became more and more convinced that I live in a very a special time in History.
I don’t say this arrogantly, as I would be a hero, nor do I say that I’m living in the worst situation in the world, so that the whole world should know about it.I’m doing this because, as humans, we look for inspiration, in the past or present, here and there, so that we can know what actions we can do and what are the mistakes we should avoid.
That’s the whole purpose of sharing experiences : it inspires other people to do things or avoid mistakes by seeing what results it produces.
When we read (hi)stories, that’s what we enjoy. The experience, living the lives that we don’t have, seeing the results of it, so that we can build a direction to follow in life. That’s also what we do when we read fictions or watch movies and series.
I just created Trésors anthropologiques a few weeks ago, but a lot of topics that came into my head were more desciptive of life in France as a Muslim. I thought “what I want to share need a whole publication on its own, init ?” And because I now that I stuggled a lot with procrastination, I decided to not think about it and do it right away, not even 2 hours after having the idea.
Now, bismiLlah.
2. See it as a diary that uncoming generations could be reading
I know that Allah created people, each one with their own skills and interests. Some of them are so passionate about researching into History that I’m telling to myself that maybe their role is to share stories from the past with their contemporaries so that they could be inspired and know how it comes that they are living in their specific situation (in the future). I want to help those people find a part of the informations they are seeking by simply doing one thing : writing a personal diary.
3. See it as having news from a part of the Ummah
I’m also thinking that as I am interested myself into knowing how other Muslims live in China, Pakistan, Senegal or elsewhere and find this very interesting, other people might think the same about Muslims in France.
Let’s have a strongly connected family, brothers and sisters !
