From Tragedy to Fulfillment: A Conversation with Shazia Imam

Shazia's story begins in a small American town, where she faced unique challenges as a Muslim. It was not until later in her life that she renewed her connection with the Divine after losing her son soon after his birth and then going through a divorce. Despite the taboos around these topics in her community, Shazia is unapologetic about sharing her story to let other women know they are not alone and that they, too, can find fulfillment after tragedy.

Keep listening to more about Shazi's serendipitous encounter with a spiritual teacher that helped her find a deeper approach to Islamic spirituality, in contrast to the Islam she was raised within a traditional Indian-American Muslim household. Along the way, Shazia has explored numerous healing modalities, reexamined cultural and religious norms as a Muslim woman, and found a way to live a balanced life.

Find Shazia Imam online at these locations:
TheLifeEngineer.com
IG: @thelifeengineer.com
Facebook.com/ShaziaTLE
Feminine & Fulfilled Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/feminine-fulfilled/id1347262113

Chapters

• 0:21 Exploring Spirituality and Healing Journeys
• 11:45 Spiritual Journey and Healing Path
• 23:27 Somatic Healing and Love-Based Islam
• 31:54 The Evolution of Islam
• 40:46 Finding Online Resources for Personal Development

Transcript

Rose Aslan: 0:21

I'm Dr Rose Aslan and I'm a transformational life coach, breathwork teacher and scholar of religion who supports helpers, rebels, misfits, marginalized, and spiritual and spiritually curious folks. Welcome to Rahma Throws, where I create a bold space of warmth, understanding and pluralism in a world that often feels chaotic, polarized and judgmental. You are not alone, and the stories I share here will reinforce this. Each episode will delve into inspiring stories, practical tips and thought provoking and heartfelt conversations with thought leaders, healers, coaches, mental health professionals and other individuals who are part of the quiet revolution of women healing around the world. So join me on this podcast exploration as we explore what happens when we allow compassion into our lives, one story at a time. Hi salams. Today, on this episode, I have with me Shazia Imam, speaking from Dallas, texas. She is an award-winning speaker, icf certified coach and host of the top 12 podcasts.

Rose Aslan: 1:58

Feminine and Fulfilled. After experiencing her own life while apart, after losing her son and then husband, shazia realized it was a divine push to begin living her real life. This blossomed into finding her soulmate, discovering her feminine power and living her deep purpose, one which involves women unleashing their whole selves to feel fulfilled, happy and whole. Isn't life more fabulous that way? Shazia, welcome. Any woman and any Muslim woman who is on this path to helping other women fulfill their divine feminine to come into their own, to find their purpose of life is a friend of mine, so it's such a pleasure to have you. So let's get started. I was really excited to speak with you. First of all, my condolences on having lost your son and your husband, and I'm glad that you will be able to share this with me and that you've processed enough to be able to share this with us today.

Shazia Imam: 2:58

Yeah, and I just want to clarify. I was thinking recently I think I need to shift my bio a bit because we lost our son, but our marriage fell apart.

Rose Aslan: 3:07

So I lost my husband.

Shazia Imam: 3:09

the grief was in losing the marriage, which of course, we can touch on, and actually at the time that we're talking now, rose, my father passed away recently as well, which is quite unexpected, and the grief process was actually quite different. So it's been a really interesting journey.

Rose Aslan: 3:25

My condolences on the loss of your father as well.

Shazia Imam: 3:27

Thank you, thank you.

Rose Aslan: 3:29

Yeah, so as a result of this, it sounds like you've been through some very difficult times. You've been pushed to explore your inner self, perhaps more than other people, due to these tragedies. So could you tell me a little bit? When do you remember first starting getting interested in spirituality in general, before we get into healing? When did you get interested in spirituality?

Shazia Imam: 3:50

So spirituality for me, I would say, came in two phases. I was born Muslim into a Desi South Asian family and I was born and raised in the United States. So my experience growing up in the 80s and 90s as a Muslim in a small white town was going to the musjid, having potlucks, having a community, and so definitely that was a part of my identity. Being Muslim was part of my identity. But because I grew up in, like I said, a small town, I was one of very few brown people. I also took on an identity of being white.

Shazia Imam: 4:28

I think I thought I was white until I was in college, to be honest. So for me, I always felt that there were two parts of me and I just lived like that. So for me, I didn't really find my own sense of spirituality until I was about 22. It was my senior year of college and then I found it again at 30 after my son passed away and my marriage fell apart. I definitely came to a very spiritual relationship with Allah. So I've always felt very close to Allah. But I've definitely transitioned from the Halal Haram of Sunday school to then learning more about my Dean in college, becoming practicing, putting on the hijab when I graduated and then moving into that deeper sense of connection and reflection when I turn 30 and beyond.

Rose Aslan: 5:22

So could you tell us, if you're willing, what happened when you were 22, other than kind of learning more about Islam?

Shazia Imam: 5:29

Sure. So there was this guy that I had met and I got really excited. He was Muslim, he was also Desi, and I was so excited because I thought, oh my gosh, here I am, I'm going into my senior year of college and he's going to be the guy and I will check off all the boxes of doing the thing I'm supposed to do as a Muslim girl and in our community. You get the degree, you get married, you marry another Muslim Desi, and then you live that white picket fenced dream with jobs and buy a house and all of the things. And unfortunately it turned out that he had a mental illness. I don't think I've ever shared this story actually publicly. So here I am just thinking my fantasy is going to be fulfilled. Prince Charming has come and he has a very severe mental illness and even knowing that, even finding that out, I thought it's okay. But he checks off all the boxes and who else is going to marry me? I thought nobody would want to be with me.

Shazia Imam: 6:30

I'd always been a rebel, I definitely was a nonconformist, so the idea of a Desi guy being into me just felt like I had hit the jackpot. Everything happens to us for a reason and I believe he came into my life specifically because he gave me this book. He gave me this book and I don't even remember the name of it, subhanallah but in just the first few pages it said something to the effect of if you are spending more attention, paying more attention, or spending more time or giving more priority to something other than Allah, than you are an idolater. It just hit me and I was like, oh my gosh, whoa, what am I doing with my life? And now that I say that, it sounds very harsh. Right, I don't subscribe to that. But at that time we're on our journey and I thought I've got to change.

Shazia Imam: 7:19

So, as senior year started, what had actually happened is there was a new community that had come up at my university too, because I did try to join the Muslim Student Association my freshman year, but they were all these international male students. It didn't fit me. They were talking about whether music is halal or haram. Come on, I'm a freshman in college. That's not what I want to be talking about. So, by the time I hit my senior year, there were two women who had come together and they were reviving a real undergraduate Muslim feel. And so, again, timing, it's all about timing. So I joined and it was wonderful. It was a new group of students, so many of us really coming back to our dean.

Shazia Imam: 8:02

It was also post 9-11. We're literally talking about that same time frame, so a lot of things are happening at once and so I just got really involved. There was a community of sisters. There were nine of us were still bonded. Two decades later we're still so close and, yeah, it was just a lot of learning. It was almost like starting over again, and so that's where I started really deepening my learning and understanding outside of what I'd learned in Sunday school. Also, feeling that community at where I was in my life at that point, and that was very important. To be on that journey with others, that's what I needed at that place community, if sounds was really fortifying in your spiritual experience.

Shazia Imam: 8:45

Yeah, absolutely Coming back to the muzzard feeling that to the point that, yes, when I graduated I did put on hijab. All of the women in our group, we all put on hijab. I was the last I said no, I really have to fill this out. I never, ever thought I would wear hijab. Like I was a girl with the pixie cut with purple streaks in her hair, like hijab just didn't seem like something that would be of interest to me. I liked it for others, but again, our path. It's so interesting.

Shazia Imam: 9:16

So at 22, I graduated, I put on hijab and my dad was so angry with me. My mom was like do whatever. But my dad really said now you're going to lose all these opportunities. You had the whole world in front of you and you're becoming an extremist. So it's really interesting because people thought my dad was making me wear it and in fact, my dad was so upset about it. So there's these nuances, even within our community that I've noticed that non-Muslims don't really understand. It's not just you do things a certain way. So even that was part of my journey and saying, dad, I really do want to wear this. And two weeks after I started wearing hijab, I got three job offers in the worst market. So again, all of these things part of the journey, such clarity in this was the right path. I was doing the right thing and going from there Beautiful.

Rose Aslan: 10:10

And I love that he had purple hair. I also had purple hair back in high school, as well as green and blue hair, so I love that fellow colored hair at the Sniadam Beautiful. And I think MSAs and Muslim Student Associations for many American and Canadian Muslims are often really important places that play a pivotal role in them finding religion, spirituality, away from home, away from the mosque setting. So that's important. That also for you played that role you mentioned then at the age of 30, when you lost your son. Would you be willing to share more about that? I can't imagine having had my son at 31,. I just couldn't imagine what it would be like to lose your son.

Shazia Imam: 10:48

Yeah, it was very devastating. So at 28, we lost our baby boy and it was very unexpected and my marriage started to unravel, understandably, after that, and it's interesting because losing my son was so difficult, but losing the marriage was actually harder. It was harder because it really points to the pressure that we have as a community for our lives to look a certain way, and I couldn't imagine failing. That's what I thought it was. I thought it was failing and so I'm going through all of this. I'm at the lowest point in my life. The lowest point, I mean to the point where I would drive around and I would wish a car would come hit me and that I would die, because I didn't think my life had any value. I thought it was worthless. I lost. Now my marriage is ending what's my worth? So in 2010, I had turned 30 and a dear friend of mine, zora, she told me about this program called Rihla, and Rihla is a three-week spiritual journey that you take. It's in all sorts of places around the world and it was coined by Sheikh Hamza Yusuf, and what he wanted to do is he wanted to create the opportunity for people to have. In Islam, there is this idea of if you go away for 40 days, if you inculcate a habit for 40 days, like that's how it really lasts. He wanted to take Western Muslims and give them this opportunity to learn their farthalain like basics of Islam, and it's surprising because even when you think you know a lot of things, we actually don't know the basics. There's so much to relearn. So it was going to be in Spain three weeks in southern Spain and the mountains and Granada. Zora says Shazie, I really think you should go to this. And I thought, zora, you've got to be kidding me, because my husband has pronounced divorce and we're going into the Iddith period and my Iddith period will end while I'm in Spain. Are you kidding me? I have to save this marriage. I can't go, I can't go and she's you have to go, just go. And I don't know. I'd listen to her. I really valued her and, again, love is always putting things in your path.

Shazia Imam: 13:02

So I filled out the application, I was accepted and I was writing it. I didn't want to go and when I arrived because I did go I found myself being very much of a loner. So I've already shared with you how much community matters. I am an extrovert and I get to the program where, literally, like the women were staying in a barn okay, an old stable, basically with all these bunk beds, you are around people, but I didn't want to talk to anyone. I was just in my own place. I came truly to just receive whatever I was meant to, because my life was at its end.

Shazia Imam: 13:42

I felt I was thinking what am I doing here? Why am I here? What is going on with my life? Everything is out of control, everything. And so I would just be wandering, I would wander the mountains and I would just come back for meals and then I would wander and I remember one day making du'a to Allah and I just said make this clear, make it easy. Why do you have me here, just really crying out in those moments where you really like there's nothing else. And I remember just making this du'a and then going for lunch and I sat next to this woman, this older woman who was from Australia and I don't know why. I started telling her my whole story and so she's listening and she says there's somebody you need to meet and I said, okay, she said the Sheikh of Dr Omar bin Abdullah is here from the Gambia. Sheikh Mohammed.

Shazia Imam: 14:36

Yes, and she said he's here for one day and you need to meet him. And I said, okay, I don't know who he is. I was the first foray into this, mirjul. I'm using AirQuest, but the spiritual part of the Islamic community.

Rose Aslan: 14:49

This is great to hear how someone from more mainstream community got exposed, so keep on going, please.

Shazia Imam: 14:54

Yes, she gets it set up, so I meet with him and he doesn't speak English at all. And she said the other, the manners in which that you speak to a scholar or a shoe of this level is to just ask what advice do you have for me? So I went with one of the volunteer coordinators, Zaynab, and she speaks Arabic, and so I just sat there and I guess he asked her why is she here? I don't even know what he asked, because it was an Arabic. I just asked what advice do you have for me? So he looks at me and he gives me this weird where there's a compilation of Vicar and for me it was Vicar and two Suras to read.

Rose Aslan: 15:34

So to translate for people who don't know Arabic, as Zicar, as Sufi remembrance, or remembrance of God, and Sufi's have formulaic prayers that they repeat in order to repeat, in order to purify their hearts more.

Shazia Imam: 15:46

Yes, and we even have Vicar. Like even mainstream Muslims, like, after you pray, you'll repeat like Subhanallah, alhamdulillah, he gives me something very specific, it's a word. So, when it's a compilation of these different things, it's a word that's specific to you. And as soon as he said it, because he said say Ya Allah 111 times, say Ya Wadud 111 times- and I knew what Ya Wadud meant.

Shazia Imam: 16:10

The most loving, ya Allah, of course, allah, o Allah the most loving. And then recite Surah Insura and Surah I can't think of the name Idha Jah Nasr, surah Nasr. So as soon as he says this, I already know Surah Insura. This is the Surah that says verily, with every hardship there are eases. And it repeats itself Verily, with every hardship there are eases. And I just started crying because I knew I was like God. He's seasoned to my soul. And the thing is, it wasn't him, it was that Allah had sent this. It was I had cried out and then Allah had sent the response. I'm going to start crying again.

Shazia Imam: 16:48

And I knew in that moment that I was really taken care of. Allah loved me. I felt it deeply and so I said, okay, that was it, the meeting was done. And so I started reciting this word every day and I decided it's like it gave me the relief to be like I don't have to control anything. There was nothing for me to control, and so I let go completely.

Shazia Imam: 17:11

And this point was pivotal for me to understand that our relationship with Allah is not transactional. I speak a lot about this with my clients. It's not transactional. We don't do something, that we're not good, and so Allah responds we just are. And then Allah is there and that is what I felt that Allah was taking care of me in this hardest of time in my life, and that set me on a beautiful spiritual journey that still to this day, I feel so connected to Allah. Not because of the things I do I am practicing, alhamdulillah, I'm observant but I feel connected with Allah through nature, through conversation, through just the miracles that I see, the knowing that I have, that truly I can let go because Allah has it taken care of and so much has opened up for me since.

Rose Aslan: 18:11

Beautiful. Thank you for sharing, shazia, and would you say that your healing path coincides, as intertwined, with your spiritual path?

Shazia Imam: 18:20

Yes, I really. I'm like how long do you have? The story of my life is so fascinating because after that moment where I truly I felt like Allah had sent me this message, I found that once I let go, life started moving very rapidly for me. So, to finish that story because I did mention I was right in the, which means for Muslims, this is the period where it gives the time to reconcile. You have this three month period and if you reconcile in this time, then you're still together, and if you don't, then divorce is final, and I think it's such a beautiful thing to allow people to come back.

Rose Aslan: 18:58

Actually and technically, it's also to make sure the woman is not pregnant too.

Shazia Imam: 19:01

Yes, I'm not into all the technical anymore, but you're right.

Rose Aslan: 19:06

My scholar coming back for a moment. Yes, you are correct.

Shazia Imam: 19:10

You are correct. So when I came back, the divorce was final and I don't know what my former husband thought, but he thought that we were good. So he called me when I had arrived back, thinking he was going to pick me up from the airport, and I said we're divorced, like we're not together, and I actually didn't tell anybody about this and I lived out of my car for about two months because, again, the shame I was still so worried about the shame. I lived out of my car. It was right Ramadan. It was right around that time too, it was in that season and it was just a very spiritual Ramadan and it was the freest I'd ever felt in my life, because actually nobody knew where I was and there was a part of me that's a little bit of a loner.

Shazia Imam: 19:56

It's really interesting because I'm such an extrovert and I love people so much. But there's a part of me that when I can be alone, I feel a freedom that I don't when people are like where are you, what's going on, what's happening? So I was completely on my own and when I let him know because then he called me again a few months later and he's, I want to try to work things out and I said we're done. And then he said, oh, okay, but I want to be with you. I want to be with you, and this whole time he had been not wanting to be with him. So here it is, I let go, I let go completely, and now he wants me back. So it's very interesting. So we did get back together, we did do this Cliff Notes version, we did get back together for a few years and then ultimately ended, alhamdulillah, and that was the right time for us.

Rose Aslan: 20:43

But yes, that was part of my healing journey.

Shazia Imam: 20:45

Thank you, that was part of my healing journey. It's almost as though Allah knew, like she needs baby steps, she needs gentleness, she needs tenderness, like we can't just all of a sudden do everything all at once. And that worked for me because by the time it ended again. So actually, for people on the inside, I'm like I'm on my third marriage now because we had to have our Nica again.

Rose Aslan: 21:09

So I married him twice. I love it. So I'm on my third marriage. Two men, three marriages.

Shazia Imam: 21:18

Two men, three marriages. It's very interesting because that was part of my healing. When we got back together again, I came in a little bit different. Now I'm coming in and with a spiritual perspective, Now I'm going deeper into my journey. Now I'm diving deeper into who I am and what happens if I let go. And those years were pivotal too for the healing. So I really love the way that Allah just does everything beautifully and just the timing. We as humans we think, oh no, by 30, like I was thinking, oh my God, my life's going to be over because I'm going to be in a divorcee at 30. And guess what? I met my now husband at 35 and he's fantastic. We're a really good match together. We're going on almost eight years and now when I look back at my 30 year old self, I do wish I could have said you're going to be so good. It's just not in the way that you thought, it's just not in the timeline that you thought Time to us means something, but to Allah it is something else.

Shazia Imam: 22:20

And I just love understanding that and even when I don't understand it, just allowing myself freefall into it, even when I don't understand something, I love that I've come to a point where I can reflect on Allah knows, and it's going to just work out just right.

Rose Aslan: 22:37

That's a wonderful story. Thank you for sharing how you found hope and beauty inspiration through the difficulties and through the hardships. Absolutely. I'd love to talk more about healing modalities. Most people who are in this kind of world that we're in coaching and helping others. Often we try different healing modalities. Which ones have you tried? Which ones have resonated with you the most?

Shazia Imam: 22:59

I love all the modalities, right, I think anything works and I'm a believer and throw it all, throw everything at it. If there's not someone's like, is that really going to work? I'm like I don't know, but it doesn't hurt to try. But I love about healing is that all of these modalities at some level they just feel good, they allow something to be processed. So where I'm at in my journey now is something that I think isn't talked about as often, is somatic healing.

Rose Aslan: 23:25

We're in the right place now. Here's Shazia. I talk a lot about somatic healing here, so excellent.

Shazia Imam: 23:30

Yeah, our body really knows things. So, again, they see girl growing up in the States. It's a very petty way of thinking. It's all about practicality. It's all about get the good education so you can keep checking these boxes. I had this theme of checking boxes in my life. It's a very mental exercise, kingbok. But our healing and our movement forward doesn't come from checking off boxes. It comes from that deeper work and our body actually knows.

Shazia Imam: 24:01

The answers are in our body as well, and so I have found the thing that allows me to be the most connected is any sort of somatic healing or somatic work. So that can look like for some people it's breath work. I think at a very basic level it can be breathing, and if you go all the way, it's dancing and movement and anything that involves your body. Yeah, for me what it's been is the dance and the movement. So anything that incorporates that, I find that I'm able to really tap into myself. I can really tap into my intuition. I can tap into letting, like releasing things, creating big visions, like feeling and seeing the vision that comes to me when I'm in that movement and when I can.

Shazia Imam: 24:50

it's just like letting myself go because it gets me out of my head. Otherwise I can be a very heady person. I'm an engineer in my background, so I love it. I wish that we would do more of it. I think it's something still very new, even as a modality, but I love it and it can be like fun. It can just be in your room to a song. It can be. If you want guidance, there's guided somatic experiences. There's so many ways to do it.

Rose Aslan: 25:16

Thank you for sharing. I knew that's why we buy, because I'm also very much into somatic healing, body breath work. All that is so powerful for people, so I'm so glad you've also brought that into your life and maybe with others around you. What's in your toolbox then, whenever you're noticing that your nervous system is out of whack and dysregulated? What do you pull out? What are your kind of go to resources?

Shazia Imam: 25:37

My go to resources is definitely around breath. Oh, the longer exhale I don't know the technical term for you. Could do a count of an inhale for three in your exhale through the mouth.

Shazia Imam: 25:47

You could do for a six. I do this with my clients before we start our sessions and I love that. I'll do the same thing If I find myself like my nervous system is like out of whack or charged or whatever is coming up, I'll do that, and just that I can think about it it's done. So I'll do that. Something else that I really like, and I don't know if it's considered a modality per se, but I just feel my feelings. I think it's really important to feel the feelings.

Shazia Imam: 26:13

So, don't resist them that's something I used to do before I went through all of this work is I didn't want to feel the feelings. I wanted to compartmentalize them and put them away because I had to show up a certain way. And now I just feel the feelings. If I'm sad, I'm going to cry. There's nothing wrong with it, and sometimes my husband will say what happened and I'm like I don't know, nothing happened, I'm just sad. It's okay. It's okay to be sad, but it's okay to be angry, it's okay to be happy, even it's also. Don't feel guilty for feeling happy, feel all the feelings to their fullness. And that acceptance of my feelings is powerful because it allows me to be.

Rose Aslan: 26:52

Writing the waves of being human.

Shazia Imam: 26:54

I think we can call yes, the feminine is very cyclical and, just really leaning into that, I just pull from that all the time. I really do a check in. And one other tool I've been doing recently I want to share this one. This is so good too is I don't know. I think I saw this on Instagram somewhere, but it talked about when you wake up in the morning, you're in a theta state. Again, not sure the technical terms, but you're in a theta state, which means that your subconscious and conscious, I think, are more connected. Something's happening Anyhow.

Shazia Imam: 27:32

It's a great time to not just have an alarm blaring or grab your phone or start the day Right when your eyes are fluttering. Oh, it's a great time to connect to whatever it is that you're wanting to connect with, whether that's on a spiritual level. I actually learned this in my spiritual path in 2010. You can actually, at that moment, ask a love, make an intention for the day. Love, make my day XYZ, whatever you feel. So it's the moment you can connect spiritually. Just recently, what I've been doing is I tell myself I am loved, I am safe, I am held, and it just starts my day off really grounded because you're affirming to yourself in that theta state where you're at. So it can go either way. You can either tell yourself something or you can connect with Allah.

Rose Aslan: 28:23

Either one has always been very helpful for me that's really powerful, especially nowadays, since most of us are so addicted to our screens. Probably what's the first thing most of us do is we grab our phone, right the news and then we get active. Our nervous system is activated immediately if we open up the news or something right, or look at social media and we see other people's issues and events going on around the world. So what a better way to start the morning. Nations are connecting with the divine. Beautiful, great idea for other people to try out. Anything else you want to share, that's in your toolbox.

Shazia Imam: 28:55

The last one I'll share is forgiveness. This one was really important, so I use a modality called Ho'oponopono, which is from the Polynesian culture. It might be from others as well. I had learned this as a way to really release things. It's a great exercise to do. I'm going to just share this podcast episode. It talks about it, but on my podcast, feminine and Fulfilled. If you listen to episode two, forgiveness, I talk about it in there in depth. What I love about forgiveness is it really is a modality to release and let go.

Shazia Imam: 29:33

I find that the thing that I can hold on to are just the recurring thoughts or this person did something, or why did this happen to me? There is this quote that says that resentment is like drinking poison and hoping the other person will die. I don't ever think I had that level of resentment, to be quite honest, but I still had too many things sitting on my brain, too many things that when I did forgiveness the first time, oh my gosh, it was like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders.

Shazia Imam: 30:07

I find that I still incorporate that. It's almost like it was a big thing when I first did it, but now it's more of a maintenance thing, and I love forgiveness because it allows me to live in the world in such a trusting way. I was everybody wonderful to me? No, they're not, but I choose to see the world in a way that people are, and if they're not, then I let it go. I don't need to hold on to it. I don't need to be strong and right and again, I'm not trying to control my life. I want to see the good in life and I want to be a part of that. Forgiveness is really a great tool to allow that to happen.

Rose Aslan: 30:48

Yeah, that's beautiful, and, of course, in Islam we also have istighfar, seeking forgiveness from Allah, and so it's a beautiful to take from. Personally, I love learning from all the different wisdom traditions, and then it also connects back to our own tradition, right, there's nothing different, and might as well make it even more fulfilling and even more rich with other traditions within it.

Shazia Imam: 31:08

I love that you reminded me of that. You're right, it's exactly like what we have.

Rose Aslan: 31:12

Yeah, beautiful. So what does it mean to be Muslim now for you? You've been this long journey from being, as you mentioned, from a traditional Dacey American household with a pretty conventional approach to understanding Islam I'm assuming from a fair based approach and a lot of people I've worked with, a lot of women I've worked with, come from similar backgrounds. What does it mean now to be Muslim? What does it mean to be on the spiritual path as a Muslim, far removed from that original way of understanding Islam? I would perhaps describe what you've told me as being on the love based Islam approach, and this is what I speak a lot about my podcast. What is that like? And yeah, tell us what that's like really, and then we'll go from there.

Shazia Imam: 31:51

I would agree wholeheartedly. It's very love based. My Islam has definitely evolved into understanding that the real gem of our spirituality and our faith is actually our relationship with our creator, and that is what I really focus on. Again, I'm observant, so I follow the things, but I'm not into the things. I'm not into the rituals I'm not into is this right or is this wrong? I'm over the halal and haram. Ultimately, allah, who created the heavens and the universe, I don't think is worried about your nail polish. Okay, I'll just use that example, because people can talk ad naaz and we're looking to somebody to give us a ruling on something. And look, here's what I love.

Shazia Imam: 32:34

There's something that Siddi Yahya wrote. This I had said once Yahya wrote this yeah, so he had said you know how we talk about the straight path, right, surah Fahd, the straight path to that. We need to follow the straight path. He said we all have a straight path, but it's different, it's unique for each of us. That really landed for me. So for some people, they really appreciate the clarity in the rules. They're very scribbulous, want to make sure they're not getting anything wrong, and I love that for them.

Shazia Imam: 33:03

And for somebody like me who is more free spirited. That's not going to work. What works is this feeling of Allah is with me, so it's for me. It's definitely shifted into a deep relationship. It's shifted from feeling that Allah is like a schoolmaster Cause that's how I used to see Allah as a male schoolmaster, I feel Allah is very maternal. There's a feminine we know that has the masculine and the feminine attributes, or the 99 names that we know of. I really feel into that. I feel that like being held, being taken care of, being understanding as my friend.

Shazia Imam: 33:44

That is where I'm at today and it does have me sometimes raising an eyebrow at things that I did grow up with traditionally, wondering what, like I need to know a little bit more about that. Is that really true? And it definitely has me feeling very jarred and annoyed when more of the cultural norms come in where women have to be in a completely separate space. That's not a part of our sunnah or our example from the Prophet Sallallahu Alaihi Wasallam or things that really put women in a less than position Again, not a part of our faith, but yet there's plenty of cultural norms that make that happen.

Shazia Imam: 34:24

So I find myself definitely openly saying I love following more of a Sufi path. I haven't joined any Therigar group or anything like that, but before I used to feel embarrassed. Don't say I'm Sufi, but I am being. Sufi is also part of our theme, the saw, so I definitely feel more spiritual and I feel really comfortable with that and I'm still continuing to evolve. I'm still continuing to evolve and I'm open to that and I'm curious about it and I know that my constant will always be a love.

Rose Aslan: 34:56

Yeah, absolutely beautiful. Thank you for sharing, and it's that curiosity that keeps someone like you keep on looking and exploring. Allow yourself to see what else is out there, to look into other traditions, to see what benefit you can bring into your own tradition. It's so rich what you've shared. As I mentioned before, I work with a lot of this particular woman who have enraged the Halal Haram dichotomy, who really want to go towards his love based Islam. They find it so difficult because the guilt is so strong. What do you tell people who are struggling with the fact that they know this love based Islam is true for them, but this guilt won't go away. They can't remove it from their conscious?

Shazia Imam: 35:32

Yeah, there's a lot of unraveling that has to happen. When I first started on my journey to my spiritual journey was in 2010. I would say my personal growth journey, like the finding myself, really started in 2013. So they were happening at the same time and it was very afraid that if I went on this personal growth journey, that I would actually lose my faith. That was my biggest concern and I didn't want to do that, and so I found myself being very called to this journey. I was starting to get training as a coach to and learning these modalities we were talking about earlier and going to events that I've never seen anything like it and I thinking, oh, my.

Shazia Imam: 36:13

God, is this shirk, Is this wrong? Is this allowed? And what I learned over time is that I allowed myself to start trusting myself. I love that. I don't have the specific thing to do or not do, because everybody has to go through it themselves. I can be on this side being like. Of course it's great, it's wonderful to be on this side, Trusting yourself pushing your intuition, your inner wisdom, is leading you to a good place.

Shazia Imam: 36:42

Exactly, it's about trusting that. I knew enough, I had enough faith to understand if something was going beyond what I thought was okay, that I could not participate or pull back and then allow myself also to be open to things that, yeah, you know what. Maybe I wouldn't. Maybe if, like I, was standing in a community of Muslims, I might think I'm weird. But will Allah think this is weird? No, so, being open to new things and how I expand my heart in so many ways and it had me connecting with Allah in a deeper and deeper way and that's a piece Again, if you trust yourself and you also ask Allah I definitely would ask Allah all the time.

Shazia Imam: 37:24

Please make sure I'm doing things right. I still do that. Allah will make things clear as well. So it is good to start exploring. It is good to move out of the halal-haram framework, because if you don't, what I have seen is when women get stuck in that place that where you're talking about, they don't allow themselves to explore that more spirituality, that love, what happens is they start losing faith and that becomes a more slippery slope. It's actually better for you to explore that love-based Islam, that more spiritual place, than to not and then continue to be disillusioned, upset, not connecting at all, because Allah wants us to turn back. So you can't make any mistake that you can't turn back from. If that helps you to say, okay, let me learn or try, then I've always seen it be very expansive for myself and for other women to move that way.

Rose Aslan: 38:24

That's really useful and I'm definitely going to share this episode with people who have these issues and I really want them to hear how someone like you has been able to transcend those, often we say, problematic approaches and lack of love in religion. So it's beautiful to see that it's not like that. It doesn't have to be like that if we push ourselves a little bit further out of that envelope. I love what you said, that you know, while other Muslims think about us doesn't matter. It's what Allah, what God, thinks about us, that really matters.

Shazia Imam: 38:51

Yes, yes, and I just think Allah is like. You're doing great. I just feel like that you're fine, you're good, yeah, and if you need to say that to yourself, or hear me saying that, or whatever it takes like you are, you are doing great. For anybody listening, you're doing great. The fact that you even think at this level, if you're reflecting at this level and you are in that much of a relationship that you don't want to do the wrong thing, that's beautiful. That already tells me like you're not going to do anything wrong. Yeah.

Shazia Imam: 39:23

You're going to be good.

Rose Aslan: 39:24

Yeah, excellent, thank you. And as we wrap up, what pros of wisdom would you like to leave with listeners that life lessons, things that you find really essential to living a good life, a fulfilled life?

Shazia Imam: 39:36

That's a great question. So my problem, wisdom would be to be open. I think that this is something that was missing in religion. For me, organized religion can be and not just Islam, but in general can be. So this is the way again, the rules, and this is how you do, and this is what you believe in. This is what you don't believe. It says you know what? I just believe in being open. Again, if we are to just look, all you have to do is go outside, and I'm looking at the clouds right now through the window.

Shazia Imam: 40:03

If Allah created all that we can see with our naked eye and we believe there to be even more beyond that and we believe in our Lord that we don't see but we trust is there listening Then let's not be closed off to things. Let's continue to be open, because there's so many things that we don't understand, so many things that we don't know, and it can be very delightful to be open and to be curious. It's a different paradigm than what we've learned. We'll show you like beautiful signs and it's delightful to just pay attention to that.

Rose Aslan: 40:45

Absolutely fabulous. Thank you, shazia, and it's been an absolute pleasure to have you on the show. Could you tell listeners if they want to look you up, if they want to find you online, where can they find you in the online world?

Shazia Imam: 40:58

I am everywhere, so my website is thelifeengineercom. I'm on Instagram at the Life Engineer. I'm on Facebook at Shazia TLE, as in the Life Engineer, and also please tune into my podcast, feminine and Fulfilled.

Rose Aslan: 41:16

Excellent, thank you, and it's been wonderful. And if you look into the show notes, you'll also find all these links copied into the show notes. So thank you, shazia.

Shazia Imam: 41:27

Thank you, rose.

Rose Aslan: 41:35

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