Abdal Hakim Murad – God of the Wild Places Paul Yunus Pringle
AI: Summary ©
AI: Transcript ©
Bismillah AR Rahman AR Rahim. Welcome everybody or welcome back,
because there's still some stragglers who we haven't seen
since before the lockdown, I think that we're back in, in our stride
and having these public events, people tend to see CMC as very
kind of bookish and a public event here is a few elderly professors
peering at a manuscript. But actually we do try to be more kind
of inclusive of the wider community and
the tale of the great outdoors is probably symbolically the best way
of getting away from the box, I think, well, welcome change. So
Hamdulillah, Paul is a familiar figure of CMC since his shahada,
and you had your wedding here, as well as the carrier so happy
memories.
But Paul is also a person who has a very interesting, and I think
too many of us relatable life story. It's not the kind of
standard story of how I find the truth of Islam. But it's a series
of reflections on the the nature of modernity, the standing that we
have or don't have of gender masculinity. And also, it's almost
like two stories that interweave towards the end the story of your
personal struggles with self and God and truth, but also the story
of these rather harrowing marathon experiences that you had. And it's
very interesting to see how the two stories kind of converge
towards the resolution at the end of the book. But what I'd like to
do, if I may, is, if I could invite you to read a paragraph,
which reflects your experience of all of these marathons that you
ran across the Sahara desert in Morocco, at least very beautiful
passage from salaam aleikum, everybody.
This is from the introduction to the book.
The sun began its descent behind the high dunes of El Marcille. I
hold myself to my feet, re shouldered the burden of my heavy
pack, which contains all I needed to survive this week, and left
checkpoint three.
One of my bivouac mates a serving soldier, Army commando and veteran
of the notoriously tough P company selection had been forced to pull
out at the second of today's mandatory checkpoints.
The skin on his left foot was masturbated and was separating
from the flesh.
His injuries were the result of three days and around 130
kilometers of running, walking and occasionally crawling over dunes,
dry windy beds, and salt flats and temperatures in excess of 40
degrees centigrade. This was the Western Sahara and all its salvage
glory.
It made no sense that I was still there. Me, the 58 kilogram school
teacher. The last few days have been among the toughest of my life
and the thought of a further 100 kilometers was hard to
contemplate. I was nosiness, my head, pounded, every square inch
of my body ached. And then, at the midpoint of the brutal 71
Kilometer overnight stage of the marathon de sol, I began the
ascent into outmuscle, the sky darkened revealing the myriad
desert stars. Soon I would be blind to their beauty in more ways
than one. The light when blurring the perfect crests of these
Lawrence of Arabia dunes hardly hinted at the hellish assault on
mind, body and spirit that the night would bring. For years, my
heavy heart had pain for adventure. Soon I would be truly
tested, forced to operate at the very limits of my endurance from
moment to agonizing moment, hour after glorious hour.
Thanks, I found that very beautifully written passage
actually the book has some considerable literary merit.
Could you explain perhaps for those of us who are
not familiar with marathon world, exactly what a marathon is and
what an ultra marathon is?
Marathon standard marathon distances 26 Miles
anything.
It's really considered an ultra if it's over 50 miles. So any
anything beyond 50 Miles usually they're they're they're Ultras
that are 50 100 Miles is quite common, even anything up to 400
miles is not unheard of, and often are in the in the ultra marathons
tend to be in more demanding environments.
And you can go as slow as you like.
There's usually a cut off there so there's that either it will be a
marathon disarm, but it's safe if you're in
If you're caught up by the camel, yeah, there's someone walks behind
the course with leading a camel. And if the camel catches up with
you, you're out. That's it.
But there must be lots of other rules, how much are you allowed to
carry? Do you have to provide your own tent sleeping baby food, it
varies vary some the marathon disarm is, is what they call a
stage race. So there are compulsory and overnight stops on
that. So you have to stop overnight. And you share the car
tent is really just start here see and kind of cover from from the
sun and the worst of the wind.
And the in terms of what you have to carry, there is a mandatory kit
list. But
there's, there's there's much tooing and froing on the on the
website in the run up to the event with Ken people exchanging ideas
about how you can reduce the weight and that back to the
absolute minimum cutting, cutting toothbrushes and soap and
toothbrushes and half and cutting the corners of foil food packets
to take just a little you know, and it does actually make a
difference over the over the course of a week if you're
something when you're by especially when you my size.
Because in the end is, you know, for a great big man, it's no big
deal. But I was I was carrying almost a third demand body weight
at the beginning of the race, you know, which, which was no fun. And
a lot of it is quite high tech nowadays. So presumably, if you've
got a big budget, you're at an advantage. How did you cope if
you're a school teacher on a shoestring I was
I had a family and wasn't earning a huge amount of money. So I had
to
I had to be quite creative, especially
in the Yukon race because you're dealing with temperatures as low
as minus 40. And some this is in the Canadian Arctic, sadly open up
in Northwest Canada.
And either the cat there as the catalyst is quite rigorous and the
check, you know, to me because it's it's life threatening in
other ways. And and, you know, like there's some people have had
life changing for us by injuries in that race many people actually.
So they're quite they're quite strict about the bucket list on
that particular race. And but you know, if you go as you see if
you've got a limit an unlimited budget via a minus 50 rated
sleeping bag, but I wasn't in that position. So I had to I had to
cobble something together and see what was available at the local
camping store. Exactly. But
But I mean, you must at times have wondered whether you were
literally going to make it because I noticed he was actually in the
headline. Somebody from the marathon disabled last year
actually died during the race. I think a cardiac arrest or
something a young guy it is very, it's on the edge, isn't it? Yeah,
yeah, there are a couple there are a number of occasions
and they were in the overnight stage of the desert race.
The year is the year prior to the year two park in the the race was
the race organizer, Patrick Bauer Frenchman
was criticized in some some regions of the press for having
allowed this race to become too easy. So he must have taken that
to heart because
there's always what the what the term we termed the dunes, D which
is kind of rich because of their origins every single day on the
race. But he calls it the Dunes Day because it's the it deals with
the the high dunes as we just heard.
And there's also the the overnight stage which is 50 miles and the
euro did it in response to these criticisms he decided to drop the
dunes stage right in the middle of the overnight stage. And these are
dunes or lay hundreds of feet high. And then and the way that
the year I did it was was appalling. It was like the the
sand stones from start to finish and
I'm in the middle of that.
That long stage the overnight stage and I really thought
I really thought it wasn't gonna make it but there was no way
as luck would have actually there was no way to call an end to
anyway because the helicopter wasn't flying because of the
storm. So there was there's no choice it just keep going
Yeah, that's one of the most terrifying passages. And I have to
confess, when I read that I was kind of asking, Why?
Why do people do it things that are extremely painful and
dangerous, and presumably quite expensive sporting events. I know
some people are doing it for charity. And you can understand
that that a lot of these competitors seem to be just
proving themselves to themselves to the army. What strikes them?
Yeah, it's interesting, because
it's, it throws people together, and this really intense
experience. And so yeah, in the end, we find yourself, I found
myself
on many occasions, in conversation with people and, and people have,
often very, very often and have very interesting stories and very
interesting reasons why the find himself in that particular
situation.
It's nobody, I don't think anybody wakes up in the morning and says,
I think we'll go and run 130 miles across the Sahara Desert, you
know, so people tend to have a compelling reason for being there.
And there's always a backstory, you know, and as I say, there
seems to be the shared experience seems to bring about
an unusual level of trust, and people share more of themselves
than you would normally expect of people who've only just met you
know, so is there a there's often a very, very interesting
backstory. So you don't just retreat into yourself and nurse
your injuries. You're on the lookout for other runners. There
is, yeah, there's a lot of injury nursing going on. And but yeah,
people people do tend to
an inch, an interesting thing happens. And what happened in that
desert recently that when the storms really blew up, and this
this
they call it drafting, where whereby they look like they're
doing it in the Tour de France and on the cycles, but the same sort
of thing, but on foot, and that somebody takes the lead and takes
the worst of the impact of the of the wind in the sand. And then
people run behind that person. And then when when the one at the
front had enough as much as they can take the appeal off to the
back and so on. So, so there's a real kind of shear, people do
support one another, and are encouraged to do so.
I want to read a brief section from your description of the Yukon
marathon which, since I would rather be warm than cold most of
the time sounded like actually a more drastic and soul sapping
experience than those sort of 40 plus temperatures in the Sahara,
you know, and more, more dangerous, objectively more
dangerous.
I leave checkpoint to just as dawn is tugging at the blanket of
darkness. Apparently during the same dark, troubled night I'd
spent battling with myself in this terrible, beautiful place. The
Yukon sky had been lit up with a spectacular display of the
Northern Lights, so you miss them. And aesthetically, it feels
symbolic of something that I that I missed them, or beauty or
semblance of pleasure is now lost on me. It just hurts all the time.
I route around in my waist pouch for anti inflammatories. I find
one and a bit. I swallow them and plow on
my hydration bladder is still frozen solid, no great surprises.
It's below minus 30 Now, there's no doubt about it. This place
could kill you. ISIS crystallizing on my beard, mustache and
eyebrows, even on my eyelashes. As I struggle for the pain builds
again and I sink into a dark mental pit. My weakened vulnerable
state invites a vicious, unfamiliar little troll onto my
shoulder. Your sales me with every painful event you can conjure from
my past, every hurt every betrayal, every humiliation is
played out.
In my mind in glorious Technicolor, every emotional wound
whatever the stage of healing is worried open again. The troll sits
there laughing
the pain in my hip jobs me back to the moment and I trudge miserably
on. So we meet this troll several times and it seems to be part of
your own personal kind of inward wrestling with yourself. But it
sounds here as if the race has made the troll stronger rather
than strengthened you against the trolls. So it's this book is not a
straightforward account of how you must yourself and therefore
achieve nirvana of some kind is much more ambiguous than that,
isn't it? Yeah, I'm not.
I don't think that like Johnny, for any
But he is ever straightforward. It's an I think it's, it's, it's
often a series of highs and lows and, and what I needed, what I
needed to arrive at eventually was some sort of middle way. And but I
think
the both, both the highs and the lows of work for me were both part
of the same thing
that the needed, may not find myself because of the way I
delivered when I was young.
I found I mean, I,
I've lived a life when I was a young man, that was, there was
excessive in many ways. And, and the consequence for me of that was
an inflation, or the ego, the nafs was in control of me, you know,
and
and I think that's why I found myself.
When I stopped, I stopped drinking alcohol. For example, when I was
25 years old, I knew, I knew that there was going to be no progress
in my life spiritually, as long as that was part of my life that had
to go, if any, if any progress was going to be made. But that was
just the beginning of a long journey thereafter. And, and that
that kind of inflated
Eagle
needed something really bake, to break it or to or to start to
break it down. And I think that's why why I was drawn to these
extreme events, it seemed like the song mostly this, the tyranny of
the nafs was
could only be broken by a can another kind of tyranny, the
absolute absorption and in the physically, emotionally, mentally,
and the activity brings you right into the moment because there's
there's nowhere else to go. So was it a form of escape? Would you say
you're running? You're running away from your issues? I think it
was.
I think it was that was perhaps the intention but it's not really
what happened because it because what you're left with is yourself
doesn't there's no nowhere else to go. There's there's no
it's it's
it strips away all over nonsense all the all the ideas about who
are who are thinking,
who are want other people to believe I am and you're left with,
with the truth in some sense, you know, and,
and it just seems to be something that I needed to,
to clear away to disturb to get rid of some of the noise.
And and and and I think the fact that these, these events take
place in nature in very beautiful places, I think is part of that as
well. It's it's part of the picture. So there's quite a lot in
the book about the yearning for the primordial for a sense that
modern life has alienated us that it's a search also through the
meaning of your masculinity, desire for initiation, all of
those very, very, very archaic things kind of Shamanic things
that you feel modernity has banished us from so is that why
many people go into sporting events? Would you say because
they're trying to return to a more physical experience of themselves
and getting away from the screens and the cars? I think, yeah, I
think I think perhaps that is that's the case, but I don't know
how, how conscious people are that that's what the yearning for and I
think I was quite blessed and
because of the path that my life have taken, the the, the, the
place that drinking alcohol have taken me to, then the people that
I met subsequent to that and finding myself and with groups of
men, talking about this, this idea of masculine initiation, which is
something that has existed in primitive inverted commas
societies forever, and which has largely been largely lost, and
women the mechanisms for for taking boys on that psychological
journey from boy psychology to man psychology, the mechanisms had
been there and but in the West have been largely lost.
And then and, you know, there's there's the wonderful African
proverb, The, the, if we don't, if we don't initiate the boys,
they'll burn down the village just to feel the warmth, it's a
responsibility we have to bring boys
went up so I'm speaking as a man so I speak. I mean, I'm sure
there's a
corresponding process for women but I'm not I'm not qualified to
tell that story.
But yeah, well, we've lost largely lost that in the West, but I was
in with men who were talking about it and who recognized that it was
missing and I was guided towards. And it was one of the things I
mean, when this was, it's part of my searching for some, some kind
of truth, something that was real, I found myself in a situation,
touch on it briefly in the book, where I went out and took part in,
you know, a modern day, masculine initiated a process. And it was,
it was great, I didn't know what a good move me a little further
along the path, you know, traditionally, initiation would be
an initiation into the
transcendent secrets of the tribe. But do these modern men's retreats
have any kind of spiritual concreteness about them, the
follow up, it's the follow the same trajectory. As initiations.
It's one of the one of the fascinating things about these,
these processes as they, they all follow the same format, no matter
where in the world, they take place, they all tend to happen
around the same age, and that kind of 13 They're about 1213.
But then, they also they follow that kind of classic hero's
journey.
Arc, where there's a
there's a descent, the boy is
removed, sometimes forcibly from from the decay in
the domain of the feminine, because up until that age, the
largely left with amongst women, and the forcibly and traditional
societies are often forcibly removed from that, then there's a
kind of dissent. And then there's usually some sort of ordeal that
has to be,
has to be taken on. And then there is this idea that the secret
knowledge of the tribe is passed on, and then there's the return
with with a new responsibility and in the community. So there is an
awareness of that and these modern day approaches.
The not
outwardly spiritual as such, but there is there is an awareness in
a lot of people, I think a lot of men who are drawn to them are on
some sort of spiritual search and
find the and find the way subsequently, you know, but they
must be quite unsatisfied, if there isn't something really
concrete at the end of it, because initiation is about unveiling the
true meaning of things and beginning a specific incantation
or prayer or right, that has been handed down by the ancestors, but
it's hard to imagine how these slightly New Age men's retreats
can really supply that and I think that's, I think, what what perhaps
what what happened, I couldn't really speak for what happened for
me and I think what it did for me, it was like it opened, it opened
down wind
on some level and kind of cleaned it out and sewed it back together
again, so it could begin to heal. But there was work to be done, but
it kinda it was it was a stepping stone for me to something,
something more real, because it revealed to you what you needed or
because it satisfied a need it I felt more like an adult I felt
like a man for the first time in my life, even though I did that
when I was
waiting to be
in my early 30s I
still felt very much like a boy. I think you know, and I think the
modern world does that infantilizes people and and it
dangles all the all the trinkets and you know, it
tries to convince us that
that if that they tried to convince us that we can purchase
peace of mind we can put your safety we can posture security,
and pleasure and all the rest of it and you build this castle over
this fortress.
stuff around you. But I think the reality is that you can never
build up that wall high enough anyway. And it's it's, it becomes
less for me, it became less of a fortress and more of a prison.
And it's
sort of think that
that that kind of infantilization display as part of that CD you
keep you keep, keep the little boy entertained, you know, and, and I
had to I had to move beyond that to make more like, first I had to
get rid of the mind altering substances, you know, and then I
had to
approach life more as a man and as a boy. I mean, Jung has this
phrase, pure eternus, the eternal boy, which is how he characterizes
modern adults that they never really experienced initiation into
the mysteries, they don't go into their gender, and it's
significant. So they're always kids looking for treats. And
Robert bleh if he followed, if he followed follow, then that's the
exact point and when the book is booked the sibling society, which
was again says there are no adults. You know, it's got old
trying to Cana trying to boys trying to initiate other boys and
this is why I think this is at the heart of the you know, the the
problems that we're having the gang culture, like little little
boys, psychologically little boys trying to initiate other little
boys north, all of these more murders in the US, which is
usually disturbed young, its lack of initiating cell movements, and
it seems to be becoming worse absence of an adult man.
But one of the stages that you pass through and you do talk about
it in the book was your
tribulation with with alcohol and I now have a new book about
Muslims and alcohol, would you be prepared to explain to people who
maybe have never touched a drop? What it is that is appealing about
it and how one can
leave it behind? It's
gonna say it's a whole what I tried to do with with that book,
which is called hope for the Muslim alcoholic
1212 step recovery in the light of Islam is to take I mean, it's a
difficult one and alcohol is haram and it's around for good reason.
It's a mercy deck, you know, they, it's a protection against the, the
forgetfulness of Allah that comes about when when people drink
alcohol, it's, is that the main reason for its prohibition? As
somebody who's been through that tunnel? How would you describe the
essence of the experience?
I, it's a curious thing that says, it's a very difficult thing to
explain. But
I think,
for me, I can only speak for myself, it was a
it was the antidote to fear. I was a very, very fearful child. I was
frightened of everything. This is the troll.
Exactly.
I was very fearful. And
the first time I met, I grew up in Scotland. And Scotland has a very
unhealthy relationship with alcohol.
It's I don't know why. But it's always been that way. And I
suspect, sadly, always will.
It,
it for me, it was a bit fear. And the first time I drank alcohol,
all of a sudden,
that fear was gone.
And that was a very, very attractive thing for somebody
who'd always felt those three Dutch courage before you go over
the top. It was the trenches. For me, it was like, it felt like
I'd been born
like, three or four drinks short of normal, you know, so it really
is rather than Dutch cottage, it was like, enabled me to be like, I
perceived everybody else to be of the old this is what it feels like
to be normal. I mean, it's a it's a delusion. And it's an it's a
lie. But it's a very seductive lie when you feel so frightened all
the time. And so, as a consequence of that, I did it again as often
as I could,
you know, trying as much as I could, as often as I could, after
that, I mean, obviously not very much at that age because I didn't
have any money. But, but as soon as I did have money, you know,
when I was 16 I was drinking very regularly. And with bated breath,
I think fundamentally is about fear.
I mean, when I was a teenager, I would go out drinking sometimes
with friends. But my experiences were the difference. I did it
generally to be one of the boys to have enough pints in the pub to
keep up with everybody else. But I remember once vomiting in a ditch
outside this country, pub and thinking is actually quite
horrible. It's like being seasick, and you can't quite balance and
the world is going around and you want to vomit and think, Is this
actually worth it. So I never really was kind of seduced into
the heart of the thing. I think there's a
fundamental difference between someone who drinks excessively,
because they've decided they're going to drink excessively, and
get drunk or whatever. And somebody who has that, that
addiction, if you like,
something different happens, the phenomenon, I think the the the
average drinker, even if they drink too much, doesn't experience
the phenomenon of craving. Once alcohol goes into the system seems
to be processed somehow differently by certain
individuals. And I think I was probably one of those individuals.
And what happens is, once alcohol goes into your system,
I lost the power to decide how much I was going to drink. And
also, I lost power over how I behaved really. And that's why it
brought me a
blessing, they brought me to my knees, very young, I stopped
drinking when I was 25 years old. Because I knew I just knew that
and I feel blessed that I was I was brought up in a in a religious
context.
It's not I mean, it's not a context, ultimately, that worked
for me. But it was a religious context. So I had a sense that
the life I was living,
there was a golfer developed between the life I was living in a
leaf I felt I should be living. And it became intolerable to me by
the age of 25. And to the extent where, where I thought you had the
strength to snap out of it? Well, I think I was, I wouldn't say I
had the strength, I think I have a real sense that he was
picked up and pulled out of it, you know. So if somebody is
watching this, at some point in their personally struggling with
alcohol or some other addiction, is there a word of advice that you
would offer?
I think, seek help, and don't allow shame, to get in the way of
seeking that help. Because it's unlikely if you've crossed that
line, or if you're one of those individuals that have described
who, as for whom it's different once once I'll call in as the
system,
you're not going to be able to sort it out yourself, it's
unlikely you're going to be risotto yourself and seek the help
that's there.
And that's what that that recent book is all about. It's about the
those those touch points between the 12 step approach to recovery
and, and Islamic teaching, I've tried to show that these are these
are compatible, this is not something for some other group of
people. It's, it's there and it's
it's legitimate and compatible with Islam. It can be tough for
young people in Muslim communities to admit that they have these
issues and to go to community elders to parents to Imams,
they'll just kind of
box their ears and tell them to sort themselves out so would you
recommend they go to some counselor or professional
therapist or what should they do if if that person is has crossed
that line? And
it's you know, the you often hear this become homeless part of
common parlance this this phrase rock bottom and people tend to
have the picture of rock bottom is the street drunk laying in the
doorway, you know, and et cetera, et cetera. But it doesn't have to
be like that the left you can get off that lift any floor you don't
have to go at the basement you know.
So if I would say that if drinking
I mean, alcohol is haram but if it's more there's no use just
telling somebody It's haram. It says if the if the if the
struggling with that as an addiction, it's
if it's become intolerable intolerable to us, but if it's
cost
In the person more than money, then seek help. And I think the
1212 step fellowships are a good a good place to go because it is a
spiritual program. And people Muslim who are struggling with
alcohol would find
familiarity there, I believe. So you'd recommend something like
Alcoholics Anonymous
12 Step programs, I think and there is, I believe there's an
organization called melotti Islami in the United States. It's not
it's not made its way to the UK. I don't know much about them. But
it's, it's a 12 step fellowship with a specifically Islamic focus
worth looking into. There's one interesting moment that you
describe when you're going through your phase of having a
relationship with alcohol, where you're on a cold day,
pub calling, I guess, in Edinburgh, and then you see
somebody who's doing something rather different. No surprise that
it was a pivotal note for me. I didn't realize that for many, many
years. I mean, I must have been in my early 20s. And I'm, I think,
pub crawl even makes it sounds rather more glamorous than it was
to be honest with you. It's, I was I was alone, you know, and I was
just wondering, from pub to pub, and I was drunk. And it was early
early evening, Margaret team, I realize now and I was walking
along George Street in Edinburgh past past one of the big churches.
And the church was closed
and I was standing at a bus stop I smoked at the same sort of
standard smoking a cigarette at the bus stop.
And it was
a man a drawl doubt this is prayer man.
And man, I knew I knew enough to know that this was a Muslim, but
beyond that, I knew nothing you know, but
I watched this man I will stand in Europe. I was lost completely
lost.
directionless
and ironically this this man I remember them to finish compasses
so he had direction for
Italy Elito is paramount and he'd be pretty shoes to unseat any, any
any prayed. And
I can remember
just being really struck by the contrast that I was living this
chaotic life at the time.
direction was kind of hopeless. And here was this man who seemed
to me to be somehow touching paradise, you know. And
it just really struck me, you know, there's something really
struck me in that moment. And I wanted to speak to this man, when
he finished his prayer, but I was too I was just too ashamed, you
know. And, and I just, he went on his way and rolled up his prayer
mat and went on his way. And I wandered off back off the street
into some dingy little pub somewhere, you know, but it stayed
with me and never, never really left me. It took a long, long
time. I was a slow burner, as you as you know, it took a long, long
time.
But eventually, eventually I was I was guided towards the truth.
You want to say something about that sort of the happy ending,
although somebody once said to a new Muslim, you have won the
battle now you must fight it. Yeah. It's the beginning of
something new. But all of these things, the extreme sports, the
experience of alcohol, issues with masculinity, all of these things,
they're kind of all symmetrically, did you sit? Do you see it as
providential that you're slowly? Nothing? No, when I look at the
minute look at the my life, I think it was all all leading
towards Islam. It it makes perfect sense. Now to me, that a hard
road? Yeah, yeah. But it was,
for me, it had to be that way. Because it was so like I say, the
NAFSA that had become so inflated, that it had to be that way. And,
and there had to be the
the level of pain if you like, both in terms of just the way I
was living and the way it felt. But also, you know, consciously
going out there and doing these, these things that we've just
spoken about in the book, Center.
Like a seat to quiet and all that that noise and allow, allow
something else to,
to bubble up to the surface. You don't want to make me
to make my vision a little clearer on I think.
So yeah, I do feel it was all it was all providential and guiding
me towards something. And you're now in a little cottage in the
Scottish Borders with a Muslim wife
Hamdulillah. Looking back on this.
Salam Alaikum.
I just wanted to ask you in terms of your experiences, especially
with the marathons, how did that create the intimacy that you
wanted with God? Because I guess the book itself is talking about
God in these kinds of situations and places? And how did you go
through all those moments help create that intimacy? And also,
how would you recommend to someone who insha Allah will never do a
marathon in their life? How to kind of recreate or experience
something like that as well?
That's, that's a really nice question. I'll leave that
question. It's a little late. I think it's very insightful, that
you've used the words intimacy, because that's, that's certainly
how it felt to me. And there's some, there's a little episode in
the book, which took place in the middle of the marathon disarmer,
which is 130 mile Ultra in the desert, Moroccan desert. And I
found myself for the first time
during the race at stopped that give you what they call a road
book, which is a kind of strange name for it, because there aren't
any roads anywhere in the hill racing, it's just salt flats and
sand dunes. They give you this road book, which has,
you know, as compass bearings and Tallinn information and distances
and everything on it. And I was stopped to check, I was with this
guy from Deus Ex parachute regimen, guy who had been covering
ground together.
And, and I'd stopped to look at the road book. And when I looked
up, he was gone. He was like, three 400 meters ahead of me. And
there was it was a there was a soul.
It was an assault flats, it was absolutely dead flat. Except for
this. It was lake
you know, there was there's old John Ford's movies in Utah and
Arizona, where you get those
mountains like like the one in close encounters, that was that
was the there was this pletely flat apart from that, often the
distance, and it was completely unknown. And it was totally
silent. And, and that was fine. I became aware it was I was in
floods of tears. And I didn't really understand that. But
looking back, I now see that it's just like, it's that this this
idea that, you know, the primordial revelation, you know,
God and nature, and just being there just it was It wasn't an
intellectual
process, it was it was a totally overwhelming emotional experience.
spiritual experience. So and now an intimacy is, is a is a
beautiful words to describe how that felt.
And with regard to the second part of your question,
it doesn't have I don't think there has to be 130 males in the
Sahara Desert, I think, just nature is there. It's beautiful.
And for me,
even as a child when I was
up in the highlands and Scotland, and knew I kind of felt it, I
could feel that. That the truth of it all, you know, I didn't
understand that I couldn't articulate it. But I think just
being in those places, and especially if one can be in those
places, consciously.
With intention, I think I think that's that's how that's that's
what I would endeavor to do.
It's just a comment rather than a question. And perhaps I don't know
if you agree with, with with that concept of understanding from them
principle as to why people do the extreme sort of 100 miles, 400
Miles marathon runs? Would you say it's, it works in a way to improve
your soul to improve yourself, your nefs is that perhaps at the
end of running such a marathon, would you say? I've turned myself
into a way that it's easier for me now to let's say, maybe do PMO
later
or pray at night or wake up very early because now I have control
over myself. Perhaps there is this I'm sure all of us know it.
As in after, in one of the chapters of in Quran sorta shrimps
after many very strong and scary oath of Allah subhanaw taala. At
the end of that oath there is one of cinema masa and Hammerhead
Majora taqwa, as in talking about the self itself, could that be
part of a flemons that God has in you tame yourself in spiritual
way, and also perhaps physical way? And by the end of that
activity, physical activity, you're stronger, you can live
longer, worship better, and so on. Does that make sense? Or I think,
I think I understand, I think I understand what you're saying. And
I think the
if, when I
first signed up to do one of these events, I knew I mean, I wasn't,
I've never done any sport at all. And I wasn't I wasn't, I wasn't on
fit, I wasn't fit. And I knew that I thought, if I've got any hope
of completing this, this is going to take discipline, I'm going to
have to get up early in the morning, in the middle of winter,
and get out there and run with a plaque on my back. And with ankle
weights on and with hand weights, and I'm going to I'm gonna and
heavily weighted pack, I'm gonna have to go there, and I'm gonna
have to do it. And I'm gonna have to ignore the blisters, and I'm
gonna have to ignore the shin splints, I'm gonna have to ignore
the pain and just do it. Right. So
discipline. Yes, absolutely. But also, I think, what it does, is it
getting up early on these races, even Well, the reason why we're
out on the races, getting out there, doing that stuff,
return Gita and actually a much more natural way of being. I mean,
if think, we we've evolved to follow the prey beasts and the,
the, you know, the way the crops as the, as the amounts were to
move around, we're constantly on the move. So human beings are
meant to be on the move. So I think it what it also returns you
to a more natural, human way of being, in a sense, you know, it
felt like that we that way to me anyway.
Hi, there, thank you.
I was just wondering about all the things that you've suffered, and
everything you've been through, and the things that you've
learned, have you come away with some thoughts and advice for young
young lads growing up in the world today? Anything that you would
love to share with them?
I'm increasingly thank you for the question. And it's a really
important one. You know, it's, I think
I've been thinking a lot recently about
the responsibility that
adult, the eye as an adult, male, as a man most my responsibility in
that, in that situation. And I think
men need to step up more
than ever the half done and help
young men to make that journey. I think, I think it's, we can't just
see over, you know, you know, saw yourself Oh, it's I think I think
I as as an adult male have have have a responsibility to step up
and make that transition from boy to man. Easier for the young for
the young man. Because it's, it's, it's getting harder all the time
to make that journey. No, it's the modern world this is actively
working against boys making that journey at once. Don't miss the
young, there's so many
distractions and so many temptations that went there even
when I was when I was young, you know, it's
it's
it I suppose, it's it's, it's about
what I tried to do is I mean, there are a number a young men,
like sons of friends, sons of family members, and I just
I just try and be there and
something and not not necessarily advice, but
just just, I just try and speak from experience the experience
that I've had. And hopefully if, if it's done with the right
intention, it will be useful. But I think I suppose the point I'm
making is can't just lay it on the, on the boys, the adult men to
step up to the responsibility and help them. I was wondering in the
course of writing the book, whether you're influenced by
similar literature, and specifically I was thinking about
the Japanese novelist, Haruki Murakami wrote a book, what I
talked about when I talk about running, I've not read that book.
I'm aware of it, but I've not read it.
i
Yeah, there was certainly books that I had read.
Because
the other thing about people that take part in those kinds of events
is they tend to be a bit obsessive. I saw, you know, it was
like, read every book about ultra marathon running that exists in
every every recommendation about cats, and just everything. So I
did read a lot of stuff at that time.
I didn't read that, though. But yeah, it's it's useful, but a lot
of the time.
I don't know, I don't know about how he approaches the subject and
that book, but it's because it's autobiographical and about
running. So it's a similar methodology, if you like, what,
what what I found in the stuff that I was reading is that that
spiritual element was absent. A lot of men being men, a lot of it
was about cats, a lot of it was about, you know, diet, and, you
know, training runs and preparation and all that. So it
tended to tended to be a bit
technical. So, for me, the stuff that I was eating didn't have
didn't have that. There's something missing. For me, it's a
bit.
Yeah. Does that answer your question? I saw Yes. Yes, thank
thank you, thank you.
I'm about to run the half marathon in March, which is a drop compared
to what you've been through. But for me, as a very inexperienced
runner.
I'm someone who
finds this really daunting. One thing that I do, when I'm running
and around just before this, it was really tough. And mentally, I
get that troll as well. When my body if I feel very big mind and
body separation. And I feel as though
I can't, I'm out of control. Like, you know, I want to stop, you
know, want to stop. But one thing that keeps me going is having a
mantra, or a word or a prayer when I was little, my dad told me to
breathe out who and say him as I was like, doing something hard.
And that's what I do now when I'm running. And I've met other people
who, and I've now met other runners still don't feel part for
the running crew. But I've met other people who have other
matches and not have a spiritual kind. And I wanted to ask you, if
you had a particular prayer or word or a mantra that you kept,
as you did that, that's really interesting. Good. And I don't
think anybody else did that.
You have to bear in mind that the I wasn't Muslim when I, when I
approached these events, these were, I genuinely feel that these
were part of my journey to Islam. But and I felt that I just
because I growing up, I wasn't the sporty one like that. My brothers
were the sporty ones, you know, obviously, kind of quiet, bookish
kind of one, you know, but
and I just didn't feel like I belong there didn't it's like, I
didn't feel like I had a right to be doing these events. Right. I
thought I was
kidding myself on so who do you think you are signed up for this?
You know, but um, I used to when I started running in preparation for
the desert race.
It was horrible. I hated it. I hated I used to. I used to live in
Ralston Greene in London. And my first training runs were to
Queen's Park, which is only about a mile away from most than
highroad. You know, so I used to run there and run back and nearly
honestly nearly killed me. I just hated it. And I just fell off
what's thought of what have I done? You know, I've signed up for
this 230 miles in the Sahara desert and I can't run the Queen's
Park. And it was awful. But then
you know,
started to
start to get stronger. You know,
I used to run past there was a newly built at that time newly
built gym. And I'd be shuffling along with my heavy pack and my
ankle weights and my hand weights. And we'd watch the people through
the window of the gym, watching the TV with headphones on, running
on treadmills. And I thought that's the that's not the way to
do it. This is the way to do it, you know. And then, and then I
used to I started to the mantra that it's silly but the mantra I
use those to chant to myself, MDS mellophone DiSalvo, MDS, NDS. NDS,
just just a really caner
to distract myself how painful it was for a start, but just to keep
me focused on on the task at hand. So yes, I did. I did have a mantra
of sorts, but there wasn't there wasn't. There wasn't too much kind
of spiritual intent behind it at that time. Salaam Alaikum.
My name is Solomon. Sinister, nice to be here. Just wanted to firstly
say, say thank you for being very open and vulnerable. About your
story.
In your talk, you mentioned the importance of role models. So I
wanted to ask, Who are some exemplary men that you've met in
your life? And what specifically, is it about them that you admire?
Thank you
without wishing to embarrass or shame, because one of them sitting
right beside me.
I took my Shahada with Sheikh Abdullah Hakim, but seven years
ago now.
But I met Sheikh Abdul Hakim many years before that many years, it
took me a long, long time to make my decision. I think it was, I
think, when I first met you about 18 years ago, it's incredible,
isn't it?
And
just the
the kindness that you showed me, the
one thing I remember vividly, I think, was the first time first
meeting with you here in Cambridge, and you're in your
office at the university. And
you said something, which really struck me.
And, you know, because I was I was saying, I need I need guidance,
Anita needs guidance. And he said,
I can't remember the exact words, but you said something like, I'm
not I'm not sure, I can guide you, but I can be your friend.
And that really, really struck me. It stayed with me today. And it
was.
And I think it was just that, that kindness of thought this this this
is this is Islam, and I don't want to be part of that someone I want
this, you know, and
we spoke many times subsequently. And I mean, it's not that's not
the appropriate place to go into, but the circumstances on my life
at the time, made it very difficult for me to, to,
to come to Islam, but
But it definitely never went away. And then the fact that that
someone so busy,
would make time for me was was very, very powerful for me. So
Sheikh Abdullah Kim, certainly
a sporting icon.
And I suppose
my first my very, very first
experience of Islam with I think I really see this as a privilege
now.
I went on our Saturday night to
cricket with mosque.
And she
made barbecue.
I was there and it was June Ramadan, and the HUD job was in
full swing. And I just thought what is this and I was completely
mesmerized and,
and another wonderful man who gave me a great deal of time, and spent
a lot of time in this in this company along with the Islamia
School, which was just along from where I left and so these are
these are two very important figures in my life.
I suspect that there's a lot more questions and I think people are
really benefiting really grateful for your frankness. It's a book in
which you
talk quite a bit about some of the harder things in your life and I
think a lot of people will be will be really profoundly influenced by
that.
But what's the next book is a sneak preview of what I did to
stick the the
the hope for for the Muslim alcoholic is that's just been just
been published in Kindle and Kobo and Apple Store, but
it's coming out in paperback soon. I don't I don't know when but
soon. It's only a little bit but I'm Hope I really hope inshallah
it will be it'll be a useful
little offering.
Otherwise, I don't know. I'm going after, after contemplating to
think what's next. It's
the most.
I mean, I'm not one of my things that I do is storytelling. And I
sort of, you know, put together some little collections or
traditional stories as well, Scottish stories and Irish stories
and some may be able to do something with that. Wonderful.
Look forward to that.
So sorry, we're out of time. But there is an opportunity to mingle
now there'll be juice and nibbles outside and I think we still got
some more copies of your book of food, be happy to sign some. Some
further ones. They're on sale for five pounds, I think. Okay. Thank
you very much. Thank you. Thank you.