Naima B. Robert – My Story of Coming to Islam
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My name is Naima B. Robert, and I've
been Muslim for 18 years.
Well, I grew up in Zimbabwe,
and I grew up in a non religious
household.
I grew up really not believing in God,
until I got to my late teens,
And I started to think there must be
there must be a higher power. There must
be something out there that's looking out for
me, that knows me better than I know
myself.
I was introduced to church, went, a couple
of times.
But for me,
the fact that they told me to believe
without any proof or without being able to
convince me,
meant that I couldn't commit to it. So
I didn't go back again.
And it was only when I went to
the UK and I was at university,
and in my 1st year of university, I
went to Egypt for a festival.
And in Egypt, I, for the first time
it seemed, noticed these women wearing hijab.
And
I was not impressed
at all.
As far as I was concerned, they were
oppressed, they were repressed,
And I raged about it for a good
2 days before I actually asked somebody,
why do you cover?
And
I think
that was what, you know, people would call
my my my light bulb moment or what
Oprah would call my moment,
was when she said to me, because I
want to be judged for what I say
and what I do, not what I look
like.
For me, that was just like,
woah.
Wait a minute.
Where did you get that idea from?
And I started to think,
what is this Islam that makes this woman
so strong,
so confident, so sure of herself? That she
doesn't need to do what millions of women
do everyday, which is put themselves out there
to be assessed, to be accepted, to be
admired.
And I wanted to find out more. And
really, that was my introduction to Islam. I
started to ask questions. I started to read.
You know, I I started to mix more
with Muslims and I actually went on a
journey of discovery, which I, you know, I
I talk about in my book from My
Sister's List.
I think everybody faces different challenges when they
accept Islam, depending on where they're coming from,
depending on, you know, who they become Muslim
around, what kind of community they come into.
I was very fortunate because I became Muslim
at a time when at university,
it's like it was like everybody was becoming
Muslim. Like, everybody was either starting to practice
or was becoming Muslim. So we had, like,
a whole big group of us who were
on this dean high.
And we go to the masajid and we
go for the taraweeh prayers and we, you
know, cook iftar for each other and it
was Masha'Allah, it was really amazing. We were
in this sort of new Muslim bubble.
I think some of the hardest challenges would
be things that you're just used to from
Jahiliya. You know, things like maybe for some
people's address code, for me it wasn't so
much because I actually chose to start covering,
start covering my hair and then just, you
know, as my iman grew and my knowledge
grew, I just covered more and more.
But, you know, so maybe friends from the
past that you were close to, that you
realize were not really helping you and your
din anymore.
Guy friends,
definitely, if you had close guy friends, you
know, that was a difficult
that was a difficult transition. And it wasn't
as difficult for for me or for the
person who's becoming Muslim. It was difficult for
them as well, for them to understand
that it's not personal. Something that I need
to do because of my religion. And of
course, you know, the reactions of family when
they thought that basically I'd just gone mad.
And,
you know,
I think that idea of
you used to be
You used to be so much fun. You
used to be so cool. You used to
be so clever. You used to be so
ambitious. You used to be. You used to
be. You used to be and then you
became Muslim
and it was like for a lot of
people
You were all these amazing things, then you
became Muslim, and now there's nothing. There's just
you Muslim.
You know you're not with us anymore. You're
not fun, you know, you're not contributing, you
you've just opted out, basically, of life.
I think for me that was a that
was a big concern for me if I
remember the poetry that I used to write
when I first became Muslim.
This idea of
I still want to be myself,
you know. I I I've spent 18 years,
19 years, 20 years being me.
I want to be Muslim
and be myself and be me still.
And that kind of struggle of the nafs,
I guess, that jihad and nafs that you
have between balancing who you are and what
Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala expects from us.
That jihad is hard enough.
When you add the jihad that you have
between yourself and your nafs, and what Allah
wants from us, and then what other people
expect from you, whether they're Muslim or non
Muslim. It can become a real time of
turmoil and conflict, and it can be really
difficult. SubhanAllah. But, Alhamdulillah, you know, you make
your way through. And I think most of
us go through a journey of self discovery
even within Islam,
where
you maybe
became Muslim,
shut out everything from your previous life because
you wanted to do the right thing Islamically.
And then, alhamdulillah, you know, after a while
you you you get used to being Muslim
in a way and you you find your
feet and you get a better understanding, I
think. And you realize that not everything that
you were before
was haram. Not everything that you were before
or loved before
was something that you had to abandon. And
so you start to reincorporate into your life
the things that were important to you, the
things that you were good at. But now
it's in halal context. And now it's in
Islamic context. Now it could even be a
bada if Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala accepts it
from us. I've met so many people who've
been through that journey, you know, of becoming
Muslim, abandoning everything and everyone. You know, living
like that for many years sometimes and then
alhamdulillah after a while you realize that it's
not the way I thought it was at
the beginning. You know there is more space.
There is room. I can still be me
because being Muslim makes me the best version
of me. Doesn't make me into somebody else.
It just makes me the better version of
the one I was before, the person that
Allah created me to be.
My family were an interesting case.
My mother, who was a Christian, was happy
that I had found God. She was quite
pleased about that.
My father was an atheist, and
he was one of those people who felt
that you used to be you used to
be so amazing, you had so much potential,
you were going to do great things in
the world. And then now you're Muslim, you've
given up on everything. You know, you're gonna
marry some man, and we're never gonna see
you again. So there was a lot of
pressure, I think, on that side to sort
of to prove him wrong in a way.
Alhamdulillah, Yani, he's now, one of my greatest
supporters. But I think with the family, it
really was they felt it was a rejection
of of who we were as a family
and who, you know, who they had expected
me to be and who I had been.
So it was tough. It was tough. I
mean, my my sister, Marsha, she, she was
very supportive. But, you know, we had members
of the family who considered me a pariah
and just thought that I was a write
off, basically.
Alhamdulillah, you know, these things take time, sometimes.
And people need to see you finding your
feet within this new path.
When you get married, you know, when you
have start having children, it becomes normalized in
a way. And also, you as well, you
change. You know, when you're a first Muslim,
you wanna tell everybody about this amazing deen
and you wanna convince everybody this is the
truth. You should all be on it. You
should all be Muslim. And if you don't,
you're not Muslim. You're going to hellfire. You
know? And so a lot of revert find
themselves in a situation where they alienate
a lot of their family members because they're,
like, going in hard and going in hard.
And it takes a while for you to
realize that that's probably not the best approach,
and you need to have a lot more
jicama, a lot more wisdom when you're dealing
with people. And remember the love, You know,
remember what it means to be family. Remember
what it means to have love for your
family members and have that that that relationship
with with people in your family without compromising
your your religious principles.
So,
you know, as far as family is concerned,
some for some people, it is their biggest
test.
As I said, I was in a bubble.
I was away from home. I was away
from everybody. I was in university. So when
I first became Muslim, I didn't really, I
wasn't affected so much. Stuff that I would
hear second hand.
But, you know, as as the years go
by, it can be very very difficult and
and, you know, it is something that you
struggle with. But you just make dua, and
you continue to make dua that Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala keeps you guided, and that he
guides and opens the hearts of people around
you and that you,
through your
actions, through your attitude, through your behavior
can actually be effective dawah to these people,
around you and these people that you grew
up with. And if, at the very least,
change their perceptions of what it means to
be Muslim and insha Allah even open and
soften their hearts to the message of Islam.
The writing came by surprise.
I always enjoyed writing when I was younger,
when I was a teenager, but I never
thought of it as a career or something
that I would do, you know, as an
adult.
And it was born
around the time that my son was maybe
6 months, 8 months old, my eldest.
And I would take him to the library.
And at the library,
I love books. And we go to the
library, and we would take
so so much time in the children's library
just enjoying the books and, you know, choosing
which ones we're going to take home. And
really the biggest thing for me was that
there were no books about Muslims.
There were no books about Islam.
And I really wanted my son to grow
up with a very strong sense of himself
and a sense of pride in who he
is as a Muslim. I wanted him to
see himself
reflected
in the books that we were reading and
bringing home.
And really that's how the children's writing was
born. I just started writing little rhymes based
on some of the things that I liked
from the library, based on the some of
the ideas that I had seen. I just
started writing little rhymes for children and,
my first book, The Swirling Hijab, was a
result of one of those first sessions.
And I just started working as a children's
writer and my niche was multicultural children's literature
because there was, at the time,
a huge void in the market for books
about Muslims. Alhamdulillah, now a lot more. But
when I first started, this was now 2,000,
2,001.
There was nothing. So The Swirling Hijab was
actually revolutionary in its own way because it
was a book,
very much a children's book, it's in rhyming
texts, and it's about a girl playing with
her mother's hijab. And at the end it
says, you know, that covering her mom as
a part of her faith is what the
hijab does best. Now, that was before all
the hijab fitna, that was before the niqab
bans, this is before Europe went crazy, And
the publisher was brave enough to just say,
this is part of Muslim's life, this is
part of Islam,
and we want to help you celebrate that.
And so they did. And then after that,
we wrote about many different things. We wrote
about Islamic art, about how Muslims welcome, you
know, new babies.
I wrote a lot of books that looked
at different cultures and how different cultures live,
etcetera.
So that was the children's writing.
From my sister's lips came
literally
by Allah's planning because
I wasn't intending to write a book. I
ended up meeting my agent because she wanted
me to write a children's book for her.
And in the end, she came to my
home and, you know, I cooked for her
because she wanted to go out to eat.
And I said to her, well, I don't
mind going out with you, but I cover
fully, so not everywhere will be appropriate. And
she was just it just blew her mind.
And so she just couldn't get her head
around it. So she was like, excuse me.
I just need to know what do you
mean you cover fully. So I explained it
to her, and I said to her, you
know, I have always wanted to write a
book about what it means for me to
be a Muslim woman and to live in
the UK and and how I became Muslim.
Because every time I see a book that's
written about Muslim women, it's a sob story,
you know. It's a tragedy. It's some big
drama. And that's not our that's not how
we live, you know. That our lives aren't
like that. So she was really excited by
the idea and she said, look, I can
get you a book deal. If you can
write this book, I can get you a
book deal. And, alhamdulillah, she did. And so
that was the result. The result of that
was, from my sister's lips.
Alhamdulillah.
Amazing
help from the sisters that were around me
at the time. Just we did interviews. We
talked about everything and, we had a great
time doing that. And then I went back
home to my father's house in Zimbabwe to
actually write up all the interviews
and write the book. And the book took
about 6 weeks. It was just inspired.
I just sat down at the computer. The
words have just come.
And my father was one of my main
proofreaders so he would actually read the manuscript
and give me ideas on how to improve
this bit. So that I have to mention
this. I think he was the one who
made sure that I mentioned polygamy, I think,
and he was the one who made me
put the sisterhood at the end of the
book because he felt that that was really
the strongest message of my life and on
the book was Islamic sisterhood and what that
sisterhood means and what it and what it
can offer to the world. So that was
from my sister's lips, and then after that,
obviously, I wrote, many different novels for teenagers,
and all of them just wanting to
share
Muslim life with Muslims and with non Muslims.
And for young people to see themselves reflected
in the books that they read, and also
to be able to tackle some of the
issues that our young people face, that we
as adults have a hard time dealing with,
a hard time facing up to, things that
we don't talk about in general.
So, you know, From Somalia With Love, Boy
Versus Girl, Black Sheep, She Wore Red Trainers,
All of them deal with the reality of
being a young Muslim in in in the
West today and around the world, really.
So that's that's really how that's how my
writing trajectory has gone. I hope, inshallah, to
be able to write more books in the
in the style of From My Sister's Lips.
I have a lot of books inside me.
I still have to write about Hajj.
I would really like to write a book
about my as well
and, and include my poetry. So that's a
new thing for me.
This is the poetry, and, it's it's a
journey that I'm really enjoying.
And it seems to be touching people, and
it seems to be making a difference in
some people's lives. And, really, that's all we
can ask for, alhamdulillah.
I knew from my sister's lips was speaking
truth. I knew
that.
I wrote it from a place of
of love, really.
You know, I wanted to set the record
straight. I wanted people to be surprised
and inspired and learn from this book.
And just the love that I got from
sisters who actually were involved in the book,
how easy it was for the book to
come out. And then the response that we
got afterwards, I've had people saying they started
to wear hijab because of the book or
that's made them proud to be a Muslim.
And I know even some people who became
Muslim after reading that book. So,
you know, was I think, insha'Allah, was a
result of my intentions were really set the
record straight,
put this out there as a good deed,
insha'Allah.
And Allah will bring the success. So,
you know, Alhamdulillah, I pray that Allah accepts
it from me and from all the sisters
who were involved and also from, you know,
my husband, Alaydul Hammel, because he was a
huge part of that book, and and facilitating
it and supporting it and making it happen.
And, subhanAllah, he used to actually say that
he's hoping that
his one of his best deeds will be
helping me to write that book,
because it was, masha'Allah, such a a a
book of dawah. It was a book of
dawah.
And doctor Saleh Saleh also was involved and
may Allah have mercy on him, and and
and reward him, you know, for his work
on it.
It was it was a labor of love.
I think that's the best way to put
it.
It's been a journey.
It's been a journey.
Can I say,
it's been a journey of
self discovery?
There's been hardships,
there's been trials,
there's been successes and triumphs.
And,
at the end of the day, I think
the best thing
about it is that I'm still standing.
You know,
when he passed, and I had Hamu,
I just was thrown into a whole new
world, a whole new role.
You know, I've I've been
sort of stay at home mom, I've been
work from home mom, I've been a homeschooling
mom,
and for the first time,
I'm mom and dad.
I'm a working mom. I'm a single mom.
I I run a company. I run 2
companies, and I run my husband's company as
well as sisters.
And,
yeah, it's a new it's a new life.
And
this is what Allah has decreed for me.
And because I'm still standing, I know that
Allah has put khair in it for me.
So even though it's nothing like I knew
and nothing like I expected,
I have
full
that there is clear in it for me
and that I can handle it. And I
think that makes a huge difference. Allah is
my waleem. He's my waleem, and he will
never let me he will never let me
fall. And I believe that with full certainty.
And so even when the tests come, even
when the trials come, even when it feels
overwhelming,
I know that he is there and that
he's wish willing me to call through and
that he will not let me fall and
that he'll catch me.
I think one of the things that I
would say to, mashaAllah, every sister that's out
there is keep your head up.
Keep your head up. This life is not
easy.
This life is full of trials. Alhamdulillah. We
have a good time. A lot of us
have a good time at it but it
is a trial. But if you see the
trials and the tests as a challenge,
you will face it in a different way
from if you see it as like a
punishment or something that you is being imposed
on you that you've got no control over.
Everything that happens to us is a challenge.
And when we have the mindset that even
though we are going to achieve and we
are going to win and we are going
to actually we we're going to we're gonna
step up to the plate
and we're gonna put our game face on,
then you approach it with positivity and confidence.
And know that Allah Subhanahu Wa Ta'ala wants
good for you and that he will guide
you if you want guidance. And so,
make intention is the first thing. Make intention
and then take the first step. Allah Subhanahu
Wa Ta'ala will always help you if you're
making your way towards him. The hadith Qudsi
tells us if you come towards him, a
hand span he comes towards you at arms
length. Meaning, he will not leave you to
make the whole journey on your own without
helping you, he will help you.
Make the intention,
take the first step, surround yourself with good
company. That's the advice I have for my
sisters out there because
in those ways at least whatever happens,
if you don't get on deen before you
die at least you die trying, and I
think that is where we all want to
be that we Allah takes us when we're
striving and he takes us when we're trying
and he takes us when our hearts are
already attached to him, when our intention is
already to rejoin him. And I think that's
the advice that I would give to my
sisters.