# Purpose | Yazin Alirhayim

I've spent alot of time trying to figure out what my goals from life are, and these thoughts inevitably lead to the question of purpose: 

> Why was I, Yazin, created?

Being a Muslim, I'm lucky to already have that answered for me. I say lucky because many a person has already tried to figure out their purpose, expending their entire lives in the process without finding an even remotely convincing answer. Turns out some things you just can't solve with a calculator and unlimited scribble paper. 

The Quran tells me that I was created to serve God:

وَمَا خَلَقْتُ الْجِنَّ وَالإِنسَ إِلاَّ لِيَعْبُدُونِ

That's it?

Yup, that's it. While it may sound incredibly limiting — people often _automatically_ think a nun praying in the mountains completely excluded from society. In reality however, it's quite the opposite: it's **liberating**. 

## [](https://yaz.in/purpose#liberating-youre-nuts)Liberating? You're nuts.

Let's look at our alternatives. Many people subscribe to the _make the world a better place_ purpose -- the idea that we were put on this Earth to leave it in better shape than we got it. 

Well, comparing the two, the former is an even more generic purpose than the latter. To serve God is, in it's essence, to do good — with one essential difference: it takes into the account the issue of **intention**. 

And that makes _all the difference_.

Two people could be doing the exact same action, with very different intentions — and yes, intentions do matter .. a lot. So do feelings, and "soft" things like honesty, kindness and charity.

Keep in mind that this purpose I mention doesn't tell me _what_ I need to do, but governs _why_ I would do it (namely, to serve God). 

Done correctly, this gives me (and Muslims, in general) an overwhelming air of peace and tranquility. Because I know something that others struggle so hard to know. I believe it at my very crux, and want to share it with the entire universe -- shout it from the rooftops, and tell every living soul.

That sense of pure _relief_ that comes from having a 100% certainty that I know exactly _why_ I was created — that is **priceless**.

Trust me when I say, it makes ALL the difference in the world.

## [](https://yaz.in/purpose#islam-and-muslims)Islam & Muslims

Sadly, Islam is arguably the most misunderstood topic in all of life today. It's ridiculous how a religion - one that I believe in at my very core - can be stretched, and misinterpreted beyond recognition — to the ridiculous state that we see depicted in the media today. While that alone is sufficient cause for distress, what's even more painful is that Muslim's themselves have begun to succumb to the same ill thinking.

Where Muslims in the past would've proudly identified themselves as such, much the way ivy league grads always make it a point to announce their credentials at every opportunity .. today speaks a very different story. You rarely come across a person today that identifies himself/herself as a Muslim anymore -- many, in their attempt to "fit in".

To that end, I feel like my purpose is to share that feeling that I hold so dear -- what I know about Islam, the _true_ Islam — the _what-you-really-think-about-when-youre-all-alone_ Islam. That overwhelming sense of inner peace. The feeling that no matter how good, bad or utterly devastating things are (as is often the reality that many oppressed Muslims find themselves in these days) it _will_ work out. 

That ability to make peace with anything and everything that God has planned for you. 

It's often a combination of two things:

1.  doing everything _humanly_ possible to achieve the goal that you so wish to achieve, and
2.  leaving things in God's hands. 

If things work out, then thank God -- it was for the best. If things do NOT work out (and this is where many people struggle to reconcile), then it was _also_ for the best.

**What?** Yes. God knows best after all, and you accept that in his infinite knowledge, he knew that not giving you what you so dearly wanted is actually better for you, even though you don't realize it yet.

This belief is priceless.