Practicing Detachment: A Daily Guide to Freeing Your Heart for Allah

I seek refuge with Allah from the accursed Satan.

Arriving Spiritually Before You Arrive Physically

Because you're still spiritually, emotionally, mentally back at work or whatever it is that you were doing. If you're on the phone right now, the validity of your Jumu'ah is in question by the way. So there is a different category there.

But the first person that I'm speaking about — you actually have to worry about how long it takes to disconnect. So not only are you not present in Jumu'ah, you're still present at what you left behind. And Allah reverses that and says: approach Jumu'ah, approach the prayer in the masjid and leave behind everything else — physically, emotionally, financially — put it all behind you. And focus on where you are at.

So arriving to a place spiritually before you physically get there. If you forget everything else that I'm going to say, remember this insha'Allah ta'ala and ask yourself: do I arrive at a place spiritually before I physically get there? Whether it is my salah, whether it is my grave, whether it is the Day of Judgment. Or if I am young today, have I spiritually already arrived at old age? And if I am in health today, have I spiritually already arrived at sickness? And if I have money today, have I spiritually already arrived in poverty?

What do I mean by that? Have I prepared myself and rehearsed the scenario of where I will be in the future so many times that when it comes it's actually natural? And the entire time I'm connected to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. Not another circumstance in place of the circumstance, by the way.

Because the circumstance that you fear might never come. You might never experience sickness. Allah azzawajal might take your life suddenly. You might never experience poverty. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala might take you while you're wealthy. You might never experience persecution. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala might take you from this world while you're still safe and living a life of privilege.

But you've put yourself in the circumstance in a way that you connect to Allah if that time were to come — so that if that time comes, Allah will find your heart consistently connected to Him. The pulse of your spirituality has not changed. You're already settled in the moment before it arrived.

Rehearsing the Future: The Day of Judgment and the Signs

So let's walk this back a bit insha'Allah ta'ala. The furthest place away from us right now in terms of a meeting — at least by our calculations — is the Day of Judgment. And the Prophet ﷺ is telling you to rehearse that moment over and over and over again in your life so that you can spiritually arrive there before you physically get there.

What if you rolled that back and someone says:

"When is the Dajjal coming out?" And you ask yourself right away:

"What did I prepare for it?" When is civil war going to come? — I'm not preaching civil war from the minbar by the way. But we all talk about the collapse of societies and everything breaking down and things getting really difficult for us. And at some point, as the Prophet ﷺ said:

(Sunan Abi Dawud, Hadith 4338; Sunan al-Tirmidhi, Hadith 2168)

When people see an evil and they don't change it, it may be that the punishment extends to everybody else because they didn't change the evil that was in their midst. So if things were to break down because of the failure of the world to stop the most evil genocide that is playing out on our screens, and we were to find ourselves in an adverse situation —

What have you prepared for it? Do you already have in your mind and in your heart and in your spirituality what you would do? Have you arrived to that place spiritually before it physically arrived, while asking Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for protection? That is true for every single one of the adverse signs of the Day of Judgment. And you have to approach it that way.

Imam Ahmad rahimahullah was asked by a person: are Ya'juj and Ma'juj Muslim or Kafir? Like, are they going to be claiming to be Muslim or are they going to be outright Kafir? You know what he said to him? He said: "Do you know the du'a when you enter into the masjid?" And the man said, "No." He said, "Learn that first." Focus on learning the du'a to enter into the masjid before you try to come to some super convoluted answer about something in the future that you're never really going to be able to diagnose right.

Before you get to these forecasts and these things that have no benefit to you — what have you prepared for that moment? What have you prepared for every single thing that you read about, and attached yourself to a version of yourself that you want to be should that moment arrive in your lifetime? That's the question. It's always spiritually transcending the physical moment and being there.

The Example of Abu Bakr and the Companions

You know what that looked like in the time of the Prophet ﷺ? It looked like Abu Bakr as-Siddiq radiyallahu ta'ala anhu — for months before the Prophet ﷺ comes to him and tells him that he's going to be his companion on the hijrah, Abu Bakr radiyallahu ta'ala anhu had kept two camels to the side that he nurtured, that he took care of, so that when the moment comes — if it comes — that the Prophet ﷺ asks me for sohbah, for his companionship on the journey, I'm ready to go.

He's already played out the hijrah in his mind so many times, he's rehearsed it to where the response came natural. How many of those companions of the Prophet ﷺ that found themselves on the battlefield of Uhud had already played that exact scenario out a million times before they actually found themselves there? You think they just rise to the moment in the moment? They arrived at the moment well before they physically got there. It's spiritually putting yourself there before you actually get there.

Two Types of Spiritual Preparation

The scholars mention that that is of two types. One of them are the inevitable natural progressions in life. And so who are the most successful young people? Throughout history, by the way, the most successful young people are those that transcended their youth and already went ahead of their years — they actually say "ahead of your years" — and planned in reverse.

So I'm physically 13 or 14 or 15 or 16, but I'm spiritually and mentally already in my 30s. And I'm looking back at how I need to craft a physical life to arrive at the spiritual place I want to be when I get to that place. There's a natural progression — things that are inevitable in the cycle of life, unless something tragic happens.

And then there are the "what ifs." And for the what ifs, the believer prepares themselves emotionally and spiritually for worst case scenarios. Because the worst thing that can happen to you, if you prepare yourself for a worst case scenario, is that something of a lesser severity comes of that and you rise with ihsan to that occasion — because you're already prepared for way worse than that.

So in my mind, I'm already preparing for a moment in which I have no money to my name. So if Allah azzawajal tests me with half of my wealth, with 75% of my wealth, I've already prepared myself mentally, emotionally, spiritually for what it would look like to have no wealth whatsoever. I've already told myself what I'm going to say. I've already asked Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala for firmness in that situation. I'm not attached to a particular circumstance. Alhamdulillah.

When it comes to people in our lives — may Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala protect our loved ones, may Allah azzawajal preserve our families — think about the people of Gaza and the scenarios that they've had to play in their minds over and over and over again. As hurt and as painful as it is for them to lose their loved ones, do you think that not each and every single one of them has already played out that scenario in their minds? That Allah azzawajal may test me with this? I might find myself in this situation.

So yes, it's going to be a shock — because experiencing is not the same as preparing. But at the end of the day, I have attached myself to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala and not put myself in a situation to where I take too much comfort in this dunya or find my stability in the matters of this world. I approach life like a stranger, where I see it as a place that is inherently unstable, that is predictably unpredictable. It's meant to be deceiving. It's meant to be uncomfortable. Things are going to happen in my life. Let me spiritually put myself ahead without divorcing the moment that I am in.

And that's the thing about the Prophet ﷺ. He was still physically present. He was still emotionally present. But he was spiritually transcendent alayhis salatu wasalam — already looking towards the future all the time, already looking towards that moment with Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. No one can read about the Prophet ﷺ with his family and with his companions and say that the Prophet ﷺ was unhealthily detached.

Practicing Daily Detachment

How do you achieve that? Perspective. By practicing daily detachment in a way that is healthy. You know how you practice daily detachment, dear brothers and sisters? You give of your money regularly. You are used to the visual of your bank account going from this number to that number فِي سَبِيلِ اللَّهِ. You're used to it. You do it all the time voluntarily. And so if the moment comes to where you're shocked and that number decreases without you having prepared for it, you're already used to seeing that number go down.

You learn to detach from the people around you. How? By neglecting them? No — detachment is not neglect. They have rights upon you that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has assigned. You love them fully. You maintain ihsan, excellence towards them, for the sake of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala.

You know how you detach from them? What Aisha radiyallahu ta'ala anha said — that this man ﷺ, that beautiful, pure, perfect man, who was so attentive to the moment that he was in that he would drink from the same part of the glass that Aisha radiyallahu ta'ala anha drank from — but when the call of salah was made:

(Referenced in Musnad Ahmad and related narrations from Aisha radiyallahu anha)

It was as if he didn't even know who we were anymore. Think about how profound that is. He knew the place that I put my mouth on the glass a moment ago. But when Allah azzawajal called him, كَأَنَّهُ لَا يَعْرِفُنَا — it was as if he didn't know us anymore. Not that he was neglectful, but: I have to go to salah.

You're already practicing a daily sense of full detachment. You don't do that if, when you go to your salah, you're carrying a million things and then you're deliberating a million things in salah and then getting right back to it after salah. It doesn't work that way. You're practicing it on a regular basis.

And so every single day — with your dhikr, with your remembrance of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, with your exposing yourself to those whom the dunya has betrayed so that it doesn't betray you — it's one of the things that the scholars of suluk mention. That if you surround yourself with people who were not deluded by this world in the first place, or the world betrayed them, then you're less likely to be betrayed by it.

Think of it this way. It's like if you knew a friend — someone that stabs people in the back — and you already know four people that have been let down by that person. When you're with that person, it doesn't matter how charming that person is going to be. You've spent time with the four people that that person has sold out. I already know who you are.

And so when you're around people who have not been deluded by this dunya, or who have been betrayed by its promise, then you're less likely to be deluded by it yourself. And that's one of the benefits of constant accompanying of the poor, constant accompanying of the oppressed, constant accompanying of the betrayed, constant accompanying of the sick.

How am I going to ever be betrayed by the promise of health if I'm always around sick people? How am I going to think that I'm always going to live in safety and ease if I'm around people that have been betrayed by that promise? How will I be deluded by my money if I'm around people that are poor all the time? It's good for your heart. It's good for your mind. It keeps you calibrated. It reminds you who this dunya is — who this world is — all the time, so that it never betrays you again. I know who you are. I know what you're putting forward.

The Statement of Imam Hasan al-Basri

Likewise, dear brothers and sisters, when you look at the lives of the companions of the Prophet ﷺ and the way that they lived their lives in this regard — they trained themselves on a daily basis to transcend their circumstances. Do positive circumstances affect me in a disproportionate way? Do negative circumstances affect me in a disproportionate way?

SubhanAllah, there's a very powerful statement from Imam Hasan al-Basri rahimahullah ta'ala. He said — and I'm going to have to read it in full because every single sentence is so beautiful:

He said: "I swear by Allah, I have known people" — and the implication is that he's talking about the sahaba, because he is a tabi'i — "I have met people and kept company with groups amongst them who neither rejoiced when things of the world came to them, nor grieved when things of the world left them."

By the way, he's talking about unhealthy happiness and unhealthy grief. Of course we're happy when good things happen to us. We're sad when bad things happen to us. But he's saying that they were not handcuffed by the circumstance of joy or handcuffed by the circumstance of grief.

He said: "The whole world was worth less to them than the dirt that you walk on." They saw the whole world — with everything that it has — as less than the dirt that you walk on.

"They would not mind if the dunya sat upon them or if it rose upon them." They saw sunrise and sunset in exactly the same way.

"And when the night would come upon them, they would present themselves to the night, they would set their feet, and then they would place their faces in the dirt, and their eyes would flow with tears until it came down their cheeks. They would call upon their Lord to free them from their sins."

"And if they did something good, then they would spend their time asking Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala to accept it. And if they committed a sin, then it grieved them."

SubhanAllah — Sa'id ibn al-Musayyib rahimahullah mentioned something to the effect that you should strive to get to a point that nothing pleases you more than Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, and nothing causes you fear more than your own sins. You fear nothing more than your sins, you want nothing more than Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. That's the emotional switch that has to happen.

So what caused them happiness was when they were able to do good. They felt better when they gave something in sadaqah than when they bought something for themselves. They felt better when they spent time fi sabilillah than when they spent time on themselves. They enjoyed doing good deeds more than they enjoyed splurging on themselves. And what caused them grief was not when someone else did something to them — but when they sinned against themselves and transgressed against themselves. So when they committed a sin, it bothered them. And they would ask Allah to forgive them.

And he said: "I swear by Allah that they were not safe from their sins except by the fact that they were always in a state of tawbah." Inabah — turning back to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. They were turned back to Allah before the sin even happened. And so the sin was immediately put into perspective and forgiven.

Can you put yourself in a situation to where the world around you happens, the circumstances happen, but you don't put your hope in those circumstances — and you transcend those circumstances by always thinking one step ahead, by always spiritually being at a place that you are not physically at right now? Can you get there?

Two Closing Reflections

First: The Prophet ﷺ and the Year of Grief

I'll end with two thoughts in this regard. Number one — with the Prophet ﷺ and the circumstances that came to him. One of the wisdoms that the scholars mention about the Prophet ﷺ not losing Khadijah radiyallahu ta'ala anha and Abu Talib right away — the Year of Grief came years later, years later than the point of revelation — is that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala built into the Prophet ﷺ the love of the Qur'an and the love of qiyam, the love of the Qur'an and the love of that night prayer.

Simultaneously, he's loving Khadijah radiyallahu ta'ala anha, he's finding safety in the physical protection of Abu Talib. But Allah azzawajal was nurturing something else in the Messenger of Allah ﷺ — so that when that hit came, the Prophet ﷺ had something to lean on. He didn't have Khadijah anymore. He didn't have Abu Talib. But he had a decade's worth of learning the Qur'an and qiyam to immediately take that as his source of comfort and to spiritually transcend the circumstances.

He didn't love Khadijah less. Khadijah radiyallahu ta'ala anha would not have complained that the Prophet ﷺ is getting so religious and so he's starting to pay less attention to me. No. He just loved Allah more.

The love of Allah becomes more. And that love of Allah subsumes everything else and puts everything else in perspective. And so you have to nurture those habits to where you can weather those moments. Because you're building into something that is transcendence.

Second: The Saying of Ali ibn Abi Talib on Zuhud

The last thing that I'll say to you is the saying of Ali ibn Abi Talib radiyallahu ta'ala anhu about al-zuhud, about asceticism. A very powerful saying:

He said that zuhud, asceticism, is not that you own nothing. It's that nothing owns you.

A person can have the whole world in their hands, but it doesn't mean anything to them except to the extent that it earns them the pleasure of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala — because they have gotten themselves used to using that for the sake of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. A person can have all the people around them, and they love those people for the sake of Allah and they're grateful to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. And they don't love those people any less. But they love Allah more because of the presence of those people. They say: alhamdulillah, Allah gave me these people as a gift. I'm pleased.

And so:

To Allah belongs what He took, and to Allah belongs what He gave. I'm at peace. I might be hurt, but I'm at peace.

The Free Dessert: A Final Analogy

And I want you to think about this analogy. If you found yourself in a situation to where you were at a place — let's say that you ran out of time. Let's say that you were at a resort and your checkout time is 12 o'clock, and then the resort said: "You know what, you can stay for another eight hours." Those eight hours will be more beloved to you than the whole eight days — because you feel like you got something for free. Like this was a gift. I didn't even pay for this. I just got these eight hours.

You're at a restaurant — or, something that's more relevant if you're young — you're playing a game, you're at a bowling alley, and they change the clock and say: "I'm going to give you another hour, another 30 minutes." That 30 minutes, that hour, you find more joy in it than anything else. Or they bring out a free dessert for you. I didn't pay for the dessert. You forget that you paid so much money for the whole meal, but then that dessert came for free. Oh my God, I'm so grateful for that extra.

That's how you should treat every blessing you have in your life right now. We did nothing to deserve it. So you look around and say: alhamdulillah. Everything I have right now is that free dessert. It's that extra time. Every day, every circumstance should increase you in gratitude. But connect yourself to the Bestower of all blessing.

May Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala make us amongst those that He's pleased with. Allahumma ameen.

Closing Du'a