Preparing for what truly matters

A reminder that death doesn't wait

I still remember the moment I heard the news.

Z was gone.

At first, it didn’t feel real. My ears couldn’t believe what they were hearing, and my mind refused to process it. How could she be gone? I had just seen her. We had just shared the same spaces, breathed the same air. She was supposed to go home, rest, and wake up the next day like the rest of us. But she didn’t.

I kept replaying our last moments together, how offhandedly I waved goodbye, not knowing it would be the last time. Our last conversation, the last words we shared… she was really gone.

And yet, my mind refused to accept it. I kept replaying it in my head, over and over, the disbelief, the confusion, the heaviness in my chest. It felt like the world had shifted, like I had been pulled into some alternate reality where life just… ends. Just like that.

And then came the grief. The realization that I would never see her again. Never hear her voice, never run into her in class, never share a moment of laughter on our way home. Just gone. Buried beneath the earth, while the rest of us continued living as if nothing happened.

I couldn’t stop thinking about how easily it could have been me. We usually went home together. What if I had been on that bus? What if my name had been the one people were whispering about? What if my soul had been the one taken while I was still so unprepared?

Was she prepared?

That’s when the fear settled in. Not just the fear of death, but the fear of what comes after. The grave. The questioning. The reality of the Barzakh.

I keep wondering—what was on her mind as the realization hit that her time was up? Was she satisfied? Were there things she wished she could change? Was she scared, or was she at peace with the life she had lived?

Sometimes, I find myself thinking back to the last day we spoke. I wish I could have warned her. Would she have listened? What would she have done differently?

Her death shook me in ways I can’t fully explain. It forced me to look at myself, at my life. If I had died in the state I was in, what would I have to show for it? Nothing. I wasn’t truly living for this world or the next—I was just existing, drowning in my own misery.

For so long, I had been chasing things that wouldn’t even matter in the end. I let my love and desire for this world blind me from why I was really here (—for the umpteenth time. How do I keep falling into the same trap?).

But after Z’s death, it all became clear, nothing in this dunya is truly ours. Not our dreams, not our possessions, not even our own lives. It can all be taken in a second.

When our time comes, everything we chased in this world—our ambitions, our status, our belongings—won’t matter. The only thing that will matter is what we’ve sent ahead for the Akhirah.

So how do we make sure we leave this world ready for the next?

In the end, what truly matters is how well we’ve prepared for the Akhirah and how much we’ve strived for Jannah.

I pray Allāh forgives her, grants her ease in the grave, and reunites us in a place where there is no grief, no pain—only eternal peace.

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Assalamu alaykum wa rahmatuLlahi wa barakatuhu

I’ve been wanting to write this for a while, but I just… couldn’t. Every time I tried, I felt stuck. Like putting it into words would make it too real. Like once I wrote about it, I’d have to accept that she’s really gone.

I won’t pretend we were the closest of friends, but her absence lingers in ways I didn’t expect. I still find myself looking for her face in the crowd. Sometimes, I catch a glimpse of someone dressed like her and, for a second, I think it’s her, even though I know it isn’t. It’s strange how someone can be here one moment and then just… gone.

I’m still in shock. Maybe that’s why it’s taken me so long to write this. I didn’t know how. I didn’t have the strength. I still don’t know if I do. But I knew I needed to. And I hope, in some way, this serves as a reminder, not just for me, but for you too.

Life is fleeting and none of us know how much time we have left. May we use whatever remains in a way that pleases Allah (SWT).

May Allāh (SWT) accept her deeds, expand her grave, and make it a garden from the gardens of Jannah. And may He grant us the ability to live in a way that prepares us for our own meeting with Him.

And may this Ramadan be a time of reflection, growth, and closeness to Allāh for all of us.