Me and My Mother

There's a lot of difference between my mother (may Allah preserve her) and I. Her resilience, patience, strength, independence, wisdom and self-assuredness strike me at times and make me feel like I inherited only some of her physical attributes and not the admirable qualities. These qualities would have definitely been indispensible in the last 2 years for me not to mention throughout life - which is inevitably full of injustice, hardship and tests.

But there are a lot of differences between my life and my mothers'. She can barely remember her parents as they passed away when she was very young. She was married off pretty much as soon as she reached puberty and thenceforth began a life of marital/in-law strife - typical life of marriage if you ask me, but hey I'm a (justified) cynic. She had to adapt to the settings God put her in and hence she either applied all the qualities she already had or acquired them - you can't really know which one but either way they became part of her character. Whereas me - I've had a life of ease. Of course, if this was 10 years ago I'd tell you I had the worst life imaginable but I was of a different species then - a teenager. My "hardships" amounted to my parents not letting me wear "trendy western clothes", not letting me go out with my friends, coming down on me like a ton of bricks if my brother spotted me in school within a 10 metre radius of a guy etc. I wasn't pressured to continue my education after college, I wasn't pressured to do housework, I wasn't pressured to even earn a living and after my family were fairly confident that I wasn't in any danger of becoming a tart :-D they let me wear what I wanted.

Sometimes I wonder what kind of person I would've been had my upbringing been different. Had I been accustomed to hardship, difficulties now would not be so trying. Of course, that's not really useful because I can't alter what has passed and I can't (and don't) regret the blessing of ease, walhamdulillah. What I can do is behave as though I have patience, fortitude, self-confidence, resilience. I can keep my mood swings under the wraps of smiles. I can don a fake coat of thick skin to sheild me from what others say and think of me. The outward actions will be pretty much the same as someone who already has these qualities naturally but inwardly it will be more of a struggle. Until insha'Allah they become second nature to me.