Al-Insomniyya

MEMORISED: SURAH KAHF JUZ 1  35 pages   Remaining: 565 pages 1.8 juz   Remaining: 28.2 juz CONSISTENCY: 55 days of learning. Missed days = 0 (Referring to learning new portion. Revision has included couple of days missed which has to stop) PLAN: 7.5 Lines/day (half a page) Wake up 1 hour earlier - revise recent 3 pages once and then new portion. Review all of Baqarah every day at least once. Make sure to do all reviews from now on - not one missed day. ANKI - prioritise Surah Baqarah/Hifz vocab if can't do the other decks. Revise Surah Kahf at least twice a week. So if I do half a page from now on: SURAH BAQARAH SHOULD BE COMPLETED ON FEB 19 2016 (in sha Allah)

Alhamdulillah I finished Juz 1 a couple of days ago. Felt very emotional, almost tearful, when I memorised the last verse (and I'm certainly not either of those generally!). Ideally I would have liked to blog at the time, but always running out of time. A few points to reflect on: The review plan as previously mentioned does work if stuck to. There was a period of 2-3 days when some of the review was neglected due to revision for Arabic exams. This part of the juz is subsequently now weak. When I see a 'trigger word' I can read that whole section but then seem to stumble again at the end of that 5 lines. I realise its not just memorising and being aware of the meaning. When you memorise a part, you are also impritinting that section, that screenshot into your memory. And when you do too much in one go (or leave a few pages weak and so have to do them together), it can get muddled. Whilst my previous plan was to stick to 5 lines a day until end of Surah Baqarah and...

Inevitably I'm having to make sacrifices in the pursuit of hifz at this stage of my life. Some of the things that are being sacrificed: Gym - I cancelled my gym membership yesterday. I've been a regularly gym goer since my late teens so this is a big sacrifice. Two years I will not go gym. I will go back to kickboxing in January inshallah but the marathon 2-3 hours heavy lifting several times a week will come to a halt for now. My routine for now is homebased: Running twice a week on the treadmill Chin ups/Pull ups every other day - takes just 10mins. Lets see what changes this brings about. FA/Nk every other day. Marriage - ha, the bane of my parents' lives. Every time they can bring it up they will. I'm not too fussed about this myself, but am aware the later I leave things the more difficult it will be to find someone from a seemingly already super fussy bunch of great British Muslim women. But if I can get hifz done in the next 2 years I really dont care....

Last Sunday, I missed my A level Arabic class in the morning so that I could catch up on everything and generally was a little fatigued from working many days in a row, and a particuarly stressful T+O shift on the Saturday. I should mention, I say fatigue in retrospect as I keep pushing myself and driving myself. I'm not sure if its the self discipline and willpower that I have instilled over the last few years or just adrenaline at finally having some control over my life and fulfilling this one big goal of mine.  Despite the above for some reason I ended up distressed at times during that day, losing focus. I started late, having wasted some time on the internet in the morning. I once read the first hour sets the rudder for the day and this certainly was true. I mention this day as it was a day when I - momentarily - wanted to give up. Only in salaah was I able to focus and revise some of the Quran.  However, by the next day I was fine and I'm still chugging along, consi...

So over the last week I've neglected my ANKI deck. Inevitably the reviews built up and I stopped learning new words. My hifz I have kept up obviously - this is my first and foremost priority. But I got to a portion yesterday where I did not recognise 3 words in the 5 line segment I was due to learn for that day. Immediately this was a problem. Until now I have been learning with meaning, as I had already learnt the words in advance via ANKI. I realised not only did this help with making sense of what I was learning, the actual phonetics of those invidividual words were already in my head - i.e. part of the memorising was already done. Many times I have heard people doing hifz (who do not understand any Arabic) trying to relate the words or sounds they were memorising to their mother tongue. Well I prefer to relate it to the actual meaning! Learning these new unknown words took me back to my two previous attempts from yesteryear at hifz where I was just memorising sounds. Lear...

A new technique I'm trying to implement - reciting 5 lines in one breath. I'm trying to apply this both to revision and to the new 5 lines I'm learning every day. I remember Shaykh Akram Nadwi mentioning once how in Nadwatul Ulama they had an entire verb table 3 times in one breath. I actually think there's a logic to this apparent madness. If you can recite something fluently (without compromising accuracy) then it is better encoded. I'm finding I'm remembering previous day's memorised portions better with this 'speed reading' technique. At present I'm not just sticking to reading the new portion 10 times throughout the day in isolated episodes, but especially whilst driving really mastering a new portion well so that I can (almost) read that new 5 line segment in one breath. Inevitably the efficiency is also increased with this technique. You end up reading very fast. Couple of other things: Driving to and from work is a real blessing...

Top three screenshots are from the Quran app. Very handy as it is always in my pocket. It has same template as Uthmani mushaf and also has meaning and audio, although lacks a word for word breakdown. I do try and use a physical mushaf when possible as it let's you visualise which page you are on, which side of the Mushaf it is on etc.  The fourth screenshot shows the tally app I am using which also reflects the revision pattern I'm following at present and which appears to be working for me. Although it says last 3 pages to be read 5 times, at present this is 9 pages (what I have memorised of Surah Baqarah). There's a satisfaction in being able to recite everything you know from memory in one day although obviously the more I learn the more difficult this will become and eventually impossible. Final screenshot is of ANKI, hammering home all the individual words.