Fig & Olive

Woman in long sleeve ankle length body-con dress —Quranic reminders —Family photos of a friend you’ve never met —motivational quote —Islamic event this Saturday! If Neil Postman, author of Amusing Ourselves to Death, thought TV was bizarre —“We’ll be back with a quick look a molestation,” a quote he pulled from a Daytime talk show […]

Many will suggest writing a list of “must-haves,” “nice-to-haves,” and deal breakers when looking to get married. While this may be good advice from a practical standpoint I think it’s also important that we also tell a story of how we’d like our marriage to look, the texture and feel of our day-to-day shared existence […]

We often get it confused. We fear empathy because we fear it will move us to incorrect action. We assume that if we empathize with the ‘abuser’ our pity will overwhelm us and cause us to have mercy on him in his actions. But the ‘why’ never has to affect our ’what’ though it can […]

This is the post I wanted to post in December 2019 but I started to doubt myself and wonder if a true goodbye is necessary for this little blog. Whether it is or isn’t I’ve decided to share it anyway. Thank you, out there, for your support over the years. I am eternally grateful. Original […]

In the fight for women’s rights, our bodies have been a missing part of the conversation. Women marched their way into the workforce and demanded equal pay and equal opportunity but as we pushed our way into the top positions in the workforce —as we fought for equality, we left our bodies behind. How did […]

Modesty and faith come together. If one of the two is missing, so is the other. [Hadith] My dad used to repeat this Hadith a lot when I was growing up —especially as a teenager. It frustrated me because I didn’t want to believe it (I also just wanted to fit in and wear the […]

Maybe because I often buy into a “rugged individualism” approach to life I’ve found it hard to completely comprehend what people mean when they say it’s hard to get married. I know that our culture doesn’t make it easy to get married but it is, after all, our culture and everyone born into it knows that there will likely be […]

Hijab is Not Simply a Choice: It’s very difficult to have an honest conversation about Hijab. Muslims go into defense mode and non-Muslims go in to attack mode. The basic question that surrounds the tension -is hijab a choice or a form of oppression? As Muslims we’ve been trained to say of course it’s a […]

Some years ago, while I was studying at Azhar, a young sister wanting to practice her faith asked me to clarify the spiritual dimensions of modesty. This was my reply. Alhamdulillah, I believe it had a great impact on her back then, so I want to share it so you could also benefit insha Allah.  […]

Nation’s Impact Needless to say, the heyday of the Nation of Islam was before my time. My parents weren’t involved in the Nation and it was never a part of my religious upbringing. Nevertheless, its impact is still felt in the black Muslim community and the larger black community. Malcolm X was and is a […]