Beyond The Honeymoon. With Bilkisu Abdullahi

25/07/2025

“Helping Muslim women strengthen marriages through the Quran & Sunnah. Practical tips, inspiring stories, & resources for fulfilled marital life. 🌟”

29/08/2020

The easiest way to be loved unconditionally by your spouse💖💝💗💋💓💜

I have never known my husband's income until after we got married despite courting him for 9 good years. Funny enough it just wasn't my problem. My greatest fear then was " why love dies?" I heard a lot of married people complained about how their husbands maltreats them, I see people that were crazy in love get separated or have problems few months after marriage, I hear married women say men are all the same, and that marriage was not all about bed of roses. I used to be terrified and scared, I wanted to find solutions for all, but most importantly I wanted not to be a victim, no matter what.

So I watched out for behaviour that could lead to violence in any man I met. I watched out for disrespectul behaviours. Sometimes I pushed them to their limits, just to see their reactions. Things that if i try now ehnnn?😂But guess what? He passed it all, all my craziness and my childishness, he always played cool... I told my friends that I know if i marry him he will never maltreat me no matter what..

I knew what I wanted in a man, but I didn't know why I wanted what I wanted. I wanted "security"(remember how in our last session we discussed that because women birth and nuture babies our need for security is as strong as the men's need for s*x) my own kind of security was not "money" like many other girls , it was triggered by the fear of things I have heard and seen about marriage. I wanted peace, and an atmosphere to flourish, I wanted love, and happiness, I wanted to change the perspective, I wanted to tell the younger generation that love was possible even after marraige. I wanted to find out the solution practically and share it with the world, I wanted to change the narrative for women. Yes I dared to dream big.

Like every other typical couple, before now, marriage was not as easy as we thought It was going to be.. even after settling with my Mr. Right, we started out as best friends that we were, then we felt comfortable enough to attack and then we threw mud balls at each other and we lost our safety in the hands of each other and we put ourselves first before each other, we built our fences and filters to protect ourselves from one another, we hesitated to give love, we tried hard to play it cool, day by day, after all, all we needed was to survive. Unconditional love was a big No... Happily everafter remined a myth. To be frank We never had any major issue but we where just there.

This wasn't only my story but a typical story for an average married couple today. The question is why is it so difficult to love and to be loved unconditionally by our spouses, even though at the core of our being, we yawn for it?

Lets travel back in time, Isn't it funny that we made the most important decision (marriage) of our lives at a time when we have very little knowledge, understanding or planning.? Most of us use all our energy, time, and resources to plan a grand wedding reception than we plan for the marraige itself. We marry based on assumption, we think everything will work out since love conquers all.

Our fucos was on romance and s*x appeal. We imagine being listened to, cared for, loved and supported. Most of our expectations were positive and primarily selfish. We never thought about how we are going to give all of these and much more to our partners, how we are going to stand by them no matter what, how we will give them our unconditional love, unconditionally.

Yet we wanted to be loved unconditional. Wasn't that an unspeakable expectation? Isn't it painful that it isn't happening? Lets be very sincere, isn't our desire for unconditional love the main reason we wanted to get married in the first place? Wasn't it
our core expectation? Do you know that not feeling loved is the root of every trouble and sorrows?

Why does the thought of unconditional love seaming very unrealistic for a lot of us. Do you know that we have a powerful inmate drive that demands fulfilment of unconditional love?The need for unconditional love is in our very soul and must be satisfied in oder for us to be happy, ecstatic and blissful.

They've question still remains, how can we cause our spouse to love us unconditionally? Some of us will go to a great length to acheive this, they would buy it if money could buy it, .. but the answer is really simple.... "Give it". Period!

Do you know that giving love gives a much greated experience of love than receiving love?, and that what goes around comes around. So the one single means that you can get unconditional love from your spouses is by giving it to them first. it's that simple.

So what is unconditional love? What will we lose if we decide to love our husband's unconditionally? What are we afraid of?

Unconditional love means to be completely loved, never judged, always understand and
Love externally.. like the love mothers have for their babies....he cries, squirms, poops, and makes her goes through pains, sufferings and sleepless night but she kisses him and calls him her bundle of joy. Wives (mothers) knows how to give it and husbands know how to receive it, because they got it from their mums too... and they expect it from the woman that love them... so you know how to, ....give it pls.

You should know that to love hubby unconditionally you must let go of the fear envy and doubt of the mind (limitation). You must learn to control the mind and not let it control you. You will learn to love along side manifestation of respect, devotion, admiration and loyalty and only then will you feel the love you have always sought for, you will benefit in ways unimaginable and your marriage will be amazing.

Change your behavior, make a commitment and you will move from pains and sufferings to bliss in a short time.Treat your husband like the most important person in the world, to you that is HE.....

Hope this helps....

Pardon my errors and please repost.
Yours loving Bilkisu Sarkinhanya.

See you in our next class.

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29/08/2020

Why we act the way we do. Part 1

Have you ever watched an animal geographic documentary? Do you recall how different species of animals live together in the same ecosystem and prey on one another? How only the fittest of them all can survive and procreate? How the preys are forced to deduce several means of survival from their predators, means such camouflaging, fleeing, acting dead, using their poisonous skin or substance.This is termed the "fight or flight" mode.The first thing each and every organism strive for is survival and then after surviving, they think about having offsprings (procreation).

Well, our bobies on one level is a biological entity that shares a universal condition of existence with it's biological cousins. Just like these animals.

In the bengining of time, our forefathers lived in caves and mountains and were always prone to danger from other tribes and animals. They fought alot, to keep their mates and space .They were constantly at war and so always alert at threats to their existance. Day by day, their primary drive was to survive and then to procreate. Whenever they are faced with danger, their biological instinct was to protect themselves through what ever means possible "Fight or Flight" response. Cascades of events such as adrenaline secretion, activation of hypothalamus, increase blood flow to the limbs and the body is instictively put in place, without any effort at all.

Unfortunately enough in the era of civilisation, where fighting is so out of fashion and we are expected to capture only the smiling moments even in photographs, this survival instinct comes back to hurt us in ways we cant imagine, it becomes difficult for our mind and bodies to differenciate between life threatening situation or when as little as our peace of mind or well being is threatened, the same cascade of events is biologically activated.

Our primary drives to survive and to procreate controls us in simple, subtle and complex ways. Ways we are unaware of, ways we can't even imagine. Most of our internal and external reactions are trackable to these drives. The different between us and animals in the bush is that we can pause in between an action and our reaction and think. If a lion catches a prey, it doesn't bother whether or not the prey has a family that loves it, Or offprings to carter for, it just pounce on it meal .. unlike human it doesn't have any consciousness at all.

Anytime we are faced with a life threatening situation (or just a threat to our peace of mind or wellbeing), our body and mind work together (physiological and psychological) to avert us from that danger and this is naturally done instinctively and automatically. In between the threat and this automatic respond ( is a thin thread) lays our power, the power to apply wisdom and self control which makes us more human and less animal. And Because most of the time our minds cause us to categorize events that are not life threatening at all, as life threathing, we have to learn how to consciously distrust this biological instinctive cascades of events so as not to overreact and regret later. We have to deploy self control and wisdom.. we can do it, if we learn how.

Misclassification of event as lifethreathing is the major cause of ongoing stress and distress in todays world. Therefore, we most learn not to always accept our automatic responses but to use our common sense to differentiate a real threats from a bump on the road. We must learn to carefully evaluate what we are faced with and not let the mind always shift to its most primary respond. It is up to us to stop the action.

The secret is to train ourselves to ignore the automatic respond and consciously analyse everything that we encounter, so as to live a more joyous life.It's time to take charges of our behaviour, and take control of our minds and not to allow it to control us. We can do it but only if we learn how.

Our "Hot button" is what triggers us to act hirewair, even over things that we should just smile and pass by, we all have different hot buttons, recognise them and unplug them one by one not allow your mind and body to jump into unthinkable actions.

lets take for instance, hubby A screams and scold his wife in public. and that was her hot button, she became so pi**ed off because this is not the 1st, 2nd nor 3rd time and she has been letting him get away with it. But this time around, she wanted to put an end to it. She came so close to his face without anyone noticing and she said I told you to stop shouting at me in public but you won't listen, if you do it again, I will insult you publicly. She just pressed his hot button by talking to him rudely and he replied without thinking "try it and see how I will teach you what your parents haven't taught you", he went further to insult her parents and so she cursed his parent too and he gave her a dirty slap out of annoyance and she angrily ran into the room, packed her belongings and left the house hurriedly, he never went after her for months and later sent her a divorce.

Notice how none of this was planned for? but they allowed their animal instinct take away what they they have built for years or even decades. She should have waited for him to calm down and then communicated how she felt about how he treated her, He should have apologised when she complained to his face, she shouldn't have spoken to him rudely, he shouldn't have brought her parents into the matter, let alone insult them, she should have let him know that she was raised better, by not dragging his parent along, just because he dragged her's...one of them should have walked away. Only and only if they had paused to think. But they both didn't and it cost them their marriage.

When your spouse react intensity to something, it is only wise and kind to remember it as his area of sensitivity, so you can avoid striking the nerve that send the message of danger.

It is also wise to know your automatic responds to his action because some of our reaction are really uncalled for, we can learn to recalibrate our sensitivity to calmer and more realistic response, because when we get use to acting crazy because our hot button has been pressed, we will act even crazier when the button is pressed more often, like a nerve getting more and more sensitive.

So if you are the hitter you need to back off when you notice hubby is been caught in a psychological trap and if you are the hittee, you need to step back and explain to yourself that it's ok and you are safe.

Hope this helps....

Pardon my errors and please repost.
Yours loving Bilkisu Sarkinhanya.

See you in our next class.

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29/08/2020

Anatomy of marraige part III.

What would happen if you decide to make a cup of hot chocolate tea on a cold rainy day? after putting into your tea cup some chocolate powder, you add in half cup of milk and some hot boiling water and then suddenly, you mistakenly add a spoonful of salt instead of sugar? Would you waste your time lamenting over the lost resources, time and effort or would you rather quickly toss it into the sink and make yourself another proper cup?

Well, that's what you should do if you think your relationship is too messy to be cleaned up,... start all over again. It's likely that you start again and slip again. Start again and again and again, putting in mind that until it works, everyday is a brand new opportunity to restart. However, if its not that bad, just remove away all the mud you have introduced into your scared space and never reinstall them again, (putting in only sweet)when they manage to creep back in, locate them and uproot them.

Remember your scared space is like a container, even if only one person puts in the sweet stuff, the container will be sweeter. Do your part without any expectations. Remember your partner is not reading this, so you now know better.

While reading this, if your feelings of hurt and betrayal is raising from your core being to your throat, know that, this is what we don't want for you, we are trying to remove your pains and replace it with Joy and happiness. We can't do that by lamenting about how hurt you were, just like lamenting about your Wasted chocolate tea will not make you another cup.. so just decide to get rid of that pain and then you would.
Refuse to be a victim,begin this process so that your pain will end...give love another chance to blossom and it would, you have a better chance now that you know better.

It's easy to make up your mind and decide to start all over again but I think the most difficult part is to cope with hubby's annoying traits when they come visiting again. Since he is not reading this, he is likely to remain his same self. It is you who knows better and must react differently to his crazyness. You must not follow him down the rabbit hole or else your time here would be as useful as useless. Remember when you resel with the pig you both get filthy.

So the only way you can react differently is when you learn how to control your mind and not let it control you.The task of controlling the mind is the most worthy effort you will ever make, it will change your life in all areas. And this is how we go about it, next time when hubby start acting out, instead of feeling angry and frustrated, and venting too.. or pouring out your mind or scolding him or acting even more crazier, may be causing a scene or hurting each other in the process and regretting your words and action later. Instead of throwing mudballs all over the place and causing damages to the scared space, remove yourself from the equation and dont feel like his target. The only reason why you get angry is because you see yourself as his target and you feel his actions are all about you.

Next time, this is what you should do when he starts .... Firstly, remember nobody wants anger, it's not a place he wants to be either. Secondly, look at him as been helpless and help him get over whatever it is that he is going through, sometimes just by doing or saying nothing or just by giving him some space. Thirdly, Instead of pitying yourself and feeling like the victim of the attack, redirect your energy to having some sympathy over your erring husband. You are not responsible for his bad behavior, so don't take it personally.

The fact is that we all have flaws, no one is flawless and in most cases the flaws we focus on are those that trigger our own peculiar weakness. That's why some flaws dont really bother us while others are difficult for us to endure. If his action cause you pains, the pains you feel is coming from your weakness and not your strength plus in most cases our spouse's flaws in relation to their good qualities is pretty few and far between, So look at him through the eyes of love.

What should you do if you try as much as possible but things gets out of control ?

No matter how deeply out of control the conversation gets, if the tension is high and you both are out of control, you have to immediately physically withdraw yourself and use the two magic words "I'm sorry" say it like you mean it, mean it.

I'm sorry does not necessarily mean that you are wrong, so you don't have to wait until you are at fault to use it. As soon as you see things heading to the wrong direction, use it. It's the most potent de-railer of negativity, the most effective diffuser. Use this two words often, when you do, you are sending a positive message of "stop before we get hurt" and that you value your partner and the relationship more than your ego.It also says "I love you and I don't want to hurt you"..Try it, it works.

It doesn't matter whether you feel like saying the magic words or not, just make the sound when things are escalating, remember we are trying to control the mind and not let it control us. But you must not expect the same from your spouse, as you don't have any control over his mind. You should only be concern about your behavior.

"I'M SORRY" is a default circuit breaker, it works like magic, so it should be employed without fear, don't waste your precious time trying to get things back together by using some diplomatic means, just make the sound "am sorry". It's safer.

Never allow some offence, minor or major to be more important than the commitment of love for your spouse. Dont allow yourself to be distracted by evil thought.

Your spouse is the most important person in your life, the correct attitude to have is that you wish them to be happy, and it doesn't mean giving them material wealth which only brings temporary happiness. It means treating them with love, respect and kindness.

Hope this helps....

Pardon my errors pls and repost.
Yours loving Bilkisu Sarkinhanya.

See you in our next class.

Follow this link to join my WhatsApp group:

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29/08/2020

Now that you have built your fence and filters and thrown mudballs at one another.. you have
Let all the bad stuff go and refuse to let the mind reinstall them, refuse to let negative thought to come in and take root.As soon as you start having a bad thought about hubby, remind yourself of the other 101 sweet things he has done to/for you and quickly uproot the bad thought or else it will spread its root and cause resentment in your heart.

On our next write up we will talk about the techniques to achieve this and how you will have everything to gain by practing this.

Anatomy of marraige part II

Now that you have built your fence and filters and thrown mudballs at one another.. you have exchange your love and happiness for safety and the desire to be right and when you smell a potential attack from hubby you know exactly the face to make to avert it. No wonder "happily ever after " and ecstatic marrital life style continuous to be a myth and only possible in Bollywood series.

Someone in this group said men are like babies, if they offend you and you ignore them they tend to continue doing it, but if you scold them, they learn never to repeat it again. And my reply is that, yes scolding a man might work, but with consequences. Like I have once said in one of my previous write ups, men will choose respect over love 100% of the time, infact to a man love is respect plus intimacy. And without respect most men will never be able to recognise love.

So when you scold him or react crazy because he acted wrongfully, sure just like a child he might be quick to stop whatever it is, but deep within him, whether consciously or subconsciously he is likely to feel disrespected.. and what happens when he does? he builds walls and filters around himself and refuse his love free flow of reaching you. because you have just shot him with a mudball..and if you scold him continuously and consistently, just like a child, he might get so used to it that it losses it's effect on him. And you will need yet another strategy. So choose to be kind, choose respect..choose love.

So when hubby hurt you over and over again, when your anticipation of happily ever after is crushed, it is only natural to feel unsafe and betrayed. When people talk about ecstatic love being possible, you are likely to ask yourself whether you would ever trust him with all of your heart again or you should just act like the soldier woman you are for the rest of your life and give up on love.

Well at this point you should know that hubby equally feels betrayed by you. You both must have being acting inappropriately towards each other for so long. But the good news is that you can start all over again and the better news is that you can do this alone even without his participation.

Most of the current despair, pain and confusion you are burdened with can be almost completely gone in less than 2 weeks, but if and only if you put in the effort. By taking responsibility of the mess and not blaming it on hubby.The greater your effort to be sweet the faster the mind shift.

Forget about the past mistakes, it makes no sense to try to go back and relive the pain of the past. Put everything behind you and start all over again, start afresh like a new couple.

Be in charge, and don't allow your mind to take control over you.. give only sweetness, and when you are forced to react choose to get hold of your emotion and let it go..

Let all the bad stuff go and refuse to let the mind reinstall them, refuse to let negative thought to come in and take root.As soon as you start having a bad thought about hubby, remind yourself of the other 101 sweet things he has done to/for you and quickly uproot the bad thought or else it will spread its root and cause resentment in your heart.

On our next write up we will talk about the techniques to achieve this and how you will have everything to gain by practing this.

Pardon my errors and Pls repost..
Yours loving Bilkisu Sarkinhanya.

29/08/2020

Anatomy of marraige part 1.

Before the end of this lesson, we will be learning exactly how we wreck our marriages by our ownselves, and what to do or not to do to live a happy joyous marital life....

Prior to meeting your spouse, you two were two independent individuals.Then Boom, you met, by whatever chance, got married, and started growing an entity together, an entity that can only be available and accessible to the two of you, "the sacred space".

This is a separate entity from the both of you and can only be made from that which the both of you put into it. Like a smile, a kind gesture, a loving expression, or bitterness, resentments, judgement and criticism.

You would agree with me that when two people are in love for the first time, initially it is all love, when they both are head over heels for each other, always having each other's best interest at heart and let's say all of a sudden one of them dies, .... what do you think Is going to happen to the other person? he /she will leave the rest of his life with the relationship remaining etched in his mind as a positive relationship..... yes or yes?

In marriage, if you fill your sacred space with only positive vibes, it will grow and remain only positive.Your marraige is the sum total of what you both put into it, whether the good, the bad or the ugly. If all you put into it, is sweetness, respect and positive expression, that is all that will be there and vice versa ...its like adding sugar to a glass of water, the more sugar you add, the sweeter it becomes.

Beautiful, isn't it? But as you get more and more comfortable with each other, it becomes ok to do, or say mean things to each other, whether deliberately or as a slip...be it a critical comment or just an effort to control....something unloving..and Alas, that might be the beginning of the end of a joyous relationship.

Whether the one who started off, apologises or not, or even worse, claims to be right. Or whether the one who was offended complained or not. To the relationship, unloving attitudes is like literally bending down to pick some mud and then, molding it into a ball and throwing it at your partner and what happens when you do so? He gets pi**ed off but overlooks it or he returns the gesture. What seemed like a perfect relationship will now turn into a filthy mud party. It’s like slaping your partner back for slaping you because he started the slap in the first place and before you know it, there are slaps every where and now the relationship is no longer a safe place for both of you. Does it make sense.?

And what happens afterwards? When problems begins, we become disappointed, and we think all men/women are the same, and we now comfirm that ours is not going to be any different from the rest of the world's And we we conclude that marriage is like that and that "Happily everafter” does not exist afterall.. and we distance ourselves from our soulmate and then we build walls and filters to protect ourselves from the safest place and the trusted person who should be there for us...and we put on our defence artillery and we learn to retaliate in some fashion. Unfortunately enough once the attack begins it only gets worse.

We don't need mudballs, Fence and filters in the sacred space, we need love, support, compassion and understanding. But once the attract begins, we begin to act to each other like we should to the rest of the world or even worse, we make the walls more impenetrable just so as to protect ourselves first...we go back into our shelves, we hide our feelings, so as not to be judged, we filter his actions and his words and we give meanings, we judge in our head, we become defensive , and we lie, we threaten and by so doing, we deny love access to freely flow....

Walls and filters are essential to survival in the world but not in our marriages, when we bring our walls and filters into our sacred space we loose the ability to taste the sweetness of love ... Walls and filters keeps us out of dangers but they block important feelings.

It isn't too late to clear it out.. and we will talk about how to in our next class..

Pls repost!

Yours loving Bilkisu sarkinhanya.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to learn along side😇
And pls pardon my errors.

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29/08/2020

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The king that he is..

Everyman is a king in his own house, and should be treated as such. In other to be loved by the king, common sense will tell you, you need to be the queen , but I personally think you should give up the crown and be his servant..Because being the queen will mean having your own mini palace under his kingdom, with your maids and servants, doing your own thing and occasional seeing your soulmate only when the needs arises, and this is not what we want.

We want closure, we want exclusivity, we want passion, we want love, we want togetherness....so be around more often then the queen... be the servant he sneaks to see.

Have you ever had an obedient maid, who happily does all you ask her to do and much more, without frowning, murmuring or complaining? How would you feel about her? Wouldn't you think she's a blessing and hope that nothing takes her away? What about a maid who is always grumpy, and takes hours to get things done, who is lazy and always wait until you ask, and just never does any thing right? Who nags and complains behind your back and tells people everything she knows about you and your home? Well, thats the differences between a stubborn and a submissive wife..who do you think your man will be happy to live with? who would you choose for you son? Who would you rather be?

I personally think one of the reason men fall for their maid is because for once they have gotten the one quality they miss in their wives (submissiveness), I'm not trying to justify their action and I know some men can be promiscuous in nature (God forbid) but we the 21st century women (i know my right!) Have contributed so much in pushing our husband's further away....there is no two ways about it, you can never be a stubborn, selfish, rude, and/or an uncaring wife and still be top on his priority list. If you want him to not be able to breath without you, we will have to be ready to pay the price of submissiveness, selflessness and get control of your mind and not the other way round, you will have to be mindful of your thought, your actions and most especially your words....You most be ready to shoulder your marital responsibility squarely.

Act ladylike. Ladies are classy, elegant, gentle as a dove, ladies are quick to listen and slow to speak, they are cool, calm and collective. When hubby scream at you and you screamed back you don't act like a lady, when you speak with someone and the person on the 3rd roll hears you, you are too loud...when you scold your kids and you disturb your neighbours, you didn't act like the lady you should and your kids will learn to shout back cos they think it's normal. When your husband disrespect or disregards you publicly, no matter how much you are burning with range, dont go down the rabbit hole with him, remember if you resel with the pig you both get filthy, but the difference is, the pig will love it, so remain calm. Respect yourself, respect your spouse and respect your marraige. Save your energy for later, that will give him time to ponder and regret his action and also give your rage time to subside, so that you would be able to communicate (not confront) and discuss with him how he made you feel, respectfully..
Pls repost!

Your loving Bilkisu sarkinhanya.

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