As the blessed month of Ramadan quickly approaches, Muslims of all ages and all nationalities anticipate all the goals they wish to reach. Though this great anticipation for the month is shared amongst most of our Muslim brothers and sisters, many are torn by conflicting worries about the timing of this year's Ramadan.

The summer has gifted us with sunny weather, and forced us to endure its hot days and nights. The idea of no drinks or food to sustain us during 14-hour days can seem overwhelming.

“It’s going to be painful,” many of my friends complained back in the month of June before our final exams. It saddened me to see that in their concern for the hardships that we will have to endure in August, they have lost sight of the true meaning and the blessing that is Ramadan.

…this time, Ramadan comes before the beginning of a new school and work year giving us the chance to indulge ourselves in strengthening our iman so we can start off this new year on a good note.

For some, the ideal Ramadan would be in the short hours of the winter time, where many of us can just sleep off the last few hours of daytime after work or school, which is very understandable. However, Ramadan should not be something we endure, but rather, a month whose every moment we should embrace. Of course, when our throats are dry and our stomachs are rumbling, we can easily forget that sometimes, but if we can teach ourselves to look past the hunger we might see the beauty and opportunities that lie in the long hours of Ramadan 2010. 

For students, our school year is undoubtedly filled with more than our share of commitments; schoolwork, part-time jobs, team sports, and other extracurricular activities. With so many preoccupations filling our time and minds, we can easily get caught up this world, and forget about our religious responsibilities. For this reason, I will find that when Ramadan falls during a school month, what is supposed to be a holy month, just feels like any other, with a little bit more hunger.

Obviously, juggling many different responsibilities can be difficult, and though we may not want it, sometimes our religious responsibilities take a back seat. However, this time, Ramadan comes before the beginning of a new school and work year giving us the chance to indulge ourselves in strengthening our iman so we can start off this new year on a good note. In the closing month of this summer we can benefit from the reviving experience of dua’a (supplication), Quran and sincere prayers that can help us step into a new lifestyle in the new year.

Great opportunities lie within this upcoming month, particularly because we are away from the pressures of work and school. As Muslims, we are a minority in this society. At school and work, we're surrounded by non-Muslim peers. While in the environments of work and school, we can often lose ourselves in the expectations of these peers. We might swear. We might forget the limits of the hijab. The line between right and wrong becomes a little hazy. Staying on track is hard. Seeing non-Muslims around us -- how they act and dress -- anything we do will seem extremely modest. But we should remember that they are not our standard. There’s no sense in using them to define our behaviour. 

Ramadan is our time to review ourselves as Muslims. And if we find we have strayed off the straight path, we can right ourselves again. While it is often hard to do that with the unchanged lives of our non-Muslim peers surrounding us, this summer we are blessed with the perfect opportunity.

No number of words expressing the beauty of Ramadan can deny that this month will be very hard. Nevertheless we have a lot to be thankful for. We have to remind ourselves that the people to whom we give zakat (poor due) -- the poor and hungry people we are remembering during this month, and insha Allah (God willing) for the rest of the year -- are not given a specific cut off time before they can eat. They do not have a table filled with food waiting for them when it’s time to eat. They eat when they can find food or when they are given food.

In the long hours of Summer, when the last few hours are creeping by, we have to teach ourselves to remember that many people, Muslim and non-Muslim alike, do not have a timetable up on their fridge and a clock on the wall counting down the minutes until they can eat. And for that, we should say Alhamdulillah, thanks be to Allah.

Ramadan serves a thousand beautiful purposes, and fasting is only a small part of it.

Ibtihal Yaaqoubi is a budding writer and a student at Omer-Deslauriers High School.