I’ve been toying with the idea of starting a new category–a series of short post on my blog: Sunday Notes. Sundays feel like a pause, a day of quiet reset. It’s when I arrange my week, warm up with a few meetings, and carve out more time for myself—time away from my husband, from people, from the noise. I’ll use this space to jot down small reflections from the day and share them here.
This Sunday was delightful. Classes haven’t resumed yet, so the afternoon was mine to spend journaling, planning my week, and tying up loose ends on essays and applications. While working on an application, I turned on Eat Pray Love as background noise. I can’t recall the last time I watched it, but it brought back faint memories of how that movie (and honestly, Elizabeth Gilbert’s books) once filled me with the most whimsical ideas about travel. The Sunday movie marathon didn’t stop there. I followed up with Lonely Planet, a story about two strangers meeting in Morocco, entangled in their respective chaos, and stumbling into love. Then came Ticket to Paradise, a lighthearted family drama set in Bali. (Though honestly, it felt more like Hollywood’s Bali than the real one I know.)
Watching these movies, I realized how much I crave travel—not the rushed, surface-level kind, but the kind you can savor. I want a journey that stretches over months, with room for solitude and reflection. In all these stories, travel is portrayed as transformative: every journey leads to a new love, a revelation, or a fresh way of seeing the world. Which I think is how it supposed to be, we are not meant to find breakthrough in an enclosed space, surrounded by permanence and safety. They happen out there—in the movement, the unpredictability, the unfamiliar.
“Travel through the land and observe how He began creation. Then Allah will produce the final creation. Surely Allah has power over all things.”
(Surah Al-Ankabut, 29:20)
This verse from the Qur’an encapsulates the spirit of traveling as a way to reflect on Allah’s creation and deepen one’s understanding of His greatness.
Come to think of it, I feel inspired to draw a connection—how the craving for a break, the longing for travel, ultimately leads to a deeper yearning for enlightenment, and, at its core, a desire for the knowledge of God. When we step out to see people, landscapes, and the vastness of His creation, we are gently guided to see more of Him.
This realization shifts my perspective entirely. It deepens my appreciation for the call to pause, to step away, to journey. It’s not just a whim or a need for distraction—it’s rooted in something far more magnificent: our inherent yearning to draw closer to The Creator. And isn’t that a journey worth taking?
*Putting more pause in next week calendar and planning my next trip.
A (V) in Writing: 