Why I Chose To Be Muslim

*Before reading this post, you need to understand that this is my experience, my thoughts, my opinions. If you disagree, that's fine, you're entitled to your own beliefs and opinions. I am in no way trying to say anyone else is wrong for their beliefs, this all about me and my own beliefs.*

Many people have asked me why I converted and I figured Ramadan is a great time to explain my decision. I was raised a Christian. Meaning I was baptized as an infant, I went to Sunday school as a kid and sporadically attended church as a teenager. I believed it because it was all I knew. I grew up in a southern area in a county where the majority of the population is white and Christian. To this day, there is only one Muslim family that I know of (there could be more, I'm just not aware of them) in the entire county, and a few Jewish families. But, even then I had questions. There were always things that didn't really make sense to me, but when I would ask I would be told only "Because the Bible says so". 

When I met my Muslim husband, the only thing I knew about Islam was that Muslims didn't eat pork and many Muslim women wore head coverings. That was it. What you need to know about Islam is that it's not just a religion, it's a way of life that affects a person's culture. I began studying Islam in an effort to understand my new boyfriend better. I wanted to know why he thought a certain way, why he did things a certain way, I was really curious.

When I began looking into Islam, I had no intention of converting, I just wanted to understand exactly what was believed and why. But, what I found was that the more I read, the more intrigued I became. Those questions I'd had as a Christian were answered by Islam and I discovered that Islam just made more sense to me. It was easier and made more sense to believe in the Qur'an because it wasn't written from a hundred different view points by a hundred different people and changed who knows how many times throughout the years.

Many people believe I converted for my husband but that isn't true. You cannot convert for another person. When you convert to Islam and say the Shahada it has to be because you believe it, not because someone else does. A Muslim can not force another person to convert either, despite that common misconception. I converted because it felt right to me and that's how it should be.