“I liked you better…”

In the grand scale of things, this happened fairly recently. Back in 2012 to be exact. At first I was baffled, and got taken aback by this… but later I realised it would be a compliment—even if it wasn’t meant to be one.

What was the best compliment you’ve received?

It is all about finding your voice

Back in 2012 I was a fairly new revert to Islam, and it had also taught me something else than how to pray five times a day, and how difficult it was to learn Arabic. It had, finally, taught me to stand up, have opinions, and not being afraid to voice them out.

Obviously, I had been a bit of an activist before, but now… it was next level. What sparked this whole compliment was yet another attack against the Palestinians in Gaza. When I voiced out my support for Palestine over the other entity, someone I knew back them commented on one of my Facebook posts with something that would become the best compliment of all time.

I liked you better when you didn’t have opinions.

Opinionated?

After that I had a lot of soul searching to do. Had I only been a second rate friend to people? Had I only mattered if there was no one else to hang around with? Did I even have friends?

And after that, I realised that the whole “I liked you better when you didn’t have opinions” -comment was actually a blessing in disguise, as it had revealed the true nature of these so-called friends of mine. Over the years, I have learned to hold fast to my opinions, to stand firmly on my two feet, and yet, still to be kind to people.