Dear Reader, Thank you for the Light you bring to this planet.

Thank you for the work you do and what you make available for others. Life experiences have inspired in me a commitment to the empowerment of myself, first and foremost, and from this springboard, the empowerment of women and all human beings. I was brought up as an Arab Muslim in Mombasa, Kenya in quite orthodox fashion but with an exposure to global culture. My religious affiliations are now tenuous but I remain deeply spiritual. I thought myself opportune to be writing a book on women's rights in Islam yet with each new realisation, it is clear to me that Islam is not a religion and religions do not empower and liberate people, especially not women. The Muslim populace, learned and lay alike, have accused the world of not understanding their religion, yet it is Muslims who have misunderstood and misapplied the message of the Quran and teachings of Muhammad; demonstrated at one extreme by the suicide bombers. Neither the Quran nor Muhammad established a religion, just as Jesus did not establish Christianity nor Moses Judaism. All the messengers mentioned in the Quran, from Adam to Abraham, Joseph to Jesus and Moses to

Muhammad, are referred to as being Muslim/having embodied Islam yet none of them practiced what we today call Islam. All of them rejected the tradition, culture and religion of their time and certainly did not create religions of their own. They spoke against conformity to past tradition and called for the awakening of people to a higher consciousness of Unity; an acknowledgement of the Oneness of all Life and the Source we, all, emanate from. Traditions, in any culture, have little to do with Truth and Empowerment because it is only in the present moment, now, that Truth and Empowerment may be discovered. Yet, to live in the now, requires a heightened awareness of ones self. Thus the wisdom in the Greek adage, Know thyself. I feel that women, globally, would benefit immensely from the awareness of the subliminal psychological prison that religion and past traditions continue to impose upon them. Otherwise, though we embrace new philosophies of empowerment, we remain limited by the old. I feel that a deeper, more fundamental, liberation is necessary towards empowering of women a psychological liberation - that has little to do with where one lives, what one wears or how much one earns for a living. Empowering women empowers humanity as a whole since women found the bedrock of any family, society and civilisation. Empowerment, however, starts with ones self right

where one is. The power, and I do mean Power in true sense of the word, is in the hands of each and every woman and human being to take the helm of ones Life in ones hand and to steer ones self in the desired direction. If youve never done it before, just like driving a vehicle, it is scary and seemingly complex beyond comprehension. The sooner you take the wheel and practice, however, the sooner you get the hang of it so to speak and the sooner you propel others into doing the same by furnishing the example of its possibility to others. My writing, the various pieces I have posted and continue to post, represent but snippets of my journey in and through my own vehicle. Yours Sincerely, Hanaan Balala