So the update:
I did try and go back to Islam for maybe 3 months, this was a very trying time for my relationship, given a few factors.
My husband is not a Muslim (we tried hanging out with other Muslim couples at the time and I tried to lead a good example) he drinks alcohol on occasion, usually when with family, eats pork when he wants to. He did not like seeing me in hijab or abaya like when I went to the mosque and had definite fears that I would wear hijab- this was understandable, changes are not always easy for someone when they are drastic!
From my perspective, if I take on a religion, I want to do it correctly, I would WANT to wear hijab because the religion I felt, asks that. I would WANT my marriage to be valid and thus have a husband who if he at least didn't practice 100%, respected the faith. This was asking a lot for a man with no spiritual upbringing, though he has the qualities most spiritual aspirants seek in his demeanor, the understanding of why one would need to make changes that seemed unnecessary, i.e. what does being a good religious person have to do with eating pork or covering hair-things we now know answers to, these were not clear to him.
In the end, I decided this was not a path that he would see as a good match. Given that I feel that there is more than one path way to God, I figured a happy marriage is something that is also key to spiritual health.
To say, I left practicing Islam for my husband sounds so easy to judge, granted there will be those who sit there and think that. I think the greater message is that, I DO want my husband to discover God through a pathway that is a good match for him, that is a big priority for me, to eventually be on the same path to God with him. I felt like teaching my daughter about religion would be hard if our views were splintered, I would be risking her rebelling against either one of us and I don't want a child raised in a home without a solid foundation/faith.
So, this has brought me back to Vaishnavism. It's interesting, I left because things got too intense, people might have heard me say this before: If you are doing anything right, it can get very intense or intimate (not of course in an inappropriate sense!). I felt like I was bitten by the bhakti bug, I felt ecstatic during kirtan, I would feel weight lifted and so close to God, moments that felt effervescent (light and sweet) and full of epiphany.
At the same time, I felt, this religion is so different on the surface, especially to explain, than what I have come from. It was hard for me to say, I practice Vaishnavism or Hinduism because one is so foreign I'd have to explain it and I didn't know how without losing people and the other seemed so vague and still foreign to people.
Coming from an Abrahamic path I feared the direction I was heading, was it the right one? And so I went back to something more familiar, something which left me blocking out mantras and banning thoughts from my head.
After a while I felt like it was not as meaningful, like I made a fear based decision...
Here I had been praying for years for God to show me the path for me. I prayed for Him to make it known whichever path I should choose and I would follow without second thought. I didn't choose Sanatana Dharma or love of Hinduism, to be honest I would not have choosen something so far from my own although it always fascinated me.
I read the Gita and was very quickly seeing things in a more positive light, whereas I'd felt so spiritually lost and lifeless, far from God, hear I was, walking and singing and feeling this very presence of the Divine near to me.
After leaving Islam (a religion I do love and respect, I think it requires a full supporti, i.e. husband and wife practicing, or at least full respect in many cases) and please don't think I had a bad experience with the religion, or that I left because of things I didn't agree with...
I realized that I had not completely trusted God, here I'd prayed for a sign or a message and God just came directly to me, in a name I'd not known but with His same love and compassion. On one side I could be doubtful, thinking...what Hinduism and is it the way?
But, why would God at a time of vulnerability, send something into my path that made me realize Him so much more, if it was a wayward way for me?
Sometimes answers come in different forms.
That is my story till now.
