"The Rest of Ramadan: Prayer as Rest & Restoration" by Desiree F. Magsombol (5/31/19)

Khateebah Desiree F. Magsombol shares her journey of recovering from workaholism in “The Rest of Ramadan: Prayer as Rest & Restoration.” In her khutbah, Desiree talks about how her journey out of burnout helped her discover a beautiful new way to value herself through built-in Islamic worship practices that mandate daily rest and taking breaks.

Bio:
Desiree F. Magsombol, JD is a Resilience Toolkit Facilitator with Lumos Transforms and a Training and Technical Assistance Provider for the National Prison Rape Elimination Act Resource Center with Impact Justice. Her personal experience with violence early on drove her to seek spiritual refuge. She converted to Islam her sophomore year of high school, finding community amongst her Muslim classmates and those at her local mosque in Long Beach – Masjid Al-Shareef. She is deeply grateful for the first Muslims she met, who taught her a loving, kind, and expansive Islam that was inherently American in its connection to the Black/African-American community.

Through observing the character and practice of her dear late Imam Omar Amin, she saw how work could be elevated to an expression of faith, and what it meant to truly serve the community. This, along with her personal experiences, led her to advocacy work with foster youth in residential care, LGBTQ survivors of domestic violence, and survivors of sexual violence in prisons and jails throughout the country. Her work with prisons and jails made her particularly fascinated in how individuals experiencing stress and trauma impact whole organizations and their cultures. With Lumos Transforms, Desiree facilitates community workshops and provides consultation, subject matter expertise, training, program design, and delivery for organizational clients about growing resilience, stress and burnout management, and trauma-informed approaches.

Desiree enjoys discovering how the never-ending well of Islam continues to be related to all things she cares about, from anti-violence to feminism, from community healing to the neurobiology of stress, and everything in-between. She loves watching babies push their own strollers, walks in the local nature center, and spending time with family and friends.