Myriad Moments

Myriad Moments is a collection of reflections, essays, observations and personal storytelling exploring reinvention, resilience, creativity, culture, identity and the moments that quietly shape us. Part editorial journal, part reflective storytelling space, these pieces move beyond professional identity into the human experiences behind the work, the travel and the transformation.

Originally shared through Substack, personal essays and long-form reflective writing by Tarnia Riggs and Zahra Sahara.

Year of the Horse 2026

The Year of the Horse signals a shift from endings to new beginnings. Exploring themes of freedom, momentum, courage and personal growth, this article draws on Chinese astrology, numerology and Lunar New Year traditions to examine the opportunities and energy that 2026 may bring.

After a year of release and reflection, the Horse invites us to move forward with confidence and purpose.

The Moves I Made

By the time I turned fifty, I had lived in nearly fifty homes.

Part memoir, part reflection, this deeply personal piece explores the places, people and experiences that shaped my journey. From Adelaide to London, Greece, the Red Centre and Sydney, it is a story about searching for belonging, embracing change and discovering that home is not always a place—it is the person we become along the way.

50, Now What?

Part memoir, part manifesto, 50, Now What? explores the realities of midlife beyond the clichés. Written for those navigating reinvention, uncertainty and unexpected freedom, it reflects on identity, resilience, burnout, motherhood, career changes and the courage to begin again.

Raw, honest and deeply personal, this is a reminder that life doesn’t end at fifty—it simply asks a different question.

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zahrasahara.substack.com/p/50-now-whatr

When Your Workplace Makes You Sick

Not every workplace leaves visible scars.

Drawing on lived experience, this candid reflection explores toxic workplace cultures, burnout, poor leadership, psychological safety and the subtle ways chronic dysfunction impacts our wellbeing. It is a reminder to trust your instincts, recognise the warning signs and reclaim your power when an environment no longer aligns with your values.

Sometimes the bravest career move isn’t staying—it’s choosing yourself.

Not a Manual — A Map

Some stories are too large for a single book.

Not a Manual — A Map introduces three deeply personal works in progress that explore resilience, motherhood and midlife reinvention. Together, they form a journey through survival, self-discovery and the courage required to begin again when life doesn’t follow the script.

From navigating chaos without a blueprint to raising a neurodivergent child to rebuilding identity after fifty, these books share one common thread: learning to trust yourself when the map no longer exists.

Part memoir, part reflection and part invitation, this is the story behind the stories still being written.

Building a Plane While Flying It

Some lives follow a plan. Others are built in mid-air.

Building a Plane While Flying It is a memoir of resilience, reinvention and learning to navigate life without a blueprint. It explores the realities of survival, single motherhood, toxic workplaces, difficult relationships, personal awakening and the long journey back to self.

Through moves across countries, careers, identities and chapters of life, this story reflects on the lessons hidden within chaos and the strength discovered through adversity. At its heart, it is about recognising that even during life’s most turbulent moments, we are often building something stronger than we realise.

A story of survival. A journey of self-reclamation. A reminder that starting again is sometimes the bravest thing we can do.

A Change in Perspective Is a Whole New World

Sometimes the symbols that call to us make sense only years later.

In this deeply personal reflection, I explore the unexpected connections between the Eye of Horus, the Sacred Heart, motherhood, spirituality and the search for meaning across cultures and traditions. What began as a collection of tattoos, travels and intuitive choices slowly revealed a larger story about awakening, perspective and the ways our lives can be guided long before we understand why.

Blending personal experience, symbolism, spirituality and self-discovery, this piece is an invitation to look again at the signs, patterns and moments that may have been quietly shaping your path all along.

Time Is Not What We Think It Is

What if time is less fixed than we imagine?

This reflection explores our relationship with time, questioning the calendars, clocks and milestones that shape modern life. Drawing on nature, human experience and personal observation, it considers how time is measured, interpreted and felt — often in ways that have little to do with the numbers on a clock.

From leap years and seasons to grief, joy and personal growth, the article invites readers to step back from society’s timelines and reconnect with a more natural rhythm. It is a reminder that while we measure time, life itself unfolds through change, experience and presence.

Perhaps the most important moment is not someday, but now.

Love Zahra Sahara

Some names feel like more than names.

Love Zahra Sahara is a reflection on identity, symbolism and the meaning we attach to the words that find us. Exploring the Arabic roots of Zahra, meaning radiant, blooming and luminous, alongside Sahara, the vast desert landscape of silence and transformation, this piece considers the balance between light and stillness, growth and surrender.

Blending personal reflection, spirituality and symbolism, it explores the idea that true self-discovery often happens between the flowering and the wilderness — between becoming and simply being.

A gentle reminder that both the light within us and the empty spaces we travel through have something to teach.

Love Is a Mirror

Sometimes the most important lessons about love have very little to do with the people we loved.

This deeply personal reflection explores the patterns, beliefs and wounds that often shape our relationships long before we become aware of them. Moving beyond questions of rejection and heartbreak, it examines how love can act as a mirror, revealing hidden stories about self-worth, attachment and the ways we have learned to seek validation.

Through honesty, vulnerability and hard-earned insight, the article invites readers to shift the focus from those who could not love them fully to the deeper question of why certain relationships felt familiar in the first place.

A reflection on healing, self-awareness and the transformative moment when we stop asking why they didn’t choose us and start asking why we chose them.

The Pattern: Loving the Unavailable

Sometimes the most powerful lessons about love begin long before a relationship ever starts.

This deeply personal reflection explores the hidden patterns that draw us towards emotionally unavailable partners and the childhood experiences that often shape our understanding of love, worth and belonging. Moving beyond blame, heartbreak and rejection, it examines how familiar dynamics can quietly influence the choices we make in relationships.

Through honesty, self-awareness and hard-earned insight, the article invites readers to look beyond those they loved and towards the deeper stories that made those relationships feel familiar in the first place.

A reflection on healing, boundaries and the transformative moment when the question changes from “Why didn’t they choose me?” to “Why did I choose them?”

The Mirror and the Myth of Nonjudgment

Sometimes the people who enter our lives are not there to stay. They are there to show us something about ourselves.

This deeply personal reflection explores the unexpected lessons hidden within friendship, attraction, shame and self-perception. Through a series of encounters that spanned decades, it examines the mirrors we attract, the patterns we unconsciously repeat and the ways our relationships often reveal the parts of ourselves we have yet to fully understand.

Moving beyond judgment and appearances, the article explores themes of self-worth, sensuality, boundaries and personal growth. It asks not what is wrong with the people we attract, but what those connections might be reflecting back to us.

A reflection on honesty, healing and the powerful moment when self-awareness transforms old lessons into new beginnings.

Work to Live or Career First? The Two Mindsets

Most of us spend years chasing success, security or freedom without ever stopping to ask whether the path we’re on was consciously chosen.

This personal reflection explores the two dominant approaches to work: the career-first mindset, driven by ambition, achievement and professional identity, and the work-to-live mindset, where employment becomes a means to fund a life beyond the office. Drawing on experiences from billion-dollar infrastructure projects, consulting, banking, travel, single motherhood and career reinvention, it examines the rewards and hidden costs of both.

Through honesty, humour and hard-earned perspective, the article invites readers to question the stories they’ve inherited about success, busyness and self-worth, while considering whether their current version of work still aligns with the life they want to live.

A reflection on burnout, freedom, identity and the ongoing process of rebranding ourselves as we grow.

My Parenting Rules — Raising Spirited & Neurodivergent Kids

No one hands you a manual when your child doesn’t fit neatly into the boxes the world expects.

This deeply personal reflection explores the realities of raising spirited, sensitive and neurodivergent children through the eyes of a solo parent who learned through lived experience rather than textbooks. Moving beyond clinical labels and parenting theories, it examines the challenges, breakthroughs and hard-earned lessons that emerge when intuition, advocacy and unconditional love become your greatest tools.

Through honesty, resilience and practical wisdom gained over nearly two decades, the article offers reassurance to parents navigating meltdowns, diagnoses, uncertainty and exhaustion while trying to do their very best.

A reflection on parenting, perseverance and the powerful realisation that no expert will ever know your child as deeply as you do.

Sufism and Spiritual Oasis

Vision of Paradise

What happens after this life?

Written from the perspective of a seeker rather than a scholar, this reflective exploration examines Islamic teachings on Jannah, the Seven Heavens, Barzakh and the afterlife journey. Blending faith, philosophy, personal reflection and curiosity about the unseen, it considers some of humanity’s oldest questions about purpose, existence and what may lie beyond the limits of our physical world.

A thoughtful journey through belief, wonder and the search for meaning.

The Three Stages of Ramadan

Ramadan is often associated with fasting, yet within the Sufi tradition it is also seen as a journey of spiritual renewal.

This reflection explores the three stages of Ramadan — Mercy (Rahmah), Forgiveness (Maghfirah) and Freedom (Nijaat) — and the deeper lessons they offer beyond food and ritual. Drawing on Sufi wisdom and personal reflection, it considers how Ramadan can become a time to receive grace, release what no longer serves us, and reconnect with a greater sense of purpose.

Whether you are Muslim, spiritually curious, or simply seeking a moment of reflection, these timeless teachings offer insights into compassion, healing and inner transformation.

Ya Dayim — The One Who Remains

Some experiences arrive before the words to explain them.

The first article in the 99 Names Series reflects on Ya Dayim — “The One Who Remains” — a name often found in Sufi remembrance and contemplation. Through a deeply personal experience in Al-Masjid an-Nabawi, this piece explores what happens when a moment touches the heart before the mind understands it.

Part spiritual reflection, part travel memory and part seeker’s diary, it examines themes of permanence, change, surrender and the quiet recognition that while everything in life shifts and evolves, something eternal remains.

A story about faith, timing, meaning and the moments that find us before we are ready to explain them.

Laylat al-Qadr — The Night of Power

Among the final nights of Ramadan lies Laylat al-Qadr, the Night of Power — a night described in the Qur’an as better than a thousand months.

This reflection explores the spiritual significance of Laylat al-Qadr through both Islamic tradition and personal experience. Blending faith, contemplation and a deeply personal encounter during Ramadan 2014, it considers the themes of divine mercy, destiny, surrender and the unseen moments that quietly shape our lives.

Whether approached through worship, reflection or simple curiosity, Laylat al-Qadr remains an invitation to pause, listen and seek something greater than ourselves.

Coming in the Back Door to Islam

Some journeys begin with certainty. Others begin with questions.

Coming in the Back Door to Islam is a deeply personal reflection on a spiritual path shaped by curiosity, experience, travel and an enduring search for meaning. Drawing on encounters with diverse traditions, sacred places, mystical experiences and Sufi teachings, this story explores how faith can arrive through unexpected doors.

Rather than a conventional conversion story, it is an account of synchronicity, longing, discipline, spiritual awakening and the gradual discovery of a path that felt like home. Through Ramadan, prayer, dhikr, Sufism and personal reflection, it examines the relationship between seeking, surrender and transformation.

At its heart, this is a story about thirst, guidance and the quiet ways life sometimes leads us exactly where we need to be.

Spiritual Secrets of 13

Some numbers appear so often in our lives that they begin to feel less like coincidence and more like conversation.

The Profound Spiritual Secrets of 13 explores the symbolism, history and spiritual significance of one of the world’s most misunderstood numbers. From the lost 13th moon and Friday the 13th to Sufi teachings, sacred numerology and the mystical science of letters, this article examines how cultures have interpreted the number through both fear and reverence.

Blending personal reflection, spiritual symbolism and metaphysical exploration, it considers themes of transformation, balance, divine timing and the cycles that shape our lives. Whether viewed through the lens of ancient traditions, Sufism or personal experience, 13 emerges not as a symbol of bad luck, but as a reminder of renewal, growth and the courage to begin again.

Al-Khadir — The Green Guide of Hidden Mercy

Across Islamic and Sufi tradition, few figures are as mysterious as Al-Khadir — the Green One, the hidden guide associated with divine wisdom, renewal and unseen mercy.

Drawing on the Qur’anic story of Musa (AS) and Al-Khadir, this article explores the spiritual lessons hidden beneath life’s apparent hardships and the deeper wisdom that often reveals itself only with time. Blending Islamic tradition, Sufi teachings and a personal spiritual encounter during Ramadan, it reflects on guidance, patience, remembrance and the paths that quietly unfold behind the scenes.

Al-Khadir reminds us that not every blessing arrives in a form we immediately recognise — and that sometimes the greatest mercy is hidden within the mystery.

Rajab and the Return to the Heart

Before the arrival of Ramadan comes Rajab — one of Islam’s sacred months and a time of quiet preparation, reflection and inner renewal.

This article explores the spiritual significance of Rajab through Islamic tradition and personal contemplation, reflecting on sacred time, remembrance, the 99 Names of Allah and the subtle journey of returning to the heart. It considers themes of stillness, intention, divine presence and the gentle work of preparing the soul for deeper transformation.

Rajab reminds us that every journey begins with a single step inward — a pause long enough to remember who we are and why we are here.

Sufi Interpretations of Iblis (Satan)

Iblis is one of the most complex figures in Islamic spirituality. While mainstream Islamic teachings present Iblis as the jinn who refused Allah’s command to bow before Adam, some Sufi traditions explore deeper symbolic and metaphysical interpretations of his story.

This article examines both perspectives — the orthodox understanding of Iblis as the embodiment of pride, arrogance and spiritual separation, alongside Sufi reflections that view him as a tragic figure whose story raises profound questions about obedience, love, free will and the nature of divine unity.

Through Qur’anic teachings, Sufi philosophy and spiritual reflection, it explores the tension between ego and surrender, reminding us that the greatest battle is often the one within ourselves.

As Above, So Below

Few phrases have travelled through spirituality, philosophy and popular culture quite like “As above, so below.”

Most people recognise the saying. Far fewer understand where it comes from, what it originally meant, or how different traditions interpret it.

This article explores the famous Hermetic principle through the lenses of Islam, Sufism, metaphysics and modern science. From the Qur’anic concept of signs in the horizons and within ourselves, to the Sufi understanding of the human being as a microcosm of creation, it examines the relationship between the inner and outer worlds, the seen and unseen, and the patterns that appear throughout existence.

While many esoteric traditions view “As above, so below” as a system that can be used or manipulated, Islamic thought offers a different perspective: not control, but recognition. Not correspondence as power, but correspondence as a sign pointing back to the Creator.

A reflection on patterns, meaning, consciousness and the profound question of what the universe may be trying to teach us.

Companionship of the Heart — A Seeker’s Insight on the Soul Twin Flame

Some connections arrive not to complete us, but to help us remember who we were before life taught us to hide.

This reflective piece explores the Sufi concept of companionship of the heart through the lens of soul-flame connections, emotional healing and spiritual remembrance. Moving beyond popular ideas of twin flames, it considers how certain relationships act as mirrors, gently revealing the self beneath years of conditioning, survival and protective armour.

Drawing on themes of presence, vulnerability, trust and the polishing of the heart, the article reflects on what becomes possible when two people meet without judgement, performance or fear. Not to fix one another, but to create a space where both can return to their truest nature.

A reflection on sacred companionship, emotional safety and the quiet journey home to the soul.

Companionship of the Heart: A Sufi Reflection on the Path of Mutual Polishing

Some companions enter our lives not to complete us, but to help us remember the light we carried before the world taught us to hide it.

This contemplative reflection explores the Sufi understanding of companionship of the heart — a sacred connection where two souls walk alongside one another in remembrance, presence and trust. Moving beyond modern ideas of soul mates and twin flames, it considers how spiritual companionship can become a mirror through which old wounds, fears and protective layers gently fall away.

Drawing on themes of vulnerability, mutual healing, divine remembrance and the polishing of the heart, the article reflects on what becomes possible when two people meet without judgement, expectation or performance. Not to save one another, but to create a space where both can return to their original nature.

A reflection on sacred companionship, emotional safety and the quiet journey back to the Beloved.

Fasting from Chaos: The Soft Returning

Sometimes the most important form of fasting has very little to do with food.

This deeply personal reflection explores a different kind of Ramadan — one centred on healing, restoration and the gentle return to self after extended periods of stress, pressure and survival mode. Blending faith, personal experience and spiritual reflection, it considers how Ramadan can become a sanctuary for those whose bodies and hearts are seeking recovery as much as discipline.

Through themes of intention, gratitude, surrender and divine mercy, the article reflects on the idea that healing itself can be an act of worship. Not every journey looks the same, and sometimes the most profound fast is stepping away from the chaos that has kept us disconnected from ourselves.

A reflection on healing Ramadan, spiritual renewal and the quiet grace of returning home to the soul.

Angels in Islam: Celestial Beings of Light, Their Roles and Divine Hierarchy

Across Islamic tradition, angels are described as beings of pure light, unseen servants of Allah who carry out divine commands with unwavering obedience and precision.

This exploration examines the role of angels in Islam, from the great archangels entrusted with revelation, sustenance, life and death, to the countless angels who record deeds, guard creation and worship continuously in the Divine Presence. Drawing on Qur’anic teachings, Hadith and Sufi reflection, it offers insight into the unseen world that exists alongside our own.

Through themes of guidance, protection, accountability and divine order, the article reflects on how angels serve as reminders of tawhid, submission and the intricate harmony woven throughout creation.

A reflection on celestial beings, spiritual symbolism and the unseen forces that accompany humanity on its journey back to the Divine.

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