When we are told to be honest, we as men hesitate because we fear that showing our feelings will make us look weak. Our closed ones rely on us. We’re expected to be responsible, not vulnerable.
– Muslim Belal
In a world where Muslim men are expected to be immovable pillars of strength, there’s a silent pain echoing in their hearts. Muslim Belal, a UK-based filmmaker, spoken word artist and nasheed performer known for his raw, heartfelt poetry and unapologetically honest storytelling, and Essam Muhammad, an American spoken word artist, nasheed singer and actor known for blending personal narrative with uplifting, faith-centered messaging, came together for a conversation many fear to start.
On the Muslimi Experience with Boona Mohammed, the two creatives, each shaped by different upbringings and personal battles, opened up about what it really means to be a man who struggles, who feels, who breaks… but who can’t cry out loud.
Their conversation framed around their collaborative 14-track album Qalbi was more than an artistic dialogue. It was a call for healing, a reckoning with the emotional trauma buried under layers of masculinity, poverty, survival, and faith.
When Two Deaths Awakened a Thousand Realities
The soul of Qalbi is pain real, raw, and relatable. Essam Muhammad shares that the album was born after losing two young friends within two weeks. This wasn’t just grief. It was an awakening. The kind that forces you to confront the culture of silence around men’s mental and emotional well-being.
The album takes us into the world many Muslim youth are growing up in:
- Drugs, violence, and gang crime
- A lack of opportunity and hope
- A sense of brotherhood, but also betrayal
- A culture where men must “man up” or be shamed
When the world tells boys to be “tough,” they bottle up. They don’t cry. They don’t speak. They cope. And too often, they cope through self-destruction.
“Instead of turning to substances to numb the pain, we should take our hearts out,”
Muslim Belal reminds us. That’s the message at the heart of Qalbi.
Spiritual Surrender as Therapy
The things we go through as children often impact us much later in life. Muslim Belal shared how, from a very young age, he watched his mother struggle. She was isolated, and because of that, he grew up used to being alone. He carried that loneliness inside himself for years.
But his mother had taught him one thing that stayed with him: talking to God is like therapy. Whenever life became too heavy, that’s who he turned to—only Allah could help.
When he later heard that Islam means complete surrender to God, it resonated deeply. He realized that’s exactly what he had been doing for years, without even realizing it. And alongside that surrender was a love for music, a natural talent that he carried since childhood. Writing and expressing himself became a form of healing. His secret to writing quickly and powerfully is Speaking directly from the heart.
Before embracing Islam, he had spent time in Christianity. But after his conversion, everything came together, his faith, his voice, and his creativity, now used with purpose.
Essam Muhammad recalled a traumatic experience from when he was fifteen. His mother had fallen into a coma and remained in that state for months. The emotional toll of that time was heavy. But during her illness, he found himself returning to Islam. He began praying five times a day and started learning about the deen. That period of hardship became a turning point, deepening his connection with Allah in a way that would stay with him for life.
Qalbi: When the Heart Speaks
What sets Qalbi apart isn’t just its musical richness. It’s that it speaks directly from the heart, something Muslim Belal says he learned to do as a child. That’s the secret of writing that touches souls: you don’t write with your mind, you write from your wounds. From your truth.
The album doesn’t just tell stories. It opens a space for other Muslim men to see themselves in the fears, in the failures, and in the faith that rises from rock bottom.
Out of Gratitude, We Cry
The conversation ends with a reminder of a feeling that surpasses even trauma, the unmatchable feeling of begging Allah on the Day of Arafah, as Muslim has beautifuly added this in the “Will I see you again” track:
Standing on a mountain Looking at my palms,
Eyes full of water, hours of Dua
Now they call me Haji, My head shaved bald,
I didn’t see this coming.
That sacred, raw moment, when you stand stripped of pride, image, expectations.
Just you. Your pain. And your Lord. And for once, crying isn’t a weakness. It’s worship. Maybe it’s time we teach our sons and brothers that vulnerability isn’t shameful. It’s spiritual.
That honesty isn’t weakness. It’s healing and that the bravest thing a man can do is ask for help.