Anxiety and faith are both subjects where bad information does real harm. This page sets out who is behind what you are reading, so that you can weigh it properly.
Who writes these guides
Kashish Mustafa
Kashish Mustafa writes the guides in this section.
She writes about anxiety because she has lived with it. While working out how to manage her own, she read widely on what actually helps and worked through it with professionals rather than trying to solve it alone. Over time she brought it under control. These guides are largely an attempt to set down what she wishes someone had explained to her at the start.
That is the vantage point they are written from. Not someone studying this from the outside, but someone who has been through it.
Sabrly itself exists because the two kinds of help available to an anxious Muslim rarely meet in the middle. Mainstream wellbeing tools tend to ignore the deen entirely, and a good deal of religious advice treats anxiety as a spiritual failure rather than something to be worked with. These guides are written from the position that both deserve to be taken seriously at once.
Kashish is not a clinician and is not a scholar of religion, and does not write as one. Where these guides touch on clinical or juristic questions, they say so, and they point you toward the people who are qualified to answer them.
Specialist review
We want to be straightforward about where this currently stands, because claiming a review process that does not yet exist would be worse than having none.
Clinical review
We are arranging review of our health related guides by a therapist registered with an appropriate UK body, such as the BACP, UKCP, BABCP or HCPC. This applies particularly to the guides covering panic attacks, obsessive doubt, and fasting alongside medication.
Until that review is in place, those guides carry a clear notice that they are not medical advice, they avoid anything resembling diagnosis, and they route you to qualified help.
Scholarly review
We are arranging review of the guides that engage most directly with Qur'an, hadith and points of fiqh by someone with recognised scholarly training. This applies particularly to the guides on iman and anxiety, on tawakkul, and to the discussion of doubt in wudu and prayer.
When a guide has been reviewed, the reviewer will be named on that page along with their credential and the date of review. If you do not see that line, the review has not happened yet.
How we handle sources
- Qur'an is cited by surah name and verse number, so that you can check it yourself.
- Hadith is attributed to its collection. Where we are not certain of a specific narration number, we name the collection rather than guess at a reference.
- Points of fiqh are described as general principles, not as rulings for your situation. Where a matter genuinely depends on your circumstances, we say so and tell you to ask someone qualified.
- Health information is kept to well established consensus. We do not report single studies as though they settled anything, and we do not make claims about treating or curing any condition.
What Sabrly is not
Sabrly is a self help tool. It is not therapy, it is not a medical device, and it is not a treatment for any diagnosed condition. Neither the app nor these guides can diagnose you.
If you are struggling in a way that affects your ability to work, study, sleep or pray, the right step is a conversation with your GP or a registered therapist. In the UK you can refer yourself to NHS Talking Therapies without going through your GP. If you are in crisis, call 999, or call Samaritans free on 116 123 at any hour of the day or night.
We would genuinely rather you got proper treatment than kept using our app. Our guide on choosing an app or a therapist says the same thing, including in the cases where the right choice is not Sabrly.
Corrections
If you find an error in a guide, whether it is a misattributed hadith, a point of fiqh we have handled carelessly, or a health claim that is not accurate, please tell us at hello@sabrly.app. We will correct it and update the date on the page.
This matters more than usual here. People arrive at these pages while they are frightened, and an error has a cost beyond being merely wrong.
Commercial interests
Sabrly is a paid subscription app, currently £59.99 per year with a monthly option, and these guides exist in part to help people find it. We think you should know that while you read them.
What we have tried to avoid is letting that shape the advice. Our comparison guide recommends competitors where they are the better fit, tells Android users to go elsewhere because we do not support Android yet, and points people to free NHS treatment where that is what they actually need. If you ever find a guide bending the facts to sell you something, that is a failure on our part and we would like to hear about it.