‘No reason to shy away’: A young person’s reflection on inviting friends to community-building activities

In this personal reflection, 18-year-old Anis Mihrshahi shares his story about how he overcame his own fears and inhibitions to invite his friends to the Faith’s community-building activities. 

For years I had thought about inviting my close group of school friends to activities, but was always too nervous to do so in fear of rejection. Knowing the [Brisbane] youth conference was coming up, I reflected for a while and realised that the Faith and its activities were such an integral part of my life, and so the conference would be a perfect opportunity to display how special it was to me, and allow my friends to hopefully gain some insight while also meeting a wonderful group of Baha’i youth.  

Prior to this I had discussed the Faith and its core beliefs to some extent, so my friends weren’t completely unfamiliar with it. I ultimately decided that creating a group chat would be the best way to communicate with all of my friends, and sent a lengthy message explaining the goal of the conference, the concepts that would be explored and connected it back to conversations we had previously had.  They were very excited to come after hearing about it, and signed up. Over the next few weeks, I had many one-on-one conversations, further explaining the conference, the Faith and anything that sparked their curiosity.  

As the dates approached, the excitement was palpable, and that feeling carried over into the two days of the conference. The conversations at the conference were uplifting, sophisticated and meaningful, with many of the topics heavily resonating with all of us. My friends’ interest and engagement was incredible to witness, and completely eradicated any existing fears I had about inviting friends to future activities.  

When discussing their highlights and reflections, my friends shared about the performances, presentations and devotions, and how unique and special the atmosphere created was, sharing about how welcoming everyone was, and how easy it was to bond so quickly with so many people. In total, six of my friends attended over the two days and it was clear that the conference had the power to invigorate – so much so that they eagerly discussed future opportunities to attend more activities.

Now, a few months later, my friends have attended many events including deepenings, devotionals, and Naw Ruz celebrations. Three have finished Book 1. Another has also finished Book 2 and 3 and several have attended the weekly Paris Talks book study – a compilation of talks by ‘Abdu’l-Baha from his first stay in Paris. We are currently planning to host an upcoming deepening, with all my friends keen to help with community service projects organised by the children’s class and junior youth groups. One is eager to start his own junior youth group/children’s class as soon as possible.  

This experience was an absolute blessing to be a part of but also made me realise that if the intentions are pure, there is never any reason to shy away from teaching others about the Faith.