Providence 2009

The trees are a little way away from this building, separated by an oversized parking lot. But even though, and perhaps because, the trees are so far, one can hear the sweet calls of various birds from time to time, especially in the dead of night; which is strange. Birds are usually not up so late. Maybe that's also part of man's contribution toward the disturbance of the echosystem?
It's very late at night and the din of the traffic has died out. It's very very quiet; just ten minutes before midnight, and I can hear this persistent, most sweetest of all, song of a solitary bird. Its musical, whistling melody is most soothing to the soul. I stop reading and listen to the bird. Its tone and syllables rise and fall as they ride the wind. Wonder what bird it is? It sounds exotic. I wonder if it is too restless, or too restful at this hour of the night. It has been singing for the past hour now and I wonder who will fall asleep first; the bird or I?

An Eventful Journey

It was hard to say goodbye to my children yet one more time. I had spent a few wonderful months with them and it was now time to move on to my next destination. This time it was Toronto, Canada where my sister lives.
So I gave one final hug to my darling granddaughters and my dear son and wiping my teary eyes, sat down in the car next to my dear daughter in law. My flight was in the afternoon but I had to leave early as my daughter in law would be dropping me off before going to her work.
It was an hour's drive which we spent talking about various things. Before we knew it, we were taking the exit for the airport. My daughter in law helped me with the bags and check-in after which we said goodbye. "God bless my son and his family and keep them all safe," I prayed in my heart.
Having rid myself of the heavy bag, I walked towards the security section. I was grateful when I emerged safely on the other side. Security check can be a harrowing experience and the only way to stay relaxed through the process is to remember that it is a necessary operation for the safety of all passengers. Who wants to find himself on a flight sitting next to a terrorist?
Soon I was heading towards the gate assigned to my flight. I found a seat and settled down with the book I had borrowed from my son to keep myself busy during those hours of waiting. I couldn't read beyond a few pages before my head started to nod and my eyes closed. I had been up since 3:00 am; it was Ramzan, the Islamic Holy month of fasting. I just rested my head against the back of the seat and napped. This exercise would be repeated at least  a few times over the next five hours. Around 1:00 pm, I got up and walked upto the computer screen where the information about my flight was at display. Thank God it was on time; 1:35 pm. But what seemed very odd was the fact that I could not see a plane at the end of the boarding gate. No sooner had I found my seat again, did they announce that my flight was cancelled because of bad weather in New York. Imagine the anxiety of the passengers at that moment because many of us had to take a connecting flight from NY. I got in touch with my son and also with the airline I was booked with. Thank God I found out that they had transferred my booking to another airline that would take me to Toronto straight from Hartford airport where I was. I was obviously relieved, but there was one little glitch there; the flight was leaving in about forty minutes; which meant that I had to go back to the ticket counter, get my bag checked in on the new flight, go through security check again and still make it in time to board the plane. Well there was not much choice was there?
I literally ran my way back to the ticketing counter, and after explaing the situation, got my new boarding pass. My bag had been checked in at 8:00 am that morning and now I had to retrieve it and get it on the Air Canada flight. I was more than a little relieved to find out that, because the previous plane had been late, my bag was still in the hold. I don't know what would have happened if they had had to unload it off the plane. Still it seemed to be taking the gentleman forever to retrieve it from the hold. Bless the young woman at the counter who, sensing my fretful behaviour and anxiety, offered to bring the bag to the Air Canada terminal and told me to hurry on there myself. Again I ran to the place and explained my position to the man behind the counter, at the same time displaying my new boarding pass. Regardless of the urgency I was feeling because of lack of time, the person refused to check me in saying he had no information I was on that flight. I had to suggest to him to check in his system and find out. In the meantime, true to her word, the young lady appeared with my suitcase. "Luckily", the Air Canada person found my transfer on his system and agreed to check me in. Much relieved, but still a long way from my ordeal being over, now I had to run back to the security check.
 If I had any hope that it would be easier the second time around in the same day, it was quickly and efficiently dashed by the relaxed attitude of the security guards I ran into. I kept repeating that I had a flight to catch in less than ten minutes but it was as if I were talking a foreign language. And the fact that I was wearing shoes with laces, had on a belt around my waist, was wearing an overcoat, had a shawl around my neck and carried a sweater on my arm did not really help. Anyway, I thought the best way to deal with the situation was to stay calm and not create any suspicion in the minds of the people I was dealing with. I was praying constantly under my breath and looked obviously relieved when I was again on my way to the new gate. I was running again and was endlessly grateful to God for granting me the strength to be doing so. Inevitably, I was reminded of the words of my orthopaedic surgeon who, years ago, had told my husband after my accident that I would never be able to run again and would be lucky if I could even walk straight. God's mercy and my loved ones' prayers had definitely worked the magic which enabled me to reach the gate in the nick of time. Imagine my indignant annoyance when I heard the same airline guy tell me, " You can relax now, we haven't started boarding yet. " I looked at the clock; it was only five minutes to the flight time. As soon as I put my stuff down and sat down, boarding was announced; so along with some other passengers, I started walking to the gate.
My surprises had not come to an end yet. As I reached the end of the chute that connects to the plane, I noticed that instead of an aircraft, there was only a step ladder attached to it. I could not believe my eyes, as after walking on the tarmac, we were led to the smallest of planes one could imagine. Uuughhh, excuse me? Is this the plane that was going to fly me on an international flight all the way to Toronto? And in this bad weather? What choice had I but to keep walking. As I reached the plane, horror of horrors; I noticed I did not have the sweater on my arm any more. Excusing myself to the crew member standing there, I retraced my steps, and sure enough, there was my sweater, lying on the ground. Picking it up, again I ran towards the plane. I handed my boarding pass to the officer who was checking them; but wait. Murphy struck yet again, and a gust of wind blew the boarding pass out of my  hand and landed it, very conveniently, under the belly of the aircraft!!! It was just unbelievable!!In my total nervousness, I made a move to retrieve it, only to be stopped by the kind officer who told me to proceed into the plane while he got my boarding pass. I went up the ladder and finding a seat, settled down. There were just about fourteen passengers on the plane. As the engines revved into life, the flight attendent began explaining the safety rules and the exit strategy in case of an emergency. It seemed like a joke to me because I was thinking; there's no way anyone is going to survive if this thing goes down. As the plane started to taxi down the runway, the flight attendent announced that the rear of the plane was so heavy that the weight imbalance could cause major problems during flight. The solution? One of the two very fat passengers sitting in the rear would have to move up to a seat in the front.
And I was thinking...what if this had gone unnoticed? My mind, exhausted as it was from the whole day's proceedings, refused to think what could have happened.
Finally the plane took off and we were airborne. All through the flight, the plane flew at a height of just ten thousand feet and I could see the land and water very clearly below. Sometimes the turbulance shook the small aircraft so badly that I gripped the sides of my seat and prayed. Despite everything, the plane finally landed safely which brought the nightmare to an end. Never before was I so glad, and so grateful to put my feet back on the ground.

Heart Or Mind???

The seat of all intelligence, feelings and emotions is the human brain. It is also the centre of wishes, desires, likes and dislikes. It is quite likely that the brain is also the 'home' of our soul. For all our knowledge and learning is an experience of the soul.
Why then is it, that we involve the heart in activities which are clearly the undertakings of the brain? eg. when we say that 'we must choose between the heart and the mind', or that 'our heart tells us differently than does our mind', we only mean that two separate parts of our brain guide us in two different ways. The only two things in conflict are the 'intelligence' and the 'emotions', not the heart and the brain.
The heart, though an extremely vital organ in the human body, is incapable of thinking. The heart is given the function of purifying the human blood and circulating it throughout the body.
So when we feel that our heart desires a certain thing, we are merely being guided by the emotional part of our brain. The other part of the same organ which is responsible for more processed and intelligent decisions, steers us away from frivolous desires and pursuits.
It is time we stop blaming the poor heart for our wrong decisions, or giving it credit for our wisdom of choice.

Pas Che Bayad Kard???

Man is born a gregarious animal. It is not in his nature to be isolated from the rest of his race and when that happens it is hard for him to survive or flourish.
Man is not a self-sufficient creature and needs the support of others throughout life. His interdependence on others can be judged by the mere fact that a human child takes the longest of all creatures to learn to look after himself. And if he is forced to live away from loved ones, his emotional dependence and affinity keeps him closely entwined with them. This is why a person who chooses to live by himself is often teased and stigmatized with titles like 'hermit' and 'loner'. Such a person is looked at with skepticism and mistrust. People wonder at his sanity and try to avoid his company.
Man on his own cannot achieve much in life. On the other hand, when he pools his mental and physical abilities with others, mega miracles are achieved.
The human soul must mingle with others in order to reach the sublime heights of acquisition in any given field of life. Man must live a life which is more expansive in approach to various things. It is only through the experiences and perspectives of others that we come to know of areas which we may not encounter in a direct way. The joys and sorrows of others have much to teach us. Their tragedies often help diminish our own pain and suffering, and their joys and quests inspire us to strive harder and to keep up our hope and faith.
Mixing and associating with others gives us a vantage point in life. It gives us opportunity for unique experiences and thus unique memories. A person who refuses to allow others to enter his life is an unfortunate soul. Such a person can only have an isolated outlook on life because he does not have the privilege of having others contribute to his experiences.
The experience of meeting people is like the flowing water of a river; for it allows the flow of fresh thoughts to pass through our lives. Contrary to this, life lived in a cocoon of isolation is like the putrid rancid water of a stagnant pool, and can only give rise to a character which is the same. Just like such water is a breeding space for disease and pollution, an isolated soul gives rise to contempt and hatred, self-righteousness and conceit. Isolation renders the human soul incapable of magnanimity and understanding, of love and sacrifice, of accommodation and generosity. This in turn produces a monster who believes himself to be right and above board in all he does. He believes his own deeds as the ultimate achievement of success. He believes that his approach to life, and toward religion and God, is correct which becomes the biggest catalyst to his lethargy and failure to further advancement through effort and perseverance.
They say that an enemy is your best friend if he points out your weaknesses to you, and a friend who hides them from you does you the greatest dis-service. So when we share our experiences with others and allow them to criticize us, we must realize that we are going through a process of self-improvement and evolution. When we look around us, we see everybody in the shape of the evolved human species. But in actual fact, very few are eligible for the title of 'human'. Only those who accommodate and adjust to the changing times and factors of life are the ones who are evolving constantly and acquiring the supreme characteristics of the human being that God planned to put behind the steering wheel of this planet.
If we go into isolation and concern ourselves only with the well-being and interests of our self, we will be responsible for the decay of first the family unit and then the entire society. If we sit in a darkened room and spend hour upon hour rolling the beads between our fingers, how many people will benefit from this ritual? How will it help feed the hungry children in our neighbourhood? And how will it save the down-trodden of the society from further exploitation and degradation?
Our religion does not ask us to waste our time in rituals; rather, it compels us to go out and help improve the lives of our fellow human beings. Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, educate the ignorant. But the Muslims of today have isolated their own interests from the interests of humanity. We seem to be concerned only with our own betterment and salvation. But we must not forget; turning beads in dark isolation will bring salvation neither to the nation nor to us. Islam is a religion of practise and deeds, of 'amal' and 'ilm'.
The meaning of the title of my essay is: 'So What Needs Be Done?'
And here lies the answer: instead of isolating it, we need to mingle our soul with those of others in the world around us. The need of the hour is 'ilm' ie. knowledge, and 'amal' ie. is practice. Without the employment of these, we will remain an incongruous tribe of ignorant people isolated and far removed from the path of reality. At the end of our journey, we will realize that our isolation benefited us neither in this world nor will it redeem us from God's wrath in the next.

Free Will or Destiny???

It is often very hard, sometimes impossible to understand how things work in our life. On the one hand we are told that our life has been pre-planned and that we cannot escape destiny. On the other hand, we are held responsible for our actions and every decision we make.
True that our destiny has been written in The Safe Book of God, even before we are born, and even though sometimes it seems like we are driven by some unknown hand, we really are making our decisions consciously and of a free will. Why should we be punished for our bad deeds if they are not our own; and why should we expect to be rewarded for our good actions if all that we are doing is follow a preordained agenda of fate?
We know that God created all human spirits at one time. He then took an oath of allegience and total submission from each spirit. According to the Quran all spirits consented to accept and submit to God's every command. This makes them all Muslim, as the word 'muslim' means 'one who submits to the will of God'.
After years of pondering over this strange phenomenon, I have come to a conclusion of sorts, which not only clears a lot of ambiguity, it also brings peace to the mind. This is what I feel.
After all the spirits were created, they were shown their entire future life in a flash; a small task for the Almighty. The spirits were presented with every opportunity that their life on earth would present them with. Then they were given their options, and the free will to choose the path of their preference. Whatever choice the spirit made, was then recorded in The Book of Fate and marked as our 'destiny'.
This means that our spirits have already 'lived' their life once before and have made their choices. But they do not remember, just like they do not remember their existence in heaven before coming to live on earth in the form of a human.
God has knowledge of what path we will follow in life as our spirit has already made her choices. This explains why we shall be held responsible for our deeds. If we blame our destiny, we blame our spirit and hence the blame falls indirectly on us, as we are our spirit. So even when we say that we are victims of our destiny, we are still responsible for the decisions we take as these are the decisions taken by our spirit.
Unfortunately, the privilege of free will was given to our spirit long before we became concious of it, and as soon as it exercised this free will, the decision was stamped down as a final deed, and as our destiny. This is why we sometimes feel that we cannot really plan our future, as it has already been planned for us. All we can do is to set out on a path and meet the consequences. This is the extent of planning we can do.
Events, happenings will sort themselves out as we move along and as time passes. We are just like a herd of cattle or sheep. They wander all day in the fields, scattered and spread out in search of food. As evening approaches, they head back home. Just like them, we the humans live in this worldly life, struggling and striving. We all go our haphazard and busy courses, and all the time, with every passing moment, we are drawn towards our home, our eternal life, our Creator.
We often wonder why God causes some to prosper and progress while others remain captives of their destiny. The truth is that we are all captives of our destiny; driven on our path by the choices our spirit has made. We have formed our destiny ourselves and the only way it can be changed is by the Divine intervention of God's mercy and benevolence.
And so it is that we must bow our head before our Captor and silently but constantly remind ourselves to be humble, as captives must be. For He is the One and Only who can set us free.

Faith!!!

For a person who has no faith, it may be the hardest thing to understand what it is, but at the same time, a person who is blessed with it may find it the most natural thing and in fact a vital componant of his fabric.
What is the active factor in a bird's mind when he flaps his wings and takes off from a cliff? How does he know that he will soar upward into the depths of the sky, and not drop to his death on the rocks below? It is his faith that helps him take his chances with his life.
Faith gives you power over the odds in life. It brings clarity of mind and ideas. When you have faith, you can take on challenges and overcome the fear of failure. Wishes that are supported by a strong faith are always easier to achieve. Having faith is like a child holding the hand of his parent when crossing a street. He knows that his parent will see him safely to the other side and not let harm come his way. When we place our faith in God, we know that He will watch over us and guide us on the right way.
Faith is strength. Faith is vision, for it lends us the ability to see the possibilities of life ahead.
A life without Faith is like a body without soul; and what is a body without soul but a mere skeleton; an empty cage without a song bird.
A person without faith is like a traveller without a compass; a student without a teacher. Having faith adds pleasure and satisfaction to our every endeavour in life. It gives us hope and a destination to walk towards. A faithless person believes that there is no life after death. To him, life on this planet is all God has to offer us. It is not hard to imagine how insipid and limited such a person's existence must be. How sad and pitiful for such a being to think that the experiences of his life here, just a few years if viewed in the scheme of things, is all that he was created for. That when he adheres to his base qualities, there will be no accountability for his misdeeds and no punishment for him. And if on the other hand he conducts himself on a path of righteousness and lives in fear of God, there will be no reward for his hardships and sacrifice. If we believe in God's blessing and mercy, we must also believe that He will judge and we will face the consequences which are drafted by our life in this world.
True that we see many things around us which do not make any sense to us. But we must not forget that man is born with limited capabilities. Our power to see and understand is in no way sufficient for us to decipher the codes and mysteries of Creation. We must acknowledge our humble existence and embrace the truth. Faith is that certain things must be left alone with the acceptance that everything makes sense to the Creator and He does nothing without purpose.
Faith is always accompanied with peace and harmony, joy and hope. It gives meaningful purpose to life. It lends beauty and a certain grandeur to our existence. It provides embellishment to humanity and brings it closer to Divine reality. Those who live without faith, might just as well have been sheep or cattle with no direction and no purpose; born only to feed their bodies and starve their souls.