Eid Mubarak Everyone!

Ramzan and Eid is over now. In spite of everything, and the sad fact that mosques were almost closed, quite surprisingly, it still was a good Ramzan. It was free of all distractions like the iftar parties and lots of shopping trips for Eid . We realized for the first time, that the true Ramzan is an experience of being in retrospect. We had time, to focus on our prayers, Holy book and self-improvement.

The plane crash on Jummat ul Wida was earth shaking for us all. We all felt deeply for this great loss of so many precious lives, particularly on Eid day. We realized, there are more ways to die even in these days. It isn’t just all about this Corona Virus.

Going back on the Ramzan, most of the time, we ended up being in communication with each other and our loved ones. Online chats were at their peak. Live sessions on Instagram became the norm. Even I enjoyed some of them. In fact, I became quite addicted to these.

In any case, the superfluous in our lives got a good back seat. It reminded me of this poem by Rumi which I really love. It has everything about how to lead a successful life, in it. I’ve put his words on a very favorite painting of mine.

Ungrateful ones get shaken up:

I’ve noticed one thing in life. When we are not grateful for so many of Allahs’ blessings… He gives us a good shake up, to show us how much better off we were! All of us had really gone off track. it was quite the norm to crib about almost everything, back then. Now, we look back at the same time, valuing all that we had taken for granted then.

This Corona is Allah’s way of shaking us all up together.

 Hope we learn and realize fast.

The reason:

Once in my life I was going through a bad patch. It was just happening so that no matter what I did, things kept going from bad to worse. my friend Seema, said to me,

‘Pray that you find out why Allah has put you through this.’

It was then that I realized, that when God puts us through any type of ‘test’ there is a ‘reason’ for it. So, we need to ask Allah to help us find out why He put us through it.

It is like an exam which is designed to bring out certain traits in the students. Let us hope we do understand it all pretty quickly.

I just thank God that the earth kept blooming as beautifully as ever. The magnolia flowers are blooming on my tree. This painting of the magnolia flowers on my tree, was done last year:

A repentance exercise:

My mentor Mahjabeen was saying, ‘pray to God, and clarify to Him, pointwise, that I’m sorry for having done this, and this and this – specify each wrong that you have been doing – repent categorically to Him.
It is an exercise worth doing.

This reminds me of something…

The reason:

When I was newly married, I had a friend named Nuzhat living across the street from me. One day I was visiting her and she was very upset. She said, you know I punished my little two-year-old daughter for something, and all the time she was under the impression that I had done it to punish her for plucking a flower from their garden. She hadn’t ‘got’ the reason for that punishment!

She said, ‘It is so important to clarify the reason for the punishment to the child first.’

Well, that’s not the way God works, He just puts us in the ‘test’ and in the process we either automatically learn. Otherwise, He will need to punish us in other ways till we ‘get’ it. Perhaps it’s a ‘nirvana’ thing too.

Like there are these persons among different sections, who believe that Allah will keep giving them different lives, in different shapes and forms till they finally reach their best form. Then it is nirvana.

Whatever!

This Covid19 is no joke. It isn’t a normal punishment either. It makes it very clear to us, that God is very angry with us.

Realizing that we had gone off track.

When one looks back at our lives, we were indulging in all sorts of wrong things in many senses. We were doing them blatantly on a daily basis. Even taking Allah’s name with these things, and expecting to get away with them.

‘why do I always get caught the first time I do something wrong? Everyone, here has been doing it for years, nothing happens. But I do it once and I get caught!’ I asked my friend Attiya Kiyani in college.

‘You should thank God it is like this.’ she said, ‘It means that Allah wants to help you! Otherwise, those He doesn’t like, He lets them be successful in the wrong that they are doing, (making it seem fair seeing to them) so they get punished even more.’

Is this what He is doing now?

Giving us a chance to improve ourselves and say, ‘toba’ and repent?

Is this it?

Yes, we have been bad.

In what ways?

1. Being two-faced: not strictly honest.
2. Not being truthful: keeping a gray area.
3. Not caring about others.
4. Doing too much to show off.
5. Especially spending more than necessary on everything. In functions, on clothes, gifts, travel, food and everything.
6. Not caring for the poor and helpless.
7. Having concurrent online relationships. Many, leading double lives.
8. Telling lies online, being different personalities there. (I know persons with many accounts on Facebook and Instagram.)
9. Doing fraud to others and getting away with it.
10. Saying things purposely to hurt others. Being judgmental.

Making amends:

In short, we need to get back to doing the four things that make one successful in both worlds:

1. Being truthful.
2. Not cheating others.
3. Being of a good personality.
4. Living on honestly earned income; or an income which doesn’t exploit other humans.

That’s all.

So, even if Ramzan and Eid are over now, we still need to keep the six rozas or fasts of Shawwal. It isn’t over yet. I’ve never succeeded in this all my life so far. Lets hope I do succeed this time. How about you?

It is important that we try to follow the Covid19 precautions more diligently, even after the lock down is unlocked! Isn’t it the same, with Ramzan? So, we are over with Ramzan (the lockdown) but it was practice for the real life, which is our new lives now.

Stay blessed and protected, my Readers. ?