Life is Wonderful

Wonderful?

When I say wonderful, it does not automatically mean all things happy and beautiful, smooth sailing and all that stuff. So many things happen to us daily, the good , bad and the ugly. Is that not considered wonderful? I often wonder, how did I deserve all the good and fantastic things that happened to me and my friends? Did all that come by chance?

Positive Envy - maybe that is too strong a word

When I see my friends enjoying wealth and having a great time, do I ever get a tinge of envy? Even jealousy? Sure we can feel all this if it is in a positive way. We envy that they are so blessed by Allah and a little jealous because we know they worked hard and they also had been worshipping and doing all sorts of good deeds to please Allah. We want to race with them in doing good deeds and let the envy be a good positive envy. A motivation to try our best to improve ourselves. We do not want to be left behind in our ibadah.

Accepting and being Grateful

It does not mean we too want to have the chance to travel abroad for a family holiday every school term holiday. It does not mean we also want to be able to fly to a distant foreign land to enjoy quality family time.

Family and Friends are more important

We however do want to have the chance to enjoy our family and friends in a happy and peaceful environment. We want to continue our usual routine of being able to attend our classes, our gatherings, having a regular job and income, being healthy and able to have good family relationship with our parents and in laws. We want good loving and pious children.

Needs vs Wants

These are needs and not wants. The wants are the foreign holidays, the luxury cruises and the shopping trips that seem to suit the pockets of the rich and famous. Well, I am neither rich nor famous. Such things do not really interest me too much nor do such thoughts occupy much of my time. Surely I have better and more realistic things to do.

Like catching up with my good books or finally making that fluffy buttermilk pancake recipe that I had been craving to eat. Heh Heh, simple things in life are sometimes best. And within our reach at anytime, insha Allah.

Insha Allah my needs are taken care of and the wants are only icing on the cake. Take it or leave it. Everything is from Allah and He has power of all things.

What Priorities?

It does not mean we do not know how to appreciate the wants. That's why they are called wants. We want, we would really like that but they are not even minor priorities. Non priorities where there are so many urgent things that need to be settled.

Have a Heart

We have not even raised enough funds to send to our suffering brothers and sisters locked in warn torn countries. They are still starving, women and children sharing bread dipped in salt, men shot when they try to leave their homes in search of food and medication. Many children died due to lack of medical and health care. We are so concerned with enjoying worldly pleasures that we have forgotten our brothers and sisters - they are living on the same planet, I have to remind myself.

Be Thankful Always

Allah may not reward us the same way as He rewarded our friends. He know better how to dish it out to us in a way that benefits us personally. I am sometimes envious, but with pride and happiness for our friends' success and achievements. We are thankful to Allah that He loves our friends and we hope He will also love us too.