My daily chores overwhelm me,
So much to do in so little time,
I cannot stop and take the time to see,
And not even a minute do I have to think about the One Above, most sublime!
Work, work and work…that’s all I can perceive,
From the morning till the eve,
My thoughts are filled with mundane tasks,
My life defined by a thousand masks.
A perfect depiction of ‘life in the fast lane’,
Sometimes I wonder if I’m going insane,
Stress is like my air,
And somewhere between, I can’t help but feel despair!
My family life is limited,
And it’s almost as if I’ve been prohibited,
From having peace and tranquility,
Oh how I long for more stability.
I don’t know when last I’ve read a book,
Or even taken out time to cook,
I don’t have time for exercise,
Perhaps it’s all part of the compromise,
But, the worst of all I can’t even say,
I can’t remember when last I put down my head to pray!
This cannot be the way to live,
This one-sided, way seems poor,
There has to be a better way,
More balance would be better I’m sure.
How do I find what I really need?
The things that I’ve always thought could wait.
What do I do to find the peace?
Before I wake up and find it’s too late.
Human beings are not one-dimensional. Alhamdulilla, it is a mercy of Allah (SWT) on us that we can function on many different levels. Thus, maintaining a balanced life is essential for our well-being. When we focus on only one aspect of our lives, (whether it’s work, or family, or friends, or even spirituality), then we will find that we can’t achieve true contentment, because our lives are unbalanced.
Islam emphasizes this concept of balance or moderation and it places importance on both the material, everyday tasks as well as the spiritual tasks. It is for this reason that forms of worship in Islam is not limited to praying or fasting only, but a simple thing like smiling at another human being for instance has been regarded as a form of charity, something which pleases Allah Almighty, a different form of worship. For Muslims, then, achieving a balanced life should be easy.
When a person’s life is unbalanced, then it makes the person more susceptible to physical as well as mental illnesses.
Insha’Allah in my next post I will look at ‘living a balanced life’ in a little more detail.
Until then, take some time out to reflect on your own life. How balanced is your life? Do you make time for different things in your life? Or, do you find yourself making much more time for some things than for others? If you’ve been feeling stressed out, angry, depressed, burnt out, etc… then perhaps the real problem is that your life is unbalanced…
What do you think about all this? Share your thoughts with us, we love to hear from you?
Until my next post, take care and try to live a more balanced life…May Allah make it easy for us all!
I leave you in peace!
Was-salaam Waffa:)
ReplyDeleteI trust that you are doing well. I know exactly what you mean about studying and balance, its rather hard to find balance when you have assignments, tests and exams and a very short time limit. In any case though, some sort of balance is still important, because even though studying is your main focus now, if you do it all the time you can end up feeling very stressed out and even burnt-out.
I find that it helps to schedule things, make time for activities other than studying that you enjoy as well, that way you have limits.
Also, I don't know if you're familiar with a concept in health psychology called psychoneuroimmunology. This is basically about mind-body healing. What's suggested in this is the conept of "Mindfulness" and this is being completely aware of the thing you're doing at the time, so you focus all your thoughts only on that thing (e.g praying) and when any thought comes into your mind, you consciously ignore it and re-focus only on that one thing you're doing. It's verrrry hard to achieve this:) but it really does add more value to life.
In any case, you seem like someone who is quite level-headed and your focus on the important things in life seems good, alhamdulila, soon your studies will be over and then you will have more time and choice of what activities you wish to pur first etc.
Forgive my ranting, and take care, and don't let your studies stress you out, if your intentions are right, you're going to do well anyway.
Take care!
Was-salaam
Asalaamu Alaykum
ReplyDeleteThere is a hadith that goes something like this
''If you make time for Allaah swt, Allaah swt will make time for you'' SubhanAllaah
Love this Blog post.
I do sometimes feel that things are unbalanced in my life that can sometimes make me feel stresed, I also sometimes feel the urge to worship Allaah swt more than I already do and wish that time would just come when I should really just do it.
JzkK
@->---
Subhanallah, that is a beautiful hadith indeed, and it is also so true. Sometimes you think that you have no time for ibadah because of other things, but when you actually take time out, leave everything else and spend time in worship of Allah then amazingly you have so much time to do everything else that you need to do, you can see Allah's mercy all the time.
ReplyDeleteA wise moulana said to me recently that our Imaan is not always at the same level, it fluctuates, sometimes its up and sometimes down, he also quoted hadith, but I cant remember it properly now. This really helped to make me feel better because there are times when you find yourself bogged down with so many things and you feel that you dont make enough time for worship.
Insha'Allah though, as you said if we make time for Allah, Allah will make time for us and ease our path towards Him.