A few days ago, I receive the passage below from UKS messages..it touches so many aspects of my life and feeling ashamed that I have bought the book for close to 2 years and yet haven't really past the first few pages..Yep..busy..busy... After reading the email that has part of the message on it, I have begun reading the book "Don't Be Sad " on Monday and now still on it..the beautiful words keep flowing from the pages and the messages tend to explain so many details of what my own life has been and how to contemplate and expect many issues and maybe how to resolve some.... This early in reading the book I can say that I have come to peace with many things and at the same time will try my very very best on many aspects of my life as if.....
Today is all that you have...When you wake up in the morning, do not expect to see the evening – live as though today is all that you have. Yesterday has passed with its good and evil, while tomorrow has not yet arrived. Your life span is but one day, as if you were born in it and will die at the end of it. With this attitude, you will not be caught between an obsession over the past, with all its anxieties, and the hopes of the future, with all its uncertainty. Live for today: During this day you should pray with a wakeful heart, recite the Qur’an with understanding, and remember Allah with sincerity. In this day you should be balanced in your affairs, satisfied with your allotted portion, concerned with your appearance and health.
Organize the hours of this day, so that you make years out of minutes and months out of seconds. Seek forgiveness from your Lord, remember Him, prepare for the final parting from this world, and live today happily and at peace. Be content with your sustenance, your wife, your children, your work, your house and your station in life.
So hold that which I have given you and be of the grateful (Qur’an 7:144)Live today free from sorrow, bother, anger, jealousy, and malice. You must engrave onto your heart one phrase: Today is my only day. If you have eaten warm, fresh bread today, then what do yesterday’s dry, rotten bread and tomorrow’s anticipated bread matter?
If you are truthful with yourself and have a firm, solid resolve, you will undoubtedly convince yourself of the following: Today is my last day to live. When you achieve this attitude, you will profit from every moment of your day, by developing your personality, expanding your abilities, and purifying your deeds. Then you say to yourself:
- Today I shall be refined in my speech and will utter neither evil speech nor obscenity. Also, I shall not backbite.
- Today I shall organize my house and office….
- Today I will strive to be obedient to my Lord, pray in the best manner possible, do more voluntary acts of righteousness, recite the Qur’an, and read beneficial books. I will plant goodness into my heart and extract from it the roots of evil – such as pride, jealousy, and hypocrisy.
- Today I will help others – to visit the sick, to attend a funeral, to guide the one who is lost, and to feed the hungry. I will stand side by side with the oppressed and the weak. I will pay respect to the scholar, be merciful to the young, and reverent to the old.
O’ past that has departed and is gone, I will not cry over you. You will not see me remembering you, not even for a moment, because you have traveled away from me never to return.
O’ future, you are in the realm of the unseen, so I will not be obsessed by your dreams. I will not be preoccupied about what is to come because tomorrow is nothing and has not yet been created.
‘Today is my only day’ is one of the most important statements in the dictionary of happiness, for those who desire to live life in its fullest splendor and brilliance.
Taken from the book, ‘Don’t be Sad’ by Aaidh ibn Abdullah al-Qarni, International Islamic Publishing House pg 31-33.
