Not a final exam

I attended a talk by Amira Hass a couple of years ago where someone asked her if the protests we saw in Israel that summer would bring about social change.  In her answer, she said that social change is not like a final exam.  It's not a one time event that we prepare for, execute and then forget about afterwards.

That's true for a lot of things.

Maybe the problem is that we're in school for so long that we forget this.

Life isn't a series of semesters where you take a course, write the exam, pass and get the certificate.

It's about showing up every day and doing what it takes to make things work and make things better.  Day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year...

It's how relationships work.  How businesses work.  How society and social change work.  It's how life works.

It isn't a final exam.

Prayer for a partner

In the story of Musa 'alayhi salam, after Allah tells him to go to Pharaoh, Musa makes the famous prayer:

قَالَ رَبِّ اشْرَحْلِى صَدْرِى

[Musa] said: My Lord, expand for me my breast [with assurance]

وَ يَسِّرْلِى أَمْرِى

And ease for me my task

وَ احْلُلْ عُقْدَةً مِنْ لِسَانِى

And untie the knot from my tongue

يَفْقَهُوا قَوْلِى

That they may understand my speech

Surah Taha : 25-28

Right after this, though, he makes a prayer, that's not so well known.  He asks Allah to appoint a minister from his family, his brother, Haroun.  And this is what Musa asks Allah for in this partner:

اشْدُدْ بِهِ أَزْرِى

Increase through him my strength

وَ أَشْرِكْهُ فِى أَمْرِى

And let him share my task

كَىْ نُسَبِّحَكَ كَثِيرًا

That we may exalt You much

وَ نَشْكُرَكَ كَثِيرًا

And remember You much

Surah Taha : 31-34

What a beautiful description of a partner and the purpose that they aim to achieve together.

Human development and tawakkul

In human development, we progress from dependence to independence.  We're born as creatures completely dependent on others for our care and basic nourishment and protection.  As we grow up, we learn to do things on our own and we become more independent.

For some, the development stops here.  They learn to do things on their own and as much as possible they want to do things on their own.  They don't want to have to rely or depend on anyone.  They want to do it themselves.

But there's a level beyond independence.  None of us is perfect and we all have different strengths and weaknesses.  If we can work with others and let their strengths compensate for our weaknesses, we can create a whole that's greater than the sum of its parts.  That's interdependence.

I used to think that the progression ended there.

And then, I realized that there's another step beyond relying on others.

It's tawakkul -- where we depend on God.

I remember reading about Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and how he had a habit of praying an hour every day.  And then when his day was going to be particularly busy and challenging, he would pray even longer.  He knew he needed God's help even more that day.

I'm also learning myself, ever so slowly, that everything comes from God.  He is the Cause of causes.  And if He chooses to grant you something, no one can prevent it from reaching you.  And if He chooses to withhold it from you, there's no way you can get it.

So you make your effort, but the result is up to Him.  So if you don't get what you were striving for, you don't need to beat yourself up about it.  It's not all in your hands.  You don't have control over everything.  You just need to keep trying.

Perhaps His withholding of the thing you wish for is good for you.  Perhaps it's part of a lesson that you will not be able to learn any other way.  Perhaps it's His way of protecting you.  Certainly, He has a good plan in everything.

And when you realize this, somehow life gets a lot less stressful.  You don't put so much pressure on yourself because it's not all up to you.  You learn to accept whatever situation you're in because you know that a higher power and a better planner has put you here.

Now, stepping back and thinking about all this, the truth is, from the beginning, we were completely dependent on God anyways.  So tawakkul, is not so much a new step, but a realization of our original condition.

I got to thinking that's basically what we're doing in being Muslims -- in submitting to God -- we're just being true to ourselves.

Because whether we like it or not, we are servants of God.  We were created as such.  And when we realize that and act accordingly, we're just aligning ourselves with our inner, original nature.

It reminds me of the first line of the Girl Guide promise... "I promise, to be true to myself..."

We've always had a hard time explaining that to the girls.  And now I know it has a deeper meaning than we ever thought.

Finding God... at Work

Transcribed from a short talk by Shaykh Abdal Hakim Murad:

Often, Muslims working in a contemporary, fast-moving, turbo-capitalistic-world workplace, feel guilty and uncertain and think that perhaps they're selling out.

In fact, ours is not a worldly religion, but a religion that teaches us to be at ease in the world. 

And our founder, the Holy Prophet, salla Allahu 'alaihi wa sallam, was in the world. 

He was not a monk or a nun.  He was part of his society.  He fully participated in the political and economical and social and marital life of his culture. 

He was an economic actor.

So when we look at issues like this, we find that we're able to go right back to the fountain head of the religion to see what he, himself, had to say about issues that are very contemporary, but in fact are part of the timeless language of human ethics. 

This is about issues that are eternal -- issues of charity, issues of empathy, issues of justice.  This is not a new innovation.

What I want to do, is consider a hadith -- a well know saying of the Holy Prophet, salla Allahu 'alaihi wa sallam.  It's narrated by Jabir bin Abdullah and it's in the collection of Al Bukhari, so it's rigorously authenticated.  And he says, sallaAllahu 'alaihi wa sallam,

Rahima Allahu imra'an
sahla al-bay'ee
sahla ash-shiraa'ee
sahla al-qadaa'ee
sahla al-iqtidaa'ee

It's one of those pithy, syncopated, rhyming statements that we often find in the hadith. 

What it means is,

May God have mercy upon a person
who is easy in his buying,
and in his selling,
and in his taking of money in a loan,
and in his reclaiming of money that is owed to him.

Not a very elegant English translation, I'm afraid.  Even if you don't know Arabic, you'll know how zippy is the original.

And it's a prayer from the Prophet, that God should have mercy on these people.

This may come as some kind of culture-shock, because we tend to assume nowadays--Muslims, like everybody else -- that religion, spirituality, personal transformation, the "Hotline to God", are things that happen in a beautiful sacred place, a little quiet backwater, perhaps a retreat centre, perhaps a place we go to on Friday or Saturday or Sunday, and the real world is out there, where we accumulate all kinds of bad vibes, which we then purge at a place of worship.

Sometimes we treat a place of worship as a kind of spa, where we go to decontaminate.

That's a very unhealthy way of looking at what we do 5 or 6 days a week.

The Muslim vision is that of a totality. 

Everything is to be incorporated into the Fundamental Human Project, which has to be, for Islam, as for all other religions, turning away from the self, towards the other -- the Other with the big 'O' and also the other with the little 'o'. 

Turning away from our lower selfishness toward something that, in some strange but convincing way persuades us that it is what we really are, underneath.

The fundamental turning, which the Qur'an calls Tawbah, which we translate as repentance, means turning, turning away, and turning away from sin to righteousness, which is another way of expressing turning away from the rubbish within, to what is beautiful that God has placed within the soul.

So, when the Holy Prophet salla Allahu 'alaihi wa sallam, is speaking about economic matters, and matters of business ethics, this doesn't surprise us because everywhere belongs to God.  And everywhere is a place where God is to be celebrated -- even the computer terminal in the estate agent or wherever it is that you work.  Muslims are invited to find a way of sanctifying every moment of those experiences.

Imam Al Ghazali, one of the great ethical thinkers of Islam used to say that humanity basically exists in three categories:

Rajulun shaghalathu dunyaahu 'an ukhraahu, fa huwa min al halikeen

Category number one is the person whose worldly concerns distract him from his otherworldy concerns, and he is of the lost.

Wa rajulun shaghalthu ukhraahu 'an dunyaahu, fa huwa inshaAllah min al faa-izeen

And a man who is distracted by his otherworldly concerns from his worldly concerns and he is, God willing, one of the successful

wa rajulun a'aanat-hu ukhraahu 'ala dunyaahu wa dunyaahu 'alaa ukhraahu fa huwa min al muqarrabeen

And a man whose worldly concerns help him in his otherworldly concerns and he is of those brought near to God.

So we move close to God, not by skirting the realities of the world but rather going through them.  And that takes some doing.  Particularly in the modern world, where it is fair to say that the average contemporary workplace is not primarily geared up for fostering the spiritual life of its employees.

But in any case, whether we're Muslims or not, if we have any interest in what we call spirituality, it's something we're going to want to think carefully about.

---end of transcript---

So it's not about choosing this world or the next, it's about using this world for the next.

The ant on the carpet

Imagine an ant walking across a carpet.  As he walks, he crosses over fissures and crevices and climbs up and over bumps and mounds of seemingly random colors.  He can't understand what purpose this veritable obstacle course could serve.

Of course, the ant has a very limited perspective.  And if he could see the bigger picture, he would see clearly that the terrain he's walking across is actually a part of the beautiful pattern on a Persian carpet.

As we live our lives, we also have a very limited perspective.  We face obstacles and disappointments and plans change and things often don't go the way we wish they would.

Looking back, though, we can often see that whatever happened was exactly what we needed.

We just didn't know it at the time.

And ultimately, we know that although we might not see it, God always has a beautiful plan for us and things happen exactly as He intends it in His infinite Wisdom and Mercy.

From a Rumi poem related by Shaykh Abdal Hakim Murad in a lecture about relying on God.

What you do has an impact on who you are

Dr. Abdal Hakim Jackson was really trying to drive this point home at the RIS Knowledge Retreat in 2011.

We often think of who we are -- our personalities and character traits -- as the source from which our actions emanate.  A generous person will give generously.  A patient person will remain calm in the face of distress.  A courageous person will stand up for what is right even at the risk of personal harm.  And people with less than desirable personality traits will do less than desirable actions.

Sometimes we use this reasoning as an excuse for our behaviour.  "Well, I'm just not a patient/brave/(insert any other quality in here) person," we say.  As if our personalities are carved in stone and there's nothing we can do about it.

The thing is, it works the other way around too.

Even if you're not born a generous person, if you keep giving and giving and giving (even if you don't feel like it), these actions will have an effect on your heart.  And over time, you find yourself wanting to give.  You've made yourself into a generous person.

Fake it until you make it...as they say.

So it's not a one-way street.  Just as our inner character traits affect and manifest themselves in the actions of our limbs, the actions of our limbs affect and manifest themselves in our inner character traits.

Not to judge

When facilitating group discussions or a setting up a good working environment, we often talk about a 'safe space' -- a place where people don't get hurt and aren't afraid to get hurt.  One of the ground rules of a 'safe space' is that we're not supposed to judge.

I've always had trouble understanding this one.  What does it mean not to judge?  Don't our minds make judgments automatically all the time?  Is it possible to stop these thought processes and just accept information without interpreting it, linking it with other things and thereby judging it?  Is it really possible not to judge?

At first, I thought that maybe the issue isn't so much in the thoughts but in the actions that result from those thoughts.  It's hard to control our thoughts.  We have a much better handle on actions.

Perhaps not judging really means not letting our thoughts cause us to say things or do things that make people feel hurt -- i.e. things that make people feel less or smaller or wrong or unworthy.  The actions may be very subtle and almost subconscious -- a scoffing, rolling eyes, subtle turning away, a dismissive tone, a condescending attitude.  Maybe it's not so much that we shouldn't judge but that the way we act or the words we say should not make people feel judged.  We should not make people feel hurt or belittled.

Yes, that's true.  We need to make sure we don't hurt people with our actions.

Then, I realized that we can take it a step further than that.  Yes, we can control our thought processes too.  Yes, we can suspend judgment.

It's a matter of consciousness.  And patience.  And humility.

Because to judge inevitably requires making assumptions.  You have evidence of A and then you make assumptions (based on experience or logic) that links A to B.  And you keep making links.  Until you come to the conclusion that a spelling mistake or two or three means that the writer is incompetent or lazy or doesn't care.  Ouch.

That's judging.

And it doesn't have to happen that way.  Sure, there's a spelling mistake.  But it could be there for any number of reasons.  And not judging means that you don't close off possibilities.  And you don't insist on coming to a conclusion. 

Yes, there's a spelling mistake.  But you don't really know why there's a spelling mistake.

This is consciousness.  To know that you don't know.  And to know that there are many possible, perfectly fine explanations behind any piece of evidence.

So you don't close doors.  You leave them open and let more of the story come to you. 

This is where the patience comes in.

It can be uncomfortable not knowing.  Because you realize that you're not in control.  You don't know. 

It takes some humility to accept that.

Ultimately, though, the truth is you really don't know much.  There's a whole life story behind that email.  And you can't possibly know and make conclusions on it based on the placement or misplacement of a single letter.

And if you can just wait and let more of the story come to you, the opportunities and insights and new perspectives and gifts that come through that open door can change your life.

Your test

I wrote this for Sahar today and I realized that I need this reminder myself...

Know that wherever you are, whoever you're with, whatever situation you're facing -- is exactly what Allah has written for you.  This is your test.

Impress Him.

Making a difference

We all want to "make a difference".  The truth is, whether we want to or not, we do make a difference.  It's just a question of what kind of difference are we making.

Every purchase we make makes a difference.  Every dollar we spend is a vote for what we want to exist in the world.  By choosing to buy something, we're voting to keep that thing available for sale and to have more of it produced in the future.  By choosing not to buy something, we're doing the opposite.

Just in terms of food, we can choose to eat local foods, local organic foods, organic foods, foods that we grow ourselves or just the cheapest thing on the shelf.  Each one of these is a choice and each of these choices make a difference.  It makes a difference in terms of what foods will continue to be produced, which methods of production will be more profitable, which will be less, and thereby what we'll likely have more of in the future and what we'll likely have less of. 

Each one of these methods of production has an impact on the world.  They use different amounts of fossil fuels in the production and transportation of the food.  They use different amounts of pesticides and fertilizers.  And all of that makes a difference.  

Even without spending money, we make a difference by the things we say and do.  We can encourage people and give them fuel for their endeavours or we can ignore them.  We can be extraordinarily kind or generous or industrious and inspire others to do the same.  Or, we can do the bare minimum and perpetuate a culture where that becomes as the norm.

We all make a difference.  It's just a matter of what kind of difference we're making.

(I'd like to credit Jeff Short for the ideas about different foods and how they make a difference.  This was the topic of his speech at Toastmaster's last week)

Explaining myself

I find that I'm explaining myself quite a bit these days.  When I was in school, it was clear.  I was in school, working on my PhD.  It's a known box.  No further explanation necessary.

Now I'm not in school.  I've got the PhD but I'm not interested in working in biomedical engineering.  That's where the explanations start. 

"Why?" people ask.

I don't like the work, the tedium of research.  I haven't found it to be a good use of my skill set or a good fit with my personality.  I'm disturbed by the amount of biohazardous and chemical waste we produce in research -- and the amount of waste in general -- especially when we use plastic disposable everything to run our experiments in aseptic conditions.  I question whether this allocation of resources into research is really the best way to alleviate the suffering of people who are sick. 

Having spent many, many hours with people who were terminally ill, I wonder how much better patients' lives might be if the same effort we put into extending their lives was put into improving the quality of the days they already have.  Actually, even a fraction of the effort would make a huge difference.  Improving the quality of their days doesn't require brilliant scientists in state-of-the-art research facilities using expensive equipment and toxic chemicals.  Just a visit by someone who cares would do it.  Some time spent reading a book or holding a hand or just sitting by the bedside would do it. 

Aside from all that, I believe that we have more pressing problems.  I believe that our train of progress is heading for an abyss of environmental catastrophe and social crises.  I could ignore that, go on with business as usual and tinker about inside the train like a good engineer.  Or, I could try to do something to prevent our train from reaching the abyss.  Somehow, the latter course of action just makes more sense to me.

Cooking lesson

I cooked dinner today.  I didn't start the rice early enough so we had to wait a while, after everything else was ready, for the rice to finish cooking before we could start eating. 

I was going to use a large knife to cut the steak and, not wanting to dirty any extra knives, I used it to cut everything else as well.  I'm not so used to the large knife so everything ended up being cut more coarsely than usual -- the ginger, the celery, the carrots.  Whoops. 

Instead of cooking the steak first and then putting in the onions, I did it the other way around, onions first. 

When making the stir fry, I had the oil on pretty high when I put the meat in the pan, along with the marinade, causing a lot of hot splashiness.  Whoops.

In the end, the meal was fine.  And, with all the mistakes I made in the process, I got a great cooking lesson too.  Experience may not be one of the kindest teachers, but it is one of the best.

Where are we going?

My friend has a three year old, who she pushes in the stroller when we go for our runs.  On Friday, as we were running, her daughter asked us, "Where are we going?".  Between gasping breaths, I tried to explain to her that we're not really going anywhere.  We're just running. 

Sometimes, it's really more about journey itself and how you traverse than it is about the final destination. 

Someone else's game

Every game has rules and objectives.  Do this, don't do that.  When you get this, you win. 

Professions also have their rules and objectives.  Work overtime.  Get a raise.  Publish papers.  Apply for grants.  Whoever gets the most money / publications / funding wins.

But what if you don't need that much money or that many publications or that much funding?  Maybe this isn't the game for you. 

You don't have to play someone else's game.

The carpet merchants

I once heard about a group of carpet merchants whose shops are all next to each other in the marketplace.  Individually, they don't keep regular hours.  As soon as one of them makes the amount he wants for the day, he'll close up shop and leave the rest of the day's business to the others.

When I first heard about them, I thought, "Don't they know how to do business?"  Then I thought, "Wow!  How altruistic!  Instead of competing, they're sharing the business."  Now, I see it differently.

They're just choosing how to spend their time.  Once they have the money that they need, they move on with the rest of their day and do other things.  Instead of living to make money, these merchants making money to live.

Obstacles on the road

Sometimes, the road of life is smooth and easy.

Sometimes, it get's a little bit rocky and uncomfortable.  The road isn't too bad, but it's not good either.  It's certainly not bad enough to consider turning around, retracing your steps and finding a better road.  So you stay on it telling yourself that the road could get better any time now.  You never know what's up ahead.  You chug along.

Then sometimes, the road becomes almost impassable.  Life gets really, really hard. 

Some obstacles on the road give you no choice but to stop.  And think.  What is this road?  Where is it going?  How badly do I want to get there?  Is this the only road that I can take?  Could I try another path?  Would I prefer to go somewhere else?

As frustrating as they are, the obstacles on the road -- especially the really big ones -- give us an opportunity to think, to regroup and to question our goals and assumptions.  Then we can strengthen our resolve to continue on this path or to try another one.

What do you want to do?

Seems like a simple question, doesn't it?

I remember a friend asking me this close to ten years ago.   He had asked me what I wanted to do after graduating and I mentioned something along the lines of whatever would make my family happy.

I actually didn't see it as my own choice to make.  I saw my life as an optimization problem where my task was to do whatever would be most pleasing to people around me.   I was quite content with that.

My friend wasn't.

He tried to ask me what I wanted to do.   I told him it doesn't matter what I wanted to do and so I never really put much thought into it.  I didn't know what I wanted to do and I wasn't too keen on figuring it out.  I honestly didn't think that what I wanted was important.  My plan was to do whatever I needed to do, to do my duty and do what was needed of me.

My, how things have changed...

Now, I find myself devoting much of my time trying to figure out the answer to that question that I didn't even think was worth answering.  What do I want to do?

If I've learned anything in the past few years, it's that I don't want to do what I don't want to do.  It's just too hard.  And painful.  And frustrating.  And a waste of my time and effort.  A waste of my life.

So, while I have the luxury and the opportunity to do it, I'm going to spend some time trying to figure out some answers.  Because now, I want to do what I want to do.

Your Life or Your Money

If someone put a gun to your head and asked you to choose between keeping your life or keeping your money, you would surely keep your life and give away your money. But every day, millions of people go to work, to jobs that they hate. Thereby, in effect, giving up their lives in exchange for money. Every day.