"Switch off your phones" Day

Of all the days, including friendship day, fathers day, mothers day, earth day, valentines day, sisters day etc., the day being suggested in this post would have the most positive effects!

There should be a day celebrated when we switch off our phones and switch off a lot of tension and get connected to those around us!

we never realize the amount of time our cell phones consume and the extent to which they disconnect us from  the near ones. I am sure that on such a day we would discover many new things in our selves and in our homes. We'd get into many other activities and get away from a network of restraint, the network of mobiles.

The idea is not to advertise against the use of mobile phones but the proper and moderate use of the device!

Faana; Destroyed by chance or by choice

Yeah I might seem crazy blogging about a movie that was released some six years back! but the fact is that i have actually seen it pretty recently! It is fairly possible that I fall for a song years after it breaks all music records!  that's me!

On the surface this movie is just another love story of Zoonie (Kajol) and Rehan (Amir Khan), in short Zoonie dances while she boasts about the colors of her homeland even though she is blind but looses all the color in her life when she gets her eye sight back!

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But this movie has a deeper meaning below the surface, that deciding between right and wrong is easy but deciding between the lesser of two evils and better of two goods is what 'makes' our life. And this actually 'makes' our life, If we think, these decisions are in fact the major ones and the most frequent ones i.e lesser of two evils and better of two goods. So in this is a story about two people one who makes the right decisions and the other who does not. One who is clear about life and the other who is not. Both are destroyed one by chance and luck and the other by choice, hence having different outcomes of this destruction! Pretty close to what I have advocated in another post.

Also I read some where, and have forgotten the source that:

"To Live is to Love and to Love is to Die"

[NOTE:  Have removed all the references regarding the love with God (Submitting to divine will willfully) because people were not liking the fact that we should relate to love with God from a Bollywood movie :) so have removed the content which unnecessarily added Sufi touch to the movie.
Hence i am not advocating it as a thought changer, but just a good movie.or atleast a movie that I enjoyed watching :)]

Attitude is all that matters!

A positive attitude can cover up for 'aptitude' but aptitude can never cover up for a negative attitude! That is why, while recruiting, most organizations equally evaluate both attitude and aptitude. We can find so many instances of this around us, Amir Sohail the star batsman of Pakistan lost the glory of his career due to his attitude in a cricket world cup match at banglore where he gave an insulting gesture to the bowler, after that not only his innings ended so did the glory of his career.

Spain won the last football world cup because they had the winning attitude, and many times teams win big events not having enough statistical backing all due to attitude. Pakistan were the minnows in world cup 1992 but won!

Owing to his attitude Julian Assange (the founder of WikiLeaks) has not done justice to his potential.

Islam teaches us to have a positive attitude towards life, problems, success and everything in general, faith in Allah gives us the right attitude to conquer 'our own' world if not the whole world! Because the very first verse of Quran is a source of endless confidence, humbleness and positiveness as it suggests that all praise is for HIM the Lord of all worlds. So how can a Muslim have a negative attitude?  How can we look down upon someone when we know that all praise is for HIM, and how can we lose a fight when we know that all praise is indeed for HIM. 

Neo-Colonialism: Valentine's Day in Pakistan

Apparently the British left the divided sub-continent, but their superiority stays. We are still a victim of cultural colonialism, as is also stated by Imran Khan in his Book "Pakistan; A Personal History".

Valentine's day is a full fledged part of our culture thanks to the media! because 'love' is in the air because its 'on air' on every channel. One argument that one gets to hear in favor of this day is: whats the big deal, after all its all about "love". The thing is that its not about love its about the detriment of our religious/cultural and social values. Because our religion states that each day is a day of love for a Muslim. A Muslim means endless love for humans, relations, humanity and Allah Almighty, and we must strive to set better standards of this love every moment. For a Muslim love and its expression is NOT restricted to 14th Feb! its a round the clock matter!

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Imagine all the school going children and teenagers watching all this campaign on the media and the decoration of shops and the sale of gift items. What sort of a focus shift this would cause! There is tremendous difference in the environment of the schools of today and the schools to which our generation went to. All this is due to misconceptions about Islam and lack of understanding about the values that our religion gives us.

This concept is very tempting, its easy to spread these celebrations, the youth can easily fall in this trap, but we need to spread awareness.

I think things can be made clear if we start calling the day "St. Valentine's day"! maybe then our attitude towards it might change and we might stop blindly following the west.

The only positive thing that I enjoy each year about this day is that the deserving flower shops earn a lot!

Quran in our Academic plan

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Quran is no doubt a part of our academic plan and is being taught at various levels and I must appreciate the works of the institute Al-Huda (Islamabad) in imparting deeper knowledge about Quran.

But the problem here is that at such institutes elders, who have got interest in learning Quran are more likely to come, and most of us, since childhood, are not taught to be inquisitive about Quran, to explore it deeper with our own understanding and, learn more and more from it. It is no doubt very important to memorize all or portions of Quran but understanding it again and again is very important.

To nurture such mindsets, academic institutes should at school level help students develop interest in Quran and its teachings.

Just like Paulo Coelho in his book "Aleph" writes that no two journeys on the same road are the same, similarly each time we will reflect on the meanings of various verses we would come across new things and would discover new horizons. One thing  more very important is that students should be taught to relate to verses, like when we recite the second verse of Surah Fateha:

ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ

Translation: The Beneficent, the Merciful.

Having read this students should be taught to relate to it and think of how they find Allah Almighty as beneficient and Merciful and experience sharing and discussions are always very productive for learning. It must very carefully decided that at which academic and mental level which surahs should the children be asked to think about.

One thing very interesting I came across a few days back when someone told me that Quran gives us the evidence that Jesus Christ (Hazrat Eesah A.S.) was not born in December but in fact he was born in October. I was surprised and asked: how? The answer was simple that Merry (Hazrat Maryam A.S.) was asked to shake the tree of the dates to let the dates fall down for her to eat (which means dates were ripe to fall off), and this happens in October in that region and not December! So no two journeys of reflection on the same Surah can be the same indeed!