Infinite Ink

Looking inwards

It's so easy to get distracted. Especially when you have your heart set on a certain goal. In your word and deed you may be achieving your goal, but in your heart and intention you may be failing spectacularly. 

I think often about some poetry I read a few months ago. The line that stayed with me was, "reading books leaves you no time to act, you are indeed a reader but lack action". Around that time I was reminded of the Islamic teaching that compares knowledgeable people of inaction to donkeys carrying books. It's a harsh image, and the purpose of it is clear: to send the message loud and clear that intellectual stimulation, the firing away of your neurons in response to high-level thought processes, and the illusion of being busy with useful ideas, is nothing if it doesn't lead to action. 

A saying of Mufti Shafi Usmani goes like this, "Knowledge is that which makes you restless until you act upon it."

Restless? Yes, we are. Acting on our knowledge? Ah, well...

The thing is, we are well and truly knocked out of the loop, off track, and it's easy to go wandering in zig-zags and think that it's a straight line. True, a straight course that leads to a destination is in reality a redirection at every step towards the goal.

Even writing this is of no use, really--oh, OK, I am rearranging my thoughts into a pretty pattern and smiling at my own handiwork. If it doesn't make me actually do something within the next five minutes (because, really, I am going to forget about this book Infinite Ink after five minutes and get caught up in something else), then it was a useless exercise.

That is, unless I really started off and maintained a true intention. That's something so beautiful that it brings me to tears. In the world, you can make all the effort you like throughout the year, but if you don't ace the final you don't get that A grade. However, with Allah, it's "A for effort", that is, top grade as long as you're striving towards your goal with a good and clean heart. If we think we've achieved some high status just by slapping on a hijab onto our bodies, or slamming our foreheads into the ground and calling it a prostration, we need a good re-think, followed by a reorientation.

Heartfelt action and action-oriented heart. It really is that simple.

What do you think when you look inwards?