Misguided and Misguiding

The Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) said, "Truly, Allah does not remove Sacred Knowledge by taking it out of servants, but rather by taking back the souls of Islamic scholars [in death], until, when He has not left a single scholar, the people take the ignorant as leaders, who are asked for and who give Islamic legal opinion without knowledge, misguided and misguiding" (Fath al-Bari, 1.194, hadith 100).

The Love that is...

What is “Love”?

The Oxford dictionary states that Love is:

1)       a strong feeling of affection

2)      a great interest and pleasure in something

There was a load of other definitions from various dictionaries, the point being, the definition of Love is not the same everywhere.

Someone said to me the other day that we live in a society, such that we are brought up on a false belief of what Love should be. It is our exposure to Hollywood/movies/adverts/Disney/society which defines our perception of “Love”. It defines it in such a way, that it becomes unrealistic, and it is in fact unreachable, in my opinion.

Perhaps we grow up watching Disney movies, which builds us into the thinking that one day we also, will meet our Prince Charming or Princess Jasmin. It plants a seed that grows into an infatuation of searching and expectation that can’t possibly be fulfilled and thus leads to disappointment, depression, ungratefulness and lack of hope. I mean how are we meant to feel what Prince Charming felt for his Princess? They’re not real, its fantasy and that’s where fantasy will stay.

When people get married, perhaps one does not feel the “Hollywood love” for the spouse, especially in an Islamic marriage, where technically you don’t really know the other person at first. Or perhaps after a few years of Marriage, the spark kinda dies, either way it makes them paranoid, they start thinking that something just aint right in this marriage. Why? Because you ain’t feeling the Luuuurve that Dr Dre raps about?  This kind of paranoia leads to a dissatisfaction in marriage and instead of building on the positive aspects of ones relationship, one is led to an on-going search which can last a life time if you let it. I direct this at boys in particular, not because I hate them…but because in general it is in the nature of a woman to be satisfied with any small bit of good in a relationship, (I remember my mum saying once,  that a woman only cries when she feels she has lost completely everything – meaning if there was just an ounce of something, she will hold on to it).   And so in the end these boys become old lonely men who now just want to marry to save themselves from loneliness and that “Hollywood spark” no longer matters. So in the process of reaching this lifetime learning curve, they have just simply messed up too many girls lives, to possess the same as what they started with, the only difference is that THEY have become a little wiser. They learnt to find the spark in every individual, rather than chasing the spark that doesn’t exist.

Problems occur when people try to conform to other people’s ideas of what love is, or what a meaningful relationship should be and not for what is suited for their own relationship. In my opinion every couple has an individual definition of “Love” which is unique to their own personal relationship with their partner. And that in itself is what I think is beautiful.

Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.
-Maulana Jelaluddin Rumi