The story of Hope and Fate

What we are always told in life, is to hope for the best and expect the worst.. or something to that effect. But we are never warned that, hopes, the unrealistic ones, can be extremely devastating. These hopes have the power to let you sink to the bottom, to eventually leave you hopeless. You start wondering where you are, how did you get there, what went wrong, what did you do wrong, what did you do to deserve this.

We are never told to know when to stop hoping, when to give up entirely. And this is something that can never be told because it is one of those things you learn after bitter experiences. You learn when it is time to stop hoping. This should be the time when you've done all you could to stop something bad from happening, in fact you have done more than you even imagined yourself doing. This is the time when you have given more than you could, more than you were capable of giving. This is the time when you realize that your efforts are going in vain. And if it's not just a personal experience, then your efforts might be given a wrong meaning, a reflection of a thought that never entered your mind. And this is the time when you should stop. All the time you were trying to bring improvement in the state of affairs, you were hoping that things would eventually turn out well, and that you'll forget all of this or at least mark it and put it in the 'Fun and Learning' cabinet of your memories storage. But as it doesn't turn out that way, this is the time when you give up just on the efforts, this is the time when you have to sit back and leave everything on Allah. Allah asks us to make efforts but also to trust Him and to believe that whatever He gives to us is the best for us, no matter if it doesn't seem that way at the time. So this is the time when you keep hoping, but this is also the time when you stop fighting. You leave everything on Allah, and you don't even so much as move a finger to improve the situation. You just let it be. At this point, again, things could go in both ways, they could either be in your favor, or they could either push you to the edge, to the line which separates you from 'living your life' and 'just going through it'.

If all goes well, then you are happy, then all the decision you made seem to be the right ones, all hopes that you had seem to be realistic.

But if this is not the case, then you are quite far away from the happy-folk's land, all the decisions you took seem to be the wrong ones, all hopes seem to be unrealistic. And this is exactly the time, when you should stop hoping that things would ever be the same again. You should always hope that somewhere along the way you'll be able to buy a home in that happy-folk's land, but you should stop hoping that things would go your way at the moment. If they haven't until now, then hoping that they ever would is equivalent to pushing yourself to the edge and then not even wanting to be rescued. If you have left everything on Allah, then accept whatever he sends your way, because whatever he sends would eventually turn out to be the best. The things that you didn't get in spite of working hard, praying hard and hoping hard, are the things which are not good for you, which are not meant for you to have. There are somethings which have to be accepted as fate. But at this point, you should know that at least in the future you'll be saved from the torture of thinking 'I could have done something', because you know that you did all you could have done, and you know that you gave even more of yourself than you should have and than you could have.

I might have not been able to make my point clear through this post. I might not have been able to do justice. But I guess this is something you have to go through to understand, to really understand. And unfortunately, we all go through it at some point in our life. :)

The book with two faces

Yes, yet another article on facebook. Yes, yet another article focusing on the atrocities and injustice of this social networking site but also shedding light on the exhibition of extreme imbecile attitude from our side. With too many emails popping up with Facebook in the subject line, yet another article on the same topic seems to be a drag, it's like playing the old, old song everyone has tuned themselves out to. In spite of knowing this, I want to and need to have a say in the matter.



Most of us claim that we cannot imagine life without facebook. You don't have to exercise your imagination cells for this diminutive task as we've all been there done that. There was obviously a time when there was no facebook and I think we all survived that dark age.

We claim that facebook lets us connect with our friends. Well, ever heard of MSN, GTalk. It's not exactly called 'connecting with friends' when you update your status every other second as if the world actually cares about what you do the whole day. It's simply called 'addiction'.



And to connect with who, the friends who lack the sheer decency of calling you up to invite you to their party, instead they prefer to send you an event notification. And the people who can't even remember your birthday and need to be alerted by a system. In order to keep up with such friends we refuse to abandon facebook!

And then, of course, there are our farms to worry about.
"Who would plow my fields if I don't log in after every 14 hours or so?"

And all the photos uploaded by 'friends' without looking at which I am bound to contract a deadly disease. At one hand we keep complaining about the threats to our privacy posed by any social networking site and on the other hand we ignore of all such breaches made by facebook which badly needs to go through quality assurance. I am not going to accentuate the loopholes in their privacy policy nor am I going to highlight the bugs in their system. What I am trying to put forward is a simple statement

"Have we actually become obsessed with a social networking site which has put an end to our social life?"

I though socializing meant meeting a lot of people. Actually meeting, talking face-to-face. But yes, in this busy life of ours we don't find enough time to socialize, yet we find the time to 'relax' in front of the pc and meet people simultaneously. Working in parallel, the need of time.


Why am I against facebook? Why do I advocate quitting facebook. If I don't like it I can quit, why force others to do the same?
I do so because of one simple reason;

"I can't stand being humiliated in front of the whole wide world."

I am not going to quote any Quranic verses or Hadiths because to be honest I don't find myself knowledgeable enough to do so. Yeah, shame on me to talk about something I don't have a clue of. But what I speak here is, to the best of my understanding, pure logic based on a simple enough postulate;

"You defend what you claim to belong to."

We cater to our egos at all the wrong times. Now when there is a need for our so-called ego to come in and play it's part we sing a lullaby of our social needs and put it to sleep. The time when our reputation is at stake we choose to hide behind the veils of internet, because who would know if a Muslim logs in or not. They keep insulting our religion and we keep pretending we didn't hear a thing. From all the books they could have burnt they chose to celebrate a day to burn OUR book. And all we have to say is

"they are not actually burning it they have just put an event."

If all it is is an event then why not "Burn all books day".

We keep fooling ourselves with excuses that sound lame even to ourselves. We try to evade the truth by weaving reasons, such as:

"We are not visiting that page"

Would you keep going to a building where there is only one room where you are treated like dirt, like you are made of stone and nothing hurts you?

"In fact we have joined the community against celebrating such events."

Really!? How's that coming along? Has it brought any betterment yet?

"This is exactly why Muslims have been labeled extremists. Quitting facebook altogether is the intense reaction they are hoping for so they can later make fun of us."

NO. Extremism would be to stop using internet. Who is stopping you from using other social networking sites. There are alternatives for all the facilities they provide.

Socializing	Chatting applications, Email groups (where private conversations are in fact private)
Photo sharing	Picasssa, Flickr etc.

It's not going to put even a dent in their business. They have millions of non-Muslim users.

Its not our intention to make them suffer. It is just our way of saying 'No'.

We keep coming up with ideas of how to participate in the event and defend our religion.

Either come up with an idea strong enough to compel them to quit insulting us or.. quit yourself.

Quitting facebook would be equivalent to shouting out to the world, without even raising our voices one pitch, that

"We are Muslims. And we respect our religion more than anything else."

This of all the places is not where you can apply the theory "Can't fight them, join them." It's a situation where you keep fighting till you win. No one's asking to wage a war against them. Just a request to make them understand that what they are doing is not called freedom, it's just simply wrong. And this post is a request to all Muslims to make them understand that there cannot possibly be any other motive behind these gestures,.. other than the obvious one.

Note:
This goes not just for facebook, though the post has been written in a way that focuses only on Facebook. This goes for all entities which are promoting or participating in such events.

The Crash

This post was written yesterday, 28th July, 2010 Wednesday, the night of the crash.

It's been a long time since I wrote something for my blog, and all the recent posts have come from some deep, dark corners of my mind, so I sure didn't want another sad post to be my first post after a long time. But I have to get this out of my system.

Today, at office, concentrating on coordinating with the QA department to resolve the issues occuring at client side, the news of a plane crash in Islamabad landed on my ears. We all have become a bit accustomed to hearing bad news, a bomb blast here a riot there, or maybe it's just me who has become utterly heartless, but whatever maybe the reason, I continued to work on the task at hand.It was after a while when I started hearing from my colleagues that their relatives or acquaintances happened to be in the plane. That is when it started mattering. That is when the environment at my office became what can be called gloomy. Coming from a team where laughter is the evidence of work being done, the quiet seemed to be a bit saddening.
Coming back home, it was the first time when I was actually waiting for 9 o' clock news. All along I beared with the sense of drama being created by the news channel (is there a need to mention the name?), what with focusing on the news caster and going from bottom to top.. really, were they trying to imitate the entrance scenes usually attributed with the lead roles of movies.But still, just focusing on the words and tuning out all the drama they were trying to put in for I don't know, increasing the viewership or something, I watched half of the report being shown. All of us watched the families crying, calling out to their loved ones, while we constantly ignored the question they kept broaching for the audience, "Who was responsible for it all?". Do we really need to ask that? It wasn't like a bomb was placed in the plane that we would need to ask where the security was? It's not like the President of some country was flying that we would ask who wanted the President dead. It was a plane crash!! For crying out loud.. A PLANE CRASH. I went along with all of that. But then the news channel brought in something that compelled me to storm out of the tv lounge, and I really mean storm out.
They interviewed this person, who actually seemed to be a pretty intelligent and experienced guy. And to keep it brief, what this guy was saying was that the crash was due to some HUMAN ERROR. And all of a sudden.. they found the guy responsible.. Yippeeee... Congratulations to the news channel, they found that out all by themselves.. And here's the person to be blamed for the deaths of 152 (is the figure correct?) people including himself.. and the person is.. the PILOT.
Now what I ask is...
We all have been taught never to speak ill of the dead. I think this is not just a teaching of Islam, but all religions. Then how come blaming the pilot is not considered speaking ill.
There have been countless times when the pilots have been RESPONSIBLE for getting the passengers safely to land.. how many time the news bulletin have thanked these pilots?
How many times did this particular pilot flew the plane safely? How many times was he thanked?
Do all planes who face difficulty in bad weathers crash? NO. Then are these pilots ever considered the heroes of the nation. Then how come this pilot is the villain of the story?
And how come we are forgetting that the pilot himself passed away too. I don't think he was out for a suicide mission. How many people do we know of who would gladly and deliberately crash the plane on a mountain?

Okay. Let's just say for a minute that this WAS the pilot's mistake. Let's just say HYPOTHETICALLY that the pilot himself crashed the plane deliberately. That this was in all his and only his mistake. Then haven't we been taught to forgive and forget. Well who would forgive when the lives of 151 innocent people were lost. But when you call something a mistake, then as far as I know, it's a MISTAKE, something that was not done on purpose, but something that just happned. Aren't we supposed to forgive in that case? And it's not like the pilot himself is alive? He died with them all. Who are we to judge? Who are we to decide? Why not let the matters of Allah be His matters only? Why interfere? Who gave us the right?

Just received an sms, informing that an ex-class fellows's sister in law, the mother of a 6 year old girl, is also a victim. Which reminds me of something else. While they were interviewing the affected families, none of the relatives, in their state of immense grief, once mentioned that the pilot is to be blamed. Had any of them said the same thing, I would not have been this angry, because going through something like this, takes a lot from you, and mostly it takes away the ability to decide, the ability to decipher between what's right and what's wrong.And in such a state sometimes somethings are said or done, that needs to be forgotten later on. In fact, that needs to be forgotten immediately. Then if these people didn't say anything like this how come the people who have expertise in planes and in flying, who had not been embraced by grief thought they can blame someone and actually came out and did just that.

And for the life of me I cannot understand how a pilot can say something like this about a fellow pilot. Have they all resigned? Do they think they'll never fly a plane again, and such a thing cannot happen with them? Did they forget all that?

...........

The essence of 'Life'..

A post to collect all the thoughts which have been going through my mind a lot lately. Things I have pondered over. Things I keep thinking about. Things that I keep discussing with people. And things that I have wanted to write a post on for a long time.

Happiness went away on a greyhound bound for Georgia:

(The above is a line from a song :P)
It seems like ever since we've 'grown-up' happiness doesn't seem to stick around. And dissatisfaction has become more permanent since we've started with our jobs and have started earning money. And this is not just my opinion. I have really asked around and this was the general opinion. And reasons have also come up. The main reason being that we've stopped enjoying the small things. We've let go of the small joys and have started focusing on the big things. We've forgotten that it's actually the small things that bring life into our lives. We've unconsciously started running after money.. and tada... we do have money now.. (well to some extent.. at the end of every month.. before we spend it all... :$) and I thank Allah for that.. not that I dislike the concept of salaries.. but we've engrossed ourselves so much into "adulthood" we've lost all essence of life..
Remember the times when we went out for lunch/dinner with family/friends ONCE in a bluemoon. That was the time we enjoyed eating out. Now eating out has become a norm and eating-in has become .. well.. how do you put it.. not very interesting...??!!!
Remember the times when we used to rent movies over the weekend. That was when it was actually we fun. We still enjoy watching tv and movies.. but it has become a routine and hence, not that much interesting any more..
Remember the time when we used to read.. actually read books. When we became so much involved in the 'story-book' that we found ourselves IN the book. That stopped happening for me a long time ago. Now we all have so many other things going on in our minds that it has become impossible to detach ourselves from our real lives and enjoy being a part of the book.. Now every time I am reading a book something steals me away from it, more often than not it's my cell phone, with another forwarded message or sometimes a 'hi-hello' one from a friend.
A few months ago we had a company-sponsored training. The focus of the training was "Communication and Presentation Skills", but the trainer also mentioned a few things related to the topic of this post. She said back when we were children we were not afraid to try out new things. We enjoyed doing something new everyday. She also said to spend time with children, play with them. And she is right. When you are playing with children you are really having fun. And it was also advised to spend less time watching tv. There are other ways of relaxing. One activity which we should all carry out to realize the quality of our life was this: In one minute write down all the things that you enjoy. It seems that one minute would be less and you would have more things to write when the time's up, but that doesn't happen. In my case there was still time and I had nothing more to right. :| (I don't exactly remember the time allowed, maybe it was less than one minute, but I do remember that I was short of things to write. It was like sitting in an exam, writing answers you didn't prepare for.)

Now we are living a routine life.
We've stopped spending time with our families. If I give my example, I spend 9 hours of everyday in office, and when I come back I switch on my computer and start looking for things that I can watch that day. The only hours I spend with my family are the hours where there is no electricity and hence no TV, computer,... but even then I have my cell phone. Why do I feel it important to share jokes with my friends or talk to them but I don't categorize spending time with my family as important?

Lack of Confrontation:

Another thing which is actually sort of related to happiness is that we've started taking ourselves too seriously. (I know it's a quote, but couldn't find the reference. It goes something like ' Don't take yourself seriously, nobody else does. But it's a quite true).
We think we are just too important. We let our egos take the best of us.

As children when we used to have fights with our friends, the next day it was all better. Don't say that then it was on petty issues.. like who'll bring a ball the next day.. we still fight on small issues.. it's just that our priorities have changed. A ball seemed important then. We've changed our perspective of "what's important" now. And our perspectives are still quite wrong.

We've put up a image of ourselves for others so that they would like us. But inside, we are not that good.
Because inside we keep grudges,
because inside we hate others,
because inside we are jealous of others,
because from inside we are not happy,
because from inside we actually dislike our own existence.

These days we don't confront people. And for good reasons. :) We don't wanna fight in front of the whole wide world. So we refrain from that.. which is good. But we still keep grudges, we start ignoring others, we meet everyone with a smile, but no one should know what's going on in those little heads of ours.. because what goes on up there is not something everyone would like to know. We think it's our right to analyze people, and so we focus on all the bad things. We think it's right to criticize others and call it healthy criticism. We think it's right to judge others. We think it's right to be jealous of others, because we don't consider it jealousy, we consider it improving ourselves, bringing betterment in ourselves. Well, is that really true?


I think I have written enough. Comments are welcome. :)

Would we still???

On my way to office, yesterday morning, I was, as I usually do, reciting Ayat-ul-Kursi, durood shareef..
When I noticed that I do this whenever I get scared of Mobile-Snatchers and the likes and I started to wonder that we, human beings,.. well most of us, remember Allah in our times of need. We do remember Him when we are happy but the enthusiasm is heightened in sorrow. And I questioned myself..
"If I had everything good in my life. And I knew that sorrow won't reach me.. Would I still remember Him? Would I still pray?"

And this is what I put up for everyone to think (comments are welcomed)

"What if we have everything good happening in our life? And we know for sure that nothing bad is ever going to come? And we won't do bad to anyone around us, so that we don't have to beg for Allah's forgiveness either. And we had nothing bad happen to us in the past as well. Would we still talk to Him? Would we still cry out to Him? Would we still pray?"

Shadows of the past.....

It amazes me sometimes, how we keep living in the past. How something bad that happened to us a long time ago still has the power to affect us. I am not talking about things that have put a permanent dent on our lives, but things that we have overcome, simple facts that we have learnt to live with, the facts that are no more facts.
A simple example would be not getting something you really worked hard for, and even after you have realized that that something really wasn't for you, and what you've got as a substitute proved to be perfect for you. That not getting that something, not getting your desire, not getting what you wished dearly for, may have been depressing at the moment, but all got better after that. And maybe you got what you wanted to, but a little late. And you know all this, you know that whatever happened, happened for a reason, and a good one. You know that what happened was the best thing that could've happened to you, but whenever you are pushed down the memory lane, and you have to travel through the same depressing time again, why aren't we strong enough to make the journey down that road again with a smile, knowing that it had all passed now, and what you have at the present is good enough for you. Why?

And why, when you keep on telling people, who are going through something like that in the present, that everything will be fine. You keep reminding them that life won't give you anything you can't handle, and you really believe it too.

But even then, why do we still let that past control our today??
Or... is it just me????

Penny for my thoughts......

Prologue
A lot has been happening for the past month or so (why do my posts have to start with this?), and I have had time to think a lot about all that's been happening, this isn't because I have nothing better to do, it's because I can't stop thinking about it all. And my friends have to go through the torture of listening to me and then calming me.. So I decided to save them from the trouble and pour all this on my blog (but I would still make them read it, so there's no salvation for them :P)... so this is sort of a page from my personal diary (which by the way I don't have :P). So here goes....

Penny for my thoughts

...maybe if I could just be able to steal myself away from all this, maybe if I could just learn to forget, maybe then I'll stop feeling like this, maybe then I'll feel a little better... maybe if I could just stop dwelling on the past... maybe...
...maybe if we could just stop the blame game, maybe.... maybe this wouldn't happen.....

The wars inside...

A while ago I received a forwarded sms from a friend and I thought I would write a post on it, but wasn't able to because I didn't get time, and when I did get time, I wasn't in my "writing mood".
I have deleted the sms now, but this is what I can remember:

An old man told his son;

"Every day two wolves fight inside us. One wolf is good, joy, happiness.. the other wolf is evil, anger, ego.."

The son asks;

"Which wolf wins?"

And the old man replies;

"The one we feed..."

And if you think about it, this is very true. At the end of the day, what matters is the decisions we made, in fact, the entire day depends upon the decisions we make. We can decide to get angry and not only ruin our mood but also other's, or we could just let it be.


The human aspect
And I wonder sometimes about us human beings.. how we are made.. sometimes in fact, most of the times, we forget all the good a person has done for us, and remember the one bad thing he does, the one mistake he committed.

And sometimes it's because we have had enough, maybe we were forgiving and forgetting things for so long that we can't continue with it anymore. At that time we think that putting an end to it all is a much better option. And sometimes we are right in thinking that.


Forgiving and Forgetting
I read this (also in an sms), and I am not sure whether it's correct or not...

"Learn to forgive people for their mistakes, like you want Allah to forgive you for yours"


But it's so hard to forgive someone, right???
And why should we be the one forgiving others? Why don't they try? Why be the first one to end a petty fight?
And sometimes we even forget what it was all about, how it began, but we still continue living between walls...
And we are so wrong in doing all this. We expect Allah to forgive us for even bigger crimes, and we expect others to forgive us every time we hurt them, but we are not willing to do the same for other people.


And those we love
And then there are times when we vent out our feelings, more specifically our anger, on the people we love. These are our parents, our siblings, our friends, or maybe just someone who's willing to listen. These are the people who had nothing to do with making us angry or depressed. These are the people who have always been there for us, and this is exactly why we take them for granted...


Everything happens for a reason
Now isn't that true? Everything happens for a reason. Isn't that what everyone says, particularly those who at the moment are enjoying the best of everything, their lives couldn't have been any better, and they are the ones to give you advice. What do they know??
But let me tell you, they are right. 100%. Everything does happen for a reason. It's what you do with it that makes all the difference....


And you get what you deserve
And I have finally realized that this is very very true. A while ago, I found myself in a situation where whatever decision I made would leave one of my friends hurt. And one decision would hurt me more than the other. And guess what I did.. I made the decision that would hurt me less, and guess what.. I was wrong, the decision I made did hurt me as well as the other person.

But the thing is, about an year ago, I put one my very nice friends in such a situation. It was for the same event, and the situation couldn't have been more identical. And she, being an intelligent and mature person that she is, made the right decision. And still I was furious with her, and I didn't talk to her at all for (I don't know) a few days, when somewhere in my heart I did know that it wasn't her fault at all, it wasn't her doing, but someone else's, but I still had to show my anger, and I chose this way (silence) to let the anger out of my system. I ignored her, even when she herself came and talked to me, I just passed by, ignoring her. It must have hurt her a lot, I realize now, but at that time I had my own anger to cater to.

And now I understand how wrong I was, when fate put me in the same situation, and when I made the worst decision that I could. I realize now how wrong I was....
But never the less, I don't want time to go back or something, what's done is done..

but...


...maybe if I could just be able to steal myself away from all this, maybe if I could just learn to forget, maybe then I'll stop feeling like this, maybe then I'll feel a little better... maybe if I could just stop dwelling on the past... maybe...
...maybe if we could just stop the blame game, maybe.... maybe this wouldn't happen.....

Bad times...

You learn a lot of things from people around you.... if you just care to notice. Like I learnt from a friend of mine that a person should always keep alive the spirit to enjoy everything no matter what.
This life is too short, the time gone would never come again so why waste it.
Everyone has their own set of moods, you don't have to ruin yours because of others. I am not saying be selfish, no not at all. You have to be there for others too, support them in their troubles, walk them through their worrisome phase and get them walking back on the path of happiness. But not enjoying, not making the most of the time you have, just because others don't feel like it is a little short of stupidness.
Sometimes we get so preoccupied with our lives, our troubles, our worries, our problems that we forget to live. We forget that everyone else goes through the same thing every day, even if they don't show it, they might be going through even worst than we can imagine.
Again, I am not saying that we should forget our problems, don't do anything about them and continue living like nothing has happened. Just saying that a bad day isn't the end of it all. :)

Friend - a relative term

The statement popped into my head while I was pressing my clothes.. Pressing is such a boring job that all kinds of inane stuff moves through my head while I am trying to get done with it..

But come to think of it, in my case, this statement does turn out to be true, very true.
Friend IS a relative term.
I am not trying to be philosophical or something, in fact, I hate philosophy. But this is so true, if you just think about it.

I don't know why I started to write this post, but I thought I have to, I just have to, even if I don't write anything worth reading. :P

So, back to the point.. I say friend is a relative term. You ask why... because I think everyone has their own definition of Friend, of what friends are supposed to be.
Friendship might mean different thing to different people.
Some people may give this relationship more importance than it calls for. And some might not understand why it's worth anything.

The importance may be learnt after a broken friendship, or the importance might be lost after realizing how much friends can hurt. The importance may break on you when you have a blast with your friends, or when you miss them.

But the thing is it might not be what you think it is. And others are sure to have a different opinion then you.

For example, when we were kids we all had a different perspective. A friend was a person who had the most expensive toys, and was also willing to share them with you. At that time friends changed and it wasn't that hurting.

I remember every other person used to be my friend. My favorite dialogue was "Dost nahi ho yaar."
Till college I used to threaten my friends with
"Mein tumhein apnay dost kee post se kharij kar doon geen" :P

And as I grew up the definition changed in a drastic manner. Now I think a million times before giving the title of friend to anyone.

And that works, because eventually, when they do what I expect them to do, it doesn't hurt that much, and it doesn't matter that much, and in the end you think that all that happened was for a good reason.

Another example, for some people breaking up a friendship is not that difficult, because for them friends aren't that important and thus they don't care. For them the definition is quite different.

Hence proved,
'Friend' is a relative term.

Those moments...

Ever had that moment in life when disappointment reaches the peak point.. or shall I say reaches the pit.. when you think you can't be more disappointed with yourself.
Ever had that moment in life when you are depressed...
Ever had that moment in life when you don't understand how you ended up being like this, how you ended up where you ended up, when you stop for a moment and consider whether what you've got is what you wanted from your life.
The moment when relationships betray.
The moment when you think no one would understand you.
The moment when you realize that the way you've been your entire life isn't the way to live life. When you realize that it's high time you change yourself. When you decide everyday that this would be the day when you'll change yourself, and be like what you want to be and not like what you are by nature and then by the end of every day you realize that you can't change yourself.
The phase when you are exhausted, thoroughly exhausted and you don't understand why you are tired.
The time when you are not tired because you got no rest all day long, but when you are tired of yourself.
The moment when you think about where you'll be one year from now, and you don't know..
The moment when someone asks you what are your plans.. and you don't have any answer for that. This is the moment when you start dreading such questions.

And the moment when you start wondering 'at what point did all the things start going wrong....'

When you miss your friends…..

You miss your friends at the most oddest of times.

You miss them not only when you are depressed, don’t know your way through an assignment, or you are too low for you don’t know how to deal with the things life is throwing at you. It’s not only in these moments that you miss your friends but at other occasions too, when you never imagined you would miss them, at least I never thought I would.

Some of these moments are:

• At lunch time, when you sit and eat your lunch all alone. Even when the lunch comprises of your favorite…. things just don’t seem that good when you don’t get to share it with your friends, when you don’t get to talk to them and laugh at the most silliest of jokes, and take longer to eat a sandwich that would normally take only 10 minutes, saying “yaar khana hamesha aram se khana chaye”

• When you are sifting through a magazine and you find something pretty interesting, you look around to find someone you can share it with and find no one who would be able to understand why you find it amazing.

• When it’s raining heavily outside and you don’t have anyone to walk with and enjoy the blessing.

• When you have to walk to the bus stand alone, with no one there who would listen to you complaining about buses, and your constant rambling on a topic no one has an answer to namely “Why does Karachi have such a situation of public transport?”, when you have no one who would reply to your comments with their own mustard with equal detest.

• When you watch an amazingly nice movie or a surprisingly stupid one, and you don’t have anyone around who would discuss it with you.

• When you log on to “cricinfo.com” to read up on the current match between Pakistan and India and you have no one else around who shares the same excitement and no one who doesn’t share the excitement at all and continues saying “come on yaar, we have work to do!”. (Yeah you even miss them scolding you.)

• When you buy a brand new mobile and don’t have anyone you could show off to.

• When you finally achieve something and you don’t have anyone to shake hands, deliver a hearty congratulations and then hug and hug tightly.

• When you don’t have anyone to play “Name Place Animal Thing” with to kill your time or maybe to waste it.

• When you don’t have anyone you could waste your time with right before a Final exam when you should actually be studying but realize that there are better and much more important things in life than studying like the reasons you didn’t study last night.

• When a quiz is announced in a class, you look back and don’t find a friendly face or to be more correct the face of a friend whose expressions would prove that you’ll not be the only one failing this quiz.

It’s 5:40 in the morning, and my head was roaring with the above, and so I decided I should post them on my blog. My net’s not working so I am writing these on Microsoft Office Word. Will post it as soon as possible.

(The above was written yesterday, 30th July, 2008)

Sometimes....

Sometimes you have to leave a thing that you hold important for a thing that is important,

Sometimes you have to make the right decision even if it doesn't give you an pleasure,

Sometimes you have to give up the thing you love for the thing you need...

We: the ungrateful lot (Collection of Random Thoughts)

We, human beings, are amazing creatures. We are highly unpredictable. There is nothing in this world that can satisfy us. We are almost always unhappy with what we have and we are always looking for things that we don't have. Well, here by we I mean mostly ME, but I think there are a lot of people out there who are like me in this respect. Not all human beings but most of us are like this.
We should always try to bring betterment in our lives but is it necessary to have it on the expense of our happiness? We worry ourselves sick for the things that don't matter. Work hard, yes but be happy at the same time. Why not be satisfied with what you have and still work for greater things.

I have always noticed that we (again mostly me) thank other human beings a lot. Whenever someone does anything for us we thank them. That is fine, we should thank them. But why not thank Allah as well. After all, Allah is the one who really helps.

When we succeed we give the credit to ourselves, but when we loose it was all our luck. I believe in luck, I believe in what has been written. But I also believe that for some things Allah has given us the power to change. He has given us the power to make the choices and face the circumstances, enjoy the good that those choices will bring and also bear the bad that those choices might bring. But isn't success is something that Allah decided to give us for our hard work, then why not thank him too. Why does it become so hard for us to offer those 2 rakats of shukrana. But when it is defeat that we face, we never fail to blame others and then eventually qismat. Why???

What do you do????

What do you do if you become an after thought to the people you care about?
What do you do if they stop caring about you?
What do you do if you don't have them to share your feelings with you?
What do you do if they become irritated with what you say?
What do you do if they don't claim to be your friends anymore?
What do you do if it had always been a mistake?
What do you do if it was never more than a mere acquaintance?


What do you do if you were never more than an after thought, a part of lost memory?