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On Falling and Beginning Again

On Falling and Beginning Again

 

 

 

یہ مضمون اردو میں پڑھیں

“I keep failing at it,” I told him quietly, and there was real frustration in my voice. Not because I did not know what to do. I already knew. The doctor had explained it clearly; the routine was clear; the exercises were clear, and yet some days I still couldn’t stay consistent. Some days I felt tired. Some days I felt emotionally defeated. Some days the mind simply said: leave it; you can’t keep doing this forever. What’s the point? And after missing the routine a few times, another feeling would appear. First helplessness, then sadness, then guilt, and eventually a dangerous thought: maybe I just cannot do this.

He listened carefully and then said something that completely changed how I viewed the struggle. “As soon as awareness returns,” he said, “return to the process.” That was it. No dramatic speech, no demand for perfection. Just return.

At first, the simplicity of it almost disappointed me, because I wanted a permanent solution, a technique that would make consistency effortless, a mindset that would eliminate resistance forever. But he was describing something much more realistic. Not perfection. Practice.

He explained that the mind drifting away is not the real problem. The real problem is what happens after drifting away. Many people miss a routine once and emotionally conclude that they have failed, and then the guilt itself becomes heavier than the original task ever was. I have seen this happen repeatedly in my own life. Miss one day of exercise, and suddenly the mind says the whole routine is broken now. Miss a few days of journaling, and suddenly you stop completely. Delay one difficult conversation, and emotional distance grows for months. It is rarely the first fall that destroys consistency. It is the hopelessness that follows the fall.

He emphasized something extremely important. “Thoughts are thoughts,” he said. “The process is what you control.” That distinction changed everything for me, because many of us spend our lives trying to control what appears in the mind: fear, resistance, laziness, hopelessness, negative thoughts of every kind. But thoughts often emerge automatically, whether we invite them or not. The real question is what we do once we notice them.

He explained that whenever the mind becomes absorbed in worry or helplessness, we must gently bring it back to the process, not to emotional drama, not to catastrophic thinking, but simply back to the question of what is the next thing I need to do right now. That is all. I realized how often I had been trying to solve life’s problems emotionally rather than practically. I wanted to feel motivated before acting. But he was teaching something different: act first, return first, practice first, and let the feelings follow later, in their own time.

He encouraged involving supportive people around us. “Tell them to remind you,” he said, and he did not mean politely or delicately. He meant honestly. “If I start speaking helplessly, tell me directly that I still have to continue.” That idea struck me deeply, because growth is difficult in isolation. The mind can get trapped in its own emotional narrative, but sometimes another person can interrupt that narrative and remind us of who we were trying to become.

I remembered an elderly relative recovering after surgery. The physiotherapy exercises were painful, and every movement felt exhausting. Some days she would say, “I can’t do this anymore.” But her daughter would gently reply, “You have to.” Not harshly. Lovingly, but firmly. And day after day, that encouragement mattered, because often people don’t need someone to remove the struggle. They need someone to help them return to the process.

He then described something I found profoundly important: internalization. At first, knowledge exists only intellectually. You understand something, you agree with it, you even admire it, but it is still external. Real transformation begins when repeated practice slowly turns knowledge into character. That process is slow, painfully slow sometimes. You remind yourself repeatedly. You fail repeatedly. You return repeatedly. Until one day, something that once required enormous effort begins feeling more natural, not because you magically transformed overnight, but because repetition reshaped you.

I thought about learning to pray consistently as a young boy. At first, it required constant reminders. Then slowly, through repetition, it became part of my identity, until missing it started feeling unusual rather than performing it feeling difficult. That is internalization.

He explained that many people misunderstand self-improvement. They think change happens through one powerful resolution, one emotional breakthrough, one perfect moment of motivation. But real growth usually happens differently: quietly, repeatedly, through returning. He described how people often make strong resolutions and then fall again, and because they fall, they conclude the effort was meaningless. But he challenged that entirely. “Fall,” he said, “then stand again.” Because perhaps growth is not measured by never collapsing. Perhaps it is measured by how many times a person returns.

Then he said something deeply balanced. “Be strict about correcting the mistake,” he said, “but compassionate about the fact that mistakes happen.” That distinction is incredibly important, because many people confuse self-compassion with permissiveness, or they confuse discipline with self-hatred. But he was describing a healthier balance: don’t justify the mistake, correct it, and don’t become cruel to yourself simply because you are human.

I once met someone recovering from a long emotional burnout. Every time they missed their routine, they attacked themselves internally. You are hopeless, they would think. You never stay consistent. You ruin everything. And strangely, that harshness made consistency even harder, because shame drains energy rather than restoring it. Eventually, they changed their approach. When they slipped, they stopped dramatizing the fall. Instead, they simply returned, quietly, without emotional collapse. And over time, that gentler persistence proved far more sustainable than the harsh version ever had.

That is perhaps one of the hardest lessons in growth. Improvement is rarely linear. There are advances, setbacks, resistance, fatigue. And yet, transformation still happens if you keep returning.

I loved something else he said. “Think of it as something you will keep doing for life.” That single reframing completely changes the emotional relationship with growth, because many people unconsciously expect instant results. After three days of effort, they want certainty. After one week of consistency, they expect permanent change. But human development does not work like that. The body changes slowly. The mind changes slowly. Habits change slowly. Character changes slowly. And strangely, accepting that slowness often makes persistence easier, because now every imperfect effort still counts. Every return still matters.

I began noticing this in my own life afterward. The people who truly grow are not always the most naturally disciplined people. Often, they are simply the people who keep returning, after failure, after fatigue, after distraction, after discouragement. They return, again and again, without needing the return itself to be dramatic.

In the end, what he offered was not merely advice about habits or health. It was a completely different philosophy of growth. You are not destroyed by falling. You are destroyed when you stop returning. And perhaps real strength is not found in flawless consistency. Perhaps it is found in the humility to begin again, as many times as necessary.

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Why Comfort Is Not Enough

Why Comfort Is Not Enough

 

 

 

یہ مضمون اردو میں پڑھیں

I once asked him a question that had quietly bothered me for years: “Why do people who seem to have everything still feel empty?”

He looked at me for a moment and said, “What do you mean by everything?”

“Comfort, I suppose. Money. Status. Security. Entertainment. The freedom to do almost whatever they want.”

“And none of those seem sufficient?”

“Not always.”

I thought of several people I had known over the years. Some had achieved much of what others spend their lives pursuing. Their careers were successful. Their finances were stable. Their lives appeared comfortable from the outside. Yet whenever I spent enough time with them, I sensed a restlessness that those achievements hadn’t resolved. At the same time, I had known people whose circumstances were objectively more difficult. They carried burdens others did not. Yet they often had an aliveness that seemed strangely absent in people with easier lives.

He nodded and said, “So perhaps comfort and meaning are not the same thing.”

I expected a more satisfying answer. I asked, “Isn’t comfort part of a good life?”

“Of course it is. Rest matters. Pleasure matters. Security matters. There is nothing admirable about making life unnecessarily difficult.”

He paused for some time, and then added, “But suppose every discomfort disappeared. Would that automatically answer the question, What is my life for?”

I thought about it. “No,” I finally said.

He smiled faintly and said, “Then perhaps comfort solves one kind of human problem without solving another.”

That distinction stayed with me.

For much of my life, I assumed dissatisfaction meant something was missing from a person’s circumstances. More success. More recognition. More freedom. More enjoyable experiences. If enough problems could be removed and enough pleasures added, fulfillment would surely follow. Yet experience kept complicating that theory. A person could possess comfort and still wonder why any of it mattered.

After a few moments, he asked, “Have you ever been busy and yet strangely empty?”

I laughed and said, “More than once.”

“What was missing?”

The question immediately brought a particular period of my life to mind. My days were full. Meetings, responsibilities, deadlines, projects. From the outside, it looked productive. In fact, if someone had asked me whether I was accomplishing things, I would have said yes. Yet there was a question quietly following me through all of it. Why does any of this matter? I wasn’t asking it consciously every day. But I could feel its presence. Eventually I said, “I think I lost sight of why I was doing any of it.”

He nodded. “That is different from being tired.”

I thought about it for a moment and then said, “I was tired too. But this felt deeper.”

“Perhaps you were not only short of energy,” he said. “Perhaps you were short of meaning.”

That was the first time the word came up in our conversation.

After a pause, he asked, “Have you read Viktor Frankl?”

“Only a little.”

He nodded. “Frankl developed what became known as logotherapy around a deceptively simple idea: human beings do not merely seek pleasure, power, or the reduction of discomfort. We also need to experience life as meaningful.”

I had heard that idea before. Yet hearing it beside the discussion of comfort made it feel more concrete.

“So meaning was the main thing he thought people were looking for?” I asked.

“He described the search for meaning as a central human motivation.”

Then he added a qualification I appreciated. “That doesn’t mean meaning explains everything. Human beings are more complicated than that.”

I nodded.

He continued: “Depression, anxiety, trauma, grief, and many other forms of suffering can arise from numerous causes. Meaning is not a replacement for treatment. It is not a cure-all.”

“Then why is it so important?”

“Because even when you understand symptoms, habits, and emotions, something important may remain unexplored if you never ask what a person’s life is oriented toward.”

He paused. “What are they living for?”

That question felt larger than I expected. We often ask people what they want. What career do you want? What kind of house? What income? What lifestyle? What experiences? But what are you living for? belonged to an entirely different category.

It forced me to think not merely about what I hoped to obtain, but about what made obtaining anything worthwhile in the first place.

Seeing my expression, he offered an example: “Imagine two people doing equally demanding work.”

I nodded.

“Same hours. Same effort. Same salary.” He said. “One experiences the work as something to endure until payday. The other believes the work contributes to something deeply important. Wouldn’t both still become tired?”

“Of course.”

“So what changes?”

He smiled. “Not necessarily the exhaustion. The meaning of the exhaustion.”

I understood immediately. Meaning did not remove the cost. It changed the relationship to the cost. I thought about parents caring for a sick child. The sleepless nights are real. The exhaustion is real. Love doesn’t magically eliminate any of that. Yet most parents wouldn’t experience those sacrifices the same way they would meaningless deprivation.

“They know what the tiredness is for,” I said.

“Exactly,” he said. “A burden can remain heavy and still become worth carrying.”

He later spoke about Frankl’s experiences during the Holocaust and the ideas that eventually emerged in Man’s Search for Meaning. But he was careful. “People sometimes turn Frankl into a slogan.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“They hear his story and conclude that meaning allows people to overcome anything.”

I nodded.

“But that isn’t a careful conclusion. Extreme suffering can overwhelm people. Trauma is real. Human resilience varies.”

“So what’s the more accurate lesson?”

He thought for a moment and then said, “Meaning can give a person something to orient toward even when suffering cannot immediately be removed.” Something to live for. I found that formulation both humbler and more profound. It didn’t romanticize suffering. It simply refused to assume suffering had the final word.

I asked another question, “Did Frankl think meaning had to come from some grand achievement?”

“No,” He said, smiling. “And that may be one of the most liberating parts of his thought.”

I leaned forward slightly. “How so?”

“Because meaning can be found in many places.” He began counting examples. “It may emerge through work that contributes something worthwhile. Through creativity. Through service.”

I nodded.

He continued, “Meaning can also emerge through experience. Love. Friendship. Beauty. Nature. Genuine encounters with other people.” Then he paused for a while and added, “And sometimes, when suffering truly cannot be removed, meaning may emerge through the way a person chooses to meet that suffering.”

I frowned slightly. “That sounds dangerous.”

“In what way?”

“It could sound as though suffering itself is good.”

He nodded immediately. “That’s why we have to be careful.”

I appreciated the answer. There was no romanticizing pain. “If suffering can be prevented, treated, corrected, reduced, or resisted,” he continued, “then responsibility may require exactly that. There is no virtue in preserving avoidable suffering simply because it might be meaningful.”

That felt balanced. “Then attitude becomes important when the situation genuinely cannot be changed.”

“Precisely.”

I thought about losses people carry. A loved one who cannot be returned. A diagnosis that cannot be erased. A limitation that must be lived with. An irreversible chapter of life. “What then?” I asked.

He looked at me quietly. “Then the question becomes: How will I meet what I cannot remove?”

I found myself thinking about several people I knew. One had lost much of the independence they once enjoyed because of illness. Another had suffered a loss that permanently altered the shape of their life. Neither person seemed happy about what had happened. Nor should they have been. Yet both possessed a dignity that did not depend on pretending the suffering was good. Perhaps meaning, in those moments, was not found in the circumstance itself. Perhaps it was found in the way they carried it. “Meaning is larger than usefulness,” I said.

“Much larger.”

That distinction felt especially important. We live in a culture that often measures worth through productivity. What have you built? What have you produced? How much have you accomplished? Those questions matter. But if they become the only questions, what happens when productivity becomes impossible? What happens during illness? Disability? Old age? Dependence? Would meaningfulness disappear simply because output decreased? Frankl’s vision suggested otherwise. A person can create something meaningful. A person can love meaningfully. A person can receive beauty meaningfully. A person can endure suffering meaningfully. The possibilities were larger than productivity alone. I found that reassuring. It meant meaning was not postponed until some future day when I finally accomplished something impressive. It might be present in an ordinary afternoon. A sincere conversation. A responsibility handled well. A moment of honesty. A difficult choice made faithfully. A beautiful sunset actually noticed rather than rushed past.

He seemed to sense the direction of my thoughts. “Why do you think people postpone meaning?” He asked.

I smiled. “Because we associate it with something big.”

“Go on.”

“One day I’ll discover my purpose. One day my work will matter. One day I’ll do something important.”

He nodded. “And what happens to today?”

I laughed. “It becomes something to get through.”

That answer felt a little too familiar. For years I had treated the present as preparation for some future significance. Perhaps meaning was always waiting somewhere beyond the next milestone. Frankl’s perspective challenged that assumption. Instead of asking only, What do I want from life?, it invited another question: What is life asking of me right now?

When I asked how that worked in practice, he offered examples: “If someone needs to be heard, meaning may lie in listening well.”

I nodded.

“If a piece of work requires integrity, meaning may lie in doing it honestly.”

“Yes.”

“If you’re witnessing something beautiful, meaning may lie in being present enough to receive it.”

I smiled and asked, “And if I’m facing something I cannot change?”

“Meaning may lie in the kind of person you choose to remain while carrying it.”

The idea had become surprisingly concrete. Meaning was no longer a distant mission statement. It was this person. This responsibility. This situation. This response.

Eventually I asked him something else: “If meaning matters so much, why do we choose comfort instead?”

He smiled and said, “Because comfort usually asks less of us.”

The answer was immediately understandable. Distraction is often easier than reflection. Entertainment is often easier than contribution. Scrolling is often easier than learning. Avoiding a difficult conversation is often easier than having one. Comfort is immediate. Meaning usually asks for participation.

“But comfort isn’t the enemy,” he added.

“No?”

“Of course not. A meaningful life can include rest, pleasure, laughter, friendship, leisure, and joy,” he said. “The problem arises when ease becomes the standard by which everything is judged.”

That felt true. Many meaningful parts of life are not easy. Parenting can be exhausting. Learning can be frustrating. Keeping promises can be inconvenient. Creating something worthwhile can require years of effort. Yet afterward these experiences often leave behind a kind of fullness that passive comfort rarely provides.

“Not easier,” I said. “But fuller.”

He nodded.

I remembered a man I once knew who changed careers. The new work paid less, involved more uncertainty, and demanded more effort. When I asked why he seemed happier, he replied with a sentence I never forgot: “For the first time, I feel useful.”

I shared that story.

He smiled and said, “That may have been one source of meaning for him.”

“Not the only one?”

“No. People are not machines whose worth depends on output.”

Again, the idea widened. A human life could matter without becoming impressive. A person could matter during seasons of giving and seasons of receiving. Presence mattered. Love mattered. Gratitude mattered. Dignity mattered. The way joy was received mattered. The way suffering was carried mattered.

As I reflected on my own life, I noticed something. Some days filled with entertainment left almost no lasting impression. They were enjoyable enough, but strangely thin. Other days contained very little excitement, yet remained memorable because of a meaningful conversation, a period of concentrated learning, an act of service, a moment of beauty, or a responsibility taken seriously. Those days were not always happier. But they felt more inhabited. I had participated in them rather than merely consumed them.

As our conversation drew to a close, I returned to my original question. “So why do people who seem to have everything still feel empty?”

He thought for a while before answering. “Sometimes because what they have answers questions the human heart was never ultimately asking.”

I waited.

“Money answers, ‘What can I afford?’ Comfort answers, ‘How can I reduce inconvenience?’ Status answers, ‘How am I regarded?’ Pleasure answers, ‘What feels good right now?'” Then he added quietly: “But none of them necessarily answers, ‘What is worth giving myself to?'”

That seemed to bring the entire conversation together. The problem was never pleasure. Or comfort. Or success. Or wealth. The problem was expecting them to carry a weight they were never designed to carry.

Later, I reflected on our conversation. When restlessness appears, perhaps the first question should not always be: How can I feel better? Sometimes another question deserves to stand beside it: What am I living for right now? What matters in this moment? What is being asked of me here? Is there something worth loving, serving, creating, receiving, or enduring that I have stopped noticing?

Meaning does not eliminate pain. It does not guarantee happiness. It does not replace treatment when treatment is needed. But it can provide direction where comfort alone cannot. Perhaps human beings need more than a pleasant life. We need a life that points somewhere. Something worth loving. Something worth serving. Something worth creating. Something worth receiving with gratitude. And when suffering truly cannot be removed, some way of meeting it that allows us to remain human rather than be defined entirely by what has happened.

Comfort can make life easier. Meaning helps us understand what makes the living worthwhile.

 

/by

Not Punishment—A Call to Return

Not Punishment — A Call to Return

 

 

 

 

یہ مضمون اردو میں پڑھیں

I asked the question with a heaviness I could not conceal: “Why is this happening to me?” I said. “What have I done to deserve it?”

He allowed the question to remain between us for a few moments, as though the assumption behind it needed to be examined before the event itself could be understood.

Then he asked quietly, “What makes you think that, in this life, people receive only what they deserve?”

I looked at him, surprised.

“Isn’t that how it works?”

“Not entirely,” he replied. “Some consequences in this life do arise from our own choices. But this world is not the place where every person receives the full reward or punishment they deserve. If it were, every good deed would receive its complete reward here, every wrongdoing would meet its full consequence here, and every moral account would be settled before death. But that is clearly not how this life has been arranged. The righteous may suffer, wrongdoers may prosper for a time, and children may experience hardships they did nothing to bring upon themselves. Final recompense belongs elsewhere.”

I sat quietly with that. Until then, I had not really questioned the assumption beneath my words. Something painful had happened, so I had instinctively looked backward, searching for the offense that might explain it.

He continued, “Before you conclude that a hardship is a punishment, ask whether you actually know why it has come. It may be a trial. It may be the natural consequence of a choice. It may interrupt a direction that would otherwise have harmed you. It may expose something you have been refusing to see.”

He paused before adding, “Or its full meaning may simply be something God has not made known to us.”

That possibility unsettled me. I had been so eager to explain the event that I had never stopped to ask whether I possessed enough knowledge to explain it at all. Something painful enters our lives, and the mind immediately begins searching for a reason. A plan fails. A relationship becomes strained. A decision produces an unwelcome consequence. Something we relied upon is suddenly taken away. Almost instinctively, we ask whether God is displeased with us, whether we are being punished, whether the hardship is the price of some mistake. There was something final about the way I had been thinking.

If this was punishment, then the verdict had already been delivered. The past had been judged, the consequence had arrived, and all that remained was to endure it under the weight of guilt.

He was asking me to leave room for another possibility. “Even when a difficulty follows something you have done,” he said, “why assume that its only purpose is to make you suffer?”

I did not answer.

“A consequence can hurt and still contain mercy. It may show you what comfort had allowed you to ignore. It may stop you from continuing in a direction that was slowly taking you farther away. It may wake you while there is still time to turn.”

I began to see the distinction. Punishment, as I had imagined it, looked only backward: You did this. Now you must pay. A reminder could also look backward, but only in order to make a different future possible: This is where you have been heading. Is this still where you want to go? That did not make the pain unreal. It did not mean that every difficulty could be neatly interpreted. But it changed the posture with which I stood before it.

He gave me an example. “Imagine a child walking toward a dangerous road,” he said. “The parent calls out, but the child continues. The parent raises his voice, runs toward him, and pulls him back sharply. The child may be startled. He may even experience the intervention as unpleasant. But what is the parent trying to do?”

“Protect him.”

“Exactly. The discomfort is not the purpose. The return is.”

It made sense. I began to wonder how often I had judged an interruption only by how it felt. If it disturbed me, I called it harmful. If it frustrated my plans, I assumed something had gone wrong. Yet perhaps some interruptions had stopped me from continuing in directions whose consequences I had not fully understood.

He was careful, however, not to let me turn that thought into another formula. “Do not conclude that every hardship means you have sinned,” he said. “And do not assume that every setback is a direct warning from God. Prophets were tested. Good people suffer. Some pain comes through the wrongdoing of others. Some comes through the ordinary conditions of life.”

“Then how am I supposed to interpret it?” I asked.

“With humility.”

I waited.

“You may not know why it happened. But you can still ask what it calls you to do now.”

That felt both more modest and more demanding. It was easier to give the event a label. If I called it a punishment, I could collapse into guilt. If I called it meaningless, I could collapse into resentment. But if I asked what response was now required of me, I had to become attentive. Perhaps I needed patience. Perhaps I needed to repair something I had damaged. Perhaps I needed to abandon a habit I had been defending. Perhaps I needed courage to endure something that was not of my making. Perhaps I needed to seek help, set a boundary, apologize, forgive, or simply accept what could no longer be changed. The event did not always tell me why it had happened. But it could still become a moment in which I examined where I stood and where I was heading.

He used an Arabic word. “Tanbīh,” he said.

“A warning?” I asked.

“A warning, yes. But also an alert. Something that wakes your attention.”

I thought about moments in my own life when events had forced me to see what ordinary comfort had concealed. There had been habits I knew were unhealthy but continued because their cost had not yet become visible. There were relationships I neglected because I assumed they would always remain. There were compromises I justified because nothing immediately seemed to follow from them. Then, at some point, something interrupted the pattern. At the time, I experienced mainly the discomfort. Looking back, I could sometimes see that the interruption had made honesty possible.

Not every painful event yielded such a clear lesson. Some remained difficult to understand. But even then, I began to see the value of refusing to waste the moment.

“If a consequence awakens you,” he said, “then the door has not closed.”

The sentence carried more hope than I expected. Even when I had contributed to my own difficulty, the story did not have to end with the mistake. There was still room to acknowledge, repair, and return. The consequence did not have to become the final definition of my life.

He then spoke of tawbah.

I had often understood repentance mainly as asking forgiveness after doing something wrong. He described it more fully.

“Tawbah means return,” he said. “You recognize that you have moved away from where you should be, and you turn back.”

There was movement in that understanding. Repentance was not remaining permanently before the past in shame. It was allowing what I had seen about the past to change the direction of the future.

“Then remorse has a purpose?” I asked.

“Yes. It should soften you, not imprison you. It should help you return, not convince you that return is no longer possible.”

I sat quietly with that.

Perhaps this was the difference between remorse that heals and guilt that destroys. One says, Something needs to change. The other says, You are beyond change. The first can become movement. The second becomes paralysis.

After a while, I asked the question that still troubled me: “But why must some reminders be so painful? Why can’t we learn through something gentler?”

“Sometimes we do,” he said. “But gentle reminders are easy to postpone.”

I knew immediately what he meant. There were truths I had understood for years without allowing them to alter my conduct. I had heard advice, felt unease, noticed warning signs, and still continued. Knowledge can remain abstract for a very long time. Sometimes a consequence makes what was abstract suddenly personal.

He was not glorifying suffering. He was not saying that pain was desirable or that we should passively accept every harmful situation. He was simply refusing to let pain become empty when it could become instructive. “The difficulty itself may not be good,” he said, “but something good may still be asked of you within it.”

That sentence gave me a more careful way to think. I did not need to call the hardship a blessing while I was still bleeding from it. I did not need to pretend that loss was pleasant or injustice acceptable. But neither did I have to assume that suffering had left me with nothing except suffering. There could still be a response.

He suggested a question: “When something difficult happens, do not ask only, ‘Why is this happening to me?’ Ask also, ‘What is being asked of me now?’”

The first question searched for an explanation I might never receive. The second brought me back to a responsibility I could still fulfill. It shifted my attention from speculation about the hidden purpose of the event toward the moral possibilities that remained within the present moment.

I began trying to practice that. When a mistake produced an embarrassing consequence, I asked what needed to be repaired. When a plan failed, I asked whether the moment required perseverance, reconsideration, or acceptance. When I found myself repeatedly disturbed by the same pattern, I asked whether I had been refusing to notice something about myself. The answers did not always come quickly. Sometimes I discovered that I had indeed drifted. At other times, I realized that the hardship was not the result of anything I had done, and that my task was simply to endure it without surrendering trust, dignity, or compassion. Either way, the question helped me engage with the moment instead of merely passing judgment upon it.

Before we parted, he returned to the words with which we had begun. “You asked what you had done to deserve this,” he said. “Perhaps that is not always the question.”

“What is the question, then?”

He looked at me gently and said, “Will this bring you nearer—or will you allow it to take you farther away?”

I understood then that he was not offering me a complete explanation for suffering. He was giving me a way to stand within it. I could not always know whether a difficulty was a consequence, a test, a warning, or part of a wisdom I could not yet see. But I could refuse to let uncertainty drive me into despair or distance from God.

Sometimes the pain may expose a path from which I need to return. Sometimes it may ask me to remain faithful on a path I should not abandon. And sometimes its meaning may remain hidden while the response it requires becomes clear.

Now, when hardship comes, I try not to rush toward the conclusion that I am being punished. I pause before passing judgment upon the event—or upon myself. Perhaps this is not a door being closed. Perhaps it is a moment in which another door has quietly opened: the door of reflection, correction, patience, and return.

The question is no longer only: Why has this happened to me? It is also: What response will bring me nearer to God now?

/by

The Patience of Influence

The Patience of Influence

 

 

 

 

یہ مضمون اردو میں پڑھیں

Finally, one day, I asked him, “If I have done everything I reasonably can, what do I do when nothing seems to change?”

He looked at me thoughtfully. “How do you know they haven’t?”

I smiled. “I think I would know.”

“Would you?”

His question caught me by surprise.

He continued: “When you speak to someone today, when do you expect the change to happen?”

I thought about it. “Now,” I admitted.

He smiled and said, “Most of us do.” Then he leaned back in his chair. “But human beings rarely change that way.”

I asked him what he meant.

“Think about your own life,” he said. “How many of your deepest convictions were formed the very first time you heard them?”

I searched my memory. Very few. Most of the ideas that had shaped my life had returned again and again over the years. Sometimes they appeared in conversations. Sometimes in books. Sometimes through painful experiences. Often I didn’t appreciate their significance until much later.

He seemed to read my thoughts. “Influence usually works quietly,” he said. “It settles before it grows.”

That explained something I had never understood. I had been treating every important conversation as though it were a final examination. If nothing changed immediately, I assumed the conversation had failed. Perhaps that was never a fair expectation.

He smiled as though remembering something. “Many years ago,” he said, “someone gave me advice that I completely ignored.”

“What happened?”

“I repeated the same mistake for years.”

“And then?”

“One day I found myself remembering his words almost exactly.”

“What had changed?”

“I had.”

The simplicity of the answer stayed with me.

The words had been waiting long before I was ready to receive them. Perhaps that is true more often than we realize. Sometimes we are planting thoughts in ground that has not yet been prepared. That does not mean the seed is wasted. It simply means it has not yet found its season.

He must have noticed the image forming in my mind. “Think of a farmer,” he said. “He prepares the soil. He plants the seed. He waters it. He protects it from weeds.” He looked at me. “Does he then stand over the field demanding that the seed grow before sunset?”

I laughed and said, “Of course not.”

“Why not?”

“Because growth doesn’t happen that way.”

He nodded. “Then why do we expect people to?”

I had never connected the two. A farmer works faithfully because he understands that growth follows its own rhythm. He cannot manufacture life. He can only create the conditions in which life may flourish.

Perhaps influence works the same way. We prepare the soil with kindness. We plant truth with sincerity. We water it with patience. We protect the relationship with respect. But the growth itself comes from a place beyond our control.

That realization transformed the way I looked at time. Every sincere conversation no longer had to produce an immediate result. Every act of kindness no longer had to receive an immediate response. No longer did every piece of advice have to be accepted before I could consider it worthwhile. Some seeds germinate quickly. Others remain hidden for years. Yet both are still seeds.

Before we left, he said something I doubt I will ever forget. “You are not called to manufacture change.” He paused, and then added, “You are called to remain faithful in your influence.”

As I walked home, I realized that hope looks different now. It is no longer the anxious hope that insists on immediate results. It is the quieter hope that trusts sincere effort is never wasted, even when its fruit remains invisible.

Now, whenever I find myself becoming impatient with someone I care about, I picture the farmer. He is not idle. He works diligently. But he also knows when to stop striving and simply wait. Perhaps that is what patient influence looks like. We prepare. We plant. We nurture. And then we entrust the growth to the One who alone can bring it forth.

There is great peace in becoming a faithful farmer of souls instead of trying to become their maker.

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When Principles Cost You Dearly

When Principles Cost You Dearly

 

 

 

یہ مضمون اردو میں پڑھیں

I said it almost defensively, “But if I act on this, I’ll come across as difficult. People won’t like it. It will create awkwardness.”

He didn’t argue. “That’s exactly the point,” he said.

I looked at him, unsure whether I had misunderstood. “What do you mean?” I asked.

He paused for a moment, then quietly said, “If your principles never cost you anything, they are probably just preferences.”

That landed harder than I expected. We like to think of ourselves as principled people. We say we value honesty, integrity, fairness, faith. We speak about doing the right thing. We admire it in others. We even intend it for ourselves. But intention is easy, until it comes with a cost. Because sooner or later, life presents a situation where acting on a principle will make you feel smaller in the eyes of others. You may lose approval. You may lose comfort. You may lose status. You may even lose relationships. And in that moment, something very quiet but very real happens inside. A negotiation begins. Is it really necessary to take a stand here? Can I be flexible this time? Does it really matter that much?

On the surface, these sound like reasonable questions. But often, they are not questions. They are exits.

“Principles are not tested when they are convenient,” he said. “They are tested when they cost you your ego.”

That word “ego” made everything clearer. Because what we often fear losing is not something external. It is how we are seen. Our image. Our acceptance. Our comfort within a group. And that is why compromise becomes so tempting. Not because we don’t know what is right. But because we know what it will cost.

He didn’t deny the difficulty. “Of course it will feel uncomfortable,” he said. “You may feel exposed. You may feel misunderstood. People may react.”

There was no attempt to soften it.

“But if you have decided that this is your principle,” he continued, “then you have to stand by it.”

That word—stand—felt heavier than it sounded. Because standing means not adjusting based on reactions. Not retreating when it becomes inconvenient. Not reshaping your values to fit the moment. It means staying. Even when it is uncomfortable.

I asked him something that had always confused me: “But where does the strength come from?” I said. “Because in the moment, it doesn’t feel like I have it.”

He didn’t answer immediately. Then he said, “From remembering where you are ultimately headed.”

I didn’t fully understand.

He explained: “If your motivation is to please people, then their reactions will control you.”

That made sense.

“If your motivation is comfort,” he continued, “then discomfort will defeat you.”

I nodded.

“But if your motivation is that one day you will stand before God,” he said, “then everything changes.” Because now, the question is no longer: What will people think of me? It becomes: What will I present before God? And in that frame, many of the smaller fears lose their grip.

He then pointed to something very practical: “Two things will help you,” he said.

I listened carefully.

“First, steadfastness. Second, prayer.”

I was expecting something more complex. But he kept it simple.

“Steadfastness,” he said, “means you have already decided.”

That was important.

You don’t wait for the moment to decide. Because in the moment, emotions are strong. Pressure is high. Clarity is low. You decide beforehand. This is who I want to be. This is what I will stand for. And then, when the situation arises, you act not based on how you feel but on what you have already chosen.

He added something that felt both honest and liberating: “Yes, you may lose something. Your ego may take a hit. People may not like it. You may feel left out. But that is part of the test.”

The second thing he mentioned was prayer. And here, his tone changed.

“Without a relationship with God,” he said, “steadfastness becomes very difficult.”

That was something I had experienced but never articulated.

Because when you rely only on your own personal strength, it runs out. But when you repeatedly return to God, when you stand in prayer, when you bow, when you acknowledge your need, something shifts. You are reminded that you are not standing alone. That your effort is seen. That your struggle matters. That your small acts of integrity are not insignificant. “They are part of your meeting with God,” he said.

That phrase stayed with me. Your meeting with God.

He gave an image that I still think about: “Imagine,” he said, “that every time you act on your principle, you are responding to a call. A call not from people. But from God. And when you respond, when you stand firm, when you choose what is right, you are, in a sense, saying: I heard Your call, and I came. That transforms the act. It is no longer just a social decision.
It is a spiritual response.

I remembered a small moment from my life. There was a gathering where a conversation had turned uncomfortable, something I didn’t agree with. It wasn’t extreme. It wasn’t dramatic. Just one of those situations where staying silent would have been easier. I felt the hesitation. If I speak, it will disrupt the flow. If I stay quiet, it will pass. In the past, I might have chosen silence. But that day, something was different. I didn’t argue. I didn’t preach. I simply said, “I’m not comfortable with this.”

There was a pause. A slight shift in the room. A few looks. And then the conversation moved on. It was a small moment. But it stayed with me. Not because of what others did. But because of what I did.

That’s when I understood what he meant. Principles are not always tested in big, dramatic situations. They are tested in small, ordinary moments. Moments where no one may even remember what you did. But you will. And perhaps, more importantly—God will.

In the end, he brought it back to something simple. “Make your life a reflection of that response,” he said. A response to God’s call. Not perfectly. Not flawlessly. But consistently.

Now, when I feel that hesitation, that pull to adjust, to avoid discomfort, to protect my image, I remind myself of something he said at the very beginning. If it costs you nothing, it is not a principle.

And if it is a principle, it is worth standing for.

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From Vision to Action: One Step at a Time

From Vision to Action: One Step at a Time

 

 

Creating a compelling vision for one’s life is both inspiring and essential. It provides direction, sparks purpose, and aligns our energy toward something meaningful. But soon after that clarity emerges, another experience often occurs—overwhelm. The gap between where we are and where we want to go can feel vast. We might ask ourselves, “How will I ever get there? There’s so much to accomplish. What if I fail?”

This is where we need to pause and reframe. Because progress is not achieved by solving the entire puzzle at once. It happens by taking the first clear step—with faith, humility, and courage.

Begin with What You Can Do

In every situation, the first question should not be, “How do I solve everything?” but rather, “What can I do right now?”

The idea is not to plan 300 steps ahead, which only causes anxiety. Instead, focus on one small but right step that you can control. Put your energy there.

Often, we immobilize ourselves with questions about the future:

  • What if it doesn’t work?
  • What if I can’t handle the next phase?
  • What if I run out of strength?

But the present asks us to focus on today, not solve tomorrow.

Let the First Step Reveal the Next

Once you take that first meaningful action, a surprising thing happens: the next step becomes clear. Like headlights in the fog, you don’t need to see the entire road. You just need to see far enough to keep moving forward.

Trying to control or predict the entire journey often comes from fear. But faith-based living teaches us: We are responsible for effort, not results. The solutions belong to God. Our role is to take wise, humble, consistent action, one step at a time.

Destiny Reveals Itself Along the Way

You might think, “I’ll arrive when I reach this milestone.” But every destination turns out to be part of a longer journey. As soon as you achieve something, new responsibilities, emotions, and uncertainties come up.

Even joy can cause fear: What if I lose what I’ve just found?

This is a reminder that life isn’t a fixed point — it’s a changing, evolving journey. There is no “final arrival” in this world. There is only movement, growth, surrender, and constant re-alignment.

Faith, Not Forecasting

When we create a vision for our lives, we must remember Who ultimately shapes the outcomes. We may walk with wisdom, but only God sees the full picture. Our responsibility is not to predict every step but to act with trust and integrity at each decision point.

Let the future unfold as it will. Focus on doing the next right thing—and trust the One who writes destinies to handle the rest.

Reflection Questions

  • What is one action I can take today that aligns with my vision and values?
  • Am I fixating on outcomes I can’t control instead of focusing on what I can do?
  • Where do I need to let go of the illusion of control and trust the process more?
  • Have I mistaken a milestone for the end instead of embracing the next chapter of the journey?

Final Thought

Don’t let the size of the mountain prevent you from taking the first step. You were never meant to carry the entire journey on your shoulders—only to walk it, one step at a time.

And in that walk, God meets you.

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