You and I both crave and desire fulfilment. More specifically, humans generally seek methods and ways to fill up the emptiness in their hearts and develop a dependency on things in this dunya, like fleeting relationships and the validation we receive from others. Just like many others, I find myself getting very much attached to the people who enter my life. Placing high hopes on these people, I had many expectations of these people who constantly seem to let me down.
One disappointment after another, I set myself up to be in a state of disarray and absolute shambles. But then again, these people are not to be blamed for such cataclysmic consequences.
In other words, I placed my hopes in the wrong place. I placed them in this dunya, this transient world that was never meant to last for eternity. Why place our expectations in the creation, rather than the Creator Himself?
We get consumed by the momentary situations in our lives, both good and bad, some more susceptible than others. We fall prey to what may seem, momentarily, to be our entire world at that particular point. Fixated on temporary, ever-changing inconstants, our hearts shatter when we inevitably get let down by others or get separated from what we gradually get attached to.
In reality, the nature of the world is not meant to carry or provide the need for permanence, for this world is only temporary. Naturally, it follows that we are not meant to find the fulfilment we need in mere worldly desires.
“There shall be no compulsion in [acceptance of] the religion. The right course has become distinct from the wrong. So whoever disbelieves in ṭāghūt and believes in Allah has grasped the most trustworthy handhold with no break in it. And Allah is Hearing and Knowing.” (The Qur’an, 2:256)
We are meant to seek out the handhold of God, for we have been blessed with the fitrah (nature) of being close to Him. The handhold that will never break, the one and only place we can lay our dependencies. This particular verse teaches us that one particular place is God. While we can seek help from others, they are means used by Him, the only one who can provide us with the necessary salvation.
However, we must realise that nothing in our lives happens without purpose. There are no coincidences or accidents in life. Everything that will ever come your way has been planned out by Him. When we experience such events, the pain of having been so attached serves as a reminder to always return to Him and to re-evaluate our lives and the decisions we’ve made to get to that point.
No one said it would be easy to detach ourselves from the very things that seemed to propel us forward. The darkness of the night precedes the dawn and things will gradually get better if we make the choice to swim upwards towards the surface of the ocean. All the best, dear reader, and may Allah ease all of our affairs in this dunya.