Harsh it may sound the above phrases, but that's what we Muslim believe !
And that' what my Quran teacher (Makcik Limah) sometimes told me & my friends every Thursday Night some 25 years ago when we had our Pot Luck feast after our Quran Recital Class...."Do not Waste Food or else You'll be The Devils' Friend"......something like that....
And that's exactly what I'm telling my kids...trying to instill good habits within them.....i.e. NOT TO WASTE anything....not to waste food, time, electricity, A4 paper, colour pencils, erasers, water etc etc....
Is it working? Are my kids listening to me? I don't think it's working yet because I can still see them wasting most of the things I mentioned above. Maybe because those things are ABUNDANT and easy to come by......in short they've become UNGRATEFUL....they take things for granted !
I always tell them stories of my hardships when I was a kid, and ask them to be thankful for what they are having right now. However my stories seem not to leave much effects on them because they don't seem to be able to imagine a family with no rice to eat, a boy with no books 1 month before a major exam, a bathroom with no tap water and a house without electricity ! It's just a fairy tale to them.....because they were born into this perfect and ready-with-everything world !
This situation where my kids are wasting things really makes me feel sad. BUT I'm not giving up on them just yet. I'll never stop educating and telling them to appreciate what they have !
This by itself I consider a big improvement in my own mental attitude and the day when my kids realise the importance of NOT WASTING things will be D-day as my GREAT IMPROVEMENT DAY !
So you may ask "What's ALL this story about your kids wasting things got to do with your topic today?".
My answer is this.....it is human nature to see other people's weakness and shortcomings whilst ignoring the fact that they might have the same bad attitude !
In this example, I must admit that I sometimes have the same attitude. Maybe not much towards food and other material things but mostly towards wasting time !
Every one of us is granted 24 hrs per day by God. No one is given more hour than the other ! So precious time is, that if God decides to take it away from you means that you have it no more ! Even then not may of us seems to appreciate the short and so little time they have on this earth !
I just realised that I waste too much, way too much time...
- on watching the TV (the remote control is like being glued to my hand!)
- on the internet (FB in particular - this one I'm taking a BIG STEP to overcome!),
- on doing petty/unimportant things (like reading Junk Mails),
- on chatting away about unimportant topics (be it online or offline),
- on daydreaming (about various things)
- etc etc etc
So my biggest improvement for this week is to realise the time I have wasted and my aspiration to make full use of the balance of my uknown time left on this world.....and the best way to do that is to LIVE LIFE TO THE FULLEST (borrowing Great Eastern's tagline) and to LIVE LIKE YOU'RE GONNA DIE TOMORROW !..........and my biggest step this week is to STOP using FB during the weekdays and to use only a couple of hours in the weekends ! The times saved from this activity will be used to do more work, to spend more time with my family and to LIVE LIFE ! Yeeehaaaa!
So that's all for today......Keep Improving My Friends ! Include Me In Your Improvement Quest If You Have One Coz I'll Surely Support You ! Let's Make this World A Better Place For You And Me And The Entire Human Race !
Sincerely,
Amir Hamdzan
Our First Rented House (2004) .....small, hot & stuffy, but we were grateful !
