QUOTE OF THE DAY

"Ask and its given..."

Friday, February 11, 2011

Sorry seems to be the hardest word.

.

..
Forgiveness,
Is more than saying sorry
Forgiveness,
Means accepting peoples flaws

-Anna Faris


Forgiving can be a difficult task for some. Especially when the person who is at fault never came to apologize.

Have you ever experienced the act of being FORCED to forgive someone by a higher authority? And once you did, that someone gave you a smirk indicating: he/she had won. (>>.<<)
My mom used to do that to me all the time specially when it involves my older sibling.


Frankly, I really admire someone who forgives easily to others for any mistakes/wrong they’ve done. My father told me once in the car while on the way to KL the other day, about the story of a man and his neighbor.

There was a wise-kind-gentle man who had this one mad-angry neighbor. Every day the neighbor would throw his garbage at the gentle man’s door! Then, one day, the garbage stopped appearing. The kind man wondered why and asked people about what had happened to his neighbor. He was told that the neighbor was sick, in bed. So, what the kind hearted man did was; he went and visited his angry neighbor to make sure he’s ok and to wish him well. The neighbor felt so embarrassed that he then embraced the kind man character when he recovered and became angry no more.


Many has narrated that it was the story of Prophet Muhammad (p.b.u.h) and his Jewish neighbor. However, since there is no authentication of the source I dare not claim that it’s a hadeeth. ( And the story is a bit more different.. hihi)

But lets put aside religion facts and lets emphasize on the jeez of the story. What’s most important is that, this story teaches us the value of always to be forgiving. Because by showing good virtues to others, it will make one realize that there’s a chance of being happy again (and sing along Barney’s “Happy Happy” song together with your friends).

Being forgiving to me is like keeping yourself away from becoming revengeful.

When we’re angry or full of vengeance, not only we’ll be depressed, but we will also constantly be giving out negative thoughts to ourselves and our surrounding. These thoughts will offer us a ‘not good’ feeling. And that’s pretty much…..STRESSFULL!!

However, I understand that some people have the tendency to take advantage of the constant-forgiver. Huh tell me about it. I’ve experienced it my whole life (no, I’m not ever the forgiver nor am I the advantage taker, I’m just the OBSERVER). To those people, well, I just wish they change.

Yes, I’m not an easy forgiver myself; but I tend to let things pass by and forgive anyway. I just don’t know how to be mad at someone for so long specially when its for a small matter like a stupid misunderstanding. But somehow, it would be nice if someone would apologize and forgive and move along with the world (wth am I saying..lol..) .

Remember: Apologizing doesn’t always mean you are wrong and the other person is right, it just means that you value your relationship more than your ego.

XOXO;
Ameera


4 comments:

Abdullah said...

Nice Ameera! You keep discussing interesting topics.. Don't stop!!

Firstly, let me confirm that the story of the man and his neighbor is a hadeeth. i remember studying it in secondary school.

As for apologies and forgiveness, this is when the historian in me kicks in..

In the year 300+BC in China, a great military general called Sun Tzu was at war with his neighbor province (Empire at that time), he knows that even if he overthrows the Emperor, he will face resentment from its people which will be difficult for him to control and maintain peace.

What he did is a genius move.. he went on war with them.. defeated them captured their king and about 5000 soldiers.

Instead of locking them up or killing them, he made an unprecedented move.. He fed all of them well and released them without them even asking for mercy!

To the soldiers this was an admirable act, but to the king this was an insult and he has to seek revenge..

To satisfy his pride and ego, he went on war against Sun Tzu hoping that he would defeat him and get back his integrity, but Sun Tzu's army still won and he did the same thing again, fed the king and soldiers well then released them.. This made the king furious.. He gathered an even larger army to crush Sun Tzu once and for all.. But Sun Tzu's tactics were too smart.. he defoeated the king again for the third time and did the same act again..

The king by then was going crazy, not only he has been defeated threetimes, but he felt insulted for the third time! he gathered a much larger army to crush Sun Tzu. but this time it was different.. his own army killed him and went to Sun Tzu requesting him to be their leader!

What Sun Tzu did was using forgiveness as a weapon against the enemy, he treated the enemy with so much generosity and respect that the enemy's soldiers admired him..

At the end of it, he conquered the enemy's land and its people's loyalty at the same time just by a simple act of

FORGIVENESS!

Abdullah said...

Here comes the Ustad Abdullah..

We all seem to forget that the most forgiving and the most merciful is Allah the almighty!

Not only did Allah created a whole surah about it, but said it over and over again in other surahs;

وَأَنِ اسْتَغْفِرُوا رَبَّكُمْ ثُمَّ تُوبُوا إِلَيْهِ يُمَتِّعْكُم مَّتَاعًا حَسَنًا

"And ask forgiveness of your Lord and then repent to grant you comfort well"

إنما التوبة على الله للذين يعملون السوء بجهالة ثم يتوبون من قريب

"But the repentance of those who do evil in ignorance and repent soon"

Also, if you noticed, every almost every warning ayah, he excludes those who repent..

أولئك يلعنهم الله ويلعنهم اللاعنون

after that he said

إلا الذين تابوا
(except for those who repent)

he also said

خالدين فيها لايخفف عنهم العذاب ولا هم ينظرون

after that he said

إلا الذين تابوا

yet another example

إن المنافقين في الدرك الأسفل من النار

again, after that he said

إلا الذين تابوا

another example

ولهم في الآخرة عذاب عظيم

after that he said

إلا الذين تابوا

he also mentioned

فمن تاب من بعد ظلمه وأصلح فإن الله يتوب عليه

وإني لغفار لمن تاب وآمن وعمل صالحا ثم اهتدى

واستغفروا ربكم ثم توبوا إليه إن ربي رحيم ودود

إن الله يحب التوابين

and many many more...

All these ayat emphasizes on allah's mercy towards his people no matter what wrong you did, you will be forgiven if you apologize and repent.

Also, let me highlight some facts about repenting which you might or might not already know..

1) The door for repentance is always open.
2) Allah is happy when someone asks for his forgiveness and repents. according to the hadeeth
إن الله يفرح بتوبة أحدكم
3) The one who repents from his sins, is as if he has never sinned before. according to the hadeeth
التائب من الذنب كمن لا ذنب له
4) The prophet Mohamed used to ask for allah's forgiveness more than 70 times in a day according to the hadeeth
والله إني لأستغفر الله في اليوم أكثر من سبعين مرة


And let us be frank... All of us have committed sins regardless of how small or big the sin is... and no one is to be judge for that except for allah the almighty..

so let us all ask for allah's forgiveness and for his mercy and for him to help us fight shaitan and give us hidayah (guidance) not to commit them ever again..

Advice: always try to read nabi Mousa's doá after prayers

ربنا لا تزغ قلوبنا بعد إذ هديتنا وهب لنا من لدنك رحمة إنك أنت الوهاب

(Our loard dont deviate our hearts after you have guided us and grants us mercy as you are the giver)Ad

MaMMaMia said...

whoa.. haha.. this is a long one...

enjoyed reading it :)

your knowledge is very wide mashaAllah.. you should make a blog. seriously.. haha

Abdullah said...

haha.. hamdillah im bless with a curious mind (geek).. i do have a blog but i cant remember when was the last time i typed my thoughts there or what did i even type about.. most of the time i dont even know what to type about... unlike you mashaállah.. u bring up good topics to talk about (most of the time).

Is that your diplomatic way of asking me to stop clogging ur blog? :-S