iPause

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم 

(In the Name of Allah, The Ever-All-Merciful, The Ever-Specifically Merciful.)

   It has been a long time since I wrote my last post.  Working to advance oneself in life is a tolling job.  I had planned on writing the second part to the "No Cell Phone!?" post but, as you can probably guess from the title of this post, I am going to take a little pause from that and share something else with you.  And, no, sorry, this is not going to be about an iPod, or an iPad, or any other iWhatever-you-might-think-of.  It is an iPause, nonetheless.  By the way, you can now share any of my posts on the dreaded facebook, twitter, the buzz, and good-old email.  I added those buttons at the end of every post. :)

   I wanted to share a khutbah (religious sermon/talk) with you about akhlaaq.  Al-hamdulillah, I have "full rights" to type it up and even add some annotations that might not have been part of the original.  So, following is a transcription of the khutbah with my annotations in parentheses (...) .  It should be noted that this khutbh was given to an audience who subscribe to a specific line of thought so most of the references are from scholars of the same line of thought; this should not hinder from the main message, which is applicable all across the board. I pray to Allah that we all benefit from it, Aameen:

No Cell Phone?!

In the Name of Allah, the Ever-Compassionate, the Ever-Merciful

Humans are always questioning things and wondering about how life would, or would not, be under different circumstances and with different resources. Many of these questions have the cliché beginning, "I wonder what life would be like without..." Most of these questions are just random imaginations which we enjoy running through our minds. Interestingly, if such a situation ever does arise where we have to actually live through that "I wonder" question, our perception of such a scenario changes in a whole new way. From being an interesting notion --maybe even an adventurous experience for some-- it becomes completely unbearable and unacceptable.

Not so coincidentally, I had to experience one of those scenarios myself not so long ago. Although I cannot claim to have allowed my mind to ever concoct an adventure-laden experience mimicking such a scenario, I can say that I had thought about what most people would feel like in such a situation --including myself. It was one of those natural thoughts that cross the minds of a number of people in this day and age. It was the thought of "life without a cell phone".