Happy-ness?

So the other day i wanted to post something here but failed because I was using my phone and Google gave me gajilions of security questions and decided to turn me down. 

My futile attempt has made me realise that i wasn't able to let go of this blog... yet. Although so many posts have been reverted to draft, it has secured a really special place in my heart. Looking back at my first post dated back in 2011, from updating my life trasition from Wangsa Maju to Bangi,  high school stuffs, artsy and college (not to mention 70% used to be football related lols). Funny how people (read: me) can change. 

"We have been bent and broken, hopefully, into better shapes" 

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Having a lot of me-time these days has helped me to think about this concept of attaining happiness in life. In hindsight, when I reflect back on my journey 3-5 years ago, I realised that a lot of my decisions were affected by this one thing- I have always wanted to be happy. Happy by my own definition (as I claim but it’s often shaped by the society’s ._.)

Well, who doesn’t, right? Everyone wants a worry-free life, not being bothered by too many problems and more often than not, a happy life is equated with a perfect life. However, my past (rather few) experiences taught me that there are “things” that will jeopardise my ideal, happy life especially when they decide to give me a little surprise and come in the most unexpected way. 

Hence, I guess the real question that I should be asking myself is- how long do I actually want to be happy? In my opinion, there’s only two kind of happiness- short run and long run. 

Short run happiness, as how I believe, requires little effort- such as staring at the beautiful sunrise in the morning and bumping into your old friends back in primary school (I mean the “close friend” category and not the ones that make you feel awkward )

As opposed to that, long run happiness requires more effort and time in order for you to gain it. Also, the process of attaining it might not be as enjoyable but you do it anyway. A simple example would be students sitting for their exams; the process ain’t fun in its entirety, demands a lot from us but we still find our way around it as we have this end goal in our mind that we want to try our best and achieve that good results. 

When I asked myself earlier- for how long do you actually want to be happy- I didn’t mean that these two categories are mutually exclusive. That means I do not have to choose one over the other- sometimes they might even overlap. What I intended to do was to widen the scope of happiness that I was aiming for. What i wanted to do was to SHIFT my focus- from short term to long term. 

So, for how long do you actually want to be happy, dear self? 

1 day, 1 month, 1 year, 3 years and so on? And how do you even distinguish short & long term? How long does a period need to be to qualify into the latter category? 

Since I cant answer this question, I’m just gonna re-define the category and make them simpler- short term is any period in this wordly life (Dunya) and long term is the period of time in the Hereafter. Sorry for the sudden conclusion but my train of thoughts can’t provide me with any better transition, really. 

Back to the real issue- being happy. When I think about the primary aim of being happy in this life (Dunya), it leads me to another question; Why does our God create a spectrum of feelings, if we were only to experience a sole emotion of happiness? I also have no absolute answer for this, but I believe that all the other feelings- sad, angry, disappointed, fear etc are created for us for specific reasons and it could be necessary for our growth as a human being. 

“We cry, to heal. We feel, to stay human” -Yasmin Mogahed

I don’t know where is this leading- it is an impromptu writing and I have not really thought about it thoroughly- im sorry people if you have read this long 

So maybe, having a mindset to be happy is fine (and we should), but let’s not restrict it to only this world- i think this idea applies better best in the Hereafter.

Hence for the time being, let’s slowly invest our time and effort into this long run happiness “route” where Eternal happiness is promised ❤️

“And the life of this world is nothing but play and amusement. But far better is the house in the hereafter for those who are Al-Muttaqun (the pious). Will you not then understand?” (Quran, Al-An’aam: 32)

That one fine day

Suatu hari nanti,
semuanya kau akan lupa,    
kepenatan, kebosanan, keraguan,
bila kau dapat tahu segala hikmahnya,
kerna dalam penuh kasih sayang Dia merancang.

Dan sekarang,
kau hanya perlu percaya
dan kali ni, betul betul percaya,
yang diberiNya itu hanyalah yang terbaik,
cuma kau perlu belajar meletakkan neraca atas hukumNya.

That one fine day will come
and you'll finally able to say to yourself
"glad that I pulled through!"

Senyuman terukir di bibir,
tapi tak ramai yang tahu,
betapa gundah dan lelah hati ini.

Tak mengapa, Dia ada, Dia tahu,
Selalu.

Selalu orang kata, "syurga itu mahal sekali",
tapi, dengan semua jatuh bangun hidup ni,
kau terjatuh, tergelincir dan terhenti,
terkadang kau tertanya, kenapa semua ini terjadi

Tapi, kau kena tahu, niatNya bukan untuk menzalimi,
Ia hanyalah medan sapaanNya,
semata untuk membersihkan, dan menyayangi.

Kalau kau tak pernah rasa sakit,
macamana kau nak kenal erti sihat?
kalau kau tak pernah rasa sedih,
macamana nak kenal erti bahagia?

Harus kau bekerja kuat melayakkan diri,
walau kaki tak mampu melangkah,
dan wajah tak mampu menipu,
tapi hati harus terus mempercayai,
Kau punya tempat di Sana, bukan di sini.

Selagi kau belum sampai,
kau jangan berhenti lagi.


From me, to me and everyone else who can relate. adios.





                                                                                                                                                

Appreciation

"Jangan pernah letak harapan penghargaan pada seseorang,
sebab manusia memang terlalu lemah untuk beri penghargaan yang seseorang patut dapat"

This statement suddenly reminds me of my college days. I used to get severely affected just because of the work that we did wasn't really recognised by *this someone*. It wasn't the greatest feeling ever when you put so much effort to do something but in the end you felt like you were underappreciated. Only God knows (and perhaps my friends as well) how sad and disappointed I was back then.

But at the end of the day, I started to question myself
So what if we were under appreciated?
So what if people didn't acknowledge the work that we have done? *I think it wasn't that good after all, lol*
Am I here solely to impress them? 

As I was talking to my friend, she reminded me "You have to remember the fact that all of this happened with Allah's permission. Bila kau rasa yang kau tak di-appreciate tu pun, Allah yang susun dalam aturanNya"

It got me thinking, there is something really important that I needed to learn, for He won't test us without any reasons.

Baru sedar, sebenarnya kita tak perlu pun 'dahagakan' penghargaan dari seseorang tu, kalau kita betul- betul tahu the real One yang kita nak impress is not the people here, but the One up there. I'm being hypocritical as I write this because I still crave for people's acknowledgement when I do certain things. I think that is normal, well I *hope* it's normal to feel this way. Nevertheless, now that  I know my priority, hope I can work towards it!

Mungkin hati belum cukup mengenal Dia,
Bila tiap yang dilakukan bukan keranaNya,
Mungkin Dia nak ajar supaya berhenti berharap pada manusia.

I wish someone had told me about this earlier so that I don't have to go through all the dramas, but well I think there are some things that you will never understand until you experience it yourself. Having said that, I'm not claiming i'm all experienced now, perhaps I just began to understand this concept and it overwhelms me so much that I feel the need to share it (I believe in the power of sharing!) Afterall, this is just my two cents, wallahu'alam.

p/s: writing about college days is like writing some sort of ancient history, little did I realise it's only 6 months back!

biasiswa

now it all makes sense when they said  "nanti kalau dapat scholarship, jgn besar kepala" 

mungkin sebab kita mudah lupa.

scholarship tu bukan utk buat kita rasa superior dari org lain
scholarship tu bukan utk kita merendah- rendahkan orang yang tak dapat
scholarship tu juga bukan penanda aras seseorang tu berjaya atau tak

mungkin,

scholarship tu salah satu pintu rezeki, dari beribu- ribu pintu yang lain
scholarship tu salah satu ujian dariNya; to see how we deal with all the blessings God has given us.

 "Jika kau merasa besar, periksa hatimu
  Mungkin ia sedang bengkak

  Jika kau merasa tinggi, periksa batinmu
  Mungkin ia sedang kehilangan pijakan"
-Salim A. Fillah-

Just a reminder for all of us (including me, of course) ; the forgetful ones.

:)

"but how come you've never told me about it earlier?"

and I can feel a part of me starting to break....

Kita selesa, mereka sengsara

If I've learned anything from this book, 
I'd say, 
I've learned that history repeats, 

It is so similar, as if he is still alive today, 
in his vision of eradication, 
by any means, is practiced every single day, 
taking lives that don't even deserve his enmity. 

"Apartheid" wasn't okay in South Africa,
it wasn't okay in Nazi Germany, 
but why is it okay in Palestine? 

If you were now in Hitler's time
during the genocide, 
what would you do, 
to those afflicted and terrorized? 

Just keep quite and be a law abiding citizen?
"let the leaders do their jobs"
well, that's what they said

Little did we know
behind each statistics 
there lies a story, a hope
of a small and harmless girl 
who wishes that one day
the world will see her as she is 
knowing that she did nothing
to deserve their enmity.

Of tanks, planes and missiles, 
Of barren land and fruitless trees,

Of fading screams and global silence.

#SaveGaza 

kecapekan

Tak usah nak kejar benda yang tak pasti,
Rugi

"Belajar putus asa,
dalam mengejar cinta yang tak pasti entah apa hujungnya"