Inspiration for a Spiritual Practice Incorporated in Daily Life

Imagine a modern Man or Woman's life.  By modern I don't mean someone who is present, fresh or intelligent; now a days the meaning has changed into one who takes stupidity as progress, who turns his or her back on sacred and buys into what is profaned. In exchange of spiritual bliss and freedom, he buys imprisonment and captivity. These are stupidity that modern man erroneously think as progress, but in reality they are but moving further away from true freedom that is his or her birth right.

There is no peace without justice

There is no justice without mercy

There is no mercy without love

There is no love without freedom

~ Sufi Master Shaykh Nooruddeen Durkee, may Allah bless him

If we honestly look at our life we will find that it is surrounded by activities devoid of any higher / spiritual purpose and its all about gross transactions, satisfying our base senses, mental conditioning and hence sentimentality, competition of amassing wealth, base survival on the basis of money making etc. The process is so energy draining and occupies so much of our time (about 99%) that it takes away all the vitality from our life. Soul begins to starve and stays undernourished. The price that is paid for undernourished soul is very high, it has effect in the more grosser realm. In spiritual body, emotional body and as well as physical body. Issues start to appear in terms of anxiety, emotional imbalance, unhappiness, chronic depression, fear, health problem, fatigue and so on, forgetfulness and heedlessness of purpose and eventually losing the way to the Kingdom.

The growing nature of the secular world brings uneasiness to the soul and that uneasiness is exactly proportional to the degree of his self's refinement, or the purity of his Heart (by Heart we refer to spiritual faculty) or evolution of his soul.

:: A Spiritual Law ::

Your uneasiness with secular life divorced from spiritual reality

is proportional to

the evolution / maturity of our soul.

So when a soul find himself, herself into such a life, most of them have no other choice, since they are often sleep-walking in life, they are not even given enough time to look at the mess they are into, and before they could realize that they have wasted all their life, they suddenly one-day find themselves diagnosed with cancer or any other life threatening diseases, rapidly moving towards the only certainty in life - which is death. Every human beings suffer, but this suffering that is caused by life devoid of meaning, life without any connection with the nourishment of Divine Love can be agonizing.

Every human being is condemned to death, but to hear it in a state of unpreparedness and ignorance while being diagnosed with a disease of certain death is something different. Suffering become intense and permanent until death, may God have mercy on all of humanity, all sentient beings.

A human being spending all of his, her life not knowing about this most precious substance in the Universe called Love and which is experienced in its highest form in participation with Divine Love, by knowing that we, each of us are Loved beyond imagination and that each one of us have the opportunity to Love the Beloved One with all our Heart and Soul in this very life time ~ to live life without that knowing is living in earthly-hell. What can be more missing than that? Is that not fire? Without that knowing and being immersed in the knowing (gnosis) isn't everything else is fire, fire of suffering?

 

Now those who are lucky and have received grace, they are intelligent enough to sense that something is wrong in their world. This is already a great leap, great leap towards freedom; the  beginning of this journey happens to begin through doubt and confusion,  through questioning - into the first glimpse of the realm of negation ('la' - arabic). They may even find doors open for them to escape from the prison into a more expansive world where they can have more time and nourishment for their life.


SUFFERING IS OPTIONAL

What can such a spiritually matured person who have experienced that fire of suffering, someone who have walked the barren desert devoid of any spiritual nourishment, one who has seen the true face of this deceptive world can do?

A regular, grounded and practical spiritual practice can be the best pathway to reconnect with what is lost. A regular spiritual practice incorporated in life, it can be a dedicated time for remembrance, meditation, prayer, a walk in the nature, waking up at a certain time in the night and contemplate, prayer in sync with natural rhythm ~ anything which is practically possible within a modern life's schedule, something which can be maintained on a regular basis and something not very taxing on the body, heart and soul to begin with.

One may seek counseling from a physician of the inner Heart for exact prescription. But the broader guidance is given in the Book of Guidance.

This is what the Last Testament offers us:

Wazkur Rabbaka fee nafsika 

tadarruAAan wakheefatan 

wadoona al-jahri minal qawli  

bilghuduwwi wal-asali. 

Wa la takun minal ghafileen

 

 And remember your Lord within yourself, 

in humility and in reverence,

without the loudness of words (that is, in silence)

in the mornings and in the evenings,

And do not be among the unmindful.

~ The Quran 7:205 ~

So the above verse calls for incorporating a spiritual practice in life, and it recommends that it be at both ends of our day; morning and evening representing two ends of day, symbolizes opposite states, opposite times, beginning and end.

Its interesting that this remembrance is to be made within, within the self, without our soul and since that domain is beyond words ~ we are told to remember the Real without any apparent speech or loudness of words (wadoona al-jahri minal qawli), this is an invitation to dive within, to be contemplative, to be silent and thus to reach the One Who Choose to Remain Silent.

The Sufis say, "God is the Silent Emptiness and is therefore most easily reached in silence."

Silent act of devotion also protect the beginner from the showiness and most importantly the worst of sins, spiritual pride. May we also be protected from them and find the connection back to the more real part of who we are and the eventually may we reach the knowledge of the Real, al-Haqq.

wala yuheetoona bishay-in min AAilmihi illa bima shaa

and they encompass not a thing of His knowledge except for what He grants. (the Quran 2:255)

And without the Living One, the Source of all Knowledge granting that precious and subtle knowledge, that priceless gnosis, none can attain it. That is certainly the granting of grace.

Sadiq M. Alam / Dhaka