At times, this is how Allah set us free

Allah give us gifts. But then we often become dependent on those gifts, instead of Him. When He gives us money, we depend on the money - not Him. When He gives us people, we depend on people - not Him.

When He gives us status or power, we depend on, and become distracted by these things. When Allah gives us health, we become deceived. We think we will never die.

Allah gives us gifts, but then we come to love them as we should only love Him. We take those gifts and inject them into our hearts, until they take over. Soon we cannot live without them.

Every waking moment is spent in contemplation of them, in submission and worship to them. The mind and the heart that was created by Allah, for Allah, becomes the property of someone or something else. And then the fear comes. The fear of loss begins to cripple us. The gift - that should have remained in our hands - takes over our heart, so the fear of losing it consumes us. Soon, what was once a gift becomes a weapon of torture and a prison of our own making.

How can we be freed of this?

At times, in His infinite mercy, Allah free us… by taking it away.

-  Yasmin Mogahed | Official site of Yasmin Mogahed

fa iza faraghta fanswab,

wa ilaa Rabbaka farghab.

So when you are freed - ascend,

And make the Lord your exclusive object.

- The Quran, chapter 94, last two verses

Human beings appraise not the Divine with true appraisal.

and again, 
They have not estimated Allah with His rightful estimate.

Indeed, Allah has Supreme Power, Exalted in Might.

- Message of the Quran (22:74)

Sufic Wisdom via Green Mountain School