When it’s going good. I haven’t had class in about a week due to being on Eid vacation and honestly, it’s thrown my schedule completely off. I’m so accustomed to having a set schedule. Wake up, breakfast, Fiqh Class, Nahw class, Azhar, writing session, review, Family time and sleep, then rinse and repeat. It’s been a welcomed break but at the same time I’ve realized a few lessons, mainly that pressure causes us to excel. When everything is going well sometimes we relax a bit too much. We forget what we need to accomplish and how short our time is. This is one of the reasons why we procrastinate when the realization hits that we don’t have forever.

This is also why many students are lulled into mediocrity, they don’t work to their full potential because for them the night before an exam is enough to pass it.  They are smart, no buts about that, but exceptional they aren’t. An exceptional person creates, re-creates, critiques, and they might even finish everything only to realize that it could be done better if they started anew. Every moment is their last in their eyes, every breath is a moment to benefit from.

On this vacation I’ve realized that I’ve been relaxing more than I normally would. I wasn’t writing as much, I wasn’t memorizing and studying enough. Now that the days are dwindling, I’m beginning to realize that I had so much time to utilize that I lost.

Isn’t this exactly how we are with worship?

In times of duress and difficulty it’s easier to call on God. We call on Him more than a child calling on their mother. Yet when things are great, when everything is easy, the fasts become less, the late-night prayers are a rarity, and dhikr less sincere.

This is why it’s good to remember that our lives are finite. Who knows, I may never finish my book and it may never get on your shelves. I may never get to see my children grow up, but there is one thing I do know, one day I will stand in front of my Lord. Am I preparing for it? Are you preparing for it?

They said about Sh. Murabit al-Hajj that had he known when he would die, he wouldn’t have been able to increase in any good. What about us?

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