Juggling Between Our Needs and Wants

On Monday, Apr 16, I will be attending a conference at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel. It will last for 4 days until Thursday. On Friday, again I won’t be able to have my free time in office. By the look of it, for the whole week next week I will be away from internet and my intention to catch up with blogging community will be at bay.

While thinking about the schedule that gets tighter week after week, for a moment it came flashing in my mind with questions like, what exactly am I running after in this life? Am I not having enough with what I have right now? Am I in the right course in selecting priorities for my day-to-day life? What about for the life as a whole? Am I that grateful with all that God has destined for me? Do I pay back enough for what God has given me in a form of my ibadat?

At once the thought of Marslow Theory I used to learn some decades ago also came playing in my mind. I am particularly interested in the bottom most needs for humans – physiological needs – as simple as needs to eat to continue living.

Marslow Theory or not, the words from my religious guru rings in my head until I almost see in the manner it was spoken. Of course it was in Malay language and it literally means, “We are sent by God to live life on earth nothing other than to submit to Him in total. But God has encased us in a physical body. Physical body needs food to survive. Hence, the food that gives the livelihood to the physical body is just merely to enable us to submit to Him”.

On the same note, imagine if we were to be created without the need of foods. We can remain idle just like a box in a store room for decades and yet still alive. Don’t talk about using toilets since you have nothing to purge. We can just enjoy looking at the sky witnessing the changes of the day and night for months if we wish. We can just remain sleeping for years. Why should we bother to trouble ourselves with all those earthly things when we could even survive without moving a finger? One thing certain, there will never be any progress takes place for mankind.

The irony is, being humans; nothing will ever satisfy us because we are created to be such. While drowning in a swimming pool, it is absurd if you are thinking of having a big bungalow and a luxury car, instead of screaming out for help for you to be able to breath. Once breathing is taken for granted, our stomach is constantly demanding to be replenished. Starving person never wants to see a menu to order his food, anything will do. But once the food is regularly delivered until we don’t have to think much of it, don’t you think it’s time to consider where to put up a night? Where the place is provides better shade from the sunlight, better protection from the rain? Having all those, so then you’d say, “Hey, I am human too; I think I am in love…”

Well, well, well, I tell you what, it goes on and on until we don’t know where is the point for us to stop. As a matter of fact, on the other hand, stopping or not is out of question here. The only concern is whether we understand or not what grateful is all about – at any point of life while having what we have or wanting what we don't have. The answer will only be unveiled if we can really understand the deeper meaning of “grateful”, far beyond the meaning of the word can offer.

Let's pray to God for the verse below to inspire us upon something:

Al-A'raf (The Heights)

وَلَقَدْ مَكَّنَّاكُمْ فِي الأَرْضِ وَجَعَلْنَا لَكُمْ فِيهَا مَعَايِشَ قَلِيلاً مَّا تَشْكُرُونَ
(7:10)

YEA, INDEED, [O men,] We have given you a [bountiful] place on earth, and appointed thereon means of livelihood for you: [yet] how seldom are you grateful!

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