Two aspects of life

Have you ever felt that you are a little happier on a certain day for no obvious reason? Or some days you may feel too sad despite everything under control? Did you ever notice that you go through spells in life when everything will go well, you will be at the top at your work, your bosses will be happy, you will be up-to-date with your jobs, you will be getting the results you want and will feel on top of the world. Gradually that time would pass and you'd go through a period where you'd feel life to be bumpy. Nothing will go smoothly. You will be grumpy and irritated. I have recently become aware of this so called 'cycle'. I had wished to prolong the 'good' time and tried to somehow avoid the 'difficult' bit. I feel I have cracked the code.

I feel there are two 'bits' of life and both need nourishment and care. A 'physical' or 'visible' life we have and an 'unseen' or so called 'spiritual' part of life. I understand in modern Britain, it may be obsolete to use the terminology 'spiritual', hence I will use the term 'unseen' part of life. A nice car or a house, pretty or a handsome spouse, nice job etc feed the visible or 'physical' life. It makes you happy but the happiness is short-lived. The more you feed it, the more it needs. It's almost like a drug addiction. The more you get it, the lesser the pleasure becomes with the same dose and more dose needed to get similar euphoria. It does indeed make you feel happier no doubt, but the pleasure will definitely be short-lived. For instance. You have bought a lovely car. The euphoria and pleasure is there but will gradually wean off. After sometime, it will become a routine. Then you may want a different car or a different model, so on and so forth. Every time you 'feed' your physical life, you may end up in peace for sometime but there will definitely be something next. Your mind or 'physical' life will attract you to the next 'aim' of life. In doing so, the 'physical' life gets fed and consequently get healthier and healthier, requiring more and more 'food' but the poor 'unseen' life, which some of you may not be aware of, get frailer and frailer. As both parts (physical and unseen lives) make your life, you will invariably notice that despite having most of the wishes fulfilled for the 'physical' life, you may still not have the inner peace or tranquility. If you say you have that peace or tranquility without feeding the 'unseen' life, there are good chances, you may never have felt or understood what that inner peace or tranquility is. We have countless examples of millionaires who could easily feed their physical life, having complete chaos in their life. There are many examples of millionaire's suiciding. That is a perfect example of neglected 'unseen' part of your life, which makes you unhappy or discontent overall.

What is that 'unseen' part of life. How can we feed it and make it healthier? It is nonetheless, part of our life. Our whole life (physical and unseen) can't be complete or content until we pay attention to this 'unseen' part of the life. Let's see how we can look after the 'unseen part' of our life along with, the usually well looked after or the one we worry more about, 'physical' life. Let's start with an example. Its a Friday evening, and you bought a take away meal for your family. This is your's and your family's favourite take away. You came out of the shop with the food parcel and immediately met by a homeless person sitting in the cold. He looks at you with lots of questions and hunger in his eyes. You think for a second, and hand that food parcel to him and go to the shop to get the take away for your family again. This is where you have fed your 'unseen' life. The peace and serenity will be incomparable. The thirsty and hungry 'unseen life' will have a breath of fresh air. The healthy and ever building 'physical' life may initially try to convince you to keep the food for your own family, they are waiting for you at home, it may get too late for dinner etc, but eventually you will feel the other part of life, the 'unseen' part, once nourished, will make your 'physical' and eventually your whole life more content and peaceful. This was just an example. In short, some deeds and acts of kindness will bring some nourishment for the other part of your life, the often ignored part of your life, the 'unseen' part of your life. For your complete life to be healthy and peaceful, you will need both 'physical' and 'unseen' parts of your life to be healthy. You cant have one part overcompensate for the other. If you ever have to choose one, feeding the 'unseen' will be a better one although the 'physical' part will intermittently nudge you to be fed.

The modern day living is moulded to feed the 'physical life'. Commodities and attaining luxuries of life have become the utmost aims. Children grow up with this mindset, if you are rich, you are successful, unaware of being in a race of comparisons and achieving supremacy over their friends and foes. The 'physical life' gets the privilege, the 'unseen' one, ignored.

Is it difficult to feed the 'unseen' life? If so, why is it difficult to feed the 'unseen life'? Some of the the deeds or acts to feed the 'unseen' life may be simple and common as I gave the example above. But sometimes the definition of a 'deed' which may feed the 'unseen' life may be not be straight forward for our limited minds and understanding. I may be selling elicit drugs or a poison thinking I am doing a good deed. So who defines or describes the 'unseen' life-feeding deeds. This is where the "true" religion kicks in. As I mentioned above, some of the 'unseen' life-feeding deeds will be simple and full of common sense. But some will only be understood in the light of the divine guidance. The true religion defines what is the 'food' for the 'unseen' life, not what is in the air or merely a social trend.

So if you think you are having more of those sad, discontent days, then think yourself, are you feeding both parts of your life proportionately? Are you feeding the 'physical' bit more than the 'unseen' bit? If you manage to find that balance of feeding both parts of your life, you will be the happiest person on the planet and would have cracked the code of humanity as defined by the Lord Almighty.

Signing off

Ahsan Mughal