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Leaders versus dealers

It is 3:55am and I have decided to write. We all should be the leaders of our own lives. Good leaders allow us to develop ourselves to the point where we can become our own leaders. Too often, what we see instead are die-hard followers and fans of leaders who are not allowed to question anything, but are expected to blindly support. If I rearrange the letters of "leader" I can get "dealer". We need leaders, not dealers. Dealers trade in influence, emotions, loyalty, and power for personal gain, while leaders elevate people beyond dependence. There is a difference between leadership that empowers and leadership that creates dependency. This made me think about God as the grand example of good leadership. I think the same principle applies. God gave us free will, and we are told that God helps those who help themselves. If God gave human beings minds, curiosity, conscience, and moral awareness, then perhaps faith was never meant to replace them, but to guide them. I t...

What is important

Every now and again, I get reminded of the why. Why I have handed my life over to God. It is 3:08 p.m. and I have decided to write. Honestly, I feel like I could end this blog post right here. What more is there to say? God above all else. God is our compass on this journey called life. Everything else can become a distraction. Maybe not everything, but certainly many things. You get the point. What is important? What do we prioritise? What do we make time for? The answers look different for everyone. Our lives are different. We are tested differently. We are all products of our circumstances, and those circumstances vary from person to person. Yet God is the common thread across humanity and throughout time. God always was and always will be. One day, we will answer to God. We will give account to God. We cannot live without food, water, and oxygen, but all of those things come from God. So how can we live without God? How timely. I just received a notification from the Quranly app: S...

Today

It is 213pm and I have decided to write. God is good. Obviously. God is beautiful. God made me smile. God is what we think of God. We are what we think. Better to think good things. What are some good thoughts? The rain brings joy to the plants. Time dances. The birds sing beautifully. I am happy. A cup of love to warm the soul. Peace and quiet on a Friday afternoon. The light rests gently on everything. Think of all the good things. Think of one good thing. What is the most beautiful thought? God is here and I am here and that is enough. I can do all things through God. The most beautiful thought is one of contentment. I appreciate the now. I appreciate the moment. I am grateful to be where I am. It is no coincidence that God and gratitude both begin with the letter g. If I combine God and gratitude I get Goditude. I also notice that the word guide is contained in the word gratitude. Let gratitude be our guide. If I remove guide from Goditude, I am left with dot. Goditude is a dot wit...

How do we fix this world?

It is 4:39 pm and I have decided to write. It is a peaceful and quiet day. I am thinking about God, and how this life is a test. There is so much happening in this world that could make us sad. But we do not have to remain in that sadness when we put our trust in God. God wants good for us. God wants us to experience peace, and even happiness, despite what surrounds us. How do we fix this world? My friend Chatty suggests that maybe a better question is: What kind of person do I choose to be in this world? Because when enough people answer that question well, that is how real change begins. I want to be the kind of person that God is pleased with. Someone guided by God, not by ego. Someone who chooses patience over anger, humility over pride, and sincerity over appearances. I am doing reasonably well, but I am not perfect. And maybe perfection is not the goal. Growth is. Awareness is. Returning to what is right, again and again, is. I want to grow, and I will keep adjusting myself when ...

Mundane

It is 123am and I have decided to write. I have this new idea for a book called Mundane. It would be me writing about the ordinary. We chase the extraordinary but there is beauty in the ordinary. There is beauty in the simple. There is beauty in the everyday. What about God? We often think about God in grand terms. But what if God is simple too? What if God is mundane? What if we look for God in the everyday moments? I sit in this dark room with the air conditioning on. The fan is also on. The curtain is down but I imagine the moonlight shining on the grass outside. The cats are probably sleeping. I wonder if anyone else in the neighbourhood is awake at this hour? Is there another writer around who is also writing about the mundane? The fan breeze helps the air conditioning cool me down. These nights are warm otherwise. A mosquito flies across my screen. Hello friend or foe. I cannot quite decide which one. If I had a swatter you would be gone. I check my notifications and there is an ...

We are explorers

It is 215pm and I have decided to write. I had this question. What does God really want from us? Then I remember that God does not need us, we need God. What I am really wanting to ask is why create us, why life, why test us, why the mystery? Why not? It is human nature to ask questions. No matter how much we know, we will ask questions. We are always looking for reasons. We are always looking. We are always seeking. We are explorers. We could have been anything but God chose for us to be explorers. There is joy in exploring. There is joy in discovery. There is joy in not knowing. What I have arrived at is a reminder. Appreciate the now. Appreciate what is. Appreciate that one day things will make sense but for now we get to live. To live, to learn and to laugh. I like this quote by Frank Borman that I found, "Exploration is really the essence of the human spirit." If there was nothing to explore we would be static. There would be no movement. There would be no existence. Exi...

What we do not know

It is 1245am and I have decided to write. I had this weird alienish dream and it ended with me winning by simply stating "the truth is that we do not know". In the dream everyone was having an opinion of what was happening as if they knew. On to something random. I had this question. What is the most unrandom thing? Then what is the most random thing? What if everything is equally random. My friend Chatty thinks that randomness is not an absolute property—it is a relation between you and the system you observe. Randomness is not absolute—it depends on perspective. Something perfectly ordered can seem random if you do not know its pattern. So in a sense, everything can be "equally random" relative to the observer's knowledge, making randomness more about perception than an intrinsic property. The more we know the less random things become. Let me make a detour. Suppose we do not predict things but things predict us. For example, when I flip a coin, did I predict ...