DISTRACTIONS

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ourselves and regress ourselves is recorded and known to God.

[75:12] To your Lord, on that day, is the final destiny. [75:13] The human being will be informed, on that day, of everything he did to advance himself, and everything he did to regress himself. [75:14] The human being will be his own judge. [75:15] No excuses will be accepted.

[23:101] When the horn is blown, no relations among them will exist on that day, nor will they care about one another. [23:102] As for those whose weights are heavy, they will be the winners. [23:103] Those whose weights are light are the ones who lost their souls; they abide in Hell forever.

I like to think of those weights as our good deeds. God’s reward. We want to get as many good deeds as we can in this life. We can positively reinforce the good that we do and acknowledge it going into our record. Our own encouragement or pat on the back. We have to be careful not to become boastful, proud or arrogant. All good comes from God. But this check to reality can help us to not get sucked into the void of distraction.

Many times, we don’t have an immediate reward directly presented to us. But we know our reward is in the Hereafter. [32:17] You have no idea how much joy

and happiness are waiting for you as a reward for your (righteous) works.

An extension of positive reinforcement of things being written to our record is to ask God for rewards in Heaven. For instance. “Let my record show that I am here for Jumu'ah, paying attention, remembering God and heeding the reminder that I will be held accountable.” We know God has already recorded all that, but when we consciously acknowledge it ourselves and thank God for being able to do it, it reinforces the blessing.

Then, we might add “And it would be nice if I had … in Paradise.”

Why ask? If we cannot conceive the beauty and joy that awaits in Heaven, why try?  Well, why not? We can take the Quranic descriptions of Paradise and know that whatever we come up with, it exceeds it. Trying to conceive of it, and knowing how beautiful it is, gives our mind this connection to the beauty that exists there. Not only do our hearts melt for the beauty of Paradise, but even our mind right now, thinking the positive thoughts, benefits from such a thought. We get double benefit.

Some personal examples: I would love to have gelato in heaven. A cherry tree I can share. Nice grass that I don’t have to tend to. And so on. What beautiful things can you come up with? And again, the point isn’t to get greedy or “I’ll do this, so You give me that” behavior.

We know that even just making it to Paradise is great. [3:185] Every person tastes death, then you receive your recompense on the Day of Resurrection. Whoever misses Hell, barely, and makes it to Paradise, has attained a great triumph. The life of this world is no more than an illusion.

It is about being able to connect to the true reality. Understanding that we have a record that will note everything we do. Understanding that we want to return to God with a record we are proud of, with heavy weights because we will be held accountable. Understanding that Paradise is the eternal abode as a reward. So, whether we get the cherry tree in this life or not, doesn’t matter to us. May God make us aware of the reality. Help us stay focused on the truth of this life and avoid all the pitfalls of distractions. May God accept all of our good deeds, however small, acknowledged by us or not, and help us grow in good beyond expectations.

[2:25] Give good news to those who believe and lead a righteous life that they will have gardens with flowing streams. When provided with a provision of fruits therein, they will say, “This is what was provided for us previously.” Thus, they are given allegorical descriptions. They will have pure spouses therein, and they abide therein forever.

Kenan