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We believe that a true and comprehensive understanding of Islam would not be possible without careful recognition of the Prophetic Tradition and the Prophet's Household. And Allah is the Source of Strength.
 

A Life Underutilized Is A Life Wasted

" Many scholars and philosophers would try to bring in new reasons for the existence of life and would try to rationalize why we, the humans, have been sent into the world, for what purpose?

It is a testimony to Allah's will and might, that because Allah could, Allah did create us.

But Allah has given each of us, a unique skill, a unique talent, our true potential. The greater the potential and resources, the greater the responsibility.

Our responsibility is our reason for creation and to exist and in Allah's own words, Quran Surah 51, Ayah 56, is to serve him (Allah).

The service to Allah is our faith in Tauheed, Adal, nabuwat, Imamat and Qayamat, to be translated into Kalimah, Namaz, Roza, Haj, Zakat, Khums, Jihad, Amr bil Maruf Wa Nahi Anr Munkir, based on our sincerity and piety.

But we all must realize that the service to Allah as an individual is the bare minimum.

In a fair and competitive corporate world, where hard work is rewarded, the higher the potential of the person, the bigger the job responsibility is put on his shoulders. That is why the top management are the ones with highest individual potential and are eventually responsible for any line management failure.

For example, a safety incident which occurred because of a technician's fault, the CEO is directly responsible, because it is the CEO's responsibility to ensure competent HR is hired, properly trained, the right Operating Procedures are developed and implemented. That is why the CEO earns in millions and the technicians or other field operators do not have a similar extravagant pay scale. The CEO is responsible for everything while the technician is only for his own actions.

That is why, the higher the potential, the lower the singularity of an individual. People with potential think beyond themselves and widen the circle of their responsibilities. Their service to Allah is much outside the horizon of their own personal life.

Allah says in Surah 23, Ayah 62, that a burden is not laid on any soul except to the extent of its ability. This proves that every soul has different ability or potential and thus shall carry a different set of burden, shall carry out a different spectrum of service to Allah.

Why is there poverty in the world, illiteracy in the world, ignorance in the world? Why is there extremism, infidelity, wickedness? Why do our children, who are born innocent, grow up to be snakes and scorpions who spread fitnah an fasaad?

It is because we did not realize our true potential, or we did not make efforts to increase our potential. Our charity, our act of kindness, our contribution, is limited to our own life, or usually, to the lives of our wife and children. We did not spread our circle of responsibility to our poor relative, our uneducated neighbor, our deprived friend. We gave few rupees to the beggar but we did not take responsibility for sending their child to school.

The world is in a mess today because we did not capitalize on our full potential. Allah gave us wealth, intellect, independence, time, peace. Our potential had every opportunity to materialize itself, but we ended up spending money on our leisure, and time on extravaganza.

A company which hires hi-potential, highly paid individuals to do lowly jobs which could have been managed through a much lower skillset and payscale, is bearing the economic cost of such misadministration.

Imagine, the cost we are paying by underutilizing our talent, our skillset, our life and how will we be able to justify the "economic" loss before the absolute accountability?

Imam Hussain (AS) stepped outside his personal self and showed the world the tremendous amount of potential and ability Allah had granted to the blood of Prophet (SAW). Why not should then the authority promote such potential to the ranks of Prince of Paradise (AS)? After all, the top potential is the one which is highly paid. "

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