There’s a story I once heard about a donkey who fell in a hole. Not knowing what to do, its owner decided to bury it alive. The donkey was so scared it panicked and started to shake the dirt off. More and more dirt came pouring in, so much so that it stepped on it as it went higher and higher. At the end of day, it finally managed to jump out of the hole!

Are you able to see what I see? Such is life.  Time and again, we’ll find ourselves being thrown with dirt that we don’t see coming. We face hard times – i.e  losing a job, failing exams, finding ourselves in mounts of debt, and so on so forth.  Times like these, isn’t it so much easier to give up and run away, sweep everything under the rug and pretend nothing happened? Doing so, I realized, only leave me thinking about it days after and makes me feel so depressed and sad and annoyed and the thought of ‘WHAT IF‘ keeps popping in my head. It got me thinking how on earth do some people feel so alive and happy? They’re so lucky to not face hardship! Little did I know, no one gets out of it.

Some question -

‘Why is my life so difficult? Why is it full of problems? Why can’t it be easy?‘

Guess what? No one’s life is easy. Life isn’t all sunshine and rainbows. It isn’t meant to be easy. If it isn’t hard, then we won’t know what  Happiness is. And if we had everything, we wouldn’t know what Happiness meant. It is the simplest term I can find to understand this logic.

Why does it seem like some don’t face problems is because they learn how to look on the brighter side and see these problems as TESTS for them. Instead of drowning in depression on how life keeps throwing lemons at them, they take it in and they build themselves through it. I thought this was a whole load of crap up till I tried for myself. Besides what did I have to lose right? If it didn’t do me good then I’ll just suck it up anyway. 

The result? It was satisfying. Of course it took practice and lots of time but I was able to control my being better than I did before. To accept and understand the fact that ALL things happen for a reason and that He won’t allow something to happen unless it is good for me – it was an experience that I’m holding on tight till date. I trust that He knows whats best for me even though I think otherwise. It struck me when I chanced upon this -

But it is possible that you dislike a thing which is good for you, and that you love a thing which is bad for you. But Allah knows, and you know not.
Al-Baqarah, Verse 216 

Tests are nothing but trials to make us better individuals. If we perceive our tests to make us miserable, then miserable we will be. BUT if we put it in a way that we’re able to make lemonade with all them lemons, then life will be pretty awesome as how we make it to be. It is really up to us as to how we want things to work out, really. But it’s sad how some refuse to embrace this and rather dwell on their never ending problems. If that makes you happy,I can’t force you, all I’m saying is that there’s a better option and it starts from within.

We can’t run away from all the problems that come our way, but we can work through it and be better or we can let it bring us down. Ultimately- it is YOUR choice. yes, your choice, you decide what’s best for yourself. So look on the bright side. Remember, there’s always two sides to a coin. Our problems are as temporary as our happiness, so make do with what you have at best. It starts with a positive mind and the determination to be better than who we are today

Keep Smiling

-Hana