Decoding Poetry 

| Daily Blogs, Reading & Writingby

One of the many things that I inherited from my father was his love for poetry, specifically Urdu Ghazals. Poetry appears in many forms: poems, ghazals, nazms, sonnets, odes, elegies, ballads, free verse, etc. Personally, I love anything that rhymes.  

Poetry is quite powerful as well, if you get the hang of it. When I am able to connect with the seemingly un-seeming words of a poem, I am hooked. It feels like magic as it makes me start looking at the world in a different light. No wonder Poets were both chastised and cherished by powerful governments right through history, just because poems have the ability to stir the masses. Our own Allama Iqbal is rightly credited with instilling a sense of unity and belonging in our struggle to form a country for the Muslims of the subcontinent.  

The beauty of poetry, whatever language it may be in, is that its real meaning is often hidden behind layers, which one has to peel back to reach the heart of it. 

So over time, I developed a simple method to understand poetry. 

1. Read the poem. ‘Duh. That’s so original!’  you might say. But the reason I mention this is that you might get frustrated because the words are too difficult, OR you don’t understand the meaning or context. Don’t worry, that is normal. Just keep reading and finish the poem in one go.  

2. Highlight the difficult words and find their meanings. In the age of AI, you can find the meanings very quickly. I normally take a picture and put it in Gemini and ask it to give me the meanings of the difficult words. I do still highlight those words and write their meanings inside the book. It saves me going back and forth between the book and Gemini during my multiple re-reads.   

Read the poem again. At this point, the first layer should be removed, and the literal meaning would be surfacing.  

3. Find the hidden meanings. This is where the magic lies, and it requires a little bit of effort. I call this as ‘finding the meaning of the meaning’ or what the poet actually means. This step is important and would need a little bit of research on the poet and his worldview.  

Because great poets do not write about just anything. They write about things that matter the most to them. Things that make them emotional. So to peel this layer and get to the hidden meaning you would have to find answers to some questions about the poet like ‘the times the poet lived in’, ‘what were some issues that society was facing at that time’, ‘what were some issues that the poet was going through’, ‘what did the poet normally write about?’, ‘what was his world view’, ‘what images or styles did he normally uses’.  

Again, Gemini is a great time saver here. And normally, you would have to do this once for one poet. Because things that matter to great poets normally do not change in their lifetimes. Also, a poet hardly changes his style, e.g., a poet may use nature to explain his take on life. , 

Note that you might not agree with the poet’s worldview, but it is still important for you to understand where he is coming from.   

These three steps are most important, and let us study them with an example.  

e.g.  

The Woods are lovely, dark, and deep 
But I have promises to keep 
And miles to go before I sleep 
And miles to go before I sleep 

Here, the literal meaning can be that the poet likes the woods and likes to watch them. But he has some other work and wants to do that.

But this literal meaning is not very magical. Is it? So we have to ask some questions about the poet. Robert Frost loves nature. His poems, at least the ones I have read and loved, are all about nature. But he also relates them to life and choices in life.   

So if you understand Frost’s style, you might peel the next layer and see that by ‘woods’ he means the ‘world with all its attractions’, and by ‘promises’ he means ‘responsibilities’ and by ‘sleep’ he means ‘death’. So the meaning of the meaning becomes that although he loves many things that the world has to offer, he has many responsibilities that he needs to fulfil and cannot ignore. And these responsibilities are so many that he denotes them by ‘miles’. And perhaps it would take a lifetime to fulfill them. But maybe somewhere along the way, he would find some other attractions like this and would just pause for a while to enjoy them, and then he would move again.  

This is what I mean about finding the meaning of the meaning.  

If you want, you can stop here. But I have a few more steps. 

4. Find your meaning. You don’t need to go with what the poet probably meant by his poem. Poems, Ghazals, and Nazms are so full of options that you can draw your own meaning. For example, in the lines above, I like to draw a meaning that connects with my own being and its relationship with my Creator — the magnificent Allah Almighty — and with the attractions that Allah Himself has placed in this world for us. 

If I use these attractions to pause for a while, enjoy them, and re-energize myself, then they are helpful. But if I allow them to make me forget my responsibilities and the purpose of my life, then I am at a loss. 

5. Listen to a good orator so that you can know how to recite the words with correct pronunciation and weight. I love doing that. Because it helps me read with emotions.  

6. Finally, read it many times and also explain it to others. Often, I explain a new Ghazal or poem that I have decoded to my kids or my wife. Sometimes the expression on their faces, when they get to know the actual meaning,  is priceless. Many times, they explain the meanings that they understood to me, which I love even more. Most importantly, this helps me memorize the poem.  

Well, that is it for today. I will leave you with a poem by Robert Frost, and you let me know in the comments your meaning! 

Nature’s first green is gold 
Her hardest hue to hold 
Her early leaf’s a flower 
But only so an hour 
Then leaf subsides to leaf 
So Eden Sank to Grief 
So dawn turns down to day 
Nothing Gold, can stay. 

Pakistan’s soul is bigger than its size.

| Daily Blogs, Faith & Lifeby

In his extremely informative book 1971 — Fact & Fiction, Afrasiab Mehdi Hashmi writes that Pakistan’s soul is bigger than its size.

This sentence made so much sense to me that I had to stop reading for a while and think about what I had just read. Pakistan’s soul is bigger than its size. Which meant that the idea behind Pakistan is larger than the land it occupies. As Pakistan was not created as a separate homeland for people belonging to a specific race, language, colour, tribe, or ethnicity, but rather for people, the Muslims, who wanted to live their lives as per the Quran and Sunnah.

I do not know whether our founding fathers fully grasped the depth of the idea of Pakistan that they were striving for. Maybe they just wanted freedom to practice their religious customs and rituals without fear of discrimination from an antagonistic Hindu majority. Maybe some, like Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah, had something broader in their mind, like an Islamic system of finance and governance. Or maybe even some were motivated by the greed of earning power, money, and position.

Maybe our founding fathers imagined and planned for it, or maybe they did not. But this is what we have today. A Pakistan that unites distinct nations — Punjabis, Sindhis, Pashtuns, Baloch, Muhajirs and others — by their belief in Allah and His final Messenger ﷺ.

Suddenly, we are in a position to not just freely practice our beliefs but also show the world the beauty of an Islamic way of life. How complete it is. How successful it can be. How Islamic values can organize society, economy, education, justice, family, politics, and morality. Pakistanis are now tasked to show how an Islamic system can protect the poor through Zakat and Ushr, and how minorities and non-Muslims can be protected with justice and dignity. How taxation can be fair and limited. How governance can be moral. How wealth can circulate. How power can be restrained. How can the law be above the powerful.

The more I think about it, the more I see it as a huge responsibility that has been placed upon us. History has seen much bigger Islamic empires such as the Banu Umayya, Banu Abbas, and the Ottomans with the same responsibility. They, too, held within their boundaries people who belonged to different races but were united by their belief in Allah and His final Messenger ﷺ.

But now, history has passed this baton to a much smaller and much less powerful country – Pakistan.

Additionally, this modern world has brought with it many new complex and intricate systems, like banking and finance, media and propaganda, mass education, modern armies, international law, technology, and nation-state politics. All of which has to be studied and structured in accordance with Islamic rules.

And in 78 years of our existence, how well have we done towards fulfilling this responsibility? Despite some pessimistic judgements, I do not see complete darkness. We have worked towards Islamic banking and Modern Islamic education systems. We have a professional armed force where soldiers can easily inculcate the glorious Islamic principles of Jihad and Shahadat. We have scientists, scholars, teachers, writers, businessmen, students, and ordinary people who can still dream the Islamic dream and execute it within their individual and social capacities.

Also, as we move towards 100 years of our existence, we must protect ourselves from forces that can take us away from the Quran & Sunnah. We must protect ourselves from our own laziness and lethargy. We must protect ourselves from corruption, nepotism, dishonesty, and the love of shortcuts. We must stop treating Pakistan merely as a piece of land from which we extract materialistic benefits.

We must raise our children with modern education, yes, but also with strong tarbiyyah. They must learn mathematics, science, finance, technology, and languages. But they must also learn what is right and wrong. They must know who they are. They must know why Pakistan was created. And how to defend that dream.

This divine purpose of Pakistan cannot be protected merely by slogans, flags, songs, or speeches. It has to be protected by living it every day. In our homes. In our schools. In our offices. In our businesses. In our politics. In our courts. And most of all in our characters and in our hearts.

Pakistan’s soul is bigger than its size.

But a soul must be protected.

That, perhaps, is the real test.

And that, perhaps, is the real Pakistan Dream.

How Not to Win An Argument

| Be Productive, Daily Blogsby

His eyes were bulging out of their sockets. He had a very sullen, sombre expression on his face, which had turned red, possibly because of the underlying pulsating arteries about to burst. He sat on the edge of the seat with his arms on the table right opposite his opponent. It looked as if they were dueling rather than debating.

He was not letting his opponent explain his point of view. He would cut his opponent’s sentence, quickly pass a judgement, which basically meant how stupid his opponent was (and as a reflection of how bright he was). His carefully selected audience immediately clapped, and his paid staff immediately turned this long debate into a short clip for YouTube and Instagram, after which his copywriters came up with a clickbait title that basically said he had destroyed his opponent. And then, with the help of bots and fellow sympathizers, they made the video viral.

When I saw this short clip, although I agreed with his point of view more than his opponent, I immediately felt that this was exactly how not to win an argument.

For me, there is a difference between winning an argument and settling an argument. You might win an argument with theatrics and a carefully planted audience. But settling an argument basically destroys the opponent’s defense bit by bit, so much so that the opponent himself feels that he has lost, and next time he either should change the topic OR change his line of argument.

I have seen much more intense debates on topics which were much more sensitive, but carried out with a calm and peaceful demeanour. e.g., Rather than burning the books of the Bāṭinī sect, Imam Ghazali (ra) chose to burn the arguments inside their books. A burnt book can always be written again, but an argument that has been properly exposed, answered, and defeated cannot rise again with the same strength.

I feel we should try to settle arguments and not just win them. The best way to do that is to try to understand the line that your opponent is taking to such a deeper level that you can explain your opponent’s argument more lucidly than the opponent himself. Listen to him in a calm and composed manner. And don’t try to put words in his mouth.

And after he finishes, take his argument and defence apart, bit by bit. Make sure you cover all angles and reply to all his points. Sometimes your single sentence would destroy his entire line. This is how you can settle the argument and not just win it.

Obviously, this requires a bit more reading and preparation than a simple fist fight of words. Well, it’s just a thought. You tell me what you think. Till then

Cheeku Panta!!

Super Service from Noon.Com

| Daily Blogs, Life In Kuwaitby

Just received my first package from Noon.com.

I had ordered an e-reader, which was supposed to be shipped from Abu Dhabi. Considering the current situation, I assumed it would take at least a week to reach Kuwait. Even the expected delivery date was showing 14th to 15th June.

But lo and behold, it arrived in two days.

I don’t know whether I was lucky and placed the order at just the right time or whether this is normal for them. Either way, I was pleasantly surprised.

I have been looking for my first e-reader for quite some time, but I was not able to find it in any of the electronics stores here in Kuwait. Recently, I read a positive review of Noon.com on 248am.com and thought I should give it a try.

I am glad I did.

I will definitely consider ordering from Noon.com again when the need arises. As for the e-reader, I will use it for a few days and then write something about the experience.

In Favor of ‘Comfort Zone’

| Daily Blogsby

So you are telling me to “come out of my comfort zone,” to “explore life,” because “you only live once.”

But my question to you is: why?

If I am fulfilling my responsibilities, then let me enjoy the comfort of my comfort zone. Let me relax, recharge, and basically be comfortable.

Don’t tell me that you wake up at 3 a.m., pick up heavy boulders, swim in a freezing river or lake, kill a bear with your bare hands for breakfast, and then you do this and then you do that, and then finally, at night, you sleep out in the open with hard rock as your bed, leaves as your blanket, and the sky as your roof.

I don’t care if you sleep with the lions.

After my 9 to 5, I am happy to eat freshly prepared, tasty, home-cooked food, lie down on my bed, read a book, and sleep with my head on a comfortable pillow, under a blanket of just the ideal weight, with the room temperature set to just the right centigrades.

Thank you very much.

I, and millions like me, have spent a considerable amount of time and effort making our lives comfortable. So when you come and tell me to leave that comfortable life, then sorry, I would simply say that you are yapping.

Maybe one day, if I decide, after all my calculations, that I feel like taking some sort of risk, then I may leave my comfort zone, dip my toes into the freezing water, and see if I am interested or not. If not, I will wear my socks and shoes again and come back to my comfort zone.

But if I like it, then I will make plans to extend, not leave, my comfort zone to include whatever new thing I want to add to my life.

You might ask: what will happen if life throws me a curveball and I am pushed out of my comfort zone?

Well, that is a possibility.

But then why make my life uncomfortable today on the assumption that it might become hard tomorrow? Why not enjoy the wonders and beauties of life while I can?

And who knows whether my assumption about the curveball is even correct? Maybe I make my life uncomfortable to prepare for financial losses, but I get health losses instead.

I am truly sorry, but I am not interested in challenging my comfort zones, only to get stuck while climbing a mountain and die of hunger and thirst. Good luck to all the daredevils out there. But I am frankly not very interested in it.

Till then, I will enjoy the comforts that Allah has bestowed on me. Be thankful. Be gracious. And even ask for more.

Chow. Chow.

Where Lies the Power…

| A Better Muslim, Daily Blogsby

In our recent Taleems, I was reading this Aayat:

Inna al-hukmu illa lillah
إِنِ الْحُكْمُ إِلَّا لِلَّهِ

It is hard to find a single English word for hukm. It can mean order, rule, decision, judgment, command, or authority. So perhaps one way to translate it is:

“The final rule and decision belong only to Allah.”

And then, as often happens while reflecting on the Quran, I started having a conversation with myself. I started piecing this Aayat together with some other unsolved equations in my brain.

The Quran is like that. You can go as deep as you want, and the deeper you go, the clearer the picture becomes. I do not know how deep I have reached. Maybe I am still in shallow waters. But these questions are my attempt to understand these words of the Quran a little more.

Does this Aayat mean that all political struggle is a waste? That rulers and heads of state, whom we consider the most powerful people in the world, are actually not powerful at all? In many other places in the Quran, Allah says that He gives mulk — power, kingdom, authority — to whom He wills. So should we blame rulers for our state of affairs? Or is there another question before that? When we are not doing our duty to Allah, can we expect rulers to do their duty towards us?

When we are not obedient to Allah, why do we expect others to be just, obedient, merciful, and responsible towards us?

Am I waiting for society to change, while society is waiting for me to change? Is there a link? Will society change when I change? Or at least, will my part of society change when I change?

Maybe this is why many of the learned scholars stayed away from positions of power. Even when power was offered to them, they refused it. They chose instead to focus on learning, teaching, reforming hearts, and preserving the principles of Islam. Perhaps they understood something that we keep forgetting: power is not always where we think it is.

إِنِ الْحُكْمُ إِلَّا لِلَّهِ

And maybe this is also why so many “impactful” leaders — those whom we call great, cruel, wise, foolish, successful, or disastrous — often set out to do one thing and end up doing something entirely different.

They planned. Others reacted in ways that they didn’t expect. And history moved forward.

But finally, whatever happened was whatever Allah commanded to happen.

Inna al-hukmu illa lillah.

I wonder, but if I can only wonder.

Take care and till next time.

Assaan Naikiyyan – Easy Good Deeds

| A Better Muslim, Daily Blogs, Faith & Lifeby

I read this book, Assaan Naikiyyan, by Mufti Taqi Usmani, many years ago and found it very helpful. So I included its reading in our daily Taleem after Isha.

The premise of the book, as the title suggests, is how to do deeds that carry the highest reward with the minimum effort. Till now, we have read three easy good deeds.

Intention. For any action that we do during the day, we should make the intention that this action is purely for the Raza of Allah. Even for work that is purely for our duniya, like going to the office, going to the gym, or going out to dinner with family or friends, as long as it is not a haraam activity, we can make the same intention. It does not take much time, but it converts the entire action into a form of worship and therefore becomes a means of earning a great reward.

Dua. Ask Allah. Speak to Allah. Before any action or after any action. When you succeed or when you fail. When you are scared or when you are confident. When you are happy or when you are sad. Ask for His Help. Tell Him what is going on in your life. What is good and what is bad? What you liked and what you did not like.

Often, Ulema explain dua not only as “asking Allah” but also as “talking to Allah.” And Allah is the only One who encourages us to make duas and ask Him for everything and anything that we want. Even our Prophet ﷺ guided us to ask Allah for help even if the lace of our shoe is broken and needs to be mended.

Again, this does not need much preparation or any big effort, and the rewards are so many that they cannot be counted. The biggest reward that the book mentions is that dua builds a strong, unbreakable bond between Allah and us. Is that not the biggest reward one can hope for?

You only need to remember to do it. And the more often you do it, the more natural it becomes.

Masnoon Duaein. These are the duas, or invocations, that our Prophet ﷺ used to recite before starting his daily activities. For example, waking up, going to sleep, entering the washroom, coming out of the washroom, eating, drinking water, looking in the mirror, wearing clothes, leaving the house, returning home, entering the masjid, leaving the masjid, starting a journey, etc.

There are many books available that contain these duas. If we can memorize even one dua per day, then within a few days, all our daily work will start with the blessing of Allah, because it will begin with the prayer that our Prophet ﷺ taught us. And hence, the rewards would be much higher, while the effort would not even total more than five minutes per day.

Well, that is where I have reached in the book so far. As I read more, I will add more.

Till then.

Take care!

Switching to ‘A Blog A Day’

| Daily Blogsby

So last year, i.e., 2025, I published a total of …. wait … (drum roll) … 9 blogs. Yaaaayyyyyy.

Yeah, okay, I know it’s not much. But I was just mocking myself for writing 1 blog every 41 days. Well, I wrote more but published less, but who is counting those, right?

And it is not that my blogs are being shortlisted for Pulitzers and whatever writing prizes are out there in the world.

So this made me wonder about my blog writing process. Which, if broken a bit further, is writing, editing, writing, editing, editing, editing, writing, editing, deleting everything, writing, deleting that, then recovering what I had deleted 3 edits ago, then reading, writing, editing, editing, editing… Well, I know you get my point.

The worst part of my entire process is reading what I have written. If it was once or twice, then it is supposedly fine. But reading whatever junk I am writing close to a million times is not fun. Not as fun as writing. Which makes me pity the total number of zero readers that I have there for this blog.

Sometimes I stare at the last sentence I wrote as if I stare long enough at it, I would discover the magic sequence of words in the sentence that would make Hemingway blush. But what do I get after staring at the sequence and looking like a zombie for hours? NOTHING. NAATA. ZERO. No magic sequence. No Hemingway breaking his pen.

Well, Hemingway is to be blamed for this predicament of mine. I read somewhere that he said he rewrote the ending of A Farewell to Arms, the last page of it, thirty-nine times before he was satisfied. When asked what the problem was, he said, “Getting the words right.”

“Getting the words right”. The “Magic Sequence”!!!

And although he didn’t say, but I do wonder whether he felt that the final combination was right or still was ‘just no right’. Maybe he got bored after trying 39 times. Maybe he thought that now the combination is getting worse rather than getting better. Well, I don’t know whether he felt that way or not. But I do.

For me, after creating drafts after drafts after drafts. I often feel that maybe draft 4 was better than the current draft # 32. And then it makes me feel. UUuuggggghhhhhh.

So I have decided to stop going for the perfect combination and ‘just start writing’. No MS Word. No reading my blogs out aloud. No changing the fonts and background colors to make me wanna read the draft again. Just type my words directly into the blog space here. And read it once (yes, please, allow me to read and edit once. I am not that confident) and then hit Publish.

And I will do this every day. Every single day. What comes out of it? I don’t know. Do I get more readers or less? Although what can be less than 5? I should hardly care.

So the metric right now is ‘A Blog a Day’. Maybe I would still be writing bigger and more nuanced blogs with N to the power of n drafts (where n is the number of words in the blog). And most of these blogs would never get published. But maybe the ones that do get published would make Mr. Pulitzer stand up and notice.

But for now. ‘A blog a day’. And this one for today. Till then

Cheeku Paanta.

A ‘Documentary’

| Daily Blogsby

Dear Blog,

Yesterday, someone sent me a link to a “documentary” and urged me to watch it because, apparently, it was “very well made.”

Nowadays, hardly anything in the media is “very well made”, but I decided to watch it anyway.

I could not get past the first five minutes.

And there were many reasons for that. Frankly, I was surprised I even lasted five minutes watching that crap. Maybe because the sender belongs to GenZzzz, and I try to humour them whenever I can.

So it started with a few faces flashing on the screen. Media people. Their mouths were moving, but I hardly registered anything they said, because, to be honest, I do not respect them enough to lend them an ear.

Even those few flashes of their faces were enough to ruin my mood.

But I continued.

These media persons — or “anchors,” as they are politely called — are famous for taking money and selling any product to their viewers. I do not know if there is a specific name for such people. Maybe one day I will come up with one.

Anyhoo, I moved forward through the filth, sorry I meant the ‘film’.

There were some slick drone shots. Then a few more people appeared — even more cringe than normal. That is when I paused and checked the channel owner.

The channel was called “PakistanTV – Digital.”

To tell you the truth, that was the first thing I wanted to check, because this GenZzzz sender is, in my book, pretty biased. But I thought, fine, whatever. Maybe PakistanTV was some new YouTube channel. Maybe some upcoming YouTuber had decided to make documentaries.

But then I found out.

PakistanTV is PTV.

More cringe.

Which meant this was not a documentary. This was a paid media PR campaign, promoting all the cringe people as “saviours” of the nation.

The video had been uploaded three weeks ago and had reached only 96,000 views.

Imagine that.

A state-sponsored video, made with state resources, slick editing, nice makeup, polished accents, and all the fanfare in the world — and the reach was what?

Ninety-six thousand views in three weeks.

I mean, it would have been better not to make the video at all. Better to disappear quietly than go through the humiliation of unpopularity and zero traction.

If you are calling something a “documentary,” and that too a “well-made” one, then at least check what kind of reach actual “well-made documentaries” get.

Frankly speaking, the topic itself was of interest to me. Maybe that is why I lasted 5 minutes. It was about the war with India in 2025. We did kick some ass there. But there are still some questions that remain unanswered, mostly because of the blanket blackout of truth from India. Which only shows how badly bruised they still are.

But things will remain hidden, as they usually do nowadays.

And these stupid “documentaries” will keep coming out. Stupid people will keep forwarding me stuff. Five minutes of my life will keep getting wasted. And then I will have a headache for the next three or four days because those stupid faces will keep flashing in front of me.

Anyhoo, that is life, isn’t it? 

If I did not have such experiences, I would not be coming here and blogging about them.

And regarding this topic of interest, I probably would have to wait for a book that comes along, and I am able to fill in the missing pieces. Till then.

Cheeeku Paanta

The Four Noble Traits of Hazrat Jaffar Tayyar ؓ

| A Better Muslim, Faith & Life, Personal Growthby

The four noble traits that made Hazrat Jafar Tayyar ؒ beloved to Allah, even before the advent of Islam (during the age of Jahiliyyah).

  1. Avoidance of Alcohol. He says that he never went near alcohol because he saw that alcohol destroys intellect.  
  2. Avoidance of Idolatry. He says that he avoided idol worship because he saw that idols could neither provide benefit nor harm.
  3. Avoidance of Adultery. He says that because he possessed a strong sense of honor regarding his wife and his daughters, he never committed adultery.
  4. Avoidance of Lying. He says that he never lied because he regarded lying as an act beneath the person of a high character and an act lacking any moral worth.

The importance of the traits, besides being beloved to Allah, can be assessed from the fact that they were specially revealed by Allah on Prophet Muhammad ﷺ through Hazrat Jibrael ؑ

In my journey through life, I’ve realized that character isn’t built all at once; it’s assembled piece by piece from the virtues we choose to honor. I blog about these traits to ‘collect’ them and try to integrate them into my own life and identity. For me, Hazrat Jafar Tayyar’s ؒ story is a reminder that true integrity begins long before the world notices.

#NobleTraits

And then there is you…

| Faith & Life, Insightsby

A son reflects on his father’s life, lessons, faith, and final days — a deeply personal tribute to Abu Hazur (1934–2025).

I close my eyes, and I open them. I breathe in, and I breathe out. Sometimes I speak, but mostly I stay silent. I spend my day in meetings, handling escalations, assigning work, coaching my team, and coding my dreams – always trying to do what is required of me. The daily hustle becomes tough, and I want to stop, but the world is not kind to people who stop. Minutes would turn into months and months into years without me realizing how far back I had fallen. So I put one foot in front of the other, move from one task to the next, and keep going. But sometimes everything comes to a grinding halt. The world keeps on spinning, but I just cannot move. I know that I should move and work and dream and travel and read and write and code – there are still so many things to do… but then there is you… 

Your giant palms are scrubbing Nivea on my tiny 8-year-old face to protect me from the dry Abu Dhabi weather. You and Ammi are going out for a walk, and I, taking advantage of being the youngest, want to tag along. ‘It is a long walk, and you will get tired,’ warns my mother. I don’t know what long and tired mean, but halfway through, I am dragging my feet and dreading the remaining part of the walk. Suddenly, in one big swoop, I am in your arms, my head on your big chest, totally relaxed and comfortable. 

After retirement from the Pakistan Air Force in 1977, you were commissioned in the UAE Air Force. That is where you worked for 17 years till you retired and moved back to Pakistan in 1994. You spent most of these 17 years alone, sacrificing for the education and health of your children. It was only after having kids of my own that I realized how big a sacrifice you made for us.

Read more

Why We Follow the Fiqh of an Imam 

| Faith & Lifeby

Whenever Muslims discuss the differences of opinion in the practice of prayer, fasting, trade, marriage etc. one phrase quickly emerges: “Brother, just follow Qur’an and Hadith directly.” It sounds simple, even appealing. But in reality, the path from Revelation (Qur’an & Hadith) to daily rulings is not that straightforward. Between the verses of the Qur’an, the thousands of authentic hadith, and the practices of Sunnah of the Companions, there lies a vast ocean of interpretation, reconciliation, and application. 

This is precisely why Islamic scholars gave birth to Fiqh by defining the Uṣūl al-Fiqh — the science of how to derive rulings with consistency. 

Revelation Is Abundant — And Demands Method 

  • The Qur’an has 6,236 verses. Roughly 500 deal with law (aḥkām). 
  • The hadith collection contain nearly 700,000 narrations, with around 7,000–10,000 considered rigorously authentic (Ṣaḥīḥ) across the six canonical books. 
  • Add to this the sayings and practices of the Companions — the people who learned Islam directly from the Prophet ﷺ — and we already have overlapping, sometimes apparently conflicting, evidence. 

How does a believer decide which narration to act upon when one ḥadīth says the Prophet ﷺ raised his hands multiple times in prayer, while another says he raised them only once? Both are authentic. Which one do you choose? 

Without a framework, one person will pick one ḥadīth today, another will pick a different one tomorrow, and soon Islam becomes fragmented into personal preferences. 

Uṣūl al-Fiqh: The Missing Layer 

The genius of the great Imams — Abū Ḥanīfa, Mālik, al-Shāfiʿī, Aḥmad — was not only in collecting hadith but in creating a consistent logic of preference: 

  • Why should one narration be preferred over another? 
  • What if a hadith contradicts the continuous practice of the people of Madinah? 
  • What if a solitary hadith (khabar al-āḥād) clashes with a well-known principle? 
  • How does one reconcile apparent contradictions in Qur’an and Sunnah? 

This logic became Uṣūl al-Fiqh. And out of it came the madhāhib (legal schools) of Islam. They ensured that one ruling was not an isolated decision but part of a structured method that could be applied again and again to new issues. 

Why Not Just Translation? 

Another challenge in doing our own interpretations from Quran and Sunnah would be our understanding of the Arabic language. A ḥadīth in Arabic may carry an idiom, a cultural expression, or a subtle grammatical form that vanishes in English or Urdu. Without mastery of Arabic idioms, one risks distorting rulings by taking a literal but shallow reading. 

The Wisdom of Following an Imam 

Following an Imam is not blind imitation. It is recognition that: 

  • The Imams were closer to the sources, both in time and in mastery of language. 
  • They systematized the principles of preference (Uṣūl al-Fiqh), ensuring consistency across rulings. 
  • Their schools protect the Ummah from fragmentation into individualistic Islam. 

Just as one trusts a doctor to interpret medical journals rather than self-prescribe from random articles online, we trust an Imam and his methodology to interpret revelation rather than self-derive from translations. 

Conclusion 

Between Qur’an, Hadith, and Fatwa lies a vital bridge: Uṣūl al-Fiqh. 

It is this science that takes us from raw texts to coherent law, from scattered narrations to consistent rulings. To dismiss this layer and attempt direct interpretation is to ignore centuries of scholarship, language, and methodology — and to expose oneself to inevitable contradiction. 

Therefore, following a madhhab is not weakness; it is intellectual humility. It is a recognition that the ocean of Revelation requires the compass of Uṣūl, and the compass was given to us by the Imams. 

Monday Morning Meanderings – A philosophical look on modern life

| Faith & Life, Personal Insightsby

Is this what life is? Is this what we are here for? A few clicks here and there. Opening screens, closing screens. Thinking, deciding, delegating, taking ownership. Reading emails, replying to them. Sending some more emails and waiting for their replies. Eight hours per day – spent. Eight hours per day – gone from our lives.  

But this is what makes money. Money that pays the bills. Enhances my quality of life. Keeps me and my family happy and secure. I can buy stuff. Buy books and read them. I can explore fascinating places with my family. I can even help people with the same money. Poor people. Unhealthy people. I can support causes. I can build Masjids. I can buy shops. Start my own business. Give more jobs. Make more money.

But then what is money? A piece of paper. The entire world economy is built on this paper. Every country owes money to another country. Where is the value of money? Who decides which currency, which piece of paper, is stronger than the other? All of it is just speculation. We just assign a number and call it the value of the currency of that country. But if that country goes into war, the ‘value’ of that currency starts falling. But who decides by how much? The country with all of its resources is still there.

But why should I bother about the money? The paper. I didn’t build this paper economy? I don’t manage it. If I have enough of these pieces of paper, I will be safe. My family will be safe. If I, or my creator, keep me out of harm’s way, what do I care about the countries that go into war, or run into economic recessions? I am good and I am fine. Before, people used to work for rice and flour. Now we work for these pieces of paper. What is the big deal then? And when the time comes, when the powers that be decide to pull the plug, I will figure things out then. I will carry my skills to another company, another country. If Allah wills, I will survive. And if HE doesn’t, then who can fight HIS will?

But what if Allah wants me to do something about it? What if Allah is not happy with me just sitting and ranting and writing a blog about it?

This world is temporary. Why should I worry so much about a thing that is temporary? As long as I fulfill my obligations towards Allah, shouldn’t I be fine? Man was given limited control of this world by Allah, and man is crazy. Man will create problem after problem. And then take credit for solving those problems that he created in the first place. When the plug is pulled and the world ends, then we will realize that this was all temporary. This was all, not real. Those who had accepted the temporality of this world would survive and would be happy. And those who had thought that this world was everything. Would suffer. Heavily.

The Fifth Discipline – My Book Notes

| Reading & Writingby

These are my notes from the book – The Fifth Discipline by Peter Senge

About the Book

Full Title: The Fifth Discipline – The Art & Practice of the Learning Organization
Author: Peter M. Senge
Publisher: Penguin Random House
Read On: Kobo Books (April ‘2005 to July 2025)
Year Published: 2006 (Originally published in 1990)
Short Summary: The Fifth Discipline is about how individuals and organizations can achieve lasting change by thinking in systems, challenging assumptions, and continuously learning together.
About the Author: Peter M. Senge is an American systems scientist, organizational theorist, and senior lecturer at the MIT Sloan School of Management. He is best known for his work on organizational learning, systems thinking, and leadership development.

Book Summary

For individuals and organizations to deliver lasting positive changes and not be one-hit wonders, Peter Senge offers five disciplines, that need to be implemented in the DNA of individuals and/or organizations (whomsoever wants a lasting positive change)

These five disciplines are

  1. Personal Mastery → Lifelong learning and growth by aligning actions with personal vision and truth.
  2. Mental Models → Becoming aware of and challenging the assumptions that shape how we think and act.
  3. Shared Vision → Building a common, genuine purpose that motivates and aligns people.
  4. Team Learning → Developing group intelligence through dialogue, reflection, and coordinated action.
  5. Systems Thinking → Understanding interconnections and feedback loops to see the whole system—not just parts.

The Fifth Discipline is Systems Thinking, which, as per the author, ties all the other disciplines together.

My Notes On The Five Disciplines

The five disciplines are the meat of the book, so below is a summary of each of the five disciplines as I understood and learned from them.

Personal Mastery

  1. Commit to lifelong learning. Lifelong learning means, as my father used to say, A man learns from the cradle to the grave.
  2. Learning should not be random; instead, it should be aligned with my vision and purpose in life.
  3. Get out of your comfort zone. I should not spend too much time on things that I am good at and/or comfortable with; instead, I need to spend more time on things that I am mediocre at or not very comfortable with. This will enhance my learning.  Somerset Maugham said, “Only mediocre people are always at their best”.
  4. Stay between rationality and intuition. Rationality is the result of deep thinking and reasoning, while intuition is a spark, an idea, or a completely random thought. Stay between both of them. Don’t drop one for the other.

Mental Models

  1. Be mindful that my thinking and decision-making are heavily influenced by, and sometimes even dependent upon, my biases, my deeply ingrained beliefs, assumptions, generalizations, and internal pictures of how the world works. If the need arises, be prepared to challenge these mental models.

Shared Vision

  1. Vision is concrete; purpose is abstract and enduring. Purpose is where I want to go and why. And vision is ‘how’ I will get there.
  2. There is a tension and resulting stress because of the distance between my current reality (where I am) and my vision (where I want to be). This tension is good because it is the fuel that will drive me forward.
  3. Being a visionary leader is about solving day-to-day problems with my vision in mind.
  4. Having a vision is something that needs to be internalized. So that all my decisions, thoughts, and actions are aligned with my vision. My purpose (link) is to ‘get closer to Allah’, and my vision is ‘before doing anything, think how I can seek the pleasure of Allah in what I am doing’. The daily actions that I do concerning my family, myself, my job, my worship, etc., all should be aligned with this purpose and vision.
  5. It is not what a vision is; it is what a vision does.

Team Leaning

  1. When I am leading teams and even family, I should have open dialogue and discussion. Each member of the team should feel safe to have this dialogue and discussion with me.
  2. In team meetings, I should encourage silent members to bring their point of view and thinking to the table. This should be done repeatedly so that the team understands the culture and eventually feels free to contribute.
  3. I should not overpower my team with my thinking and my vision. I should let them evolve their own visions. As long as we are all aligned with the company’s vision and the greater good, we are fine to carry visions of our own.

Systems Thinking

This is the fifth discipline. And probably most critical to understand, because, as per Peter Senge, it ties everything together. The following concepts need to be understood, which I feel are beneficial about systems.

  1. Systems Thinking is the discipline of understanding how parts interact to form a whole, and how it helps to see Patterns, Connections, and Root causes.
  2. Delays are time lags between action and outcome. Delays often mislead people. They might think, e.g., that result c is because of action 5, but a deeper analysis of the system (systems thinking) would reveal that it was actually because of action 2. Delays are something that I should be mindful of and should not jump to conclusions.
  3. Leverage Points. They are small, well-placed actions in a system that lead to large, sustainable improvements. It’s like a snowball effect, but in the right direction.
  4. Systems usually fail because of ‘Shifting the Burden’ and ‘Limits to Growth’
  5. In every system, there are two types of internal systems – one that is trying to increase output and the other that tries to maintain stability by resisting change. They are known as
    • Reinforcing loops are systems that amplify change (growth or decline)
    • Balancing loops are systems that resist change (growth or decline) and maintain stability.

Understanding Reinforcing and Balancing Loops.

One of the reasons that systems fail might be due to the ‘Limits to Growth’ principle. Here is how it usually plays out.

  1. Reinforcing Loop (R): Growth leads to more growth. E.g., more customers → more revenue → more investment → more customers
  2. Balancing Loop (B): A hidden constraint begins to push back.
    E.g., staff burnout, supply chain bottlenecks, quality issues

The result is that growth stops or even starts to reverse. The solution is ‘Don’t push harder – identify and address the limit’. Remove the ‘dead pony’ from the well.

Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle

Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, when applied to systems thinking, means that sometimes you cannot observe the system without influencing it. e.g., I cannot observe the engineers supporting the helpdesk system without affecting their performance. So sometimes, in order to observe a system, some different methods might be needed.

Power of our subconscious

An effective way to focus the subconscious is through imagery and visualization. For example, world-class swimmers have found that by imagining their hands to be twice their actual size and their feet to be webbed, they actually swim faster. “Mental rehearsal” of complex feats has become routine psychological training for diverse professional performers.

My Thoughts About & During the Book

  1. It was a good book. Some of my concepts were reinforced, such as what is called in the book ‘Systems Thinking’.
  2. The book was not a very easy read. I had to read and reread some passages. Sometimes I felt lost. Reading the table of contents and also discussions with ChatGPT helped reinforce my understanding and internalize the concepts.
  3. I do not see the five disciplines beneficial as a single framework. But I did find parts of the book very helpful. Especially the parts where it explained the System Thinking with (Reinforcing and Balancing Loops) and the ‘Limit to Growth’ and ‘Leverage’.
  4. The book is too heavy, meaning too many words, pages to explain simple things. Most of it felt redundant. I skipped the 2nd and 3rd parts (which were almost half of the book) as it felt more like marketing fluff to me. Some of the success stories revealed in these sections seemed to me were twisted to make them fit into one or more of the disciplines.
  5. I tried to understand Systems Thinking and feedback loops by linking it with Imran Khan’s and PTI’s rise and fall (and possibly another rise). That was an interesting discussion with ChatGPT, and maybe I will write about it someday.

Conclusion

Overall, it was a good book that everyone should read at least once.