A Bedouin came to visit our Holy Prophet (PBUH). He saw that grandsons of our Holy Prophet (PBUH) were playing happily with him. These two innocent kids were too much happy that they had forgotten their external environment and smiles on their faces were really wonderful. As is the case with most of the tribal men, the man was very strict with everyone in his family and had never allowed his children to be so frank with him and had never seen such a scene in which children were found to be playing with an elder. It was rather strange for him that a well-grown man was grinning and smiling at the children who were playing by climbing on his shoulders or running around him.
The man returned to the desert with a strange discovery. He was of the view that there should be strict control on wives and children so that they should never disobey him or belittle his command and authority in the family. His mentality had paid him and when he entered the house, the house fell so silent as if there lived no one who knew to speak, smile or laugh. But this was a strange discovery that the giggles and smiles of the children were more beautiful and pleasing then their silent and grave faces. The house with an atmosphere of love and affection appeared more meaningful than the one where there were only silence and sheer obedience.
How much beautiful scene is this when a son sees his father and comes running and hugs him. The joy of the sight of his father fills his heart and emerges on his face. To some of the readers, it might appear as something familiar and not something strange but it is a reality that majority of our people still think that we can have a better control on our children and other family members and stop them from leading astray to the perilous evils found in the society by being strict on them. This is a good thinking and the intentions behind this thinking are worth appreciating but then we are going to deprive our children and people around us of the impressive power of love.
A group of educationists volunteered their services to go to a certain developing country and change the fate of the area by equipping their children with education and also teaching them the good values. When they were about to leave, their inspirational leader gathered them and said, ‘You should never forget that your action would make lasting impressions than your words. Your best and most repeatedly used weapon should be love and kindness as it would bring the people close to you and after winning their hearts, you would be able to mould their minds and characters. In the absence of love, you would never be able to inculcate love in people and people who have not experienced love and who don’t know how to give and receive love would not be of much use to themselves or the people around them.’
Many a times I wish this message to be conveyed repeatedly to the parents, teachers, leaders and all those who make influence on the lives of others and whose words are given importance and whose characters are taken as role models to be followed. Love, affection, kindness or whatever we call it, has such a strong power that it is one of the living miracles and its power of magic would never end. You might have also read a number of similar stories in world-famous inspirational book ‘Chicken Soup for the Soul’.
This is a series of books in which true stories have been compiled about the people when they experienced something that moved their hearts and you can see that all these stories have one theme, ‘giving and taking love’. Usually, our general perception limits us for taking or expecting love, affection, kindness and similar treatments from others but experts of the field say that giving love is more important than taking it. The day we start giving love to others, we would definitely start receiving it as well and intensity, measure and frequency of this love would be far expanded than the love we gave to others.
Unfortunately, our concept of love is both limited and dangerous. Majority of our youth thinks that love is the feeling that a male feels for a female or vice-versa but in most cases, it is found that it was the lust and temporary feeling that stems from the carnal desires due to the factors associated with the age. Similarly, majority of the parents are afraid that their children would waste their time by getting involved in such activities that might turn out to be pernicious both for their future and character. This is what we can call a limited scope of love.
When we read quotations about the different virtues and miracles of love, we feel as if it has no limit and it is like oxygen that is needed by every living being, in every moment of his life.
Love was the power that was assigned to the prophets to change the minds and souls of nations in past. It was love and strong emotional attachment that made the people discover new possibilities even in business and commerce. Charles Schwab, one of the most successful and inspirational business managers of all time, regards love and concern to others’ feelings as the important ingredient of his success formula. It is love that made the teachers so effective that they turned dull students into most motivated and successful students.
On my way to office, there comes a narrow path in which only one person can pass at a time and I have seen that many a times, people like to show their love to the person coming from the opposite to wait on a side, with a smile. It is not needed to mention here that how much the spirits of the person would be elevated who receives this sincere smile.
The process of giving and receiving love cannot be limited to any geographic position or area. It is good that you should express your love in form of a broad smile, or a small act of kindness, or greeting warmly, or being helpful to everyone present in your house but then same things can be taken out of your house wherever you go. You can greet a taxi driver before you tell him your address, you can smile and say ‘Salam’ to a shopkeeper before you ask for something, you can smile and shake hands with the person who cleans your office or brings tea for you, you can even pat the shoulder of a kid who is coming back from school and give him a smile, and there are innumerable occasions when this flow of love and affection can be put into practice.
Some may say that these things are good in books and they don’t actually work in practice but it is to bring in your knowledge that there were thousands of high-spirited people who did so and they were never disappointed and same rules apply to us and none of our efforts would be wasted in this regard; be it in our house or outside.
This feeling of giving and receiving love gets so intense when we look at people around us who are depressed due to numerous reasons like unemployment, inflation, insecurity, uncertain future and many more and these things would remain the same until we don’t invent few artificial things to smile and share love. This would definitely change our souls, if not our surroundings.