I keep looking and following the life stories of the rich people in the world and in my ownn country. Powerful and rich people who seem to have everything in life in abundance. People who never know what is human sufferings.
Are they really happy in life? Is everything always rosy and are they always smiling with happiness?
You be your own judge, but I feel that underneath the cover of posh living and supreme luxury and comfort that they enjoy, they are still human beings with a lot of human problems which money alone cannot solve. Money and power can certainly solve a lot of problems but many personal problems elude the dissolving power of money and the liquidating potency of power itself. Yes you can buy off people and get them to do what you want with money, but certain things you just have to do yourself, Yes you can exert political or military power on people and countries who or which fall out of line to make them toe the line you want, but you can't stop them from creating more problems for you.
Perhaps some of the happiest people on earth are not necessarily the rich and mighty. When people smile and appear to be very happy and contented with life I take a very close look at their economic wellbeing. They are certainly not always rich, In fact some of the very rich seemed to be unable to smile because of the problems they face or more importantly, of the nagging issue: how to become richer? Or how not to become poor again? As they say, those on the lowest level of life do not have to fear falling down anymore. The higher you re the greater the fear.
Those living on the luxury of power on the other hand will always be unhappy for the power can leave them any time. Everyday they have to be concerned with their supporters so that they will keep supporting them and their enemies who will continue to tug at their pillars of support.The saying goes that those who live by the sword will die by the sword. And so those who live by guiles and pretenses will certainly be uncloaked one day. It's only a question of time when that will happen and some will be lucky to leave the world before that happens while others may not. Often the law will catch up on them once they are out of power.
In the meanwhile the smiles of the happy faces of the common men (and women) who don't have much to worry much about in terms of acquiring or losing, keep on smiling. Are they really happy? Only God knows but they give you a certain amount of comfort and satisfaction, giving you the confidence that they certainly are some happy peole in this world.
And they may not be rich or powerful.
2 comments:
Akhi,
You have knocked down a very basic assumption that money can buy happiness. But what is the purpose of life? Is it purely the pursuit of money as the passport to happiness. Many fail to ask this simple question, why are we here. Last night I was watching TV Al-Hijrah and the program shown was about Dr.Zakir Naik, a prominent individual from India who talked about the subject on the purpose of life. In short,we must go and find the answer in the Al-Quran. We are here to serve our Creator, which means we must do what Allah commands and refrain from what is forbidden. That is the raison-de-etre of our existence and happiness is achieved through performing our obligations and duties as expected of us as prescribed by Allah.
The simple question what is the very purpose of life, which you've raised, is indeed the most difficult to answer if you're not living by the al-Quran and the Sunnah, with iman and taqwa firmly planted in your heart and soul, Akhi. As they say money cannot buy happiness but you cannot be happy without money too in today's world where everything had been monetized. On the other hand it haws been clearly proven that people with very little money can live a much happier life than those with a lot more money. And some rich people also lead a more miserable life than the poorer man.
Yes, the man of religion lives in order to serve God or Allah. But can he serve better with more money and can the man with more money serve Allah better than the one who has less and must devote more of his time to earn a living, to feed himyself and his family? Those are some of the ancillary questions which have cropped up.
And yes, there are those among the Muslims who chose to lead a poor and penniless life - the Sufis. Once they had attained their goal of being with Allah, they would be very happy to the point of being crazy. Is that real happiness or the laughter of the man with a lot of money, lives in luxury and can impose their will on people of a nation or the world because of the power they enjoy?
That's an even more difficult question to answer as I see it.
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