Forget about changing the world

Category: Faith & Spirituality, Featured Topics: Self-Help, Sufism Values: Contentment, Humility, Wisdom Views: 3060
3060

Bayazid Bisami was a Persian Mystic from north-central Iran who lived from about 804 AD to 874 AD.

The following is attributed to his writing:

“When I was young I asked God, ‘Give me the energy so that I can change the whole world.’ I saw everyone doing wrong. I was a young revolutionary then and I wanted to change the face of the earth.

“When I became a little more mature I started praying: ‘This seems to be too difficult. Life is slipping away and almost half of my life has passed and I have not changed a single person, and the whole world is too large to tackle.' So I said to God, ‘My family will be enough. Let me change my family.'

“And when I became older,” says Bayazid, “I realized that even the family is too much, and who am I to change them anyway? Then I realized that if I can change myself that will be more than enough. So I prayed to God, ‘Now I have come to the right point. At least allow me to do this: I would like to change myself.’"

This is not the story of only Bayazid, it is the story of people since the beginning of time: We want to change others but seldom do we think of changing ourselves. An enlightened person understands that to even change oneself is not an easy task. At a deeper level the whole world exists within us and if we change ourselves we can change the world.


  Category: Faith & Spirituality, Featured
  Topics: Self-Help, Sufism  Values: Contentment, Humility, Wisdom
Views: 3060

Related Suggestions

 
COMMENTS DISCLAIMER & RULES OF ENGAGEMENT
The opinions expressed herein, through this post or comments, contain positions and viewpoints that are not necessarily those of IslamiCity. These are offered as a means for IslamiCity to stimulate dialogue and discussion in our continuing mission of being an educational organization. The IslamiCity site may occasionally contain copyrighted material the use of which may not always have been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. IslamiCity is making such material available in its effort to advance understanding of humanitarian, education, democracy, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law.


In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, and such (and all) material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.