Re: the triviality of now
o soo jao aflatoono! 
chakkar aa gaye hain parhtay parhtay. 
jitnay moonh utni theoriyan. 
Re: the triviality of now
hehehe
well i am at the office and have got nothing else to do but post on GS … for twenty more minutes 
Re: the triviality of now
yayy im going home now 
Re: the triviality of now
Yeh i knwo what you mean...we're human and we do have our human attachments...sigh..one day at a time dear...dunno what else to say or do..just that in every situation there's a lesson to be learnt and that makes you wiser and stronger.
BTW...Pristine used to write stuff liek this? No way!
Re: the triviality of now
interesting read even though very cynical.
Re: the triviality of now
thankyou everyone for indulging my behooda bongiyan for so long..
Re: the triviality of now
Wow. That first post is perfect in its description. I think that way, but you actually put it into words!
Re: the triviality of now
chalo ek aur mil gayin agreement karne wali. im looking for disagreement here :-/. ziada khush nahi ho raha ye farma ke mein :-\
Re: the triviality of now
oh I will disagree when I wish to, you cant force it out of me you know. Plus people have been complaining, so Im trying to bring out my nice agreeable side. Meri compliment leh lau, itni asaani sai nahen milti. :p
Re: the triviality of now
i deserve a compliment and a disagreement 
Re: the triviality of now
hello?? like??? meri reply ko koi importance hee naai dee 
bhaYee!!! i disagreed with u not agreed
or maybe my reply was too smart n u dint get it
Re: the triviality of now
end mein exactly ka kia matlab tha
Re: the triviality of now
tobbah astaghfaar!!!
wo EXACTLY us AYAT k lyay tha bhayee!!!
i mean, it was an AYAT and ofcourse every Muslim is going to agree
lekin shuru mein toh i disagreed
Re: the triviality of now
bahanay na banao . hum donon ek hi baat keh rahay thay..
Re: the triviality of now
Feelings help a man to create his own world around him. Whenever you meet someone, you gain some feelings and you let go some feelings and in this exchange, both the persons gain an amount of idea about the other. When you meet repeatedly, your ideas and your feelings solidify and you start to make a judgement. When something unthinkable happens, your judgement shatters and the world that you had created around yourself collapses.
Feelings can be for a moment or they can be long lasting, but with feelings, we have a mind to think over our actions. Your thought process can overcome any feeling and the logic can suppress any rash action. We have to create laws so that our actions are governed by rules and not by whims.
Its not about feelings, its about what you do with the time given to you. Shall we let a person die becuase he is going to die anyway, if not today, then later. If you have the power and you can do good, then do it. Even if its meaningless, then why not still? Maybe it might not matter to you but just might for another.
What you do today reflects on you later. The more you get attached to something, the stronger your feelings become and at the time of dissappointment it remains on your mind to shun the nonsense and think straight. What you do next ultimately decides whether you want to forget it or keep it fresh. You can keep the memories fresh by always thinking about it or you can just decide when and where to stop.
Time heals wounds, it also lessens the joy, but you have to decide what you prefer today. Time will pass, but how you pass it is all that matters
Re: the triviality of now
Ravage, the above that you have stated is rather deep, and takes time to absorb all. Anyway following is my take on it.
Life is not futile. This earthly life of ours is a test for us for the life to come in the Hereafter. The life’s trials may include loss of loved ones, hunger, disease, rejection by loved ones, lack of opportunities in life, wealth, health, happiness etc. etc.. We will have to account for our beliefs and for actions and reactions to what life throws at us.
By experiencing the ‘moment’ that we are living the present, that flitting of a moment linking the future with the past – maybe in other words ‘consciousness’ we still have the future to look forward to and the past to reflect upon. Hope of having a better future and regretting the past mistakes make the life to go on. Hopelessness is a curse on life.
Life lived for a purpose in not meaningless but adds a lot of value to it. Life is never static and constant but always on the move and ever changing throwing surprises at us whether good or bad. Disappointments in life make us appreciate the pleasures it gives us.
Believing in God and living life to His commands gives life its ultimate meaning.
Brother Ravage in the next post I am posting last few chapters from Alija Izetbegovic’s [the former president of Bosnia Herzegovina – an Islamic scholar in his own right] book ‘Islam Between East and West’
I think it does address the points raised by you. Even if it doesn’t, it’s worth a read.
Re: the triviality of now
Submission to God
Extracted from Izetbegovic's book - 'Islam Between East and West':
Nature has determinism, man has destiny. The acceptance of this destiny is the supreme and final idea of Islam. Destiny -- does it exist and what form does it take? Let us look at our own lives and see what has remained of our most precious plans and the dreams of our youth? Do we not come helplessly into the world faced with our own personality, with higher or lower intelligence, with attractive or repulsive looks, with an athletic or dwarfish stature, in a king's place or in a beggar's hut, in a tumultuous or peaceful time, under the reign of a tyrant or a noble prince, and generally in geographical and historical circumstances about which we have not been consulted? How limited is what we call our will, how tremendous and unlimited is our destiny!
Man has been cast down upon this world and made dependent on many facts over which he has no power. His life is influenced by both very remote and very near factors. During the Allied invasion of Europe in 1944, there was, for a moment, a general disturbance in radio communications which could have been fatal for the operations under way. Many years later, the disturbance was explained as a huge explosion in the Andromeda constellation, several million light years away form our planet. One type of catastrophic earthquake on the earth is due to changes on the sun's surface. As our knowledge of the world grows, so does our realization that we will never be complete masters of our fate. Even supposing the greatest possible progress of science, the amount of factors under our control will always be insignificant compared to the amount of those beyond it. Man is not proportional to the world. He and his lifetime me not the measuring units of the pace of things. This is the cause of man's eternal insecurity, which is psychologically reflected in pessimism, revolt, despair, apathy, or in submission to God's will.
Islam arranges the world by means of upbringing, education, and laws. That is its narrower scope; submission to God is the broader one.
Individual justice can never be fully satisfied within the conditions of existence.
We can follow all Islamic rules which, in their ultimate result, should provide us with the "happiness in both worlds"; moreover, we can follow all other norms, medical, social and moral but, because of the terrific entanglement of destinies, desires and accidents, we can still suffer in body and soul. What can console a mother who has lost her only son? Is there any solace for a man who has been disabled in an accident?
We ought to become conscious of our human condition. We are immersed in situation. I can work to change my situation, but there are situations which are essentially unchangeable, even when their appearance takes a new look, and when their victorious power is veiled: l must die; I must suffer; I must fight; I am a victim of chance; I get inevitably entangled in guilt. These basic conditions of our existence are referred to as "the border situations."[1]
Sure, "man is bound to improve everything that can be improved in this world. After that, children will still go on dying unjustly even in the most perfect of societies. Man, at best, can only give himself the task of reducing arithmetically the sufferings of this world. Still, injustice and pain will continue and, however limited, they will never cease to be blasphemy."[2]
Submission to God or revolt -- these are two different answers to the same dilemma. In submission to God, there is some of every (human) wisdom except one: shallow optimism. Submission is the story of human destiny, and that is why it is inevitably permeated with pessimism: for "every destiny is tragic and dramatic if we come down to its bottom."[3]
Recognition of destiny is a moving reply to the great human theme of inevitable suffering. It is the recognition of life as it is and a conscious decision to bear and to endure. In this point, Islam differs radically from the superficial idealism and optimism of European philosophy and its naive story about "the best of all possible worlds." Submission to God is a mellow light coming from beyond pessimism.
As a result of one's recognition of his impotence and insecurity, submission to God itself becomes a new potency and a new security. Belief in God and His providence offers a feeling of security which cannot be made up for with anything else. Submission to God does not imply passivity as many people wrongly believe. In fact, "all heroic races have believed in destiny."[4]
Obedience to God excludes obedience to man. It is a new relation between man and God and, therefore, between man and man. It is also a freedom which is attained by following through with one's own destiny. Our involvement and our struggle are human and reasonable and have the token of moderation and serenity only through the belief that the ultimate result is not in our hands. It is up to us to work, the rest is in the hands of God.
Therefore, to properly understand our position in the world means to submit to God, to find peace, not to start making a more positive effort to encompass and to overcome everything, but rather a negative effort to accept the place and the time of our birth, the place and the time that are our destiny and God's will. Submission to God is the only human and dignified way out of the unsolvable senselessness of life, a way out without revolt, despair, nihilism, or suicide. It is a heroic feeling not of a hero, but of an ordinary man who has done his duty and accepted his destiny.
Islam does not get its name from its laws, orders, or prohibitions, nor from the efforts of the body and soul it claims, but from something that encompasses and surmounts all that: from a moment of cognition, from the strength of the soul to face the times, from the readiness to endure everything that an existence can offer, from the truth of submission to God. Submission to God, thy name is Islam!
[1] Karl Jaspers, An Introduction to Philosophy
[2] Albert Camus
[3] Gasset
[4] Emerson
Re: the triviality of now
paranoid, ibn sadique thank you both for posting your thoughts. paranoid your article might benefit from the one ibn sadique just posted above. atleast theres some similarity in content.
I guess I dont have anything more to add to your posts. i will reflect on this and perhaps bother both of you later :)
Re: the triviality of now
hey, sure, life is meaningless and your emotions suck when you look at it like that. I mean, who knows joy when it's written out like this:
Here we have exhibit A, which is the happiness one felt when a close friend came around and put her hands over your eyes and you had to guess who it was.
Feelings are difficult to put into words, and are very personal. If I was to write out a thrilling account of some happiness I felt, I would get into using so many metaphors and words that I couldn't tell what day it was anymore, just to get others to feel the same way. But they can't, unless they feel it themselves. However, happiness rocks, if you look for it everywhere. It's not hard, just hold happiness and peace as the highest goal in this life. I'm not advocating complete degenerate hedonism (although that would be fun). My moral code looks more like:
What gives me pleasure
What gives me pain
Due to my conscience, if I was to kill someone, that guilt would cause me pain. So I keep away from it. Other than that, I can keep most of my emotions in check.
Due to my ambition, I am planning for the future, so I don't just spend every penny on drugs and alcohol. I am looking for profound and future happiness when I go to the school.
The world is emotions, and we sometimes forget that when we're looking at it logically. It's one thing to say, "happiness", it's another to imagine the last time you had a fun time. It's also very easy to disregard the realities of the world when we're in the logical nothing-sphere. Emotions are there to stay. By logically saying that they are useless, doesn't make a difference to the fact that emotions exist.
This is an analogy I gave my friend when he was talkin about hte same things:
You know how you go to British Columbia to bike and ski and stuff, right? Well, what you're saying now about everything being useless is kinda like going to BC, and sitting out of every fun activity cause you'll end up back in Toronto again. That's such a cynical attitude.
Life IS made up of nows and moments and experiences. But that's just logic speaking, and logic is cold and hard most of the time. Consider this: When your kid takes their first step, or says their first word, will you be thinking "alright, that's another moment in my life. I am feeling nothing"?
Re: the triviality of now
it is hedonism, even if not degenerate, because your conscience is conditioned to expecting a certain conduct of yourself. and I agree, in the absence of religion that is the most logical philosophy.
http://www.utilitarianism.com/hedonism.html
Im not arguing with all of that, nor am I saying that its unimportant to be happy. Im saying that it cheapens my notions of human existence, i thought relationships and feelings were a lot more than moment specific mental states.
kher.. dafa karo.