The beginning and end of each year is often associated with the famous "self-accountability moment." The idea itself is undoubtedly good, as it is hoped that a Muslim adopts this practice regularly, if not daily! However, this moment often yields the opposite of its intended purpose. Instead of motivating self-improvement, repentance, and renewal, it becomes a time for regret over the past and apprehension about the future. This can be attributed to several factors, the most significant being the lack of clarity in defining personal success and adopting rigid standards of seriousness and achievement inspired by self-help resources, which often constrain individuals into molds that, if not followed, label them as failures.
When discussing success, ambition, and seriousness in life, the mind often conjures idealized images inspired by so-called self-development materials and stories of great and successful individuals, such as waking up early, going to bed early, exercising regularly, following a healthy diet, limiting TV or YouTube viewing hours (if any exist), maintaining constant activity and energy, demonstrating persistence and determination, and rarely or never exhibiting laziness, idleness, or indulgence in leisure activities and wasting time, and so on.
But the truth is that the matter is much simpler—and deeper—than that!
Consider the employee who fulfills his duties diligently but rushes to leave the office the moment his shift ends. Now compare him to a colleague, a social star, who invests extra energy beyond job requirements to climb the career ladder. Fast forward a year or two: the former remains where he is, while the latter has been promoted to his manager.
Did you instinctively judge one as more successful than the other? Perhaps you favored the dazzling second example over the seemingly ordinary first?
Hold on, let's revisit them after office hours.
The "ordinary" employee returns home, greets his family warmly, prays, and enjoys a lively meal with them. He spends time discussing his children's day, connects with his spouse, then heads to the mosque, recites Qur'an with his teacher, and later joins friends in a beneficial gathering. He also volunteers weekly in charitable activities.
Doesn't this perspective suddenly shift your impression of him? He no longer seems so "ordinary," does he?
Now, let's check on the social star. He returns home exhausted, greets his parents (unmarried due to his demanding ambitions), and fulfills their requests with care. However, his fatigue drives him to collapse into bed. He wakes up late, eats alone, and prepares extra tasks for work to boost his career (not required by his job but part of the price for his professional aspirations to advance in his field). Afterward, he performs the Fajr prayer, recites his daily supplications, and leaves a morning greeting for his parents on a note stuck to the fridge before heading out to work.
Does the shine of this "successful" example begin to dim?
If you now lean towards favoring the first over the second, you may also be mistaken.
The truth is, there is no right or wrong between these two models—or anything in between—but rather These are individual life choices, reflecting personal definitions of success.
You are neither required nor invited to judge or lean toward one over the other! Instead, you are invited to reflect on these models in terms of how each defines its accepted meaning of success, organizes its priorities and tasks accordingly, and consents to pay the price for achieving them with effort, time, and years of life over the long term. In return, they are satisfied with the spiritual and material rewards they reap.
The term "paying the price" is not a threat of loss but a recognition of reality. Every balance in life has its scale of giving and taking. No one enjoys all virtues nor suffers all vices, but the matter lies in accepting a certain balance, taking responsibility for its outcomes, and being content with the results apportioned. For instance, if your definition of your relationship with your parents is greeting them with a morning note on the fridge and a goodnight in bed, that is your choice. If you seek a more satisfying definition, strive for it.
If, for example, you are content to perform the obligatory prayers, avoid prohibitions, and then spend the rest of your time lounging on couches watching TV or scrolling through social media, that is your choice. If your priority in life is to earn enough money to ensure a good standard of living and toil in several jobs or long working hours to achieve that, that is your choice. If your priority is to exert the least effort and time necessary to secure a modest income and then spend your remaining time and energy on charitable work or personal interests, that is your choice.
The crucial point is to confront yourself honestly, decide what you accept and what you do not, and align your actions with that decision. The goal is to live a life you are satisfied with and that you accept accountability for before the Lord of the Worlds—accountable for everything you do and do not do in it, for everything you are and are not within it. Each person is required to craft a way of life they can answer for on the Day of Reckoning.
But if you go through life haphazardly without effort to shape, define, and specify what you are genuinely willing to take responsibility for, you will ultimately feel like someone who packed for a summer trip only to end up in the Arctic! Or like someone who lived their entire life without truly experiencing it!
You are spending your life to build your existence, consuming your breaths for your soul, offering from your worldly life for your afterlife, and you will be resurrected alone and held accountable alone. So confront yourself honestly about defining your life, its meanings, the price you are willing to seriously pay for what you truly seek or abandon, and how you balance the scales of your interests, energies, and temperaments. Free yourself from illusions of separating religion and worldly life, from the obsession with relentless comparisons, rigid molds, and unjust categorizations of success, failure, ambition, and stagnation.
You either tailor your aspirations in life to match your capacities, or you develop your capacities to meet your aspirations in life—or you remain oscillating between the two until you find balance. And if you live knowing that you will be held accountable for your life, it remains for you to live in preparation for that accountability with everything you are and are not, with everything you do and refrain from doing.
The key to a serene life does not lie in success, advancement, fame, wealth, or abundance of family and friends. Rather, the key is being honest with yourself, taking responsibility for your life, refraining from coveting the lives of others, and sparing yourself the torment of comparison to the scales they have accepted or adopted for themselves. Avoid burning your own life with the sighs of regret and the laments of "if only" and "I wish!"
-------------------------------------------------------------
Read this Article in Arabic
