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Abu Hurairah reported that a man had once approached the Prophet SAW: "Advise me! ""Advise me! "Rasulullah SAW said, "Do not become angry and furious." The man asked (the same) again and again, and Rasulullah SAW said in each case, "Do not become angry and furious."
[Al-Bukhari; Vol. 8 No. 137]
I remember this one time when these well-known words of a Hadeeth went well out the window before I could do anything about it.
I was just so out-of-my-mind angry.
Anger can be such a tiring feeling sometimes.
Ryhn and I once talked about Anger after a Skills class one time, when her group was assigned to present on the subject. I have nothing against this particular emotion, and our short discussion resulted in the agreement that Anger, negative or not, still has its place among all the other existing emotions. I don’t think I can deal with a world without Anger; the monotony of impassive happiness or mute indifference would just stifle me out of my wits. I see Anger as one of the most important sources of passion; its the motivation and the stimulus of a person to stand up for what he believes in, to express strongly against a wrong, and to right that wrong. Anger keeps us from weakly submitting to anything that forces us to compromise our rights or principles against our own will. How do you otherwise figure that tens of thousands of people would go through the trouble of painting banners and holding demonstrations, coupled with the risk of being labeled anti-patriotic, or even being arrested? With that said, anger against oppression and injustices, if properly harnessed, can lead to positive results.
But wait, I digress.
I mentioned that I found myself uncontrollably angry one day.
What I failed to mention was that I couldn’t fix it because I didn’t have a figment as to why I was so livid.
It was downright baffling.
I just sat there, trying to work out where it was all coming from because it was quickly draining me both physically and psychologically.
Why I didn’t just go and make Wudhu’ right there and then, I don’t know.
I suppose I was perhaps a little amused at the absurdity of the whole situation. When I get angry, I usually get straight to the source of it right away and when the source’s discovered, it becomes my target point for positivism. That way, anger dissipates, problem solved. What stalled me that day was that I couldn’t even figure why I was angry, never mind finding a target point.
The results of such an anger wasn’t so healthy. I ended up becoming some sort of walking human landmine to those unfortunate enough to have crossed my path that day. Things got ugly, and word got out to "steer clear from Lubna unless you have a thing for getting your head bitten off".
Astaghfirullah, it was just horrid. Harnessing the anger did no good; the reins weren’t sturdy enough.
And so, it was with half a rational mind that I finally remembered the Wudhu’ solution. For those who aren’t familiar with the Hadeeth, it goes something like this:
"Anger comes from the devil, the devil was created of fire, and fire is extinguished only with water; so when one of you becomes angry, he should perform ablution."
[Abu Daud; Book 41, No. 4766]
Pretty cool, eh?
I later went around apologising to those I had unintentionally hurt, and pleaded temporary insanity (Section 83 of the Penal Code, unsoundness of mind, but lets not get started on that).
It doesn’t change the fact that I had acted so deranged though. People may forgive, but forgetting is another matter altogether. Wounds heal, but scars will always remain.
I don’t have a problem with my own scars; they serve as a reminder to me. Its the scars that I’ve left on other people that bother me. Disfiguring others just doesn’t rest well with me.
Never again, Insya Allah.
A lesson well-learnt.
When everything felt like an oxymoron
November 2006
Enough said here.
