THERE IS GAIN IN LOSS
A Teaching of the Quran
ONE of the teachings of the Quran is that a person ought not to grieve over what has escaped him (57: 23). This is a very important principle which is essential for the building of a successful life in the present world.
The present world has been created in such a way that everyone necessarily experiences loss. No one is exempt from this, not even the prophets. This is not loss in any simple sense. It is rather a ladder to great progress. The truth is that in this world, without loss, no one can ascend the great ladders of progress. If a person is orphaned in childhood, that is apparently a huge loss. But the second aspect of it is that the deprivation of the guardian leads to self-confidence. If the father lags in economic progress, his children have a great motivation to work hard and compensate for it. They work so hard that often they earn greater success than their father.
An individual was once given agricultural land by his father but his relations, by illegal means, managed to take away this ancestral land from him. Then he left the village to work in the city. There he got a job in a factory, where he found a great opportunity to demonstrate his expertise. He gradually made progress and finally became the owner of the factory. Whatever he had lost in the agricultural field, he found with greater advantage to himself in the industrial field.
In this world there are so many opportunities that here even in loss there is some aspect of gain. Here, after losing a great deal, a person can find much more than he had before, provided he does not lose courage, and continues to make the best use of his Godgiven abilities.
In this world, after losing a great deal, a person can find much more than he had before, provided he does not lose courage, and continues to make the best use of his God-given abilities.
Frustration is the loss of hope and courage and is frequently due to some temporary loss. But if a person can set his eyes on the future, he will never have this feeling of frustration, because circumstances in the world keep changing and just as the earth keeps rotating so that night becomes day, similarly opportunities arise in abundance and if one opportunity is lost, then another is immediately there to be availed of.