Satisfaction

Quran Talk

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Rolling Stones - Keith Richards & Mick Jagger - I can’t get no satisfaction

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VZ4mAfta3s

Cow never asks am I satisfied with my life

two central questions that people ask themselves when determining whether they’re satisfied with something in their life:

1. Am I doing better than I was before?
2. Am I doing better than other people?

This applies to wealth, but also to attractiveness, height, and other things that people fret about. “But the problem is,” Norton says, “a lot of the things that really matter in life are hard to measure.

So if you wanted to be a good parent, it’s a little hard to know if you’re being a better parent now than you were a year ago, and it’s also hard to know if you’re a better parent than the neighbors.”

So people turn to dimensions of comparison that can be quantified. “Money is a terrific one,” Norton says. “If I need to know if I’m doing better than I was, the easy thing to ask is, Am I making more money? or Does my house have more square feet? or Do I have more houses than I used to?”

The research Norton has conducted illustrating this phenomenon is dispiriting. In a paper published earlier this year, he and his collaborators asked more than 2,000 people who have a net worth of at least $1 million (including many whose wealth far exceeded that threshold) how happy they were on a scale of one to 10, and then how much more money they would need to get to 10. “All the way up the income-wealth spectrum,” Norton told me, “basically everyone says [they’d need] two or three times as much” to be perfectly happy.

https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/12/rich-people-happy-money/577231/

[30:6] Such is GOD's promise—and GOD never breaks His promise—but most people do not know. [30:7] They care only about things of this world that are visible to them, while being totally oblivious to the Hereafter.

Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts.

Some of the things that matter the most are not measurable in the worldly sense?

Righteousness, virtue, honesty, etc.

[7:26] O children of Adam, we have provided you with garments to cover your bodies, as well as for luxury. But the best garment is the garment of righteousness. These are some of GOD's signs, that they may take heed.

Hoarding

[102:1] You remain preoccupied with hoarding. [102:2] Until you go to the graves.

التَّكاثُرُ = the competitive quest for more / hoarding.

“We buy things we don't need with money we don't have to impress people we don't like.”

God makes us satisfied

[53:48] He is the One who makes you rich or poor.

أَغْنَىٰ = Ag-nah-ah = Rich = free from need

وَأَقْنَىٰ = ag-nah-ah = poor = makes satisfy

Root = ق ن ي = to acquire a thing; to cause to acquire; make contended; satisfy; preserve; make satisfy with a given thing

GOD is the only one who can make us satisfied

Motley Crue movie - Dirt

Being impressed by the abundance of sin

[5:100] Proclaim: "The bad and the good are not the same, even if the abundance of the bad may impress you. You shall reverence GOD, (even if you are in the minority,) O you who possess intelligence, that you may succeed.”

[9:55] Do not be impressed by their money, or their children. GOD causes these to be sources of retribution for them in this life, and (when they die) their souls depart while they are disbelievers.

[9:85] Do not be impressed by their money or their children; GOD causes these to be sources of misery for them in this world, and their souls depart as disbelievers.

God has everything we need

Addiction - drug, porn, depression etc. root cause is lack of satisfaction

Depression - some people have a genuine psychological imbalance

I think out of the 9 different traits for depression only 2 have to do with biology

"no food one problem- lots of food many problems”

Diogenes - Apocryphal

Greek philosopher and one of the founders of Cynic philosophy. ~350BC

Stories of him take minimalism to a whole new extreme

All he had was a cup to drink from then one day he saw a boy drinking from his hand and he cursed his cup and got rid of it

Alexander and Diogenes

While Diogenes was relaxing in the morning sunlight, Alexander, thrilled to meet the famous philosopher, asked if there was any favor he might do for him. Diogenes replied, "Yes, stand out of my sunlight." Alexander then declared, "If I were not Alexander, then I should wish to be Diogenes." "If I were not Diogenes, I would still wish to be Diogenes," Diogenes replied. In another account of the conversation, Alexander found the philosopher looking attentively at a pile of human bones. Diogenes explained, "I am searching for the bones of your father but cannot distinguish them from those of a slave.”

Choose Your Priorities Carefully This Life

[17:18] Anyone who chooses this fleeting life as his priority, we will rush to him what we decide to give him, then we commit him to Gehenna, where he suffers forever, despised and defeated.

The Hereafter

[17:19] As for those who choose the Hereafter as their priority, and work righteousness, while believing, their efforts will be appreciated. [17:20] For each one of them we provide; we provide those and these from your Lord's bounties. Your Lord's bounties are inexhaustible. [17:21] Note how we preferred some people above others (in this life). The differences in the Hereafter are far greater and far more significant.

Clayton Christensen - How to measure a life

Kafar = disbeliever but also means unappreciative

Hell and Satisfaction

Imagine if you had the best most extravagant life - but no improvement whatsoever for all of eternity - how long before you would be absolutely miserable?

Eternally hopeless knowing for sure your situation will NEVER change

Imagine you had to spend your life digging a hole, now imagine if that task was expected from you for eternity

[13:14] Imploring Him is the only legitimate supplication, while the idols they implore beside Him, cannot ever respond. Thus, they are like those who stretch their hands to the water, but nothing reaches their mouths. The supplications of the disbelievers are in vain.

[88:6] They will have no food except the useless variety. [88:7] It never nourishes, nor satisfies hunger. [88:8] Other faces on that day will be full of joy. [88:9] Satisfied with their work.

[24:39] As for those who disbelieve, their works are like a mirage in the desert. A thirsty person thinks that it is water. But when he reaches it, he finds that it is nothing, and he finds GOD there instead, to requite him fully for his works. GOD is the most efficient reckoner.

Matthew 6:

Treasures in Heaven

19 “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 20 But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. 22 “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are healthy, your whole body will be full of light. 23 But if your eyes are unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness! 24 “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.

Do Not Worry

25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27 Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? 28 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29 Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? 31 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32 For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.