DAILYREFLECTION
Look at those who are beneath you and do not look at those who are above you, for it is more suitable that you should not consider as less the blessing of Allah.
To the one who put the phone down last night feeling a little smaller,
You saw the kitchen, the promotion, the family photo on a beach. Nothing in your own life changed in those ten minutes. And still your home looked plainer when you lifted your eyes.
We know that feeling well. It only ever looks in one direction.
The Prophet ﷺ understood this about us, and he gave our eyes a direction. In wealth and in worldly things, look toward the person who has less than you. He ﷺ gave the reason plainly: so that the blessings Allah has already placed in your hands keep their true size.
Somewhere tonight a person is asking Allah for the exact things you walked past this morning: a body that works, a door that locks, someone who calls to ask if you have eaten. Those were chosen for you by Allah, who knows what you need far better than a feed does.
Looking toward those with less softens us too. That person is our brother or our sister, and noticing them is where giving begins.
In matters of faith, the scholars add, the direction reverses. There we look to the people ahead of us in worship and character, and let them pull us forward.
So here is our ask. Before you open the feed today, name three things in your life that someone else is asking Allah for. Say alhamdulillah for each one, out loud.
We will do the same.
SUNNAHSTORIES
Sumayya and the Swing That Grew: an original fictional story for families
Sumayya had one swing, hung from the old fig tree behind her building. She loved it until the family across the street built a trampoline, round and blue.
Every afternoon she watched from the balcony as the children over there flew up past the fence. Then she looked down at her swing. It seemed to have shrunk.
One evening Mama took her to carry soup to the new family in the dark apartment at the back. A small boy named Bashir opened the door.
"Is it true there's a swing?" he asked. "I can see the rope from our bathroom if I stand on the bucket."
Sumayya blinked. Then she asked if he wanted to try it.
They took turns until the sky went orange, and Bashir shrieked every single time.
That night the trampoline was still there. Sumayya looked at it for a moment, then down at the fig tree.
"Mama," she said, "the swing got bigger."
Mama smiled, and whispered alhamdulillah.
For families: What is something in our home we have stopped noticing, and who could we share it with?