Mastery: Perfecting Our Submission to God Alone

Published: March 30, 2018, 2:20 a.m.

b'Mastery. Greene, Robert. Penguin Publishing Group.\\n\\u201cIn order to master a field, you must love the subject and feel a profound connection to it. Your interest must transcend the field itself and border on the religious. \\u201c\\xa0\\n[6:161] Say, "My Lord has guided me in a straight path\\u2014the perfect religion of Abraham, monotheism. He never was an idol worshiper." [6:162] Say, "My Contact Prayers (Salat), my worship practices, my life and my death, are all devoted absolutely to GOD alone, the Lord of the universe. [6:163] "He has no partner. This is what I am commanded to believe, and I am the first to submit."\\xa0\\n[2:165] \\u2026Those who believe love GOD the most.\\n\\u201cA false path in life is generally something we are attracted to for the wrong reasons\\u2014money, fame, attention, and so on. If it is attention we need, we often experience a kind of emptiness inside that we are hoping to fill with the false love of public approval. \\u201c \\xa0\\n[76:8] They donate their favorite food to the poor, the orphan, and the captive. [76:9] "We feed you for the sake of GOD; we expect no reward from you, nor thanks. [76:10] "We fear from our Lord a day that is full of misery and trouble."\\nWe don\\u2019t change because of what we know we change because we care\\xa0\\n[13:11] Shifts (of angels) take turns, staying with each one of you\\u2014they are in front of you and behind you. They stay with you, and guard you in accordance with GOD\'s commands. Thus, GOD does not change the condition of any people unless they themselves make the decision to change. If GOD wills any hardship for any people, no force can stop it. For they have none beside Him as Lord and Master.\\xa0\\nJiro Dreams of Sushi (85 years old \\u2013 making sushi for over 60 years)\\xa0\\n\\u201cWe don\\u2019t care about money, All I want to do is make better sushi. I do the same thing over and over improving bit by bit. There is always a yearning to achieve more. I\\u2019ll continue to climb, trying to reach the top, but no one knows where the top is.\\u201c - Jiro\\nIn an interview with one of Jiro\\u2019s apprentices he said that it took him 10 years before they would allow him to cook the eggs for egg sushi. Even then every time he tried it was rejected. It took him 200 tries before Jiro accepted it and he said when that happened he almost cried, but he kept it to himself because he didn\\u2019t want to show his excitement.\\xa0\\nYou can be completely dedicated to something yet always be doing whatever you are in the cause of God. The two are one in the same. They do not need to be mutually exclusive.\\nSomeone asking if they should be a doctor because they were concerned that it would distract them from worshipping God.\\xa0\\n\\u201cJust as a well-filled day brings blessed sleep, so a well-employed life brings a blessed death.\\u201d - Leonardo da Vinci\\nImportance of repetition\\xa0\\nCommencement speech from US Navy Admiral William McRaven,\\nIf You Want to Change the World, Start Off by Making Your Bed\\nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGRXaFf9LFU\\xa0\\nNo broken window policy\\xa0\\nToday we want everything new \\u2013 we want novelty \\u2013 constant stimulation\\xa0\\nThis is what makes apps like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat so popular\\nThe world is full of information, but what we really need is wisdom\\xa0\\nWisdom is the condensed down optimal use of information\\xa0\\nAnd wisdom comes through Mastery\\xa0\\nWhat is the difference between a chess grandmaster and an intermediate chess player, is that the intermediate player will consider more moves, but the grandmaster while looking at fewer moves will look at only the best ones\\xa0\\nSo much of the religion is repetition\\n5 times a day we perform our Contact Prayers\\xa0\\n[70:34] They consistently observe their contact prayers (Salat), on time.\\nWe recite the same things every time\\n17 times a day we recite the Al-F\\xe3tehah\\n[14:40] "My Lord, make me one who consistently observes the Contact Prayers (Salat), and also my children. Our Lord, please answer my prayers.\\nBefore we eat we mention God\\u2019s name or when we wake up in the morning we say:\\nBismillah AlRahman AlRaheem (In the name of God, Mos'