23 Principles of Virtue from Maxims of Ptahhotep

Disclaimer: What follows is mostly borrowed text from the textual archives available online. My contribution to it has not exceeded the editing. 

Ptahhotep (ptāħ ħwtp) was a  Vizier in the ancient Egypt. He was recognized as a sage, city administrator, and oldest son of Djedkare Isesi, the fifth dynasty ruler (r. 2414-2375 BCE). The Maxims of Ptahhotep were composed during 24th century BC . These maxims are one of several “wisdom” texts found in ancient Egypt typically composed in narrative form. In this text, a father and famous sage instructs his son. This particular set of precepts, however, stands out because they touch upon the most important aspects of human relations and yet the most central ideals for which members of this African kingdom held in high regard. In that kingdom, members of society were measured by the principles of self-control, moderation, kindness, generosity, justice, and truthfulness (used with discretion), which suggests not harmony but a way of guarding against the excesses of power, ruthlessness, and untruth. These virtues, then, tell us the ideal person was thoughtful, calm, and paid attention to the divine—in fact, the ordered world created by humans in ancient Egypt was a mirror image of the order that governed the cosmos. 

Following are some of his golden principles:

1. Be merry all your life.

2. Toil no more than is required. 

3. Nor cut short the time allotted to pleasure.

4. Don't waste time on daily cares beyond providing for your household.

5. When wealth comes, follow your heart. Wealth does no good if you're glum.

6. Great is Law.

7. If you are a man of authority, be patient when listening to words of a petitioner. Do not dismiss him until he has completely unburdened himself of what he had planned to say. 

8. Injustice exists in abundance, but evil can never succeed in the long run.

9. Do not gossip in your neighborhood, because people respect the silent.

10. To listen is better than anything, from it is born perfect love.

11. As for the ignorant man who doesn't listen, he accomplishes nothing. He equates knowledge with ignorance, useless with harmful. He does everything detestable, so people get angry with him each day.

12. A perfect word is hidden more deeply than precious stones. It is to be found near servants working at mill-stone.

13. Only speak when you have something worth saying.

14. Love your wife with passion.

15. A woman with happy heart brings equilibrium. 

16. Those who continually lust after women, none of their plans ever succeed.

17. Do not blame those who are childless, do not criticize them for not having any, do not boast about having them yourself.

18. Do not repeat a slanderous rumor, do not listen to it.

19. May your heart never be vain because of what you know. Take counsel from the ignorant as well as the wise 

20. He who has a great heart has a gift from God. 

21. He who obeys his stomach obeys the enemy.

22. Teach your disciple words of tradition. Act as a model for children, that they may find in you the understanding and justice of every heart, since man is not born wise 

23. Punish with principle, teach meaningfully. Act of stopping evil leads to lasting establishment of virtue.  

Image credit: Relief from Ptahhotep's tomb, web.

This Is What Starting Small Looks Like

Want to make $1 million in sales?
Start small: sell a $10 item to one customer.

Want to create a podcast?

Start small: record a voice memo on your phone.

Want 1,000 true fans?

Start small: do something that gets you one true fan.

Want to build a profitable startup?

Start small: build a basic web app in a weekend and get 10 users.

Start small.

Show up every day.

Keep refining your craft.

Take risks and get uncomfortable.

And most importantly:

“Embrace feedback as a gift.” – Seth Godin

Repeat these steps for days, months, and years, and you’ll become the person you aspire to be.

text source: Justin Jackson

How Much To Pour of Your Self?

Being a sensitive person can be a confusing, complicated thing in this still harsh world. It feels intuitively right to open, to feel, to enhearten our daily life, but the world is still vibrating at a more armored and edgy place. It is not yet attuned to the ways of the open heart. So what to do? We don't want to deaden our capacity to feel, but if we feel too much, we get run over by an often heartless world. I have found my best answer in three places: 

Selective Attachment: carefully discerning between positive and negative individuals and environments, and only attaching to those people and places that can hold our tender heart safe. 

Strong Energetic Boundaries: being physically and emotionally charged, so that we can more effectively repel unwelcome energies. 

Conscious Armoring: learning how to put on armor when necessary to manage the world and difficult situations, and, consciously removing it when it is no longer needed. 

If we cultivate these practices, we stand a much better chance of preserving our sensitivity. Once we lose it, we lose our connection to the moment altogether. Here's to a sensitive way of being! What a courageous path. 

- An excerpt from 'Spiritual Graffiti'

Fetch The Horizon

To be a sensitive individual in a, generally, unforgiving world can trigger situations demanding considerations of great depth and resonance.
While endless intellectualization of the details and enormous question marks of our lives comes natural to us, it is the ability to harbor faith into the unresolved as not a sphere of fear, which is the ultimate act of Becoming.

Today I came across a passage of a letter Rainer Maria Rilke wrote to a struggling young poet, and for a moment there I was the only addressee of this letter.
I've read it uncountable times since then and would like to share it with you too!

 

Therefore, dear Sir, love your solitude and try to sing out with the pain it causes you. For those who are near you are far away... and this shows that the space around you is beginning to grow vast.... be happy about your growth, in which of course you can't take anyone with you, and be gentle with those who stay behind; be confident and calm in front of them and don't torment them with your doubts and don't frighten them with your faith or joy, which they wouldn't be able to comprehend. Seek out some simple and true feeling of what you have in common with them, which doesn't necessarily have to alter when you yourself change again and again; when you see them, love life in a form that is not your own and be indulgent toward those who are growing old, who are afraid of the aloneness that you trust.... and don't expect any understanding; but believe in a love that is being stored up for you like an inheritance, and have faith that in this love there is a strength and a blessing so large that you can travel as far as you wish without having to step outside it. 

 
Fetch the horizon, I think to myself as I conclude the read. 

Baadshaahat Ikhteyaar Ki Baat Hai

The Life And Death Of Most Of Us

Most of us will settle for fine.

Most of us will stream mp3s instead of asking a friend to play the guitar.

Most of us will run on a treadmill at the gym instead of going to the park.

Most of us will watch 10 second videos on a computer instead of going to a play.

Most of us will eat something we can throw in the microwave instead of learning to cook.

Most of us will aspire to being known, to being famous for just a little while.

Most of us will be willing to be embarrassed, to hurt ourselves, if it means being known.

Most of us will be more concerned with that, with being known, than being remembered by anyone special.

Most of us will decide that it's too soon or too late in life to go after what we really want.

Most of us will never actually sit down and think about what we really want.

Most of us will spend more time reading status updates than we spend reading books.

Most of us will take more pictures of ourselves than actually looking at the world around us.

Most of us will take the one unique and precious life we've been given and spend it being, just ok.

Most of us will make do.

And you will meet most of us and when you do, remember this.

Be the few.

Be the few.

- Iain Thomas, 

The Life And Death Of Most Of Us

For years I belonged to most of us, until one day I no longer did.

She

“She was never crazy, she just didn’t let her heart settle in a cage. She was born wild.. and sometimes we need people like her. For it’s the horrors in her heart which cause the flames in ours. And she was always willing to burn for everything she has ever loved.” 

– R.M Drake

What If?

He said to her, “Who are you going to believe? The mirror, a photograph, or the eyes of the man who thinks you're the most beautiful woman on the planet?"

So, who are you going to believe?

Of Scars And Warriors

We all, people of flesh, have scars. Some wear scars on their sleeve, some lock them up in the dark recesses of the heart.

A scar turns into an ugly wound when we are ashamed of having one. 

Warriors are never embarrassed of having scars. 

A warrior's wounds are a reminder of the battles they fought, of the valour they showed ... Scars are their medals! 

Embrace your brokenness and dance! For nothing is more beautiful than a broken heart that whirls holding its pieces together.

Dast afshaan chalo, mast-o-raqsaaN chalo

Khaak bar-sar chalo, khoon bada-maaN chalo!

Too Small, I Tell Myself

Sometimes this life seems too small 

To make all the voyages you want to make

To build all the bridges you want to build

To travel all the seas you want to travel
To say all the words you want to say

To fight all the demons you want to slay 

Sometimes this life seems too small

To dream all the dreams you want to dream

...

This life, in fact, is too small

I tell myself.

Only like a single grain of sand,

In which reflects the entire Sahara!

- leenah.

Why Must You Join Rahbar?

A Rahbar fellow, Zuhaib Sheikh explains why must we need to be a part of the TCF Rahbar program.
Its not only his words, but also the life pulsating through the accompanying images that makes one a believer in the spirit of Rahbar.

I'm thankful to Karim Jindani for sharing this with us at twitter.

گدگداتی آنکھوں کے

جگمگاتے پردے پر

خواب پروئے تتلی کے

رنگوں جیسے کچے ہیں

  یہ بچے میرے بچے ہیں

ناخدا جو مل جائے، 

پھر یقینی ساحل ہے 

اک ذرا افزائش ہو 

دیکھ کمر کیا کستے ہیں

  یہ بچے میرے بچے ہیں

چاند ستارے ہوں تسخیر

سوچ کے پنکھ جو مل جائیں

خواب اڑانوں کے پرزور

اور ارادے سچے ہیں

  یہ بچے میرے بچے ہیں

دوستی محبت کی

ایک چھٹانک بانٹو  تو

چاہتوں کے موتی یہ

بھر نچھاور کرتے ہیں

  یہ بچے میرے بچے ہیں

If it touches your heart in any way, please be a part of it. Be a part of Rahbar! 

It's just a click away: TCF - Rahbar 

Rahbar can be so much more with your inclusion! 

More About Rahbar

Having first shared the per-requisites of being a Rahbar (here), here's sharing with you the Rahbar JD - as simple as it gets. 

Isn't #Rahbar more about your personal spiritual beauty regimen! 
Hai na? :) 

Counting On It

“The books we need are the kind that act upon us like a misfortune, that makes us suffer like the death of someone we love more than ourselves, that make us feel as though we were on the verge of suicide, or lost in a forest remote from all human habitation—a book should serve as the axe for the frozen sea within us.”

- Kafka in a letter to Oskar Pollak.

I hope so.

When Your Fears Are Your Practical Approach

It is then that when one comes across a dead spirit, one has to make a call if one wants to live with a ghost, or get a life! 

Happy are those who choose life. 

Take Note, Please

A Story Of Sight Beyond Sight

How about a li'll story time this weekend night? 

As the night turns cold, have you snuggled well into your blankets?

Well, lets start if you have! You just gotta hit the play button underneath and together we'll weave the sufi magic in a night out of the Arabian Nights ...

Post by Touching with fingers the naked body of dreams.

Harun al-Rashid [the caliph] gave the order, "Bring this Laila, so I might see why Majnun--out of love for her-- has cast such passion into the world and why from the East to the West lovers have made the story of his love their mirror." They went to great expense, employed much trickery, and succeeded in bringing Laila to the caliph. She was in a private chamber; at night the caliph would light candles, gaze at her for a while, and then reflect for a while. [But he could not see what was so special about her.] He said to himself, "If I get her to speak, perhaps her special quality will become more apparent in her face, by means of her speaking." He turned to Laila and asked, "Laila, is that you?" She replied, "Yes, I am Laila. But you are not Majnun. Those eyes that are in Majnun's head are not in yours. How can you see Laila with eyes with which you see other than her and which you have not cleansed by tears? Look at me with the vision of Majnun!" 

Those who look at the beloved with the vision of the lover are those whom, "He (God) loves..." [referring to Qur'an (5:54) "God will bring a people whom He loves and who love Him"] 'The defect [in most people] stems from the fact that they do not look at God with the vision of the lover; they look with the vision of knowledge and the vision of philosophy. 

The vision of love is something else. 

From the Discourses of Shams-i Tabrizi (Maqalat-i Shams-i Tabrizi)

Of The Gold Coloured Day

One hundred years 

from now,

it will not matter 

what kind of 

car I drove,

What kind of 

house 

I lived in,

How much I had 

in my 

bank account,

Nor what my 

clothes looked like.

But the world may be 

a little better place

because 

I was important

in the life

of a child.

~ anon.

The day was the first of the last month of the year and we were sitting in the front garden of the National Lace & Textiles, Mill. The sun beat down fiercely and for some time it was difficult to imagine it to be winters already. Apart from the few hiccups that are a part of the routine, it had been a smooth visit to the facility; perfectly drawing to a planned closure. ‘Alhamdolillah’, I thought with a sense of relief, ‘Another milestone successfully completed’. It was the moment when Col. Obaid Zia, CEO of the facility was winding up his farewell address to us: “Forgive me for taking so much of your time in narrating my journey of success. You people must not be enjoying the strong sun. But let me assure you once again, that it was a sheer pleasure to meet you, and host you.” Colonel sb. had been extremely gracious.

I looked at the mentors on my either side and glanced at the mentees in front, ‘Are we done?’ I thought. “Does anyone of you want to ask anything from Sir?” I probed the mentees, a group of almost 60, 15-years old girls visiting the Textile mill as part of an Exposure Trip of the Rahbar Cycle. To be honest, while relaying in my head the words of gratitude I meant to deliver on behalf of the visitors, I wasn’t really expecting to hear a reply to my question. Hence, it took me by surprise when I saw her rising from her seat among rest of the 9th graders. 

"Sir, you just mentioned about taking our time... I want to let you know that the ten minutes you've taken of our time are the most profitable investment we've made today. Years from now, when any of us would've exhausted completely and could be thinking of calling it quits, be it any field, these ten minutes would not let that happen. We will survive. And grow. And shine. Thank you for taking these ten minutes from our time."

She sat down. 

Colonel saheb was beaming, placing his hand over his chest he bowed his head in humbleness; while my spirit soared with pride! 

Nothing that I was about to say could have been more meaningful and more genuine than what had just been said.

As numerous hands automatically moved to clap, I did not know if there was a single thing I was clapping for. The inspiration in the form of Col. sb., the young mentee's honest (& eloquent) words, the gist of the entire excerice that had so well been recieved, the future that sounded so promising, and the realization that we are the today of such a bright tomorrow... it all combined to interweave an overwhelming sense of thankfulness.

The winter sun was blazing uncharacteristically, but what I'll remember this day for is the warmth of heart felt gratitude that filled the air and turned the afternoon a blissful gold.

PS: All conversations have been translated from Urdu with as much closeness to the actual as possible.

I Sent A Letter To My Love

... And on the way I dropped it!
I dropped it, I dropped it
Yes, on the way I dropped it

The following talk touched me on so many levels... primarily because of the speaker's passion for her simple labour of love, and secondly because it reminded me of my mother - one person with whom I relate the word letter to. She wrote letters to her parents, her sisters and brothers. Laced with prayers and an oozing sense of warmth.

When I initiated this blog a couple of years back, it had the same underlying motive.

But she is right, nothing compares to that personal statement of affection, that comes from no where and asks nothing in return ...

To all you beautiful souls spread across this planet, trying to chip in their share of love ... Hats off to you! 

Much love & respect!

Too Beautiful To Put Into Words

If you need something badly enough, it finds you. They say.

Look, what I found just now... Both things simultaneously flowed into my domain, as if on their own, just when I needed them the most... We all need assurances, don't we?  

"In the right light, at the right time, everything is extraordinary." Said Aaron Rose.

If they make sense to you, be sure your need got addressed! :) 

1. "No one believes the sincere except the honest." - Kahlil Gibran
2. 
   

Magic Moments

Have you ever noticed the magic in prayer, 'dua'?

The dua that someone makes for you. A genuine, sincere dua.

That is magic.

As the car moved close to his shabby bicycle, the silver bearded baba peddled it faster. The small tiffinbox and a dirty tool bag hanging from its handles, jolted violently. The car window rolled down, someone gently called out, "baba ji, sunnain!"

Baba looked away, clearly terrified. The car, with its hazard lights blinking now, kept its lazy pace beside his cycle. Baba peddled still harder. 

Another window, this time in the rear, rolled down. A six year old's innocent voice rang out most passionately, "baba ji, please baat sun lain!"

This worked.

The cycle slowed down, and the hazard lights parked in front of it on the left of the road.

Baba parked his cycle over its stand and walked to the car. Out of the window in front, emerged two bags weighing not more than two kgs. "Ye qurbani ka gosht hai, ye lay lain."

Unlike majority of the recipients of the evening, he didn't rush to grab the bags. He made a very slow, deliberate move. Held the bags in both hands, and peeped inside the window.

His eyes looked most earnestly at his new friends, fully aware of their interest in him, and equally reciprocating. He looked too tall to be doubled over by someone's kindness. The man knew that he was fully capable to acknowledge the kindness and return it in kind. The dignity with which he expressed his gratitude was astounding. 

And that's when the baba donned a magician's hat in place of his white namaz wali topi. His duas, murmured between his lips like a secret spell, wrapped my heart in a rainbow. 

The magician smiled a smile I'm still in trance of.

It was the smile of pure happiness. Such happiness that is a rarity to find in adults!

Every year around this time, carrying out this same simple ritual driving for a few hours, I meet a magician. A magician who gives me a few magic moments that keep one going till the next Eid arrives. 

Such simple pleasures. Such genuine expressions! 

Incidentally those were the last two bags. The job was done. All the meat had been distributed.

The hazard lights switched off and quickly the car's back lights diminished into the fast approaching night.

While the magic of gratitude remains in the air.