"Oh no! Not that!" my eyes got fixed on a big black star next to my feet on the prayer mat as I made the intention for the Friday Salah Dr. Nasr was leading in the hospital sanctuary- as usual and I happen to attend one off of such Friday afternoons whence I had to be at hospital for a p.m. session.
I tried to ignore it and concentrate on the verses of Qur’an he read. Only recently I realized that he is a hafiz as well mash’Allah-"how on earth you became a medical doctor, then specialized in Dermatology and memorized the Qur’an too-"I felt a bit envious…

After the sala’m was said, I immediately picked the star and it looked though as if it was navy blue-I smiled. There you go;it was not black! Rather it matched my blue shirt I was wearing. "Aha! another star for my basket:) Must be because of that project I introduced there last week..." I pampered myself-a typical human move to avoid facing bad consequences/warnings. But the smile vanished soon when I looked closely “No it iss black! Jet black! As black as the polish I put on my son’s shoes last night"

I immediately slipped it into my valet as if trying to hide from the prayer colleagues and said "walaykiumassala'm" to Mrs. Nasr who bent by my side with her hand out to shake and a lovely and kind smile on her beautiful face reflecting her faith.

As I walked towards the department and deliberately left the lifts to walk up the stairs to level 5, not only as a part of the contract I made with Sister Vivian that we would lose a few more pounds in weight by this summer:) but also for the reason that I wanted to have some more moments to think about that black star-why did I get it?? There was a list of things which came to my mind, which I had done wrong-which could be done in a much better way-and many which did not need doing at all!

Actually last year during a woman’s weekend we heard a talk from a lady counsellor who gave us a tip how to recognize our efforts for any good cause, even if trivial-for self, family,friends, community etc. We must keep collecting these gold and silver stars in a little imaginary basket hanging around our neck. Not to boast or become Mr.Ms.Biggy, but because this activity keeps giving us a boost needed to continue struggling for the good causes we can participate in-because it is harder to continue a task than just initiating it. We initiate so many projects in life, but it’s very few we go on with. A lot of serenity and perseverance is required to do that; and I strongly believe that Faith is something which can help these values the most.

However I personally felt that whilst we do this activity, we must not forego the mistakes we make in this endeavour due to slackness and wrong moves on our part; be it because of merely a mistake or because of our own and dearly preferences. We must then be prepared to own any 'black star' as well which comes to our basket because of such! These black stars may be reminiscent for us to keep in mind what went wrong and what needs to be avoided in our future voyage.