A "Congkak board" full of belief

The Belief System Analogy

Assalamualaikum to all,

I just like to say, at first I was very reluctant to publish this post as this is one of the contents of my book, insyaAllah entitled "Metamorphosis" (still not in the market yet :P). I thought, if i publish the contents then the book wouldn't be a surprise anymore. But then a sense of guilt runs through my arteries and veins, "I had been sharing a lot of ideas to my friends and families over this time, why should this be different?". Well, for one, this is actually one of the best analogy I managed to come up with so far. But now I feel much better as to me this post will be my sadaqah to all the readers.

I was thrilled by my own analogy. I'm not sure whether it is easy to understand or not, I hope you guys can help out and give comments. Sometimes I think I went too far in my imagination. This is only a fraction of a chapter in my book. Check it out:

Everybody have different potential in life, there are things we can and cannot do. But no matter who we are, we can never know exactly what is it that we can and cannot do unless we have tried it out. Therefore our belief system should always be put on “can” mode rather than on “cannot” or “maybe” mode. This is the basic understanding of a belief system that I think is acceptable to most people.

Another understanding of the belief system is that we should all believe that every good thing is possible. Humans are created at first in perfection and its nature is for good. Just like the creation of the earth and all living creature. Everything is created on the basis of good. Therefore, every human being in the world is capable of good things. The real question is whether we want it or not. Can I be any simpler?

It is true that human are also capable of doing bad, useless or negative things. But just as much as we can put a “can” and “cannot” mode on our positive belief, we can also put it on our negative belief. For example I like to believe that I am not a failure.

I like to imagine the belief system as a board with endless holes, like a very long congkak board that have no ending. There are two lane of course, one on the right and the other on the left. On the right many of the holes are filled with pretty colorful marbles while the holes way in front that seem like it will never end are still empty. On the left, the holes are closed tight and there are no spaces to fill with anything. But some of them have some dirt on it making my congkak board look messy and dirty. Overtime I may need to sweep off the dirt to make sure my board is clean. 

Did you get the idea? The holes on the right are the positive belief I have and on the left is the complimentary negative belief. On the right the holes are open, it is on “can” mode, and the pretty marbles are the achievement made. While on the left, the holes are closed tight and this signifies any negative belief that should be closed so that we will not try to achieve something negative in life. However, sometimes we slip and make mistakes when we fail to achieve our positive belief and fall into a negative belief. These are the dirt on the closed holes. Nevertheless, such dirt can just be sweep off from the board therefore our belief system will always be clean and tidy. This is the normal and healthy belief system.

We have to set in our life positives belief and let the holes open meaning putting these beliefs on “can” mode. At the same time, the complimentary negative belief must be closed and put on a “cannot” mode. For example we cannot believe that we have a good memory at the same time believe that we are also forgetful. Sometimes we fail to memorize and forgot something that we should remember, this will be the dirt that will spoil the board, but since we left that hole closed, the dirt is not something permanent. It should not give effect to the holes on the right side that is already filled with pretty marbles. In other words, when we fail to achieve our positive belief, that is just a common error, all we have to do is sweep it off our mind and focused on filling the open holes. Therefore, we will never give up on a positive belief and we will always feel that a negative belief is something that we should not have.

To be continued....:)

This is a diagram of a healthy belief system. As addition to the above post, I like to add that the broom that sweeps the dirt can be three things, seeking forgiveness, repentance, and prayer. The three ways to clean our belief system so that we will have a healthy belief system to get us through the day.... :)