The Difference

Dr. Shakira Nandini

The difference between patience and compulsion is as vast as the distance between the earth and the sky. Often, people confuse compulsion with patience and expect rewards from Allah for it. True patience is accepting any trial from Allah with an open heart and without complaint. However, in our society, the opposite tends to happen.

When faced with a trial, we become anxious and feel the need to share our woes with others. For example, after a significant financial loss, we recount our story to many, often concluding with phrases like, "What can we do? We’ve just been patient and left it to Allah." In reality, we first exhaust every possible means to recover our loss, and only when we realize all is lost do we start speaking of patience.

While striving to recover a legitimate loss is acceptable, sharing our plight with everyone is not. This is not patience but compulsion, as we feel forced to endure our situation. After bearing the burden, we claim to have been patient, which is essentially deceiving ourselves.

True patience involves accepting Allah’s trials willingly, without sharing our grievances with others. If one believes they are in the right, then remaining silent and recognizing it as Allah's will is true patience. Observing this in our surroundings or evaluating ourselves in similar situations can lead to a better understanding of the fundamental difference between patience and compulsion.