When you wake up in the morning, do not expect to see the evening – live as though today is all you have. The author of Don’t Be Sad illustrates through the Qur’an and the Sunnah how every modern spiritual ailment can find remedy in Allah’s Book or in the life of the beloved Prophet (blessings and peace be upon him). Would you sell your ability to hear and see for the weight of Mount Uḥud in gold, or your ability to speak in exchange for huge castles? Sometimes we feel like the whole world is against us – and then there are moments in which we feel we have conquered the entire world, yet we are still unsatisfied with our accomplishments.

If you suffer from depression, an act of charity will have a more potent effect on your sickness than will the best available medicine. It’s the type of book you need to take your time with, take notes, and reflect on the meanings behind each story. It exposes to the modern reader how God teaches us to deal with the tests and tribulations of this world. Nevertheless, many have worshipped other than Him, and the masses are thankful not to Him but to others. I gleaned whatever I found to be pertinent to the topic of the book from these sources: Verses of the Qur’an, sayings of the Prophet (bpuh), stories, parables, poems, and sayings of the wise.

We seek refuge in You from fearing anything except You, from depending upon anyone except upon You, from fully trusting anyone except You, and from invoking anyone other than You. Many people of this world are unduly fearful of future poverty, hunger, disease, and disaster; such thinking is inspired by the devil.

This is because idleness allows your mind to wander in the past, the present, and the future, with all their difficulties. Your tastes and preferences are specific to you, and we want you to stay as you are, especially because that is the way you were created and that is how we know you to be. The consequences of such behavior include artificiality, unhappiness, and a destruction of one’s own entity.To Allah ascend all good words, your deeds, sincere supplications, tears of the innocent, and invocations of the afflicted.

I did not add any footnotes to the book, thus making it easier for the reader to peruse without interruption.Hence do not be in a state of agitation if you give someone a pen as a gift and he uses it to satirize you, or if you give someone a walking stick to lean upon and he strikes you with it. Live for today; during this day, you should pray with a wakeful heart, recite the Qur’an with understanding, and remember Allah (the Exalted) with sincerity. Whenever I feel stuck or something, I pick this one up and I open any random page, and Voila; I have found reassurance. To the afflicted, give tidings of a sudden relief that will reach them with the speed of light in the blink of an eye. Episodes of the past are finished; sadness cannot retrieve them, melancholy cannot make things right, and depression will never bring the past back to life.