Life is not fair - thank God

Each time we come across a challenge or hardship, we begin comparing our situation with that of someone else and come to an unfair conclusion that life is not fair.

Years ago, I was negotiating leave with my manager and got disappointed when he flatly refused to grant it. For the next few hours, I kept resenting how my senior had been permitted to go on a longer leave.

Only later I heard that he had gone for a serious treatment for cancer. It took me days to get out of the guilt as to how I had moped over someone else getting leave instead of finding out why. I did not get leave, but I enjoyed good health.

Usually, the events that happen in our interconnected lives may benefit some and disturb others. Not all of us are blessed with the wisdom to reflect on, and find the good in it.

So we do the easiest thing to do, which is blaming self, others, or God, or all together.

What we fail to understand is that in reality, the difference is in the way we perceive things.

It is one event or one incident, but two or more different perspectives.

I strongly believe that life is God-given. When something seems all bad to me, it does not mean there is nothing good in it at all. God is the master of all; he is fair to all.

It is the smallness of my mind that makes me think narrowly and conclude that God is good to someone else and unfair to me, whereas he is all the time the benevolent Master working on something more beautiful.

Therefore, all I need to do in tough times is to ponder over what I can do to make the situation better and work on it to the best of my strengths.

I then leave it in his hands and wait in hope that it will turn better and in my favour. And almost always, it does.

That is when I happily thank God that life is not merely fair but better than that.