Chasing a Mirage

“People are running after a shadow – a shadow which is themselves. That is why they are ill – and the harder they run, the more miseries catch up with them. They flee from themselves all their lives in pursuit of a desert mirage that turns out to be nothing but sand. After all that struggle to reach that ‘oasis’ and to quench their thirst, they find that their struggles and false hopes have made them more parched and that much closer to death for their efforts. This is the fate of those who waste away their lives in vain amusement.

The main goal of Islam and of Sufi Paths, especially the Naqshbandi Path, is to bring people back to themselves, to teach them to stop the fleeing from their own shadow and to stop chasing a mirage.”

 

Mawlana Shaykh Nazim, the 40^th Shaykh in the Naqshbandi Golden Chain.