Why do we fantasize about collapse when blessed?
The Learned Discipline of Gratitude: Why Boredom Breeds Ingratitude and How to Transform Our Hearts
Summary
Sh. Ali Mashhour delivers a comprehensive Islamic lecture on the critical importance of gratitude (shukr) as a fundamental aspect of faith. He explains that Allah has blessed humanity abundantly, both in visible and invisible ways, and has made clear the covenant: "If you thank Me, I will increase you; if you are ungrateful, My punishment is severe." Sh. Ali Mashhour emphasizes that gratitude is not a natural human trait but rather a learned discipline that must be actively cultivated, as human nature tends toward boredom, ingratitude, and transgression. He illustrates this through the Quranic example of the people of Saba (Sheba) in Yemen, who were given endless gardens, water, safe travels with rest stops throughout their journeys, yet became bored with comfort and began praying for hardship—ultimately leading to their gradual destruction.
Sh. Ali Mashhour draws parallels to modern society, particularly in America, where unprecedented comfort and convenience have made people so bored that they fantasize about societal collapse through popular entertainment genres like zombie apocalypses and dystopian narratives. He warns that this ingratitude manifests destructively in personal relationships, careers, and life choices, where people destroy their own blessings with their own hands by constantly wanting what they don't have rather than appreciating what they do. He stresses that the Companions of the Prophet never fell into this trap because gratitude was their first learned lesson, and he calls Muslims to train themselves to see the "full half" of the glass rather than the empty half, recognizing unseen blessings and protecting themselves from the greatest punishment: self-inflicted destruction.
Note: This transcript was generated using YouTube's automatic captioning, with AI-assisted cleanup for readability. It may contain inaccuracies due to background noise, audio quality, or limitations of the transcription software — particularly during Arabic recitation. Listener discretion is advised; please refer to the original video for precise wording.
[Arabic recitation]
Gives us in this verse a very clear rule and a very clear set of circumstances for us to receive his bless has endowed us with blessings as he has described in blessings that we can see and perceive. And blessings that are behind the scenes that perhaps are a m multitudes and that many times hold those blessings that we can see things that don't even occur to us that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is endowed each and every one of us. We are born into the mercy of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. When every each and every one of us is born into this world in spite of our circumstances, no matter what our individual circumstances are, we are born enveloped in the mercy of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. And Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala tells us how to receive those blessings. He says, "If you thank me, I will increase you. And if you are ungrateful, my punishment is a very painful one, is a very severe one. We understand from this that each and every blessing that we receive we are expected to thank Allah and gratitude to Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala it is the essence of belief in Allah in the last day gratitude is the epitome of belief and Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala he even refers to the believers as the thankful and he refers to the disbelievers in the Quran as the ungrateful. Allah subhanahu wa'ta'ala tells us if you were to attempt to enumerate and to count the blessings of Allah you would fall short. you'd be unable to because as we mentioned we are born enveloped in an essence of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala's mercy. Now we are to be thankful but we are finding an uphill battle with gratitude because as human beings the human nature is boredom and boredom breeds ungratefulness. Boredom breeds ungratefulness because gratitude is a learned discipline. The human being is not naturally born a gracious person. The human being is not naturally born with the gift of gratitude. This is a learned discipline. This is a learned honor that a person learns to be grateful. And learning to be grateful hinges on a person not taking what he has been given for granted. And this is something that every human being suffers from because naturally the human being is an ungrateful creature. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala says, he says, "And if you all were to attempt to enumerate the blessings of Allah, you would not be able to. YOU'D BE UNABLE TO. AND INDEED the human being is ungrateful and the human being is naturally by nature transgressing. The human being naturally goes beyond what is allotted to him. The human being naturally crosses his boundaries in his binds. The human being naturally is Now notice the workings that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala uses here. He doesn't say.
[Silence]
He doesn't say the human being is, you know, A LITTLE BIT UNGRATEFUL. THE HUMAN being naturally pushes the boundaries a little bit. No, that's not what he says. He says indeed the human being by nature is extremely oppressive and extremely ungrateful. That's what he tells us subhanahu wa ta'ala about our own nature men and women alike all human beings. This is the nature that we fight with. And Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala gives us guidance. He gives us guidance of the Quran and Sunnah so that we may learn how to become grateful. So that we may learn how to thank his blessings. sub tells us about ourselves in verses that our prophet said used to recite every Friday morning for every single week for he would recite these verses. any of the world. Is it not the case that the human being was at one point in time nothing to even be mentioned? Not even a thought. All of humankind, not one or two of us, all of humanity was not even a thought. It merely we merely existed in the eternal knowledge of Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala. Indeed, we have created the human being from drops of sexual secretions from the mother and the father. And we gave to him hearing and sight in order that we may test him in this life. We are to be tested. And we have guided the human being. We've given him the nature of right from wrong. AND WE'VE GUIDED him and he thus chooses whether he will be grateful or ungrateful. That's really what we are fighting against here. Will we be grateful or will we be ungrateful? And now we must learn how to be grateful, how to find our nature, our ungrateful nature. Because as we mentioned, what breeds ungratefulness? Boredom. A person looks at the mercy and the blessings of Allah that are around him and he feels like, "Yeah, yeah, I I understand I'm blessed and all that, but this is the beginning of the of the person's misguidance, this attitude, the idea, THE CONCEPT THAT THE HUMAN BEING DESERVES SO MUCH MORE THAN WHAT HE'S been given already." And don't think that this is a new idea or this is a new attitude or that nations before us did not practice this. Don't imagine that because nations before us fell into the same things that our nation falls into. Our nations are not special. They're human. And humanity by its very nature repeats itself. And so Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala teaches us that the human being by nature is ungrateful. The human being by nature is transgressing, is oppressive. And that the human being tends towards ungratefulness, tends to scoff at the blessings of Allah subhanahu WA TA'ALA, TENDS TO look around him and see only what he does not have. When they look at the blessings of Allah, the human being naturally can only see what he doesn't have, can only SEE WHAT HE WISHES he had, can only see what others have and cannot see what he has. Naturally, this is how the human being is. The human being naturally can only see the half empty part of the glass. But we learn to be grateful. How do we learn? Is this something that a human being naturally stumbles on? No. We learn from the Quran. We learn from the sunnah. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala teaches us in the Quran how to be grateful. He teaches us in the sunnah how to be grateful not just for this or THAT BUT FOR EVERYTHING that we have for those things that we notice and especially those things that go unnoticed by the human being. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala teaches us this gratitude because the agreement that he has taken upon himself that if you all thank me I shall increase you and if you are ungrateful know that my punishment is a very painful one. And so our position is to train our eyes not to wander and drift to the half empty part of the glass, but to train our eyes to fixate on the half full. Our position is to not see and imagine what we wish things were, but to see and imagine what things could be if it weren't for the blessing of a loss of heaven. This is a learned skill. Nations before us have fallen, much greater nations. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala tells us about the people of seven in Yemen. It was said that they had endless gardens of all that the person could desire and water flowing through it and a dam and Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala gave them everything that they could possibly want or imagine. Just gave it to them. AND HE TAUGHT THEM TO BE THANKFUL, to be grateful, and he gave them safety. And Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala, not only that, but he gave them something that is almost unheard of even in our time today. that when they would travel all the way up to Amab and cut through the absolutely inhospitable deserts of the Arab Peninsula that along their route countless villages were set up all the way on along their roots all the way to Ashe where there they did not have to even carry bring any extra sustenance with them. Road stops thousands of years ago. Who can imagine all along their roots? It's said that they could they could be a fool in one village, get on their animal and go to the next v village by and by the next and by the next. And so they We're burdened with having to carry sustenance, having to carry provisions, having to plan very carefully for their travels as safe as could be imagined, as comfortable as possible for their day. But they got bored with this. This was boring. That's not fun. Who wants to be comfortable all the time? And so they started to ask for love with their hearts. They started to say they started to scoff at these blessings that Allah had given them. And they started to say, "Oh Lord, I wish that, you know, it's great that our travels are so short and comfortable, but I wish that you could make our travels very distant." IMAGINE THE HUMAN BEING IS SO prone to boredom and is so prone to ungratefulness that he starts wishing for pain when he gets too much comfort. That is your nature. That is my nature. As we said, gratitude is a learned discipline. And notice what we say learn discipline. It's not something that comes naturally to the human being. And number two, it is a discipline which means that by its very nature you can practice it for 10 20 years and if one day you stop practicing it, it will recede. That's the nature of a discipline. It's not riding a bike where you never forget where it just comes naturally after that. You will always fight with your nature. Imagine the inhospitable desert, the dangers of the desert, and they're praying that Allah will make their travels treacherous. They are afraid that Allah will make their travels difficult. And so Allah did what? He gave them what they asked for. And he divided them up very very slowly. The people of Sebath, they were not destroyed all at once suddenly by some cataclysm. No, the people of Seah were destroyed at a snail's pace and this in itself is a moment of reflection for us because Allah has already agreed with us that if we are thankful he will increase us and if we are ungrateful ful his punishment is a painful one. We today we do not even we it's hard for us to even connect with people going through any kind of difficulty in our lives today. Today, the average American in America today, we can't even reconceptualize difficulty anymore. Things that would take a time of day of toil and chore come to us in a moment of in the window of 10 minutes. Today you have water waiting for you to turn it on. Electricity, heat, cold. It's too hot. Would you your drink to be a little bit cooler? Would you it to be a little bit warmer? Here it is. We live in such a sophisticated comfort that you don't have to settle with hot or cold. You can make it 6 to 7.5° AT ABOUT a 0.1 degree more for your beautiful skin to be just so comfortable to the point that we forget what pain feels and we start to pray for our own downfall. Why do you think in America one of the most popular genres is societal collapse and zombies? We look around and we are so comfortable. We start to fantasize about everything falling apart because this is too boring. We have to manufacture our own drama. Now it's too boring to always be comfortable. I want to be hungry a little bit. I want to be uncomfortable. I I wish I didn't have access to medicine, to hot water, to fire. I wish I didn't have access TO THESE THINGS. WOULDN'T THAT BE GREAT? HERE'S A MOVIE about it. HERE'S AN ENTIRE SERIES where you can fantasize about the collapse of modernity. Why do we do this to ourselves? Because gratitude is a learned discipline. IT DOESN'T COME NATURALLY. A person learns to thank Allah subhanahu.
[Arabic recitation]
If we were to have a television show or a movie all about things being perfectly comfortable, every single audience member would quit watching. If there was no problems in the show, nobody cheating on anybody, nobody crying, nobody in misery, nobody dies, no fear, no anything, just everything is going good. We will stop watching. That's boring. We need to have drama all the time because as we said, boredom is what breeds ungratefulness. So we fantasize. The housewife who has all that she could want fantasizes about all this going away. And this is actually holding ME BACK. I WISH I was with the name. I wish I was with that guy. I wish I was with Joe Schmo from high school. I should have done that because now who am I? I just I'm just a milk pocket. Just a mom. This is what we learned. The man, he learns that maybe actually it's your coworker. Your coworker is who YOUR SOULMATE SHOULD HAVE BEEN, NOT YOUR WIFE AT HOME, NOT THE MOTHER OF YOUR CHILDREN. SHE'S THE ONE THAT holds the keys to all of my happiness. And so they go about destroying every good thing in their own life with their own hands. And that is the greatest of of punishment from Allah. Not that it's taken away from you that you yourself use your own hands to destroy your own life. That's the greatest of humiliation. And that's exactly what Allah gives to those who are of great. We look back to our to the companions of our prophets. Not one of them had THIS PROBLEM. NOT ONE OF THEM. WHY? Because the first lesson they learned was gratitude. We have this problem. the problem, this phenomenon of destroying our own lives with our own two hands. Why? Because we've missed this lesson somehow. We drama. We want to manufacture it. When someone has something good to say, we listen halfheartedly. But if there is some juicy scandal of foot, well then I'm all ears because please I need to feel alive. I need to watch misery. This is this is what really jumpst starts my little heart and see this is the danger that we face and we can't see Allah's blessings around us anymore. WE START TO LOOK AT Allah's blessings in a very very distorted manner. We start to see Allah's blessings as punishments. That's really the ultimate the ultimate.
[Arabic recitation]