Duties of Brotherhood in Islam

I was in Adelaide masjid for the usual Friday usrah last week. Most of the time I was a bit quiet. Had lot of things on my mind wif exams just over and now worrying bout the result and so on. Didn't feel like talking much. Hurm twas quite awkward but I just got over it. The first session with the brothers was about Seerah of the Prophet Muhammad. Most of the time I didn't really concentrate on what it was all about this time. Too bad I couldn't really focus on it and it was entirely my fault for coming late. But at least I learnt a few things during the second session with the sisters. Jana talked about the book Duties of Brotherhood in Islam written by Imam AL-Ghazali. Erm it also applies to the women of coz! Basically it was about the duties you have towards your brothers or sisters in Islam or in another word friends maybe. Those duties are
1. material assistance
2. personal aid
3. holding one's tongue
4. speaking out
5. forgiveness
6. prayer
7. loyalty and sincerity
8. informality

But of coz we didn't have that much time to talk about the whole duties tho. So we chose the duty holding one's tongue. That really intrigued me. Personally I think this is one of the hardest or maybe the hardest part of it. It may sound simple enough but no. Talking is so so easy that sometimes we say things without even thinking what it might do to anyone or ourself. Especially talking behind someone's back. 'Gurls' thing' they say. You can't put more than one girl together long enough to without having them start gossiping about something..someone. Gosh I find it hard myself. I simply can't keep my mouth shut man. I might as well not talk at all. What do you think the gurls mostly do spending hours together?? Or else they wouldn't have spent time together..don't tell me they spend time doing activities which does not involve talking and talking bla bla bla. How beautiful Islam is to set out that it is in fact our duty to hold our tongue or keep our mouth shut from blurting out bad things about other people rather than treating it as a courtesy or a moral thing that one should do.

Ibn al_Mubarak said:
"The believer tries to find excuses for others, while the hypocrite looks out for mistakes"

That's just one of the examples actually. You should in many circumstances hold your tongue. For instance:
- When your friend confided something in you regardless of whether she said it's a secret or not, you should KEEP IT TO YOURSELF. Which I find so hard to do at times coz like i said words just slip your tongue without you even thinknig or realizing that you were revelaing something about someone to another person which might be the wrong person to be told. And imagine what that would do to the person that had confided in you. And when she finds out what you did, even if i were that person I won't ever trust myself. Then again, why would I or even anyone else still wanna do it? There are sayings ;

"The breasts of free men are the tombs of secrets"

Maybe when you're sort of a gossiping person, your life will never be peaceful coz people will bug you all the time to get new stories out of you. And they themselves wouldn't wanna trust you to tell you anything about them.

"The fool's heart is in his mouth, but the intelligent man's tongue is in his heart"

Although sometimes I feel worried of being a quiet person, when I think of this, it's actually an advantage coz the more you talk, the more bad things might come out and what would that reflect of you to people? Although people might wanna listen to your gossip or bad things about other people, you've in fact shown how you can also talk behind their back. They would get a clear picture of how bad a person you are and u can hardly find a true friend. Hardly!

- When your friend is in distress or something, she might treat you badly. Or ignoring you whatever. I've had that recently. Isn't annoying when you really think of it? Coz what the heck. Why would she wanna put the blame on you for her own emotional state or problems whatever?And you might sometime feel how unfair it is, don't you? If I didn't think much I would have given her the same treatment. Yep I did that. Stupid isn't it. But I couldn't control myself and maybe coz I was only thinking for myself. As if I was never in her situation. Did I even ask her what was going on or something? Nope, I did not. Then why would I make things worse by doing that, giving her a cold shoulder just becoz she ignored you when you didn't even consider what was on her mind?? Exactly. Why ekk??Hurm no idea. I personally think that's a normal reaction people have. And how hard it is to hold you tongue and stop yourself from giving her a piece of your bloody mind. Things were bad enough but I only made it worse by adding the salt to the wound. I read somewhere from one of the motivation books sometime ago. When you're having a problem in a realationship with someone, be it friends whatever, think of the good things you had together, the time spent, how much that person had been a good friend to you in the past, then consider whether it would be worth it to just spoil the good things you had together out of a silly dilly little bad things that he/she did to you. Sounds simple enough, isn't it. IF we make it simple. Well about the gurl, well after a few days, things got back to normal. She was the one who actually started to talk to me. It was actually nothing. SILLY of me. Now I'm a loser, coz I was not strong enough to be the one to do it. I made it a big deal out of a small thing and didn't want to get over it. Now who's the one who got problem??? ;p <---- - Erm what else. Well, I actually hardly do this, don't like it anyway, but some people really love to probe into other people's affair. Even it's your best friend. Never think that being a best friend you have the right to know everything about her. She also got a right to have secrets. The Prophet once said:
"Do not spy and do not pry. Do not severe relationships and do not fall out, but serve God as brothers"

That's about it, more or less from what I got in the usrah. It made me look back to myself, assessing what better traits I have more than others than I can actually judge them based on the little dittle unpleasant behavior they have. It is like a piece of white paper laid down in front of you. If you take a pen and put a little dot in somewhere on the paper, you won't even notice the whole white spaces but the dot. That's very human in fact, so easy for us to see other people's faults or weaknesses no matter how insignificant they are without remembering that they have something good. And how about yourself??