Hey friends,
Here’s a fun story I’ve been thinking about recently. It’s narrated by the 9th-century Islamic scholar Tirmidhi. It goes along these lines:
One day, the Prophet Muhammad noticed a Bedouin leaving his camel unattended without tying it. He asked the Bedouin “Why don’t you tie your camel?” The Bedouin answered “I place my trust in God”. The Prophet said “Trust in God, but tie your camel”.
This is great stuff. Trust in God, but tie your camel.
This ties in (lol) with the Stoic concept of
The Trichotomy of Control that I
wrote about a year ago in this newsletter. There are things within our control, there are things partially in our control, and there are things outside our control. We’d all live happier lives if we focused our attention only on the stuff we could control, and let the rest go.
Tie Your Camel reminds us to put the effort into helping ourselves (within our control), but beyond that, from being free of expectations about the outcome (outside our control).
Have a great week!
Ali