Believe: an acceptance that something exists or is true, especially one without proof.

Conviction: the quality of showing that one is firmly convinced of what one believes or says.

I was 19 when I stumbled upon an article about the confession of an elderly white man about old age and about dying, and there was this one sentence of what he said which became etched in my mind until today. He was talking about God and he said, ’…and yes, I wish and I have wished for very long now that I had that sort of conviction in God but I don’t, that would have made this journey so much easier.”

His words resonated so strongly with me at that time, being one of my life’s most stressful times. I had just turned down a RM300K scholarship to England and had to make up to it by staying back in my old school and attempting STPM and A-Levels at the same time. I brought upon me the kind of stress that I never imagined could do so much damage, but giving way to my parents’ wishes meant that I had no choice but to carry on with it.

Reading his words during those tough times made me realize that conviction in God is NOT the same as believing in God. People like me believe in God but we don’t have the conviction in God. We use the 90%:10% rule which means that we trust ourselves 90% and God only 10%. This 90% me, 10% God meant that we overly rely on ourselves to address all the challenges in life. Under the 90% rule, regardless of whether God helps or not, whether the forces of nature and the world are with us or against us, we take full responsibility of our destiny. We believe that God is there, powerful and all, but we don’t trust our children to play alone outside the house. We don’t slack on even one assignment even after being awarded 5/5 in our appraisals. We still look right and left, and again right and left just to be sure before crossing the road. We make great effort to find the ‘one’ even if we know that God has it all planned out, and we still look out for our loved ones at all times even if we know God has it all covered.

So when I came out of university and started mingling with people from backgrounds different from mine, it became apparent that people have alternative rules. Instead of 90:10, a lot had 50:50. Theirs is more of a collaborative model where they do half the work and leave the rest to God. They truly trust God to see it through, to make it happen. And they don’t chase the end until it comes through. They don’t stay alert and cautious all the time. They let go. This I realized, is CONVICTION in God. This amazed me because there is so much more acceptance and relaxedness in this people. And I must say that I started wanting to emulate them.

Unfortunately, I realized soon after that, that conviction is not something you can talk your mind and heart into. You have to grow up in that conviction. That conviction must have worked for you for so long that it becomes part of your definition of life and for this to happen it has to start young. And that’s when I realized that raising children with that conviction is one of the greatest gifts you can give to your children. Making them believe that effort is necessary, but always leaving the other half for God to work it out teaches them to build conviction in God. This I find is more important than any education or material endowment, and this is how I started inculcating the practice of worship in my household. Leaving the other part to God by cutting some of our worldly effort and channelling it into worship in one form or other – prayer, observance of religious festivals, rites and rituals, etc.

And true enough that children are able to build conviction so much more easily than us adults. All they need is continuous exposure and involvement. All that seemed to be the affairs of the pious, the religious and the elderly work wonders for young minds, especially those who have the tendency to take on more responsibilities and a higher accountability. By continuous involvement especially in activities that are engaging and interesting and suited to their age, we don’t only build their conviction in God and release them from the burden of perfectionism, we also teach them the very art of religion, striking a balance between cynicism on one hand and fanaticism on the other.

And in doing all this and growing with them, maybe one day, people like me will eventually see through all the science, technology and human intervention to realize that the continuous heavy rain that has come down hard to wash away the haze that was plaguing us for weeks on end was actually God doing his 50% just in time for to get our spirits up again for the festive season. 🙂🙂