SubhanAllah!
This morning, my husband noticed a car stuck in the snow just one house before ours. He went outside and found four men struggling to free their wheels. In order to help them, he brought from home a bag of sand (so that wheels could get a traction), a snow shovel, and helped them use a jack so the car could come out. After about an hour or more, they finally succeeded.
During the process, my husband learned that they had been stuck there since 3.30 a.m. yes you read it right 3.30 a.m. SubhanAllah, in freezing temperatures. They also told him he was the only person who came out to offer help even asking if they needed anything else, like coffee.
They had called a towing service as well, but were told it would cost them, so they were on their own.
This incident quietly exposes something deeper about our times. Many cars and people passed by, yet no one stopped to help. Most were likely rushing to work, caught in their own schedules and daily cycles. This is individualism at its peak. Not the healthy kind that values personal responsibility, but the isolating kind that teaches people to mind only their own lane, literally and metaphorically.
Capitalism has pushed this mindset. Productivity over people, money over mercy. When every minute is monetized, helping someone feels like a “loss”. We are so trained to outsource kindness to services and institutions, forgetting that community is built by hands, not invoices.
Islam, however, teaches us otherwise. We are not islands. We are accountable not only for our individual prayers but also for our presence in others’ hardship. A delay, an exhaustion for someone else’s relief is not a loss. It is sadaqah. It is worship.
May we all unlearn this cold individualism before it freezes our hearts, not just our roads.