Finding the key 
Within the family of believers, the practice of Sufism offers an inward, mystical perspective that looks at how we live our lives. The wali is a Sufi teacher who is the last in a chain of successive teachers going back to the Prophet Muhammad. A story tells of one wali who is bending over in an alley looking for something. A disciple of his asks him what he is looking for, to which the wali answers: “My son, I have lost the keys to my house.” After helping him search for a while without success, the disciple asks his teacher where exactly he thinks he lost his keys. The wali answers: “I think I lost them inside my house.” Confused, the disciple asks: “Then why are you looking for your lost keys out here?” The wali responds: “Because there is light out here, my son.”
This story made me think about the billions or even trillions of locks and keys there must be around the world, opening all kinds of doors, windows, drawers, cupboards or even starting engines. Keys are such an essential part of our daily lives that we hardly notice them anymore.
Every key has its particular ridges and valleys. The locks have pins and tumblers, wards and bits that define them and create a particular pair of lock and key. One has to imagine, though, that among the billions or trillions of keys around the world there must be quite a few that fit the same locks. This means our keys all open multiple doors, vehicles or drawers around the world, without our even realizing it.
The story of the wali and this simple understanding about keys should inspire us all to try some new approaches in finding keys to solutions today. All around us we see problems; we see doors and windows that are locked tight, without key or solution. But there is always a key that fits, if only we knew how to look for it.
We look at our seas and we realize that the life within is dying, with temperatures rising, pollution growing and overfishing ongoing. We look at our forests and arable earth and see that their total surface is diminishing at a frightening rate. We look at the damage wreaked by extreme weather around the world and can no longer deny that human-induced climate change has made these episodes more intense, frequent and, ultimately, deadly. We look at our own societies and see fear; we see more and more people who do not trust their officials and take refuge in the extremes. We look at Gazans and Ukrainians dying every day and we no longer understand how our world could tolerate any of this.
Let us not shy away from saying we are not perfect. We have achieved a great deal as humanity, but we have also done so much damage and made many mistakes. To give it another honest try, we must look inwardly and tell ourselves that there are many keys that may open the doors we are trying to open. We simply have to start looking in new places, to regain trust and hope in humankind, and to build upon the many achievements we have made in organizing our societies, an international order and a set of rules and values we all try to respect.
We are not infallible, but with a fresh approach and wise leadership the keys that fit can be found. We must not forget, as Charles Dickens once wrote, that very often “A very little key will open a very heavy door.”
• Hassan bin Youssef Yassin worked closely with Saudi Arabia’s petroleum ministers, Abdullah Tariki and Ahmed Zaki Yamani, from 1959 to 1967. He led the Saudi Information Office in Washington from 1972 to 1981 and served with the Arab League’s observer delegation to the UN from 1981 to 1983.
