Â鶹Éç

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It was a heart-breaking end. After the glorious Moroccan victory against Portugal, England versus France, the game many of us were waiting for, saw two splendid teams each carrying the hopes of their nations. Then as Harry Kane’s second penalty shot went over the crossbar, that was it for the men’s team, England’s World Cup dreams. The Sunday Times headline summed it up, ‘it’s all over for England. Again.’ But even as devastated fans and pundits agonise over what might have been, what could have been done differently, what this tells is that sport magnifies the feelings of loss, regret and defeat which are a part of all our lives. The education we were denied, the job we never got, unrequited love, broken relationships, the argument we wish we’d never picked, - the stuff of life which requires risk and where so much of our emotional energy is spent. Feeling regret or wronged is natural but it can be all consuming, even paralysing. The most important thing is to keep moving forward, however slowly. I think turning a loss or a regret into a catalyst for doing something productive lies at the heart of the human spirit. It’s how I understand the Islamic virtue of repentance as something which gives relief to our hearts. That it may be less about seeking God’s forgiveness for the wrong that we’ve done and more about forgiving ourselves and acknowledging our limitations and weaknesses. Making peace with ourselves and others allows us to live with gratitude, to renew our commitment to the good we can still do in our lives. It helps us to move forward so that one day we can hopefully tell a better story about ourselves. Last week the Â鶹Éç revealed its list of a 100 most inspiring women from around the world. Many of the women live at the centre of social, political or religious conflict – Afghan writers who’ve known only war, but still have faith that their words and deeds can inspire a different future, Ukrainian journalists who want to chronicle the daily lives of people living under Russian shelling and human rights activists from all walks of life for whom justice is a collective and unrelenting struggle; each of them gives hope. So whether it’s the England men’s football team or how any of us pick ourselves up after a loss or a defeat, the words of one of these women, the south Sudanese Sarah Chan resonate, ‘You are what you believe about yourself, so believe in a future worthy of all your dreams and aspirations.’