It was about 10:30 p.m. when I returned home from a family reunion. I entered the living room to witness my mother’s panic stricken eyes staring at the television. It was only a few seconds until I realized what the news channels were broadcasting. One of the most popular restaurants in Dhaka was attacked by terrorists. My mother started dialing every relative who lived in Gulshan, praying that none of them were inside the restaurant.

The news said that some police officers were shot and a few innocent people were murdered. At that instant I could not understand the gravity of the situation. The little girl residing in me, who often shut her eyes from the horror-stricken reality, wanted to believe that everything was going to be solved within a couple of hours. However, that did not happen.

Around midnight, when I heard about the officer-in-charge of Gulshan being killed, I started taking the situation more seriously. Our security force, whom I believed could save us from this calamity, was being threatened. Who could save us from this apart from God? Even though I spent hours praying for all the hostages’ safety, my helplessness took a toll on me. Hours passed, and my inbox was filled with my people’s guesses and predictions about the situation. ISIS did claim the attack and all the news channels were closed from giving out live broadcasts. But none of the hostages were released yet.

I watched the sunrise as I lay awake in my bed. I could not stop guessing what was happening. No matter how hard I tried, I could not shake the horror off my mind. What was going to happen? Will none of them come out alive? Have they killed them all? The series of questions kept swimming in my brain until I finally fell asleep around 8 in the morning.

I woke up to find out that, according to reports,13 hostages were rescued, five attackers were killed and one was caught. I forced out a sigh of relief. The incident was over. The horror was over. Or at least, that’s what I wanted to believe. But it wasn’t.

For the next one week, my Facebook news feed was filled with only posts about the attack. Despite my countless efforts, I could not avoid the reality. My stomach churned every time I read something new about the hostages or attackers. The blood covered pictures of the dead bodies made me sick. Almost every member from that restaurant, whether hostages or attackers, was given a role by the social media. Someone was framed as a hero, whereas someone’s intentions were questioned. Some were identified and some were not, but every life lost was honored. The murderers were despised from the core of almost every living heart. Profile pictures were changed to black wallpapers resembling a sign of mourning, all silently acknowledging the huge impact left on us.

I only browsed through my news feed every minute and with every new news, I felt the dark shadow of fear dawn on me. It was as if sleep had left me for good and even if it tried to conquer my tired eyes, the horror of the attack haunted it through scary nightmares. Every time I closed my eyes, I was filled with images of the horror-stricken eyes of Abinta or Tarashi pleading for their lives to be spared before the murderers, or the braveness of Faraaz’s heart to be able to choose friendship over his life. What would I do if I were in their places?

My beautiful and beloved country was being threatened -- was there nothing I could do? I felt the thin threads of peace being torn off my chest, releasing a threatened and unprotected heart. Every time I stepped out the front door, I was afraid of being attacked. I was concerned for my family and friends. Even though I knew my presence could not possibly make any difference, somehow staying close to them assured me of their safety. The attackers were identified to be people from well-educated families which made me question everyone around me. I could not trust anyone completely and always felt a need to justify my intentions to everyone, too. I looked for answers and soon enough I found them.

One day out of frustration, my friend exclaimed how Bangladesh was definitely going down the ruins and that “there was no hope." These words seemed to trigger the emotions of positivity being suppressed by fear until then. I realized that the attackers were being successful in making us weak by letting fear control us and we could not let that happen. The negativity of the murders had snatched away our faith and it had to be restored.

Yes, six people had managed to kill reportedly 20 innocent lives but there were still hundreds and millions of people protesting their acts of aggression. In the last month, many countries who had never heard of Bangladesh before stood up in our support, regardless of their culture or race. There could be hundreds out there planning more of such vicious attacks but that cannot not lower the strength of the millions of other hearts which cried at the death of 20 mere strangers.

We are not fully selfish. There is still one force uniting most of us together and that is love. And it is not just the romantic love, or the love for a friend or family, but the love of one person for another. There is still hope for this world if this love is utilized to minimize the negativity.

Of course these words are indeed more difficult than they sound because after all, we are aiming high. This incident made me realize that even though we name various materialistic achievements when we are asked about our “aim in life," the core and most important aim (besides survival) is peace and happiness. Think about it. Whatever you might desire now, whether it is money or power, the main aim lies in the reason behind desiring it but not the thing itself. That means we are constantly striving to achieve happiness for ourselves. But what if we worked for everyone’s happiness as a whole instead of focusing it on ourselves only?

Because as I believe, happiness and peace coexist collectively. According to me, peace cannot exist separately for individuals. If one part of the world is lacking peace, the other parts can never be fully free of worries. It disrupts the balance of nature. Because, like I said, our hearts are still connected with the common thread of love. There will be many people trying to destroy this peace but there will be many more trying to restore it.

Therefore shift the focus from you and center it on everybody as a whole. Forget about playing the lead role in your story and instead try to play a strong supporting role to make the story worth reading. Yes, do fulfill your dreams, but change the motive behind them. If we all try to work for common peace and happiness, the world will be stronger than it ever was.

Change will seem difficult if we try to bring it all at once. Let’s all try to change one brick at a time in order to change the bigger picture. Minimize the negativity within ourselves and embrace the act of love. It is possible because it is instilled in our very nature.