Patience is the talisman that guards the treasure of Our union; whoever breaks this talisman comes away with the treasure.
And with Allah lies all success.
A useful note
His words, exalted is He, “Competition for increase distracts you” (1) to the end of the surah (At-Takathur: 1).
This surah is devoted exclusively to promise, threat, and warning, and it is sufficient as an admonition for anyone who reflects on it.
The phrase “distracts you” means: it preoccupies you in a way for which you have no excuse. To divert (ilhāʾ) from something is to become busy with something else. If that diversion is deliberate, it is subject to moral responsibility; if it is unintentional—such as his ﷺ statement about the striped cloak, “It just now distracted me from my prayer” (1)—the person is excused, for this is a kind of forgetfulness. In another hadith: “The Messenger of Allah ﷺ was distracted from the child” (2), meaning he became unaware of him. One says, “lahā bi-shay’,” meaning “he busied himself with it,” and “lahā ʿanhu,” meaning “he turned away from it.”
Lahw relates to the heart, while laʿb (play) pertains to the limbs; hence the two are often mentioned together. For this reason the wording “Competition for increase distracts you” is more severe in censure than “preoccupies you,” because a worker may engage his limbs in a task while his heart is not distracted by it, whereas lahw implies heedlessness and turning away.
Al-takāthur is a mufāʿala (reciprocal) form derived from kathra, signifying that you vie with one another in abundance. The verse intentionally omits mention of the thing vied for, leaving the expression unrestricted and all-inclusive: everything with which a servant competes against others—apart from obedience to Allah and His Messenger and whatever benefits his eternal abode—falls under this takāthur. Thus takāthur may concern anything: wealth, status, leadership, women,