As militant Islam does its level best to discredit the religion, it's important to remember that there are other voices within the faith. One such is the Sufis, a branch of Islamic mystics who live islam [submission], iman [faith] and ishan [awareness of G-d, "to act beautifully"]. Every Saturday, therefore, we spend some time with the Sufis and their 'crazy wisdom'.
This verse comes from the Hadiths of the Prophet Mohammed (pbuh), via Fadiman & Frager's Essential Sufism:
bq. "Value the worth of five things before they are replaced by the other five conditions: value your youthfulness before old age arrives, value health before sickness strikes, value your wealth before you become needy, value peacefulness before hardship comes, and value life before death arrives."
So, here's a question for you - have any of you had an experience that changed the way you valued one of these 5 conditions? If so, help others learn from that experience too! Use the Comments section to describe what happened, and what it taught you.
my health. i didn't realize how fortunate i was earlier in my life, even though it wasn't easy. now i have a disease called 'cushings'. presumably it is rare. but i wonder, looking around me, whether it is more a matter of 'rarely diagnosed'.
you see, with cushings, one gains tremendous weight. i've gone from 105 pounds to 225 pounds in a very short time. this happened even though i exercised, ate properly, and held down a full time job, as well as being active in my community. not all obesity is due to excessive intake.in fact, most of the people i've met who have cushings were very active...a day in my life before cushings meant that i walked a minimum of 6 miles, exercised using my home equipment, cleaned house, worked a minimum of 8 hours, played with my dogs, did things with friends, was involved with my husband.
in searching for answers, i spoke with dr. durandhar at wayne state university who discovered that a human virus, adenovirus 36, also causes obesity and he's quite blunt that diet and exercise won't change that condition either. he's working on developing treatment and hopefully a cure. why? because he's found the virus present in more than 30% of the patients he's examined. and he's developed obesity in test animals who were exposed to this virus.
he states that there are 9 distinct causes for obesity. most have nothing to do with how much food one eats.
.... so when you see someone who is obese, don't automatically assume that they eat too much and do too little.
if you are gaining weight, examine your life carefully. if you haven't changed your behaviors, then demand that your doctor run appropriate tests to seek answers. if you have one of the 8 out of the 9 causes of obesity, you need medical help as you won't lose weight without it.