As delicate as silk, as strong as steel…

A few days back, I was in a friend’s kitchen helping her cook an elaborate dinner. She told me to take a couple of dishes out of the oven. When I opened the oven door, a smell of burning hit me and I frantically looked around for the glove that one normally uses to pick up hot vessels. Couldn’t find it and ultimately, I ended up using an ordinary wash-cloth to pick up the hot dishes. Sure enough, in a matter of seconds, I got two nasty burns near my wrist. My skin crumbled like parchment paper and I still have those ugly marks on my hand.

The incident served as reminder: our human body is such a sensitive piece of apparatus. Paradoxically, it’s also one of the most robust systems one could ever dream of designing. It’s so sophisticated in that it has a super-efficient temperature control system; the digestive mechanism co-ordinates so well with the nervous system; our sleep cycles are designed perfectly, the endocrinal system, the respiratory system, the reproductive system… All of them function so beautifully, on their own, in perfect sync for years on end. So much so that even in the worst cases of systematic abuse, the human body functions as efficiently as it can. It doesn’t go down without a fight. We should be treating this body with all the respect and dignity that it deserves. Yet we subject it to some of the worst conditions. Cigarettes, alcohol, red meat, drugs, caffeine, pills… whatchamacallit.

Give your body absolutely the best that you have to offer and rest assured, it’ll serve you faithfully throughout its life-time. And yours.