While stress may be necessary for human survival, the excess of it certainly affects our health and productivity. It is claimed that in the United States nearly 20 million people suffer from stress in terms of attributing their illness or symptoms to it. Stress related compensation cost nearly $200 million per year. Loss of productivity and stress related illness directly or indirectly amounts to $50 billion per year. Many corporations and individuals are spending nearly $15 billion per year on stress management of their employees. ¹Newsweek 042588

There is enough medical evidence to link stress to the causation of peptic ulcer disease, hypertension, coronary artery disease and depression. In addition, many common problems like tension headache, insomnia, impotency (in man), frigidity (in women), are stress related to causation of diabetes, suppression of immune system and development of cancer.

In our day to day life, stress affects peace at home, job performance at work, grades in school and even our eating and mating behavior.

Warning Signs Of Stress

The earliest signs of stress are irritability, mood swings, difficulty in sleep, lack of concentration, abdominal distress, extreme sensitivity to criticism, weight gain of weight loss, fear of failure, poor appetite, or hunger, and increase dependence on tranquilizers or alcohol for sleep.

Conditions  Which Cause Stress

Psychiatrists have identified some 50 stressors. In fact any change, good or bad, is stressful. A change in job, or job description, in school, residence, financial status, loss or gain of a family member or close friend, injury or illness, national calamity or news of riots or violence all can be extremely stressful. Muslims living in a non-Muslim society may acquire some additional stress. These may include such factors as preserving their identity, practicing Islam (i.e. in food matters or timing of prayer), defending Islam on a hostile media and settling conflicts between family members: the spouse, parent /child, and practicing / non practicing factions.

Who Are Prone to Stress

Although stress spares no one including children, certain professions get more then their share. They include the sales person, the stock broker, the secretary, the inner city school teacher, the air traffic controller, the medical intern, the police officer and those handling complaint departments. It is interesting to note that qualities like being ambitious, compulsive, high achieving, productivity oriented are looked upon as signs of efficiency by the employer, are also type A personality traits, so dangerous to our health. So the art is to have these qualities, with a cool type B personality in order to live happily and have a longer time.

Coping With Stress

Although we are all exposed to stress, why can some of us cope with it better then others ? Is it the way we deal with the stressor, or the way we are built? There is some evidence to suggest that some of us may be genetically predisposed to depression, or have deficiency in the level of neurotransmitters, the mood regulating hormones, or just do not produce enough adrenalin on demand.

A person's religious belief has an important bearing on his personality and his outlook in life. By putting the trust in God, a believer minimizes the stress on him by reducing his responsibility and power to control his failures.

Proven ways to handle stress as being practiced now range from meditation, sleep, exercise, socialization, biofeedback, psychotherapy and tranquilizers. In this article we are going to discuss how to deal with stress in the light of the Quran and the Sunnah.

Stress Factors

Psychologically the stress results from the following factors.

1. Fear of the unknown, and our inability to recognize, foresee and control it.
2. Loss of things, and people in our life dear to us, and our inability to recover these losses or accept them.
3. Our inability to see through the future. In fact we might be more stressed if we do see the future.
4. Conflicts between the mind, and the reality and our failure to accept the reality (i.e. the phase of denial). It is the lack of the inner peace due to our internal conflicts which leads to the external disturbances in our behavior and affects our health.

Quranic Reflection on Stress Factors

Let us examine how the Quran deals with such situations. Our losses are a part of trial for us:

"Be sure We will test you with something of fear and hunger, some loss in goods or lives, but give glad tidings to those who are steadfast, who say when afflicted with calamity: To God we belong and to Him is our return. They are those on whom (descend) blessings from God and mercy and they are the ones that receive guidance." (Quran 2:155)

Whatever we are given is a gift from God. We are not their owners. Everything belongs to God and returns to Him. So if we don't own these things why mourn their loss or wax proud on receiving them.

Only God knows what our ultimate destiny is. We cannot peek into our future. We do, however, have a limited free will; we are free to choose between good or bad, to believe in God or not to believe in Him, but we have no control over future not related to our ability to act in the present - whether my wife will have a son or daughter, whether his / her eyes will be brown or black, or whether I will have an accident tomorrow or not. Worrying over such things is of no use.

Rejection of faith in the Quran is described as a disease, its cause being arrogance and reluctance to accept truth.

"In their heart there is a disease and God has increased their disease and grievous is their penalty because they lie to themselves". (Quran 2:10)

Thus when a man lies to himself, he creates an inner conflict - between his heart and the mind. In order to contain that conflict, the mind sends signals to glands for secretion of hormones like adrenalin which leads to rapid heart rate, perspiration, tremor, the basis of a lie detector tests.

This conflict could be due to "small" crimes like theft or adultery, or big crimes like rejection of God.

Three Stages Of Spiritual Development Of Soul Age

The Passionate Soul

Nafsul Ammara:

"I do not absolve myself. Lo the (human) soul is prone to evil, save that whenever my Lord has mercy. Lo, my Lord is forgiving; merciful". (Quran 12:53)

This soul inclines toward sensual pleasure, passion and self gratification, anger, envy, greed, and conceit. Its concerns are pleasures of body, gratification of physical appetite, and ego. In a hadith we are told, "Your most - ardent - enemy is your evil self which resides within your body". (Bukhari)

If this evil soul is not checked, it will lead to unusual stress and its resultant effects.

The Reproaching Soul

Nafsul Lawammah:

"Nay, I swear by the reproaching soul" (Quran 75:1)

This soul is conscious and full aware of evil, resists it, asks for God's grace and pardon, repents and tries to amend and hopes to achieve salvation.

"And (there are) others who have acknowledged their faults. They mix a righteous action with another that was bad. It may be that Allah will relent toward them. Lo Allah is relenting, merciful". (Quran 9:102)

"There are two impulses within us. One, spirit, which calls towards good and confirms the truth. He who feels this impulse should know that it comes from Allah. Another impulse comes from our enemy (devil), which leads to doubt and untruth and encourages evil. He who feels this should seek refuge in Allah from the accursed devil" (Hadith).

This soul warns people of their vain desire, guides and opens the door to virtue and righteousness. It is a positive step in spiritual growth.

The Satisfied Soul

Nafsul Mutma 'innah:

"O (you) soul in (complete) rest and satisfaction. Come back to your Lord, well pleased (yourself) and well pleasing unto Him. Enter you then among My devotees, enter you in My heaven". (Quran 89-27-30)

This is the highest state of spiritual development. A satisfied soul is in the state of bliss, content and peace. The soul is at peace because it knows that in spite of its failures in this world, it will return to God. Purified of tension, it emerges triumphant from the struggle and resides in peace and bliss.

What Should We Do In Panic And Despair?

In panic situations non-believers behave differently from believers. They have no one to turn to, to ask for mercy and forgiveness, they know and believe not in any life other then this worldly life, over which they have no control. Naturally they get more depressed which in turn leads them to even more wrong doing. If they were used to casual drinking, after drinking,  they will increase their consumption of alcohol and end up as alcoholics or habitual criminals.

In a state of depression a believer, on the other hand, is advised to do the following:

Increase Dhikr (remembrance of God)

"He guides to Himself those who turn to Him in penitence - Those who have believed and whose heart have rest in the remembrance of God. Verify in the remembrance of God, do hearts find rest". (Quran 13:27-28)

Be constant in their prayers

"O you who believe, seek help with steadfastness and prayer. For God is with those who are steadfast". (Quran 2:153)

Pray to God for Forgiveness.

"And I have said: Seek forgiveness from your Lord. Lo He was ever forgiving". (Quran 71:10)

Better Ourselves

In addition to the above believers are also expected to constantly struggle to better ourselves.

"Surely God does not change the condition in which people are until they change that which is in themselves". (Quran 13:11)

Increase Quranic Recitation

"O mankind! There has come to you a direction from you Lord, and a healing for (the disease in your) heart, and for those who believe a guidance, and mercy. (Quran 10:57)

The echo of sound has a medical effect, and is now widely utilized. The recitation of Quran or listening to the same has a wholesome effect on the body, the heart and the mind. It is said that the letter 'alif' echoes to the heart and latter 'ya' echoes in the pineal gland in the brain. Dr. Ahmed El Kadi of Akbar Clinic, at Panama City, Florida, conducted and has published the effects of listening to the Quranic recitation on physiological parameters i.e. the heart rate, the blood pressure and the muscle tension and reported improvement in all, irrespective of whether the listener is a Muslim or a non- Muslim, Arab or non-Arab. ²For more details, please refer to Dr. Ahmed El-Kadi's article on this subject in this book. Obviously it can postulated that those who can understand and enjoy the recitation, with a belief in it as word of God, will get maximum benefit.

Prophet Muhammad's Prayer During Stress

All the prophets, being human beings, had to undergo tests and trials which resulted in temporary stress. They constantly remembered God and received peace through His remembrance. The Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), for example, himself used and advised his followers to use the following D'ua (prayer) in times of distress.

"Allah is sufficient for us, and He is an excellent guardian, and we repose our trust in Allah."

"Surely we belong to Allah and to Him shell we return. O Allah, I beseech you for the reward of my hardship. Reward me, and compensate me for it with something good."

Excerpted from the book Islamic Perspectives in Medicine by Dr. Shahid Athar.

Dr. Shahid Athar is a Clinical Associate Professor at Indiana University. He has written and published over 110 articles on Islam, authored "Peace Through Submission" and edited "Islamic Perspective in Medicine". He is a frequent speaker at many Muslim institutions, mosques, universities and churches all over the USA.