Our whole life hangs by a thin thread and that thin thread is the spirit (ruh). It is amazing that we devote our entire attention to our body not our spirit. This body is a cage; the real spirit resides within this cage. The body is only a means of transport. It is a vehicle and the real passenger is the ruh. What we have done by giving the body preference over the ruh is very foolish indeed. It is like receiving an important visitor and instead of taking care of the visitor we leave him standing by the front door and instead begin washing his car or paying attention to it. We dump the visitor and instead pay attention to his mode of transport. In a similar way, this is what we do with our spirit. The real passenger, the ruh is completely neglected until it becomes malnourished, withers and dies whilst the body bloats.

[This short excerpt is based on the talk 'Sickness of the Soul' which was delivered by Shaykh Abu Yusuf Riyadh ul Haq on 26th November 2005 in London. For a more comprehensive understanding of this topic please refer to that lecture]