Why zebras don't get ulcers?

I must first admit that i don't understand more than half the book, and that i cheated and skimmed through certain chapters that don't interest me yet.

However, given the subject nature - the science of stress and its impact on our well being, it is a reader friendly and very interesting book. I don't think i can introduce this book as well as Amazon.com Review, so i shall lift their text and show it here.

Amazon.com Review
Why don't zebras get ulcers--or heart disease, diabetes and other chronic diseases--when people do? In a fascinating look at the science of stress, biologist Robert Sapolsky presents an intriguing case, that people develop such diseases partly because our bodies aren't designed for the constant stresses of a modern-day life--like sitting in daily traffic jams or growing up in poverty. Rather, they seem more built for the kind of short-term stress faced by a zebra--like outrunning a lion.
With wit, graceful writing, and a sprinkling of Far Side cartoons, Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers makes understanding the science of stress an adventure in discovery. "This book is a primer about stress, stress-related disease, and the mechanisms of coping with stress. How is it that our bodies can adapt to some stressful emergencies, while other ones make us sick? Why are some of us especially vulnerable to stress-related diseases, and what does that have to do with our personalities?"

Sapolsky, a Stanford University neuroscientist, explores stress's role in heart disease, diabetes, growth retardation, memory loss, and autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis. He cites tantalizing studies of hyenas, baboons, and rodents, as well as of people of different cultures, to vividly make his points. And Sapolsky concludes with a hopeful chapter, titled "Managing Stress." Although he doesn't subscribe to the school of thought that hope cures all disease, Sapolsky highlights the studies that suggest we do have some control over stress-related ailments, based on how we perceive the stress and the kinds of social support we have.

Read this book and you will find out more about why many of us fall sick around exam periods, or whether claims we often hear regarding stress and its association and stomach ulcers or cancers are valid. I'm now more aware of what my body is going through when i am stressed, and will now actively monitor myself to take note of the danger signs and try to lower my glucocorticoids level.

Here's a short story regarding one of my favorite board games that is in the footnotes of the book. Prof JJ has taught us well to learn to appreciate footnotes, that's where the juicy stuff is...

I listened to a tape of this sermon, called "Back in the Box," by Rev John Ortberg. It concerns an incident from his youth. His grandmother, saintly, kind, nurturant, also happened to be a viciously competitive and skillful Monopoly player, and his summer visists to her were littered with his defeats at the game. he described one year where he practiced like mad, honed his Machiavellian instinct, developed a ruthless jugular-gripping style, and finally mopped up the board with her. After which, his grandmother rose and calmly put the pieces away.

"You know," she said offhandedly, "this is a great game, but when it is all over with, the pieces just go back in the box." Amass your property, your hotels...[the sermon takes off from there]...your wealth, your accomplishments, your awards, your whatever, and eventually it will all be over with and those pieces go back in the box. And all you are left with is how you lived your life.

Life is too beautiful and short to be spent chasing after things that at the end of the day means nothing. Treasure those around us. Life is fragile, we have to nourish it. It will finally mean something someday.