If Just One Person ...

Have you ever heard the argument,"If just one person will gain ... it's worth it?" Or, "If just one person will be hurt ... it's not worth it?"

It makes for a compelling argument but only emotionally.  Logically, it doesn't make sense.  For example, I recently read a news item about an Israeli umpire dying after being hit by a ball.  Does anybody think we should outlaw all ball playing in which a ball is thrown, because "if just one person will be hurt, it's not worth it?" Of course not.  People play ball.

Does anyone think we should ban all cars because, "If one person is killed by a car, the minuses outweigh the benefits?" Certainly not.

There needs to be a cost analysis, i.e. benefits versus the minuses, plus knowing how many people will be affected, before a decision can be made.  In some cases, it might very well be the right thing to do even if only a few people will stand to gain or lose; in other cases, not at all.

Taking Ideas to Heart

As a follow-up to the previous post, I heard the following in a shiur today.  We have much more knowledge than previous generations but lack the heart.

We take in a tremendous amount of information, but it doesn't obligate us; the knowledge is peripheral to us, not part of who we are. We run from idea to idea. In previous generations, people felt obligated by knowledge, they acquired what they learned.  Sara Schenirer comes to mind as an example.  She went to hear a speaker, Rabbi Flesch, who spoke about Yehudis of the Chanuka story and the power of Jewish women to continue her legacy.  She so took his message to heart that she changed the world with her Beis Yaakov movement.

Someone was giving an ongoing shiur on a certain midda and she asked a rav whether she should hone in on the midda again and again. The rav said we are living in a time that if you do that, with the intention of getting people to absorb it, the people won't come back because they'll say they heard it already.  They want variety. 

So we run from shiur to shiur and it's exciting, with new topics and each speaker with his or her style. Our challenge, said the person giving the lecture I heard today, is to take the “v'yodaata ha'yom” (and you shall know today) and make it “v'hasheivosa el levavecha” (and take it to heart), see how you can make the ideas part of your lives. We need to slow down and think about what we heard.  Even if we hear many ideas, we should take one idea and make it ours, make it practical and real to us.

Disclaimer: There are always those who take in ideas and change their lives as many baalei teshuva and converts can attest.

The Emotions Ruler

Within two days, I came across two versions of the "ruler idea."  I read the first one in an article by Miriam Adahan.  She writes,*  "I created a little two-sided ruler. One side shows varying degrees of happy faces and a happiness scale from 1–10. The other side shows varying degrees of pain, also from 1–10." 

She has children use them to show how happy they are or how painful something is or was.  Quantifying it can be very helpful in teaching how to prioritize and maintain a proper perspective.  It sounds like a great idea for adults too! If we had to pick a number to fit a genuine tragedy and a number for burning the onions, that could readily help us tone down our reaction to that which is more trivial.

Two days later, I read an article in Binah by Chaya Spirer Leeder, a social worker, in which she describes being in a hospital and seeing a chart with faces depicting levels of happiness to pain.  #1 was a smiling face and #10 was a crying and screaming face.  The nurse occasionally asked her what number she was. 

In her practice she uses the same idea to "allow the kids to re-evaluate their feelings and put events into perspective, prompting them to think, 'Is this really the worst thing that has ever happened to me?' The answer is usually no."

She also showed how by ranking a bad feeling, it enables us to think about what we can do to lower the number and if we can't lower the number, how to change what we think about it so we can feel better.

I like the idea of rating feelings, for the reasons mentioned above, and also because when other people tell us their assessment, it enables us to understand their perspective.

*for the full article see: here

What Moves You May Not Move Me

Back in April, I wrote: here about people who are moved by different things, and what appeals to one in his mitzva observance or in not violating a prohibition, may not speak to someone else. 

I was reminded of this today as I was reading about a former Mirrer talmid who said there were countless times that he was tempted to enter a business deal that wasn't perfectly honest, but then he thought, "How can I do this? Rav Nosson Tzvi [the rosh yeshiva] respects me!"

It's like when Yosef Ha'Tzaddik was on the verge of sinning and he saw the image of his father Yaakov which prevented him from sinning.  In both cases, the motivation was not the prohibition involved, that G-d said, "do not commit adultery," "do not steal," but an image of someone respected whom they could not let down.

Our minds work in interesting ways, don't they?

Emotional Ties

R' Grylak of Mishpacha magazine tells the story about how, after the Holocaust, a community of survivors including his father-in-law formed in Milan.  There was a Polish survivor from a chassidishe family who had given up religion after being in Auschwitz.  One day, he announced that he was going to marry an Italian non-Jewish woman.  The religious members of the community were appalled but none of their arguments were effective to dissuade him.

Then someone said, "How can you do such a thing?! Have you forgotten that you are the only living descendent of a beautiful family of Gerer Chassidim from Lodz?"

Now, what kind of reasoning was that when the man had dropped Yiddishkeit? And yet, this is what convinced him and he cancelled his marriage plans.  It's like all those Jews who are not religious who are proud to let you know about their rabbinic ancestors.  Why are they proud when they themselves aren't religious? Apparently there is something in their neshama that lets them know that this is worthy of admiration.

The lesson R' Grylak learns from this is that a person is kept from sin (and I would add - is inspired) only by what is relevant to him personally, what he is tied to emotionally.  It's hard to capitalize on this insight because what is meaningful to one person is not to another.  There are many ways people have been convinced not to marry out, and what worked for one is not a guaranteed approach for someone else.  Likewise, for religious people, some love the structure of halacha, others love the mystical approach.  There is a way to speak to every child and adult.  One needs wisdom and siyata dishmaya to find it.

You're the Boss of Your Thoughts

The halacha is that one of the people sent home from battle is one who is afraid.  Once the war begins however, the Rambam says he should rely on Hashem and realize he is fighting for the sake of the oneness of Hashem's name and not show fear.  He should not worry about his wife or children. On the contrary, he should remove all thoughts from his mind except the war.  Anyone who begins to feel anxious in the midst of battle to the point where he frightens himself, transgresses a negative commandment.

It occurs to me that a lesson we can learn from this is that we can control ourselves and our thoughts.  It is not valid to say, well this how I feel so I can't help it.  Hashem does not give us mitzvos that are impossible to fulfill.  If there is a prohibition of being afraid, we can distract ourselves and not be afraid.  The same would apply to other negative emotions we have that are unhelpful if not worse.  Hesech ha'daas - distraction, turning our minds to positive pursuits, is the way to go.

Taking My Emotional Temperature

There is a line in a hit song from the 70's that goes like this, "It can't be wrong when it feels so right."  I came across this line yesterday and thought, things have only gone downhill in the intervening decades.  Have you noticed? People are very invested in their feelings and some of them have this bizarre idea that if they feel a certain way, this somehow has the validity of objective truth. 

They feel the reverse too, that "it can't be right if it feels so wrong."  Is that true? Are our feelings the arbiter of morality, of right and wrong, of what G-d wants of us? Are so so intuitive that are gut feelings are always correct? Are we such holy people that our every thought and emotion is in sync with the will of G-d? Not me ... I need an objective way of knowing whether something is right or wrong for the Yetzer Hara is great at convincing us that good things don't feel right.

Intellect versus Emotion in the Courtroom

I heard a speech given by a lawyer who used to be a prosecutor and is now a defense attorney.  He said  that as a prosecutor you try to get the jury mad, to speak to their emotions, so they hopefully forget the actual laws involved.

This was said with no shame.  He was simply sharing how lawyers work and telling us that rather than focus on Truth and encouraging the jurors to concentratrate on the information being presented, they play on the court's emotions.  As the Zohar says, this is an alma d'shikra ( world of lies).

Mind versus Heart

A Maggid arrived in town whose arrival was highly anticipated because he was such a terrific speaker.  When his drasha was nearly finished, he would look at the packed shul.  He had just finished telling them a very sad story and the men sat with lumps in their throats and tears in their eyes.  He suddenly shielded his face with his hand so that only one half of the shul was able to see his expression.  Then he stuck out his tongue and made a funny face.  The half that could see it burst into laughter.  The other half, still moved by his sad story, were still on the verge of tears.  Each side stared at the other, one side unable to understand why the other was not crying and the other baffled why the rest were not laughing.

The Maggid explained to them what he had done and why.  "A moment ago I had you all on the verge of tears and I can make you laugh just as easily.  I can make you feel whatever I want! Never listen to someone just because he is a brilliant speaker.  The message has to be true!"

I was taken by this story, by how we can be manipulated, by how we are susceptible to a good talker or a good writer and are so easily swayed in our emotions.  The prevailing attitude is you can’t argue with feelings and feelings are not right or wrong, they just are – but this is not a Torah view.  And yet, I see it often expressed by frum people.  Our minds are supposed to rule our hearts (mo'ach shalit al ha'lev) but you wouldn't know it nowadays! Today it's "this is how I feel" and that is supposed to give it the stamp of legitimacy.