Carrots, Eggs, and Coffee

anonymisss- i missed this entire discussion. Everything was well put. However, I hope it doesn’t give you any extra conflicts to deal with.

If you can pull this off- can I suggest a trip to Israel, with a good friend, to recharge your emotional and spiritual batteries? I find just going there already rejuvenates the soul.

areivim, if I wasn’t just there three weeks ago I’d probably seriously consider it. I do need it.

I’m not a big advocate of therapy/psychologists unless it’s very necessary. Being that we do not have details I couldn’t judge. Most of the time, the tougher the situation, the stronger you will come out of it.

Focus on emunah and davening- it lends strength you never knew you posessed.

In times of trouble, the davening itself heals, you don’t necessarily need what we term “results”. We don’t know what the best results are for us; but it feels good just to unload and put everything on Hashem’s “shoulders”.

About the davening-I am really trying and I hear what you’re saying about unloading as opposed to results. It’s hard. Also, I feel like such a faker! I always talked about emunah, but now that’s it me, it doesn’t look like I’m doing very well. I think I need help in this.

I’m wishing you lots and lots of hatzlocha and may Hashem grant you with menuchas hanefesh.

AMEN!! Thank you.

~a~

oh, I get it ames. Sorry, I can’t sahre the joke because I don’t want to retype it just to have it deleted again. But if it was a mistake a mod could let it go up.

Kapusta, thanks for keeping me in mind. Isn’t it a funny thing though? Sometimes, I also have cr members in mind when I daven and I don’t know their names. I guess hashem knows who I’m talking about.

Mayan-Thanks, although I don’t think I can go anywhere right now, between work and college…

~a~

Thanks, ames. It’s so nice to have people who care and try to help. I really do appreciate your concern and continued interest.

I actually spoke to a therapist that I know (on the phone) a few days after it happened who reassured me that I am perfectly normal for feeling this way and it’s ok for me to be sad, even very sad. Then, I was barely functioning; not eating, not sleeping, forget about smiling. I am doing better already in that way (eating, sleeping.) My thoughts aren’t 24/7 on this like they were even just a few days ago. But it still makes me painfully sad when I do allow myself to think about it, and it bothers me that I still say why did it have to happen. I shouldn’t be talking like that!

~a~

anonymisss, I have no answer for you, youre asking the age old question of tzaddik v’ra lo. one thing I can promise you is that Hashem wants you to be happy more than you do, times are crazy right now, best I could tell you is that it’s a very very big kapara, maybe for you, maybe for the world. It says (somewhere, maybe gemara) that if a person is going through something, they should check their maasim, check for bitul torah, (I think, dont quote me) and if none of those need improvement then its yisurim shel ahava. It happens that someone will suffer for someone else. It seems like this is doing a good job on you, and dont be angry at yourself, youre normal, I doubt theres a person in the world who ever went through something and didnt ask questions. remember gal gal hachozer and my offer still stands if you want it. 🙂

keep smiling :):):):):)

talk, vent, whatever you want to call it 🙂

nice answer, squeak

moish01: are you asking about people who outright SAY they are happy & that their life is perfect? or about people whose lives seem basically perfect to you?

well, no. they actually make little tiny things seem like the biggest catastrophes ever. and you just wanna laugh in their face.

my point is, why is THAT fair? (or is it?? i guess no one ever said life was fair)

you have people who struggle with things every day of their lives and they’re expected to be just as good as the next guy who was never faced with a temptation in his life.

fair??

moish I have to give you this one and tell you it sounds to me that youre describing a very, girly, girl. no matter what anyone tells you, everyone has their own pekela. about the second question, both people are doing what G-d intended for them to do on this world, not the next guy, them. when its time for the next world, the guy who got everything good asks if its fair, if he had the chance to accomplish great things, no one ever told him just how great it was.

ames I think your idea for a thread is a completely lost cause.

🙂

moish01: if the things they complain about really bother them that much, then they can be suffering as much as someone else might with a more difficult life. happiness, though it may seem to, doesn’t depend on how much/how easy you have it, like ames said, it’s all in your attitude & outlook. as these people prove, it’s not hard to complain & find the bad stuff in even the easier situations if you’re not trying to appreciate what you have.

i think the main thing is to realize that happiness really doesn’t depend on anything but your state of mind, and that G-d really does give you everything you need & knows that you have the ability to withstand any challenges you were given. (not saying this is easy.)

just think – i’m sure there are people who have it worse than you. they could be asking this same question, except in their minds, you are the one who has it so easy. could be they’re not struggling in the same area (for example; maybe they are responsible for a family & don’t know where they will get the next meal for them). imagine being in a worse situation than you are now (it can ALWAYS be worse) & then try to appreciate that you don’t have to worry about that. maybe the people you are talking about should be doing this too, but it is not your responsibility (or mine) to fix them.

moish, before we argue this point (and I do have LOADS to say) let’s define the term “fair.” Go ahead, what does it mean?

~a~

moish01: maybe the guy who broke his pinky had/will have a harder challenge at a different time in his life. or maybe at that time, that is not the only issue he’s dealing with. maybe his family’s a mess but all alive, so in a skewed way he might be jealous of the other guy, who might be jealous of him. i don’t think this specific example thing is doing much. i think squeak put it well (“some people will act…”).

so if this guy stays at the top and fights his whole life he’s much greater than the first guy, right? if not, he’s waaay lower.

i don’t think anyone who is still alive knows exactly how schar & “who is greater” works.

moish, this reminds me of the story of a godol who, as a child, overheard his parents discussing him. They were disappointed that he was not interested in learning Torah, considered that perhaps he was not meant to be a talmid chacham, & discussed ending his schooling & apprenticing him to a local tradesman so he’d have a livelihood. Hearing how saddened his parents were at the prospect, the child told his parents he would start working at his learning. When he was much older, after the publication of one of his many seforim, he said, “What if I would have become a tradesman, & when I reached the olam ha’emes, the RBSH would have asked me what I accomplished? I would have told Him that I davened every day, conducted my business honestly, and learned occasionally, but He would have expected my seforim.”

Knowing that Hashem only expects us to do the best we can do, not the best someone else can do, is somewhat reassuring. But sometimes we don’t even know our own potential, and the thought that we might be missing it is frightening.

moish, your definition of the word fair sort of answers your question. Every person gets what he needs (we’ll skip deserves for now) to be the best person he can be. God doesn’t compare you to your neighbor, He compares you to the person He knows you can be.

There’s a famous moshol (don’t know where it’s from) about a man who trained his whole life for mountain climbing. When he made his longest, hardest trek up one of the world’s tallest mountains, to his great disappointment, he saw a young boy up there. The man was devestated! He worked so hard for so many years to get here and this youngster, in his short lifetime, was up here already! What the man did not know, was that the boy was born at the top of the mountain.

moish, in your example, the first guy was born on top of the mountain, no sweat. The second guy, it was hard for him, he worked for it and got there.

Hashem doesn’t necessarily look to see where you are, He looks to see where you came from and what kind of effort you made to be where you are. People might appear to be towards the lower half of the mountain, but they could very possibly be far, far ahead of someone who seems to be at the top.

~a~

Moish, I once heard a brilliant piece about the Chanukah candles from R’ Lipa Rabinovitz (of Yeshivas Ohalei Shem in Yerushalayim)

On Chanukah, the gemarra tells us there are 3 ways one can do the mitzva of kindling the lights.

1. 1 light each night

2. every night light for the number of people in the home (e.g. If parents and 3 kids, every night 5 lights will be lit)

3. Beis Hillel 1 on the 1st night, 2 on the second.

The 2nd case was referred to as Mehadrin. The 3rd case is Mehadrin Min Hamihadrin.

Lets look at this. On the 1st night Mehadrin does 5 and Mihadrin min HaMihadrin is doing 1. Yet the one who is 1 is doing the mitzva better than the 5! The camera shows that the person lighting is doing more than the mihadrin min hamihadrin lighting 1, however, the camera lies.

He compares this to a beis midrash. Seder might be for 2 hours. Some guys might get pshat during the 1st half hour, then go for a smoke or a snack, whilst others are toiling to make sense out of that which their friends find so simple.

Those that get it quickly, in this example, are the mihadrin, those that toil are the Mihadrin Min HaMihadrin. The Mehadrin often fall into the trap of complacency. They are stuck at 5, yet those that toil, the MeHadrin Min HaMihadrin, granted they are overshadowed by the Mihadrin in the beginning (5-1), but the next night it’s (5-2), and eventually they take the lead.

In Pirkei Avos it says, ???? ???? ????, literally, no pain, no gain. Kol Haschalos Kashos. Things are always difficult in the beginning. We need to work on ourselves in order to grow. For some the nissayon is starting and staying with it. For some, it is not resting on our laurels.

Rashi says that there are times when Moshe is written before Ahron, and times Ahron is mentioned before moshe. This is because they are equal.

R’ Moshe Feinstein asks how can you say the were equal, we know nobody can reach the spiritual level of Moshe Rabbeinu?

He answers that they are equal in that they both fulfilled their purpose in life and were equally “Shalem”, complete.

I disagree JayMatt. The guys who “get it” in the first half hour are “going too far ahead” and end up just as lost as the slow kids. That is, the establishment ignores them just as much. A bored mind is bad enough, but a bored mind of the highest caliber is prone to find things to occupy itself. Unless the things it occupies itself with help the bochur grow in learning (maybe to the point where he achieves a level where he can go to an elite yeshiva and actually be challenged) which is unfair to expect.

There, I’ve spoken out against the establishment publicly, proving that I am not a real psychologist.

moish, fine have the story your way. It makes no difference. My point is that the struggle and effort is what’s important, not the “location.” Those specific challenges that you, moish, have are what make you.

~a~

I agree with you squeak. A rebbe has the difficult task of making sure the “slower” students don’t get left back while not allowing the “quick” students to become bored and ignored.

However, that was not what I was referring to.

The example I was giving, however, if from a Beis Midrash environment where people learn chavrusas. The Maggid Shiur will give out Ma’arei Mikomos which need to be prepared in time for shiur. Some people will struggle to complete them prior to shiur while others will do it quickly, then waste the remaining par of seder. People will often be “fooled” by those who are able to accomplish this task quickly. This is the parallel to the chanukah candle and the mihadrin and mihadrin min hamihadrin I was referring to.

Thanks for helping me clarify that. One knows what they want to say, but it takes assistance from someone else to know what you really are saying. Toda Rabba

Moish, Everyone gets judged based upon where they are. The point of the moshol wasn’t to make you feel that you are so far removed (which you aren’t) but rather to show you that the main focus in life is spiritual growth. A yid needs to be growing spiritually. This is difficult both when things are hard, and when they are easy, as the dvar torah explains.

As you have stated, there was a “regression” spiritually, but that’s in the past. When a boy climbs up a ladder, and all he does is look down (or remember his previous falls) he will not get very far. However, if he look up at all the climbing he can still do, there will be a greater distance traveled (If my memory serves me correctly, there is a story about R’ Akiva Eiger to that effect)

The point of the moshol wasn’t to make you feel that you are so far removed (which you aren’t)

jay, first of all, i am. what’s the point in lying?

and second, who said the regression is only in the past? i was just labeled the source of evil in my friends. real nice title, if i may say so myself.

JayMatt, I am even vaguely aware of the chavrusa style learning that goes on in one or two yeshivos in this world. My point is, why are these kids “finished” in half an hour? Because they are supposed to be learning what is on the maareh mekomos sheet. If they are prepared for shiur, they are kings of the universe. That doesn’t give these kids any motivation to stay in the B”M after they are “ready” for shiur. Hence, many are satisfied and battel away the remaining 2.5 hours.

>>why are these kids “finished” in half an hour? Because they are supposed to be learning what is on the maareh mekomos sheet.<<

If you are learning only for shiur, then you are correct. But if you are learning for the sake of learning, and you accept that Torah is Ikar, than you could easily spend the rest of time going deeper into the sugya, reviewing the previous shiur, going into a previous sugya which the shiur skipped.

Just because they are supposed to be learning what is on the ma’arei makom sheet, doesn’t mean they can’t learn anything else. They could also discuss with others how they learned the ma’arei mikomos.

The problem here is the mentality, not the ma’arei mikomos sheet. I have seen the ones who struggle in the beginning who later become greater than the “quick” learners. And do you know what? Even after they overtake them they don’t “give up” after the 30 minutes. Torah is valuable to them and they don’t wasted it (nor do they waste their time)

If you are learning only for shiur, then you are correct. But if you are learning for the sake of learning, and you accept that Torah is Ikar, than you could easily spend the rest of time going deeper into the sugya, reviewing the previous shiur, going into a previous sugya which the shiur skipped.

Just because they are supposed to be learning what is on the ma’arei makom sheet, doesn’t mean they can’t learn anything else. They could also discuss with others how they learned the ma’arei mikomos.

JayMatt, I think you just elucidated on my point. Thank you. I see we agree, but have different things to say about it. My take is, why do we think that it is right to EXPECT these kids to “learn for the sake of learning”? The fact that the brightest are out smoking for half of seder proves that we are not giving them the motivation or the drive.

Moish, I see you are a major lamdan