Let’s Work Together On 1 Middah

i think we have a winner…

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The most important part of being happy with what you have is recognizing that Hashem has decided that you should have exactly what you have now. Anything more or anything less would not only not be good for you, it would be bad for you. Hashem has given you everything you need in this world, monetarily, mentally, etc.

teen, simply think once a day “Everything I have is a gift from Hashem”. A good time to think this would be by “posaech es yadecha u’masbea lichul chai rutzoin” in Ashrei.

ames: sure no prob!!!!

asdfghjkl, in all honesty: did you read it through?

of course i read it. i read anything with words.

moish01: good for you man!!!

ames: yeah!!! glad i made ya happy!!!!!!!

anyone have anymore stories/divrei torah on being happy with what you have? come on it’s only monda we can’t be out of stuff already!

beautiful piece ames and right on topic.

We really need to be happy with what we have… And I am happy to say I was zoicheh today to be able again to stop myself in my tracks. When we get 100 we want 200- So someone dear to me had given me assistance today and I was hoping they could help me out also for something in the future. At first I was disappointed when they said they really cant and then i said, hey wait a second- they just put themselves out (time and money) for me today- am i a loser that I will ignore it?!? And it really set my perspective straight. thanks e/o for the chizuk in this thread of working on ourselves to be better ppl!! I hope e/o else is taking it to heart as much as I am!

beacon: yeah i;m kinda getting worried abt ames too!!! she’s your sis(lol) so call her!!!

shkoyach: ha good night pal!!!

beacon: k good!!! are her kids acting up???

beacon: yeah she’s got lots of work she said!!! ha i can’t wait too till she sees this!!! hee hee!!!

This is a copy of an article by Rabbi Yaakov Salomon posted on aish.com:

It’s a blazing night in August. You grab a PowerAde and sneak in a serene midnight repose on the porch swing. The faintest tinge of a breeze wafts at your sweltering brow. It is a few minutes before midnight.

Suddenly, a bluster of blinding light douses the darkened sky. The breeze is abruptly transformed into a ferocious gust that lifts you inches off your seat. Fear abounds, but strangely, it is accompanied by a remarkable tranquility that confuses and calms you at the same time.

In a flash you find yourself in a scene from a sci-fi movie as a spacecraft, the size of two football fields, lands before you. A short ladder descends and a creature of sorts makes his way out of the vessel and walks towards you. You are too dazed to move.

“I am Kriz from the planet Magxac,” he says. “I come in peace, just to explore your land. Can you show me around?”

He invites you into his Trans-orbitor and instructs you to push a button and choose any location on Earth in any time period.

“It is a combination of your GPS/Time machine/Super-sonic jet. It can take you anywhere in just seconds. Try it,” he cajoles.

After taking a few minutes to allow the shock to wear off, you decide to show off some of Earth’s wonders. You set the dial for 1476 BCE and you are whisked off to the shores of the Red Sea. Three million Jews are waiting in angst as Egyptian chariots rumble in the distance.

“Watch this,” you whisper to the alien.

The mighty waters part and the dry path is quickly filled by ecstatic Jews.

Kriz is not impressed.

“Big deal,” he says. “Happens every day on Magxac.”

Undaunted, you set the dial ahead a few months and together witness manna descending from the heavens in the desert. Same ho-hum reaction.

Frustrated and disappointed, you head back to the present and emerge from the craft with your newfound friend. It is 7 A.M.

“Whoa! What is that?!?!” cries Kriz, pointing to the sky.

“What is what?” you reply innocently.

“THAT! That giant orange orb that is blinding me!”

“You mean the sun? Haven’t you ever seen the sun?”

“On Magxac, it is always dark. This sun of yours looks awfully close. How far away is it?”

“Actually, it is 93 million miles away.”

“Incredible! I can’t even look at it!”

* * *

Do we ever stop to realize that the existence of the sun or its perfect placement is truly miraculous? Had the sun been 92 million miles away we would probably burn to death; 94 million miles away and we would freeze.

Frequency is blinding. We don’t appreciate things as miraculous because we are inured by the limitations of our vision.

The only reason we don’t immediately think of the sun as a miracle is because it is always there — rising and setting and shining exactly the way we expect it to. But frequency is blinding. The sun, like so many things in life, is genuinely miraculous. We don’t appreciate things as miraculous because we are inured by the forces of habit and the limitations of our vision.

In Ethics of Our Fathers, our Sages teach that ten miracles occurred in the Temple. No sacrificial meat ever became putrid, no fly was ever seen (for hundreds of years) in the butchering stations, the rains never extinguished the pyre on the Altar plus seven others. The laws of Nature were transcended in the Temple.

But there is something strange about this list of ten. Each miracle mentioned relates something that did NOT happen. Our customary dictionary definition of what is a miracle is quite different:

1. An amazing or wonderful occurrence

2. A marvelous event manifesting a supernatural act of God

But what about things that don’t happen? Can they also be considered miraculous?

Example: Of all the hundreds, if not thousands, of blessings that Jews recite, there is only one that mentions “God’s Heavenly Throne.” That, believe it or not, is the blessing that we say several times a day after exiting from the bathroom:

Blessed are You, HaShem, Our God, King of the universe, Who created the human with wisdom and created within him many openings and many cavities, exposed and known before Your Throne of Glory, that if one of them were to be ruptured or one of them were to be blocked it would be impossible to survive and to stand before You for even one hour. Blessed are You, HaShem, The physician of all flesh who acts wondrously.

Essentially we are marveling at the wonder of how the many openings and cavities in our bodies are NOT blocked or ruptured — allowing us to function and exist. What does NOT happen is miraculous, and we must see it as such.

Similarly, when we sit in a doctor’s waiting room and fill out forms describing our medical history, we should count every ‘check’ in the ‘no’ box as a miracle of something that did not happen — and there are hundreds of them.

Americans are loathe to speak about it (bad karma?), but who would have predicted in 2001, after 9/11, that no major terror attack would take place on US soil in seven years? Is that not miraculous?

And what about our precious little children? Any mother will tell you that it is inexplicable that toddlers don’t choke on things every single day — marbles, popcorn, pennies, watch batteries — while crawling around the house. Stairwells are too often left unblocked, yet these tiny treasures seem to live with a special protection from Above.

Safe sky travel is considered a given. While we all deplore the ever-growing incidence of departure and arrival delays, we forget how astounding the safety statistics are. Get this. The total number of flights scheduled to operate worldwide this month is 2.55 million. 307,000,000 seats will be offered to travelers around the globe! Only a tiny percentage of those passengers will experience a mishap of any kind. Incredible.

MIRACLES IN ISRAEL

No one doubts that the establishment of the State of Israel, after Hitler’s decimation of European Jewry, was an open miracle. Scattered around the world, hated everywhere they lived, persecuted in the north and the south, the east and the west, Jews survived and even thrived. But sometimes we forget that every day that Israel doesn’t implode — surrounded by its sworn enemies, many times its’ size — is a miracle we should never take for granted.

And most astonishingly is the following framework for something we have all become intuitively aware.Do we realize the magnitude of the miracle we recently experienced in Gaza?

The world is now far too well acquainted with the fright and terror experienced by the Jews who live within striking distance of our enemies in Gaza. The panic and hysteria that occurs when a siren goes off and a missile is imminent has been depicted in a frightening film on this website and has been viewed over a million times.

As painful as each and every casualty is, thank God, the losses have been comparatively minimal. But do we realize the magnitude of the miracle before our eyes?

Harold Gans is a mathematical consultant and international lecturer throughout North America, Israel, Australia and South Africa. He was a Senior Cryptologic Mathematician with the National Security Agency, United States Department of Defense until his retirement after 28 years of service. He recently reported the following:

On Jan. 5, 2009, Ehud Barak, Defense Minister of Israel, announced that 125 Grad-Katyusha missiles had fallen on populated areas of Beersheva, Ashkelon and Ashdod. This is 40% of the missiles fired; the remaining 60% fell in open areas. Of the 40% that hit populated areas of these cities, 2% hit buildings. I obtained satellite photos of Beersheva, Ashkelon and Ashdod. My analysis indicated that the average percentage of the ground covered by buildings in these three cities is 39.7%. This takes into account the different sizes of these cities.

Now, the expected rate of rockets hitting buildings should be the same as the percentage of the ground covered by buildings: 39.7%. Yet it is only 2%. The odds of this happening by chance are 100,000,000,000,000,000: 1.

Note that this has nothing to do with the bad aim of these missiles; we are only counting the 40% that actually did fall in populated areas of these cities.

God has given us a universe that is saturated with wonder and amazement. When we tune in to the marvels that surround us we can feel His presence and experience unparalleled joy. But there’s a whole class of miracles that is easy to miss — the “non-events” of life. In some ways, they can be even more providential than the obvious ones.

Just ask Kriz.

syriansephardi, im just curious: is there such a thing as someone being a syrian ashkenazi??

BYM: the last name ashkenazi is syrian!! If that’s what ur askin????

Ames: hi! I just saw ur post, I was away that’s were I’ve been…so do u write 10 things a day ur thankful for?? I have a book of it but I always forget to write in it!!!!!!

I say #4 but for all the cr addicts round here def 7!!

ss: no i meant is there such a thing as someone being syrian but is ashkenaz as opposed to sephardi lol.

cuz i was noticing that your syriansephardi is the same thing repeated twice….

i can get very technical dont mind me

ames: i’ll go with 4 or 6.$

i vote #4!

Bais…:ohh haha nope but I didn’t make up my name!! Someone else did when they would read the YWN so I just continued the name, they gave me the password bc they don’t use it anymore…

im going to try this one!