Cat Nap, Cat Walk

“You who are on the road, must have a code that you can live by, and so become yourself … Teach your children well … and feed them on your dreams” (CSN&Y)

All eyes are on you.
Remember - you're center stage.

Recently, I was speaking with a wonderful, wholehearted and proud Jewish colleague of mine about the dynamics of  religious observance. We were talking about how difficult it often is to teach children about the importance of Judaism while so many struggle themselves. He remarked, "How can we teach our children the power and beauty of davening when it's such a challenge for ourselves to remain involved and connected to it each and every day?" Yet, perhaps his answer came immediately thereafter. "But you know," he continued, "I love shul. I love going there. There's something so wonderful about being in shul."

Another colleague once shared with me the following incident that the local shul's Rov related on Yom Kippur. Each day, in the Rov's Daf Yomi shiur, there was always this one fellow who would come and fall asleep on his Gemara. Day after day, the man simply came and slept through the entire shiur. 
A bit puzzled and curious, the Rov approached the man after the shiur one day, and hesitantly asked, "If you don't mind me asking, although it is really great that you come to the shiur, and of course you're always welcome, I was just wondering why you come if you fall asleep?" 
With a deep sigh, the man replied, "Listen, Rabbi. I never really had the mind for Gemara. I learned it when I was younger, but I never thought that I had the head for it. But," he changed his tone and proudly continued, "you may think that I get nothing out of it since I always fall asleep. It's not true. I do gain from it. When my children wake up in the morning, they see my bed empty, and they ask my wife where I am. I want my wife to be able to tell them that I'm out learning Torah!" 

We all have role models in life. These role models are formed in our youth and continue throughout our lives. Although they may slightly change over time, we remain within the relatively similar wavelength of those we grew up with unless we make the conscious effort to change our perspective in life. There are athletes, movie stars, teachers, Gedolim, family members and friends. They can certainly serve as meaningful role models if they have wholesome and respected characters, and endorse positive and honorable lifestyles.
Yet, why do so many people "wanna be like Mike"? Simply because they were "trained" from their youth that this would be the greatest dream. This would be the greatest form of success. But what if every father woke up early to learn, and showed their children the value of Torah? What if every father told and demonstrated to his children their love for going to shul? Although it may be challenging for us, we inspire the next generation by what we stress. By what we value. By what we show our admiration and desire for.
The father who wakes up early to learn will have a better chance of having children who will grow up respecting and loving Torah.
The father who tells his children how much he enjoys going to shul will have a better chance of them following in his dedicated and admirable footsteps.
When was the last time we told someone how wonderful it was doing a mitzvah?
Remarked how meaningful our davening was?
How fulfilling it is being a Jew?
Each person is a role model for others.
We are on display.
We are all on the "cat walk" of life - and we don't have nine of them to squander.
Let's be good models.
Let's be super-models!

Say to yourself ten times today:
"Hazshem, please help me be the best I can be - for myself ... and for others!"

Unplugged

“Electricity is pulsing through our veins, a charge is racing … energy, filling the ominous void within you; no need to live your life in that gap; got what you need right here on lightning tap, so charge me, charge you” (MH)

Are you sure you're plugged in?

Something's wrong. People sense it. The Jewish world feels it. And although we may live in an age with a unprecedented, powerful Ba'al Teshuva movement, we lose countless people each day to assimilation and intermarriage. Yet, besides the staggering number of disassociated, unaffiliated Jews throughout the world, we recognize a growing presence of religious Jews that lack feeling and emotion towards their daily observance of Judaism. You can almost sense people davening, saying brochos or wearing tzitzis in a completely unattached manner.

Like a body without a soul.
Why? Why are people not feeling the fulfillment and sense of spiritual achievement when performing mitzvos?
We know that the Torah and mitzvos have infinite power with which they are designed to infuse us with overwhelming joy and ecstasy.
But why do so many people not feel it? Why aren't they charged with positive energy from learning and doing mitzvos?

The other morning, after I got myself ready for davening, I slipped my Blackberry onto my belt and ran out to the car. When Shachris was over, I sat back in my car, took out my Blackberry to check my emails and texts (of course only after davening!), and noticed my battery nearly drained. 
"Funny," I thought to myself, "I know I charged it last night."
When I returned home, I went to take a look at my charger, and I quickly realized what went wrong. Although I certainly did plug the charger into my Blackberry, I didn't recognize that the charger wasn't plugged into the wall. My phone may have plugged in, but it still didn't charge. Even though the phone was plugged in, the plug wasn't! 


It is true. Torah and mitzvos are designed to charge us. Give us life. But we may think that as long as we plug them into ourselves we will feel charged. Unfortunately, this is not enough. The Torah and mitzvos themselves have to be plugged into the Source. When we learn and fulfill mitzvos, it does not suffice to do them with an empty mind and a severed heart. If we are not fulfilling our job with the understanding that we are working to be attached to - plugged into - the Source, Hashem, then we will not walk away charged.
Keeping Shabbos is not merely a mitzvah - it is a way to connect to Hashem. Tzitzis is not merely a four cornered garment - it is a way to wrap ourselves with holiness, thus coming that much closer to our Father. Yet, because people often do not comprehend this concept, Shabbos, wearing tzitzis, and any other mitzvah for that matter, becomes meaningless.
Becomes a body without a soul.
Even if people fulfill them - they have the charger plugged into them - the charger isn't connected to the Source ... and their energy and soul will soon run out of battery power. They will continue through life drained of spirituality and religious fervor.
It is, therefore, our most vital duty as Jews to make sure that when we fulfill a mitzvah, daven, or learn, that we are truly charging ourselves. That we realize what and why we are doing each particular action, and remained plugged in - to Hashem, lest we stop functioning as another 'cell' of His great and most powerful army.

Who's in charge here?
Be charged. Be super-charged.

Say to yourself ten times today:
"Hashem, please help me remain connected to You - always!"

Why Should I Cry?

"Every night in my dreams I see you. I feel you. That is how I know you go on … Once more let us open the door … There is some love that will not go away” (CD)

Let us mourn today, and
rebuild tomorrow!

Perhaps, the one day a year that remains far from our understanding is Tish'a b'Av. We are told that it is a day of fasting. 

Why?

Because both the first and second Beis ha'Mikdash were destroyed on this day.

Many people, especially children, struggle with this concept. They ask, or perhaps only think, "What's the big deal? Why should I mourn for a building that was destroyed over 2,000 years ago? What does it mean to me?"

We never saw the Beis ha'Mikdash. We cannot grasp what we have lost since we have never experienced it.

So why do we mourn? Why must we fast?

There was once a couple who remained childless for many years, yet awaited Hashem’s intervention and salvation with complete and unrelenting faith. In due time, Hashem heard and answered their tefillos, as the woman became pregnant. The couple was overjoyed and filled with elation, while they patiently anticipated the birth of their child. However, when the woman went into labor, she was met with difficulty and danger. The most experienced and reputable doctors were called, and then the top surgeon was dispatched. Finally, the husband was ushered into the doctor’s office and given the most dreadful and heartbreaking news.

“Your wife is in a very dangerous situation,” the head doctor painfully explained. “We are at a point where we may not be able to save her life. The only way that we can preserve her life is to allow the baby to die. You have to make the choice. Either you choose the life of your wife or that of the child.”

With this, the husband let out a piercing and agonizing cry. How many tears did he weep for a child? How many tefillos did he pray with incessant fervor to merit this boy? Yet, to enable him to live he must allow his beloved wife to die. How unbearable the pain!

“Let my wife live!” screamed the broken a husband.

The woman heard the noise from within the labor room, and realized the desperation and bleakness of the situation. She wanted to know exactly what was going on.

The doctor entered the room and told her, “You are very weak, yet the baby is healthy and big. It is not possible for you to deliver him. We must surgically remove the baby in order to sustain your life thus killing the baby.”

The wife trembled and said, “You cannot do this! I give you no permission!”

“But your life depends upon it!” responded the doctor.

The wife adamantly cried, “I must do what is proper in the eyes of Hashem. I refuse to take my life at the price of the life of my son!”

The doctors tried unsuccessfully to convince her to reverse her decision. They told her that she had her entire life ahead of her, and that her husband loved her. She had to make the decision on behalf of the both of them, they would say. Yet, she refused to be persuaded. All she ever wanted was to have a child to survive her.

She was ready and willing to give her life for that of her son.

There is no describing the cries and screams. The woman knew that her minutes were counted. She called for her husband, and said, “I am going to pass away as is the way of the world, and it is the design of man for his heart to forget the pain. Yet, there is one request that I ask of you. This boy that I am giving birth to will never see my face. Tell him about me. Tell him how I suffered for him, how much I love him. Tell him everything I did for him until I gave him my life. Tell him that I want him to follow in the ways of the Torah, and that this would give me the greatest of pleasure and merit in the World Above. And tell him that on every yartzeit he should learn to give merit and lift my soul.”

As the woman completed her words, the baby was born and she tragically passed away.

The boy lived with the memory of his mother – her image set before his eyes at all times. On her yartzeit, he recited Kaddish as tears streamed down his cheeks. When he grew older, each year he would close his store on that day, gather a minyan to learn Mishnayos, and he himself would learn all night and lead davening during the day with a broken heart.

Yet, the years passed and his emotions cooled and diminished. But, he was still loyal in observing the yartzeit, although he no longer closed his store or gathered a minyan to learn. And, even though he lead the davening, his davening was cold and expressionless.

Before evening, he went upstairs to visit his father, yet his father refused to see him.

The son shook in fear and asked, “Father, why do you hide your face from me?”

The father responded rebuking, “I was in shul, and I heard your cold davening. Is this the way a son davens for his mother – for a mother who in her death gave him life?”

The application of this moshol could not be any clearer. Chazal remark that the Beis ha’Mikdash is also referred to as a Mishkan since it served as a mashkon, collateral, for the sins of Klal Yisroel.  It was through its destruction that we were saved, as Rashi relates, “Hashem unleashes His anger on wood and stones.” Rather than annihilating Klal Yisroel, he destroyed the Beis ha’Mikdash. The least we can do is observe the time period of its ruin by davening for and lamenting it! Would it not be only proper for us to mourn its destruction and pass along to our children this sense of indescribable loss – one that both they and we have never merited to see, yet through it we live today? Does the Beis ha'Mikdash not deserve at least this much?

The Navi Yirmiyahu states, “For I have heard an outcry like that of a woman in labor, in pain like a woman giving birth for the first time. It is the voice of the daughter, Tziyon, for she will wail, she will wring her hands, 'Woe is me, now, for my soul has been wearied by the killers.'” From here our moshol is vividly clear. A woman in labor has given her life to protect her son from death. Is it not appropriate that her son mourn her loss? Is it not a sacrifice worthy of mourning?

(Translated from Ma’ayin ha’Moed)

We may have never seen our holy Beis ha'Mikdash, but if we would only realize how it gave us life! 

Let us keep it alive - let us bring it back alive!

Say to yourself ten times today:

"Hashem, I am sorry that Your Home was destroyed - because of me! Please give me the strength to help rebuild it!"