The King is in the Field

Hi everyone!
I hope you had a great week and have an even better weekend!
Yesterday, August the 11th, marked the 1st day of the last Hebrew month of the Jewish year - Elul.
Elul is the month that precedes Tishrei - with the high holidays of Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, and Sukkot.
The Jewish Mystics liken Rosh Hashanah to a time when the people come to crown the King in His palace.


But in the month of Elul, the King comes to the field to visit His People. In a spiritual sense, G-d Reveals Himself to our souls and Draws us closer.
He Gives us a special opportunity & ability to connect to Him in this month, to get in touch with our Judaism and Spirituality much more smoothly.
This experience of re-connecting is known as 'Teshuva.' Improperly translated as repentance, it really means to "return."
But to return to our soul and its mission means to change from our daily patterns, and who wants to change?

Many, myself included, suffer from what psychologists define as a "victim mentality."
Let's take a pauper for example: Sadly there are times when a person feels the need to resort to begging for his livelihood. At first ashamed, one who begs can oftentimes pass a certain point where it isn't hard anymore for him to beg. It even becomes hard to stop! To extract himself from his new mentality. My friend once saw a guy in Brooklyn who always begged in his neighborhood -
driving a nice volvo that same day!
Someone explained to him that the guy was now comfortable with it.

We may not be paupers (thank G-d), but we can still be suffering from a victim mentality in our personal lives.
We're stuck, we're in a rut. So many things we do, we do b/c it's become a part of our routine, our mentality. It's become who we are.
I can slip to such a point that I think this is me!
Teshuva means returning to your real self.
But we all know how hard it is to realize how far one has fallen, and even harder to extract oneself from this new mentality.
Comes the month of Elul - a special, opportune time to take the things you thought were you, but really aren't,
and get in touch with who you really are. Not the worldly mentality we have become accustomed to,
but rather the internal, Divine mentality our souls naturally possess.
The King is Ready - All we have to do is go out to greet Him.

Shabbat Shalom!

Daniel
--
May you be written & sealed for a good & sweet year!

Beyond Freud

Freud, Adler, Frankl.
3 Jews that revolutionized psychotherapy and the way we look at the human being and what drives him.
But what differentiated them?
Unfortunately, there isn't enough room here to do justice to each man's theories.
But let's take a quick glance, 1st into the outlook of Sigmund Freud:
Everything we do is out of a desire for pleasure, or alternatively out of a fear of pain.
Alfred Adler: By incorporating Nietzsche's Will to Power, Adler emphasized that every person desires to be heard; to succeed and reach the top. Power. Success.
Viktor Frankl: Founding "logo-therapy," Frankl, using evidence from his experiences in the concentration camps (see his bestselling book Man's Search for Meaning),
expounded his belief that it is the striving to find a meaning in one's life that is the primary, most powerful motivating and driving force in a human's life.
So here we have the will to pleasure, power, and meaning. What did Frankl see that Freud and Adler didn't?

To be happy, said Frankl, one MUST transcend his/herself, instead of focusing solely on one's self-centered needs.
(Adler emphasized "self-actualization" - to make sure everything is good for you 1st. For ex. give your child EVERYTHING: Good schooling, $, languages, music, leads to happiness).
But, argued Frankl, there will always be a flaw, someone that has more than me. No! A person's happiest time in life is when he forgot himself, even for just a moment,
and helped someone else, showed kindness to a spouse, contributed to a greater cause than just self. To leave one's constraints and go beyond self.
There's a book entitled "Generation Me" that shows through statistics that this generation is more self-centered than any before it.
But shouldn't emphasizing "me" lead to joy?
Maybe for the body; but not for the soul...


Which leads us to Jewish Mysticism.
We are taught that each of us possesses 2 souls: an animal soul, and a G-dly soul.
Freud and Adler peered deep into the human soul and found, essentially, dirt.
Desire, lust, power, selfishness, arrogance, ego.
And they were right.
They peered into the animal soul, and that's what they found.
But they failed to look a bit deeper. Beyond the animal soul and into the G-dly Aspect we all possess - the Divine Soul.
A soul which desires kindness, purpose, selflessness; a pursuit of truth and meaning.
Freud wasn't wrong; he just didn't peer deep enough.

What lies at the core of our being, as Frankl discovered in the hell of a concentration camp, is a desire for meaning. That's what keeps us going, that's what drives us.
Not the pursuit of, but rather the transcendence of - the mundane.
It was interesting to see Basketball star Amare Stoudemire, straight off one of the biggest deals in NBA history, searching for meaning here in Israel (see here if you think I'm lying).

Whether he's Jewish or not is still unclear, but regardless, here's a man who could, and has, attained most material fantasies & stardom any person could ever dream of, and yet is running off looking into the Torah & Mitzvot for meaning in his life.
This search for meaning is a trend seen by many of the world's "stars" and it signifies a human desire for something beyond the "self" - a truth and a deeper meaning to life.
The pursuit of pleasure alone cannot bring joy. It only encapsulates a minute part of our daily lives. And negativity is ALWAYS easier to remember. Rather, do for another, live a purpose filled life and happiness will come, for happiness is not attained, but is rather a by-product of purposeful living.

Shabbat Shalom!

-Daniel

P.S. To read a fascinating story regarding Frankl which I highly recommend, click here

Souler Powered

B"H

Does the spiritual exist? Do I have a soul? Is there a Divine Life-force beyond the physical?

Well, let's take a trip back in time for a moment and imagine we were sitting in a preschool class (Oh the good old days :).

The teacher takes out a few pictures depicting the weather:



The 1st picture depicts a sunny day. "What's the weather?" The teacher asks. "Sunny!" Everyone yells.
How did they know? Because they saw the sun and its rays.
Next comes a picture depicting a rainy day. The children all guess correctly again, pointing to the dark clouds and numerous rain drops.

Now comes the 3rd picture.



"What's the weather here?" Asks the teacher.
"It's windy!" Everyone yells.
But wait! How did they know?? There's no wind to point to!
Well, one can see the effects of the wind - the leaves flying off, the man and kite bending backward, etc.
Let's take Love. It can't be seen, it can't be weighed or heard. But its effects are blatant.
Radio waves are everywhere. But I don't see them!? Well, bring a radio into your room, turn it on, and you'll hear the waves.
The waves just needed a proper vessel to express themselves.

The SOUL can't be seen. It can't be heard.
But its effects are apparent. And like radio waves, the soul too needs a body to express itself and to carry out its mission.
If you look at the Hebrew words for wind and rain, you discover something fascinating.
Wind in Hebrew is Ruach, as is the word for soul or spirit. Spirituality is Ruchaniyut (Wind, like that which is spiritual, can't be seen.)
Rain is Geshem; physicality is Gashmiut. (Rain, like all things physical, is seen.)
So too by the Spiritual G-dly Life Force that sustains our world. It may not be seen, but through its effects (like Divine Providence - see last email ;)
and the world's vitality, we can deduce its existence.
{To see more on the subject, look here}.

May we keep our eyes and ears attuned to that which isn't openly seen or heard, and sense the subtleties of this world; the
silent underlying force behind life - in the world & in us.
'...And a great and strong wind splitting mountains and shattering boulders before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake-not in the earthquake was the Lord. After the earthquake - fire, not in the fire was the Lord. And after the fire a still, soft sound.' (Melachim-I Kings, Ch.19 verses 11-12)
Shabbat Shalom!

-Daniel