As a not-spectacular newcomer to Torah Judaism, I think it's sometimes intimidating to see all the very special and talented baalei teshuvah and converts. Sometimes, it seems like everybody was an upwardly mobile wildly successful professional before they became frum, then they merely transposed all that onto their new frum self in a Torahdik way.

It's also definitely inspiring. And it's certainly fun to read about!

Furthermore, as a fellow college-dropout BT said to me, "I don't think I deserve credit for becoming frum. I didn't have anything else in life anyway. But those people who had fully built successful lives and then left it all? THAT'S impressive! THAT'S real mesirut nefesh (self-sacrifice)!"

And I have to agree.

Particularly those who came from careers that are impossible to duplicate in their former full secular glory within the frum community (i.e. female singers, dancers and actors of either gender, models, etc.) They do have an outlet within the frum community, but it's not at all the same.

So they deserve enormous credit for making such a life-upending decision -- all because Hashem said so. And because of that, they also bring a hefty zechut (merit) to the Heavenly Scales for all of us.

But there's another side to it that gets ignored.

If one was a top-notch speaker/guru/dancer/singer/emcee/event-planner/missionary/performer/politician/journalist/whatever, it's good to take a break from that -- and not just to figure out how to upload the kosher version of your formerly secular role, but to really internalize Torah values so that it imbues the heart and mind, regenerating the art or role as a natural outflow from a truly Jewish conduit.

I've seen people go back into their art or profession before they're spiritually ready.

And depending on the expression demanded in that art form or profession, they end up doing a "kashered" version of their former role -- with all ego, lack of tsnius, compromised integrity, and invented loopholes this sometimes entails.

For example, I once observed a person who'd become frum via their spouse, but still had a lot of issues with certain aspects of Judaism. Not yet comfortable with even very nice people in the frum community, the person still sought out secular colleagues, associates, and clients who wouldn't spot the religious inconsistencies in this person's behavior and attitude. The problem was this person's form of self-expression and profession kept this person firmly in the limelight and the world of eye-catching self-promotion and competition.

The kashered version of the profession did do some good, but as far as I could tell, the person and the person's family were paying a price.

Leaping out as a role model or representative of Torah spirituality is a problem when one is not internally there yet.

This doesn't (and can't) mean inner perfection.

But if your profession or art keeps you in the public eye and/or within an anti-Torah framework, then it's good to take a long stride back from it if at all possible.

What's meant by "anti-Torah framework"?

Every art form today is soaked with heresy, Eastern mysticism, immoral idealization, and a road to success that is paved with halachically forbidden or problematic "musts" -- and not because of the art itself, but because of the culture that has grown around it and the methods or equipment deemed necessary to express this art on a professional and award-winning level.

And lot of other roles and careers suffer the same kind of corruption.

Therefore, rather than genuine soul-expression, a lot of frum expression seeks to imitate the secular expression with a kosher version of the secular embodiment.

This is a process, of course. And one needn't wait one's whole life before feeling ready to do re-engage. But at the same time, it's also good to take a break (IF possible) from external expression. Meaning, one can write or paint or sing for oneself until one is solidly ready to present to the public.

Obviously, performance-oriented expression demands an audience, and this becomes more complicated when taking a break from it all to regroup oneself. (I honestly wouldn't know what to suggest for, say, actors or emcees or speakers.)

Also, if your sole source of livelihood derives from this profession, then that throws another wrench into things.

If a person risks impoverishment by taking a break, then that has to be handled differently than a person whose art serves as non-parnassa self-expression.

I don't feel I can say "Do this" or "Do that."

The individual situations vary so much in their details and consequences that I don't see where hardline advice fits in.

But I do feel that IF possible (IF!!!), it's good to take a LONG break in order to get in touch with your genuine soul needs and expression.

And if you find that break imposed on you by external circumstances, you can feel good about it and feel the blessing in it (even if you also feel frustrated too).

(That's kind of what happened to me.)

Yes, it might look like missed opportunities or failures, but it's really an opportunity to regroup your inner self. Other people might also pressure you to get back into things in a superficially kosher way or you might feel a little lost as you grope around to adjust to the new and deeper you.

That's normal.

But I can't help what I've observed.

I have seen people jump back in too soon and it doesn't seem so healthy, spiritually speaking.

You don't want to be a superficially kosher imitation of secular art or non-Jewish roles.

You want your soul to have nourishment and expression for its real essence.

(But at the same time, please remember that no one can be perfect about this and it is a process with all the ups and downs of any spiritual process.)

First of all, the REAL short-cut and most painless path to teshuvah is demonstrated in Rav Shalom Arush's book The Garden of Miracles: Say "Thank You" and See Miracles. (You wouldn't believe what kind of miracles people experienced purely by thanking God without doing anything else.)

Basically, you stand there (or sit) and just thank Hashem for every single thing you can think of for as long and as much as you can.

You can experience salvation from just that alone.

But there is another "short-cut," and that involves focusing on enjoying yourself and side-stepping your yetzer hara in that way.

Also, I want to point out that you can achieve true teshuvah this way, but not necessarily complete teshuvah -- although never having made complete and perfect teshuvah, I cannot say for sure.

Anyway, your goal is to fill yourself up with good acts and good thoughts and good middot (qualities) until there is no room left for anything bad.

In a sense, it's really doing sur m'ra v'aseh tov (turn from evil and do good) backwards with the intention of turning from evil as you go along.

(If you ignore sur m'ra completely, you end up like those people who just pick and choose or who constantly seek out loopholes for their weaker points.)

I'll give you an example.

When I first started keeping Shabbat, way back in the USA, I encountered 3-day holidays and extremely late sunsets. As all you chutznikim know, some years bring a 3-day fiesta with every chag. And depending on where you live, a summer Shabbat can end long after bedtime.

Friends and spending Shabbat with enjoyable hosts still made this all enjoyable, but you can still end up with a lot of free time, especially if you get stuck in a non-religious environment on your own.

So I read a lot. But I wasn't picky about what I read and anyway, I didn't immediately know the importance of Shabbat-compatible reading material.

(This gets further compounded if you see your otherwise fine frum host reading the newspaper or news magazine with his bowl of cereal before heading off to his 9 AM davening, which was what it was like in many communities in America at that time.)

Even more challenging, there wasn't a whole lot of frum reading material at that time. Frummies barely even had magazines! (And now you've got a dozen.)

Then I learned that you were supposed to confine your reading material to "the spirit of Shabbat." I confess that I initially ignored it. How could I spend hours reading something like a formal English commentary on the Parsha? Or an English translation of a mussar book. Yes, read them of course. Of course! But to spend the entire afternoon and evening doing so? EVERY Shabbat? And what about those 3-day yantivs, eh?

But then some very riveting and inspiring frum Holocaust memoirs starting appearing, so I joined lots of women in reading those. But depending on the content, they're not exactly within the spirit of Shabbat if you consider that Shabbat is supposed to be a joyful time.

So I tried to concentrate on whatever I deemed "kosher" novels and books and magazines for Shabbat. And I kept this up for quite a while.

Occasionally, I made a stab at reading purely Torah, Shabbat-spirited material ONLY, but found such restriction too much of a strain.

But the more I delved into Torah Judaism and put into practice and learned, the more I changed on the inside without even realizing it.

At one point, I found that even a "kosher" secular book or article took me out of Shabbat. 

This was a good sign because it meant that I'd finally become sensitized to the sanctity of Shabbat.

So it started off with mild disorientation, but I still wanted to be entertained in the conventional way.

Then it kept getting stronger. I started to feel a kind of yuck when I'd get up from my non-Shabbosy Shabbos reading.

Once, as a guest in someone's empty apartment, I discovered a whole array of American news magazines out in the open on a magazine stand. And what tantalizing topics! That Shabbat, I kept reading them until I made my soul sick. The contrast was so tangible and so unpleasant this time, I instinctively resolved to stick to only frum books from now on.

(This still included Holocaust memoirs, BTW.)

As time went on, I even had a couple of Harry Potter novels on the end table which I kept glancing at throughout Shabbat, but didn't pick up. (Even though I knew better, I was still a big Harry Potter fan at one point.) And it wasn't a wrenching challenge because my refusal was emotional and not intellectual.

As time went on and I kept progressing in my mitzvah observance (with the normal set-backs that accompany any spiritual advancement) and connecting to the spirit of Shabbat, my reading material kept narrowing down, but for emotional reasons, not intellectual ones.

Meaning, I didn't need to struggle with resisting the temptation to read this or that. The temptation was either barely there or not there at all.

So I wasn't feeling deprived or in a constant battle with the yetzer hara.

And to be perfectly upfront, I still occasionally peruse something that's not completely within the spirit of Shabbat, but that occurs maybe once a year or every two years.

At the same time, I don't want to put down the value of gritting your teeth and going head to head with your yetzer hara. People do it and do so successfully.

But the thing is that those types who tend to succeed in this manner also become kind of hard and judgmental. You see them marching along with a set jaw and a hard or determined look in their eyes. But they get a certain gratification from knowing that they are fighting the good fight and see their misery as a sign that they're in the trenches, which means they're doing the right thing. And they do a lot of good things. They end up running things or being the go-to person for certain tasks or say yes whenever asked to do a mitzvah like visiting the sick or hosting guests, etc.

At the same time, because they're weighted down and acting out of self-compulsion rather than simcha shel mitzvah, they don't always do these mitzvot graciously. They can be tough hosts or inflexible administrators of whatever task they've taken on.

And they tend to believe that whatever iron-clad behavior they engage in is good for the recipient and will explain exactly why their limitations benefit the recipient (who may not sense the benefit).

Having said that, there are some traits you do just need to grit your teeth and get down to work on them directly because you can't just ignore them while you focus on pumping up their positive opposites. You just can't allow certain behaviors to get out of hand.

And it goes without saying that you are supposed to do a daily cheshbon hanefesh.

But for myself, I realized pretty quickly that I can't function in a constant state of miserable grit. I'm not very good at suffering. Life feels very ugly and overwhelming in that state, and I don't feel any sense of satisfaction of a job well-done in that state, which the above people obviously do feel. Also, I can't just brush off the unbending cold interactions with people that this state often ends up producing. I feel bad if I can't host guests with warmth, etc. For me, just the bare fact of "doing it" feels way below par unless I'm doing it "right."

So if you're like me (maybe a bit too hedonistic to "enjoy" maintaining a stiff upper lip, a clenched jaw, and general emotional suffering), then focusing on strengthening the good points and gathering insights into the deeper meanings and spiritual aspects of different mitzvot might be the way to go (while still gritting your teeth in certain other areas of your personality when necessary).

This post used Shabbat reading material as an example, but you can apply the principle to anything.

Let's say you tend to get resentful and envious and covetous of others. The minute you start to feel that encroaching sense of bitterness or resentment, what can you do?

You have at least 3 options:

1) You can just catch yourself WITHOUT identifying the feelings as "the evil trait of envy" or "the strict Torah prohibition of covetousness as stated in the Ten Commandments" and immediately start blessing the other person. You can murmur the blessing or think it in your head silently. If someone has exactly the car you want, you can say, "I wish for this person to be able to afford an even nicer car -- or to receive more cars just like this one! Hashem, may you bless this person that this car never breaks down and that this person never experience any hardship from this car."

2) You can also say, "Thank You, Hashem, that I don't have such a car. Even though I really want one, I realize that my not having it means that having my junky car (or not having a car at all) is what's best for me because everything You do is for my very best. So thanks, God!"

3) Or you can just ignore everything and dive straight into counting your own blessings: "Thank You, Hashem, for giving me a good working refrigerator, I have indoor plumbing, I have comfortable shoes, I've got a real comfy pillow, etc."

Whatever makes you happy.

Having said that, you may be gritting your teeth at first as you do it. But usually, you'll start to feel some good pretty quickly.

But wait! Didn't I just say that you need to avoid teeth-gritting? Yes! So depending on what you're working on and how you decide to go about it, you may need some grit to get you over the initial hurdle. But then you get to feeling good. Also, when you bless others and wish the best for them (however much you manage to work up in your heart at any given moment), Hashem sends blessing to you.

So when you do that, it starts feeling good and you have that to look forward to next time it hits you. It's not like you're saying, "I must not feel envy. Envy signifies a serious lack of emuna. I must control my mind and my heart to prevent any envy from entering." That's pretty heavy. And like I said, some people can manage this way. But I'm not one of them.

With Shabbat reading, I didn't even try to limit myself. I just kept on going with enhancing Shabbat and the reading material adjusted on its own. (BTW, talking to Hashem regularly really helps with this because it gives you something really beneficial and enjoyable to do on Shabbat, if you can find that private moment.)

But with envy or hatred, I find I need to side-step it more proactively.

So it depends.

And it is a process. At first, maybe you don't want to try at all. Then you kind of bounce back and forth before finally being catapulted up to the next level.

Okay, so the point here is that you work according to your own personality and do what feels good with the intention of self-improvement, but without focusing overly much on "I'm firmly engaged in an intense program of self-improvement!" (unless of course, that makes you feel good and happy).

Related posts:

• How to Use Joy for Self-Improvement
• How to Live the Good Life? Request It for Others
• When Mussar & Self-Improvement Don't Work
• The Most Effective Way to Fix Your Flaws

When you first become frum (Orthodox/Torah-observant), the prohibitions can hit pretty hard.

For example, you enjoy Shabbat and love hearing all the inspiring gems that go along with it.

At the same time, you also get tangled up in all the minutiae of everything that's forbidden on Shabbat.

And this is true with every other aspect of frum life.

But at some point, you start to fall into the rhythm of things and eventually, you start to experience the liberation that the prohibitions actually provided you all along.

Having said that, this doesn't mean that you never again ram into a prohibition. Because no one is perfect except God, you can knock into or chafe against certain prohibitions again and again.

You've got your Divinely imbued flaws and weak spots and there's no free ride out of their grasp except to just get down to work, spiritually speaking.

And that work is the journey of a lifetime.

But how can prohibitions be liberating?

Well, it's as if you've lived your life on the monotonous rocky Moon. The ever-black sky is full of stars and the blue-marbled Earth looks so cool up above.

And you've got your super-cool perfectly pressurized spacesuit, and your moon-rover that bounces all over the bland surface.

And you can jump thrillingly high!

Inside your theoretical moonbase, you float around, catch airborn food with your tongue, and have a great time while doing all your other stuff.

Then you get back to Earth and your body feels heavy and you can't bounce around like you used to.

At first, everything feels "off," and you can barely eat a hamburger. You're overwhelmed by all the color and light after the Moon's black-and-grayish environment.

But...you have oxygen.

You can BREATHE. You've got a beautiful azure sky around you (which is also sometimes gray or purple or dark blue or black or -- when the sun is setting -- a canvas of azure, lavender, peach, crimson, and pink!) and you've got day (DAY!!!) and night, and trees, and flowers, and countless other goodies.

But in the beginning, you mourn your lack of bounciness. You miss floating. You get irritable over feeling too cold or too hot after that nice temperature-controlled environment you used to enjoy. You fret over the lack of colorful interesting objects in your new nighttime sky.

Okay, to be honest...when you were on the moon, it's not like there were TONS of colorful spheres -- just the one marbled-blue Earth.

But still! Now all heavenly bodies are just plain white (except for Mars, which sometimes looks the color of pale rust).

And driving just isn't the same on Earth.

But eventually, your body adjusts to Earth and you realize how great it is to walk around without being confined within in a bulky pressurized suit, and you start to experience all the advantages available on Earth.

And sure, maybe you sometimes miss being able to jump thrillingly high or being able to bounce-drive however you want without being hemmed in by nuisances like street lanes, speed limits, traffic lights, and oncoming traffic.

And maybe all the color and light still overwhelms you from time to time and you miss your old place with its stark simple contrast of grayish rock (sometimes BRILLIANTLY grayish, when the Sun hits it just right) and its star-and-Earth-studded black sky.

Nonetheless, you're still profoundly grateful and appreciative for the very limitations of gravity and atmosphere, which are precisely what enable you to do all that which you enjoy on Earth, but remain impossible on the Moon.

UPDATE: This post was accidentally posted in rough-draft form when it was only one-third finished. Please read on for the entire completed post...
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They say that history is written by the winners.

But what if the battle isn't quite over yet?

Then the history is controlled by whoever has the most control.

Growing up, I was taught to be proud of the State of Israel and its army. I was taught that the modern State of Israel was brought about by kibbutznikim and the Haganah. Needless to say, kibbutznikim and many regular (not rabidly anti-Torah Leftist) Jews in the Haganah did indeed fight on behalf of the Jewish people for the State of Israel.

There are even unnamed graves of Jews who survived the Holocaust only to die fighting for the Jewish people after smuggling themselves straight to Israel and not fully recovered from the death camps. They hadn't been in the country or their military unit long enough for anyone to know them and all their family members had been murdered. Consequently, when their lifeless body was found on the battlefield, no one knew exactly who they were. Yet they received an honorable burial and until today, grateful and humbled Jews visit their graves to pay homage to their anonymous sacrifice.

Yet throughout all this, Torah observant Jews never made an appearance.

That's right -- not even the dati-leumi, Religious Zionist Jews.

The settling, rebuilding, battling, and establishment of the Jewish country was portrayed as a completely secular enterprise. Orthodox Jews only made an appearance as pesky interferers but never as contributors.

Yet contrary to the establishment history, Orthodox Jews -- even ultra-Orthodox Jews -- were the first settlers and the first fighters in modern Eretz Yisrael. And they worked and sacrificed despite interference, sabotage, and other forms of discrimination set against them by the anti-religious reps in charge (not to mention the discrimination by the Turks and later the Brits).

Without any relief in sight, these people went up against malnutrition, disease, unimaginable poverty, harsh living conditions, oppression, and Arab attacks -- all to create a Jewish presence in the Land of Israel, fulfill the mitzvah of settling the Land, and pave the way for their fellow Jews suffering from pogroms.

The first Jewish defense force was actually established by the strictly Orthodox students of the Vilna Gaon and the Baal Shem Tov in response to the lack of protection from Turkish authorities. The aliyah of the Vilna Gaon's students took place in 1809, decades before the word "Zionism" was even coined, and an armed Jewish defense force formed shortly after their arrival.

This Jewish Guard even had headquarters (in the Old City of Jerusalem) and was commanded by some of the most outstanding students of the Vilna Gaon along with other rabbinic leaders.

Yes, that's right: The very first weaponized Jewish defenders in Eretz Yisrael were also armed with Gemaras.

(Sorry for the unpleasant shock, Torah-hating Leftists.)

Many members of the Sefardi community also joined with their Ashkenazi brethren to protect their fellow Jews from marauders.

Unfortunately, the brilliant talmid chacham, Rav Yosef Shick was slain in the line of duty. Rav Menachem Mendel of Shklov was also seriously wounded and blinded in one eye.

But you'll probably never hear about them on Yom Hazikaron (or any other time). These kinds of warriors aren't considered part of the "cool" crowd.

The Jewish Guard succeeded in collecting the necessary weapons for self-defense: clubs, knives, pistols, and rifles.

Because two Jewish Guard leaders were both named Shmerel (short for "Shmaryahu") and because the two Shmerels dedicated themselves to making sure every Jewish Guard member owned a pistol, pistols became popularly known as "shmerelach."

In addition to guarding the homes and families, circumstances also forced the Jewish Guard to accompany travelers and stand watch over storehouses of building materials and food.

As Jewish settlement expanded outside the walled city of Jerusalem, new and more dangerous positions needed to be put into place by the Jewish Guard. These men stood guard day and night to protect the innocent Jews, taking a shift of guard duty and then a shift of Torah study throughout this time.

Before he could even make it to Shacharis one morning in 1820, Rav Hillel Rivlin (the head of the Ashkenazi community and the head of the Ashkenazi beit din) received word that a group of newly arrived Jewish immigrants had been kidnapped by Arabs, who demanded the ransom of 1000 gold napoleons.

After consultation between the leaders of the community and the Jewish Guard, they all formed a plan. Pretending to have the ransom in a bag, two Jewish Guard men would set out with the kidnappers' representative.

In the meantime, all the members of the Jewish Guard stole after them along winding routes to near where is now Bnei Brak.

(While all this was going on, the Jerusalem community fasted and prayed for their success.)

At that point, the Jewish Guard launched a surprise attack which freed the prisoners, demolished the camp, and killed the leader along with many other bandits.

Who's the Israeli Superman now, eh?

(You probably have never heard of this stunning Raid on the Outskirts of Bnei Brak. You likely will not hear about it on Yom HaAtzmaut either, nor will a movie ever be made about it. But I am profoundly grateful to Jews like this who first enabled Jewish settlement in Eretz Yisrael, from which I personally benefit today.)

The years 1820-1822 saw the Jews of the Jerusalem area terrorized by ruthless bandits led by their sheik. Via meticulous intelligence-gathering, the Jewish Guard discovered the hideout of the terrorists and launched a surprise assault one night, slaying the chief and putting an end to the terror.

Later in 1873, Bedouin terrorists attacked Jewish homes nearly every night.

Turkish police proved unhelpful.

At a gathering the home of Jerusalem's chief rabbi, Rav Meir Auerbach, another surprise attack was planned.

The night before the attack, Jewish inhabitants filled the synagogues and study halls to recite Tehillim/Psalms and pray for the success of the Jewish Guard.

At midnight, the Jewish Guard launched a 3-prong assault on the hideout in the mountains.

The attack was so unexpected that the stronghold was demolished within 30 minutes with 150 dead on the enemy side.

The Jews no longer suffered from this group.

In the incredible book Rebels in the Holy Land by Sam Finkel, you can meet the strictly Orthodox Yaakov Laskovsky, a "Litvish cowboy" from Russia who settled in Ekron in the 1880s. Whenever he encountered groups of Yishmaeli bandits, he would give chase until he caught them, then beat the living daylights out of them. (He was a one-man anti-terror unit.) Moshe Raab is pictured in the book sporting a full beard, black hat, and an enormous shotgun. Raab was one of the guards who protected Petach Tikvah from Yishmael attacks in the late 1800s.

Much later, the tzaddik of Jerusalem Rabbi Aryeh Levin smuggled dozens (or maybe hundreds) of messages in his coat for the Haganah fighters imprisoned by the British, whom he visited frequently.

In her searing Holocaust memoir, From the Depths I Call, Lea Fuchs-Chayen was a strictly religious teenage survivor who regularly allowed the Jewish Underground to store weapons in her easy chair, despite the risk if she was caught and despite the danger of explosives in her furniture.

And there are many more to tell of, but that's enough for now.

You won't be hearing these stories during the ceremonies, celebrations, programs, and speeches of Yom Hazikaron and Yom HaAtzmaut. Mainstream history books have deleted these courageous and devoted Jews with their pistols and their payos from existence.

But they did exist.

And we in Eretz Yisrael are here today in their merit.

Please remember the first Jewish Guard and all the others.

Just because they were what today would be called ultra-Orthodox doesn't mean their contributions don't count.

They do.

A recent event brought home how far we need to go to give the benefit of the doubt, especially when the doubt is cast by the news media.

My husband was personally involved in this recent situation:

Years ago, a man whom we'll call "Pinny" opened a felafel restaurant with high-level kashrut certification.

The organization certifying Pinny's kashrut was surprised to learn that he'd falsely maligned the kashurt organization on a standard Israeli news channel. They checked it out and there he was, standing in his store next to their kashrut certificate with PINNY'S FELAFEL featured prominently on the certificate and reporting on their supervision as a substandard money-making racket.

Case closed, right?

Wrong.

Recently, Pinny contacted the same kashrut organization requesting certification for his new pizza restaurant.

The chutzpah of it all! How dare he turn to them for approval when he gave a false report on TV against this same organization?

They turned him down.

To make the "truth" even more evident, he demanded certification 2 days before Pesach, which is cutting things pretty close and puts a lot of pressure on the supervision. What kind of a person does that?

When his calls weren't returned, he texted mussar to the mashgichim (kashurt supervisors) like: Derech eretz kadmah l'Torah -- good manners precede Torah, etc.

At the same time, a couple of guys in the organization felt uncomfortable with the stonewalling. Sure, he'd maligned them on TV, but maybe he'd done teshuvah in the meantime? And yeah, the mussar texts and the demand for kashrut certification the day before Bedikat Chametz didn't show great derech eretz, but nonetheless...something seemed "off." Something just didn't add up.

Finally, the Pinny's rabbi called the kashrut organization. He'd known Pinny personally for years and found him to be a sincere and trustworthy individual. Why wouldn't they even speak to Pinny? Why were they limiting Pinny's only means of livelihood?

"Pinny falsely slandered us on TV," they told the rabbi.

"Impossible," said the rabbi and decided to check things out.

He called them back after Pesach. "Gentlemen," he said. "You've got the wrong man."

What had happened?

Pinny sold his restaurant to another fellow BEFORE the televised interview. THAT fellow stood next to the kashrut certificate which stated PINNY'S FELAFEL as he maligned the organization -- when it was no longer Pinny's felafel joint, but someone else's.
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It's important to air things out and get the facts before committing to a certain narrative.

Yes, it's very difficult to so when the "evidence" blares itself from a TV screen in front of your face.

But it's a major reason why you shouldn't automatically believe anything you see on the "news."

Some people cop an attitude when insulted, i.e. "How dare that person talk that way to ME!"

Many people go on and on about why they didn't deserve to be treated a certain way (as if it would be okay to maltreat them had they indeed put a toe out of line).

But there's a difference between saying something just plain hurts in contrast to acting like it's only wrong because you don't think you did anything to deserve disrespect or offense.

But who deserves disrespect or offense? When is that halachically acceptable?

Whether we're Jewish or not, we're all made in God's Image.

And among Jews, there are firm laws about treating your brothers and sisters with generosity and compassion (even when you also need to treat them with din).

The truth is that even when we do something wrong, that doesn't permit the other person to respond past the boundaries of halacha.

To be exact, the other person isn't allow to be behave badly at all.

Sure, you may not like being called to a court trial or informed that your behavior was hurtful or wrong. But if the other person is correct, they aren't behaving badly by calling your attention to what you've done wrong and, when necessary, asking for compensation (like if you stole from them or something).

There's an implication that it's okay to hurt people who are wrong (whether purposefully or unintentionally) when actually, it's NOT okay.

Self-protection? Permissible.

Retaliation and open game with bad middot? Forbidden.

Of course, there are extenuating circumstances.

For example, anger is considered avodah zara and disrespectful language is generally forbidden. Yet it's understandable when a person lashes out at someone who has repeatedly and unrepentantly mistreated them in some way. Decent people strive to respond with dignity to difficult situations, but even a very good person still has a breaking point.

The big indication in that kind of scenario is whether the person who lashes out feels ashamed or regretful at having lost control, even if the offender really deserved it.

Despite the decent person's recognition that the one who mistreated them is the real offender and that the mistreatment shoved them into a very strenuous nisayon, the decent person still wishes to have handled the situation with more dignity, better middot, and more emuna.

Until we accept that fact that pain is pain and allow ourselves to sympathize with the actual pain (rather than looking to see if it was deserved or not), we will have a hard time being truly compassionate people.

Of course, it's important to point out the obligation to scrutinize one's deeds in a such a situation. The pain is from Hashem, Who uses the offender as an agent of that pain. You ask Hashem why it happened.

If indeed, you mistreated someone to the breaking point, inciting a decent person to lash out at you, then that should come through as you analyze the situation with God. But many times, you'll discover another message Hashem wants to impart to you.

When someone confides their pain to you, it's important to sympathize, even if you see a reason for their particular challenge. Why? Because it still just plain hurts that person and it's possible to sympathize with that pain and confusion.

We don't always need to look behind the person for the reason.

We can just let go and be compassionate.

Several times throughout his 1824 mussar masterpiece, Pele Yoetz, Rabbi Eliezer Papo emphasizes that the main mitzvah of honoring one's parents and in-laws is AFTER they pass on (may we all live in good health until 120!).

He notes that even if one's parents or in-laws were extremely pious people and everyone left behind is confident they're doing great in the Afterlife, one can never really know for sure. Therefore, it's best to go beyond the yearly kaddish and other traditions of honoring our dearly departed. He notes that it's not enough to do all the important things one does during the 12 months following a parent's death. No one can rest assured regarding one's fate after death, and so children and children-in-law should continue to pray and perform good deeds (like giving charity) on behalf of their parents for the rest of their lives.

In fact, he even goes so far as to say:

Lest this all sound frightening and gloomy, Rav Papo reassures us that we'll receive tremendous blessing for showing departed parents so much care and compassion. Their departed souls will bless our living souls and God will also be very Happy about our concern and compassion for people who are no longer able to help themselves.

So providing merits for departed loved ones is an all-around win-win situation for everyone involved.

To this means, Rav Papo composed a short prayer to say, and he recommends that it be said at the beginning of each day.

Where it says "etc," you can apparently fill in whatever person you choose. You can also apparently say this for a grandparent or anyone else for whom you wish to provide merit in the Afterlife.

You should also feel free to change the Hebrew possessive in the last line to feminine form or plural, if necessary, i.e. instead of nafsho, you can say nafsha for a woman or nafsham for several people.

Here is the prayer in Hebrew, English, and transliteration:

יהי רצון מלפניך ה אלוקינו ואלוקי אבותינו שתקבל ברחמים וברצון כל מעשה הטוב אשר אני עושה בין במחשבה בין בדיבור בין במעשה ויהיה הכל בזכות ובמנוחת ולעלוי נפש רוח ונשמה של אבי ואמי וחמי וחמתי וכו'. יהי רצון שתהא נפשו צרורה בצרור החיים

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May it be favorable before You, O God, our God and God of our fathers, that You shall accept with compassion and favor every good deed that I perform, whether it's in thought, in speech, or in deed, and may it all be considered as a merit and respite and elevation of the life-force [nefesh], spirit [ruach], and soul [neshamah] of my father and my mother and my father-in-law and my mother-in-law, etc. May it be Your Will that his [or "her" or "their"] soul shall be bound in the bond of [eternal] life.

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Yehi ratzon Hashem Elokeinu v'Elokei Avoteinu sheh tekabel b'rachamim uv'ratzon kol ma'aseh hatov asher ani oseh/osah bein b'machshavah bein b'dibur bein b'ma'aseh v'yiyeh hakol l'zchut v'l'menuchat ul'ilui nefesh, ruach, uneshamah shel avi v'imi v'chami v'chamoti, vechuleh. Yehi ratzon sheh tahei nafsho tzrurah b'tzror hachaim.

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May we all succeed in completing our full rectification in this lifetime without tribulations or disgrace.

The Torah compares the Jewish people to olives.

Why?

Because the most precious aspect of an olive (its oil) only comes forth when pressed.

Olives on their own are bitter, unattractive, and not good for much.

But olive oil contains many healthful properties and contains a wide variety of highly beneficial uses.

And this segues into the heart-stirring life and personality of Janusz Korczak (pronounced "yanush korchak").

Born as Henryk Goldszmidt in Warsaw in 1878 or 1879 to assimilated Jews, Korczak later took on the pen name "Janusz Korczak" and rose to become one of the most heroic figures in the Warsaw ghetto.

Because we'll be discussing several books in the post, I've provided some images to give you a better idea:

(The words in blockquotes way below are taken from page 92 of Gutta: Memories of a Vanished World.)
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The terror Korczak felt as a child upon witnessing the brutal methods common in Polish schools during his time combined with several other impacting experiences inspired him to develop more compassionate and more effective child-rearing methods.

While I haven't yet read his books, he apparently favored a gentle and mature approach with children, while still inculcating necessary values of responsibility, self-discipline, consideration of others, and emotional maturity.

Unlike the American pop psychology movement, which viewed (and still views) self-esteem as a goal rather than a result, it seems that Korczak understood that self-esteem was the result of making good decisions and engaging in mature behavior, rather than something that can be merely bequeathed to a child (or any person).

Even his books for children, praised for being able to enter the mind of a child so appealingly, were meant not only to entertain, but to inculcate important values.

Not only was Korczak raised in a completely assimilated environment, his family life wasn't ideal either. In fact, his father later died in a mental hospital.

Korczak himself became agnostic and didn't believe in forcing any religion onto children.

After attending university to become a pediatrician, he served in the Polish army, and eventually joined the staff of a Polish orphanage.

But because of their hate-filled attitude toward Jewish orphans (who weren't always literal orphans, but placed there by destitute families who'd lost one parent), Korczak went on to open his own orphanage for Jewish children where he was free to apply his own methods for raising children and did so with tremendous success, as attested to one of the last surviving orphans, Itzchak Belfer. (Link below)

Within Polish society, Korczak rose to become one of the leading pedagogues of his time, with his own popular radio show where he propagated his child-rearing theories via stories and wry humor.

With the publication of his book, Kaytek the Wizard, Korczak became the JK Rowling of Poland when his book hit enduring bestseller status, its fandom similar to that of the Harry Potter phenomenon. But it wasn't his first novel; other popular books preceded this one.

Korczak's brilliant assistant, Stefania "Stefa" Wilczyńska, was no less dedicated and heroic than he. Never married, she was viewed as a true mother by the orphans who continued to visit her after their own marriage with their children, whom Stefa related to as if they were her real grandchildren. In fact, Stefa successfully ran the orphanage on her own for a couple of years when Korczak was called into military service during WWI.

In the 1930s, Stefa visited Eretz Yisrael and worked with the children of a kibbutz where she provided the staff with good guidance and advice on how to improve their care of the children before returning to Poland.

In Korczak's orphanage in Poland, the children described the set-up as a mother-father dynamic, with Stefa as the mother who remained "at home" with the children and Korczak as the father who supervised them in the early morning and came home from his other work in the evenings to children who skipped and danced to greet their returning "father."

After the Nazi invasion of Poland in 1939, arrangements were made for Stefania to flee to Eretz Yisrael, but she chose to remain with her orphans and enter the hell of the Warsaw Ghetto.

Despite his Polish connections, his non-Jewish lifestyle, his noble Polish appearance, and the willingness of influential Poles to hide him, Korczak remained with his children when the Nazis forced the orphanage into the Warsaw Ghetto.

There, he, Stefa, and their assistants made every effort to create a normal and even thriving life for their children. Even though they too were starving, they did everything they could to provide whatever food and activities for the orphans.

In his 60s at this time, Korczak developed terribly swollen feet from entire days spent plodding from one welfare institution to another, standing in lines and begging bread or buckwheat for the children. He also suffered lung problems among other health issues.

He personally and lovingly cut the children's hair and nails, told them funny stories, weighed them, and gave them their medicine. He also checked on them as they slept, pulling a fallen blanket over one slumbering child and checking the forehead of another suffering from fever.

How was a man broken in health, rejected by the very society to which he'd given so much (including endangering himself as a doctor on the battlefield), and himself starving able to provide nearly 200 children with not only their physical needs, but the love and tenderness they so desperately lacked?

As an agnostic, he didn't even have God to lean on.

Gutta Sternbuch, the scion of a respected Chassidic family and a graduate of the original Beis Yaakov seminary in Cracow, also joined the staff of the orphanage.

Gutta taught the children blessings and Hebrew songs. She said Shema with them at bedtime and regaled them with stories of tzaddikim and miracles.

Periodically, Korczak sat by and listened to Gutta's religious uplifting, impressed by the positive impact she made on the children. Despite his own feelings toward any religion, he encouraged Gutta to continue because it made the children happy and that was all he cared about.

When Gutta wasn't able to make the curfew, she spent the night at the orphanage. During those times, Korczak asked her about her upbringing and Beis Yaakov experiences, to which he listened with a curious and open mind.

At one point, he told Gutta,

Then he implored Gutta,

She promised.

At one point, Korczak and his staff arranged a special outing for the children.

The controversial head of the Judenrat, Adam Czerniakow (who gained hot-button fame when he committed suicide rather than participate in Nazi deportations), initiated a park project. He gathered a group of Jewish artists and architects trapped in the ghetto to create a park of trees, mountains, valleys, a waterfall, cows and sheep -- all out of paper.

(They had no other materials.)

The children were outfitted in special navy-and-white uniforms for the outing, also all made out of paper.

Because of the Nazi terror and deprivations, the children were in deplorable condition despite the best efforts of the Korczak's staff. Some were just days away from death.

But they radiated joy as they visited the "park" and enjoyed every moment of the outing.

Gutta later recalled: "If I could, I would award this park the highest prize for human endeavor and creativity...I was so proud of the Jews who created this park."

Throughout the entire ordeal of the Warsaw Ghetto, Korczak struggled to find escape and refuge for the children. Until the very end, his former friends and the Polish Underground were willing to help him personally, but Korczak refused to abandon his children.

"You do not leave a sick child in the night, and you do not leave children at a time like this," he stated.

One effect of starvation is not just physical lethargy, but mental lethargy. Apathy seeps into the sufferer.

Korczak and Stefa experienced this too, but they fought it for the sake of the children, continuing to minister to them with all the love and care they could muster.

In the first week of August 1942, the Nazis decided to liquidate all children's homes in the ghetto. On that day, Korczak requested 15 minutes to ready his staff and the children. The nearly 200 children between the ages of 2 and 13 were dressed and groomed as meticulously as possible under the circumstances.

To soothe their terror as much as possible, Korczak told them they were going to the countryside where they would experience fresh air and eat berries.

With Korczak heading four neat rows compromised of the children, Stefa, and the nurses & teachers devoted to the children throughout their ghetto incarceration, Korczak held one particularly debilitated child in his arms while holding the hand of another as the heart-breaking entourage was marched all the way through the ghetto to the main boarding platform.

As they moved forward, one of the teachers bravely tried to prop up the children's spirits by breaking into a rousing marching song about keeping one's head up through a howling storm.

It was a very long way to the trains and the children suffered, but the group was not allowed to stop walking.

As they crossed over a bridge, their heartless escorts shoved the youngest ones up the bridge and then knocked them down the other side as Poles below shouted, "Good riddance, Jews!"

Upon reaching the boarding site, they encountered thousands of other Jews sentenced to cattle car transportation.

At that point, one Judenrat official urged Korczak to come with him to the Judenrat for a possible reprieve. But Korczak feared leaving the children for even a moment.

And Korczak's fears proved right.

As the Judenrat official stood there, the Nazis ordered Korczak's orphans to be loaded into the cattle cars.

At this point, the account splits. Some say that a Nazi official, influenced by a person with sway, approached Korczak with a document that would allow Korczak to return to his residence.

Others say that this officer was actually working under Nazi orders because sometimes internationally famous Jews were transported to Theresienstadt, a concentration camp with deceptively better conditions designed to mislead the Red Cross.

Still others say that an SS officer recognized Korczak as the author of his children's favorite books and offered him an escape.

But Korczak refused to leave his children.

Then they were sent to Treblinka where their final moments were lost to history.
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Note: The shock of losing Korczak and his orphanage was so great that for years, various people claimed to have spotted Korczak, Stefa, or the orphans around the Polish countryside.

But no evidence exists of their survival.
*
Gutta Sternbuch would have accompanied them to their final destination, but Hashem had other plans for her and she survived to marry and raise a family and nurture fellow refugees, as documented in her memoir.
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When we read of heroism, it's easy to get caught up in the jaw-dropping "What!" and lose sight of the subtler "How?"

With very few exceptions, most heroic people unknowingly worked up to their heroism via a series of smaller heroic decisions throughout their lives. The heroism of Korczak and the others stands out not only because of the ultimate sacrifice they made in the end, but also because their heroism was ongoing. It's easier to be a hero for a moment than to keep up the heroism through deteriorating health, mental lethargy, disillusionment, constant terror, and the bleakness of a truly hopeless situation.

And that's the real lesson to take away from such stories:
It's the decisions they made in the good times that affected how they responded in the bad times.
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Even though I'd come across Janusz Korczak's story decades ago, my discovery of Stefa was a lot more recent. Equally devoted to the children throughout their lives, Stefa refused refuge in Eretz Yisrael and also accompanied her cherished charges into the gas chamber.

And according to eyewitnesses, even throughout the terrible hell of the Warsaw Ghetto, Stefa's physical and emotional deterioration wasn't as rapid or pronounced as Korczak's.

Why?

Women's Studies devotees will certainly proclaim that it is merely because Korczak's male status earned him historical status while Stefa's gender relegated her to the sidelines.

But the truth is that Korczak was an international celebrity in that part of the world. Respected by colleagues for his military service and his education while adored by the nation for his theories, wry humor, and writing, Korczak was both the (l'havdil!) JK Rowling and the Dr. Spock of his time complete with books, speaking engagements, and his own radio show, all of which was the TV and Internet of its time.

And this likely propelled his deterioration too.

While I can't know for sure, accounts indicate that Korczak was never able to make peace with the betrayal of the Polish society he'd helped revolutionize and build. A handful of colleagues were willing to save him, but not save the children whom he treasured more than himself.

Everything he'd devoted his life to was being torn apart and annihilated.

The horrific circumstances rammed him into the wall of disillusionment again and again.

He'd invested heart and soul into propelling society to a better place, using his fame to make his world more moral, caring, wiser, and compassionate.

Yet it all ended with him carrying broken children in his own faltering arms while dragging his broken body past jeering countrymen into crate on wheels headed for a gas chamber.

I'm not sure if he ever sensed the precious golden oil that managed to seep out of the olive press in which he found himself.
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Itzchak Belfer, artist, sculptor, and last survivor of Korczak's orphanage

Note: Janusz Korczak achieved even more in his life than what's written here. Furthermore, his ghetto diary was saved and published, revealing much more about his life and his personality. There is also so much more good to relate about Stefa and the teachers and nurses who tended the children in the orphanage, which are available online and in books. This post is just a drop in the sea.

Regarding spiritual matters, it's often helpful to use 3-dimensional real-world metaphors to get some kind of grasp on how lofty spiritual physics work.

Many people think that because they're very flawed or nothing special, then their prayers are nothing special either.

But this isn't true.

Particularly when praying for others, a sincere prayer from the heart of an otherwise flawed and sinful person can still be very powerful.

How does this work?

Let's say you're a parent.

And let's say that one of your children possesses the ability to be serene, caring, clean, and to courageously do the right thing, yet instead is pulled after his or her yetzer hara.

And so this same child tends to act out as a bitter, selfish, resentful, rebellious, chutzpadik brat. Furthermore, this same child also enjoys a good romp in the local pig sty, making this child often dirty and smelly.

Yet upon seeing the suffering or potential suffering of another sibling, let's say this child comes to you in all his or her muckiness and addresses you with a heartfelt plea: "Mom/Dad, I know that due to my usual behavior and appearance, I don't deserve any favors from you. However, I'm genuinely concerned about my sister. She's about to marry the wrong guy/she's not healthy/she's suffering from serious financial problems/Etc., and I can't sleep at night thinking about everything she's going through. Her pain also pains me personally. Can you please, please help her out? I really can't stand to see her suffer. Please?"

How would you feel?

Wouldn't your heart be touched that this self-absorbed wild child decided to leave his or her bewitching pursuits for a moment to care about and plead on behalf of his or her sibling?

Wouldn't you be gratified and hopeful at this wonderful sign that maybe, finally, your errant child is coming out of his or her own personal darkness?

And despite your child's stench, filthy appearance, and appalling behavior, wouldn't you feel moved to respond positively to such a heartfelt and selfless plea?

Obviously, Hashem is infinitely above human emotions. So far above, in fact, that His Love and Compassion toward us is beyond anything we can ever feel for each other, including for our own children.

And so this kind of prayer is very powerful. Therefore, you shouldn't automatically dismiss yourself as so wretched or unimportant that God won't take note of your prayers. He will!

Many people mistakenly assume that it's gaava (arrogance) to feel that their prayers are important and even transformative. But in reality, this assumption of gaava is a heretical and harmful assumption. Your prayers and your conversation with God are very precious to Him.

(Your connection with God is also the only way out of the pig sty and the soul-destroying behavior, whether your own or someone else's.)

It's really important to know that despite however flawed or messed-up you are, your prayers are still cherished by Hashem and can even be answered positively and relatively quickly.

God wants your heart.

Yes, it's true that many things need to be prayed for a long time and demand lots of inner work before you reap fruits.

And it's also true that some things simply aren't meant for you, for whatever the reason, and you never see the fruits of those prayers in this lifetime.

But some things (even MANY things) are given to you just for the asking...if you simply make the request.

For example...

Once, I simply couldn't settle down (both physically and mentally). I couldn't figure out what to do with myself and my life, what Hashem wanted me to do with myself and with my life. I sat down to do stuff, but couldn't settle. So then I paced over to another room to do something else, but couldn't engage in that either. This sitting-pacing-puttering kept up until I realized I needed to turn to Hashem for guidance.

I stopped in the hallway, raised my hands, and said, "Hashem, please tell me what to do with my life!"

Immediately, I heard a siren -- and not a test-siren either, but a real one. "Ah-ha!" I said. "You want me to sit in my safe room and talk to You." (Because finding a bomb shelter and praying are all you can and should do in the face of an oncoming missile.)

Additionally, my area had hardly been under attack at that point and we didn't have sirens blaring every week, so a real siren at that exact moment was a definite sign.

So that was a pretty clear -- and fast! -- answer to my request.

And since then, I've obeyed that answer a lot.

When the first of my friend's female triplets got engaged, I was very excited. I was fond of this trio and happily attended the engagement party. Yet when I discovered who the boy was, my heart sank.

While I did not know the boy personally, I'd met his parents a couple of times and found them (especially the father) to be particularly coarse, crass, immature individuals. Furthermore, 3 of their first four children displayed particularly problematic middot, especially the 12-year-old boy who tantrumed and whined wordlessly until he was fitted with a napkin around his neck and then spoon-fed his meal by his mother. (Shades of Colin Craven!) This happened at a public gathering, BTW. As shocking as his uninhibited infantility was, I was even more shocked that his mother indulged him so theatrically and willingly, and that his father looked upon him affectionately while murmuring justification of his son's bizarre behavior.

It was somewhat reassuring to see that the 14-year-old brother was looking on the whole scene with horror. What a relief to see that despite the bizarre and dysfunctional family dynamics, at least one child knew that his parents' and brother's behavior was seriously out of whack.

Yet when the 8-year-old sister started whining for some of the same pampering ("I want the soft part of the bread!"), the father snarled, "Oh, knock it off! You're just copying him for the attention!" (Yet without missing a beat, the mother passed the girl the white part from her own bread when the father turned his head for a moment.)

There's more yuck to relate, but let's just say that wasn't even the worst or most shocking thing the father said that night.

(I met this family another time a couple of months later, and they were still awful and strange.)

Anyway, I didn't know what to do.

On one hand, you can't judge a boy by his parents (as the oldest brother clearly proved).

Nor can you judge someone by a couple of incidents that occurred 18 years ago.

Yet on the other hand, it's very unlikely for such people to change even over the course of 18 years.

And it's also unlikely for the son of such people to turn out decently.

Unlikely, but not impossible.

(Not to mention, such people likely treat their daughters-in-law like garbage.)

This situation (particularly after the official engagement) wasn't covered clearly in any of my lashon hara books. I seriously considered calling a rav to ask whether I'm halachically allowed to say anything, but as I tried to mentally rehearse the shailah, it seemed unlikely. I've had mixed experience asking shailot; some rabbis tend toward sarcasm or grumpiness, which makes me tongue-tied.

The fact that the incidents occurred 18 years ago and did not directly involve the boy (who was only around 2 at the time) threw a wrench into things.

I also couldn't speak with my husband because he knew this family, making it non-toelet lashon hara. (Not to mention, my husband didn't share the same opinion of them as I did due to the man having helped my husband get a good job at one point, for which my husband was very grateful and appreciative.)

So I turned to Hashem and told him about how conflicted I felt and how much I wanted this girl to marry a very good guy, and that if this guy wasn't the right one, then Hashem should bring her "good and true zivug b'shaah tovah u'mutzlachat." (I got this nusach from Dayan Fischer when I accompanied a friend to get a psak.) Another gem I'd heard about was to daven that the potential mate be healthy in body and soul and come from an emotionally healthy (bari b'nefesh!) family. So I asked for that too.

Interestingly, the mother approached me 2 weeks later and quietly informed me that the shidduch had been called off. She'd noticed some issues in the boy and his family that "weren't so compatible" and after consulting with a rabbinical authority and getting a bracha from another rav, they all cancelled the engagement.

I was thrilled, of course.

A couple of months later, this same triplet got engaged for real to a good guy. Ironically, his mother isn't physically healthy (she's in a wheelchair), but I kept hearing about how nice the family is, and how all the brothers so willingly carry their mother in her wheelchair up and down stairs without complaint and without trying to duck out of the responsibility.

So that's Hashem taking the prayer literally. I davened only for her zivug to have an emotionally healthy family because I thought that's most important as far as in-laws go. And that's what she got!

Just to be clear: I don't consider myself the main player in this saga. The triplets are each other's best friends and were of course discussing things amongst each other and davening for their engaged sister, and davening with much more heart as only a womb-sharing sister can. The same can be said for the parents and other siblings, who were of course davening and investigating with deep care and concern.

At the same time, I don't think my prayers on behalf of the betrothed triplet were nothing. I definitely feel that Hashem listened to me too.

That's not gaava; that's just spiritual physics.

The point is that all of us (the girl's parents, me, etc.) were regular flawed people, yet Hashem listened to our prayers and answered in our favor in a timely manner.

You don't need to be a tzaddik to receive Divine favors. Many times, you just need to ask.

A friend of mine was writing down 100 gratitudes a day when one day, she just decided to list ten times as many. She thought it would take her an hour. After all, how long does it take to write 1000 words? But it ended up taking her much longer and she kept it up throughout the day between her other responsibilities.

A few days later, her mother sent her $1000, saying that she'd gotten a nice tax return that year and decided to spread the surplus among her adult children.

At first my friend didn't make the connection. After she'd completed her list of 1000 gratitudes, she felt worn out and anticlimactic, and then forgot about it. Yet when she realized that she'd received a present of exactly $1000 (and her parents are not people of means) only a few days after she'd written up exactly 1000 gratitudes, she said, "If only I'd know God was paying 1 dollar per gratitude, I'd have listed a million!"

Now, no offense to this friend, but while she possesses some wonderful qualities, she also possesses some real flaws too. She struggles with some pretty bad middot (but at least she struggles, rather than denying them). Yet Hashem gave her this $1000 windfall anyway without her even specifically asking for it.

My point is that you can be massively flawed and messed-up, yet you have a right to humbly ask Hashem for anything...ESPECIALLY on behalf of others.

Too many people today feel like "only truly great people can do that," but that kind of thinking is all wrong when it comes to connecting with Hashem.

Just pour out your heart and ask.

Then see what happens.

Sure, the answer could be no.

But what if it's yes?