While many people today erroneously view “talking to God” as a Breslov thing or something that “only truly great people do” (rather than the way truly great people became, well, truly great), the truth is that anyone can do it and reap incredible benefits from it.
If you just start talking and force yourself to get past the stuttering, tongue-tied obstacles, and discomfort, Hashem leads you the rest of the way.
To illustrate this, let’s look at the example of someone who is not even Jewish.
Brown Face, Big Master
I came across the example of Jamaican-born Joyce Ford Gladwell (mother of best-selling author Malcolm Gladwell) in her son’s book, Outliers. Back in the Sixties, Joyce wrote a book of her own called Brown Face, Big Master—“Big Master” being the Jamaican term for God.
Joyce descended from biracial relationships on both sides of her family and while obviously black, Joyce inherited the lighter side of brown skin. In Jamaica, lighter-skinned black people benefited. The biracial progeny of the white men and their Jamaican mistresses (who surprisingly often lived together as if husband and wife) were seen as being friendlier and more trustworthy by the white colonists.
So these children were given better jobs and opportunities. Jamaican society thus developed along racial lines, with lighter skin being highly prized, even within a single family unit. Lighter-skinned black people received better jobs and better lives, and achieved great successes. For example, by 1850, the mayor of Jamaica’s capital was a light-skinned black person.
Joyce’s lighter skin granted her success, too, and she and her twin sister went on to university in London, where Joyce met and married a white English mathematician named Graham Gladwell.
As a young couple with a baby, this educated and well-bred couple sought out an apartment near London. After an exhaustive search, they finally found one in the suburbs. But the day after they moved in, their racist landlady insisted they leave, saying angrily, “You didn’t tell me your wife was a Jamaican!”
Now, unlike today’s microaggressions and imaginary penalties, this was real racism with extremely unpleasant consequences.
And Joyce had every right to be hurt and offended, which she was - at first.
But, having been raised in a religious environment, Joyce responded by turning to God.
And the outcome was very different and more transformative than lawsuits and demonstrations:
If you just start talking and force yourself to get past the stuttering, tongue-tied obstacles, and discomfort, Hashem leads you the rest of the way.
To illustrate this, let’s look at the example of someone who is not even Jewish.
Brown Face, Big Master
I came across the example of Jamaican-born Joyce Ford Gladwell (mother of best-selling author Malcolm Gladwell) in her son’s book, Outliers. Back in the Sixties, Joyce wrote a book of her own called Brown Face, Big Master—“Big Master” being the Jamaican term for God.
Joyce descended from biracial relationships on both sides of her family and while obviously black, Joyce inherited the lighter side of brown skin. In Jamaica, lighter-skinned black people benefited. The biracial progeny of the white men and their Jamaican mistresses (who surprisingly often lived together as if husband and wife) were seen as being friendlier and more trustworthy by the white colonists.
So these children were given better jobs and opportunities. Jamaican society thus developed along racial lines, with lighter skin being highly prized, even within a single family unit. Lighter-skinned black people received better jobs and better lives, and achieved great successes. For example, by 1850, the mayor of Jamaica’s capital was a light-skinned black person.
Joyce’s lighter skin granted her success, too, and she and her twin sister went on to university in London, where Joyce met and married a white English mathematician named Graham Gladwell.
As a young couple with a baby, this educated and well-bred couple sought out an apartment near London. After an exhaustive search, they finally found one in the suburbs. But the day after they moved in, their racist landlady insisted they leave, saying angrily, “You didn’t tell me your wife was a Jamaican!”
Now, unlike today’s microaggressions and imaginary penalties, this was real racism with extremely unpleasant consequences.
And Joyce had every right to be hurt and offended, which she was - at first.
But, having been raised in a religious environment, Joyce responded by turning to God.
And the outcome was very different and more transformative than lawsuits and demonstrations:
I complained to God in so many words: “Here I was, the wounded representative of the negro race in our struggle to be accounted free and equal with the dominating whites!”…
...And then God said, “Have you not done the same thing? Remember this one and that one, people whom you have slighted or avoided or treated less considerately than others because they were different superficially…Have you not been glad that you are not more colored than you are? Grateful that you are not black?"
My anger and hate against the landlady melted. I was no better than she was, nor worse for that matter…We were both guilty of the sin of self-regard, the pride and the exclusiveness by which we cut some people off from ourselves.
___________________________________________
This is exactly what Judaism’s continuous exhortation to turn to Hashem and cry out to Hashem does for us.
Joyce obviously already had a relationship with God; she didn’t just start off their relationship with complaints. And she turned to Him for answers and solace. In return, she received the full loving message Hashem intended via the deplorable behavior of the white landlady.
And this transformed Joyce into a better person than she was the moment before.
Interestingly, God did this for Joyce even though she probably didn’t have real emuna.
Raised in a strong Christian environment, it’s safe to assume that Joyce misguidedly believed in God as one of divine set of triplets. Yet when she turned to Him, He still lovingly and compassionately helped her out.
All the more so will Hashem do with those of us who truly seek Him out and come to him as genuine monotheists, despite our foibles and transgressions.
This is exactly what Judaism’s continuous exhortation to turn to Hashem and cry out to Hashem does for us.
Joyce obviously already had a relationship with God; she didn’t just start off their relationship with complaints. And she turned to Him for answers and solace. In return, she received the full loving message Hashem intended via the deplorable behavior of the white landlady.
And this transformed Joyce into a better person than she was the moment before.
Interestingly, God did this for Joyce even though she probably didn’t have real emuna.
Raised in a strong Christian environment, it’s safe to assume that Joyce misguidedly believed in God as one of divine set of triplets. Yet when she turned to Him, He still lovingly and compassionately helped her out.
All the more so will Hashem do with those of us who truly seek Him out and come to him as genuine monotheists, despite our foibles and transgressions.
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