I wanted to write a little bit about PPD (post-partum depression) because I've had it (and didn't feel I could reach out for help because of the current simplistic cheerleading attitude toward it) and I've also been labeled as having it when I didn't have it at all, and both responses were detrimental.

But both situations also taught me that the well-intended portrayal of PPD as a purely hormonal blip and the attitude people must have toward it can actually cause problems.

I think that at least some PPD therapists realize the possible complexities involved in PPD and the variants in individual situations, but this doesn't seem to make it to the public.

First, I'd like to describe what it's like to be smacked with the PPD label when you don't have it.

Years ago, we had a very difficult houseguest staying with us when my youngest was around 7 months old. (I agreed to this for certain well-intentioned reasons, but the wrong decision resulted from my incorrect reasoning.) The houseguest was usually not around and came home late at night, and then I also saw him in the mornings. Overall, he had a pleasant personality, but he was too self-absorbed to live with.

Once, I found my baby with a mouth full of tobacco and hands full of chewed cigarettes in his hands (courtesy of the guest). Another time, I caught my baby just as he was biting into the foil wrapper of antidepressants (or antipsychotics? Again, courtesy of the guest.) The guest also used to sit up at night eating sunflower seeds and spitting the shells onto the Persian rug. Sunflower seed shells are a choking hazard and this meant that I needed to shoot out of bed in the morning before my 2-year-old climbed out of bed (the shells have a pleasant salty taste for 2-year-olds) and before I could put the baby on the rug, and thoroughly vaccuum, then inspect the surrounding floor for stray shells.

Yes, I told him to stop and I told him why. No, he didn't stop.

There were other stresses with him, but it's too much to say.-

Thinking it would help the guest, my husband tried giving him lots of positive attention and also hurrying him out of the house in the mornings, both to ease the burden on me and to prevent the guest from lounging around all day in bed.

Anyway, I started feeling really frazzled and hopeless. In the course of talking on the phone with friends, they asked why I sounded so down. I said I didn't know why. And as strange as it sounds, I really didn't! Life had been stressful before the guest moved in with us, so I didn't consider that he was the cause. I thought I just needed to work on my middot and my attitude.

Immediately, I was told by every single person: "THIS is post-partum depression! It is TOTALLY normal and there is NOTHING to be ashamed of! And it can happen anytime during the first 12 months after birth! Do you want the name and number of the frum organization for post-partum depression? I'll be happy to give it to you!"

At that time, I was still strong on therapy being the answer to everything, so I appreciated their encouragement to get help. But I didn't feel this was PPD.

The problem was when I tried to tell them I really didn't feel this was PPD, but something else I couldn't figure out. I got interrupted or otherwise silenced every single time I rejected the PPD diagnosis. Why? Well, I must be in denial! Or simply reluctant to get help! That's part of PPD! (It is, BTW. A couple of the official symptoms are being afraid that people won't understand you or that your baby will be taken away.)

Pretty quickly, I started to get frustrated because I kept being told I had a problem I was sure I didn't have.

This made me feel even more frazzled and hopeless. Also, I had a tendency toward depression, so being bullied into seeing myself as depressed when I wasn't...well, it was depressing.

Finally, I decided to sit down and really think about what could be the source of my unhappiness. It didn't take long to realize that the guest was just too much for me. And despite how chessed and being compassionate is supposed to make you grow, I realized that what we were doing wasn't real chessed or compassion; it was "enabling."

So the guest was out by the next day. And I immediately started feeling better! At first, he was really angry at me for kicking him out, but then a year later, he called to sincerely apologize. He's actually a very good and likeable guy, and that period of depression and anger on his part were simply the results of his coming to terms with an upbringing that looked idyllic but was actually very dysfunctional.

But the whole thing got me thinking.

If your friend is down and isn't sure why, what ever happened to saying: "Do you want to talk about it?" or "Is there anything I can do to help?" or "I'm sorry to hear that. What's your name for davening? I'd really like to daven for you."

I know that friends can't be therapists. And how can they know what my real problem was or how to draw it out of me? They can't.

But denying a person's reality and insisting that his or her perceptions are wrong can drive a person crazy. Also, insisting that someone is depressed is also damaging. Being pressured to see myself as depressed aggravated an already desperate situation.

But everything Hashem does really is for the best and I got an insider's view of how attitudes were changing within the frum community, both in ways that were good and ways that were not so good.

Awareness is good, but simplistic thinking is not.

Yet that is what is pervading the mainstream media including the frum media: simplistic solutions to complex problems of the nefesh.

In A Secure Base, John Bowlby described a case involving a first-time mother suffering from post-partum depression to the point that she experienced urges to harm her 6-month-old baby. And she felt terrible shame and fear about this. Despite her feelings, she really loved him very much. In Bowlby's eyes, she seemed like a very nice and normal person and her feelings didn't seem to go with her intelligent and caring personality.

So what was going on?

It turned out that these urges intensified after visits with her own mother.

Now, this woman felt like she had a good relationship with her mother and felt like her mother was helping her. But really, the mother was inserted all sorts of stuff under the radar that hurt and enraged the woman, which twisted around into feelings of rage at her innocent little baby.

(BTW, this kind of relationship in very common with a personality disordered parent. If a Narcissist mother crowns you as the "golden child," then you might go around thinking that you and your parent have a great relationship and even say things like, "My mom is best friend!" But really, all sorts of unhappy stuff is roiling underneath the surface and you can come away from get-togethers feeling bad about yourself. In a nutshell, a harmonious relationship with a personality disordered person can only occur on their terms. So an adult child who has unconsciously adapted to those terms may think the relationship is harmonious when really, it's very one-sided against the child's needs.)

Anyway, once Bowlby helped the woman to see how her own mother was making things worse (and that the mother was the cause of the post-partum depression), he then was able to work with the woman on dealing with the real issues at hand and also limiting time spent with her own mother.

There were more details that I can't remember, but the story had a happy ending and the woman went on to heal from these feelings and enjoy a loving relationship with her baby boy.

(Although I can't help wondering whether, if she were treated today, the real cause of her extreme feelings would be missed in favor of a round of antidepressants. I think it would depend on the insight of the therapist.)

In fact, before I ever heard of Bowlby, I noticed that a lot of post-partum depression seemed compounded by other people, particularly the husband. Yes, of course, there is hormonal flux going on after birth. Combine that with a traumatic birth (even a normal "easy" birth can be traumatic, depending), stressful events or environment (even normal ones, like upcoming holidays or happy events or coming home with the baby to young and dependent children still in diapers or not sleeping through the night themselves), serious sleep deprivation, and so on, then it's a wonder that most women don't break down after birth!

And I want to stress that there are many cases in which the woman's surrounding family and family background is really good yet she suffers PPD anyway. This is completely realistic and as I said, it's a wonder that not every woman suffers PPD after birth!

We should not jump to condemn her family members when a woman suffers PPD.

But if you compound all the above "normal" stuff with family members who are stressed out, critical, selfish, demanding, narcissistic, or uncaring (and these could be the husband, older children, parents, parents-in-law, or adult siblings/siblings-in-law), then you could have a recipe for a serious overload on the woman's already overtaxed body and nefesh.

True Story #1
A very famous letter circulated throughout the frum community from a husband whose wife suffered PPD. It was very good that he brought awareness from the husband's side. The interesting thing is that when he described how he initially responded to his wife's difficulties, he really sounded strange. For example, 3 months after birth, a baby is usually not sleeping through the night.

Think about that: Birth is a emotionally and physically grueling event. But you don't get to rest and recover from it. Even if you go to a mother-baby rest center and sleep through the night there, it's usually only for a few days and you still need to do lots of babycare yourself (like feedings and soothing a crying baby). Then you come home (maybe or maybe not fully recovered) and deal with waking up several times a night.

Some women feel worse 3 months after birth than they do immediately after the birth.

Furthermore, the woman in this case was dealing with older children who were still very young and helpless, plus work, and so on. And the husband was actually getting angry at her for being exhausted and overwhelmed! (That's how I remember him describing himself).

I really don't think you need your wife to be diagnosed with PPD in order to behave with compassion toward a wife who is seriously sleep-deprived and overworked.

But apparently, he eventually did teshuvah and that is really good. And it's good that he publicized his experience in the letter. (My only problem with it, if I remember it correctly, is that he kept emphasizing how he should have been more sympathetic and supportive because her overwhelm resulted from PPD, and not that he generally needed to be sympathetic and supportive when his wife was going through a rough period.)

True Story #2
I personally know, just off the top of my head, 2 women who were initially diagnosed with post-partum depression, then never recovered. Both were calm, competent types, and one I always thought of as being particularly mature for her age when she was a teenager--a very good solid head on her shoulders. You know the type?

And last time I saw her (a couple of years after birth), she was still medicated and paranoid with no end in sight. Her husband seems like a very good guy and has been sticking by her, but I know that her parents are very dysfunctional people and some of her siblings are also problematic (read: mentally ill), one of whom was living with her and her husband for a few months before she gave birth...coincidence?

The other woman had a real jerk of a husband. But she kept pretending everything was fine. But everything hit after the birth of her second child. Eventually, her husband got fed up with living with a depressed wife and they're divorced now with the kids in his custody. Allegedly, he and his mother turned the older child against the mother and when the baby was five, the husband sued for (and won) custody of him too. During the that whole period, the mother lived with an elderly aunt (between hospitalizations for mental illness).

Depressing Middot
Finally, PPD can be brought on because of the mother's negative middot.

For example, if a woman is narcissistic and on the lazy side, the routine acts necessary to keep a baby alive may cause her overwhelming resentment.

Having said that, babycare is stressful even with the most easy-going baby, so a normal woman can also experience resentment or overwhelm at times. But someone who is truly narcissistic and isn't up to doing much in the best of times (especially for anyone but herself), she can get depressed after birth.

​But it isn't hormonally induced depression (although hormones can contribute to her negative feelings). It's just that life has overwhelmed her middot. And medication will not help with that root cause.

So there is a lot more to PPD than just hormones.

Unfortunately, in the current environment of psychology, these observation are ignored in favor of relating to PPD is if it's just a virus that needs rest, chicken soup, and maybe some Prozac.

And that's where the tricky part lies.

Many people mean to be helpful. But like with all the sciences, money and personal bias/agendas tend to determine the solutions and treatment of the problems.

For example, I would say that the reason why most episodes of treated (with rest, nourishing meals, and other people taking on her household and childcare responsibilities until she recovered) PPD go away (including those treated without medication) and never recur is because the mother received the support she needed. Now it was embedded in her subconscious that she is not alone and that she had nothing to fear because the community met her needs.

I have no proof for this, but it makes sense based on my observations and reading.

I really hope we can move past simplistic thinking when it comes to anything on the spectrum of mental illness, even regarding a disorder that really is sparked by biology beyond our control, as is the case with PPD.

Yes, there are helpful aspects to psychology.

The studies conducted by psychologists can be very helpful. Observations are helpful.

The problem lies in the treatment.

We can see the same parallel in conventional medicine.

For example, if you're feeling exhausted, it's very helpful to measure your vitamin levels. Are you low in iron, vitamin B-12, or something else? If your throat is sore, it's good to know whether it's the strep bacteria or a virus. X-rays and other diagnostic tools that require lab work prove immensely helpful in diagnosis (barring human error or faulty equipment, of course).

However, if you get strep 3 times in a month despite taking antibiotics exactly according to directions, conventional medicine doesn't have a solution except to give you increasingly stronger antibiotics...which also harm you by killing the good bacteria with the bad, making you more likely to get sick again.

(This is when you start imbibing probiotics, freshly squeezed citrus juice, and the right herbs to prevent a recurrence--yes, speaking from personal experience. At the time, I didn't realize I should also speak to Hashem about what message He was giving me with all the strep, but I should have done that too.)

Sometimes, conventional treatment is the way to go; surgery can save lives and prevent the need for long-term treatment.

So observation and then the diagnosis that comes from observation can be helpful.

This means that, say, studying 500 people for 20 years regarding mental illness, ADD, trauma, dysfunctional childhoods, etc., can be very constructive in understanding what is going on with people.

For example, a good friend lent me John Bowlby's A Secure Base. Inspired by his own upbringing by detached parents, his traumatic separation from his beloved nursemaid at age 4, and then being sent to boarding school at a very young age (ten), he investigated parent-child attachments and came up with some valuable observations about the importance of the parent-child, particularly the mother-child connection, that emphasize the importance of a healthy dependable parent-child bond.

And Bowlby also made observations about the causes of mental problems, like when he spotted the root of one woman's extreme post-partum depression (she had violent urges toward her 6-month-old) was spending time with her mother. Finessing her mother out of the scene, along with other stuff I can't remember, led to the woman's healing and being able to form a warm and healthy attachment to her baby boy.

But again, even when the observations are accurate, the solutions may not be right or may not be right for everyone.

Furthermore, some of the experiments they conduct for these studies are a bit disturbing. Some involve showing children inappropriate images and some involve treating children badly on some level.

And some studies are faked, fudged, or shoved aside.

Researchers also like to search for the reason behind the normal human responses. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but because they are mostly secular, this leads them down the wrong path into lots of theorizing (i.e. story-weaving) about so-called evolutionary necessity for such behaviors. (Even if you believe in evolution, you must admit there is no proof for their theories and no way to prove these theories. Too bad they don't look for the motivation somewhere else, like in the human soul.)

In the field of Narcissism and personality disorders in general, a lot of lay people have led the way. By compiling observations, they were able to puzzle together a picture of a very real disorder that helped victims recognize the very real pattern of their tormentors and stop feeling crazy and confused.

Yet again, the treatment failed. There is no official "cure" for personality disorders and treatment is unsure (except that people love Dialectal Behavior Therapy for Borderline Personality Disorder--and yes, it is helpful, but not a sure-cure). Dealing with such people is no easy trick either. So people were cautioned to create "No Contact" or "Low Contact" relationships with personality disordered people. Yet this also caused problems because "No Contact" is fraught with complications and sometimes, you can't go "No Contact." Well-intended "helpers" ended up harassing fellow victims by insisting, "Oh, just quit your job!" or "Just go No Contact and stick to your guns about it!"

This was until people started popping up and saying "I can't go No Contact; this is my child's parent. This person is in my life whether I want it or not" or "There is no remotely feasible way to quit my job; I'm stuck with this boss for now, so what do I do?"

The whole personality disorder field also words things as if the personality disordered person is completely aware of how manipulative they are and are calculating every move they make. (This is sometimes true, but usually not. Their behavior is more instinctive and "feels right.")

This field also fumbles with regard to personality differences. Rather than realizing that even mentally ill or very bad people still have talents and areas of incompetence, likes and dislikes, and all different temperaments, experts simply divide everyone into a different type of personality disorder: narcissist personality disorder, masochist personality disorder, passive-aggressive personality disorder, masochist passive-aggressive personality disorder (I'm not making this up), borderline personality disorder, and so on.

More recently, they've taken to acknowledging personality types by labeling extroverted narcissists as overt or exhibitionist narcissists, and introverted narcissists as covert or closet narcissists, and especially mean ones as toxic narcissists. This is a step in the right direction, but it is still not the whole tamale.

So again, the observations are helpful, but treatment and solutions are still up in the air.

Dr. William Glasser's method of Reality Therapy had amazing success in treating juvenile delinquency in a locked facility for habitual offenders and also in treating hallucinating traumatized veterans in a mental hospital.

Yet Psychology 101 never even mentions him and his work is hard to come by, even though his success rate was so high. I took psychology and sociology in college, read the latest bestselling psychology books (like Susan Forward and John Bradshaw), yet never even heard of Dr. Glasser until I was well into my thirties.

So this is another problem, that people aren't learning about methods that actually work. (Just for knowing, Reality Therapy mirrors mussar on several points, but it veers off with an emphasis on a person's relationship with people and not with God).

Furthermore, important studies can be ignored, even by respected publications. This has been particularly true in the field of psychiatry, in which certain medication have been shown to either be harmful or ineffective in most studies, with only a minority of studies showing it to be helpful. And based on those minority studies, psychiatric journals will hail that medication and psychiatrists will prescribe it.

I personally know people who went through therapy that they claimed to have found helpful, yet they still display appallingly bad middot. One even enthused to me about the emotional maturity she developed through therapy, which shocked me because I always thought of her as one of the more emotionally immature people I've met. I was like, Oh my gosh. If this is how you are now, how much worse were you before?

Even more common, I've met tons of people who felt helped by therapy and do feel better, but don't behave better -- or not much better, anyway. One young woman credited her expensive and highly recommended therapist with saving her life when she was suicidal, but this same therapy over the long-term still did not stop her from drinking, using hard drugs, rampant promiscuity, and treating some people badly.

One of the big draws of therapy is feeling validated, feeling like you're doing something to help yourself, and having someone there who compassionately listens to you. This doesn't mean that it helps as much as people like to think.

Of course, I also know people who were greatly helped by psychology, but there's always a limit. The deepest & most important work can only be done by ourselves (and this is something that the truly effective therapists are the first to acknowledge).

So in conclusion: Yes, therapy and the field of psychology can be helpful. Yes!

But ultimate solution is to turn inward and upward: to your soul and to God.

Related posts:
Dialectal Behavior Therapy Self-Help - (Maybe you want to understand more about it, which might seem funny after I've said that nothing beats classic Jewish mussar, but I'm all for transparency and doing your own research. It does incorporate several core Jewish mussar concepts like prayer, giving the benefit of the doubt, and zehirut/bechinah/mindfulness. But you'll see it's still missing that emuna connection.)
Six Reasons Why Logotherapy is the God-Fearing Person's Therapy of Choice - A guest post written by a frum logotherapist, logotherapy comes very close to Jewish classic Jewish mussar (maybe even closer than any other type of therapy?), but I have no idea of its rate of effectiveness.
Where is Modern Psychology Taking Us?
Why You Need to Dig for the Treasure Hidden in Your Own Backyard

A few weeks ago, I came across one of the new & improved psychology systems: Internal Family Systems. And it claims a very high rate of effectiveness:

From the Internal Family Systems Skilled Training Manual:

That's pretty good! Better than the years of talk therapy so intensely pushed in my youth. (And also accompanied by "proofs" of its effectiveness, I might add...)

(Full disclosure: I haven't investigated this method in depth.) But just reading articles about the notion of "modular mind" and that a person has "different selves running around inside" him or her immediately made me think of the Jewish idea of a yetzer hara.

Anyway, based on neuroscience, this new method labels and describes the different selves. But I just kept thinking: "yetzer hara" and "nefesh habeheima (the animal soul/self)" and "yetzer tov" and so on.
And the idea that the bad things you do aren't the real you?
Well, doesn't it sound very similar to what Judaism has already been teaching for millennia?

But because the majority of neuroscience researchers and readers aren't familiar with authentic Jewish sources, guess what some align this to? Buddhism!

It's not difficult to understand why, after so much secular psychological science, people yearn for some spirituality in their psychology. All in all, the human soul knows that its human representative is more than just a high-IQ ape, and the human soul cries out for nourishment.

But for a while now in the frum community, people like Sara Yoheved Rigler, Guttman Lochs, and Rivka Levy have been explaining in convincing detail the innate problems with the Eastern spiritual paths.

Many of us are already familiar with what some say about the verse in Beresheit (Genesis 25:6), which states that Avraham Avinu gave gifts to the children of Keturah and sent them "eastward to the land of the east": These were spiritual gifts, sparks of a sort. And then these spiritual gifts apparently got treifed up along the way and became these impure spiritual systems found in the East today.

But the reason why people find these systems so compelling is because there is truth to aspects of these systems.

It's sort of like with Christianity. Christianity kept certain Jewish values, like giving tzedakah, caring for the poor and disadvantaged, talking to God, allowing traditional marriage only, opposing all forms of murder (including abortion--which is a form of murder in most cases except those allowed by Jewish Law--and infanticide) and much more, but they diluted it with a lot of other stuff (like saying that 3 is 1) along with picking and choosing according to their whim (like interpreting some statements of the Torah with absurdly black-and-white literalness and ignoring other obvious and essential statements) or the whim of their time and surrounding culture. And they do have an English version of the Tanach included within their own system.

But again, those core truths (however diluted) are what made Christianity so compelling and what still attracts people today, albeit not on the conscious level.

The point is that while the attraction of the progressive and deeper developments in psychology is very understandable, it's neither the full picture nor the real picture.

When reading about the newer developments and studies, I also get this "Ooh, shiny!" response to it. And the truth is, they are effective (at least to a point) because they're coming closer to classic Jewish mussar. For example, you can find the concepts of "self-compassion" and "a positive self-image" discussed copiously, particularly in Chassidus -- but not using those modern-day terms.

Judaism also discusses "mindfulness" at length and teaches how to achieve it (especially the 978-year-old text, Duties of the Heart), but it doesn't use that terminology.

However, while lacking the modern terminology, the classic Jewish sources contain the whole picture and get to the root of it all while providing you with the authentic path to achieving whatever it is you need to achieve.

The main problem is that when you're lacking the real picture and imbibing a diluted truth, you're ultimately not going to be able to solve your issues at their root.

Just as one example, Judaism considers any kind of suffering (whether it's putting your hand in your pocket for one coin and accidentally pulling out another or massive brutal suffering) to contain very real meaning, even if the suffering is so abominable that there is not human 3-dimensional way to understand it.

Finally, there are the very real issues of the human soul, the Jewish soul, the World to Come and one's place in it, and gathering the broken scattered sparks to bring the world to its final rectification for the benefit of all (and the more you sincerely invest in this rectification, the more you'll enjoy it when it finally arrives; tzaddikim who suffered the most in the This World receive the most enjoyment in the Next World).

And these issues need to be attended to. Even if your mind isn't aware of them, your soul is.
_______
May we all succeed in attaining our soul's rectification from love, emuna work, and truly good deeds, and not via suffering and tribulations.

Related posts:

• Why You Need to Dig for the Treasure Hidden in Your Own Backyard
  
• The Most Effective Way to Fix Your Flaws
• How to Find & Follow Your Soul's Message
• If the Torah is So Adamant, Then That Must Mean Something: Why Polytheism Really is So Awful

Updated addendum to original post:
The exact Jewish texts and chapters that encourage what modern psychology calls "mindfulness" (as discussed below) are:

• Shaar Habechina/Gate of Understanding in Chovot Levavot/Duties of the Heart
• Zehirut/Watchfulness in Mesilat Yesharim/Path of the Just
• In Pele Yoetz, you can browse through several chapters that encourage "mindfulness" (i.e., Thought, Protective Devices/Gederim, Clinging to God/Deveikut, Carefulness/Zehirut, Inclination/Yetzer, among many others).

There are more, but these are a good start.

The last couple of generations have seen tremendous development within the field of psychology, including increasing knowledge of how the brain works (although this is mixed with a lot of assumption rather than hard science). Combined with new access to long-term studies (20 years or more), a lot is opening up.

And when applied correctly, it can be very helpful...to a point.

What do I mean?

I read an article written by a likable young genius who corrals the latest books on a given topic within psychology, then sums it all up in an appealing and easy-to-understand article.

And if you've never come across these concepts before, they're thrilling and effective...to a point.

Let's take his latest: "5 Ways to Overcome Anger." A worthy endeavor, indeed!

He starts off with a keyword fashionable among today's self-improvement enthusiasts:
"mindfulness."

Mindfulness basically means to make yourself aware of something, then take a step back to observe it objectively. And it is truly a great development in the right direction.

The thing is, if you've been doing any kind of regular hitbodedut ("regular" doesn't have to mean a full hour a every single day; it could mean 20 minutes a day, or an hour every other day, or even just once a week), then you'll likely already have started practicing "mindfulness" on your own, without realizing you're doing it or what it's called.

"Mindfulness" is a kind of awakening, which is exactly what connecting to Hashem on a deeper level does for you. You awaken to the real consequences of an act and whether the autopilot-attempt at feeling good (via copious carb-and-fat ingestion, drugs, a bottle of rum, watching way too many funny cat videos, or yelling at someone, etc.) leads you to actually feel good. (Ultimately, it doesn't.)

In fact, both Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzatto's Path of the Just and Rabbi Ibn Paquda's Duties of the Heart (among other beautiful books) dedicate entire chapters to "mindfulness" -- they call it "zehirut" (watchfulness) or "bechina" (examination).

It's a type of emotional/spiritual awareness and maturity. So if you've been truly working on yourself and asking Hashem for help, then you've already started practicing it.

But getting back to the secular science of self-improvement what are some of the mind-science recommendations for overcoming anger?

1) Examine the who, what, where, and why of your anger.
Again, this is something you'll automatically do if you are regularly speaking to Hashem about your feelings and life events, and doing a regular cheshbon hanefesh (examining your deeds and motivations).

Because you're talking regularly to Hashem as your One True Close Friend, you anyway turn to Him when you feel angry, resentful, envious, or low, and then thresh it all out.

2) Avoid triggers.
He gives nice tips for avoiding triggers, but some of it ultimately makes me think of that cognitive dissonance in which atheists need to engage in order to survive. And it's ALLLL over the self-help world.

Not that he's an atheist. I don't know his beliefs. I'm referring to an atheistic way of thinking.

It just doesn't work for the long term unless you drift into some sort of state of disassociation and cognitive dissonance (which is the opposite of what mindfulness means to do).

For example, his research advises you to get creative with distraction and minimization. (Again, these are good ideas, but just not practical for many people over the long term.)

Therefore, the research recommends against reading or listening to things that drive you nuts. Again, if you're engaged in spiritual growth via hitbodedut, you'll start avoiding that stuff on your own. Speaking from personal experience, emotionally unhealthy stuff starts to feel obviously bad.

But when he addresses dealing with triggering people you can't avoid, like co-workers, he advises you to do things like find a way to politely leave a board meeting until you calm down.

But what if you can't calm down (whether because your co-workers are truly so bad or whether because you are so messed up)?

What if it has just been too much? What if this board meeting happens to be the last straw?

What if it's a situation you simply can't leave? Or it's ongoing relationships, like with family or neighbors or fellow congregants?

(Most self-help relies on the fantasy that you have superior control over most aspects of your life, including how much you can sleep, etc.)

THIS is where psychology falls short. Without Hashem, without the emuna that even painful or aggravating events are truly beneficial somehow and using difficult people as loving messages for what you need to fix in yourself, and without prayer...these triggers just aren't manageable.

In my experience, you can use these methods to handle an ongoing trigger like a pro for around two weeks, max. Then you'll either explode or get depressed or break down in some other way...unless you either become repressed, disassociated (neither is good for mental or spiritual health) or have naturally thick skin that allows stuff to roll of off it.

(A lot of consistently calm & laid-back people are actually disassociated, if their calm is not coming from emuna.)

To prevent this post from being even longer than it already is, I'm skipping the next 3 tips. Again, they're good advice but more of the same (train your mind, break the mental loop, ride the wave) and are things you automatically do when you've been engaged in honest hitbodedut.

Is the above all good advice? Is it helpful?

Yes!

For example, if despite hitbodedut, you're still checking into Facebook several times a day, even though it makes you feel increasingly depressed, then reading the above can add impetus to stop yourself, due to Tip #2: "Avoid triggers."

But the above aren't the full answer. (Even though their well-meaning proponents portray them as being the key to what you really need.)

Mindfulness, self-compassion, and many other concepts popping up today are indeed helpful. But they're much more limited than their proponents realize. (It's legitimately very exciting and inspiring when you first discover them. But then life happens...)

And yes, even with regular hitbodedut and mussar (cheshbon hanfeseh, praising and thanking Hashem, changing behavior, prayer, etc.), you can still have anger issues. BUT the big difference is that hitbodedut and mussar move you forward for real.

Using hitbodedut and mussar, you will genuinely progress from inside your deepest self.

Some stuff goes shockingly fast while some improves erratically and slowly. It depends where you're holding and what issues God gave you.

A lot of people don't like to hear this, but I gradually came to the conclusion that nothing substitutes for reading original mussar material -- yes, even for very secular or non-intellectual people. ("Mussar material" means the centuries-old ethics books written by the original masters themselves.)

The original mussar speaks to your soul and on a certain level, slices through any intellectual and religious limitations.

And yes, the big resistance learning original mussar is the feeling "But they don't tell you HOW to do it!"

I definitely understand this because I used to say this too.

The thing is, they do tell you, but they mostly don't spoonfeed it into you, which is what our generation (me included) really needs. After I read Garden of Emuna, it was like a key that opened up all these other mussar books.

But the truth is, had I quieted my mind for a moment to ponder the ideas in these books and put their advice into action even before fully understanding it, they would have really helped me even without reading Garden of Emuna.

In hindsight, I needed to make a serious mental effort to understand what they were trying to tell me and to force myself to act, but I just didn't. (Actually, they helped me anyway on some level simply because it's Truth and Wisdom, and it still seeps through all your mental muck to illuminate your mind at least a little.)

It doesn't matter which ones you read; go where your soul takes you.

Some of the books easier to get through are:
Garden of Emuna by Rav Shalom Arush
Words of Faith by Rav Levi Yitchak Bender
Strive for Truth by Rav Eliyahu Dessler
(I'm probably missing some, but this is a good start.)

Chassidic works written by the original tzaddikim are very good and have inspired people from all walks of life, particularly the works of Breslov and Chabad.

But the golden old classics like, Ways of the Righteous, Path of the Just, Duties of the Heart, Way of God, etc., are still very worth reading to get whatever you can out of them. And you will get something you wouldn't have had otherwise.

I want to note that Chassidic works, plus the first 3 books listed, were written by great people who also studied the golden old classics in great depth, so reading Chassidic works by the original tzaddikim will also get you the classic works by osmosis, so to speak. (I am not Chassidic, by the way.)

I can't stress how important it is to read the original works, even if it's a translation and even if the language is initially so obtuse that you can only commit to a paragraph a day.

The research-based advances in psychology are helpful.
Classes or modern books based on classic mussar sources given by regular rabbis or rebbetzins are helpful.

But I can't help noticing that ultimately, nothing comes close to the original works written by the true Sages.

A post on atheistic thinking:
The Infinite Puzzle of the Universe

In the Naaleh newsletter that appeared in my Inbox this morning, there was yet another wonderfully insightful dvar Torah on the parsha from Rebbetzin Shira Smiles.

Regarding the Plague of Darkness, she discusses how the darkness affected the Egyptians versus how it affected the Jews. The Torah says that the Jews had light in their homes.

But what kind of light? It wasn't just a physical light.

The Jews merited light because of their attachment to Torah and mitzvot.

She recalls the advice of Rabbi Pincus:

This is a running theme throughout Judaism. By keeping your eye on the ball moving forward by increasing light (even if it's only a very small light, like the flame of a matchstick), you can fight off your own darkness.

You add light, rather than adding more darkness to the darkness.

And those who run from light and embrace the darkness end up getting stuck there, helpless to harm you further.

But then she adds more depth and insight to the phenomenon of Darkness:

This describes the direction of our world today. Daat (the mind) is lost. Even something as simple as gender has become a confusing and controversial. (And I'm not talking about the very real scientifically diagnosable syndromes in which the actual chromosomes or body parts are atypical.)

"They had lost all understanding and couldn't even function in the world."

Today, young Leftist radicals are referred to as "snowflakes" due to their tendency to "melt" (or collapse into a meltdown) when faced with facts they don't like. On the non-political side, you have an increase of young people sitting at home with their smartphones and social media. (In truth, this has increased among people of all ages, but it's most extreme among teens.) Those who go to college often major in subjects that won't enable them to get a job. Suicide is up. Increasingly, many people truly cannot even function in the world.

Yet the way to create light is the same secret Gidon discovered during the Pesach Seder millennia ago: Yearn for Redemption!

As Rebbetzin Smiles concludes:

Related Links:
Naaleh Online Torah for Women
True Greatness Hides Itself before God Makes It Known (discusses Gidon the Judge)

Everyone has at least one thing they really want but haven't managed to get yet.

For tzaddikim who are truly happy and satisfied with whatever situation Hashem has given them in life, they yearn for the final Redemption.

But for the rest of us, there's a lot more.

Some people want things that are excellent to want and even commanded to pursue: marriage, children, a home in Eretz Yisrael, the good health and strength to do mitzvot, geshmak prayer from the heart, real geshmak Torah-learning, etc.

And there are other desires that are also good and very understandable: to escape a difficult financial situation, to lose weight, to have a child or spouse or other family relation behave better, to acquire a larger washing machine, good schools, to have quieter or more pleasant neighbors, a better and more fulfilling job, and so on.

Then there are the things that aren't essential, but are natural to desire: a more luxurious home, a live-in housekeeper, the "perfect" car, success in whatever, and much more.

So there's a lot that we want, whether spiritual and obligatory or more material and non-essential (or anything in between), that we can't manage to get.

And I can't know the reasons why, but I also can't help making certain observations in myself and others.

One big factor is that Hashem might have bigger plans for you. He might be pushing you to a higher standard because He knows you can reach that height.

He also might be saving you from yourself. You're sure you're ready for whatever it is, but really, it could end up bombing you in ways you hadn't considered.

There are things I really want and I do get frustrated about not getting them.

But then I try to remember all the people I've known who got what they wanted (or FINALLY got what they wanted) and it didn't work out like you'd think.

And I've seen this in my own life too. There were things I really wanted and got, but it wasn't good. Then there were things I got only later and it was so much better for me that I got to grow in the meantime.

So I get chizuk from the following, even though the examples might seem negative on the surface.

Why? Because everything Hashem does truly is a chessed, even when it really doesn't seem like it.

(And there are still things I really crave!)

Adoption is very popular in America, whether it's home-based adoption or bringing a child over from the Far East, South America, or Eastern Europe.

Growing up, I knew a lot of adoptive families. And many were very functional and nurturing.

But many weren't. And that seems weird, right?

I mean, you have a couple who strove for years to have children (treatments, operations, etc) and went through all the paperwork and expense of finally adopting that yearned-for child...and then exhibited a lot of poor parenting when they finally got that child. And I don't mean the one-offs that we all suffer, but consistent hitting or emotional neglect and stuff like that.

Also, a lot of adoptive families either adopt more than one child or else end up miraculously having their own children after they'd given up hope and adopted that child. For example, one friend of mine was adopted from Korea and she had 2 older white siblings who were also adopted. She once confided that her mother used the paddle pretty often, but she didn't know there was anything genuinely wrong with that until she was around eight and changing with the other girls after ballet class and another little girl said, "Hey, what are all those bruises on your bottom?"

My friend hadn't know she had bruises, but could only think that they were from the paddle, which is what she told the other little girl. The other girl frowned and replied in a way that allowed my friend to understand that wasn't normal or acceptable discipline.

And I'm thinking about the mother: Gosh, you really wanted these children -- so why are you so angry and harsh with them?

That's just one example. And there are also organizations created by adopted children to help other adopted children deal with the fact that they were raised by dysfunctional adoptive parents -- showing that abusive adoption isn't such an uncommon scenario.

Another situation I've seen several times is parents who finally had children after years of infertility or miscarriages and end up treating them with coldness or bad temper. In fact, they sometimes can be less patient and more short-tempered than parents who had children right away. (They aren't always, of course. There are many very fine parents who had children after a lot of prayer and fertility treatments.)

But why are they like that when they should be filled with gratitude and relief?

What happened to all the desperation, the yearning, and then the initial abundance of gratitude?

I found part of the answer from one such mother who was really short-tempered with her very sweet, intelligent, and well-behaved son who was born to them after years of infertility. (Her impatience with him was extreme and I wasn't the only one to notice.) One time, she wanted him to come in the house after he was playing in the yard and he was busy trying to scrape every last bit of dirt off his sandals. (He was anxious to do everything just right around her because she would hit him if he didn't toe the line.) She snapped at him to just get in the house already so she could give him his dinner already and he started the stressed whimpering he did when she got like that. (I forgot to mention he was only four.) It really was a problem because he could be damned if he did (come in with dirt-tracking shoes) and damned if he didn't (inconvenience her by taking the time to clean off his shoes), and how he is supposed to know what's the "right" thing to at any given moment?

Anyway, her shoulders sagged and she said, "It's really hard for me that he's so insecure because I'm like that too. I wish he wasn't so much like me."

And therein lies the rub. All these years of infertility, she never really invested in deep inner work on herself. And yes, her son's early years, she was warm and loving. But when he started developing his own personality (which was an extremely nice personality, as me and his neighbors and his teachers could attest), she couldn't handle it.

I wouldn't even have called him insecure. That was her perception of him. But it wasn't accurate as far as I could tell.

(BTW, this is one of the big reasons why Rav Shalom Arush emphasizes that Hashem uses our children's problematic behavior as a mirror to reflect the parts of ourselves that need extra polishing in order to bring out the wonderful potential Hashem imbued within us. This also goes a long way in lessening parental anger because you see that it's not really the child's fault and nor is it necessarily that you're doing something "wrong" in chinuch. Furthermore, you have a way to handle the behavior by addressing it within yourself and by talking to Hashem about it.)

And if you're wondering where was the father, who also prayed and yearned all those years for a child? He never intervened as far as I could tell. And in general, the father seemed kind of disconnected from this long-awaited child.

But I couldn't help wondering if this is what these people were like after so many years of yearning, then how problematic would they have been had they had a child right away, without all the yearning and then the gratitude that comes with it?

Then there's shidduchim and marriage.

My husband and I knew one young man who was on shidduchim for most of his twenties. He did all the segulot (40 days at the Kotel, praying at Amuka, 40 days of Perek Shira, 40 days of Shir Hashirim, blessings from tzaddikim, etc.) -- and he even did a couple of 40-dayers twice.

But when he finally got married to a girl he found extremely desirable, he was so verbally and emotionally abusive toward his new wife that she was starting to break down and was seriously considering divorce a month after the wedding.

Derech hateva, wouldn't it have been kinder had Hashem kept this guy single?
_____________
And again, while I've known many wonderful singles who remained single with no apparent reason for a baffling long time, I've met quite a few who have obvious arrogance issues. In fact, some people I didn't know when they were single, but I met them soon after they were finally married and was surprised at the arrogant (and sometimes unethical) way they treated people. Nothing to do with them being single or married, that's just how they were.

(And sometimes, people respond to a humbling nisayon by becoming even more arrogant.)

I've met a couple of couples who'd dated for years before finding each other, and noticed that they lacked integrity in exactly the same way -- partners in crime, so to speak. I guess they needed to meet just the right person who was a jerk in exactly the same way they were!

As another example, I remember one young woman who had always been successful in every single way...and boy, did she know it! I tended to avoid her because I resented the  condescending way she treated me for things that weren't my fault (I wasn't intellectual and cultured enough by her standards), but I noticed that even with people she seemed to like, she cheerfully inserted irritating little comments and criticisms accompanied by an oh-so innocent little giggle if they seemed upset. 

Much to her discomfort, she watched as all her friends got married off while she stayed single.

When I encountered her much later, I was surprised to see she still wasn't married.
I was even more surprised to see her behave in such a normal non-snooty manner and expressing gratitude for the good things in her life.

Upon arriving home, I immediately started davening for her to find her zivug, something I hadn't considered doing earlier. I really felt her pain when speaking with her and I just thought, "This is too much already. It's torture to be on shidduchim for so long." But really, it was her own teshuvah and middot work that had awakened my sympathy.

But what would've happened had she found Mr Right right away? She'd likely have continued being the same snooty catty so-and-so she was before.

The humbler and kinder person was there underneath her superiority complex, but apparently needed this nisayon in order to be drawn out from under all the undesirable middot. In truth, she's a fountain of good qualities.

Conversely, we all know couples who got married within a short time, yet weren't emotionally mature enough to handle marriage or who ended up married to a very problematic person.

(And we know many lovely couples too.)

Again, like with couples who needed to wait for their children, getting what you want doesn't mean you'll have the gratitude or middot to carry you through.

The wait can be an opportune time to do some inner work, even as it's very painful.

In fact, I think that remaining single when you really want to get married is one of the most torturous life-challenges, psychologically speaking. It's a spiritual and emotional desire emanating from the very soul, and is very painful when not fulfilled.

(And yes, I'm well-aware that there are singles who truly have great middot and emotional maturity, yet still haven't found their zivug...and who can know why? I'm NOT saying we should judge people or nitpick at them.)

There was an Israeli musician just starting out when he somehow lost his demo tapes and couldn't keep a hard-won appointment with a production company.

In despair, he went on to other things and became frum and had a pretty fulfilling life. At one point, a friend found the demo tapes and the Israeli suddenly remembered he stored the tapes by that friend. How could he have forgotten something so vital and obvious?

Then he listened to the tapes and realized a few things:

1. The music wasn't as amazing as he'd originally thought.
2. The content of the music wasn't something he'd be proud of now as a frum Jew.
3. The direction in which he'd have ended up had he pursued this career would not have been emotionally or spiritually healthy for him.
4. He was creating music now that was truly good both for him and for his listeners.

He felt grateful to Hashem for having lost the demo tapes, which changed the course of his life for the good.
________________
Another example is that in people who've managed to trimmed down quite a lot of weight, I've seen a sudden change to less modest clothing. Is that what Hashem wants her to do when she loses weight: show off the exact outline of her new figure?
________________
For many people, excess weight or singlehood or financial blahs or physical weakness can bring on embarrassing or discomfiting situations. The same is true regarding a badly behaved spouse or children. (And a lot more.)

All in all, NOT getting what you want definitely increases humility -- if you allow it.

It's written so many times throughout our Sages that humility is one of the most important yet most difficult qualities to cultivate.

Yet we're also told that Hashem cannot stand to be with a person who is haughty or prideful.

So in that humbling moment, Hashem is actually very close to you.

Of course, you can also fight it. Many people do respond to humbling circumstances by becoming even more strident and egocentric.

But really, we're supposed to focus on the humbling aspect of it all.
____________
Also, there's just being "ready for it" when "it" finally comes.

It's not a chessed when someone achieves renown or success before they're ready to handle it properly. We see this all the time.

Conversely, we've all seen people (including ourselves) who expressed gratitude for either not getting it at all or for getting it much later when they were finally ready for it. The gratitude came in hindsight because it's hard to tell that you're actually not ready for something that you really want. That's normal.

Finally, there are some famous stories in Jewish sources about wonderful people who got what they wanted, then transformed for the worse.

I admit I'm a little nervous about this post being misunderstood.

It's about getting chizuk and comfort for those difficult times, not waving aside very real feelings of pain.

Certainly, no one should tell infertile couples, "Well, it's okay because you'll probably  be abusive parents anyway!" or tell singles, "Well, you clearly just need to develop some humility!" or tell overweight ladies, "You can't lose weight because you'll just end up dressing like some pritzah off the street, and who need that?!"

Certainly, no one should brush off the pain of others with cheerful platitudes or destructive blame (even if meant constructively).

It's for looking at yourself (and me looking at myself), not for condemning other people.

I just know that not getting what I wanted has led to increased compassion, insight, and humility (along with the naturally occurring lows of frustration, resistance, and despair) and especially increased closeness to and reliance on Hashem. And I've seen this development in others too.

Personally, there are a lot of things that I desperately want right now, from very good and spiritually desirable things all the way down to non-essentials.

And some I'm kind of getting after intense prayer and chesbon hanefesh, but some have been withheld for years with no end in sight.

And that's how it goes.

So I try to remember from past experiences and also observations of others that it really truly is good that I'm not getting them yet, even though it's hard because I really want them.

May Hashem grant all the wishes of our heart l'tovah!

Related posts:
The Two Main Keys to Parenting Success
Loneliness & Rejection as Aspects of Mashiach
True Greatness Hides Itself Before God Makes It Known

There's an interesting couple of posts over at Emunaroma (links below) that fit right into what's going in the current parshas (Shemot & Va'era).

Throughout his commentary on the Torah, the Kli Yakar emphasizes that Hashem chooses the "מעט /m'at" -- the lesser, the minor, the small one, the insignificant.

Whether it was the more diminutive Har Sinai or the younger sibling (Yitzchak, Yaakov, Moshe Rabbeinu, etc.), God chooses the m'at.

I'm mean, look at Yehudah, the progenitor of Mashiach: a middle child.

And Tamar? She comes out of nowhere, has been married twice without ever producing a child (not ideal shidduch material), and is pretty quiet. In fact, our Sages note that the whole reason why Yehudah didn't recognize her on the road (despite her having been his daughter-in-law twice) was because of her great modesty and refinement when at the home of her father-in-law...she even covered her face, so he really didn't know what she looked like.

(You're not obligated to cover your face when visiting your in-laws. The Sages just note that Tamar chose to of her own accord, which later proved advantageous.)

Further down the line, you have Ruth. Again, her refined modesty and reluctance to stand out are what actually make her stand out. Her refinement and concern for modesty is even more startling considering that she comes from a particularly brazen nation. Furthermore, she's a convert from a nation despised (with good reason) by the Jews. To make things even more complicated, she looked different. Apparently, the Moavites had a distinctive look, making Ruth identifiable at first glance.

In other words, she was an ethnic minority of one from a most unpopular ethnic group.

(Note: I looked up Moavite archeology to get an idea of what the Moavites might have looked like, but found very little. Almost nothing remains of that once-powerful nation.)

Yet very quietly and unassumingly, Ruth swept up all the Moavite sparks of vitality with her when she left and elevated them with her conversion to Judaism.

And that was the beginning of the end for Moav.

Later, she married the great Boaz and their great-grandson ended up being King David...again, the direct line of Mashiach. Ruth also merited to have her story written out and an entire megillah named after her.

In Shemot and Va'era, we have Moshe Rabbeinu, the baby of the family and a stutterer. He actually spends significant parts of his life undercover:

• He's born in secrecy within a closed home to hide his light.
• He's hidden in a floating box in the Nile (while his sister hides herself to watch over him).
• He's locked up in an underground prison for several years.

Moshe Rabbeinu actually tries to get out of the leadership position Hashem has chosen for him. After his first official meeting with Pharoah leads to increased suffering for his beloved people, Moshe Rabbeinu tells Hashem: "Perhaps I was the cause, since You sent a stutterer like me to him?"

Moshe Rabbeinu is definitely not engaging in any self-promotion here. In fact, he thinks he's the wrong man for the job and is not afraid to tell this to God Himself.

Also, it's worth noting that Aharon Hacohen shows absolutely no jealousy over the fact that his younger and less silver-tongued brother is chosen as the great redeemer. Due to Aharon's profound humility and willingness to play second fiddle his entire life, his descendents are rewarded with the eternal priesthood.

Devorah Haneviah led the nation to military victory, but first she tried to avoid doing so.

There are many, many examples throughout Tanach of the lesser person, the one trodden upon or ignored, being chosen by Hashem for an exalted role.

Here's one of my favorites: Gidon.

The story of Gidon in Judges has always been one of my favorites. When I finally studied it with the commentaries, I found even more to love.

We come across Gidon during a downturn in Jewish history. Gidon is born to the Jewish nation as it's oppressed by the camel-riding crescent-bearing Midyanites (the precursors of today's Arabs).

Initially, Gidon is a member of the smallest tribe, Menashe. Furthermore, his family is one of the smallest and least significant of the Menashi families. And within his immediate family, Gidon is one of the younger brothers.

In other words, in terms of external status, Gidon is about as unimportant as you could be within the trodden-upon Jewish people at that time.

Gidon is working away in the threshing house.

Unbeknownst to Gidon and his father, an angel is invisibly waiting outside in the courtyard under a tree.

Knowing that discovery means death, Gidon tells his father, "Abba, you are old. And if the the Midyanim will come, you will not be able to flee. You go, and I will thresh."

That's according to Rashi. According to Radak, Gidon tells his father, "My father, you are old. Enter into your home and I will thresh because if the Midyanim will come, you don't have within you the strength to flee."

That's when the angel said in the name of God, "You have upheld the mitzvah of honor [honoring your father] and you are suited to that all of my children shall immediately be redeemed by your hand."

The angel became visible and declared, "God is with you, mighty one of valor."

(Please note that Gidon did not tweet, "Dude! Angel just appeared to me and declared me 'mighty one of valor'! Please follow me!" Nor did he upload a selfie of himself and the angel to Instagram. Nor did he update his Facebook page with the new twist of events along with a request to "like" the "angel 'n' me" post. In fact, he was rather hesitant about his newfound status. Okay, I'm kidding about the social media. I know there was no such technology back then.)

Both Radak and Malbim state that Gidon's mesirut nefesh for kivud av (putting his father's safety and well-being above his own) ignited the merit which caused the angel to make itself known and everything else that followed.

But there was one other reason why Gidon was chosen.

Radak explains that the night before was Leil Haseder of Pesach. Gidon said (in addition to the text of the book of Shoftim), "Last night, we read the Hallel and my father read me, 'When Yisrael went out of Egypt' -- If our forefathers were tzaddikim, then perform a miracle for us in their merit. And if they were reshaim, then just as you performed for them, perform a miracle for us too."

(Again, Gidon said this privately to God and the angel. He spoke quietly from the heart; he did not pass it on to the town crier.)

And Hashem said, "By your life! Because you acted as a defender [sanigor] for my children, you are worth Me speaking with you immediately."

VERY powerful stuff, as you can see.

Just the quiet self-sacrifice for his father and then arguing with God to perform a miracle not just for himself, but for the ENTIRE Jewish people...Gidon was suddenly catapulted from oppressed insignificant little Jew to prophet and national redeemer.

Not bad for a boy from a small tribe, eh?

There was no audience for Gidon initial actions. Just his father and an angel.

But Gidon's vocalized care and concern for everyone else apparently went viral in Shamayim.

The sparks Ruth's conversion swept out of Moav:
The Powerful Secret of Sincere Conversion

The more I learn Tanach (Genesis-Chronicles II), the more awe-inspiring facets I discover. No surprise there to those already in the know about Tanach, but still.

One of the things I tripped across was the profound love the Neviim (Prophets) held for their fellow Jews.

When I first read Shlomo Rotenberg's account of Yirmeyahu (Jeremiah) Hanavi in Am Olam: The History of the Eternal Nation, I was astonished to learn how badly he was treated and even more astonished to discover the depths of his love for the very people who'd tormented him. His great mesirut nefesh (self-sacrifice) to do whatever he could for his people went beyond anything I'd ever imagined. And even when he couldn't do anything to relieve their suffering, he went to great lengths to suffer along with them out of his great love and empathy.

Recently, I wanted to take a look at Yonah Hanavi's early life, which takes us back to Melachim (Kings) II, Chapter 9. He was the young Navi and unnamed disciple whom Elisha Hanavi appointed to risk his life by anointing Yehu as king.

Right there in the text, the men around Yehu mock Yonah Hanavi, calling him "meshugah" (crazy). The commentaries explain that these types considered the Neviim "meshugah" because the profuse hitbodedut (seclusion in personal prayer) of the Neviim cut them off from "inyanei ha'olam" ("issues of the world"). 

People also considered Yonah Hanavi to be a false prophet because when he revealed a doomsday prophecy to the Jewish people, they did teshuvah, which cancelled the harsh decree of doom.

This is supposed to happen regarding doomsday prophecies (teshuvah cancels them out) and the entire reason why Hashem reveals doomsday prophecies (to inspire the kind of teshuvah that wipes out this type of prophecy), but people didn't take that into consideration.

His prophecy wasn't fulfilled (fortunately), so they judged Yonah Hanavi wrongly.

But later in Sefer Yonah, Yonah Hanavi risks his life to avoid prophesying to Nineveh.

Why?

Because he doesn't want the upcoming teshuvah of Nineveh to be used against the Jewish people, as in: "See? The non-Jewish people listen to You. But as for Your own People? Look at their lack of loyalty and dedication to You..."

He resisted any Heavenly prosecution against the Jewish people, anything that might cause any suffering to the Jewish people.

He was willing to die just to avoid this.

His urging the sailors to toss him overboard in the middle of a violent storm is incredible. If you've ever seen powerful waves or read the accounts of megahurricane survivors, you'll know how terrifying that kind of water is.

Yet his love for the Jewish people was greater than the violence of the storm.

We find this same quality in Moshe Rabbeinu, who despite being slandered by certain elements, still expressed his wish to die rather than be the leader of a new and better-behaved people.

And in fact, as is well-known, this was the defining difference between the righteousness of Noach and that of Avraham Avinu. Noach cared deeply about his own teshuvah and his merit saved him and his family members (even the not-so-deserving ones like Cham and Canaan).

But Avraham Avinu cared about everyone, as evidenced by his pleas to spare the evil city of Sodom (among other compassionate acts).

We could go on and on. The Tanach is full of such inspiring examples.

Okay, now we could just sit here basking in the awe and love that well up as we read about these people and their unconditional love and self-sacrifice.

But with proactivism stamped into our souls and Jewish DNA, we always need to bring the lessons home.

I'm pretty far from the level of Yirmiyahu or Yonah or Moshe Rabbeinu. So what can I do other than bask in warm fuzzy feelings toward the extremely holy people of yore?

Well, there's a little prayer that pleads for Hashem to bring us back in complete teshuvah before Him from love, and not via trials or humiliations.

I can't always love people and I especially can't feel driven to sacrifice my life for people who treat me like something stuck on the bottom of their shoe. (Heck, it's often all I can do to refrain from indulging in some cathartic lashon hara about them, let alone get all lovey-dovey about them.)

But I can certainly ask Hashem to transform them into the kind of wonderful people He originally created them to be.

And I can ask that they do teshuvah from love, and not from suffering.

Suffering feels awful. It's better that everyone does teshuvah from love.

So if we can't internalize the love and compassion of our great holy ones, we can at least ask Hashem to inspire everyone to do complete teshuvah from love and not from suffering.

And by doing so, we transform ourselves too.

We get one step closer to the level of our Neviim.