Achieving Greatness

It sounded like I was being vague or trying to avoid answering the questions. Really, I wasn’t. It’s just that the questions didn’t have concrete answers.

“How do you know what to do and when?”

“How do you know when to give and when to hold back?”

There were more specific questions, but even these I couldn’t answer. I kept telling her, “I learned over the years from my experiences, more precisely, I learned from my mistakes.”

We learn techniques and pick up tools along the way, but these merely act as a starting point. They are nothing but a base.

A person reads a recipe and makes a cake, but you don’t become a true baker until you’ve made those experiment cookies, the ones that were half burned and half baked. The challah dough that never rose, that taught you more about yeast and sugar than any book on bread making. The dancer who twirls and spins with grace, ease, and beauty, she fell at least a hundred times. The mother who looks so tranquil nursing her baby, it took her four lactation consultant meetings and a month of not getting the feeding right before she finally got the hang of it. The couple happily married, they learned after many many years of working on their marriage, on themselves, how to live in harmony. They reached the point where they are at now after learning how to give in to the other, not when they were wrong, but when they knew that they were right.

A person doesn’t learn a trade just by attending classes and a business doesn’t grow from one good investment. That great Rabbi or Rebbetzen that you see, they worked so hard and faced so many challenges to get there. Don’t read about their acts when they were already in their old age. Read about the mistakes and difficulties they faced in their youth and middle age and then you will truly learn from their greatness.

You learn from experience. You learn, not by being “born that way” or “lucky” you learn by making mistakes and you achieve greatness by trying once again.

The brothers, Yosef’s brothers. They judged him, and they made a mistake. G-d gave them a second chance and this time Judah proved his brotherly love and loyalty.

Then Judah approached him and said, "Please, my lord, let now your servant speak something into my lord's ears, and let not your wrath be kindled against your servant, for you are like Pharaoh…For your servant assumed responsibility for the boy from my father, saying, 'If I do not bring him to you, I will have sinned against my father forever.’ So now, please let your servant stay instead of the boy as a slave to my lord, and may the boy go up with his brothers (Beresheit 44:1-33)

You might ask how could such holy, righteous people err? How could they do what they did? King Solomon (Mishlei 24:16) teach us, “The righteous fall seven times and rises…” Read it as, “They are righteous because they fall seven times and rise.” It’s the fall and what we learn from it that makes us great.

The beauty of being human, the beauty of being a Jew…we’re not supposed to be perfect. We were created with a side that has clarity and one that blurs every step we take. This is good, and this too is good because it pushes us to grow and gives us the potential to be better people than we were before.

***

I try to make it every week to Bircat Cohenim (the Priestly Blessing) on Shabbes. Last week I tried to make an extra effort to get to shul because it was not only Shabbes, but Chanukah and the Shabbes before Rosh Chodesh when we bless the coming month.

We started to climb the 206 stairs from my street to the shul where my husband and sons davened in time to make it. On the way the toddler made one too many stops. There’s the playground with the slide and the playground with the merry go round. He wanted to rock on the bicycle-horse and took his time getting off.

When we at last made it to the top the prayers were over. I missed it all. “Oh well.” I thought in disappointment and we started to go for our Shabbes family morning walk (which goes around a mountain instead of climbing all those stairs). My husband said, “Maybe you’ll make the Breslov minyan.”

“No chance, every Shabbes they end the same time as you do.” I pouted.

We walked and came to the Breslov minyan. This week, just for me, they took their merry time singing and had just finished reading the Torah portion. They hadn’t even blessed the upcoming month or prayed Musaf.

“They waited for me!”

I walked into the women’s section. Only one seat vacant. I went to it and looked at what would be my spot. On the table of this Chassidic minyan was a single Sefardi Siddur (the type of prayer book that I use), put out no doubt just for me.

And Joseph said to his brothers, "I am Joseph. Is my father still alive?" but his brothers could not answer him because they were startled by his presence. Then Joseph said to his brothers, "Please come closer to me," and they drew closer. And he said, "I am your brother Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. But now do not be sad, and let it not trouble you that you sold me here, for it was to preserve life that God sent me before you (Beresheit 45:3-5).

they were startled by his presence: Because of embarrassment. [From Tanchuma Vayigash 5]. Please come closer: He saw them drawing backwards. He said,“Now my brothers are embarrassed” (Tanchuma Vayigash 5). He called them tenderly and pleadingly and showed them that he was circumcised (Gen. Rabbah 93:10). to preserve life: Heb. לְמִחְיָה, to be to you a preserver of life. [From Targum Jonathan]-Rashi

And God sent me before you to make for you a remnant in the land, and to preserve [it] for you for a great deliverance. And now, you did not send me here, but God, and He made me a father to Pharaoh, a lord over all his household, and a ruler over the entire land of Egypt (ibid 45:7-8).

You see this minyan, they waited just for me and that seat, it was vacant just for me. Not only did I hear the blessing of the month, get to pray musaf with a lovely minyan and receive Bircat Cohenim, but I received a kiss from Above and learned a lesson as well. You think you know it all?

You think you know what His plan is and that when you don’t get something or don’t make it to something it was a mistake or accident? You think that when you do get it or make it, really it was you? You think it was actually in your control? Nothing in! Isn’t that liberating!! There’s a Master Plan and a Master Planner. The world is being constantly watched and governed over and so are you!

***

She’s overwhelmed and enveloped in despair. This isn’t going right, and this isn’t going right, and the list gets longer and longer. She’s frozen in the pitch-black night of helplessness, loneliness and depression. No one understands the full extent of what she’s going through and this makes the challenges that much greater.

Nights are the worst, not just for her, but for most of us. At nights there’s too much quiet and too much time to think. She’s a grown woman and yet she feels like a little scared girl. A little girl who’s alone and suffering in a world that engulfs her with darkness.

Fears and the worries they overwhelm her. If only she could go to the little girl that’s inside of her and hug her and hold her. She looks for approval and love and attention from every outsider. Sometimes she does feel the love, but sometimes she doesn’t and then she returns back to the darkness and the night. She returns back to her little girl solitude and she’s frightened. She lacks what she thinks she needs most-comfort and security.

What can she do to overcome this? What can any of us do to overcome our moments of helplessness, loneliness, sadness or fear?

And God said to Israel in visions of the night, and He said, "Jacob, Jacob!" And he said, "Here I am." And He said, "I am God, the God of your father. Do not be afraid of going down to Egypt, for there I will make you into a great nation. I will go down with you to Egypt, and I will also bring you up, and Joseph will place his hand on your eyes. And Jacob arose from Beer sheba…(ibid 46:2-5)

What can we do? We remind ourselves that G-d is with us in those very moments of nighttime. He descends with us to our lowest depths and raises up to our greatest heights.

He holds us and comforts us. He wants us to turn to the little girl that we all have inside and be compassionate and kind to her. He wants us to know that He will comfort and hold her and always love her. He wants us to know that we are never alone, because He’s always there.

***

May we always remember that we have a second chance and achieve greatness from our failures and fallings. May we relinquish control to the Master Planer and know that the Plan is planned perfectly for us. May we always feel His presence, even in the darkest of nights.

Shabbat Shalom, Chodesh Tov! Chanukah Sameach!

Elana