Do you remember all that chatter about the coming of Moshiach around Pesach time? How many times did you hear that all the airplanes parked up in the airports were just waiting to take Yiedden to Eretz Yisroel? Families had accepted with a full heart that they wouldn’t be together and some favourite delicacies would be off the menu. It seemed that the virus had purged some of the ugliness of human existence. We had a lev Chadash or a Lev Tahor we would now be different. We started to speak about what really mattered. For an extended period, I think many had connected or developed a more authentically Torahdik lifestyle, hoping that the afterglow of the sacred time would stay for a little longer. But then life moves on and we get back to regular life albeit with a mask and distancing {aka-doing Hishtadlus and following the law}. We forget those elevated pledges and we return to the values and the folly of pre Covid life.
Is this inevitable? The leining for the second day of Rosh Hashana suggest that this is the tragedy of human life. Think about it. If you were on the leining committee why would you continue the narrative past the final stages of the Akeida story? It’s Rosh Hashana, the birth of Rivka is not relevant!
Many answers have been given. One that I find compelling suggests that even after the highest moment in Avrohom’s life, society just got back to normal. Children are born and life continues. People did not changeHaHHhegfjkh , the Akeida made no waves, had ni impact on society. This is the pattern of human existence. We too have high moments, we speak from the depths of our Yiddishe souls, we are being genuine, we hear ourselves screaming hineini but then time moves on.
How can we battle our resistance to change? Leadership education often points to a number of issues:
1. Loss of control. Change can make people feel that they’ve lost control over their lives. Something happened that perhaps wasn’t planned and now they are dealing with unpredictable consequences.
2. Excess uncertainty. People will often prefer to remain mired in misery than to head toward an unknown. We need to feel safe with the changes taking place, an inner safety that tells us we can manage the change that is taking place.
3. Everything seems different. Change is meant to bring something different, but how different? We are creatures of habit. Routines become automatic, but change jolts us into consciousness, sometimes in uncomfortable ways. Too many differences can be distracting or confusing.
4. Loss of face. By definition, change is a departure from the past. Those people associated with the last version the one that didn’t work, or the one that’s being superseded are likely to be defensive about it.
5. Concerns about competence. Can I do it? Change is resisted when it makes people feel stupid.
6. Past resentments. The ghosts of the past are always lying in wait to haunt us. As long as everything is steady state, they remain out of sight. Old wounds reopen frustrations of past failures.
We all learn that malochim are called omdim, static beings, whereas we are mehalchim, we are dynamic and move. We are not supposed to be static beings. We're supposed to learn, to sweeten like wine over time into something better than we were yesterday. We constantly laud that idea. When we finally go to practice self-improvement, though, something quirky happens.
Why does this happen? Research led by Lydia Emery from Northwestern University might offer a clue, as summarized by Ashley Lyles in Psychology Today.
The researchers found that, when people had lower clarity about their self-concept, they generally were not as supportive of change. It's human nature to cling to familiarity to some degree, and because we use external validation to form and confirm our perception of ourselves, it can be scary to see those we see as our foundation become willing to shift. We have to face the question of whether the changes we see somehow will alter our future or, worse, break the connection with the person who means so much to us.
In a few places in the Tanach, Hashem tells various people not to return on the same path by which they arrived at their destination. For example, when Hashem sent a Novi to warn Yerovom about the idols he was making the people worship, Hashem told the Novi not to take the same path home. After being warned, the king asked the Novi to stay and eat, but he could not. We read,
“But the man of Hashem answered the king, “Even if you were to give me half your possessions, I would not go with you, nor would I eat bread or drink water here. For I was commanded by the word of Hashem: ‘You must not eat bread or drink water or return by the way you came.’” So he took another road and did not return by the way he had come to Bet-el.”
Why would Hashem tell the Novi to take another road home?
In Yechezkel’s prophecy of the new Beis Hamikdosh, he outlines some rules that go along with it and among them is this:
When the people of the land come before Hashem at the appointed Yom Tovs, whoever enters by the north gate to worship is to go out the south gate; and whoever enters by the south gate is to go out the north gate. No one is to return through the gate by which he entered, but each is to go out the opposite gate.
Hashem explains to us that when we come to him our lives are changed forever. Hashem tells us: “For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into you own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.”
We have times of greater spiritual sensitivity. We say and do things which are a true reflection of who we really are. But we also fail to live up to that potential and easily slip back to former habits. We were genuine in our rejecting lavish simchas that incur huge debts and are more about showing off than celebrating. That was then and now the societal pressures return and excuses are made and we just have to buy and do and need and want.
Chazal remind us that after the Akeida life continued, perhaps we should realise that this is what it means to be human. We don’t need to like it but we might need to accept it.
Kesiva Vechasima Tov dear readers. With Hashem’s love and help let us daven and hope that next year will bring about the awakening we so need, until we dance together hand in hand
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