Special Guest Post From Racheli

It has occurred to me that this life, in which we seem to always take for granted, is exceptionally difficult to handle. Many people you will soon discover as you get older seem to give up and allow the media to control their difficult times by succumbing to the all too well known word, “drugs”. Whether it be over the counter or under, whether legal or illegal, it seems we can’t seem to live with out some sort of way of numbing our existence, leaving us temporarily lost in another universe. This happens to be only a bittersweet existence since after the drug wears off we find that unlike what we have just experienced time has gone on as usual and we have merely missed out on perhaps another chance to change what is our uncomfortable way of life.

“I give up!” an all too common phrase, “I’ve had enough I can’t take this anymore!” Why do we give up? Why do we loose hope? It reminds me of when you discipline a child by putting him in 'time out', turning on the timer for a few minutes, after which the child is waiting patiently for the timer to be up, then, when the child thinks that the timer is never going to be up he runs out of his place in a fury which only causes the parent to have to extend the discipline further. If only the child would have known that a few more seconds the timer would have been up and the punishment finished without it being prolonged any longer. You would think the same with us. Things really don’t change as we get older. If only we would wait a little bit longer and right when we feel we can’t take it anymore we would just fight a little bit longer we would make it through the struggles.

We like to blame our problems on our current situation; stress, be it family related, work, friends, or just day to day things such as problems with a leak in the faucet or some such nonsense in the house. We explain this as the reason for our blow-ups, and only if we had an easier life would we be more agreeable. Why must we blame all our problems on everything but the real source of them, ourselves. What is it that makes us blame everything but ourselves? Fear? That seems to be the root of a lot of our failures. Failures to thrive, to work to live, to do anything. We are afraid to fail, to be embarrassed, hurt, to be happy or sad, it stops us from truly accomplishing our goals. “I can’t do this I’ve been hurt to many times or I can’t be responsible for this project my last one blew up!” You might even have the habit of repeating a mantra to yourself “you can do it! You can do it!” before you do anything thing but there always seems to be that creeping notion of how you really can’t. What can we do to overcome this sensation of fear? How many books have been written upon it, lectures, essays all saying basically the same thing. This is the modern age we want quick fixes, easy outs and a lot of “everything is going to be ok”. Well you know what it isn’t! We can’t sit around and think everything is going to work out if we do nothing about it! We need to drop the medication, the therapist, and settle down into ourselves and make things right before more of our lives get caught up in this horrible mentality of helplessness. Can we do it alone? NO! G-d made other human beings upon this planet and He did not make us hermits. We are here to learn from each other and grow together. We have answers staring us right in the face but we push them down because they are too difficult and again those terrible feelings of “I can’t do it” come creeping in. Rabbi Yaakov Hillel said that anything that is cheap is not truth. All the therapists and counselors that seem to know all the answers for you by telling you what medicine to take and what husband to divorce without giving you the benefit of the doubt that you can actually work at something and figure things out on you own. It feels so amazing when you work at something so hard and accomplish it. But please don’t misunderstand me, while you are in the muck of things and there seems to be know end in sight, you just can’t take it anymore and you want to give up, Rebbe Nachman said to “Never give up! If you believe you can break something, have faith that you can repair it.” There is always hope. HA KADOSH BARUCH HU did not leave us alone.