Slow and Steady

Like those of you who do shnayim mikrah, I got to a point in this parsha where I couldn't help but feeling overwhelmed. As you approach Az Yashir it begins to hit you that there is going to be a lot of Rashi to get through since he tends to write at length when explaining poetry.
On a similar note, in my English Lit class we have a lot of reading to do each week and a similar feeling of despair sets in at some point as I begin to count down the pages until I'm done with the assignments. It's kind of like that feeling that I'm sure most people feel when they enter YU and see all of the requirements they will have to take in the coming years.
So how to cope?
When I was in Yeshivat Sha'alvim I had the zchus of being in the rosh yeshiva's shiur. At one point in the year Rav Yaakovson shlit"a spoke to our shiur about a sefer he had received for his bar mitzvah called Chosen Yehoshua. This is basically a sefer that tries to address the standard concerns of a yeshiva bachur as he enters yeshiva. This issue of despair is one of the topics Rav Yaakovson spoke to us about. When a bachur enters into yeshiva and notices the vast number of seforim he is meant to conquer in his lifetime it is quite normal for him to be overwhelmed at the shear volume. The Rashis on Az Yashir are only a part of that huge mountain of literature. It towers high above the simple books assigned in Lit class and even above the monstrous course load of YU.
The Chosen Yehoshua gives a mashal of someone who is supposed to move a huge pile of dirt. He looks up at this great mountain in front of him and he immediately gives up. How does he finally conquer it? He realizes that if he just moves one bucket a day the mountain will slowly decrease and he will eventually be successful. One daf at a time, one siman at a time, one posuk at a time,...
Eventually the job will get done if you stop complaining about how unconquerable the territory is and instead just put your head down and tackle it one step at a time.

Tefillah

In English Literature we have begun reading Robinson Crusoe. For those of you who may have not read it, Robinson Crusoe is alone on a desert island for 30 years. As the time goes by he becomes more and more aware of G-d and he slowly becomes religious. A few times throughout the book he discusses prayers of both thanksgiving and hope for salvation. Since this book is pretty much what I've been spending the majority of my free-time on in the last week I'd like to discuss the topic of tefillah.
R' Akiva Tatz asks a number of questions on the topic of prayer that make the process seem rather foolish. The most obvious problem is that we call it a service but all we are doing is asking for what we need. Another issue is that we believe Hashem to be a gracious Father who would give anything beneficial to His children and withhold anything harmful. If that is the case, why ask for things? If it is beneficial He should give it even before we ask, and if it is harmful he should withhold it no matter how much we ask. So what good can come from our asking? Of course there are many more questions on the topic but let's begin with these.
He answers the issues by saying that the point of tefillah is not to change the decisions of Hashem, but rather to change ourselves. When we ask someone for something we are acknowledging that they are the source of that thing, otherwise it would be pointless to ask them and not someone else. Asking Hashem for something shows that we recognize Him as its source. This changes our attitude towards the request. We aren't asking for something that we want, but rather something that we can use to serve Him. We are acknowledging that everything comes from Hashem and that using it for any purpose aside from His service is pointless.
Before we ask, something can be harmful for us. If we would have lots of money and use it improperly, that is bad for us. But if we use that money for the proper service of Hashem it is extremely beneficial. The duty during tefillah is to ask for the money so that it can be used for avodas Hashem. It is to recognize that it comes from Him and thus must be used to serve Him. Any other use is improper. This change in our own view changes the request from a request for that which is harmful for us to a request for that which is beneficial to us.
A note which must be remembered is that along with the recognition of where everything comes from comes a maturity to accept an answer of "No". If we realize that Hashem gives us that which we need to serve Him, if He refuses to give us something it must be that we were not meant to use it in His service. Just because you ask with the right focus doesn't guarantee an answer of "Yes".

Little Things

There is an elderly man who davens in YU and he usually sits near me on shabbos. This week he sat two seats away from me. He's a quiet guy who comes and goes with little fanfare. I'd assume most people around YU would recognize him but few probably know his name. Anyway, this man has trouble getting his tallis to stay on his shoulder and when it falls down he has trouble putting it back up. There is usually someone nearby who steps over and helps him with his talis and being that I was right next to him today I took the liberty to lend a helping hand.
I don't even think that this was such a big deal. Here I am seeing someone who is having a little bit of trouble doing something and I was in the perfect situation to help with very little effort. I would like to think that most people would have done the same. Those little things that we can do for other people can really make a tremendous impact.
It happens to be that I had just read about "Attending to the Little Things" in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Stephen Covey discusses the little things in his introduction to Interdependence as one of the six deposits that build the Emotional Bank Account. "In relationship, the little things are the big things."
Of course the book is talking about relationships with people that we know, but the same is true about the relationships we have with people that we don't really know. Usually we aren't necessarily concerned with our relationships with those people, but there is no reason not to be. The impression we make on them contributes greatly to the kiddush shem shamayim we can create in this world.
Try to keep an eye out for those little things that go on around you everyday. Look for the possibilities. Hold the door open for someone, say hello to the security guards,... If you care to look for them then you will see they are everywhere.

Bain Ha'Zmanim

As I have experienced time and time again, bain ha'zmanim is usually a little of a disappointment for me. It starts with grand ideas of learning X amount of hours a day, covering a crazy amount of ground, catching up on chazara,... and inevitably none of those goals are realized. Either the days are too crazy with running around and doing those little things you don't have time for during the semester, or they are filled with "much needed relaxation" which carries on for longer than expected. Either way, the days fly by and the learning is less than ideal.
This past week was one of those "much needed relaxation" weeks. Someone extremely close to me was going to Israel and we spent a lot of time together before she left. But this week I want to accomplish; this week I want to grow. So how do you do it? How do you decide to stop the relaxation that is so easy to get lost in? What is the best way to make sure you don't waste too much of your time?
The Orchos Tzaddikim says that the field of a lazy man is over-grown with weeds, his fence is broken... If you're lazy, you can let any problem linger for a little while. "I'll fix it tomorrow." So how do you stop this cycle? Don't push it off until tomorrow. Don't think about doing something, just do it. If it is tolerated for a second it can be tolerated indefinitely.
In terms of accomplishing during bain ha'zmanim the same idea can be applied. Don't set aside learning until tomorrow or later in the day, just do it NOW! Before you go off to do the next pointless activity, finish that which you set out to do. Be realistic and make a list of that which you can actually accomplish. Divide it up according to each day and do that day's quota of learning before moving on to the relaxation that you need during the break.

Stam Emunah

The other day I was tutoring a couple of girls from Stern in Statistics for Business and at one point I said, "Well, it's basically just the chicken vs. the egg." Needless to say, that sparked a little discussion about evolution which inevitably turned towards emunah. So here's my take:
We don't know if the chicken or the egg came first. We weren't there. From the religious stand-point it probably could've been either one. Hashem could have created an egg and He could have created a chicken. I can't see a reason to choose a side. But the question arises, do we hold of evolution? How does science impact our view of ma'asei bereishis?
I've recently grown fond of this subject after listening to a shiur by Dr. Gerald Schroeder. (Not to be confused with the piano-playing Peanuts character, who, by the way, I'm extremely envious of. I digress...) In the shiur, Dr. Schroeder discusses the first few pesukim in the torah and how to understand them from the view of a Jewish physicist. Although I'm pretty much taking his word for it on the mathematical formulas as well as the various mekoros he discusses, his ideas are very compelling.
I was trying to tell the girls a little about this when one of them said, "I don't like to get into these things. I just have emunah." And that made me think of a whole different shiur by Rabbi Akiva Tatz about emunah. Essentially the way he describes emunah has nothing to do with blind faith. In fact, he doesn't even translate it as faith, but rather as "faithfulness". The idea of being a ma'amin is living up to Hashem's expectation's of us. Doing that which we are supposed to be doing.
In his discussion of emunah, Rabbi Tatz says that emunah must be preceded by emes. You must have clarity of your mission before you can be faithful to completing it. And that is where I think the study of evolution can play a role. We aren't supposed to blind ourselves to science, nature, or anything really. The study of the natural world can lead us to a greater awe for Hashem, not detract from that awe because it's "natural" and "coincidental". As I once heard from Leuitenant Birnbaum, (longer story of who that is) "It isn't a co-incidence, it's a Kah-incidence!"
We are supposed to delve into life, see what tools Hashem has given us, realize what He wants us to do with them, and do it. That is emunah. It is not a blindness, it is a powerful realization of a purpose; it is seeing that purpose.
In another shiur, Rabbi Tatz says that Hashem said to Avraham, "Lech lecha." Literally translated this means, "Go to you." He was telling Avraham to become the person he was destined to be. Avraham wasn't unique in that Hashem spoke to him, Avraham was unique in that he actually listened and that was what made him a ma'amin. That call is constantly going out to each and every person. "Go to you. Become who you are meant to become through the tools Hashem has given you." That is the emunah we should be striving for.