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Contemplating Each Ratzon
It has been explained above that a person has three components. The most inner force is Divine. It is Hashem's will, which is referred to in the sefarim hakedoshim as the "point of the Shechinah" that rests in the neshamah. The force outside of that is the inner will of the "I," which is referred to as "our will is to do Your will." The third force is the outer "I" that often chooses the opposite of Hashem's will, chas veshalom, and is referred to as the "animal soul."
In every area that one confronts, these three forces will either want to do an act or to avoid it.
All of our work with middos depends on contemplating these forces. In every middah and every aspect of avodah that one wants to improve, one must first examine what it is that moves him to do a particular act. What are the causes that might have an impression here, and what does one feel is motivating him?
We will discuss the attribute of anger, for example. When one gets angry, his avodah is to contemplate (usually after the event, because at the time, the anger is strong and one does not have much control): from which ratzon does this anger come? Does Hashem want me to get angry? Is it from the inner "I"? Or perhaps it is just the outer "I" that chose anger?
Of course, one must work gradually, but we will speak of the general goal.
A person must consider every detail of his life - Torah, tefillah, good deeds, eating, neutral matters, etc. - and examine each act, seeing if it is good or bad. That is to say, who wants to do this, and who does not? This exercise will afford him great clarity in life. He will know which acts foster closeness to Hashem, (since those acts stem from the inner will to do Hashem's will) and which acts are not positive. He will also identify the acts that are positive but performed with the wrong motives.
Any area one is working on must be clearly analyzed, both during the time set aside for contemplation, and when confronting the issue in daily life. Then, the avodah divides into a number of stages:
The first stage is, as we said, clarification. One identifies all the ingredients, and sees "who" wants and "who" does not. Why does he want, and why does he not?
The next stage is to daven to Hashem that he will only do proper and sincere acts, and will not perform improper deeds.
The third, highest stage is to perform each act lishmah (with pure intent) as well as lo lishmah (with ulterior motives). Of course, each Jew should strive to live only for Hashem! We should always strive and push to reach that level. But we must take one step at a time, and not attempt large leaps. We cannot suddenly switch from lo lishmah to lishmah, as mentioned before. We cannot jump from the world of evil right to the world of good. One must go through the entire process. After a person goes through contemplation and tefillah for a long period of time, he should start adding lishmah to the lo lishmah in each act.
Strengthening the Element of Lishmah
We will provide some examples to bring this principle to life, but there is one point: One can never move from lo lishmah right to lishmah; he moves to a mixture of lo lishmah and lishmah.
For example, a person sits down to learn Torah. He begins to clarify his desire to learn. There may an outer will not to learn, because he is too lazy to exert his mind. There is an inner will to learn, because that is what Hashem wants, in accordance with the halachah. The inner "I" has a feeling of "our will is to do Your will." That is to say, "I, too, want to do Your will and learn Torah. I might not feel it, but the will is there." The outer will has a mixture: it wants, and doesn't want. It doesn't want, because of its laziness, but it wants to learn for honor, or fear of punishment, etc. Each person has his own reasons.
Ultimately, the person sits down to learn. Why is he learning? If he does so lo lishmah, it is because of honor, pride, or fear of punishment. Hence, it is all lo lishmah.
In fact, to learn purely in order to please Hashem, with no thought of pride, or honor, or fear of gehinnom, or desire for Gan Eden, is extremely difficult.
What, then, is the proper way to approach the learning?
After one has clarified the various wills, he must daven to Hashem to show him the true ratzon, so as to act perfectly lishmah. He will say to Hashem, "I know that my inner ratzon is to engage in Torah in order to please You, and my outer ratzon is filled will all sorts of ulterior motives, but I do feel a small ratzon to learn lishmah! How much? Maybe one percent, maybe less, maybe more. And so, Master of the World, I come to learn, both in order to please You and in order to satisfy my personal interests. Help my point of lishmah to become stronger, and my lo lishmah to become progressively weaker." If one doesn't even feel a slight ratzon for lishmah, he should daven to attain that itself, but it is highly unlikely that one who has reached this point will not feel any such ratzon whatsoever.
And so, slowly, one will come to magnify his inner ratzon to learn with more and more lishmah. Each time, he will add a bit more inspiration. It should not be with great excitement, but with an inner sense of quiet, step by step, with stability. He makes himself closer to lishmah and slowly disengages from the wills of lo lishmah. All of this must come with tefillah to Hashem to help him progress according to his pure yearning.
That was one example. Here is another one: A person decides to perform an act of kindness. He hears that someone is ill, and decides to make a trip to visit him in the hospital. Before he embarks, he should pause and clarify for himself why he wants to travel and why he might not want to. The reasons not to go are that the trip costs money, it will be difficult, uncomfortable, exhausting, and so on, depending on the situation. After that, he should clarify why he does want to go, either from his higher level or from his lower level.
He will say to himself: "Does Hashem want me to go? Yes! (This is where it is clearly a mitzvah to go; sometimes, this is not the case.) Does my inner point of ‘our will is to do Your will' want to go? Yes! If so, deep down, I want to go. On the other hand, the outer part of the ‘I' must be examined. On one hand, it does not want to go, because there are expenses and exertion. On the other hand, it wants to, because after the person will be discharged from the hospital, he will return to the neighborhood, and when he will meet me, he will ask, ‘Why didn't you visit me?' I will feel uncomfortable and embarrassed. To avoid that shame when facing him, I want to visit him lo lishmah."
After one has concluded this analysis, he should stand in tefillah before Hashem and ask, "Master of the World, I know that on the current level of my heart, the will to make the trip stems from superficial motives. Please help that the only true motive for the mitzvah will be so as to please You, and not for vain reasons!"
A person should be aware of his motives, and discover that many, possibly the vast majority, are lo lishmah, and then ask Hashem that the true motive, that of "our will is to do Your will," should become apparent in the soul and then, he will really want to do each act lishmah.
After that, he prepares to embark, and again says to Hashem, "Practically speaking, why am I going? I have pure as well as ulterior motives. I have a slight ratzon to please You, and a lot of self-interest." He continues and asks Hashem that his will to act lishmah will be alert, vibrant, and revealed, but knows that in the meantime, he only has a little lishmah and much lo lishmah. This is the proper order.
Strengthening the Power of Lishmah in the Soul
Understandably, the details are many, and we come across innumerable situations. One example mentioned before was the desire to eat. A person must clarify if he wants to eat that food or not. On one hand, he wants, because he has a desire due to the animal soul, but Hashem might want him to only eat a part, or perhaps even to eat all of it, but with less focus on the taste, and so on.
He approaches the act of eating this food, knowing that from a perspective of lishmah, there is no reason to eat it. He might already be full, and this food might have no value other than its taste, but he feels that he cannot withstand the temptation. In fact, there is no sin involved. He might make a berachah (blessing) before it with great intent, and yet, he must realize that from the standpoint of the inner truth, Hashem is not involved in this act of eating and will derive no satisfaction from it!
What should he do? He should eat, but he must stop for two minutes and turn to Hashem in prayer and say, "Please, help me to merit truly feeling that I do not need to eat this food!"
In this way, although he ate the food in the end, he removed its "sting." He may continue to eat, but he is also suffering. The main desire has faded, and the pasion for it has fallen. He should hold the food in hand and continue to daven. If the tefillah is sincere, he will gradually find that the desire weakens.
There are other ways to serve Hashem in this area, but they all have the same general approach. One starts with a mixture of lishmah and lo lishmah. At first, the lishmah is minimal, and the lo lishmah is dominant, and one's avodah is to change the percentages through his work, increasing the lishmah and decreasing the lo lishmah.
The work will take a long time, and one must progress gradually, but thoroughly. There will be more lishmah and less lo lishmah, and so, one will gradually progress. As a person's level rises, he will reach a stage where he will be able to forgo some things. It will not be a result of a struggle over it, but he will simply feel that he doesn't need them. The aspect of lishmah has become stronger, and the lo lishmah weaker.
Understandably, in some areas, the lo lishmah will be very strong, in some areas, the two forces will be almost equal, and in some areas, the lishmah is stronger. As one strengthens the force of lishmah, it will not only reside in that one area of his efforts, but will become an evident strong force in the soul, and thus spread to other areas. Everything must progress gradually, as one slowly weakens the force of the lo lishmah, until the lishmah becomes the dominant force in the soul. There will still be many areas in which one acts shelo lishmah, but the general yearning that fills his heart will be to please Hashem.
In this way, the lishmah will be a powerful force throughout the day, and he should daven to Hashem that the small element of lo lishmah will be nullified by the predominance of the lishmah. His avodah will be much easier, because the lishmah will be the dominant force in his soul, and he will naturally think a great deal throughout the day in a manner of lishmah. Not merely his mind, but mostly his heart, will yearn to please Hashem.
Examining the Inner Truth of the Lishmah
A person should work step after step, making the lo lishmah weaker and weaker. He will sense that his deeds are performed with pure intentions. Then, the task will be much more subtle: one must examine each act, and suspect that what seems to be lishmah is all fantasy.
Hence, in the beginning, a person examines each of his acts, to see if it is done lishmah or lo lishmah, and continually strives to strengthen the lishmah and weaken the lo lishmah. Once he feels that his main motive is lishmah, he is faced with a completely different kind of avodah.
At first, the yetzer hara convinces a person to act lo lishmah. In other words, that is one's initial level. Once a person seeks to serve Hashem lishmah, it tries to confuse him to think that his intent is lishmah even when it is not. The deep self-interest of a person affects him in many ways, and he may think that he is acting with pure intentions, while in fact, much of what he does is for ulterior motives. Deep down, the motives may be lo lishmah, and one must examine himself deeply to see where he really is!
This is a lifetime struggle, and even the greatest of the great tzaddikim always suspected that they might not be acting with the proper motives. Even if on the surface, something seems to be lishmah, it can really be lo lishmah!
If a person does not sense even the slightest element of lo lishmah, he must know that he is in a world of fantasy! There is no such thing as an act that is totally pure. If one feels he is so pure, there must be a major error in his whole path!
There will always be elements of self-interest, and even if they are a very small percentage, one must keep davening that Hashem will remove them from his midst, as we mentioned before.
Once a person is primarily immersed in the world of lishmah, he must check if his lishmah is genuine, or only an illusion. Often, a person will say, "I am doing this for the sake of Hashem," but these are only words. Deep down, his soul has no sense of lishmah.
To perform this kind of self-examination, one must possess a high degree of sensitivity to subtle feelings. One who has this sensitivity immediately feels the falsehood in each act, and never ceases to distrust his motives.
In each act, one must suspect that the true motive is lo lishmah, and that the lishmah is false - a ruse of the yetzer hara that tries to delude him in this way.
To live this way all the time, one must be on a very high level, with the strong capability for inner self-doubt. On one hand, a person must always suspect himself, but on the other act, he must act, and not allow all his doubts to stop him from acting. The Chovos HaLevavos states that included in the value of caution is the need to careful not be overly cautious. Caution can prevent a person from everything, and he won't accomplish anything.
There is no precise answer as to how cautious one must be. It depends on each person's level. But we must remember one fundamental point: a person must pour out his heart each day before Hashem, asking that He will direct him to the truth. If one does not do this from the depth of his heart, it is likely that at the very root of his outlook, he has been duped, and then, his whole avodah is an error!
The Search for Truth - the Avodah of our Life
This principle, although mentioned in the context of lishmah, encompasses all the areas we have discussed from the beginning until now.
A person needs to look at situations with his own eyes, and he does not always have the opportunity to ask someone. Even if he asks, there is no guarantee that the other person will understand him properly. A person might create entire structures of thought, but it will all be built on faulty foundations. He may have heard correct principles, but did not grasp them properly. He thinks he understood, and builds his whole avodah on what he thinks he heard, and continues with what he is doing, thinking that he is succeeding in general, with just occasional setbacks.
How, then, can one be confident that his path of avodah is proper? The truth is that no one has the right to be confident of his way. If one claims to be certain, that it his most fundamental problem! A person must always suspect that he is in error. Every day, one should daven to Hashem and cry from the depth of his heart, "Master of the World, maybe I am in error! Please place me on a true path!"
The Alter of Novahrdok zt"l, even when very old, said that if he would know of someone who could talk to him and show him the truth, even if the person would be in a different country, he would travel to meet him to receive the truth from him! Every day and every period, he would reevaluate his way to see if it was true, and even if it was true, he would ascertain that it was right for him, and so on.
A person can never be confident! Only the wicked are confident, but the tzaddikim always question themselves, lest they not be doing what is required of them. Along with the questions, they serve Hashem with joy, because they are doing their best, using all their abilities, davening to Hashem to be saved from error, and thus, hopeful that Hashem will show them the truth.
But this is contingent on a person always doing what he should, and davening literally each day, and several times a day, "Master of the World, maybe I am mistaken! I might be making a minor error, or a major error!"
There is no confidence in this life! Only after a person leaves the world, he can know if he acted properly or not. The Heavenly court will examine his heart, and he will then know the truth, but in this world, there are no guarantees.
"Behold, He does not trust His holy ones" (Iyov 15:15). Not only Hashem doubts us, but we must also have self-doubt, as Chazal said (Avos 2:4), "Do not trust yourself until your day of death." Not only is there a concern that tomorrow I might stumble, but even today, I might be on the wrong path! If great people followed a certain path, it is true, but perhaps I don't understand it properly, or do not apply it properly to myself.
One cannot be sure of anything in life, other than the need to daven to Hashem daily and hourly that He show one the truth!
The great danger in all we have said in this series until now is that one might now think he has a clear path, he already knows, he can try to start, and he will surely succeed. In fact, he will only succeed in trying, but cannot be sure that he will really succeed in obtaining results. He must cry to Hashem each day and beseech, "Allow me to know the truth. Maybe I didn't understand properly. Maybe the one who gave a talk made a mistake, etc."
One must always ask for the truth about life, and about his general behaviors, as well as the details: "Master of the World, show me the truth. Maybe I am in error." The more one knows, the more he can err and think that he knows. On one hand, a person needs to work with a definite path, but on the other hand, he must suspect that he is in error.
May Hashem help us to truly merit trying to become close to Him and having the right intentions. At the same time, one must always ask to truly be close to Him, to be saved from error, and to be placed on the proper path.
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