Droshos - Dealing with Life's Problems

Different Reactions To Our Problems

There are many ways how people deal with their problems.

The hospital is full of sick people who are suffering tremendously. How do all these people deal with their illnesses? There are different kinds of reactions a person can have to their problems.

Some people despair and say, “That’s it – it’s the end.”

Others just don’t think about it and say, “It will be okay.” They take their mind off it, such as by spending all their time on the phone with friends.

How do we deal with our life? As we get older and more mature, we realize that life is not a bed of roses. Life is full of difficulties. Some people are happy in spite of their problems, but it’s not because they’re on a high level; it’s usually because they’re just more care-free kinds of people. They are superficial and living in denial. But the real way to deal with life is to actually deal with it.

Deal With It

The Ramban writes that to live in denial is like denying Hashem. Nothing happens by chance, and Hashem has a specific reason why He sends us each problem.

When you have a hard situation, you have to try and think: What has caused this to come upon me? Who has brought it? It didn’t just happen by itself.

Life is very precious. We can’t disregard it and just assume everything will be okay. There is a purpose to our life and our problems. We need guidance in how to deal with our problems. Every problem has a way how to deal with it. All of us are busy, whether in our jobs, taking care of our family or worrying about our health. When we encounter a problem, we are likely to despair right away and say, “I can’t do it – I can’t succeed. Others are better and more successful than me, but I can’t.”

If we act like this, we will definitely never be successful.

A person can live his whole life and just stay the same, and his attitude is that as life goes on, he just complains more and more about increasing difficulties. It’s hard to make a living, he has to marry of his kids, his marriage is hard…

We need to learn how to deal with our difficulties in life. We will try here to give some advice here for life from our teachers. This will give us the hope to go on.

Realizing How Our Life Is Not Normal

Many people live like this: A person gets up in the morning, he davens quickly -- in shul -- or in his house…or he doesn’t complete the davening, and at best manages to put on Tefillin… and then he goes to work.

Really, this is not a way of life. A person knows that he lacks an organized kind of life; he knows that rushing through davening because he has to get to work or davening alone in his house is not a way to live. But what can we do about this?

Set aside some time every day to think

There is an answer to this from the Ramchal (in sefer Derech Etz Chaim), and without this, it’s not possible to survive life: Every day, take a little bit of time for yourself. We are busy all day, but we also have plenty of free time on our hands. For five minutes a day, we can take the time to think a little.

A person might learn Torah each day, and he knows in his head what he is supposed to do, yet he never thinks about it. He thinks, “I know this already – what do I need this for?”

But without some time to think, we have nothing in our life. Although we learn Torah, do mitzvos and support our family, it’s all nothing if we don’t have time to think. Although Torah is important and we need it, without some Emunah in Hashem, we remain with nothing in our life. Without some Emunah in Hashem, the Torah we learn doesn’t really affect us so much, and when we learn the Torah’s advice for life, we think we know it already and wonder why we have to learn it.

The Lies In Our Life

The world we are living in is full of falsity. It’s not only government politics that is full of lies; in our own life, even in the Beis Midrash, we are living a lie many times.

A simple example of this is that a person can donate a Beis Midrash in his own name, and he’s doing it all for his own honor, so that everyone should see his name. The people learning in the Beis Midrash see his name and also think that this donor is going to Gan Eden for this, and are in awe from this person’s kindness – who really did it all for his own honor, so that everyone should see his name plastered on the wall.

A life without Emunah is a life of falsity. Our whole life is a lie if we never have Emunah, if we never stop to think!

Only with a life with Emunah in Hashem can our Torah and mitzvos affect us. The problem is that no one has time to think; people are busy all day and there is no time to think about life.

Find five minutes a day to think

The Mishnah in Avos states, “Remember where you come from, and to where you are going, and to Whom you will have to give a self-accounting to.” If we always keep this in mind, that one day we will have to give a self-accounting to Hashem for our life – five minutes a day each day to think about this – our life will change completely.

One time I was by a funeral and the person who was giving a eulogy said, “I don’t want to take up any more of your time.” I thought to myself, what a shame! People finally have a few minutes to think about what the purpose of life is, and they’re getting rushed through it, missing the opportunity. Of course, we shouldn’t look forward to funerals for this opportunity, but once we are at a funeral, why not use the opportunity and think a little about our life?

For five minutes a day, if we think about what the purpose of life is, we have hope in our life to deal with our problems. A life without any thinking is hopeless. It’s a whole different kind of life when we know that the goal is to eventually give a self-accounting to Hashem. Don’t wait until you’re seventy years old to do this – do it every day, for five minutes a day. We don’t mean to learn mussar for these five minutes a day; just think. Everyone can do this. When we do this every day, we will begin to breathe our life with Hashem.

Yes, we still have to eat and sleep and stay normal, but along with this we need to think for five minutes a day about why we live, and this will help us deal with our problems.