Fixing Your Wind - 014 Bragging Part 2: Egoistic Talking

Water-of-Fire-of-Wind: Enjoying To Talk About Oneself

With the help of Hashem, we will continue to discuss how we rectify the traits which stem from the element of wind in the soul. Currently, we are discussing fire-of-wind, which is the root of the trait mesaper b’shevach atzmo, to brag of one’s praises. [Previously we discussed earth-of-fire-of-wind, and now we will discuss water-of-fire-of-wind].

The “water” aspectoffire-wind is when a person enjoys speaking about his praises. (Water is the root of enjoyment\pleasure\desire, which are all traits that “drag” a person).

Every person, generally speaking, has qualities. Some people do not possess actual qualities, so they imagine that they have qualities. One brags about qualities that exist in himself, while another kind of person will brag about non-existing qualities in himself. In either case, the person is bragging about himself to others.

First we will speak about the root of this matter, and then we will get to the details of this.

As we said, a person brags either about qualities he knows he possesses, or he speaks about qualities he imagines he has; either he has the qualities or he imagines them, and upon that, he brags about them. Another factor involved in bragging is that a person can simply love to talk [about himself].

When one is having a good time bragging about himself to other, first of all, he enjoys dwelling on his qualities; this involves the negative trait of gaavah (conceit). When we get to discussing gaavah, with the help of Hashem, we will explain about it there[1]. Right now, we are dealing with a different aspect involved in bragging: the fact that one is enjoying the fact that he is speaking about himself, which is the trait of mesaper b’shevach atzmo (speaking of his praises).

Understandably, gaavah\conceit and mesaper b’shevach atzmo\bragging are interrelated topics, but right now we are focusing the discussion on the actual ‘bragging’ aspect of bragging, and not on the ‘conceit’ aspect involved in bragging.

What A Person Likes To Talk About

When a person brags about himself, as we said, there are two factors: the fact that he enjoys speaking about his qualities, and the fact that he enjoys talking about himself.

First of all, before we proceed on how to fix this kind of bragging we are discussing, it must first be clear to a person what a person likes, both when it comes to his physical areas and in his spiritual more areas. This actually takes deep inner soul-searching in order to figure this out. Then, the next step a person must figure out is, to know what he actually likes to speak about with others.

The two are not mutually exclusive. Sometimes a person likes something but he doesn’t like to talk about it, for whatever reason. Maybe it’s because it’s personal, or maybe because he feels like he is giving away a secret if he would talk about it.

So a person must figure out these two things: to know what he likes, as well as to know what he likes to talk about. A person who doesn’t know what he likes is in a pitiful situation. He has nothing to get vitality from. In addition to knowing what he likes, each person also needs to know what he likes to talk about.

Some people, when it comes to most things they talk about, are just talking randomly, about any topic that comes their way; they do not know what they really like to speak about. This kind of person will speak about what happened that day or yesterday, or what’s new, or what others are talking about; but other than that, there is no focused topic going on in their conversations. This is a sign that something is amiss when it comes to his self-awareness.

It should be clear to a person the things that he likes – as well as what he likes to talk about.

Here in this chapter, we will focus on the second aspect: what a person likes to talk about. One can examine his conversations and see where his conversations gravitate towards, and in this way he can slowly learn about what he likes to talk about.

Bragging About Qualities: “I Love Myself”

Everyone loves himself. Some people say that they hate themselves, but no one hates himself totally; they love themselves too. A person might even love and hate another person at the same time; and he might feel both love and hatred towards himself. But most people feel that they love themselves very much; even the few people who feel like they hate themselves still have some love for themselves.

Being that a person generally loves himself, and he loves himself more than anything else, naturally, he loves to talk about himself too. A few rare individuals penetrate very deep into their souls and they love others as much as they love themselves, but most people love themselves more than anything else.

There are also people who love others more than they love themselves not because they have reached a deep spiritual level, but actually because they hate themselves, so they love others from that very place of self-hatred in themselves. But this all takes place in one’s consciousness. Deep down in one’s subconscious, even a self-hating person loves himself – with even more love than how much he thinks he loves others.

In either case, a person always loves himself; the only question is if he loves to talk about himself or not.

Some people love themselves but they don’t like to speak about themselves. Either this is because the person has a modest personality, or because he feels that it is arrogant to do. Others are so reserved that they never speak about themselves at all, and they feel like talking about anything personal might somehow “endanger the entire world” if they were to reveal it. This is an unhealthy nature in which a person is being extreme about protecting his privacy, to the point that nobody should know anything about him.

There are also more reasons, as well, why a person would never speak about himself. The point is, though, that a person might love himself very much, but he might not like to speak about himself with others, for all sorts of reasons. So not everyone likes to speak about themselves.

Some people like to speak about themselves and not about their qualities (which stems from wind-of-fire-of-earth, the subject of the next chapter). But here in this chapter, we are discussing one who likes to speak about his qualities because he loves himself, and thus he loves to talk about himself as a result.

The Nature of Self-Love

The next step, after figuring out if one like to talk about his qualities or not, is for a person to know what he loves to talk about the most.

When it comes to the love we have for ourselves, there are two layers to the love. There is unconditional self-love we have for ourselves, which is to love ourselves for who we are, as well as conditional self-love that we have towards ourselves, which is to love ourselves for our personal qualities that we recognize in ourselves.

The unconditional love we have for ourselves is usually in hidden from our consciousness, while the conditional love that we have for ourselves (love of our qualities) is usually consciously revealed.[2]

If a person does not actually have any particular qualities, he will imagine that he has qualities. This is a survival tactic that a person develops, which stems from his innate self-love.

If a person likes to talk about his qualities, besides for this being a negative trait of bragging, it is also increases his gaavah (conceit), because as he is enjoying his bragging, his ‘fire’ increases, and he gets more conceited with this, magnifying all of his qualities and feeling full of himself.

It also causes a person’s imagination to increase and he will make up qualities about himself which he does not have. At first a person might start out honest about himself, but with the more he gets used to bragging, he begins to make up non-existing qualities in himself, being that his imagination has increased and become more dominant.

1)    Don’t Talk About Yourself So Much

As we have said in the past, the key to the solution always lies in the nature of the problem. When we discover the root of the problem, we can know that the solution lies in its root.

Reb Yeruchem Levovitz said that a person must know his qualities even more than how must know his shortcomings, or else he will not know how to fix his shortcomings.[3] However, besides for this, a person needs to enjoy hearing about his qualities. In this way, he won’t come to speak about himself as much as he used to, because he will be receiving enough enjoyment from hearing about his qualities.

This uses the shelo lishmah (ulterior motivations) of the soul for constructive purposes, because by getting used to compliments about himself, he will feel less motivated to talk about himself, since he has grown more confident about his qualities.

There is a well-known saying of Rav Chaim Volozhiner, that there is always an element of shelo lishmah in whatever a person does. There are levels to shelo lishmah. The worst level of shelo lishmah is when one is motivated to prove others wrong or to feel conceited, but shelo lishmah can be used in a healthy way when one enjoys hearing about his praises.

We cannot uproot our shelo lishmah totally. Therefore, to a certain extent, we may enjoy hearing about our praises, as long as we don’t go overboard; we have an aspect shelo lishmah in our souls which is always there, so we will have to learn how to use it in a healthy manner.

Now, if one enjoys hearing about his praises, this is fine, as long as it is not overdone, as we said. The problem is when a person talks about his praises to others. Why must he speak of his praises to others? This is unnecessary. When one talks about his qualities with others, he’ll come to reveal his entire personal and inner world to another.

Just as it is forbidden to reveal secrets that someone tells you, in a deeper sense we need to have the same attitude towards our own inner world; it should be ‘forbidden’ for a person to reveal his inner qualities to another! These are private ‘secrets’ which should not be revealed to others. If one knows about his qualities, he should keep it to himself; don’t reveal the ‘secret.’

Thus, part of the solution to bragging - which is the more obvious part of the solution - is for one to train himself, slowly but surely, to lessen the amount that he speaks about his qualities with others. In addition, it is recommended that he should get used to not speaking about himself at all.

2)    Talking About Your Shortcomings

But another thing he needs to do to chip away at his bragging, which is not as obvious, is that he will need to get used to speaking about his shortcomings as well – something he is not used to doing.

Firstly, one must become clear about what his shortcomings are in the first place. If one doesn’t know any of his shortcomings, it can be said of him that he doesn’t recognize himself at all. Our qualities and shortcomings are in fact always changing with time, so one has to always become familiar with them.

There are some people who will have a very hard time with this part of the solution, because some people cannot handle talking about their shortcomings at all with others. They feel like they are slighting themselves when they admit it if they were wrong or acted incorrectly in any way.

In more extreme cases of this problem, if a person hurts another person by accident, like if he accidentally smashed into someone’s car - and it was his fault - he still might not be able to admit it that it was his fault. He has a problem: he never admits to his shortcomings, so he will never say he is wrong, even when it is clear that he is. At best, he will pay the other person back for the damage and think that he’s acting above the letter of the law, just to placate the other person, but deep down, he feels that he is not wrong, and he even feels righteous at himself for being so nice as to pay back the other for the damage incurred….

But when a person is truthful, he is aware of his shortcomings; the more a person strives to be truthful, the more he will become aware that he has certain shortcomings.

This does not mean, of course, that he should intentionally go looking for shortcomings in himself. Rather, when he realizes that he made a mistake, he should acknowledge it, and in addition, he should admit it. He should make sure to speak about his shortcomings with others. This should not be overdone, but it needs to be done to a certain extent, when the situation calls for it.

(Of course, if he is a person who generally has a low self-image of himself (a problem which stems from negative shiflus\lowliness[4]), then this avodah is not for him, because admitting his weaknesses will only make him feel lower about himself, and the the loss will not be worth the gain.)

So first, a person should learn how to admit it when he’s wrong. But even in situations when he is not wrong, he must still get used to admitting his faults sometimes. He can try practicing this with his close friends, as well as with his family members.

This should be done sensibly of course, because if a person is always talking about his shortcomings in his home, his family will grow tired of hearing about this, and eventually they will lose respect for him.

Yet, if it one takes the opposite approach and he never talks about his shortcomings at all to his family, either this is because he is very arrogant, or it is because he thinks he is perfectly righteous and holy. He has formed an erroneous belief in his head that it’s “forbidden” to think or speak about one’s personal weaknesses and shortcomings with others. And he will end up raising children who also will also avoid admitting to their mistakes.

Perhaps he will justify his thinking by claiming that it’s more important to always be “positive” and never be negative, so that is why he feels that he should never speak about his shortcomings. He might even base his behavior on the words of Chazal that one must have an ayin tovah, to have “a positive eye”, as well as other quotes from Chazal, to justify his misconceptions. But in always being “positive” and never talking about his weaknesses, he is disconnected from reality. (You are probably familiar with homes that are run like this, in which being honest with oneself and with family is sacrificed for the sake of keeping a ‘positive’ atmosphere in the home.)

So, to a certain extent, the children need to hear their parents sometimes speaking about their shortcomings. It is healthy for them, and it teaches them that, yes, we can be wrong sometimes; because we have certain shortcomings and weaknesses. They will learn that when you are wrong, you must admit it.

How much of your shortcomings should you talk about, and how much should you do it? This is a matter that cannot be given exact guidance. It should be done sensibly, within proper limits, and it should not be done too much.

In summary of up until this point: besides for lessening how much you talk about your praises to others, you also need to get used to talking about your shortcomings with others. This will slowly chip away at one’s nature to brag about his qualities and talk about himself with others, with the more he gets used to it. It will not totally get rid of his nature to brag, but it can certain chip away at it to a large extent.

Two Kinds of Self-Absorption

Furthermore, there is an additional factor to consider when it comes to bragging (besides for the fact that one enjoys to talk about himself, as well as his praises): the fact that one brags about himself to others and he becomes simply self-absorbed as he’s talking.

When a person has a tendency to brag about himself and to talk about his qualities with others, it is usually because he is self-absorbed. Some people are consciously aware as they are bragging that they are “bragging”, but most people who brag are not aware of it, because they are simply self-absorbed.

There are actually two kinds of self-absorption: it can stem from water-of-fire-of-wind, or it can stem from wind-of-fire-of-wind. In this chapter, we are discussing self-absorption that stems from water-of-fire-of-wind; in the next chapter, we will discuss self-absorption that stems from wind-of-fire-of-water.

When the self-absorption comes from wind-of-fire-of-water, the person is not consciously aware that he is absorbed in himself. Even if he is aware of it, it is only minimally. When self-absorption stems from water-of-fire-of-wind, however, a person is fully aware of the fact that he is self-absorbed, as he is bragging about himself. He is mainly absorbed in the feeling of enjoyment he is having as he brags about himself. (This is what we will discuss here).

When one is bragging about himself on a regular basis, it is because he is absorbed in himself; he’s “immersed in his own daled amos” (four cubits). But he is not trying to be absorbed in “himself”; rather, he is absorbed in the feeling of enjoyment as he is talking about his praises, and as a result, he becomes immersed in himself as he’s talking.

Some people are deeply absorbed in their problems. Others are absorbed in their shortcomings. Others are absorbed simply in themselves in general – not in their problems, not in their shortcomings, but simply in themselves, without being aware of anything going on in their surroundings (all of these examples stem from wind-of-fire-of-wind, which will be discussed in the next chapter). Here we are discussing one who is absorbed in the enjoyment of speaking about his praises to others, which stems from water-of-fire-of-wind.

If a person is enjoying a desire, this is rooted in the element of water. If a person is enjoying so much to speak about his praises, this stems from the “water” (enjoyment\desire) aspect in his “wind” (speech). He is absorbed in his own “daled amos”, as he speaks about his praises with others.

The Nature of Self-Absorption

Self-absorption is one of the hardest human weaknesses to overcome. There are many human weaknesses that exist, but being self-absorbed is one of the deepest and challenging problems to uproot. This is become a person’s “I” is most dear to him, more than anything else - and that is what makes self-absorption one of the hardest things to stop.

The “I” of a person is what prevents a person from seeing truth. When a person purifies his being, his “I” is purified, but before the “I” is purified, it gets in the way of all truth. Every person has an “I” which he worries about – we all worry for ourselves and our needs. But a person who is overly self-absorbed has a much sharper feeling of self-worry than a person who is not as self-absorbed as he.

Some people worry for themselves and are absorbed in themselves only when nobody else is around, and they become immersed in themselves when they are alone. This is a lesser degree of self-absorption. Others are self-absorbed in front of others, but only if something pressing is causing them to act selfish. For example, when the monthly check is being given out, the person pushes people or cuts the line, to quickly get to his check. But on his day-to-day basis, he will usually not get aggressive about his needs, and he lives normally (at least, that’s how it appears).

But when a person regularly brags about his praises to others, he is entirely self-absorbed entirely. In his mind, the world begins and ends with him alone. He is kind of imprisoned inside his ego – and it’s a very scary kind of prison!

It is very disturbing when we see how self-absorbed a person can be – he has no feeling for what is going on his surroundings. Examples include not acknowledging his neighbors’ lives or even his chavrusa’s life (whether it’s his morning chavrusa, afternoon chavrusa, or night chavrusa).He lives a kind of existence in which the world begins and ends with him!

Even if he is interested in another person’s well-being, he always has some agenda of self-gain somehow. If he davens for another person, he is doing so that he can get answered first by Hashem. If he gives tzadakah, he does so only so that he will get zechusim (merits). He does everything for his own gain.

This is the general outline of self-absorption; here we are discussing a detail of self-absorption, which is to brag about one’s praises on a regular basis. But bragging is only a result of self-absorption, and in fact, it is only one of the results; there are many more problems that result from self-absorption.

A person who is very self-absorbed will not even hear what is told to him. Not only does it go through one ear and go out through the other ear; the words never enter his ears in the first place! He never absorbs what is being said to him. He is totally wrapped up in himself.

3)    Beginning To Leave Self-Absorption

Our general avodah is to reach three kinds of love – love for Hashem, love for the Torah, and love for the Jewish people. Each person as well has a personal manifestation of this avodah: one must be able to give up a part of himself. The Chasam Sofer said that just as we have a mitzvah to give away maaser (a tenth) of our money, so must every person have “maaser” of his ego – to set aside times every day in which he gives of himself to others.

This is not accomplished by simply doing something kind for another person. It is not done by traveling to mountains and field to engage in Kiruv Rechokim. It is not done when a person thinks he has to do chessed because he read in sefer Chovos HaLevovos that one gains a lot of merits when he engages in benefitting the public. Such a mindset will mean that a person is doing favors for others solely because he wants to get rewarded and to gain merits; he is concerned for his own well-being.

To counter the problem of self-absorption, one needs to devote some time of the day in which he does not live totally for himself. To accomplish this, he should try doing one thing lishmah – for the sake of another person, and not for himself. He should just try to do one thing a day for another person in which he is not doing it for the sake of getting rewarded in This World or in the Next World. And even more so, he shouldn’t even do it for the sake of giving a nachas ruach (satisfaction) to Hashem. He should just do an act of kindness for another simply for the sake of another’s well-being.[5]

Of course, on a deeper level, we do everything because it is the will of Hashem and because we should want to give a nachas ruach to Hashem. But the real way “to do the will of Hashem” is to be concerned for another person’s well-being. Your actual motivation should be, that as you are doing an act of kindness for another, it should be totally for the sake of just helping him.

The Chazon Ish said, “I enjoy it very much when I make people happy.” One needs to simply enjoy making others’ lives easier, whether it is to help others physically or spiritually, or in other matters. The point is to do something for another person entirely for the other person’s sake – and not for any personal agenda at all.

This is like the “opening of the size of a needle” which can form an opening in one’s ego and allow room to allow others into one’s existence: one needs to allow a small space in himself in which he acts entirely altruistic - and not for himself at all.

Not only should it be a space that acts altruistic towards Hashem, but it should be a space that is altruistic towards other people. This is because it’s very possible that a person is altruistic towards Hashem, but not towards people.

So each person needs to make a small space in himself that will be concerned purely for another person’s sake. Just as burying and escorting the deceased is called “chessed shel emes”, true kindness, because it involves no personal gain, so must we all have a place in ourselves that does some “chessed shel emes” for others.

The truth is that all people need to acquire the trait of being able to act altruistically for others, but a person who is self-absorbed especially needs to acquire this trait, if he ever wishes to fix himself. By making this small “opening” in the ego with this little “needle”, he has already popped the balloon of self-absorption inside himself, and he gains immensely.

Surely the self-absorbed person will have to still work on himself to uproot it, but by developing this power we have described, he is very close to uprooting it. He will have made an opening in himself, which is a very great achievement, for one who has been used to being self-absorbed.

Again, this concept is not only meant to fix self-absorption; it is needed in every Jew’s avodah, because it is a very fundamental ability that is needed, if one wishes to live a life of truth. It is not enough if a person has love for Hashem and the Torah; he needs love for other Jews too. This is because we have three pillars that are needed to uphold us – Torah (love for Torah), Avodah (love for Hashem), and Chessed (love for other Jews).

If one develops the power to do something purely for the sake of another’s well-being, he has popped the balloon of self-absorption with this little ‘needle’; he is very close to attaining pure Ahavas Yisrael. It is like a little match that you throw into a pile of straw – it can burn the entire pile. One little point of purity can destroy much evil. It is the point of truth in the soul which can penetrate through the entire ego, acting very much like a needle.

There are people who reach high spiritual comprehensions due to their love for Hashem; others reach it due to their love for Torah; and others reach it from just deep Ahavas Yisrael. This is because there are different soul roots for each person’s unique soul. But in any case, all of us need to be able to uncover at least some minimal degree of selfless love, for others.

In Summary

To summarize, the solution for one who is absorbed in talking about his praises to others, is:

1. To get used to lessen the amount of how much he brags about himself to others,
2. To talk about his shortcomings sometimes with others,
3. To devote a bit of time every towards doing something altruistically for another, so that he can begin to come out of his self-absorption.