According to the great philosopher and physician, Rabbi Moshe Ben Maimon (Maimonides), to be physically healthy is “among the ways of God. Because one cannot understand or have any knowledge of the Creator if he is ill. Therefore, he must avoid that which harms the body, and accustom himself to that which is healthful and helps the body become stronger.”  

In other words, taking care of our physical body allows our soul to reside in a healthy vessel, which helps us to achieve our life’s purpose.

However, taking care of your body is not an end in itself. The end goal of living is to continuously develop a deeper closeness with God. We do this with both our body and our soul. The body is a ‘servant’ of the soul and allows the soul to grow and refine itself by following the Torah’s directives.

Tending to our physical selves includes eating healthfully, exercising regularly, having good sleep habits and managing stress.*  Additionally, taking vacations, enjoying a hobby and having other special interests help to nourish and reinvigorate our bodies and souls, and are included in this “Ball.”

 * NOTE: It is prudent to consult with a physician to assess your personal physical condition before making changes to your diet or exercise.

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A person is composed of both body and soul. The body is finite, but the soul is eternal. Judaism teaches that your soul will live on after you die. 

The soul was ‘breathed’ into us by God. It’s a spark of God’s essence.

 

STOP: READ THE FOLLOWING CAREFULLY…

 

Your soul is your real self.

If most of your time is spent taking care of the physical self’s stuff (i.e., work, exercise, your appearance, your net worth, your possessions, showcasing your image on social media), you will eventually feel angst, emptiness and/or sadness. These nagging feelings are a ‘soul alert.’ Your soul is telling you to invest more time in your spiritual life.  

 

What can I do?

Here are some suggestions to help you develop an even more intimate, personal relationship with God, the One who created you:

1.) Set up a regular time for quiet.  Find a peaceful spot. Turn off your phone. Reflect on your day, your direction, your life. Meditate. Listen to your soul talking to you.

2.) Talk to God several times each day — not only 3 times daily from a prayer book, but also throughout the day — in your own words.

3.) Experience gratitude. Thank God for the things in your life that you might take for granted. For example, each day when you first wake up and use the bathroom, focus on the simple pleasure of being able to “relieve yourself.” (Imagine if you couldn’t.) Or what about whenever you notice your body’s amazing design, its sinews and muscles, like those near your elbow joint when you bend your arm to brush your teeth.

4.) Notice, and say out loud, specific things that you enjoy in the moment. Yes, this all may be nothing new, but it works to restart your ‘joy machine.’ See the miracles in everyday life: a rainbow, a rose-bud, a peach, a puppy, a baby, the dew…

5.) Learn Torah. The Torah is the instruction manual for life given to us 3,300 years ago by God. It is THE most efficient way to learn how to connect with God. The Torah gives instructions, commandments, also known as mitzvahs, which help us take advantage of our time on Earth in a way that we’ll  feel connected to God in this world…and the next.

5.a.) To start learning Torah, acquire a Chumash (Torah with commentary from the sages). Start by following along with the current week’s parasha (chapter). You’ll instantly be ‘on the same page’ as every Jew on the planet! 

5.b.) See ‘THE LEARNING PYRAMID‘ (scroll below) — a sleek, simple guide to add Torah learning into your life.

6.) Attend classes or visit websites to discover the core values of Judaism. Websites can provide wonderful wisdom to guide and inspire you, sites such as:

        aish.com

        chabad.org

        simpletoremember.com

        torahanytime.com

7.) Seek ‘spiritual navigators’ to be your mentors and teachers. Discover and listen to world-renowned Rabbis such as R’ Manis Friedman, R’ Yisroyel Bernath or the late R’ Lord Jonathan Sacks or R’ Noah Weinberg (search YouTube…). 

8.) Ask yourself which of your character traits need upgrading — 

 Do you often experience: 

        …jealousy?  
        …anger? 
        …laziness? 
        …addictive behaviors? 
        …procrastination? 
        …disorganization?

 

The refinement of character is a large part of the work God wants from us. If you are not already learning about character development in Jewish sources, contact a kollel or Partners In Torah (partnersintorah.org) and request a learning partner. 

 

9.) DIY reading of the classics, Pirkei Avos or Path of the Just works, too. Find those on Jewish websites or in bookstores and libraries. More suggestions: Ethics of the Fathers or If You Were God by the late Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan.

 

10.) Research has proven that just seeing green outdoors restores your spirit. Take a walk — schedule time to be in nature on a regular basis.

 

11.) Try observing the Sabbath in whatever way you can. Every Friday at sundown Jews recharge and restore for 25 hours. You can learn more about this popular practice online. Start with one small step, like lighting candles before sunset.

 

Take care of the ‘Soul Ball’ and see how much better you feel.

• Pick one activity from the list above. Try it for 5 days in a consistent way. 

The Learning Pyramid

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One of the greatest sources of joy is the love we give and the love we get. Our relationships with family and friends will either rise or fall depending on the time and quality of the attention we invest. 

For example, there’s no comparison between marriages of couples who make regular time to talk each day ‘face to face’ and those who live in a blur of texting. 

Friend relationships where the people rarely speak by phone or who don’t FaceTime or Zoom, but connect only through Instagram, WhatsApp, texts or emails, remain superficial and unsatisfying. 

The book Ethics of the Fathers says that ‘one sign God is happy with you is when the people in your life are happy with you.’ 

Those all-important relationships need nurturing!

How are you caring for your spouse, partner, parents, siblings, other relatives, friends, co-workers?

 

Interesting tip:

 

The Bible compares people to trees. Why? Because trees produce fruit, but only with the proper amounts of water, sun and nutrients. Your precious relationships need the proper amount and the right kind of care, too.

If you’re feeling isolated, maybe the relationships of special people in your life are “undernourished.” One sign is when the people in your life seem to be keeping their distance.

 

 

Ask yourself: 

 

What might I be doing — or not doing — to push others away?

 

If your marriage or significant relationship isn’t getting better every day, then it’s probably stagnating or deteriorating.

 

If your children seem angry, unhappy and non-communicative (….excluding teenagers!), perhaps you need to change something in your parenting style.

 

 

Alert: Our mother and father each deserve extra-special thought, too.  

 

Why? The fifth of the 10 Commandments requires that we treat our parents with incredible care. 

 

Parents gave us the ‘Ultimate Gift’ — life itself! They changed untold dozens of your diapers, fed you thousands of meals, wiped your tears away, fed you, housed you, etc. Make sure you look closely at your parental relationships.

 

 

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The danger we face in ‘Career Ball’ is becoming a workaholic. Particularly in a world that defines you by your career. 

When people first meet you they’ll often ask, “So, what do you do?”  (What do I do?!  Many things…I’m a parent, lawyer, son, runner, reader, etc.)  This is a hint they’re probably sizing you up by your job title, your income or who you work for. Given these common societal misconceptions, beware:

EMOTIONAL DANGER LURKS HERE.

If your job title is how you define yourself — and how you support your self-esteem — you could wind up spending excessive amounts of time on your career. 

Judaism, however, does NOT define a person by their career. Rather, your personhood is showcased by several other factors:

How you behave morally (i.e., Are you kind, truthful, patient, generous, cheerful, warm, non-gossiping, not petty?, etc.).

How you spend your time (Do you spend adequate quality-time with your spouse, children, parents and also helping in your community?).

Do you make time to learn Torah and other Jewish works?

Judaism teaches that every person is created “in the image of God.” This awareness alone can create healthy self-esteem! All that being said, obviously one’s professional life is extremely important. And, if you’re lucky, you like the work that you do to support yourself. But, be careful that your career doesn’t monopolize your life/time at the expense of the other key areas.

The flip side of the coin is that sometimes your career does require extra attention because you haven’t invested the needed time. 

 

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Imagine you’ve gotten to where you feel your life is well-balanced…

Your body feels great, you’re taking good care of your soul by learning Torah and engaging in regular prayer/meditation.

You’ve got your love-life moving forward towards commitment, or you’re working on your existing marriage.

Your career is trending upward.

Seems like you’ve “got it covered.”

Well…not quite. 

You still might feel like something is missing.

The Talmud asks: “If I’m only for myself, what am I?”

It’s giving us a strong hint on how to boost joy. 

 

 

We need to extend kindness to those outside our circle of friends and family.

Your life will not feel quite right unless you’re helping others.

This can take the form of volunteering at a food bank to pack or to deliver groceries; visiting people in a nursing home; contacting someone who’s stuck homebound or feels isolated; calling a friend who’s going through tough times. 

Devise ways to give. Find your ‘sweet spot’ based on your background, abilities, financial situation and social reach. 

Fill yourself with good.

Consider having you and your family invite Shabbos guests over, especially single people who might otherwise be alone, or Jews who have not yet experienced Shabbat.

When choosing a Chesed (kindness), pick an avenue that resonates with your personality and utilizes your talents.

 

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KEY POINTS

• Some drivers in our lives are destructive or keep us from reaching our potential.
• We can think of common drivers likes steps on a ladder from most negative to most positive.
• By acknowledging your drivers, you have the opportunity to focus on and change them.

When you step back and look at the landscape of your life, what’s drives you? What shapes what you do, not in terms of priorities—the things you focus on—but the engine that pushes your life along?

Seeing our lives as being driven is not new to psychology. Freud mapped out his 5 stages of development: oral, anal, phallic, genital, that not only propel a child’s development but can shape the adult’s.¹ And Maslow became famous for his Hierarchy of Needs, which moves up from the biological to self-actualizing.² As these authors point out, there are good and bad drivers, but each sets the pace, the tone of your life. You can choose what drives you, but the challenge is that you don’t choose. Instead, you accept what you get, or get used to, and call it life. You can change that, but first, you need to know where you stand.

Here are some of the most common drivers, ranked from those with the most significant positive impact (passions) to those providing the most negative impact (addictions). The line separates what we might consider adverse mental health from the positive.

Passions / Purpose

Goals

Routines

______________

Emotionally Driven / Shoulds / Self-Criticism

Anxiety / Depression

Addictions

Here’s how they break down:

Addictions

Here we think of alcoholism, drugs, sex, workaholism. What makes them addictive is that they kidnap your brain. Rational thinking goes offline, your midbrain pleasure center takes over and you just do what you do because you do it. You’re the passenger, and your addiction is running your life.

Anxiety / Depression

Unfortunately, this is the driver for too many of us. According to the Anxiety & Depression Association of America, anxiety is the number one mental health problem in the U.S. affecting 18 percent of the population.³ It can take many forms—panic attacks, obsessive-compulsive disorder, generalized anxiety, phobias. But regardless of the form, the impact is the same—your life is derailed. You worry, you avoid, you feel compelled to do things that you know are irrational, occupying too much of your time and mind.

Depression is the cousin of anxiety. Often, they go hand-in-hand. Worry leads to feeling overwhelmed, which can lead to feeling stuck or trapped, leading to feeling hopeless. When one or both of these take over, you are either always thinking about the what-ifs of the future or regretful and trapped by the past. The present dissolves into a blur.

Emotionally Driven / Shoulds / Self-criticism

While these are not formally diagnosable conditions, each has a negative impact on your life. Folks who are emotionally driven tend to run their lives based on how they feel. If they “feel” like cleaning up the house, they do; if they don’t, they don’t. While there’s an apparent spontaneity in their lives, they also struggle with the discipline needed to get things done that are difficult or necessary. They miss deadlines, problems get swept under the rug, they can seem to be unreliable to others.

Those driven by too many shoulds can go too far in the other direction. Rules run their lives. They can seem rigid with their black and white thinking and may feel guilty for breaking the rules. Because the rules are usually inherited from others, running your life this way often keeps you out of touch with your deeper needs and wants.

Finally, self-criticism is the bully who beats you up when you break the rules. Rather than enjoying your life, you spend much of your time trying to stay out of trouble with yourself.

Routines

Routines are useful. Without them, our anxiety goes up and we are essentially forced to invent each day from scratch. But if your days become too routinized, we’re running on autopilot; there’s too little spontaneity, few opportunities for joy. Life is safe but bland.

Goals

Setting goals and working towards them are good antidotes to routine’s downsides. You are proactive rather than reactive, creative rather than staid. But you can undermine your goals if you are emotionally driven. When the going gets tough and the goals are not your own, you lose enthusiasm, or your expectations are unrealistic. When that happens, it’s easy for anxiety, self-criticism, and depression to take over.

Passions/Purpose

Passion and purpose are at the top of our ladder because they arise from that core of who we are and want to be and carry none of the baggage of the others. When driven by passion and purpose, we are honest with ourselves and others. There is a natural integrity as our inner and outer lives reflect each other. We have the discipline to do what we want and need to do, yet can change our minds and be spontaneous without guilt or self-criticism.

So, when you step back and look at your life, what are your drivers? What keeps you from moving up that ladder? What do you need to do to reach greater fulfillment? How can you start today?

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As parents, we want our kids to feel good about themselves, so we try to praise them as much as possible.

That’s not necessarily a bad thing. Research shows that there are benefits to praising kids. A simple compliment can generate self-worth and pride. However, it depends on what kind of praise we give, as well as when and how frequently.

As a psychotherapist who works with parents and children, I’ve seen over and over again the negative effects of overpraising a child’s talent or outcome (“This looks amazing!” “You’re so handsome!” “Good job!”).

But these short, exaggerated reactions can cause kids to only focus on things that may harm their self-esteem. They might feel performance anxiety (“If I get this answer wrong, I am dumb”), for example, or believe that they are only appreciated for their appearance (“What if people think I look weird in this shirt? Then they won’t love me”).

So should you praise your kids at all? Of course. But there are right and wrong ways to give praise. Here’s what parents of confident, self-motivated and mentally strong kids always do:

1. They praise the process

2. They never make it a competition

3. They use observational language

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KEY POINTS

• People can build strong relationships by becoming better listeners and improving communication.
• Being a good listener involves clarifying, reflecting feelings, attending to non-verbal cues, paraphrasing, and asking open-ended questions.
• Conflict is inevitable, but its impact on a relationship depends on whether partners feel understood.

Strong relationships require good communication. Being a better communicator may sound intimidating, but it’s really as easy a building a key skill: being a good listener.

It sounds simple. We (mostly) hear our partner’s questions, comments, stories, complaints, and helpful suggestions. But how often do we truly listen? Too often we’re only superficially registering that they’re talking, waiting for our chance to jump in and say what we want. That needs to change. Everyone wants to feel heard in their relationship, your partner included. For good reason too, because research shows that being a good listener is an important social skill that nurtures social connections (Gearhart & Bodie, 2011).

Improving your listening skills starts with answering a basic question: What is the simple key to improving communication with your partner? The answer: Give a “C.R.A.P.O.”

Yes, you have to care about what the other person is saying. But C.R.A.P.O. is also a clever acronym to help you remember the five key behaviors for being a better listener:

1. Clarify – How often are you 100% perfectly clear about what your partner tells you? Probably not that often, or as often as you think. That’s not good enough. If your partner explains themselves, shares how they feel, or tells you something important, they deserve to be fully understood. No mistakes, fuzziness, or misinterpretations allowed.

To get it right you can’t rely on assumptions. To remove all doubt, just ask. Keep them talking so you can gather more information and enhance your comprehension. Along the way, your questions can also help your partner process their own thoughts and feelings. To accomplish that, we should ask things like:

• “What did you mean by ___?”
• “Am I correct that ___ is the key issue?”
• “Can you give an example of ___?”
• “When you mentioned ___, what exactly are you saying?”

2. Reflect Feelings – Ok, I have to fess up. I should have named this “empathy” but spelling out C.R.A.P.O. required an “R” so I improvised. That said, the “R” could also stand for “Really Important.” Of the five keys, reflecting feelings may be the most essential. To master empathy you need to realize that behind anything your partner communicates is an emotion they’re hoping we pick up on. Sometimes it’s super obvious (e.g., “I feel completely unappreciated around here.”). Other times it’s not clear at all, like when your partner just gives a loud sigh or says “I’m tired.”

When it’s ambiguous, don’t ignore it. Instead, give a C.R.A.P.O. by making an effort to figure it out. Dig in to identify deeper feelings and identify them as specifically as possible. Instead of saying “you sound mad” branch out to more nuanced feelings like hurt, frustration, annoyance, undervalued, or unfulfilled. If those sound hard to identify, they may be at first, but you’ll get better with practice.

It’s also ok to be wrong. Even if you’re off base, your partner sees that you’re trying, which opens the door for them to elaborate. In fact, when it comes to empathy and relationship satisfaction, research shows that effort matters more than accuracy (Venaglia & Lemay, 2019). You get points for trying.

This is what empathy or reflecting feelings looks like:

Scenario: Your partner comes home and complains about their commute.

Bad: “Sounds awful.” Or “Yeah, commuting sucks.”

Better: “You must be frustrated.”

Best: “You work so hard, that commute must be stressful and is the last thing you needed.”

3. Attending – Being a good listener isn’t just about what you say, but also how you look. Though you may spend more time worrying about finding the right things to say, you also need to attend to your nonverbal signals. Those involve anything you do that sends messages to your partner that go beyond the words you use. It’s everything you do to show your partner that you’re completely present and fully engaged. Doing so shows your partner that they’re important to us and helps us pay attention. Here are few ways to boost nonverbals:

• Sit squarely facing your partner
• Be open (e.g., no crossed arms)
• Lean slightly toward them
• Maintain eye contact (no staring at your phone or other screens)
• Have a relaxed posture (not too stiff or rigid)

4. Paraphrasing – A big part of listening is making it clear to your partner that you “get it.” To do that, you want to recap what your partner just said to you, but in your own words. This shouldn’t devolve into a word-by-word thesaurus challenge, but should be a quick summary. That isn’t easy, but your efforts are worth it because paraphrasing shows you care and are fully invested.

To really capture what your partner is saying and rephrase it, you’ll need to pay really close attention and listen intently. Not coincidentally, these are two key pieces of being a good listener. Here are some suggestions to help you with paraphrasing:

• “You’re basically saying…”
• “Sounds like…”
• “Essentially…”
• “To me, it feels like…”

5. Open-ended questions – When most people talk, you’re honestly not super interested. But your partner isn’t most people. Your partner deserves more from you. Show them that you give a C.R.A.P.O. by letting your partner have the spotlight. Not only that, do everything you can to let them talk and work through their thoughts and feelings.

The easiest way to do that is by asking open-ended questions that show your partner you want to hear more. But not just any questions. You’ll want to avoid simple yes/no questions, and ones that focus on who, what, when, and where facts (though getting those right is an important part of the clarify step). Instead, pose questions that require deeper analysis. Some great options are:

• “What led you to that decision?”
• “How do you see this situation resolving itself?”
• “How did you arrive at this conclusion?”
• “What do you think led to this happening?”
• “What was their intention?”
• “If I was in a similar circumstance, what would you suggest I do?”

Every relationship has flaws. But relationship discord doesn’t have to threaten your relationship. Rather, conflict’s impact on a relationship depends on whether partners feel understood (Gordon & Chen, 2016). When someone doesn’t feel heard, conflict is harmful, but when we feel like our partner knows where we’re coming from, disharmony is less of a threat. When you use your emotional intelligence by taking the time to show your partner that you truly care about what they’re saying, they feel heard. Being a good listener is an important life skill both in and out of your relationship. But, when our partner “gets us” and we felt heard, communication improves and the relationship grows stronger.

This essay is adapted from Stronger Than You Think: The 10 Blind Spots That Undermine Your Relationship…and How to See Past Them.

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• Attempts to make others happy increase happiness more so than trying to make oneself happy, new research suggests.
• The findings may seem counterintuitive, but they confirm previous research that shows that people derive happiness from helping others.
• Feelings of “relatedness,” or being close to others, may help explain why helping others boosts mood.

Martin Luther King Jr. said the “surest way to be happy is to seek happiness for others.”

New research published by a team of psychologists at the University of Missouri-Columbia suggests that King’s words are as true today as they were a half-century ago — that our own happiness is, in part, influenced by the kindness and generosity we show others.

“Americans are guaranteed the right to ‘pursue happiness’ for themselves,” say the researchers, led by Liudmila Titova and Kennon Sheldon. “But might they be better off if they pursued happiness for others? We compared the two strategies, showing that, ironically, the second pursuit brings more personal happiness than the first.”

Helping Others Boosts Happiness

To arrive at this conclusion, the authors asked a group of research participants to engage in a series of behaviors and thought experiments that pitted acts of self-directed happiness against those aimed at improving the happiness of others. In one study, participants were approached on the street after parking their cars. They were given a few quarters by a research assistant and were asked to either feed their own parking meters or the meters of an adjacent car. The researchers then asked participants how happy they felt. Interestingly, people who fed others’ meters showed a greater boost in happiness than those who fed their own meters, despite not knowing who they were helping.

In another experiment, the researchers asked participants to either recall a time they tried to make someone else happy or themselves. Participants were asked to write a few sentences describing the event and rate how happy it made them feel. Again, participants who were prompted to recall a time they tried to improve the happiness of someone else reported higher levels of remembered happiness than those who wrote about a time when they tried to improve their own happiness.

“The results of these studies extend findings from previous research by showing that people derive boosted personal happiness from attempts to make other people happy — an approach that might seem counterintuitive for a lot of people at first,” state the researchers.

Inspiring Feelings of Closeness

The research squares with other studies showing how spending money on others increases one’s happiness more than spending money on oneself. But it’s not just financial generosity that has the power to increase our happiness — donating our time to someone in need, or simply adopting a mentality that puts others’ happiness above our own, has a positive impact on our psychological well-being.

The researchers offer a good explanation for why they saw the results they did. They suggest that it has to do with our basic psychological need for “relatedness,” or feeling close to others. According to the researchers, an attempt to make another person happy inspires feelings of closeness which, in turn, explains why people end up feeling happy themselves. The same chain of reasoning does not work when attempts at happiness or mood enhancement are self-directed.

Furthermore, this research adds another bullet point to a growing list of scientifically vetted techniques aimed at improving happiness. For instance, other emerging research has found that increasing our sense of mattering and autonomy, as well as making an effort to surround ourselves with optimistic people (and to live in a happier society), are also viable ways to improve psychological well-being.

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Benjamin Scheibehenne from the University of Basel and his colleagues, Jutta Mata from Stanford University & Peter Todd from Indiana University, suggest that even though people will claim to be pretty good at predicting the likes and dislikes of others we are often anything but good. Surprisingly, they present evidence showing that the longer we know someone, far from our predictions getting better, they may actually get worse.

In one set of studies, those subjects who were asked to predict the preferences of people they had known for a relatively short time were accurate 42% of the time. Surprisingly those who predicted the preferences of someone that they had known for a much longer time were accurate just 36% of the time. Perhaps the most telling result of all was how little awareness people had over how well they actually knew people. In pre-study tests, both groups estimated that their prediction accuracy would be at least 60%.

Excerpted from: Older? Yes! But Wiser? Maybe Not! – Insideinfluence.com July 5, 2011

Although many may be surprised by the results of this study, my anecdotal experience as a marriage and relationship coach firmly backs them up. The biggest problem most couples have is not what they don’t know about each other, but rather what they think they do know. I’m amazed by how often my clients – some of whom have been in their relationships for decades – are convinced that they know all sorts of things about their spouse, when in fact they don’t seem to have a clue. And although their cluelessness is obvious to me (and their spouse), it’s usually not at all so for them. In fact, as the results of the abovementioned study indicate, the degree to which they are sure of what they know is often a pretty good indicator as to just how off-base they actually are.

We tend to forget that our experience is a product of our unique and personal perception of life.

The study attempts to identify reasons why longer-term relationships might engender less knowledge and awareness – such as a decreased motivation to learn, a higher likelihood to assume knowledge, or a greater tendency amongst the “more committed” to feel the need to tell little white lies. These explanations are valid but fail to nail the essential point, which is that we tend to forget that our experience is a product of our unique and personal perception of life. As a result, we generally equate greater experience with greater knowledge, but the truth is that no matter how convinced we are about the way something looks to us, we must never assume that it looks that way to the next person. If we truly understood this, we would feel a powerful combination of humility about our own perspective, and curiosity about how the world actually looks through the eyes of others.

I’m struck by the kinds of things that people assume about each other. I’ve come across husbands who are convinced that their wives don’t care about their own children, and wives who believe that their husbands are only interested in working them to the bone. I’ve even had people tell me with complete wide-eyed sincerity that their friends actually derive great pleasure from being difficult and uncooperative. It’s almost as if they believe that people wake up in the morning, look in the mirror, and say to themselves, “I think I’m going to ruin somebody’s life today!” And they are often so enamored by their personal take on reality that even when their spouse or friend denies having those thoughts and motivations, they refuse to believe them.

The basic assumption of innocence that underpins America’s legal system often fails to extend itself to our personal relationships. Many of us are likely to fare better at the hands of an anonymous jury of our peers than at the hands of those who supposedly know us and care about us most.

According to our sages, the fast of Tisha B’Av is meant to wake us up to the fact that the painful lack of holiness in our world, and the more than 2,000 years of suffering that our people have experienced as a result, have all been caused by baseless hatred (sinat chinam in Hebrew). There is no better time than now to reflect upon the truth that most hatred stems not from people’s actions, but from our assumption of guilt regarding their thoughts and motivation. No doubt, there are people out there who are making poor choices and behaving improperly on an objective scale, but we must never forget that it’s our tendency to attribute hostile intent, and not the deeds themselves, that causes the anger, resentment, and ultimately the hatred that we feel within ourselves for our fellow human beings.

So next time we feel the urge to judge someone we know – be it a relative, co-worker or a friend – let’s stop and take a moment to get in touch with how frustrating it feels to be misunderstood and pigeonholed by someone else. With a modicum of humility, we just might let go of our assumptions and consider the possibility that the people in our lives are really no different than us. They’re trying to do the very best that they can, regardless of how things may appear to us.

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