Welcome to the program. We're talking about what one does when saying Kriat Shema (recitation of the Shema). For that matter, this applies any time a person realizes that negative forces are going on inside him that don't really want to keep to what he has to keep to. Suppressing them, as we said, doesn't work. So what is a person supposed to do?
Rav Wolbe says in Alei Shur, volume 2, page 363, that a person has to get into the practice of having a discussion, a dialogue with those forces, to convince them that he really has no choice. HaKadosh Baruch Hu is your king. He's the boss over your impulses and urges as well. We're responsible for all our deeds. God gave us so much. We owe him so much. How could I be? “I don't want to get up in the morning for Kriat Shema.” I don't want to get up at 8 o'clock on a Sunday morning when Zman (time) Kriat Shema is 8.18. I don't want to get up at 7.30 to pray an 8 o'clock minyan (prayer quorum). That's not the real you, as we said. That's the Yetzer Hara (evil inclination) that has stolen your identity and says, “I don't want to get up.” You want to get up. He doesn't want you to get up. Your Yetzer HaTov (good inclination), which is right now speaking to you in the second or third person, has to say, “You know what? You know what you owe God? You're sleeping in his mattress. You're living in his house. You can't get up in the morning and say thank you.” You have to have a discussion with yourself.
It's a little bit more than that. The Gaon of Vilna, in his commentary to Mishlei 16.7, says that a person has to use the concept called Yamin mekarev, usmol marchik. Bring closer with the right and push away with the left. What exactly is that referring to? One of the things the Gemara brings down in Sotah 47a is a tinok. Rashi learns that tinok means literally a child. If you're too tough on a child, pen yivrach, he's going to run away. He's going to commit suicide out of fear. Therefore, don't be so tough. You have to have a balance. That's how Rashi learns it. But the Gaon of Vilna has a whole different explanation. The Gaon of Vilna says, “Why is it called a tinok? The child.” Those are the ways that I took from when I was young. Derachim means Middot. That refers to my animal instinct or animal soul. I followed it forever, and I got used to it. So it's called a tinok because it's been with me from when I was a kid. And that is what science calls the inner child, but the Gaon of Vilna preceded it, as many of our Torah psychology did. We all have a child inside of us.
And you have to talk to that child, just like when you want to talk to your own child. The kid wants to eat candy before he eats his meal; you have to talk to him. You have to explain it to him on his level until he understands it. Now, sometimes you have to be tough. But the rabbis make a diuk (textual inference): Yamin mekarev, the right hand brings close. The left hand brings close. Usmol marchik, and the left hand pushes away. Smol doche, I'm sorry. The left hand pushes away. Yamin mekarev, and the right hand brings close. The left hand is the weaker hand. It means the pushing away has to be weaker than the bringing close. It means you have to work with your inner child until he agrees and understands why it's better for him. We all have that inner child.
One of the rabbis says, K'neged arba banim dibra Torah. The Torah speaks about four children. Now, hold on. They said even if you're alone. So why am I reading about the four children? The rabbis answer that everyone has all four children inside them. We all have a tzaddik (righteous person). I'm sorry, a chacham. We have a wise side. We have a rasha. We have a wicked side. We also have a part of us that doesn't even know how to ask. And at petach lo (you open for him). We have to start talking to him on his level. All of these are inside of us, and we have to learn how to work with, not ignore, our inner child.