Over the past two days, we’ve discussed Rabbenu Yonah talking about a concept that he coined Tikva B’Pratim, which means relying on Hashem for the details. He quotes a pasuk in Tehilim,
קִוִּ֣יתִי ה׳ קִוְּתָ֣ה נַפְשִׁ֑י
Kiviti Hashem Kivta Nafshi/I hope to Hashem, my soul hopes
My soul is to Hashem.
Rabbenu Yonah says, “This concept is extremely honorable. Through this conditioning of constantly the recognizing Hashem all the small details in your desiring soul will accept the Bitachon.”
What exactly is the desiring soul?
In Mishleh 1,22, Rabbenu Yonah explains that there are three types of souls that a human being has. Soul number one, he calls the the soul of growth.
People have it, animals have it, and even trees have it. And this, he says, is found in the human being in his liver. It's called the nefesh.
Number two is Koach Hamitaveh/the force of desire. Human beings and animals have it and it's found in the heart. It's called the Ruach, or animalistic soul.
Finally, we have the intellect. It's referred to as Kavod or the Neshama, and that's what separates human beings from animals.
The Nefesh Hamitaevet is the animalistic instinct, the instinctive feelings that we have inside of us.
Says Rabbenu Yonah, it's not enough that our bitachon is in our brains. Our bitachon has to get into our gut to have a natural, immediate reaction. How do you get there? Through the conditioning on what he calls the Pratim. Rabbenu Yonah writes the same in 3,26 where he says the highest level of bitachon is,
קִוִּ֣יתִי יְ֭הֹוָה קִוְּתָ֣ה נַפְשִׁ֑י
which means that the soul of desire -your gut, your animalistic self, your natural reaction- has received bitachon. That's your automatic reaction. This is what he calls hatikva bapratim/the hope in the small details. This is no small exercise- keeping Hashem on your mind constantly in the little things.
If your bitachon is only in your head, it won’t help you because when stress and anxiety come in, you don't have a head. Your brain shuts down when you're anxious.
Anxiety creates a flight or fight reaction, and Hashe
Made it this way for a reason. There's a part of your brain that Hashem put there to protect you, called the amygdala, which releases a chemical called cortisol that makes you energized.
When you hear the screeching sound of a bus, you run. Your frontal cortex, which is the thinking part of your brain, shuts down, because if you're going to start thinking and make a decision, you’ll get hit by the bus. So you have no brain when you're anxious. Therefore, if we wait for our brain to kick in, it's not going to happen when we need it the most. When we're anxious, we want to overcome our bitachon.
But we have the answer.
We need to get to the point where our bitachon doesn't need our brain.
When bitachon has become a natural reaction, so that just like you hear the bus screech and you run, you hear the bus screech and your bitachon is activated. It’s an animal instinct and that comes about through conditioning.
This is a fascinating concept that we need to spend more time on- bitachon that becomes instinctive. Have a wonderful day.