The Rambam, in the laws of Teshuva, tells us that even though Teshuva and crying out to God are always good, during the ten days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, it's extremely beautiful, and is accepted immediately. He quotes a pasuk and adds, Call out to Him when He is close.
Call out to means pray. So it’s a rule that Aseret Yeme Teshuva is not only a time for Teshuva, it's a time for prayer as well. Of course, it’s always a time for prayer,in a sibur/group, and Rambam continues with a pasuk that says, Whenever we call out to Him, but it’s something special for the individual to pray during Aseret Yeme Teshuva, so of course, we should take advantage of these days to pray.
As we've mentioned in the past, Rav Wolbe discusses that one of the biggest interferences in our prayer is arrogance. He explains that we know it says that when a person prays, he has to leave all of his business behind. When you close your eyes and start to pray, a picture of the next meal you have to make, or the next deal you have to make, should not pop into your mind. Your mind should be clear of those things.
But how do we do that? We're involved in so many things. How do we just stop and shut our brains off?
The answer is, if a person really believes that everything that he does needs prayer to be successful, he will realize, “Why am I even thinking about that? As if I have control over it!?”
All of those interferences are a sign that we haven't connected those things with prayer. If a person connects their next meal, or their next deal, with prayer, then it's not going to pop up, because you know that it needs prayer to happen. And if it does pop up, that means that deep down, I think that I can do it on my own.
And therefore, in the words of Rav Wolbe, the biggest interference to our prayer is Ga’avah/ arrogance, because deep down we give ourselves a certain amount of credibility. Not only are the things that we have to do on our minds and preoccupying us, but we see ourselves as the center of the world. Our needs are the most important thing.
Even when you are praying with kavana in the Amida and you say Refaenu,, thinking about the sick person in your home, or Barchenu, thinking about the success that I need in my financial life…. you're not saying
Refaeni /heal me and Barcheni/bless me. You’re talking about the Jewish people at large, so if a person is only focused on themselves, they're lacking in the actual text of the prayer. Therefore, Rav Wolbe says Tefila and Ga’avah prayer and arrogance are an oxymoron.
The two can't go together. The essence of prayer is humility, and that humility of prayer gives us a different outlook on life. Therefore, we need to, of course, focus on prayer, but we also have to spend a little time before we pray focusing on the need for prayer. Rav Wolbe writes in a different place, that deep down, we really believe that we can handle things.
We believe that we can take care of things. We think we have a certain understanding and knowledge, and we can do things, and so therefore prayer is an extra.
Well, at least during Aseret Yeme Teshuva, we have to really feel that we can’t take anything for granted. The decisions are being made now, and we really, really need our prayers to make things happen.
That's one of the reasons that it's easier to pray during Aseret Yeme Teshuva-because of the realization of how much we need prayer and how nothing is taken for granted because decisions are being made now.
So let us start our prayers with a little thought when we bow down to Hashem, that we are humbling ourselves to God. That's why we bow down at the beginning of prayers, to stress the concept that we can't do anything on our own. We need Hashem for everything, all year long, but, especially during these special days.
Have a wonderful day.