Today we will share a thought related to the concept of Matza, Marror, and Korban Pesach. These are the three highlights of the night of Pesach. One of the questions asked is why we eat the Maror; why are we celebrating the Maror?
One of the explanations that the rabbis give is that after Yetziat Mitzrayim, we realized that, in retrospect, the maror was good. The hard work was good. We got out earlier because of it. If not for the hard work, we would have never gotten out. We were going to reach the 49th level of contamination. So the hard work was good. And that is also why we dip the maror in the sweet charoset- In order to show that the bitter brought us the sweetness.
This is one of the fundamentals of our lives. We always have to believe that everything that is happening to us is exactly directed by Hashem.
On one of my trips to Israel, Chacham Yehuda Ades told me that one of the main things to work on in life is to never be Makpid-in your heart things should not bother you. I told the Rabbi that it happens about 100 times a day that things don’t go the way we planned.
How are you not supposed to get slightly upset?
For example, you have a flight to catch, and when you get to the terminal they tell you it’s the wrong terminal. They switch you to terminal four from terminal two, and now you have to take a shuttle. Then they move you from one gate to another, etc. How do you just stay calm?
And what about when people make mistakes? What if you’re driving somewhere and your wife or daughter puts the wrong address in the Waze and you end up in the wrong place?
Or, what if, as happened to me once, you take an Uber but instead of going to E. 10th St, it goes to East 100th St? You’re driving and driving and wondering what is going on.
Rabbi Ades answered that you are supposed to think to yourself, “Imagine that an angel came down and whispered into your wife’s (or daughter, husband or whomever it may be) ear and said, ‘Punch in East 100 Street instead of E. 10th St.’” You wouldn’t get upset. You would say that God sent an angel down to do it. It’s the Ratzon Hashem/Will of God. Every step of life is the Will of God.
And then you can say to yourself, “I don’t know why, and I may never know why, but it is good for me that
God sent an angel down to change my terminal.”
That is the concept of reframing. You always have to put things in the right perspective.
I heard a related thought from the Rav Don Segal.
He said that every morning we say, “שעשה לי כל צרכי
she’asah li kol sorchi
Hashem did everything for me
Usually we think of this as meaning that we have everything that we need. But he explained that it means more than that. As a mashal, if you get up in the morning and on your way to shul you slip on a banana peel, you are supposed to say to yourself, “Wow, I did not realize that I was supposed to slip on a banana peel today.“
She’asah li kol sorchi means that everything happens exactly the way it was supposed to happen. We just didn’t know about if. This is more than just saying kapara after the fact. We are supposed to realize, from the outset, that this is what is supposed to happen. And for every small thing that happen in life, such as buying all your Passover meat and then coming home to a broken oven, you have to say, “Oh, I didn’t realize that I was going to buy meat and now I can’t cook it.” This applies to all the glitches in life.
“I didn’t realize the shipment was supposed to be late and I wasn’t supposed to receive my goods on time. I didn’t know that that was supposed to happen to me. Now I know, and now I realize.”
It’s an upbeat approach to life and it’s the biggest reframe that we can have, to look at everything with the
she’asah li kol sorchi lens.
Hashem is doing exactly what I need at every given point.
When I told Rabbi Ades, “Easier said than done,” he said that this is a life‘s work.
I’ve been hearing classes from Rabbi Ades for 40 years, since my very first year in Israel, in 1981 when I learned under rue Great Mashgiach Rav Wolbe in a yeshiva called Beer Yaakov.
They were very strict about staying in yeshiva for the high holidays. And although I grew up in Monsey, every year we would go to Brooklyn for the high holidays, in order to keep our minhagim and heritage. So I wanted to pray in a Sephardi minyan, but it wasn’t acceptable to them.
It happened to be that Rav Wolbe‘s uncle was Rabbi Yaakov Kaminetzsky, whom my family was very close to. So my parents asked Rav Yaakov what I should do. He said that I should pray in a Sefardi minyan. When I told Rav Wolbe, he said, “Okay, if that’s what the Rabbi said, that’s what you do,” and he sent me to Kol Yaakov, where his son-in-law was the Mashgiach at the time.
That Rosh Hashanah was the first time that I heard Rabbi Ades speak, and it left an indelible impression on me. He talked about speaking softly and the Igeret HaRambam, and he’s been talking about the same topic, literally, for 40 years. That’s what, “a life’s work,” means. She’asah li kol Sorchi is not something that you can just get intellectually. Every second of our lives, every day of our lives, we have to take these important lessons and internalize them.
Have a wonderful day.