Passing the test of yeoush
Is there anyone out there who doesn’t have some yeoush in their heart at the moment?
(I mean, who actually cares about the Jewish people and Eretz Yisrael, and revealing Hashem’s true goodness in the world?)
Hard times we are going through spiritually and mentally at the moment.
Many of us have so much yeoush, so much despair about everything that is going on.
It looks like evil has all the cards, all the ‘leaders’ in its pocket, all the army bought and sold, all the good people tied down and neutered.
That’s how it looks, for sure.
But Rebbe Nachman told us very clearly:
THERE IS NO YEOUSH IN THE WHOLE WORLD!!!!
====
What does this mean, tachlis?
It means that we have to lift our head out of the news, and out of the headlines, and out of the social media, and out of all the fear and worry and anger sloshing around – and only see Hashem.
EIN OD MILVADO.
There is only God.
God is arranging every single little detail here, and when God is ready, all this turns around for the very best it could be.
At least, for the people who finally make some sincere teshuva, let God into their lives, and hopefully also get with the true Tzaddikim like Rebbe Nachman and Rav Eliezer Berland.
====
If you are making some real teshuva….and trying to figure out what God wants from you personally, in the middle of all this… and trying to boost your emuna, your belief that EIN OD MILVADO….and working on identifying, acknowledging and then praying on your bad middot, that God should take them away, finally…. and giving tzedaka to genuine Torah observant Jews…and working on identifying and then sticking close to the real Tzaddik HaDor….
Really, you don’t have a lot to worry about.
====
That doesn’t mean life is going to magically become ‘easy’ – life is never ‘easy’, and it’s not meant to be easy.
‘Life’ is what happens when a soul has a bunch of bad middot and outstanding spiritual debts it didn’t clear up between itself and other people.
Gehinnom is what atones for the sins between man and God, that weren’t atoned for in a person’s life.
And ‘life’ is what atones for the sins between man and man, that they didn’t make teshuva for while they were still in a body.
That’s why it’s hard.
That’s why it’s tough.
That’s why it can sometimes seem so very unfair, and difficult, and painful and hard-to-withstand.
Because we are all down here fixing those ‘old debts’ from previous lifetimes.
====
Our generation is the worst of all.
It’s the one that came back five million times, already, and still didn’t manage to ‘fix’ things properly.
And the time is growing short, before we get into the ‘next stage’ of the world’s spiritual development process that is called geula.
That’s why the pressure is on so much everywhere, and increasing daily.
But we have a real tzaddik in our generation who has been working so very hard to ‘sweeten’ all this for decades, already.
And the people who are associated with that effort, even in the smallest of small ways, even just by having one of his prayers in the house, or giving 10 shekels to kosher tzedaka recipients associated with him or his community, or even, just following the advice to say three tikkun haklalis a day, or to read a book of tehillim – whatever it might be – we are in a bubble of protection right now.
==
The Rav has said repeatedly in the past that Shuvu Banim is the ‘ark’ of our generation.
The flood waters are reaching epic proportions – the flood of heresy and evil that Rabbenu warned would cover the whole world at this period of time, shortly before Moshiach is revealed.
Who is a strong enough ‘swimmer’, spiritually, that they can stay afloat in this mabul all by themselves, without going under?
I know I would have ‘drowned’ a long time ago, God forbid, without the Rav’s steady encouragement and protection, and without Rabbenu’s advice to do hitbodedut, work on overcoming bad middot, and to simply see God behind every little thing that is happening.
Or at least, to try to.
====
What’s the alternative?
Yesterday, one of my kids was half passed out on the couch, suffering from non-stop irritable stomach issues from all the stress and worry.
What sent her over the edge yesterday was the ‘news’ that we are about to have a week-long black out in Israel.
It might happen, it might not.
Either way – I’m not going to worry about it now.
There have been so very many horrible predictions that simply haven’t materialised – even over the last three months!
Even in the North, the Rav said right at the beginning that anyone who would listen to him had nothing to worry about.
And what was he saying to do?
To stay in your home and pray your socks off – a whole book of tehillim a day.
====
They are controlling us via our ‘fallen fears’ and our despair.
But when you connect to the Tzaddik HaDor, when you get aboard the Shuvu Banim ark – you can ‘float’ right over most of the worst of what is going on right now, wherever you happen to live, whatever happens to be going on.
That’s why I keep going on about it.
There is no other advice, for this period of time.
====
Before me and my husband got to Breslov, and then later to the Rav, we went through so much suffering and hardships, on so many different levels.
We were literally broken into pieces, and that happened more than once.
Why?
Because we still had so much arrogance, so many bad middot, so many feelings of entitlement.
God owes us nothing.
That’s the bottom line.
We are here to fix our souls, not to own big houses and have diplomas and degrees plastered all over our walls, or to have holidays in the Caribbean.
====
Life is just one big series of disappointments – until and unless we really internalise the above.
So, I don’t know what is going to happen next.
And I am also having some days when the yeoush waxes again, and I have to really put in some spade-work spiritually, in the hitbodedut, to get it back under control again, and to remember:
EIN OD MILVADO.
God is doing everything.
God is controlling everything, and everyone.
====
So, I don’t give a monkeys about Bibi, Biden, Trump, Nasrallah, Sinwar, Klaus, Soros – they are all just puppets, tools.
Their whole ‘power’ lies in the fact that we give them the respect and ‘weight’ and power that really belongs to Hashem only.
My job right now is to keep working on my emuna, my own bad middot, seeing Hashem in the world as much as possible – and then making the most of the wonderful life Hashem has still given me.
And given you, too.
Every breath is a present.
Every breath means that God is giving you more of a chance to fix your soul up, even if its via harsh suffering and pain, before moving upwards into ‘eternal life’.
It’s a good deal.
====
Don’t envy the evildoers and all their power, fame, money and materialistic prosperity.
They are having their final hoorah before God finally uproots them from all the worlds, forever.
Good wins this battle eventually, that is 100000% guaranteed.
The only question is, how we can keep ourselves ‘afloat’ while the floodwaters continue to rise.
====
On that note:
The full shiur the Rav gave over a few weeks’ OK about how writing the Torah scroll for the soldiers, kidnapped, and to get the war to end has now been fully translated into English.
You can read it on the RavBerland.com website HERE.
====
It’s full of chizzuk and very deep hints, as usual, but here is a snippet to whet your whistle:
Now that we are writing a Torah scroll, we are surrounded by fire, fire descends from heaven, and every letter is black fire upon white fire.
Every letter is black fire upon white fire – we merit to draw down fire from heaven mamash.
Because we need to pray that this war will end, because there is no end to it.
They already said that there is no end to this war. Because it is impossible to enter every house. Every house is booby-trapped, and all of it has underground tunnels beneath the houses. There are endless tunnels, endless tunnels.
It is impossible to finish it in a year.
Everything is booby-trapped. It is impossible. Every house takes a whole day, until they enter, check it, and so on. So already half the army has been removed from there.
====
The Rav was ahead of ‘the news’ by at least three weeks….
Tov.
I will put the details to donate for the scroll at the bottom of this post – please give whatever you can!
And if you gave already and you still have more ma’aseh – give again!
Whatever you can afford.
Get yourself aboard the Shuvu Banim ark, because this isn’t over yet.
====
Separately, I am taking a short break from blogging, because I have the mss of ‘Conversations 2’ to edit.
So, very slow posting next week, until I’ve got this project completed, BH.
====
Don’t give up, dear readers!
The finishing line is in sight, the doors of the ark are still open, and all this turns around for the very best very soon.
====
REMINDER:
You can help to write the Rav’s Sefer Torah for the soldiers in the following ways:
20,000 nis – donates a whole section of parchment (including the actual writing), and gets your names transcribed as donors.
5,000 nis – donates a page (parchment and writing).
OR, donate whatever amount you can afford.
In all cases, just go to THIS link, and make it clear in the comments that the donation is for the Rav’s Sefer Torah.
YOU CAN ALSO MAKE A ‘STAGED’ DONATION OVER A FEW MONTHS, IF YOU WANT TO BUY A PAGE ETC, BUT CAN’T AFFORD TO DO IT IN ONE SHOT.
A parchment:
https://buy.stripe.com/eVa9CMglm1RJ4kU00d
A page:
https://buy.stripe.com/dR67uE2uw0NFdVueV8
Anything smaller:
One of your best posts. Ein Od Milvado! Thank you Rivka
After a month after not having sinned in a certain manner I will give 15% of my money for this purpose. That means in several weeks $160. I don’t know what that accomplishes. Little, but for me that’s a lot
It’s huge. It’s not *the amount* per se, it’s the intention, and where the money is actually going to.
The prophet Jeremiah cursed his persecutors that they should give their charity money to unworthy people….
That’s probably a much greater curse than it sounds.
The Rav Berland Parsha commentary this week really helped my yeoush. I’d like to share the section here:
What did Amram do? Everything is written in Rashi. If you read the Rashi, it says that ‘Amram separated from Yocheved.’ What does it mean ‘Amram separated from Yocheved?’ We’re not talking about some random Jew in the background, some Jew in Eilat or in some basement or cave. Amram was the Gadol HaDor! Amram who kept the whole Torah! Amram who was going to be the father of Moshe Rabbenu.
When Amram divorced his wife, everyone else also divorced their wives. ‘What is this?! Every male newborn is going to be taken to the Nile?!’ ‘What?! We’re going to have children just to throw them into the Nile?!’
But then, Miriam came. A girl aged 5 ½, she was six years and six months older than Moshe, calculated from the time that she returned Yocheved to her husband. She said, ‘Abba, you’re sinning to Hashem!
!!!
*Pharaoh doesn’t exist, he never did and never will exist. There is no Pharaoh, there are no terrorists, there is no ISIS, these things simply don’t exist!’
‘The sitra achra (dark side) doesn’t exist. Pharaoh is the dark side, he doesn’t exist!*
!!!
And what’s more, you should know that Pharaoh only decrees in this world, while your decree is affecting the World to Come!’ Because these souls need to come down into the world. A person thinks to himself. ‘I’m not going to bring any more children into the world, and it’ll be easier for me that way.’ Those children that should have been born through that person may have been destined to become the Tzaddikim of the generation. Now, maybe they’ll be dropped into some rasha’s (evildoer’s) lap; who knows where these souls will end up?
And that person will be held responsible for whatever happens to them, because he was meant to bring another 10 souls down into the world, and he didn’t. So now, they got reincarnated who knows where, maybe by non-Jews, maybe they need to convert now… So, everything that now happens to them, that person is responsible for it, because he was given the job of bringing down another 10 souls, and he didn’t do it. He abstained.
He thought maybe he wouldn’t have enough food for them. He didn’t know that the souls bring their own food with them. Children bring their own sustenance with them. The moment a person brings another child into the world, they bring another room along with them. You’ll see how the apartment’s rooms expand with each and every child and you can sit there comfortably with each and every child.
Those children that you were meant to bring into the world and you didn’t, their blood is on your head. And Amram was also held responsible. He was 120 years old, maybe even 130 years old, already, and a little girl aged 5 ½ came and said, ‘Abba, you’re sinning to Hashem! Pharaoh never was and never will be. It’s just our sins, it’s the darkness of our sins, and what’s more, these souls need to come down to this lowly world, no matter what!’
She also told him, ‘Pharaoh only decreed against the males, while you are also decreeing against the females. What’s going on here?!’ So, there’ll be a girl. If a man has 10 girls, they’ll have 100 children. What’s the worst that can happen, let’s be sensible! You can’t prevent the future generations from being born.’
83 And so, Amram got up, after three months when the whole of Am Yisrael had got divorced, and all the children were crying, and all the mothers were crying and everyone was crying, ‘Ima and Abba have split up, who is going to help us to grow up? We’re going to end up being criminals, we’re going to end up becoming chilonim (secular Jews)!’ ‘What’s going on here?!’
So, Amram got up, banged on the table and said, ‘Rabotai (gentlemen)! There’s been a terrible mistake; I erred. For the last three months, we’ve all been divorced, but now return to your wives! Because I’ve made the biggest mistake of my life!’