So Hard to Change - Parshat Beshalach

I just don’t get it. I know, sometimes, that I will repeat a mistake. Yet I do it anyway. Maybe if I had some sign from heaven to actively pursue the proper course I wouldn’t busy myself with mistakes. Nah, don’t kid yourself - that doesn’t really work either. How do I know that? Even a sign from heaven wouldn't shake me to change?

The Children of Israel had just witnessed God's hand actively at work in Egypt. Not one, not two or three, not five - but 10 plagues were brought upon the Egyptians .Yet, were the Israelites turned into immediate believers? Does this week's parsha, Parshat Beshalach, tell us that when they were taken out, they were unfailingly trusting of God and Moses? No, because apparently it was not true. They were taken out of Egypt via a circuitous route because they were suspected of wanting to go back to Egypt at the first sign of trouble and if there were an easy path to return, they would take it.1 Rashi even brings cases where this did in fact occur and it was expressed verbally, even within a few days of the Exodus!2 Seeing God's hand at work did not create consistent, true believers. It apparently doesn’t work that way. Change needs more than that.

A mindset is perhaps the most difficult thing to change. The Rambam, too, notices and highlights the difficulty repenting from thoughts.3 There are limiting beliefs and mindsets that limit and hold us back. There is negative self-talk and a lack of belief in one's worthiness. We 'nay-say' ourselves.

Miracles, as we see, cannot change us - but they can inspire us. There are miracles occurring every day around us. We need to be open to those occurrences around us and locate those things which move us and then go in that direction.

Yet as humans we are capable of making that change. Life challenges us time and again. Sometimes it even knocks us down. And each time we need to get up again. It can take more or less time but we can get up - emotionally and noetically - each time.

By focusing on what we wish to be, we can move forward towards that change that we wish to see in ourselves. The motivation towards fulfilling our own meaning is the prime motivation in life.4 Being able to find that meaning and work towards it, can help us create a new mindset; not by battling the old one, which would only empower the old one, but, rather, by replacing it with a more positive and energetic one.

There is so much to live for. Then we will be able to live the change that we want to see in ourselves.

 Notes

  1. Shemot 13:17
  2. ibid. 14:11-12
  3. Mishneh Torah, Laws of Repentance, 4:5
  4. Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning

Have A Great Shabbat!laughing

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