Studies in Spirituality (Covenant & Conversation Book 9)

From the perspective of eternity, we may sometimes be overwhelmed by a sense of our own insignificance. We are no more than a wave in the ocean, a grain of sand on the sea shore, a speck of dust on the surface of infinity. Yet we are here because God wanted us to be, because there is a task He wants us to perform. The search for meaning is the ques

and everything to do with social disapproval.

that what matters is not that God does what we want, but that we do what He wants. God laughs at those who think they have godlike powers. The opposite is true. The smaller we see ourselves, the greater we become.

“The religious man differs from the apparently irreligious man only by experiencing his existence not simply as a task, but as a mission.

The essential principle here is what the Sages meant when they said, “A prisoner cannot release himself from prison” (Berakhot 5b). It needs someone else to lift you out of depression.

Frankl used to say that the way to find meaning was not to ask what we want from life. Instead we should ask what life wants from us. We are each, he said, unique: in our gifts, our abilities, our skills and talents, and in the circumstances of our life.

“So thank Him every morning for the gift of life. Say the Shema twice daily for the gift of love. Join your voice to others in prayer so that His spirit may flow through you, giving you the strength and courage to change the world. When you can’t see Him, it is because you are looking in the wrong direction. When He seems absent, He is there behind

We can make a difference, and it is potentially immense. That should be our mindset, always.

Yet this is, as Maimonides said, “the way of the world.” We are embodied souls. We are flesh and blood. We grow old. We lose those we love. Outwardly we struggle to maintain our composure but inwardly we weep. Yet life goes on, and what we began, others will continue. Those we loved and lost live on in us, as we will live on in those we love.