my hassidut

The other day my wife was moving something bulky and heavy. Right before she began lifting it up, I suggested she clear a place to put it down first. I said, "That's what HaShem did, first he cleared a place for the world and then he created it." (To me, this was an implicit part of the teaching of the initial Tzimtzum)

Some people, when they learn Torah concepts, they stick them in a compartment called 'Torah.' Then they start to move things from 'Torah' into 'Something to ponder' eventually some of them get through to 'Affects Everyday Life.' (Of course there may be all different boxes with all different names.)

I don't have those intermediary boxes. I only have the 'Life' box. Everything that I hear and learn, everything that I think, automatically goes into my life. Things eventually get deeply piled into the box and I need to rummage around to bring them back into affect, but I don't have different category-boxes, there's only the one box.

This, I suspect, makes prayer a very different experience for me. Knowledge, experience, action, life, they're all synonyms for me.

People sometimes try to re-center, re-balance, or change my hashkafa. I don't really understand why, because generally, I don't see any point of conflict in particular. I agree with their ideals, it's just that God dealt me my cards, and dealt them theirs, each of us needs to play the hand we've been dealt.

For me Hassidut is a brilliant light that illuminates my world--the whole box. No item in there remains unturned when I'm learning. Maybe if people understood that I don't have the other boxes they wouldn't try so hard to change me. They would realize they don't have to; by simply telling me points of Torah they've already made it into the box, they've already won me over. [I don't even know if using the term Hassidut casts the net too small--I see Hassidut as the union of the entire Torah, what I mean by Hassidut is the totality of Torah.]

Only today, via an email from Yitz over at Heichal HaNeginah, did I really understand the difference, what it is that has got everyone so confused about me.

Thank God, I've reached (ie. God has brought me to) a point in my life where this is something that helps me and makes my life-experience richer. For years I struggled with this and suffered not understanding this not-so-subtle-difference. I'm happy for that time too, because it's a part of me, a part of the experience HaShem gave me -- straight from him to me.

B'ezrath HaShem each of us will succeed in playing their part of the whole that we are meant to be.

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