"A person plans, for example, to purchase a table, chairs or the like. Preferably, before leaving the house, he should think to himself and say, "I am going to buy a table and chairs. I cannot really choose at all. Only HaShem will determine which table I will purchase. What I do and the choice I make will not make any difference at all, but nevertheless according to the level of hishtadlut (required effort) expected of me, I need to go about making a choice, as the book Mesillat Yesharim says that even though one extends an effort, he must know that his effort does not really accomplish the result."
~Building a Sanctuary in the Heart, Section 4: Belief in Divine Providence
I was puzzled by this statement at first - I mean, how can/could one really live this way? And what does it mean? Does it mean that if I make a bad or immoral choice, that G-d also already determined that immoral result, too? To take it to a very harsh extreme, if a person commits adultery, is this saying (as if such a thing were possible) that G-d determined the adulterous act, and the participants simply determined the engagement and steps leading up to it?
On the other hand, there was something that rang true to me in this concept, as it reminded me of a passage from the Tao Te Ching, wherein Lao Tse teaches that "The master does her work, and then let's go. The people around her look at the results and say 'look what we've done!'"
There is an idea in Taoism that espouses a detachment from results, with a focus on the service of working towards noble results. Succeed or fail, the master stays even-keeled emotionally.
There is also a principle taught in the Jewish Oral Tradition from Sinai, Pirkei Avot, which informs us that the Spiritual reward of life is tied to our efforts and struggle in our endeavors, and not to the results.
And doesn't this make sense? After all, haven't we all witnessed the terrible failures of people despite their sincere and hard-working efforts to reach a successful outcome? And haven't we seen people 'get lucky', experiencing incredible success and results with almost zero effort?
So how can we imagine that results are within our control -- we all know that this is not true. But we also know that our efforts regarding a matter are absolutely within our hands.
So how, I wondered, does this tie in with the teaching that "everything is in the hands of G-d, except for our own personal awe of G-d." This is a core tenet in Jewish philosophy. But if all effort is within my hands, how does choosing furniture for my home or picking an unbruised apple from the fridge tie in to my own personal awe of G-d? If only the personal awe of G-d is within my control, and all other things are pre-determined, then how does effort play in?
It occurred to me that an awe of G-d implies a sensitivity to the values G-d has shared with us, like creating peace in my home, honoring my wife, caring for and providing an education to my children, engaging in acts of charity, creating a just society and a just world, and an overall concern and dedication to the well-being of my fellow human beings (and the natural world around us!). Peace in the home and an ability to provide for my wife and children certainly further ties in with striving towards financial stability, which entails developing myself professionally and seeking secure and successful employment.
In other words, an awe of G-d is most sincerely manifest in an effort to live according to the values G-d has taught me, and to meet the day to day responsibilities and duties inherent to fulfilling those values.
And its ironic, because personally, I have always been a results-oriented person, even somewhat obsessed with the goals I want to get to, and seeking the shortest and cleverest path to get there. My own focus has always de-emphasized the world of effort and pre-occupied with the goals themselves.
But when one realizes that no matter how hard he or she works, the goals are never within our control, it shifts the focus of our lives in a very meaningful, and even positive way.
The results will be what they will be. We can not control them, because no matter how carefully we plan, there is always a profound element of unpredictability (translate: pre-determination). But our efforts to reach that goal are squarely within our control, as are the motivations behind our efforts.
And it is impossible to speak of a focus on effort without also committing to living within a structured daily schedule, as unstructured effort is like an open firehose with no fire-fighter holding it -- time dispersed at random with its full value unrealized.
If we work for the sake of Heaven, then we work with focus and discipline for those around us - our spouses, our children, our community, and our world. If we are working for our own self-gratification and egos, then we are essentially idol-worshipers wherein the idol is our own selves. For G-d has challenged us to devote our energy to the world around us, and only to ourselves in as much as our own self-care is necessary to serve the world. Selfishness, arrogance, and hedonism place my own physical self before G-d, and are therefore is no less corrupt than idol-worship itself.
The master does his or her work, and then lets go. And the people around marvel and say: "look what we've done".
The world turns because G-d turns it. And the table I sit at in the home I live in is a blessing from G-d, and not the result of my actions. More accurately, the blessings are possibly a result of the spirit in which I engaged in those and other action; for if that spirit of effort is pure and G-dly, it is the actual source of blessing in all of our lives.
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