Mussar Program

Class #13

Challenges provide the curriculum

for our spiritual growth.

by Alan Morinis

2007 JewishPathways.com

"A person who has mastered peace of mind has gained

everything." (Rabbi Simcha Zissel Ziv, the Alter of Kelm)

Jewish sources use several terms to name the soul-trait of undisturbed

equanimity. The most descriptive is menuchat ha'nefesh, calmness of
the soul.
The calm soul rides on an inner even keel, regardless of what is
happening within and around you. I liken it to surfing. Even as the
waves are rising and falling, the calm soul rides the crest, staying
upright, balanced, and moving in the direction you choose, though
exquisitely sensitive to the forces that are at work all around.
But before we surf off into this peaceful and beguiling sea, I want to
bring up one of the first Mussar teachings that piqued my interest in
this tradition. It was from Rabbi Israel Salanter, the father of the
Mussar movement, who said:
As long as one lives a life of calmness and tranquility in the
service of God, it is clear that he is remote from true service.
Here we are being cautioned that "calmness and tranquility" are
contrary to spiritual service. This sentiment is echoed in a more
general way by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz, who writes in The ThirteenPetalled Rose:
The Jewish approach to life considers the man who has stopped
going he who has a feeling of completion, of peace, of a great
light from above that has brought him to rest to be someone
who has lost his way. Only he whom the light continues to
beckon for whom the light is as distant as ever, only he can be
considered to have received some sort of response.
These teachings tell us that the Jewish spiritual journey isn't supposed
to lead you to a station called peace and tranquility. Rather, if that
happens to be where you lodge at some point along the way, then
you've been traveling the wrong track. If you're living in a state of
equanimity, you need to shake yourself awake because you've clearly
fallen asleep.

It's seductive to think of a total escape from the storms and turmoil of
life. Comfort, sweet and soft, invites us to snuggle down and drift off
to sleep. Can that be a spiritual goal? Imagine you're on a ladder.
Would you want to be asleep?
And yet shalom peace is one of the highest Jewish values. And
menucha calmness or rest is the essence of Shabbat.
So how can we square the positive and negative sides of equanimity?
The fact is that we can have both. Having the soul-trait of equanimity
doesn't spell the end of our struggles, but is rather an inner quality
that equips us to handle them.
Trying situations crop up in everyone's life. This is not accidental. Life
is constructed to give spiritual trials to the soul (nisyonot in Hebrew)
that score direct hits on the traits of your inner life where you yourself
are particularly vulnerable. That's what makes them tests! If you are a
person prone to anger and someone steps on your toe (literally or
figuratively), or you are sorely tempted to steal and someone leaves
an open purse right under your nose, then you have a spiritual test.
What's the ideal? To rise to the test and to triumph with flying colors.
This means stretching into the middah (soul-trait) in a way that is both
difficult for you to achieve, and good for the soul.
The reality, though, is that you could go either way. That's why the
test is real. If you pass a test, then that aspect of your inner being
gets strengthened and you earn the right to move on. Otherwise, you
are likely to encounter the same test again at some future point.
When one thinks of tests along the curriculum for growth, negative
challenges likely come to mind lust, greed, rage, arrogance. But
there are positive challenges as well. Success, for example, can
sometimes be more of a challenge than failure, for arrogance and
greed feed on success even more effectively than on failure.

So life keeps delivering tests to our doorstep, whether we happen to

be living through days of darkness or when things are going well. We
do ourselves a favor by embracing our struggles because they are
inevitable, woven right into the plan. In fact, if we are committed to
our own growth, we won't even want our struggles to end!

A Scenario
One night the Moss family came home very late from a wedding.
Everyone was exhausted. When they got to their front door, Dad
couldnt find the key. They all started to search in the car, on
the sidewalk but after a few minutes they came up emptyhanded. The baby started to cry and everyone was freezing in
the winter night.
What do you think are the best, rational steps the family should take?
Who should do what?
Envision what would ensue if the family began to panic.
Envision what would ensue if the family acted with order and calm.

Distancing Yourself
When you see struggle as not only inevitable but as spiritual practice,
you are being true to the Mussar insights of staying awake on the
Jewish way. This says nothing, however, about the inner attitude you
adopt as you contend with your challenges. Here's where equanimity
comes into play.
In his letter to his son, Nachmanides (Ramban) advises: "Distance
yourself from anger." And in Orchot Chaim (Ways of Life) of the Rosh,
we are advised, "Distance yourself from pride." This phrase, "distance
yourself," shows up elsewhere as well. We are surely not being told
never to be angry, proud, jealous, etc., because Mussar teachers
consistently assert that this would be an unrealistic goal. Everyone
experiences the full range of inner states, and in and of themselves,

every inner trait is neither good nor bad. More important is how we
respond to what we feel.
"Distance yourself," then, can mean only two things. Either we are to
stay physically far from other people who are angry, proud, etc., or we
are being directed to develop some kind of inner distance from the
experience of our own anger, pride, and other incendiary middot.
Although there are definitely times when we ought to stand away from
powerful outer forces, we should be less concerned about these
external influences than we should the impulses that arise within us.
We are solely responsible for the inner forces that can lead us astray
and so these are our first priority. In order to create some distance
between the stimulus that comes at us, and our reactions to it, we
need to cultivate a strong inner witness. This perspective helps keep
you from being infected by those outer influences that swirl around
you.
That same inner faculty also keeps you from being pushed around by
the forces that arise within you. The distanced witness is not
susceptible to the tides of doubt, temptation, jealousy, etc., that wash
through the interior world.
Cultivating an inner witness means being sensitive and aware of what
is taking place inside you, without being identified with the feelings
themselves. You remain separated from them. Lets say, for example,
that you find yourself waiting in a line while the person in front of you
fumbles through a purse apparently crammed with every conceivable
thing except the needed credit card, and you start to feel impatience
that is quickly becoming anger. At that moment, recall the need for
the inner witness, and call yourself to pay attention to the sensations
you are feeling as just that sensations. They dont compel any sort of
response. You just witness them and so dont identify with them as
being you.
Do we still face real struggles? Yes. Do the consequences matter? Yes.
Do we still feel the full range of human emotions and drives? Yes. In
other words, every aspect of your current life is real and important.

You would be wise to embrace it, because it's your curriculum. But at
the same time, cultivate the witness which will make you the calm
master of the inner realm, and not the victim.

The ideal state of tranquility is not a state of numbness. Rather, the

ideal is to remain conscious and balanced in the midst of whatever
might be going on within you and around you. When things are going
well, it is easy to remain calm, but when things get difficult, we tend to
get all stirred up and turbulent. We have the potential to remain calm
amid the storm, but developing that capacity requires practice.
Meditation is one practice that fosters tranquility. A regular practice of
meditation involves sitting still and silent for a period of time every
day. Inevitably, a wide variety of inner states arise some pleasant,
some not. Over time, you can get quite good at simply living in their
presence, without feeling slave to any of them, whether repugnant or
alluring. This practice prepares you to be calm in the face of all sorts of
turmoil.
I'd like to offer another practice to the same end. Rabbi Steinsaltz
describes the Jewish spiritual experience as a constant beckoning
toward the light. If we take that word "constant" seriously, then the
light we seek must be present at all times and in all situations, no
matter how murky or even dark they appear to us. We are assured
that it is there, and that we are capable of seeing it, but it is up to us
to cultivate the inner sensors that are alert and attentive to it.
This cant be described any better than inner light. The more we try
to describe it, the less accurate is the description. Even calling it light
is a metaphor. It is a presence that defies classification in the terms of
this world, but is perceptible nonetheless.
Your practice for this period is to tune into the inner light that is
present in all things and beings. This may not be easy to do at first,
because we are not looking for physical light, but something more

subtle. To start with, it is valuable just to pick out an object that is

right near to hand and to ask the question, "Can I see the inner?" Look
for a subtle, brilliant presence behind the apparent surface. In time, as
you explore, you will begin to see what Rabbi Steinsaltz is pointing to.
As you strengthen this practice, over time you will grow increasingly
aware of the radiant Presence that is a constant in the ever-shifting
contexts in which you live.
Heres a perfect application of having a key-phrase for this middah. In
addition to the morning affirmation, you can remind yourself several
times a day to seek the inner light. If you have eyes to see, and if you
are patient, it is there in all the people you meet, and in the telephone
and the apple, too. Are you in a caf? Take a different look at the
coffee cup. Or are you in a classroom? Look at the blackboard, then
look again. Can you glimpse the light within everything you see?
Record your experiences in your Accounting of the Soul Diary.
This is not a mystical practice, but mental training. By assigning your
mind the task of looking for something that is to be found in every
situation, you will cultivate and strengthen your inner witness. The
outcome is that you will have equipped your mind with the capacity to
anchor itself in a solid and tranquil place. From there you can observe
life even amid the churning seas of emotion that arise in stormy
episodes. Without this training, you are likely to be tossed about on
the waves of inner feeling that wash through you; with it, you are
capable of mooring your consciousness in the role of witness, and so
be tranquil.
An inner eye connected to the constant light won't give you a life of
fewer challenges and struggles. But it will help you develop the trait of
equanimity, which will in turn helps you to engage and triumph. That's
may be why the Alter of Kelm tells us: "A person who has mastered
peace of mind, has gained everything."
Here are some suggested key-phrases for you to use:
Rising above the good and the bad.
Be still and witness.