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Automatic transcript; may contain mistakes, especially in Hebrew.
This week's question is actually a continuation from last week. Last week, at the end of the answer, I said that in davening, what one might do in order to improve their davening is not just to talk to Hakadosh Baruch Hu, but actually to stop and listen. And when we're davening, if we pause and we allow answers to rise up from within, it can make our davening more meaningful. In that context, this week's question goes as follows. At the end of your answer, you said that if you're silent for a little bit, then you may be able to hear your self-conscious answer. But honestly, I feel like if we did that, we would always hear the answer we want to hear, because we penetrate our minds to say it. So, the avodah of davening is the bitl of the ego. And what you're referring to is the ego. Of course, if a person wants to hear something, we know this is true outside of yourself as well, you're having a conversation with someone, sometimes you hear the thing you want to hear. Of course, if your ego is in charge, then there is no doubt that you're going to hear your own voice.
and not this voice of the soul, and you're simply going to confirm the things that you want to hear. The whole avodah of davening is to submit ourselves before God, to recognize that our ego is trying to kill us, and that Hakadosh Baruch Hu runs the world. It's why we go to Hakadosh Baruch Hu to ask Him for our needs, it's why we spend a significant amount of time in davening praising Hakadosh Baruch Hu, it's why in Shema we say, and we recognize the infinite oneness that exists in the world. The whole avodah is to be mevat al our ego. It is true that when your ego is in charge, you will hear yourself answer that question. But if you're really working on yourself and you're davening, and you're really thinking to yourself, what does Hakadosh Baruch Hu want from me? Then the answer that wells up from within may be conflicted, because maybe you're going to have a bit of ego and you're going to have a bit of soul. But the more you practice the art of getting in touch with your soul,
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the clearer the answers become. How did I learn this? I'll tell you the truth. Many, many years ago, I was talking to a woman from Australia, who's not even a Jewish woman. And we were talking about the concept of tefillah. And she said to me, when do you ever listen to God? Sounds like you talk a lot, but when do you ever listen? And it was very striking, because I had never thought about davening that way before. I called my Rebbe, I spoke to him about it, and he said, that's a little bit of a Bechina of Ruach HaKodesh. When you can hear God's voice well up from within, and it guides you and directs you in your life, it's a very high madrig and it's certainly something we should be shooting for. And I believe that that's what Elio Anavi meant when he said that we don't find God outside of ourselves in the thunder and the lightning and the mountains. We find God in the still, small voice that exists inside of every one of us. And tefillah is an avodah of turning inwards. The word palel means to imagine. Imagine. So if we're tapping inwards in our davening,
in order to connect to Hakadosh Baruch Hu who is outside of ourselves, then we need to slow down the world. All of the thoughts of the ego that come rushing at us, those are the thoughts that we need to slow down and really analyze because those are the things that trip us up in our lives. When the ego is involved, we may act immorally, we may act without authenticity, without integrity. But when the soul is in charge and we're listening to the voice of the God that's inside of us, we're listening to the soul. We tend to make better decisions, and our lives tend to go better. So it's not just good advice in terms of davening, but in general in your life, you have to become attuned to listening to the voice of the soul.
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