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March 14 - March 28, 2024
Jews absorbed into their very beings the idea that you must act as if the desired outcome was already the reality.
You might mistakenly assume that you act in accordance with your feelings, but the ancient sages teach that in reality, you just as frequently come to feel in accordance with how you act. The principle is clear: If you don’t like the way you feel about something or about someone, start acting the way you would act if you already felt the way you wished you would feel, and you will soon come to feel that way.
Your actions can change your feelings.
if you act the way you would act if you really were filled with optimism and courage, then pretty soon you actually will start feeling more courageous and optimistic. This may seem as if you are pulling on a mask to wear among the people with whom you work and live. Well, yes, that is true, and if you really want to become more effective, not only in the area of economic productivity but in all of life, then you need to develop a comfort in yourself about leading and a comfort in others about being led by you. That sometimes does entail wearing a mask.
Heroic leadership—any leadership—is, like priesthood, statesmanship, even genius, a matter of externals almost as much as of internalities. The exceptional are both shown to and hidden from the mass of humankind, revealed by artifice, presented by theatre. The theatrical impulse will be strong in the successful politician, teacher, entrepreneur, athlete, or divine, and will be both expected and reinforced by the audiences to which they perform.21
One of the most important distinctions you need to learn to make is between those things in your life that should be constant and unchangeable and the kind of change you should welcome.
we must be comfortable with the idea that even positive change will most times have negative components.
when great change is happening in one area, you should try your hardest to focus on familiarity and consistency elsewhere.
Some people mistakenly assume that a transaction can only take place if one side withholds information from the other. They assume that a transaction constitutes one party outsmarting another. This is a failure to understand that when two parties sculpt a true transaction, it is not one party taking away something from the other, but two parties cooperating to create entirely new wealth.
If you want to know tomorrow, you must know yesterday.”5
The problem is that screen images are so seductive that it is almost impossible to escape their impact for some considerable period of time after exposure. The powerful pictures send emotional shock waves ricocheting around your brain. As the result of an hour or two in front of either a large or a small screen, you become desensitized to the delicate. What is more, you are rendered more passive by the nature of this form of entertainment.
reading about ideas or things grants you the most freedom to absorb or to reject. Pictures impact your emotions in a way that can cause temporary emotional imbalance.
Television dulls your imaginative powers, whereas reading or listening to the spoken word develops these vital powers.
By spending a little preparation time actively anticipating a successful outcome to your efforts, by dwelling on that outcome, and by savoring the success with a smile on your face, you will actually be impacting your body and mind. You will be preparing yourself to bring about the success you crave.
Accustom yourself to analyzing today’s events in the light of yesterday’s history for the purpose of making necessary changes for tomorrow.
As you read the newspaper or watch the news, always ask yourself, “What is the underlying principle?”
The human desire to not be restricted in any way at all is a spiritual desire and is thus found in the Torah.
