Keeping It Going

11 Tishrei, 5769

Okay, so Yom Kippur is over. You had a great davening, your tefillos were answered iyH, you feel great. The question now is: how do you keep that going?

Many of us know what it's like to make a New Year's Resolution. No, not the ones you make on January 1st - the ones you make during עשרת ימי תשובה. You want to daven better. You promised not to say Lashon Hara for ten minutes a day. Maybe you even decided to work out twice a week, to stay in better shape and help you observe the mitzvah of ושמרתם את נפשותיכם. How do you make sure you're not back to your old ways by the end of Succos?

Before we get to that, if you do happen to get back into your old habits, you shouldn't feel bad about it. Human beings are creatures of habit - Rav Yisrael Salanter is famous for saying that it's easier to keep 613 mitzvos than to change one character trait. So don't get down - get back up and try again.

But how do you avoid that first failure? Well, there are no surefire secrets, but here are a few methods that might help you keep that New Year's Resolution for a month or two, until it's ingrained in your being and you don't even have to think about it anymore because you do it so readily:

1) Write it down. Sounds 5th-grader-ish, I know, but it works. When you write down your two or three middos/mitzvos a day, it keeps you focused on it. Mark off whether you were successful or not. That way, you can literally see your progress as you grow.
2) Don't pick too many. Keep it simple - one, two three - but not more. If you finish these, you can move on to other things.
3) Grasp inspiration from somewhere else. The Shofar, the Selichos, the fasting, the tefillos - all these are great reminders of the need to grow and improve our neshamas. During the year, we lack these reminders. Pick out one or two religious items that will spark your neshama and inspire you to grow. A suggestion, if you need - Mezuza. You see one every time you walk into a room, and Rav Eliav Silverman pointed out that the Rambam kinda compares Mezuza and Shofar - by both he has a לשון of עורו שנה משינתכם, wake up from your slumber.

If anyone has any other suggestions, I'd love to hear them - please feel free to post underneath!

Also, if people are interested in this blog running through Hoshana Raba, or throughout the year (that'd probably be once a week), please feel free to post and let me know. Thanks!

הצלחה רבה!