Say you're a parent with a disrespectful, disruptive child. A child who's acting out, and child who's going off the path, G-d forbid. The normal, natural initial response for a parent is to ask themselves: what's going on here? Why is this good? But then, we can take it up a level: Why is this happening? What's the message? How can I relate to this in a productive way?
Here's one possible idea: Kids are the purest beings on the planet. (We were that way too, when we were kids.) All kids have the intention, deep down, to be helpful to their parents. If that kid is misbehaving, acting out, off the derech, in a certain sense, it means they've taken control of the family. It's unhealthy, yes, but kids need connection, attention, parents.
If the parents are struggling; if the family unit is breaking apart; that kid doesn't want to have a divorce in the family, G-d forbid. If the only way he can keep his family intact is by creating an emergency situation, or 'shock', then that's what he's going to do.
I've never seen a divorce in a family where a kid was suicidal, anorexic, or self-mutilating...See more here...
There's no better web-magazine with which to feed your soul than breslev.co.il. Here's our great line-up of articles for this week. By the way, the website is multi-lingual: English, Spanish, French, Russian, Hebrew and Deutsch:
The Tenth Man - By Rabbi Lazer Brody
Moshiach with a Smile - By Rabbi Shalom Arush (translated by Rabbi Lazer Brody)
Fearless Frogs - By Tal Rotem
Peace Now and Always - By Dovber Halevi
Our True Mission - Rick Eskenazi
The Easy Hard Test - By Racheli Reckles
Head Above Water - By Chaya Golda Ovadia
Restoration and Reforestation - By Rabbi Lazer Brody
The Upside-Down World - By Rivka Levy
The Big Ten - By Rabbi David Charlop
With Blessings,
Dr. Zev Ballen
