Emuna Therapy

Log B'Omer in Meron

What is it about the holiday of Log B'Omer that attracts a half million Jews of all types from all over the world to make the long pilgrimage to the gravesite of Rebbe Shimon Bar Yochie every year on the anniversary of his death?

Rebbe Shimon was a sage who lived about about 2,000 years ago. Most of the people who come to sing and dance with us in Meron know nothing about him or his teachings and yet they are drawn to come. Why?

It is for the same reason that throughout history thousands of Jews who weren't even "religious" willingly gave up their lives for their religion rather than submit to a forced conversion.

It is for the same reason that although secular Jews might not keep Shabbas or most of the other holidays such as Passover, Succos and Shavuous. Almost all Jews regardless of their level of observance light a menara on Chanukah.

This phenomena of lighting  Chanukah menoras at a time when 95% of their neighbors of another religion are lighting up their homes and trees with different kinds of decorations takes courage. The reason they do this mitzvah more than others is because on Chanukah the Greeks were not interested in destroying the Jewish people, what they wanted was to destroy our religion.

The reason that there will be 500,000 Jews of all stripes in Meron Israel tonight is because Rebbe Shimon's soul, like the holiday of Chanuka ignites in all Jewish souls a powerful fire and wish to be connected to Hashem and preserve Judaism at all costs. 

May all your prayers be answered, speedily. Amen.

Dr. Zev Ballen

An Open Miracle

A son gets to see a miraculous revelation of his deceased mother's love during personal prayer. This short story will send chills down your spine.

With blessings,

Dr. Zev Ballen

The Secret To Thinking Positively

The secret to the very best way of keeping your thoughts on a positive track is actually in your vocal chords - it's your capacity for SPEECH.

Try it!

The next time you find your thoughts turning in the negative direction, don't despair, just start speaking (To G-d or yourself; just be sure to speak positively). By being careful to speak positively (even if you don't yet feel positive) it forces your thoughts (which precede speech) to line up in a positive direction before you express them verbally. The result will be positive thoughts.

Some people like a visual image: Imagine that when your vocal chords are vibrating positively they become a powerful magnet that pulls only positive thoughts into your mind.

It works because we have much more control of our speech than our thoughts.

Bye the way, tonight, I'll be posting a video clip about one of the most miraculous and beautiful signs from Heaven that I've ever received. It happened just this week. I wish the same for you, dear friends!

Remember to live strong, live with emuna!

Dr. Zev Ballen

Live Broadcast: Getting Back Up!

 

How many falls must a baby get back up from as he or she grows into becoming a person. It's so inspiring to watch babies as they don't even worry about their falls but simply get up and keep on trucking.

We all have a gift that is deep within us. It's the self-confidence of having gotten up from thousands of falls! Hashem programmed everyone with a powerful innate drive for mastery.  Toddlers are impervious to the bumps and bruises that are part of the exhilaration of learning to stand up and walk. They simply tune out the  pain in order to succeed. Hashem led us on and simultaneous put into our parent's minds to lead us only as much as was necessary but to not worry or  interfere with us too much.

Rebbe Nachman begins his book Restore My Soul by telling us how vitally important it is to know how to fall and how to get up because it's inevitable that in our effort to climb the ladder of spirituality there will be times that we will fall as well as rise up. We therefore need to become very "expert," says Rebbe Nachman, in: how to find G-d when we're 'going up' (by not becoming arrogant) and how to find G-d when we're 'going down' too.

In either case, we must gird our loins, and strengthen ourselves, as we did so long ago and act with the pure inner-driven faith that enabled us to succeed when we learned to walk by ourselves. Just as the toddler never despairs and gives up so mustn't we. Let's show Hashem that we're willing to search for Him in whatever situation we're in.

One way of becoming an expert in finding Hashem, even in the falls, is to remember and re-visit as much as possible, our earliest successes which have been most deeply engraved into our pure and innocent infant minds. Like ink on clean white paper. Good is to be remembered. We want access to all the good that was done for us and is in us. It's only the bad that should be forgotten. We need to preserve and keep those positive, loving and inspiring elements of our past relationships before us and around us at all times. Once you work to find Hashem (the goodness in yourself and in your personal history, for example the love and encouragement you received from parents, siblings, relatives, teachers, coaches etc., then you must work to strengthen those neural pathways anyway you can, and through an awareness of them keep them alive and active.

 

G-d Willing we'll be broadcasting today's lesson live from the Chut Shel Chesed Yeshiva in Jerusalem at 5:00 PM Israel time. The broadcast, as well as my lessons posted are Mac and iPod compatible. If you tune in too early to the live broadcast link, you'll be sent to the main page of the Breslev Israel website, so try to tune in as follows: 10:00 AM in NY; 7:00 AM in LA and the West Coast, 8:00 AM Denver, 10:00 AM Mexico and Central Daylight; 3:00PM in the UK, 5:00 PM Johannesburg and Capetown, 5:00 PM Israel. G-d willing, we'll try and post a link to the lesson for all those who couldn't see it live by 12:01 AM Monday (Israel time).

If you can't see the broadcast, you might need to download a new version of Flash Media player, which you can do here. We hope you enjoy the broadcast.

With blessings,

Dr. Zev Ballen

The Defense Called "Denial"

The defense called denial has its origins in infancy. This occurs when the baby sees a stranger for the first time. Due to his feeling overwhelmed by "stranger anxiety" the infant turns his face away from the stranger as if to say "if you're out of my sight then you don't exist." 

Some of us have remained at this ostrich-like stage of emotional development and use the rather primitive defense of denial to massively block out something that we unconsciously believe will be too overwhelming for us to deal with.

Denial can also effect whole communities and even nations.

Howard Morton is a seasoned journalist who is making riveting contributions to our web magazine.  As you can see below, Howard's agenda is crystal clear - to help us deal with our widespread tendency for denial.

This guy is well-researched and very worth checking out: Here are some samples of his invaluable work:

America Tomorrow - By Howard Morton

The 69 Year Old Warning - By Howard Morton

It Can't Happen in America - By Howard Morton

When It's Cool To Hate Jews - By Howard Morton

The 21st Century Aryans - by Howard Morton

Dear friends, please remember to:

Live strong, live with emuna!

Dr. Zev Ballen

The Misery of Wealth

In my work as a psychotherapist, I've met people who made millions of dollars, and I honestly can't think of one who is really happy. How many people do we all know who think that a lottery win is going to solve all of their problems? But when they did a study on big lottery winners, they found that most of the time, the 'big win' just buried the 'lucky winners' under a pile of emotional, and even financial, problems.  They didn't pray for the money and as a result, it didn't come with a blessing. They had just as many problems as before, maybe even more.
 
Earning happiness
 
This brings us to a very important point, that people need to work, earn, and sweat a bit to get vitality and a delicious feeling from their accomplishments. And 'work' isn't only what we do in the office from 9 to 5. Primarily, it's the work that we all need to do on ourselves, to create the spiritual vessels we need to hold all the abundance that G-d wants to give us. And we can only do this key, spiritual work if we are using the right tools and methodology for the job, that's being transmitted to us straight from our Sages.
 
Secular psychology has some great methodology, but by itself, that's not enough. Apart from all the physical tangibles and status symbols, we also need to know what to focus on in our lives to be really successful and fulfilled, and that wisdom we can only get from our Torah sages. Oftentimes, the things our rabbis will tell us to focus on are exactly those things that many of us sacrifice in our pursuit of financial or career success. Things like enjoying our lives and living passionately; or having a good, solid, loving relationship with our spouse; or being a good parent - all these things can be dropped by the wayside, in our mad dash after bigger homes, bigger bank accounts and fancier vacations than the neighbors.
 
Who do we want to be successful for?
 
Really, we can sum up the formula for success and fulfillment in one sentence: who do we want  to be successful for?
 
One hard and fast rule that emerged from dealing with all these 'successful' people is that none of them felt fulfilled when they were only working for their own success and gratification. I'm not talking about lazy people here, or people who achieved their wealth the easy way, via a lottery win or windfall. These people put in an awful lot of effort; they slogged away for long days and nights of hard work, and they were super-organized and very efficient.  Even so, if they were only working for their own self-aggrandizement, honor or wealth, they still didn't feel fulfilled, even when they reached and even surpassed the financial or career milestones they'd set for themselves.
 
In some cases, not only did they not feel fulfilled, they even felt more sad and broken than when they'd started out. Here they were, they'd reached the peak of success and they still didn't feel so great. So then, they'd fall into depression and start asking themselves what was the point of it all? What else was there to live for? What was left to strive for, or to achieve?
 
Tony Robbins is a very popular, successful and famous motivational speaker. He once said that he was in the middle of giving one of his motivational seminars, when during a break, his stock broker called him and told him that his investments had just made him $400 million. That's a tremendous amount of money, more than most of us could ever hope to make in a lifetime. Robbins said that it felt good to hear that he made so much money but not as good as you might expect. He said that what was really giving him a lift was being at his seminar, and seeing how he was inspiring and helping other people. He went home that night, and he explains that his marriage was going through a very rough time. When he and his wife got into yet another conflict, he explained, all the remaining good feeling from the $400 million practically evaporated.
 
Money, even a lot of it, is not the panacea for happiness and fulfillment that so many of us believe it to be. So if money is not going to make us fulfilled, what is?

 

Looking for more good reading? Here's my prescription for this week:

Jealousy and Sibling Rivalry - By Rabbi Shalom Arush

G-d of Rebbe Meir, Answer Me! - By Tal Rotem

It's Not What We See - By Rabbi Lazer Brody

Can't Buy You Love - By Dovber HaLevi

Reversing Low Self-Esteem - By Rivka Levy

The Secret of Joy - By Racheli Reckles

The Main Course - By Tal Rotem

Rashbi's Passing - By Rabbi Moshe Miller

America Tomorrow - By Howard Morton

The Shabbat of History - By Rabbi David Charlop

Remember - Live Strong, Live with Emuna!

Dr. Zev Ballen

A Mother's Torah

 

This is the first in a series of exciting new lessons which show the beautiful "fit" between how healthy children develop physically, emotionally and spiritually at the same time. Learn how a mother's loving ministrations enable her new-born infant to develop into the spiritual giant he or she was meant to be.

With blessings for a great new week!

Dr. Zev Ballen

A Non-Conformist

In a world where so many people are so far from real happiness, a thinking person realizes that there is no choice other than living life differently than the great majority of people.

With blessings,

Dr. Zev Ballen

 

 

Stimulus Protection

image credit: jfelege

There is no such thing as perfect parenting. What we know about what works best to raise  psychologically healthy children comes from studying parents who do a "good enough" job.

There is however, a "Parent" who in fact is perfect.

He is our G-d (and Parent) in Heaven - Hashem.

Here is an example of Hashem's infinitely wise parenting. When a child is born you may notice that they seem somewhat detached and unresponsive for the first week or so before they become more alert and seem to "hatch" into greater social awareness. The reason that babies are initially detached is because G-d provides them with what psychologists call a stimulus barrier to protect them from being overwhelmed by all the new sights, sounds, and feelings that they were not exposed to into the upper realm or in the womb.

G-d in his infinite wisdom created the stimulus barrier as a template for us to eventually develop the capacity to protect ourselves by keeping out of our minds what is not good for us and only letting in good thoughts, images, ideas, feelings, memories, etc. Hashem the Ultimate watch-guard, who protected us when we were so small and helpless, now calls upon us to access the same ability that he put into us so long ago.  Now we must serve as our own censor and sentinel deciding from moment to moment what to give our attention to.

With blessing for a great day!

Dr. Zev Ballen

 

The Torah of Mothers

G-d's faith in women is so great. He gives them the awesome responsibility of caring for infants and young children. It is the quality of a mother's loving ministrations to her infant ( particularly when they are looking at each other during feedings) that form the deepest neural pathways of love and security that the child will ever have. The experience of living in a symbiotic orbit of oneness with mother is the template from which the infant will mature and be capable of faith in his other mother (who he can't 'see' as easily). His Mother in Heaven.

G-d Willing we'll be broadcasting today's lesson live from the Chut Shel Chesed Yeshiva in Jerusalem at 5:00 PM Israel time. The broadcast, as well as my lessons posted are Mac and iPod compatible. If you tune in too early to the live broadcast link, you'll be sent to the main page of the Breslev Israel website, so try to tune in as follows: 10:00 AM in NY; 7:00 AM in LA and the West Coast, 8:00 AM Denver, 10:00 AM Mexico and Central Daylight; 3:00PM in the UK, 5:00 PM Johannesburg and Capetown, 5:00 PM Israel. G-d willing, we'll try and post a link to the lesson for all those who couldn't see it live by 12:01 AM Monday (Israel time). If you can't see the broadcast, you might need to download a new version of Flash Media player, which you can do here. We hope you enjoy the broadcast.

With blessings,

Dr. Zev Ballen