Thursday, August 25, 2022

We Are Not Trapped by Our Past Decisions

 

Parshat Reeh begins “Behold, I set before you today a blessing and a curse.” Rabbi Moshe Feinstein notes the peculiarity of the word “today” in the verse. He suggests that the Torah here is reminding us that often people think that the life that they live today is based on the decisions that they made a long time ago. And now we are trapped by those previous decisions. While it is true that decisions have consequences, and sometimes it is impossible to totally undo a decision, every day is a new opportunity. Every day we have the choice: to either affirm our past decisions and continue down the path that we have been on or to choose to do things differently. While we may feel stuck due to past decisions, the Torah wants us to always remember that so long as we are alive we have the ability to make new choices, different choices. One definition of insanity is to do the same thing over and over and yet expect different results. If we want to see changes in our life then we must make different choices and act in different ways. While this might be difficult, the word HaYom reminds us that every day is a new opportunity to make new choices. 

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