Authentic Service

Do you help the needy when they ask for help so that you’ll sleep better or because you really care?

Do you defend the defenseless out of guilt because you really are a kind person?

Don’t feel bad, you are not alone. All of us struggle with authenticity. That’s because G-d created us with two sides; a right and a left. Traditionally the right is associated with Chesed – kindness, and the left with Gevurah – discipline. You could say that these two are attraction and rejection or love and respect.

Each of us have leanings to the right or to the left. Each circumstance and situation we find ourselves in will call first to our natural tendencies. Then we need to discern – through our minds – as to whether we are acting consistent with our values and what we believe or are we are simply responding to our natural path of least resistance.

You see a person who appears to be disheveled and disoriented and he asks for money because he is hungry. Who could turn down the request of a hungry person? Your natural tendency is to pull a bill out of your pocket. Then your mind kicks in and says but wait, maybe you will be feeding an addiction instead of a hungry person.

Do you walk away and forget the entire matter? Or do you rise above your natural tendency, combined with your intellectual thought process and go to the store and buy the fellow a sandwich?

In this week’s Torah portion the Jews prepare to cross the sea. The Torah says the water was for them a wall to the right and to the left.

This imagery evokes our need to be consistent in all things. There is a strong wall to the right and one to the left. Our job is to pass between them, to always evaluate as to whether we are living our truest authentic self.

Good Shabbos!

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