GOT INSPIRATION?

By Chaptzem

Have you been inspired lately? Have you felt that feeling that you have a soul that is connected to something higher, something more than the physical confines of your body? Did you feel something higher awaken in you? Did you feel that little pilot light deep within you burst into flames?
What was it that inspired you? Was it a great business deal, or was it something of a higher, more spiritual nature?
How hard did you have to work to find that inspiration? Was it something that you had to seek out, or was it something that was right there staring you in the face all along?
Sadly, the answers to those questions for most of us are pretty pathetic. We seem to have an aversion to being inspired and many times are quite avoidant to coming in contact with anything that may inspire us. Even when we do finally find that inspiration, most of the time it’s pretty sad what the source of that inspiration is.
Even scarier than what inspires and motivates us is our fear of being inspired. We’re just plain and simple too scared to let go and become inspired. We so badly need to always be completely and entirely in full control of everything that we’ve become afraid that if we let ourselves go and become inspired we’ll be forced to feel things, and maybe even do things, that we may ordinarily not choose to do on our own.
When was the last time that we’ve had an extra minute to think about how lucky we are to be the chosen people that can communicate with our Creator any time we choose? When was the last time we took a moment to sit down and listen to a beautiful piece of music and soak in the lyrics that Dovid HaMelech wrote, without the din of the many multitudes of electronics overpowering the sound? When was the last time that we actually got loose from our daily constraints and just let our minds go, and allowed our souls to be touched? Are we really so scared to let ourselves go and just feel free and vulnerable? Are we so scared that we won’t be able to ever come back again and regain control? When was the last time that we’ve seriously thought about HaShem and His awesomeness? Are we that scared of it because maybe by thinking about it we may realize that we don’t have so much control over everything?
We live in a world where everything is instantaneous. Everything is ruled by instant gratification. Everybody wants everything before they even think about it. People want the store salesmen to give them their full, undivided attention from the second they walk into the store until the second they leave. They want their messages to be e-mailed to them ASAP, their appointments texted to them and their food packed nicely in a little take-out box, hot and ready to eat while they jump back into their double-parked, climate-controlled vehicles. People start honking at intersections before the light even turns green, just so that when it does they’re already rolling. The fact is we live in a time where everything must be instant and immediate.
With everything always being an emergency and everyone having their needs fulfilled so expediently, how can we expect anyone, especially the young children of this generation, to have the patience to slow down and work hard for anything? Why should any kid feel it important enough to invest any amount of time to accomplish something if he doesn’t get to see the results right away?
Better yet, how on earth do you explain to a child, and make him truly understand, that he has to daven three times a day? What does he get from davening? You have to do it again in a couple of hours anyway, so what’s the whole point? And if you need something and daven for it, will you get it right away? If not, then why bother davening?
We all want the best for our children and would do anything to make them happy. However, when do we cross that line and move from providing to overindulgence? Does a child really need a four-hundred dollar iPod, a laptop computer, a PlayStation Portable and a twenty-four-speed bike with shocks and alloy rims?
With children getting everything and anything they want without even having to give a sneeze, is it a wonder why they don’t feel like davening to HaShem anymore? Totty and Mommy get them everything they want much quicker - and they barely even have to ask.
How hard do you have to work to get a response from a cell phone or a computer? Not really that hard. You push a button and there it is - instant response. You click on a link and there you are - you’re viewing a web page from Taiwan. Davening is nothing like that. It’s not a favor or a business deal between man and HaShem. I’ll daven to you HaShem if you give me what I want right away. Or, HaShem, I’m doing you a favor and davening now. Davening is about connecting to HaShem in a way that only the soul can. Davening is about letting go of the physical and being brave enough to let your soul go in its own direction, without any conditions or strings attached.
People are in such a hurry today that they end up overlooking the entire landscape around them, leading to a serious inspiration deficiency. People aren’t inspired or even fazed by the magnificent and wonderful world that we live in. With the technology and speed of everything today, we’ve begun to take our average day for granted. Unless something monumental happens during the day, we’re completely bored.
The truth is that it’s not because there is nothing to inspire us in our daily lives, it is because it just takes a lot more to get the job done. Every minute of every day we’re being bombarded by flashing ads, ringing telephones, buzzing cellphones, bleeping IM’s and emergency sirens from outside our windows. We don’t even interact with live humans that much anymore. There are so many things out there calling for our personal attention every minute of every day that we don’t have the time or patience to let ourselves feel the things that tug at our soul.
If we could just feel comfortable enough in our own human skin to let it sink in that we don’t, and can’t, control everything, we might just feel a little something, a little connection, a little inspiration, some spiritual uplift and much satisfaction that even many years of work can’t bring us.   

Chaptzem is a heimishe blogger who authors the Chaptzem Blog, the most popular heimishe web-site. The Chaptzem Blog has been quoted many times in the mainstream media and is viewed by thousands daily.
www.chaptzem.blogspot.com