Staying Focused on What REALLY Matters

Insight of the Week

The Torah commands in Parashat Kedoshim (19:16), לא תלך רכיל בעמך – introducing the prohibition against gossiping, sharing negative information about other people. Why do so money people indulge in gossip? Why are there those who spend entire Shabbat and holiday meals talking about how other people dress, about other people’s houses, about other people’s marriages (or divorces), other people’s kids, and about other people in general? Why do people make these things the topics of their conversations? The most likely answer is that other people’s problems are a distraction from our own problems. By thinking and talking about other people’s issues, we can temporarily escape from our own issues, and this feels soothing. We find comfort in gossip because it enables us to take our minds away from our struggles, from the difficulties that we face in our own lives. But diverting our attention away from our struggles means diverting our attention away from our goals, from our purpose in life, from the hard work that we should be investing to make the most of our brief sojourn through this world. This is part of what makes gossip so dangerous. Primarily, of course, gossip is wrong because it damages other people’s reputations. But beyond the harm inflicted on others, by talking gossip we also harm ourselves. The Mishnah in Pirkeh Avot (3:1) teaches: הסתכל בשלשה דברים ואין אתה בא לידי עבירה . דע מאין באת, ולאן אתה הולך, ולפני מי אתה עתיד ליתן דין וחשבון . מאין באת, מטפה סרוחה . ולאן אתה הולך, למקום עפר רמה ותולעה. ולפני מי אתה עתיד ליתן דין וחשבון, לפני מלך מלכי המלכים הקדוש ברוך הוא. Look at three things, and you will never come upon sin: know from where you came, to where you are going, and before Whom you will in the future make an accounting. From where did you come? From a putrid drop. Where are you going? To a place of earth, rot and worms. Before Whom will you in the future make an accounting? Before the King of king, the Holy One, blessed be He. The message of this Mishnah can be summarized in a single word: focus . The Mishnah is teaching us how to remain focused on what really matters, on what is really important, on our purpose in life. In the moment, it seems that the gossip we are sharing is really something important. That other couple’s divorce, that other kid’s expulsion from school, the scandal involving some well-known figure in the community…it seems like a really, really big deal, something that we need to talk about over and over again. But the truth is that it’s really just a distraction. Talking about these things are not going to move us forward. It will not help us achieve our goals. It will not help us realize the purpose for which Hashem brought us into the world. This is one of our greatest challenges – to stay focused, and not be distracted by the nonsense that seems so big, so important, but in truth is actually diverting our attention away from what is really big and really important. This is such a difficult challenge, that we pray each and every day that Hashem helps us overcome it. Following ברכות השחר , the series of berachot we recite each morning, we add a prayer asking Hashem to save us from things like יצר הרע (the evil inclination), חבר רע (a bad friend), and שכן רע (a bad neighbor). This prayer includes a request that we be protected from לשון הרע (negative talk). One understanding is that this means we should be saved from people who might wish to speak לשון הרע about us. Alternatively, however, this might mean that we pray to be saved from the lure to speak לשון הרע , to indulge in gossip. We ask Hashem to help us stay focused on what really matters, rather than allow ourselves to get distracted by nonsense such as other people’s private affairs. Let us stop wasting time on nonsense, on what other people are doing. Let’s instead focus as much as we can on what’s really important, on making our lives meaningful by achieving meaningful goals.