Serenity in the Current Level, and Aspiration to Go Higher
For every step of the way that we are in, there are always two angles to consider. On one hand, a person needs to be serene in the place where he is. He needs some degree of menuchas hanefesh (serenity of the soul) and to be somewhat content where he is, because if he isn’t he cannot be connected to the here and now, and then he will never get anywhere. On the other hand, a person also needs to have aspirations to get past the current level. He must want to get past where he is and rise higher spiritually.
“Torah scholars have no serenity, not on this world and not on the Next World.”
On one hand, we need yishuv hadaas (composure of mind) in our current state. If a person is always trying to think of how he will get to the next level, he is not connected to where he is now, and then he will not succeed in getting to the next level.
For example, when a person is learning a daf Gemara, if he keeps thinking about getting to the next page of Gemara, he will never succeed in the current daf he is learning. The Vilna Gaon said that when a person is learning Gemara, he must concentrate only on the current page of Gemara he is learning, as if there is no other page of Gemara that exists other than the page of Gemara in front of him.
On the other hand, we also need to aspire for a higher level than the current one. If a person has no aspirations to go higher in his Torah learning and he is simply content with what he’s learning now, of this it is said, “Torah, what will be with it?”
So while a person must be fully concentrated on the page of Gemara he is learning, feeling serene where he is and not to think of anything else other than what he’s involved with, at the same time, he also needs to have the general aspiration of knowing a lot more Torah, and to be aware that the page of Gemara in front of him is but a step in the process.
In the example of learning Torah, a person needs to be connected to the current moment of his Torah learning, and to be content there, but simultaneously, he also needs to aspire for more, to know that the current page of Gemara is but a part of the Torah. But this idea is also true with all situations of life in general. On one hand, one needs to be connected to where he is now, and on the other hand, he also needs to know that his current place is just a step in the process.
