Breaking One’s Nature

Breaking One’s Nature:

Rav Shmelke of Nikolsburg zy”a said (Hanhagos Rav Shmelke M’Nikolsburg, Siman 52) that if a person’s yeitzer tries to tell him that he has to stop learning because he is too tired or because he doesn’t understand what he’s learning or because people are disturbing him, he should silence the yeitzer hara and overpower him. He should break his nature and learn with even more strength. He says that when one does this, he “breaks the external klipos and is given atonement even for sins that bear the punishment of kareis or death because learning out loud and with pleasantness, without any outside thoughts, and with shuckeling, purifies the soul, sharpens the mind and destroys damaging forces.