How many women have time to read a Kuzari or to read the Chovos Halevovos? A mother of children, she can’t even find time to read it in translation. So if you were given that opportunity, grab it! It’s a different type of bechirah. She’ll become great in mussar, in daas Hashem. No question she’s suffering – she lost out on having children and also the bechirah of children – but she can become great in daas, in mussar, in yiras Hashem and ahavas Hashem, in the midst of her difficulties. There’s so much to learn, so much to gain that a mother of children just can’t do.
She’s not of that bent of mind, of reading seforim? She can become great in gemilus chassodim. There are careers in helping other people; a lot of things to do that mothers of families cannot do. But still in the sense of what they could have accomplished, of what could have been, of the opportunities with children, they’re choshuv k’meis.
And so these three, the poor and the blind and the childless, are all alive; they’re capable of achievements and greatness and perfection. They’re capable of all good things but in order that we should understand what life is for – bechirah, choosing – our Sages taught us that missing out on even a little bit of that life is chashuvim k’meis.
