Physicians, Not Experts
How much must one toil to remove ga’avah from himself? The Ba’al Shem Tov dedicated his life to helping even the simplest Yidden understand this problem. Ga’avah isn’t only a problem for great people. It stands behind the problems of even the simplest people as well.
If a person is bad at communicating with people, he goes to an expert who will help him with the tools to better communicate. The expert will teach him how to smile, how to answer, how to carry on a conversation.... This person doesn’t have a ga’avah issue... rather, we say he simply has “communication issues.” Everything is given a clinical term today—all because we don’t want to deal with the root cause. One must understand that there is a root issue here, and it is diagnosed by a spiritual healer.
How Humility Changes Everything
When a person begins to feel that he deserves nothing... he has done so many aveiros and earned so many blemishes... he doesn’t deserve anything, and when he does get a small “reprimand” from Above in the form of a negative event, he doesn’t complain, because he feels that he probably deserved it... Now he begins to advance in all areas of avodas Hashem.
Now—when he recites Birchas HaMazon—he feels great emotion when he says לנו יחסר לא תמיד הגדול ובטובו, in His great kindness we will never lack.... Similarly, he begins to treat people differently. And he therefore merits to understand Torah, to daven properly, and for his tefillos to be answered... and thus he begins to see success in his life.
