Travis Freeman grew up in Corbin, Kentucky and lived a typical, all-American kind of life. But one morning in 1993, at the age of 12, Travis woke up with a severe migraine that lasted nine days. On the tenth day, he woke up with the headache gone but with a new problem: His left eye started to hurt. Then it started to swell. The next day he went to the doctor and found out he had a massive infection. He went to the University of Kentucky hospital, where the doctors ran tests and found out he had a severe sinus infection, one that at the time was fatal for 70 percent of the people who contracted it. Of the 30 percent that survived, most lived in a vegetative state. He was the second person in the world to have it only affect his eyes. The doctors were able to save his life, but he would never be able to see again. As Travis said, “In less than two days, in less than 48 hours, I had gone from perfect 20/20 vision to no vision at all. My life was flipped upside down.” He spent 17 days in the hospital, and those days changed everything about his life. He would now have to learn how to live life all over again. He began to set goals for all that he wanted to achieve, working to fulfill one goal at a time. In seventh grade, Travis Freeman had learned how to do most things without his eyesight, but one thing was still missing — football. He desperately wanted to play it. Travis worked hard, originally just hoping to practice and condition with the team. But in eighth grade, he had improved so much that he was no longer just practicing, he became their starting center. He went on to play four years of varsity high school football and recently documented his life story in an autobiography called Lights Out. In his book, Travis writes, “We promote the truth that disability does not equal inability. And it’s our belief that every one of you has a disability. Every person has a disability, but it’s just an obstacle or a challenge that you have to overcome in your life… Because you can overcome the challenges and obstacles that you face. There is hope in hard work, perseverance, determination. We can rise above the things that try to hold us down.” After the sin of the Golden Calf in this week’s parsha, Moshe comes down the mountain and breaks the luchot. While many commentators assume he does this either to show how angry he is or to show the people that they are not worthy of these luchot, the Midrash Tanchuma writes:
כֵּיוָן שֶׁיָּרַד וְקָרַב אֶל הַמַּחֲנֶה וְרָאָה אֶת הָעֵגֶל, פָּרַח אוֹת הַכְּתָב מֵעֲלֵיהֶם וְנִמְצְאוּ כְּבֵדִים עַל יָדָיו שֶׁל מֹשֶׁה When Moshe came close to the encampment with the first luchot, he saw the letters flying off. The luchot suddenly felt very heavy and they smashed to the ground. However, Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik zt”l (Derashot HaRav 68-71) points out that something does not make sense. If we look a little bit later in the Torah (Shemot 34:4), Moshe prepares to go back up the mountain again and he carries with him the second set of luchot:
וַיִּפְסֹ֡ל שְׁנֵֽי־לֻחֹ֨ת אֲבָנִ֜ים כָּרִאשֹׁנִ֗ים וַיַּשְׁכֵּ֨ם מֹשֶׁ֤ה בַבֹּ֙קֶר֙ וַיַּ֙עַל֙ אֶל־הַ֣ר סִינַ֔י כַּאֲשֶׁ֛ר צִוָּ֥ה יְהוָ֖ה אֹת֑וֹ וַיִּקַּ֣ח בְּיָד֔וֹ שְׁנֵ֖י לֻחֹ֥ת אֲבָנִֽים How is it possible that he carried the luchot up the mountain, yet he wasn’t able to carry them down the mountain? Simple physics would confirm that carrying something down a mountain is easier than carrying that same object up a mountain. If these luchot were so heavy, shouldn’t it have been more difficult to carry them up the mountain than it was to carry them down? Rabbi Soloveitchik beautifully explains that Moshe going up and down the mountain had little to do with his physical strength and more to do with his mental strength.
On the way down the mountain, Moshe felt crushed, tired, dejected, and disappointed. He felt as if his strength was sapped. Bnei Yisrael had been taken out of Mitzrayim, ready to assert themselves as the chosen nation and develop a relationship with Hashem. Tragically, in a matter of a few hours, they had descended into a terrible sin that left Hashem wanting to sever that relationship. And so Moshe here felt completely defeated, and therefore couldn't hold onto the luchot anymore. The emotional and physical weight was too much to bear.
Later in the Torah, as Moshe is on the way back up the mountain, his mindset was changed. Now Moshe was full of hope, vision, and purpose, and nothing could stop him. Says the Rav: “In this role, Moses could overcome all psychological and physical obstacles.”
These were the exact same size luchot as earlier, with the exact same weight, and Moshe hadn’t gone to the gym in the interim. The only thing that changed was his mindset.
From here we learn that we can do anything — we just need the right mindset.
Every one of us has goals, dreams, and aspirations. There are things we want to accomplish, whether professionally, in our family, or religiously. We have an idea of what we are aiming to achieve. The question is: Do we let our minds turn our challenges into heavy stones that weigh us down or motivate us to fulfill those goals? Are the luchot in our lives weighing us down or helping us up the mountain? Rabbi Shlomo Freifeld, the renowned rabbi who founded the Shor Yoshuv Yeshiva, relates the following story:
I think back in my own experience to when I finally began to make something of my life, and I can identify the day. In those days I was in yeshivah surrounded by a group of brilliant near-geniuses. These were my friends, my associates, my role models, and I tried to pattern myself after them. And then one day, I sat down in a room by myself, put my head in my hands, and had a heart-to-heart talk with myself. “You are not brilliant,” I told myself. “You are not a genius or a near-genius. You have to be who you are. You have to start your learning from the fundamentals and work your way up. There are no shortcuts for you.” Believe me, the experience was painful. I felt as if a dagger had been plunged into me. But it was my liberation, my personal exodus. That day was the turning day of my life. If we lack the right mindset and attitude, if we think we are only set up to fail, or if we think we can’t accomplish something, then like Moshe, the stones in our lives will become too heavy. However, if we have the right mindset, are determined, and believe in ourselves, then nothing can stop us as we take the stones lying in our way and carry them up the mountain. | 
Comments
Post a Comment