06 Jun EVERYTHING IS AMAZING AND NOBODY’S HAPPY
If your antenna is
extended and you
are paying attention,
powerful and
inspirational messages
and reminders are
being broadcast to us
regularly. I was recently flying to New
York when the woman sitting next to
me grew increasingly frustrated that
her television screen wasn’t working.
She was forcefully pushing every
button and practically slapping the
screen trying to revive it. The woman
stopped a flight attendant walking by
throwing her arms in the air, and with
great exasperation announced,
“Nothing is working!” The flight
attendant stopped, looked at her, took a
deep breath and said, “Nothing is
working?! Ma’am, we are 33,000 feet
in the air, flying in a metal box with
wings that will get us to our destination
in just a couple of hours. The plane is
working just fine and isn’t that the
main thing?” With that, she turned to
continue the beverage and snack
service but her words kept ringing in
my ears.
Sure, it would be nice if the
entertainment system was working.
Certainly, it would enhance the trip if
the Wi-Fi was functioning properly.
But even when they aren’t, as long as
the plane is working, that is the main
thing, and we should never lose that
perspective.
Several years ago, a I read the
following observation of a comedian:
Everything is amazing right now,
and nobody’s happy. We live in an
amazing, amazing world, and it’s
wasted on a generation of spoiled
people that don’t care. This is what
people are like now: they’ve got
their phones and they’re like “Ugh,
it won’t…” GIVE IT A SECOND!
It’s going to SPACE! Can you give it
a second to get back from space?? Is
the speed of light too slow for you?!
I was on an airplane and there was
high speed internet. That’s the
newest thing I know that exists. And
I’m sitting there and they go “Open
up your laptops you can go on the
internet,’ and it’s fast, and I’m
watching YouTube clips, I’m in an
airplane! And then it breaks down,
and they apologize that the internet’s
not working, and the guy next to me
goes “Ugh, this is ridiculous.” Like
how quickly the world owes him
something he knew existed only like
10 seconds ago!
Flying is the worst one because
people come back from flights and
they’re telling you their story, and
it’s like a horror story. They act like
their flight was a cattle car in the 40s
in Germany. They’re like, “It was
the worst day of my life! First of all,
we didn’t board for like 20 minutes
and then they made us sit there on
the runway for 40 minutes! We had
to sit there!” Oh really? What
happened next? Did you FLY in the
AIR incredibly like a BIRD? Did
you partake in the miracle of human
flight?! … You’re sitting in a chair
in the SKY! People say there’s
delays. Delays? Really? New York
to California in 5 hours. That used
to take 30 years!
We are living in incredibly blessed
times. We have comforts,
conveniences, amenities, luxuries
that our ancestors couldn’t dream
of. Living with indoor plumbing,
electricity, cars, planes,
smartphones, FaceTime, Waze…
each new thing is a game changer
that transforms the quality of our
lives in ways we don’t fully
appreciate. With the advancements
of medicine, we have not only
longevity, but do you realize how
routinely we recover from illness
and survive some circumstances
that previously would threaten life?
Consider that in the 1600’s the
lifetime risk of dying in childbirth
was 4 percent. For every 100
births, 4 young women would die
in the process. While bearing a
child still carries risks, it is far, far
safer than it was even just a hundred
years ago.
Don’t get me wrong. I am not
minimizing the pain of childbirth or
the challenge of aching knees or hips,
or even the frustration of slow Wi-Fi.
However, as Stephen Covey writes in
his 7 Habits of Highly Effective
People, “The main thing is to keep the
main thing the main thing,” and the
main thing is that the airplane is
working, our heart is beating, a healthy
child was born, and a mother survived.
We certainly shouldn’t deny our
feelings when something hurts or
when we are injured physically,
emotionally, or spiritually. We can lean
into the pain, cry and even complain
for a bit. But we must never lose
perspective or context or allow our
entire outlook and experience to be
clouded or defined by what is missing,
hurting, or frustrating, especially when
the “main thing” is still working.
The gematria of the word modim,
gratitude, is 100. The Kol Bo (Siman
122) writes that this is an indication of
our obligation to give thanks at least
one hundred times every day.
Beginning with the gift of waking up
in the morning, with each food and
drink we can enjoy and ingest and with
every successful trip to the bathroom,
each day we stop ourselves one
hundred times to say a beracha, to say
thank you Hashem that with whatever
else is going on, the main things are
still working.
Towards the end of the Amidah, after
listing all our requests, needs and
supplications, we say Modim, Thank
you Hashem. In the responsive Modim
we recite during the repetition, we say
modim anachnu lach, we are grateful
to you…al she’anachnu modim lach,
that we feel gratitude to you.
Among the things we must not take
for granted and for which we should be
grateful, is knowing the main thing is
the main thing and being grateful when
the main thing is working.