12 Nov STOP BOWING TO BUSYNESS

When is the last time
you asked someone
how are they are doing
and they didn’t
answer, “Busy?”
In his article “The
‘Busy’ Trap,” Tim Kreide writes:
If you live in America in the 21st century
you’ve probably had to listen to a lot of
people tell you how busy they are. It’s
become the default response when you
ask anyone how they’re doing: “Busy!”
“So busy.” “Crazy busy.” It is, pretty
obviously, a boast disguised as a
complaint. And the stock response is a
kind of congratulation: “That’s a good
problem to have,” or “Better than the
opposite.
Look around and you’ll notice it isn’t
generally people pulling back-to-back
shifts in the I.C.U. or commuting by bus
to three minimum-wage jobs who tell you
how busy they are; what those people are
is not busy but tired. Exhausted. Dead on
their feet. It’s almost always people whose
lamented busyness is purely self-imposed:
work and obligations they’ve taken on
voluntarily, classes and activities they’ve

“encouraged” their kids to participate in.
They’re busy because of their own
ambition or drive or anxiety, because
they’re addicted to busyness and dread
what they might have to face in its
absence.
One study from the Monthly Labor
Review found that people estimating 75-
plus hour workweeks were off, on
average, by about 25 hours. It mentioned
that a young man reported working 180
hours a week, which is quite literally
impossible, since that is twelve more
hours than a week contains. How many
hours a week do you work?
When angels in the guise of men appear
before Avraham in this week’s Parsha, he
offers them water to wash their feet. The
Chizkuni explains – “This all occurred
during the season of the desert winds,
known as sharaf. Hashem had made the
day especially hot, so that the feet of
travelers would be soaked in sand and
sweat.”
But Rashi quoting the Gemara (Bava
Metzia 86b) has a different understanding:
He believed they were idolators who
bowed down to the dust of their feet and
therefore Avraham didn’t want them

bringing that idolatry into his home.
The Shelah HaKadosh (Torah Ohr)
wonders, what kind of idolatry is
this? Of course, it is wrong to
worship anything other than God,
but who would be so foolish as to
worship the dust of their own feet?
The Divrei Yechezkel, the Shinover
Rav, says not only is it not lunacy,
but many of us in fact worship in the
same way. These “idolators” were
merchants. They travelled and ran
around doing business, selling their wares,
growing customers. All of that activity
and “busyness” kicked up dust. The idea
that they were worshiping the dust of their
feet, says the Shinover, is that they were
bowing down to their busyness, they were
kneeling to their efforts and initiative.
These merchants were obsessed and
addicted to running around, staying busy,
and kicking up dust. They mistakenly
attributed success to the level of their
activity, they assumed their determination
and work, their busyness yielded results,
not Hashem. That is avoda zara, idolatry.
Many people tie their self-worth to how
busy they are, or at least appear to be.
When people ask us how things are going,
many of us are in the business of
busyness and instinctively talk about
how little time we have, how much we
have going on, how busy things are.
Leisure
time used to be viewed as a status
symbol. Now, free time has come to
be looked down on as idleness.
Instead, hectic busyness has become
the symbol of achievement.
ו ְרַחֲצּ֖ו :guests his told Avraham
םֶיכֵלְגַר, wash your feet, get rid of that
dust, eliminate the addiction and
worship of busyness, and enjoy some
slow living.
יֹוסֵי בֶן :says) 1:4 (Avos in Mishna The
יֹועֶזֶר -אִיׁש צְרֵדָה אֹומֵר,- י ְהִי בֵיתְָך בֵית
:רַגְלֵיהֶם, -ו ֶהֱו ֵי ׁשֹותֶה בְצָמָא- אֶת דִּבְרֵיהֶםו ַעַד לַחֲכָמִים, ו ֶהֱו ֵי -מִתְאַבֵּק בַּעֲפַר
“Make your home a gathering place
for Chachamim, sit in the dust of their
feet, and drink in their words with
thirst.” The simple understanding is
that the Rebbe, the teacher, used to sit
on a chair, surrounded by students on
the floor at his feet. Alternatively, it
can refer to being humble in their
presence. But why then didn’t the
Mishna say so explicitly, why connect
it to making yourself dusty with the
dust of their feet? And do Talmidei
Chachamim really “kick up dust” with
their teaching, aren’t they sitting
down?

Based on the insight of the Shinover, the
current Rosh Yeshiva of Ger, R’ Shaul
Alter, suggests that maybe the Mishna
means if you are going to attach yourself
to busyness, it should be to noble activity
and movement, to making a difference
and finding meaning, to not just making a
living, but living.
So what is the antidote to worshipping at
the altar of busyness? Don’t we need to
remain super active to get everything
done these days? After telling them to
wash their feet, to stop bowing down to
being active and working excessively,
Avaham then told them,
“.tree the under rest ,ו ְהִ ּשָ ׁ עֲנּ֖ו תַּחַת הָעֵץ”
Says the Shinover, Avraham was telling
them, “Lean under the tree, put yourself
under the protection and support of
Hashem’s protection. Yes, take initiative,
work hard, but then put your trust in
Hashem. If Hashem wants you to be
successful, He can bring the success after
a reasonable amount of work; if you
continue to work excessively, you are in
fact not trusting in Hashem and have
diminishing spiritual returns.”
Yes, there are seasons and periods of
busyness. Of course, we have
responsibilities, obligations, dreams and
ambitions. But we must stop worshipping
the idolatry of dust, bowing down to
busyness.
We must not only remember that it is
acceptable to slow down, it is a value and
a virtue, it is the true badge of honor. I
was recently talking with someone that
would be defined by most people as highly
successful. I asked him about his daily
schedule and he was telling me that he
starts working early in the morning, tries
to finish most days in time for when the
kids come home from school, makes sure
to find time to exercise and learn each day,
and to spend time with his wife in the
evening. When he finished describing the
balance and boundaries of his life, I was
more impressed, not less.
It’s time to wash our feet of the illusion
that busyness equals productivity and to
start leaning under the tree and enjoying
the shade of Hashem.