14 Apr TAZRIA-METZORA: FOCUS ON YOUR JOURNEY

The Vilna Gaon, in his
commentary to the
Book of Mishleh (16:1-
4), discusses how each
and every person is
created as a unique and
distinct being, different from all other
people. We all have not only a distinctive
appearance, but also a distinctive set of
qualities, natural talents, and ways of
thinking and processing what we see and
learn. This is because every single soul is
unique. No two souls are alike.
This point is probably not new to most of
us. But the next point made by the Vilna
Gaon is fascinating.
He writes that during the times when there
was prophecy, a person could go to a
prophet who, through prophecy, could
analyze his unique soul, and on this basis
advise the individual what his role and
mission in the world is. The prophet could
tell the person what kind of person to
marry, what kind of career to pursue, what
kind of activities he should be involved in,
and so on, in accordance with his unique
characteristics. But nowadays, the Vilna

Gaon says, when we don’t have prophecy,
we have the power to do this ourselves.
The Vilna Gaon writes that each person has
a certain level of ru’ah ha’kodesh, a kind of
spiritual insight resembling prophecy,
which helps him identify his unique
mission, what unique role he is to fill and
what unique contribution he is to make.
The Vilna Gaon here is teaching us
something so important, and so powerful,
which, I’m afraid, some people fail to
realize. He is teaching us that the only
thing that matters is our unique mission,
our unique journey through life. What
other people do, or the way other people
perceive us, is irrelevant. We each have a
journey to take to life – and this is what we
should be focused on.
So many people get distracted from their
journey because they’re too worried about
what others think of them. They’re too
busy trying to impress their peers, trying to
get attention, trying to win approval and
admiration. Trying to impress people is so
foolish, because what other people think
does not matter. What matters is our
journey, our mission, our efforts to achieve

what we’ve come into this world to
achieve. This is what we should be focusing
on – not on impressing people.
Parashat Tazria and Metzora deal mainly
with the subject of tzara’at, a type of
affliction that would befall those who
indulged in lashon ha’ra – gossip and
negative talk about other people. Very
often, we feel the need to hear and spread
gossip, to talk about other people’s faults
and mistakes, so that we can feel good
about ourselves, so we can feel that we’re
better, that our lives are more impressive
than theirs.
This, too, is terribly foolish. Other people’s
mistakes and other people’s faults have
nothing to do with us. The fact that our
fellow did this or didn’t do that says
absolutely nothing – nothing! – about how
we’re doing, about whether we’re living
our best life, about whether we’re on the
right track, whether we’re fulfilling our
unique mission and advancing in our
unique journey. Everyone has issues of
one kind or another. Everyone is struggling
with something. How somebody else is
managing with his issues says absolutely

nothing about how we’re managing with
ours. Focusing on other people’s struggles
accomplishes nothing but diverting our
attention away from the work we need to
do to overcome our own struggles.
Let’s stop worrying less about what other
people think of us, and what other people
are doing, and start worrying more about
working to grow, to achieve, and to pursue
the goals that we have been brought into
the world to achieve.