Twelve Steps and Yiddishkeit

A recovering person writes:

I’m in a lot of pain that I never thought I would feel if I threw myself  into the program. When I first walked in to the meeting rooms I was told that it’s ok not to feel perfect. I was fine accepting that until the days just kept passing. I now feel directionless, despite the good things that have been pointed out about myself. People introduce themselves as ‘grateful recovering sexaholics’ but I don’t feel that. All I see in myself is a lot of ego, resentments, anger and hate… My life may not even seem better than it was before joining the program. I may be healthier but certainly not happier. I think the only thing preventing me from acting out is again is my ego, because otherwise I’ll have even more shame and humiliation directed at myself.

Rabbi Twerski Responds:

One of the greatest principles in the 12-srep program is “Keep it simple.”

It really can be quite simple, if we keep the first mitzvah. We may ot know what the first mitzvah is.
In Bereishis, we are told that Hashem created the universe, from the tiniest ameba to the awesome super-galaxies that are so immense that we cannot even imagine them. Hashem created all this by Himself, unassisted.

Then on day #6, Hashem said “Naaseh Adam, Let us make man.” Who is the “us?” Whose help is Hashem seeking, and why could He create the whole universe unassisted, but needs help in creating man?

The Baal Shem Tov explained that all living things were created in a state of completion. They did not have to do anything on their own to change themselves from their state of creation. Little bears would grow to be big bears, and little alligators would grow to be big alligators. Even those living things that underwent transformation, such as the caterpillar becoming a butterfly, did so automatically, because the change was programmed in their genes. Angels did not even grow at all. They are created as complete spiritual beings.

For reasons known only to Him, Hashem wanted a different type of creature, called man. In contrast to all other living things, man is created incomplete. Man comes into the world as an animal, or, as it says in Job (11:12), “Man is born a wild ass.” But man is not intended to remain just an animal. Man must, by his own effort, become a spiritual being.

When Hashem said, “Let us make man,” He was addressing man, and He was essentially saying, “I could create you completely spiritual, but then you would be just another angel. My idea of man is that he must change himself from the animal he was created into man. Therefore, I cannot create you as spiritual. You must develop your own spirituality. You must participate in your own creation.”

The mitzvah given to man is to become spiritual. That is what is meant by “Let us make man.”

But the animal component of man does not seek to become spiritual.

Therefore, “G-d blew a spirit of life into his nostrils,” and it is this spirit that enables man to rise above the animal state in which he was created.” The animal component seeks only pleasure, comfort and self-gratification.

Man’s spirit gives him the ability to do things that animals cannot do, such as:
to seek a goal in life
to distinguish right from wrong and to choose right
to defy a bodily urge when it is wrong
to give of  oneself for the betterment of others
to delay gratification
to forgive an offense
to be humble
to be compassionate and considerate
to search for truth

When a person does all the above, one is implementing the spirit and one is, therefore, spiritual.

What is spirituality? It is becoming that which man was meant to be. It is fulfilling the first Divine command, “Let us make man.”

It is obvious that in addiction, the animal component of man dominates him and does not allow him to implement his spiritual abilities. When the addict recognizes this, he turns to G-d and says, “I want to be that which You intended me to be, but the animal component in me overwhelms me. Please help me resist it and become that which You want me to be.”

Every human being has a mission, to become man. Whatever station and circumstances one has in life do not affect this mission. Fulfilling this mission is every person’s purpose in existence.