Are you able to enjoy what you have?
Or do you look past what you have ‘in the hand’, to see what else might be ‘in the bush’? Do you find it hard to appreciate the beauty of what you DO have, because of the pleasures that you DON’T have?
It’s a common attitudinal struggle.
Think about the Jews in the desert, who were lucky enough to eat Manna from Heaven daily.
The Manna looked pretty bland, but it tasted great; in fact, one was miraculously able to savor whatever taste one desired.
And the Manna was so easy to procure. The Torah tells us that the Manna fell – every morning - right by the Jews’ tents.
Yet, the manna was also a source of stress for some Jews.
Why?
- The Manna couldn’t be stored. Whatever fell in the morning would spoil by the next day.
If you have ‘fresh’ Manna delivered every morning, why do you need some in the pantry?
Because we like to feel secure.
No matter what you have today, you want to feel secure about tomorrow; you don’t want to feel vulnerable.
The Jews needed to trust - REALLY trust - G-d and His Manna-delivery. Without the trust in tomorrow, they couldn’t enjoy what they had today.
- The Manna didn’t look as delicious as it tasted. A quick Google search reveals a study of how much a specific food’s appearance impacts its taste.
The food can taste great, but we want it to look great, too. Satisfying one sense (taste) isn’t enough; we want more (sight).
The Jews suffered from this need for multi-sensory pleasure in the desert. They had Divinely-tasty food, but they couldn’t ‘eat with their eyes’.
So here’s a lesson. Do you have Manna on your plate today? Do you have a blessing that G-d has granted you in your life? Of course you do.
So enjoy it.
Don’t let what you don’t have, or your inability to control the future, get in your way.
When we can rise about our self-generated impediments, we can come out of the desert and appreciate life.
Mendy wrote...
The Jews were, in many ways, coddled by the Divine. They had few material worries.
But they were learning to rely on G-d. They would have to remember that reliance, that sense of trust, when they moved to a life where it seemed that they were taking care of themselves, where G-d's input was no longer obvious.
In the Torah portion we'll read this Shabbos, Moshe, in the last weeks of his life, reviews this Desert Journey with the Jewish people.
In Deut. 8:3 he says: "[G-d] afflicted you and let you hunger, he fed you the Manna".
How did G-d 'afflict us' with the Manna?
He didn't. He gave us a situation in which we could afflict ourselves.
Dr. Jorge Sintes wrote...