Rav Dovid Leib Schwartz, a prominent Tolna chassid, mentioned an insight he heard on the words (Bereishis 49:8) “yadcha b’oref oyvecha, your hand will be upon the neck of your enemies” which are in the pasuk before “gur aryeh Yehuda.” The roshei teivos of these words are yud, beis, and aleph, which equal thirteen. The last letters are chof, fei, and chof, which equal one hundred twenty. From when a person becomes an adult, a boy at his bar mitzvah, until the end of his life at 120, he must be fully cognizant of his battle against the yetzer hara, and know how to grasp this spiritual enemy by the neck. This knowledge is especially relevant when fighting the urge to sleep longer than we should. Even when we are kara and shachav, crouching and lying down on our beds, we need to know we have the ability to fight strongly like the lion.
It is said that when Rav Elya Lopian was in his 80s, he made a special effort to get up very early in the morning, even earlier than he had when he was younger. When asked why he began doing this, he responded, “It dawned on me that pretty soon they are going to be calling me back from this world. When I get to Shomayim, and they begin questioning me on whether I kept the Shulchan Aruch, I don’t want to fail the first question! I need to get up earlier than usual like a lion so that I can at least get the first question right!”
Can we try to awaken a little earlier than we have? Can we make more time to daven and learn Torah?