Last week I shared a letter from a single woman about to turn 30 who resents being seen as part of the “shidduch crisis.” Her emphatic response to such labeling: “I’m not a crisis.” The following is my response.
Please do not allow the “shidduch crisis” label to depress you. We are a crisis-ridden generation. Everything has become a “crisis”: Job crisis, children crisis, school crisis, political crisis, medical crisis, financial crisis, real estate crisis, health crisis, government crisis, Israeli crisis, international crisis, and on and on. In short, our whole world is one big crisis.
While we may not be able to control the situations that befall us, we can control how we react to them. Yes, you and so many others find yourselves in a frustrating predicament. You have gone on more dates than you care to count but it has been to no avail. You have yet to find the right person. Sometimes you wonder if he really exists. The answer to that is yes, of course he does. You just haven’t connected yet. It’s one of our basic teachings that Hashem created a soul mate for each and every person.
“So where is he?” you ask again. You want to scream out that question. You can be angry. But you can ask that same question in prayer – in heartfelt pleading to G-d. These are your choices. And the choices do not end there. One path can lead you into the pit of darkness, into an abyss from where it’s difficult to emerge. But another choice is to adopt a positive attitude. Place a smile on your lips and go forth enthusiastically and vivaciously.
As you weigh these options, bear in mind that an angry, cynical attitude will drive people away from you. And this is especially true when it comes to shiddichum. I have had the zechus, the merit, to make countless shiddichum. And when I would ask shidduch candidates what it was they were searching for, the prime factor was simchas hachaim – a happy and joyous attitude toward life. Those who convey a bitter attitude and an angry countenance are usually rebuffed.
More than beauty, more than money, more than impressive diplomas, it is this simchas hachaim that renders a person a stunning shidduch candidate. And this holds true for males as well as females.
These, then, are your choices: Simchas hachaim – laugh away your problems, banish your fears, and try to remember the amazing teachings in our Hebrew language – lashon hakodesh. Time and again I have written that the Hebrew language is an amazing key to untold treasures but that most of us have misplaced that key or lost it altogether. We do not have that guiding light that would shed illumination on our problems.
In the holy tongue, the word for face is panim, derived from the word pnimiyut – your inner self – teaching us that that which is within our hearts, minds, and souls is reflected on our faces. It can be seen in one’s eyes, on the contour of one’s lips, in one’s entire body language.
Work on your pnimiyut so that your face reflects sunshine rather than gloom. A warm, charming, welcoming face will attract people to you.
In the Hebrew language every word is definitive. When we feel overwhelmed, lost, and baffled we must only attempt to understand the literal meaning of the word and it will give us clarification. “Crisis” in Hebrew is mashber. Mashber can mean a birthing stone on which centuries ago women gave life to their newborns. What can we derive from the deeper meaning of that teaching? Every crisis can be harnessed and converted into something creative – something better and more beautiful. Growth and new life can emerge from crisis. But again, that will depend on the choices we make. Those who can’t accept it can easily collapse under the stress of their crisis. They can enter into the deep darkness of depression. On the other hand, there are those who under crisis become hard as nails, angry and cynical, cruel and nasty.
Catch your breath, take a few minutes, and think about these options. Where would you like to go? Where would you like to be? Which attitude would you like to assume? Obviously you would like to convert your crisis into a positive new life and blessing. So stop being angry with people who file you under the label of “shidduch crisis.” They are just parroting what they heard in a speech and they think it’s clever. But you and I know it is not. It’s more painful then cleaver.
So be bigger than them. Ignore them and put a smile on your face. Say to yourself, “From my crisis I will create a magnificent Jewish home – a home of faith and love, a home where children are nurtured with the sacred milk of Torah, a home where shalom bayis prevails, a home where the door is always open to guests, a home where the lights of the holy Shabbos illuminate every nook and cranny.”
Be determined to turn your crisis into a birthing stone and create a blessed new life for yourself and for your future family.
(To be continued)