Chapter Three
Shattered Illusions
The ego does its best to avoid making eye contact with the truth. But what happens when the pain of reality forces its way in, making it impossible to ignore?
How do we react when faced with difficult news?
We are quiet. Still.
We feel almost detached, separated from the collective illusion of the world. So much seems irrelevant, at least for the moment. The ego loses its pull, and its voice is muted. In these moments of clarity, we feel little to no urge to indulge the ego. Gossip, envy, and other ego-driven impulses lose their appeal entirely. Physical urges similarly fade—appetite diminishes, along with the craving for material indulgence or superficial validation. (Indeed, on one level, the purpose of mitzvos is to rein in both the body and the ego, allowing the neshama—the true self—to shine through. This allows us to live with perpetual perspective, rather than oscillating between fleeting moments of clarity and being abruptly thrust into jarring spaces of awareness.)
This flash of perspective shifts us into an undistorted reality, bluntly exposing that the world we may have heavily invested in is not real. Its value is reduced to zero.
When the ego is engaged, it instructs us about what is important. However, in this space, we can’t access it and have little or no connection to the reality into which we have been thrust. We have nothing to hold onto—neither to the illusion of reality nor to reality itself. The sharp pain of futility, coupled with the shame of wasted pursuit and potential, fills us with fear and anxiety.
At varying levels of awareness, we do not ask, “Where has my world gone?” but rather, “Where in the world am I? Who am I? What have I been living for?” Our reality is turned upside down and we have to reorient ourselves without a true north. Our emotional foundation is shaken because our construct of reality is upended.
Imagine people playing a board game who come to believe that the game is real life. Then a knock at the door reminds them that there is another world—the real world—and it’s jarring, shocking. They have labored in a game that is not tethered to anything real. Similarly, the wider the chasm between true reality and the world we have been living in, the more painful it becomes when stressors arise, as it creates an existential threat—the fear of non-existence.
Logically, when an egocentric person’s ego deflates, their sense of identity collapses, leaving them disoriented and confused—a deeply terrifying experience. In contrast, when a person grounded in reality faces a challenge, their perspective sharpens and becomes clearer. Life’s challenges either destabilize our entire world or reaffirm it.
The Pain of Distance
Suffering is distance from Hashem, but, more deeply, it is separation from existence. Hashem is everything. He is existence; reality itself. But when our days are spent carelessly, we are incompatible with existence. Similarly, the transition itself from This World to the Next also hinges on our behavior. A person who identifies with his body will be less prepared—and will suffer greatly as his whole identity ceases to exist—while one who knows that he is truly a neshamah merely discards the garment of physicality and moves painlessly into a new reality. Rav Nachman teaches that for one who truly believes in Hashem—and lives in reality—the moment of death is a seamless transition from one life to the next, akin to “removing a hair from a cup of milk.”
It is precisely death—and reflection on this fragile and finite existence—that punctures the illusion of This World and deflates the ego. We concede the world’s finite, temporary nature and want to attach ourselves to something more, something real. Far too often, we distract ourselves from the pain of self-awareness until the ego comes back online.
Depression is aptly described in Torah sources as a taste of death. When we die, the soul separates from our body. A person who is not growing and moving forward in life will force a rift between the body and the soul—the very experience of death itself. A flash of perspective further illuminates this rift. Our soul aches to grow, and stagnation feels like death because it represents a form of spiritual death. The accompanying feeling of futility—that what we are doing does not matter—leads to the inevitable, excruciating conclusion that we, too, do not matter.
As noted, when we live a meaningful life, our resolve strengthens. However, when our pursuits lack fulfillment, we anxiously wait for clarity to fade. This is crucial because our ability to exercise self-control is deeply tied to how we manage fear.
Terror Management Theory explains that our fear of death—and the anxiety it triggers—is managed in two ways: by embracing meaningful values (mortality salience hypothesis) or through distraction and avoidance (anxiety-buffer hypothesis). Extensive research, spanning hundreds of studies, shows that awareness of mortality heightens anxiety, compelling us to cling more tightly to our values as a way to manage fear. We double down on whichever reality we have invested in.
To be continued
