Fixing Your Earth - 013 Changing Routine

Laziness Stemming From Water-of-Earth: When The Flow of Life Comes To A Halt

Previously, we spoke of how to solve laziness due to our element of earth-of-earth. Now we will progress to address the four kinds of laziness that come from our water-of-earth.

The nature of water is to flow; thus, when a person experiences a halt to a certain flow he’s used to in his life, this can breed on laziness. This will be the general outline of the laziness we will discuss here; there are four kinds of branching laziness that this can become.

2-A] Laziness From Change In Routine (Earth-of-Water-of-Earth)

Earth in the soul provides a person with the power of seder, orderliness. The other elements are jumpier in their nature; fire is jumpy, wind moves, and water flows. But earth stays in its place; this helps a person maintain his orderliness and being organized. However, sometimes the ‘water’ within the element of earth can cause a person to be lazy, when the “flow” of his regular life has changed in some way, and then the power of seder in a person actually contributes to his laziness.

For example, a person is used to a certain way of living; he does the same thing every day and sits in the same seat every day in his shul. This can be a cause for laziness, because is very used to the same things every day, and as soon as he goes through some change in his lifestyle, he gets lazy. The “flow” of his lifestyle gets stopped and he becomes lazy. This is how the earth-of-water-in-earth in the soul contributes to laziness.

The person is used to living his life a certain way, and as soon as he goes through even the slightest change, he finds it very hard to think about how will now go about his lifestyle – a kind of laziness.

2-B] Lazy From Slight Changes (Water-of-Water-of-Earth)

Another kind of laziness which branches out from water-of-earth is laziness stemming from water within water-of-earth. This is when a person finds it hard to go through even a very slight change. It is when a person gets lazy as soon as anything in his life comes to a halt, when he has to take a different direction.

For example, a person gets stuck in traffic, and he has to take a different route to get to his destination now. He’s upset that he has to take a different route, and he gets lazy at the thought that he will have to take a different way to go, and he finds this very hard.

2-C] Lazy Because There Is A Major Change of Direction (Wind-of-Water-of-Earth)

Another kind of laziness can come from wind within water-of-earth, and this is when a person experiences difficulty when there is an overhaul to his lifestyle. Most people can identify with this kind of laziness – that it’s hard to change your direction in life.

This kind of laziness can be felt easily by any person who becomes a baal teshuvah or a convert; he has to change his whole lifestyle in order to live a Torah lifestyle, and he finds the change of direction to be very hard.

2-D] Lazy From Feeling Uninspired (Fire-of-Water-of-Earth)

Another cause for laziness is coming from fire within water-of-earth. This is when a person is constantly seeking to be elated, wherever he is; and as a result, the person is constantly uninspired from his surroundings.

For example, sometimes a child in seventh grade wishes he could be in high school already – he has a nature to grow, but he takes this to an extreme and wishes he could escape the level he is currently at so he can ascend it.

A person who gets lazy in his life because of this reason is acting jumpy with his need for growth. He sort of feels like he is in mourning even as he is with others, because he always needs elation wherever he is, and thus he wishes to give himself constant elation.

These are the four kinds of laziness that come from water-of-earth. Now let us go through the solutions to each of these.

2-A] Solving Laziness Due To Earth-of-Water-of-Earth

Laziness coming from our earth-of-water-of-earth is when a person is lazy as soon as he experiences some small change in his life. This can either be because a person is simply immature and he can’t deal with changes, or it can be because he used to a certain seder (schedule) in his life, and a change in his seder bothers him and he can’t deal with the change.

To counter this, a person should get used to changes in his seder. For example, he can get used to waking up at a different time of the day; he should counter his seder in life by developing a different seder.

Another example: if a person always walks a certain path to his shul, he should deliberately take a different route. Or, if he always davens in a certain shul on Shabbos, he should try a different shul sometimes. Or, if a person always sits on one side of the table, he should sit on a different side of the table.

Many more examples can be added on to the ones we gave; the point is to change the seder he’s used to, which gets the soul used to the concept of a change in routine.

On a deeper note, the transition of death is most difficult for someone who is used to his seder of life, because he is leaving this world and going into a completely different one. It’s terrible suffering for someone who is used to routine. By getting used to changes in routine, one can lessen this suffering.

2-B] Solving Laziness Due To Water-of-Water-of-Earth

The next kind of laziness we discussed was laziness stemming from water-of-water-of-earth. This is when a person finds even the slightest change to be difficult, because he has become so used to a certain routine in life.

To counter this, when a person is walking, he should suddenly stop and stay where he is for a bit, and then he can continue walking. This gets him used to the idea of halting sometimes, which is hard for him, since he is always so used to continuing his routine without interruption. A person can try this either with his actions, words, or thoughts – he should get used to stopping them sometimes.

If a person doesn’t know how to put a halt on any action he does, then his action is controlling him. If a person doesn’t know how to stop talking, his talking controls him. If a person never learns how to detach from a thought he’s thinking about, then he’s being controlled by his thoughts. We must be in control of what we do, say and think.

For this reason, a person has to get used to the idea of detaching sometimes from what he’s doing\saying\thinking, as this will get him used to putting a halt on routine. In this way he will slowly learn how to adapt to changes.

A person should start only with small changes and not try to begin making drastic changes. The concept of stopping our actions will help a person be in control of his actions, and the same goes for speech and thoughts. When a person gets used to thinking, stopping, and then returning to thinking, his power of thought becomes more developed, and he develops more yishuv hadaas (a settled frame of mind).

With the help of Hashem, we will continue in the next lesson with the solution of the last two kinds of laziness stemming from water-of-earth (wind in water-of-earth, and fire in water-of-earth).