The Spiritual Foundations of Mental Health

What happens when a person experiences a thought storm?  How can we be of help to ourselves or others in stormy weather?

How can we declare complete resolve to make changes in our lives when we know we can't just flip a switch on habits?  It begins by appreciating the power of being a want-er.

Our Sages say that it's possible in our lives for yukky things to taste sweet and sweet things to taste yukky.  How does that work and what can we do about it?

The Talmud says that service of the heart is prayer.  We place before our Creator the contents of our hearts and acknowledge: all these feelings come from a single simple source.  In this manner we disentangle from this world and create a doorway for extraordinary change and annulment of decrees.

How much love, resolve, and contribuation is available to someone who understands the flow that flows through his heart and mind?  A lot!

I'm excited to be back after the excitement of moving my family from New Jersey to the Land of Israel!  Today's topic was inspired by an encounter with an 8 year old Israeli boy a few days after our arrival.  As always, I welcome your feedback at either henry@jewishwellbeing.org or 845-393-1529.

Listen to Rashi's precise description of how a person's heart works.  Our job in this world is not to manage the feelings of our heart, but to see the truth behind them and make gentle choices.  In that manner, we partner in the expansion of the precious space inside our heart.

Knowing we are susceptible to partial and fluctuating worldviews is a wonderful advantage in finding connection with other human beings.

It looks like we act out because things frighten us.  What if it was upside down - that give a playing field to fear when we rebel against the truth of how we work?

Good moods are lovely but sometimes they trip us up!  The challenge of seeing what's true - about good and bad moods - are even sweeter.

A busy and scattered mind can be a wonderful encounter with our lack of control.  Seeing our lack of control can be a wonderful reset - a letting go of needless exertion that frees me to new understanding.  And even if it hurts to have a scattered mind, that's ok, too, because it's part of a safe and healthy world.

Of course the answer is yes.  But why does it often look like they don't?

God, grant me the serenity to accept what I cannot change, the courage to change what I can, and the wisdom to know the difference!

Your heart bubbles up with clarity about life but you often forget and don't see that clarity.  Making room for that gap is a big part of becoming a spiritually mature and successful person.

We live in a feeling that can shape our sense of what is real, what is possible, and what we are dutybound to react to.  And we can glimpse a window opening to reveal a reality beyond that feeling.  

A simple few words in the weekly portion illuminate how illusions take root in our lives.

There is a powerful, self-centered, and snippety command center that can clutter and burden our lives.  Pesach reminded me that my life will only brighten and expand as I turn away from that command center and turn toward the Divine command center.

The source of Pharoah's tyranny was his total intolerance for his own lack of control.  The more he felt threatened by this lack of control, the more he needed to compensate by controlling all around him.  We each flow with an inner Pharoah!  Seeing the impersonal nature of this flow within us offers tremendous insight to finding powerful and creative freedom to navigate challenges...

Everyone in this world has experienced an Exodus.  Learn how to mine both the historic and the personal Exodus to discover a wellspring of hope and resilience.

Why do people seek relief in habits they know to be destructive and undignified?  How is it possible that at times we sense deeply the truth of a Higher Power and at other times we fully question this truth?  What lies at the heart of psychological stability?

Your body is not synonymous with the insecure, self centered aspect in you.  While it is inclined to comfort and cannot generate its own sense of purpose, it is ready, willing, and able to be guided by the soul - with love and acceptance.  Is your soul loving and accepting of your body?  Is it deeply grateful for the body's role in accomplishing anything of value in this world? &nbs...

The great reset buttons of our lives are happening all the time - resets from dark and insecure feelings, lack of vision, hopelessness.  Purim is an especially rich time to sense the power of our capacity to reset, to transform from darkness to light.  Are we getting in the way of those resets?

Every one of us has experienced a place in our lives where we once had no access to something important - a skill, a wisdom, confidence in some arena - and then we had access.  How does that happen?  Certainly persistence, courage, and asking for counsel make a difference.  Are we open to seeing how all change includes an ingredient that cannot be chalked up solely to us and our eff...

Much of the suffering we experience in life is built on the premise that someone - myself or others - or some event is causing my pain.  Now, if we can just find the culprit or what's to blame, we can get respite.   But this analysis is built on a misunderstanding.  Painful feelings are built in to the design of life: all humans flow with negative, insecure feelings.  They...

When we see loved ones act in unhealthy ways, we can get concerned - even frightened - and react.  But reactive efforts to help are generally unwelcome.  Reactive efforts to help are grounded in a belief that "So-and-so's behavior is causing me distress and therefore I must get him to change."  Even if we don't say those words, So-and-so picks it up and doesn't like it.   ...