Overcoming Despair and Building Faith and Trust
Rabbi Allen writes:
It takes trust and faith to overcome despair. Rebbe Nachman of Bratzlav, who is known to have struggled with depression, teaches us, “Hanukkah is not just some celebration of miracles performed in the past…It is a guiding light for people from all walks of life, from all eras in time, to see through the darkness of their personal lives and to become part of history…It is also the knowledge that G!d is with us, even when we lose the battle.”
There is faith and trust that G!d is with us, and that G!d will be with us, and that we will never be alone. But there is also something even more fundamental: just plain faith and just plain trust. Not trust or faith in anything, but as a state of being. Living with trust. Living with faith. It is a moment-by-moment experience. It is being in the now with confidence, security, and a sense of well-being. It is setting despair aside and opening our hearts and minds to find new ways of being, new answers, new avenues. Some of us may attribute such feelings to faith and trust in G!d, while others of us may experience it differently. No matter how we describe it or to what we ascribe it, when we feel a sense of trust and faith in our hearts, it feels just right. (Allen, 2021).
Reference
Allen, K. (2021). Diminishing despair and growing trust and faith. Jewish Boston. https://www.jewishboston.com/read/hanukkah-day-4-diminishing-despair-and-growing-trust-and-faith/
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