ESSAYS| 2017

ESSAYSss| Essays 2017

To Find Meaning One Must Make Meaning

By Bentzi Avtzon, Bala Cynwyd, PA

Essays 2017 / Finalists

MyLife Essay Contest 2017 About this there’s no question: In today’s digital age the average person is exposed to more information than ever before. What happens across the globe is known before it can be referred to in past tense. Even when we don’t seek it, when we begin the morning insistent that this time

Read More

All Fun and No Joy: The Paradox of Life in the Postmodern Era

By Yossi Grossbaum, Folsom, CA

Essays 2017 / Finalists

MyLife Essay Contest 2017  We have more conveniences today than ever before. Forgot to buy some household supply or ingredient? You can have it delivered to your doorstep in less than an hour. Looking for information about any obscure subject? The answer is instantly accessible using a device that almost everyone carries in their pocket.

Read More

Love: The Basis of the Torah

By Rochel Cohen, Leeds UK

Essays 2017 / Finalists

MyLife Essay Contest 2017 Life issue: Low self esteem. Children sing it. Teacher’s discuss it. Parents enforce it. Day after day we recite the same verse of ‘Hareini’ – I take upon myself the positive commandment of ‘and you should love your fellow as yourself’. Rabbi Akiva states that this above statement is the basis

Read More

Wanting Desire

By Mushka Silberberg, Chicago, IL

Essays 2017 / Finalists

MyLife Essay Contest 2017   Introduction Pulling oneself out of bed at the command of the six a.m. alarm clock is never easy. Most people want to be successful and productive, but when the daily grind hits, many cannot gather the motivation to actually do what they must. While they understand the negative results of

Read More

How to Kick Bad Habits to the Curb

By Rivkah Shanowitz, Montreal, QC

Essays 2017 / Finalists

MyLife Essay Contest 2017   Preface What  is  a  habit?  A  habit  is  a  routine  behaviour  that  is  followed  regularly   to  the  point  that  it  becomes  involuntary.  This  behaviour  then  gets   stored  in  the  Basal  Ganglia,  the  sub  conscious [1]. There  are  many  pop-­psychology  books  today  that  deal  with  overcoming   habits.  Luckily

Read More

The Dynamics of Happiness

By Rafi Chemel, Toronto, ON

Essays 2017 / Finalists

MyLife Essay Contest 2017 Introduction The current age seems to be fraught with a strange paradox. On the one hand, never before has there been such an abundance of material wealth, prosperity, technological development and medical breakthrough. To put it simply, life is better than it has ever been. Yet simultaneously, the rate of depression

Read More

Why We Need a Break

By David LIchtenstadter, Brooklyn, NY

Essays 2017 / Finalists

MyLife Essay Contest 2017 We all love to relax and to be entertained in the time that we know that life has real meaning and we have serious goals to achieve. So it is intriguing why we have the urge for these acts and to know if they are at all permissible. In today’s day

Read More

Committing to Your Purpose in a World of Cheap Substitutes

By No'a Bat Miri, Milford, CT

Essays 2017 / Finalists

MyLife Essays Contest 2017 Many parents loathe the day their little one discovers the word “why.” It’s not simply that children can be quite indefatigable in their exploitation of this subtle weapon that bothers a parent, but the thought that this is where her failure begins: after feeding, cleaning, and giving all of the other

Read More

The Heart of the Matter

By Gale Levin, New Haven, CT

Essays 2017 / Finalists

MyLife Essay Contest 2017 It is a basic tenet in Judaism that everything in the physical world is a reflection of the spiritual world. This makes sense since G-d looked to the Torah as a blueprint to create the world. (Midrash Beraishis Rabbah 1:1) So, in order to understand the workings of our soul, it

Read More

Chassidus: Not Just a Problem Solver

By Moishe Kaltmann, Brooklyn, NY

Essays 2017

MyLife Essay Contest 2017   As Rabbi Yochanan ben Zakkai lay on his deathbed, surrounded by his students, he moaned and cried out.[1] “There lies before me two roads, one to heaven and the other to hell… and I do not know on which one they will take me!” Such a story needs explanation. Rabbi

Read More