ESSAYS| 2015

ESSAYSss| English

Enhancing Your Home with Sacred Silliness

by Chaim Karp

Essays 2015

MyLife Essay Contest G-d said to the Children of Israel, “You shall build me a Mikdash, a sanctuary, and I will dwell in them”. The obvious question is, the verse should have read … build me a sanctuary and I will dwell in it. The Rebbe explained in his inaugural discourse Basi Legani: build me a

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Finding Balance: A Contemporary Paradigm

by  Avraham Arieh Trugman

Essays 2015

MyLife Essay Contest One of the most fundamental pillars on which all Chassidic teachings are based, is the need to “translate” every story, mitzvah (commandment) and concept in the Torah into an understandable and relevant message that is both practical and personally meaningful. In this article we will take a highly symbolic kabbalistic and chassidic

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Educating through Love or Fear?

by Dovid Ginsburg

Essays 2015

MyLife Essay Contest The following essay compares the relationship of love and fear of G-d, as explained in a Chassidic discourse, to the role love and fear play in education. We then glean a practical application in the choice between discipline with fear or love. Love or fear With regard to education, the question is

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Do You Live Life or Does Life Live You?

by Yochanan Ress

Essays 2015

MyLife Essay Contest You can either live by design or by default. There is a choice. In psychological terminology often used in the context of personal mastery, one can live from an ‘internal locus of control’ or an ‘external locus of control’. The former means that you are empowered by the realisation that you do

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Tapping into the Infinite

by Sophia Katz

Essays 2015

MyLife Essay Contest What is your drive that gets you out of bed, to the cup of coffee, and out the door into a day of unending responsibilities? What gives you the strength to work so incessantly, be it practicing an instrument to become a more skilled musician, or travelling the world to experience new

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Beyond Empathy

by Yitzchok  Kaufmann

Essays 2015

MyLife Essay Contest Life is full of relationships with other people, from close family and friends to coworkers and acquaintances. Although every relationship is unique, all relationships share common characteristics. The fundamental and defining characteristic of all relationships is human connection. The deeper the connection the better the relationship. The depth of connection depends on

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Soul-Based Conflict Management

by Shimon Chyrek

Essays 2015

MyLife Essay Contest Sometimes our feelings can become so overwhelming that we have no space for another person’s reality. How can we have difficult conversations while at the same time promoting the health of our relationships? Tanya, chapters 18-­25 and 41, lend some wisdom to this issue. One of the reasons we so often get

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Growing through Recognition of Duality

by Shmuel Lieberman

Essays 2015

MyLife Essay Contest Major life problems are often the byproduct of one’s perspective.  Indeed, the majority of life’s struggles are largely based on our perception of reality.  However, when approaching these issues through a “Chassidic lens,” we often find that these supposed life problems are truly nonexistent.  Take, for example, one who shockingly discovers that

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The Rebbe’s Enduring Leadership

by Yochanan Gordon

Essays 2015

MyLife Essay Contest 2015 During the 2000 presidential election in which Al Gore was looking to unseat incumbent President George W. Bush, a technical error involving many of the election ballots in the State of Florida made it difficult to determine which candidate many voters intended to vote for. A subsequent Supreme Court ruling overturned

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Sorting Through the Uncertainty

by Jason (Shlomo) Laufer

Essays 2015

MyLife Essay Contest 2015 In today’s rapidly expanding global economy, there are many opportunities to achieve financial success. However, they are accompanied with a great deal of risk that can cause financial and emotional instability. If viewed incorrectly, fiscal hardship, such as losing one’s job, can be psychologically debilitating. However, by understanding and using Chassidic

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