Prayers for Success?

Well, let me tell you, we thought
​we were doing fine, we were achieving
as much as we could. That is,
until he joined our unit.

He was short, looked like an outsider,
not very impressive. A quiet guy.
​But in the very first two-thousand-meter run,
we saw that he was different. He outclassed us all,
and he came in first. The one who came in second
didn't get to the finish line until more than
half a minute after he did. In calisthenics,
​he managed ten times better than anybody else.
On drills and hikes he stood out,
way beyond the rest of us.

 In one word: Outstanding!

 One time, in the darkest hours of the night,
we were on guard duty: me, the stars,
and the new recruit. I asked him,
"Okay, tell me. How did you get to be so good?"
​He looked at me in surprise. He said, "Do you
think I was born this way? I don't have the best
innate skills in the world, but I firmly believe that
I must be able to apply everything I tried to teach
everybody else. When I was a counsellor
in a youth movement, I always told my group that
we must contribute to the country, and that it is
very important it is to join the army. So when I enlisted
I finally had a chance to prove,
first of all to myself, that I can make a useful
contribution and that I can play a significant role.
I believe that I have great potential strength,
all that is needed is a strong desire and hard work
to fulfill that potential."

So that is how there, under the bright stars,
he gave me a lesson in ethics.
Maybe that wasn't his intention,
but I thought long and hard about what
he had said. How far have I come to fulfill
my own ideals? Suddenly, somebody shows up
and shakes you up completely.

You think you are doing so well?

Just look at how far you can really go,
as long as you don't make yourself
any concessions, as long as you don't look
only for a convenient lifestyle.

Don't give up on your ideals, your own truth!

Prayer is not simply standing in front of the Creator
​it also means to stand up in front of myself!
​The meaning of the word "prayer" in the
Bible is "justice." When I pray, I place before me
all the ideals in which I believe:
helping others, justice in the land,
the value of the study of Torah,
faith in the Creator of the world.

I ask myself a very simple question:
Where am I, and where are the ideals?
"Where is all my exalted talk, and where
are my real deeds?" Prayer comes to "shake me up,"
to help me judge myself. What is the gap between
the ideal and what truly exists? Prayer demands
of me to become a great person, to use my strength
to strive constantly to fulfill the ideals in which I believe.

Do you want to delve more deeply into this subject?
To understand how you can make this happen?
Now that you have acquired the new Brit Olam Siddur,
we invite you to join us for a series of lectures
that will teach you how to focus your energies
​and to use the amazing force of prayer properly,
in a way that will allow you to engage
your own tremendous ideals and move forward
from the ideals to positive action
in your day-to-day life.