Effort vs. Trust and How to Make Decisions

This past Shabbos, my third-grader related a beautiful Torah thought that he learned in school. As soon as I heard it, I knew I had to share it on the Bitachon Blog!

The Torah teaches that if you see someone loading an animal with packages, you should help the owner to load the animal. However, if the owner does not assist, then you are not required to load the packages either.

So too, Hashem wants to help us with our work, with our endeavors. However, we must try as well. If we don’t try, then Hashem will not help us either.

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Effort vs. Trust

This idea touches on the age old balancing act between Effort and Trust.

Bitachon requires that I believe that everything that happens comes from Hashem. What I have or lack, what happens to me, my health, my job, my family - is all decided by Hashem.

But Bitachon also requires that I do my fair share. If I want Hashem to help me out, I had better show that I am trying as hard as I can. The passerby only has to help load if the owner is working too!

What exactly is “Effort”?

Effort means to try your best within reason.

Imagine you ask you child to clean his room. You recognize that this may be a difficult task for him to perform all on his own, and you offer to help him. What would you expect from your child?

Personally, I would expect to see active involvement. I am happy to guide, advise, and even sweep up the mess, as long as the child is working with me.

If he is throwing things away, picking clothes up off the floor, and returning toys to their places, I am thrilled to sort, collect, and pick up along with him. But as soon as he sits down on his bed to watch me work, I am done helping.

What one might expect from his child is a good barometer to measure what God expects from us. Hashem understands that we can't do it alone. But if we sit on the couch and put our feet up thinking that “God will provide!”, we may be in for a big surprise! Hashem will assist us, provided that we are working too.

Decision Making

There are 2 general types of decisions, and each requires a different approach:

1. Material matters

   When it comes to making decisions in the physical realm, it is often hard to know which choice will lead you to success.

   For example, you have an opportunity to buy a house. The real estate market fluctuates, and you cannot know whether the house will go up or down in value. Proper effort would require you to do some research and find out whether the market is expected to rise or fall. Once you have all the information in front of you, you must make an educated decision based on what your eyes can see.

   Let’s say you decided to pass on the house because an expert advised you that the market was likely to fall. You made the right decision based on research and expert opinion.

   It soon becomes apparent that the market has not fallen at all; it has skyrocketed beyond anyone’s expectations.

   

   This is where Bitachon comes in. You did your part - you put in your reasonable effort in making the decision. Whatever actually happens is due to Hashem’s decree. You did not make a bad decision; Hashem decided you were not meant to have that profit.

   Conversely, if you bought it and made a windfall on it, you still need to have Bitachon and attribute the success to Hashem. Your gain is also only because Hashem willed it to be so.

   (Needless to say, if you bought the house and its value dropped, you will need a large dose of Bitachon! As long as you did your proper effort before buying it, you need not feel bad about the loss, or feel that you made a bad decision. Here too, the loss was Hashem’s decree.)

2. Spiritual matters

   In the spiritual realm, you still have to put in your effort - lots of it.

   There is a major difference, though, when it comes to making decisions.

   In the physical realm, we have no way of knowing what is ultimately the right choice. In the spiritual realm, however, we do have a way of knowing what is right!

   Hashem gave us an instruction manual - the Torah! - to guide and teach us, to tell us what is right. The excuse “I just did what I thought would be best” doesn’t work, because we have the actual answer available to us!

   It is true that not everyone has sufficient Torah knowledge to come to the correct conclusion. But everyone has access to someone who does have that knowledge. Hashem provided us with Rabbis who are learned and experienced. They can and will happily answer our questions and guide us. Our proper effort is to learn or to ask!

   For example, you would like to take advantage of a great deal caused by a pricing error, but you are not sure whether this is ethical or not.

   Even though you may not personally know the answer, there is no need to guess! Is this permitted by halacha (Torah law) or not? You can find out the answer by calling a reliable Rabbi.

Practical Bitachon

1. Don’t use “Well that must be what Hashem wanted” as an excuse. You are responsible to put in a reasonable effort! If after all your efforts, you still fail, then “that must be what Hashem wanted”.

2. Regarding material decisions, do your due diligence and then decide according to what seems best. Hashem will take it from there!

3. Concerning spiritual matters, if you don’t know what is the right thing to do, ASK! (Tip: the more you study yourself, the better position you will be in to know what to ask, or how to ask! Sometimes relating all the pertinent details clearly can make all the difference!)

Discussion:

What do you  think constitutes a “reasonable effort”?