Fixing Your Earth [Laziness] - 016 Lethargy & The Solution

Fire-of-Fire-of-Earth: Laziness From Lack of Vitality

With siyata d’shmaya we will conclude in this lesson about the element of earth and its trait of laziness. We will now examine laziness that comes from fire-of-fire-of-earth.

As explained in the previous lessons, the element of earth is the root of the nature of heaviness, which prevents a person from moving. The element of fire jumps out of its place, and in the soul, it enables a person to expand past where he was. Fire-of-earth is when earth and fire collide and oppose each other, where the “fire” bursts out with greater intensity after it has been stifled by the non-moving nature of earth.

Fire-of-fire-of-earth is when the “dry” natures of both fire and earth combine, forming a “dryness” that is more total. Although fire is hot element and earth is cold, their common denominator is that they are both dry elements. Therefore, the dryness of earth and fire are able to combine with each other.

When a Person Becomes ‘Dried Out’

In this lesson, we will learn about the laziness that comes from fire-of-fire-of-earth, which is a kind of laziness that comes from becoming totally “dried up” in the soul. We find that the more inner vitality (chiyus) a person has, the less he will become ‘dried up’ in his soul, and in contrast, the less inner vitality a person has, the ‘drier’ he will become in his soul. When a person is lacking in chiyus, he will become lazy.

The element of water is moist, while the element of earth is dry. When a person feels pleasure (water) in what he is doing, he feels inwardly alive about it, he will feel more motivated, and he will move more. But when a person doesn’t feel pleasure in what he does, he is ‘dry’ about it, his motivation ‘dries up’, and he becomes lazy and apathetic in his actions.

In many cases, laziness is coming from the dryness of the element of earth. With fire-of-earth, the two dry elements meet other and the dryness becomes more total. But there is a difference between the dryness of earth and fire. Earth is dry by its very nature, whereas fire dries out other elements. In terms that apply to us: Either a person doesn’t have sufficient chiyus to begin with, or, he used to have chiyus, but he has become dried out.

When a person is doing anything that is constructive, he will generally have more chiyus when he does it, and if he is doing something detrimental, he usually has less chiyus from it (and if he does get chiyus from it, it is only imagined chiyus). With a nature of fire-of-earth, though, a person’s dominant nature is earth, so he is generally unmoving, and when his fire bursts out, the earth still dominates the fire somewhat, and this doesn’t allow the fire to move in a balanced way. As a result, the person’s behavior is negatively affected. The person becomes ‘dried out’ from this imbalanced burst of fire, and the negative cycle is repeated.

Additionally, the dry nature of earth causes even more ‘dryness’ in the soul after the person has acted upon his fire. This explains why there are some people who don’t enjoy what they do to begin with, while others begin to do something with enjoyment but later they lose their enjoyment in it. The second kind of person has a nature of fire-of-fire-of-earth – he becomes very ‘dried out’ after he has acted upon his intense fire.

When “Chiyus” (Inner Vitality) Is Missing From Torah Learning and Mitzvah Observance

When a person does the mitzvos or when he learns Torah, he is able to do so with pleasure in it. But there are people who will do mitzvos and they don’t have pleasure in it, and there are people who regularly learn Torah but they don’t have any pleasure in it.

When it comes to learning Torah, there are different levels of pleasure in it. There is intellectual enjoyment in it, which pleasures the mind, and there is also a more spiritual kind of pleasure in Torah learning: to feel the sweetness in learning Torah. But there are people who regularly learn Torah and they still have no pleasure in learning it. They don’t have chiyus in it. After they finish learning, they become even more ‘dried out’, from the lack of chiyus. A person may feel intellectually connected to his Torah learning, because his mind can revel in the wondrous wisdom of the Torah and in the analytical aspects of the Gemara, but inwardly, he may not feel connected to it, in his soul.

A person may perform all of the mitzvos with meticulous observance, but he can find himself constantly doubting or regretting what he did. He doesn’t have a pleasure in doing the mitzvos – instead, he always feels doubtful about what he did. Although he understands intellectually the importance of the mitzvos, he doesn’t feel connected in his heart, to the mitzvos. This resembles the statement, “The wicked are full of regrets.”[1] A person is full of regrets, which are doubts, about what he does, when he lacks pleasure and inner vitality in what he does.

Because he is somewhat apathetic about what he does, this attitude slowly ‘dries out’ his soul, as he continues to perform the mitzvos. It is really stemming from the lack of chiyus in his soul, which causes him to ‘dry himself out’, in the form of doubting everything he does. He begins to act from a ‘dry’ place in himself, and with the more he continues to act, he becomes even more ‘dried out’, as a result of performing apathetically. This is fire-of-fire-of-earth.

There is a fundamental difference between the way the element of fire moves, with the way the element of fire moves. A person may perform work in the heat and ‘work up a sweat’, yet this doesn’t dry him out, because he is using the element of wind, which is a moist [vitality-giving] element. But when a person moves by using his element of fire, this is an intense burst of movement, but the person does not feel energetic about what he does. Although he is acting out of excitement, he is not actually feeling more ‘alive’ inside from his progress. So he will be excited, but that still doesn’t mean he is getting chiyus from what he does. It is because his ‘fire’ is drying him out.

If a person is more goal-oriented – for example, if he is trying to get to get to a certain goal and purpose in his Torah learning - then it will not bother him that much if he isn’t getting taanug\pleasure or chiyus (inner vitality)throughout every step of the way in his Torah learning. But if a person isn’t that goal-oriented, and he is acting out of fire, then it will depend on the following:

1)    If his nature is water-of-fire, he will be able to find pleasure in his progress, even if he is far from his goal.

2)    If his nature is more fire-of-earth, there will be an ongoing contradiction between his earth (non-movement) and his fire (intense movement). He will always begin his Torah learning and mitzvos performance from a ‘dry’ place in himself. He will have no chiyus to begin with, and later he finds himself having doubts and regrets over the fact that he even began.

The Total Laziness That Results From An Absence of Chiyus

This is the laziness that results from fire-of-fire-of-earth: the person acts from a ‘dry’ place in himself, and this only dries him out even more – and at some point, it turns into laziness. A person like this lives with no chiyus - no inner vitality - in his life. Physically he is alive, and he is moving, but it’s as if he is dead inside. Deep down, his soul is sorely lacking in vitality.

At some point, this absence of ‘feeling alive inside’ increases a person’s laziness, and eventually, when things continue like this, it can make him become totally lazy. When fire-of-fire-of-earth dominates, the dryness of earth and fire meet and combine with each other to form total “dryness” in the soul, which causes a person to become ‘dried up’ in himself and to lack pleasure and vitality in what he does.

Three Main Categories of Laziness

The laziness that comes from fire-of-fire-of-earth does not stem from the actual trait of laziness itself, but from a lack of inner vitality. The problem here is that the person lacks pleasure in his basic movements. He isn’t getting pleasure from any of his movements, because if he would, it would infuse him with enthusiasm.

In previous lessons, we have explained that laziness usually stems from an inner feeling of “heaviness” – the person feels “heavy” inside himself, and that is why he acts lazy. A person may be physically heavy, but if he has inner vitality, he can still move quickly and he doesn’t get lazy. But if a person has “inner” heaviness – if he feels “heavy” and weighed down, in his soul – then this will make him lazy. Some people are born with a nature to be inwardly heavy, in their nefesh habehaimis (animal soul).

When a person feels heavy, either this is coming from the body (being overweight), or it is coming from his “animal” soul (lethargy). But here we are talking about a third source for heaviness: a lack of inner vitality, which increases a feeling of heaviness coming from the soul. That is fire-of-fire-of-earth: it adds heaviness onto the heaviness that’s already there.

Becoming Lethargic In Old Age

The laziness that results from fire-of-fire-of-earth causes a general imbalance in a person’s movements, leading a person into an extreme state of lethargy.

For example, a person may have been very active when he was younger, and he was involved in productive activities, and when he gets older, he can’t be as active, and he moves less, and he also moves slower. But in others, this will manifest in a more extreme way: they simply lose their drive for life when they get older.

This is especially the case if they didn’t learn Torah in their younger years. If a person lived a materialistic kind of life, if he was very ambitious his whole life about attaining worldly financial achievements, and his main goal of life was to receive his pension when he retires, and the like - such a person will feel like he has nothing else to live for when he gets older. He does not possess any real chiyus in his life. As a result, there is a feeling of ‘heaviness’ that develops in his soul, causing him to become slow-moving and lethargic.

When people like this enter old age, they feel that there is nothing to live for. Physically, they can be 100% in shape, and all of the doctor visits and blood tests show that they are perfectly healthy. But on their inside, in their souls, they are dead. They feel unneeded, because their children don’t really need them anymore and have moved on with their own lives, busy with their own families now. They find no compelling reason to get out of bed in the morning. They become lethargic, not because their element of earth has gotten heavier on them, but because they lack chiyus in their life. And their chiyus continues to be drained from them with the more that they perform, increasing the negative cycle of the lethargy.

Additionally, if a person is also physically heavy, he will feel even more lethargic. The combination of his physical and inner heaviness will produce a kind of lethargy\laziness that is total. ‘Heaviness’ comes from the element of earth, and there can also be inner ‘heaviness’. From fire-of-fire-of-earth, there is an additional kind of heaviness, of not feeling satisfied (sippuk) in what one does, which adds to the feeling of heaviness that is already there.

Repairing Lethargy (Fire-of-Fire-of-Earth) and Laziness In General

As mentioned in previous lessons, much of the solutions that we are presenting in these lessons are not only a solution for the specific issue discussed in the particular lesson, but can also be used to solve other issues. The concept we will now explain is not only a solution for laziness that comes from fire-of-fire-of-earth, but a solution for laziness in general. We are mentioning it though with regards to how we repair fire-of-fire-of-earth, because it is more effective in dealing with this particular kind of laziness.

Identifying Your Basic Sources of Chiyus (Vitality)

A person has two parts of his life: his physical side of life, and the soul part of his life. One must always clarify what gives him personal chiyus: “What revitalizes me?” Getting more specific, a person needs to know: “What gives vitality to my physical body? What gives vitality to the ‘animal’ part of my soul[2], and what gives vitality to the more spiritual parts of my soul?”

We are not talking about just the needs of the physical body alone, but also the needs of movement for the body. Some people feel calmed when they sit in a certain position, others feel calmed when they run, and others feel calmed whey lie down. Others feel calmed when they eat certain ‘comfort foods’, and others feel calmed by eating slowly and calmly. We know that the physical body is revitalized from relaxation, rest, eating, and other things. One must know what gives him this basic level of comfort and relaxation.

The “animal soul”, the nefesh habehaimis, gets vitality from various physical desires, including desires that are called “the impurity (zuhama) of the Serpent.”[3] Although these desires are not holy, a person still enjoys them, and that is our current state, in which we are affected by the “impurity of the Serpent”. Not everyone will want to admit to it, but a person still gets some degree of chiyus from these base desires. One needs to acknowledge that he does have enjoyment from these base physical desires, so one should not deny that he enjoys certain physical pleasures. He must know which particular physical desires give him this basic kind of ‘feeling more alive.’

Yet, although this is a basic level of chiyus, many people are not aware where they get basic chiyus from. Instead, they live their whole life without knowing what gives them chiyus, and they suffer from this. To comfort themselves, they may convince themselves that they are “accepting suffering with love”…. but this is just ignorance.

Getting Spiritual Vitality

Above the “animal” level of the soul (the nefesh habehaimis) are the more spiritual parts of the soul: the nefesh Elokis (G-dly soul), the Ruach, the Neshamah, Chayah and Yechidah. In this lesson, we can’t go into detail here about those higher parts of the soul[4], but in general, a person must know how to give vitality to each of these parts of the soul.

One must know where he consciously gets chiyus\vitality from – he must be aware of the chiyus, when he is getting it. To give an idea of what we mean, we know that “the Torah is our life” - learning Torah provides a person with spiritual energy, with chiyus - and one must be aware if he is indeed getting chiyus from Torah learning, or if he isn’t. There are people who honestly feel that they do get chiyus from their Torah learning, but they cannot always name the specific kind of chiyus that it gives them. If that is the case, then they are not aware of the chiyus when they are getting it, so they are not really getting chiyus. It is not enough if a person “knows”, on a general level, that he gets chiyus from his Torah learning. He must be consciously aware of the chiyus. Otherwise, it is no different than knowing that you withdrew money from the bank, which is just a factual piece of knowledge.

Getting Your Basic Needs of “Chiyus” - Through Proper Self-Care

Most people aren’t getting sufficient chiyus in their life. They don’t know where they get chiyus from, and even when they do know what gives them chiyus, they are usually not consciously aware of the chiyus when they are getting it.

The following is a sharp statement, about the situation of today. Most people are suffering terribly, because they don’t get enough chiyus. Just as we understand that the physical needs to be nourished with the eating properly, so must we understand that there are basic emotional needs for the soul which give vitality to a person (specifically, this is referring to nefesh habehaimis, the ‘animal’ level of the soul), and if these needs are not met, a person suffers. This is a more basic kind of issue, which needs to be dealt with before we consider all of the many spiritual problems that people have today (which most people are also suffering from).  Many people are suffering on a simple emotional level, in their nefesh habehaimis (animal soul) – the level of the soul that most people are at - because they don’t know where they get basic vitality from. This is like a person who isn’t aware that his body needs water, so he doesn’t drink.

The more a person is aware of what gives him basic physical and emotional chiyus, he must then seek how he can nurture these parts of himself. It is impossible to say exactly how a person should do it, because it depends on each person’s needs. But the idea is that every person needs to get his basic needs for physical\emotional chiyus.

Each day, a person needs to make sure that he is getting his basic physical\emotional needs, so that he can have a basic level of chiyus. One should begin by making sure to feel a sense of satisfaction after he has provided himself with any of his basic physical\emotional needs. This may sound very unspiritual, because it is not about taking care of one’s spiritual needs, but about taking care of oneself on a basic level: the basic needs for physical nourishment and emotional well-being. These are not the actual needs of one’s neshamah, but the needs of the body and nefesh habehaimis (animal soul), and they need to be nourished properly, before one gives his neshamah its spiritual needs.   

Of course, a person should not turn this basic self-care into the main part of life, because that would be the antithesis to a truthful kind of life. But a person will certainly need to provide nourishment for the basic needs of his physical body and his base emotions, so that he can acquire a basic level of chiyus. Sadly, many people today are not aware of where they get chiyus from, and this means that they aren’t getting sufficient chiyus, because they don’t know how to give it to themselves. It is written, “The righteous person eats to satisfy his soul”, and so does any person need to satisfy his soul on a basic level, by providing vitality to the “animal” level of his soul, the nefesh habehaimis.

Practically speaking, if a person needs to make sure that not a day goes by in which he doesn’t take care of his basic needs. If the day is over and he is ready to go to sleep, and he remembers that he did not provide himself with enough chiyus that day, he should make sure to get it right now, before he goes to sleep.

People today aren’t getting enough chiyus, and they are just doing whatever they ‘have to’ do, because they know that they “have to” do it all, and because they have no other choice, etc. People feel like they ‘have to’ go to sleep at night, wake up on time the next morning, daven, learn Torah (or go to their workplace), and do all the mitzvos - but only because they “have to” – without getting any chiyus from all of this. They aren’t aware of the chiyus they are supposed to be getting from all aspects of their day. People are not even aware of what gives them a basic level of chiyus.

If a person wants to start providing himself with a basic level of chiyus, he should make sure to “nourish” himself physically each day. As an example, each day he should make time for himself to eat a certain food, or spice, or some treat, which he likes. A person should discover whatever calms him on a physical level. This is just an example of the idea, and it does not have to be practiced in all cases.

Certainly, we do not mean here that a person should become gluttonous with these desires. The idea is that a person needs to become aware of the little things that provide him with physical enjoyment. This helps a person identify what gives him chiyus.

This idea will work better for those who have a dominant element of water (pleasure), and it will be harder to implement for those who are dominated by the nature we are discussing in this lesson, fire-of-fire-of-earth, a ‘dry’ nature which doesn’t like to try new venues of pleasure. Even so, a person with a nature of fire-of-fire-of-earth will need to take this route, in order to repair his ‘dried out’ nature.

Laziness In Most People Does Not Come From The Element of Earth

The element that opposes the dryness of fire is: the vitality-giving element, water. The element that opposes the dryness of earth is: the moving element, wind. Therefore, when a person has a lot of fire and earth in his soul, he will need to make a lot of use of the elements of water and wind. He will need to provide himself with pleasure (water), and he will need to provide himself with movement (wind), in order to lead a life of chiyus, life-giving vitality, to counter his dry nature.

When most people are lazy, it is not because their dominant nature is earth. Rather, it is because they lack chiyus, and this ‘dries out’ their soul, causing them to avoid performance. That is the laziness that stems from fire-of-fire-of-earth which was described in this lesson. When the soul becomes ‘dried out’ from a lack of inner vitality, this in turn will prevent a person’s ratzon (will) from being active. So the laziness that manifests in most people is not coming from a dominant element of earth, but from an inactive ratzon, which is a result of a ‘dried out’ soul that comes from a lack of chiyus.  

Even in those who do have a dominant nature of earth, it is not that common for a person to have a nature of earth-of-earth, and that is why their laziness cannot be coming from a dominant nature of earth. Rather, their laziness comes from a lack of sufficient chiyus – a dearth of “water” in the soul. And if a person also does not have that much wind in his soul, his element of earth will surface take over, and by default, it will dominate the person’s soul.

As a result of lacking chiyus, some people become dominated by their element of earth (lethargy and laziness), others become drawn towards seeking various lusts and other improper desires (water), or they become easily angered (fire), or they will overwork themselves with different activities (wind). In any of these cases, it is because they don’t have enough chiyus in their life - they aren’t getting their basic needs of physical and emotional well-being - which leads them towards any of the above undesirable reactions.

Therefore, the way to repair the laziness that stems from fire-of-fire-of-earth is not only a remedy for a person who has a dominant nature of earth (though such a person will be more helped by the solution described in this lesson). When a person lacks chiyus, this is a more universal kind of problem, because it applies to almost all people, and therefore, repairing fire-of-fire-of-earth is also a way to repair a much broader issue in the soul.

Drawing Forth Spiritual Energy From All That We Do

Moshe ascended Har Sinai for 40 days. How did he ascend from the earth to Heaven? He had to transcend human nature. In elemental terms, he had to leave behind this world, which is the element of earth, and ascend into Heaven, the spiritual, which is represented by the element of wind. In order to do this, he had to become an entirely “moving” being, because wind is a moving force. The element of wind is spiritual in its nature, and it is above the materialistic element of earth. Moshe’s power to receive the Torah from Heaven, and to give it to the Jewish people, was enabled to him because he had already acquired the ability to receive chiyus from everything. This was the “movement” of Moshe Rabbeinu: he was able to receive chiyus from all of the “movements” of Creation – everything that there is – and this gave him the power to ascend to Heaven and receive the Torah.

In terms that apply to our own souls, a person is able to receive chiyus from everything. A person is able to receive chiyus on a private level, when a person finds his own “private spiritual share” on this world - a unique area in Torah learning. One can become connected to it, and then he can receive his personal chiyus from it. When one finds his unique source of spiritual chiyus on this world, this will also weaken his laziness (when it stems from lack of chiyus, such as in the case of fire-of-fire-of-earth), depending on how much chiyus one absorbs. But one will need to become consciously aware of the chiyus he is receiving.

In this “world of action” we live in, many people ‘train’ themselves to “do” what they have to do, but without enough putting any feeling into it. The general attitude on this world is that the main thing is “to do”, and that putting feeling into it isn’t important. Although it is true that a person needs to fulfill all of his obligations to Hashem, it is enough to “do” them alone – one needs to put feeling into it and derive chiyus, an inner vitality, from it. Even when people lead a life of “serving Hashem”, it can just be an all external actions, devoid of vitality. It is certainly true that one must be careful to do all of the mitzvos in all of their details, but to remain at that level is external, and it is not the completely true way of living. One must certainly do all that he needs to, and carefully observe all of the mitzvos, even when it is difficult for him - but he must also make sure to receive chiyus from it.

There are different ways of how a person can receive chiyus. One way is, that whenever a person overcomes his nature in order to fulfill any mitzvah or halachah, he should become consciously aware of the chiyus he gets, from overcoming his nature.

Even if a person isn’t getting chiyus from doing a mitzvah, he can still receive chiyus from anything on this world. A person can even receive chiyus from the act of eating his food, when he is feeling the physical enjoyment in it. Although this appears to be very unspiritual, it is still a form of chiyus to the person, as long as the person is aware of that it does give him some chiyus. A person can train himself to receive chiyus from everything. (There is also a higher level than this, which is when a person does it all lishmah, for the sake of doing Hashem’s will, and not because he gets any vitality out of it.)

It is always possible for a person to derive chiyus, in anything he does. A person can derive chiyus from overcoming his nature in order to carry out his obligations towards Hashem, as explained above. Or, a person can get chiyus from the fact that he has nullified himself to Hashem’s will, even though this does not feel pleasurable to him. As an example, a person asks a question to a Rav and he must abide by the Rav’s answer, even if the Rav’s answer makes no sense to him and it goes against his logic. He can get chiyus from the suffering of his mind, which cannot understand the Rav’s logic, by subjugating his personal will, in order to nullify himself to Hashem’s will from him.

One get derive a satisfying feeling of chiyus, whether from pleasure or from suffering, because one is able to get chiyus from everything and anything. When a person receives chiyus from everything, this weakens his laziness. There are many different responsibilities of life that a person has, between raising a family, earning livelihood, and taking care of various responsibilities of life, and a person should learn to get chiyus from all of this, as opposed to living monotonously. Of course, a person only gets chiyus from all of the aspects in day-to-day living only after he is living in the ideal way in the first place.

There is no event or part of life where a person cannot draw forth vitality from. Here is a strong example. Even when one visits mourners and one is contemplating about death and grieving, one can still receive vitality from this, because it is written, “It is better to go to a house of mourning, than to a house of festivity, and the living will take to heart.”[5] A person is able to draw forth more “life” even from the dead, when visiting the house of a mourner, because thinking about the deceased causes him to contemplate the meaning and purpose of life, and he can derive great chiyus from this.

In Summary

This is how a person can weaken laziness, and specifically, the laziness that stems from the dry nature of fire-of-fire-of-earth. The contradicting elements of fire and earth within this nature will normally ‘dry’ a person out, but when a person learns how to drawn forth vitality from everything, both from pleasure as well as suffering\pain, he learns how to get vitality and pleasure even from contradicting forces. The ability to receive vitality from contradictory forces is also the depth behind the future Redemption, when every person will be able to derive inner vitality from everything.

In Conclusion

In this lesson, we discussed the contradicting elements of fire and earth and how it contributes to a lack of chiyus (inner vitality) in the soul. However, there are additional aspects of this contradiction between fire and earth (such as the fact that fire causes a person to elevate himself, while earth causes him to lower himself), which were not discussed here. One needs to study all of the aspects of all of the four elements (earth, water, wind and fire) and how they clash with each other, and it is not possible to explain all of it in one lesson. Here, we have focused the discussion on just one of the main aspects of the contradictory forces contained in the nature of fire-of-fire-of-earth.