Beha'alotcha 5774

Abe, an elderly Jew, was being treated in NY presbyterian hospital in the upper east side, it’s one of the world’s best hospitals.  After some time, he requested to be transfered, to tiny little dinky jewish hospital in the lower east side. 

When he meets his new doctor at the new hospital the doctor says, “I see that you’ve asked to here from one of the best hospitals in the world...I don’t get it, did you have a problem with your doctor?

Abe responds, “My doctor was the best in his field and on top of that, he had a bedside manner that couldn’t be beat, about my doctor I couldn’t complain.”

So, the doctor says, “Was it the nursing staff, did the nurses not treat you right?”

- “my Nurses were beautiful both inside and out, they took such good care of me, I couldn’t complain.”

Maybe, the food wasn’t good, did you have a problem with the food they served you?

- “my food was prepared to order by a 5 star chef whenever I wanted, about the food I couldn’t complain.”

Perplexed, the doctor says, “Abe, tell me, if you had such a good experience at that hospital, why did you ask to be switched here?”

With a smile, Abe looked at his doctor and said, “Because here I can complain.”

Everyone loves to complain, it’s a part of life.  Some people do it more, some people do it less, but pretty much everyone complains.

So what’s wrong with a complaining, a little complaining never hurt anyone, did it?

It does.  Negative thoughts are patterns of thought which impact the rest of our thinking and those around us.  We all know from experience how being around someone who complains constantly and is overly negative impacts our own moods and thoughts.  But the effects are not just emotional, negativity has a negative physical impact on us as well. 

According to an experiment done in 2012 by Professor Murray J. Munro, of Simon Fraser University, in Vancouver.  Chronic complaining and negativity can even have strong physical repercussions on the complainers themselves, and on the people around them.

In the experiment, the test subjects were exposed to controlled amounts of complaining from various people who volleyed their complaints in pre-planned ways (in meetings, email messages, social media, etc.) at pre-determined intervals. The impact of exposure to complaints was assessed by taking periodic blood pressure readings and cortisol measurements from each subject at the beginning and end of each day.

Analysis of the data from the daily complaint inventories revealed a significant positive correlation between overall “negativity” and blood pressure levels.

What was most striking about the results of the study, however, was the finding that second-hand complaining was even more harmful to the test subjects than their own self-generated whining. Hearing people complain during staff meetings and reading negative e-mails resulted in significantly higher blood pressure and abnormally elevated cortisol levels. We all know the dangers of high blood pressure. But elevated cortisol levels are equally as bad. Over time, these have been shown to have numerous negative effects, such as:

■     Impaired cognitive performance

■     Suppressed thyroid function

■     Blood sugar imbalances

■     Decreased bone density

■     Decrease in muscle tissue

■     Lowered immunity and inflammatory responses in the body,

■     and many other health consequences

So science shows that the more complaining we do, the more problems we cause ourselves and others, giving you and everyone around more reasons to complain.  It’s a vicious cycle. 

There’s a good deal of complaining in the Parsha this week, Parshat Beha’alotcha.  The first verse in chapter 11 of this week’s parsha says, “ויהי העם כמתאננים רע באזני השם,” the meaning of this phrase is not clear, I’ve seen it translated as:

●     the people were looking to complain to God

●     or that the people were as murmers speaking evil in the ears of God

●     or that the people were as though in mourning over themselves, they were bad in the ears of God. 

No matter how you translate it, it’s clear that there infected with negativity.  The result of this negativity was a fire from God broke out and was devouring the edge of the camp.  In addition to the literal meaning of God punishing the people, this can also be describing a metaphorical sense, in which they were being consumed by their negativity.  At first it was only on the outskirts of the camp, or their consciousness, and this incident ended.  But 3 verses later, the negativity rears it head again. 

A few complainers started to complain about the lack of variety in their diet, only once they started complaining did the rest of the people also pick up the complaint and called out, it was better for us as slaves in Egypt, if only someone would serve us some meat! 

The negativity was infectious. 

It was so infectious, it impacted Moshe as well.  After Moshe heard their complaints, he complained.  The first response of Moshe in this episode is: למה הרעת לעבדך - why have you done such evil for me, to place the burden of this people on me...I can’t do this, it’s too much for me.  He ends his complaint by saying, I’d rather you kill me than I have to continue to deal with this. 

The people seem to be in a rut.  How did they deal with the culture of negativity that was spreding their midst, from the rabble all the way up to Moshe? 

God’s response is to command Moshe to gather 70 elders from amongst the people, people who are respected and who have influence, and I will speak with you there and put some of the רוח or spirit from you and spread it to them, and then you won’t be so alone.

What I see in this story is advice on how get out of a rut.  Moshe and the people were stuck in a negative state of mind.  God told Moshe to gather a community of positivity around him, and share some of the positive forces in his life with that community.  After he’s successfully gotten himself out of a rut by actively sharing positivity with other influential people, then God turns his message to the wider community.  Saying, there is hope, all is not as bad as it seems. Get ready, because tomorrow there will be meat. 

But meat wasn’t going to just appear, they had to get ready. 

Negativity doesn’t just go away, it needs to be willed away. 

From Moses, to the elders, to the people, the cycle needed to be reversed.  God said, Moses you need to snap out of it, instead of wallowing in complaints and self-pity, be proactive.  Gather people who have the potential to be a positive force, share the burden with them, spread a positive message to them, and then let that positivity continue radiate outward.  Finally, in order for the people to feel a resolution to the negative situation, they needed to Get ready themsleves.  התקדשו the Pasuk says, get ready, and then the meat will come. 

If we are stuck in a rut, we have to choose to see things differently, we need to create an environment for positivity to take root and grow.

To drive this message home , in the very next episode of the Parsha, we see another complaint and we see how to handle the situation in a positive manner.  There are two men who are prophesying in the camp without sanction, concerned about the impact on Moshe’s authority, Joshua runs to complain about this to Moshe. 

Instead of being caught in the complaining trap and causing a domino effect of negativity, Moshe spins the situation with a positive outlook, saying, “are you jealous for me, if only all of God’s people could prophets.” 

It would’ve been easy for Moses to get upset, most people would have and then reacted negatively and spread the negativity around some more.  Moshe identifies the beginning of a negative thought pattern and changes it around.  Lesson learned.

Can we learn the lesson as easily?

I believe our sages alluded to the difficulty of creating positive thought patterns and the destructive cycle of negativity in a gemara from Masechet Yoma.  The Gemara says “צדיק מעצמו, the righteous are alone, ורשע מחבירו.The wicked person is with his friends.  What does this mean?  צדיק מעצמו דכתיב: “זכר צדיק לברכה, The impact of a righteous person is only on himself because the verse says a tzadik is remembered for blessing; ורשע מחבירו דכתיב ושם רשעים ירקב.”

while impact of a wicked person is with his friends, as the verse says “the name of the wicked [plural form], shall rot.”

Read this as saying, negativity will spread to others on its own, the wicked person is with his friends.  It is more difficult for positivity to spread, the righteous are alone.

Therefore, we have to be the catalyst for the spread of positivity.

Some suggestions for doing this might be:

●     identify triggers for negative thought patterns before they lead us down a negative road, once down that road it’s harder to turn around.

●     make a point to surround ourselves with positive influences.

●     actively look to do positive things in order to start positive thought patterns. 

Negativity and complaining are a part of life, everyone has ups and downs.  But left unchecked they can have real repercussions on ourselves, our loved ones, and our communities both physically and emotionally. 

For some of us, this advice will hopefully add positivity in our lives and minimize unnecessary complaining.  It’s important to note, that extreme negative feelings can also be a symptom of clinical depression caused by chemicals in our brain, not just by negative thought patterns.  In the case of depression, a person will not be able to remove themselves from the negative thought patterns.  It is very important that we seek external help from experts when they see a constant pattern of negativity in their lives that they are not able to remove themselves from.

Left unchecked, negativity festers it begets more negativity, and it hurts us.  We owe it to ourselves and the people around us, to do whatever it takes to inject more positivity in our lives. 

May we all be blessed to live a life of happiness, see our cups not just half full, but overflowing with blessing, and may we share this positivity with everyone we come in contact with.