{"id":385784,"date":"2011-09-26T20:37:24","date_gmt":"2011-09-26T20:37:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/%d7%9c%d7%9c%d7%90-%d7%a7%d7%98%d7%92%d7%95%d7%a8%d7%99%d7%94\/the-crock-of-gold\/"},"modified":"2024-07-29T19:06:19","modified_gmt":"2024-07-29T16:06:19","slug":"the-crock-of-gold","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/385784\/","title":{"rendered":"The Crock of Gold"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\u201cThe distinct sign of trust in Hashem is when a person\u2019s thoughts don\u2019t focus on money.\u201d [The Garden of Emuna<\/a><\/strong><\/span>]<\/em>
\u00a0
In Irish mythology, the illusive crock of gold was always to be found at the end of the rainbow. Even if we don\u2019t desire fabulous wealth, most of us would be very happy to have financial security; we feel it gives us access, options, it pays our way in this physical world and, as Torah \"\"Jews, it makes serving Hashem easier when feel we have our financial needs met.
\u00a0
There\u2019s a lot to choose from in Breslev teachings about trust and earning a livelihood.\u00a0 As I was looking through the Garden of Emuna,<\/strong> I wasn\u2019t sure exactly which quote to use to introduce this essay so I opted for this one.\u00a0 As I was typing it out though, it occurred to me that even now, maybe I focus on financial security more than I care to admit; so perhaps Hashem chose this quote for me to meditate on.
\u00a0
I must confess that I\u2019ve been fortunate; I\u2019ve never been in debt. I grew up with debt being considered something close to a disease.\u00a0 If we didn\u2019t have the money, we did without.\u00a0 I can\u2019t say, however, that I ever felt any material lack [something for which I now thank Hashem continuously] but neither did we ever look forward to financial security and that was something that hung over me as I was growing up.
\u00a0
I\u2019ve also never been a big earner; as a secretary, I could never command a high salary and it was always important to me to work in a pleasant environment, preferably a creative one, which always tended to pay poor to average salaries.
\u00a0
I was always encouraged by my parents to save, for which I am now eternally grateful.\u00a0 However, none of this, while in fact being a Torah ideal, was based on emunah, but rather pragmatism.
\u00a0
Now my life has changed considerably over the past few years and bitachon<\/em> (trust in Hashem) relating to earning a living has been quite pivotal.
\u00a0
As I said, I always worked in creative environments but there reached a point where I felt dissatisfied with what I was doing; I felt I wanted to do something vocational but I didn\u2019t know what exactly.\u00a0 I left my job and eventually I was privileged to get a job working for a Torah institution, with which I had had a longstanding connection.\u00a0 This was my first test of bitachon<\/em>. Prior to taking the job I had been offered a more \u201cstable\u201djob working for a medical company I had temped for, so initially I actually turned down the offer of working for the Torah institution because it was only a three month contract with the \u201cpossibility\u201d of something more long term, and at a very<\/em> reduced salary; I would have been barely able to cover my expenses.\u00a0 However after I said no to the offer, I immediately regretted it; I knew that I had to work for this organization, that it was exactly what I was looking for, and I wasn\u2019t going to worry about the money. <\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

And so, I started my three months contract \u2013 I recognized straightaway this is where I wanted to be, but the Principal there couldn\u2019t guarantee anything permanent for financial reasons.\u00a0 As the weeks went by I said to Hashem, “You can\u2019t seriously kick me out now, after all I\u2019ve been through to get here; I\u2019ll go if I have to”, but really I felt like a wilful child determined to get my own way.\u00a0 Hashem was listening.\u00a0 The job became permanent but initially my salary more or less stayed the same.\u00a0 And this is where it got interesting.\u00a0 A few months later, a close relative abroad suddenly started sending me monetary gifts on a regular basis; he\u2019d never done it before. He carried on doing it all the time I was working for this organization and as my salary started gradually to go up, my overall income at one point exceeded anything else I\u2019d earned before.
\u00a0
Fast forward several years, and I found I had come full circle, out of work again by choice for personal reasons.\u00a0 As the months went by, I always felt I could rely somewhat on my \u201cgifts\u201d to see me through this stage in my life. At about the same time though, I was also starting to feel a bit uncomfortable about \u201crelying\u201d on them \u2013 on the one hand, they made a huge difference but on the other, I couldn\u2019t stop myself anticipating the arrival of \u201cthe cheque\u201d and I wondered if perhaps I was trusting less in Hashem and more in the person who was sending them.
\u00a0
Be careful what you wish for, even if you only think it! The economic storm hit, and the gifts dramatically<\/em> declined. Rather bizarrely, I felt a sense of relief because now I could rely completely on Hashem but at the same time I really wanted the security of those gifts.\u00a0 Hashem obviously thought differently. But I also experienced something very interesting.\u00a0 Even though my current financial situation is unstable, I don\u2019t feel that anxious about it.\u00a0 I know that because Hashem gave the money in the first place for a reason, He also took it away for a reason.
\u00a0
I have had to tighten my belt and yet I don\u2019t feel I lack anything. The other day I was binning a pile of old receipts from a few years ago and was surprised how much I spent on this and that. Now I live on a strict amount per week, use cash as much as possible, and recently I found that, at the end of the month, I still more or less had the same amount left \u2013 I can\u2019t really explain why and it\u2019s happened before.
\u00a0
And yet, while I don\u2019t feel anxious, from time to time I still find myself focusing on money, wondering how I will manage in the future, what if Hashem doesn\u2019t change the situation and soon, how this\u2026 what if that\u2026
\u00a0
So when it comes to bitachon<\/em> then, for me it\u2019s still work in progress because, on some level still, I\u2019m still looking for my crock of gold at the end of the rainbow.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe distinct sign of trust in Hashem is when a person\u2019s thoughts don\u2019t focus on money.\u201d [The Garden of Emuna]\u00a0In Irish mythology, the illusive crock of gold was always to be found at the end of the rainbow. Even if we don\u2019t desire fabulous wealth, most of us would be very happy to have financial … Continue reading “The Crock of Gold”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":62109,"featured_media":1286601,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_joinchat":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[83803,15186],"tags":[26661,16369,22089,24775],"author_post":[15340],"new_serie":[],"class_list":["post-385784","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-good-income","category-spiritual-growth","tag-debts","tag-emuna","tag-income","tag-bitachon","author_post-yael-karni"],"acf":{"intro_text":"

Even if we don\u2019t desire fabulous wealth, most of us would be very happy to have financial security; we feel it gives us access, options, it pays our way in this physical world\u2026<\/p>\n","breslev_id":"20468","post_views_count":"170","help_field_to_import_order_in_category":"124","updatetime":"01\/01\/0001","special_content_in_the_post":"none","meta_title":"The Crock of Gold","meta_description":"Even if we don\u2019t desire fabulous wealth, most of us would be happy to have financial security; we feel it gives us access and options\u2026","paragraph_first":"","paragraph_second":"","youtube":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/385784","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/62109"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=385784"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/385784\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4839976,"href":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/385784\/revisions\/4839976"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1286601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=385784"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=385784"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=385784"},{"taxonomy":"author_post","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/author_post?post=385784"},{"taxonomy":"new_serie","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/breslev.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/new_serie?post=385784"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}