Conquering Distraction: Harnessing Reflection to Align Our Lives with Torah and Mitzvos

What do YouTube and ancient, evil dictator parents and the Eight Sahara all have in common? Maybe you've never thought about this, but there could be more than one answer. One of the unifying factors of all of these four separate entities is that they all engaged, and continue to engage, in the practice and art of distraction. See, oh, readily apparent to the eyes, the distraction that is social media, youtube. You can't make a seum on it. No matter how long you choose to scroll through social media and the different platforms, you cannot finish all of it. It just continues to go and go. It can be very distracting. An ancient dictator, paro, were told. Tich ba'alavah sa'avodah, engaged in the deception that would be to increase the labor so the Jewish people should not have any thoughts of rebellion. They wouldn't have even a second to formulate a plot to overthrow paro. And parents engage in deception so that the child, when they're about to have a meltdown because there are no cookies left, can distract the child and say, oh, look over here a shiny, happy, beautiful apple and look over here. Isn't that greatest distraction? And lastly, the Eight Sahara, were told, says the messiah shahram in chapter two, engages in the art of deception, taking a page at a paro's playbook to distract us from ever thinking about our ways, throwing another distraction in front of our plates, in front of our minds every day, so that we never have that moment to relax, sit down and meditate about what life's about, what we are doing, and comparing notes with our actions to Hashem's holy Torah. Because if we would sit down for a second one session, says the holy messiah shahram in chapter two, well then, immediately cut al-darche and we would drop our old ways and we'd think about life and choose a better path. Cane he atzah sayit sahara mamashal b'nayadam. Distraction maybe I need to take care of this. My business, I need to take care of this. I need to engage in the certain hobbies, all good, happy practices, the distraction that keep us scrolling, so we never take that time to think about our lives and what we are really on this planet to accomplish. The call to action is to schedule one weekly session for 60 seconds. How did I pray this past week? How was my adherence to Hashem's halachos this past week? Did I increase in my shalom bayis in my midos this week? What is my mida of the month? How was my sleeping schedule? Was I on time to things? Did I live with a certain orderliness. Am I too haughty, too lustful? But to think, to have a hejban anafesh and analyze one's ways. Perhaps this is the way that we will merit to overthrow the dictator of the evil, yaitzahara, and to mount a rebellion, to take back the reins on our lives, to choose the path of Torah and mitzvahs, through a moment of meditation and making a hejban anafesh.