The Power Of Will

Copied from Reb Shmuel at tikkun:

Rousing words of encouragement from a master:

Our problem is not that we don't have the opportunities to grow. It is that we don't have the proper will and desire to grow. In all circumstances, there are always excuses. The kids were sick, the boiler broke. I had to work overtime. I was so tired when I came home and I had to spend some time with the family. We know the excuses and they're all valid excuses. But they don't really explain our failures.

We fail because we despair of being successful.

We fail because we do not believe that we have it within us to succeed. It is not the interposition of obstacles that prevents us from succeeding but our own lack of confidence and determination and sheer will.

We fail because we are making a mistake. Because the truth is that we do have it within us to succeed. Because the truth is that each of us possesses the most incredible Divinely-powered instrument that can help us smash all obstacles and scale all peaks.

It is called the human will.

- Rabbi Shlomo Freifeld, founder and dean, Yeshiva Sh'or Yoshuv