Growing Out Of Toys

I spend quite a bit of time using public transportation. I sit and observe the people around me and find a significant percentage who are playing with toys. I refer not to the children, they are usually sitting and looking out the window or munching on pretzels or the Israeli-born "Bamba". I refer to the adults. Playing with toys. Really. Adult toys. They have names like "Blackberry", "Iphone", "Ipad" "Ipod" or "mp3 player". Others talk endlessly on their favorite and most often used toy, the "cell-phone". Since I own none of the aforementioned contraptions [which I call adult toys], I ask myself "What am I missing out on?" "Why do they all have and I don't?" "Why am I more than content to sit on the bus without any form of amusement?"

I will tell you my conclusion: Everything we do is because we feel a void, a lacking. We sleep because we are tired, we eat because we are hungry [or bored or nervous or looking for easy pleasure], we go to work because we want money or a feeling of being useful or important, we marry because we feel alone and want companionship of the other gender and all that entails etc. etc.

We use these toys because we are ..... empty, at least to a certain extent. If a person feels like they lack nothing then they don't need these forms of amusement. So you are sitting on the LIRR. Many of the passengers are reading their New York Times or texting away. You say to yourself "הן עם לבדד ישכון ובגויים לא יתחשב" -  I am a Jew[ess]. I don't do things just because everybody else is doing them. I am going to use the next 47 minutes in a Jewish, Torah-dike way.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!

What does that mean??

Hmmmmmmm. I have no ideas. But here are a few anyway: You can review that day's daf yomi shiur [unless you are actually on the train that has the daf yomi shiur...]. Unless you have learned something 4 times it doesn't really count, said the Steipler. You can look through the Tosfosim or other meforshim. You can have a seder going through mishna brura or shmiras shabbos ki-hilchoso. You can go through a mussar or chassdishe sefer you find stimulating. You can go through Nach. You can listen to a geshmake shiur [using a toy:-)]. You can say tehillim. You can think of the chesed that Hashem has bestowed upon you - your family, health, parnassa, a roof over you head etc. etc. You can think about ways to improve your relationship with your parents or children. You can think of problems you have and strengthen your bitachon that Hashem can solve them in a second. You can sing a silent niggun and experience simcha that you are alive. You can feel remorse [simcha-dike] over aveiros you did and joy over mitzvos you did, called a cheshbon ha-nefesh. You can look around and thank Hashem that your life isn't empty like that of those around you. You can just allow yourself to relax for a few minutes and enjoy being you. There are so many worthy things to do!

An aseres yemei tshuva thought:-).