| |
To My Dear Students,
Premier baseball star Alex Rodriguez admitted this week that he had used banned substances to enhance his skills and his statistics. Among the reasons he offered for his violations were the pressure to live up to the high expectations of his enormous contract, and that many other major leaguers were taking steroids at the time.
The Dubner Maggid (18th century) told the following parable:
A man was traveling through the forest. In a clearing he saw a large wall featuring numerous targets. An arrow was in the bull’s-eye of each target. Then he saw the archer in the distance preparing to shoot another arrow. He excitedly ran over to him and said, "Sir, I have never seen such amazing accuracy and skill. You have hit a bull's-eye every time! How did you become such a perfect shot?"
"It's quite simple," the archer replied. "First, I shoot the arrow and then I draw a bull's-eye around it."
This is a description of the human mind at work. We tend to always see ourselves as right, no matter how wrong we may be, and then construct arguments "around" our position to justify our behavior.
Rodriguez wanted to take steroids. He then drew reasons around his desire—there was pressure to perform and a culture where everyone was doing it. But reasons are not excuses! Everyone thinks up “reasons” to do what they want to do, but this does not give us license to do it!
There is an army saying: “The maximum effective range of an excuse is zero meters.”
Shabbat Shalom,
Your Rabbi |
