For Kaplan, the second type of failure that calls for repentance is “the failure to keep on growing in character.” (The Meaning of God, 183) This goes to the root of what we confess in the Vidui, We abuse, we betray…. We built up behavior patterns based on our experience, Kaplan says. But then, the conditions of our life change and impose new responsibilities on us that our experience and patterns did not prepare us for. Instead of responding to the new conditions and obligations, we keep repeating our old patterns of behavior. Whether we call it “fixation,” rigidity, laziness, or lack of imagination, we all get caught in this. To prevent it, we need to stay aware.
Kaplan brings the example of a child, for whom obedience and deference to parents is a virtue. But when the child matures, the virtue of initiative is important: He or she must take responsibility for his own career and mate choices. One might also mention the need for parents to transform from parent to guide as their children mature, to practice tzimtzum (contraction of the fullness of their being), instead of fixating on a certain role in relation to their children. The transition from single to married life entails a similar transformation of character, as do all major changes in economic status, health, and innumerable other aspects of our lives.
His conclusion: “Whenever we recognize the inadequacy of our acquired personality to do justice to the demands of a new situation, and we try to overcome the obstacles that prevent out lives from manifesting the divine, we are practicing repentance, or the return to God.” (Ibid., 184)
Where and how have we have gotten stuck in an old behavior pattern that is no longer life-giving? In what relationships have we allowed our old selves to become “fixated” instead of opening our hearts to new (and sometimes awkward and painful) growth?
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