Why do I keep repeating the same arguments and mistakes, and how does Elul help break the cycle?

Rabbi Landau explains that many people treat change like magic: “I’ll think it, say it, align with it, and boom, new reality.” But real change does not come from wishing. It comes from breaking the cycle.

Psychology, he notes, has a name for the trap: repetition compulsion. “You keep doing the same thing, but you expect different results.” In marriage it looks like the same arguments over and over. In parenting it is “the same yelling, the same reaction, as if this time it’s going to work.” But it doesn’t, “because nothing changes if you don’t change.”

That is why he calls Elul such a good gift. Elul is “a time to manifest the year you want to live,” and the way to do it is in the words אני לדודי ודודי לי, I am to my Beloved and my Beloved is to me. “I move first, I break the cycle, I’m aligned with what I have to do, then Hashem responds.” That, he says, is real manifestation.

Going deeper: Rabbi Landau's teaching, level by level

Surface claim

Rabbi Landau teaches that change does not come from thinking or saying the right things, but from breaking the cycle.

Fear, vulnerability, or tension

People keep repeating the same argument and the same reaction, hoping that this time the result will be different.

Underlying need or longing

He describes it as wanting to stop living in survival mode and to live the year you actually want.

Deepest human truth

What does Ani l’dodi v’dodi li teach about change?

I move first, and then Hashem responds. Nothing changes if you don’t change. In A Soul at Peace, Rabbi Landau suggests starting with one specific reaction you know doesn’t help, and stopping it the next time it rises.

More questions from this teaching

• Does manifestation really work, or is there a Torah way to create the life you want?