Why don’t the things that really matter come instantly?
By Rabbi Shalom Landau.
Rabbi Landau teaches that wanting long-lasting results instantly is “impossible.” Doomscrolling rewires the brain, he says, “so now you expect everything, marriage, money, meaning, to feel good instantly. That’s not how God built the world.”
He cites the Midrash: “Everything created in the six days requires finishing.” Why? “Because the world was built incomplete, so you could finish it.”
Marriage, he says, “isn’t a pill. Marriage isn’t instant.” It is a project, and a project takes time. “Real things are not delivered, they are developed. The joy is not in having it, it’s becoming someone who built it.” His conclusion: “If it comes instantly, it was never yours.”
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In A Soul at Peace: Things That Are Built, Not Given
Going deeper: Rabbi Landau's teaching, level by level
Surface claim
Lasting things are developed, not delivered.
Fear, vulnerability, or tension
A mind trained by scrolling expects marriage, money, and meaning to feel good right away, and is let down when they don’t.
What may be behind it
Why was the world created unfinished?
So that you could finish it. In A Soul at Peace, Rabbi Landau writes that the world left Hashem’s hand unfinished “by design,” so that you would be a partner.
Deepest human truth
The joy is not in having something, but in becoming the person who built it. What comes instantly was never really yours.
More questions from this teaching
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