Do I Need To Think About Olam HaBa (World To Come) Daily In Order To Get In? (6 minutes)

0:00Each one of our mitzvot is going to bring a reward. Sometimes the reward will have a partial benefit in this world, but the vast majority of the reward is in the next world. It's very difficult for people, especially if you're not learning Torah on a daily basis, to truly believe in the next world. It is nearly impossible to fully believe in the next world, in the Olam HaBa, without learning Torah on a daily basis. I don't mean believing in the next world in the sense of saying, okay, everybody goes to heaven and everything is going to be great one day in some theoretical dreamland that people create in their minds. I mean literally believing in a way where you know that this life is just a hallway to the real life that's waiting for us. Where your entire life in this world is just a preparation for that life. Your life here is going to take on new meaning and direction when you understand it as a mere prelude to Olam Haba. This mindset transforms our actions and purpose in the present world.

1:27We have to have that same mindset about Olam HaBa. All the mitzvot that we do right now, all of the good deeds that we do right now, all the chesed that we do right now, all the Torah that we learn right now, all of that is supposed to be put in our mind as preparation for Olam HaBa. If someone doesn't learn Torah, it is very difficult to believe in the World to Come. And the reason why is because when you're living your whole life in this world, which means that you're involved in business all day, family, material, and everything else, then that means your life is generally consumed with this world, things of this world, and you're consumed with material. Olam HaBa has nothing material. It's all spiritual. So it becomes very difficult to connect to this spiritual world. Because you have nothing in common with this world. You're always involved in material. To connect to this spiritual world because you have nothing in common with this world, you're always involved in material things. You're always involved in making money, going to a party, going on vacation, buying this, buying that. All of it can be wonderful; you are allowed to enjoy your life. But if your life is consumed with material pursuits...

2:49then it gets to a point where it becomes impossible to connect to this next world. If it becomes impossible to connect to this next world, then it becomes impossible to even think about it when you're doing mitzvot. If it's impossible to think about it when you're doing mitzvot, then you start losing the meaning of why am I going to do a mitzvah? Why would I do a blessing? For what? So Hashem makes it any tastier if I drink it? No, it has nothing to do with that. Why am I going to do any mitzvah? So Hashem says, oh, good job. You start forgetting, why am I doing all of this stuff? This means that the minute the Yetzer Hara shows its face, you become very vulnerable, and you could easily fall off. Unfortunately, like it happens a lot of times, you fall off a cliff. When people fall, they don't fall like when you were a little kid, where you just slip on the ground and have a little scab. Unfortunately, when it comes to religion, if people are not learning and they fall off, it's sometimes difficult to get them back up. They fall off, and they start going to such a far, far away land because the initial fall sometimes feels like freedom. The Yetzer Hara lies to you and gives you the feeling of freedom.

4:14So you stopped feeling, you know, connected. You used to pray every day—once, twice, three times a day. You used to learn, you know, an hour a day, or two hours a day, or even 15 minutes a day. You used to recite a blessing every time you went to the bathroom, and make a blessing every time you ate. And you did all of these things. It became a structure, just like Hashem meant for it to be. And then one day, you stopped. Oh, I didn't keep Shabbat. Oh, I didn't keep kosher today. All of a sudden, it's like, oh, I didn't keep Shabbat. But you know what? I went to the beach. I didn't keep kosher? Hashem didn't kill me. I ate chazir and Hashem didn't kill me. All of a sudden, you start feeling this freedom. Wow, great. It gives you this initial feeling where it's like you're doing something good. You're not keeping any mitzvot anymore, and I'm released from this world. That's why, unfortunately, there are some movies and interviews online where you can see these people who used to be very, very religious and now are completely anti-religious. You go from black and white and full uniform to anti-religion. Initially, when they first do it, you see them with a smile. Ah, it's so great. I'm free in this world. I don't need to go to shul. I don't need to do this. I don't need to do that. Then the Yetzer Hara says, okay, now you've gone from a candidate to a part-time employee. Now you like it so much that you're a full-time employee.

5:40That's it, now you're my slave. Now you can't leave. At that point, the neshama (soul) starts feeling it and misery sets in. The emptiness, the hole is created and it's impossible to fix it without more pain. Why? Because the pain is required to peel off. all of the Sitra Achra that you added to your body, all of the sins that you added to your body, all of the anti-attitude, anti-Torah attitude that you had in your body, it's going to take some effort to peel all of that off. So that illusion that we had, that stopping to do mitzvot is going to be good for us, is just the Yetzer Hara's genius illusion to make us, to fool us into doing it.