The military cabinet of the Russian Tsar was in despair. Napoleon’s army was in the process of conquering vast tracts of land; cities and villages were overtaken easily, and he was close to the capital. The Tsar was listening to the army generals, and they were showing him on the map how close the French army was. “In such a situation,” they summed up the discussion, “we haven’t any way at all to prepare a counter attack.”
The Tsar nodded, and then motioned to his personal military secretary to come to him. “Go to my office,” he said to him, “and bring back the large map of Russia that is hanging on the wall.” This map was ten times bigger than the map in the war cabinet room.
The map was brought, and then the Tsar turned to the army generals and said: “Now, explain the situation again. How close is Napoleon, and why don’t we have any chance of advancing?” On the large map, Napoleon didn’t look so close anymore, and suddenly it seemed that there was hope and that it wasn’t too late to go out on an offensive and save the situation.
I don’t know if this story really happened or not, but I use it often when I have to explain this concept to myself or to someone else who is at a crossroads in his life, and it seems to him that all is lost – it’s too late and all that can be done, as the saying goes, will be too little and too late. At that point I try to enlarge the map, stretch the picture of the situation both vertically and horizontally, and suddenly it seems that every step and action, which on the small map seemed barely noticeable and unimportant, can be seen on the large map as being significant and very impressive. And then one acquires the desire and the strength to prepare an offensive.
And something else for those among us who are struggling: when we begin to make changes in our lives—whether in behavior or feeling, in action and speech, or even in thought—we must not wait for immediate applause and recognition from our surroundings. The people around us, even those closest to us, do not immediately recognize the change, the process, and certainly not the trend. Why? Because they have not expanded their perspective and therefore do not see our small steps. But we do see them. We know that this time, our frustration over something that happened lasted five minutes instead of six. We notice that the negative and pessimistic outlook was less determined than before, that the despair or setback lasted two days instead of two and a half. These are things that only we can see. There is nothing to do but acknowledge and note these changes for ourselves on the larger map and continue. Gradually, the change will become a process, the process will become a trend, and suddenly, the environment will be surprised and ask: “Hey, you’ve changed! Amazing, how did you do it?”
Presented in honor of the story of “Pesach Sheni” that appears in this week’s parasha, parashat Beha’alotcha. There, too, it seemed that all was lost, and that there was no way to make up for the missed Pesach. But the bigger picture told another story, and they were granted another chance.
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbi Zalmen Wishedski