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Life is complicated. From the moment that we awake in the morning there are various different pressures and demands on our time; many distractions and nuisances that get in the way of us fulfilling the days’ tasks. We may ask ourselves, imagine if Hashem had created the world in a way that we are not pulled in all different directions and in a world where we are not constantly being distracted from what is really important in life? Envision our day being occupied primarily with Torah, Mitzvos and acts of Chessed. Our financial worries would be to a minimum.

nd Yitzchak sent Yaakov, and he went to Padan Aram to Lavan the son of Besuel the Arami, the brother of Rivka, the mother of Yaakov and Esav. (Bereishis 28:5)

Burial, Shivah and the end of life are fascinatingly a topic that few of us ever really care to discuss. As we age, we ignore the reality that one day we will have to make serious decisions for some of the people we love and are close to us. If we wait until the last minute to make these far-reaching decisions they become even more difficult and many times more costly.

Avraham Avinu, whose inheritance to his descendants was to be the midda of chessed - loving kindness, certainly sought out each and every opportunity in his long lifetime to perform this mitzva. Yet it is not until he reaches beyond the 100 year milestone that the Torah makes direct mention of this activity.

The Chofetz Chaim ztl was a prolific author who was the mechaber of many seforim. In his introduction to his Sefer Ahavas Chessed he details the acts of kindness performed throughout Sefer Bereishis and beyond.

No doubt, you are all still basking in the afterglow of all the Yomim Tovim. The re-entry into the atmosphere, however, is fraught with danger. When one has become habituated to the rarified spiritual stratosphere, a reentry plan is vital. The space shuttle needed special solar panels to absorb the intense heat generated upon re-entry. Deep-sea divers need to decompress to avoid ‘the bends’. If we attempt to re-engage with the world without having formulated a strategy to do so, it could well all end in tears. The possible disaster scenarios are either to ‘crash-and-burn’, or to revert to type, to accept mediocrity and the banal, and give up the good fight.

The Torah tells us that Kayin and his wife had a son and they called him Chanoch, and he built a city and called the city like his son, Chanoch.