The Three Weeks - Between the Straits - Why mourning, which means shifting happiness and pleasure to yearning for His Glory to be revealed and clinging to understanding essence of self and others as having divine dignity during this time is so important

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In the above podcast, Rabbi Yaakov Zalman Labinsky explains through the actual words in theory what the three weeks is about.  Read the transcript and listen to the podcast and then below please see why this is so exciting and inspiring to really ask Hashem to help us reveal His Glory over our natural reactions.
Here is a transcript:

The three weeks of mourning precede the 7 weeks of consolation. It is called Bain HaMitzarim, between the straits. The root letters of straits is tzara, from mitzarim, tzadi raish hai which letters turned around spell ratzon, to want or to yearn. That is the basis of the root of the word yearning, ratzon, to run. The new ratzon the new yearning comes from the tzara itself. The new desire for greater closeness comes from the capacity of distancing itself and your ability to hold onto it, to contain the pain, and then be able to find a deeper yearning within the pain.

In ratzon comes from keser [Hashem's Attributes of Mercy are in keter and we are made in His Image, meaning that our essence, our divine dignity, reflects Hashem's Attributes of Mercy]. That is important to know. If tzara brings ratza, and ratzon is rooted in keser, and  keser is the root behind chochma bina and daas! It is called the shorshe amochi – the root of the mochi is chochma bina and daas. …a person awakening their ratzon and in the ratzon is the root of their keser which is the root of their moichim - you will draw down new moichim from a new yearning to get close to Hashem, to connect to Him and He will give you new moichim to perceive in general and specific, which is chochma (general) and bina (specific), and then integrated into daas based on the new yearning to return, which is based on the pain of the tzara.

For the seven weeks that follow the seven weeks of consolation, leading to Rosh Hashana, that [editor note: the work we do to do battle with the pain of letting go of happiness and pleasure associated with worldly matters and instead seeking to identify happiness and pleasure with divine dignity] will start to permeate your middos.


We can have patience during the three weeks to  look at how our imagination regarding happiness and pleasure are trapped in worldly matters causing us to react with hurt and upset.  We can make an extra effort in teshuva, asking Hashem to please help us release happiness and pleasure along with the Shechina that is in galus with the trapped happiness and pleasure.  We beseech Hashem to please help us re-associate happiness and pleasure as He designs them to be experienced, as the result of learning Torah, emulating Hashem's Attributes of Mercy (keser) and living with emunah and bitachon, faith and trust.  Hashem desires to give us true pleasure, but our minds need to be a vessel that can contain that pleasure.  When during the three weeks we introspect and work to experience what we lost, we develop a yearning for Hashem's presence.  That understanding of real pleasure is an important teshuva.  we  build into our minds a shift from what we perceive as happiness and pleasure in worldly matters to a higher and truer happiness and pleasure.  Our mind becomes a vessel to receive real pleasure proportional to the pain we held and did battle with when re-associating heartfelt pleasures with what Hashem designs for us to be real pleasure.  When we get a glimpse of the new  pleasure that Hashem wishes to give to us - devekus based on our essence - we realize its superiority over where we previously defined happiness and pleasure.

Such a teshuva accomplishes a real change in our will and our thought.  it uncorrupts something at the deepest switch inside of us, giving us more consciousness over an area of our mind that we did not have before.

There is a women's teshuva call, easy, gentle guided teshuva, to help us with this work every day of the three weeks, except Shabbos.  The calls are at 8 am and 10 pm eastern time.  the calls are recorded and are posted at www.brachagemach.com where you can get more details.  If you would like to join us, please send an email to shulikleinman@beyondanydoubts.com