The Magic Solution for All Problems in 2 Minutes: Is It Possible?

Stuck for years in matchmaking? Struggling to make ends meet? Want to buy a house, but your bank account says it's a pipe dream? Facing a medical issue and the doctors are talking surgery? Don't worry, the end to all problems in 2 minutes with a spiritual practice. How easy, right? Abracadabra, and salvation is on its way. And if you want it in express delivery, then you'll have to do the practice twice a day (pardon the sarcasm).

Who doesn't love spiritual practices? They're light, don't require long-term commitment, and aren't too demanding. Usually, they require a one-time act or for a limited period. Truly a convenient magic solution.

No wonder it catches on.

Maybe we've gotten a bit carried away? Maybe we've gone a bit too far with it?

With all due respect to spiritual practices, which of course have their origins in the literature of our sages, we didn't come to this world just to do a practice. If we have some difficulty in life, stagnation, things not going as we planned, and the only spiritual solution we focus on is a practice, then maybe we missed the point. Stagnation in life is usually meant to awaken a person to strengthen themselves in Torah and mitzvot, not to cut a red apple on Friday night or put a chicken leg in a jacket pocket (examples of practices, yes?). If we desecrate Shabbat, speak gossip left and right, disrespect modesty, and think that with the practice everything will settle back in peace, then we have a problem.
The blockage that Hashem places in our lives is not intended for us to perform this or that practice, but to awaken us to repentance, strengthen in mitzvot, and take another step in the service of Hashem. When there's a problem in life, look up, remember Hashem who can do anything, and that was the whole purpose of the barrier we have in life—to remember Hashem, to draw close to Him, to strengthen. And thus, if instead of progressing in faith and mitzvot, we seek a practice to make life easy, we've missed the whole point.

When Rabbi Shach, of blessed memory, the leader of the previous generation, was asked by a person in need of healing who told him he went to a "Baba" and it didn't help, the rabbi firmly replied: "Torah and prayer are the tools we know. Beyond them, there is nothing else in the world!", and with that, he closed the discussion. And in another similar matter, the rabbi also replied "to strengthen in Torah and mitzvot and to pray more and more, and Heaven will have mercy. This is our way, this and no other".

This is not to say one shouldn't do spiritual practices. A practice that includes prayer, like saying chapters of Psalms, arouses divine mercy, and likewise, a practice that includes learning ethics or strengthening a mitzvah obviously also arouses mercy and adds merits. A practice that consists of actions not necessarily leading to the closeness to Hashem—as long as it has its source in the literature of our sages, it may indeed be effective, and it may also strengthen the sense of trust in the salvation of Hashem and fill with hope. However, we need to give practices their proportional place and not make them something they are not. With all the focus on practices, we must not forget the real strengthening. It is clear that if Hashem sends a difficulty into a person's life, the purpose is to awaken him to strengthen in faith and trust, prayer, Torah, good deeds, and mitzvot. It doesn't make much sense that the Creator of the world would send a difficulty just so that he puts a red bracelet with a blue stone on his wrist, or eats jelly...