How Is Your Environment Affecting You? Or, Why You May Want To Live In a Cave

September 22nd, 2008         Email This Post Email This Post       Print This Post Print This Post

The Rambam in Hilchos Deos Perek 6 says that your environment is a crucial part of your growth. He says that if your surroundings are terrible and you can’t isolate yourself in your house, you should go live in a cave. That’s a heavy statement!

Let’s look at how our surrounding affect us. When you are at a wedding, the joy is infectious. Lively music makes people energetic. When people yawn, they often set off a wave of yawns around them. If a blind person just hears someone yawning, he will often yawn. Even reading the word yawn can make people yawn, which will cause others around them to yawn. (Did I say yawn enough times to get you to yawn?) If someone is happy and smiles at you, it can be hard not to smile back. Your environment has an immediate, deep impact on you.

It isn’t just our mood. Over the past 18 months, I have noticed new beliefs are absorbed by osmosis (such as “we can accomplish”, “things are positive”, “I have amazing potential”). You start believing the messages around you: how everyone acts, what you listen to, and the things that you read in books or online. They just slip in to the way you think. Even if you know you don’t want to think that way, continued exposure just lets it seep in under the radar.

What does the environment include? Basically, our environment includes everything we are exposed to. We have many different environments: home, work, school, where you spend your spare time. Your environment includes what you listen to, the people you interact with, and the material you read.

Whatever we are constantly exposed to becomes normal. Watching, hearing, or reading the news - sick drama about murder and corruption - is junk food for the mind that clogs your brain and can lead to premature brain failure. People react to insults by insulting back, which seems normal, however Chazal tell us of the immense reward for holding your tongue instead of responding. Negative reactions to events fail to keep in mind “gam zeh litovah - this too is for the good.”

Our friends influence us the most. We share our thoughts with them and spend a large amount of time with them. I recall reading a study that said you can predict your future based on your group of friends. Peer pressure isn’t just for kids. It can determine your entire life! Different peer groups in the same locations could completely alter the environment.

This may sound like the “nurture” side of the nature/nurture debate, disregarding free choice. However, the Rambam is telling you to CHOOSE your nurture. The best way to predict the future is to invent it - choose the peer group you want to be like! Rav Aharon Soloveitchik (in Parach Mateh Aharon, on Rambam’s Sefer Mada) said that your free choice is choosing your environment. It is vitally important to shape your environment to be conducive to your growth as a Jew. Anything less is leaving one of the biggest factors to chance. Blaming our environment is just an attempt to shift the blame off ourselves.

Set your environment to work for you! In architecture, form follows function. The function of your environment is to help you grow. Your environment should look like whatever will help you grow the most, possible including:

  • A good peer group for positive reinforcement.
  • Listen to positive, encouraging audio on an mp3 player when you aren’t doing something else.
  • A place that is quiet or loud, private or public to best suite your needs for learning, working, and introspection.
  • What is good about your current environment? Get more of it!
  • Find people who model the path you want to take. People that are inspiring, have great middos, or know a lot of Torah. Spend time with them. Build a relationship with them. Join them for Shabbos.
  • Smile at people. People smile back. Practice smiling right now. You can even blame me if someone asks why you are smiling.
  • Put up pictures in your room or cubicle of people you admire.
  • Find a nice picture of the world/galaxy/universe and put on top “bishvee-li nivra olam - The universe was created for me!”
  • Hang up inspiring quotes.
  • Join positive discussions.
  • Gather a group of friends and ask how you can encourage each other to be more positive, happy, and growing. Suggest signing up for this blog.

For some people, their main environment would just take too much effort turn into something more positive. Choose a better one, at least for part of the day. It may be time to leave.

 

Right now: make a list of 20 things you can do to make your environment at home, work, or school more conducive to growing!

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