The cry of the heart is our secret weapon, and it also connects us to Hashem. And such a connection is sweet, that sometimes one forgets the lack. You must remember that the one delaying your salvation is Hashem Himself, who loves you immensely and only He truly knows what's best for you. Only He truly knows how to bring you closer to Him. Rebbe Nachman says that preparation for a mitzvah is more important than the mitzvah itself, because preparation builds the vessels. Without preparation, without desires, without prayers, how can we appreciate what we received? How can we merit to thank Hashem for all the kindness He does with us? Because without waiting and without preparation, it all turns into one big pride.

The main work is to toil, to want, to pray. You can't receive immediately what you want, you can't immediately draw close to Hashem. Sometimes, not only do they not open a door for you, but they seemingly push you away, distance you, drop you to such a low place. But you must not despair. It all happens so you will strengthen in prayers, strengthen in desires, "Master of the Universe, until when? Master of the Universe, I can't take it anymore! Save me!" Even the leper has hope. He just needs to strengthen. You can't reach the fruit without passing through the peel. You can't reach the morning except through the evening before it. It is precisely from the hardest periods in our lives that the greatest salvations have grown.

Did you receive a blow? Know that the one who gave you the blow first created the healing. Hashem precedes the healing to the blow. To be a Jew is to struggle for the connection with Hashem within the routine, within the endless race of a thousand and one things that need to be done. Constantly trying to rise, trying to reach a higher reality than the one I'm in. There are times when nothing works out for us. Livelihood, children's education, peace in the home. Or a person doesn't get along with himself, finds it hard to concentrate in prayer, finds it hard to be in simcha, there are such times and such times. And we don't get confused and don't despair. "Back and front You have formed me." This is how You created me, that I have both back and front. The neshamah wants the front – forward, enough being back, we want forward. But it can't be without back. What is back? It's the most important work with Hashem. It's doing things without feeling anything.

You don't feel anything, and yet you continue and continue and do the work. Again saying the blessings, again saying the prayers, again Tikkun HaKlali, again Shema on the bed with almost closed eyes, all this is the work of back. First back, only then do we merit the front. A person should rejoice in the simple works. Even if he feels nothing. Even if everything is dark for him. Because this is what Hashem wants. Hashem wants you to prepare the vessels to receive the light called front through the work of back. The light of front is a light that warms a person, it's such a wonderful light, that then the person bursts with simcha and starts to dance, and loves everyone, and doesn't care about anything because Hashem is smiling at him, Hashem sends him a hug. But Hashem wants the sweat you sweat in the trial. When you still don't have it, and yet you continue onward.

There is no situation where you won't go through difficulties and crises. Everyone "goes through it." But you continue onward to want Hashem. Don't "get angry" with Hashem because He doesn't give you what you want. Don't despair. Don't fall in your mind. Even the leper can discover the light within the darkness. If only he strengthens in emunah. It's important how we look at what happens to us. What glasses we use. If we know that everything happens to heal us, to rectify, to purify, to wash, to bring us closer to Hashem, if we understand that this is the sole purpose of the sufferings we go through, then everything becomes much easier. But if we look at everything that happens to us as if there is no supervision, then it can truly lead to despair and breaking. There are such difficult trials that people go through, and only through emunah can you get through everything! Hold on through everything that happens! Believe that Hashem knows what He is doing with each and every one! He is doing the best for you! Accept it with emunah! With love! When you believe with complete emunah that Hashem is full of mercy, that He created the world to reveal His mercy, then the questions are nullified. This emunah fills a person with calm and gives him the strength to stand in all the trials. I believe in You, Master of the Universe, that You are doing only the best for me.

I am too small to understand every time what good is hidden in every concealment, in every trial You test me, in every trouble I go through, heavenly calculations cannot be understood, but I believe that I will yet merit to see the good hidden even in this concealment. We see hard things in life, and we ourselves go through hard things, and if we don't precede emunah to intellect, the emunah that everything is good and there is no bad, then we might God forbid fall from emunah. Hashem wants us to strive to believe in Him. To strive to believe that He does not do anything bad to us in life. The holy emunah takes these gray, hard, confused lives, where a person doesn't find himself, and everything is blocked, and all the hard things that happen to us, each one and his matters, and turns them into something good. Into something beautiful.

Whoever has emunah does not break and does not despair, he knows there is no situation in the world that Hashem cannot save him from, he always remembers that Hashem is all-powerful. And the main emunah is in the place where the intellect shows us a certain situation that is not good, and we cast aside the intellect and hold only to the emunah that everything is for the best. When does a person know he has attained complete emunah? When he constantly says thank you. In all situations. He lives with the emunah that everything that happens to him is from Hashem, and it's all for his good. Just to say thank you. For everything, to say thank you. Even for the leprosy, God forbid. Parshat Metzora is not only for lepers. It has an important message for us too. Today there is no leprosy of the skin, but there is leprosy in the heart. There is coldness and apathy towards matters of kedushah. When a person runs after the desires of his body, then the spiritual light is closed off from him, and when the spiritual light is closed off from a person, then he is like dead. He has no vitality and no simcha. Metzora = one who brings out a bad name, speaks lashon hara and gossip, which is a very difficult desire, and no matter how much we read and learn and hear lessons about guarding the tongue, we still fall. Master of the Universe, help us never to harm others with our tongue and not to believe any bad thing said about another. That we should be careful even of the dust of lashon hara. Whoever has a brain in his head will hasten to wage a fierce war against this difficult inclination. Everything can be lost if we fall into gossip and lashon hara.

What kedushah will rest on our prayers, on our Torah learning when they are said with the same mouth that was just defiled by speaking lashon hara and gossip? If a person looks at himself with the eye of truth, at how much he himself is immersed in such defects and shortcomings, then he will have no desire to look at others, to speak about their defects, and to enjoy hearing about their falls. When a person knows his purpose and understands his work here in this world, then there will be no place for lashon hara and gossip, he will have no time at all to talk about others. But a person who is not connected to the true purpose for which he was created, has no purpose that enlivens him, then he feels such emptiness inside, such lack, that when he hears some lashon hara about someone, it really enlivens him, it makes him happy to know he is better than someone. When a person understands his matter and his purpose in life, then he will no longer be interested in anyone in the world, he will also have no time to deal with anyone because he has so much to accomplish and do, he values every moment. Our teacher Rabbi Eliezer Berland: ["When a person speaks lashon hara, idle words, nonsense, then he begins to lose what was allotted to him to speak! And he can die prematurely, God forbid, he speaks, speaks, his stock runs out! His life runs out! Everything leaks, everything drips! No words are left! No life is left!

Because a person lives according to the words allotted to him to speak, and on the contrary, if he speaks all day in words of Torah, in words of kedushah, he constantly receives more merit to speak! More holy words to speak! And by being given more holy words to speak, he receives more life and more life. One must go with the perspective that I am the worst Jew in the world, there is no worse than me, every Jew is better than me, holier than me, wiser than me, how can I speak about another? How can a Jew reach this? To speak about another Jew? How can he suddenly fall to such low levels! To such terrible levels! The animalistic nature of an animal is that it bites, kicks, and gores, but the animalistic nature of a person is to speak lashon hara, to speak about another, a person cannot receive kedushah this way. And what is the rectification? They bring him two birds, they let him hear a good voice, a soft voice, a voice of pleasantness, through the song of the birds they return to him the power of song, the power of melody, the pleasantness, the tranquility, so that all his words will be only praises and thanks to Hashem, praises and thanks to everyone, to his family, to his friends, only to praise and glorify them, how wonderful you are, how good you are"] (thus far our teacher the rabbi).

Every time you hear someone speak badly about someone else, immediately the evil inclination instills such trust in the one who hears in the one who says the bad thing. Why would he lie? He's not just saying, he's not just making things up, there's no smoke without fire... you have to run away from it like fire. If a person merits to guard his tongue and ears from speaking and hearing forbidden things, after a few weeks they will stop telling him, they will take this merchandise to someone else. To someone who is interested in listening. And this will be to his honor and glory. That everyone will know to be careful with their tongue when speaking with him because he is not willing to hear lashon hara and gossip. The mouth is an opening. And like the opening of a house, if it is open all the time, nothing will remain in the house, so too the mouth, a time to open and a time to close. Therefore, a person was created with two eyes, two ears, two nostrils, and only one mouth. To tell us to minimize speech.

"And consider the words before you let them out of your mouth," says the Ramban in his famous letter. This is such a high level, but if we want, if we insist, if we don't stop praying for it, we will reach it. Even the leper, despite being in such darkness, in such loneliness, in such shame, he too needs to know he is not alone. That Hashem has not abandoned him. Hashem never abandons a person. This very knowledge that Hashem is always with you should give you the strength to continue, not to despair, God forbid. Not to fall into sadness, God forbid. Remember that this is Hashem's way to elevate you to another level. So many people tell that it is precisely from this great darkness that they reached such a closeness, such a connection with Hashem. Do teshuvah, you reach Hashem, "Return, O Israel, to Hashem your God." A Jew who does teshuvah for the hardest sin imaginable should walk happy and calm. It's a pity that a person sees in sufferings and concealments and falls the distancing of the Creator from him, and instead of doing teshuvah and drawing close, he begins to lower boundaries and distances himself, God forbid. It's a pity, this was really not the intention of Hashem, who loves every person with a soul's love. The Creator's love for His children is beyond human comprehension. With Hashem, there are no punishments in the simple sense, there are rectifications. When a person, within his sufferings, within the terrible pain over his sins, when he begins to speak from his pained heart with Hashem, he meets a true friend who hears the prayer of every mouth, who is close to all who call upon Him. In the end, we understand there are no punishments and revenge, from Heaven they do not reject a person, they do not distance him, on the contrary, the sufferings are meant to bring a person closer. The day will come when our eyes will be opened and we will see that in the depth of judgment lay a depth of mercy and kindness. The day will come when we will see how much we need to thank Hashem for arranging things in the best possible way.