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482 | A New Light
resolve that this will be my entire intent. You have
written in the Gemara that unless You help me, I will be
unable to overcome my evil inclination. If You do not
give me resolve, where will I get it from? You must help
me and give me a strong and powerful resolve, so that
even the slightest urge to sleep will not enter into me,
heaven forbid. If You do not help me, I will sleep away
another day of my life, and it will be a day of death,
may heaven have mercy. And it is Your will that I not
sleep away my life. It is Your will that I live. Give me a
perfect and strong resolve, and may I be entirely and
solely dedicated to wanting You.
Please help me engage in the struggle to attain holy
sleep. That is the struggle to attain life. Help me fight
to achieve holy intent in the minutes before I fall sleep,
because those minutes determine everything. Please give
me the strength to overcome the evil inclination of sleep.
Give me the strength to fight against it until I vanquish it.
Give me the strength to stand and pray and plead for my
soul. Give me a powerful strength of will to want only
one thing: to gaze upon the pleasantness of Hashem and
visit His palace!
Master of the universe, help me be strong and deeply
aware that the will to sleep is absolute evil, the most
despicable evil inclination. Give me the awareness that
its sweetness is absolute evil. The evil inclination sells me
counterfeit sweetness for a minute and wants to seize my
entire life, to cut me off from You and drag me into evil
sleep, to cause me to cling to harsh “husks,” and to fill
me with fears and contamination—and in that way to
kill my hours, days and years. Please! I am suspended
between life and death. Rescue me! Without Your help,
I will fall into this cursed and murderous sweetness.
Without Your help, I am dead. Why do I have such a
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Of course, these are only examples, and everyone can add to
them from his own mind in accordance with what he has learned
in this chapter, in accordance with everything that he learns and
knows, and in accordance with the words that Hashem will place
on his tongue.
Practical Preparation
In summation, the work of the will and yearning at the time of
going to sleep is the work on which all of a person’s life depends. In
accordance with a person’s intentions at that time, that is how his
entire day will appear, and that is exactly how his life will appear. A
person may by no means allow the desire to rest or sleep enter him.
He must sleep with the complete faith that only Hashem gives life,
and he must experience great resolve and yearning to be close to
Hashem and cling to Hashem. As a result, his soul will be renewed,
his faith will be strengthened and healed, and he will wake up easily
and with alacrity, filled with energy and yearning to pray and serve
Hashem. Hashem will satiate him with holy will. As the verse states,
“You satiate every living being with will” (Psalms 145:16). And that
will influence his entire day and his entire life.
Therefore, when a person goes to bed, he must set aside a long
block of time to prepare himself to sleep with faith, prayer, intent
and yearning. At the very least, he must recite the Bedtime Sh’ma
properly, with all of its verses, from a siddur, while standing up. He
should prepare an alarm clock and a washing cup, and he should
know what time he wants to get up. He should then lie down with
the simple faith that it is not sleep that gives strength but Hashem
alone, and with the intent to serve Hashem. And he should engage
in many intentions, yearnings and prayers until his soul clings to its
root and rises to the Source of life, and in that way draws down to
himself life and strength.