Trust in God according to the Gra means not to do effort and not to depend on one's own thinking.
I would not say this except that I have found that when I do effort and or depend on my own thinking --either things don't work out or they get worse. To some degree I imagine that some people have a kind of ability to put their minds to something and it gets done. They have success embedded into their fates. But that does not seem to be the case for me. Rather I have found that when I in fact put my trust in God, and do no effort, things work out.
Moving from place to place seems to be an example of this. Once I went to yeshiva with the idea in mind that God would take care of me. And that is exactly what happened. God granted to me a wife and children and a living also. Other times I moved from one place to another --not based on trust, but based on the fact that I felt the first place was intolerable and the second seemed to be great.
This type of thinking just got me from the frying pan into the fire.
[See Proverbs chapter 3 at the Gra's comments. Also check out the Alter of Navardok's book the מדרגת האדם ]. Don't take this the wrong way. I am not giving advice here because I have never managed to walk this fine line very well. Usually when I was trusting in God I was not doing so consciously. I simply did what I believed was God's will -and I could have been mistaken- but still for some reason God still blessed me. When I went to Israel I also was doing what I felt was God's will, I certainly was not thinking of how I would be making a living. Yet that was either the peak of my whole life or at least one of the major great periods.
What I suggest from all this is highly personal for each person according to their best understanding. It is not like a kind of thing that you can define well.
I would not say this except that I have found that when I do effort and or depend on my own thinking --either things don't work out or they get worse. To some degree I imagine that some people have a kind of ability to put their minds to something and it gets done. They have success embedded into their fates. But that does not seem to be the case for me. Rather I have found that when I in fact put my trust in God, and do no effort, things work out.
Moving from place to place seems to be an example of this. Once I went to yeshiva with the idea in mind that God would take care of me. And that is exactly what happened. God granted to me a wife and children and a living also. Other times I moved from one place to another --not based on trust, but based on the fact that I felt the first place was intolerable and the second seemed to be great.
This type of thinking just got me from the frying pan into the fire.
[See Proverbs chapter 3 at the Gra's comments. Also check out the Alter of Navardok's book the מדרגת האדם ]. Don't take this the wrong way. I am not giving advice here because I have never managed to walk this fine line very well. Usually when I was trusting in God I was not doing so consciously. I simply did what I believed was God's will -and I could have been mistaken- but still for some reason God still blessed me. When I went to Israel I also was doing what I felt was God's will, I certainly was not thinking of how I would be making a living. Yet that was either the peak of my whole life or at least one of the major great periods.
What I suggest from all this is highly personal for each person according to their best understanding. It is not like a kind of thing that you can define well.
