Before Your Apartment Burns Down

In early 1992, some tenants let three apartments in an Orthodox neighborhood in Israel burn to the ground while they asked a rabbi whether a telephone call to the fire department on the Sabbath would violate Jewish law. Observant Jews are forbidden to use the phone on the Sabbath, because doing so would break an electrical current, which is considered a form of work. In the half-hour it took the rabbi to decide “yes,” the fire spread to two neighboring apartments.

This may seem quite ridiculous to those of us who do not follow Jewish law but in many ways, it can be easy for us to metaphorically “let our apartment burn” by not acting unless given an “okay” to do something about it.

Many times we have the tools and resources to put the fires of our lives out, yet we choose not to do anything about it because we know that it will require work. We don’t want to have to break a sweat or do hard things.

A client I worked with last year came to me in a similar situation where she felt like there were little fires all around her. The way she described her situation reminded me of one of my favorite memes.