Not because nothing is happening inside you.
But because too much has been happening for too long.
Emotional numbness is often not emptiness.
Sometimes it develops because a person has carried hurt, fear, disappointment, resentment, or shame for so long that feeling it directly becomes overwhelming.
The personality creates distance from those feelings as a form of protection.
In Torah language, baseless hatred is not only a social problem.
Baseless hatred means treating a person’s G-d-given purpose as if it does not matter.
Sometimes that is directed inward.
A person may believe, “I have to please others to stay safe,” “I have to avoid this,” “It is pointless to try,” or “I have to protect myself.”
Those beliefs can turn into not taking your own goals seriously.
Sometimes baseless hatred is directed outward, when a person stops taking another person’s goals, pain, or purpose seriously.
Prayer is one of the tools for transforming that hidden hatred into relationship and responsibility.
But prayer only works that way when a person is not just performing words.
A person has to begin with the belief that there is a Creator, that the Creator is good, and that even in numbness, confusion, shame, or distance, the person is still loved by Him.
Psychologically, this gives the person an inner experience of being lovingly parented by something higher than their wounded self.
That belief does not usually become real from craving relief alone, from wanting the numbness to stop, from trying to force yourself to feel spiritual, or from the pain being intense enough that you need something to change.
It begins through meditation.
A person thinks about how great the Creator must be, that everything exists only because He gives it existence every moment, that He knows the whole story of a person’s life, and still desires relationship with human beings.
Other people may begin through noticing goodness, help, or moments of mystery, but Chabad Chassidus gives this process a clear structure through meditation.
This is why Chabad Chassidus teachings matter so much.
Chassidus does not only tell a person to feel more.
It explains what to think about until awe, trust, and gratitude become emotionally possible again.
That is also why Chabad leadership matters for this generation.
Leadership is guidance and accepting responsibility.
It is not about building the largest personal community.
The Jewish people always described Moses as a leader because his Five Books guide us, not because of his physical presence alone or because everyone was part of his personal tribe.
A real leader, like the Baal Shem Tov, gives people the ideas they need in order to return to relationship with The Creator.
After centuries of persecution, exile, trauma, confusion, and emotional numbness, many Jewish people inherited a nervous system that struggles to feel trust.
So atheistic, random, or emotionally disconnected beliefs can become easier to absorb.
Rabbi Soloveitchik saw value in atheism when it leads a person to take responsibility for the world, not wait for someone else to fix it.
But when atheism becomes the belief that life is random, unsupported, or without a loving structure, it can train the nervous system to feel alone inside existence.
Not always because a person thought through those beliefs deeply.
Sometimes because numbness makes relationship with The Creator feel far away.
Chabad Chassidus gives the mind a different structure.
It explains why belief in a good Creator is more logical, more healing, and more emotionally honest than believing life is random.
To heal from trauma, a person needs a framework that helps them face suffering without experiencing it as abandonment.
The deepest meaning comes from believing that existence is created by a good Creator, that concealment is not abandonment, and that life is asking for relationship and responsibility.
The nervous system is not moved by abstract slogans.
The nervous system contains patterns that can react almost like a very young child inside the personality.
When a person attaches to beliefs like “life is random,” “anything can happen for no reason,” or “there is no loving structure behind existence,” the body often feels less supported and moves toward survival mode more easily.
That survival mode becomes people-pleasing, avoidance, control, resentment, shame, or emotional shutdown.
But when the mind is given truth to think about, a person slowly becomes emotionally available.
This is the top-down path: the mind receives a truer belief, and slowly the emotions and body learn a different way to relate to life.
Then awe begins.
Awe is not simple fear.
Awe is a blend of sadness, fear, and wonder.
Sadness, because His goodness is always able to be more revealed.
Fear, because if life comes from Him, then life is about responsibility.
Wonder, because the Infinite Creator desires relationship with human beings.
After awe, a deeper joy is felt, because the person is no longer trapped inside numbness, hatred, or self-hatred.
They are standing in relationship.
That is when prayer becomes powerful.
Prayer is not just saying spiritual words.
Prayer is where hidden hatred becomes honesty, honesty becomes awe, awe becomes trust, trust becomes gratitude, gratitude becomes responsibility, and responsibility becomes relationship.
Without that inner movement, prayer becomes performance.
With it, prayer becomes repair.
The Baal Shem Tov taught that the fact a person remains alive by the end of prayer is a miracle.
When a person feels, “When I am with You, I desire nothing on earth,” the soul should leave the body in divine ecstasy.
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More guides:
If people were jealous of Moses leadership in the desert, it was probably worse in Egypt, if spiritual giants guided people to be against Moses after Sinai, there was likely more of that happening in Egypt, 80% of jewish people had misguided beliefs about Moses and the Creator before the exodus.
Chabad rabbis being generational leaders for the Jewish people doesn’t mean people should send their kids to chabad schools or copy chabad culture.
It simply means they revealed teachings the generation needs in order to return to relationship with The Creator, ideas that allow people to feel deeper awe and transform atheist/unhealthy beliefs.
Lots of Lubavitch Chassidim misinterpret what the Chabad Rebbeim wrote or said.
The Lubavitcher Rebbe is the only generational leader that lived after the holocaust, the Rambam and the Arizal are also generational leaders.
In 1951, the Rebbe began explaining that the leader of a generation can be someone that passed away, and he published over 70,000 pages of teachings supporting his world view, you need more then a slogan of ‘a dead rabbi can’t be the leader’ to debate his world view.
The Messiah will be a leader that is beloved by everyone.
How to understand curses in the Hebrew Bible.
How does free choice work?
Why was suffering built into creation?
