Question:
My question is a painful one but I hope the Rav can advise me. I am an older single in shidduchim and a few months ago my oldest niece got married BH. However it has been incredibly painful for me as she is significantly younger than me. My niece is a teacher and cannot support her husband in learning so she relies on her parents to help her each month. What she does not know is that I actually help my sibling with the support money. In all honesty, I did it as a zechus for myself for a shidduch, as I was in so much pain I felt like I needed to do something big for Hashem and take something painful and turn it to something special. It is now quite some time later and I am still waiting for my shidduch. Sending over the support money every month has become harder and harder and almost making me feel a resentment to Hashem (I know it's so bad but shidduchim has just been so tough...). My question is, do I push myself to continue sending the money or do I stop because it is affecting my relationship with Hashem? (she can get by without my portion but it would be tough).
In addition, I have taken on so many 40 day segulos such as perek shira, shir hashirim, Nishmas, shmiras halashon but they seem to work for everyone else but me.
Should I push myself to do another 40 days even though it is so tough or stop for now?
I am so sorry for this painful question and I thank you for taking the time to answer it.
Answer:
Hello,
My heart goes out to you, and the other thousands of older singles, that are still waiting for a yeshua. This issue is one of the most difficult challenges of our generation, and we all daven that Hashem should help you and everyone else, find their zivug soon. We don’t understand the ways of Hashem and why certain things happen, but we do try to strengthen ourselves with the emuna, that He knows what is our ultimate best, and there will be a time, that we will also understand it. It is very hard, but don’t give up.
Regarding your question; the tzedakah that you are giving, is a tremendous zechus for you. It says that a mitzva done when it is difficult is worth 100 times more than a mitzva when it isn’t. R’ Chaim Velozoner says something extraordinary. He says that the gemora says,” what is considered pain? When a person sticks his hand into his pocket to take out one coin, and he took out the wrong one. Now he has to stick his hand back into his pocket to get the correct one, that is considered “pain”. Let’s call that one unit of pain. For that one unit, the person gets 100X the reward, then if the mitzva would be done without that pain. Says R’ Chaim Velozoner, how much reward does a person get if the difficulty is two units of pain? He says that it is not 200x times no pain rather, 100x one unit of pain! Meaning that the sechar for that mitzva is a whopping 10,000 times the sechar of the mitzva done with any pain! Let’s extend this a little, how much is the sechar if the mitzva has 3 units of pain… 1million times the sechar... and 4 units… 100 million... five units 10 billion times…
Now I ask you, how many units of pain are involved with giving the tzedakah to your niece, 25- 50 units of pain… do you have a calculator that can calculate the tremendous sechar that you will get for those couple of hundreds of dollars?!
So, by all means, if you can physically and emotionally, continue helping your relative, and the sechar that you will get for it, is tremendous. More than you can imagine. And the benefits that you will have from it will help you tremendously.
Why Hashem has not yet sent you your bashert, is a separate issue, we don’t know, we wish we did, but we just don’t know. Right now, it is terribly difficult, but chazal say that when Hashem will repay everyone for the difficulties that they endured, we will be paid back, in the same way, that it was painful. For example, it says that l’asid l’avo, that Hashem is going to heal, the lame, and the blind, but not just that they will get healed, the lame person will have super feet, and the blind person will have super eyes.
So too, IY”H with you, Hashem should send you your bashert soon, and you should be zoche to have children who will be true ovdei Hashem and talmidei chachamim.
Keep strong, and IY”H your yeshua will come soon.
