Trapped in the Triangle of Joy-Doubt-Control
Trapped in the Triangle of Joy-Doubt-Control
and getting out of it
This week’s guest contributor to our Sage Advice series is Ilana Cowland, an educator, relationship coach, international lecturer and author of The Moderately Anxious Everybody.
I think you will enjoy her analytical yet emotionally nuanced approach to the problem posed to her!
Question:
I hope you can help me….
I'm very grateful to have a job in today's market. I'm happy to be making money and earning a living, and I recognize that feel good about myself that I’m being productive.
On the other hand, there's so much about my job that makes me unhappy. Mostly, I don't think my company is very ethical. The corporate culture here borders on abusive. I come home so drained, and it's affecting me way beyond the long hours that I spend in the office...
The problem is that if I leave, who says I'll find another job??
I feel trapped!
Advice from the Sages:
I'm really sorry you're struggling!
It seems to me that you're caught in the Joy-Doubt-Control Triangle.
You go to work, in order to get joy (be productive, add value, make money, earn respect).
The doubts you have about your work, however, reduce your joy.
The problem is that you're scared of leaving because you have no real control over the outcome should you decide to leave.
Does this sound right?
There’s an interesting jewish concept that might shed some light on your situation. It's actually quite cryptic, so we’ll need to unpack it in order for you to find it useful.
אין שמחה כהתרת הספקות
There is no joy like the resolution of doubts1
When I hear Rabbinic wisdom-statements like this, every skeptical bone in my body starts buzzing.
What do you mean, “there’s no joy like the resolution of doubt”?? Really??? Because I'm sure I can think of some bigger ones. How about getting married? Or having a baby? Or a million other happy experiences!?
What bothers me most is that it's a Rabbinic statement. This is not your mom saying, "nothing could make me happier than watching you eat right now". When your mom says something like this, she simply means, “I'm very happy.” She’s just saying it in her “mom way.” And you get that. You don't challenge her logically by firing back, “oh c’mon mom, I'm sure I could find some thing that would make you happier,” because you understand that it's a just turn of phrase. But the Sages of the Talmud didn't make throw-away statements. If they said it, they meant it.
How, then, are we to take literally the notion that “there is no joy like the resolution of doubts?”
Here is a different way to think about joy:
Quantity of pleasure is not always proportional to the quality of joy.
Normally, a clear, massive sky is objectively more beautiful than a single ray of light. A king's lavish banquet brings more delight than a bowl of cabbage soup. And the vast, open air of Switzerland objectively leads a person to more joy than the scarce air in a dank cave.
Unless…
…you are lost in a tunnel, and think you will die there.
In this scenario, when all is dark, and you think it's over, what happens when you suddenly see that single shaft of light? Nothing could bring you more joy in that moment. It is your very state of deprivation that gives you access to immense appreciation.
A king's banquet is wonderful, but if you've been starving for weeks, that bowl of watery soup, which soothes your hunger pangs, tastes like heaven. You would no doubt enjoy that lifesaving meal more than the luxury of a royal feast.
I heard a holocaust survivor relate, that after all these years of eating well, nothing tasted as good to him as cabbage soup. Cabbage soup was his first hot meal after his camp was liberated.
When we have easy access to pleasure, increased pleasure increases our joy. But if we have been drowning under water, even the smallest gasp of low quality air would beat the pleasure of any amount of Swiss air while on vacation in the Alps. It's just how we’re wired.
So it's certainly true that there may be larger reasons to celebrate in life, but the quality of joy does not, when you look at it closely, depend linearly on the quantity of pleasure.
So we can conclude that if the Sages tell us that there’s no joy like the joy of resolving doubts, it must be because doubt deprives us of joy like drowning deprives us of air.
Why is this true? Why do doubt and joy behave like each other's nemeses? (As they do in your work dilemma.)
To answer this question, I'll ask another one. (Am I Jewish? Guilty as charged.)
How do you read this word?
CONTENT.
Do you think con-tént? Or do you think cón-tent? Are we talking about a feeling of satisfaction, as in the first reading, or rather that which makes up a whole, like the content of a book?
“Content” is one of my favorite English words because of the connection between its two meanings. Can you think of something that will make you less content than being in the middle of a great book and discovering some crucial content is missing? We feel content when the content is whole, when nothing is missing, when everything is in its place, exactly as it should be.
And this indeed, is my favorite definition of joy:
When that which is overlaps perfectly with that which should be.
In the gap between what is and what should be lies the drain of happiness. The bigger the gap, the faster my joy drains away.
When I'm in a place of doubt — I don't know if I made the right choice — I don't know what the right choice is — I don't know what is going to happen next — I have a very hard time accessing the feeling that things are as they should be, because I don't have the peace of mind to know what things are (and sometimes, I also don’t know what they should be).
When in doubt, my mind oscillates between possibilities. Whether I have a decision in front of me that I'm debating, or whether my body and mind are on different pages (like when I'm in a relationship I know logically I should not be in). Until the doubt resolves, I cannot fully embrace any single reality. Doubt blurs my reality in its violent oscillation between possibilities.
It's hard to access the "it is" state when I'm stuck in the "could be" stage. So if joy requires total harmony with what is, and doubt throws a question on what is, the two cannot coexist...
…hence, the joy we feel when the doubt is removed.
But what are we supposed to do? Doubt is certainly a part of life.
If doubt obstructs my access to joy, and doubt is such an unavoidable feature of life, how can Judaism demand from me to be in a constant state of joy?
Take for example, the experience of being in Israel right now (I live in Israel with my family). lran is threatening an attack, purposely keeping us guessing as to when it will be. We are sitting ducks waiting for the Ayatollah to decide if or when they're going to bomb us. How are we supposed to access joy when reality is so unsettled? “There is a noise outside.” “Was it a motorbike? Or a missile siren?” “Will we survive?” “Will there be casualties?” “Will there be miracles?” How does one access joy, serenity or calm, when there are so many possibilities???
So here is what I do know:
I know that Gd has the answers, even though I don't. This is comforting.
I know He loves me, even when life is not easy. Life is inconsistent, but Gd isn't.
I know that Iran thinks it's up to them, but they themselves are actually just another proxy — just like all our enemies have been before them.
I know that ultimately, we the Jews, will prevail.
These, to me are givens. My givens provide me with my framework for viewing life. You want your givens to instruct how you look at life. You don't want what you see in life to instruct your givens, since, like I said, life can be erratic.
And then, I have the things I'm working on:
I try to remember that the way it is is the way it's meant to be. This current uncertainty is part of the design. If Gd didn't mean for me to be experiencing it, it wouldn't be.
So while I don't have certainty in the traditional sense of the word, I have a different sort of certainty — the certainty of God's plan. And if this time, the theme of His plan is uncertainty, so I know that this is the reality I must embrace.
I have to transcend a little to access it. I have to give up my idea of comfort. Certainty is far more comfortable than uncertainty. Uncertainty requires me to forego control and to trust in my Higher Power. And that's when I laugh at myself. Because I realize that having control is in itself a delusion. I realize that it took uncertainty to remind me that I'm not in control even when I think I am. I realize that I'm always in Gd's hands, and that this is a much better idea than being in my own hands. The only thing that has actually changed is my awareness. So what I do is I let go of thinking that I need to be in control. I let go of pretending that I am in control. In so doing, I regain serenity, and I reclaim joy.
So let’s summarize:
The reason that you work is to give you joy and work does do that for you in a variety of ways. But this job is not ideal, and so you are filled with doubts, which, in turn, reduce your joy. The obvious thing would be to leave the job, but the uncertainty that this brings fills you with anxiety of the painful feeling of a lack of control, so you go back to resigning yourself to not resigning.
What can you do?
You have every right to joy. You have two options to reach it: you will either find it by making peace with your job, or you will find it by leaving it. If you know in your heart that this is not a job that can bring you joy, you will have to face the uncertainty of leaving this so that you can invite the opportunity to find a better one. Only you can know and you can choose between your doubts of staying, and the uncertainty of leaving, but whatever you do, prioritize the goal of attaining joy over the goal of avoiding fear. This guiding principle will lead you to the sort of certainty that will bring you the joy you seek.
Best of luck with your decision!
Ilana Cowland is an educator, relationship coach, international lecturer and author of The Moderately Anxious Everybody. She was born in the UK, and currently lives in Israel.
You can follow her and her husband Jamie’s account on Instagram @ ilanaandjamie where they share insights on Judaism and relationships.
This notion is referenced in an even earlier source, Torat HaOlah by Rabbi Moshe Isserles.
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