He related how one day, at his yeshiva, the shiur was having a very animated discussion about the sugya that they were learning. Everyone was getting excited and worked up, and had something to say. That is, almost everyone. One bachur approached him after the shiur and said it was boring.

How would we respond to that bachur? One approach may be to tell him to keep his comments to himself. “We are learning Hashem’s Torah, which sustains the entire world. Can’t you see how excited everyone was? How can you say that you are bored?! You really need to work on yourself. Get back to your learning and don’t complain.”

Another approach may be to instruct him to keep pushing through. “That’s life! Not everything is exciting. You just have to do it anyway. I don’t always find my learning exhilarating, but I don’t let that stop me.”

A third, more optimistic approach, may be to try to convince him that he’s not really as bored as he thinks. “I saw that you wanted to join your friends and ask a question. I could see in your eyes that you found the discussion interesting. Don’t be down on yourself. Try to be more self-aware, and you’ll see how much you really do connect to learning!”

A new-age approach might be to encourage him. “Torah is so geshmak! Just keep trying, and the enjoyment will come. It’s guaranteed. Just keep hanging on, and you’ll see.”

However, Rabbi Kalish didn’t use any of these approaches. Instead, he said something that most of us wouldn’t even consider saying. He said, “You’re bored. That's a really healthy space to be in. It’s okay to be bored.” He then went further, “We were learning sugya of kiddush b’makom seuda. That’s your very sugya. It’s about bringing kedusha into our physical lives; merging ruchniyus and gashmiyus. That’s exactly what you are struggling with!”

Do we appreciate the brilliance of this approach? Every other approach pushed away that bachur’s feelings. This first one shamed him for even having such feelings. The second approach simply disregarded his emotions. The third told him that he misunderstood his own feelings. And the fourth approach implicitly told him that those feelings are a problem, but he’s like a sick person who will be healed one day. The common denominator in all four approaches is that the bachur, who was clearly struggling in the first place, feels that his rebbe doesn’t understand him and will now be plagued with guilt about his feelings. At best, he will be sure to always push his feelings under the rug, since they have been deemed negative or dangerous. At worst, he will be too honest to push away his feelings, and he will either reject the rebbe or Torah, chas v’shalom.

Contrast this to Rabbi Kalish’s approach. He accepted the bachur’s feelings and led the boy to self-acceptance. The boy’s expression of boredom was his way of expressing a lack of connection to the Torah, but it was also a cry that he wanted to connect – yet he couldn’t. Rabbi Kalish didn’t push away his feelings, and he didn’t push away the Torah. This is the first step in paving the path of connection.

All of us are educators and mentors - whether we are educating our students, our children, or ourselves. Most of us, for some reason or another, absorb and convey the message that our job is to negate our feelings. We believe that success comes from ignoring our emotions or even condemning them. Nothing could be further from the truth. Emotions are part of us. Running away from them or distorting them is running away from ourselves. It is only when we are in touch with ourselves that we can truly begin the process of growth.

In my opinion, this is the message that our generation needs to hear. The number of young people I meet who are struggling on some level is staggering. A rebbe from another yeshiva recently commented to me that it seems that mental health is rapidly declining. As Rabbi Kalish says, we are a generation of p’ninimius (inner meaning), and we need to learn to connect with ourselves and others in that realm.