Overcoming one’s ego is more pleasurable than conquering almost any other bad middah
Not so long ago (but before the hullabaloo concerning judicial reform began), I had a week of near-constant euphoria. Better yet, I was able to identify the two events that set off that euphoria and file them for future reference. Neither involved winning the lottery.
The first had to do with an early-morning disagreement with my wife. Not that the disagreement itself was the source of my euphoria. Indeed, it was so mundane that even Dov Haller, my go-to source for insights on middle-aged couples, could not have done much with it.
My wife asked me to do something that I was happy to do and to which I readily assented. My mistake, apparently, was asking her to reset the alarm clock accordingly. That was interpreted as having conditioned my assent on some reciprocal benefit.
That had not been my intention, and I balked at offering the requisite apology. After davening and a walk around the neighborhood, however, it occurred to me that my request to reset the alarm clock in such close proximity to hers could well have been understood as some sort of quid pro quo. And I was ready to offer a profuse apology, which was received with both joy and surprise.
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