Author: Rabbi Dr. Abraham J. Twerski

Hanging on to resentment is akin to allowing people whom you don’t like to live inside your head without paying rent.

  Numerous times in the Scriptures we find the prophets reprimanding people for behavior that resembles drunkenness, although they were not imbibing; as for example, “They blundered, although not with wine; they erred, although not with ale” (Isaiah). It should come as no surprise, therefore, that I have been able to utilize insights gathered from […]

Modern psychology has placed great emphasis on guilt as a negative emotion, something which should be eliminated lest it hinder a person’s creativity or cause a depressed mood. The implication is that people should not feel guilty, and this attitude has resulted in some psychologists criticizing the concept and practice of teshuvah in the days […]

Although we abstain from work on Shabbat, we would be less than honest if we claimed to observe it to the fullest.

Often misery strikes for no apparent reason, and the victim’s suffering is intensified because it appears to be unjust. Why should the innocent suffer?

“Of course a person should do teshuvah, but I am a bit puzzled. I observe Shabbos, I keep kosher and taharas hamishpachah. I daven every day, I attend a Daf Yomi shiur and I am honest in my business dealings. What exactly should I do teshuvah for?”

It is certainly awful to lose one’s job, but it is worse to lose one’s self.

While technology has given us many near-miraculous inventions that have certainly improved our lives, it has ushered in a number of problems. Knowledge might appear to always be good, but this is clearly not so. The Torah refers to the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Nuclear science has brought great medical advances and […]

The Catskills! About as close to Gan Eden as we can get! Fresh mountain air, no congestion, wide open spaces. We can hardly wait for those summer months. But during these months, parents must remain vigilant. The danger is two-fold: What a child may do and what may be done to a child. I have […]

How will our children learn about the evils of drug use if we don’t talk to them about it?

  Some years ago, I attended services in a large, impressive-looking synagogue in a New York suburb. But while the actual building was quite magnificent, the congregants’ decorum was appalling. During davening, people were conversing fairly loudly with their neighbors, with apparently no consideration for those who had, in fact, come to shul to pray. […]

In all addictions, I have found the same dynamic: A person feels a compulsion to drink, use drugs, eat, gamble or smoke, and it is extremely difficult to resist the compulsion. Although one may be sincerely motivated to overcome the addiction, the compulsion is usually overwhelming. Oftentimes, an individual will not have the willpower to […]

Trying to discuss anxiety in a one-page article is like trying to fit the Pacific Ocean into an eyedropper.