Our personality has three layers to it - intellect, emotion and action; what we think, what we feel and what we do.
Intellect: Are my opinions on issues, philosophies on life and attitudes to myself and others.
Emotion: Are my moods, desires and passions; what I love and what I hate.
Action: Are not my beliefs or feelings, but what I actually do, how I live my life, and how I spend my time and energy.
Ideally, these three faculties should be in sync. My beliefs and ideals should direct my passions and ambitions, which should in turn be translated into my lifestyle. But so often we find this is not the case. What I know is right doesn't always feel right, and what I feel like doing is not necessarily what I do.
One of the greatest challenges in life is to try to overcome this mind-heart-body disconnect - to develop the right attitude in the mind, positive desires in the heart and then to do the right thing. Now, this isn't easy.
That's where Tefillin come in. The Tefillin help to achieve a spiritual alignment of mind, heart and body; uniting our thoughts, feelings and actions towards a power higher than all three.
These black boxes are holy objects, charged with immense divine power. We place one box on the head - the home of intellect, with its straps dangling over the heart - the place of emotion. Then the other box rests on the forearm next to the heart, with its straps wrapped around the arm and hand which are the tools of action.
The head Tefillin binds our minds to the divine will, that we should know what's right and wrong. The straps dangle down so that this knowledge should flow into our hearts and become a passion for goodness. And the passion resting in our hearts should in turn be translated into action, that we live a life of meaning and purpose, based on clear and pure morals.
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