Life is Full of Oohs and Ahs

I’m calling on the Savior to be all that I need
Please forgive me, my behavior had me lost at light speed

– GRITS Ooh Ah (My Life Be Like): featured in The Fast and The Furious: Tokyo Drift

The Rabbi told a funny and illuminating story today about a young man who went to the sauna with his father and grandfather. For older people, you could say that in the sauna, the hotter the better. But for a child, the heat was very uncomfortable, so at one point, his grandfather came behind him with a bucket of iced water and poured it over his head.

The child’s reaction to the sudden spell of cold water in the hot sauna was almost painful, and he yelled out, “Ooh!” But then, after a few seconds, he saw that it actually felt good to have the ice water cooling off his body in the hot sauna, and then, with a big smile on his face, he exclaimed, “Ah!”

It highlighted an interesting lesson: life is really full of oohs and ahs. Some things start as feeling bad invoking the oohs, but then we see that it is a good thing, and we realize the ah feeling afterward. There are many examples of this where things perhaps start out difficult, only for us to realize how truly worthwhile they are: whether it’s education, embarking on a meaningful career, dating towards marriage, or even following G-d’s commandments (the mitzvot), often we experience these as hard at the beginning, and they require a lot of work and discipline, but in the end, we see with clarity that they are for our benefit.

This also works in reverse order, where we first experience the ah and only later realize the ooh sensation. A lot of examples of this are vices in life where people get addicted to money, materialism, power, fame, sex, alcohol, drugs, etc. The initial feeling from these is often pleasurable and wanting and pursuing more—they are so very ah! But as we mature and wise up, we realize that too much of these are really big oohs. The feel-good moment gives way to withdrawal and a downward spiral of needing another high and another, and these end up ruling one’s life instead of the person being in control and on a positive path for themselves, their families, and communities.

These are collectively the ah-ha moments in life when we realize that oohs are often really ahs, and the ahs are frequently really oohs. As we head towards Rosh Hashanah, this is a good lesson that if we can take a step back to see the consequences of our actions, we need not be surprised by the iced bucket of water in the sauna anymore. We can work to make every moment ultimately meaningful and spiritual ahs in our precious pursuit of life and good.