We all have good behaviors that we try to model. Politeness, respect, kindness, those sorts of blanket ideas about being decent people. Beyond that, though, we have specific good deeds which we are individually tasked with. True mitzvehs in the Yiddish sense of “good deeds” rather than mitzvahs, the commandments from the Torah.
It’s not clear to me how we take on these tasks. Do we choose them based on our personalities? Do the fates (or G*d, if you prefer) confer on us those good deeds we are best able to perform? Or are we given the good deeds that require the most effort from us? A mix of both?
For example, one of my mitzvehs is reuniting dish sets at the Salvation Army. I love china and spent many years in Florida buying and reselling china. I no longer do that, but when I go into the Salvation Army on one of my regular searches for treasure, I often spend an hour in the dish aisles. Not shopping for anything, but finding the sets of dishes that have been separated on accident, either in the donation or the pricing process. The sad fact is that many sets of nice china get separated and lose both their value and their purpose. By bringing the soup bowls and dinner plates and tea cups and saucers back together on the shelves, I’m helping those dishes go to a new home. I’m helping people buy matched sets on which to enjoy their nourishment. It’s a small deed to be sure, but it feels like something I’m meant for. It gives me pleasure and it’s useful.
Two of my other mitzvehs are not well-suited to my personality, and yet they are my good deeds to perform.
I am an introvert. A text book sort of introvert. I will go to great lengths to avoid interacting with people and, although I’m able to do so for short periods of time, I find it exhausting. Meeting new people is a kind of agony for me, which requires significant girding of my loins.
That said, as I walk across campus during the summer months, it’s not unusual for me to see students and their families posing in front of various landmarks for pictures. Of course, it always means one member of the family is left out of the picture. Despite my discomfort, my mitzveh requires me to approach and say, “Would you like your picture taken together?” To date, no one has ever turned the offer down, which is how I know it’s a good deed and not an intrusion.
Friends don’t let friends pitch with their zippers down.
This business of approaching strangers is not at all suited to my personality, but it does not compare to the final mitzveh that I’ll mention here. XYZ. I am the person who tells you when you forgot to zip your pants. Or your slip is showing. Or your sanitary napkin has leaked through on your khaki pants. If you’ve ever been in an elevator on your way to an important presentation and some stranger said, “Um, your fly is down,” that was me, or one of my people. I once crossed behind a line of presenters on a stage to whisper into the ear of the guy who was about to stand up and speak in front of a thousand people: “When you stand up, turn back toward me like you have something to tell me. Then zip your pants.”
He did it, in a convulsive gesture of horror, and I could feel the members of the audience who had already noticed it exhale in relief. That is the mystery to me about this particular mitzveh. As uncomfortable as it makes me, I cannot imagine how uneasy I would be to let someone walk around in that state without telling them. Yet I know people who won’t point these things out, because it embarrasses them. As though I’m not embarrassed to say, “Oh, hey, you have a big booger in your mustache.”
I think that’s the nature of these tiny good deeds, though. They find us, or we find them, based on our view of the world. I spend a lot of time not looking people in the eye, so I suppose it’s natural that I should be the one who notices the gaping fly and flash of underwear.
What about you? What are your tiny good deeds? Why is it your mitzveh?
I love this, Bryn. You are a very good person. And that’s just the beginning. 😀
I can think of a few mitzvahs I actually do. Insignificant as they seem, I think every single one is valuable. 🙂
That’s why I want people to claim them. Because those little good deeds are important, even if they’re not grand, heroic acts.
I love this idea of tiny good deeds. Because they can make a difference. Yours are truly kind.
I also offer to take photos for people; it’s no trouble at all and so much nicer for them to have a pic of the whole group. It is one of the few situations in which I talk to strangers on purpose. ☺️ I’ve been known to reshelve books that I find out of place at the library, I let people jump ahead of me in line in certain circumstances, and I’m a very polite driver.
Ah, it never occurs to me to let people bump up in line, but then I don’t live in a place where we’re much forced to queue.
Letting someone know when the women’s bathroom is out of toilet paper.
That’s a very important public service!
For me. mitzveh is more than a “little” favor – it is when we reach deeper into that place of charity within us in a way that requires something of us, but for which we will receive no reward. Not so far as mitzvah, prescriptive, obligatory, freighted with all kinds of meaning, intended as teaching communication, as in grandma’s radical hospitality, but something that may even surprise us as soon as we do it (and we always DO it), because it was not preconceived, it just sort of happened spontaneously, and we hope it will not be noticed. Often feels odd to talk about it, because we don’t want to draw attention to our deed, we will sound self seeking.
One evening recently a friend described helping his depressed acquaintance with a spiritual insight my friend had only recently put together himself. It was a tremendously moving description. Afterward, I asked him if he knew what I meant by mitzveh, intending to thank him for the mitzveh he had done for me and the others who had heard him, as well as for his depressed acquaintance. He responded to my question as though I had asked if he knew the word mitzvah instead, and bolted for the door.
So for tonight my mitzveh is sharing this little story with you, so I can let go of my need to explain mitzveh and mitzvah to my friend. He has no need of this explanation, and I found your site as I was clarifying it for myself.