Who doesn’t dream of deep uninterrupted pure learning of the Talmud with a study partner? Well you don’t need to dream it can happen; it’s just a matter of habit and accustoming yourself to it. First of all if I’m his learning partner and not his talking partner 90% of the potential pitfalls are gone!
This week’s Torah potion says: “If you walk in my statutes” and Rashi explains this means “you should toil in Torah”. ‘All I need to do is keep on learning’, I keep telling myself, “and I’ve got to close the gaps between me and everyone else!” That’s the way it is when you come back to Judaism at age 30. You feel like you must be an accomplished scholar in two years flat! It can’t be that at this age I won’t finish the entire Talmud!
I sit and learn with a religious boy and I’m sure that since he’s only a child I’ll be okay with my Talmud learning. After my learning with him I’m hiding behind my book so people don’t recognize me and run out of the study hall embarrassed. “How does that boy know it all by heart? Ah! It’s no big deal when you start that young,” I try to reassure myself. My despair will lead me to give up so I really need to be fair to myself.
I have no reason to compare myself to some genius kids who memorize whole tractates of Mishna by heart. We are not there! Our job is to slowly but surely progress and increase our proficiency. We’re not in a race with any one.
With guidance from a rabbi who will show us the correct way to learn and lead us to serve G-d in the best way for me, together with a lot of Divine assistance I will get where I have to get. One day I may even rival those children!