There are many people who at times walk through adulthood feeling strangely empty. Chronologically, we are adults, yet internally we don't always feel fully grown. Instead, we experience ourselves as spectators, bystanders, or passive participants in our own lives.

Why?

One possibility is that we have not yet discovered the loving authority within us—the presence of the neshama that can offer guidance, connection, compassion, and steady accompaniment to our inner world.

Without that loving presence, the nefesh—our lovable inner child—is left alone. And when the nefesh is alone, it becomes overwhelmed. We get stuck, paralyzed by fear or disappointment, watching life happen rather than actively living it.

The Torah offers an insight when Hashem says, "Na'aseh Adam"—"Let us make man."

To whom was Hashem speaking?

The Baal Shem Tov teaches that He was speaking to each one of us.

In other words, Hashem is saying: "Partner with Me. Together, let us make you into the person you were created to become."

But what does that partnership look like?

Each of us has been created with extraordinary potential. Potential, by definition, is unfinished.

We are intentionally created incomplete, with places of weakness, fear, and untapped possibility. That incompleteness is not a mistake—it is the worksite of our life and the very reason we are here.

Yet the journey only becomes overwhelming when the nefesh faces the incompleteness alone. By itself, it cannot face the inevitable disappointments, failures, and loneliness of being human while also reassuring itself that everything will be okay. It needs the loving presence of an inner adult—someone able to remain present and connected and not run from the pain.

Deep within every one of us is a question waiting to be answered:

Who will take responsibility for my life? 
Who will answer the call to be the loving authority I need?

The work of yedidus — deep inner connection —begins by allowing ourselves to feel the pain of the nefesh: the ache of unmet potential, unresolved struggle, and facing life's challenges alone.

Yedidus means we stop hiding from that pain. We stop escaping it or blaming others for it. Instead, we stay connected long enough to hear what the nefesh has been trying to tell us all along:

"I long for more, but I don't know how. I hurt, and I need someone to be with me."

Then comes the turning point.

"I'm here. I'm ready. I'm willing to become that loving presence."

The heartfelt and vulnerable pain arouses our neshama to answer the call. 

The neshama is not afraid of pain. It does not rush to fix or judge. It accompanies. It encourages. It offers wisdom, direction, compassion, and the willingness to seek whatever resources are needed to continue growing.  As the connection deepens, it offers the nefesh the expectations and boundaries that come along with loving authority.

When we accept responsibility for this inner relationship, something remarkable begins to change. We stop waiting for life to happen to us. We stop feeling like bystanders in our own story.

Instead, we become active partners with Hashem in our own creation—living with greater freedom, deeper purpose, stronger will, and the quiet courage to become the people we were always meant to be.

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Inner Connection begins with this truth:

Every heart longs to be seen, known, and accepted without condition.

This is what Hashem offers us. It is what we long to receive from the people we love.  It is what they long for in return. And it is what the lovable child in ourselves—the nefesh—longs to receive.

When I find myself overwhelmed by feelings of frustration, disappointment, or inadequacy, I don't try to silence them.

I listen.

Before I fall asleep, I ask my nefesh a simple question:

"What are you feeling?"

Then I let it speak:

"I feel like a failure."

"I'm discouraged."

"I'm frustrated."

"He’s so much farther than I am in life."

"I’m a loser."

Are those thoughts true?

Not necessarily.

But in that moment, my nefesh is overwhelmed by them. Rather than arguing with those feelings or trying to fix them, I'm  with them.

Where did I learn this?

From Hashem.

Listen to this powerful Midrash Tehillim (4:3): “When a person has a visitor, the first time he comes, he’s offered a couch.  The second time – a chair.  The third time – a stool.  The fourth time he comes, he is told, ‘How much you bother and crowd me!”  Not so with God.  The more we press and come to His place of prayer, the more joy exists before Him.”

Wow.  What an astonishing idea.

Hashem never says, " Hello - this is getting old," or “Hello - we dealt with this – 17 million times already” etc.  He never becomes weary of hearing our hearts.

Knowing that changes the way I approach Him. I want to unburden myself to Him. 

It also changes the way I try to relate to my own nefesh.

This is exactly what I saw in my favorite parenting book, “How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen So Kids Will Talk.” Listen to what the author’s adult daughter recalls from her own childhood:

“I remember saving up the frustrations of my school day.  I knew that I could bear it when the teacher was mean or some terrible injustice occurred because when I got home I could tell my mom.  She’d listen to my outrage and I would be soothed and strengthened for the next assault.  Even as a little girl I noticed that other parents were different and I remember wondering how other kids got by without having anyone to listen to their sorrows.”

This is the gift Hashem gives us.

This is the gift a parent gives a child.

And this is the gift our neshamah gives our nefesh.  Try it.

The next time you find yourself overwhelmed, don't rush to fix the feelings or push them away.
Instead, ask:

"What are you feeling?"

Then listen.

Not as a technique to make the feelings disappear.

Not as a strategy to regain control.

Simply because every part of us longs to be seen, known, and accepted, to not feel like a burden to another.

Only after your nefesh has finished speaking you might ask:

"Would you like my help thinking about what comes next?"

And thus, upon the foundation of trust and warmth, begins the next stage of Inner Connection: Loving Authority and Guidance.
Thanks for reading,
​Henry Harris
To view this idea as a video, visit HERE.

One of the foundational ideas behind Jewish Wellbeing is that healing doesn't begin with trying harder. It begins with connection.

We often experience ourselves as if we're divided—part of us longs for what is good and meaningful, while another part struggles, reacts, or gets pulled in directions we wish it wouldn't.

The question is: What is the relationship between those two parts?

A remarkable passage in the Gemara offers a profound answer.

In Berachot 10a, the Gemara asks why King David repeatedly says, "Bless Hashem, O my soul." Why does he specifically direct his soul to bless God?

The Gemara explains that it’s most appropriate that the soul bless God because it resembles God.  Just as Hashem fills His world, so too our soul fills our body. Just as Hashem gives life to the world, the soul gives life to the body. Just as Hashem is pure, the soul is pure. Just as Hashem sees but cannot be seen, so too the soul.

This isn't simply a philosophical observation. It offers a powerful way of understanding ourselves.

Just as we are meant to turn toward Hashem for guidance, comfort, love, and wisdom – ie have a dynamic connection to Him, our nefesh—our emotional and physical experience of life—is meant to turn toward our neshamah for loving connection.

The job of the nefesh is to present its needs before the neshama, to rely on it, and to accept and tolerate the discomfort of its guidance.  The job of the neshama is to love the nefesh, comfort it in its pain and warmly draw it closer to its world of meaning and purpose.  It is meant to lead the nefesh with the same qualities through which Hashem leads us: wisdom, compassion, patience, and love.

There are, in a sense, two distinct entities within us.

There is the neshamah—the calm, wise, loving adult.

And there is the nefesh—the lovable child that longs to be understood, comforted, and guided.

The deepest question isn't, "Which one am I?"

The deeper question is: How connected are they?

This, to me, is one of the clearest Torah sources for understanding inner connection.

The real work of growth is not fighting ourselves. It is strengthening the loving relationship between our neshamah and our nefesh.

When that connection grows stronger, lasting freedom becomes possible.

To see this idea in short video form, visit HERE.

Wishing you continued inner connection,
Henry Harris