Episode 162 - If reward isn’t owed, what does a righteous life create?

Ever felt your stomach drop at the sight of flashing lights in your rear-view mirror? That jolt captures a truth we dig into: fear shapes behaviour, but it’s a poor compass for a meaningful life. We explore how fear of punishment keeps us from drifting, yet why a life of mitzvot isn’t a strategy for racking up spiritual points—it’s the work of restoring a broken baseline.

We unpack a paradox that trips many of us up: if good deeds don’t “earn” us anything, why do them? Our take is simple and demanding. Humanity fell below zero, and every honest act—seen or unseen—pushes reality back toward Eden, the original design. That’s not reward; it’s consequence. We talk about moving from entitlement to appreciation, from keeping score to keeping faith, and how this shift changes homes, teams, and communities. Expect real-world examples, from obeying stop signs to choosing quiet generosity, and how these choices create calmer families and cleaner work.

With Sukkot on the horizon, we bring it home. The sukkah’s fragile walls teach reliance, not control, and show how joy flows from trust. We share a personal claim: a life oriented to Godliness feels almost utopian—not perfect, but profoundly steadier. If you’re ready to stop waiting for the world to fix itself and start building your square metre of Eden, this conversation offers a map and the motivation to move. Subscribe, share this with someone who needs a reframe on “reward,” and leave a review with your biggest takeaway—what’s one habit that’s bringing you closer to Eden?

Chapters

• 0:00 Holidays And Schedule Notes
• 0:31 Fear Of Punishment As Motivation
• 1:34 Don’t Rely On Deeds For Reward
• 3:23 Reconciling Reward And Mitzvot
• 5:23 From Deficit To Eden-Like Zero
• 7:14 Personal Utopia Through Godly Living
• 9:50 Sukkot Prep And Blessings

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Good morning everybody. Welcome to the Trust Factor, the podcast that guarantees your success when you implement its divine age old teachings. We're coming out of Shabbat and going into Sukkot. Monday night is Sukkot, which means we'll be off on Tuesday and on Wednesday. Back again on Thursday, and then the following week, Monday, Tuesday, we're back into holiday. So sporadic posts and podcasts. When obviously when there's holidays, we're not going to be posting anything. But in between where we have opportunities to post, I will. We left off on Friday talking about the concept of punishment, not reward, but punishment specifically, talking about how punishment or the fear of punishment is a very, very powerful and effective tool in making sure that people conduct themselves in a righteous manner. And again, it doesn't only apply in the spiritual realm, it applies in this realm. You know, there's a reason why we don't blow through red lights. There's a reason why we don't blow through stop signs, or at least we shouldn't, because it's the fear that you're going to get caught and you're going to have to suffer the consequences, which could mean that you're going to have to pay a lot of money for insurance, or you may not even be insurable, which means you may not even be able to drive, you may have your car impounded, and so on and so forth. That's why our heart drops into our shoes when you get pulled over, even if you don't know what you did or you did nothing. But there's a police officer behind you, even if he's got his lights on and he's just trying to get you out of the way, your heart drops. Why? Because it's the fear of punishment. It is a motivator and it is very effective and it is necessary. But now we move forward a little bit. And he says that it is not proper, he says, for a person to rely on his good deeds and to assure himself that he will receive compensation in this world and in the world to come as his due for his deeds he performs. In other words, it's not right for us to expect that we're doing these mitzvahs, and because we're doing these mitzvahs and we're living a godly life, that means we're going to get reward. That may be the case, but what he's saying here is that that's not the reason that you should be doing it. He says this is not an appropriate attitude of trust, for his deeds do not earn him anything. Rather, one should exert himself and put forth an effort to fulfill God's will and perform his commandments in appreciation for the kindnesses that the Creator constantly bestows upon him. I was thinking about this last week. This is my take on it. There's a lot of conflict back and forth here and discussing are the mitzvahs that we do over here benefiting us and that we receive a reward, and then we talked about the obvious mitzvah that you do outwardly that people see, so you'll get paid outwardly, you'll get rewarded in an obvious manner so that there is this sense of cause and effect, and then we said that the hidden mitzvahs that you do will build the hidden world, which is Ulama, and we had all these conversations about it. And also before and now it repeats that the mitzvahs that we do in this world don't do anything for us. How do we reconcile this? And that was a tough one for me. I spent a few weeks thinking about this. I think I finally come to an understanding, my own personal understanding. I haven't bounced this up of anybody, but here's the way I see it from what we've learned so far. The way that God created this world and us originally is He created Adam and Eve and they were perfect beings. They were perfect beings and they lived in a utopia. They lived in the garden of Eden. We all know that, that the garden was prepared for them, and that they didn't have to do any work, they didn't have to struggle, they just had to enjoy from everything that God was giving them. The world was a utopia until they sinned. When they sinned, then humanity fell as a result of that. And now our job has been since then to be able to restore humanity back to the level of perfection, back to this utopia, back to restoring the world to its original form where all we need to do in this world is just enjoy from the beauty of the world and everything that God wants to give us, has to give us, and wants to give us. That's our job. That's why He created us to give to us, to do for us, to have a positive, uplifting relationship. But in our frailty, we failed, and it started with Adam and it continued generation after generation. That man was frail and faulty and we make mistakes and we sin and we are corrupted in our thought processes and some of our actions. And so what's happening right now, my friends, is that when we do the mitzvahs, when we live a godly life, what we're trying to do is to restore the world back to the way it was when Adam and Eve were alive before they sinned. You understand? So that's why, in my mind, the mitzvahs that we do over here don't earn us an additional reward. We are not entitled to additional reward. But it's a that's why it takes me right back. It's a consequence of our actions. If you do good, you will get good. In other words, if you want to restore this world to goodness and to perfection, then you have to strive for goodness and perfection. That is the net effect of our actions. If you want to refer to it as a reward, that's your prerogative. But I'm here to tell you it's not a reward. And Khovot Ravovot is alluding to it over here, then it is not a reward. We cannot be rewarded in this world or in the next for anything that we do. Why? Because we are at a constant deficit. Because we sin, because we err, because we fail at many of our attempts of doing good, therefore we are starting at a deficit. And all that we do is just to get us back to zero. But zero, my friends, is the way that the world was before the sin of Adam and Eve. In other words, it was a utopia. In order for us to get back to start to zero, that would require us to do the mitzvahs, to perfect the world, and in doing so, we would directly benefit by having done the mitzvahs, and now we will live in a perfected world. It's very simple, right? It's not the other way around, like we said, that after 120 years, you're gonna come up to the pearly gates and you're gonna give an accounting and you're gonna say, But God, I put mezuzas on every single door in my house, and I welcomed Torah scholars into my house, and I and I gave the poor what to eat in my house. So you owe me, and God will say to you, Who gave you that house so that you could put a mezuzah on and that you could host the needy? Who gave you the money to purchase the food to be able to feed not just the other people but your family as well? But God, I I I used my car to drive people around and to help people to go visit the sick and the needy. Who gave you the car? Who gave you the ability to walk and to think and to reason and to breathe and to function? Who gave you that? I did. And therefore I owe you nothing. You continue to owe me. You understand? We're living in a society where obviously we have a generation of entitled individuals, so this may not sit well with some people, but that's simply how I understand it. And if we approach life in that way where we understand that we aren't owed anything, and in fact, we owe tremendously, and we could never possibly repay God for all of the kindnesses that he does with us. We just couldn't. There aren't enough hours in a day and enough years in a person's life to be able to repay him. But really, he doesn't need to be repaid. He doesn't want repayment. He wants you to repay for you so that we can then live in a beautiful utopia, not dissimilar to the one that He originally created for us, that He originally wanted us to have with Adam and Eve before the original sin. And that's where we strive to get to. And every action that we take either builds and gets us closer to that or destroys and pushes us further away. And the more people we have doing the right thing more frequently, living a godly life, the faster this world becomes that utopia once again. Now you may have a communal utopia for the entire world. If we all got together and did the right thing and conducted ourselves properly, we would convert this world back to the way that it was in the Garden of Eden. But it doesn't mean you have to wait for everybody else. If you're living a godly life, you know what I'm talking about, in that you're already benefiting from it. I can tell you, my friends, that my personal life is a utopia because I live a godly life. My personal life, my family life, my business life, it is a utopia. It's not perfect, it's not perfect. It is as close to a utopia as possible. Why? Because I'm constantly living a life where I'm trying to bring godliness into my life. If you do that, you too will be able to say that you lead a life that is almost utopian. We're constantly trying to perfect it. But in that effort, we are benefiting from every positive decision that we make to follow his instructions. That's the key, my friends. It's not a difficult concept, but it takes an effort. We have to do it. You can't sit around waiting for it to happen, waiting for the world to perfect itself. In fact, we see what happens when you sit around waiting. When you're not proactive, the default becomes that we've pushed further and further away, which now makes the work of getting back that much harder. My friends, worry about yourself and then worry about your friends and your family and your community. And if everybody does their part, we in our days will be able to bring the world back to the way that it was and the way that it was intended to be when God created it. Have a spectacular day today. Get ready for sukkot. I wish you a lot of success in building your sukkas today. Get out there, put them up. It's going to be a beautiful day where we are. Get the sukkas up. The weather's supposed to be beautiful. Put in a little extra prayer that it should continue to be beautiful so that we have an amazing, amazing sukkot. Have a wonderful day, my friends, and we'll chat again tomorrow.