Adapted from: Around the Year with Reb Meilech by Yisroel Besser

This Shabbos marks the celebration of a beginning, which is itself a beginning: It is the start of the first month of the year, Rosh Chodesh to the rosh hachadashim, the first of the months.

Tzaddikim revealed the power of this Shabbos and its special koach to enable a person to begin again.

Reb Meilech lowers his head, and his shoulders sag. “Who am I? How will I ever climb up out of my current situation?” He asks this in a dejected, discouraged voice. “That is what ‘he’ wants us to believe, but this Shabbos tells us differently. Listen to the words of the Beis Avraham.”

The very first mitzvah we received was that of kiddush hachodesh, and where did we receive it? In Mitzrayim! While we were still there. This was to show us that a Yid who wants to get close to Hashem should not wait until he rids himself of his yetzer hara or until he feels like he is completely pure. Rather, while he is still in the pit, still in his personal meitzarim, he should find the strength to start serving Hashem.

Rav Gamliel Rabinowitz relates the story of a Rav who is on the way from Yerushalayim to Bnei Brak, where he is to be mesader kiddushin at a wedding.

On the way, the car he is in gets a flat tire, and it looks like he might be late for the chuppah, keeping everyone waiting.

Imagine the Rav would stop the trip then to analyze what caused the puncture — was it a nail on the road? A sharp rock? Was the tire itself faulty? — and refuse to continue until they determined the reason for the flat.

“Not only wouldn’t he make it for the chuppah,” Reb Meilech laughs, “but he wouldn’t even make it for the mitzvah tantz!”

They change the tire as quickly as possible and drive on. He has a chasunah to get to. Later, after the chasunah, he can do his investigation as to what happened.

We need to repair our holes, but not stand there and analyze, wonder, speculate, and consider, because then we’re stuck in place.

That’s the koach of chiddush, a koach given to us while we were still in Mitzrayim. Move on, move forward, and continue on your way; later, you can think about how to make sure you don’t fall again.

Chazal state (Berachos 4b) that one who recites Tehillah LeDovid three times each day is destined for the World to Come. This refers to the tefillah of Ashrei, and Rav Zalman Brizel would explain what makes this perek unique.

When a Yid finishes saying Ashrei, he concludes by calling out, va’anachnu nivareich kah mei’atah v’ad olam, halelukah, But we will bless God from now until forever (Tehillim 115:18).

“A person who proclaims three times each day that he is serving Hashem Mei’atah, from now,” said Reb Zalman, “is guaranteed Olam Haba. Fuhn yetzt bin ich a nai’eh Zalman, from now, I am a new Zalman,” he would say, “ready to try higher.”

Reb Meilech smiles. “Even if your name is not Zalman, the vort is true. Starting Mei’atah, from now, again and again and again, is how a person becomes great.”