Tzedek Work V. Mitzvah Work

I left New Orleans at 4 am and headed for San Francisco. I was going from the extreme of feel-good volunteerism to feel-guilty advocacy. I mean neither term as a pejorative. New Orleans painting houses represents an essential brand of "Jewish Identity" tzedakah. Those in need reap the benefits of being cared for and those who care feel like they have done their Jewish for the day. Everyone walks away sated.

I am developing a theory (and I am sure I am not alone in it since it was a Christian seminarian who got me thinking about this) that real tzedek work and not just mitzvah work involves some distress and discomfort. Because, if I walk away discomforted then I am going to be motivated to change the situation that makes me need to do mitzvah work. Feeling good about painting a house will not keep me up at night. Feeling upset that there is no system in place to guarantee that someone else will continue the work of repairing the house I painted, however, will make me lose some serious sleep. I think this is known as "productive discomfort."

Too much distress leads to burn out and feeling so overwhelmed that one is paralyzed. The distress has to be encountered in moderate doses.

It was in this transition from Do gooding to good learning that I traveled from New Orleans and the Big Easy to San Francisco and the Big Bridge.