When Jermaine heard that his mother was trapped on the 15th floor with the building on fire, he knew he had to get to her. But the front door was already blocked by police so he had no choice but to scale the building. Which is exactly what he did. And he did this with a fractured hip from a fall earlier that day. But with his mother’s safety as his only concern and priority, he climbed up that building until he found her and was assured that the fire was contained and that she was fine. There is a powerful concept in Chassidic philosophy that the mind should rule over the heart. The idea is that we don’t want to make decisions based on pure emotion. But there is another idea that the innermost heart should rule over the mind–that ultimately we need to sometimes do what needs to be done, even though it isn’t rational and our intellect would tell us it is impossible. What Jermaine did came from the innermost heart, from his love for his mother, and in doing so, he accomplished the incredible.
Cover Image: The GED Section
