Rabbi Nachman's Secret to Elul: The Joyful Path to True Repentance

Some time ago, I spoke with a family member who shared what the month of Elul was like in her school many years ago. Sadly, she did not have fond memories.

"Elul at school," she recalled, "was a stressful and frightening month. The teachers spoke in a way that wasn't encouraging. To inspire the girls to keep the mitzvot, they used stories and Midrashim that were certainly true — but instead of drawing us closer, they simply made us count the minutes until the lesson ended."

"And how did that affect you?" I asked.

"For most of the girls, it went in one ear and out the other," she replied. "They carried on as usual. But I was a very sensitive child. I would come home crying, filled with fear."

I thought to myself what a painful experience that must have been for a little girl. Thankfully, she said: "My mother would calm me down. She explained that Elul is really a month of mercy, hope, forgiveness, and compassion. Thank God, that perspective comforted me and gave me a completely different understanding of repentance."

We continued talking and both hoped that today these messages are presented differently. As Breslov Chassidim, we agreed that Rabbi Nachman offers an entirely different approach to Elul, that is gentle, hopeful, and centered on returning to God through love. Anyone familiar with Rabbi Nachman's teachings knows that his path awakens a person to sincere repentance before Rosh Hashanah, not through fear, but through kindness and compassion. His method has the remarkable ability to inspire every Jew to return to God — even someone who feels unimaginably distant.

Rabbi Nachman's Revolutionary Approach to Elul

Before exploring Rabbi Nachman's unique perspective, it is important to note that, like all the great tzaddikim, he emphasizes the importance of confession, regret over one's sins, and sincere commitment to improve.

At the same time, Rabbi Nachman introduces the practice of hitbodedut — personal conversation with God. During this intimate prayer, a person tells God everything that has happened, including their mistakes, failures, and the areas in which they long to grow.

His surprising innovation is that after pouring out your heart, you must not fall into sadness. Instead, you should choose joy.

Rabbi Nachman teaches that in order to experience genuine joy, a person must search for the good within themselves. Only then can true repentance and genuine closeness to God become possible.

As he writes: "A person must be extremely careful to remain joyful at all times and distance himself from sadness as much as possible... One must search and seek within oneself some little point of goodness, in order to revive oneself and come to joy. Through finding that little good within oneself, one truly moves from the side of guilt to the side of merit and is able to return in repentance."

Find One Good Point

What a remarkable teaching.

If you want to repent, Rabbi Nachman says, the very first step is not to dwell on your failures. First, find one good point within yourself — one mitzvah, one positive quality, one spark of light to hold onto. That single point can lift you from darkness and despair into joy.

He explains: "A person must judge himself favorably and find within himself some good point in order to strengthen himself, so that he will not fall completely, God forbid. Rather, he should revive himself and gladden his soul with the little good that he finds within himself."

Instead of constantly telling yourself, "I'm not good enough," Rabbi Nachman encourages a completely different inner dialogue: discover what is already good within you.

He writes: "Whatever mitzvah or good deed a person has ever performed, he should search for it. Even if that good is mixed with many imperfections, he should still extract the good point from it. Then he should continue searching and gathering more and more good points."

Why Does This Matter?

What difference does it make to focus on your strengths?

Rabbi Nachman explains that finding good within yourself leads to joy. Joy enables a person to pray, sing, thank God, and ultimately return to Him sincerely.

He writes: "Then he can pray, sing, and give thanks to God. For it is well known that when a person becomes discouraged because of his shortcomings and sins, he often cannot pray at all. He cannot even open his mouth because of the overwhelming sadness and heaviness that falls upon him. But when he revives himself through this advice, by finding the good points within himself, then he is able to pray, sing, and thank God."

Rabbi Nachman also connects this idea to the verse: "I will sing to my God while I yet exist."

He explains that the words "while I yet exist" refer to the little bit of goodness that still remains within every person. It is precisely because of that remaining goodness that one is able to sing and praise God.

The Danger of Despair

Rabbi Nachman also warns against trying to repent while seeing only one's failures.

He teaches: "Most people who are distant from God are distant primarily because of sadness and depression. They become discouraged when they see how much they have damaged through their actions. Each person knows his own inner struggles, and because of this they become despondent, and many eventually despair completely."

The tragic result is that instead of drawing closer to God, they lose the ability even to pray.

"Because of this they do not pray with proper concentration, nor do they even do the good they are still capable of doing. Therefore a person must understand that although his discouragement may stem from real mistakes, the despair and sadness that follow are actually the work of the evil inclination, whose goal is to weaken him completely. One must therefore strengthen oneself constantly by searching for even a little good and many good points within oneself. Through this, one will truly merit returning to God."

Returning to God Through Love

Our conversation ended with smiles and hope.

We both expressed the wish that every teacher would embrace Rabbi Nachman's extraordinary approach — helping children discover the joy of repentance, inspiring them to return to God through love rather than fear.

Perhaps that is one of Elul's greatest gifts: reminding us that the journey back to God begins not by condemning ourselves, but by recognizing the goodness He has already placed within us. From that place of hope, joy, and gratitude, genuine repentance becomes possible.