Discover joy and satisfaction in your life WITHOUT gurus and their hippy dippy followers

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When Rabbi Chaim Shmuelevitz, the great dean of Jerusalem's Mirrer yeshiva (d. 1979), was a lad, he went to visit his uncle, the dean of the Grodno rabbinical seminary in western Belarus, inquiring which of his disciples was the "best".

His uncle took him to one of the corners of the study hall and showed him a star-student and said: "This is the greatest bachur in the whole yeshiva." Rabbi Chaim was perplexed — in mentioning all the previous great disciples, his uncle never even mentioned this lad, yet he is the greatest in the whole yeshiva?!

The Rosh Yeshiva answered, "This student's defining trait is greater than all of the other lads in the yeshiva — this bachur is a mevakeish, he is a seeker and a searcher. The others may be smarter, more diligent, more pious, but he is the hungriest, he wants it the most." That mevakeish would grow up to be the great Steipler Gaon, Rabbi Yaakov Kanievsky (d. 1985).

Commenting on Jethro's declaration, "Now I know that the Divine is greater than all the gods," Rashi, the foremost rabbinical authority, explains, based on the mechilta, that Jethro had ample basis for comparison, since, "she'lo hiniach avodah zarah she'lo avdah," he had experimented with — indeed, worshiped — every form of idolatry in the world.

At first glance, this teaching sounds demeaning. But the Alter of Kelm (d. 1824) points out that in fact it is a huge compliment.

The Torah and our sages are telling us that Jethro was a mevakeish. He was searching for Truth and wasn't satisfied until he discovered it. With each new religion he thought he had come upon it — until discovering a greater truth elsewhere and he went to explore. He probed and asked and inquired and searched and didn't stop until he found the ultimate Truth.

For many others, it would have been good enough, they would have been fine with questions that are unanswered. Others would have tired or become bored or distracted by something else. Not Jethro. He was a mevakeish, a seeker with an insatiable appetite for learning and growing.

We can't necessarily control how smart we are, how well we remember things or our ability to focus for long periods. But, we can all control and improve our sense of being mevakeish, of being hungry for discovery, of having an appetite for learning and of yearning for truth.

Think about it. The whole world heard about what had happened to the Jewish people; everyone read about the splitting of the sea, the battle with Amalek and the giving of the Torah. They turned the page of their "newspaper" and continued sipping their coffee. Only Jethro, put the paper down and said, "I need to take a closer look. I want to see this with my own eyes. I need to understand what happened and learn about these extraordinary people for whom extraordinary miracles occurred."

Jethro was a mevakeish, a seeker, and it is the story of his arrival that precedes the biblical narrative of giving of the Torah to teach us that the prerequisite to kabbalas haTorah, receiving the Torah, is being a mevakeish, a seeker of truth.

A verse that appearing both in Psalms and Chronicles is part of our Pesukei D'Zimrah prayers we recite every morning: "Yismach lev me'vakshei Hashem. Let the hearts of those who seek the Divine rejoice." The Chafetz Chaim (d. 1933 ) explains that when one seeks and searches for something, he is not satisfied unless he successfully finds or obtains that which he is looking for. However, one who is mevakeish , finds great pleasure and joy from the actual search, regardless of its ultimate success. The process itself, the exercise.

Our sages compare Torah to water. One unique quality of water is that it lacks taste. It is "delicious" based on how thirsty you are. Nobody reaches for a "delicious glass of water" with their steak. But afterarunorattheendofafastday, nothing tastes better or more refreshing than a cold glass of water. If you are not mevakeish, Torah is bland to you — it's nothing special. If you are thirsty for it, it is the most delicious thing in the world. Whether Torah is bland or tasty is up to the attitude we bring to it. Be thirsty and show your children you are thirsty.

Learn, study, read, go to classes, ask, inquire, be curious, just be a mevakeish — don't stop searching, seeking and growing.

Isidor Isaac Rabi (d. 1988) was a physicist and Nobel laureate who was recognized for his discovery of nuclear magnetic resonance, used the world over in MRI machines. He was born into a religious Jewish family in Hungary and came to the US as a young child.

A letter to The New York Times in 1988, published shortly after he died, tells an amazing story. The author recalls that Rabi was once asked, ''Why did you become a scientist, rather than a doctor or lawyer or businessman, like the other immigrant kids in your neighborhood?''

Rabi answered, ''My mother made me a scientist without ever intending it. Every other Jewish mother in Brooklyn would ask her child after school: 'So? Did you learn anything today?' But not my mother. She always asked me a different question. 'Izzy,' she would say, 'did you ask a good question today?' That difference — asking good questions made me become a scientist!''

Ask good questions today and every day. Be a mevakeish, and discover joy and satisfaction.

Rabbi Efrem Goldberg is the spiritual leader of the Boca Raton Synagogue.