A person must know that all beginnings are difficult but that when one accustoms oneself to go in the ways of good people the habitude becomes second nature and it is no longer difficult for him to do it. On the contrary, it is a pleasure for him until it reaches the extent that if once it happens that there is a thing which holds back so that he will be unable to perform that good deed to which he had become accustomed even if it is only a matter of extra piety then he will find it very hard and it will appear in his eyes as if that day he did not behave like a Jew and his flesh will be in pain and his soul will mourn. Chazal said the following expression “One who recites the Shema every day when once it happens that he did not recite it, it will appear in his eyes as if he never recited the Shema in his entire life!”.
