Rabbi Dr. Yosef Sokol's Definition of Success
Finding Meaning at Work, Creating a Continuous Story, and Becoming Godly
This week’s Shtark Tank episode featured Rabbi Dr. Yosef Sokol, a psychologist who sees patients, does research, and trains the next generation of therapists as a Professor at Touro. He wrote a book based off of his experiences treating suicidal veterans and burnt out bahlabatim, connecting psychological principles with Torah ideas. I learned so much from this episode, but I felt that we had to run through some really deep ideas very quickly. So in order to help myself, I took the AI transcript and cleaned it up a bit. Here it is.
Please Note: Although I tried to edit it to reflect the actual conversation, this is mainly a tool to help those who have already listened to the actual episode.
Therapy for a Burnt Out Bahlabus
Yaakov Wolff:
You wrote Becoming Godly, and in the introduction you bring a case study that really sets the stage. It’s a foundational story that many of us can relate to as Bnei Torah navigating the workforce. Before we get into the frameworks and solutions, can you share that story and how you came to use it?
Yosef Sokol:
Yes. I introduced the book with this case because it frames so much of what follows. A young man came to me for therapy. He had been part of the yeshiva and kollel world, did well, and then began the transition out of kollel. Financial pressures were mounting, and career-wise he knew he wouldn’t end up in chinuch eventually.
But in the meantime, the transition was rough. His jobs weren’t working out, his family life was struggling, and even his marriage was suffering. What struck me was that he didn’t see continuity in his life. He couldn’t connect who he was in yeshiva and kollel with who he was now—or with who he might become. His sense of self had fractured into past, present, and future, without an integrating story.
Yaakov Wolff:
Before we get into his case more deeply—since he came to you as a therapist, but also with a heavy religious element—maybe you can share your own background: psychology, yeshiva, and how the two come together in this book.
Yosef Sokol:
Sure. My “Rabbi Doctor” title feels appropriate here because both parts are relevant. I learned in several yeshivas, starting withTorah Temima, eventually getting Semicha from Yeshiva Bais Yosef in Brooklyn (Rav Drillman’s Yeshiva). Alongside that, I pursued psychology. I earned a PhD in clinical psychology and now serve as a professor in Touro’s PsyD program, training psychologists. I also see patients, and conduct research for VA (Veteran’s Affairs).
Both backgrounds inform how I approach these struggles—and how I wrote this book.
Torah and Psychology
Yaakov Wolff:
There’s a natural attraction between Torah and psychology. Many Rabbanim read pop-psychology, and psychotherapists sometimes pull from Torah ideas. How do you see the deeper overlap?
Yosef Sokol:
It’s true—sometimes people make superficial connections that don’t really hold up. The way I’ve come to see it is that Torah and psychology are two different languages, with different methods for establishing truth. In psychology, it’s empirical studies. In Torah, it’s mesorah from Har Sinai. Very different systems, but both are describing the same objective reality: the human being.
So the two can illuminate each other. Torah explains the purpose of the world—why people are the way they are. Psychology explains how people actually function—how we make choices, how we grow. Together, they give a fuller picture.
Yaakov Wolff:
You mentioned change and growth. These terms get sloganized, but they’re also core to both Torah and psychology. Can you unpack them more deeply?
Yosef Sokol:
From a Torah perspective, growth means becoming similar to Hashem. The Ramchal writes that the world was created so people could become Godly—halachta b’drachav, walking in His ways.
From a psychological perspective, growth means change. We are the sum of our choices; our identity is the story of those choices over time. When those choices connect to a deeper purpose—as Torah explains—then both languages converge: growth means living a purposeful, meaningful life.
And the research backs this up. People who live with a sense of meaning and growth have better mental health and wellbeing.
(YW: To clarify this critical point, the Torah provides us deep meaning. And in psychology we learn of the importance of this meaning. This is how I understood it.)
Creating a Continuous Story
Yaakov Wolff:
So let’s go back to the case you opened with. What exactly was happening for him—Torah-wise and psychologically?
Yosef Sokol:
His struggle was that his life no longer felt like a meaningful story. Humans need to feel like they’re growing. When that stops, we burn out, stagnate, or even fall into depression.
His transition from kollel to the workforce felt discontinuous. In kollel, he was elite—like soldiers in the military, who feel set apart from civilians. Once he left, he felt like “just a baalabos,” which in his mindset meant “less.” Without continuity, he couldn’t project himself into a meaningful future.
Imagine you're reading a book and you just open the book right in the middle, read a bit abd try to guess what will happen next. It’s going to be very hard. But if you read the book slowly and carefully up until the middle and then guess, it's a little easier. When somebody has this meaningful story that they understand, they develop this sense of a future that they work towards.
My work with him was to integrate past, present, and future into a unified story. To see his years in yeshiva as the foundation for what he’s doing now, and his present as the stepping stone to what he can become.
I saw this also in my work with the VA. I saw soldiers who were suicidal, in part becaue they felt like they were disconnected from their elite past. They asked themselves ‘I’m just a civilian now?’ And at a certain point I realized that this was the same as the question ‘I’m just a bahlabos now?’
Yaakov Wolff:
Some might respond by blaming the educational system—that it set him up to think of himself as a prince in kollel, and now he feels like a peasant. What’s your take?
Yosef Sokol:
I sympathize, but it’s complicated. On one hand, yes—the system sometimes teaches only one narrative: Shevet Levi. And when people leave, they feel lost. Psychologically, that can be damaging.
On the other hand, there’s beauty in that pure, simple ideal. My own years in yeshiva were part of my story, even though I didn’t stay in kollel forever. The Rambam writes in pedagogy about starting with simple frameworks before moving to nuance. Sometimes we need that simple clarity first.
So I wouldn’t discard the system. I’d say: yes, it needs more nuance, but don’t lose the beauty either.
Yaakov Wolff:
So what’s the healthier story we should be telling? How can someone leaving yeshiva integrate their past into their present and future?
Yosef Sokol:
It’s about growth, not uprooting. The healthy baal teshuva keeps family ties and adds to them, rather than cutting them off. Similarly, the healthy Ben Torah leaving yeshiva doesn’t discard his past. He carries it with him.
The years in yeshiva are real, and they enable what comes next. They build a person in a certain mold, which carries over in to the career. Torah and avodas Hashem should continue to shape one’s choices and identity, even in the workplace. When people see that underlying unity—that their whole life is one continuous story—they can move forward with meaning and purpose.
The Hashkafa of Growth and Unity
Yaakov Wolff:
Can you give some more mareh mekomos—Torah sources—that speak to this view? Psychologically, I understand striving for integration and using it to grow. But where do we see Chazal framing it in similar terms?
Yosef Sokol:
A central source is Kol ma’asecha yihyu l’shem Shamayim—everything we do should be for the sake of Heaven. The Rambam and many others expand on this at length. Every action, every choice, should be oriented toward Hashem.
The Rambam explains that the highest level of religious growth is knowing Hashem. So even something as basic as sleep should be framed around that goal: sleep enough so that you can learn Torah and think about Hashem, but not so much that you waste time, and not so little that your mind is too weak.
Everything in our lives should be integrated around that central principle: Hashem. Becoming like Hashem, in my language, is the unifying goal. So whether avodas Hashem is expressed in a beis midrash or in a law office, it’s still one avodah. The purpose is the same.
And here’s a deeper point: Hashem is echad. One. Everything about Him that seems multiple—anger, mercy, jealousy—is, as the Kuzari explains, really one. We perceive different aspects depending on context, but Hashem is unified.
So too with us. We should aim to be one, to act as one, and to unify our choices into a coherent whole. That’s why integration isn’t just psychologically healthy—it’s spiritually imperative.
Yaakov Wolff:
What are the keys to really feeling this in your bones? Intellectually, I get it. But let’s say after a long day—kids, family, work—I’m exhausted. I manage to grab a few minutes to learn, and I can tell myself, “Good, I checked the box.” But it doesn’t always feel as geshmak as being free to learn all day.
Yosef Sokol:
That’s very real. And I’ll say: if we didn’t miss that full-time immersion, we’d be missing something important. There’s a beauty in those years of freedom to learn without distraction. It’s natural to long for it.
But to make our current lives meaningful, we need to consciously reflect on why we do what we do. Why do I spend time with my children? Why do I go to work? How do these choices align with the person I’m trying to become? Why do I learn, and what does Torah mean to me in this stage of life?
If you regularly set aside even a few minutes to think about these questions—on a walk, at the end of the day—you begin to see the unity behind your actions. Most of us are motivated by wanting to be good people, to care for others, to do what Hashem wants.
And the way we interpret our actions shapes how we experience them. That’s a core idea of cognitive therapy: it’s not the event itself, but the way we frame it, that affects us. The better we can see our actions as part of a unified framework of avodas Hashem, the more meaning we’ll feel in them, even when life is complex.
Finding Meaning at Work
Yaakov Wolff:
I think for most listeners, it’s not hard to see the meaning in investing in family—spending time with a spouse, with children. Work, though, is more complicated. Personally, I feel blessed to work for an amazing nonprofit, ADI Negev, which does holy work. But let’s take the stereotypical case: someone crunching numbers in a corporate office, helping a few millionaires make a few extra millions. Is there a way to give that kind of work meaning beyond “well, I need the paycheck to support the more important things”?
Yosef Sokol:
Most of our chachamim throughout history worked ordinary jobs. Some were blacksmiths, some chopped wood, some were merchants. Rashi had a vineyard. A few were doctors, which we can easily see as helping people, but many did what we’d consider mundane labor.
So how did they see it as avodas Hashem? The Gemara discusses this: paying workers on time, being honest in business, fulfilling your responsibilities. Yaakov Avinu was a shepherd. Moshe Rabbeinu was a shepherd. Would anyone say their work wasn’t avodas Hashem?
The problem is that we often don’t see Torah in our daily work. But being honest, fulfilling contractual obligations even when no one’s watching, that is embodying Hashem in this world. Many mitzvos are about how we live in the world—bein adam l’chaveiro—not just learning or davening.
So yes, even “helping millionaires make millions” can be avodas Hashem—if you’re doing it as a Ben Torah, with honesty, responsibility, and integrity. Some of the most beautiful Jews I know don’t have prestigious titles. Within their capacities, they live as integrated ovdei Hashem, and that’s deeply meaningful.
And don’t think that having a “religious job” eliminates the challenges. When your paycheck comes from chinuch or rabbanus, it can blur the line between serving Hashem and just doing your job. That comes with its own pitfalls. Every path has its challenges. The key is reframing: seeing work itself as avodah, not as a distraction from it.
Yaakov Wolff:
That’s profound. But one thing I noticed: many of the examples you gave are lo sa’aseh-based—avoiding wrongs like dishonesty. Whereas mitzvos like learning Torah or davening are proactive, pulling us closer to Hashem. Could that be why people have a harder time appreciating their avodah at work? And maybe related to that—someone could succeed 98% of the time, but then one failure in shmiras einayim or another area makes him feel like the whole effort was worthless. How do you think about that?
Yosef Sokol:
It’s a real challenge. Psychologically, we’re biased toward noticing negatives. You can hear 100 compliments and one criticism, and the criticism will weigh just as much as the compliments. That’s how we’re wired.
So yes, we may work on a middah constantly and then stumble once, and suddenly we feel like failures. The dissonance is powerful because we know we’re meant to be aligned with Hashem, so the gap stands out strongly.
But I’d stress two points. First: there are plenty of asehs—positive mitzvos—in daily work. Just today, I spoke with a veteran who was suicidal. My job as a psychologist in that moment was to help him see meaning and purpose in his life. That’s chesed. That’s tefillah—I was silently davening for the right words. That’s avodas Hashem in the fullest sense. And the same applies to lawyers, doctors, businesspeople: if you frame your work as helping others, doing what Hashem wants, you’re surrounded by mitzvos aseh.
Second: failure is built into creation. Hashem gave us a yetzer hara precisely so that growth would mean something. Without resistance, there’s no real becoming. I once spoke to Rav Brudny about helping a bochur struggling with shmiras einayim. He told me: focus first on helping him not feel crushed by guilt. The aveirah itself is one challenge, but the guilt and despair can cause far greater damage. Yes, we work on shmiras einayim, but the bigger avodah is helping a person see that failure is part of the struggle, not proof that he’s worthless.
So yes—we notice negatives more, and we often undervalue positives. But avodas Hashem is about framing: seeing that every effort counts, and that even in failure, the struggle itself is part of the growth.
Yaakov Wolff:
That’s very important. Another related point: humans love comparisons. Dan Ariely’s Predictably Irrational opens with this idea. We compare ourselves constantly. So even if I recognize the avodas Hashem in my own work, I compare myself to my friend who’s a rosh yeshiva, or runs a nonprofit, and suddenly what I do feels lower. Should we see that as a distraction of the yetzer hara to be avoided—or is there a constructive way to think about it?
Yosef Sokol:
Both. On one hand, we need to focus on our own mission. As the saying goes, Hashem won’t ask why you weren’t the Vilna Gaon, but why you weren’t Yaakov Wolff. The story you’re writing is unique. That’s what matters.
On the other hand, a deeper understanding of Torah and humanity shows that every path has its own challenges and opportunities. Rav Yaakov Kamenetsky pointed out: it’s better to be a businessman who yearns to learn more, than to be in kollel wishing you were doing business. Desire and direction matter as much as circumstance.
I treat people in kollel who are unfulfilled, who don’t enjoy learning. That’s tragic. By contrast, a businessman who carves out time to learn because he truly wants it—that yearning brings him closer to Hashem.
So yes, the grass always looks greener. A kollel man may look at nonprofit work and think, “Wow, such clear chesed.” Meanwhile, the nonprofit worker may think, “I barely learn, and I’m distracted.” Every path seems cleaner from the outside. But in truth, no path is simple. What matters most is not which role you have, but who you are within it.
Yaakov Wolff:
As we near the end, I want to touch on another aspect of your book that intrigued me: your theory of identity. You’ve hinted at it, but could you spell it out? What is this methodology, and why is it important?
Yosef Sokol:
Yes. I developed a therapy called Continuous Identity Cognitive Therapy. Its goal is to help people experience a single, unified sense of self over time—seeing themselves as growing, and envisioning a positive future self they’re becoming.
I first developed it for suicidal patients, because my research showed that a fragmented sense of self—no continuity between past, present, and future—was a major risk factor. When people regain continuity, their mental health improves dramatically.
But it applies broadly. I’ve used it in many areas of psychotherapy, and it’s being adopted in the VA and elsewhere. And it aligns beautifully with Torah: a healthy Jew, from a Torah perspective, also sees his life as one continuous story, growing closer to Hashem over time.
Labels, Identity, and Practical Takeaways
Yaakov Wolff:
Up until now, we’ve focused a lot on the “continuous” part of your framework. I want to zoom in on the “identity” part. I thought a lot about how to name or frame this podcast: are we talking about baalebatim, Bnei Torah, post-yeshiva? Labels affect how we see ourselves. How much should we be paying attention to those labels? Are they central to our identity, or are the underlying decisions and emotions more important?
Yosef Sokol:
Great question. People like labels in the abstract, but very few like applying them to themselves. We instinctively resist being put in a box, because we know we’re more than a label.
In one study I did on shidduchim, I asked participants to identify their religious group—“Modern Orthodox,” “Yeshivish,” etc.—and people really disliked the exercise. Given the choice, they’d create endless variations, because each of us is a unique mix.
So yes, labels can be useful shorthand, but they’re oversimplifications. If you think of yourself only as “post-yeshiva” or “balabus,” you lose the richness of who you are. Labels don’t capture our truth. They’re tools, not identities.
Yaakov Wolff:
Fair. But here’s a practical angle. You sit next to a guy at a wedding, you’ve never met, and you want to make small talk. The usual script is: “What’s your name? What do you do?” That’s shorthand, but it reduces identity to profession. Do you have a better suggestion?
Yosef Sokol:
I actually tried something recently that worked well. I asked: “What do you do? And what would you do if you didn’t need to make money?”
That second question opens a much deeper conversation. Some people would actually keep doing what they’re doing. Others light up when talking about something completely different. It gets to their values—what they care about, what they want to become.
Values are like fingerprints. No two people have the same set in the same order. If you want to get to who someone really is, you need to get to their “why,” not just their “what.”
Yaakov Wolff:
Beautiful. Last question for today. As we approach the Yamim Noraim, what’s one thing you’d suggest people do more of, that doesn’t require lots of time but could help them apply what we’ve been talking about?
Yosef Sokol:
Take ten seconds, here and there, to check in on why you’re doing what you’re doing.
Changing a baby’s diaper? Pause for a moment: I’m doing this because I love my child, because I want him to grow. That’s imitating Hashem, our Avinu.
At work? Ask: how does this connect to my values, to who I want to be? Even in simple tasks, if you remind yourself why you’re doing them, you’ll see the deeper meaning.
If you have more time—say, on a walk—reflect on the bigger picture. Why do I learn? Why do I parent? Why do I work? How do these pieces connect to something greater—helping others, coming closer to Hashem?
The more you make this kind of reflection a habit, the richer, more integrated, and more meaningful your life will become.