I read a great story the other day.

It’s about a boy the son of a great rebbe. Forgive me for not having all the names I didn’t write down the source because at the time I thought That’s it? That’s the whole story? But as time goes on the story takes on a whole new meaning.

One morning the rebbe wakes up his son for work. They get up and go on their wagon to where they work in some sort of field.

That day the father — the great rebbe — says to his son “One thing son; today is a fast day and we cannot eat.”

The son works and works and during the course of the day the work gets harder and harder as his hunger pangs grow stronger and stronger. He grows weak.

They finish their work that day. Go home. Eat a meal. Go to sleep.

The next morning the father the great rebbe again wakes his son for work.

But this time the son says “Father I can not.”

The father asks “But why?”

And the son says “Because what if I can not eat again today?”

His father the great rebbe says “Today is not yesterday.”

That’s the whole story? I think to myself at first.

But as the day goes on and the problems mount I hear those words over and over.

Someone calls. Her husband is leaving today at one. She watches him — with his boxes packed — from the window as we speak. She’s not sure she really wants this to happen and it is in her hands.

And I say the words in a different way. I say “Today you feel like this. Tomorrow you won’t.”

I say it to myself about all events hour by hour.

It’s true.

Each day seems encased in its own time-release capsule.

The events and challenges contained in one day are not necessarily the same in the next.

Your one-year-old’s teething pains are not going to exist when he’s five. And your 12-year-old’s adolescence problems are not going to be the same when he’s 20.

At least one self-help program has the slogan “One day at a time.”

I’ve heard this line many many times but it never comforted me. It never hit the spot. What so I’ll suffer “one day at a time”?

Because there are so many of those moments moments like when the boy in the story says to his father “I don’t want to go to work I’m afraid I’ll suffer today as I did yesterday.”

But the rebbe’s words offer hope: “Today is not yesterday.”

Time.

Sometimes I think thoughts like How come I didn’t do this? Or How come I didn’t understand that?

In retrospect I might understand something while at the time I had no idea.

Because at one a baby’s teeth come in. At ten other issues come up. At 12 something else and at 20 something else. As time goes on new information is released into the brain to understand situations that may have baffled us before. We can’t force understanding to happen before its time.

And when we ask ourselves “How could I have done such and such a thing?!” or “What was I thinking?!” we can answer ourselves without guilt “Today is not yesterday.”