“This shall be the law of the metzora.”
(Vayikra 14:2)

In the midrash (ibid.) Chazal tell of a peddler who went from town to town shouting “Who wants to buy an elixir for life?” Rabi Yanai heard this peddler’s announcement called him over and asked to buy the elixir. The peddler said to him “You don’t need it.”
Rabi Yanai insisted until the peddler took out a Tehillim and showed him the pesukim: “Who is the man who desires life who loves long life wherein to see goodness? Guard your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit. Turn away from evil and do good seek peace and pursue it.” (Tehillim 34: 13–15)
Rabi Yanai said “All my days I read this pasuk and I didn’t know the simple meaning until this peddler came and announced ‘Who is the man who desires life?’” (Rav Shimshon Pincus)
Some things are simple and basic yet when we hear them we become as excited as if we’re hearing them for the first time. Rabi Yanai knew the pasuk “Who is the man who desires life ” but suddenly he heard it differently.
This happened to me one Simchas Torah when I was very young.
I was dressed in my Yom Tov finery and holding a slice of cake from the kiddush. I was looking for a spot from which to watch the men’s section my heart expanding with joy. The men danced enthusiastically below and sang “V’sein Banu” in the regular familiar tune. “L’avdecha b’emes uv’yirah uv’a-ha-vaaah ” to serve Him in truth fear and love.
I gazed at the whirling circle enchanted by the children on shoulders and sifrei Torah raised with emotion. “V’sein banu v’sein banu yetzer yetzer tov ” they sang with vigor and great joy dancing with all their hearts and souls. One minute passed and another and another. The song finished once twice four and five times. And they started over again and again. I waited for them to switch songs I waited for them to sing something else but no. No one changed songs for many long minutes.
Why aren’t they switching songs I wondered. Aren’t they getting bored?
But then I discovered something surprising. Not only weren’t they bored they were excited and yearning dancing beyond their physical limitations. At some point the song had become a prayer; they were begging Hashem to give them a yetzer tov to serve Him in truth fear and love.
I was too young to understand how much feeling pulsed through that shul. How much yearning and longing the men had making it impossible to stop that song. For the more they sang it the deeper it became peeling layers off their neshamos until all that was left was the Jew dancing on Simchas Torah crying aloud “Yetzer yetzer tov.”
“Because of their greatness because those hearing are people of substance they become enthusiastic as a result of a new view of well-known basics. This is exactly what happened to Rabi Yanai… the peddler shows him a familiar pasuk. And something happens. Suddenly the words aren’t heard by his ear. They go into the soul itself.
The words suddenly take on new flavor. Shemiras halashon becomes something you can give out to people on the street. Something you can declare an elixir for good life.” (ibid.)
We all want to feel that quiver of the neshamah and the flutter of elation.
We’ve learned about lashon hara since playgroup Krias Shema we’ve said since we’re toddlers “Elokai Neshamah” has turned into a mumble each morning. It’s all so mundane we sometimes seek something new a deep idea an exciting shiur tefillos at distant kivrei tzaddikim some special segulah or a particularly auspicious time.
No Rabi Yanai tells us. The most “basic” ideas — the well-known tefillos and oft-said perakim of Tehillim can bring us to that great depth. We achieve this by focusing on something intensely hearing it with a more mature ear delving into it a bit hearing it again and again as we peel back the layers.
And suddenly the fire in our hearts is ignited and we find the inspiration we were seeking right before us.