Consider The Yetzer Harah

There is a Gemera where Antoninus asks Rebbe, "When does the Yetzer Hara enter, at conception or birth?" Rebbe says at conception. Antininounus says, "Impossible, if so it would break out of the womb." Rebbe conceded that Antoninus is right. Rav Avhraham Grozentsky says this doesn’t seem to make sense because the main thing the yetzer hara wants is pleasure/comfort, so why would it break out of its comfortable womb?

He answers that it is a mistake to think what the yetzer hara wants is pleasure. Its main drive is to be free and unfettered, to oppose any control, to defy. One of the ways the yetzer hara remains unrestricted is by always choosing pleasure, but that is only one example. Even in the absence of pleasure the yetzer hara's number one priority is to be its own master. We see from this example the yetzer hara is more bothered by being confined than it is excited by an idyllic setting like the womb.

This explains why people are so often self destructive, because there is a natural human drive to not feel controlled even when this rebellion is not in one's best interest. This explains why O.D.D. (oppositional defiant disorder) is the most frequent diagnosis within adolescence. This also explains why in today’s climate, with such few social restraints, the yetzer hara is having a field day. (adapted from Rabbi Abraham J Twersky, Prayerfully Yours.)