(1/2) If I am I because I am I...

1:50 I actually feel like I've heard this before, and I've always wondered why that second part is necessary. It's implied because of the first. I don't know if we have to be medayik. It's a quote. I don't know if it's the words of Chazal in that regard. But there's a lot of deep wisdom here that needs to be understood. If I am I because you are you, and you are you because I am I, then I am not I and you are not you. But if I am I because I am I, and you are you because you are you, then I am I and you are you. Okay. In order to understand this, we need to start with a Rambam in Hilchas Deis. The Ramban in Hilchas Dei says as follows: It is the way of people to follow other people. The way that Hakadosh Baruch Hu created us is that we are social beings.

2:38 And so naturally We are going to be impacted by our surroundings. To that extent, the Rambam says that we are obligated to surround ourselves by righteous people Be around God-fearing people. And if you are not, the Rambam says you should leave that place if you can. And how far should you go? The Rambam says if necessary Go to the deserts, go to the caves. Get away from people that are impacting you negatively. What does that mean? What's the value proposition to us there? So it goes as follows: the first thing we need to take away from this Rambam is When a person says to me, "Oh yeah," but I'm not impacted by that. That would be a very, I don't, I don't want to say it's a lie, but it would be a very foolish thing to say. Be a very foolish thing to say. I'll give you an example of this.

3:44 Years ago, we had a guy in yeshiva. And he felt himself to be a big independent. And I asked him, "Well, tell me why you're dressed the way you're dressed." So he said, "What do you mean? I'm dressed the way I dress because this is what the way I like dressing." I said, "And you're not impacted by the way that, And that anybody else dresses." And he goes, "No, of course not. So I said to him, and just like I want to say this in the most respectful way possible, but that's a very foolish thing to say. There's nothing wrong with being impacted in the way that you dress, but we should acknowledge that the fashion industry exists and that they spend. Billions and billions of dollars a year in order to impact you. So later on, this same bachelor told me that originally he did not agree, but then he told me that there was a movie that he saw And this movie convinced him that I was right.

4:41 I am not allowed to watch the movie because supposedly the movie is inappropriate. I have not seen the movie. But there was a movie that came out in that time called The Devil Wears Prada. And apparently there's not sneer scenes, and nobody should watch it. But in that movie, there was a scene where basically somebody was making fun of the fashion industry, and this person in the movie showed how you think you're wearing that color because you chose that color. Let me explain to you how the fashion industry has chosen that color for you. There's a look. There's a look that exists in the world, and people spend massive amounts of dollars sending that look to you. And so, when you purchase it, you think, "No, I made this purchase. I made it. I chose it. Your purchase was heavily influenced." My brother, when he worked in advertising, still works in advertising, but he works on a different end of it.

5:40 So he was working with a company called Skittles. You guys know Skittles, the candy? Oh. Skittles. By the way, what's the taste? I was about to say, what's the tagline? Is it 'taste the rainbow,' right? Now I see it's 'share the rainbow, taste the rainbow.' But Skittles is 'taste the rainbow.' So my brother was working on a deal that they were making a Sean White Wii game. You guys know what Nintendo Wii is And you know who Sean White is The great snowboarder. So they were making a snowboarding Wii game, and they wanted Shawn White to be the one, like they have Michael Jordan for NBA, they had the Shawn White Wii game. So they need corporate sponsorships because these games cost a fortune of money to put out, and you're not going to pay a thousand dollars for a game. You're going to pay 150 bucks for a game. So they get a lot of corporate sponsors. So Skittles was working on a deal to be the corporate sponsor of the Shawn White Wii game. Because Skittles is considered a very cool candy, and Sean White is a very cool, snowboarding type of personality. So it was a good shidduch. My brother told me the amount of money that they were talking about spending on this Wii game.

7:00 It was not a small amount of money. It was millions and millions of dollars. So I said to my brother "There's no way you could convince me. Let's say the number was ten million dollars. There's no way you could convince me." That Skittles spending ten million dollars to be the corporate sponsor of the Wii game of the Sean White Wii game is going to make them back ten million dollars. So my brother said, 'They're not going to make ten million more dollars because of that.' My brother said "You are right. We're going to make much, much, much more than ten million dollars." I said, "How could you possibly know that?" So my brother said, 'Not only are we going to know exactly how much money we make. We're not even spending this money in order for you to buy Skittles.' I said, "Okay, explain." He said, "All we want to be is on the list." I said, "What's the list?" He said, "The list is when you go into a store right now, and you guys think about it. You'll probably realize it's true yourself. I know it's true for me. You walk into a grocery store, you have all of these chocolates in front of you.

8:05 You have a list: Cadbury chocolate. If you're from the UK, right? If you're from America, maybe it's Nestle Crunch. Maybe you've got Reese's Peanut Butter Cups on there, right? What is it? Snickers, Twix, right? Everyone's got their own, but you have a list, and on that list is your top three. And they know that the chances are that if you're on the list That you'll buy the product. So they're not even trying to get you to buy Skittles. They just want to make sure that Skittles is in your top three. And their numbers will bear themselves out from there And it's a wild thing. So here you have a guy Who he has he buys the Shawn White game. He buys the Shawn White Wii game. He sees that Skittles taste the rainbow. It's all over the thing. And my brother told me how they were working on how when you do cool moves, there'll be a rainbow in the sky, and there'll be a special cheat code to turn the snowboard into a giant Skittles wrapper. And on the half pipe, they're all gonna have different Skittles, different Skittles emblems. They're gonna do all this stuff. That Skittles should be the corporate sponsor.

9:12 My brother said he goes, they do it in movies all the time. When you go to see a James Bond movie. You know the car that they drive, that's sponsored. They don't just say, let's get a Ford. It's BMW and it's Lexus and it's Infinity and it's whatever. These companies are paying millions of dollars to have their cars in those movies. Why? Because we're impacted by it. The first thing that the Rambam teaches us is it's not simple at all to be authentic, to be the truest version of yourself, to be loyal to the person that you really are. I would start off by saying I won't say impossible, but nearly impossible Because of how much we're impacted. The Rambam wrote that back then. Chaver, what was the impact that a person could have on another person back in the times of the Rambam? I don't believe that. Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't know if there were advertisements in the times of the Ramla.

10:10 But now let's play it out in today's world. Just by show of hands, how many people here are on some form of social media? When I say some form of social media, I just don't even mean WhatsApp. Just regular Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat. How many of you are on any of those mediums? You're not on any. Not anymore. You got rid of it. You got rid of it. But you were okay. I'll change the parameters of the question. In high school, how many of you had Instagram, Snapchat, or Twitter? Kacha half. Simcha, you stayed off completely. Impressed? I'm impressed. All of you. Was that okay? But say that's pretty good. Rabbi, do you think you're impacted by the constant barrage of a particular social media message? Why do you think it is that when these celebrities put their names on something or say something people listen?

11:07 There's a certain flow of society. What the Rambam said back in his time, if it was true then It was not even a drop in the bucket relative to what we have in today's society. So the first thing to take away from the Rambam is a question: Are we really behaving the way that we're behaving because that's the unique self that we have? Or are we behaving the way we're behaving because of what we're told to do? Let's take that question a little further. When you ask a question on this statement Meaning no, the Rambam gave us a foundation, a fundamental principle. We're just saying that nowadays it's all. And nowadays the barrage of impact. What was the second half of the statement? We're going to we're going to get to that. We're going to get to that. We're going to get to that. What is yourself?

11:55 Is yourself. That one second. One second. That's point number two. Before we get there, very good, but we're going to get there in a second. There's another thing we need to ask ourselves, and this is maybe uncomfortable to ask, but necessary. If the Rambam is saying this idea that we're impacted by our surroundings and we should put ourselves in good surroundings because of that. And we know right away that today it's impossible to escape. Impossible. Very, very unlikely that we're going to isolate ourselves. The way that the Rambam says to run into the caves, to run into the deserts, to hide ourselves from these. Don't push my butt. You know me long enough. You know how to press eight twelve and get a certain schmooze from me. There's another question. What choices are we going to be making? In the coming months and years of our life And where will those external influences take us? The Rambam obligates us, at the very least, to put ourselves in growth-oriented surroundings, surrounded by righteous people who are doing righteous things.

13:13 If we are going to be making choices that are going to expose us to very negative influences Is it possible for us to say that we won't be impacted? There's a beautiful story that I heard from my rebbe. Should be a zaychad rafu shleima. My rebbe told us that the great mashgiach of Mir Yeshiva When Mir escaped from Poland, they went through Shanghai, China. So in Shanghai, China, the mashgiach of Mir was Reb Chatskel Levinstein. Chatskel Levinstein was a fire and brimstone mashgiach. But he loved the boys very, very, very much, and the boys loved him very much. He could give them powerful musr, but they also knew that he was literally doing everything to keep them alive. So they loved him very much. After the war was over and the mier now had to move on from Shanghai, the question was where they were going to go.

14:14 So many came to Eretz Israel and rebuilt the mier here in Eretz Israel, and some went to America and built mier in Brooklyn. Shmuel Bernbaum, Zechatzadik Levracha. Some of the great Rosh Yeshiva of America were mere Rosh Yeshiva. Rav Chatskal Levinstein ended up becoming the Mashgiach and Panovich. How did he become Mashgiach and Panovich? My Rebbe told us that there is a very, very small part of history that most people gloss over, which is that Rav Chatskal, after Shanghai, he didn't go to Eretz Yisrael. For a zman, he came to America. Very, very overlooked part of history that Rivchaskel was the mashgiach in Mir in Brooklyn. And what happened? He announced that he was leaving Mir in Brooklyn, and the boys said, "Rebbe, why?" They were so excited to have the privilege of learning under Rivchaskel. Why are you leaving? He said, "Chill Shabbos." Chill Shabbos.

15:15 They said, "Rebbe, who's being mechal Shabbos in Mir, Brooklyn?" He goes no. The boys in yeshiva are not being mechal shabbos. But there's chilul shabbos in the streets And because of that, there's chilul shabbos in the walls of the yeshiva. And it's having an impact. Rav Chatskel said, "I can't stay in Mir, Brooklyn." I'm going to Eretz Yisrael because I don't want to be exposed to chilul shabbos. This was Rav Chatskel, who was already the great mashgiach of Mir, who had led the boys out of Poland through Shanghai, led them to safety. He said he was being impacted by the fact that there was chilul shabbos in the walls of the yeshiva. My rebbe used this story to illustrate the Rambam that a person should not say, 'Oh, I'm going to go somewhere, but don't worry, I'm not going to be impacted. You will be impacted.'

16:02 A person has a responsibility to themselves to make sure they're putting themselves in a growth-oriented environment. And yet, here's the catch to that: it's also true in yeshiva. That a person could be impacted by a group of friends, or by a rebbe, or by rabeim, or by the modality of a yeshiva, they could also lose themselves. I'll get to that in a second, Sam. I know you're listening. It's hard to say. Could also lose yourself. Meaning, in yeshiva Guys are learning, guys are davening, guys are working on themselves. Of course, this is a wonderful thing. But is it possible for a person to lose their personality? Is it possible for a person to come to yeshiva? And it's true, maybe he's learning more Torah. But is it possible for a person to lose their unique self in yeshiva as a function of peer pressure or pressure from rebbeim?

16:57 It's possible, and therefore, it's also incumbent on a yeshiva to say to the talmidim: make sure that in your growth, you're not growing in a way that's chas v'shalom, taking you away from your truest version of yourself. So you have guys in yeshiva. Sometimes they come to yeshiva. And they get very frum. You ever see this? And it could be a good thing, but it could also be not such a good thing because they might be losing that sense of identity they have. So I'll tell you one last story, Sam, and then I'll get to you. When I was in Mevaseret So there was a kolol guy in the yeshiva. Some of you have heard the story from me before. And his name was Adam Vogel Who's now Rav Usher Vogel, who's Rebbe in our yeshiva. But at the time, he was just Adam Vogel.

17:52 Big tzaddik, soft-spoken, gentle, Talmud chacham, the legend, the era Maz boy, like all the good stuff. That is good to know. You guys didn't know. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said. You knew. So, say that. So what happens? So I wanted to be like that because I thought that's what I'm meant to be. So I started speaking a little bit quieter and being a little bit nicer and walking around with a smile on my face. Hi, how are you? Like a gentle little edelmaedel. I'm walking up the back hill towards the beis medrash, and this room was the elephant graveyard, the room where our classrooms were, where our classrooms currently are, used to be the beis medrash, and the mashgiach of the yeshiva sat in Rev Isaac. What's now Rev Isaacson's room, right by those big windows, and he was sitting right there, and he sees me walking up the hill, and I've got my hands clasped together, and I've got my head bowed down, like the Rebbe says in Igeres Rebbe.

19:02 And all of a sudden, I hear from the window Berg. And I look up, and there's the mashgiach. And I, very gently, look up and say, "Yes, Rabbi." And he goes, "Get here right now." So I start walking, and he goes, "Run!" But I know they're imbalances. You're not supposed to run, so I'm walking quickly. I'm doing all the things that I'm supposed to be doing. I finally come to the beis medrash, and the mashgiach looks at me and he's like, "What are you doing?" So I said, "What do you mean?" You're not Vogel. So I said, I know, but like I see him, and he's a real role model. He's such a person to look up to. I thought maybe If I worked on myself, I could really become somebody special like him. And he starts screaming at me, Chas v'shalom, you're not Vogel. Don't do that. You're going to explode.

19:53 So I said, What do you mean? Is this not what I'm supposed to be? And he goes, Of course, that's not what you're supposed to be. You're a loud, obnoxious person, right? You have to like. You guys know me by now. Yeah, you have to be you. If you become somebody else, if you become Vogel, what's the sense in that? And it was a big musser for me. First of all, as you should know, it's a tremendous relief because I didn't know how I was going to live the rest of my life being like. I was. Let's put it this way: you're not going to hear stories about me at Yitzi's wedding if I had become Vogel. Which maybe some of you are going. Maybe you should have become Vogel. But no, you hear what I'm saying? It's possible, even in yeshiva, in the name of frumkeit. To lose yourself And that's equally dangerous. So on the one hand, a person has a responsibility to make choices that are going to take them closer to Hashem.

20:42 Whether that's where they go to college, who they marry, or what community they live in, all of those things are designed to make. Exceptionally important choices in a healthy way to make sure that you're going in a way that's going to be to serve Hashem. Because remember, Abosi, these choices you make next they're huge. But at the same time, I also need to question you. In the name of growth, a person could also lose themselves. I know your question, so I'm going to hold off because that's what I want to get to for a while. The question you started asking before. One second, I want to call Sam first. I'll get to that question. Sam. Two things, one from four, and then one from four. I just said. So the one from four is Should you ever have a mindset that maybe That maybe even if you're in a bad environment, you'll stay strong enough to influence others to be better than you're going to be worse.

21:42 What a first of all, what a beautiful thing That a Jew should have such a perspective. That a Jew should say. Sometimes I need to go into a place that's not so good to help others. That is a very humble and special approach. And humble. It's very humble. It's very humble. It's humble because I'm putting others before myself. That's your. I'm assuming you're going to be that. But a person has to know when they're ready for such a thing And if you go before you're ready, you'll be impacted and you won't impact. And the only way to truly impact is if you are not impacted. And sometimes you see that even after many years of working on themselves, a person could go to such an environment and be impacted. And personally I think that a person very often sees that people have this approach.

22:37 But they do it a little bit too early. And that little bit, especially, remember, a baby is in utero and the baby is forming. We want a baby to be born on time. Assuming that it's not too much. But when a baby stays in a mother's stomach for nine months and the gestational process is complete, it's much better than if a baby is born early because any little bit of a difference, even days and hours make a difference. Doctors will say, let's see if we can get to one more day. What's one more day going to make a difference? It's important. Right now, you're in a very exciting but also a very important time in your life where you're still forming. So if you told me now at eighteen years old that you want to go to wherever, which maybe won't be the best environment, and maybe it won't have the best chevrah around you, but don't worry, I'm going to impact others.

23:25 That's a decision a person has to make very carefully and with a lot of guidance. Most likely you'll be impacted, and that will be bad for you, and it will be bad even for the people you're trying to impact. What was your second question? And also, I feel like a lot of the time, especially in Shiva, when that happens, not like no one ever makes kind of that conscious decision. I don't know if anybody made that conscious decision to be revolting, but I feel like a lot of times it's just so conscious that we don't even notice, and then you can't even distinguish between what's me and what's the other person. You're raising a very important point. I happen to have done it more consciously. But I think you're right that there are things like groupthink. So you'll just start to think a certain way because people are thinking that way. Now it's certainly better to think Torah thoughts than not Torah thoughts. But even within the realm of Torah thoughts, a person has to make sure they're retaining their unique identity to think their Torah thoughts, and it is subtle, which is exactly why we're talking about it today. Eitan, you had a question before.

24:29 I know you had your hand raised also, but I thought you had a question before that. Because you accidentally said nine years, not nine months. Is that why everyone's laughing? I said nine years and not nine months. So I misspoke. Nine months. If a child stays in their mother's stomach for nine years, I imagine the impact would be dreadful for everybody. And I sometimes feel that there are those boys that have not yet left, but overall yeah. Last week he spoke about how you have to have certain kinds of absence to create real meaning, and how you only start growing when you get smaller, so how you balance that with trying to keep yourself in shape. I certainly don't think that a person's responsibility is. I think it's other. I think a person has a responsibility to make sure they don't go down a bad path.

25:36 But meaning if you just mean it's more generous. You just set up everything in your life. Or the better way to put it is to set up everything for your future generations' life to be perfect and to not have any negative. I think I understand the question you are asking. You are saying if nothing that could ever happen, how are you going to grow? I don't think we need to be concerned about it. I think there's going to be plenty of absence and plenty of void, no matter what you do. You don't even have to. There are certain situations where you don't necessarily like everything bad is prevented, but like in certain things We owe it to ourselves and our children. We would never, for example, raise our children like when you're going to buy a house. They're too young to appreciate some of these things. When you buy a house, one of the things you might consider is whether this is a busy street.

26:26 Right? Right. For example My good friend lives on Broadway. On not on Broadway on West Broadway. He lives on West Broadway. West Broadway is a very busy street. Very busy street, right? Very busy street. So when he bought on West Broadway, I said, "Are you concerned at all that there are cars that are going by? It's officially a thirty five mile an hour street." People are doing fifty sixty on that street for sure. So he said, 'Yeah, we're gonna have a gate in the front, and it's a big yard.' Has a big white picket fence, and about a year and change ago, a car lost control. Smashed through his fence and actually hit his house. The house is a good twenty five feet back from the so you know which house I'm talking about. Is everything okay? It's polka dots on his front door, a purple door with yellow polka dots. Baruch Hashem, everybody was okay.

27:29 But he was like, it's crazy. It doesn't matter where he is. He's right across from the shul. Baruch Hashem, everything was taken care of. But still, if you had a choice of where to buy a house, you would probably more likely buy on a side street than on West Broadway. Why? Because we do our best. Caldecott is great. I live on a Caldecott. We do our best to ensure the safety of our children. The absence will always be there. It's part of life. But we have to protect our children. So we have to put ourselves. There's no doubt about it, but sometimes people say, 'Don't shelter your children.' There's no doubt that a person has to have a level of appropriate, negotiated exposure. But if rockets are falling, nobody makes fun of somebody else for going into a shelter. Person like nobody in what's called in Stayrote.

28:26 Very good. That's exactly the point. These no, this it absolutely is the case. The things that are happening right now, they are absolutely killing society, and it's amazing to see because it's so insidious, because it's so subtle. So you don't even necessarily see that it's happening. But for example, That's the point. Aren't there things that damage people, and there are things that. This is killing people. But it depends on the thing. And reasonable people could disagree on what's killing people. But the fact that probably in this conversation which is not going to happen now But probably in this conversation we would disagree about certain fundamental things Is probably more indicative of how impacted we are because of what society has. So I'll give you an example. This very quick example. This. So I flew back from America last night into Israel. And one of the things you dread if you fly a lot, unfortunately I fly a lot. If you fly a lot, what do you dread?

29:33 Who am I going to sit next to? I don't want to talk to people next to me. So some people like the hawk. I fly enough. I just want to sleep. So I get on the plane and whatever. It's a whole fight, and I had to get a window seat. Baruch Hashem, I got a window seat. I show up, and there's this young couple. A guy and a girl, and they're sitting in the aisle seat and the middle seat, respectively. As I'm coming, they get up to let me in, and I say, "I'm so sorry. I know you're probably hoping I was like one of the last people on the plane. As I know you're probably hoping to get the window seat." They said, "No, it's no problem." It turns out that they are ministers from Colorado. And they're Christian. I don't call them missionaries, but they're very proud of their beliefs. And we spent about the first three and a half hours of the flight discussing the theological differences between Judaism and Christianity. Too much time. First of all, that's a lot of time. Why didn't you record that?

30:30 It was a fascinating conversation. I have to say though I certainly disagree with the idea that three is one and one is three. He was twenty eight year old minister. And very well educated in Tanakh. Very well educated, quoting chapter and verse. And of course, I showed him how certain things he's reading are just like that's I said you have an English translation of the original document and therefore you never knew that this word means something completely different. He was like, wow, that's crazy how learning it in the wrong language makes a difference. I'm like, yeah, maybe. And he did have certain interesting theological approaches about how it could be that an infinite being could become finite. Obviously, I don't agree with that, but he was a thoughtful person. We started talking because he's from Colorado and he has these Christian beliefs. I asked him, 'What's it like for you living in America today?'

31:26 And he said, "It's wild watching the moral decay of America" And he sees that as part of his mission. He has about two hundred and twenty-five people a week that come to his church, and it's actually interesting that his method of education is quite similar to my method. But he was talking. About the moral decay that's going on around us, and perhaps it's not physically killing people. He was arguing, but certainly spiritually, it's killing people. And on that, we were definitely on the same page. Rebbe, I will pick this up again tomorrow.