Alei Shur - 16

2:41 the right college, right? We shift the way we see the world and all of a sudden there are midos that shift along with it, as he will explain. So again, Revolbi takes the complex path. He doesn't tell you it's binary. He tells you both are true, right? They are powers, right? But they're powers that are also deos. You have a power of sight, right? Is your mida a power, like a power of. sight? Is anger like vision? So Revolbi is saying, right, is you can't work on your sight. Right? So, when you're, I mean, again, aside from, like, you know, those, like, things you could do, right? But, so when it comes to a mida, Revolbi is saying, you can't just label it as a power, right? Because then you don't have any capacity to manipulate it. But, at the same time, Revolbi is saying, it's not not a power, right? It's still a power.

3:42 But the nature of that power is that it's also deos, right? It also comes from a worldview. It also comes from a way that you think about the world. So, when a person is misboning, he's thinking deeply about his midos. So, he will find, this is already, like, homework for you guys. You'll find that you have what we'll call initial reactions, okay? Person's natural reaction, his first thought, so to speak, will be to anger. Right? Why? Because he's going to pour out his anger on another person because you went against the thing that I wanted. Right? You upset me. You embarrassed me. I wanted something. You went against my will. So his first reaction might be towards anger. What would be another example of a muskal rishon? Muskal rishon hula bal gaiva. Might find out that your initial reaction is towards arrogance. Ki magialo kavar v'tihila.

4:50 As you're examining yourself, you might say, wait a second. What's the thing that sets me off? Start to think about it. My world view is that I am deserving of honor and praise. Right? Look at me. I'm the best. Right? And so your initial attitude might be one. Of arrogance. For other people, it's laziness. So everybody has a different initial reaction. Right? So where does this initial reaction come from? The initial reaction comes from a vision that we all have inside of us, how we are supposed to behave. Okay? So there's a vision inside of ourselves. And that vision dictates how we're supposed to behave. For example, So why does the kaison get angry?

5:58 The Kaizen gets angry because there's a vision in his head, that that's in his heart, that that's how he's supposed to behave. The Balgaiva has a picture of Kavod, right? So since Kavod is inside, since Magili Kavod, so what is his thoughts? His thoughts are arrogant, right? Well, the lazy person is driven by, there's danger out there, right? I don't want to have to confront the danger, better to be lazy, right? So it's like, how many times have you heard people that say, I don't know, I'm kind of a little afraid to go to college. Why? Because I didn't try in high school. So since I didn't try in high school, I think I'm smart, right? But, I don't know, maybe when I go to college, and now I'm a person who's no longer lazy, right? I came to Yeshiva and I'm no longer lazy. Now when I go to college, I might find out I'm not actually smart. So it's like, people are afraid to try. Why are they afraid to try? There's a sakana in trying. What's the sakana of trying? Fear of failure. Fear that I'm going to be stupid.

7:03 Why is the Balgaiva a Balgaiva? He's not just naturally arrogant. It's because in his heart, what's the vision that he has in his life? He's driven by kavod. So the arrogance, there's people like, I'm working on my arrogance. You know, there's a guy who said to me once, the vision that he has of himself, Baruch Hashem, this year, is I'm really, truly a humble person now. And he said it maybe like, literally, I believe it goes about 10, 15 times in the nature of the conversation. And I'm like, do you not hear yourself? He's like, you don't understand. I'm probably, like he was literally going, I'm probably one of the most humble people like I know now. I'm like... Well, there happens to be that being able to say you're humble it takes tremendous humility. Like Moshe Rabbeinu said, I'm anaf mikol adam, but by Moshe Rabbeinu it actually was anivus. Could you imagine having such a lack of self-awareness? Well, what was he saying? He was saying things like, the arrogant things I used to do I'm no longer doing. But the arrogance was very clearly still there. Why? Because it comes from a worldview.

8:06 It was a way of seeing the world. He was driven by Kavod. Let me just finish up this last piece and then I'll get to you. Most of the time it's imagination. Most of the time your initial reaction is flawed. And there's a problem with the picture you're painting. And those are generally the midos that drive us. So Revolvi made a very big move. We're talking about midos. What's midos? Midos are powerful. So they're powers, right? What's the problem if you call them powers? If there are powers, you can't change them, just like the powers of sight, right? Okay, so they're not just powers. They're also deos. Okay, well, let's think about what deos means. Deos means that there's an internal story, that you're telling yourself, right? And how do we get to bad midos? Bad midos are not like a person's naturally arrogant, right? And it's not just a question of working on it by stopping to do these things.

9:07 See, this is what's so critical, right? Revolve is saying, don't just stop doing these things, but understand the nature of the story that you're telling yourself and understand that the bad mida is coming from that story, right? So it's like you're arrogant, right? So how do you work on your arrogance? Okay, well, challenge the story that you're telling yourself that you're deserving of covered. Not because a person shouldn't be treated with dignity, but what have you done in your life. that's actually deserving of any covet? The catch-22 with covet is if you chase after it, it's poison, and it's other people's responsibility to chase after you and give you covet. That's always the challenge. You have to run away from it in order for it to be food. And everybody else has to throw it at you. And it's the amazing thing, because everybody in Klaue is supposed to be chasing everybody else with covet. And everybody in Klaue is supposed to be running away from the covet that everybody else is throwing at them. In Mele, everybody gets what they need. Of course, what happens is that those that are seeking covet,

10:08 as the Mishnevo says, it'll run away from them. And most people are too arrogant to give covet to other people, to say that was really meaningful. Like, I'm really proud of you. That was amazing. You're really deserving of that. So, we have to challenge the story. Changing your midos isn't, I stopped performing this activity, because that's just suppression. What's Ravel be saying? Let's get to the core. Let's get to the root. Okay, yeah, Shmuel. That was really my question, because we find, and probably a lot of people find, that when we try to work on something, like I said, we work on all the outcomes. We don't want to work on the core. When we reach the core, especially in Gaiva, and maybe because I heard from Levi and the Kamar Rebbe, especially Gaiva is something that, it's not something you can specifically work on, it's something you have to ask Hashem for. So, I'm like, I could have understood that the wrong way, that's why I'm asking.

11:13 Yeah. Meaning, so, yeah, I get to the core, that... that I'm missing. I think I've ruined my life on a big level, so therefore I don't deserve it. Well, the things I do good, I deserve a counter for that. So yeah, I got this. Fine. Even if that is the core. I'm not sure if it is or isn't. Even if that is the core, how do I go from there? Where do I go from there. Right. Well, so maybe what the... Again, I would love to see the quote from the commander inside, but maybe what he was saying was at some point, asking God for help when it comes to arrogance, would be the only cure for arrogance because it would be the recognition, of retelling that story. The story of my arrogance is that I am in control, and the way of retelling that story that I'm not in control is tefillah. Maybe that's what that means. But it's not just like I'm asking God for help and God will remove it from me.

12:09 It's gufa banyan, right? It's exactly what you need in order to turn it, right? Arrogance doesn't mean that you don't know that you're talented. Some of you know my friend Rav God Friedman. So, one year they invited him to speak in Mavassar, and he came with his guitar now. He tells the story that when he was in between schools for a little bit, so he used to sit on the front stoop of his porch, and I remember this very clearly, he used to sit on the front stoop of his porch and just play guitar all day. What happens, guys, if you play guitar all day? You'll get really good at guitar. Guitar is not that complicated an instrument. So he got awesome at playing guitar. So he came to Mavassar, and he's got his guitar, and he was playing behind his head and playing behind his back, and he was going crazy, right? And then he looks and he goes, Tonight's cheer is on humility, and I am the best guitar player in this room, right? And he's like, and I can say that with confidence, because I am the best guitar player in this room. And humility is the recognition that God gave me that talent, right? And I invested in that, but it's God's talent, right?

13:12 And that's the difference, right? So it's retelling the story of it's my talent, right? Nobody ever brags about being seven feet tall. I think, I can't believe I'm about to quote this in this shiur. This is a very low place to draw from, but maybe we'll reveal some nitzots of Kedusha. Do you guys remember a character called Ali G. Yeah. Sasha Baron Cohen. Ruben, you remember this guy. Yeah, he still does Ali G. Yeah, I've probably watched him. It's not always Ali G. Well, so he used to do this character called Ali G. So when this character was big, so they hired, TNT hired Sasha Baron Cohen to make commercials for the NBA on TNT. So some of them were really funny. So I think he was asking, maybe it was Kobe Bryant, and he asked him, like, why does a ball bounce? And Kobe Bryant's like, because it has air in it. He goes, well, this room got air.

14:16 This room ain't bouncing. You know what I mean? They're like that, that Ali G move. But I'll never forget. Like, I think it was one of these sentences. Maybe it was Ben Wallace. And he asked him, he said, so did you work very hard at becoming seven feet tall? And he's like, what? Because it's not something you can work hard at, right? And if you're seven feet tall, regardless of whether or not you can play basketball, you're going to get scouted, right? Because if you're seven feet tall, there was a kid who was seven feet tall in Woodmere many years ago. He played for Woodmere High. And Rick Pitino came to Woodmere to scout this kid seven feet tall. The assistant coach of Rambam was at the practice where Rick Pitino came to scout this kid. And he asked Rick, he said to him, he goes, why are you here scouting this kid? He's not that good. So Rick Pitino said, there's one thing you can't teach. You can't teach seven feet, right? Because you can teach the kid footwork, you can teach the kid how to shoot, you can teach the kid how to dribble, but you can't teach someone to become seven feet tall. That's why there's this kid. I think maybe he's going to go in the second round. Played for Central Florida. Taco Fall.

15:23 He's a monster. 7'7", 7'6". Yeah, he's like, he just turns around and dunks. He doesn't even jump. His arms are like over 10 feet tall. It's like, if you don't get drafted, I mean, how bad do you have to be? All you have to do is stand like this and it's hard. You know? JaVale McGee did it. JaVale McGee gets a bad reputation because of Shaq. Yeah, Shaq almost destroyed that man's career. He was actually, he's actually a really decent NBA player. It's just that Shaq chose to destroy him as a person. That comes with its own bad me, though. Anyway, so, I don't know how we got on that. Okay. Kasher. Yeah, you don't work on being 7 feet tall. You don't take pride in it. Most of the things we have, like, because you're good at learning. Shkoyah, who gave you those brains? This is like, why are you walking around saying, look at me, I'm good at this. You didn't do it. Yeah, so you're saying, but I'm good at learning and I'm capable of sitting. Well, who gave you Zitzfleisch? Yeah.

16:19 I feel like it still comes out as arrogant, though. You say, I'm the smartest person in the room, or I'm the most smart kid in the room. Yeah, no, obviously I don't think that Moshe Rabbeinu, when he was writing the words, anaf mikol adam, I don't think he was uncomfortable at all saying those things about himself, meaning the words came through him, the godly words came through him, and he wrote, I am the most humble of all men, and I don't think he was uncomfortable on any level. And if it was not a godly imperative, I don't think in a million years he would have written it. You understand? It's just like, yeah, I don't walk into a room and go, I'm probably the best rebbe of this yeshiva teaching Ali Shor. I don't do that, right? I mean, it's true, but no, I'm joking. I don't do that because that's exceptionally arrogant. You know what I'm saying? But you should know. You should know the talent that you have. And you should ascribe it to many gifts that you've been given, none of which you are in control of.

17:06 Yeah, I also feel like if your mindset is, I got this gift from God, then it'll make you less arrogant. Yeah, by definition, you won't be arrogant. In fact, you'll be humbled by the gift that you've received, and it'll actually become mission critical. So all of a sudden, the intellect that you have, if you value that it came from God, it will be used for godly purposes. And you won't, in the same way that you won't boast about, I mean, people probably do, but most people don't boast about saying, wow, I'm so great, I'm 70 tall. You won't boast about, wow, I'm so great, I'm so good at learning because God knows for God. That's right. And if you find someone who's doing those things, it's more likely that they're suffering from low self-esteem and they have to put themselves up on a pillar. It's called, I let my game do my talking for me. Yeah. Rabbi said that unless he was talking about God, he wasn't talking about God in the imperative, that he wouldn't have written it. Have you ever seen Rabbi Nachman's comments about himself and about his story.

18:01 That is one of the most curious things about Rabbi Nachman to me. Rabbi Nachman is a very complicated person. If you've read any of the, you know, any of the biography that Rabbi Nosson wrote about Rabbi Nachman, he was a person that suffered tremendously in his life. An exceptionally self-aware person. And one of the things that's uncomfortable for people that read Rassal over Chassidus is the way that Rabbi Nachman speaks about himself. And so there's two ways of taking that. One way of taking that is... This is really strange. because people don't talk like that. And the other way is, Rabbi Nachman says some wild things about himself, like, it will be my Torah that's learned in the generation of Moshiach. He's like, it will be because of me, like certain things. He spoke very frankly about himself. Those that deeply believe in Breslov Chassidus, that are makusher to that, that it moves them, they have to believe, that Rabbi Nachman was coming from a place of such authenticity that he felt it was a godly imperative to say those things about himself. Those that believe that Rabbi Nachman.

19:02 was not a tzaddik, and you do have many people that believe that, so those people that believe that Rabbi Nachman was not a tzaddik are quick to point out the arrogance of those statements. In fact, a haver of mine showed me a sefer written by people that were specifically very against, not nanachs, but actual Breslov Chassidus, and they compiled all the different quotes in one chapter that Rabbi Nachman says about himself as proof of Rabbi Nachman's arrogance. Of course, you know, as I once asked Rav Zooker about it, and Rav Zooker said, well, I mean, Rav Shem B'Yohai said things about himself, right, but obviously if Rav Shem B'Yohai said, we all assume that Rav Shem B'Yohai, I think correctly, was a tremendous tzavik, and Rav Shem B'Yohai said those things about himself. He was doing it, Rav Shem Shamayim, and it was coming from a very deep place of a godly imperative that caused him to say those things. And when Chazal wrote them down, I don't think they were uncomfortable on any level because they understood that. Okay.

20:06 You're going to start to think about these midos, and you're going to start to put them under the microscope. You're going to start to see the mistakes that are embedded in the way of seeing the world, in this, what we call the muskal rishon. Yeah, like the examination, yeah? So, what should determine what is the true way of seeing every single midah? Seichel, your intellect, and halacha. Intellect will tell you that... Anger will always remove you from the purpose that you are trying to achieve. So let's take a classic example. Why does someone get angry? Because I'm so hurt by what you did to me. Why are you hurt? Because you care deeply about that person. So what do you want? To be connected to that person.

21:08 What's your anger doing? Driving you farther away from that person. So intellect will always tell you, if you're actually paying attention, that the midah, the bad midah here, that's damaging your life, if you actually examine it, it will become clear that it's damaging your life. You want kavod. What's the worst way in the world to get kavod? Being an arrogant person. Pay attention to me. Who are you actually, Mechavid? People who don't want it, right? So there's no midah that's coming from a bad place. that's actually working for you, right? By the way, that's why people work on their midahs to begin with because the midah is not working for them, right? So people come to me and they say, let's say a kapton, you guys know what a kapton is? Someone who's makbet on everything, yeah? I mean, they're very, like, strict. This is the way it has to be, right? So when they get to my office and they say, Rebbe, I'm having trouble with my roommates, right? I don't seem to have the capacity to be flexible. I don't have the capacity to just, like, let this other person have a mess in the room.

22:12 and not be, like, really frustrated by it. And by the way, that doesn't mean that you can't say respectfully to somebody, hey, you know, we all have to share this space. Can we please live in a normal, decent, human way? Yes, you can say that to a person, right? But this person's coming in and saying, I've got no friends because if it's not my way, right, it's, like, so uncomfortable for people that they detach from me, right? So if you think about it, what's the midah itself, he already recognizes on a sechah level the midah's not working. If it was working, I wouldn't be here to begin with, right? None of you would be in this year if on some level all of your midahs were working for you, right? So the fact that you're here says what? Rebbe, there's something that's not working for me here. What's not working. What was that.

22:54 Well, there is no one's midah that's working properly. not, right? That's the human condition, right? So everyone's like, you know, embarrassed to say that they've got bad midos, but why should we be embarrassed? The human condition is uncalibrated, right? Except if you're a tzaddik, then fine, right? But outside of the tzaddik, I'm using Tanya language right now, outside of the tzaddik, everybody in the world is not calibrated correctly. The benoni can behave in an inappropriate way, but his midos are all over the place, and the rosh is following his bad midos. So, you know, we're all in this boat together. I have bad midos, terrible midos. Arrogance is not truthful. Because you didn't create the mylas that you have, as we spoke about. The truth is, everything you're proud of should be attributed to God. So the whole thing, it's just possibly not true. Laziness does not have its base in reality. Because the sakana that you imagine to be true,

24:01 it's not real. The thing you fear, it's the monster in the closet. You open the closet, you turn on the light, it's not there. So why am I lazy? Well, let's say you're lazy because you're afraid. You fear of failure. Well, if you try, you may not get 100 on the test. You might not get a 40 either. Chances are you'll do in the 70s and 80s, even if you do just a basic amount of work. If you'll go to class every single day, you'll pay attention in college. the homework that the teacher assigns, right? Even if you don't put in massive amounts of. work in studying for the test, you'll probably do okay, right? But it's easier to say, I'd rather play 2K right now, right? And then cram before the final because you just don't want to confront. And that's what losers are made of, right? Why are winners winners? Winners are winners because they overcome the fear, right? Winners also have the fear. They're not stupid. Winners are playing the game understanding that there is sakana out there. But the difference is because they have an objective understanding that the sakana is not as big as it is inside of them, they're able to overcome, persevere, and succeed. Losers, the imagination is so.

25:07 big and so not based in reality that they can't get themselves to do it. Yeah. I don't even think it's about overcoming it. I think it's the paradigm shift that even, trying is success. It's not really about the success. Yeah, but everybody on some level is going to have some fear. Yeah, except for one success. Right. That's when I say overcoming. I mean overcoming that... It's not true to say that there is no sakana. It's true to challenge the sakana that you have. And then once you challenge it, you'll realize that's not as big as I thought it would be. You speak to people who are about to apologize to someone. Let's say they're doing a step nine in their lives. And they're freaking out. What is going to happen? That's why I always try to get them backgrounded in reality.

25:47 What exactly do you think is going to happen? I think they're going to tell everybody in the world this thing that I did wrong. First of all, if they already know the thing you did wrong and they haven't told everybody, they're probably not going to tell everyone now. And if they have told everybody, then it's already too late. Like, what are you worried about? Let me understand this. You're going to come make a sincere apology, and now they're going to choose to tell everybody the bad thing that you did? But it's so built up in our imagination that it's like, and this is always what happens. Okay, you had five to do. How many did you get to? I got to three. Well, why did you get to three? I couldn't find the time. I don't know. Yeah, and which was the one you left out accidentally? You know what I'm saying? Like, come on. It's all like an imagination. It's all living in this world of imagination. There's some. There's some dragon out there that if you don't face the. dragon, you're not going to actually succeed. And by the way, the catch-22 is once you face it, it's over. Because the game is that once you turn around, it's already over. And that's why Yaakov Adino had Kvitzes HaDarech when he turned around, to go back to Harabai. What happened? What does Rashi say? He was already there. Because the journey was.

26:49 to turn around. The journey wasn't actually to look for the place. The journey is to turn around. So very often, the journey is just to turn on the light and see that all those figments of your imagination, all those demons that you were thinking you can't possibly overcome, they're not real. Every great story involves a princess and a dragon. The hero is the one who faces the dragon, conquers the dragon, gets the princess. You know that. You know that the princess hides behind the dragon in your lives. So the Avodah is to recognize, that the dragon isn't real. Dragons are mythical creatures. They don't exist. That's why we make them dragons. They're not real. Face the dragon. The whole thing goes away. It's the difference between success. What was that? Yeah, everyone's got their version of it, but they're always mythical characters, right? It's never like it's some sort of werewolf or it's some sort of dragon, right? It's never like a bear, right? Why is the bear not the mythical creature that you have to conquer? Because we know we can conquer a bear. It has to be so big in our imagination for it not to be real. And the whole thing is a fairy tale, right?

27:52 Okay. There's a Medrash that it's a lion from the Medrash. You're talking about the Gemara that speaks about the lion and the Kajdash Kadashim? Mm-hmm. No, I read it in Mr. Sishan. That what. There's a guy who wants to go to Antora, so he's like, all right, so go to this city. There's a lion in between the cities. All right, fine, so we'll bring the Rebbe here. No, there's a lion outside the door and whatever. Right. Yeah, but it's all made up, right? When using your intellect, because work happens in the mind, right? It doesn't just happen, right? It's not a behavioral model of psychology. It's a cognitive behavioral model, right? So the work in your mind, when you start to really think deeply and clarify what these midos are, so then what are you going to do? You're going to examine these pictures that you have inside of you, and you're going to start to understand how this story that you have inside of you, this picture that you have inside of you, is coming to interpret these actions, and this is what I need to do. Take, for example, the person that's operating out of fear, right? What's the fear? What's the fear doing, right? I have a story in my heart, and the story says you are incapable of confrontation, right? And now something happened.

29:20 So what's going to start to happen? My fear of confrontation is going to determine that their activity was aggressive. Perhaps it wasn't, right? But I'm going to interpret it as aggressive. Why? So that the aggressive behavior, right, it now gives me license to pull back. But all of that was happening where? Inside of yourself. None of it was real, right? If you would actually ask yourself, wait a second, was that person being aggressive, or was that my fear interpreting their action? Because we all think we live in the objective reality, and none of us do. ומלכם הציורים המותיים יבער עשיך הציורים הנכונים. קצת להגיב על מה לשוף. So what do we want to replace it with? More accurate depictions of what's going on in the world. That's the only thing that makes sense, right? So if you know about yourself, for example, that you have the fear of confrontation, right? And now you're going to confront someone, what would be the story you would want to tell yourself? Well, what are my objectives in this conversation? What should I be striving for? I should be striving for a peaceful solution. I have the capacity to hear somebody else's criticism and to be able to criticize in turn,

30:24 to be able to arrive at a space of peace. So what story do you have to tell yourself to get there? I am capable of doing that. It changes the way you behave. So think about the thing you don't want to do. Here, Nachi likes some homework. Think about the thing you don't want to do. Think about the story that you're telling yourself, that's giving you license not to do it. Right? Then challenge that story. Ask yourself, is the story real? If the story is not real and you've come to that determination, I'll give you a hint, spoiler alert, it's not real. Right? If the story is not real, what story would you want to say in its place? And then put that into action. So the story is, I'll make up a story, right? The story is that my roommate's actually been doing something that bothers me since Elul, right? And now there's, you know, a week left to Yeshiva. The story I've been telling myself is this person will never listen to any Muslim. There's no way they're going to be a Macabre from me, right? So it doesn't matter what I say, they're not going to listen to me. Then you check yourself and you say, wait a second. Okay, but it really bothers me when they do this. I've never confronted them, right? What is the fear of confrontation?

31:33 Is the fear of confrontation just in them, or is that fear of confrontation in me? You come to the recognition, yeah, but I probably could have said something politely, right? And even if he wouldn't have listened to me, maybe it would have gotten better in degrees. At least I would have been able to register some displeasure. There's value in that level of communication sometimes, right? So what story should I need, what I need to tell myself? First of all, this person's not a Rasha. Maybe this person is a person who's... Looking for the opportunity to, you know, to hear some criticism. For all I know, I don't know what's going on inside of them. Maybe if I said it with a soft start and a gentle tone, maybe they would be more willing to listen. Maybe if I was more compassionate towards understanding their humanity, they would be willing to listen. Maybe I need a bit of courage, right? Retell the story, then act from the place of the new story. You hear? so what happens as you do this.

32:34 and you start to retell these stories to yourself and you start to become regular it becomes regular you become accustomed to the new and truer versions of the story what will happen the day will one day arrive where, you've rectified yourself where all of a sudden the stories you're telling yourself are more in line with reality you're not interpreting events anymore in an angry way right you're not seeing everything through the lens of gaiva and jealousy and anger and whatever it is right so you're more capable now of lowering the temperature, retelling the story and acting from a more genuine and authentic place. that's called ticanamidos yeah. so when a person let's say is struggling with gaiva, they see the story another way, And that's the way they really feel inside. However, up here they know the story. They know what it says in the Sfarb, but the story is different. I've read in the Safer of Arush that in Riyadh, people feel like they're not being real with themselves when they tell themselves that other story that they read.

33:39 that is supposed to be true, and they feel like they're lying to themselves. Tanya addresses that question. And Tanya has an amazing, amazing answer to that question. Tanya says, a person sometimes feels like, let's say, there's a part of them that wants to wake up for davening, and then there's the part of them that doesn't want to wake up to davening. So then they think to themselves, well, I guess the part of me that wants to daven isn't really real, because this other part of me is really, really strong. And Tanya says, if you're thinking about yourself as two souls, I'm sorry, if you're thinking about yourself as one soul, then maybe that's true, right? But if you think of yourself as two souls, nefesh ha-bohamis and nefesh ha-lokis, then it's okay to have competing voices, right? Because we understand that a person is a bifurcated entity, and he has two different mechanisms of expressing himself. So you're going to have, let's say, for example, your nefesh ha-bohamis, and your nefesh ha-bohamis is going to say, gaiva, gaiva, gaiva. You're going to have your nefesh ha-lokis that knows what it says and what it doesn't. That intellectually believes it, because the nefesh ha-lokis is in the seichel, right? But it's not like in you in the same way,

34:47 because that Nefesh HaBaham is strong, it's batokif inside of you. So you have these two voices, so you think to yourself, well, I know who I really am. I'm really the Balgaifa. But intellectually, I know that it's not true. No, no, no. It's two competing voices. One is an intellectual, Nefesh HaLukis, godly voice. The other is Nefesh HaBaham, this very strong, childlike protector that's inside of you. And those competing voices, which are both you, that's understanding that as part of the battle. So it's not not you, because you just read it in a sefer, and you know it intellectually. It's actually a very godly part of you. But a very childish, more human, more animalistic part of you wants to be a Balgaifa for whatever protective reasons that it has. And it's all designed to protect ourselves, right? Yeah? Sometimes you have intellect, and you know what you're about to do. Let's say.

35:37 You read this forum all about it, and you start questioning about... Isn't it amazing the bias that we'll have? Like you read something as clear as day, and you knew it as clear as day. Let's say you went to sleep that night, right? And you knew as clear as day, the Sefer I just read gave me this great Yitzha for getting up in the morning. I'm going to be Ms. Gabri Kairi. I'm going to get up like a lion. It's going to be awesome. Go to sleep the night before. I say Shema, and I'm like, Mamashav Kavana. Tomorrow morning, when I open my eyes, I'm going to get up like a lion. And that first scintilla of waking up inside of you, and all of a sudden, you already have to make a bracha, you have to make a berchazat. Because you're already starting to... Last night, that Moshe Sefer that I learned, maybe it didn't apply to me today. Maybe I didn't really understand it. Why? Because Yitzhar is very clever. Yitzhar knows inside of ourselves often how we justify things that we want. You could do it with anything. It's the guy in the office. It's the guy in the office who justifies the... way of being is no different, really, fundamentally, than the guy that convinces himself he doesn't need to wake up in the morning. Right? Yeah.

36:50 How do you go about a scenario where, like, you have a bad middah you've had for a while, and you have, it's sort of a, you have a reputation that you have it, and then you go to yeshiva or whatever, like, you work on it, but the people who've known you for a while, sort of, you still sort of have that same reputation, and something, and some things I think you're able to, like, outwardly, like, show it, but, like, something like arrogance or anger, stuff like that, it's sort of hard to... Yeah. Well, you know, I'm sure the Rosh is quoted in the Sikha this year, but I'll say it anyway. You know the story that Stephen Covey tells about the woman who came to him and said, I think my husband is cheating on me? Yes. Said, said, well, why, why do you think your husband's cheating on you? Because he went away to a conference. So just because a man goes away to a conference means he's cheating on you? So she says, yeah, well, that's where he met me when he was married to his first wife. right? So you can't talk your way out of a problem that you acted your way into. The only way.

37:52 out of a problem that you acted your way into is to act your way out of it, right? And that takes time, and sometimes people can't let go and you have to know that that's something in them. So for example Moshe Rabbeinu. Moshe Rabbeinu hit the rock and because of that he wasn't allowed to go into Eretz Yisrael. Well, that seems extreme, right? He shouldn't be allowed to fulfill the destiny of Klal Yisrael because he hit the rock, So one of the answers given that I very much appreciate is the answer that was given by the Lubavitcher Rebbe. He said you have to understand 40 years earlier. Moshe Rabbeinu was told to hit the rock, right? But he was told to hit the rock. He quotes the Medrash as a pedagogical move. They were slaves, right? So the only way a slave can understand is through force, right? That's where they were. They were in a very childlike place We don't educate children a three-year-old. We don't explain to them why they shouldn't stick their hand in fire We just go, don't stick your hand in fire Right? We don't have the will, Don't explain to them all the things that are going to happen. Whereas if you do that with a 16-year-old, that's inappropriate. They need a higher level of explanation. Where now it's 40 years later.

38:55 And Qal Yisrael has already died out, and the generation of the Midbar has been reborn. And Hakadosh Baruch Hu told them, speak to the rock. And Moshe Rabbeinu was insensitive, not to what Hakadosh Baruch Hu told them, but it was a pedagogical move that Moshe Rabbeinu was doing. He was saying, no, they need me to hit the rock, because the same stubbornness I see is still there. But God said, hey, if you're going to define them by who they were, then you can't be the one to lead them. Because a leader needs to clearly understand where his flock is. And Moshe Rabbeinu, again, on a small level, didn't understand where Qal Yisrael actually was. So remember, part of it, Ruvain, might be, you can't talk your way out of a problem that you acted your way into it. It might take, listen, you knew these people for 18 years beforehand, it might take another 18 years to act your way out. Your good friends will be able to see the changes. Those that can't see the changes, might be like those people in life. that are stuck with their own stuff. And don't scoop up their stuff and bring it with you because that's not your stuff. Make sense? Yes. Okay, let's keep going. So it comes out.

39:57 So what are midos? Midos are their thoughts. And therefore the Rambam put it in This is how a person should behave. So this is the basis for everything. Because if it's not for this concept then how could we ever work on ourselves? However, However, we have still not gotten to the root. even if you've gotten to all of this by the way let's review what all of this means all of this means means that you looked at the thing that wasn't working for you in your life you examined the story that you were telling yourself that brought you to that to that initial way of reacting that was messing yourself up you challenged that story, retell the story you've done all that work. still you haven't gotten to the roots why? because still even after all that where did that initial story come from? and it's still even though you're retelling the story now but that story came from somewhere that initial story that was it came from somewhere inside of you and that we have not removed we're telling ourselves a new story but what was that thing inside of you that was driving the old story?

41:35 ultimately we are a very very deep creation all of our midos are very deeply embedded in ourselves and had they not been created inside of us we wouldn't find them inside of ourselves. so Revolvi here is saying a very deep thing, creation itself created God in creation itself created bad midos why? because if you didn't have bad midos you would have no capacity for choice, So there is no human being that doesn't have bad midos. You know why? Because if you didn't have bad midos, you would do the right thing all the time. If you do the right thing all the time, what are you? You're a robot. What does God want? God wants choice. Why does God want choice? Because that's how we partner with Him in creation. That's how we make Dira B'tachtayna.

42:39 That's how we rectify our midos. So you are created with certain, natural tendencies towards bad midos. Each one of us with our own natural tendencies, right? Nature versus nurture. What does Revol be saying? Both. Nature is a part of it. But he's not saying nature like just genetics. What's he saying? He's saying much more than that. Ani Hashem, Osekol Eilech. God Himself creates bad midos. Why? It's part of free choice. Even if a person has rectified his Midos, but it's not ever really. assured. Why not? Because in the Shoresh, it's not really ever undone. What happens? Unbelievable thing. You could go 30 years of being abstinent, 30 years being sober. What happens? All of a sudden, you fall off the wagon. How'd you fall off? Because ultimately the Shoresh, the root, is still there. Why is the root there? God gave you that root. Why? Free choice. No way of getting rid of that root. Rav Yisrael Salanter wrote that when a person is young,

43:55 he has to really take musr and rectify his midos, and then when he gets to a state, when he grows up, then hopefully he'll be in a state where he can conquer his yitzer. Because as time goes on, it's possible, what's going to happen? Those bad midos will reawaken. even if you've rectified your midos you haven't gotten to the root. so that's why ultimately they're called deos we can understand the picture, the story that we tell ourselves that's within our tchum that's within our capacity to change however ultimately the root remains and a person always must be vigilant of the root which is like another. another way to look at this you need to have that. Chazal say when does a person's taivas nashim start to diminish