Alei Shur - 3

3:00 whoa, you can't learn about the Tzarmidos from a Sefer? Isn't that what happens in the world of yeshivas? People sit down and they learn Tzvarim, and that's how they learn themselves? No. We'll see. We'll see what he says. In order to create a strong foundation for this approach, the approach of Aleishore, the approach that you're not going to be able to learn yourself from a Sefer, let's begin with this famous Vilna Gaon in Mishlei. The Gaon in Mishlei says as follows. What does it mean, somebody who walks straight and fears G-d? Every person needs to walk in the way that is uniquely designed for them. It's their need. Because no two people are alike. We do different Averahs. I do my Averahs, you do your Averahs.

4:16 But my Averahs are coming from a place in me. And your Averahs are coming from a place in you. So let's say I come to you and I say to you, you did this Averah, you know it's interesting, I do the same Averah. So you know what I did to protect myself from this Averah? I did this. So you... Talmud of Berg should do the same thing. What's the problem? The problem is that your Avera is not necessarily coming from the same place that my Avera is coming from and. Because our Avera is coming from two separate places, For you to work on yourself the way that I worked on myself doesn't make any sense. For example, Let's say my Avera is coming from a lack of self-esteem, But your Avera is coming from anxiety, So if I tell if I tell you you should work on your self-esteem, And the guy starts working on his self-esteem, but he doesn't have self-esteem issues, So it doesn't make any sense and now he's not doing the Avera and what does the Rebbe tell him? You got to try harder. You really just got to try I see that you're not doing the work because if you're doing the work it would have worked out already.

5:22 It's like it's like when it's like when a fly is going as hard as it can against the glass window You ever see that the fly is trying to get outside and it's going as hard as it can, Right in Sekilu you have this motivating Rebbe on the side going if you'll just try harder. No, there's a glass window there, Sometimes you have to just go around, you have to realize it's not for you. So a Rebbe can come, I know this is like the anti-Rebbe schmooze, right? A Rebbe can come and they could say, do it like this because that's how I did it. Maybe, but maybe not. What's one got to do with the other? I'll tell you my favorite marshal in the entire world. I heard this marshal many years ago from Rabbi Dr. Levitz. How many of you have heard Rabbi Dr. Levitz before? Rabbi Dr. Levitz was a Talmudic of Iran color, he was a Talmudic of Saloveychik. Now he's retired, but he was one of the preeminent psychologists. Have you heard of Dr. Levitz? One of the preeminent psychologists in the Jewish world. And he said the following marshal. And it's a true story. He said a woman came to his office and she said,

6:25 I need you to see my son. My son has lost his mind. All he wants to do is play with purses. Yes, for those who are already, I want the truth, you've heard this marshal before. You heard it afterwards. Okay. You have to help my son, he's obsessed with purses. So Dr. Levitz said, okay, that's interesting. He doesn't even want to get married. He's 25 years old and he doesn't want to get married. He just wants to play with his purses all day. Will you please see my son? He says, okay, I'll see your son. 25 year old young man comes into Dr. Levitz's office. Dr. Levitz wants to do what's called joining with him. Right, whenever you sit down with a client, the first thing you want to do, you want to join with them. Make sure they feel comfortable. So he says to this young man, he goes, your mother tells me you like purses. Young man leans forward and he goes, I love purses. Dr. Levitz says, what do you like to do with them? He said, I like to line them up in different shapes, different sizes. I like to put things in. I like to take them out. I like to rub them against my face. He's going on a whole arichos of what he likes to do with his purses. Dr. Levitz says, your mother tells me you don't want to get married.

7:27 The guy smiles and he says, why should I want to get married? A person gets married for companionship. I have all the companionship I need for my purses. Plus, I have no Shalom bias issues in my purses. Yeah? They cost me much less than a wife. You start thinking about it, by the way, right? Some of you are going, doesn't sound so crazy, right? I see Shalom agrees with me. Yeah? Doesn't sound so crazy. Now listen, just to make you guys aware, it happens to be it's a very big storm coming. And it's supposed to be like 90 mile an hour winds. So that's the wind you're hearing. We just got to close it. Because the windows are open and cracked. OK, so we'll close it a little bit. Yeah, b'ezer Hashem, everyone should be safe and everyone should be OK. Thank you, Alisha, for taking care of that. I appreciate your service. Now. So, Dr. Levitz looks at the audience. He pauses the story at this point. He looks at the audience. I was in the audience that day. He looks at the audience and he says, ìSo, who had the problem? The mother or the son?î So, it was amazing. In the audience, there were all these.

8:37 Rabbanim and there were these old school Rabbanim and then there were like the younger crowd. I was in the younger crowd and this is many years ago and many pounds ago. Itís not nice to laugh at that joke, yeah? So, the old school Rabbanim all said the son because heís obsessed with purses. And all the younger Rabbanim, like you guys, said the mother. And Dr. Levitz agreed with the younger Rabbanim and he said, ìExactly. Itís the mother that has the problem.î. And you should have seen these old school Rabbanim up in arms. It was the cutest thing in the world. They were like, but what do you mean? Don't you have to pull him in and like grab him by the shoulders and say to him, you're spending your life playing with purses. So Dr. Levitt smiles at them and he says, okay, let's play it out. How's that going to go down.

9:28 You're just like his mother. What was that. You're just like his mother. For sure. For sure he's just like his mother. He said, how's it going to go down? You have a problem with purses. No, I don't. Now what? What's the next part of the conversation? Yes, you do. No, I don't. It's going to get stupid. Right? So at some point, one of them goes, well, you don't have to help him anymore. It's so silly. He didn't have a problem because he didn't recognize it as a problem. So Dr. Levitt said, I can't help you if it's not your problem. So he said to him, so what are you doing here in my office? So the young man said to Dr. Levitt, oh, you have to help me with my mother. She's driving me crazy.

10:02 So he said, okay. And that's what they worked on in therapy. You should have seen these older men. They were going crazy. You worked with him in therapy on his relationship with his mother? He's obsessed with purses. He's not a Klee. You're right. But it doesn't matter. I can't come to a Talmud and say, this is what a Talmud should do if he doesn't have a problem. And even if he does have a problem, his problem is not the same as my problem. There's arrogance to thinking that all people are the same. It's arrogant from the part of Rebbe. And then, by the way, don't take this the wrong way, but I hear guys all the time tell it to me,

10:34 Rebbe, I gave him such good advice. I gave him such good advice. You know, we clap our hands. You know what that means? It means advice is bad. Why? Not because advice can't be a currency of support, but because a guy came to you and you said, oh, when I was dealing with this, this is what I did. So what? You don't know what's going on. You don't know what's driving it. So the Graham Mishle is saying something unbelievable. You have to deal with the person as they are, not as you are. And don't look at, and by the way, and vice versa, don't look at another person and say, you know, I saw that when Polonyi was working on this problem, this is what he did and it worked. for him. No, in our world of Dasa, of Yiddias Atsmenu that we're trying to get a hold of here in Alishore, it's going to be about what's driving my Avera and then coming with a Tikkun on that. You hear the difference? It's a fundamentally different way of looking at it. So just, Yoko, I'll get to you in one second. Just together, first thing in homework to think about for this week. What are my Averas? What are the things that are driving my Averas? What are the midos? What are the fears? What are the anxieties? What are the inner negative beliefs?

11:41 Whatever they are, what are the things I need to be thinking about that somebody could look from the outside and go, oh, it's just this, but really in myself, I know it's coming from that. Yeah, Yoko. Does that still mean that there's a certain level of if you can find the root of the problem than other scenarios? I'll tell you the truth. I don't even know that that's true. Even if you and I, let's say, were both suffering from self-esteem problems, and even if it worked for me, I'm not convinced that it would work for you. It might be, again, it might be a currency of support. Like a baseline, not the exact. Right. But it should come with that, right? Yeah. It should come with that. In other words, when a Rebbi sits down with a Talmud, or when a friend sits down with a friend, it should come with, let's first recognize that we're two different people with two different life experiences. You're asking me what I did in that situation, I'm happy to share. But it's much more valuable to help someone on their own discover what they think would work for them.

12:42 Shlomo? So if you see that someone's doing something, let's say a friend's doing something that you don't agree with, and you shouldn't tell them you're doing it wrong, you should ask. That's a little too psychology even for me, right? That's like, how does that make you feel? You know, like the classic guy that walks into a therapist's office and goes, I'm really dealing with anger, like I have tremendous anger. And how does that make you feel? Angry, you know, at you right now for asking such a dumb question. Actually, one of the therapists that I respect probably the most in the world, he'll never say how does that make you feel, right? Because, first of all, it's so cliche. Second of all, he says it's such a bad question, right? Most people, A, have already told you how they feel.

13:25 And, B, the question that he asks, which I think is much more rich and much more powerful, is he says, what was that like for you? Right? Because then you get like a much richer type of experience. So, no, we're not looking to go over to people and say, how does that make you feel? I do think this. I think that if somebody is a friend and you see them doing things that you're like, ooh, that's not the best version of themselves because you care about them. There might be value in sitting down with them as a friend, but what would that look like? It won't look like, listen, I see you're doing this and you need to do this, right? We're not doctors prescribing things, right? It might be because we're a friend that we sit down with our friends and we say, you know, I'm really noticing, in a compassionate way, I'm noticing that, like, you seem to be struggling with this. And then you just leave it open-ended. And if they go, no, I'm, honestly, I'm kind of happy. I'm not really struggling with that. And you might know they're lying to themselves, right? But then it becomes, they don't have an issue. We can't make people have an issue that they don't have, right? We can, you know, as a friend, we could say, I think it's something you should think about.

14:32 But we're, we can only deal with somebody who's honest enough to say, yeah, I have an issue. So if they don't think they have an issue, then they can never really work. Isn't that the way it goes? The only thing I can tell you, though, and this is the good news, is that if they have an issue that they're not willing to recognize, life is going to teach them that they have an issue. So I was very blessed to my Shana Aleph, I have a very good friend whose name is Rabbi Asher Klein. I don't know if any of you guys know him, he's from the Five Towns. Rabbi Asher Klein was in high school with me, he was in B'Assarit with me, and there was something that I was doing that was not the best thing. And he pulled me aside in my Shana Aleph, and he said to me, I think we need to talk. I said, about what?

15:13 He said, about this thing. The first thing I tried to do was I tried to deflect, I was like, no, it's not really like that, and he goes, stop, come on, you're bigger than that. And I was like, yeah, you're right, I do have an issue with that. He said, why don't you go speak to Rabbi Waldman about it? I said, you're right, and I did. I did. He was a good friend and I, Baruch Hashem, was in a good enough place that I was able to ask for help. And he was smart enough, by the way, if you think about that, to say not I can help you, but go to a rabbi who knows a little bit more. Rabbi Waldman was like our resident like psychologist slash rabbi. And Baruch Hashem, he helped me through. it. But yeah, if somebody says, no, I don't have that issue, it's not really much you're going to be able to do for them in life. Their life is going well. They don't have a problem. Paul Yacob, you have a question. Yeah. Maybe we should don't give advice, but ask directly, like sort of ask directly questions where they can come to that conclusion on their own.

16:05 If they do. If they do. Let's say Ellie had an issue, right? I mean, I love Ellie. If I saw Ellie had an issue, I would pull Ellie in and I would say, Ellie, it seems to me like you're struggling with this issue. Ellie would turn to me and either go, you're right, I am struggling with this issue. I'd like some help. Or he'll say to me, no, I'm good. And if he says to me, no, I'm good, then at that point as a rabbi, I would say to him, I really hear that. If it stops working for you, let me know. You know what I'm saying? But the last thing I'm going to do is beat him over the head with it, right? Does that make sense? A young man, many years ago in yeshiva, struggling with a certain hashkaphic issue. And the hashkaphic issue, his parents saw the world one way, he saw the world a little bit different, and he wanted to make this choice in his life, whatever that choice was, based on the way he saw the world. His parents saw the world very differently. And he came to me, he said, what should I do? My parents want me to do this, because this is their world view. I want to do that, because this is my world view. What should I do? So what didn't I do? I definitely didn't tell him what to do.

17:08 But I'd much rather help the person figure out what's really going on inside of them. His gether has to be different than my gether. No two people are created equal. OK? OK. Yeah. Because what I can help a person do and what we can help each other do as friends is we can help them build the road, right? They've gotten to a point, if somebody comes for help, right? They've gotten to a point where they've run out of road, right? It's just, you know, there's just empty desert and it's rocky terrain. The way we help people build that road is by asking them clarifying questions, right? And those clarifying questions open up, right? Every question is a little bit more road, right? What would it mean to you to make that decision, right? You build a little bit more road. But more than that, it actually teaches a person how to get the answers themselves, right?

17:56 If you tell a person what to do, you're chopping their legs off. If you help them build that road, they're learning massive amounts about themselves while they're going through the process. Now the process of being stuck in that struggle is actually empowering. You know the difference? It's an amazing thing. Elliot. Sir, based on this, what would you say is your opinion on motivational speakers. Don't get me started. I think it's great to go to a sheer where you're motivated and you walk out and you're like, that was really, really great and it makes me want to go diving. And you know how long that's going to last? A day. Maximum. Maximum. I find that sometimes it gets me through one minion. I can't even get through the day. One minion. Now it might have been worth it just for that one minion. The real value of a motivational speaker is, should be, two things.

18:45 Number one, that I do recognize about myself that I have that excitement inside of me. And two, that it gets me to do the actual work. Here's a big mistake, a common misconception. People say inspiration never lasts. That is not true. Inspiration lasts forever. Excitement doesn't last. The difference between excitement and inspiration is education. Excitement is when you're part of this great massive and everybody's doing it together. That's exciting. Right? But it's not inspiring. Inspiring is, I understand the value of this. You understand? So, hopefully, a motivational speech, and it's often not this way, but hopefully a motivational speech, or a sheer for that matter, is something that makes you think, and it's something that teaches you something that you never knew before. So, one of the things that I very much dislike is when you have those who obey him, that they're really inspiring, but they're inspiring because of their volume. You know what I'm saying? They're speaking really loudly. Right? They're speaking really dynamically. But the content, if you actually start to break it down, it doesn't really make any sense. That's number one.

19:47 And even if it does make sense, if it made so much sense, why are they shouting it, right? Chazal say, divrei chachamim benachas nishman. And I'm not saying that every once in a while it's not good to have a rebbe who gets up there and goes firing brimstone. But you should know the talmidim on the other end of that, and again, this is just one man's opinion. The talmidim on the other end of that, even if it's like exciting, it often long term will leave a person feeling debilitated. They don't know what to do without it. And you hear it all the time in yeshiva, guys are like, how come the rebbe, just don't roast us, just tell us. You can't, you're not smart enough to hear things in a gentle way, in a normal way that it could change you. You don't need to be roasted in order to do that. You know what I'm saying? Okay, weiter. So what does it mean when the passage says, הולך בישר, it means, בדרך הישר שלו, walk your path, don't walk somebody else's path. אַת־בֹּבִי שֶׁבָּעֵּנֵי אַבְרִיָּוֹס הוּרָאָקִי אֶנֶם יְהוּדְם זֶה שְׁעוּצָרָךָ Even if the rest of the world is saying, I think you're making a mistake. Have the conviction and have the courage to say, I know myself, I have to do me.

20:52 וַאַפָּפִּי כֵּן הוּלך בישר, הוּא יָרֵי אַשֶׁם You want to know who the person who fears God is? The one who is confident enough to do Him. I know this is my path, I know my aveira, I know what I need in order to fix it, I'm walking my path. Now it's fascinating. What does the Pesach in Mishlei say? You fear God if you do that. Because if you don't do that, let's say Jeremy and I are having a conversation. Let's say I'm being an abusive rabbi, chas v'shalom. And I tell Jeremy, listen Jeremy, this is what you got to do. And let's say Jeremy is being honest with himself, and I really don't.

21:23 And let's say I go around, terrible rabbi that I am, and I tell her of Isaacson, and I tell her of Lovi, and I tell her of Levi, and I tell her of Nir, koski. I don't know, man. I told him this is what he needs to do and he's just not listening to me. Let's ask God to trash him around in Yeshiva. You know, Kaski, there's going to be a part of him that says, maybe I'm lying to myself and I should just, like, listen to Rav Berg. And maybe he's getting pressure from Malevian, maybe he's getting pressure from Malevian, pressure from Rav Nir, right? If you fear me, that's the way you think. If you fear God, you listen to your own voice. The voice of God is deep within all of us. If you fear God, you'll listen to that voice with conviction and with courage. Just because a rabbi disagrees with the decision that you are making doesn't mean that the rabbi is right. It doesn't mean the rabbi is wrong, but it doesn't mean the rabbi is right. Fair? Okay. Now, Revolbi is going to explain, a little too close to home, Revolbi is going to explain what this groan Mishle means. Ma ma'od rochach mizzeh ha'od, ma mitzah be'chum, ma yis'v rak la'askam avet'hi lamei a'cherem. How far are people that are just looking for the approval of others?

22:29 And, and, and by the way, that's on some level, that's all of us. That's all of us, until you reach a certain age, right? You reach a certain, as we get older, it's true, we care about that a little bit less. I, I feel bad, Mr. Schrodinger, I'm calling, you're the only other guy in the room that's but it's true. When you, when, when I was young, the thing I cared about most in the world was what people thought of me. You get a little bit older, you care a little bit less. Do I, do I care not at all? Of course I care. And do I, can I honestly say to you that I care only in the most healthy way? It's not true, that wouldn't be true. That wouldn't be true. But yeah, but I'm still working on that balance. You reach a certain age and you're like, I really don't care what anybody thinks. At this point, I've got, you know, less years than, than more years. I really don't care. I see it as people get older. What was that.

23:11 I don't know, sometimes it is and sometimes it isn't. If they're doing it inappropriately, then I hear that. But like, Rabbi, you know Rabbi Tversky, Rabbi Abraham J. Tversky? He wrote a, he's written many, many, many books. So he wrote one when he was like 80 years old, and he basically said, here's what I really think. And everyone was kind of like, oh, I can't wait to read this, you know? There are people that have the courage to just get up there and they don't really care what anybody thinks about them, they're just going to do it. With Malinowicz, the Rav of Beis Tvilo, where of Isaacson, Bavins, he could care less what anybody thinks. He just gives it to you straight. By the way, whether. you agree with him or disagree with him, it doesn't matter. He's not looking for the approval of others. How many people from their bosses, from their friends, from their spouses, from their children, from their, tell me them. I want right now to be very, I want the Troings to walk out of this year and I want them to go, Berg. Of course I do. But you have to know yourself enough to say, I've got to stop searching for the approval of others. Yeah, Momo.

24:08 Can you change the beginning of the line, ma'am, ma'od rachok. Yeah, how far? Ma'od rachok. From the content we saw before. Yeah, meaning if you're, we're talking about having the conviction and the courage to follow your own path. Come on, we're all looking for the approval of others. So this is going to be step number two for the homework for this week. Where is your approval seeking? Who are the people in your life that you really, really want them to go, yeah, you're awesome? Who are the people in your life? Yeah, what are the scenarios, right? I'm in yeshiva, I want Rav Berg and Rav Isaacson to think I'm awesome. I want my rabbi to think I'm the top guy in shir. I want my friends to think I'm the nicest guy, right? What are those biases, right? We're all working on clearing these biases. What are the biases, right? Seeking the approval of others is quite a large bias. Is it a bad motivation? Saying like, can't that be helpful? You know, somebody asked me a question years ago. It's a great question. They said, you know, we speak a lot in yeshiva about narcissism. But some of the most incredible things to be done in the world were done from a place of narcissism, right? If you read the Steve Jobs biography that was written by Walter Isaacson.

25:21 You'll see he had some real issues that man, and yet he revolutionized the entire world. So is it so bad? Yeah. I would love for all of us to have the gift in our lives of being able to do amazing things from a place that's not debilitating on an internal level. Right? So being a CEO means having a tremendous amount of confidence, but confidence doesn't mean the same thing as narcissism. Ultimately, if you have that narcissism, let's say, and I'll go to your example in a second, let's say if you have that narcissism, you built something astronomical, but you destroyed the person. Right? A person who's doing something to seek the approval of others. I think they say the whole Facebook movie was built on that. Right? Zuckerberg built all of Facebook because he had this crush on this girl. Right? And at the end of the movie, he's like... And he's just refreshing. Right. So I've seen that clip. So... What's the shot on that? Build something awesome, but can you build it from a healthy place? I think the difference between leadership that's healthy versus leadership that's not healthy,

26:26 and this is not a statement about politics in any way, but it happens to be the state of politics today, is when you have these deeply flawed, unaware, narcissistic people and then they manage to rise to heights because of those dysfunctional sort of internal ways of being that they have. We're going to have the type of dialogue that we have today in the world. So there's a lot of bad outcome from that. Yeah. Is one who changes his behavior uncertain that he will sign up. That's a great question. Yes and no, right? It definitely is to some degree, and I think we all know that intuitively. But sometimes we have to know that changing our behavior would be appropriate, right? In other words, I'm happy to joke around with my friends, right? But in my world, my Rebbe is like, you know, he is the guiding light in my life.

27:29 I'm not joking around with my Rebbe. And that's not because I'm trying to seek his approval, right? I'm not saying that there isn't that element in my life that I've wanted to seek his approval, because there definitely has been. But the notion that I would joke around with him like I would joke around with some of my friends, it's far, right? Like, I would put my hand around my friends. I would not touch my Rebbe. I wouldn't touch my Rebbe. When my Rebbe came to give me a hug when I left to Eretz Israel, It was not uncomfortable in a sense, it was very loving, but I couldn't bring myself to hug him back. I wouldn't have had that. It was like I received his hug and with the appropriate modesty and humility, I hope, I showed him that I loved him for giving me that hug. But I wouldn't touch my rabbi. And I see people all the time going over like, Nachi, forgive me for doing this, but this move of like, yo rabbi, yikes, yikes, you know what I'm saying? Like, I don't do that.

28:33 So that's not approval seeking, that's appropriate. You have to know for yourself, you'll figure out what the balance is, right? And that's part of being mindful and aware of who you are. Like if I'm with this crowd of friends and I act one way, and I'm with this crowd of friends and I act a different way, you have to ask yourself at least the question, am I doing that because, or is that what's appropriate in this scenario, right? These are not people that would respect people who acted that way, and so I'm just being respectful by being around them in that way, right? A little bit different. Yeah. Yeah, again, I think that's where really knowing yourself is going to come into play, right. Because obviously we don't want people to think negative things about us. We're not interested in people thinking, you know, I'm a mean person. But there's probably a deep part of you also that authentically wants to be a respectable person who treats others with, you know, compassion and kindness, right? So the question is more, can it be coming from that place and can I be working on this other place? Whatever gadarum that other place needs. Yeah, Ellie.

29:41 Well, isn't it kind of like true happiness in terms of Miles' thing? Isn't it kind of like that true happiness is the courage, like it's a book, but it's a courage to be disliked. Like the courage to just continue on being you instead of having everyone else, instead of changing yourself based on how you want others to perceive you in these certain contexts. Chazal say that what makes a Jew a Jew is rachmanim, bayshanim, and gom l'chassadim. Right, we're merciful, we do chesed for others, but we're bayshanim. What does it mean to be a bayshan? What does it mean to be a bayshan? Busha, literally, I guess, would be translated as embarrassed. Does that mean that Jews are walking around embarrassed? Chas to shalom. I think what a bayshan means is that a person is saying to themselves, this is... This is an uncomfortable behavior, right? So, there's a difference between having integrity, which I think is what you're talking about, right, and having the conviction to live with that integrity, which is...

30:39 It's his opinion no matter what. Right, and I think that's awesome, right? But I think there's something off about a person that just says, well, I don't care if I'm disliked or not, so I'm just going to do whatever I want. I think that person probably needs maybe a larger experience to inform them that the way they're behaving is inappropriate, right? Today, I think the notion that you're talking about has been very destructive, right? Because I don't think that it's coming from a place of integrity. I think that for most people it's coming from the opposite. So, for example, the notion, right, of like, I'll do whatever I want in public and I don't care what people think of me is not sneas. It's not sneas. Who says that you should be able to just live your life without thinking about, you know, getting that critical feedback of, ugh. But if it's coming from a place of integrity. From a place of integrity, Eli, I'll have the courage to share with you that I think a lot of people are unaware.

31:42 So what they think is integrity is really just a lack of awareness slash this world that we live in that lacks boundaries, right? It's not an accident. And again, again, this is not a statement of politics. It is not an accident that the biggest political discussion that's happening in the world today is about walls. It's not an accident. We have spent the last 80 years of history tearing down the moral fabric of society. It makes sense that it was going to manifest itself in physical walls, right? And it makes sense that people that have more old-school values are saying, we need to have strong boundaries. And people who have this, like, new way of seeing the world are going, like, why should there be any notion of boundaries? It makes sense. It's the logical conclusion of what people have been saying on a moral level, right? If there's no such thing as marriage, why should there be such a thing as country? Do you ever think about that? Why should there be such a thing as country? Why is this line in the sand any different from that line in the sand? Why am I less responsible to the person in Mexico than I am to the person in America? And by the way, that's not an excuse at all for any racist rhetoric.

32:47 I'm just saying we've always understood on a basic level that there's such a thing as this is our country and there has to be rules that govern that country. It makes sense that people are trying to, you know, say we shouldn't have physical barriers when for years they've been saying we shouldn't have any moral barriers. Does that make sense? Okay, weiter. There are people in their lives that what are they ready to do? They're ready to do what everyone else is doing. And here's again, hard thing to hear guys, but it's true. Yeah, meaning in this case doesn't mean to wait. It means like, yeah, there there's a there's a vision sometimes in yeshiva. I'm gonna be the best in yeshiva. I'm ready to do it. Why? Because everyone's doing it. Everyone's doing it. So I'm gonna do it. guys That's Something off about that. The guy next to you in yeshiva is shtaiging. Great. What's that got to do with you? But Rebbe, isn't there such a thing? I know some of you guys in your head were thinking about the Gemara, But isn't there such a thing as kinasei from Tarb al-Khahmah that I'm jealous of the person next to me that I want to do better?

33:53 Great, for sure. I want to tell you a true story. This will probably be the last thing I teach you today. Young man in Mevaseret, 20 years ago, comes to Mubasarah with intention of I'm gonna do something great with my year in Israel. And he's looking around in yeshiva and there are guys that are doing good guys that are doing good and there are guys that are doing less good and like many young men what does he start thinking. well maybe if I was in an environment where people were doing more right so then I would do more so he starts to consider checking out a different yeshiva. I won't tell you the name of the yeshiva a different yeshiva was known as the flip out yeshiva back in the day okay, it doesn't matter what it was this is the flip out yeshiva, so he needs to get some space from Mubasarah he needs to get some clarity, so Rav Shechter from YU was going to Shalvim for Shabbos and this young man had friends in.

34:56 Shalvim for Shabbos so he says I'm going to go to Shalvim for Shabbos this way I could talk to my Shalvim friends and I could decide what I want to do okay. goes to Shalvin for Shabbos and he's talking with one of his friends and he says I'm thinking about switching to X yeshiva because I feel like in that yeshiva the guys are like flipping out left and right and I want to be I want to be a flip out I want to be one of those flip outs. So this friend says you know there's a guy from that yeshiva who's shun a bet in that yeshiva who's here right now for Shabbos. Really cool guy maybe you should go speak to him.

35:27 That's a great idea. He sits down with this guy and he says to him the whole thing you know I'm, I feel like some guys are doing well and some guys are not doing well but I feel like maybe if I was in a better environment where people are flipping out and this this guy from this yeshiva is nodding smiling the entire time and he goes I hear you and then at the end he goes I really don't think you should switch. The guy was shocked. What do you mean? Aren't you shun a bet in that yeshiva? Aren't you one of like the flip outs? Aren't you one of the guys like I should be looking up to? He goes look I'm going to be honest with you. In our yeshiva it's true a lot of people flip out. You know why they flip out? Because a lot of people in our. yeshiva flip out. I said, so what happens? On the outside, it looks like they're bench pressing 200 pounds, but they're not really building any muscle because it's all the spotter. He said, in Mivassara, it's true, Mivassara was known for this even back then. Not everybody will do it, but the guys that do, do it for real. So he said, look, if you really don't think you can do it without a spotter, then fine, but you chose Mivassara, do it. Be real in Mivassara. So I left Shalvim that Shabbos.

36:35 I left Shalvim that Shabbos, I came back to Mivassara, and that was when I got serious in yeshiva. Because this guy, who by the way went on to become Pritikosh of Arav, said to me, stop lying to yourself. Don't do it because everybody else is doing it, do it because you want to do it. And the craziest thing happened. Once I made that decision, I opened up my eyes and I realized. People were doing a lot better than I gave them credit for, and here was the worst part. They were doing a lot better than me. So here I was being this judgmental Shana Aleph guy saying guys aren't doing it. So I remember, it was like a Sunday when I came back, I said to Rabbi David Einhorn, who was my chavrusa, I said to Rabbi Einhorn, I was like, yeah I'm going to get into it now, but like, like, I don't know if, I don't know, like I feel like I have to just ignore the fact that people aren't doing it around me. And I'll never forget what he said to me. He goes, I don't see you here post night seder. So I said, what's post night seder? Not even lying. He goes, do you know there are guys in the space medrash till.

37:37 like 11 30 every night? I said, really? He said, yeah. So that night I stayed in the beis medrash till 1 30 in the morning, and I didn't wake up for shachars the next day. So my medrash, Shalom Sklar, today is Chashu V'Rav as well, he said, I noticed you in the beis medrash at 1 30 in the morning. I didn't say anything to you because I wanted you to make that mistake. So he said, don't make that mistake again. After that, I didn't leave the Beis medrash after 11.30. 11.30 was the latest, because I knew myself. You should know, the second I stopped focusing on others. and just trying to do it because other people were doing it, that's when it really got started. That's the avodah. Don't spend this year or any year of your life trying to people please. People please comes from a deep place of a lack of godliness inside of yourself. It comes from a place of, I'm not enough for myself, so I need to have you tell me and confirm for me that I'm OK. You're OK. You're okay. But until you get in touch with the godly part of you, you're not going to be okay. Know what I mean? And if you don't know what I mean, that's okay, too.

38:42 As the G-d explained, somebody who's holy, he walks in his way, he knows himself, he's going to make boundaries for himself to save himself. And he's going to be strong in those boundaries. Even when other people don't like it. Doesn't matter if people like it or not. When you stop trying to get other people to say, yeah, it's good, then you're a Yarei Shamayim. And by the way, even your Rebbeim. Rebbe, I just need you to understand where I'm coming from. No, you don't. You do not need me to understand where you're coming from. If you honestly believe that you're doing okay, live with that. Yeah, Menachem, last question. Alright. Yes. We have to be smart enough to know that we don't know everything, right.

39:53 And confident enough to listen to our own voice. So if my Rebbe would tell me, Mordechai, think about what you're doing, you better believe I'm going to sit Zion Nakiam on that. I'm going to spend an entire week thinking about what my Rebbe said. I will share with you that there was something in my life, I'm not going to get into the details of it, that I had made a decision I wasn't going to do. And I was getting a lot of pressure to do it from a lot of outside sources. And I wasn't listening to any of them. And then my Rebbe sat me down and he said to me, I know and appreciate the way you feel right now, but in 20 years from now, you're not going to appreciate what you're doing. And it shook me to my core because my Rebbe did not speak to me like that. As Ruparnas was known not to give advice, it shook me to my core. I stopped and I said, Rebbe, I'm really going to think about what you said. I did, and I came to a very painful conclusion that I was wrong and he was right.

40:57 I didn't want to see that he was right because of my own bias. Baruch Hashem, I listened to him. It's now 18 years after that decision, I shudder to think what would have happened if I wasn't smart enough to respect my Rebbe and to check myself and to realize I wasn't acting with integrity. I could have hurt someone very badly. Baruch Hashem, I didn't, but I could have. You have to know that when smart people, Menachem, I'll speak directly to you. If Revlapyansky tells you... Do something. You've got to be smart enough to know I'm privileged to have a relationship with Rev. Biansky. I'm not saying you have to listen. I'm saying you should listen. And then make your decision. Okay? All right, Rebosa, we'll stop here for today.