Parshas Toldos - Dare to Dream

2:38 We would go every summer to Cape Cod, Massachusetts. We lived in New York. We would go to Cape Cod. So people would say to my father, "How long is the drive?" So he would say. It depends when my wife falls asleep. If she falls asleep later, then it's longer. If she falls asleep in the beginning, we could get there in two and a half hours. At the end, when are we going to get there? We'll get there when we get there. So let Rivka wait, like every other mother in the history of the world who wonders what's going to be with her child. She has to run to Yeshiva Shem Ve'Ever to say Matheh Besofa. Second question. Third question. So we know Rashi says. That she wanted to know what was going on And Rashi says they were fighting merivim benachlas shne olamos. They were fighting over two worlds.

3:30 Olam azeh and olam abah. What does that mean? The pashim shad is Esav is olam azeh, Yaakov is olam abah. Sounds very frum. They were fighting over olam azeh and olam abah. But really, what does that mean that they were fighting over olam azeh and olam abah? Another question. We believe, fundamentally and most importantly, in free choice. Without free choice, everything in Judaism falls apart. Because we're created for a mission. What's the mission? The mission is to get close to Hakadosh Baruch Hu to build this world into a dira b'tachtonim, into a dwelling place for Hashem. That means we're charged with being in a relationship. No free choice, no relationship. As one Rebbe of mine once said. It's not impressive to stay married if you can't get divorced. It's impressive to stay married if you have every opportunity in the world to get divorced and you say, 'No, I'm sticking with you,' and you're making a choice.

4:29 If you can't get divorced, what's the big deal about being married? Fundamentally, when we think about Esav He's born, or he's in his mother's womb, and already, what do we see? What are Chazal telling us? He has a propensity for avodah zarah. Then he comes out of the womb. How does the pasuk describe him? He's hairy. He's red. He's ruddy. The Gemara compares it to David, Amalek. There's a warrior inside of him. Does Esav really have free choice not to become Esav? Hear the question. Does he really have free choice not to become Esav? Have question. Sure. We learned today in Alei Shor. It's a beautiful seder. Gets his yitzharah only when he is Only when he, once he's born. How did he? Great point. Already in utero, you see, way before he was even born. You see that there's something going on. Amazing. I'm hopeful that we'll be able to answer that question as well.

5:35 You look so embarrassed after you ask an amazing question. I just asked a fun one. Should I tell you that it's a bad question? You'll feel better about it. You ever have a bad day and do something? I mean, like I forgot I'm in a seminary. With guys, it would be like no Never had a bad day. With girls, it's like every day. What do you mean? It's always hard. I see. It's an especially bad day for you. It's lonely hard. You ever like a day where you wake up in the morning and you think to yourself I have a big mission coming today. Really like I'm gonna try not to do these averas. You wanna hear about Esav's bad day? His grandfather died. Avram Avinu died. You know what the Gemara says he did on that day? Bad day. Five things he did on that day. Five things. First of all, he had relations with a Naramu Russell, a betrothed woman.

6:43 In Judaism, we have something called kedushin and nisuin, so there's a two-step process. This was a woman who was already betrothed. He cheated with someone. That was the first bad thing he did. The second bad thing he did, you see, goes in ascending order. He killed someone. Bad day. The third thing he did, he denied the existence of God. Not great. Fourth thing he did, he denied the existence of tchias ha'mesim, resurrection of the dead. Fifth thing he did is he denigrated the bechorah. He sold it for some lentils. Five bad. That's a bad day. Cheating, murder, denying God's existence, denying tchias amesim, and selling the b'chora. But a couple of questions. First of all, are these five random things? Seems like these are very specific averos. It doesn't say he ate treif, for example. It doesn't say he was mechal shabbos. These are five specific things. What's the one common thread that ties all these things together?

7:47 Question number two: Why does it say naira meurasa? Why doesn't it say he committed adultery? Why does it specifically have to be that he committed adultery with a girl who was betrothed to be married? Question number three: Three and four. What was that? I'm saying on this act on this Gemara Three. Wait, can you say number two? He has relations with a betrothed woman. Just say he committed adultery. Why does the Gemara have to tell us that the case was one where she had erisin but she didn't yet have nisuin? She was betrothed to be married. Another one. If you deny the existence of God Is it possible to conceive of tchias amesem of resurrection of the dead? Once you deny the existence of God, by definition, doesn't that mean you don't believe in Tchias Amesim anymore? So why does the Gemara split them? First, he denied the existence of God, and then only afterwards he denied the existence of Tchias Amesim. First of all, they're the same thing. Second of all, they should be in the reverse order.

8:54 And last but not least, the Gemara is clearly leading up. It starts off with he cheated, then it moves to murder, then it moves to denying the existence of God, denying the existence of Tchias Amesim, and last but not least, the worst thing he did. He denigrated the birthright by selling it for some lentils. Girls, where does that one belong on the list? That's the beginning. That is of all you know. It's like murder is bad. It's certainly not as he sold the birthright. I get it. It's like a big deal. That was your birthright. But still, that's of all those things, the least thing. I want to share with you. Something unbelievable. It's based on a remban. But the vort itself is from Rav Lapianski. You all know who Rav Lapianski is from Washington. Massive tamu chacham. This is a special vort. This is one of those vort luch that really gives you a sense of hashkafa.

9:56 When you look at Asav Says he came out asui. What does asui mean? Meaning he was done. That's who Asav was. He lives here and now And that's it. How do we think of olam hazeh and olam haba? And this is a game changer. Once you understand this, usually we think of it like this. Up until this point, this is how I would have thought of it. You have a line. That line is called time. There's the beginning, the middle And the end. In the beginning of time, olam hazeh, this world. You move on, and there's a process. Olam hazeh becomes olam haba. That's we. That's the way we ought to think about olam haba. That's the way we've always thought about olam haba. Olam haba is not up in Shamayim. Olam haba is this world as it will one day be. So if you ask yourself what's the difference between olam hazeh and olam haba, what would you say?

10:56 It's later in the time continuum. It's just the end of the process. That's how you would have thought about it. Comes along Rvlapianski and he says, "While that's true" There's a level of depth that you're missing if you think of it like that. And here's the level of depth. This is going to be the whole move for tonight's shiur. Let's make sure we all get it. Olam hazeh is the world of now. Olam haba is the world of the future. I'll explain what I mean. Take for example a child. Instead of doing it like that, I'm going to do it like this. I just realized I can do it like this. My wife is an amazing baker. As you can clearly see. It's not nice. Don't laugh at that. Now you don't know what to do. My wife is an amazing baker. Many years ago She was in the kitchen baking cookies.

12:00 And I had at the time two little daughters. Who were driving my wife crazy Stealing the chocolate chips Eating the chocolate chips, and my wife said Get out of the kitchen. Two little kids A four-year-old and a two-year-old. Get out of the kitchen. What do you do? The two-year-old was exceptionally verbal. Some kids come out and they're just like talking from the minute they're born. The two-year-old was a talker. She's two and a half years old at the time. She just talked and talked. For those of you that have met my kids, you know that he still hadn't stopped. My kids had to go do something. They had to occupy themselves because mom kicked them out of the kitchen. So they decided to play a game that kids in there at Dershow play. It's called Sadaka Collector. What is Sadaka Collector? One of them goes outside Sheepishly knocks on the door.

12:55 The other one opens it up And this one sticks out their hand and says. Can't look you in the eye and says "My daughter is getting married and I have no money." This is what we call job training, right? So I'm glad. I'm glad that my kids play that game. I'm very proud of that. It's a game that when I grew up in the five towns, we didn't play. But Baruch Hashem, raising my children in Ramat Echemesh, right next to the five towns, and we play this game called Sedek Collector. Where are you from? Brazil. You gotta speak to her of Gava. Got good Brazil stories. The so my daughter goes out. She goes outside. It's gonna be bad. And she's the two-year-old. She's gonna knock on the door. She's gonna play the duck collector. She's gonna knock on the door and the four-year-old Close the door.

13:56 But the two-year-old's thumb. Was in the crack of the door. Now you know, in America you close the door. It's like a piece of wood. But in Israel, if you close a front door Like that. I got to embellish. Make sure you all get it. So you know how it came right off. We heard her thumb fell off. I need to hear these words. Her thumb fell off. That's right. So fully off that you had to pick it up from the floor. I'll explain. So my wife heard this shrill scream. Sometimes your kids scream and it's like they scream bloody murder, and then you say, 'What happened?' And they're like, 'She pinched me, right?' This wasn't that. This was like ten notches above that. There's certain things you can tell. This was one of those things you could tell. Now I was in yeshiva. My wife She quickly runs. She grabs a towel. She's holding on to bleeding. They call her Tsalla.

15:05 My, she called my parents. My parents live in Israel. Baruch Hashem, everybody in my family made aliyah. My mother happened to be in the neighborhood. By the way, happened to be just code word for Ashkhal Chapratas, but happened to be in the neighborhood. She comes running over. She finds the thumb. She puts it on ice. Which you're not supposed to do. It turns out all the television shows lied to us. You're supposed to put it in saline solution. If it never happens, you should know that's the better thing to do. Saline solution is better than ice. I have. Now let's do a Toma Devora minute where we discuss ice versus saline solution. She calls Atella. Atella comes and they bandage it up. Now I am in a meeting. And my phone was charging outside of the office. I come out of the meeting and I've got seventeen missed phone calls, all from my wife. So I know something bad happened. I call her up. I says, "Everything okay?" She goes, "We're going to the hospital right now. You have to meet us in the hospital. I'll tell you about it." Sheer's thumb came off. I'll tell you about it when we get there. Now this part of the story, I wasn't there for, but this is just parenthetical. Has nothing to do with tonight. Sheer's just a great part of the story. The ambulance came and was being blocked by a cab.

16:19 And the cab wouldn't move because it had someone to pick up. So the ambulance driver's honking his horn, get out of the way. And this is what the Israeli cab driver did. Because in America we give you one finger, but in Israel we give you all five. Finally, the cab moves. Hi. I'm in Mevaserim. Mevaserim is right near Hadassah and Kerem. I get into the yeshiva car. I drive. I tell the yeshiva I'm out of here. My daughter's going to the hospital. I gotta run. It's an emergency. I have to take a cab. I take the yeshiva car and I zoom over to Hadassah and Kerem. I get there and run into the emergency room. I'm telling them my daughter's coming and her thumb was chopped off. They're looking at me. We deal with terrorism. We can handle this. Calm down. Finally, the ambulance pulls up. They open the back doors, and there's my daughter, my wife, and my mother.

17:15 And my daughter comes running over and she grabs me and I'm like, yeah, I'm Superman. I'm gonna take care of my daughter. I'm gonna like everything. And I rush her in and I'm like, this the one. Like this the daughter with thumb came off. And I'm like, okay, go send the waiting room. Send the waiting room. We'll get to you. Finally, after forty five minutes, I got someone to give her a Tylenol because obviously it hurts. And they said to me. One of the amazing things about living in Israel is we have the most advanced medical technology. Even just today, an article came out that they're developing a computer chip that could end up being a cure for Alzheimer's here in Israel. We have the most amazing medical technology. So the thing they said to me is First thing we need to do is get an X ray of the thumb. So I'm looking at them going, I don't think you need an X ray. You could just look.

18:03 It's not there. What exactly are you looking for here? So they said no, we need to take an X ray. We were waiting, and finally the X ray room opened up. I went in, and they put that lead sheet on you because like kryptonite, right? They put that lead sheet on you, and they put a little sheet on her two and a half year old little girl. I was holding her thumb on, and they took the picture. Finally, the X ray technician came out and said, 'Your daughter's thumb is tough.' I say Yes. I know. So they said, "Go back to the waiting room." For real. Baruch Hashem, we finally get called in. It's like three hours later, and we get called in, and they undo the bandages and they look, and sure enough, there's a bloody stump right there. And they say, "We have two options." This is the emergency doctors tell me we have two options.

18:56 Option number one is we could sew the thumb back on. Or option number two is we could just take the skin and fold it over and make like a band aid made out of skin. So I'm looking at them, and again I'm having this very puzzled look because this is Israel, great medical technology. Is there a downside to putting the thumb back on? So the doctor said, well, it might not work But even if it doesn't work, that thumb we stuck on will be a better band aid than covering over with the flaps. So I'm like, But it might work. He's like, Well, yeah. I'm like, So it might work, but it might not work. He's like, Right. So why would I not try? He's like, Well, I'm just telling you all the options. I'm like, you do not need to tell me all the options.

19:43 The option is maybe we could save the thumb. It might not work, but maybe we could. It's a better option than any other option. You could just tell me that one option, but I don't have the strength to fight with them. So I said, okay. So what do we do? They said, like this. When's the last time your daughter ate? Has she eaten within the last five hours? I said, yeah. She was eating those chocolate chips. They said, okay. Then we can't give her a general anesthesia. We'll just give her a local anesthesia. Local anesthesia means they do what they do when you get a cavity put in. So they give her a local anesthesia, and they say, this is what we're gonna do. We're gonna put her down on the bed. And you're gonna sit on her. Oh my god. While we sew the thumb back on. So I'm thinking to myself, this cannot be the best idea. But that's what the doctors are saying. So they put my beautiful little Shira on the bed, and remember, she's exceptionally verbal.

20:33 I sent my wife and my mother out of the room because I know they can't handle it, and I'm just going to lie on top of her now. She's a little girl. And so I just sat on her basically. And one of the doctors is holding her hand, and the other doctor is sewing back on herself. She doesn't know what's going on because she's a little kid. So she starts screaming. But she doesn't just cry; she's speaking, and she's saying, 'Abba, get off of me!' Abba, they're hurting me! Abba, why are you letting them hurt me? I want Ema. I want Eba. Abba, why are you letting them hurt me? Abba, get off of me. This, at the thing couldn't have been more than fifteen minutes of them sewing it back on, but it felt to me like it was hours. And at the end She refused to speak to me for an entire year.

21:25 What? I would walk into the house, and she would leave and go to another room. Today, Baruch Hashem, we have a great relationship. But for an entire year of me going over and saying, "Hey, Shira, I'm home." That's for sure. Kids do that. They like to live inside their shoulder. I don't even have the muscle strength to do it. Little kids She wouldn't talk to me for a year. As a parent, that's devastating. It makes you come home after a twelve, thirteen, fourteen-hour day of work and you're just like, "I want to see my kids and just hang out with them for a second." She runs to the other room and eventually it works. Eventually, give them enough attention. I didn't mean presence. I meant presence, not presence. Presence. You understand? It's not true. I give her stuff. Eventually, she came back. Why is that?

22:21 Because little kids only understand right here, right now. They have no concept of time. They can't imagine what time looks like. What does that mean? Later. You ever try to convince a little kid what later looks like? Charlie Harari has a great bit. It's an amazing bit about a parent that's going through the supermarket with their three-year-old child. And they wander accidentally into the cookie aisle, and the child looks up in wonderment and says to the mother, "Look what we have discovered together." And the mother The mother starts negotiating with this child. You ever see this? And the mother's in. Now we had a cookie when we got in the car, and if you behave nicely, we'll have a cookie at the end also. And the little kids like smiling, you really want to do this. Three seconds later, the kid's a temper tantrum on the floor, screaming his brains off, and he's holding like twenty things of Chips Ahoy, which his mother has bought for him. Why? Because the kid has no concept of later.

23:21 By the way, some of us are not that different. The difference between a child and an adult is that a child lives right here, right now. And an adult has the capacity to understand that the future is embedded in the now. That what's happening right now isn't just happening in a vacuum, but there's a larger story that's taking place. And sometimes as part of that story It's not going to be pleasant now, but it's okay because it's the best in the future. As the adult in the room, when my daughter was getting her thumb sewed back on, every part of my being wanted to run and just say, 'Forget it. You don't have a thumb. It'll be fine. You'll get a shit off even without a thumb, right?' But that's not the right thing to do. I wanted to ask. It's okay to ask Even though it's totally not relevant, I'll tell you that they bandaged it up at the end and they said to us, 'You have to come back in two weeks to check it.' But no matter what, do not change the bandage and don't get it wet. My wife took off of work for two weeks. She couldn't go to work because we couldn't let it get wet.

24:24 Two weeks later, we had scheduled three appointments: one in Hadassah with the doctors, another one in Beit Shemesh, and another one in Jerusalem with the hand specialists. The first doctor that we went to in Beit Shemesh took off the thumb, and it was necrotic. It had died. It didn't take. So the doctor said to us "It's necrotic. I'm going to have to amputate it, but it's also infected. Did you not change the bandages?" We were told under no circumstances to change the bandages. We followed the doctor's orders to the T. He said you have to change the bandages. So we're like, before we amputate her thumb, let's go to the doctor the next day in your shalim. We went to the doctor the next day in your shalim. He said it is necrotic, it is infected, but he thinks he can regrow the thumb. Here's the thing: you're gonna have to come back every two weeks for treatment. He's gonna bandage it. The main thing is, don't change the bandages.

25:13 So I'm like This is not funny. Do I change the bandages? Do I not change the bandages? But in the end, we went with the second doctor in Yerushalayim because he said he could save the thumb, and the other one said he couldn't. It's an amazing hands specialist in Yerushalayim. He gave her a special treatment where he massaged her thumb, and today she has almost an entire thumb. The nail grew back, and only at the top can you see it's a little bit missing, and it's one hundred percent fine. It's mamish a miracle. And I'll tell you the postscript to that story. I had five daughters before I had a son, so one of the Rabbeim in Yerushalayim had a boy. And so everyone's coming Mazel Tov. He had a boy, right? And then all the guys are coming over to me He had a boy. You have only girls, right? And so one of the guys, a close pal, had said to me. He said he got up. Everyone stop making fun of her Berg. He has a starfish for a daughter. She regrows limbs.

26:13 At what point was it cut off? Here it was cut off. It was like a stump. So this is where it was. Was the bone cut off too? Was she traumatized? For sure. Does she still remember it? Nah, she's a little girl. She's two and a half. She hates that I tell this story. By the way, if she ever listens to this recording. How old is she now? She's eleven. My grandfather is the same age. So. Olam Hazeh, Olam Haba. Let's get back into it. The difference in Olam Hazeh and Olam Haba is very simple. Olam Hazeh is the world where we can only see what's happening right now. Olam Haba is where you see past, present, and future at once. All of time, even the future, is embedded in the moment. That's a very powerful thing. It means that. Whenever you're in a place where you're struggling deeply Why are you struggling so deeply?

27:16 Because you just want to know what's going to be at the end of it. What's going to be the end of this story? It's like a girl who's an older single. And she is not joking. And she just wants to know. It's so painful for her to go to all of her friends' weddings, and then after her friends are all married, she's going to like her NCS wires. Their wedding, and then she's going to like her campers, who are first graders. She's going to their wedding, and the whole time, what's she asking? When's it going to be my turn? She just wants to know what the end is going to look like. That's all I'm saying. All I'm saying is wishing we knew the end. All I'm about is the end of the story. So that's really what Asaf. That's really what happened. His grandfather died.

28:05 And remember, Asaf was a person. He wasn't from Russia from the time he was in the womb. To answer your question. It's who he was. He was a Sui. He had a certain personality. He was made. He lived in the present. There was nothing else to do. There was no future for Asif. So he had a traumatic event. His grandfather, who he loved, died. Avram Avinu died. And when he thought about death and he thought about the finality of death It shook him to his core. There is no future. Look at the five averos that Esav did. All of them are future-oriented. Number one, he didn't just commit adultery; he committed adultery with a naira meurasa A girl who is not married but she's betrothed. The Torah doesn't say there's just chuppah. That's nisuin. There's something called kedushin. That's called kinyan kessif, right? There's a vision of the future. That's a beautiful thing about a Jewish marriage.

29:08 When you get married, it's not just about the present. It's about the dreams that you have together. It's about what you're going to build together. It's the excitement of the future. That's what Asav broke. He took away that girl's future. He committed adultery with Anahar Murasa. We move on to murder. What does it say about Cain and Hevel? Kol de me'achicha tzolakim alay min Adam. What does Chazal say? All of the blood, all of the generations. Could you imagine? You murder someone now. We've had a couple thousand years of creation. You're killing a lot of people. But imagine killing someone in the times of Cain and Hevel. Think about how many hundreds of billions of people would have come from Hevel. Cain was responsible for the death of all of them. That's a big deal. Murder is not just about the present; it's about the destruction of a life that could have been lived, the destruction of the future, of the potential.

30:10 Denying God's existence. What is avodah zara? This is a good one. What is avodah zara? Avodah zara is about not being able to see God in its entirety. So you take a segment, like the sun is powerful. But the sun is very present. It's right here, right now. It's concretizing God. It's taking out one segment of God and saying, 'Here, here it is.' So you don't see the expansiveness of God. You're just worshiping one aspect of God, like the sun or the moon. So denying God's existence is very different than denying Tria Samesh. One follows the other. First, you deny God's existence. You can't see the continuum. You can't see the future with only one fragmented notion of God. And then from there, where do you get to? Remember, Avram Avinu died. Avram Avinu died. To Esav, that was the end. So after that What's next? In Judaism, we hold on to hope.

31:12 I'll tell you a story. There was a boy in yeshiva who passed away. When I was in Land, there was a boy in yeshiva who passed away. I'll never forget this. His brother came by the shloshim to speak in front of the whole yeshiva. He got up in front of the Aron. What does a brother do? How does a brother speak about his younger brother who died? Kid, young guy. You know what he said? He said the bracha of mechayim esim means something totally different to me now. He said now Tchiase sim is like I can't wait for Mashiach to come so I could see my brother again. See, we have a vision of the future even after death. It's exceptionally powerful. I want to take a brief pause for one second to say something that touches me every single year. Just now. In Crown Heights, they had the Kina Shluchim.

31:59 Six thousand Chabad shluchim from all over the world came together, and they take this big picture in front of 770, and it's like ridiculously inspiring. I'm always moved by it. And if you have a chance, go on Chabad.org. There's an 18-minute video that was posted from the dinner that they had. It was a shliach from Memphis, a shliach from Turkey. It's like wild the stories that they were telling about the Jews that they've reached. But I was thinking to myself, obviously I believe that the Lubavitcher Rebbe has passed away. That goes without saying, but today you have to say that. But in a certain way, he's still alive. In a certain way, it's like how powerful is that his vision lives on? That it didn't just end with him, but that the vision that he set, which was an extraordinary vision, we do not understand that. There were two giants of the time, Rav Aaron Kotler and the Lubavitcher Rebbe. They lived completely separate lives. Aaron Kotler said, "Let's rebuild Torah. The Lubavitcher Rebbe said, "Let's rebuild Klal Yisrael."

32:56 And both of them were necessary. Without Lakewood, what would the world look like? But without Lubavitch, what would the world look like? How many hundreds of thousands of Jews are cognizant of their Judaism, let alone have returned to Judaism, because some random Chabad shliach was able to go to Czechoslovakia to find the one guy that was Jewish? There's a vision there. The Rebbe died, but there's a future. There's a vision of tchias amesim there. I don't mean in the literal sense; I mean in the actual sense. And finally Where does it culminate? What's the biggest one of all? The biggest one of all is the birthright. Why the birthright? Because the birthright is an asset for the future. That's what the birthright is really about. It's an asset for the future. But let's think about it in a little bit of a different context. When you have a family If you have an only child There's no bechar.

33:52 You're just the only child. It's when there's a notion of an entire family, five, six children, that you could look at the b'chor. You see a process. You see a continuum. It culminates when Esav says "Narimurasa, murder, denying God, denying tchiasa mesim." But he denied his own family. He denied the very existence of a family. There is no value to the b'chor. The only thing that's real is right here, right now, the bowl of lentils that's in front of me. If you think about Asav, born as that ruddy child, it makes sense that he's Olam Azeh. But let's look at Yaakov for a second. What's Yaakov? Why does Yaakov get his name? Yaakov gets his name from something I would have imagined that Yaakov's name could have been amazing things. Yaakov's name could have been something that indicated that he was going to live by Lavan and he was going to keep the six hundred and thirteen mitzvot. The Yaakov Avinu was going to daven Ma'iriv at the Makamah Mikdash and see the sulem that was all the way from Shamayim Tare.

34:57 What's Yaakov's name, girls? Yaakov's name is at the moment of his birth he grabs onto the heel of his brother. Why? Why is that the seminal moment of his life that defines his very existence? Because Yaakov Avinu is all about the hemshich. He's the continuation. He sees himself as part of a process: the past, the present, and the future. That's who Yaakov Avinu is. The moment doesn't stand alone. He brings the aleph, the heel, all the way up to the yud. He sees the entirety of the continuum. That's why Yaakov Venu is the one that really should get the b'chor Because Yaakov Venu is the one that says Asav only lives with the here and now. I'm the one that lives with a vision for the future. A talmud of mine wrote an article this past week. It's a very powerful article. And he spoke about the challenges of being back in America and being back in YU.

35:57 And he defined it beautifully. He said, in yeshiva There were these amazing Discoveries of who you are. And then you come back to America, and afterwards, it's like you don't have that sense anymore of all those thoughtful conversations that you had and the talks with your rebbeim and your teachers and your mechanchot. What's going on? So he said it very well. In Israel You learn the art of being. In America, you learn the art of becoming. All the things that you're learning here You put it into practice there. And he's 100% right. But that means you have to get it clear when you're here. Here's what I want to share with you. There's a guy. A couple years ago, came to yeshiva. A great guy, a Baumidos par excellence. He knew a guy who had come to Mivaseret a couple years earlier. Who in Mivaseret had done phenomenally well. The art of being was right there.

37:00 He went back to America. The challenges of America were too great for him. And he ended up falling apart. A lot of the things that he had hoped to be never happened. And it happens. Some people just don't have that strength, that reservoir of character to be able to do it. But he knew this guy So he committed himself. From the time that he came to Mevaseret, he committed himself. It makes no sense to get into it only to throw it away a couple years later. And Rabbeinu would talk to him, and they would say to him, "Give it a shot." And he would say, 'I'm not going to kill myself learning eight, nine, ten hours a day, staying in beis medrash, really focusing on my davening when I know that in a year from now, I'm not continuing this. I'm just not doing it.'

37:48 And he did it the whole year. And when it came time at the end of the year on the roof To talk about your year, we have this thing at the end of the year where we take all the boys up to the roof of the yeshiva and everyone sits around and goes around in a circle and talks about what they feel they gained over the year. I wanted to see what he would say Because he was the guy that invested the least of all the guys in the yeshiva. He was the most standoffish. He attended the least amount of classes and minyanim. He just seemed to have no excitement whatsoever. And when he got up there at the end of the year. He had nothing to say. Whatever he said, it doesn't matter. He had nothing to say. And afterwards the rabbim were coming over to me. They're like, "That is so sad" And I said, "That's what happens when you have no dreams." He was so confident about what the end would look like that he said, "It's not worth my investment."

38:37 You're going to have the rest of your life to become But the gift that you've been given is you came to the holiest place on earth, the place where God has felt the most. And you're being challenged to ask yourself one very simple question. You get asked this question, whether you realize it or not. This question is being asked every single day in every single class. This is the question you're being asked. Who are you? That's the fundamental question. And here's the amazing part about being 18 years old or 19 years old in Israel at this moment in your life. You know what the answer is? I have no idea. The future is unlimited. The potential for what you could be is exceptional. And there are people that buy that dream of the fact that they could be anything. They could totally reinvent themselves. Everything you did up until this moment in your life, it's gone. It's finished. There's a whole new you every single moment, and you believe in that future. And you know what? If you go look today in your Shalayim and Beit Shemesh and Modiin and all over the place, you know what you're going to find?

39:35 You're going to find people who were once sitting right in these chairs, just like you. They went to yeshivas and seminaries, and they decided to do it a little differently. I'd like to do it this way. I'd like to be more passionate about my Judaism. I'd like to be more passionate about my davening. I'd like to be more connected to Shabbos. I'd like to have a stronger family connection. I want all those things, and you can be excited by those possibilities. And if you do that, and if you don't let go of that dream for the future, if you're actually willing to invest yourself and believe that it's possible that there's an unlimited future out there, that there's a trias amesim, that there's something to build up to, there's a naram urasa, there's a betrothed girl, and she's just waiting for the moment that she arrives under her chuppah. If you can live that way for the rest of your life, then the art of becoming is exceptionally exciting. And it's not the stagnation of I'm doing the same thing every single day. It's more profound than that. It's like that's the fulfillment of your dreams.

40:29 Nobody like Rabbi Arloski has this great line. He goes, nobody dies and makes their tombstone into a giant tooth, and it says, "Here lies Mordechai the dentist." Nobody does that. He got the most plaque out of any cavities. Why? Because that's not what your life is about. Ask any adult. There's the things that we do to make money to support the things that we actually care about. Sometimes you're privileged. Sometimes you get to spend your life doing things that make money for you and that are also ridiculously awesome. Sometimes But even if you don't have that, even if you're just a guy or a girl who's punching the clock because you're bringing home a parnasa, it's exciting because what you're involved in is amazing. I'm raising a Jewish family, and I'm sending my kids to yeshiva and to seminary. On Shabbos, they see me on fire for the Yiddish guy and speaking the Torah at the table, and it's awesome. The zmiros are awesome. There's something amazing about that.

41:25 That's the art of becoming. It's rooted in the art of being, and it's built on daring to dream. On believing that you have a future. I think if you look at Yitzchok's brachos. To his two children, you'll see this. Lepianski makes this diat. It's an amazing diat. Look at the difference between the two brachos. To Yaakov Avinu He says, 'Vayitain l'chah Elokim, mital Ashamayim u'mishmane ha'aretz, v'rov dagam v'tiroshe.' God will give you of the dew of the heavens, the fatness of the earth, and abundant grain and wine. You hear it, girls? Vayitain l'chah. What God will give you in the future. Yaakov Avinu is also always about the future, and what about Asav? What does he say to Asav? Twenty-seven thirty-nine. The fatness of the earth shall be your dwelling, and the dew of the heavens from above. Notice, there's no vayit hinlcha. There's no vision of the future. Asav gets exactly what he has. That's who he is. He has no dreams for the future. When you have no dreams for the future, you know what you have.

42:41 Wherever you are, that's all you have. But when you have dreams for the future You live with a sense of abundance, and that's why Yaakov is constantly blessed over and over again. The blessings, Rashi says, just keep coming. I'll finish with this story. My wife always tells this story over. Rabbi Shmuel Henny Machlis. There's a tremendous sadekas. I hope you girls have heard of Rebbeitz and Machlus. Rebbeitz and Machlus had hundreds of people in her home. They're amazing, amazing stories. It's hard to believe that she lived in our generation. Amazing stories that she had no chicken for Shabbos at twelve o'clock, and she's having a hundred fifty guests that night, and she pasha has no chickens because they have no money, and she just go and say Tehillim, and like chickens would arrive at her door. It's crazy stories like that, and they're not made up.

43:29 Incredible stories about people who were sleeping in her house, lived everywhere, and those that were too dangerous to live in the house lived in her car. Literally, her son-in-law, Avram Willig, would know how many people were sleeping in the car. He would count the shoes that were lined up on the dashboard when he was coming in the morning. There were just pairs of shoes on the dashboard of their car. It was unbelievable what she did. And she always used to say "I have all the time in the world. I have all the space in the world, and I have all the money in the world." And if there were three things that Rebbitz and Machlis did not have, it was all the time in the world, all the space in the world, and she sure didn't have all the money in the world. What was the difference? See, if you live right here and right now, then you only have what you have. And sometimes a person can feel so restricted in their lives because they only have what they have. It's like, look, I just only have so much space in my house. How could I fit 150 people in there?

44:22 And if you think of something much more expansive, like Yakhel Avinu You're just like, does there a b'nai shalom? The base of mikdash could expand. I'm here to serve Hakadosh Baruch Hu. I'm gonna feed Hakadosh Baruch Hu's children. Hakadosh Baruch Hu will worry about the space. And somehow a hundred fifty people fit in that tiny apartment in Yerushalayim. And somehow she had enough money, even though she never had enough money, and even though she certainly didn't have enough time because her life was mamish meshuda the things she was doing, somehow she had all the time in the world. You have a choice. You could live moment to moment. And there's value in being present in the moment, but you could live moment to moment as if there is no hope for the future. Or you could fundamentally change the way you see the world and just hope, dare to dream, see it bigger, see something expansive. It's an amazing gift you could have.

45:14 Hope is a very powerful thing. A therapist told me he asks his clients. You think there's any hope? Can you be hopeful? And sometimes clients say to him I really just don't think there's any hope. I can't see how it could ever get better. And so he has this amazing line And it's a gift that he gives to his clients. He says I'll tell you what. Even if you don't have hope, I have hope. So I'm going to hold on to hope for you. And he told me that it works. He said, "If you say that to a client, they lighten. You see them just lighten their whole sense of being." So I decided to try it out. And if a guy comes into my office and he's just so broken, and I ask him, "Is there any hope for change?" and he goes, "Honestly, Rabbi, there's no hope. I can't see it ever changing."

46:04 And so I try to find that pocket of hope to look in the future and to talk about what it could be. And I say that line to him. I say, "You know what? I'm really hopeful that it's going to be good, and I'm going to hold on to that hope for both of us." And you see a change. You see a shift in a person. All of a sudden, they relax. That'd be nice to feel that hope. Thanks for holding on to that for us. It's an amazing thing. Girls, that's the bracha I want to give you. Let's hold on to hope together. A vision for the future. The art of becoming—you'll get there. But the art of being. Let's take the opportunity this year to really dream about the person that we really want to be. Because if you dream it now, it could become the reality soon.