Pesach - Fifteen Steps to Freedom

2:30 Baruch Hashem, I have a little bit of a larger place in Ramat Beit Shemesh. I come back to the five towns and I remember. It takes a lot of time. Baruch Hashem. I grew up here. But what are we supposed to be doing aside from the cleaning? What are we supposed to be doing in our lives to clean out the chametz of our lives? The number fifteen. Is heavily associated with the Yom Tov of Pesach. Obviously, the fifteenth of Nissan—that goes without saying. But in the Hagada itself, there's two very important fiftes that exist. The first is the simanim of the seder. There are fifteen steps in the seder itself. Kaddish, Urchatz, Karpas, Yachatz. There are fifteen if you count them. And the second fifteen is at the end of Sefer Yitsiats Mitzrayim. It says, "Kama milus tovis l'makam eleno." How much gratitude do we have to Hakadosh Baruch Hu for all the wondrous things that He did for us in Mitzrayim? It goes on to list fifteen things.

3:37 The first being shehotziyanim Mitzrayim And finally culminating with ubanulonu es beis habachira k'de lachaper al kol avin esenim. Culminates with the fact that Hakadosh Baruch Hu builds for us a beis hamikdash. But you'll notice the lashon here is not based on mikdash, but based on bechira. A place of choice And specifically for what lechaper al kol ha'bein esenu To atone for all of our averas that we've done. And the Ritva says that these fifteen steps at the end of Sipur Yishtiyot Mitzrayim, these fifteen things that we must be grateful for, aside from the fact that the gematria. Fifteen is hayd, which is a lation of gratitude. But the Ritva says that these correspond to the fifteen steps that went from the Ezra's noshim in the Beis Hamikdash to the Ezra's Yisrael. There were fifteen steps from the men's section to the women's section, or more appropriately, from the women's section to the men's section, as we'll soon see.

4:39 We know that David HaMelech composed fifteen she'el malos, each one from one of the steps of the Beis Hamikdash. There are fifteen curtains that flank the Mishkan. These all go together. There are fifteen expressions after Kriyashma before the Geulah of Shemini Esrei: Yatsiv and Achon, V'Kayam, Yashar, and Amam, V'hu, V'Chavim, and Achma, and Ayin, and Meral. Fifteen of them. All of these fifties go together. What's this idea of fifteen? Where does it come from? What is it trying to teach us? The Maral and Guras Hashem says that there is fifteen levels that every person must journey through in this world. It starts at Ezra's Nesham. It starts at the lowest level. And journeys to Ezra's Yisroel. What does this mean? To journey from the lowest level, which is feminine, to the highest level, which is masculine. Obviously, the Maral did not mean this Chas V'Shalom in a way that denigrates women. In fact, as we'll soon see, it's quite the opposite.

5:42 What does the Maral mean over here? To go from the lowest level, which is feminine To the highest level, which is masculine, to traverse the fifteen steps of the Beit Hamikdash. There's a concept in Chassidus and Kabbalah called Liyachid Kuchobrichu Ushchintei B'Tachtoynim. The purpose of this world is to combine and connect two worlds. Kuchobrichu Which is the Rebbeimish L'olam. Ushchintei. What does Shchina mean? We don't often think about this word. "Shchina." What does Shchina mean? The Shchina means the indwelling of our Kol D'varu Hu's presence in all things. And our job is to unite these two realities. These two realities exist At least for us, as two independent things. There's the Rebbe Nishalalim, and then there's our world. The Shchina resides in our world. But the Shchina is not comfortable in our world. Because it has not been revealed in our world. And the maral explains.

6:53 I'm sorry, it's actually the kliyaker. The kliyaker explains that when Hakadosh Baruch Hu created the world He created the world with a yud and a hay. And the yud is masculine And the hay is feminine. And our job is to unite the yud and the hay. And in this way, we reveal Hakadosh Baruch Hu's presence in our world. Where do we see this? So there is an amazing Gemara. Everybody here knows the Gemara. I am sure you've heard this Gemara before. It's not possible in your life that you went through life without hearing this Gemara. But it's a Gemara that, based on Hashem, you will understand on a much deeper level in a couple of moments. Listen to what the Kli Yakar says about this Gemara. The Gemara in Sota Ish ve'Isha When there is Shalom ve'Nehem, the Shchina is Shuri Yasham. A man and a woman When there's shalom between them, the shirin is shuru yisham. Why? Because ish has the letter yud in it.

7:54 And 'isha' has the letter 'hay' in it. But if chas v'shalom There is no shalom between ish le ishtoi. If there's no shalom between a husband and his wife So then all that's left is the ashen chas v'shalom. The fire will destroy the world. What does this gemara mean? It's like a Gemara that every everybody learns. When you're growing up, it's like how could you have a shir about Shaduchim without quoting this Gemara? And some rabbi will get up there and give a bracha, and every seminar girl will say a deep amen, the deepest kavanah possible. That beis rachem, if she can only say amen properly to this bracha, then she will surely have shalom bayis with her husband. And if she doesn't have shalom bayis, it's probably because she didn't say amen with enough ferocity and intensity when she was younger. So what does the Gemara really mean?

8:41 Gemara is obviously telling us a deep side. The whole yisoyed of this world is to unite the masculine and the feminine. When Hakadosh Baruch Hu creates olam haba, He creates it with the letter yud. When He creates olam hazeh, He creates it with the letter hay. Our responsibility is to create shalom, to create harmony between these two worlds, so that olam hazeh can become olam haba, so that the yud and the hay can once again reunite. Perhaps we can suggest we can add That this is the deeper meaning of the famous medrash that we all know. That Avram Avinu, when he was searching for God, what did he see? He saw a bira dilekas. He saw a palace on fire. What was the fire that Avram Avinu saw? Why was the palace on fire? So we can suggest that in the times of Avram Avinu, when there was no yichud between the yur and the hay. Because this is what Avram came into the world to do—to create the unification between the masculine and the feminine. So he saw a world that was on fire.

9:48 And in Gufa, in that fire, is where he finds Hakadosh Baruch Hu. Gufa within the Eish is where a person has to create Shalom. There has to be attention in order to create Shalom. But it's up to us, down here in this world To reveal Hakadosh Baruch Hu's presence. If it comes, as we'll soon see If it comes from above to below, something is lacking. It's much better when it comes from below to above. And this is why feminine redemption is the story of every single geula in the history of Klal Yisrael. There has never been a story of redemption where the women were not at the center. That's what it means. It was specifically because of the righteous women in Mitzrayim, specifically because there was an awakening from the side of the feminine. That we were zayecha to the geula. And what does this mean practically?

10:50 It's a b'feirah shi'rashi. If we were only paying attention, we would have seen it. It's a b'feirah shi'rashi. There was a question. There was a question. The question was as follows: If Paro controlled the goy of all of Klal Yisrael. Could it be that Paro did not control the goof of the women of Klal Yisrael in Mitzrayim And therefore there was a question: Were the children actually Jewish? Were there Jewish children or were there Egyptian children? The concept of being suspect of who is a Jew is not new. This is a very old idea. But because the women were so modest, and because the women of Mitzrayim took care of their husbands. Their husbands did not chas v'shalm stray And this is what the pasuk says. Rashi quotes shiftekah edus liyisrael. The shiftekah, the shvatim of Yud Hey, provided testimony to Yisrael. What was the testimony they provided?

11:56 If you look when we're naming the shvatim in Parshas Bamidbar, you'll see it says Ruvain b'chori Yisrael, b'nei Ruvain Chanoch Mespachas a Chanochi. Lefalu mishpachas hapalu'i. Why do they add a hey and a yud in their names? And also, as Mascula David points out, why does the hey come before the yud? So the answer is because of the hey, because of the feminine side of the yud and the hey, because there was an awakening from the feminine side to make sure that the men in Mitzrayim behaved appropriately. Hakadosh Baruch Hu added on to every single name of the Shvatim a Hey and a Yud, and specifically in that order, because it was the feminine that leads the masculine, and not Chassvah and vice versa. And that's what it means Shiftei Ka Edus LeYisrael That the Shvatim of Yud Hey, the extra Hey and the Yud that were attached to the Shvatim's names, were made to the Geulah that would ultimately come Beschus Nashim to Kinyus.

12:59 So the question is. What was missing in Yitzias Mitzrayim? What's missing in Yitzias Mitzrayim? Why do we need to have that in every single generation? We have to see ourselves as if we are leaving Mitzrayim. What was missing from that original Yitzias Mitzrayim? As we said a moment ago, there is something lacking in Mitzrayim. The Arizal says that in Yitzias Mitzrayim, in the original Yitzias Mitzrayim. Hakadosh Baruch Hu took us out. In a certain sense, even though it was besros nashim tzidkanius shnigalu miMitzrayim, it was in the merit of the feminine that we merited to be redeemed. Nevertheless, the redemption occurred mostly from above. The redemption occurred mostly from the masculine side. Hakadosh Baruch Hu is mashpiya, and we are the mekabel in this world. Hakadosh Baruch Hu is masculine relative to the world, which is feminine, because we receive the divine light. The Arizal says that because we were in Mentes Shari Tuma Literally, if Hakadosh Baruch Hu didn't take us out, we would have been completely lost. Which means that even though there were small things that we did, that awakened the Sarusa Deleila, we awakened the force from above. La Maisa, the force from above was the generating force of redemption.

14:18 Why is that a problem? Imagine for a moment an addict Person struggles with addiction. Two addicts One addict He's heading down a bad path. Some loved ones make an intervention. They sit him down at the table. They all read their letters to him, exactly like we saw it on television growing up, right? And maybe they convince him to go to rehab. Rehab, he sobers up. Detoxes, gets it out of his system Does some therapy Gets clean. About such an addict, we would hope that they would remain sober for the entirety of their lives. But there's something lacking from that addict—a reason that will make them afraid they'll return to their previous ways. What's missing? That addict never hit rock bottom. So the awakening to become sober came from without, not from within. And that's a problem. Another addict Chas V'Shalom Married, wife, children, house, job, the whole nine yards And you know how it goes.

15:48 Person starts with their addiction Slowly goes, builds up the lying. The cheating, the sneaking, the stealing—whatever happens—before long, they lose their job. Their wife, their children, their house And at some point, perhaps at the lowest moment in their life, where do they find themselves? In the strangest of places, a person who could have been at the height of his power could find himself Chas v'Shalom living under a bridge, homeless, begging. In that moment, it's possible for the addict to have an incredible awakening and to realize This is not working. It's no longer working. It's not shayach for me to lead this life anymore. And as a result The addict can choose to check himself into a rehab. To start going to a twelve-step program, to start going to meetings To take even a menial job, doing whatever they can to get themselves back on their feet.

16:45 They go through all the steps. They make a list of all their resentments. They realize that they have to take ownership for that resentment. They make a list of all the people that they've harmed. They apologize. They make amends. They start living a life of service. They go through the whole nine yards. Of course, that person is also in danger of chas v'shalim slipping back. But the danger is significantly less. When you listen to those addicts, because they were at rock bottom, they know they never want to return. Because the awakening of Yitzias Mitzrayim was from above We can't truly say that the Yud and the Hey have been reunited. The idea that the Yud and the Hey can be united occurred in Mitzrayim. But that the ultimate process finished in that time is not correct. Why? Because Hakadosh Baruch Hu saw that we had hit rock bottom too early.

17:44 Hakadosh Baruch Hu wanted that we should be in Eretz Yisrael for four hundred years But He understood that rock bottom was going to destroy us. So Hakadosh Baruch Hu, like that parent who loves their child, had no choice but to pull the plug on the project early. And as a result, all of the subsequent exiles that exist in this world are designed to finish the process of Yitzyaas Eretz Yisrael. But with one fundamental difference And this is the core of today's she'er. Now The koyach for us to leave Mitzrayim is already there. But the emphasis now is not so much on Hakadosh Baruch Hu taking us out As it is for us to leave Mitzrayim. I have a chaver tov who happens to be a tremendous bentaira. He's a guy who has a job. And he has a very large family. He's Daven's three times a day with a minion. He's a big balchesed.

18:47 He takes his learning exceptionally seriously. He went to a yeshiva many years ago called Ner Yaakov. And you've heard of Ner Yaakov. Ner Yaakov was back in the day. I don't know how to say this nicely. It was a thug yeshiva. It was for the good geshmack boys. So he He was so messed up in high school that they didn't let him go to Israel. In his what would have been his regular shan alif, because he would have been too crazy for Naryakov. So he had to delay going a year. And when he came, he had gotten to a certain level; he had scaled it back a little bit, so he was ready for Naryakov. And he stayed two years in Naryakov, and then in the third year he was a madrich. And I won't tell you the details of the story But he made a bad choice as a madrich. Sometimes when you have these lebedik boys.

19:39 And they're doing crazy things. You have to make a decision: should I let them do this? Should I not let them do this? Are they going to listen to me anyway? He chose to participate in the crazy thing that these boys were doing, which was a bad decision for a madrich to make. So the Rosh Yisheva of Lif called him in And he put his arm around his shoulder in the way that only a Rosh Lif can. And Rosh Lif said to him You could take the boy out of Brooklyn, but you can't take Brooklyn out of the boy. " Certain He still like didn't matter how frum he was. Psychotic on the inside. He's still like a mashiach and a guy. And even today, you should know he I think he maybe is turning forty this year. He's a little bit younger than me. Maybe he's turning forty now. And even though today, Baruch Hashem, he's a wonderful person, I could still say the same thing about him. You could take the Brooklyn boy out of Brooklyn, but you can't take Brooklyn out of the kid.

20:27 And the same thing is true when it comes to Yishtiyot Mitzrayim. Hakadosh Baruch Hu could take us out of Mitzrayim. But it doesn't mean that the Mitzrayim has left us And that's our avoda. Our avoda is to journey these fifteen steps of the Beis Hamikdash from the Ezra's Noshim to the Ezra's Yisrael To go from shahutzianu mimitzrayim to ubanalano as Beis abchira kdei lachapra al kolav amosin. The question is, how do we do that? And that's where we come to the fifteen steps of the seder. And so, even though Beis Roshem this is going to be an entire sefer, I'll give you just a brief overview of what the fifteen steps of kaddish orchaz karpas yachatzar So that we can take this opportunity over the coming days to prepare ourselves for what Ezra Hashem will be a meaningful Pesach. We start off with kaddish. Kaddish, we all know, on a physical level is kiddush. That's how we start the seder. We make kiddush.

21:29 But what does it mean for us? So kaddish means as follows: Every single person is made up. Of a nefesh l'kiss and a nefesh abahamis, a godly soul—that's the soul that makes us uniquely Jewish—and a nefesh chayunis. A soul that animates our body. Kaddish and orchutz are the nefesh l'kiss and the nefesh abahamis or the nefesh chayunis, respectively. First, we'll start with kaddish. There is something that a person, a Jew specifically, must know when they're in this world. If you want to be aligned with reality Which is the goal. If you want to be organically yourself, to connect the yud and the hey The first thing a Jew must know is that we are visitors on this planet. That sounds like a funny thing to say, but it's a very important nakuda. What does it mean to be a visitor on this planet? Because we have a nefesh alokis and a nefesh abahamis, we're a little bit in two places at once.

22:29 Sometimes we feel pulled towards the Transcendent. Sometimes we feel pulled towards the physical. Which one are we? The answer is we're both. A Jew is compared to a bridge between Hakadosh Baruch Hu and this world. And because we're a bridge, imagine the Verizano Bridge. The Verizano Bridge is a little bit in Brooklyn, a little bit in Staten Island. If it's not in Brooklyn or Staten Island, it's not a very good bridge. The same thing is true when it comes to Klal Yisrael. Hakadosh Baruch Hu created us to be a bridge between this world and the next world. This world We have a part of us that's physical But we have also a part of ourselves that's spiritual, that's uniquely spiritual. This is called the nefesh l'kes. Which means that we have kedusha inside of us. We are not dependent on the physical reality; the physical reality is dependent on us. That's not a small thing to say because most people in this world, because we have a nefesh abahamis, think that we are dependent on a physical reality. After all, if we don't go to a doctor and we get sick, then Chas v'Shalom we could die.

23:38 That's true for the nefesh of a hamas. It's not true for the godly soul. The godly soul is infinite. The godly soul cannot die. And so the way that we engage the physical world must be through the lens of the nefesh luchos Which means that we are, in a certain sense, visitors here. We're not meant to be here. This is also a very empowering idea. This is not a small idea. Imagine if a person comes to a business deal. One person has ten thousand dollars to invest. Another person has ten million dollars to invest. The person with ten thousand dollars and the person with ten million dollars are both sitting at the same exact table. But when they're listening to the presentation It's two completely different experiences. The person who has ten thousand dollars knows all I have to invest is ten thousand dollars. If this goes wrong I'm out of luck. I'm stuck. If I only have ten thousand dollars to my name, and I'm going to invest all ten thousand dollars, I'm stuck.

24:40 The person who has ten million dollars could very easily say, "I'm going to invest a quarter of a million dollars," and even if it goes south, you win some, you lose some. There's an impoverished mentality, and there's an abundance mentality. The Nevi'achalokis gives us the capacity to come into this world. With an abundance mentality. It's true in the physical world. It's also true in the world of relationships. If a person gets married, for example, and they're not enough for themselves And then Chas v'Shalom they have Shalom bias challenges. What are those Shalom bias challenges a symptom of? Not necessarily of what's going on between husband and wife But the inner scarcity mentality that people have. When we show up with an abundance mentality, it means we are capable of being in this world. So the seder begins with the notion of kadosh. Every single one of us, because we are not really, truly from within this world.

25:38 When we engage in this world, we're not engaging from a scarcity mentality. And if you stop and think to yourself for a moment, a little bit of an exercise Where in my life do I engage with a scarcity mentality? Where are those places that I engage with a scarcity mentality? You'll learn a tremendous amount about yourself. Examine how you show up to relationships. Examine how you show up to scary, anxiety-provoking things And you'll be able to tell in a very short amount of time where the places are that I have a scarcity mentality, and then challenge yourself. Ask yourself: Is that a physical worldview, or is that a spiritual worldview? Does the godly soul have a scarcity mentality when it comes to these things? For example You have many girls in shidduchim. I have a daughter that's about to enter shidduchim. And for whatever reason And I have unfortunately too much experience with the negative side of this, but for whatever reason, there's this thing that's spoken about. It's completely inappropriate. It's wrong.

26:47 There are so many good guys out there. But I'm sorry. There's so many good girls out there, but there's not that many good guys out there. And what's going to be? There's an anxiety from the time the girls are very little. And it's like I have to be perfect. I have to be excellent. I have to be amazing in order to get this guy. That's frankly not that impressive. But it's like it's in the system. There's a terrifying anxiety that's in the system. How could a person show up to a date ready to connect to another person with such a mentality? Who's going to want to create a relationship with someone that's terrified? Nobody wants to create a relationship with someone that's terrified. How would the godly soul show up to a date? The godly soul would show up to a date authentically. Hey, name here I am.

27:33 This is a wonderful place to be, without arrogance but with complete confidence. This is a very special place to be. And you should know it's a very attractive thing when people show up that way, isn't it true? The guy that shows up to a date and he's like Way overly confident. It's not very pleasant to be around such a person. I see some of you have had these dates. I'm looking around. Your eyes are very telling, by the way. Just letting you know. He's not zaluna'im. It's not a person that's connecting. But you see a guy who comes in with humility, with kindness, gentle, compassionate. But confident, not swagger. Just here I am. It's a wonderful thing to. It's a wonderful thing. I was in Shirausha this morning. And there was a boy And he looks exactly as you think he would look when I tell you the story. Just whatever you're picturing in your head, that's who he is.

28:27 And he's walking around with a large tub of creamed herring and crackers. Now you know what he looks like. And he and I'm sitting with a Talmud Check it out! Look what I got! He's so excited to show up with his tub of herring. And I said I want you to know I'm so happy that you exist. You're just like a guy who has a tub of herring, and he's just mamish b'simcha. And to meet such a person who's so comfortable with his herring. I didn't grow up in that way. I didn't grow up with herring. If you know what I mean. Some people grow up with herring. I didn't grow up with herring. Grew up with kichel. I didn't grow up with drinking vodka at seven o'clock in the morning after shabbos. There are people that grow up this way. This guy clearly grew up this way, and he's holding his vat of herring. And I told him, "Oh, you are so lucky. When you go on a date, you're gonna know exactly who's the right one for you."

29:29 He said, "How?" I said, "You're gonna show up with this tub of herring And if the girl goes awesome, that's the one for you, because most people are not gonna show up to a date with a tub of herring. He's like, you don't start with a tub of hair; you start with a piece of kugel. I said, 'Mamsh, I love this guy. I'm so. I have a daughter. I'm thinking of my daughter for him. I don't know what he's gonna do in his life.' I'm also not sure it matters. The guy, Mamsh, is just so confident. He's so authentic. It's such a beautiful thing. That's kaddish. We have enough shulkes. We don't have to have a scarcity mentality. And step two Urchats. Orchats is the nefesh achiyunis, the soul that animates our body. This too is a very pure thing. Nefesh abrahamis gets a bad rap.

30:20 Nefesh abrahamis because it knows it's going to die has a scarcity mentality, but not right away. In fact In the very beginning of a child's life Even their physical self is very pure. There's something exceptionally sweet about children who are totally unabashed when it comes to displaying their emotions. It's not always a pleasant thing. If you're in gourmet glot and you have a little child And the child discovers the candy aisle for the first time and decides to throw a major temper tantrum right then and there. And everybody's looking and judging you as a parent because your child is having that meltdown. Of course, nobody's judging, but we're all judging, right? Let's be honest with each other. We're like, you're a bad parent. You can't keep your kid under control. And all of a sudden, the kid is holding a massive amount of candies. I remember Brach's Olvasholim when I was still living in America. I loved shopping in Brach's. Why? Because you used to be able to get a free bakery cookie for the kids when you shopped in Brach's.

31:33 So it was perfect. I could show up with my kids. Right away, we get to the bakery counter, and then we're good. No temper tantrums. That's how I knew it was going to be okay. There's something exceptionally pure and unsullied about that. That's urchatz. It's washing without a bracha. It's not cleaning. It's pure. There's a fundamental difference between cleaning and purification. A child does not need to be freed from themselves. We do. The saddest day. And this happens with every child. Baruch Hashem, we have another mother here in the audience, so she can attest to this. Maybe it didn't happen to your children, but it happened. I think it happens to all children. Do you remember the day when your children start caring more about what other people think than what they want themselves? It happens to everybody. It's not just my family. My daughter, she's seven now, and Baruch Hashem, she came back because she has a good mother and a good chinuch.

32:33 But she was obsessed with unicorns Obsessed until the age of five. She was obsessed with unicorns. And I remember the day that she told me, "Abba, please don't get me any more unicorn things." Because I was the father who was like If my daughter wants unicorn things, I'm going to give her every possible unicorn thing that exists. So one year Hanukkah, every night of Hanukkah, she got something unicorn. I was like, "I go to Amazing Savings just to find unicorn things." Her whole room, her whole wall is covered in unicorn stickers. I just wanted to give her everything unicorn. She comes, Abba, no more unicorn things. Why not? It's for babies. I'm like, first of all, you're five. Let's just put things in perspective. I said, 'There, that's so sad, but you love unicorn things.' She goes, 'It's for babies.' Now, Baruch Hashem, she came back around. She still loves unicorn things. I just got her unicorn stuff from amazing savings right before I came here today.

33:30 Also, I went Pesach shopping, which is an interesting thing that I had to come six thousand miles from a land of Jews to here to get stuff for Pesach. But that's a different rant for a different time. Can't get Lieber's Jello in Eretz Yisrael. That's something I just discovered. So A child does not need to be freed from themselves because they're already free. Don't you miss that? Do you remember that? It's a beautiful thing. Just to be purely yourself. So that's the conception of a child as kadesh and orchatz. It's the only one with a vav that you go together. The breakdown starts to happen by karpas. Karpas We're going to learn two lessons from. Karpas is from a lashon of perach samach. Here, the samach refers to the six hundred thousand Jews in Mitzrayim, and the perach refers to the avodas perach. What was the Avodas Paroch of Mitzrayim? We know that Paro gave all the masculine work to the women and all of the feminine work to the men.

34:39 And it was not so politically correct to say. Back then, they didn't have identification issues. So the masculine work went to the women, and the feminine work went to the men. What does this mean for us? It's a fundamental question: Are you aligned with yourself? Are you doing things in your life? Because none of us are. We're all a little bit misaligned. Are we doing things that speak to us as people? I heard a maysa. I can't tell you his name. Because I think it would be lashon hara. I heard this maysa about a certain very well-known doctor. And when he was younger in yeshiva, because he was such a brilliant guy They said to him You should really become a talmud chacham, go into chinuch, and be a marbitz torah. And he did. Until he was in his thirties And then one day he woke up.

35:39 And he realized he was miserable because he was a doctor. That's what he had always wanted. He allowed people to tell him what he should be instead of listening to who he really was. Was a tragic mistake. This doctor Because he is a man of tremendous integrity and a man of tremendous courage. He chose to leave Chinuch. He chose to go to medical school. After he was already married with children in his thirties And to go through the entire process. He didn't become a doctor until he was forty, and today he's a very well-known doctor, a very important doctor who saved many lives. And when asked, he'll tell you the story why. Because he says it's important to know that you have to be aligned with your own reality. When we say masculine and feminine, we don't necessarily mean male and female. There's certain work that we're naturally disposed to doing.

36:30 And at some point we become misaligned. That's karpas. We have a natural nefeshalokis, a natural nefeshachyunis, and we should listen to them. They tell us important things about ourselves, and when we listen to them, we start behaving in accordance with who we are. An amazing thing happens. We become exceptionally joyous, and the opposite, unfortunately, is also true. When a person doesn't listen to the truest self that they have inside of them, when they go seeking advice from others about how they should show up to life, instead of listening to their own internal godly voice, they're making a terrible, tragic mistake. Because we know the answers inside of ourselves. You ever do this thing where you make a decision, and then as soon as you make it, you go, "Nope, that wasn't it. That wasn't right." Then you switch the decision and you go, "Yep, that was it."

37:17 That was right. You ever do that? How'd you know? Remember all the people you asked up until that point, and all the different little chirping things that they said As if any of them have any basis in reality of what's going on inside of ourselves. Who knows ourselves better than ourselves? We lost confidence in ourselves. At some point, we became misaligned. We stopped listening to the inner voice. That's karpas. It's the destruction of self. There's another lesson from Karpas that's very important. Perach could also mean perach Soft mouth. Now Paro used this soft mouth inappropriately. He used it to trick Jews into coming to work for him. But there is a tzad of kedusha here. My wife showed me a book by Shai Astrov. I don't know if you girls have ever read in any of his books. He had a very beautiful lashon in one of his books.

38:18 A soul of silk. A soul of silk. That the soul is made of silk. What did he mean to say? Gentle. Gentle, no. When a person speaks perach, when a person speaks with a soft mouth in a gentle way When they're able to silence their inner critic from speaking inappropriately. That's a fundamental part of the healing process that comes along with becoming misaligned from ourselves. Very often, when we become misaligned from ourselves, if you really want to follow it up, you can look inside of yourself and you'll notice that your inner critic has become very loud. Here's a good tip. Listen to the voice that you have from within and ask yourself if you would speak that way to anybody else. The boy in yeshiva had a terrible inner critic. And he started talking. He was in my office, and he said, "Rabbi, you don't understand how messed up I am. You don't understand all the things I've done." He started verbally beating himself.

39:23 So I said, "I just have a quick question." Said, "Do you have friends in yeshiva that do similar things to you?" He goes, "Yeah. I said, "If one of them came to you and confided in you that he had done these same things" How would you speak to him? He said, "I would say it's understandable. I would say you have to understand where you come from. I would say that you're in process. I would say that this is part of the process." I said, and tell me, do you say any of these things to yourself? He goes, no, because for me it's a lie. I said, no. The lie is that you think it's a lie. As we journey through the beginning stages of adolescence And if you have the opportunity in your life to work with adolescents, just take a deep breath; it'll all be okay in the end. But as you're going through that. You know that rabbi or that teacher that speaks just with that kind, gentle voice, and sort of shares that voice with you until you can adopt it for yourself. Is there a greater gift than that?

40:17 It's interesting in yeshiva. Sometimes you see these guys that love that moster shmos. They love that like they go like parkour. Tell me how it is, Rabbi. Come, just beat me to a bloody pulp so that I'll never do it again. And chas v'shalom to do such a thing. Because they will adopt that voice, and that's a very dangerous voice, one that we need to protect ourselves from. And of course, if we're misaligned Then the next stage is yachatz, breaking the middle matzah. And of course, it's the middle matzah because we're speaking about the essence. This is the stage when a person becomes so misaligned that they feel that they've lost who they really are. The bigger piece Which is going to only be discovered later. That bigger piece that becomes the Afikoman is gone. Who am I? I'm a shadow of myself. I'm just a fraction of what I was when I was a kid.

41:12 I lost myself along the way. You should know we saw this with our own daughter. When we were living in America My daughter was Moshava. She was crazy. She had the funniest personality. Was the sweetest thing in the world. We were shopping here in Gourmet Glot And my wife is pushing her along in the cart. And my daughter She's getting agitated. Something is clearly bothering her, and she's looking around and getting frustrated. "What's going on? Are you okay?" "It's little," and she's like, "and very agitated." And finally, she looks up at the ceiling in Gourmet Glot and says, "Stop talking to me." What was going on? Every time somebody came and said 'clean up on aisle three' She thought that it was talking to her. And so she's getting very agitated. I don't know what you want from me. This voice from the heavens. I don't know what you want from me.

42:12 And she was a lunatic child; she could not be contained. And then we came to Eretz Yisrael, and we saw her entire personality changed. It's not an easy thing to not know the language that all of your friends are speaking, even in Ramat Bechamish. Where there's Baruch Hashem, a lot of English is spoken. It's not pashat. It's not obvious. It's not simple for a child to make that adjustment. So she went from being this outgoing, mishugan child who was yelling at the ceiling to very reserved. And it was a process of watching her over the next couple of years heal that part of herself. It's not a small thing. We all have yachatzes in our life, parts of ourselves that we feel like we've left behind. We think back in your life where you lost some of those pieces, pieces that were put aside for later.

43:01 Maybe we wanted to impress others. Maybe we feel we needed to live up to other people's expectations of perfection. Or worse, maybe our own coping mechanism of perfection. But there was a part of ourselves that broke in the middle. And we lost it. That's part of becoming the people that we're not for others. And so that's the brokenness. Kadish and Orchotz tell us who we are. Karpas and Yachatz tell us how we break apart. And then there's Magid. This is the beginning of the healing. I heard a line many years ago from Dr. David Palkowitz. He said If you want to leave Mitzrayim, you have to be yotzei the mitzvah of Magid. Which means if you want to leave the Mitzrayim, the restrictions and constrictions of your life, you have to be willing to tell your story. So this is the therapy. This is the part where you get to say, "This is my life. This is what happened to me."

44:00 To be able to have an MS talk with somebody else, to be able to say, 'This where I've been. This my journey.' And there is a couple of opportunities here that I'd like to highlight as part of our own tikkun of ourselves to unite the Hey and the Yud, to do the work from below, to rectify ourselves, so that ultimately Hakadosh Baruch Hu will bring the Geula. First of all, how do you tell your story? Do you tell your story honestly? Or are you the victim? And there's a big difference Because a person could tell their story And bad things could have happened to them, and it doesn't make them a victim. When a person tells over their story with a victim mentality, it means something is missing. So how do you tell your story? Another one: Who do you tell your story to? Your story should not be known by everyone. How many people should know your story?

44:46 Maybe a handful of people in the world. A handful of people who get to know every single thing about you. It's not something today with social media. It's like everybody gets to hear our story all the time. It's diseased. I have somebody I know on Twitter. He's a wonderful person, but for some reason, every time he has an anxiety attack or falls into depression, he feels the need to share it with his followers. Those are really private things. That's something that has to stay just with you. So that's a very big deal. You don't just share that with anybody. Number one, how do you tell your story? Number two, who do you share your story with? And number three, and this is a very important one: Do you share it for yourself or do you share it for another? Is your story something that can provide strength to somebody else?

45:41 Are you able to say, "Yes, we all go through different things," but I want you to know I also went through something like this and I'm not embarrassed to tell you. Because together we can go through this. Our common humanity can save us. And so we start to leave Mitsrayim when we start to become the owners of our story And our story can not only empower ourselves; it can empower others as well. Now we return to Rachza. Once we have, before we had Urchats, which was the pure state that we arrived in. Urchats is different. Rachza is different than Urchats. Rachza is with a bracha. Rachza means that now we are not purifying. Now we're not coming in pure. We're purifying ourselves. This is the process of tshuva. Once you own your story. Now what's the next step? This is what I did. What's the next step?

46:31 The recognition: I don't have to become this person anymore. I can wash my hands. And that's also not a simple thing in this world to be able to say. What my story was does not need to be the story that continues. That's a very difficult thing to say. Because many of us are trapped in our own stories It was always like this for me, and it always will be like this for me. Rachza gives us the opportunity to change our story and to do a full tshuva. Then there is motzi. We make a bracha of hamotzi. Hamotzi lechem min haaretz means in the present tense. Hakadosh Baruch Hu brings forth bread from the ground. Not that He brought forth bread from the ground, but that He brings forth bread from the ground. God consciousness. In order to unite this world with the world above A person needs to recognize that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is recreating the world at every single moment, and this too is part of the tshuva process.

47:36 Because if a person tells their story and owns their story. And a person says, "I want to change." The next thing that has to happen is to know that change happens at every single moment. AlchaDesh Baruch Hu is constantly in a state of bringing forth the world into its current reality. And it's not possible to change if you don't believe this. I'll explain. If the world is just a continuation, if one moment just follows another and it's not recreated anew, then it makes sense to say, "What I was is what I will be." Because if I was that before, and time is a continuum, so what I was, I will always be. But if time is constantly recreated every single moment, what was even a minute ago is a completely different reality than the one that's in front of me. So making a hamotzi means not only have I committed to change, but the nature of the world is that it's constantly in a state of change, and therefore I am unbound by history.

48:37 And I'm unbound by predilections of what the future will bring And that's also a fundamental part of change. Once we go through that, we return to matzah. What's the difference between matzah and bread? Weinberger spoke about this at length in the new Hagada that was just published from Weinberger, which is, by the way, beautiful. Highly recommended if anyone hasn't yet gotten it. Superb Hagada written by Nachum Dinowitz. He did a fantastic job. But he speaks at length. About the idea of simplicity. What does it mean, simplicity? Simplicity means to show up as you are, with no need for self-inflation. We are now starting to return to the way we were in the very beginning of this process by Kaddish and Orachas, as represented in matzah. Here I am Nothing fancy, no inflation. I don't need any accoutrements. I don't need anything to build up my inner beauty because I am beautiful as I am, meaning whoever I am, including all of my imperfections.

49:41 I'm capable of engaging with my entire self and saying, "This is who I am." It's a funny thing. They really learned today how to make bread look amazing. Like bread, especially in Eretz Yisrael. I've forgotten how they have it here in America. I think here it's more like pre-sliced in plastic bags. There's a bakery by me. It's a phenomenal bakery, and they have sourdough bread. Maybe you girls know how to do this better. What's with the designs on bread? They know how to make it look amazing. Bread is like art now. I can't imagine that matzo will ever be that way. I can't imagine that somebody's going to make decorative matzo. I was just in Colsave. I saw that they have chocolate-covered matzo. So it's like that's a chivish that they're selling chocolate covered matzah, but seriously, how much could you do to matzah? Really, it's very plain, it's very simple. This is what it is, but the beauty is in its simplicity.

50:44 I'm gonna tell you a secret. I shouldn't tell you this. There was a conversation in yeshiva. I'm not gonna tell you who the guys were. It doesn't matter. But this guy is a very funny guy. He went on a rant. And he said, "I don't understand what happens to these girls by weddings, Rabbi." He had gone back for his sister's wedding. And he said they spent all day in makeup. And he was going on this rant. He shouldn't have said it. It was Berabim, and it wasn't the appropriate thing to do. With all of that introduction, he goes, "Rabbi, they look terrible. They spent all day in makeup. They just look like they had makeup caked on themselves. Their hair was done up to like," They looked like Marge Simpson, just like the giant hair. He was saying in a sweet way. He's like a little bit of a crazy guy. He's like, my sisters look terrible. I would never tell it to them, but they look terrible.

51:39 So I used it as an opportunity to shift it into a more appropriate conversation. I said, and if you unpack that, what does that really mean? These girls feel the need to be something they're not. It's not attractive. He's like, just show up. Be yourself, and it's much more attractive. And that part he's right about. But we moved it into a conversation about how all of us do that. But to become a matzadik person is not a simple thing. It takes a tremendous amount of courage because it's very vulnerable to be matzo. It's a very hard thing to show up in your life and say "This is who I am," without any added extras, nothing fancy. Then there's more. Mourer has become my favorite of all the simanim because it's without a doubt the hardest. Mourer means I can feel my feelings, especially the hard ones.

52:40 I'm sure it's like this with the girls also, but I know it's like this with the guys. If you ask a guy How did that make you feel? But you don't say how did that make you feel. This is very cliché. But if you basically ask them how did that make you feel, they go. This is what they say. I don't know. Sad. Right. I'm like huh. Or happy. I'm like. Or angry. But that's that's the that's it. That's the that's the entire lexicon of emotions, right? And so I'll say to them, and if you drill down under sad, what will you find? So they say, I don't know. It was weird. I'm like, okay, but weird is not an emotion. They're like, okay. I don't know. I just didn't feel it. It didn't feel good. The last time you were able to get away with that was third grade in creative writing. The boy felt sad.

53:28 But if that's the range of your emotional dictionary, there's a problem, right? Giving people language to be able to express their pain is no small feat. To be able to say It felt really lonely. Or it felt like I was a really big loser. And brought back really Really deep feelings of not being enough Could you imagine a guy saying those things? It's like years of therapy to get there. It's not a simple thing. The hardest thing in the world is to feel our feelings. The absolute hardest thing in the world. What do you mean? Just feel your feelings. No. You could do that even physically, even if you don't give your feelings a name. Isn't that true? You ever have a feeling And you could just point to it, even if you don't give it a name. You just go like this. And it could be overwhelming. It could spread throughout all of our person, because just being able to experience the feeling on its own is huge. That's a huge part of the rectification process. Children are able to feel their feelings.

54:28 Adults have all these protective mechanisms to make sure that we don't. So the return to self, to bridge this world and Hakadosh Baruch Hu, comes with feeling our feelings. And that brings us to Korech. Korech is both a matzo sandwich and a maror sandwich. Which one is it, matzah or maror? It's both. And this is the hardest truth: that paradoxes are true. What do they say? The definition of emotional maturity is being able to hold two complex, conflicting emotions at once. Ask a girl after she's broken up with this guy, and it was him or bust. It was either we're going to get married or we're going to break up. Ask them how you feel afterwards. They'll say something like. I feel like again, if you like, unpack it. I feel really afraid to get back out there. I don't know that I'll be ready to do this whole thing again. And I also feel a deep sense of relief that I extricated myself from that relationship.

55:27 Those are two conflicting emotions. Being able to hold both of them is a sign of emotional maturity. That's Korech. Are we redeemed? Are we Matza? Partially. Are we still in the midst of our Maror? Partially. Is it okay that we're in the middle of both? Is it okay that sometimes we feel this way and sometimes we feel that way? That we go different places in our lives at different times, maybe even at the same time? Is that an okay part of the process? Are we able to become that person? That's the redeeming quality of korich. But if we can get through all of those stages, then we get to shochan arich. What does shochan arich mean? A set table. Things are now organized as they should be. Which is the whole point of the seder, to create order out of chaos. We now have a table in front of us full of delicacies, and we can eat them l'shem shamayim. We can engage with this world for the sake of Hakadosh Baruch Hu.

56:22 It means we are once again properly aligned. Order has been created. And in such a state, we have tzafun, the dessert. What's the dessert? That shadow part of ourselves, that big part that we lost way back. It returns. We're able to once again become integrated people. Where the parts of ourselves that we lost somewhere along the way once again become a part of ourselves. I'll tell you a story. This year in yeshiva There's a boy in yeshiva who's a really cool boy. He's a great ball player, maybe even a phenomenal ball player. And he came to yeshiva, and in the beginning of the year He would get very frustrated. By some of the guys that were not as cool as him, and it bothered him. And his rebbe, who's a wonderful rebbe, called him out on it And in a frontal way, he called him out on it many times.

57:15 This boy happens to be a very growth-oriented boy, and he took what his rebbe said very seriously. A couple of weeks ago I saw him walking around in the courtyard of the yeshiva in giraffe pajamas. Doing lunges with a basketball. So I said to him, "What? What are you doing?" This is certainly not the way he showed up to yeshiva in the beginning of the year. And he's doing these sort of hop lunges in this full giraffe costume in the chutzpah of the yeshiva. What are you doing? Lunges As if it was totally normal that he's walking around in giraffe pajamas. It was like a full onesie. So I pulled him over afterwards and I said, "I want you to know, I'm very proud of you." So he said, "Why?" Not because he's in the basic medrash, not because he's learning bein astarim now, not because he's davening like a mensh.

58:11 He would have beaten that kid up at the beginning of the year. The guy that he is now is exactly the guy that he would have been making fun of. In fact, it was. But part of his own rectification process is the reason that he was so upset about that is because he has that guy inside of him. He had to square it away. He was too cool to be that guy. So he hid it away. And it frustrated him every time he saw it, until he learned to accept that guy, and then he could accept himself. I remember when I was growing up So I had all these friends. Because I was in Hafter for a couple of years before I was expelled from Hafter, I was in Hafter for a couple of years in elementary school. And then I ran into some of these guys later on in high school. I remember walking down Central Avenue. And I saw this guy that I was friends with from elementary school.

58:59 I said, "Hey, how's it going?" You know, very loud, effusive, whatever it was. The guy was like "Good. What's going on with you?" I was like, "You okay?" He's like "Yes, all good." I'm like, "What happened to you? You forgot how to talk? I knew you not that long ago, and all of a sudden you're just like Like very quiet. He was very, "Anyone here from after?" I'm saying, "You know this guy?" I'm saying you met this guy before. Right? And all of a sudden he was like I don't know. What don't you know? It was a shadow part of himself that he had. He had to become a certain personality. He was a regular, normal kid running around playing football in the cement courtyard over there. What happened to him? We lose these parts of ourselves. It's an amazing thing that happens when we return those parts to ourselves. It's a very beautiful thing.

59:56 And then there's Baruch. Baruch means to express gratitude. You want to know the symptom of if you're in self or not? Ask yourself how grateful you are. Gratitude is an amazing thing, though. We love to be around grateful people. Real grateful people. You're not the fake grateful people. Fake gratitude is very uncomfortable. It's like somebody comes over to you and thanks you for something that really wasn't that big a deal "You saved my life." First of all, no, you didn't, right? She just got you a coffee. It wasn't that big a deal, right? I'm saying, but there are people that when they're very genuine in the way that they say thank you, it's like thank you so much for doing that. It really meant a lot to me. Isn't that a special person to be around? To behave in a grateful way means to lead a blessed life.

1:00:45 To lead a blessed life—that's barich. Then there's the hardest one. I think it's the hardest one. Which is hava. Hallel means to be able to sing with joyous abandon. I'm going to tell you a secret about myself. It's not such a secret because I tell it all over the place, but I shouldn't. I probably don't have as bad a voice as I think I do. But I have not davened for the Amid. I think since I'm 12 years old in youth groups like that. I'm pretty sure that I could do a decent job if I would get up in yeshiva. I'm pretty sure I could have a very nice kabbal shabbos and really make it meaningful for the boys. I won't do it. I won't do it. It's terrifying to be able to be yourself with total abandon, to sing and dance as if no one is watching.

1:01:40 To be able to have complete joy of all of the emotions to feel. Joy is the hardest one. That's why we hold ourselves back from feeling joy. There are people that are truly joyous. Rav Chaim Kanievsky is a chesalik of Rashi. You should know he was an exceptionally joyful person. There's a lot of stories coming out now about his mother, and they're all amazing. In the time that I met with Rav Chaim, I got to see his smile. I can't tell you how much Torah I've heard from Rav Chaim Kanievsky, but the smile, the joy that was in his life, was amazing. He always had a clever smile, dancing on his lips. A boyfriend of his came with very long hair. And he asked Rav Chaim for a bracha, and Rav Chaim looked at his gabbai and said, "Zeish o isha." He had a very beautiful smile on his face.

1:02:26 The tzaddikim are like that. The biggest tzaddikim in the world just feel like amazing amounts of joy. And when you see the smile on tzaddikim, like Ravitcha Meyer, when you see Ravitcha Meyer smile, it's like it lights up the entire world. It's so beautiful. To be able to sing is an amazing symptom of self. To be yourself with nobody else. Just to be, this is who I am. To sing at the top of your lungs. To sing praise to Hakadosh Baruch Hu. It's an amazing gift. And then the seder ends with Nirzah. Nirzah is the appreciation that redemption that comes along with exile. Because you can't have redemption without exile. Is better than the original product. That's a hard thing to know. Most of us don't want to go through any of this. We don't want to go through the brokenness of our life. We don't want to lose our shadow parts. We don't want to act in an inflated way because we have a scarcity mentality. None of us really want to go through that.

1:03:28 But if you do at the end To be able to say that you're a person who's redeemed, that the relationship is infinitely deeper than you had beforehand with yourself, with others, with Hakadosh Baruch Hu. That redemption that will one day occur That's an amazing gift. Also, Nirtza is the birthplace of hope, and hope is everything. Hope is the belief that life will surely change, and it will, and it does. Look around. Hope is everywhere. Yesh tikva. There's amazing hope that exists in this world. If we're in self, we can be hopeful people. And of course When we say Loshana Habav Yerushalayim, it's a Tefillah to Hakadosh Baruch Hu that we've done ours. We've elevated the Hay. And now it's up to Hakadosh Baruch Hu to reunite us with the Yud and to bring an Arama Ba. These are the fifteen steps of the Seder. These are the fifteen steps from Ezra's Noshim, the elevation of the feminine parts of this world. To Ezra's Yisrael, to the return of Hakadosh Baruch Hu into our world. Israel Hashem, we should be zeicher this year by Loshana Abba Yishalayim to have done all the work that we're speaking about, so that we can merit redemption not from above but from below. Thank you very much for coming.