Transcript
Okay, good morning. Good morning, good morning, gut voch, good summer, a gut yohr. Hope everyone had a beautiful, wonderful Pesach. Thank you for adjusting the schedule this week. I'm unable to do the shiur Wednesday, so appreciate your joining us on a Monday. It's a great way to start the week anyway, and we can chap some guests who are still here for one more morning. So thank you for being here. Our Emunah series is generally sponsored by Dr. Zavi and Bella Morgan in memory of Rabbi Dr. Brian Galbut, in memory of her mother Dr. Ellen Chanzer, and we're very, very grateful, remain always grateful to the Morgans for their generosity. So on Chol HaMoed, I, my kids, two of my kids had issues with their phones and had been begging me to take them into T-Mobile to get it resolved. That is the opposite of Simchas Yom Tov to have to go spend time at T-Mobile is the exact opposite of enjoying your Chol HaMoed or your Yom Tov. It's in fact defined by many as cruel and unusual punishment. But nevertheless, I decided and was determined, maybe for their Afikoman, I would do it. So I had just come back from a Chol HaMoed activity in which I was wearing a polo shirt. The polo shirt said Boca Raton Synagogue, but it was a polo shirt, not the way I normally dress because it was a Chol HaMoed activity that demanded that different dress. And I decided I would take them and we looked up a T-Mobile store and we're going. And we're going to the T-Mobile store and lo and behold, I didn't realize the T-Mobile store that Waze was taking us to was in the mall. So I got very frustrated. And I said I would never dress like this to walk around the mall. You know, I'm a rabbi, all that other stuff, like I don't dress like this, not on Chol HaMoed. It's quasi-Yom Tov. This is not how I dress. If I knew this store was in the mall, I wouldn't have run out with you looking this way. And I was a little bit frustrated that we didn't do more planning or care to figure out which store or where or preparing to be dressed appropriately or properly for it. Anyway, we go to the T-Mobile store, we spend an inordinate amount of time waiting there, and which was fine. It was all, I had brought my laptop with me to work, to write a drasha while there, so make best use of time. Anyway, after a long time there, they said you're better off going to the Apple Store. So then we went to wait in the, we went to wait in the Apple Store. And we're waiting in the Apple Store and the person who checks you in when you come into the Apple Store takes one look at me, looks down at my shirt and he says, "Wait, do you work at Boca Raton Synagogue?" I said, "Yes." He said, "I'm in charge of their corporate account here. Let me get you the right people and get you to the front of the line." So I said, "Oh, I see. Hashem had me embrace your place. Not only embrace your place, embrace your shirt." So we have a new, a new logo, a new, a new motto: embrace your place and embrace your shirt. You are where you're meant to be. And if Hashem decided that you were supposed to be at the store at the mall, first of all, that saved us because T-Mobile sent us to Apple, we would have had to make our way. And it saved us that I was wearing the thing I was unhappy that I was wearing because that's what identified me and it didn't give us any discount or anything else, but it did help us expedite, if you call three hours expediting, but it did get us, it did get us to expedite our time. Anyway, that is my own personal Emunah story from Chol HaMoed. I'm sure and I hope you have yours. We'll read a couple emails and dive back into the text. Dear Rabbi Goldberg, hope you and your family and community had an incredible Pesach. I remember spending the end of the last days of Pesach at BRS, recall it being wonderful, blah, blah, blah. Small but impactful Emunah moment for me just happened moments ago. I typically listen to each week's Emunah episode of Learning with Emunah during my long runs on Friday mornings. And the speed at which you talk absolutely energizes me and often creates some of my best runs. It's good to know. Does that count like EPO? Probably not. I ran the Jerusalem Half Marathon two months ago, two weeks ago, and set a personal best, which I credit mostly to your shiurim. Wow, okay. Anyhow, since there was no new episode last week during Pesach, on my run this morning I wasn't sure what I should listen to. I decided it would be fun to try to start something from the first episode on Spotify since I only started listening to the shiur the last two years. So I went all the way back because there was no new episode. Independent of that decision, Friday early morning I wanted to listen to shiur on Shvii Shel Pesach and found a nice little eight-minute podcast from Rabbi Aryeh Shoshan on Nesivos Shalom, which I loved. Fast forward to that night, I was sitting in shul between Mincha and Maariv, decided I wanted to learn something more about Krias Yam Suf. So I look next to me on the bookshelf in the random shul I was at in Har Nof, and lo and behold, there's a Nesivos Shalom, the book of the Slonimer Rebbe on the shelf. I flip to the essays on the seventh day of Pesach and the first one I read is the same idea heard earlier that morning, in which I also coincidentally heard similar ideas to recently on your shiur, how there are different levels of Emunah in the mind, heart, and limbs. I saw a lot of ideas and sources all lining up and pointing to the same thing. So I decided by the end of the chag I'd really love to learn more Nesivos Shalom since it kept showing up. Fast forward to my run just an hour ago. I chose to listen to the first episode of your Emunah shiur ever. And what source are you learning? Nesivos Shalom. I couldn't believe it. I know it might seem like a small thing, but I find that these little moments where coincidence after coincidence occur are those little winks and smiles from Hashem. He cares and puts the perfect ideas. on my next long run. So hopefully now I have to speak quickly. You can always listen double speed and run faster. But hopefully it's a safe and enjoyable and productive run. The little winks and nods from Hashem, you're wearing the right shirt, or you open up to the episode and it's the same sefer, you look over at the shelf and there it is, you open the Haggadah right to the right page, the winks, the nods, the hugs from Hashem. Who doesn't need a good hug? Who doesn't need a good hug from our Creator? And Hashem shares them and sends them to us. Dear Rabbi Goldberg, I've been listening to the podcast for a while, really gaining, enjoying. Today we had a really stressful experience on our Chol HaMoed trip. We took a wrong turn and ended up in traffic for an extra 40 minutes with a cranky baby and others who needed bathrooms. I can't say I won the challenge. I said some things I shouldn't have, and should have acted better, but at some point when I was calmer, I told my kids the now-famous line, which I was listening to that morning, of you are where you're meant to be. I told them straight out that I've had a hard time internalizing that right now, even though it's running through my head. It was a very meaningful moment for us with my kids adding their own thoughts and acknowledging that we all have things that we need to work on, and at least we know what we want to believe, even if we're not there yet. And meaningful to me because I still have work to do, having the words come to my thoughts over and over is at least a start. Thank you again. So leaning in and embracing wherever we are, whatever's happening. Some of you are traveling back today, and I hope it's smooth sailing and no delays and no frustrations. But when we lean into that mentality, that attitude, that motto, we are where we are meant to be. That's what life is about. Again back to the Shabbos Hagadol Drasha, the geulah in the galus is through the journey. If we're so focused only on the outcome and the destination, then we'll be bitter and resentful and miserable when we're along for the ride. But if we recognize the ride is the destination, the journey and the process is exactly where we find the redemption, then we lean into it. We're not trying to deny it or escape from it, we're not trying to be resentful of it. And that was the Lubavitcher Rebbe's idea of the only difference between gola and geulah, exile and redemption, is the letter aleph. When you put the aleph, when you put Hashem in the gola, in the exile, you bring redemption in that moment. So even in that circumstance, even in that bitterness, even in that frustration, even in that pain, even in that anguish, even in whatever one's going through, when you add the aleph in the gola, in the exile, you create geulah within the gola. And that's what we shared the countless stories of those even in the tunnels, even in captivity, even in their horrific, horrific exile. And we daven that those who are still held should be returned immediately and safely and whole. But even in that place one can find Hashem as so many did. You must watch. I said in the Yizkor Drasha, I talked about Eli Shurabi, who when he got out, in several of his interviews talked about seeing Hersh Goldberg-Polin in the tunnels and the faith that he drew from Hersh, and Hersh didn't get out, but Eli Shurabi picked up his baton, he found faith and parts of observance in the tunnel. Could you imagine? People who became more religious, found greater faith, discovered Hashem. They didn't say where is He and how could He? They said He's here and leaning on Him is my only way out, and continued to connect, continued to connect. Another one of the hostages who got out—I'm sorry, I forgot his name—the one whose grandfather made the magnificent Havdalah that night when he got out. He went back yesterday to the place in which he was captured, put on tefillin and said Shema. He didn't go back to the place he was captured and spit on the ground and say there is no God; he went back to that place he was captured to put on tefillin and say Shema. That when we add the aleph in the gola, we could create geulah even in the harshness, even buried underground, even in captivity, and God forbid it should never be that, but whatever we're going through, hopefully, please God, much less. But if we welcome and invite, if we find and lean on, if we feel the guiding hand on our shoulder of Hashem, if we understand that there's a process, there's a journey, there's something to extract and learn, there are sparks to take from here, wherever we are and however we find ourselves, there's something to get done, there's somewhere to be transformed, there's an experience we're meant to have while we're there. And now it's an adventure. Let's find it and figure out what it is, what difference we're meant to make or what we're meant to take out. Then it transforms and it changes the entire essence, it changes the entire experience for ourselves. One more email, we'll dive back in. L'chvod Rabbi Goldberg, thank you for the weekly shiur, blah blah, yada yada. I'm sending this email because I have a question I'm hoping the Rav can answer or address in a future shiur, but I'll start with a story. You've read emails with stories just like this in many variations. When it happened to me, I can't say I was surprised, but I was very moved. My father is a young man who was in good health and one day he suddenly wasn't feeling well. Baruch Hashem, my sister who is a nurse encouraged him to go see the doctor. After some tests were done, doctor called Hatzalah and sent him to the ER, having noticed some issues and thinking my father would need a stent. The next day when they did a cardiac cath to determine whether he would need a stent, they discovered more serious blockage, decided he'd need a bypass surgery, which is much more serious than a stent procedure. procedure. This was shocking and unexpected news to all of us and a flurry of emotions and decisions followed. This was on a Wednesday morning and I felt like I needed to ground myself from the flood of emotions I was feeling by listening to an Emunah shiur. I turned it on and one of the emails that you read was from a listener who himself had undergone a quadruple bypass surgery. Shiur 337, February 26th. This was a tangible reminder to me that Hashem knew exactly what was happening, that he is completely in charge. Chasdei Hashem the surgery was successful, recovery has been going well. I'm grateful to have seen firsthand the hug from Hashem, the pat on the back to show he's right here with me always. So she's there in the waiting room, her father has to have bypass, she turns on an Emunah shiur to find some encouragement and we read a letter from somebody who just had bypass surgery. There are no coincidences, nothing is random, it is all by design. A hug, a nod, a wink from Hashem. But I was not surprised, having listened to the shiur for some time now, I already knew that for those whose eyes are open, the signs are everywhere. If the antenna is extended, you can pick up the signal everywhere. Now for my question: How do I know if my Emunah is working? When a stressful situation happens such as parnassah, shalom bayis or other issues, I find myself in the grips of anxiety, loss of appetite, a tight feeling in my chest, thoughts swirling. I try to tell myself it's from Hashem, it's where I'm meant to be, but that doesn't get rid of the anxiety. I try to channel it by davening sometimes, but it feels kind of forced. I do have many other times where I feel a strong connection in davening, Baruch Hashem. Is the goal supposed to be not feeling any anxiety at all or minimally when a stressful situation crops up and if yes, how can one get there? Thank you. That's a great question. It's a good question. No? I'm sure it's one that occurs to many of us. And I don't know that I have the perfect answer. This is a work in progress, I am a work in progress, and we're all working on this always. But I'll just tell you my hargasha, my feelings, in hearing that question. I don't know that living with Emunah and bitachon and dveykus, the notion that faith and connection and feeling of Hashem in our lives is meant to put ice in our veins. It's not meant to put ice in our veins that we go through life without any feelings. It's not meant to make us numb. We still have feelings. There are still highs and lows, there's still happiness and joys and sadness and grief. There's still moments of anxiousness, a little worry, maybe even a borderline panic. What Emunah can do is help us regulate ourselves, to bring us back to equilibrium. What it can help us do is after we have the natural and instinctive and intuitive reaction to the situations that life has, and Hashem designed us and created us that way to be very healthy. You know the most dangerous children, the children who are in the greatest danger, are the ones who are the most fearless. Fear is a very healthy quality because fear creates boundaries for us, so you don't dangle off the side of a bridge and you don't climb to the top of a ladder and balance and you don't stick your finger in outlets and you don't do risky behavior because you have a healthy dose of fear. If you have too much fear, you have anxiety and panic, you're gripped and debilitated and paralyzed by fear, then it's unhealthy. If you have too little fear, then you live a reckless and a dangerous life that can often end in tragedy, car accidents and other accidents. So like the Three Bears you have to have just the right amount of fear, not too much, not too little, not too hot, not too cold, just right. It has to be just right. And that's true for every quality we have, and I would argue, even a healthy dose of anxiousness. If you're anxious about something, anxiousness, I can tell you only speaking from experience, when I'm anxious, oh Shabbos Hagadol's coming, I better start thinking about a topic, I better start working on an outline, I better start putting together, it's very healthy. You feel little butterflies about Pesach coming, can't now talk about it because you have three hundred and forty something days to it, so if you feel, oh I'm a little anxious, I notice on the calendar there's something called Pesach, it's coming up, let me start planning. If the anxiousness is a driver and a motivator, if we can regulate it and we can overcome it, we can channel it to be able to bring a positive action and outcome, then it's healthy. If we're stuck from it, we're paralyzed, we're debilitated, we're stuck because we're so anxious, then it's unhealthy, then it's unhealthy. So no, I think that if a person is sitting in a waiting room while someone they love is undergoing a life-threatening surgery or life-saving, hopefully, surgery, and they say, yeah, hunky-dory, calm as can be, I have no feelings whatsoever, all is good, why? Why do you ask? Then maybe there's something a little off, there's a little psychosis maybe, maybe they don't really love that person who's under the knife. If a person says I'm a little bit anxious but you know what? I'm channeling that into saying Tehillim because Hashem is in charge, Hashem is the great surgeon above, Hashem is guiding the surgeon's hands, Hashem is determining the outcome and however it turns out is from Hashem and will be for the best, but frankly, yeah. I got a little anxiousness about what that outcome will be. I know it'll be for the best. I'm prepared for it to be the best. I submit and surrender it'll be for the best, and I know it's all Hashem's hands. But, yeah, yeah. So that I think is what Hashem is wanting. So if a person is feeling more than that, if they're feeling the level of an anxiety and worry and fear that their physical manifestations of it, there's nothing wrong, and a person should see with no stigma and no judgment and no shame, should see some help because you're no different than the whole world. Corona, long before Corona, Corona, a year and a half war since Corona, has rendered the entire world, the entire Jewish world, any feeling thinking member of the world, has some level of anxiety. The whole, the whole world. And there's no shame, there's no embarrassment, and anyone who needs help and support should seek it and explore it and not hesitate for it. So if there's more than just whatever the baseline is of it. But if a person says, "I am a little anxious while I said the Tehillim in the waiting room with confidence Hashem was in charge and in control, with comfort knowing the outcome would be whatever he wanted." But yeah, of course, I little knots in my stomach. Of course I didn't have an appetite. I wasn't fressing on sushi while sitting in the waiting room for the surgery to be over. Not there's anything wrong if you're able to do that too. God bless and enjoy. But there's nothing wrong if a person says, "I'm feeling just a little bit, a little bit anxious." Emunah bitachon is not meant to turn off your feelings. We spoke about this in the past, this story of Rav Wolbe who was leaving, the talmid of Rav Leichter of Rav Wolbe was leaving a shiva call of a great Rosh Yeshiva who sat acting like he had no grief or sadness at the loss of his wife because it's all from Hashem. And Rav Wolbe turned to his talmid Rav Leichter and said, "Within a couple weeks, he's going to crash and burn." Because if you deny normal human feeling and emotion like grief and sadness, then you will crash. Because those are normal. So a little anxiousness and a little worry, a little concern, a little nerves, those are healthy emotions. There's a boundary. If they're expressing themselves in a way that they're unhealthy, then they need support and intervention. But if they are regulated in a way which is healthy, then there's nothing wrong. So that's לבי אומר מלבי, that's how I understand it. That's how I try to experience it. If I'm a little nervous, I still get nervous before every time I tell every bar mitzvah boy I meet with when I ask, "Are you nervous about your leining?" And they all say yes. And if they say no, then I worry about them. But if everyone says yes, I say, "Don't feel bad. I'm nervous before every single time I speak." It's not a debilitating nervousness and I'm happy for it because if I'm not, I won't produce. I think it's good. It's good to feel it a little bit. It's good to feel it a little bit. That's what drives us to want to prepare and to want to give it our all and to want to come through and to want to produce. So that's good. Channel it. These are healthy feelings. Normal, healthy human emotions and feelings should not be denied or suppressed and we shouldn't numb them. Emunah and bitachon are not an elixir that numb or suppress normal human emotion. A person underwent a loss, feels sadness and grief, lean in and process it and experience it with Hashem. A person undergoes a simcha, sing and dance and feel joy and jubilation and process it with gratitude to Hashem. Someone has something coming up which is something that induces some anxiousness, be a little anxious, but channel it into leaning and turning towards and asking Hashem for help. Don't deny or suppress normal human emotion. Lean in, express it, and experience it. But use it all to channel in a way that makes me feel closer and more connected to Hashem. So if my anxiousness makes me say, "What Hashem? Where Hashem? How Hashem? How do I know he's going to come through and where is he and what will be and I don't know if he's really in charge, maybe this is up to me and will I get it done?" That's unhealthy. But if you feel, "Yeah, of course I'm a little bit anxious. Who wouldn't be anxious with a surgery coming up? Who wouldn't be a little bit anxious?" But you know what I do when I start to feel anxious? I realize Hashem's in charge, he's the surgeon, he'll control the outcome and whatever it will be will be what's meant to be. And that's how I control then, that's healthy. Then there's nothing wrong with it. Page lamed hei in the source sheets if you want we have more up here. We're still learning emunah bitachon of Rav Dovid Abuchatzeira. And we're on the section, the paragraph on hishtadlus, the essay on hishtadlus ad kama. All of us have to take initiative and effort. Part of the way Hashem designed a world is that we each have a trust fund. We each have a, what's it called? Put the money not in an endowment in an escrow. Thank you. We each have an escrow where Hashem has put shefa bracha. There is great blessing in escrow for us, but in order to access the escrow, in order to transfer the funds, in order to be able to benefit from the trust, then we need to do our own hishtadlus. So the shefa bracha is already set aside. side. Hashem already predetermined what's there, or at least what the maximum of what we could draw from, but in order to tap into it, we have to do shtadlus. So we're on the left-hand paragraph. הנה לנו המעשה רב המכווננו לתלמי חיים למען נעשה המוטל עלינו ונזכור תכליתנו ולא נאבדה בטרדת העולם ובמירדף אחר הרבה הון ועלינו לדעת כי לא עלינו המלאכה לגמור ואין אנחנו רשאים להיבטל ממנה אלא על האדם מוטל לעשות השתדלות. It's not on us to do everything. You also can't do nothing. Just like the three bears, you gotta find the exact right measure. You can do excessive hishtadlus. You can do too much. You obsess, excessive, too much initiative. If Hashem wants you to succeed, to be wealthy, he can produce that by working eight or ten or twelve hours a day. If you're working eighteen and twenty hours a day, it is excessive hishtadlus. If you're working three hours a day and you say, 'You see Hashem, I showed up three hours of the day, now make it rain,' he says that's too little hishtadlus because that's not normative. That's not normal. That's not what happens. You're looking for something exceptional, you're relying on a revealed miracle. We have to do what is reasonable. We have to do what's reasonable and what is normal, and that is the prerequisite, that's what opens up the gates, that's how we access the escrow, the trust, for Hashem to transfer the shefa bracha. Shefa bracha in our health, shefa bracha in our parnassa, shefa bracha in our shalom bayis, shefa bracha in our quest to have children, shefa bracha in our quest for shidduchim to get married. We can't do excessive. We spoke a few weeks ago, the area where we're supposed to do the least hishtadlus people do the most, take the least initiative people take the most excessive, and that is shidduchim. Hashem is mezaveg zivugim, Hashem is the one who's making the shidduchim, do your part, you have to do something, you can't do nothing. But once you do your part and do something, leave it all up to, let go and let God, he is the great shadchan in the sky, he's the great shadchan upstairs. So and then in the area of work, he says do more hishtadlus, and that's where people want to do very little and say, 'Now Hashem produce, now Hashem come through.' VeHashem yazmino, we're turning the page, kol hitztarchuso גם ללא קשר למעשיו פעמים בדבר שיתעסק בו ופעמים בדרך אחר אשר ימצא לנכון. As we said often, the initiative doesn't correlate or correspond with the outcome. He demands, he requires, one of the ways that we display and demonstrate faith in him is by taking initiative. We have to take initiative. But the initiative doesn't necessarily correlate with the outcome. We could network, we could market, we could cold call, and then it turns out that it rained, we got business, picked up clients, but having nothing to do with the networking that we did. But if we didn't do any networking at all, those clients would have never come, because the prerequisite, what Hakadosh Baruch Hu in order to be able to access those bracha, we need to take our initiative. הן על כן מודים אנחנו ומשבחים ג' פעמים בכל יום באומרנו פותח את ידך ומשביע לכל חי רצון. And one of the ways that we recalibrate and we recenter and we refocus and we remind ourselves who's really in charge, who's really in control: Yes, I go to work, yes, I display my entrepreneurship and my creativity and my ingenuity, yes, I have a work ethic, I'm the first one there and the last one to leave and I work hard the whole day and I take the minimal breaks. But you know at the end of the day, the breakthrough, the success, anything that I have, is not because of me. Where does it come from and why do I have it? It's all from above, it's all from Hashem. And that's what we have to, that's what we have to remember: פותח את ידך ומשביע לכל חי רצון. If you look in the footnote, the Gemara in Berachos daf dalet tells us כל האומר תהלה לדוד ג' פעמים בכל יום מובטח לו שהוא בן עולם הבא. This pasuk, where does it appear? פותח את ידך ומשביע לכל חי רצון. I'm tempted to say it like a Sephardi right now, but where does it appear? In Ashrei. Whoever recites Ashrei, the paragraph in Tehillim at the end of Tehillim, whoever says Ashrei three times a day is guaranteed the world to come. Ooh, that's, that's simple? I could go and eat cheeseburgers and cheat on my taxes and have affairs, I can go murder and rape and pillage, I can go and do whatever I want and yet if I say Ashrei three times a day I'm guaranteed a portion of the world to come? That's all I have to do? It's that simple? I could gossip and slander, I could do whatever I want, and yet all I have to do then is say Ashrei, make sure I get my count, three Ashreis a day and I'm good to go? It's that simple? That's all, that's what the rabbis meant? Kol ha'omer whoever says תהלה לדוד ג' פעמים בכל יום מובטח שהוא בן עולם הבא? So the Ben Yehoyada, the Ben Yehoyada writes in his commentary there on the Gemara גם עוד תלוי בזה עניין אמונה כשאומר פותח את ידך צריך שהוא מאמין באמת שכל פרנסתו באה בהשגחתו יתברך ולא יחשוב כחו ועוצם ידו עשה לי חיל. It's not saying *Ashrei* each day, it's living *Ashrei* each day. It's not saying words; it's easy to offer empty lip service, to say the words every day, that's easy. That doesn't bring you to the world to come, that doesn't guarantee you a future. What gives you entrance into the world to come is not saying the words; it's living and breathing, it's thinking and being mindful, it's practicing. And that's what the *Ben Yehoyada* says: that you have to be *maamin be'emes*. You have to believe in truth, authentically, sincerely, שכל פרנסה בא בהשגחתו יתברך, that all of your livelihood comes from where? God Almighty. ולא יחשוב כוחו ועוצם ידו עשה חיל. Can a person really get there? All of a sudden we just went from incredibly easy to incredibly hard. We went from all you have to do is say it three times a day to: have you ever said it this way in your life? Has anyone ever said those words, *Poteach es yadecha*? I couldn't help it. *Posa'ach es yadecha* פותח את ידך ומשביע לכל חי רצון. Have you ever said God, You open Your hands and You provide for every living being, You satisfy, You give to every living being? Have you ever said it in such a way that you really mean that when I, when I deposit my paycheck, it's not because of me, it's all from You? All my success, all my breakthrough, all my profit, all my livelihood, all my income, it is all You. Who's the one who helped me land that client? You. Who's the one who made me believe this is the bottom of the market, now's a good time to get back in? You. Who's the one who made you think of that marketing plan? You. Who's the one who gave me the strength to wake up that early, stay up that late, and have that energy to work all day long? You. We went from it's so easy all you have to do is say it three times a day to: wow, have you ever said it the right way in your entire life? It's easy. It's easy. *Poteach es yadecha*. *Sefardim* before they make *hamotzi* and the last paragraph of—first paragraph of *benching*. *Ashkenazim* think *Ashrei* is enough. *Ashrei* is enough. The *Sefardim*, they love *Poteach es yadecha*. *Poteach es yadecha*. They love *Poteach es yadecha*. It's beautiful: *Hashem*, You open up Your hand ומשביע לכל חי רצון and You satisfy each living being with *ratzon*, with— it's a question. Whose will? Go back to *Siddur* Snippets, we spoke about this on *Ashrei*. *Poteach es yadecha*, You open Your hand, *umasbia* and You satisfy *lechol chai* every living being, *ratzon*. Whose will? Our will or His will? Which will? You can interpret it both ways, but *Hashem*, You bring that satisfaction. You're the one who provides. To say it, says the *Ben Yehoyada*, when are you guaranteed the world to come? Only when you say it with all of your *emuna*, all of your faith. Can we really get there? It went from incredibly easy to incredibly hard. To live at that level, that level of mindfulness, consciousness, that *Hashem* right now I'm depositing my paycheck and I think it's the result of my hard work and I'm depositing it with a little pride, but it's not really me, it's all You. We spoke earlier, two, three, four years ago—I don't even remember which *sefer* we were learning—who say we should get to a point when someone says, you know, where'd your paycheck come from, that we don't say Boca Raton Synagogue, you say *Hashem*. Where's your income from? *Hashem*. It doesn't matter what it says on the check you're depositing. The real source of whatever you're depositing is *Hashem*. Because I promise you, I promise you, there are a million other people who are as smart as you, who work as hard as you, who have the same education as you, and they didn't have that success. So it's *Hashem*. It's *Hashem*. He determines, He decides. Why'd He decide for you and not for others? That's a great question. That's a difficult question. That's a question for another time. Why are there those who say: I'm as smart as the person who has the success, how come I'm still struggling? How come I have no *mazel*? How come it feels like I'm a *lo mutzlach*, no matter what I do, no matter what I try, no matter how hard I work, I never get the results? I'm a *shlumiel* and *shlimazel*, I can never break through and never am able to access or open that escrow. That's a great question, a difficult question, a painful question, a question we're not addressing right now. But all of us now, *Ashrei* three times a day, from simply offering and depositing lip service, simply saying *Poteach es yadecha*, to meaning it, to believing it, to feeling it, and to instilling that feeling within ourselves. ונמצא לפי זה אמירת מזמור זה לאו מלתא זוטרתא היא. This is not some small thing. כי יצר ניצב לקראתו לבלבלו בכל זה ומטעהו. Because the ego gets in the way. I was reading a book over *Yom Tov*. This was a long *Yom Tov* with the long days. A lot of learning and a lot of family time and a lot of games and a lot of fun and a lot of time for reading and learning. So I read a couple books, but one of them I was reading is Ego is the Enemy. Very powerful book: Ego is the Enemy. Maybe a future *Shabbat Shuva* *drasha*. Ego is the Enemy. And the ego stands every— Every time we say Poseach es yadecha, the ego is saying don't mean it, don't mean it. It's not really him, it's you. You, you put in the time, you worked hard. It's your sweat and tears. It's all you. It's all you. That ego, that pride, it swells within us. So yeah, Poseach es yadecha. It's easy to offer the lip service and open our hands and raise our hands. It's easy to say the words, but to mean it? That none of it's me? It's all a gift granted from you? You gave me that idea. You gave me that creativity. You gave me that energy. You gave me that strength. It's all you. And without you I would have none of it. And it's on loan, it's never permanent. It could disappear at any moment. It could disappear at any moment. All of us, no matter what we do, no matter what area we're working in, whether it's professionally, whether it's personally, whatever talent or skill, we could wake up one day and it is gone. Star athletes who overnight lost whatever ability they had. Star musicians who overnight woke up with laryngitis or vocal issues and could never perform again. Brilliant people, brilliant people who wake up, God forbid, God forbid, a stroke, dementia, who can't perform again, can't remember again. No shortage of examples to help us realize and feel all of it. Whatever we have, whatever skills, talents, traits, blessings, they are on loan, they're never part of our permanent collection, never swell with too much pride. So whether it's the end of Yom Tov, I hope the people in your life said an enormous thank you at the end of Yom Tov, all throughout Yom Tov and before Yom Tov, of what goes into shopping, kashering, preparing, cleaning, cooking, clearing Yom Tov. No one should ever take it for granted. It deserves the greatest and biggest thank you in every direction. I don't know that we do a good enough job of this. And I'm going to generalize for a moment, you'll forgive me for it, but I don't know that husbands do a good enough job, particularly in front of their children, at every meal, before and after Yom Tov, saying to their wife, none of this happened on its own, thank you for all the planning and incredible hard work and providing this most magnificent Yom Tov where every meal, every meal surpassed the one before. And I don't know whether wives say to their husbands in front of their children in particular, thank you for your hard work, maybe running beautiful sedarim, maybe preparing beautiful divrei Torah to enhance every meal, or working incredibly hard to bring in the income that paid for this beautiful Yom Tov. And again, I know I'm generalizing and women also provide the income and maybe men also maybe cooked and cleaned and cooked, I got it, I'm just generalizing just by way of random examples, so just forgive me for it. But we don't do a good enough job of that. And one can easily swell with pride at the end of a Yom Tov and say, I nailed it. פסח תשפ"ה 2025 is in the books, nailed it. Every meal fantastic, every kugel came out perfect, every Seder was exactly the way I wanted. First of all, I don't know anyone who can say any of these things, but even if you're tempted or believe you want to, that is the ego is the enemy. We're tempted to swell with pride and say, all me. Nailed the Yizkor drasha, nailed the controversial afternoon class, which I the jury's still out if it was nailed. Nailed the thing, it's so easy to swell with pride. But you can never swell with pride. You have to realize it's on loan. You have to realize it's borrowed, it's never part of your permanent collection. And whether it's making a kugel or whether it's making a drasha or whether it's singing at a concert or whatever it is that we're trying to do in our lives, while we're tempted to feel it's all me, Poseach es yadecha. Hashem, you opened up your hand. I have videos I didn't share publicly because I don't think either of them wanted, they were private moments that I was probably invading, I think I told you this before. One was before Ishay Ribo came out of my office to perform, and then last year a couple months ago when Akiva Turgeman was coming out of my office to perform, and each of them, thinking the room was empty, sat at the door before they came in, you know in that build-up the lights go off, the music is playing, it's super exciting, super dramatic, and each of them said a perek of Tehillim and each of them turned to Hashem and said ה' שפתי תפתח ופי יגיד תהלתך. Hashem move my lips and let me sing. Because you could get up there and fall flat. You could get up there and forget your lyrics. You could get up there and your voice could crack. You could get up there and a million and one things can go wrong. And when you're done and come off that stage, and then I have a video Akiva surrounded himself with the guys and they said a perek Mizmor L'Sodah, they thanked Hashem for a successful concert. Can you imagine before each concert and at the end of each concert? Imagine, it's what we should do. That huddle before the meal? Let's daven the chicken came out well, the kugel came out good, come on Hashem, let's nail it. And the meal, so you don't have to imagine, that's exactly what we do. We make a beracha before we eat and then we bench or we make an Al Hamichya or Borei Nefashos afterwards we say, Hashem, we nailed it, thank you. We make a beracha before the cup of coffee, let this cup of coffee, everyone had what they missed most over Yom Tov. We are actually all incredibly pathetic, we shouldn't have missed anything, because Pesach, you know, when Pesach in my youth, when I was young, when Pesach was 101 ways... You can make almost anything kosher le-Pesach, non-gebrokts, and it tastes as good as it did all year all year round. But anyway, we missed nothing, nevertheless people missed many things. Some missed their coffee. Coffee snobs missed their coffee. They want not the instant and not the thing and I need my creamer and I need my thing and I need and I need. And the first coffee they had last night or the first cup this morning, that first cup you have to caffeinate with kavana. We do exactly what Akiva did before and after his concert is what we're meant to do before and after every time we eat. Hashem, let this cup of coffee turn out perfect, the right amount of—again, I don't know if it's a coffee or a milkshake what whatever, I have strong opinions about this. A proper black coffee, you know, was the way coffee was meant to drink. Once you're adding all these other things, you have a milkshake. Call it a coffee, make yourself happy. Whatever you want to call it, but it's it's a milkshake. But anyway, you make that bracha, let my milkshake turn out perfect with the right amount of caramel, the right amount of latte, the right amount of foam, the right amount of the creamer, hazelnut, French vanilla, the right amount, let it be the right amount. That's the bracha shehakol nihiya bidvaro. You help put in, you help make the right amount of it all for it to be delicious, let it be delicious. And then you finish drinking it. Interesting halachic question, can you make a bracha achrona on a cup of coffee because it was so hot, did you sip enough in a requisite measure of time? Again, not for now. But assuming you make a bracha achrona, you say a Borei Nefashot, oh Hashem, what a geshmak-gevaldig cup! Not me, I'm the great what's-it-called, barista? I'm the great barista in my home, I made the greatest cup of coffee ever. No, Hashem, it's all you. Before before and after everything we do. Before you walk into court and when you walk out of court. Before you walk in the operating room, when you walk out of the operating room. Before you walk in the kitchen, when you walk out of the kitchen. Before you walk up to the bima and after you walk away from the bima. I'm far from perfect and I'm always working on it, but I try to practice this. Before a drasha, maybe more out of desperation than anything else, I say to Hashem, please help me. Please let it come out, please give me the right words, please let it go smoothly. And afterwards if it went well, I say, phew, thank you Hashem. I have a strict imposter syndrome, so I pulled it off on them again, I can't believe they're still buying into this. Thank you Hashem for your for your help with it. That's how we're meant to live our life. That's פותח את ידך ומשביע לכל חי רצון. Okay, I'll tell you why I was wearing the polo shirt. 'Cause I went to play golf that day with two of my sons-in-law. And the two sons-in-law played in their own golf cart, and I was hosted somewhere else. I don't normally get spoiled and play this way, but there was a caddy. So the caddy, you know, if you're nice and kind and normal and you have an empty seat in your golf cart, you say, particularly when you have a long ride on a hole, come, come in my cart. So my friend, who was from Boston, I had to suffer Chol Hamoed. If the three hours in the Apple store weren't bad enough, I had to hear about the Red Sox and Boston from my caddy, who grew up Roman Catholic and didn't even know it was Passover or what it was about or what was going on. But we end up, of course, having a whole conversation about religion. And because he's from Boston, he had very colorful language and then felt very bad after. Only on the 18th hole did he say, you know, I just realized you're a rabbi, I probably shouldn't have been using the language I was all the last several hours. Anyway, but he said to me, said you know, he grew up in Boston and he was Roman Catholic and one of the prominent figures in his denomination who was at the heart of enormous controversy that had to do with causing pain to young men was a very close family friend of his and he was turned off to religion and practiced nothing all these years. So he said to me, you know, I really would love to explore religion again, but I don't even know where to begin. I wouldn't even know where to begin. This was my Chol Hamoed vacation activity. In the golf cart was doing kiruv on a Roman Catholic caddy. So, a really nice guy. So I said to him, just start talking to God. Talk to Him, not as if, but He is your best friend. Just open your heart. He's like, well, what would I say? I said, talk to Him about everything in your life, big or small, consequential, inconsequential, whatever you need His help with. I said, you know, before when we pulled up today to the course, I said, God, I barely get to play, I really enjoy, don't ruin it for me, let me come through, help me hit the ball long and straight, help the day go well. By the way, He said no. But help it be a help it be a successful day and a happy day, let me enjoy and let me play well. This caddy was blown away. He said, you ask God to play well? I said yeah, I asked Him before the last shot and I'm gonna ask Him before the next shot and I find myself when I'm in the bunker, I find myself talking to Him a lot. In fact, there's a lot more sincere prayer on the golf course than there is in the synagogue. This is a great, should be called a place of worship. So, he couldn't believe it. He couldn't believe it. So I said, what's the issue? He said, there's such bigger things in the world God has to take care of, my needs like, you know, playing well on a particular golf game? So I said, the problem is that you're trying to put God in a box. You're trying to make Him smaller than He is. God is unlimited, He's infinite, He's omnipotent. So you're right, if He had a certain amount and He could either give it to the homeless guy or to help you play well today or help you get a big tip at the end of this round, it's a little selfish. It's wrong for you to ask it when the homeless person really needs it much more. But guess what? God's got enough for everyone. God is limitless. God is infinite. So ask Him for whatever you need and whatever you want. And things as big as world peace, ending wars, healing illness, and things as small as get me out of this bunker in one try. He's capable of answering and providing it all. Nothing is too big or too small, and start there. Start there. That's all you need. That's all you need. Certainly don't go back to what you had, but that's all you need. In your own way, turn him into a Noachide. That's all you need. Don't rip the limb off a live animal, don't murder, don't steal, and talk to God. Talk to God. That's all, they're pretty easy, seven Noachide laws. They're pretty easy. So that was, that was my conversation on Chol HaMoed with him. And that's פותח את ידך ומשביע לכל חי רצון. That's the ratzon. I got in the bunker and I said, Hashem, you open up your hand and you give everyone. And I came out of the bunker feeling it wasn't your ratzon for me to hit a good bunker shot. The ratzon is His will, not ours. And if a choice or a conflict between the two, we should always want His will over ours because His will is coming from the perspective of the infinite, omnipotent one and not our limited one. And a conflict between the two, we should always, always surrender to Him. So saying Ashrei three times a day, that's easy as anything. Living Ashrei three times a day, living Poseyach Es Yadecha and meaning it, not be swelling and filled with pride about the kugel or the surgery you performed or the case you just argued in court or the investment you just made or the client you just picked up or the profit you just made or the drasha you just delivered, not swelling with pride but realizing, yes, I'm proud of the work I put in and I'm proud of the outcome, but I also realize it all came only from above. And in the rabbinate they say you're only as good as your next drasha, but I really believe that about Hashem. Until He helps me and gives me the material for the next one, I don't believe it's coming. I believe it's the end of the ride. I guess this was it, it was a fun ride, it was good while it lasted. But Hashem is the one, He's the one who either keeps the spigot, the faucet open or one day He can choose to close it and turn it off. He's the one who decides. That's true with our health. That's what Modeh Ani, that's Birchas HaShachar, this is all of Yiddishkeit and Torah, this is all Jewish life. We wake up every morning, we take for granted my knees and my hips and my ankles, they all work and everything is well and everything is wonderful. And then one day you wake up with an ache and a pain and a krechts and a this thing broke. The warranty doesn't cover it anymore, and you lived a certain number of years, and now it broke down and now it needs to be replaced. Now it hurts, now you can't take it as much for granted. Poseyach Es Yadecha, you have to wake up every day with gratitude. It's all from you, it's all from you, Hashem. One of the other books I didn't quite finish, I've been trying to make my way, but I'm finding it dense, Marilyn, is Outlive, Peter Attia. It's a very powerful book. It's a lot of data and math and formulas. I just want sort of the summary at the end of each chapter that says, and therefore do this. He's got a lot of the backgrounds on the process and the studies and the research. It's a little dense, to the end of each one, but it's basically Medicine 2.0 and 3.0, which is not reactive medicine when something goes wrong, how do you treat it and fix it, but how do you proactively live a healthy life to live longer and live healthier so things won't break down. And absolutely, it's the way that we should all be living and it's the direction we should all be turning. And you can't help but read it and sometimes say to yourself, but in the end of the day, isn't it all up to God? There are people who live this life and they drop dead of a heart attack at a young age. And there are people who live to ripe old ages. My wife had a grandfather, her Opa, who, God bless him, was an amazing, extraordinary man, a survivor in many, many ways. But I remember he was at a Pesach program we went to visit him. He was in his deep eighties, maybe even early nineties. And I remember the waiter pulled me aside, it was Chol HaMoed, we visited, he said, boy, your grandfather's got some appetite. Baruch Hashem, deep into age, he wasn't careful what he ate, how much he ate, how he lived, did he move, did he exercise, and he was zocheh to live a long life. So you say, does it really matter? You read the book and you want to say to yourself, there are people who live this book and they die young, and there are people who neglect this entire book and lifestyle and they live long. So does it really matter? So maybe we'll pick up with that next week. But that comes into the hishtadlus. Yes, in the end of the day, Hashem determines the outcome, but He relies on us to take the initiative. And and even though you could find outliers on the whole and statistically, this life and this behavior will still highly influence what that outcome, what that outcome will be, what that outcome will be. So back again, that's your homework for next week is to say Poseyach Es Yadecha, say Ashrei. And mean it. Don't just say it, live it. Just like Akiva before and after the concert, before and after everything we eat, before and after everything we do, Hashem, Poseach Es Yadecha. Help me, help me bring about the outcome I want, help it go smoothly and help it go well. And afterwards, thank you for what it did. And if it didn't, thank you for that too, because it was meant to flop. This golf shot, this kugel, this speech was meant to not succeed, and that's okay too. That's also the outcome, that's also the outcome that is warranted or that is correct. We'll pick up from here, im yirtzeh Hashem, next week. Have a great day. Next week we're back to Wednesday. Please remain for Tehillim as always. We daven that the hostages return, our soldiers are safe. Everyone takes a booklet, we can finish pretty quickly. Please remain for Tehillim.
