Farbrengen 19 Kislev Part 3, To understand Chassidish thought and life, Rabbi Yossi Paltiel - 5783

foreign [Music] I think you hit the nail right on the head but I'm going to turn it into a 20-minute speech 40 seconds I got I can drag it out so what is casinos what is casinos in a word Casitas is the soul the nashama the soul of everything a person as a soul an animal has a soul a plant as a soul a mineral everything I just saw and the soul is ultimately God the soul is God and the philosophy of hasidus and you must understand philosophy is nonsense I mean it's nice but it's not very valuable the philosophy of hasidos is about creating people who live by these ideas and when people actually live by the ideas of the Hasidic philosophy they are called hasidim hasids that's a very different Endeavor you know it's a it's it's one thing to try and understand the idea the philosophy of this that quite another to tap into its wisdom and to say Okay I want to adapt my life to it and that's what that's what real people who live in the ways that the balship inspired in the Altadena then later taught in the uniquely Chabad form and so forth and so on it's all about taking the ideas and applying it to life so like I said in a word considers is about the soul the soul the person soul of everything what's the soul of the world what's the soul of the world that is a Divine hand we don't believe in random we don't believe in the arbitrary everything that happens is by the Divine hand we quote right divine um whatever is oversight divine intervention that God pays attention to everything happening in the world is a an idea which is incredibly consistent with the Hasidic adage that there's God in everything and seeing God in creation seeing God in nature is the belief that whatever happens doesn't happen by mistake it's orchestrated by God and um it's true of the world it's true people true of a Jew the human being a human being has a spark of God that actually a big pretty big Hefty one a juicy one a delicious one right and the homage it's written in the book of books the oldest book ever written it says that God was created in the image of God but man pardon me Man was created in the image of God now of course the theologians the philosophers are all getting very nervous what does God look like doesn't make any sense that God should have a countenance and they're all busy coming up with explanations the underlying point is that whatever that is Man was created in that image we have something he created us to carry to represent what he is into the world that gives us a very special soul and hasidus is about accessing that soul and activating that soul and making it the basis for our daily living that's really true it's a simplification but it's not an exaggeration this is what hasida's wishes because see this wishes for the ideas about the soul and about God hidden and everything including in every person to become the basis for the Practical life that we live actionably by giving voices to our soul giving voice to our soul so I'm going to talk about this just for a few minutes not going to give you a very long speech just a short speech like I said look at yours um I'm sorry I'm not as good as you you're the old story I just I mean every time I go someone tells me the story about this Rabbi gave a 45-minute sermon and the front row that's sitting a very wealthy Jew who's paying for the entire event he's sleeping after three minutes and when it's all done he walks up to this rabbits rabbit swimming was incredibly inspiring it was so good it made me so comfortable and peaceful I went into automatic pilot you think you can summarize it for me in three minutes he says well listen I spoke for 45. I can't imagine see if he can try well I'll try my best listen if you're trying your best why don't you do it that way the first time here this day I would have stayed away for that one but anyway I can't promise you to give you a three-minute talk on the song like a very simple thing that is not simple at all and that is take a look at little child look at children very little children uh when they're before they're battered by life you know before they go to school and something in my head I imagine a two-year-old first day in school and he or she is playing with blacks and at this point in their young lives they don't know how to play together they play side by side they parallel play and another kid wants to have the block that the first child is playing with and of course their skills of communication are not very well developed right when the when in doubt smash the kid in the head right so so one kid's got those big long red blocks and the other kid really wants them and he'll trade all the shorter blue ones for the few big red ones in the kitchens no I want them So eventually one of the picks up a black and communicates without any shadow of that was intentions are smash another kid gets hit in the head no one's ever hit him in his life he's so surprised and so shocked and taken aback it's the first of many zetses no it's true it serves up any dances and what the child learns is the home I grew up in is not exactly the world I'm gonna live in right the way my mother and my father told me I was the greatest thing in the universe apparently not everybody agrees or there's other people who say somebody else is the greatest thing in the universe when you watch very little children what do you see number one they're not lazy at all they don't know what lazy means just ask any young couple on a Sunday morning they want to sleep right they can finally sleep and the kids are up why because there's the sun came out mom the sun came out let's go outside and plays and I'll go back to sleep I don't want to sleep yeah but I do want to sleep why do you want to sleep with your lazy bums well I get up earlier than you and I go to the kids are not interested they have so much energy they're not lazy at all they're endlessly curious endless they want to know everything they and you know how their imagination Works children to give a child information or give a child even words and you watch him use his imagination to recreate it in his own image by this time he's done he's created something which is not a role of reflection of the reality but it's a symptom of his desire to gather knowledge and at that very very tender age incorporated into his base of knowledge or his capacity for knowledge if you will they're incredibly curious they're very very curious they're very positive they're incredibly positive people they're incredibly optimistic children are positive people they learn pessimism and distrust and disappointment and all those other things in Florida they're still small I met them in Iraq yeah you told me you fly to death okay and there's another thing about children that I want to touch on which is interesting just think about this remember the first time you told the LIE do you remember the first time you told the LIE it always gets very quiet when I ask this question that's a lie when we were very little nobody told us not to lie we couldn't I I can sort of remember having a child in my class who was able to tell lies and I was very I couldn't decide if I was impressed or disgusted by his ability to say something which would happen How Could You Lie someone has a question you answered what do you say what happened I mean adults have no problem lying at all right they have 101 reasons why it's a Mitzvah to lie children have to learn how to lie because their basic condition is righteous their basic a vision is righteous so just like those four characteristics just those four and you can give you can probably pile out another half a dozen they're they're full of energy they're never lazy I think that's the biggest one they're never lazy they're endlessly curious they're very positive and they're unbelievably honest so what happened we went to school that's what thoughts went to school which is an environment that's supposed to what teach us and develop us and enhance us and whether it's in the classroom or it's on the roof of the building during recess or it's in the bus we learn a lot of lessons huh some of us learned those lessons and we learn how to survive some of us learn those lessons we feel very very crushed but we figure out how to lie we figure out how to be miserable and we have a whole philosophy to explain the sophistication of misery and we certainly become good at being lazy oh my God huh just sitting around doing nothing and our kids can't understand why we're sitting around doing nothing because they haven't learned that that non-skill you know I I professionally teach teenagers that's what I do I'm in my business as I mentioned to before and I'm not embarrassed to tell you my I'm a Shameless self-promoter my website is inside casitas.org I actually have some cards money what it wants you can ask the rabbi he listens and he listens so if you want access to my uh website please seek it out I have over 10 000 classes I've been talking a lot and recording a lot and posting a lot so it's if anybody's interested and it's it's pretty well indexed it's it's it's not so complicated it's hard it's easier to find you're looking for there's just tons of material and I'd love for you to become my student it's my number one reason for traveling but I teach adolescent I teach teenagers and um we talk about this and you know the one of the things that I constantly bring up to these kids which is so relevant to us adults is that probably the worst thing in our lives are not the bad things about us and there are bad things about us we don't want to announce somewhere and shaved of and all the rest the worst thing in our lives are bad habits the worst thing in the lives are things that we've gotten into the habit of doing that we simply cannot stop because we're sort of in a rut two weeks ago the Shabbos before last right today's Tuesday so 10 days ago I was in Los Angeles and uh a rabbi cornered me in front of a room full of people and he asked me to say what I thought was the most important thing that every couple needs in a marriage one question what's the most important thing companies in a marriage and I said I mean I was trapped I had to say something right I said don't get stuck don't get stuck when you get married you develop patterns those patterns reflect many many things for example one of the two of the partners wants to be loving and to preserve the Peace of the Union so they compromise they give in in certain things and then six months down the road they're facts this is what we do in our relationship now it's 25 years later and the guy or the girl is still stuck in this very ugly senseless activity that you've allowed in the first six months of your marriage um I would argue that what happens to couples often I mean so many times marriages fall apart simply because people fall into patterns of insulting each other it's not a big deal but you can't have a relationship like that and you're sort of stuck there you're just so used to putting each other down you can't imagine not doing it and you know what you could stop you really could stop you can't stop your partner but you could say you know what I've been insulting I've been putting it I've been making fun of you for 20 years I'm not doing it anymore and then of course two minutes later you insult her because she's so used to doing it so you make it your business to apologize right how do people stop a bad behavior they make themselves aware of it how do you make yourself aware of it you create a ritual that helps you see yourself so if you have a habit a lot of couples loving couples have a habit of putting each other down ask the children and it's just it's not a big deal but it is it's so unnecessary and could you imagine a couple of married 205 says you know what we're we're not going to make fun of each other anymore even though I still think that you're this that and the other right well there we go thank you very much I'll stop insulting you when you stop insulting me that's not the way this works I don't want to be in this kind of a relationship I love you and I want to I don't want to insult you anymore I'm used to doing it you accept it we've fallen into this pattern and I'm gonna unlearn it I'm gonna stop that bad behavior changing bad habits is worse is more difficult than changing evil character like people who are pathological Liars perhaps I don't know maybe that's the exaggeration but bad habits are very hard to fix children don't have bad habits years ago I mean I'm a public speaker and there's a rabbi in Granite who's a big cousin he's actually an international if you don't get voice lessons you can lose your voice because I talk all day I talk I don't know six seven classes a day um and some of my classes are done in public environments where I'm screaming from beginning to the end but you can see I'm I'm under the weather and I'm thank God I'm able to talk but I mean I've come to rooms no voice so you need to get voice lessons so I Know a Man who used to sing in the Opera now he's a big hostage with a big beard these things in Show and he teaches voice lessons and went up to him I said I need you to teach me how to speak correctly so he says you mean on teach you how to speak incorrectly I said what do you mean if you ever you ever see a little childhood's horse children run around all day long they scream they never get a horse why not because God made the human voice that you can shout and not lose it there's pathological stuff there's psychological stuff you know you can almost see yourself there are reasons that people when they speak in a suppressed way they're they're almost breaking their own vocal cords he said to me I don't teach people how to speak I don't do without a sing I I teach people how to unlearn the bad habits many of which are very psychological it's very profound it's very incisive it's very interesting it's fascinating but children have it right now but how do we view children when we look at little kids we watch that energy that lack of laziness that lack of sadness that incredible curiosity their optimism and I you know the the fact that they tell the truth what do we say Well they're naive they don't understand the world they're not living in the real world they're protected they're supported they're looked after they can afford to do things that nobody else could because Mom and papa are going to protect them right that's one way of saying it another way of saying it is they came into this world from A Different World and they brought their soul into this world until this world corrupts it they reflect their soul until this world presses it down you know the first time is the kid who hits you in the head with a block and you know sitting next to him standing next to him at those little 18-inch tables playing blocks during recess time you know it's the first time you got a zits in the head and the next time he's on the bus and the third time it's whenever it isn't sure we learn about the cruelty of the world and we slowly shy away from the basic childish instincts you know and then listen to this there are some people there are some people who never give them up there's some people who are grown men and women who are incredibly energetic never lazy they're incredibly curious they're very positive they never lie we have a name for them we call them sadikem we call them righteous that's what a righteous person is righteous person is not doing it better than we're doing it he's doing it from a different place he just never learned how to lie we never needed to learn how to lie now you and what I know that telling the truth is incredibly costly huh being kind and optimistic and honest is very very costly for most of us it's too expensive it's just too costly you know again I teach adolescence and one of the great cliches you hear even from very good parents is quote I mean this is such a insight into the struggle of child rearing and the the almost inevitable abuse that parents being unto the children when a mother or father will say to a teacher and a PTA for one reason or another quote I do not want my child being taken advantage of end quote so if the class has a group of children with a lot of money who are going to make very expensive parties for their bat Mitzi and their group of children the class who can't afford it and their children are going to feel very uh self-conscious about their inability to match up about what should happen is that every child should make the same exact bathroom it's when you solve the problem well it takes is one I can afford it why should I make my childhood beautiful but Mitch that's not my concern so then you have all the other parents in the middle who will say yeah I really wouldn't do this but she did it and she did it and I don't want my child to be taken advantage of this is parenting this is what we do this is what we do this is how we influence our children's Evolution our children's growth because it's hard it's hard to always be right it's hard to always be good it's always you know can you imagine people took advantage of you and you didn't care you didn't care you didn't care if you're taking advantage of he didn't care why didn't you care so he took another piece of cake so what give another piece of cake so the world does not come into an end it's a mindset but you as the distributor of the cake have to have a mindset which says as they say in Russians enjoy it I I I'm not trying to hold on to the cake so that I should be the the Mistress of cake distribution and if you took a piece before it was your turn then I feel violated that those simple realities are what separates those of us who figure out how to hold on to our Beauty and those of us who struggle with it but I think everybody knows that child in themselves knows that optimism knows that can you imagine everything lazy could you imagine never being lazy I don't know you but you and I look at Kindred Spirits I love to sit on the couch I don't know what you like to do but I shouldn't sit on the couch so much but I'm I'm in the habit of sitting on the couch you understand what I'm saying so it's a bad habit children don't sit on couches why because they can run around why should they sit still adults if they can sit in the couch why should they run around it takes less energy it's much more fun to eat chips and watch a movie and waste away that is a learned behavior it's not a natural behavior so here's a very simple insight is a grown man or woman who has I don't want to say retained who has worked to regain some of the childhood characteristics that make children beautiful that make children really spiritual you know like I said in the beginning when you're looking at a child you're seeing somebody who's coming from a Divine world that hasn't yet been corrupted and then we go ahead and do our thing and you watch kids grow up I I think about it so much I think about it so much I'm a teacher and I'm a parent and so many people I am a rabbi you watch kids in the nursery they're all happy all of them are happy really in the in the kindergarten there are a few that are withdrawing they're withdrawing you know they're not killing anybody but they're beginning to withdraw in in the in the previous children who begin to act up you know to fight to make trouble by the time you get to the second to the third the fourth grade most of the children are not smiling some are and you you you watch this you say wait a minute it was so much fun when they were two and the kids in the worst homes the kids are very dysfunctional environments as we get older the reality sits in now no one's saying this is easy and no one's saying there's a magic way to keep kids pure and beautiful as a woman they're two years old I mean the worst thing you can do to your child is say I'm not going to send my kid to school I'm going to keep him home so he's going to stay cheery eyed Lala until he's I don't know what age I'm gonna homeschool him because I don't want the world to ruin him the reality is we have to live in this world and our children need to integrate into a society and have to be around other children including children who are going to do things that are not pleasant and some rarely will you find a child that has toughness that has a fortuitous uh um a fortitude the astitutedness to be kind good righteous in in a circumstance where everybody around them is not so righteous and this is what happens as the kids grow up and when they become adolescents and they become adults you see the kind of adults that they become the those little children who somehow really what they had was incredibly good self-esteem that they could afford to be kind to the child that nobody notices they become our leaders they become people that we look to and say teach me how to be a human being or to use the form of this fabrang and teach me but that's really it's almost as simple I I'm not gonna um it's a little bit simplistic for me to say that that's the whole story but it's it's pretty close to it this is what city is about City says that Jew is a soul as they give it voice and that soul is beautiful it's always positive that's always optimistic it's those kind that told us honest and it's not easy it's not easy but let me tell you it's worthwhile it's worth it it's worth it it's really this creates a philosophy which means ideas that translate into a way of life which means a culture for a lack of words that is trying to teach people how to be open to other people how to be kind to other people how to use wisdom how to not become Petty how to work on their character and if you know a room full of hasidim you know that they're not equal they're not the same by any stretch of the imagination but every once in a while you see a person say that person is beautiful and they're not beautiful because they have the most money or they have the nicest outfit they're the most beautiful because their character is beautiful what's important they carry you know we live in a civilization where we all want to be all those things it's just expensive right if I want to be a nice guy I want to be kind I'm going to be forgiving and I'm going to be giving and I'm going to be optimistic so what kind of how much Fame am I going to have how many times does my name get to appear in the paper and that's very important that's very very important or it's not important and I think this is a this is a little window into what about Hashem taught we all have every one of us the most corrupt within us a person who's been abused and he's become angry and destructive and even violent has a soul has any Shama I'm not saying it's easy I'm not everything it's possible but you never lose the soul and the soul is always beautiful the soul is always full of energy the soul is full of optimism the soul is even honest and if we could give a little voice to that soul we will be a little closer to what considers teach us it's it I think it's that simple it is that simple it's a a simple insight into the Hasidic way of life and what you said what's your name David said that the most important thing is this is Joy it's very important absolutely the most important because it is Joy because it's counter-intuitive intelligent people are miserable who's happy the people don't know what's going on right now the people who know what's going on are happy anyway because they remember that they live in God's world not easy but possible and important and if you're just useless it's today it's today so let's say the time everybody okay we'll think of Citizen Negan I want to make a a request and a proposal if I may I'm kind of hard I'm I'm delighted that we're all sitting here I want to make a request okay there is today is the head of the year for Casitas and we have many traditions and one of the Traditions that we have is that we sing a certain song that it's it's a meditative song It's a pensive song It's a thoughtful song and we don't sing it all the time we're seeing it at weddings we go to a Chabad wedding we sing it under the khopa it's considered a holy song it's it's composed by the alternative almond and I'm going to indulge you I want to sing it okay now some of you may know it and you can sing along you know but you better sing along you're not going to sing along so then I've got help with you I want to sing the altadas and our tradition is that we sing a Negan before then we sing the Negan of the altariba and then we sing a a happier song after so this will take a few minutes okay please indulge me or enjoy me if you don't mind [Music]