CHAZAQ Event with Charlie Harary on "The Secrets to getting your Prayers Answered!"

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Bethl Community Center where tonight Kazak is once again honored and privileged to host a man who has literally changed the lives of thousands upon thousands of people. A man who was no guest to our community. We've had him many times over here. Please give a round of applause for Charlie Harrari. [Applause] Before we begin tonight's event, I just want to begin by a few quick announcements, I want to start off by thanking our anonymous anonymous sponsor. Who isn't even here? Interesting. Okay. Uh looks like he's uh looking for parking probably. Anyways, I want to congratulate and thank every single one of you for uh coming in the cold uh in the snow uh you know with the parking and the whole nine yards. So to every single one of you and so many of you before we begin just a few quick announcements. Every Monday night Kazak has a special women's class that takes place right over here. Uh we're going to have many great speakers. We really encourage all the ladies to come. Tomorrow night we're going to have Dr. Shmool Shields who's going to be speaking about nutrition for your children for a better education. Uh the week after we're going to have a special guest. We're going to have Garfinko from Orava. The week after we're going to have Pearl Abrams and we're going to have a many great speakers. One after the other, every Monday night right over here at the Bet Gil Center, 8:30 p.m. For the men, every single night, we have a program for you guys, a learning program. That's Sundays to Thursdays, 8:30 to 10:00 p.m. right over here in the second floor. We encourage every single one of you guys to come uh and learn and shike and uh enjoy. It's uh down to earth. It's exciting. Many of the guys that have joined our program have since excelled. Many of them have gotten married. I see Katan actually in the crowd. Emanuel, where did he go? He was there. Hi, how you doing? So, we really encourage everyone to come and learn and to uh join the staff, to join the team. It's really excitement. Uh has many other great events and programs. I'm just going to announce two more. this Saturday night for the men. Once again, we're going to have a malava maka motive. We're going to have kumz. It's pizza, French fries, sushi, the whole nine yards. We're going to have um inspiration, inspirational speakers. So, that's this Saturday night, 8:30 p.m. We encourage everyone to come. That will be for men only right over here in Beth once again. And two weeks from tonight, we're going to be hosting for the first time ever in Queens a filter thawn. What's a filter th No, it's not filter for the water. It's filter for your devices, for your computers. Um, we're going to be having for your iPhones, iPads. We're going to have technicians coming and installing them for you free of charge. Everything was taken care of by us. You just come and you protect yourself. You protect your families. You protect your future. uh every single one the the all the rabbis of the generation encourage and uh and more or less uh ask for every single person to put on a filter on their internet. You know, one click of a button could take you who knows where. So, please encourage your family members and friends to come two weeks from tonight, January 19th, we're going to be sponsoring a filter right here at the Betail Center as well. And we're going to have many other great events and programs. We have amazing news coming very soon. Uh the big Kazak event too is very soon. Last year we had it in in Forest Hills High School which where we had over a thousand people. It's an amazing event. We had Charlie himself there with Rabbi Cron and Rabbi Wallerstein. Uh we're going to announce the date very soon. We're working and looking for sponsorships. Uh it's a very big undertaking to bring in so many people to one room. A lot of advertising and a lot of costs. So, whoever is interested in uh spreading Torah to the masses and sponsoring that event, please come see me. If you want to promote your business as well, I know a few companies that did some advertising by us at this event. We promoted them and they saw very good results. So, uh please come and see me. I could go on and on about the Kazak magazine, the Kazak teens division, and a lot of other stuff, the parish papers, but uh I don't think we have enough time for that. I think without further ado, we're going to have the honor to call upon the one and only Charlie Harrari. Round of applause, please. Sure. Thank you so much. It's truly an honor. Can you hear me back there? No. Okay, we got to go back to the mic. This is so constraining. It's truly an honor to be here. Is it on? Okay, good. Hear me better? Is it even on? Much better. I'm getting the nod. Great. It is truly an honor to be here and thank you again Yaniv for the opportunity and the honor to speak at Kazak. It's really to see the crowd that comes out in the in the cold and the snow. It's it's a true it's a true Khuk for me. And so thank you so much. Um and I look forward to you know to being able to in some way I don't know how but to to continue to to to spread the message of Khazak. Just one word before we start about Kazak. It is truly an organization that cares so much about the spiritual welfare of each other. And when you have a community that benefits from Khazak, anything that you can do to help goes a long way. And I know that Yaniv is out there working like crazy. And so it's not just in money, it's in volunteer, it's in hours, it's in time. Whatever you have that you can give, um, please do. And with that, uh, help that uh, Kazak stronger and stronger. And it gets to a place where the entire nation that we have feels that strength until we get to a point we can have events like this in your Amen. Amen. Amen. Few years ago, I was working at a firm and it was during this period of time. It was the new year and what happens is a lot of times when you're working in a firm during a new year, they bring in speakers to like inspire you, to motivate you. It's like a downtime. Everyone's chill a little bit. And they brought in this motivational speaker. He was a coach. He was a division one football coach in Texas, which means like he was like, you know, Audor, forget it. They loved him. He was like everywhere he went, people like stopped and like, you know, said hello to him. He knew everybody. And he got up and he spoke to us. He gave us a whole speech about working hard and waking up early and and and going through pain. And it was amazing. Everyone was pumped up. I was going crazy. It was great. I was like ready to run through a wall. It was awesome. And afterwards, he opened it up for questions and a guy raised his hand and said, "What's it like to be on vacation? I know that the season starts in September. It ends in January, ends around now. And so, what's it like to have a couple of months off until the next season? what are you doing? Cuz you work so hard during the season. I'll never forget he turns around to this guy and he says, "Oh, no, no, no. You must not understand. The season is off for the fans, for the coaches and the players. We already started playing planning for next year. We're not off. The people that are watching it on television and showing up to the games, they're off. They get to wait until September. But the people actually making the difference, the people actually putting the players up, the coaches. Nah, we're not off. Our season starts the day after the last season ends. We're in a very interesting season right now. Last month, something happened. And for most of our people, everyone's wonderful. It went right by them. The season began. For most of us, we're not going to pay attention until it actually goes later on in the season. later on this summer when we start to get really and we everyone starts to bring up this topic. But for the players and the coaches, it started last month. What am I talking about? We have a season in Judaism called Gulus and Gula, exile and redemption. There's a period of time every year where we remember that there was a period of time where we had a temple, where the world didn't have sickness, where God showed himself all the time. There's a period that we're fighting for that we believe in. Now, usually we come to this in the summertime when we do that long fast in Tamuz that remembers when they broke the walls and then it culminates with that 25-hour mega fast called tishab. And most of us get into this season then 3 weeks intensity and then we get through it. Thank god we eat the bagels and after it's over and we're good to go. We're done. We're going to think about it for a long time. Awesome. Let's go swimming. But it actually started last month. And for most of us, we missed it. Something amazing happened last month that began this long season. And this year, it was even more strange cuz we did something that we almost never do. You know, God has a few rules. He doesn't mess with a few people. One, he doesn't mess with women for sure. Well, no one messes with women. That's for sure. Not Jewish women. He doesn't mess with shabas and he doesn't mess with food. He knows who to mess with. I'll tell you, when it comes to Shabas, we take this very ser. I tell you a very funny story. I mean, you have heard this from me before. I remember one time I had a guy come over for Shabbat for the first time. I'll never forget. I told him it was a day of rest. He's like, "Awesome. I'll come to you for a day of rest." He stops by my house. He's like, he he walks in. He's in like sweatpants and a sweatshirt and I'm in a suit. He's like, "What are you doing?" I'm like, "What are you doing?" He's like, "Why are you in a suit?" I'm like, "Why are you in sweatpants?" He's like, "It's a day of rest." I'm like, "Oh, no, my brother." We go to shul, we come back, he sits down and we figures that like my wife's going to serve like potato chips. You know what I'm saying? And like, you know, we're going to sit on the couch and like, you know, with a dip and he sits down. You know the rookie mistake when you come to Shabas for the first time? You know, you go all in on the kala. You know what I'm talking about, right? You have no idea. You're four pieces in and you're full. Now, you got to make a choice. Either eat till I'm full or eat till I'm sick. And we're like, we're going till I'm sick. Bring out the stretcher. It's all good. And he's in there. I'm like, rookie. Four pieces in. My wife comes out with the fish and he's like, "Oh," his eyes get bigger and then the fish is done and here comes the salad. One salad, two salads. Here comes you got to have chicken. Then you have to have me and go. You have to have a sweet coconut sour. And his eyes are getting bigger and bigger and bigger and finally it's done. And he's like, "That was the best meal of my life." And my wife goes, "Time for dessert." He goes, "There's dessert." Like, "Of course it's dessert. Like, if you don't chas, you're over for sure." And then after after it's all over, after dessert, he's like, "It's like it's done." And my wife, you know what happens afterwards? You bring out like, you know, food on the table after the whole meal's over. So just just for a second if God forbid from the table to the bed if you have one second when you're not eating you got to fill yourself up with like popcorn or something. He comes into his room. He goes into bed. He lays down. I woke him up like you okay? He goes, "Charlie, does you guys have Thanksgiving every single week?" I said, "Wait for tomorrow." He goes, "There's a tomorrow. We take Shabbat and food very seriously. In fact, if there isn't enough food on Shabbat, we've got major issues." And so God never messes with Shabbat and food except for one time. Whenever it falls out, it falls on Shabbat, you fast on Shabbat. There is one other time and that's it. Where if the fast falls out on Friday or Shabbat, no matter what, we fast. What fast was that? Sarah. This just happened a few weeks ago. Well, the fast flat out on Friday. The only reason why we don't fast on chabas is because of the calendar. If it would fall out on chabas, we'd fast on chabas, which is amazing because tisha, if we don't fast on chabas, we don't fast on chabas. But when a surbase falls out, we fast no matter what, whenever it is. Why? So, if you remember, a surate is the holiday that reme that remembers the time in which the Babylonians came and laid siege around Jerusalem. Nothing happened yet. They laid siege for two and a half years before they actually breached the walls. And we remember that day and we fast that day. And the rabbis say, "No matter when that day falls out, even if it's on Shabbat itself, you fast." Why? So there's a bunch of answers because there's and then Kipper says, and they connect ets to it must be that on that day you fast. But not so great. the bet yv says I don't like it so much there's one answer that I want to share which is very powerful by a rabbi named SA and here's what he says he says we know we have a rule that you never fast for anything that happened in the past even if it was a big deal happened in the past you don't fast on Shabbat for that was happened in the past you don't fast on the only time you fast on Shabbat is if something could be happening in the future if there's a calamity coming and you could prevent it you can Fast on Shabbat, which means if you have a bad dream, you can fast even on Shabas because you're preventing something in the future. The day in which God decides whether this year will be a tishabove is on Assara. Every year on Assaravis, God decides not just what happened a long time ago. He decides what's going to happen this year. The season begins. And because of Sarabetavius is not a past fast but a future fast, we fast no matter what. But the question I have for you is really if God wants to prevent tisha from happening this year, if this is the year where God doesn't want us to have another time we sit on the floor, you know what we should do? We should say whenever tisha falls out, fast that day. So this way you're going to remember next year. Remember you fasted on chabas? You're never going to have that happen again. But a ser it's like a nothing thing. Most of probably people probably even fast is nothing was Friday was a couple of hours. It's an easy one. Most people don't even think about it. Why is the time relate siege the one that's going to prevent the future? So, here's what I want to do tonight. I want to take a little left turn to science, back door to sports, and come back to answer this question. Let's take a trip together to Boston to Harvard. There's a man there named Robert Rosenthal. Robert Rosenald was was a psychologist who had an idea. He was living in a time, this is the 1960s, he's living in a time where everybody thought the way it works is you got what you got. You were born with how smart you are. You're as smart or as shy or as outgoing or as loud or as brilliant. That's what you have. And he said, "I don't think that's true." So he walked into a school called the Oak Tree School and he walked into a classroom and he pulled six kids out randomly. He made it up. We just pulled six kids out, held them into another room, brought them back, and told the teacher, "I just gave these kids a special test, and I can test for blooming intelligence. I can determine if this year they were like this as students, they're going to go like that." She said, "Really?" He said, "I'm from Harvard." She's like, "Wow, he was making it up. They can mess with your head. Scientists, they just do this for for fun." He leaves for the whole year. He comes back at the end of the year and goes, "Let me see the test scores. These kids top in English top six class kids kids in the class are these kids." He goes, "That's a little weird." Maybe she was marking tests and she said, "You know, I don't know. I thought this was dumb, but the Harvard guy likes them. Let me give him an A." Math. Math is objective. You can add or you can't add. If you could divide or you can't. Top six kids of these kids. Gives them an IQ test. Remember the IQ test? Remember those days? Like, you know, the lady comes into your house, you know, and she makes you play with blocks and your mom's like, "How do you do?" And she's like, "Do you have any other kids? Remember that maybe he'll be an athlete one day supposed to tell you how smart you're going to be for the rest of your life. He gives these kids an IQ test and these kids go up from an average of two to six points higher. And he comes up with a theory that has literally changed the world of psychology. And the theory goes as follows. We think that the way it works is that your reality shapes your beliefs. You are who you are. You have what you have. You can't overpromise somebody. You don't want to let them down. You don't want to make somebody get get ultimately if he tries too hard and he fails, what are you going to do? So what you do is you figure out who you are, how smart you are, how not smart you are, your background, you're this, you're that. And then from there you decide what's possible in your life. You can only be this job. You can only do this thing. You're really not like this. When you realize that in fact reality doesn't shape beliefs. Beliefs shape reality. Those kids were not smarter than the kids around them. In fact, he made the whole thing up. They didn't get letters after their name. They didn't get a sign at home. Mom didn't have a bumper stick on the minivan going, "My kids got picked by the Harvard guy cuz he's smarter than everybody else." He just made it up. They were regular kids. Because that teacher thought more of those kids that actually was true, those kids rose to a level they had never rose before. Because in truth, reality doesn't shape your beliefs. Beliefs shape your reality. What you think is true affects what is true. What you think is possible affects and I'm talking about like my idea in science. what is actually possible. That kid walks into a test, what blocks him from being great is not his ability. What blocks him from being great is his boundary, is his limitation in his mind. Before he walks into the test before he or she sits to take a test, there's a block. There's a boundary. There's a limitation in his mind. I'm not so smart. I'm not so smart. I'm not so smart. You my my brother's really smart. My friend is really smart. I'm okay. And that boundary blocks you from being who you really are. I'll tell you a funny story. I'll never forget when I was in this I was in the company called RXR after my had I had a bunch of people for Shabbat afterwards. They all went crazy. They had a whole story. I ended up being that I ended up giving a class in the in the firm every month. They everyone came down to the lunchroom and I it was like open forum. Ask any question on Judaism. I loved it. I know the answers but it was fun. Anyways, I'll never forget one time a guy comes down. We had a new new guy came down. His name was Josh. He was a new uh guy in the finance department. He was like 6'4, 300 lb. Cut. And he sits down. He's listening the whole time. Nodding away. After it's over, he goes, "You know, Charles, I want to thank you for that. That was really nice of you." I said, "You're welcome." He goes, "Do you mind if I come back?" I said, "Sure." He goes, "Well, you know, I just want to let you know uh you know, I'm not Jewish." I'm like, "I know." He goes, "How do you know?" I'm like, "Josh, you're 66." You know, like God doesn't make us that big. You know, look how you're built. We're not built this way. We're never the guys in the ring. We represent the guys in the ring, but we're never actually in the ring. So he goes, "You mind?" I'm like, "Not at all. You're welcome." So he comes back the next time. I was sitting around and I'm talking about the power of words. I've spoken about that here before. The power of words. And I'm telling him how anyone have a story where someone did did something or said something to you when you were in high school that you remember the rest of your life. So he goes, "You mind if I share?" I said, "You're 66. You can do whatever you want." He said, "You want to give the class? You can give the class, too. So he tells me the story. It's great. He said, "When I was a kid growing up," he goes, "I was born 66." That's how it was. I was like one I was one 2 3 years old, pop 66. And when you grow up in the South, everyone in the South does one thing. They play football. And when you're that big in the South, every place you go to, all everyone's drooling cuz they thinking they're going to put you on their team. When I got into high school, he said, he goes, "My coaches were like singing and dancing." goes, "But I was a decent football player, not a great one." Goes, "Cuz I, you know, on the court on the field, I was like, I was a little bit of a wimp." Goes, "Then my coach saw some movie and he wanted to try it out on me." So one day I come to practice and they go, he goes, "Josh," he goes, "Yeah." He goes, "You think you can give me a death crawl?" A death crawl is where you crawl on the floor without your your your elbows and you can't use your elbows or your knees. It's just hands and feet. Apparently, it's very painful. I've never tried it. He goes, "Yeah." He goes, "How far can you go?" Goes, "I don't know, the 20." He goes, "You go to the 20?" He goes, "Yeah, I go to 20." He goes, "Can you go to the 20?" He goes, "Yeah." He goes, "You promised me to the 20?" He goes, "I promise you to the 20." Goes, "You will go to the 20?" He goes, "I'll go to the 20." He goes, "Great. Let's go." He brings the whole team around. He gets on the end zone. He goes down. He goes, "Oh, yeah. One second." He goes, "Billy." Billy's like the shortest kid in the team, probably like the Jewish kid. He goes, "Come here, Jew, Billy." He goes, "Why don't you go on Josh's back?" He goes, "What?" He goes, "Yeah, his back." No, no. He goes, "I told you to the 20. I didn't know Billy was going to be on my back." He goes, "You promised me 20." He goes, "Yeah, but he goes, "You promised me the 20." He goes, "Fine." He goes, "You'll go to the 20." He goes, "I'll go to the 20." Goes, "Great." He goes, "One thing." He goes, "What else?" He pulls into his pulls into his pocket and he pulls out a handkerchief and he blindfolds him. And he goes, "Let's go." And the whole team is around. They're cheering for him. And he starts going. He starts going. He's going 5 yards. 10 yards. He's going through 10 yards. And the coach goes, "You good work, Josh. Five yards in." He goes, "Five yards." I thought it was longer. And he's going and he's going. He's at the 20. And he goes, "You're doing great, Josh. You're at the 10." He goes, "10. You ever have this feeling by the way when you're working out and like time slows down. You know what I'm talking about? Like you're on the treadmill. You're like, "Wow, I've been on for 45 minutes." You're like 18 seconds. You know, like time slows down in space and on treadmills, right? And you're like, "I right." He's going and he's going and he's going to the 30 and he's like, "You're doing great, Josh. The 50." He goes, "I can't I can't do it. I just can't do it." He goes, "Coach, I got nothing left." He goes, he goes, "You promised me 20." He goes, "But I can't do it." He goes, "You promised me." Now he's at the 40. He goes, "Coach, I got nothing left." He goes, "Give me five more steps. Give me five more steps." And now he's getting closer and closer to the 50. And he's got three, two, and he collapses. and he rolls over and he goes, "Coach, I told you I can't even get to the 20." And the coach goes, "Josh, turn around. You're on the 50." And he gets up and goes, "I want to tell you what it means to be an athlete." Because there are two types of athletes in this world. There are those that like to win. They don't like to get hit. They just want to get the points on the board so they win as painlessly as possible. goes in. There are those athletes that want to be great. And greatness is when you see that you can get to the 20, but you push to the 50. Greatness is when you show up on a field and you see a guy stronger than you and you know that getting through him is going to make me a better person. Greatness is when you see challenge and you get excited to see how much I could push myself in my challenge because I thought I was this strong, but maybe I'm actually even stronger. Gray people don't care about winning. Great people care about knowing that I want to push to the 50 because I'm not going to be happy at the 20 if inside me I can go to the 50. That's greatness. God says, "Here's the story. You think I want my nation to be sitting around year after year in Queens and in New Jersey on the floor. We're so sorry. I can't believe this year another tish above. Another tish above." Because you think that's what I want. You think I want another year of this, but how am I going to get them to move? How am I going to get them to grow? If I show up by the time they burn the building and we're rec recognizing, remembering a burnt building, it's over by the burnt building. When you're sitting at the test, it's gone. When you're at the 20, it's gone. The problem is that the building is burning. The problem is that when they laid the siege, when they put the boundaries, you did nothing. The boundaries led to the building being burned, not the building itself. What's in our minds is what stops us. Robert Rosell says, "It's not the test that stops you. It's that thing in your brain, the siege around your mind that says I'm not smart enough." That's what got you the bad grade. It's the this marriage is about me is what got you into the fight. It's not that she said or he said, it's that in your mind you have a block. You have a siege. It's Assarves that's the problem, not Tishabub. Because by the time you guys are fighting, it was long before then when you decided that this is going to be about me. This Judaism is about me, God. Either you step up or I'm out. It's not working for me. As soon as that happened in your mind, forget it. We lost. Because each of us can go to the 50, but we stop at the 20. Every one of us has a life that belongs in the end zone. Every one of our marriages belongs to be awesome. Every one of our prayers, everything in our life, our friends, the way we walk in the street, the way we feel grateful for what we have, every second of our day is meant by God to be awesome. We just have to fight for it. We just have to stop the siege around us that says not you, this background, that background. You're into it. You're not into it. Your parents are religious, parent not religious, you understand Hebrew, you don't understand Hebrew, you're rich, you're poor, blah blah blah blah blah. Whatever it is that lays siege and goes, whoa, relax, relax, relax. I don't want to disappoint you. Relax. You're not going to be You're not going You're not going to be relax. Stay mediocre. Perfect. Just like we like you. And God goes, "Here's the deal. If Tishba falls out on Chabas, let's move it. If Shivas Thomas falls out on Chabas, let's move it. Sarate falls out on Chabas, oh no. No way. I don't mess with boundaries. You break boundaries. That's if we want to make sure this year we don't have Tishabove. We start the season when the f when the when the when the coaches start the season, not with the fans. We're in season now. We're figuring out where in our lives have we broken and going. What's the boundary that's stopping me? What have I been telling myself my whole life that's really not that true? What belief do I have that is the reason why I can't ever get past this? Year after year after year, I am the same person. Why? What's the boundary? And every year God says you find that boundary and you push to the 50 because you have it in you. But what are our boundaries? So I believe we have two two boundaries stop us as a people. Two boundaries stop us from becoming the people that we're meant to be. And the answer I believe is found once God starts giving us the redemption package. But right now in this period of time during the Torah redemption, Moshe Aron, these are the people that brought us out. These are the leaders that show us how to get out through the back door. How? What do they have? So I want to tell you one idea and I believe it's this idea that is the boundary that blocks us all. And we're going to tie this into prayer because it all comes down to that. There's a famous story. Remember the story of Moshe of Moshe, right? Power got upset because they told him that by the way some guy is going to knock you off your throw. Power goes, "Oh my gosh, throw all the boys in the Nile. If you had a baby back then, if it was a girl, you kept it. If it was a boy, there's no shalom, no chocolate covered pretzels." Didn't work that way. You threw him in the Nile. A woman got pregnant. She was a little early. Nobody knew. She had Moshe. Finally, it came time. They come looking. They know she's pregnant. They go, "Where's the boy?" Then she goes, she hides him. As they look the other way, she takes him into the Nile and throws him and basically builds him a little tava, a little ark and sends him off in the Nile. Remember the story? Pyro's daughter comes into the Nile, sees Moshe, saves the day. The rest is history. But there's one line when this happened that's a blow away. And I'm going to say it and we're going to dissect it together. She opens her eyes. She's bathing and she opens her eyes. And she sees the child and the boy is crying and she feels bad and she says he oh it must be a Jew. So we know the way we learn this is what happened. She goes down. She's a baby in a little who who puts a baby in a little ark and sends them off. She goes, you know, it's probably one of the Jewish families that they're trying to save the kids. The kids crying. It must be a Jewish kid. She saves him. But there's a famous commenter named the Baluru and here's what he says. So that's not what happened. But she opens her eyes and she sees the yell. Now God's a Hebrew major. He knows if he's talking about a yell, who's the nar and are two different things. Who's the nar? So he says Moshe actually wasn't crying. Moshe wasn't Moshe was chilling. He was in a raft. It was a Nile. It was probably like 100°. It was gorgeous. Who would have be happy? Happy happy sitting around in a pool relaxing at 100 degree weather in Egypt. Mosha wasn't crying. He had no idea what's going on. She sees yelling. She looks up and the ball to him says is the gamach of a not the baby wasn't crying. What happened? You can imagine when she went to take Mosha, they weren't like playing wee in the house. You know what I'm saying? Like, bye Moshe. Good luck. See you later. Hold on, mommy. Pause. See you Moshe. See you later. It wasn't like that. They walked with mommy to take Mosha. You think I remember was sitting there probably hysterical crying. And Aon's job was to stand by the reeds and watch his brother go. And Bosparro comes down and she sees the baby clueless in the raft. And she looks up and sees a young boy crying and she says she feels bad for and she says he name this must be a Jew. Do you know why? Because the essence of what it means to be a Jew is that we cry when someone else is in pain. Iron is sitting there and he's safe. Iron is sitting there and he just met his brother three months ago. He's not that mature. He's only three. Iron is sitting there and he's got his life okay. They're not looking for him. But his brother's in pain. And when your brother is in pain and you're a Jew, guess what? You're in pain. Cuz we can't live our lives if somebody else is struggling. It doesn't work for us. Because whether we do this or we that or we're this or that impressive at the core of what it means to be us is that we're one family. And if one family member is in pain, there's no one in the room that can go to the wedding and not feel pain. And if we don't feel that way, we've got a problem that we're not being the essential Jew that we truly are. Some of us, most of us, all of us, we struggle with one concept. And that each and everyone, I talk about this a lot. Each and every one of us goes through what's called spiritual middle child syndrome. Anyone here psychologist know what middle child syndrome is, right? Middle child syndrome is the following. You look to your older brother, brother or sister, and you try to get them in trouble. They're not so great. You tell your parents all the time, they're not so great. Let me tell you something. They're not so great. You look to the younger person who's getting away with murder and going, "By the way, you know who's getting away with murder? Always, all of us, no matter where we are in our Judaism, am I right?" You look at someone who's more religious, you're like, "Can you relax a little bit? Like, chill out. A jer." You know what I'm saying? Like, you take it on too much. You look at someone who's less religious than you and you're like, "Can you step up and drop? You're barely Jewish." And because I'm a Tadic, let me bring you into the fault. I right in the middle. God seems to be right over my head. No matter where I go, he No, I have Judaism down to a tea. It's just It's uncanny how I figure Judaism out so perfectly that like God's like, "Exactly, Charlie. You're right in the middle. What are they doing? They're crazy. They're barely Jewish." But you you have it perfect. Everywhere I go, it's so funny. I go I get to travel a lot. It's amazing. I go to Shaws sometimes. It's the best. I walk into Shaws, the same exercise. As I walk in, the rabbi goes, "Charlie, you're going to love the shaw." So, really, how come they go, "It's right in the middle. This sh I know that sh's a little bit sh's right in the middle. The rabbi leaves, the president goes, the rabbi's a little bit like this." He goes, "I am right in the middle." The president leaves, the host family goes, "The truth is the president's like this. I am right in the middle." All of us seem to be, even if we get more or less religious, somehow God seems to follow with us no matter where we go. This year I'm like this. God's like perfect. The next time I'm feeling like this, I'm having a good day and a bad day. No matter where I shift, somehow God shifts right with me, always shining right over my chair. Why is that? How come the person to the right threatens us and the person to the left, we feel like we have to step up a little bit? Do you know why? Because we have a boundary. You know what that boundary is? That we're separate. There's a way that me and you are separate people. I am so worried about my own Judais. I'm so self-conscious about my own Judaism that every time that you're around me, if you're not exactly me, you threaten me. You make me feel bad or make me feel like I should do more because we're different people. And the essence of what it means to be a Jew is that we're one and the same, but we have a boundary. We have a siege that lays right around us that tells us, "Oh, by the way, I don't think so." Because in truth, we're all exactly the same. You know, it's funny. We all have this one fear that we all have. You know, I'll tell you, anyone who has little kids, you understand? Little kids are as honest as they come, right? That's the best. Then we pollute them. But when they're little, they're perfect and honest. And then you tell them this, tell them that, they start playing the game. Kids have a fear that we all have. We all have one basic fear, all of us, when it comes to each other. And that, and you can see it from the kids, right? When the kids come home when they're little, you put them in the house and no matter what happens, you can't hold on to them. There's no way. What'd you do today? Nothing. You have fun? Yes. What'd you do? Nothing. Did you play games? Yeah. How many? A lot. Can I talk to you for a second? No. I gotta go. I gotta go. I got to go. I got to go. You can't hold on them. Say one word and they're yours forever. What do you say? Bedtime? They're like, bedtime. Oh, daddy, can you lay with me? Can you be with me? I need you. I need you. I need you. You're like, no, I can't. It's time for bedtime. Right? They're the best. Kids are the best negotiators. They're negotiators 101. What's the first rule of negotiation? You got to get a yes. No matter what it is, get a yes. Can you lay with me for 20 minutes? No. 10 minutes? No. 5 minutes? No. 2 minutes. No. 1 minute. No. And then if you can't get this, what do you do? Use guilt. One minute. You can't lay with your daughter for one minute. Whatever you're doing must be more important than your own flesh and blood. And then once you get in the store, the bait didn't switch. Once you get in that bed, you got to stay until they fall asleep. You know what I'm talking about? They own you until they're sleeping. And then we become expert at breathing patterns. You know what I'm talking? You're in bed, you're like, I think it's getting deeper. I think it's getting deeper. And then you start counting how many seconds their eyes are closed. Eight. Mississippi 9 Mississippi 10 Mississippi I think we're good but then you got to get out of the bed but you can't get out of bed you know why cuz the bed's going to squeak and I'll wake him up so I do you got to become like a cross between like an acrobat and a ninja and you're like I'm almost out I'm almost out shift the weight shift the weight and as you're about to slip slip out all of a sudden those be little eyes pop open and look at you and they go and where do you think you're going like no I wasn't leaving why would I want a life after 7 o'clock at night do you know why kids are honest and they hate One thing, they hate feeling alone. You ever get this feeling? You get in the car and you put on the radio just so that it's on. You ever walk in someone's house and there's like things, there's screens on. You're like, "Are you watching?" Like, "No." Like, "Why is it on?" Like, "I just like having it on." At our core, we think we're alone. We think we're separate. We have a block that tells us, "Relax. Don't care too much. Don't think too much. If they're too much, it's threatening. If they're not you, we're not one. We're not really one family. You look different. You have a different background. You're Ashkanazi. You're Sparty. You're from this place, from that place. You come from here. You come from there. We're all very separate and different. And this block lays on our heads every year, year after year after year. And God says, if you want to change it, you got to go after the block. If not after the the the FDN, the not after the lash, not after all the politics that go on. By the time you get to politics, it's game over. But there's one more block. Why was Auron crying for his brother was getting picked up by the princess? You know what was happening next to him? He was going to live in the palace. This is the jackpot. He was getting picked up by the richest person in the planet forever. Why was he crying for and heard a beautiful idea that our understood one thing that a life without God is a life worth crying for. At our core deep down we have a block which is this really is about God. This whole Judaism thing really isn't good for me. I mean it's good for God but deep down not so sure. I mean, I'll do it because I don't want to get him upset. I need stuff from him. So, like, I'll make sure I'll do the right thing and I'll play the right games. That's why sometimes we pray. Why do we pray in the morning? Sometimes because we don't want to not pray because I have a good day. I don't want to mess up my day. Nobody blows off your own kipper. You know why? Because if you blow up from Kipper, you're going to have a bad year for sure. It's on the list. You don't walk away from Kipper. God's like, "Really? You're walking your own kipper? Good luck driving in February?" I don't think so. You get a new job? I don't think so. We walk through our religion sometimes and what we think is that we are doing what we're doing for the man. It's not really good for me. It's not really amazing for life. The fun they're having out there is really better than what's going on in here. But I feel a little guilty and I I I really think she want more and I feel a little bit I got some bits of inspiration, but at the core I got to play to the man. It's really not for me. And the block of not really buying that we are one people and we and and him are one is the block that stops us year after year from becoming the people that were meant to be. So how do we deal with it? How do we fix it? So there's an interesting way that as I say you're going to say how is this possible? And there's one way to fix it all and that's called prayer. How does that work? So, most of us have prayer, me included, totally backwards. We think that prayer is the following. God has stuff. I need stuff. The way I get stuff from God is I say Hebrew words the way he wants it. And I do extra stuff. I bake kalas. I say things in a cloth. I do circles in the mikvah. I wear bendals. Whatever you need me to do, I'll do some results. Whenever you want do, I'll shake chickens over my head. I'll fast. I won't fast. I'll say as much Hebrew as you need. I'll throw Aramaic in there just to mix it up a little bit because you show that I'm in as whatever you need me to do. You got it. I want stuff. You got stuff. Online Amazon spiritual shopping. That's how we roll. We're the Jews. So, we know the backward code. We love it. Everyone's got to wait online. I could say a couple of Hebrew words and poof, here it comes. I got to have a great life. And he has all the goodies. So, if I could just say it loud enough and I can cry a little bit and keep on going and do it 40 days in a row and go to the coach and do all this fun stuff, ultimately he's going to give it to me. You know why we think this way for because we live in a Judeo-Christian world. And this idea is truly when it first comes, it's a Christian source. Prayer is Latin for beg. weep for begging to beg because we believe that if I just beg and beg and beg and beg and beg, God sitting with a goodie bag going, "Well, can you get a little louder? Come on, blue team. Can you get a little louder?" Okay, fine. Here's some dollars for you. But could that possibly be? Can you imagine how offensive that must be for God who is all good and all compassion, who gave us life? Can you imagine standing in front of God and saying, "Please give me more money. I I have to take care of my kids." And God's going, "Really? You think you love your kids more than I love your kids? Please, God, I need to take care of God's like, really? You think you love me more than I love you? You think any kid in the world loves themselves more than their parents love them? You really think so? You think any parent wouldn't jump in front of a train in front of their children?" And the kid goes, "You don't really know me." Parents like, "Really? I don't know you. I want to give my entire life for you. My whole thinking isn't you." We stand before God and we're like, "Can you please? Can you please? Can you please?" God's like, "Really? You think you love you more than I love you? You think what I'm doing for you is hurting you on purpose until you can get up and say some random words that you don't even want to really say for real? You think it's like online Hebrew shopping? What is prayer?" So, in Hebrew, the word for prayer is called leit pale. Leit pal is a verb that is reflexive which means I'm going to do something to myself. I'm going to give myself something. Ple is to judge or to clarify. The goal of prayer is not to get stuff. We do not stand before God and say give me stuff. The goal of prayer is to do an exercise that will result in us having more clarity. How? Because we live our lives with one major boundary. Each of us have one boundary that stops us from the life we want. This is the boundary that keeps us from each other. This is the boundary that keeps us from God. Every boundary that I spoke about comes down to one boundary. That at the end of the day, the center of my life is me. How I feel, how I end up, how my kids do this, what's going to happen to me. The center of my world is me. And we stand before God. You can only imagine people that pray their whole lives whose entire prayer is basically one long elaborate me can you give me can you hook me me you can almost imagine God being like for real are we doing this for 40 years are you still just trying to dance around me and you think like now because you say me louder with a much another language I'll be like oh I'm sorry I'm trying to get you stop thinking about you but since you said it louder give it to you the essence of our blocks in our relationships, in our jobs, in our friendships, in our own life. The essence of my block is that it's still about me. It's really been about me. I'm going to pretend that it's about you, but I need you. You ever get in a fight with somebody and you both are talking and we both have no idea what the other person's saying? You're just waiting. Slow down. Slow down. Gotcha. Slow down. Slow down. Got And then you ever get the feeling I once saw this great quote that the worst moment of the day when you're fighting with somebody and you realize they're right midfight. You know what I'm talking about? You're like, "Oh no, they have a point. Shoot. Should I let this in?" Nah, let me just keep on fighting. We'll I'll I'll throw some more dust up. She'll wonder what's going on over here and then we'll call it draw. I'll walk away. I don't really care about you. I'm not going to lose face. You joking me? You ever fight with someone in the whole fight is I need you to be able to understand me better. I need you to understand me better. The essence of our problem is that our life is about me. How am I going to end up? When am I going to get the relationship that I deserve? What about my finances? What about my future? What about my type of Judaism? Can you believe what he or she said? Can you relax a little bit? You're threatening me. Can you step up? Cuz I have done more than you have done and this whole thing ain't working out. To be a Jew means a little bit more. This religion isn't working for me. It's too hard and complicated and I don't see enough stuff from you guys. So, can you hook me up with a little more stuff? There was someone sick and you didn't heal them when we said so. What's going on? Are you Are you okay? Because if I were running the world, we wouldn't have problems. But apparently, you need some help. The essential boundary is me. Prayer is the one time where we stand before God and God goes, "Here's the deal. If you want to know what to do with prayer is you look at it and you go, "Oh my God, it has nothing to do with me." I wake up in the morning and before I even get out of bed, I turn in front of God and go, "Oh my God." I would think if I have any possession, it's my life, but I don't have that. Thank you so much for that. I my eyes going to the bathroom walking. I got to tell you something. For those who went through Hurricane Sandy, you appreciate walking on the ground. When you wake up in the morning and you think of all the mothers that are standing by graves saying, "I would do anything to see my kid one more second." You wake up and go, "Oh my god, my life isn't even up to me." You hear about people that were healthy and then they weren't even here and you go, "Oh my gosh. Thank you just for my life." I was one time in an airport. I'll never forget. And I saw a blind man walk. It was in Delta. It was Atlanta. Atlanta's a hub for Delta. I'll never forget it. It was Sunday afternoon. And I watched a blind individual, a blind man, God bless him, walk from one end of the airport to other end of the airport. And he couldn't get through. There's a million people every, you know, flying to, you know, flight two from New York by six to Chicago and he can't even hear anything. And he's has his his cane and he's walking through and he's tripping over a bed cuz everybody wants to be online. They want to be when they're when their group is called. They want to be the first person in the group so they get the upper hair the overhead luggage. And he's tripping and I come running up to him. I go, "Sir, can I can help you?" And he was embarrassed by even me saying something. And I went back down to my seat. I'll never forget this my whole life. And I watched him go across the airport and my heart broke in a million pieces. watching him go from one air side of the airport to the next side. I could promise you the next morning when I woke up and I thank God for opening my eyes that I thank God for opening my eyes. Sure, I want all the stuff in the world, but I was like, "Oh my gosh, eyesight is also a gift. Prayer is supposed to be an exercise every day where we go, oh my gosh, it is not about me. Thank you for this and for this and you are as big as what? Even when we ask for things in prayer, we never even ask for ourselves. We ask for us. Can you take care of us? Can you give us wisdom? Can you give us strength? Can you just finally end it all so we win? And God says, if you're going through prayer and it's all about you, you are totally missing it. I don't care how quickly you read Hebrew. I don't care if you can finish an entire prayer in the morning in 27 minutes and feel cool about yourself. Let me tell you something. It's not working. That's not what it's here for. It's not online shopping. The goal of prayer is leit pale is a reflexive verb. It's an exercise program we have every day. We go to the gym every day. The gym of life where God says it's not you. All the problems we have is that it's always been about you. If we would walk through today and go, God, what do you need? How far can I push myself? Because I'm a 20, but I know I'm a 50. I know when I walk in the room, I can't hold my lip back from saying the wrong things, but I know I'm a 50. And I can't. And as I walk in, I'm having such a problem with this issue in my life. And I know in my core, I'm having a problem because there's a block in my head. Robert Rose didn't pull me out and tell me that I can do it. Nobody told me that. But I know in my core I am so much more. And every day, God goes, "Before you start your day, stand before me and remember I run this world. Look how big I am." It's in the words. Look how big I am. You are my kid. Look how big I am. Worry about me. Worry about each other. And if you walk out of that sh and you say, "I'm a little bit clearer today. I realized I was crazy yesterday. I was so focused on myself. Holy cow. I don't even have a life. I don't even have a breath without the man upstairs. Wow. I got to worry about somebody else. I didn't even ask myself for one second. All I worried about was each other. If we walk out of a shul every single day, three times, you know what happens? Leit pal. We get clearer and clearer and clearer and clearer, bigger and bigger. We break barrier after barrier after barrier. Someone goes, "Did you believe that she said what?" And we go, "Who cares?" Relax. She's insensitive. She's insecure. Stop. Can you believe what they're saying? Relax. They're the same. We're the same family. We just look a little different on the outside. Can't you see past that body into that soul? Come on. Can you believe? Come on. Look, they're struggling over there. You going to have a good time? Do you know that people are struggling bigger and bigger to the 30 to the 40 to the 50? What prayer is supposed to do, the way our prayers get answered is when we change. Our prayers get answered when we walk out of that room and we're different than when we walked in. Our prayers get answered. We look at that book and go, "Wait a second. Holy cow. This is a big world and I am I am honored to be part of it. There's someone in need and I'm honored for one moment in my day to ask for us. And there's a lot of Jews that are never going to pick up this book. It is a privilege to ask for all of us together. There's plenty to go around. Leit pal. Clearer and clearer. And every moment of clarity, another wall breaks down. In every moment of clarity, another yard gets hit. In every moment of clarity, there's an assuretaves in someone's life that the siege comes crumbling down. And that's how we break out of gullus. We step up at a sorrow bet. We realize that what's stopping us is our boundaries. What's stopping us that we think we're separate people? What's stopping us that we think there's a race out there? There's no race. What's stopping us that we think that he needs us? He don't need us for sure. Not our robotics, that's for sure. And every day, for some people it's one minute. For some people it's a lot longer. We stand before him and we remind ourselves that we need him and we are one. And when those two blocks start to crumble, the siege around Jerusalem starts to crumble. When those two blocks starts to get clear that it ain't about me, that all these problems and the stress that I bring upon myself is I'm worried about me too much. I've been worrying about me every second of my life. That's usually the pain that I feel all day is worrying about me. And the minute we start worrying about you, we're different people. We're clearer. We're stronger. We push to the 50. My blessing to us is that we realize that we're coaches, not fans. That when fighting the battle of Assara Betavves, we break boundaries. We don't wait for the building to burn. We realize that in our lives, there have been boundaries that have been stopping us becoming the people that we're meant to be. And those boundaries are usually me. and we're able to look over to the person next to us to the right and to the left to our families and friends and worry about them. When we're able to look up and worry about him and what I'm supposed to be doing for him in this world versus what he's supposed to be doing for me in this world, we become bigger. We become better. We become clearer. We become stronger. We look around. We lock hands. And we lead the way past the siege. We break the army and we become the nation that we're meant to be. My bra is that this year this community, why not? What better than here should be the light to everybody else to turn this around and so that this year we start our season early that we don't end up sitting on the floor in the summertime. Thank you so much. Thank you very much, Charlie. Once again, unbelievable. Phenomenal. Let's give him another round of applause for Charlie Ry. Thank you, Charlie. I just want to remind everyone that tomorrow night we're going to have a special class for the ladies, Dr. Shmool Shields. That's going to be at 8:30 p.m. Health uh for your children, nutrition for better uh school performance. Every night for the guys, many of you guys, some of you guys I see, but many of you guys I don't see. Please come every night 8:30 to 10 p.m. Cole learning program. We have classes in Hebrew, English and rabbi English, Hebrew and Russian.