CHAZAQ's Torah Talks #216 Rabbi Yaron Weisberg - The 3 Steps To A Great Marriage

this man who was at the time I think 69 years old and married for 47 years. I told him, I said, "Listen, no one ever taught you the basics about how to be a good husband. I'm here to teach you." And he took out a pen and paper at age 69 and said, "Teach me." And he worked at it for a year, a year and a half, whatever it was. They're in a tremendous place. Their marriage is great. I still speak to them every 2, 3 weeks just to make sure everything's in check. Love and having a good relationship does not happen by itself. These people live together for 47 years. They already got divorced. You have to be ready to put the work in to make it happen. A lot of times in the beginning, everyone's very enthused and and they're trying to do different things and then people get very busy and their marriage sort of drifts to the back. They just go like, "Okay, we'll coast." You know, everything will just be fine forever. If you want to have a thriving, loving relationship, you have to put your marriage at the forefront of your life. [Music] Welcome everyone to to this the special program Khazak's Torah talks program. We have a special guest every single week. Today we have a very special pro we have a special guest Rabbi Aron Weisber. Thank you so much for joining us Rabbi. >> We have a very special topic tonight. The three steps to a great marriage. Before we before we jump into the topic we would like to Rabbi if you could just give us a small background about yourself and the great work. >> Yeah sure. I mean I grew up in Great Neck. uh went to Shiva back in 1988 and after a few years back and forth been living with my family there for the last 29 years. I've been teaching them for over 20 years. In the last nine years or so, I run something called the marriage initiative which is something that is trying to just educate couples more about marriage right before and right after they get married. And most recently over the last year, Rabbi Ben Schaefer and myself started a marriage mentoring program which is we trained mentors to actually help uh and Kalas and newly married couples try to navigate the uh the waters of you know being newly married. >> Amazing. So everyone has their pneumonics. Everyone has there's so many books out there. the 10 ways to do this. If we shrink it down to three pillars, if you if you would say maybe like the the three-step plan, what I guess maybe one at a time, what would you say is the first step in order to um get on the journey to to have a great marriage? >> Right. So, it's going to sound a little bit funny, but the first step is actually guidance. meaning which has nothing to do with the actual marriage but from what I've seen the last 20 25 years it's probably the biggest factor in couples staying married and really being successful and having thriving marriages in all other areas everyone realizes that they need guidance you know you go to sports you know the younger players are talking to the older players you go into Rabonus the younger rabbis are asking advice from the older rabbis and suddenly when it comes to marriage people think they're going to just you know figure it out but it's not true. Marriage is one of the more difficult tasks we have in life to make it work. Hashem gave it to us like we read in last week's part. Yeah. >> You know it's not good to be alone. So marriage is good but just because it's good doesn't mean it's easy. It doesn't mean you don't need guidance. And >> I think whether you get that guidance as a kala or newly married couple that is essential. I I make I I call marriage a mush for marriage is your teeth where the people that go and take care of their teeth and go for regular cleanings their their teeth are usually good. Obviously the genetics but overall their teeth are usually in a good place. People neglect it for a little bit suddenly there's cavities and you know if you fill those cavities right away you'll also be okay. If you don't, it leads to possible root canal which is more expensive, a lot more time consuming. And if you don't do that, then they have to pull your tooth. And marriage is the same way. The people that come in the beginning, whether right before they get married, after both, and uh they get their cleaning, you know, right in the beginning, they're usually okay. They do well. They need a cleaning every few months maybe, but they're usually okay. The people that didn't get any guidance, didn't get uh anyone to help them out in the beginning, suddenly they might start feeling a cavity or two two, three, four years in again if you take care of that right away before there's too much damage done. So then you could still have, you know, a great marriage and things won't be too difficult. People that neglect it more and meet couples married, you know, 10 years, 15 years, whatever it is, you're already dealing with root canals, which are a lot more work and a lot more time consuming and a much bigger investment. And very often there's children and it's much harder. It's a much more difficult task. It could be done, but just like root canals could be done. They're hard. They're painful. And then unfortunately, some people neglect it to the point that the tooth needs to get pulled. So the earlier you get the guidance you need, the better. Everyone needs different types. You know, maybe for some for longer, some for shorter for different problems, but uh I have found guidance to be the biggest key to, you know, having a long-term successful marriage. Okay. So, we need we need the guidance but but there there's different sources of information like like let's say you have in the news there's there's there there's real news they call it fake news you have so so let's say a person they might say okay fine like in the dentist's muscle okay fine oh my brother Google wants that if you have this certain thing okay fine meaning what what would you say could you go through maybe some of the different sources of is it an older friend is it maybe someone can maybe it's their parent maybe it's not is that the wrong direction is it a friend is Is it a rabbi? Is it a specialist? What would you what source was? >> So I I heard from a few years ago he said you can never learn from watching anyone else even if he's a great RV. You know why? Cuz you're not that RV and his children are your children. You can't just cut and paste. And the same thing is true with marriage. You're not that guy. Your wife isn't his wife. You can't just go and watch other people and just say, "Okay, I'll just do what he does." You know, marriage is a very personal thing. There are a lot of great books out there. There's a lot of great advice out there. And all of that advice is probably true for most people most of the time. But at the same time, there's a lot of personal advice that's needed. How to deal with very specific situations that you and your wife have. And that's something that you need someone to speak to about to to fill them in on the information in order for them to help guide you. Who should that be? It's the same thing as with everything else in life. someone with a lot of experience who has a lot of, you know, good reviews from other people that have gone to him. You know, going to your friend usually only has his own marriage. You know, usually going to parents, they're going to be biased. They love you. They're probably going to give you advice what's best for you, but not necessarily what's best for your marriage. >> And the parent or friend, they themselves might need the help. And like >> that's definitely also true. >> You know, >> and they're giving you advice, but their their advice already is coming from a a place that they themselves need help. >> Yeah. I I've had people come to me for marital advice and they're advising others, you know, and like, you know, people don't know. So, >> but uh it's just very important, like I said, to find someone with experience and find someone that, you know, is is recommended by other people that was, you know, helpful for them. >> Okay. Amazing. Step one down, Rabbi. What's our next step? >> Our next step is taking responsibility, which, uh, you know, is is is a big problem, you know, nowadays. I just want to share a quick vote there from Mosha Shapiro. He said that you know America it's a wonderful country but there are very few responsibilities here. The only one responsibility that everyone has is taxes. The rest of the laws here about rights. It's called the bill of rights. Everyone has a lot of rights. I have a right that you shouldn't make a coffee too hot that's going to spill on me. It's not my responsibility to be careful. I have a right that you shouldn't, you know, do that. He said, "If you look in the Torah, who is all about rights and no responsibilities? Those are the people that are not any. The Torah is all about responsibility. It's all about mitzvah." Who do we say is not responsible? People that are just incapable. They're katanim. So Mosha Shapiro said in a lot of ways, you know, growing up in America has brought up generations of katanim of children who say, "I'm not taking any responsibility. I have my rights." And you know, I could sit on my rights. I don't have to take any responsibility. Or the Hebrew word is. So coming into marriage, if you're not going to take responsibility, that means what are you going to do? You're going to blame the other person. It's not about me. It's about you. And then what's the other person going to do? No, no, no. It's not my fault. It's your fault. And you have two people standing there. No one's willing to work. Everyone's just pointing fingers at the other one. It's doomed for disaster. The only way for a relationship to succeed is if two people come in saying, "I'm ready to do the work that I need to do to make this work." And in fact, when I see couples after I speak to them a little bit, usually after the first intake session at the end, I tell them, I say, "Look, I'm willing to try and help you, but it means you're going to worry about your stuff. You're going to say, "What can I do to make this marriage better?" Your spouse will say, "What can I do to make this marriage better?" No one's going to blame. You're worried about your spouse. That's my job. That's not your job. You have to do your own work. And if two people are ready to commit to their own work, then pretty much every marriage has a s chance to succeed. And there have been plenty of times where people have not come back. When I've said that, they're not willing to do it. Sometimes it's been cases a couple married over 20 years that it's just too painful. They're just not ready to to work and invest or whatever it is. is just and I'm not judging anybody but at the end of the day uh thriving marriage means two people who take responsibility for their stuff own what they need to do and continue just to work on that without looking over their shoulder and seeing all the problems of the other person what's a if somebody's a natural what they're just playing ping pong whatever happens they just deflect it what I guess in marriage or maybe in we just pass we're talking about you have in marriage what What's a practical way that somebody maybe who doesn't necessarily always take aas that they could take a >> anyone that's coming for help wants to change their marriage? You can only change yourself. So if you really want to change your marriage to go and look at the other person that's not in your control. So the way to take is by realizing that the only way I can make this better is if I actually take a and I work on making it better. I can't I can't fix the other person anyway. So if a person is coming for help which means they sincerely do want to have you know a better relationship then they each person needs to realize for me it starts with me because that's the only thing I can change is in this relationship. >> Okay what's the what's the final step? So since we had to narrow it to three, you know, I feel like we're in the gamar makus, you know, it's like uh the tenants of Judaism till we get it down to one, but we'll stick with three. And I think the word I would use is connection. And I'll explain why. You know, there there's a lot of things written about shambias. Ultimately, marriage is about creating a very close relationship to another person. And even if you have a peaceful house, and I've had many people with peaceful houses, but if there's no connection, that's not a marriage. It's two people running a business together. They do a great job. I had people call me up. We are great at running this family business together. Me and my wife, we're great. We just have no connection to each other, but we're great at just working everything out. That's not marriage. That's what the Torah wants. We make the Torah wants two people who are in a loving relationship. And that loving relationship means connection. And that means you're going to have to do things in order to figure out how to connect to the other person. A lot of those things are things very positive things. You know, Schaefer has, you know, brought to everyone's attention. Whether it's date night, whether it's compliments, whether it's appreciation, whether it's calling the other person during the day and you know asking about how they're doing, but it's things to develop a connection and then it you know from the positive things it moves into communication. You can't connect to someone without talking to them. What's our proof to that? Three times a day we >> that's our connection to Hashem. You know, we're standing in in front of Hashem. We call it Shab, right? That's so the same thing if you want to connect to your spouse, you're talking to them, but it's coming from the heart. You know, it's coming it's coming from inside. One of the I don't know who said this. I don't know where I got it from, but it's it's uh a play on words that sounds very gumar like, but the word for closeness in English is intimacy. If you break that up into four words, it's into me. See, >> the way to get close is by seeing into the other person. The only way you could see into me is if I'm sharing myself with you. That that's what's going to create the connection. That's what's going to create the closeness. >> Yeah. >> And one of the very important points is people say, "Yeah, but what about little techniques to how to fight and and how to get along with someone who's hard to get along with and all these types of things." So the says which means that if there's love then all the things the other person does wrong you'll care that much less about. You know, we all see our people that have children are going to have children. They see what their children are doing wrong. And even though sometimes they might get upset, whatever it is, but at the end of the day, they love them. So, they got a certain level upset. It's watered down a little bit. Another kid does it, suddenly you're crazy angry. You know why? Because it's the same thing is true in marriage. Everyone has faults. Everyone has things that they don't like 100% about their spouse. When the love and connection are deep, you care so much less about all of those things. I have much more important things to to care about than this. You know, just to bring you a a mush from sports, when I was growing up, there was a college basketball coach named Bobby Knight at University of Indiana. He was a Russian and he, you know, yelled, screamed, cursed, threw things at people. Mamish, why would anyone go play for such a person? The answer is I have much bigger goals. You know what those bigger goals are? I want to play in the NBA. I want to become a great player. And he's a great coach. >> They want to win the NCA championship. >> Yeah. Whatever it is. Exactly. So, you know what? When I have bigger goals, I don't even care about the smaller things so much. It's the same thing true in marriage. I'm looking to build a loving relationship. You know, besides the fact I'll call, but at the end of the day, if I have that bigger goal, I'm going to care so much less about the little things that happen during the day that, you know, would annoy a lot of people. I have much bigger goals to worry about. Mhm. saying so look look at the global scale. Don't always look at every single thing as to be midin. Oh, they did this right. It's 50-50 scale. Okay. I gave this amount to to them. They haven't reciprocated yet. So I'm waiting or whatever it is over there. >> Yeah. 100%. >> Okay. And and I guess what's I guess to leave us off. Can you give us maybe few uh final message some practical message some tips for everyone who's inspired and watching they can say they could apply to their lives? >> Sure. I'm I'm gonna say this point. I'm gonna speak about a story that called me up five years ago. His parents aren't from and he said, "My parents are thinking strongly about getting divorced. Maybe want to try to help them before they get divorced because he knew I do this type of stuff. Why not from couple living in America would want to speak to a rabbi in Israel, you know, probably because I'm cheap, you know, but uh whatever it is compared to a therapist. But I said, "Sure, I'll try to help them out." Anyway, with Hashem's help, I figured quickly out what the about what the problem was. At the end of the day, this man, who is at the time, I think 69 years old and married for 47 years, I told him, I said, "Listen, no one ever taught you the basics about how to be a good husband. Your wife didn't need it until now. For that, the reason is now she needs it from you. and if you're ready to work at it and learn, I'm here to teach you. And he took out a pen and paper at age 69 and said, "Teach me." And he worked at it for a year, a year and a half, whatever it was. You know, I wish I could read you the text that his wife sent me for their 50th wedding anniversary two years ago. They're in a tremendous place. Their marriage is great. I still speak to them every two, three weeks just to make sure everything's in check. And it taught me such a valuable thing. Number one, love and having a good relationship does not happen by itself. These people live together for 47 years. They already get divorced. Doesn't happen by itself. You know, you have to make it happen. And number two is is that you have to be ready to put the work in to make it happen. You know, a lot of times in the beginning, everyone's very enthused and and they're trying to do different things and then people get very busy and their marriage sort of drifts to the back. They just go like, "Okay, we'll coast." you know, everything will just be fine forever. I'm busy. She's busy. But we we know we're both busy. Everything will work out. Everything will be good. I'm not saying that couple's going to get divorced, but they're not going to have a thriving, loving relationship because neither of them are invested in it. If you want to have a thriving, loving relationship, you have to put your marriage at the forefront of your life. We all have time and we all have money for the things that are very important to us. All right? Some people more money, some people less money. But >> So, you don't have time, you make time for this, right? and and having the money. It doesn't have to be a lot. It could be, you know, going out for ice cream or whatever it is or taking a drive to the beach. But one thing is for sure, you will never have a great marriage if you are not ready to invest time and invest yourself and put this at the forefront and say, "I am not going to let a day go by without making sure that me and my spouse sit down and have some quality time together. It doesn't have to be long, 20 minutes, half hour. I'm not going to let a week or two go by, you know, without making sure that we spend more significant time together and and and and make sure that we have that connection time. This does not happen by itself. Most marriages that are, you know, in the 10 to 20 years stage that people feel their marriage isn't great, nobody was bad. No one was trying to do anything bad. They just sort of neglected it. They just, you know, sort of just let it go. And then they wake up one day and like, wow, what happened? like we're like two people just on two ships, you know, drifting in the ocean. And you know what happened? The answer is just they stopped investing. They stopped investing the time. So anyone that really wants to have a good marriage has to know. They have to put this at the forefront. They have to know they're going to have to invest time and effort into the relationship. They need guidance. They'll get it. But without putting in that time to make it great, then it's not going to become great. Again, you're not going to get divorced necessarily and you might have a cordial nice relationship and you might not fight, but it's never going to become great. >> Yeah. It's like you're on it's like you're on the what's called the escalator or whatever. It's either either going up or down. That's like I'm stagnant. What do you mean? You haven't worked out in a month or six months or you're going backwards. >> You're going backwards. But a lot of times people don't feel it because there's no fighting. >> Yeah. >> But the relationship is slowly slow. >> It's still like status quo. There's no like nothing volcano. Exactly. But you're waking up and you're just like, I don't feel a connection anymore. >> Yeah. >> And that connection is the essence of marriage. >> Okay. Amazing. We wisber. Thank you so much for for joining us. >> Thank you for having me. I greatly appreciate >> more question. I know that's some of your shar are on tour any time. How else can people reach you or get any your articles or lectures or >> Yeah, I mean uh I have a website the marriageinitiative.org. So people could go there. they can get in touch with me uh through that. Um you know in regard to finding things online there isn't that much right now but you know uh we're working on it and Rabbi Sha and I are working on some things together. So you know mer hopefully in the future. Yes. >> Okay. Fine. Amazing. Thank you everyone for joining us. Thank you Natan Bahar behind the camera over here from from Kazak media team over here the director and we want to thank everyone for joining us. Of course, we want to encourage everyone to sign up for dailygiving.org. A tremendous um tremendous initiative which is which is literally give a dollar every single day and you could change the world. Want to thank of course Tory Time and all the different platforms for streaming. Um and thank you for joining us. [Music]