Dr. David Lieberman: Transforming Relationships (Part 6)

welcome everyone to part six of transforming relationships with the great dr dave lieberman um we're gonna switch up the format a little bit we're gonna be um asking um some questions to dr lieberman um and uh we'll we'll see how it goes um and um with some people um we have some questions already but um everyone is feel free to submit your questions um you could um text or whatsapp them to five one six four five five seven seven one zero we can email events e v e n t s kazakh.org chazyaq.org and uh we will try our best to address them in future classes um so um as we know um [Music] the with the last few months we've been living um through the the the covet 19 um and uh barack hashem um the the cases in uh new york area have gone down but unfortunately in other parts of the country that have risen um so we're gonna we're gonna have some questions about um different uh relationships and um different uh different um aspects um from about the situation um so someone sent in a question they said that um now that everybody is home a lot more that um that now husbands and wives children and parents are spending more time than they have than ever than maybe they've ever had in their entire lives so um what should we do is strengthen our relationships uh during uh during this pandemic during situation when maybe more disagreements are arising well that's a great question it comes up a lot it's been coming up a lot you know i've done a number of zooms uh throughout and uh a lot of people have continued to do so and it's probably one of the most frequently asked questions you know in terms of relationships because uh when you bring anyone together for a long period of time uh you know it's it's easier for disagreements to sort of uh fester and for the relationship to fray a little bit which is why um it's good to number one is this is to make sure that um everyone has sort of an opportunity for their own space everyone we don't always have that ability but to whatever degree you can sort of have your own space and your space to go to when you need it when you need to put yourself in a timeout you know that's okay um also it really gives you a great opportunity to work on a number of relationship uh skills in terms of communication communication the foundation of every relationship if you can't communicate you can't have a productive relationship so you know even though it's it's um or you know a fetus to the fire when it comes to the pandemic although it's easy now um it really is a good opportunity to be able to work on relationship building skills and to have a conversation to learn really a lot of people because they don't know how to have a conversation they know how to shut down they know how to be hostile they know how to be passive aggressive they know how to scream they know how to get upset they know how to make snide remarks they know how to roll their eyes they don't know how to express themselves how they feel in a healthy wholesome way and two uh we don't always know how to hear the other person in a way that they want to be heard i was speaking with a couple recently you know it's when something is the ability to communicate to your spouse or to anyone to your kids or your kids to their parents to the siblings whatever it is communicate how you feel in a way that you believe you're going to be heard and um for us to be able to hear somebody when they have an issue particularly when it concerns us is foundational to every relationship so maybe rabbi will go ahead and just sort of lay out a couple of um do's and don'ts in terms of expressing yourself to somebody else when something is on your mind because you know when you've got these friction points i showed you something parenthetically and if you need to slow down tell me as you know i i tend to speed up sometimes um i give a talk for for different uh casual organization and uh you know from in the mushrik it has one of the toughest jobs on the planet and what i explain is it's tough job for a number of reasons but fundamentally is there are three things that increase um of anger and frustration in relationship number one is close proximity when you're in a very close confined space for example there are more issues uh on a submarine than there are on a cruise ship you know when you're in that confined space much more challenging uh a kitchen is a confined space two is when you have heat literally in the summer the homicide rate goes up we've got expressions for this hot under the collar losing their cool when a when we are hot hot blooded um uh tempers tend to flare in a kitchen you've got high temperatures third is time pressure when you've got that you know right before shabbos everyone's running around it's a it's a good opportunity for the sun to sort of be out and to poke at people and to make it more difficult because time pressure adds to it so this is the three things that machiaf has day in and day out if you're working in the kitchen they've got a closed face heat and time pressure so you know when you are you know at home and not necessarily in a closed space but if you don't have an opportunity to leave or to go or to come as you would want to um and your routine is disrupted you know rather than go to work rather than go to learn or rather than go there and there you know uh we find ourselves with a disrupted routine and sometimes responsibilities and obligations that were clearly well defined beforehand that line is now blurred uh so i hear a lot of people feeling resentful towards one person the other because i'm doing this your home why aren't you doing that or conversely as you know what i'm no longer going out i've got to work at home maybe you can xyz and so you know as something i say often in talks and relationships is boundaries are necessary in order to define our personal sense of space and responsibility and when you're at home your boundaries become too easily blurred so going back to the original threat of conversation when something is on your mind you want to do this number one and you thought this was going to be a dialogue i said hey you know what it'd be great we've got these questions by the way to everyone writing in thank you so much i appreciate the physic um and that really really beautiful nice remarks um it really is it's very nice for for this for this series and for um a lot of what i do with attorney time kazakh but um yeah so we thought why wouldn't this be nice to go ahead and give and take and uh there i go so anyway very very quickly rabbi is number one if something is in your mind bring it up but wait until you're in a sort of a calm space and the person you're speaking to is in a calm space uh bring it up in a gentle kind way don't accuse the other person just express how you feel all about i not about you when you use the word i meaning it's not you it's nothing you did wrong i'm having a hard time with this the other person won't get defensive there's a lot that goes into it but the job of the other person then is to listen to understand empathize validate doesn't necessarily mean you agree it just means you understand where the person's coming from and that's how you segue into a positive and cooperative conversation okay aren't you glad you asked just on one point what you said in the beginning what you were saying about was that let's say like if you have um maybe some time apart or something like that so like would you say that that like just like time heals all the wounds there's you have to like you have to like confront it or like good right so sometimes times time heals or wounds but sometimes that frustration festers and you know into a boil that is ready to be lanced so no i i do think that look what happens is when you're in the heat of the moment you don't have perspective it becomes all-consuming becomes very upsetting and there is what to say for cooling off and giving yourself some space after that period if you're still bothered by all means because i'll say you shouldn't have the resentment built up you should express how you feel how you do it this makes all the difference you should not walk around with simmering resentment it will it will um it is so destructive to relationships because it will leak out in subconscious ways even if you tell yourself you're okay with it so give yourself some time and space by all means and you'll find after you know 24 hours a little bit of time that uh you're okay with it and you can at least revisit in a healthier way and you don't have to jump on the other person right away but make no mistake if it's still bothering you you've got to bring it up you know honesty really is a very good policy okay sounds great i'm on a different aspect of um of the pandemic so like we know that uh sometimes it's like it's a habit that that that they're always constantly checking all those and there's a vaccine there's this oh the testing and the the mayor and this and that is all the different things that comes up so so so what's what what what what's like the but then sometimes it rises our stress level and we can't focus and so so what what's that what should we what should be our mindset uh to all amazing media and all these different things like questions great amazing again a great question and that is get like your social distance have social media distance it is it's so destructive you have to appreciate the psychology here of constantly checking in on what's going on because what you're doing is you know right when this started and parents were were calling asking questions about their kids and their worries and that i said you can't tell your kid everything's going to be okay when they're stepping over boxes of tuna fish and cartons of toilet paper because you filled your house with it because you've gone insane so you can't say bubble it don't worry about it's going to be fine it's like i need another 7 000 cases i mean it doesn't work you know you have to model for your kids first and foremost it's easier to tell your kids one thing and do something else but i said that's not enough they look at they look to you so um when you constantly check when you uh are always seeing what's going on and what makes you even more insane is that you're always changing their mind anyway so you could be sure whatever comes out is isn't even uh valid what you're really doing is you're telling yourself is you don't have trust the the apex of the talking is to do our startlists right you cannot be talking without a stylist and when you do your strawless no more no less do your stylist then you can have complete pataka knowing that whatever efforts you put in is all that's required the consequence the result is up to hashem and are completely unrelated to the specific efforts but our job is to do a shot list and however they were for whatever the um the the whatever the the outcome is that is up to hashem in our lives and with the pandemic whatever it is so if you want to be informed you want to be kept up to date and you want to know what's going on you know ask an armish person because you don't it'll eventually filter down to you if you need to know something if you're a news junkie and you want to be kept up fine go ahead i'm not i'm not a position telling anyone they should or shouldn't i can tell you the quickest way to make yourself crazy is to focus on everything in your life that you can't control tip so recipe for being neurotic is to focus on it so what happens is during the pandemic is everyone begins to focus on the one thing that they have no control over there's something in psychology called the focusing illusion very quickly basically he says that nothing is as important as you think it is while you're thinking about it but thinking about it magnifies its importance so the more you think about it the more you can become consumed about it the more you become concerned about it the more you tell yourself that it's important and it ends up creating this cascade of anxiety so the good answer or the long answer to a very good short question is stay away as much as you can from the craziness with the media okay and a different aspect of media is it's just that um like sometimes like we might see they'll get a text or whatever we'll see like online or something a picture of let's say um a bar mitzvah uh weddings like that but instead of uh having um a hundred people twenty people et cetera there are there's ten people this training or whatever it is like a few close friends are with us so and so so the the hut the the broom the grinder they might have imagined their whole life oh it's good they're gonna be like the center of attention this and that and now there's only there's only eight people there's 20 people or whatever it is so like uh what encouragement can we uh give these people who are just celebrating their special day and everything like watch the let's see the mindset right look i i you know everyone is going to experience it differently we made a bar mitzvah like right at the height of it um and uh you know we tried to make it as schmock as possible we actually had our uh you know relatives come by in the cars this is when no one was going anywhere and honk and hold up signs and you know try and do that and i reached out to a couple of a great people to make uh short little video clips from my son um i'm not gonna make sure uh he's such a great guy i'm gonna say it publicly i'm gonna get in trouble for this actually i'm not because you know because he does it now it needs some black i say that neeson black is is such a sweetheart um i anyway i reached out to whatever and he sent my son a really beautiful just personal video and now i should just give him a little shout out he's got a great program which he recently started of giving shout outs to people um and he's got a website i'm not sure what it is but you can uh uh google it or on a you know a proper internet and uh take a look and he's got a service well give shout outs and it's it's really terrific but you know what you you make the best of it um and it's important really to remind yourself you know this is true for anything of what's important when you get married the most important thing is that um you know the husband and the collar there everything else is gravy you know whether the band or this or that so if you get caught up in the for the the what's the referalities the the nars kite to stop again i get why it's important these things these now call them details that could be you know very important to some people i understand that i am only suggesting that if you pull back the lens and look from a wider perspective and ask yourself what's really important here what's our focus is it on all these extraneous all of this stuff or is it really that you know your son is reaching a milestone in terms of his um in terms of you know becoming a bar mitzvah bucker or is it that you're getting married to your zip up and remind yourself of what's important and all this stuff will fade away i'm not saying it's easy and that these trappings aren't very nice and you know important to a lot of people but the degree to which you get caught up in it is the degree to which you're going to be bothered if you don't have it does that make sense yep um and um and and going back not this question for the previous one but i wouldn't be talking about that we know that um i don't know the exact number 30 million exactly unemployment rates have skyrocketed and people you know if they're not being laid off completely they're thinking they have to take uh tremendous pay cuts like that so and um i guess not only just encourage other people but they themselves how do you have like a mood that we talked on in uh in our times when you just lost your job you have to support a family or five children or whatever it is look i i i i'm not so wise for foolishness to be able to give you an answer of how you can just you know be perfectly at peace if i snapping your fingers i can walk you through the logic of of the psychology and what's necessary and from a torah perspective obviously and that brings the difference between a moon and beta the muna is you believe and uh you recognize that this is hashem runs the world that this is hashem's world everything goes going as planned but is the recognition of all of that is geared entirely for your good and for your growth what bridges that gap between the moon and batacan is action meaning that you can't believe one thing and do something else and expect to have a tough hand you know a lot of people have a muna they believe in hashem yes it's hashem's world he runs the world but then they get worried so what's what why is because they have a mono but but it's the it's in that space again between moon and batacan the way you bridge that space is by living consistently with what you know to be true therefore the degree to which you can move through your day move through your conversations move through your life recognizing that everything that hashem does is geared for your good and for your growth tailor-made custom-made for you to optimize your potential you look at the world entirely different very nice and i guess we'll just end off just about um there was somebody mentioned to me they were saying about um that they're dating the relationships in regards to dating in the last 100 days however many days it's been is uh it's a totally different meaning and people are doing it over zoom or the phone or different stuff like that so um what should our uh approach beat uh like uh the virtual dating uh should we just not to get seriously should we do it or not what should we do yeah yeah yeah wow you're asking a great question that that deserves uh more time than than we can we don't want to cut into the good rabbi's uh time who by the way you if those of you that i'm sure you're you're listening to rabbi goldwater but he's by the way i just i'm going to answer the question but he is so poised so uh meticulous and uh art articulates so beautifully the message i i teach public speaking by the way and i still sound a fraction as polished as he is and the content is off the charts he's uh his extraordinary talents um but answer your question is look this is a changing world it doesn't work for everyone zoom i i do think that if it's something you're comfortable with that you shouldn't put your your dating on hold because of it um it does afford you more opportunities and i think there are some some very good um safety measures to put into place to make sure for example that you know that that ideally the date is set up with a shotgun there's a set amount of time to speak you can't have you know get on and then you see what the person looks like and you're like oh well sorry fuzzy internet connection and you know you can't do that it really has to be you know mensched out and structured as possible now again their number of safeguards to put into place i think it's feasible again if you're comfortable with it and i certainly get why people would not be because it uh some people don't translate well through zoom others by the way are much more comfortable with it because they may be typically a little bit more nervous and zoom affords them the opportunity to be in their own comfort zone maybe their own space and they're more relaxed so you really have to uh see if it's right for you and your personality and right for uh your comfort level and if that's so then you know move forward responsibly okay that sounds uh great and uh i think this is a great format and um um well i think this is uh this should definitely continue i just want to remind one that uh send your questions uh just like these questions um and uh about relationships about character about human nature whatever you want definitely um we'll um that will be addressed and i think it'll be great send your questions to 516-455-7710 or email events kazakh.org thank you everyone for joining us