Do NOT fast! (Do this instead) | Letters #25 and #26 of 30 Letters in 30 Days

all right Basham Welcome to our special Thursday night double class of 30 letters and 30 days this is our final Thursday night of the series our is that's Tuesday night what is it April 8 um and as I've mentioned we're celebrating the we'll call it the soft opening of the sart's house just a half a block from the aisle it's going to be live inperson women's Shear but if you want to watch it from home uh we'll be live streaming it as well right here right here please make sure that you subscribe to my YouTube uh also I don't know if anyone cares about this but I'm almost at 100,000 subscribers for my YouTube channel and I'll get a cool silver plaque which I would really like as a piece of Decor to help decorate the new soulwords house so when I get 100,000 subscribers and I get the silver plaque from YouTube um I can put it up on the wall it'll look cool can you please subscribe right now please subscribe um and turn on notifications and then you'll know when we go live on Tuesday night there's a link below in the YouTube description of uh there's a link to uh to sign up spaces are quite limited please RSVP please please please RSVP do not I I don't think I would turn anyone away for showing up if they didn't RSVP but it's going to cause problems I'm just going to be blunt it's going to cause problems there there are a limited number of chairs please RSVP ahead of time um we're gonna give sadaka with our kabad pushka app which is great fun and just to remind you we do that not just because it's fun but because uh we're learning the letters to prepare for y of n as a gift of t for theab and we're giving Saka as well and that's also part of our gift our gift is twofold it's Torah study and action um action is Deeds of goodness and kindness which bring mashiah and after all that's what at the end of the day that's what it's all about it's about bringing Messiah okay um let's do tonight's to letters anything else I'm forgetting uh I mean I could mention if I want Get your fork cups hag if you order it today I'll put the link below if you order it today you'll still get it in time for PESA this is a hag that I edited it's a hag that's really it's allus but it's in the language of 12ep recovery um I'll put a link below yeah order it today so you can get it in time for PES um okay that's that's enough business let's learn shway all right so here's our letter for uh for V Nissen for uh Thursday night Friday yeah right and then next we'll learn a letter for Zion niss for Friday night shabas okay and they're connected they're on a theme they're on a common theme see if you could detect What It Is Well you can look in the PDF and you'll probably figure out what the theme is because we gave them pretty on the- nose titles okay so forget about that game um who is this this is a baretzki who was Reb aam baretzki um P not that long ago maybe 15 years ago if I'm remember incorrectly he was a Bel mean an educator for years I think he taught for well I mean this letter is we just said is from uh is from T Shin yala from 1954 I I think he taught for over 50 years he taught at laab Chiva at Bedford and Dean and then later at Ocean Parkway uh I think he taught fifth grade and he was absolutely beloved and adored and the letter that we're going to read from the rebbit to him gives us a little bit of a glimpse as to why he was such a beloved educator he was an American boy who actually went to Poland when labovich was in Poland for that brief period after the previous Rebel left Soviet Russia and was in Poland before coming to Crown Heights and uh he went to ADOT where the Yeshiva was the central was inot and then he basically the war broke out and he basically just came right back but he was an American Boy learned in otk and then he came back and then he was one of the first 10 talm in laich when the freed came to America established uh in America uh there were some atat boys he being one of them there was some tadas boys who were attracted to Jacobson's tanir and he was one of them he was one of the 10 tomam um so here's the letter Nim okay so right here you see why he would have been such a beloved teacher uh I was informed of your request for a blessing of a speedy recovery or uh a a recover a healing for one of your students okay so here's somebody who's when he's writing to the Reb he's he's asking the Reb foras for his students uh you also I also received the second the followup uh where the update says that the operation went well and uh God willing that you should continue to report good outcomes both material and spiritually um or just like there was a material good outcome meaning physical health so too um there should be good spiritual good outcomes if for for your students and that they should be healthy in uh not just materially but spiritually both beautiful BR for a for a teacher for such a devoted teacher okay um okay and because the just said that I'm hoping you're going to report good news both materially and spiritually about your students and then the debba says since for a Jew materiality and spirituality come together they have to come together that you can't separate one from the other this a this is a basic concept in cidus by the way basic concept of is that well the big the bigger KES is not okay I'll say the first thing and then the second this is based on actually um that not only does gmas need Ras right because GM without Rus is devoid of meaning then it's purposeless but and here's the bigger needs GM Rus spiritual energy that doesn't get translated into physical deed at also lacks ultimately lacks meaning which by the way is why let's just give a little tedua again did I turn off my sound I probably turned off my sound so that I won't be bothered by it let's see yeah I turned off my sound I just gave a dollar just gave a dollar and I didn't get a sound can I get my dollar back okay hold on a second so yeah that's the whole reason by the way why we give to Doc is so that the spirituality of what we're doing should have physical grounding all right at any rate so the deba says for a Jewish person the the spiritual and the physical have to go together so it's possible to say and theba calls this Al which means like in a light-hearted way in a cute way um it's funny to me though because a lot of the Deb is jokes I mean they're funny but they're also like super I mean I guess every joke has a little truth but the Reb's jokes have a lot of Truth like if the Reb wouldn't maybe maybe I'm an but if the Reb wouldn't have said if theb would have just said it as a simple I would have been completely fine with it okay de didn't have to tell me this is I'm only saying this humorously so don't take it that seriously but whatever that's how the de says it that okay here here's Here's the the the humorous quip which is not limited to just being humorous it's actually very deep we can rely on what thees the third volume of Tanya chapter three volume three chapter three we are not as healthy today as they used to be in Antiquity you know like in the times of the gar and because of that if we fast the ways that people used to fast if we try to do that it will hurt us physically cause US problems so the AL says we don't fast as much as they used to fast and so then what do we do I mean I'm not going to get into it because theba doesn't get into it here but um the say we give it to daa instead and since I said that I don't know maybe this is pavlovian maybe I'm just getting addicted to this dopamine hit that I'm getting every time I hear the coin pretend coin hit the pretend bottom of the pretend pushka but I'm just going to give a little stalker okay anyways so yeah the Alba says we don't fast we give to do I mean we do fast but minimally because we can't handle too much fasting so we give Ducker Instead at any rate so the dev says this Al says that in our generation we're not strong enough physically strong enough to fast as much as people used to fast um yeah similarly when we're talking about spiritual healing in the old Generations they were able to tolerate harsh treatment um spiritually harsh treatment what does that mean that is to say um mus which literally means like reproach or rebuke um I mean literally means ethics but it's like uh yeah reproach or rebuke um correction criticism so what's the deal Once Upon a Time people could Toler tolerate that you know people always complain oh what's with today these little snowflakes they can't take any harsh you're not allowed to speak it you're not allowed to say a word to them they can't take it um yeah that's true are we going to complain about it it's the reality that's true I that Dev is saying it right here like you can complain about it you can say it shouldn't be that way but it is that way and theb is saying this in 1954 so in case you're saying this is from Tick Tock they didn't have no Tik Tock in 1954 okay that I was just saying and by the way the AL that I was writing in the 1700s that late 1700s early 1800s that people were much weaker than people used to be okay so the Deb says like this just like we cannot tolerate fasting because the punishment that it does to our body is just we can't we can't tolerate it we're too weak so to and it and it used to be a legitimate form of serving Hashem fasting was a legitimate form and still is to an extent so the point is the something may have been at one time a useful tool in a hasem but it's not anymore because it doesn't because we can't handle it okay so too Once Upon a Time harsh critique rebuke was helpful it was was a useful tool in ausem uh but today it can cause spiritual sickness just like fasting can cause you to become sick physically sick so harsh critique can cause somebody's spiritual illness and that EV spells it out that EV spells it out h person could become really depressed could become despondent he gives [Music] up or maybe even it'll trigger push back that the body and the animal soul and the evil inclination will will rebel against this attempt to to lower them okay incredible with the I just spelled out once upon a time you could be a little bit harsh a little bit negative with with people today they can't take it and if you do it you can complain and say well why can't we do it today they used to be able to do it yeah you're right they used to be able to do it you're right but today if you do it the says it can cause sickness not only that it won't work it will cause sick sickness spiritual sickness you're trying to help the person spiritually you end up damaging them spiritually I made a br earlier it can cause them either to become depressed right emotionally depressed it can cause them to be despondent they give up oh what's the point of you this anyways I'm so bad at this or can cause them to become rebellious oh you think I'm bad okay I'll show you bad so this is 1954 and the Reb is basically saying that the tough approach is counterproductive we don't do it we don't do it was it useful at some point in history yes is it useful now no the opposite of useful it's destructive and therefore we must cling to the ways of the B that the B showed us the O of Taz that you must surely help him surely help who help your donkey your enemy donkey actually so Ti from the BM you see your enemy's donkey crouching beneath its load you may refrain from helping him no you must surely help him the B is explained the donkey is your body why plan words donkey is is materiality the materiality of the body you think he's your enemy body is your enemy so you want to oh he's crouching under his load good let him break I'll get this guy out here this pest no you got to help him you got to be mot of the body the body is good we need him so how do you approach a person you go like this you say to him listen to me listen to me the is like it explains in P of because the is from you can go learn you can understand this by the way this week's so by the thousands of times but the mar originally I mean it's a gar but I'm saying in this the sense is um is and the here is Hashem so that the ersary of hem is like Hashem so this is what you tell the person don't break them down don't criticize him lift him up tell them how great he is tell him you're you are you were given incredible not only you were given the to overcome the problems you were given because that's just like okay so you're not gonna stumble no this it's even more than that you were given the to light up the world to make the world into a vessel for godliness uh and to do it joyfully and so here's how you criticize him you criticize him with a compliment not you compliment him with a criticism you criticize him with a compliment you understand the difference think about it you say to him you have such incredible oh it would be such a Pity if you weren't to use them and the only reason you're not using him because of sh because the loneliness of the body the body is sort of like staring is is uh opposing it but you're going to break through that how with Sim because Sim overcomes all limitations including the limitations of the body and the neab so basically what do you do instead of harassing the guy and telling him how bad he is no you tell him you're amazing you're which is and um you have such K not just to overcome the problems but to light up the whole world and and it would be such a Pity if you didn't use those K and you know hint hint and um and the only thing that's stopping you is is is the body but you're going to break through the the the barriers of the body how with Sim you're going to realize how awesome you are and you're going to rejoice in that and that Hashem is counting on you and gave you such an important job okay so that's how you approach people so um and from everything I know about Rabbi barnet's approach to his uh students it sounds like basically he lived this letter in his classroom and out of the classroom he was also known for following up with students and I mean way like way after they had left his class like following up with them into like their adult lives that type of dedicated teacher okay um so yeah we have this incredible approach to here from the reb all positivity nothing with positivity yeah and oh no I'm sorry I'm skipping the whole paragraph ah this is gmak this is a Gish last night I got excited from the little nigl here we had all those gamas flying from the cotton and the and the Tinus so here's also a little nigler from a that I was making in very and it's amazing if you look into what 981 um where it says [Music] before you you should think about the greatness of God and then after it this is the is saying in parenthesis this is the DU and the L loneliness of man okay you got the de just says before you DAV think about the greatness of God and the liness of man just that that's that's all he says he just says those two things but the says this ju position is deep it's deep it's a known thing that in TOA even the order that things go in is also instructive so if you have a list it's not just what's in the list it's the arrangement of the list the order of things in the list itself is also teaching you okay meaning to say the first thing the emphasis is to think about the greatness of God and then afterwards to think about the loneliness of man but it's not just first and then second like higher priority lower priority it's also context you don't think about the loneliness of man in a vacuum devoid of any other context if you do the truth is ironically listen to this that's actually the most self-indulgent thing if you think about the loneliness of man but as a context unto itself ironically that's the biggest self-obsession look how lowly I am but also it's harmful like that EBA said it's just abuse it's just tearing yourself apart for what for what objective But first you frame it as God is great and by extension your NE is great ah you're not expressing that entirely yeah cuz that's shiftless that's cuz your body's in the way but if you could get away from that limitation and I have a way to get away from it or get through it which is Sim then then you're going to be great okay so that's the in the s what wow did you catch that the debba says if this is what you have to transmit to your students this idea that you are awesome you are great then how much more so you have to internalize this for yourself this is you can't transmit this to your students if this isn't how you see yourself and you're going to do it even why because nothing stands in the way of will like if you want it you can do it even even if it requires changing your habits which already became your second nature that's very deep basically theb is saying to this I know you and I know you're very hard on yourself but I know that you love your students you're writing to me about their health issues you're so devoted so listen this is the de tells this loving teacher I know you want to give love to your students you cannot give them the love if you don't give it to yourself first and I know that goes against your nature because for many years that's not how you treated yourself but you're going to have to start treating yourself that way and if not for you at least so that you'll be able to do it for your students and I just want to generalize this and say because not everybody's a teacher but many many more of us are parents you have you have to be gentle with yourself you have to be loving toward yourself you have to nurture yourself like you were a child even if that goes against your your your your your nature because only when you do that will you be able to turn around and do that for your children which we all know is what our children need from us we all know that is what our children need from us with blessings for success in all of the above powerful powerful letter wow galic yeah okay now we have a second letter this is the letter that corresponds to Friday night to shabas and you're going to see why we chose it to go with the other letter it's actually earlier it's uh T Shin base so you're going to say why didn't you put the one from 1952 first well because the main one I wanted to learn was the rabbi baraty letter and then this is more of like since we're learning that let's learn this um that's how I saw itook sh um an answer to your letter from and the P the P that you sent the pan will be read or was read at the is of the um and for sure will evoke Divine Mercy abundant Mercy that's the of the p on all of those who are mentioned in the pond for everything that they need okay now what you write about needing a Tik needing a correction a rectification for the past but not having the ability to fast so the guy feels that he has some evaders in his past that need to be fixed and maybe even he has seen that fasting is one of the things you do to fix whatever it is that he did um could be anything by the way if I had to guess I have a guess it's not based on anything except for my knowledge of human nature but it probably I don't know I would say has something to do with 84 fasts but that's just my guess there's no indication of that whatsoever at any rate um you say you don't have the ability to fast so that's why we're reading this letter because the previous uh letter that EBA mentioned the idea of fasting that in the old Generations they fasted more because they could they could handle it today we don't have the ability to handle it so we don't fast as much and then the Reb took that and applied it to an approach in that in the old days you could be a little bit more you know uh tough uh gym coach Style with the with the kids and today it's counterproductive so too okay that haven't made that comparison to fasting all right so this is also about fasting so you said you did some avadas and you didn't need you need to fix it and you can't fast it's interesting because I would have told the guy see this this is why I'm not answering these letters I would have told him look in SAA the samea that mentioned in the other letter by the way p gimmel and you know I would say well you don't really fast you give Saka hold on we got to give some give some Saka this is breaking the bank Breaking the Bank okay hold on I'm going to get rich off of this one second one second you know why I said I'm going to get rich off of it because you can test Hashem Hashem I'm testing you Hashem I'm testing you Hashem I'm testing you make me Rich okay richer than I already am barash all right at any rate so that EBA says to him you should look in the sa it's a biography about theb the fourth of page 72 so there's a saying of the there and the story is basically I there's not that much context for it a guy came to a guy I don't know somebody came to the marash I think it was in and he complained about his spiritual State and the told him you need to fast you need to fast or Tinus I think you used the loan cish you need to Tinus so the guy's like okay well how much Tinus how many and and so says no no you don't know what I mean by Tinus you don't know okay so this was I'm going to read it to you okay um fasting no I guess he did say fastin you need to fast fast f inish is fasting fasting by fasting he says you gotta fast and by fasting fasting does not mean not eating from dawn until sunset I thought we fasted until but okay whatever no that's that's starving that's called that's called dieting Tinus is a Vader but I guess he does does say fast and and he says Tinus F real fasting by fasting I don't mean not eating not eating is is is starving when I say fasting I mean which means let me spell it out 15 minutes a day you should think about yourself not only did this he followed through on the advice and not only did he change um in his soul power meaning what's revealed about him but like he became a different person and says what do you have to take from that story not it's not just the story it either made it into a or revealed that it was a every single one of us has to think 15 minutes a day about himself yes that's right you have to think about yourself 15 minutes a day and that's called fasting why is it called fasting I thought fasting was when you don't eat no no no that's not eating that's starving fasting is thinking about yourself by the way I'm not saying to do that on Yim Kipper or something like I'm thinking about myself I'm fast follow Halo please but what what it's saying is the Avida that people would in the past achieve achieve through not eating meaning some type of self-refinement right that was the goal self-refinement we don't achieve that through not eating today in fact not only we don't achieve it it could actually cause damage physically and spiritually because we can't handle it but if you want to achieve the same self-refinement that they Once Upon a Time used to achieve through not eating okay so we achieve it through thinking about ourselves for 15 minutes a day and I'm telling you this in addition to what um already is a general ADI advice that you shouldn't really delve into the past and and the Damage that you've done it's like not a good place to go like that's in general like stay out of that because it's not productive don't ruminate on your uh your guilt k seems pretty clear in your case that this is the atahar coming to trip you up to make you depressed so it's coming to you and saying oh you have a Vaders that you need to still clean up yeah you think he has a noble intention you think he's really trying to get you to do chuva no he's trying to ruin your life he's trying to make you do more ofas but the way it does it talks about in uh the first uh half of P that thear comes and he tells you let's let's think about cha but he doesn't really want tra what he wants you to do is ruminate on guilt so that you feel awful and then when you're feeling awful so that causes emotional pain and then you want to numb the emotional pain so what do you do you you you physical pleasure you indulge and you you have a low opinion of yourself at the moment so you don't really have high standards of what kind of indulgence you you partake of and then boom you go to a lower level you do something even worse than what you felt guilty for in the first place and it initiates a guilt cycle vicious cycle of guilt so like please stay away from this and this has been nice of to that because just in general like don't ruminate on your guilt and then I'm also telling you this concept of thinking about yourself 15 minutes a day instead of fasting um that that can achieve whatever self-refinement that you legitimately are seeking if it is is indeed a legitimate thing that you're seeking then it can be achieved through the aforementioned practice of thinking about yourself 15 minutes a day um yeah let's continue here um Ella Ella rather what should you do what should you do you should cling to the path of Joy which is a serve with joy start there's two aspects of that a concept in a m it's interesting this is also uh Al we had the from now we have the I know they're two different letters but so at anyway there's a concept M when it's talking about a you know the beginning of mish is about and then talks about so these are different daras andem so EV is a little more refined EV is less refined he he's he he would rather just be um free to do whatever he wants to indulge and nevertheless even that lower level in fact especially that lower level because it requires more B on his part CU he's really having to overcome himself in order to to serve Hashem so that level of uh evid kanini that lower level where you have to really subjugate your your temperament and your your nature that um that can be done with joy so yeah with just a little meditation here so let's say you're in a evid kanini matv you're in a situation where you're really low and like you don't feel like serving Hashem and maybe even in the past you didn't serve Hashem you did stuff that you feel really like you know is bad um and yet you can be you can be happy how by thinking about and you don't have to think deeply about it the calls it hisb kalala think about it just a little bit how lucky you are how fortunate is your lot that you are a meaning that you have a connection to the [Music] Reb however it is whatever your status is is you are certain that theb will put you in a in a shiny place in a well-lit place he'll stand you up in the light amiti the truly bright place place of True Light you have to be strong in your connection to the and what does that mean sounds very like vague no spells it out by learning this why am I saying the opposite ofus and matters of already pased that loving your fellow as yourself is the vessel to loving Hashem your God so you you're feeling some guilt you want to fix it through fasting but you're not able to fast good so don't fast or rather really fast which is has nothing to do with not eating real fasting is think about yourself 15 minutes a day and in addition that's in addition to the fact that you shouldn't ruminate you should not delve into um thoughts of remorse it's just not not not productive it's counterproductive it'll drag you down so a hard to trying to get you to go to that place and uh you should realize that you can subjugate yourself to Hashem you know that evid kanini level and you can do it so that's one one thing and another thing is you should think about the fact that as AED you are so lucky because whatever your status is I mean maybe yeah maybe you did mess up maybe you have legitimate things that you have to really fix but you know what you're certain that if you remain connected to the debbit through learning the deas TAA and through avel okay we're GNA give another we're going to give another dollar here don't get impressed by the way I'm not giving the big I'm just giving dollars oh didn't the sound didn't go okay hold on AV okay so you're going to learn and you're gonna do a is and that is going to connect you to the Reb and you're going to be fine the Reb is going to lift you up and put you in a place of True Light galic good shabus no I have nothing more to say I think that's awesome I'm blown away I got to go think about this