Rabbi Akiva Rutenberg - The Best Way To Hear What We Need To Do

foreign in all your endeavors all the good things and if you're trying to do something not good then with no blessings for that but in all the good things that you have um you should have success and one of the reasons why we do this event Rejuvenation is um to have an opportunity to wish you all Sana okay and this is we're just a few days after Rosh Hashanah in this time between Russia this year works out it's exactly one week between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur it's always one week but this year works out as a regular week and but it's not a regular week this is the week the 10 days of repentance and as you learn about tonight in this program what does mean what does it mean and um it doesn't mean repentance even though that's what it says in the sitter and the master um and this is a very special time of year because it's a time of reconnection it's a time of reconnecting with Hashem reconnecting with ourselves reconnecting with each other and really that's what Shiva means to return and reconnect often in life we are waiting for somebody to tell us to allow us to make that step to do what we know we want to do and to do what we know inside our heart is the right thing to do there's a joke told of Two Italian construction workers Tony and his friend Mike who are working at a site in Manhattan they're both assigned to the same site and every day Tony opens up his lunch and it's the same tuna on a bagel and the tuna is not even so fresh and a little thing of water and Mike has this amazing spread of sauces and sausages and cheeses and all this kind of stuff he's not Kosher and um every day Tony curses he says but my life stinks and Mike is like and finally one day Tony says if I have another tuna sandwich tomorrow I'm jumping off this building site and Mike's like the next day Tony opens a sandwich and it's a tuna sandwich he says Mike it's been nice he starts walking over to the side and Mike says please Tony I'll talk to your mother I'll talk to your wife whoever is making the sandwich for you we'll work something out and Tony says you don't get it I make my own sandwich every day he makes a tuna sandwich and then complains about the fact that he has a tuna sandwich well we want to make a step in our life and which is really all Hashem is asking us to do we have to be willing to make that first step and you guys all made the first step just by showing up okay foreign interesting and Powerful story over Rosh Hashanah that I believe was just just came to press was I and the story happened many years ago to a rabbi who I have a lot of respect for he was the former head of the OU a psychologist and a rabbi that's why I like it from from what from Baltimore Maryland by the name of Rabbi Hirsch weinrib who's um now he's probably close to 80 years old but he's a very wise person who's helped many people in his life and this story took place back in the 1960s and as I heard the story I didn't hear it directly from him I heard it from someone who who heard it from from him he he was having doubts he was having some doubts in his own faith even rabbis sometimes he's having doubts in his own faith and he called up the lubavitcher review was the head of the Chabad movement someone who was known to have a tremendous love for Jewish people and a wise person and he called him up but you can't really get the labyr on the phone definitely about that point in his life it was very hard to get him on the phone so he got the guy by the secretary of the rabbi and he told the guy said I have some questions about my faith but he didn't he was embarrassed to say who was on the phone so he didn't say it was Rabbi weiner he said to Drew from Baltimore and he says to the Secretary of the rabbi he says please go over the message to him I have some questions on my faith I'd like to talk to the rabbi Rabbi responds back through the secretary and says where do you live she says I live in Baltimore so he says if you have questions on your faith and you live in Baltimore you should go speak to Rabbi Hersh weinrude because he is the person who will have the answer to your questions so remind me to that point says back to the secretary he says please tell the rabbi I am Rabbi Hurst wine room he tells it back to him says back to the secretary in that case tell him that he should speak to himself that was the end of the conversation everyone made a point to saying that often we know what we need to do we know what we need to hear but sometimes it's easier to say to someone else than to internalize and bring it into ourself