Josh Brody @ Project Inspire Retreat 2019

Oh back Wow I have this this is some ongoing issue issues a strong word but there's a guy in Boca whose name is Josh Brody totally differently and I know growing up I kinda feel that was only when I heard about another one I was kind of Vince I was insulted like really get somebody else says no no Brody's definitely not I had a friend in law school who was certain no matter what I told him that I converted now is Catholic you know I kind of move a little bit oh good girl okay morning everyone this is always my favorite time of these conventions because it means aroused at the end it means I can finally stop eating it's it's it's it's so ridiculous but again yeah this one I came downstairs and I was certain coffee that's it next thing you know I'm standing on line waiting for an omelet of God you know can't pancakes in one hand I got my son holding a third plate for me just because you know the pizza the pizza I ate six hours ago is not as you'll finally digested and it's time to the time to move on I happen to love I'm Sherman I'm sure I'm not the only person in this room who just loves coming to a shop a tone like this it's just something that is so right it's amazing there's so it's so enjoyable and if you actually think about it's a little bit hard to understand or drill down a little bit specifically and what it is that we really enjoy about it so obviously there's the food which you know of course as time goes on it gets less and less enjoyable but you can't stop eating anyways there's the it's great interesting classes for the most part except for this one and there's people the people part of it is what I find most interesting because coming to a shop a tone like this and being with other Jews who have a very very different background than I do I mean I grew up in the Midwest in Orthodox my whole life you know there's different pieces of our own backgrounds that everyone in this room I forget the entire convention something different about each and every one of us and when you have the opportunity to connect with another Jew that you might not have otherwise connected with it something about that that just and it's a little bit strange you know look last night Abdullah service so I'm dancing and with some guys I know some guys I don't know they weren't wearing their name tags I wouldn't know their name I was you know were hugging each other we only showers it's something that just but it's enjoyable it's like fuels feels great right it's not really so easy to explain we've talked a lot over the course of Shabbos about brother well brothers and sisters were all family but even so it's a nice idea but in terms of the actual truth of the matter were we don't know each other it's all just you know we meeting people for the first time some folks won't see until maybe next year at the convention so explaining why we feel that immediate connection as a matter of just pure logic it's not quite so straightforward but we all know we feel it I can't explain it I can't necessarily put it in towards and describe it but I know it's true I think that there's actually a very deep spiritual explanation for why it's true and even if we can't necessarily put it totally into words why we can feel it one point matura Hashem tells Moshe to count the Jewish people now the Torah has a couple of words that it will typically use for counting one word is puck HOD in other word is mone write the word minyan we down with a minyan literally means number but Hashem does not used that word when he tells Moshe to count the Jewish people he uses a word know so those an interesting choice of a word now so literally comes from the root meaning to lift up there's a couple of different lessons that Hashem was telling Moshe for us to understand ourselves as Jews if you're counting something most of the time that you're counting something you're doing it because you want to know the total let's say you're counting pennies my son has a when he's big like pretzel jugs and he's been filling up with pennies honey when he wants to how many are in it I don't know what he thought of this he stands on the bathroom scale holding it then he puts it down gets back on and he knows how much this get how much this thing weighs it doesn't tell how many pennies are in it Amish is worth but okay so you don't really care about the individual pennies all you're doing is counting because you want another totally even like dollar bills I nobody cares about each Indian each individual dollar bill you just care about the total when you're counting diamonds however totally different experience you not just you know flipping through them trying to say many diamonds you have you're taking everyone you're looking at it you want to know the color the cut the size the clarity because every one on its own is incredibly important as I was telling emotional when you count the Jewish people every single Jew is a diamond every single Jew has something unique about him or her that is different than every other Jew and you can't just count them and kind of run through it and see you know you know this chair this tribe is this many this tribe is this many you need to look at each Jew individually Burnett mentioned Friday night this idea we tried to develop a little more of a jigsaw puzzle but imagine for a second a bit of a different type of example you have a picture of a King made up of mosaic tiles so with every single tile together makes up the picture but if you're missing one tile the pictures not complete and something's off and it doesn't even matter where on the picture it is it could be in the bottom corner just smack in the middle you'll notice right away if a tiles missing as Jews our job in this world is to be Hashem as ambassadors we talked about the idea of being a light unto the nations we make up a picture of Hashem in this world each one of us is holding up a tile you know a more modern example if you are a football stadium and you see I haven't actually ever seen this amid some of it I don't really do it but in one side of the stadium everyone's given taya you hold it up and you can see from the other side a picture of something so every one of us as Jews individually has a title to hold up right your job is hold your tile because if you're not holding up your tile the pictures not complete and it tells you a little bit about the awesome power of every single individual Jew the fact that if you're not holding your tile the picture of Hashem is not complete there's a pretty awesome responsibility and awesome power that each one of us has hold your tile but there's actually not a part of it interestingly which is in terms of how we connect with each other because I can hold my tile but if the person next to me isn't holding it the picture is incomplete so when we're with other Jews even Jews we've never met before I may never see again and we'll each holding our tile we connect on a spiritual level because whether we even realize it or not what's happening is we're creating something we're making that picture of Hashem complete and we're doing it together and so by standing with Jews you never met you feel something because of what you're accomplishing and of course you know the the mosaic tile example doesn't quite do justice because you know it's a real picture every person has to be in their specific place but with with Hashem and the Jewish people it doesn't really matter where you are so if I'm always holding my tile here and someone else is always holding a tile there when we finally get together and actually you can meet each other and connect that way the spiritual connection is its new and it's real and it feels awesome and that's why this the Shabbos and the shaba tone like this it's so unique and so incredible because the truth is I think people make this mistake and they think about connecting Taschen they think well connecting to Hashem it's sort of a verb Cole relationship I'm not done here I shouldn't look there and so what we're connecting like this connecting to other Jews that's horizontal it's not maybe there's some relationship but it's two totally separate things from judy's its perspective that's actually not correct it's not up and down you know up and down and across I undo them in the direction so it's not up and down and across not exactly it's actually just one big circle connecting to Hashem connecting to other Jews that's all part of the same thing if all you're doing is sitting on a mountaintop somewhere and communing with Hashem by yourself you're not really getting it my my family and I were in Israel for the Sukkot holiday and one one day we went for this for this hike and we were hiking in this like sort of mountainside whoever like outside of in the Judean Hills and as we're hiking suddenly we come across this door in the middle of the mountain and it's a it's it's a it's so out of place it's like so we asked our tour guides what's what is that oh there's this group of monks and they live here in complete solitude and they commune with with God however they think that makes sense to do that like complete solitude they do I have no connection with the outside world whatsoever interesting my son asks him where do they get food from so he says oh yeah well but once a month if you're the right day you'll see them walking with the shopping bags cuz they just went to the grocery store you know in the next town over but but that's like a misunderstanding from Judaism Judaism is perspective how we're supposed to connect ah Shem because you can't do it on your own this is why for example all the prayers are in the plural because you can't davon just for yourself you may have you're only yourself in mind but when you're actually praying to Hashem you need to think about other Jews and how they're doing it's that connection to other Jews that really enables us to connect tosh em and of course it also it also feels good I think that probably every Jew you've ever met whether they have any Jewish education any background whatsoever inherently understands this idea about the importance of connecting to other Jews and you've heard the concept of begging I don't know about you I've never heard of Italians cals owning each other or Mexicans tackling each other they don't do that because it's there's no connection but you just get it you see no you're sitting in the airport and somebody comes over starts you know I saw you know wearing a yarmulke I have never read spell because they want to feel this especially Jew who's not often connected they want to feel that connection say living in New York I think it's a little bit of a more difficult situation because you're just around Jews all the time and sort of you kind of just unfortunately you start stop to really feel it as much when you're disconnected you really get that get that opportunity that's why actually is kind of funny I found that I often feel that like as Israelis you feel this connection with Israelis that's just automatic you got this you know yours like you're sitting reading the you know the news or whatever it is you read a story about some Israeli who invented some you know awesome you know cure for cancer or some way to help paraplegics walk again and it's just like wow you feel a sense of pride I mean did that really make any sense alright some Sabra and the middle of the Middle East does something and one of us sitting here in New York wherever it is you live feels a sense of pride doesn't does that really make sense we have nothing in common whatsoever well except that we do right we have the spiritual connection whether we've met them or not so it gives us that sense of pride and that for me this has always really gotten me really gotten me going I actually yeah but if I go to bed I always try to make sure I'm reading something and when I was reading this awesome book called startup nation and people have reread it right I had to stop reading it well he's at somebody before I went to bed because I'd be sitting there like it's like it's time to go to sleep so what are you doing and you got to go to work go to work tomorrow I it's so cool when I actually go to Israel by the way for me it's like a it's like a I think at some point some Israelis are gonna get a restraining order against me because I I'm like walking down the street high-fiving people just you know buying people launch it's just this awesome powerful experience of being with other Jews but culturally we have very little in common but it doesn't matter because as Jews we like to connect to each other and really know it or not that spiritual connection is real and it feels fantastic it impacts how you treat people when you when you hold someone in very high regard you kind of let things go because it's just yeah whatever it's fine I know it doesn't bother me there look this is this person is my mentor somebody who I just know is an amazing person so okay little stuff don't let you let it go if you think about it we know how awesome every Jew is and the spiritual connection that we have with each and every one of them why is it then in our personal relationships things don't quite go that way and the relationships with the people who are closest to us our family friends it just doesn't work out the way it really should there's this big gap between the theory that we know about however how awesome every Jew is and the spiritual connection we have with them and how we should feel about them and how we actually treat them and figure out a way to breach that gap can be really really difficult when in my pit when I found out we're in Israel for Sukkot so we're trying to figure out figure out one day we needed an activity so and I don't know if anyone else has this experience when you're with your family you're trying to find something to do and it's like towards the end of the trip and we're not sure we're gonna do whenever one person wants to do this this person wants to do this I don't have nothing any more ideas I'm not sure so we hired this tour guide and he said look you haven't done really an old city tour yet so why don't we do that oh and by the way I happen to be friends with the one guy who has a license to do rappelling off the old walls okay so when I first heard this from the guy um in that mode of we need something to do I can't think about this anymore fine oh great let's do it done okay no problem my wife and I and most of my kids we are not the adventurous types so we're doing the old city - we start the tour and but an hour - in is okay so now we're gonna go meet the guy to go rappelling okay great we start going up the steps if you've been it's inside the old city wall rep right at Jaffa Gate we start walking up the steps and then there's some more steps when you start walking across there's some more steps gonna cross some more steps finally get to the top and the rappelling guys are waiting for us I look kind of looking around like we're you know the walls much shorter over there maybe we they're you know I I can only do it in one spot and obviously it's this is the old city of Jerusalem and so you hook up the types of riggings anywhere and we're looking at each other like uh-huh yeah no no it sounded like a great idea it sounded like the kind of thing we really enjoy but anding they're kind of looking over the wall 85 feet straight down and so the tour guide of course says you know Joshua it's already paid for so if you want to do it don't do it but do you know you have to pay for it no matter what that got me by the way it's a gun we're doing it so I had to go first and because my no nose we want to do it and what happens is you know you can think that walls kind of like you know it's high part then it goes up like the ramparts and the ramparts probably about as thick as this lectern here and I climb up the guy who cooks you in but you don't actually feel the thing holding on you yet and they climb up in it and like okay I can do this and the guy that the the rappelling guy decides now's a good time to start pointing out all the sights that I can see dude I don't want to hear anything about this get me over the wall and down okay I don't have to see anything so you have to like climb over and you're kind of hold on front now of course it was an awesome experience but getting over that hump between the theory of what sounded like a great idea an axe Julie doing it I mean it was I can't even describe it it was it was not easy but it was awesome and in our personal relationships that's the same thing we know what we're supposed to do we know the theory we know how important every Jew is especially the ones in our family but actually the way we treat them something happens kind of breaks things off and you got to figure out a way to swing yourself around that wall and lower yourself down so if you want to think about ways to put things into practice one of the first things I learned when I was a junior associate of my first my first law firm I had been given this project it's very complicated research assignment and I spent you know probably week and a half working just non-stop putting together those memos ow 30 pages and I walk him to sit with the partner who's gonna review it and we're gonna give it to the client and he sits me down he says okay I read your memo it tells me everything I ever needed to know about this topic but it gives me absolutely no idea what we're supposed to do the theory and even the idea behind the theory can be easier to figure out but putting it into practice requires some very concrete steps and so I'm hoping to accomplish by the time we're done this morning is to discuss a little of the theory and then have some very specific steps that everyone can take to get through and actually do something with it and as a general matter we've all heard amazing ideas over the course of this shabbos but those ideas are not and as inspired as we feel it's not gonna stick with us it's not gonna last unless you take steps to actually put it into practice so a little bit of it we're going to talk about today this morning is going to be the specific exercises that we can do to try to work on it and actually make our relationships better a lot of these ideas I Hearst first read about from somebody strong Miller who was a rabbi in Pittsburgh for a long time and then he moved to that he now lives in Calgary let's start with a basic concept something that we pray for three times a day and at the end of every Kaddish and that's the concept of Shalom now Shalom typically we translate as peace but it's a little weird to think that we're dominating and praying three times a day and again at the end of every Kaddish for peace when it when things are going well maybe understand in a time of war or when things are not going well and you need peace so something you're gonna dive in for a lot but it's baked into the end of every single silent prayer you need to ask ourselves why that is what what are we missing we things if things are peaceful and you know things that Israel obviously at the moment are not so good not so great but when they are it seems like a little bit of okay ask for peace but no it's great I don't mean I really need it so much I think that the thing you need to understand is that the way we translate shalom as peace it's a little bit misleading if i asked you would talk about the refer to tell you that the israelis and the palestinians we're having peace talks but what does that indicate we really just a cessation of conflict that the fighting has stopped or if i said to you you know you get this lot you know you're fighting with somebody and if i'm you and your kids your mother's like you know hold your peace i'll be fine bite your tongue don't say anything and that's peace let's not really peace again that's just an absence of kind of active conflict and i think the reason that we do that is because we we look at the concept of shalom I'm already a negative perspective because because life at times can be difficult and we can have problems that are weighing us down and as a result what happens is what we need to get the conflict to stop that's a way so we think if solemn as being just stopping and ending the conflict but that again misses a little bit of what Shalom is the word Shalom comes from the word Shalom complete or hold or take it even a step further harmony things working together you mention if you're working in an office and people you can imagine a couple of different possible ways people get along there to be active conflict where people in the office are fighting it's obviously not gonna not gonna go well you can have a situation where people are not fighting but they're not really working together they're kind of doing their own thing or they're working together teamwork active collaboration and there's a there's a lot of research and it's very big nowadays in law firms in particular about the idea of people working together that you'll actually accomplish way more than you would if you're working on your own that's really what Shalom is Shalom means that we're working together in harmony again not just absence of conflict but actual wholeness and harmony about this is really what Shabbos is all about but Shabbos is that we take one day a week and we spend the time thinking about the fact that you know there's billions of creations in the world billions of people and so much going on so much complexity we stop on Shabbos and recognize that maybe but it all has one creator and that one creator has everything working according to the way that he wants it to work the world actually works in harmony according to a shamans plan we did a we just may not necessarily see it but that's what's actually happening and that's what we're doing on Shabbos right Shabbos Manuka Shabbos rest is not about just taking a nap because you had a long week it's about spending your time with a certain level of surrender that everything in the world has a purpose everything in the world has a place and a Shem has a plan for all of us but how do we greet people on Shabbos wash canals we think of Chaves but that's not really the right way to do it the right way to say it is greet someone shouts its shabbat shalom because that's really what Shabbos is it's about having that wholeness that serenity that completeness that comes from everything working according to Emma's plan if you want to improve your relationships what you need is to take this concept of Shalom Rhiannon not the absence of conflict but harmony if you have harmony if you have that completeness and you can put that into your relationships in theory at least that's what will start to make things better because it not only will reduce the conflict and eliminate the conflict but actually will create a sense of completeness that you'll have with those people in your life now of course this is not easy where people are complicated right you know what they say to Jews three opinions correctly even the same person under different circumstances will have a different reaction to the same event in the 1950s these two partners Lenny and Maury and they had a wholesale clothing business the problem was that they weren't really great in terms of predicting fashion trends so they invested all of their money into these like Madras sport coats for men which at the I guess now those actually in style I think but at the time they were not a big hit and they were sitting on 10,000 of these sport coats and they they were facing financial ruin one day guy walks into the store from Australia and tells them that he's looking been everywhere and he's desperate to find Madras sport coats they're very hot in Australia I need more you're looking at each other like this is the greatest news ever so they tell me I maybe we have a couple left they negotiate and the guy says okay I'll take all 10,000 so here's the thing I have to travel back to Australia that's why was he gonna take some time and this was the 1950s and I need a month and if you haven't gotten a telegram from me at the end of the month telling you that I'm canceling the order or then we're then we're good okay I gotta go back to the home office talk to the boss and make sure that we're good to go but otherwise we have we have a deal so the entire month is you can imagine Lenny and more you're kind of you know as they say an either sitting on your bill cos all right they're walking on eggshells or do that so it's gonna be they're basically not sure they're either gonna be financially ruined or they're gonna hit a home run the last day of the month as they're waiting in the store about getting about ready to close up gonna drink that with hi I'm congratulating themselves and their success door opens guy walks into the telegram and Lenny and more you look at each other and they're just Lenny goes over takes a telegram opens it up reads it Morrie great news my sister died right under the rule under different circumstances that's a tragedy under these circumstances it was you know obviously not so great but so dealing with people can be crazy difficult because of the fact you just never know how they're gonna react to anything you know what the circumstances are gonna be so figuring out the right way to approach relationships again easy in theory difficult in execution so how are we supposed to do it so I think I think step number one is recognizing within ourselves how we feel about things every one of us is acutely aware of our own pain when I'm having a bad day I know it and I may not necessarily show it to people that it's obvious to others but I know what's going on in my head and I know that if I snap at somebody I'm having a bad day it's not me and you know he or she's gonna have to cut me some slack because I know what I'm going through the problem of course being that were so often focused on how we're feeling that it doesn't necessarily occur to us to think about how somebody else is feeling because I'm just focused on myself and whether we realize it or not we can end up being somewhat judgmental about how we think somebody else should be feeling because from the outside I see what their life is like and so I I I know what to expect and I know what I should X from him so so when he or she snaps at me there's no excuse for it we just don't really appreciate what's going on in somebody else's life I have a very close friend who's a psychologist and his actual real specialty is dealing with youth at risk and so I was talking to one time and I asked him what's the most difficult situation you have to deal with in terms of you know helping somebody work through their problems and he said something that just frankly shocked me you but he didn't even hesitate oh it's easy the most difficult patients the clients I've ever seen are children of multi generational wealth trust fund kids really I happy to be one of those okay what's the problem you said because for them everything's handed to them on a silver platter getting a sense or feeling of accomplishment is very difficult and make helping them work through that where they can feel like they're actually doing something is not easy but again to those of us on the outside you look at the trust one kid yoga and for a truss one kid call me afterwards you don't realize how difficult it is for them because we're so focused on ourselves so step one exercise number one is taking a moment every day to just be conscious of the fact that every single person that you encounter over the course of your day is going through some pain is going through some difficulty there are very few people you're gonna meet who have it so together that they just don't have any issues all of us are working through something and it's important is that you start this process to recognize that everyone has those issues step two is recognizing that you absolutely can do something about it we talked a little bit earlier about the incredible power of every single Jew right that's not just everybody else that's us every one of us has that incredible power especially to connect to and create relationships with and help other Jews hold up their tile every one of us can do it it doesn't matter religious not religious spiritual not spiritual it doesn't matter if you were a crazy jerk yesterday starting now going forward you have that ability to help another Jew you better and help them hold their tile at the end of this but by the time done this morning we'll be chanting hold your tile ok so again that's the theory the question is how I so here's their first exercise for this morning you need to imagine yourself you are now congratulations to every one of you you are now a Hasidic Reba I know it's a lot to believe you don't feel worthy you know what what can you do you've been chosen throughout history they've been rebels who were chosen didn't quite expect it to be but you know thrust upon you can't say no you're in take a list or make a list of all your friends people you know and come across on a daily basis and spend a minute thinking about what kind of pain you may may be you know what they're going through maybe you don't but think a little bit about what issues they may be facing and how you can just at the at first level sympathize and empathize with them now doesn't matter it doesn't matter by weight if they don't know that you're a rebel that's ok you can be in secrets but even not in secret you can have a huset who's you know a year old he doesn't know who his Rebbe is but the Rebbe is responsible for him nonetheless you now have responsibility for every one of your friends now as a rebel you can't necessarily solve their actual underlying problem but your job is to at least make them feel better and at least give them the support and the comfort to deal with the day that they're going through Valley isn't this like an awesome way to view the world suddenly you're looking at all of your friends nah not as like a pity party for people but more of a I know somebody else is going through some pain and I can do something to help them feel better you'll find once you start doing this you view the world completely differently because you just viewed as your job almost to try to put a smile on everyone's face I find this when I'm when I'm running so when I run is managed a lot people do I get a little of an intense face you know it's kind of running and I'm you know hoping that it's gonna end soon before I pass out but as I'm running down the street and someone's walking towards me when I just all of a sudden say hi good morning have a great day the smiles I get are feels fantastic now part of it may be because they're just expecting that I'm gonna you know just run for a run right past them if you say something you know get out of the way but when you have this opportunity to put a smile on somebody's face it it's just a fantastic fantastic feeling for yourself okay so yeah that's a little more practical so what are we supposed to do step one in this part of the exercise say hello with a smile that's it that's the beginning say hello with a smile and mean it hi how are you nice to see you it doesn't you know you're not imparting any interesting information no no great things are happening because of the fact that you you know exchanged a couple of kind words but you made somebody feel better made somebody feel like like they care right how do we say hello and Hebrew Shalom right because when you're saying hello to somebody it's not just a greeting it's a concept it's an idea there's harmony here and the two of us whether we know each other or not or exchanging that smile and making each other feel good we're creating that harmony that togetherness just by saying hello the thing is sometimes when we do this and we do it a lot especially if you're you know a convention like this what ends up happening is that you kind of rush through it how are you great and that really doesn't work in terms of what the exercise is supposed to be it has to be thought out and intentional and the way to realize that is to recognize that when you're saying hello to somebody and you're asking them how they are and especially when you're wishing them have a good day that's not just a way of saying hello you're actually giving them a blessing where this gets back to we talked about in terms of the completeness between the relationship amongst Jews and how we relate to a Shem I'm not just saying hello I'm wishing you something I'm giving you a blessing have a great day I want you to have a great day no no really I want you to have a great day so that's why I'm saying it the story is told about Herbert Bayer Leibowitz who's a head of Yeshua in Europe then when he saw another Jew walking on the street especially if he was if the Jew is too far away from they actually talked to each other he would wish that Jew a blessing he would say in either's brought us Afghan couple your blessings on your head even though that the Jew had no idea that rally boats were saying this it didn't matter he saw another Jew because I can't because I can't actually talk to I'm not gonna wish him a good day why I want to have a good day so I'm gonna do it anyways and see what happened starts to happen when you start doing this and really working on this exercise you start to feel for yourself this sense of harmony and completeness what are a strong Miller calls a show'em personality because you recognize that there's other people in the world and you can have an impact on them you can connect to them you can help them hold their tile and that's really again an empowering feeling because you're not just living your life and trying to get through it you're having an impact on other people okay so when you've worked up your Shalom muscles a little bit it's time to move on the exercise to your remedies are over they were short I hope you enjoyed them step number two exercise number two I should say is that you're going to be a teacher but not just any teacher you're a teacher for gifted but troubled students I imagine you're working at some school for the gifted teaching them whatever whatever it is whatever subject you feel comfortable teaching but the kid that you're teaching they they're troublemakers right they don't really fit in a lot of other places and they can have a hard time behaving the way having the right way so what are you gonna do how do you make the class work and have them actually learn stuff well I can tell you one thing you will not do you're not going to overwhelm them with your brilliance and your incredible lessons on whatever subject it is that you're teaching these kids are probably way smarter than you are what you're going to do if you want to reach them is you need to be calm you need to be relaxed and you need to give them a sense that you care so I had a friend who ran the Habad house in Harvard and when he first got started at it somebody asked him there's been another outreach organization that was on campus and it wasn't successful and they ended up you know closing that and moving on but the Habad house was being very very successful somebody asked him what did you do differently than that other guy did so he said I recognized early on that I never would have gotten into Harvard so I'm not as smart as any of these kids are I'm never going to wow them with brilliant expositions on proving the existence of God and the truth of the Torah that's not going to work right but what I can do is I can invite them over for Shabbat dinner to come by during the week and grab something to eat and just show them that I'm here for them and I care and they related to that in an incredible way because he was just always just showing he cared but most importantly he was calm and we was relaxed and he didn't worry about people weren't coming were they being disrespectful it's okay I'm just gonna stay relaxed now of course this is not an easy thing to do so the question is let's talk practical exercises you can do to make it that you can exude this calmness and together with exercise one of wishing people show them that you can actually give that off so the people you're dealing with who can be difficult and who you know annoy you but you can actually relate to them and deal with them because again you're not going to be able to work with or deal with a difficult person by being more difficult than he is if you're just gonna basically you know respond to his difficulties with your own and he's not you know he's being not nice with your own that's guaranteed recipe for disaster so here's an exercise we can all do anyone drive here in New York I was driving here on Friday and of course I followed ways because that's what you know Israelis whoo and at some point it sent me on the lower level of the the GWB which somebody decided at one o'clock on a Friday was a good idea to shut it down so they could do some construction so literally we just we're sitting there not moving about a minute in it starts the horns everyone that's doing the doing this yeah when I grew up in Shenzhen the Midwest in Chicago so they taught us how to drive in Chicago 10:00 and 2:00 right I always joke with my wife in New York they teach you how to drive 12:00 in middle right is there anything more stressful in driving in the tri-state area for sure not maybe it is actually I read an interesting paper by the psychologist who some professor of anger management at the University of wisconsin-green Bay there's a faith Altimas there's four reasons why driving is particularly well-suited for making people crazy even the most calm nicest guys and women to get behind the wheel of a car and something happens III have a very close friend who is literally the nicest guy I've ever met everyone loves him putting behind the wheel of a car and he turns into some combination of like Mario Andretti Evel Knievel and the Tasmanian devil it's I'm when I Drive with him I'm sitting next to him I'm white-knuckle the whole way it's terrifying and the thing it's sort of a combination of you're trying to get somewhere you're not just driving usually for the fun of driving you're going to try and get somewhere and there's things that are stopping you from going and so that led level of stress and driving itself is inherently a little you can be a date can be dangerous if you're not careful and all the people around you are generally anonymous so nobody feels any compunctions with basically cutting people off or just being generally nasty so that lends itself to driving making people crazy so here's the exercise next time you get in your car or maybe when you're leaving here today before you start driving take a deep breath tell yourself okay I'm going home now Waze says whatever time it's gonna be for me to get home add 20 minutes then add another 20 and I'll get there when I get there and I'm going to just not gonna let it upset me not gonna let it bother me I'm just going to drive if you make it home especially if you get some traffic and you stay relaxed I can pretty much guarantee you a you're gonna feel awesome and be you just had a massive workout you have worked out your Shalom muscles in a way that is just incredibly empowering and it gets easier right the more you do it this exercise will actually enable you to drive like a normal human being and then what happens is that starts to creep into how you deal with other people the people who are making you crazy and the people who are giving you a hard time because they're just difficult people because whatever pain that they're going through makes a little bit easier to deal with them because I'm just I'm just gonna be calm people start getting upset okay and I don't know you I have you know a number of friends who I look at as being like the model and of this calmness and some people happen to have as a natural tendency they're relaxed and don't these don't work them up that's not me but we can do it right we can actually work on our Shalom muscles too we start to get relaxed and some people are bothering us it doesn't really bother us sure so I'll come back connected a little bit a little bit the end I mean essentially it's a combination of breathing helps I you know I find myself that breathing is not my thing doesn't make any sense I'm not like breathing but but a lot of it is mindset is mindset and that means being conscious of it it's really what it starts with and it is an exercise and we talked a little bit about being conscious of the fact that other people are going through pain the way to do this is find a time every day whether it's in the morning whatever time works for you and say to yourself okay I know the things I'm going to go through today or any difficult and I'm gonna deal with people who are difficult and I'm going to and I had the expectation that it's coming let's talk a little yesterday about our managing our expectations and that's a lot of what this is if you know you're gonna deal with somebody who's more difficult and you're prepared for it it is easier so it's that I you need to start in that in the book in the morning is what I find the best time to do it because you rather start your day we're just taking a moment and reminding yourself that you need to spend time and have this mindset of dealing with difficult people requires me being calm and relaxed but another great tool is the reminder on your phone we set random reminders to go out throughout you know once or twice a day you know become this they had thing I find just it starts to start you know a rhythm with it what actually starts to have an impact on you I knew I was talking a little bit earlier that you you have to be conscious of a lot of the things you're going to be doing and not just take the ideas but actually say okay I'm now going to remind myself I'm gonna review it I'm gonna think about it and when you start doing that it starts to have that impact where you're really feeling it and it enables you to deal with the difficult people because of the fact that yeah I I'm remembering to be calm you know is this story I had read about a guy who said his grandfather that he went to the doctor or when he was you know he was getting older and he had blood pressure and the doctor said to him if you know if your blood pressure doesn't get under control and you don't have a problem and the the issue for him was particularly his temper and the doctor said to him even make it more clear for you if you keep losing your temper you're going to have a heart attack and die and so why did the guy do nothing bothered him ever again because literally freedom was a matter of life and death and he was able to just you know turn that switch and say if I don't calm down I'm not gonna make it through we have the ability to do that it just takes the right impetus and the right thoughtfulness to make sure that you're keeping it in mind now by the way just to be though clear this does not require being a doormat for people who are not treating you well it doesn't mean that you have to let people just push you around but your reactions to it can be very very different so when we were in Israel for Sukkot so one we rented an apartment and one night for the holiday my wife and I went to the grocery store to pick up a few things and is you can might if you're a bit had the the mayor of being in Israel for a major holiday you can imagine what the grocery stores like because the entire city of Jerusalem is buying groceries for next couple of days and so we're waiting on line and we're unloading our stuff and all of a sudden it's found a few people behind me in line and all of a sudden I see you look a little commotion a couple lanes over and this guy walks over and says to be okay I need to put my stuff and go ahead of you why because I was checking out and in the middle of checking out the computer malfunctioned and so I had to start all over again so I got to come over here so people behind me are kind of like you know because Israelis you know culturally again they they they be a little more in your face and I was okay I said oh sorry no you got out sorry I've already started unloading my stuff you're gonna miss people behind me you're gonna happen sorry you have to wait now I could have reacted with you crazy get out of here and then spending the next you know 20 minutes telling my wife out I can't believe that guy's foot spa can you imagine he's trying to jump all these people online and I because I could have let it go ahead of me but I wasn't doing that either see you can assert yourself you can tell people no no I'm sorry this is not gonna work you don't let yourself get upset by it you don't have to let it turn into something that were this guy's problems is starting to really give you a difficulty that you're getting upset over yeah you walked away humans somewhere else I don't know yeah I don't know where I know anyone I've sold enough okay so we've done yeah right right yeah exactly right so imagine now okay so we've done a couple exercises right we've been a hosta to grabber for a little bit that was fun we've been a teacher of difficult students now it's time to really up our game and deal with the people who are just so miserable so unhappy if they feel the need to spread it around the people who are just they're jerks and they're really unfortunately people we have to come across and deal with all the time so I work in a big law firm and as you might imagine big law firms are full of a lot of difficult people actually when I was a young associate so I was working on this one deal and it was we were growing it I do corporate bankruptcy so there's a fair amount of going to bankruptcy courts so we had a very big important hearing a whole team of people and everyone's running around the morning hearing starts at 10 o'clock it's a talk in the morning or in the office we've been there all night everyone's running around gathering up boxes and papers we didn't really go to court there's probably six of us and one of the paralegals has like three or four boxes stacked up and he put them on one of these hand trucks and he takes a bungee cord and he's wrapping it around the bottom to hold the boxes in and he doesn't latch it all the way and it snaps back up hits him right in the eye he goes down and he's basically if you can imagine like lying on the floor in front of the doorway of the senior associates office and we're all just like we're not sure what to do as this happens the partner who's running this deal comes walking down the hallway and he comes walking in steps over him are we ready to leave yet and what and so the senior associate was the only guy who had any guts to say anything this partner and he says what do you got Paul I stepped over him what's the problem we deal with people like this all the time and they can make our lives very very difficult if not down right so people like this you know being a rebel is not really gonna help being a teacher is not really gonna help people like this need to up your game and you need to imagine that you're a therapist see in therapy there's this concert concept of transference when you're sitting with a with a client with a patient and they're working out whatever issues they have there's a tendency for the patient to start viewing the therapist as the person that gave them the issues in the first place if you if you if you have problems with your father or so they start treating the therapist like he is your father knees are taking it out on him and therapists are trained not to take this personally because they know that it's not them it's somebody else these therapists one times I had a therapist joke these two therapists one time are leaving the office one of them's been practicing for like 30 years and one of them is only been doing it for a few and they're walking out and the younger one has his tie and on his jacket off he looks like he just ran the marathon the older one looks like he just got to work in the morning and the younger one says to the older one I don't understand we're both sitting in the office listening to clients all day III feel like I just got hit by a truck you look like you could go another 12 hours how do you do it the only one looks at me says it's easy who listens when you know that the person has an issue it's not you you can with a little bit of thoughtfulness you can not let it bother you the key to deal with the really difficult people in your life is recognizing that they woke up in the morning angry and they spent all their time looking for somebody to direct their anger at and then you don't feel like it's not me all right if you're walking down the streets in Manhattan let's say and you come across you know an unfortunate somebody's homeless and mentally ill and they start yelling at you and calling you names it really doesn't bother you that much like I care what this guy says when you're dealing with somebody who's a difficult person who's going to be giving you difficulties not because they're near you but because you happen to be the person in front of them at the moment okay okay this is not I'm not saying this is easy but it takes a little bit of the recognition that this is the what you're dealing with and if you're thoughtful about it in advance you're and you're prepared for it right if you're dealing with a one-year-old who has a diaper rash and you're here's you're screaming and yelling you know you don't get mad at them they have pain a lot of pain I do what I can maybe I hand the kid off to their parent after a while but I do what I can when you're dealing with somebody who's going through so much pain okay it's not me I'm not gonna let it get to me because he's having difficulties now what happens is I think take all this stuff together right the idea of having a xiaolin personality of giving other people a sense of Shalom of recognizing that I can keep myself calm I can not let other things get in to bother me that I hear from other people and I think you roll all that together you really start to realize that the key to dealing with other people he's being comfortable yourself you're not going to change somebody else it's just not going to work I think what happens often is that we try so hard think we're gonna change other people that he gets so frustrated by it instead of recognizing that we just need to be relaxed about it I use this example a lot I love playing golf I'm terrible but I love playing it anyways and one of the first things you learn when you're learning how to swing a golf club is the people have this tenon Center I don't play golf in the room I know Michael does play a lot a lot if you play golf if you swing the golf club as hard as you can what happens is you clench up and your arms tighten you get like this and when is it happening is you just sort of miss the ball completely or to start a little bit if you relax and they just you know keep your arms down to sort of flow through that's when you start hitting the ball far in life we spend so much time when are dealing with other people in our relationships we're so tense as we so want to make it better and so change them I'm fine right the problems not me the problems you so I'm just gonna tense up as much as I can and soon as hard as I can to try to make things better and we're gonna with every time if we're not relaxed ourselves if we don't realize that I'm not gonna change them I can change me I think myself relaxed when that's the key we hit on suddenly dealing with other people becomes a whole different ball game because now I don't okay they have their difficulties they have their problems and I can help them and try to make them feel better and do what I can to help them hold their tile but if it doesn't work okay I'm not gonna let it upset me I'm not gonna let them bring me down and the key to all of this is making sure that you think about it spend some time every morning two minutes and just think about the fact okay today's a day I'm gonna be dealing with somebody that's difficult I know it and what I'm gonna do is I'm just gonna stay calm and relaxed and every difficulty that comes my way especially the smaller ones I'm not just gonna look at it as okay I got to deal with this I know that is hey I get to deal with this and this is an opportunity it's a workout and I'm gonna get through it when I'm done I'm gonna be a little bit stronger and the next time I do what something that's a little bit more difficult I'm gonna get through that too and sometimes I'm gonna mess up and I'm gonna try and someone's gonna make me upset I mean that's over I'm gonna say okay I tried didn't work no problem let's do it again I know here we start in the other sessions I'll wrap up I thank everyone for coming remember it's all about buffle 'no sticking about it have a wonderful rest of your day [Applause]