KLM: How to Make Mitzvos Bloom on Shavuos with Rabbi Asher Baruch Wegbreit

I'm just going to open up with a little bit of a reality check for all of us. Before we officially start this year, anyhow, I do think I should welcome the members of Torah anytime and Yibaneh. Um before I get into Shavuot, I want to share this with you. Um I just I just recovered from pneumonia, baruch Hashem. Not totally there, but I'm on my way, thank God. And so before this class, I went back to my room to rest for a minute or two, just recharge my batteries. And as as I did that, the windows open and I hear helicopters or planes, which if they're not going down into war, they're practicing at least. Not only that, I could hear the they have different sounds now when there's sirens going off. So I want to make the following point. You know, we're all saying Tehillim and for those of you who haven't received a Tehillim Kavanah card, I recommend it. But we're saying Tehillim constantly for the people who are suffering and in danger. And let's face it, for many of us it's become rote. And I just want to quote this rav here in Har Nof, Rabbi Zilber, he says, "For the soldiers, it's not wrote. For the families, it's not wrote. For the hostages, it's not wrote." So, this is what we're all about is we need to marshal up our energy and our focus and not let it be wrote, not let our prayers be wrote, and not let efforts like this we're preparing for an incredibly young tov. Let's not Let's have the sense of urgency that our situation calls for. Okay. Little bit of a heavy opening. Now, let's get ready for Shavuot. Shavuot and the Mo'adim are tremendous opportunities to get what you came for. Let me explain. We came into this earth, planet Earth, all of us came into planet Earth with a magnificent purpose. But, as we know, it's easy to get sidetracked, and Rachman l'tzlan, many people get sidetracked, and they forget why they're here, and they forget to get what they came for. You know, there was a non-Jewish thinker who nailed it on the head. Let's Let's be honest here. This is such a good point. We mistakenly look at ourselves We're We're prone to this all the time to look at ourselves as physical beings who occasionally have a spiritual experience. Adrabba, as they say in English, it's just the opposite. We are spiritual beings having a physical experience. That is what we tend to forget. And therefore, we have to welcome with open hearts. We have to welcome Yomim Tovim and Moadim. Why dafka then? Because the Yomim Tovim, the holidays, the literally the holy days, we get we get back to the real world. You know, my dad, I'm not smiling about this part. My dad passed away this year. His soul should have a liance neshama. He should have a liance neshama. My dad was like a classic loving Jewish parent. When they hear that their son is doing the following, I I basically informed them that I'm leaving a very lucrative career as an international consultant. And I'm going to go study Torah in Israel. So, you can imagine how that was received. And God bless him. He He cared about about my livelihood. The facts are the last trip I made, the last consulting trip, I lived off for a year and a half. So, you'll understand that it was a lucrative career that I left. That year, you know, we're close. We love each other. So, we're talking two or three times a week. And there was a refrain that always occurred. What was that? You know, my son, when are you going to come back to the real world? Right? I heard that a lot. When are you going to come back to the real world? Okay, fast forward about a year and a half. Baruch Hashem, I met my wife, and my parents fly to Eretz Israel for the wedding. And as we know, there's the Shabbos before the wedding, the aufruf. So, we're sitting in the this old uh holy building, the first Kiryas Joel building. We're having an aufruf. And everybody's gathered around, it's on Shabbos, and there's a lot of speakers, etc. So, uh I think my rebbe said asked uh my dad, you know, Mr. Wegbreit, would you like to say a few words? And he gets up, and here are his opening words. You know, there's something they say in the so-called real world. You hear that? He got it. He got it. The the world we spend most of our time in is the so-called real world. It's not the real world. Now, as you can imagine, after he left, he goes back to uh back to the states or wherever, uh that kind of consciousness didn't persist so so intensely. It doesn't for us, either. You know that. We get lost, and we forget which world is the real world. And that's why we need Yom Yom Tovim, Moadim, appointments with Hashem. I remember my first Moed, I think it was in at Pesach time in Los Angeles. And it was one of those the uh you have the two Yom Tovs and Shabbos all together, so you have three days of no work. Uh there weren't even phones and things like that to not be able to access. But anyhow, at the end of the three days, I'll never forget, right as the Yom Tov was going out, the rebbe said the following. He says, "People are going to say to you now, well, it's time to get back to work." And that's true. And they'll say to you, "Unfortunately, we have to get back to the real world. And the Rav said, and I humbly agree with him, he says, that's wrong. That's not the real world. This, the Yomim Tovim, when we are focused on what we came here for, when we realize that we're spiritual beings having a physical challenge and trial and experience, that's the real world, and it's the corridor to the ultimately real world, the world to come. So, the these are so precious. The Yomim Tovim are such precious opportunities to spend some days with Hashem in the real world. Right? That's Shavuos. That's what's coming up in a few days. Sounds great. So, my urge my urging of you and myself is, don't forget what an opportunity we have right now to enter the real world and really refocus. That's one of the key purposes of the Moed of Shavuos, etc. Now, I wish I could say, okay, I hope you integrate that. Don't treat it like a TV show. Go for it. I wish I could stop the shiur here, but I can't. Why is that? The tremendous opportunity that Moadim present and Shavuos hugely, the tremendous opportunity, someone else realizes what a great opportunity is right now. Want to guess? That's rhetorical. Yeah, I know you're going to say, the yetzer hara. And and this isn't me just being colorful. The Gra, the Vilna Gaon says, gadol zman, gadol yetzer hara. The greater the Kedusha, the spirituality, the potential of the time, the greater the Yetzer Harah is. Okay? So it's not so simple to just hear that we have a chance to take advantage of Shavuos. That knowledge, it's important to have that mindset that this is precious. I'm going to enter the real world for a couple days. However, it's not enough. Okay? And here's here's um and you'll I think I'm going to give you a mushal right now. We've done we've we've mentioned this before, especially with the Mo'adim. I'll tell you how I came up with this idea. I realize and you know, Peretz hinted to you that the shiur might be a little longer, although we're moving at a clip actually. But the thing is this. Mo'adim, there are so many mitzvahs going on. The Mo'adim are overflowing with mitzvahs. And therefore, I you know where I went to do some research? Okay, forgive me. I looked up how to plan a trip to Disneyland or Disney World. Excuse me. Do you know just some interesting side point if you will, Disneyland and Shawl's time to leave the little city, Disneyland is almost two times the size of Manhattan. You hear that? And this one person who's reporting about there's so much to do there that you know, they went I think 43 trips and they still didn't cover everything. Okay? That's Disneyland the hot deal. Okay, so now with that in mind, listen to the following true muscle. There's this lovely lovely young girl named Malka. And Malka was so excited cuz her parents promised to take her to the amusement park. And this is at least couple weeks ahead of the time. She's so excited. What happens? The day arrives. They go into the park. The parents pay for the tickets. And what happens? They rush through the amusement park. They're just whipping by, going through all this, passing all these rides. The poor girl Malka is crying. She's so upset. She's so disappointed. What's the nimshal? Who are those parents rushing through the amusement park? All right. There What is it? Three Three are pointed at me. It's us. When we come into a And what is the amusement park? It's a Yom Tov. It's all these glorious mitzvahs, a chances to connect with Hashem that are filtered throughout the the Yom Tov. So, what we tend to do, Rachman l'tzlan, is rush through. Rush through. Or there's two types of challenges. We'll do it quickly or we just kind of get We don't stop and appreciate the ride, if you will. Okay? This is the challenge. In other words, the Yom Tov See, the Yom Tov is sedak- Malka, I didn't even tell you what Malka was. I apologize. Malka is your neshama. And this is not a like crazy metaphor because in the Midrash Koheles Rabbah, you all know this because it's in the beginning of Mesillas Yesharim. It says there's this princess who marries a villager. The princess is our neshama. The villager is our body and she's just longing for the the palace and the delicacies of the palace and she's so disappointed with cheesecake. What I mean is unsanctified cheesecake. Unsanctified fancy wine. Unsanctified South African meat. You hear? That's That's the thing. We can get lost in the delicious delightful Now Hashem wants us to really live it up. But as mitzvahs, we we don't want to neglect malka. We don't want to neglect our neshama on the Yom Tov. That's what we have to try to attend to especially on Shavuot. So the point is this. We now have to figure out we know what the challenge is. This is such a precious time to reconnect and to remember why we came here. We're who we are. We're in essence the tzelem Elokim and neshama. What we're here to do. The Ramchal makes it clear. All the All that Hashem wants from us now, Torah and mitzvahs. That's the whole purpose we're here. We come down on mission Earth to do that, but we get distracted. And by the way, of course we know that you can uh your profession and many other things can be why we came. They can be holy mitzvahs. But that's the focus. So we know this is the challenge we're facing and we have to be on guard to make sure we attend to malka. And I have how many strategies? Give me 1 second. Two basic strategies for you. The first one is this. I'm going to share screen. Okay. This is the treasure map. This is the map to Lahavdil to Disneyland. With um this graphic contains basically before Yom Tov starts, there's mitzvahs. During the Yom Tov, at specific times. Like I said, it's just a treasure chest of spiritual opportunities. So, suggestion number one for us to maximize is reach out to me for this Shavuot map, okay? Um we're it's actually it's quite beautiful now, but we're preparing an even more beautiful version and a simpler and more clear version. So, please contact me at rabbiwigbrey@ gmail.com or or at the KLM website kavana lemitsvos. com. Uh you'll see it come up there. So, reach out and request one of these. It's much better that you request it from me than I post it. Malku will be happy that you made the effort, okay? So, that's my suggestion number one is get a map and now I want to tell you how to use this map and leave you with a special uh Yom Tov gift for everybody, including me and my neshama. Okay. I have a new hop on how to stay connected uh in terms of kavana and having kavana lemitsvos, okay? You always need to develop new hops, okay? Even what my our mission together with at KLN is that we really don't fall prey to rote and we try to get what we came for and stay focused on Hashem. Now, anything we try will eventually become challenged, okay? That's a As my rebbe, Rabbi Green, said, you can't put your your consciousness on autopilot. Not possible. So, we need to keep coming up with tricks. So, let me tell you the latest trick briefly, okay? And it will tell you how to use this map. And okay, so here it is. Anybody want to be in ecstasy? I know what the answer is. Who doesn't want to be in ecstasy if it's legal and it doesn't hurt you? So, what does ecstasy mean? Ecstasy is as follows. It's three steps to make to be absolutely spiritually hooked in, okay? What was that in uh locked in? The locked in like Shul said. To be locked in, here's what you do. S, stop. T, think. C, concentrate. I repeat, ecstasy. S, stop. T, think. C, concentrate. Now, I wish I had came up with this, but where did I I find this? In one of the first KLN founding members. Everyone knows that I share you I'm looking if I can find it quickly. One Give me one second, I'll be right back. To give credit where the credit's due. Everyone recognizes this, the famous Asher Yatzar, the first viral uh Kabbalah card. So, if you look here, it has three things. It says in Hebrew, "Atzur, stop. Hoshev, think. And Mitrakaz, Hitrakaz, concentrate. I'm telling you, it really works great. For example, let's just we'll just take one, okay? That you you're going to the shop to buy some nice wine or some nice fish, something like this. You're going to shop for Yom Tov. So, whenever you catch yourself, stop. Think. What am I doing? I'm doing the mitzvah of koved Yom Tov. I'm preparing for Yom Tov. And then concentrate on doing the mitzvah well. This really works well when you're praying. Stop. What am I about to do? I Okay, stop. Think. I'm about to make a shehakol blessing. Have kavana for that. Now, concentrate on the words of the blessing, Baruch Ata Hashem, etc. Ecstasy. So, my I How do we grapple with the fact that the yetzer hara doesn't want us to gain as much as we can here? The answer is take the map and apply ecstasy and celebrate even a few victories. Okay? That's part one. And I have a second uh strategy. Let me Second strategy. Malka. What's the greatest thing you could give Malka? And again, I I'm source space when I tell you this. The greatest gift you can give Malka is a mitzvah. The The Gra, the Vilna Gaon says in Megillas Esther that the essence of the neshama lives for mitzvahs. Neshamas, our neshamas, our souls, our Malkas, crave mitzvahs. And that's why Hashem gave in the times of Purim, he gave the mitzvah of Megillas Esther. There was no mitzvah of Krias Megillah. But the neshama reaped that. So mitzvahs are the greatest gift you can give your neshama. What I want to do is, okay, we have the mitzvah map that I just flashed up there. But here's the other thing. I want to bring out two mitzvahs that you're anyhow doing, but you probably don't have kavana for them or appreciate that they are mitzvahs, actually Torah commandments. So this is how we're going to finish. We're going to finish with a gift to our soul. The first mitzvah that I want to bring out is this. Okay? You will be familiar with the topic, but not with the kavana, I think. Here it is. Atzeres. The Gemara learns, it says in one pasuk, Atzeres laHashem. Atzeres means like an assembly or in a gathering for Hashem. And then yet another pasuk, the first one's in Devarim, uh tet zayin ches, and then in 29:35, yeah, chet tet lamed heh in Bemidbar, it says Atzeres lachem. You should have assembly for yourselves. So I know you know this. So listen, this is an injunction, says the Gemara, to to divide half the day for Hashem and half the day for you and your family and your body, Malkas villager husband. That's half for Hashem, half for you. Now, we are doing this when we go to davening, right? When we go to pray together, that's hetzei Hashem. We're We're We're gathering. We're assembling for Hashem. So, have that in mind. Your Your Your neshama will be delighted because you went to shul. You might have had other mitzvahs in mind, but you might not have had Hashem, we're gathering for you because we love you. And then, when you're eating with your family and friends, that's Sarah's la chaim. Eating, drinking wine, cheesecake. Now, that's I shouldn't have done that with pneumonia. Cheesecake. Cheesecake is for you. And And that's a mitzvah d'oraita, too. Okay? So, that's the first gift I want to give to your malkas and my malka. The second one is this. A second In other words, I'm uncovering ones that you may not be as familiar with, and if you just insert this new kavana, amazing what it'll do for your neshama. The second one is mikra kodesh. I bet you've heard that word before besides it being in the Torah and parshas Emor, mentioned a lot. Mikra kodesh is mentioned also in the special davening. We are assembling in shul. What is mikra? It's also There's an atzeres is a type of gathering together. Mikra is It's learned out from mikrei eida. They used to blow trumpets to assemble everybody, but this is assembling for holiness. Mikra kodesh. How do you fulfill mikra kodesh? Right before in the Shmoneh Esrei of every one of your davening on Shavuos, after the first three blessings, atava hartanu miklamin, v'hafta osanu, and then it says man matan toraseinu, that section you're fulfilling according to the Ramban a mitzvah d'oraita of mikra kodesh. Right? You've gathered together and you're acknowledging the unique holy day, your visit to the real world. You hear this? So, to summarize this we're about to enter the real world. And don't think it's going to be easy because we can get caught up in the you know every time has patterns that repeat itself. Now, we know there's a deep spiritual thing, but what happens is wrote to always occurs. I I'm going to tell you something a little chilling, all right? How how much wrote occurs? You know, Rachmanistlanai, I lost my dad in the middle of Elul. And all of a sudden and then my mom went in the beginning of Shvat. And so what do you do? Thank God they they were buried here and I'm sitting shiva. And now it's four months later. I just lost my dear beloved mother. Both of them I love so much. And like I see like it's the same people are coming in and I'm sitting here and I made a probably inappropriate joke. I said, this is becoming wrote. You hear that? Even such a profoundly heavy, important, emotional thing, every anything that repeats is a call to you to rise to the occasion because if not, it's just not going to be the same. So, I I think you've observed Shavuot before. I think you're used to the nig- nigunim. You're used to the pattern of just relating and eating and enjoying and not necessarily being conscious of the mitzvahs. So, that's why I want to warn you. We know there's going to be a road challenge, but let's especially now, may it help all of Klal Yisrael, let's take really seriously upping our game, staying connected to this amazing opportunity, and getting what we came for. That's my I just want to wish everybody mamash that that your your entire being, including your soul, gets the maximum out of this Shavuos, and it should be a mailis tov for Klal Yisrael. Yeah, thank you. Welcome. Okay. Uh I any questions? You can keep it recording, Peretz. Okay. Uh the Shaul hasn't spoken to us in years, I think. I I Hello, welcome back. Welcome back to our Rabbi White Great. Shaul. So, um should we assign the exhaustion we feel before davening on Shavuos uh to the yetzer hara? Ah, yeah. Oh, I yeah. Okay, that's a great one. Yeah. No no one should ever take Shaul's questions lightly. It's it's right on the point. There's a couple things to mention, uh and that's this. Uh Yes. Yes, for sure yes. Meaning, there there's this minhag that has been accept By the way, when I say yes, it's it's a free for all right now, okay? So, if you disagree with me, whoever you are, come in and press, but let me make my argument first. There's a minhag kadosh of the Arizal to stay up all night, and it's just amazing, and you have the mitzvah of Torah mitzvah, Torah, etc., etc. Now, the place this is where I I I show the Vilna Gaon's point, greater the time, greater the yetzer hara. When the 10 Commandments are read, krias haTorah of the 10 Commandments, that's where there's an inyan to mekabel the Torah. There's a Yerushalmi about that. There is like an incredible Aseres Hadibros for refuah. To be present in the krias haTorah is a huge thing. You're mekabel the Torah. You have the mitzvah of the mitzvah of zecher Ma'amad Har Sinai, which is a deraisah anytime you think about it. So huge, the krias haTorah. I haven't spoken about the tefillah, but the krias haTorah is huge. And then we're like we're we're seeing um what do you call it? Our eyes are spinning or whatever. So the for sure, if you're going to maintain And then of course we have the um we have Megillas Rus, we and we have the davening. It's a long davening. It's a long davening and all of it is precious. Mikra Kodesh. Mikra Kodesh and atzeres lashem is all contained in the davening and we're exhausted, exhausted beyond belief. Okay. So I I wish I could get sponsored by a coffee uh thing, you know? On behalf of the XL Corporation and Folgers or whatever. But okay, so there is that strategy and I I would like see if Dr. Setzer has some angles for us. I'm going to tell you another approach, okay? That um that we have to think about, okay? I'm not say I'm I'm not saying you should do it, and maybe you should. Yeah. How about everybody ask your local rabbi on this, okay? But there's a rav um here in Hornell, um wonderful rav, he teaches at Machon Rav Jonathan Taw. Maybe some of you have heard of him. So, he told me, you know, he was like everybody else, years and years and years, all night, little bit of coffee, and it's just a brutal battle till the end of the davening and on Shavuos morning. But he told me he decided to get a few hours of sleep. And already stayed up 2, 3, whatever it may be, and he got a couple hours of sleep. And he said to me, it was like um the davening was like traveling through the Garden of Eden with Hashem. It was so magnificent. Okay? So, there is, you know, it's a really um it's it's it's not a simple calculation. You hear? And I mean, okay? I I I feel that I feel it's appropriate to tell you that story. Cuz and You have somebody say hello? Did somebody say Yeah. Yeah, were you saying something, Daryl? No, I had just something brief in between. Yeah, of course. That's what this is for. Just to support what the Rabbi is saying from uh two different aspects angles and the one is the Mishna Berurah says that uh or actually I thought of uh sorry, the Kitzur Shulchan Aruch that if you Am I echoing, by the way? A little, but it's not that bad. Okay, cuz I can change it. Um it said if your your sleep is going to be your Excuse me, your davening is going to be detrimentally affected, then then you should uh not stay up all night. That's number one. And then You should not Wait, wait. You know what, Rabbi Michael, it is a little echoey if you can fix it. He said you should not stay up all night if uh your diving's going to be affected. Correct. Okay, good. And this And the other thing you were going to show So, is that better? Yeah, much better. And and then just one of the quick thing is I heard that I think you also uh way back that to Rabbi Yashiv uh that's how would stay up uh he used In general, the I don't know the exact numbers and don't quote me on it, but let's just say it was 4 hours sleep and then so what he would do is he would stay up so Okay, but maybe he means four. Yeah, go ahead. Yeah, he would Don't quote me on the number. And but he would have one less hour one or two less hours sleep. So, on on else you work. So, he did Yeah, this is what I heard that he did not sleep all night. So, you're you're actually bringing two supports for not all night. Yes. Okay. Okay, I hear. I hear. Uh anybody else? Anybody Dr. Setzer, any any tricks up your medical sleeve to have energy uh for the diving? He's taking the fifth, I think. Dr. S Okay. All right. Maybe he'll he'll mention after. But okay, anyhow, um uh um hatzlacha everybody and uh b'ezrat Hashem will um be matzliach to um have an impact uh not only on ourselves, but also klal Yisrael. Amen. Amen. You know what? How about this? How about this? Cuz these are the dear regulars. Let's uh also do a tehillim right now. Okay? Um the uh let's have in mind And the first of all just the the mitzvahs um I could go on about this but we'll focus on this that um for sure we should have in mind the mitzvah of the the Kamoka that could you imagine how desperate we would be if we're on the front lines in the hands of those disgusting creatures all those things. So just um out of love for our fellow Jews everywhere um there's a Kamoka to recite this to him sincerely. When you recite to him it's also the mitzvah of Talmud Torah. Okay? And then when we say at the end that's the particular premium place to have in mind the mitzvah to cry out to Shem in times of trouble which is a mitzvah deoraita. Can I add something quickly? Yeah, please. In New York now it's Yom Yerushalayim. And I know I think it's fair to say that for many of the people on this call having access to the old city was a critical feature of their growth. Our growth. I know for me life changed in the old city. And I just I'm so grateful that uh as a people and personally as a individually that I was alive at the time that I had access to the old city and could live, study, and grow there and meet incredible people and incredible rabbis and families com- present company included and um I just you know to to now have been at war um it just makes the gift of Yerushalayim even more dear and even more uh appreciated. Beautiful. Beautiful. Yeah, excellent. Okay, good. So, um maybe I'll just I'll recite and you guys can do whatever alongside me. We'll do um Mama Mama Mickey. Shira Malo's Mama Mickey Krosika Donoy Adonoy Yishama Vakoli Tinas Neka Keshiva Zokol Tohanunai Im Amonus Tishmoya Adonoy Meamo Kima Khasika Lemaan Kli Sia Adonoy Kisa Nashiva Vro Holti Nashiva Adonoy Mishomrim Avoker Shomrim Avoker Yekhel Adonoy Ki Im Adonoy Khesed Uveimo Fidus Uhu Yitesis Yisroel Kol Anason Akhinu Kol Beis Yisroel Hanusunim Betsar Uve Enim Uve Vasha Makom Yirakham Aleihem Tsum Tora Uvalakha Uve Or Uve Gula Zman Kariva Venoma Amen Okay, everybody. Layla tov. Shabbat Thanks so much. Yeah, thanks very much. Thanks you. Thank you. You're very welcome. Shabbat Thank you. Thank you, Rabbi Shifka. Thank you very much. Refuah Shlema. Amen. Thanks. Refuah Shlema.