Leadership Series 2022 Session #3

okay so i i just would say that i just left we have a reunion tonight of the men's trip from south carolina we have 40 men in a restaurant and i said to them i'll be back but i just have to take care of something you know so i i left uh 40 guys who completed you know five sessions of learning together and uh i and i'm kind of come back so tonight we're dealing with what i con and i sent an email out that i believe this to be really what rav noah weinberg who was a genius in in sharing the beauty of our torah and our heritage he had a class and i think this really was his signature tune it was called the five levels of pleasure and it was so profound that when i came to asiatura myself when i came looking for judaism and looking for truth and meaning and this is what he presented and it really touched my soul when i was 17 18 years old but at the same time me tell it's what touches everybody in this generation because i believe this is what everybody needs to hear so let's get let's get right into it whoops that according to judaism there are five different levels of pleasure meaning all of all the pleasures in the world that you can experience can really be divided up into five different levels and we're going to explore those levels in this class and in the next class now really the reality is that the levels of pleasure that one can experience in life can be compared to traveling in an airplane meaning when you travel in an airplane how would you like to travel of course we like to travel first class right isn't that right wouldn't you like to travel an airplane first class now if you can't travel first class what would you travel well we won't call it second class because that sounds bad like you're a second class citizen it doesn't sound good so second class doesn't so let's call it business class or executive class or ambassador if you can't travel first class you'll travel as an executive as an ambassador right so that's the second cup right what if you can't if you can't get into uh the business so what are you true we don't want to call it third class because third class are really bad that's called um tourist or coach or economy you're saving money right so that's third class now whatever you can't travel third class you know what you do you you travel you know they'll put you you know with a luggage and with the animals you know sometimes have little dogs and chimpanzees and so forth you know you can travel down there it's not such a great trip you know but that's that's fourth class and what if you can't travel fourth class you know what they do they give you a rope right you hold on to the rope for dear life and you travel from wherever you want from wherever you want to go to wherever you go on it with a rope you know that's really that's really low level traveling right now in life how do we want to travel through life we want to travel through life first class right first class but some of us don't really know how to travel through life first class and we end up traveling to life with a rope struggling onto life for dear life you know and sometimes god forbid you can let go we don't want to travel through life that way so what we want to understand now is what are the different five levels of pleasure and ha and and in every level of pleasure we can understand there's a real pleasure in this account pleasure but let me ask you ladies you see many of you have children what do you want your children what pleasures do you want your children to have right you want them to have good food you want to have vacations you want them maybe to play tennis to enjoy good music that's that's you want them to enjoy life but as they get older in life and they and they become marriageable age it's not enough just to play tennis you want them to settle down you want them to get a good job you want them to be accomplished you want them to have family right because imagine you know if you have a uh you know your 35 year old children and they're playing space invaders the whole day now space invaders can be you know it's a lot of fun it's a lot of fun but if that's where your 35 year old child is is that's what he's doing the whole day it just doesn't quite cut it you want them to settle down to have a family to have accomplishments it's not enough right so that's the same as the almighty wants for us he wants to have tremendous pleasure in life now imagine if you realize there was some tremendous pleasure out there that you didn't know about until now wouldn't you want your children to have that as well isn't that what you want so we understand that the almighty who created the whole world he understands what pleasure is really all about and he wants us to have the most exquisite pleasures in this world and in the next that's what judaism is all about now we mentioned last time you know in the four misconceptions we mentioned this idea now just repeat it very quickly that when we serve the almighty it's not because the almighty that god needs our service right it's not the one we pray and we say that god is great and he's mighty and he's awesome that god goes i'm just feeding a little bit down today and now if everybody says holy holy holy i really feel good that's not what it's about when we the almighty is an infinite being he doesn't need anything when we serve the almighty when we serve the almighty it's not because he needs it if it's not for him who is it for it's for us and we have to always remember that when we all of our judaism and all of of life is allowed to allow the almighty to give to us and even more than that and we said this last time as well that in order to achieve that tremendous pleasure he gave us a torah and the torah means its instruction manual for living the torah is the instruction on how to get the most pleasure out of life 613 mitzvahs two 365 positive excuse me negative 248 positive these are all ways for us to grow and to become full people so that we get the most pleasure out of life because what the almighty as a parent wants for us what do parents want for their children they want their children to have to be happy and to have pleasure in life and that's what the almighty wants for us he wants to have us to have the the greatest pleasures in this world and in the next and that's what judaism is all about now we have to understand and this is an important point in understanding pleasure in life is that for every pleasure there's a counterfeit pleasure that kind of feels like the real pleasure but it isn't what's a counterfeit pleasure you know what a counterfeit pleasure it looks it looks like the real thing thing but it isn't what's that analogous to is to counterfeit money imagine if someone put on your doorstep a hundred thousand dollars for you just for you you go wow that's fantastic what would you do you pick up the hundred thousand dollars you go to tiffany's you buy five watches you still got ninety thousand dollars left you feel like you're on top of the wall until you leave tiffany's and then you know what happens when you leave tiffany's there's the police yeah the police they put you you know they put on the no what are the what is it uh the armband what is it called um no they get you they put you in prison right why why you were doing so well because it was counterfeit money and that's a crime so what you thought was good for you right that you were getting a hundred thousand dollars and it sounded so promising and so wonderful in the end you end up worse than if you than before you had the money because it was counterfeit if it's counterfeit you'll end up much worse than you were than before you even had it that's the same for pleasure every level of pleasure we're going to go through five levels has a counterfeit and that counterfeit looks like the real thing now we're going to define each one and what's the real what's the counterfeit so we so we can know it clearly but we have to understand that it's such a thing as a counterfeit pleasure when you get into the class that we're going to do in a few weeks time on free will you'll understand that the counterfeit pleasures were created so that you have free will so you can choose between the real thing and the counterfeit thing and by doing that you earn more and you you have a sense of accomplishment so we'll get to that later my dear friend and colleague rabbi simco barnett's going to teach that and share that with us and it's a fantastic class from our teacher of noah weinberg but in the meantime you have to understand every level of pleasure has a counterfeit it looks good it's luring it's going to it promises something really great but really you know what happens if you go for it you're gonna end up much worse than you were in the beginning right so imagine if someone said to you you know what i can make i can make you know a few million dollars for you right just invest 50 000 in you know in me and i'll make you a few million you wouldn't do it unless you understood does it make sense check it out right if it doesn't really make sense that's the same thing the counter pleasures are luring they're saying come on invest in me i'm gonna give you tremendous pleasure check it out because maybe it's counted it so we're gonna in order and unfortunately in this generation many many people whether they're religious or they're not religious they're going for the counts of their pleasures because they're luring and they think that's going to give them real pleasure but really where they end up much worse than they were before so just reload now a second point that you have to realize for all levels of pleasure is that all levels of pleasure you you need to become a connoisseur in pleasure just like and i don't know if any of you have taken wine tasting courses right but if you want to become a connoisseur in wine you have to learn you have to take a course you have to learn that it's much more than just the liquid that wets your tongue but there's a whole variety of pleasures there's the bouquet there's the color there's the texture it goes on certain taste buds you know so you know we are a little bit barbarians most of us when it comes to work learning to to tasting wine but if you're connoisseur whoa that wine tastes so delicious so for every level of pleasure you have to understand you have to become a connoisseur i mean you can walk through a field and mist and and a beautiful expanse and a valley and a field and a beautiful mountain and you can miss the whole thing because you know focus on what's the pleasure in front of me you don't want to go through life and miss the pleasures that are available to you you have to become a connoisseur in each and every level so we want to start now based on that with what is the fifth level of pleasure right now i don't know if any anybody out there i know um eliza if you can let anybody speak here or there's a there's a chat unfortunately i'm on my phone so it's hard for me to see all the but what would you say is the lowest level of pleasure you can unmute what would you say if you unmute what would you think is the lowest level of pleasure anybody got any ideas what do you think is the lowest level of pleasure any ideas from you anybody be so bold as to unmute and give their opinion what do you think is the lowest level of pleasure of five levels of pleasure okay so i'll tell you this is the lowest level the lowest level of pleasure is physical and material pleasures now we're going to try to understand that so let's deal with them it's really a and b physical and material let's deal with physical stuff to start with that in the world at large you see there's two attitudes to physical pleasure one is the the attitude of the ascetics the ascetics you know the the those who are uh buddhists they go into a mountain and they say the following the following understanding that you know if spiritual pleasure is what's going to give you the real pleasure in life you know what you have to do stay as far as possible away from physical pleasure because that's taking you away from spiritual pleasure and the reality is that's part of christianity as well that the priests who are the holy people they don't they don't get married because if you want to get married you're being too involved in the physicality and that's bad and it's evil you know so you don't get married if you're a priest if you're a very holy person right that's one approach if you want to have real spiritual pleasure stay away from physicality going onto a mountain and fast and and and and be an ascetic and you will have the greatest pleasures that's one approach right now what's western society's approach your western society's approach is that you know listen let's be let's just be honest we're all friends here right you know you go a person who's secular you know you go into a mcdonald's and you have a big mac yeah you have a hamburger and it's great and it's got all the sauces on it and the tomato ketchup and the excuse me the tomato ketchup i thought which country i'm in the tomato ketchup i'm sorry about that i let myself slip there and i said tomato please forgive me right so you have the tomato ketchup and you have the the different the mayonnaise and you have the the dill and you have the what you have and you know one of those is good imagine if you had ten of those if you have 10 of those isn't that going to be a tremendous pleasure so that's more of a hedonistic approach that's western society is the more physical pleasure you have the more pleasure you'll have right so where is judaism judaism denies both of these right judaism is not ascetic and we're not hedonistic what do we say that you know what the world was created by god it's not bad right it's good and in fact the talmud says that a person will be taken to task in the world to come if there was a fruit a fruit that you could have eaten that you didn't eat hashem will say to you you know why did i created this for your pleasure why didn't you have the mango the kiwi food whichever whatever fruit it is right why didn't you i created it for your pleasure judaism looks as the physical world as being good but what but you know what what judaism says is don't indulge in physicality why not not because by indulging in it we don't not because we don't want you to have pleasure because judaism recognizes how you get pleasure from the physical world you know how you use the physical world as a means to an end and not an ends and in itself meaning that you go to sleep at night right not so that you can sleep and sleep and sleep you go to sleep at night so that you can wake up in the morning and bounce out of bed have energy the sleeping the physical activity sleeping is so that you can have more energy to live life to the full you eat not only you can eat and eat and eat and just have as many stuff as many steaks down in your throat is possible it's you eat so that you can have energy so you can do meaningful things with your life a person has a physical relationship between a husband and wife it's not the the physical relations as it ends in itself that's that's demeaning that's a you know your person has a relationship with a prostitute come on that's demeaning that's not pl there's something very lowly about them but if you have it as a means to express your closeness your love to each other wow that's that that's profound and it's spiritual so what's the point here that when you when you use the physicality as ends as a means to something higher then it gives you pleasure but when you use it as an ends in itself that's when you feel stick to your stick to your stomach so imagine you have a bag of chips right you have one chip it's great have another chip is great when you get to the point that you're eating the chips as an enzyme self that's where you start losing the pleasure as soon as it becomes and ends in itself right you just lost the pleasure when you use it as a means to something higher it'll give you pleasure and that's what the almighty wants so physical pleasure is learn to enjoy it right be a connoisseur of the different tastes and pleasures and physical pleasures they're beautiful and someone wants to have them but use them realize that all physical pleasure is so that you can have that physical pleasure that it gives you energy that's what the beauty of fidget physical pleasure gives you energy so you go and can go on to do something higher with your life now that's dealing with the aspect of uh physical pleasures but we said that this first level pleasure is physical and material pleasures so let's understand now because how do you get material pleasure in life right material so really the reality is that this pleasure of material pleasure is really bound up with the death with what it means to be happy in life but before we give over this idea of what it means to be happy i want to share with you a beautiful concept that rabbi weinberg used to teach about definitions so he told a story and a very profound story and this is one of his most famous stories right and i'll share it with you that a guy came into his office in jerusalem in the old city and he said rabbi i want to tell you something i travel through the whole of israel north to south east to west they say this land is a holy land i saw it all there's nothing holy about this land i went everywhere i didn't see anything holy so rabbi weinberg in his incredible wisdom said to him let me ask you a question he said sure he said on your travels how many buffet sticks did you see so the guy goes how many what robert weinberg says and he repeats himself how many before six did you see the guy says listen rabbi he says you gotta wha what's a rabbit weimax says him wait let's listen i'm asking the questions here yeah i'm asking you once and for all how many before6 did you see the guy starts getting frustrated he says rabbi if you don't tell me what about footstick is how can i tell you how many were i saw rabbi weimann looks at him in the eye and he says tell me something do you have a definition of holiness that you can say that you traveled north and south east and west and you didn't see anything holy if you don't have a definition of what holiness is maybe what were you expecting you know the colorful lights to appear in front of you an angel to tap you on the shoulder an experience of god if you don't know have a definition for holiness maybe it was right in front of your eyes and you didn't even notice so this is what rabbi weinberg is a profound idea for important things in life this is the a of judaism we need to have definition i have to have definitions so for example you know everybody wants to be happy in life right but you know what happens people don't define what does it mean to be happy so you know what they do they decide in their own mind you know what if i work my way up the corporate ladder then i'll be happy or if i get married and i have a nice house then i'll be happy or whatever it is and you know what they'll spend 20 years of their life chasing the things that working their way up the corporate ladder and chasing the things they want and guess what they get there and guess what they're still not happy why because they didn't take the time to define what is the definition of happiness don't chase after after something which you don't know whether it's really going to give you happiness or not for 20 years of your life don't invest in that if you don't really know it's really going to give you the pleasure that you're looking for better start from the beginning and define what is the definition of happiness and then you'll know what it is and you can go and get it so this is what we're going to deal with now that's the that's the footsteps lesson so we're going to now deal with what is the definition of happiness and we have as one of the ideas shares that we're sharing with you and uh alisa has alisa has it um there that we'll share with you um what is the definition of happiness and ideas share we want to share with you this with you now and you'll be able to share it with others over the next two weeks before the next year the next class um here it is um elise is putting it out and we'll share with i'll send it to you by email as well what is definition happiness so let me let me take you through it so a lot of people say that you know happiness you can't define happiness it's an emotion well judaism doesn't say that julian says you can define it so let me share with you how we take you through how we understand what it means what's the definition of happiness and how we derive that from human human experience see if i offered any one of you here a thousand dollars for your eyes a thousand dollars that's a nice amount of money you know when you take it for your eyes no no rabbi of course not okay i'm gonna up the up the antsy i'll give you a million dollars come on a million dollars you know what you can do with a million dollars a rabbi come on come on my eyes how about a hundred million dollars for your eyes you know no no no no no no my eyes are worth more to me than any money okay so now i say to you my my dear friends yeah how do you feel that you have eyes you know what you say to me the same miserable person i was before you asked me that you know it's like okay good you tell me i knew i had eyes so come on get off my back you know it's like you know i i don't feel so great i had a bad day you know so i said wait a second let's let's go through this you just told me your eyes are worth more to you than any money so imagine if i came to you i don't know if you know about this about me but you know i'm a well-to-do person and i take a liking to you and i come and i see you and i say my dear friends you know here you are you know i'm gonna give you liana i'm gonna give you this this you know i have a briefcase with me with me and i'm gonna give it to you you open up the briefcase liana and you look inside it has a hundred million dollars you know oh let's call it a million dollars even a million dollars right a million dollars how do you feel liana how do you feel leona if i give it was really true and i gave you a million dollars for free and you walk off you know how you feel leona you'd feel like a million bucks right you feel like a million dollars right here that's great you do a jig down the street but then when i say to you lyanna you have eyes how do you feel you know you know what how do we understand this you told me your eyes are worth more to you than any money than a hundred million dollars but but somehow when i ask you say to you you have eyes how do you feel you say yeah i don't know you know so what's the problem there's something very wrong over here you know what it is we got the problem of life is we get used to what we have we got used to our eyes we got used to it even though our eyes are worth more to us more to us than any money but you know what happened we got used to our eyes so you have to realize if you can get used to your eyes they're worth more to you than any money you're going to get used to the new house the new car the new wife the new baby it doesn't matter if you can get used to your eyes you're going to get used to everyone imagine a person who gets a brand new push and he feels fantastic come back in a month he's the same miserable person he got used to his push right so the trick in life is how do we not get used to the things that we have that's the trick of happiness how do we not take things for granted and that's why in judaism we wake up in the morning and we and we thank god the first thing we say is thank god that i'm alive that's the first thing that we say and we go through bracha's blessings and we thank god i have a mind and thank god that i have arms and thank god i have legs and thank god that i can move and thank god i have i can see and thank god i have a break we thank the god hashem a hundred times a day you're supposed to say a hundred blessings why because it takes efforts to appreciate what you have right it's much easier to go through life and focus on everything negative we have a propensity to doing that it's much easier to get up in the morning to say you know what oh my gosh i didn't i didn't ask attempt to to be alive and to you know and you know what i have to do today oh my golly gosh i have to go on the subway into manhattan and all those those those those those people are on the on on the subway and they're so they look so miserable and i get to work and everybody bothers me and they don't like me and i have to deal with my boss and then i come home and i come home i have to deal with my husband and yours because this is a hard time within my children oh my gosh i can't i what a terrible life i didn't ask to be born on the it's much easier to do that than to go through life and say you know what thank god that i'm alive i didn't you know what hashem didn't i didn't have to wake up some people don't wake up the next morning and you know what thank god there's a there's a there's a system that i can take a train to work imagine otherwise i'd have to walk and i go to work and those people they put up with me and all the issues that i have and thank god my boss he keeps me you know he gives me a job and he keeps me employed and even with you know i don't do such a great job but he keeps and i come back my wife bless her she's at sadeka she's a writer and you know and i i'm not such a good i'm the good husband and you know what she keeps sticks with me and my children thank god i have such wonderful children it's much easier to wake up and be negative so what we have to do is build that muscle so you see that reality is that a person that was blind and could see for the first time would be ecstatic it's ecstatic the colors the beauty wow we have to appreciate that we are much more than a blind person who can we've had we know we're not singing for the first time we've been seeing for our whole life that's much a greater gift so we have to but what's the problem we got used to it right so that's the that's the that's the happiness is the pleasure that you have when you appreciate the multitude of things that you have right what's misery the definite definition of misery is to go through life focusing on everything that you don't have and everything that you went wrong we all know people like that and it's also true for ourselves that we go through life and say you know this didn't happen right i lost my parkour pen and this didn't go well and then you're miserable the reality is that you have to appreciate that every single one of us has eyes that are worth more than men than any money we have ears we have a nose we have a heart we have hands we have we have limbs we have legs we have feet we have brothers we have sisters we have family all worth more to us than any money you understand that well rabbi weinberg used to say a beautiful and profound line that i still work on every day that every single one of us is a walking multi billionaire even if we don't have a penny to our names because we have so many things that we have that are worth more than any money each one of us do we realize that every morning we should wake up and do a jig down the street because we are walking multi billionaires even if we don't have a penny to our name and that's the definition happens and that's the first level the fifth level we call this the fifth level of pleasure that's material pleasure is appreciate what you have now what's the counterfeit of this fifth level of pleasure we said material physical and material the the counterfeit of physical pleasure is indulgence instead of saying to yourself you know what i'll have enough physical food and then i'll use it for energy it's i i i'm confused by the western concept and that our body in some ways is telling us just indulge indoles in jobs getting more and more pleasure it's not as soon as you start indulging you feel stick to sick to your stomach you don't feel the pleasure anymore and what about material pleasure the the counterfeit of material pleasure is just amassing more and more money more and more the more i have the more i'll pledge all that it's not true because the more you get right the more greedy you will be and the more dissatisfied you'll be the trick is to appreciate the material pleasures that you have learn to appreciate what you have and even if you don't have a penny to your name i have tremendous pleasure so that's fifth level of pleasure that's the lowest level of pleasure now we're going now on to the next level what's the next level of pleasure fourth level of pleasure so what's that pleasure then the fourth though this is the pleasure that most people think is their greatest pleasure right it's what the songs are all about now we understand that really each level of pleasure is not exchangeable so however much money you have it doesn't it doesn't it doesn't give you the pleasure of the next level so what's that this next level of pleasure next devil pleasure is pleasure it's in hebrew it's called bonim children it's the pleasure of love right that's what the next pleasure meaning it doesn't matter how much money i would give you let's say i would ge i would give you you know a hundred thousand dollars and then we would take your children away you'd never see them again they'd be doing fine we'll take them to a nice island they have a great time you just never see them again you'll never hear from them you wouldn't do it it doesn't matter how much money did i give you right but you just say you know even if they're doing great yeah i i might the love that i have for my children is worth more than any money that's the next ideas yet we're going to come on to that we're going to come we didn't quite get there yet uh elisa but the next i'd so so the second level pleasure or the fourth level pleasure excuse me is called barnum which means love right so imagine imagine a person who you just offered i offer you you know five hundred thousand dollars for your children and you say now what are you talking about rabbi i want my children worth more so imagine the guy who just turned down 500 000 500 million dollars let's say for his children right the next time his children he sees his children how does he feel he's oh my god you know what i spent all my life trying to work for a living to make money right i hear my children they're that that's the most precious commodity they're worth more than any money to me right so you know what he decides once he turns down the 500 million dollars he said you know what test his wife you know what i'm going to take two weeks off he calls his boss he says you know what i'm going to take two weeks off to spend spend two weeks with my children this precious commodity that's worth more than any money so the next day he goes out with his children and he goes to the park and he has a good time and he tells them stories and they play in the park and for the first couple of hours it's great and then after the third or fourth hour it starts getting a little bit tedious and then they go home for supper and it's a disaster and then they stand and then you know there's there's like you know uh food all over the carpet and it's a mess and they go to bed and it's like world war three and the and this guy doesn't know what to do it's really becoming a problem so the end of the night he's lying on the couch and he tells his wife tells his wife you know what you know honey do you think i was a little impetuous you know but i told my my boss that i needed two weeks off you know what i have a lot of work to do you know if i maybe was a little irresponsible you think i maybe i should go back to work tomorrow morning you know what you know so what does this guy need this guy needs a lesson right in love right how to love his children he doesn't know how to do it so this is what we all need so we want to deal now as we talked about definition is what is the definition of love right so let's start from this angle that everybody in who gets married wants to get married because they're in love right not because god forbid they're infatuated but unfortunately many people in our generation get married because they're infatuated right and then a few years down the line you know what the infatuation fields they thought what am i doing in this relationship so we need to understand the definition of love and infatuation so we can know the difference so let's take you through this definition so let's say you would have asked my mother of blessed memory who was a wonderful wonderful lady and you would have asked her tell me something about your son kaim so you can imagine her saying well my son he's such he's warm and he's caring and he's responsible and he's sensitive and she and as she says these different virtues of her son she would say i could imagine her saying and i love him why because when you see the virtues of another human being and you identify that person with his or her virtues that's when you feel a sense of love right that's what what's infatuation right infatuation is the or let's go the other way before we get to infection what's hate hate is the opposite right hate is you know if you see a person and you feel that you know this person he thinks he's god's gift to mankind he's so egocentric he's so selfish when you identify a person with his or her thoughts then you'll feel a sense of dislike and if it's very strong feeling you'll feel a sense of hate right so you see the what's infatuation infatuation is the gal goes to a party and she meets this guy in such a good looking guy and she comes back from the parties i met this guy and he's so he's so handsome and he's so caring and he's so strong and he's so wonderful right so she feels like she's in love why because she's seeing what she thinks is all the virtues and that's giving a feeling like love what's why it's a why isn't it love because you see understand is love blind you see who loves us the most in life who loves in general who loves us the most generally speaking you know you know who loves us the most generally speaking our parents who gives us the most criticism generally speaking our parents but wait a second rabbi i thought you told me if you love someone you see the virtues and if our and our parents love us the most you're telling me they see the faults so how does that make sense and the answer listen carefully is that when you love someone it's because you know them you see the good and the bad right but you identify the person with the good right not the bad right when you see when you love a parent loves their children because they know them they see the good and the that when you see the good right you see if you would ask my if you would ask my mother well isn't it true that your son yeah i heard all those virtues but isn't it true that he's a little bit of a hypochondriac and he's a little bit of a megalomaniac and he's a little bit of a of a pyromaniac you know isn't it true so she said yeah well you know but you know what that's the way i brought him up he doesn't mean to be that way when you love someone you see the virtues is the essence of who they are and the faults is not who they mean to be right that's when you love someone identify someone with their fault let's excuse me with their virtues and their faults isn't who they really are and i'll just share with you very quickly and then we're going to go a few minutes over but when i was in in yeshiva in asia torah i remember there's a guy that i couldn't stand because every time he came into the room i would feel he's so selfish and then i felt a sense of dislike and even hatred for him it was before rosh hashanah he came to me and he said i want to ask you as a friend he said to me you know what i have this selfish tendency and i don't know what to do about it can you give me any advice on what you could do and i want to tell you i was completely humbled because at that moment i realized this isn't who he is he isn't a selfish person he's fighting against it he wants to get out of it he's trapped by it we all have our faults we all have our inadequacy inadequacies and that's who we are the essence of a person is his virtues and his struggling is against his faults that's why i have a mitzvah to love every jew and love every person right even obnoxious people that's the mister why because even obnoxious people their parents love them because they see the virtues and they excuse them for their thoughts not that they're not responsible but we see that's not the essence of who they are so the essence of loving a person is the definition is to see a pers to for a per when you identify a person with his or her virtues right and you realize that's the essence of who they are and they're not their faults that's the definition of love and i want to finish with an addendum which you have in your sheets that you see and i just want to finish before we get to the addendum but remember with a fat in fact when you're infatuated with a person you think how do you know the difference in love and infatuation see when you're infatuated you think the person is perfect i met the perfect guy i met the perfect girl but it's the reason why you think they're perfect is because you know what you don't really see it clearly you just want to feel that they're wonderful people but you don't really know them you just met them you just met him you want to believe that he's so virtuous but the reality is that you don't really know him when you love someone it's because you know them right according to the luts the knowledge is the love right as robert weinberg used to say if you think you met the perfect gal run a million miles because there's no such thing no one's perfect you're not in love you're infatuated you want to believe it right now the addendum is imagine you saw a person walking down the street with one arm right i know you see that you know i've seen it many times in my life you walk you're walking in the street and you see a person they have one arm or one leg or they have a they have an arm with clippers at the you know at the end it's painful it's painful to see it's very hurtful you have i have a visceral reaction when i see that wow it hurts because you feel their pain imagine if i said to you ladies you know what you see that guy walking down the street you know what wow i hate that guy can imagine if i said that you say rabbi samson what kind of humanity do you have how can you hate a person who's just got a problem like that that's disgusting so now i ask you ladies what's worse to go through life to go through life with one arm or to go through life with a big ego now think about it you know a person who i know a lady a wonderful wonderful lady who has one arm she you know a wonderful lady she does amazing things she speaks to people about how life is so beautiful and what she does and how she she's she's making it she's changing the whole world this lady she's a wonderful lady but if you go through life with an ego a bigger yogurt you know what you're gonna have problems being happy because nothing's ever good enough for me i deserve more and you won't listen to other people because what are they gonna teach me i know better than them and you're gonna have problems with your wife because you know you're gonna listen to her and have problems with your boss and more than that you're gonna have problems with god because this world isn't big enough for the both of us you know because you know who does he think he is i'm not gonna admit there's such a thing as a god because i'm number one right what's worse what to go through life you know it's much worse so imagine you see a guy walking down the street with a big ego how are you gonna react to him you're going to say i hate the guy that's even worse than hating someone with one arm right i'm not saying he should be your best friend choose your friends wisely but you have to don't condemn people for their faults right have compassion on people people something called a big ingrown himself is going to feel oh what a poor guy you know i really wish he understood how to have a good life he just doesn't understand he's just caught he just caught up in his own issues poor guy don't hate people for them their faults don't condemn people for their faults that's the mistake that we all make have compassion on them realize the essence of this person just like his mother would do is that he's a good person he's struggling against the issues that he has right love people the essence of love is to see the virtues of another human being identified that person with his or her virtues so those are that we what we've taken care of today we've gone through is the fifth level pleasure physical pleasure and material pleasure definition of happiness and the next level pleasure which is the pleasure of love and the definition of love next time we're going to get to in two weeks time we'll get to the top three level pleasures of what's even greater than what most people think is their greatest pleasure in love in life which is love the judaism says you just that's just child stuff that's kids play we're going to get to really serious pleasures in the next class so we have two idea shares for you which we sent try to give over these ideas they're so profound not just to give to others which is also wonderful to do both so that you'll internalize it so you internalize the definite we gave over the definition of happiness and the definition of love take these sort of one or one pager type ideas and try to give give it over the shabbos table give it over to out to a friend on the telephone give it over to your husband give it over to someone your children give it over to a friend and just give it over even if you just read what we what i've said i gave it almost word for word the way that i said it take it and that and the greatest beneficiary will be you that you will learn these ideas and internalize them and we need these so much for ourselves so so thank you so much everybody and uh thank you for listening if anybody has any questions um i don't know if i can uh if at least you could i'm mute but if you have any questions i'm i'm available for the next few minutes before i get back to the men's uh reunion but um please let me know stephanie thank you so much it's so nice to see you last night jenny thank you jenny levin thank you for being on our title battle karina nice to see you last night thank you thank you and your sister-in-law and so thank you karen kaplan i see you there is it your hands up i don't know what that means you have a question no i don't i don't know but hello i don't know carol draco in in miami in florida excuse me thank you thank you carol such a pleasure and we're missing you tonight at the reunion and indonesia thank you so much for joining us from teaneck new jersey and i'm i'm in the reunion now with your husband lloyd who i love so much and he's had there's no one who has a handshake like your husband lloyd his his head yes someone has a question okay all right i don't hear any questions so i'll just end the night thank you so much and if you have any questions you can feel free to email me and it's great to have i didn't really see you all but i i i thank you for joining we'll see you again for the top three levels in two weeks time and please share the idea shares have a wonderful wonderful night