Life is full of challenges... A few basic steps to overcoming all your challenges! - Rabbi Anava

I'm going to dedicate this class to a full shlema for Rabbi Roei Yair ben Hagit Naomi. Amen. Who needs an immediate refuah. Amen. And anybody else who needs an immediate refuah. Amen. Should have a strong health, immediate recovery, miraculous recovery. Amen. And yeshua that you need. Mizuta sham. Sham should bless us all with a lot of nachat, a lot of yeshuot, a lot of salvation and help and Patience. Refuah, patience. Money, teeth, ideas how to get out of all my problems, solutions to all the nonsense. Zivugim. Agonim, everything. I have you know, let's cut a deal. Everything. Everything. Hakol. Everything bagel. Hakol mikol koyala. I'm a soul. Tov. Welcome everybody. Thank you all for joining us. Thank you for the ones online who are joining us. The last lecture in Miami for this tour. So for me another check on the map. And for the ones of you who followed all three lectures, not that it was planned like that, but happened to be that they're all kind of connected to each other. Where the first lecture we spoke about the concept of time and how important time is in one's life and how one needs to take the their time as if it's the most precious thing they have because that's not the most precious thing you do. And we talked a lot about that. Yesterday we spoke about finding this inner power that you have in you that drives you to do negative things to use this to positive things. And then we're left now with the Now how I do all of that? So that brings me to a level of challenges. And the reality is that most of us are all day long juggling a few types of challenges of all sorts that first of all to a point that most people already can almost can't take it depending on their challenge. And in many of the cases we don't understand why I need to be challenged. I don't understand if I need to change something. Maybe I'm doing something wrong. So it happens to be that most people are constantly busy with difficulties and challenge and in many of the cases just causes aggravation, sadness, depression, pressure, stress, and a long a list of other emotions, no benefits and tonight we're going to shed some light to see that actually the challenges there are a lot of benefits to them. But I want to share with you a quick story. When I was about I guess 15 then I needed money. You know, 15-year-old boy, I was smoking already. I I already had all the bad habits so I needed money. And you know, I wanted to go out, friends, whatever it is. And I said yesterday and I expressed that a few times that my father was a very tough father and educated me in a very strict way which down the line ripped a lot of fruits, but as it was going as a teenager I didn't like that. So why? Because in this respect I wanted something. I would ask he would tell me go and work. Our days you the kids want money, they come to the parents, I need $20. Here, here's here's 30. When I was a kid, I needed money, I I never came to my father and if I wanted something, go and work. So, I I was working for them since I was nine. So, when I was 15, I I I I really really needed money, so I couldn't find much of jobs, it wasn't much of options. But, I found a job, very very tough job. I used to pick oranges in orchards. And the season of the oranges is winter. So, 99% of the time you're working in the cold and in the rain. And I don't know if you ever had the experience of picking oranges, it's a very the tree has a lot of thorns. So, every time you pulled your hand in to pull an orange, then you get your hands scraped a lot. Unless you put gloves or whatever it is, then but anyways, there's a method how to do that. And you would be shocked how many oranges are on one tree. You can work sometimes 5 hours on one tree and you fill up huge crates. And I would get paid by the crate, not hourly or any other way, just by the crate. You fill up one crate, X amount. I don't even remember what it was per, but it was eventually, if you work normal pace, it it was equivalent to what would be an hourly rate. And I really wanted a lot of money and I wanted to I was like, okay, I like the opportunity that I can work more and and gain in the same time more money. So, I was this best worker. I would go and like I had two sacks on me going into the trees, cutting with one hand holding the tree by the the the orange in one hand, pulling it. I was like, uh While other workers would do one crate, I would do three. I would go up, down. So, and why? Because I was like, okay, you work slow, you'll make only X per hour. Work fast, you'll make Y per hour, much more. I'm already here. There was one friend that used to go with me. I was on the tree, he was down on the leaning on the tree, smoking, peeling, you know, oranges. The end of the day had like a quarter of a crate. He did now was like four crates. So, and it usually was very hard because it was always raining. And then you you wet. Now, when you were walking in the rain for 20 minutes, fine. 10 hours in the rain, you're already like you're you're So, and everything gets wet and and when you get wet, your skin becomes very soft. So, all the scrapes of the thorns are much stronger. Anyways, and you know, the orchards are usually in the middle of nowhere. They're not in the city. So, I had to walk like another like 5 km when I was done. The all the Balabai, it wasn't like always nice to take me. Anyways, long story short, I worked very hard to make a few shekels and then of course I had money to buy myself whatever I wanted. And I would come home sometimes late at night, all wet, most of my hands bruised and in many of the cases the face because you put your head in, you need to see where the orange is, you cut your face. Wet, tired, my shoulders would be sore cuz I would put me to save time. What takes a lot of time is going up and down. So, I would wear Most people would put one sack on them, so you can only have one sack of oranges. So, I would go with four sacks. So, at some point, it's heavy. So, my my shoulders would would hurt me. It was hard work. But, at the end of the day, I would come home, and I was satisfied. I finished the day work. I accomplished what I put myself as a target. And most important, I came home with a stash of money. And it was a lot of money considering a young man. And almost every time the the the ba'al ha bayit, the owner, would tell me, "You bring more friends. I need like, you know, there's a lot of a lot of trees." And every time I would bring a friend or two or three, I would go up and down up and down, and they would not survive a day or two. After a day or two, "Ah, it's too hard." Give up, and and that's it. And I survived, I remember, the whole winter like that. And like I told you yesterday, if you don't know how to learn anything from your own actions, if you can't make two things come together and realize and come to some understanding, then no offense, the situation is not that great. Because you need to learn how to observe any situation in your life and learn something from that. Because other than that, why would you go through the situation? Every situation that you go through in your life, there's something you can learn from. And in many of the cases, much more than one thing that you can learn from. Now, not only that you can learn from, you have to learn from. You should. That's the whole purpose. Hashem puts you in situations for you to figure out something. Kind of like you're walking in this world, kind of like a like a game. When I was a young child, we had a game. We didn't have screens. We didn't have Netflix and all that junk. So, when there was a birthday party, there was games. There was that We would actually play. And there was a game. I liked that game that you split into groups. And somebody has to plan that game and you would go from one place to another with hints. So, you find one place and there's a hint and whatever you find a note and go three steps and go this and that. And you know, this would be a hint and then you would find the next note and you know, somebody had to sit there and write all the note the notes. But nevertheless, I loved that game. What is it It has a name? It's like an escape room. Kind of like an escape room, an old-fashioned escape room. Hm? Like clue. Clue? Whatever. Treasure hunt? Okay, you all had a good childhood. I'm very happy. So, uh so, you all are familiar with the concept. Now, I like that. When I was a young kid, I I liked the challenge. I liked Okay, let me let me see how I can figure it out. Then it would take me to the next step. So, every situation you have in your life, it's an escape room. Sham is presenting to you a situation and he wants you to come out of that situation. He wants you to understand the value of the value. The value of the value that you understand something from something. Cuz at the end of the day, we're all blind in this world. We're placed in this world. Everybody's born in a different location in the world. Everybody goes through a different path in their world. Just the other day, I'm now here on the tour. My older kids are with me. And we started the tour in Los Angeles. And right before we made our way out to Los Angeles, we lived in Los Angeles. And we were driving around and at some point I was like, "You want some memory lane drive?" Instead of driving where the school was, where we lived. And in my mind I was like, "Psh, look at that. One little decision that two parents make changes the course of the life of a child." And I told all my kids, "Can you imagine if we, my wife and me, wouldn't decide to move to Israel, decide to stay here, you would have different lives." Different lives completely. So, every frame in your life and if you're asking yourself what I mean by a frame, then you'll have to go and watch the lecture that I I gave on Tuesday in Boca Raton cuz I was explaining that our life cannot be measured with time. We are programmed to understand that there's time. Seconds, minutes, hours, days, months. We we we see that, but the reality there isn't such thing as time. Rather, instead of time, there are situations. In Hebrew it's called matzavim. A situation. I call it a frame. Like you have a film, a video film. In the olden days, you had the film, actual film. 8 mm, 16 mm. In our days, the the the the video is measured by frames. How many frames per second? 30 frames per second, 60 frames per second. The more frames, the more quality the video will be. But every frame captures a shot. An example that I like giving when I was a young child, I used to like taking cuz I was very bored in school. I wasn't a good student. I used to take the notebooks and make in every page of the notebook a drawing. And then I would like go like this and the person would like run, do a little make a somersault, you know, dance, stuff like that. So, that's our life. It's It's situations. It's frame I like calling it frame. It's a frame. And every frame, it's a picture of your life. It's not time. It's not that a second passed. It's just a picture and a picture and a picture and a picture. Now, put them all together, then them then it's a motion picture. And every second you are required to see what's wrong with this picture and how can I change it or what am I supposed to change in it? That's called tikkun. That's called teshuvah. In many of the situations, it's already something that you're carrying with you from previous incarnations. And in many of the situations, it's part of this life that you need to fulfill. But what's important to take from that is that every blink, every frame in your life, is a situation. Going back to what I was saying, how can you figure out what you need to do in this world? 99.9% of all human beings have no idea why they came to this world, what they're supposed to do in this world, and needless to say, doing what they're supposed to do in this world. You talking about a fraction of people that actually figured out their purpose and they're doing it. The result is that they're walking on their path of their purpose successfully in most cases. That doesn't mean that they're successful. They're walking on their path successfully cuz sometimes your path is destined to be disastrous. So, you can't say I'm successful, but I'm walking successfully on my path because with all the disasters, I'm still walking on my path with my head up high, with a big smile, and the and the path of disasters don't affect me. So, that's why I walk on my path successful. Most people don't walk on their path successful even if they walk on their path. Now, when you're not walking on the path that you need to walk on, you are in most cases miserable and unhappy and you don't even know why. So, of course you have to blame it on anybody that's closest to you. And usually it's your spouse. Cuz that's the closest thing to you. All your misery, it's her. And then it's your boss, of course, and your employees, the business people, anyone who's around you is at fault to your misery and your misfortune and your all your problems. That's this this this uh strong unhappiness feeling, this emptiness, this It's not anybody's fault. It's you not walking on the right path. So, it's kind of like you're walking blindly into walls, bumping into walls. So, things don't work out. Now, there are two types of things that two types of styles of things that don't work out. The thing that don't The things that don't work out because they're not supposed to work out, and that's your hints to move on. And then the things that don't work out because you are not on the right channel. In the olden days, if you remember, the channels were not digital, we would turn a dial. And if you want to get the the right channel, there was a lot of static in between. Then you come to the right channel and then you would swing swing the antenna a little bit, poke somebody's eye, and and and uh and and and then and finally when you're on the right channel, oh, I hear well. You move a a little millimeter of the antenna, frequency is not When you are not transmitting and receiving the the frequencies on the right channel, there's a lot of static. So, when things don't work in your life, there's one group it's not supposed to work. It's not destined to work. Figure that very fast and move on. It can be a job, can be a date, it can be pursuing a real estate, it doesn't matter. You want you're trying to push something it doesn't work, doesn't work, doesn't work. How how is no? You how much shout? You stop, figure it out, how shall I recalculate, and move on. And most people are like, "But I like her." But but No. Then the other half of the things that don't work on your life, it's your static. That you are you're not doing something wrong at this point. Maybe you are, but it's you're just not walking on your path. So, Hashem is going to start throwing to you how do you call that system that now all the new cars have? Uh that that you lane assistance? You go down the off the lane this Staying in your lane. Yeah, you know, the wheel uh buzzes and shoots you back. That's what Hashem has to do cuz you don't you don't know what's going on. You're you're driving like a drunk. Zigzagging, going off the path all the time. And then you're kind of spiritually drunk if you would be observed from above. So, Hashem has to give you some type of indication. So, when you understand that every situation in your life is now a riddle in this game. How are we going to call the game? Just for the sake of the night. Treasure hunt. Scavenger hunt. That's the last option that I had. I Listen, in in Hebrew we used to call it "to find the treasure". So, I think we should stick with the treasure hunt. Who said you Treasure hunt? Okay. So, you So, every situation in your life is a stage in the treasure hunt that helps you get to the next riddle, the next hint. And at the end, you find the treasure. Almost all the games that we used to play as children, they have a very deep spiritual meaning. This is a perfect example to you. Just for the example for what I'm talking about, we all used to play a game when we were kids called the shoots and ladders. Right? That's how it's called in English? And that's like just this this game is like totally our life. You have to go one step after the other. Now, if you're lucky, then you hit a ladder. And then you fly up. That's equivalent when you do chuvah, you do something good, you you you fix a certain damage, you figure out something that Hashem is trying to tell you to do, and you get bonus, you get jumped to the next level. And if Has v'shalom, you fall on the snake, which for us we understand the yetzer hara, the evil inclination is we know we identify it as a serpent. It's a nachash. So, when you fall on the snake, you fall down in your level. And then you go up again, you go down, and you go up, and you down, and that's your life. Up and down and up and down and up and down. In the game world, you don't give up. In the real world, most people give up. And they give up on what you don't need to give And don't give up on the things that are irrelevant in their life. That's my analogy to most people that I see, talk to, whatever, teach. People are very quick to give up on what they actually need to fight. And things that are nonsense, like fights that have no meaning. And nothing will come out of it. Some disagreement. That's the not giving up. But about something small in their spiritual growth to path of success to give up in a second and a half. That that that the human common sense sometimes doesn't make sense. So, when you understand let's go to lecture number one, how precious your time is, then you also understand that you don't have time to waste up on nonsense. When I smell nonsense, few seconds and it's out. Next. Whether it's somebody that's coming to talk to me. I have many people who ask to talk to me. They sit in front of me for half an hour and they just talk nonsense. And after a few minutes I was like, "Do you have a question? Why do you want to You want to just sit with me for half an hour and talk? Talk my ear off?" Then I'll bring a pillow, put my head down, talk as much as you want and I mean, you want to You asked to talk to me. You must have a question, no? You have many times they sit in front of people the whole time they talked. And they're all right. I don't understand why you want to talk to me. But I talk to a lot of people. I I meet a lot of people and I see certain patterns. So, every second of my life is some type of a we'll call now a challenge. Some are easy challenges, some are hard challenges. I like to break down the challenges to a few groups. Because the challenges in your life already give How do you say? Spill the beans? No, not have to wait to the end of the lecture. The challenges are these riddles in the find your find your treasure. How did we call it? Treasure hunt? Find your treasure. One group, yeah, yeah. One group of the challenges in your life are the clues where you need to go. And sorry that I'm going to tell you that, but most of the times you're so dumb and you don't understand. You just don't understand that this is a clue and you get angry and you get upset and you get so frustrated and needless to say how it leads you to behavior that's inappropriate. It can be false language, that you curse, foul language. It can cause you to slander, to take lashon hara, to to look for revenge. And it's like as if somebody would have to tell you "What are you doing? What are you doing? You're wasting you so much time. You fool. It's one little message that Hashem is trying to tell you. Take it and move on." But you're so arrogant and your ego can't allow you for somebody else to do something and what are you doing really? Then you're kind of rolling it over that these are these statics that you're creating in your life. So you might be in front of your other half but there's so much static no peace in the house, fighting all the time, no shalom bayit no, you know, not. And that's your other half. You know, when couples come to me, "Should we get divorced? Not get divorced?" In many of the cases it's not It's It's not the right zivug, but in most of the cases it is the right zivug. It's just that each and every one are not even in the direction of trying to work on themselves, so the static noise causes the biggest friction between the the person who's most closest to you. And then that's why most marriages are not successful. Either they end in divorces or they're just not happy marriages. I don't I don't see a lot of couples that are still happy after 20 years. There's three vehicles parked at 20655. Please move the cars before they will get towed. You cannot park at somebody's house. Okay. Without their permission. Thank you. Thank you. So, you heard if anybody's parking and blocking drive a driveway. I can take you home if the car gets towed. Don't worry. It's just a money challenge. Yeah, it's just a challenge. It's a car. Can I ask a question? I would actually rather if you hold the questions till the end. And I'll tell you why. Because then everybody will ask ask questions and then only that my answer will take me now to a completely different class. So, Bezrat Hashem Bezrat Hashem will finish the class and if there's time I'll take questions. Hopefully you have a way to get home. But but you know they have Ubers here so you don't have a problem. Have a big car. I can take do a carpool. Okay. The wheels of the bus go round. So. See how that likes to disturb? So, a lot of the challenges And then and then I don't want to now group it into percentage. One group is the challenges that are hints for you to move on to the next place, the next stop. In most of the cases you're too stupid or arrogant to see that it's a hint and I'm and I'm using these words on purpose because people need to understand. Sometimes you tell why you say it's stupid? Because I'm maybe it's my English. In in in in Hebrew it's stippish. It's a much stippish. It's a fool. Maybe I'm using the wrong word. But But I'm talking about you somebody who's And And you know what? And when somebody tells you to your face you are a fool, you get either very offended because you know it's true, or you get very offended because it's not true and you're like, "But I'm not." Most of the hints that Hashem sends you, you don't understand. Now, what happens is when you don't understand these hints, A, you don't go really on the path you need to go on. Or you just keep on creating all this static noise. And as I said, when things don't go well, you're unhappy. And when you And it's not that you wake up in the morning like, "Oh, I'm I'm I'm I'm unhappy. Who should I blame it on?" It's not. It's just a feeling. It can be frustration. Can be lack of energy. Can be so many different feelings. And the first person in your proximity will get the the the the the anger. The Exactly. The the punching bag. And that thing itself already is a one challenge to to to look at. But that type of challenge that's the problems you create to yourself. So, it's not even say you kind of adding on yourself more hard work. Now, a lot of the challenges has nothing to do with hints. It has to do with your tikkun. You need to understand what you need to fix. So, the the way to understand it is very simple. We have to fulfill 613 mitzvahs, each and every one of us. We can't do that in one shot because it has to be done in thought, speech, and action. I think only the prophet Daniel did that. No, there was a few other individuals that did all three shot all three levels in one shot. One lifetime. No, no no incarnations. So, we are not like that. So, we need to get incarnated and every time we incarnated, we do more mitzvot. We need to fill a certain quota. Whatever you finished in a previous incarnation, it's not marked V. And whatever you achieved is protected in Gan Eden. Nothing can touch it. It's not that if you do some sin or something, it will touch what you already achieved. And every lifetime you will come and we do more mitzvot. That's it. Very simple. So, in your life, you are missing We're all missing a certain amount of mitzvot. So, you are missing 23 mitzvot. You are missing 42. You are missing 62. You are You are missing 102. Every person is missing a certain amount of mitzvot they didn't do. They didn't fulfill that quota in any type of a life. When, let's say you did a tikkun on a certain mitzvah, then in this life, it would be very very easy for you. The easiest thing for you. So, if you did a tikkun for the mitzvah of charity, in this world, you are going to be the most charitable person. It's going to be the easiest thing for you to give money. Never going to think for one blink a second. Anyone who asks something, why? You already fulfilled this mitzvah. So, the mitzvah now doesn't come with any any any kvetch. Like, let's say for example, let's say you had a different one. You did a tikkun for the mitzvah of tefillin, then you It's tefillin will be the easiest mitzvah for you. But, if you find yourself putting tefillin 5 minutes before shkiah, then you know that that is one of the mitzvot that you need to achieve because you have challenges with that. So, this is the next group of challenges that you need to be focused on. The challenges that just hint to me one of them it's what that I need to do. So, these challenges will come only in mitzvot. And I don't know about you, but I can tell you about only about myself. Certain mitzvot are very difficult for me to do. It comes with so much yetzer hara. And so much difficulty and so much no desire to do and the yetzer hara knows he can take me like that on these mitzvot. That's my understanding that that's the mitzvot that are on my list I'm missing, which means that I have to do it the right way in this lifetime cuz if not I'm going to have to come back and do it again. I didn't complete it. I didn't reach a tikkun for that mitzvah. And you can see it on yourself and it doesn't matter right now if you're observant or not or how observant you are. Because I know people who are secular and they give a lot of charity and for them giving to the kind they love it. Person is not even religious but they're very charitable. They're very generous. They like helping other people. Everybody knows that person helps. Person doesn't show me Shabbat, doesn't eat kosher. And and it's the I'm giving you one example of the many. I know people that are not observant of certain mitzvot and on the outside they look secular but they do certain mitzvot that religious people don't do in that in that level. Let's start with just with kibud av em, with the honoring parents. Don't think this is a small mitzvah. I know a lot of people who are not observing tfillin, kashrut, Shabbat, but how they honor their parents? Different level. So, first you can't judge a book by its cover because a lot of people who don't appear observant they do mitzvot in levels that you don't even come even even reach to that level. That's first of all. So, don't be so Yeah, I am a kind of much better than you. No. If you are completely not observant, then half of what I'm saying tonight is that doesn't even apply because it won't make sense. It won't resonate with it it won't have any common sense here. You need to have minimum amount of observance of the Torah and the mitzvot. So, when you understand from those challenges what you're missing, then you understanding the hint that Hashem tells you this mitzvah you have to fulfill. You have to do it the right way. So, and what's it mean to do it the right way? Let's say for a person it's very a man it's very hard to put feeling. First of all, he will have a yetzer hara with it till the last day he dies. It's not going to change. First of all. So, I'm already telling you when you if something you have a certain yetzer hara in departments of mitzvot, don't think you're going to win it. It's not about winning. It's about not giving up. Most likely you'll never win the yetzer hara. It's not designed that you would win the yetzer hara. In order for you to win the yetzer hara you need to reach a level of David Hamelech. David Hamelech killed his yetzer hara. Now, we're not even in the domain of David Hamelech. Don't try. Waste your time. I came to a long time to terms that the yetzer hara is not an opponent that I can knock out. The only thing I need to do is A to learn how to avoid him, you know, uh to to ditch him, and B how to dance in his rhythm. He starts dancing, I need to dance in his in in his rhythm. That's it. You need to know how to work with the yetzer hara. The yetzer hara is very sophisticated, but once you understand the purpose, then really the yetzer hara is your personal trainer. That's it. You might not like him. But that's your personal trainer. Now, normally people likes their personal trainer. So, I'll take you to a different department. It's like your teacher in class. Most people Most students don't like their teacher. But it's your teacher. They teach you. You know, kids are not in that level to understand. Kids just don't like the teacher. But the yetsura is like your teacher. Now, if you become an enemy of the yetsura, then good luck. But if you understand that the yetsura is coming to teach you, then he's not as severe as you would think. Because you understand where he's attacking you, that's what I need to work on. If I have a desire for this, obviously that's what I need to work on. Now, again, the whole boils down to a very, very powerful foundation that if you don't have it, won't work. And that's why I told you the story with the oranges. Because to achieve something you want, to gain something, to bring you to a place that you earned it and you are satisfied and you're proud of yourself and you need to work hard. And you're going to get bruised and you're going to get wet and you're going to get and you're going to fall a few times. But after me working in the orchards, sometimes 10 hours, 12 hours, I would come home I I would forget the pain. I forgot the cuts. I had the money. And I bought what I wanted. The time we had these big records. Remember the records? Some of you are at least my age and older. There was these big records. And yeah, and and and a record cost, if I remember correct, anywhere between 12 to 20 shekels. And an hourly rate at the time was like 15 shekels. Something like that. Maybe I Maybe I don't remember. I don't remember. But the the fact is that when I had the money, I forgot the the hard work cuz I achieved what I wanted. You don't get nothing in this world for free. Nothing in this world for free. And not only that, Hashem is not bringing you to this world for you to waste 70 years here. This world is a education system. It's a place of refinement. If you didn't get that till now, you have a problem. Your life will always be going into dead ends. When you don't understand that this is a journey in your eternal life, and what you do in this world sets a certain tone for the rest of your eternity, and needless to say will affect you in this world, if you don't have the right mind frame, again, the topic of the night won't won't make any justice. And maybe we'll hope hopefully get a person to start understanding. But, you need to understand, like I said in the previous lecture, every frame of your life, every situation is something that you need to understand and analyze and do something. And that's part of the game. That's how you get your credit points. That's how you go to the next level. So, really it boils down to the challenges are to help you to get to the next level if you are in the game. If you're in the game, it doesn't matter if it's a finding your treasure or whatever your game you're going. The point is that you need to go from one level to another. I know it's not the right way of saying that, but I do see our life like a video game. And you finish a certain level and you go to the next level. And in the next level, it's a little bit harder. And whatever you need to do, I'm not so familiar with the current video games. I can tell you the video games I used to play with. I used to play with the Donkey Kong. There was a gorilla and you had to go and jump over barrels and and eventually get to the gorilla and save, I think, the monkey or something. Something, I don't remember. Then you would get to the next level. And the next level had different types of paths, different challenges, different points. And then you would finish the second level, go to the third level. That's our life. You're like a little monkey jumping over barrels. And the barrels are all all your challenges. Now, if you understand that the challenge is here to fail you, then most likely it will. If you understand that the challenge is hopping over the challenge takes you one step closer to completing that level, then you understand that the challenge is not really something bad, is rather it's a step for you. Can you imagine if I would tell you on this roof of this house there's $5 million in cash and gold coins. It's yours. But you you say how how do I get to the roof? I hate to solve your problems. I just told you there's money on the roof. So what would be the first thing you do? You just find a ladder. If the ladder doesn't have steps, you're not getting the money. You need steps. That's it. So every barrel, every challenge you have that you jump over, then it's not a it's not a problem in your life. It's another step bringing you closer to finishing and completing the next level. So group number one of the challenges are directly to the mitzvot that you need to do or not do, the diffi- the level of difficulty in that mitzvah, it's your indication that you need to do a tikkun for this mitzvah. Saying in other words, if tefillin is a very difficult mitzvah for you, and like I said, I know many men, they put tefillin at the 5 minutes to shkiah. And not because anything they're bad or they're just that's the yetzer hara. They wake up at 10:00 in the morning, they're right away business, phone, thing, bomb, it's a few phone calls, this, that, dude, 12:00 in the afternoon, I'll do it later, I'll do IT LATER, PETER, 4:00 IN THE AFTERNOON, AND HE PUTS tefillin on. I've been there. Now, it's not because you're a bad person, disorganized, tefillin must be a huge, huge tikkun that you need to do. So, the yetzer hara will make it that you that it's like with a challenge. And you keep asking yourself, "Hashem, why do I have a challenge with this mitzvah? I I want to do it the right way. I don't want to sta- fail all the time." So, what does Hashem tell you? You have to put effort. You think you're going to get it for free? When you really want something, what do you do? I'm going to go to ticket. Uh, what is a tikkun? Tikkun is a rectification. When you have to rectify something, I now come and I stole something from you. You lost money, you have damage, and all that. Now, I I got caught, the court tells me, "Before you go to jail, pay her back." For the damage you did. That's a tikkun. I damaged something in this world, and I have to fix it. Nobody will fix it for me. Repair, fix. And they are a lot of the problems that we have is something that I'm carrying from a previous life. So, again, a group number one, it has to do only with mitzvot. Some mitzvot are very easy for you. I know people that they have a home that a quarter of this and all day long the the the the house is full of guests because they love hosting, they love feeding. Why? Because in that mitzvah of haknasat orchim, they mastered it. They did it right in a previous life. They did a completion of the mitzvah. Because to understand a little bit the concept, I'm not going to understand now everything about mitzvot. You have to understand that a mitzvah it's it works on a certain quantity. So, if I do a certain mitzvah every day, then I can do this mitzvah 80,000 day and the 80,000 times. So, I can do the mitzvah of of tzitzit 7 days times a month. I Let's say I live 70 80 years. Calculate how many times I did the mitzvah. But Shabbat I can only do once a week. And shofar once a year. So, there's certain mitzvot that I can only do 50 times in my life. You know that there's a certain mitzvot that you can maybe do once in your lifetime. And that could be the Yovel, Jubilee. And there's some mitzvot that you may the Yovel every 50 years. There's a certain a certain cycle. Every seven shmitaot, seven cycles of seven years, we have Yovel. In English, I believe it's Jubilee. Maybe I'm pronouncing it wrong. So, there are mitzvot that you can maybe do once in your lifetime. Just to see if you're you're on the same frequency with you. Can you think of a mitzvah that a man does once in his lifetime? Excuse me? Brit milah? Yeah, very easy. I mean, sometimes you Don't Don't be asleep. Hm? Did you want me to a bed? There are mitzvot that you do once in your lifetime. Some mitzvot you can only do once or two, but there's some mitzvot that you can do five times a day, 10 times a day. So, doesn't matter your level of observance. Every person has to fill quotas of mitzvot. Now, you have to understand that the same way that I just broke it down that you need x amount of repetition of the mitzvah. If you're looking, you see this beautiful painting over there, that's on canvas. So, this I can't give you an example with what I want to give you, but if you would turn to this TV behind me, and you would put that picture on this TV, then now that picture would be divided into pixels. So, now I can tell you that the more pixels the pic the picture will be more clear, more vivid, higher quality. And you don't see the pixels just when you pull it closer, then you start seeing all these squares. Every mitzvah has to fill a beautiful picture with a certain amount of pixels. So, you have to put filling on 50,000 times in order for the picture, in shamayim, of course, to look beautiful with perfect pixels. And every time you put, then there's you put one pixel and one pixel. And again, I'm trying to paint it in some idea that you understand why do I need to do a certain mitzvah all my life. And that quota is going to be, okay, I finished. Okay, Mark, you're done. And that means that you finished with this mitzvah. So, Hashem will tell you, you need to do x amount of time filling, x amount of time challah, x amount of time shabbat t'shuvah t'shmoneh esrei, x amount of time you have to observe shabbat. And I know, of course, a lot of people say, yeah, but I didn't do a lot of mitzvot all my life. When you can make other people do this mitzvah, then there's a ways to to balance it. I also didn't do a lot of mitzvot. When I became observant, I was 27 years old and I understood that the negative precepts, okay, whatever I did whatever I damaged, okay, I'm not going to do it again and that's where it ends. But the positive mitzvot, I started calculating how many positive mitzvot I missed. So I made a very quick calculation how many times I missed mitzvah of filling. From 13 to 27, took a calendar, minus Shabbat, minus the holidays, I came to the amount how many times I didn't put filling. It was a little bit over 4,000 times. Now how do you how do you catch that up? You can't put twice filling a day. Man, I'm missing I'm I'm missing 4,000 four pixels are missing. I'm going to come up to Shamayim and they'll tell me you didn't finish the mitzvah. You needed to you needed to do the mit filling 50,000 times. And if one time you miss it, one pixel is gone. So the picture is not that great. And again, for us to understand it as human beings, the picture is not that great. I'm talking all in the spiritual level. Of course, you said how do you add it? You said to teach. You're right, yeah. I used to go out in the street. You Jewish? Put filling. You Jewish? You put filling on? You put filling on? You put filling on? Now I don't know on the scale how many other fillings is worth my one filling. So if I missed 4,000 filling, then I'll put 40,000 filling on people. I have 10 times. And they're not going to argue with me in Shamayim on that. So there's a a limit how much I can run in the street and ask people if they want to put filling on. But you're right. You know how many shares I'm holding in men's filling? Because when men buy filling, a lot people don't have money. Here's $50. I invest $50 in a pair of filling. I have shares in hundreds and hundreds of filling that every day that the man puts filling, I invested $50 in there. I'm talking right now educating and inspiring. So, technically, you inspire 5,000 people, let's say hypothetically I inspired 5,000 people to put filling on, then I get the volume of 5,000 filling. That will balance what I missed. And you don't have to go to those numbers, but you have to Rambam calls it to Tshuvas Mishkal, the Tshuva of a scale. It went down like this, then then you need to make double. So, first thing that you need to remember that the challenges that come with mitzvot then you don't just missing this mitzvah. Don't don't take it as an insult from Hashem. Don't think that you don't have the power. Just understand that that's the hint. Now, once you start applying that mitzvah and understanding, "Oh, that's what I need to do." Then after a while, it will become much easier to do. And you can all testify to that if you are baal teshuvahs or converts that at some point in the beginning it's hard, but at some point you you do it every day, then it's not so hard. The beginning when I used to read Birkat Hamazon, it was for me like reading a book for 45 minutes. It was like, "Okay, I'll just stay hungry." And then the mitzvah is like, you know, it's very hard to do the mitzvah. You're thinking, "Okay, I'm going to eat. It's going to take me 3 minutes to eat, 40 minutes to read." I'm like, "Okay, I'll have the apple." But once you know how to do it, then you read it, it takes you 7 minutes. Tick tock. Same thing with filling. I said that shared with us yesterday. First time I put filling on, it looked like a disaster, you know, the filling was here and I I didn't even know. I'm like, I'm putting it from here to Once you get good at something, then it runs. So, mark on your notes when you have challenges with the mitzvah, that's Hashem telling you that's a mitzvah that you have to do. It's a mitzvah that is no good to your neshama. If you put all your effort to do that, you'll see great success cuz that's what's going to bring you great shifa and abundance. And if you are lazy to fight this, then good luck. Then all your life you'll fight with it. You're never going to win. Not that you're going to win the yetzer hara, but you can shut the yetzer hara's mouth. So you might have a certain yetzer hara that's fighting you for 2 3 years. And then if you're able to shut it down, no no, it's just you just shut it down. It's there, but it doesn't really bother you. It's kind of like And why? Cuz you're already mastering the mitzvah. You're doing it consistent and over and over. There's another type of challenge when it comes to sins, not to not doing a mitzvah. It's two different types how I see it. Because the challenge with a positive mitzvah is a mitzvah you need to do. When the challenge is with a sin, then half of it, just for the sake of the example, is the challenge the the fact that the sham is hinting to you this is sins that you need to be very careful because you didn't master them. All I talked about now is positive mitzvot. Now I'm talking about negative mitzvot. You know, some people it's the easiest thing for them not to talk lashon hara. They never slander. They don't look at other people. You know what she did. It's just not their We'll call it now their nature. Now it's not it's not their nature. It's just that they fixed this sin, so they don't have desires to gossip and chat and that. So there's a lot of negative mitzvot that some people are don't have a challenge with that, and some people do. Same idea. When the Kadosh Baruch Hu is hinting to you that you need to work on. But when it comes to sins, half of the challenge it's already not a sin you need to work on. That's just the your weaknesses. What I spoke about yesterday. That's your just your weaknesses. And the reality it's a challenge. It doesn't matter how you're looking at it. I like looking at it cuz I want to see where the challenge is coming from. Is it coming from a deficiency? Meaning I need to add a certain mitzvah or is it coming from my from where I need to put effort and to work on myself. That's already a different challenge. These are important. You get to familiar with that. You'll see that it will help you a lot in the Hashem. And you'll see that even tonight you choose one mitzvah that you understand that it's difficult and you see that there's a certain difficulty there. I had for many many years uh difficulty. I didn't even know I don't know why. I didn't figure out why. To somehow make it to Mincha on Friday. All the rest of the days was easy. Friday Mincha was a difficult Mincha. I don't know. Somehow related to going into Shabbat. I always like to help the house as much as I can. Somehow Mincha of Shabbat I I never nailed it. Always would come late. Always play without a minyan. If you know. So then after a few years I said, "Okay. I'll start praying Mincha I'll pray the second that you can pray Mincha and then I'll pray you know right from the beginning. So there's not so easy to find minyan for like that on your on Friday. So I created my own minyan. I was like, "Okay." So it worked for a while. But it's very hard to get people especially when it's winter. So it's like very cold. In the summer that's a whole different thing. Long story short I in in the analogy that I'm telling you I didn't understand why that this is a challenge? Why dafka? And I would try to come to all the explanations. Okay, maybe because I'm helping my wife, I'm not supposed to like I would try to But the fact is that I understood that there are certain mitzvot that you need to put more effort. You need to put much more work towards them and it might sound like oh, it's the same mitzvah. No, it's a different day. It's different day, different energy, everything is different. So when I get attacked by the yetzer hara, the yetzer hara by the way, I told you yesterday how he works. He doesn't make you sin. He just shows you where the sin is. That's it. Okay, well yesterday I said he opens the door and then he tells you no, go through it. But he doesn't make you sin. It's to be very clear about the role of the yetzer hara. He just shows you where the sin is and then of course gives you some good explanations why it's okay for you to do it. His commentary. So again, when it comes to mitzvot and and averot, very very clear when whatever is hard, that's what you need to put your effort on. Now it doesn't mean necessarily that you like it or it will be easy and some of them mitzvot can take you 20 years to master. But again, nobody's asking you. I'm just telling you how to figure it out. And many things you don't like, but it doesn't matter. You have a divine way to understand what you Hashem wants from you. Then the next group of mitzvot that I spoke about is the hints in the riddles of the game of your life. Which Hashem puts you in a situation and he he can't tell you, okay, go do A, B, and C." Then how can you reward you for that? You have to understand something very, very basic. Prior to the world, this world, there was only Hashem that existed, and there was nothing else. And at some point Hashem had the desire to be a king. So he had to create a nation. How can you be a king on no nation? So he created a nation. The nation is all our souls. In the beginning, the master of the universe just radiated his godly light through those souls, which this godly light was this divine wisdom. And the souls would just benefit this unbelievable pleasure. At some point, the the souls felt very very embarrassed in front of Hashem. Coming to Hashem and saying, "Listen, you just give and give and give." And well, we feel so embarrassed. We want to give you something. The Zohar calls this bread of shame, nahama d'kisufa. Like a poor person that comes to your door and every day knocks, and he's like she puts his hand out. You're fine with giving him the money or the food, but he is already embarrassed like So the souls were in the same level, and they asked Hashem, "We want to do something for you. We want to do something that we don't going to feel the shame." So Hashem says, "No problem. I will create a system. I'll create a world where you earn your mitzvot. Whatever I give you, now you earn it. You put a lot of effort, you'll earn a lot. You'll put less, you'll earn less. That way nobody feels I got more, I got less. You get You get fair square. Whatever you did, that's what you get." Of course, at that point the souls were like, "No, no, no, we're joking." But that was already 2 minutes too late, too late, and the world was created. >> Careful what you ask for. Exactly. But But our sages clarify that and they say I'm sure you heard this verse a few times if you attend your prayers. But it means Hashem wanted to give merit to the nation of Israel so he gave them a lot of Torah and a lot of mitzvot. I go in the path of what my father did to me. I don't give my kids money. Because then they'll they'll be they'll I'll educate them that I'm an ATM. So I do the same thing my father does. Go and work. Now the system works well when the child can find a job. But what if the child doesn't find a job? The child can I I tried. I couldn't find a job. What's your answer? So I have to invent jobs. Yeah. So a 17-year-old can find a job. But when my 12-year-old says Abba, you're going to America, I want you to buy me A, B, and C. Excuse me? I'm willing to carry it. But you buy it. Now what job do you give a 12-year-old? What she's going to go work now at a at a restaurant? So I have to invent jobs. Okay, water the garden. Uh pick up the leaves from the driveway. Uh clean the mess over here. And I invent jobs so she can earn money and feel very confident and uh have a strong feeling of achievement. And and really I created the job. I may I didn't really need the job and I gave her money so to educate her. That's what Hashem does with us. It's very simple. He creates the jobs so we can earn what he would give us anyways, but now he's doing it fair and square that you don't feel that I got it for free. I earned it. That's the feeling I used to have when I used to come back from the orchards. I didn't mind the scratches. You know, I still have scars on my hands. Just from that job. But I was so satisfied that the hard work gave me the results. I was happy with the results. I was focused on the results. I understood in a very early age that results come with hard work. Never in my life something came to me with not doing nothing. Now, unfortunately, in our generation, hopefully it skipped on you. Everybody's very spoiled. Instead of you You know, when I used to drive when I was young, I opened a map to calculate where I need to go, and I would plan my trip. Now, you just press a button. You know, in the olden days, you used to work to do certain things. Now, you just put it in ChatGPT, it does it for you. So, all this progress is great, but makes you so lazy. Stupid. Thank you. It makes you so I'm looking sometimes at the younger generation, and I'm like They don't know what to do They don't know nothing. So, so the the progress is very good. But if you don't If you leaning on it to be your salvation, that's that's uh First of all, that's what the It's what Allah wants. It's a form of idolatry that I go to No, no, it's such a sick sick way. You see it's coming from the stomach man. It's not coming from anything holy. >> There's an apple with a bite in it. Because most people they they don't they they they don't see the big picture. So, the next level of challenges that you have is really It's really a sham telling you where you need to go. What you need to do. The sad reality is most people are like they going looking for advice. People come to ask me questions that I'm like What do you want from me? I understand you ask me a question in Alachua. A question in the Torah but you ask me sometimes you ask me questions and I'm like what do you want from me? No, you don't see things. No, I don't see things. I see a fool think that I see things. I see a lazy person, that's what I see. Go and work hard for what you need to achieve. I don't ask advice, I ask a sham. How the day I was one of my stops on the door, I stayed over with one of my friends and he he asked me about about my rabbi and my rabbi is a big big individual. And he's like well you you you see him, you talk to him, you're like you know. And I'm like listen, I normally go there often. I'm not going to bother him with questions. He's bothered enough with questions. So, I don't go to him I have a question. I I feel bad to go there to if I escalated to my rabbi, that means that I couldn't find an answer. First I go and look for an answer. I don't bother somebody else for advice and when I need enlightenment, when I need guidance from God No offense, I don't go to rabbis. I know people go to rabbi people come to me, like as if I'm like, "Excuse me?" I should start charging for consultations. People now call me, "Should I buy the Bitcoin, sell the Bitcoin?" What do you want from me? What am I a banker? You have uh questions in your life, only Hashem will answer you. You just don't know how to ask, and in most of the cases, you don't know how to read the messages. The Hashem gives you messages all day long, gives you guidance all day long. When you can't find it, he It's not that he's losing his patience, but it's kind of like a parent that tells you something, and you don't listen, and you don't listen, and you don't listen. At some point, what does the parent do? Raises their voice. Right? You Some of you are parents. When my kids when I tell them to do something over and over and over, after a few repetitions, then the voice the volume goes up. They don't show me that. You know, you don't hear? I told you two times. I'm just giving you an example, of course. My kids. I look very nice on video. I look a very nice individual. Come to my house. I'm not that nice. I have a I have I I need to educate kids here. I'm not here to play. So, you like me, you don't like me, I don't care. Yeah. Same with my students. You like me, you don't like I I don't care if you like me or not. Yesterday, somebody told me, "Oh, you're very direct." Do you want me to be not direct? Do you want me to what? Wishy-washy? What do you want What do you want me to do? I This is the This is a cup of water. It's a cup of water. I'm not going to tell you it's a plastic thing that holds water in it. It's a cup of water. Deal with the reality, deal with the truth, swallow the the the the and and move on. So, why am I saying? And again, I know a lot of times I raise my voice at my kids, all a show. One time I pretended like I'm really like screaming, throwing things, and and I had a guest in the in the in the house. He was shocked. And then when I was done, I came back to the table and I was like, "No, they're just joking." And I went back to like normal conversation and he was like, "What just happened here?" I said, "Listen, if I'm going to ask them nice, they're not going to do it. They need to understand that sometimes Abba freaks out." That's it. You know? So, so Hashem wants the same thing. You know that in my house, if there's a problem, I'm sure it's in many houses. If there's a problem that is caused to my wife, you know what's the slogan? Wait till your father comes home. Now, my kids are like, "Hey, hey, hey, he's three freaks in America." But, but my wife waves the wait till he comes home. All the time. Now, I'm still Basari. I have a few more. I I I I'll cool down soon. Uh But, and it's not that Hashem I'm a dictator or evil. I just I gained my position in the house that I call the shots, I run the show, Ba'al HaMeah u'Ba'al HaDe'ah. I pay, I decide. And not from anything else but to put the child in the right place. I need to educate my kids. I'm not here to play with them. So, they need to know that when you they cross the line, there's going to be repercussions. There's going to be a reaction. Whether on my reaction, they're outside. I don't care. They're not listening. Well, my other one is on this live. He's my moderating, but he's old enough. He knows my tricks. The old ones are now laughing seeing me doing it on the young ones. But, it's all a show. At the end of the day, it's all a show. When I when I I have seven kids, baruch Hashem. When they were born, I told my wife "The we are the architects of each and every one of these kids' lives. I make a mistake, I'll mess up the artwork. The the final product. So, whether they choose to like me or not, I didn't like my father for many years. When I grew out of my stupidity, I understood what a great father it was, what an educational father, what a teacher. I'm forever grateful, thankful. But as a teenager, limited mind, no more him. I didn't understand that. I resented that. So, as an appreciation, I want to give it down to the next generation. I don't want to generation of spoiled kids, spoiled adults. Spoiled kids become spoiled adults, by the way. That's not that spoiled kids suddenly become not spoiled. So, if you're a spoiled kid, you're a spoiled adult. And spoiled adults are not easy to deal with. At all. They barely know how to deal with themselves. So, why am I saying that? Because when I need to show some How do you say? I'm assertive. Then I What do I do? I raise my voice. You know, in in the real world, it will come with hand movements. But But I In my situation, I raise my my voice. I have a very strong voice. When I scream or you I wave my kids under the table. But if you didn't get it the first time, and you didn't get it after the 15th time, then the reaction it's going to come not nice. It's going to come with a stronger voice, it's going to come with less pleases, and excuse me's, and at some point it's going to narrow down to become very bad. Can be with you and your boss, can be between a child and a a parent, teacher, authority. Hashem does the exact same thing. He comes and tells you, "I'm not asking much. A, B, and C." You become stubborn. Then he has to raise his voice. And at some point, the voice has to become stronger. It's not coming from hate. It's not coming from any It's coming from a talmud shiv. You're not listening. You're not doing it. So, most of the challenges that are not mitzvot, that are anything else, situations, and so forth, it's just a Hashem writing you hints on the wall. Now, when you get it, you operate, the challenge disappears. That's how it works. If challenge didn't disappear, you didn't get it. You didn't get the message. You missed one digit on the safe. That's the problem with most people. Hashem gives you all the hints that you need in the riddle, in the find your treasure, and your ego, arrogance, honor, I like to call that stupidity. It doesn't allow you to read the message. And in most of the cases, these messages are people around you that appeared to anger you or to do something to you, but they are the message. And then you're getting upset at the message and the messenger. So, you don't get the message. And then you find yourself with some challenge with your parents, with your boss, with some neighbor in a lawsuit. It doesn't matter. You find yourself tangled with some individual that you don't even understand. What does the person want from me? It's over. Take your leave me already. But that person is holding the message you need to know. And what stops you is your ego. And I'll give you one example out of a million. Two years ago, my neighbor is a little bit sick in the head. No, no, but it's And he physically attacked me and my son. But physically, like and like he cracked my head, like he really physically attacked us two years ago. And like was extreme. And you know, when you angry then all the ideas come out. Oh, I'm going to sue him. Going to sue him. I'm going I'm going to clean his bank accounts. What I'm going And then you go to the criminal path. I'm going to call my cousin Vinnie. We're going to wait for him in the dark alley when he comes out. Suddenly become all tough. And all sorts of weird ideas. And you are like you first of all you aggravated, angry, looking for like revenge. I'm going to do what I'm going to do. And every person that you see, you know what he did to me? So I had I'm also a human being. I had my neighbor attack me and my son. And a lot of people told me why didn't you defend like why didn't you defend yourself? So you know, when a little dinghy comes and attacks an aircraft carrier, the aircraft carrier doesn't do anything cuz if the aircraft carrier will shoot one missile, the dinghy goes. So I I first I can't hit another another another person. He's not a bad person. He's just a little bit sick in the mind. It doesn't matter right now. That's not the point. The point is that as a regular human being in the first few weeks, there was a lot of anger. Yeah, because everybody was giving me advice. Sue him. Make a lot of money. And do this and do that and And at the end, I was like, "Okay, if it's bothering me for a few weeks and where my mind is taking me is only negative things, nothing is positive here, then it's just my ego driving me to a path that I'm not supposed to go to. There is a situation in my life. I need to analyze right now. What does Hashem want for me? And it took me a certain amount of thoughts and time of meditating, praying, asking Hashem, give me this clarity. When something is not clear in my life, I don't run to a rabbi or open a book or something, I do teshuvah. I repent. I look inside myself, what can I change? What can I refine? And I make myself a worthy vessel to receive this godly light, which will come as the answer that I need. But very quickly I understood that in this case, that person is just a shaliach. He's just a messenger. Me being angry at the messenger, okay, maybe I'll sue him, I'll get some money. There's not going to be blessing in that money. It's not that that money is going to do any good to me. Yeah, I can sue. I have the legal rights, everything, good lawyer, I'll get some money. There's not going to be a blessing in that money. That money will go. Because I'm not supposed to get money like that. That's not how you make money by suing somebody. You can go with your ego. I'll sue him, I'll this, I'll do that. I can do this and and and listen, all sorts of evil ideas came in my mind as a normal human being. You know, like I told you, do do do that. Just for the sake of the example, there were there are neighbors. Their entire house is no permits, everything is illegal. I was like, "I'm going to go to the city hall and tell them da da da da da da." And 2 days later, there's going to be a tractor who's taking down the whole house. And then I'm like, "Listen to yourself. That's That's what you're going to do? I'm going to walk into the city hall like a snitch?" And I It's like I'm I caught myself like, "A lion, what are you thinking of? If I Hi, where are you even That's what's going on in your mind." That's your Torah. That's what the Kadosh Baruch Hu wants. Revenge? No. Kadosh Baruch Hu doesn't want that. So, you have to put your ego aside. You have to put your pain aside, your greed. Everything has to be put be put aside and understand that person is a messenger for me to do A, B, and C. It's nothing to do with me. This guy. And the second that I understood what Hashem wanted me to understand and learn and change and achieve from this encounter, look at I understood. That's it. I don't look at that person. He's not my enemy. He's just another, you know, fly on the wall for me. It's another hint for me, a divine message, the next step. Now, in that particular case, that's another type of challenges that uh this is more more of a higher level to understand is that when you're doing something wrong, not necessarily a sin, and Hashem wants to give you a certain hint by telling you, "You're not doing it right. Do it right. You're doing it 90% right." But, it all falls under the hints of of the category that Hashem is hinting you. So, really, most of the challenges you have is Hashem hinting to you how you get to the next level. And since you don't get it, then it repeats itself. And then you perceive it as something that you're challenged with. If you just open your eyes, stop what you need to do, and I'll explain to you in a second how. That's it. Then you you understand it, then the challenge disappears. Now you go to the next level. So, really, before I explain to you how I do it, you have to understand challenges are the best things that you have. Because they show you where you're holding. It's your indication. I love technology how it can teach us everything. I was now in Denver, part of the tour, and my friend has a Cybertruck. The Tesla Cybertruck. It's not that of a wow. It's a driving piece of garbage. It's It looks like a garbage It should have been. But nevertheless, it's irrelevant. If you like it, go ahead. It's It's not what I'm trying to say. What I'm trying to say is that you sit in some box. No nothing fancy is there. Plain. And this is irrelevant. But you have so much indications of what's going on. So, I put the self-driving mode, and it drives by itself, and you can look around. It's pretty cool. But I was constantly looking, and I That's how I look at everything. Every situation that I'm in, I right away take 3-4 seconds to analyze. I'm in a situation right now, a frame in my life. What am I taking from that? I have to take a few a few things. And what I took from that specific experience is how much indicators and sensors this car has. I don't know in numbers how many cameras. But it's like it has dozens of cameras and in order to drive by itself it has to has hundreds of sensors all following into one main system that causes the machine to drive. Really when you're thinking about it is the most basic thing. If this is the distance is the basic programming. All you need is the sensors and the distances and it will calculate speed. I don't think it's that much of a wild technology. The sensors is the technology not the analyzing the the the information. But what I saw was like there's so much indications in this car. You see all around you at all given times what's happening and the indications they also warn you and they also do it for you. And I was like we're driving in a Cybertruck. My life is a Cybertruck. You know how many indications you have around you that you don't even know how to read? So many cameras around you are helping you, guiding you, saving you, protecting you. And and and you you don't you you don't read the signs. So challenges I see I don't like the challenges by the way. And by the way I do I'm sorry I didn't clear it out in the beginning of the class. A challenge is not a test. Test is a test. That's an essayon. That tests you with a certain situation and he wants to see your reaction. That's an essayon. We're not mixing now chal- challenges and and and essayon is a test. That's a whole different thing. And you need to understand what's a challenge and what's a test. I'll I'll tell you in the end the the the the the basic things what you need to do. First you need to understand what you what you're dealing with. So once you understand that most of what's going on in your life, it's actually not necessarily people against you, and it's not your misfortune, and it's not your but but mazel that is not working. It's not what 90% of what you think. And then of course, some of the rabbis will tell you, "Oh, oh, this is happening because you did this, this, and this, and that, and that is happening." And they give you like a whole analysis. How do you know? How do you know? Oh, you did this, you did that, this is the end, and now it's this is happening because of that. Now, listen, unless you're the Baal Shem Tov, don't tell me things like this. You can tell me what what Most of the times that I'm dealing with things, you don't know where it came from, and it didn't come from your action. So, I when I see a challenge, I don't run into the challenge headfirst. Then you're going to get knocked down. I le hefech, I step out of the challenge, and I try to observe in what department the challenge came. Is the challenge in a sin that I'm repeating or challenged to do? Like I told you, category number one. If it's a mitzvah that is very hard for me to do, I understand very quickly, okay, this mitzvah needs more power. Maybe I'm not doing it the right way. Maybe I'm not doing enough. When the challenge comes in a way that it's almost doesn't make sense or is not clear why I have this challenge, then I don't even look at it as a challenge. I'm starting to read the riddle. I'm starting to look at the challenge, and exactly like you're reading now the the hint. Okay, what is the hint? And in many of the cases, I go wacko with it. Gematriot, numerical values, I'm going to pull out what's the the hint. But you don't don't don't be discouraged. It's almost very simple to pull out from the hint what is the what is the riddle. What is the hint? But it requires patience. It requires a little bit of wisdom. And it mainly requires from you of self-refinement that you become a worthy vessel to receive this message. Sometimes the message in front of you and you don't see it. And you're looking for a solution and the whole time it was in front of you. That's most of the cases, by the way. But again, it all under the same title, your ego, your kavod doesn't allow you to bow down and to accept now what the world is catering to you. But I'm already telling you that the majority of the challenges that don't really make sense to you, then that's where you need to first of all stop and ask, "Okay, now let me start cracking the code." Now, how do I tell the difference between a challenge and a test? Because a test Hashem wants to see reactions. And a challenge Hashem wants to you to meditate, to focus, to find a solution, to reverse-engineer what needs to be done. It's two totally different types of behaviors. And I know it might sound a little bit not familiar what I'm talking or confusing, then watch the rerun. Watch it again. But that's how I see That's how I see a test A test is testing my reaction. So, he would test me. And what what should or should not be my reaction? Anger? That's all That's a great test. Hashem is going to put a situation in front of me to see if I get angry. And if I get angry, you lost a few points. If you didn't get angry, go out of the mall, then you move to the next test. So, tests usually follow a reaction. Hashem wants to see how you're going to react. You're going to react with anger? Are you going to react with frustration? Are you going to react with insulting the person back? Or you're going to shut up. Your reaction. And by the way, many of the times your reactions are severe sins. You can insult somebody in front of a a whole room of people cuz they said something and you're like, "I'll give him back." And you insult somebody in front of other people, you don't have a place in the world to come for that even. And you're insulting somebody, and you lose your place in the world to come for something like that. So, many of the times your reactions are sins. But, I like doing everything in my life in a delay. So, I don't impulsively, you know, act cuz then 99% of the time you'll miss. I always pause for a whatever amount of time to see cuz I want to make the analogy here very quickly. If I'm triggered here to for some response, then I know Hashem is testing me. And he'll test it all day long by the way. And usually the tests are also where you need to work on. So, if you need to work on the attribute of anger, Hashem will test you all the time with little things of anger to see how how much you letting the anger go out or how much you are calming yourself down. So, when I see that the situation will trigger for me a reaction, I know that's a test from Hashem. Alan, relax, be focused. The test is on. Be very careful. Because now you're tested. So, I'm trying to look, okay, this man or woman did this and this. Okay. Plan one plus one will cause me to be anger angry. Okay, so I'm tested with anger right now. Okay, I'm not going to feed it. I'm not going to So, I I actually analyze the situation in my mind. Almost like you know these commercials that I saw a few of them that they show like a two cars coming and then they stop and then they show like the pre-accident. It's little videos, short videos and you see the two people coming and they're talking. Yeah, but you didn't look, but I didn't see, but you didn't give me uh how do you say the the right away? And then they go back to the car and goes fast and you see the accident. You know, you ever saw these videos? That's what I do. I I stop the situation. Wait, wait, wait, let me pause. Cuz once I used to react right away. So, that's my indication. When I'm called for a reaction, Hashem is testing me right now. And I you have to be very careful that in many time of the test, you can roll it over to a sin. As you can fail in a sin. And usually people fail in a sin cuz they'll go to Lashon Hara right away. If not Lashon Hara, slandering, foul language, that that that department. When I see that the challenge that I'm dealing right now, it's not about pulling a reaction from me, then I divide it. If it's a mitzvah or a sin, then I know what I explained to you. If it doesn't make any sense, the situation that I need to deal with right now, then I know Hashem is now challenging me. And in a challenge, there is the form of a test. But he's challenging me. And you know the challenges? To understand that there's a a message there. So, why would I get upset? Why would I lose my patience? Why would I be judgmental? Why would I want to do anything? Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, the message is here. Don't go. It's for your own good. Not only that it's for your own good, you're not going to get another opportunity. Who said that the messenger is going to stay? And then you're missing a hint and you're delaying your progress. Because the reality, most people unfortunately don't they don't understand that your entire life is a journey. The journey is required of you to grow. If you come into the world and you go out the same way, what did you do? You didn't do nothing. You are required to go through this journey and refine yourself and change and grow. Most people don't do that. They're still locked on the things that don't have any meaning. Everything else is meaningless. Your your spiritual growth, that's what's important. The path that you walk on, that's what's important. So again, when I get a challenged when mitzvot, I already know what Hashem is telling me. It's very clear to me. If I have a challenge with a certain aveira and and it's already in a category of a desire that is almost uncontrollable. And everybody has a fair share of a few of them. You don't have to pretend that you're such a pious individual. And Hashem doesn't like that. I I admit my sins. I admit my weaknesses. Everybody has weaknesses. Everybody has lusts. And each and every one of us has one or two or three or five that is almost uncontrollable. That that's where you give up for that specific desire or lust. So when it comes to mitzvot, I understand where where am I holding? That's my indication in regards to my mitzvot. So don't be angry. Don't be upset. Read between the lines. Understand that that desire or this lust or this weakness is giving you indication where you holding. Wouldn't you want to know? Can you imagine you putting tefillin all your life? 20 years you put tefillin on. And suddenly somebody comes and tells you, you know, you're not doing it right. The knot has to be there. Or the feeling has to be here. You don't doing it right. What do you want somebody to come and tell you that? Of course you want somebody to tell you that. So I shall be telling you that when you messing up with your miss what. And this applies by the way it does doesn't matter how observant you are. It applies to you every individual whether you call yourself observant or not you are obligated in the same level. If I'm obligated in putting feeling you are obligated. It doesn't matter if you have a yamaka, you don't have a yamaka, you wear a beard, you wear it it doesn't matter. We're equal in the obligation. I have to eat kosher, you have to eat kosher. I have to observe Shabbat, you have to observe Shabbat. There's no difference between us. Whether you do it or not but that's your that's your decision. Again, so we can move on when the challenge doesn't make sense it's not trying to pull some emotion out of me and the what I'm challenged doesn't make sense then I understand that that's there's a hint in there that I shall wants me to understand and when I understand the hint I will go to the next level. Therefore the challenges are really their steps for me to go to another step and another step. I just don't see the steps. If I figure out the steps by myself you won't have much challenges. Then the challenges are actually going to be different types of challenges. I didn't get to them yet. Now we're talking about the basic ones that you need to constantly understand. And when the challenge doesn't make sense then I don't try to fight it. I don't try to argue with it. I don't try to find much solutions. I try to understand what am I required to do and then by default the challenge disappears. So like in the look for your treasure game the the the hint can come in the form of go three steps and count you know I want two three and the third door open it and they'll be that's what that's like a hint it's like telling you do A B and C but in many of the hints it's like a question that doesn't make sense and you need to sit what does it mean and then you wonder what does it mean you need to sit that's how you have to figure out the challenge and in many of the case can take you a week or two or a month that you don't understand what is she want from me when I find a dead end then I go and I do if I really do in a dead end I will fast I will learn Torah stay up all night I will do all those actions to Hashem send me a message which I'm no different than anyone anybody can do that in most of the cases if you move aside you you see it you see very clear the only reason why it won't work is when you are you have even one little dot of ego it's not going to work because you have to be so uh humble humble for sure it's only going to work with humility because you sometimes you have to look at somebody who's your enemy and find the message within their actions and not be judgmental and not be angry and not to look for revenge and not to to go berserk I tell I I I I shared a certain story many many times how many years ago there was a certain investment that I went into and and the person didn't provide the the software that he was supposed to anyway that was beyond it was a test and a and a challenge together because it constantly caused me to be emotional and I had to control my emotions, but the test was what to what's the the the message to get out of the encounter. So, there are situations that the nisaion, the test, and the challenge gets tangled together. But now that I kind of covered briefly the challenges that we have, then there's another type of a challenge is that it's not in the level of mitzvot, it's in the level of my middot, of my attributes, because we're all required to refine ourselves. The mitzvot and the Torah are very important, but I am required to refine my characteristics. And the characteristics can be anger, jealousy, sadness, depression, many different emotions and characteristics. And then the challenge will come in the attribute that I need to to work on. And it's the same idea of what I just said before, but that has to do with my with my refinement. And to give you an example, if I need to refine my patience, then Hashem is going to give me very annoying kids. Not annoying, but kids that are they require me to challenges in the least to say. Now, there's nothing wrong with the kids. You don't have to go now to 50 million rabbis. What's wrong with the kid? Nothing's wrong with the kid. What what's wrong is you. No, no, you are the one that's wrong. The kid is just to show you how you are wrong. So, in many of the cases Hashem is challenging you to refine yourself. Now, I can continue going on and on and on in the categories how I see it in my mind of the challenges, but here is where I'm going to stop because by now you need to understand that all the challenges in your life is only for your benefit. It's only to get you to a higher level. It's only done for your good. And a very small amount of it is maybe your negligence in your spiritual growth. It's a sham putting speed bumps in your way because if you wouldn't, you wouldn't grow. If you would go only on a flat treadmill, then there's no much effort. You need to constantly raise the treadmill higher, like a stress test. You ever did a stress test? The stress test, they did that to me. They tried to stress me. It didn't work out. I was walking on the on the treadmill and I'm walking and walking and then he takes the treadmill a little bit higher, so it becomes harder and then high higher and then he makes the treadmill higher. So, and they want to see how how your heart goes. So, it's the same thing what Hashem does for you. He says, "If you're going to go on a flat treadmill or path, you you're not going to put much effort." So, it's equivalent when you go to work out. If you go now to the most fanciest gym in the world and you pay top money and you just come there with your beautiful outfit and you just sit like this on one of the benches, nothing will happen. You're not going to have any change in your body. You need to move your body. So, even if you will start moving your body in movements of exercise, nothing will happen. You can sit now on a bench and go like this 100 times. Nothing will happen. Why? Because you need resistance. In order for the muscles to grow, they need resistance. Something needs You need to push and to pull. And then happens uh an effect that you sweat and you get tired. And in many time bruised up or may or whatever it is, but the point is that you grow. You cannot grow in this world if there's no resistance. You cannot grow if there's no power that is playing with you, manipulating with you. Sometimes pulling you, sometimes pushing you. If you wouldn't have any challenges in your life, it would be like a person that's sitting on a bed like this all their life and not moving. You don't use your muscles. Kind of like the how do you live of the Lord? You know, the hostages that came out of the tunnels, they were in cages for months. They couldn't They couldn't stand on their feet. You sometimes watch a movie and your fifth leg is bended and you were you get up an hour and you You know, you get like these uh You know what I'm talking about. Six months staying with the same leg. Tangled. Yeah. Can you imagine like this, not moving for a whole thousand years? A whole for 70 years? So, the challenge is is really the rhythm of your life. Because if you're looking at a monitor in a hospital when the monitor is flat, that person is dead. Uh what indicates that the person is alive is that it goes up and then it goes down and then it goes up and then it goes down and then it goes up and then it goes down. You want a pretty equal rhythm of the up and down. So, the ups, that's when Hashem is giving you some break. Some nice moments. Some smachot in your life, some success. He's a little bit up. But very quickly he tells you, "Take a deep breath. You're going down. You're going down again." And what's the reason for you to go down? Now I know you're going to answer, "To follow you know to go to go up." You really got to work on your descent to order to to ascend. Okay, that's true. To catch momentum. But really the going up and the down, that's what Hashem wants from you. Now again, we perceive it as a challenge, and we perceive it as a punishment from Hashem, we perceive it as the a disaster in my life. Hashem is telling you in other words, "What are you talking about? Uh you're trying to jump from here to here, and I just gave you a stool. What are you complaining? You can't jump from here to here. Now your soul constantly wants to go higher and higher. So we all have this some drive in us to wake up in the morning, to go to work, to become successful, to find my other half, to raise my kids. That's most people. You don't have it, something's sick in the neshama. But the Kadosh Baruch Hu constantly tells you to be in a motion of growing. We as human beings don't have the energy, don't have the tools, don't have the desire, don't see what's going on. And more than that, not only that Hashem invents for you jobs like I invent jobs for my kids so I can pay them, he also makes the jobs hard so you can you can give you more money, more more pay. He says, "Okay, if I'll give you a little job, what am I going to reward you? A cup of water? I'll give you a big reward. I want to elevate you. I want to inspire you." So you have to understand that it's all a game. Now, here there's another side note that it's important to know that many of the times your behavior will trigger spiritual reactions that will come to your life as not such pleasant things. And you might perceive that as a test or as a challenge, but it's not. It's not just a reaction to your action. And uh what I mean is that you behave in a certain way, you can call it karma, but it's going to come It's going to come back at you. So, it's not a test. It's not a challenge. It's It's your behavior. That you did something and now you're getting your own a taste of your own medicine. Hashem always will incorporate in that some type of a message, some type of a of a test. But it all boils down that everything that happens to you is a message from Hashem for your spiritual growth. When you understand that in your mind, that really every little thing that might be difficult in my life is for my benefit, then suddenly you understand that most of the earth thing most of your challenges, they're they're not bad. That's why our sages say accept all these challenges with a smile, because it's good for you. You might not see it. It's almost equivalent to how I try to educate my kids. They don't see what I see. They just see how it's affecting them. That's my my my recommendation in every situation. Just step aside. Step aside me meaning judge the situation without being judgmental. Be very fair to all sides. You have to be fair even to the ones who are against you. If you're not, you're not doing it right. My neighbors that attacked us, if I would be uh pulling to my side all the time, I'm right, I'm the victim, then it won't work. When I'm judging a situation, everybody's equal here. I don't see me or the other person separately, cuz that way I can see the right way. So, I'm assuming that you're also understanding that to make this work, you have to come with an approach of humility, of anavah. Of um I'm not I can't be always right. Now, how do you practically do it? Practically, because you're going to come out of the door very soon, and everything that we just talked about is going to come and will apply in your life. Tomorrow in the morning, you're going to wake up stepping on a little toy, hurting your leg, jumping up and down. Now, you're required to hold your anger and to not and your patience to your kids. So, you're saying, "Okay, first challenge of the day, I passed. Check, I made a check." When you understand that in the morning when you wake up in the morning and you say modeh ani lifanecha, when you say the I thank you Hashem on the bed, you might not see it, but some note falls from above next to you, and it says what's going to be your challenge for the day. And imagine this, you would open the note. Oh, anger. Huh. And then the next thing, something angers you. Now, when you're prepared, then you don't get angry. When you're prepared, then you are set settled. Now, here comes one more element that's here that will affect everything is that in all the tests and the challenges, Hashem also wants you to refine one more quality, and it's called emunah. That you believe that it's coming from Hashem, that it's good for you, there's nothing bad. Ein ra yored min ha'shamayim. Hashem is giving me the this test. You have to have the anava and the emunah, the humility and the and the uh How would you translate it? Uh hmm? The faith. Uh belief, faith. Okay. That it's coming from Hashem. It's part of the ingredients, and that's it. And once you understand all that, then you don't you don't let it trigger you. I'll give you one example of the many from my life. I now came to Florida with a lot of my wine from Israel. I manufacture wine. I have my own vineyards. I make my own wine. Excuse me? No, the Argan Oil is my neighbors. I'm not Argan Oil. We can advertise them, too. Their wine is not as good as mine, but but it's okay. It's okay wine. So, why am I saying that? The wine came to Miami 4 days ago. 4 days I'm running after any possible individual in the system to release it from the customs and get it delivered. Something that needs to take 3 hours. And it didn't happen as you noticed. Didn't get the wine yesterday. Didn't get the wine the day before. So, Mhm? Today we got it. So, now let me give you a live example. Is that a nisayon, a test, or is that a challenge? So, now okay, in my analogy that was just a nisayon. Testing my reactions. Testing if I will get angry. Testing if I will get disappointed. Tested if I will get you know, impatient, raise my voice. I mean, I was dealing with a trucking company that for 2 days were giving me really rude answers. So, the test, do you lose your temper? Do you understand that Hashem wants you to uh hold your anger, hold your patience. So, this is for example no question a challenge a nisyona test. And you know why? Because when I'm looking at the situation and I move to the side everything is clear. There's nothing here that doesn't make sense. It's just I understand here that now I worked hard money is involved, investment is involved, etc. It's a to pure test not to lose my patience, not to get angry, not to get disappointed, not to has v'shalom start yelling at the company cuz I could technically start yelling at them. Three days, it's a delay, I have a lost a money, I'll sue you. First of all, relax. First of all, relax. Look at what's going on here. So, right away I'm stepping taking a step back and I'm asking myself, is there any mitzvah involved here? No. So, it's not a challenge with a mitzvah. So, not a hint about any mitzvah or sin. Okay, move that out of the way. Is it something that doesn't make sense? No. The wine came, it was stopped in customs, it's sitting in Miami International. Somehow it's not getting delivered. That's pretty clear to me. I I I I I understand the map here right now. Not looking who to blame right now. I'm just telling you how my thought process works. Everything is clear. It landed in time. There's maybe a miscommunication between the parties, but the fact is that it's somewhere on a truck and something in the universe is stopping it from coming to me and I'm losing my patience and I'm getting angry and I CAN'T TAKE IT ANYMORE. THAT'S what was the expected reaction. But I understand that I'm now tested if I'm going to lose my anger or not, raise my voice or not, etc. Or has v'shalom do stupid things. That's test. And the reason why I don't look at it as a challenge because everything is clear to me. I understand the stages. So, this is a test. Hashem is testing me clearly. And I won the test cuz I stood aside and I just waited to see. Not getting angry. Not getting upset. Not saying, "Oh my gosh, I could have sold so much more I would have made." And It's not even in the I'm not wasting my time on that. It's not here. Move on. Yesterday, I tried all morning. At some point in the afternoon, the answer is coming tomorrow. That's it. Okay, no wine today, kids. Let's go. Next. Challenge is where I don't understand what Hashem wants wants from me. Now, I'll give you another example. A few years ago, I came here to Florida and I got stuck in a hurricane. Which hurricane was it? About 7 years ago? I think Irma. No, no, no, no. Irma came after that. It doesn't matter. Uh it hit pretty hard. I mean, I was stuck here for a few days. But nevertheless, not Katrina. Katrina was in New York. Uh it was the one before Andrew. It it doesn't matter. Matthew, Andrew, Mickey Mouse. It doesn't matter. I don't even know who names the storms. Sit some guy somewhere and he's saying, "Okay." Yeah, I whatever. Don't Okay, let's move on. So, I got stuck here in a hurricane. I don't remember if it was a woman or a man. It probably was a man because it wasn't that bad. I think it was a category four or five. Wasn't that much damages. But anyways, I came here, I got stuck here. I had a beautiful five days without electricity and generators and evaporating heat. So finally there was a miracle and they flew me out to Boston and I had shared that story many times but when I landed in Boston as a connection flight, when I came to board the El Al flight, I realized I forgot the passport on the other plane. And I'm like not the type of person that forgets things. I'm very organized, very on top of things and that was a that was a challenge. That I was running backwards and forth from gates and you don't even know what I went through. And the whole time when I was running backwards and forth from one gate to another to the El Al security, to this, to that. Then there was one guy there was you know El Al the gate is always at the end. So I had to run all the time from gate to gate. So there was one guy every time that I was running backwards and forth telling me Myriv, Myriv, Myriv, Myriv, Myriv, Myriv, Myriv, Myriv and I'm like no no no no I'll pray I'll pray on the plane. And I'm and I'm running and I'm one phone I'm talking to the security and one El Al and I'm like occupied and I'm like going through a serious challenge. And this guy every time I passed him Myriv, Myriv, Myriv, Myriv. I told him no I'll pray on the plane. I said what do you know? And after like an hour of Myriv, Myriv I'm like that's what Hashem wants me to do. He wants me to pray on feet. And then I put everything down, put everything on hold, went and prayed my and the second that I finished praying a bit everything worked out. So, and again, going back in the time machine, is this a challenge? It's a challenge that's hinting to me on a that I need to do. So, probably did this entire thing so I will understand you're not putting a enough effort to pray a bit. It's a big thing. So, I'll stop the world because of you. I will take away your passport. It didn't make sense. I don't lose anything. I don't have any record of losing things. Shalom. I'm like so like I'm the one who always carries the passports, the money. I know I That's my personality. So, this makes sense. I lose passports. Why would I even put the passports in the pocket? And why and why and why and why That's your answer. Doesn't make sense. It's a challenge. It's a challenge that wants me to stop and do Okay, why am I challenged? Ah. Maybe I don't pray a bit in the morning. Ah. Maybe I don't do A, B, and C. So, when I take it to a In this case, was a I got my answer. Do you think that prior to that I was making an effort to pray a bit in the morning? No. Because my was telling me you're busy, you're going from lecture to lecture. You're helping people. You dedicate your life to God. You don't need to pray in the morning. Pray now on the road. So, my is a bit. And he tells me when it's okay, when it's not okay. And you know what? And my gave me all the excuses. You're busy. You're in a rush to go to a lecture. People are waiting for you. Pray after. So, Hashem the situation for you to understand something. And now, you can take these examples and figure it out. Whenever there's a challenge in your life, and by the way, a lot of the challenges repeat themselves every day, every day, every day. So, here you know, you are here either for a mitzvah or something that you need with your refinements. If it's repeating every day, you really I can't answer you every challenge why, but I can tell you that if you stop and you observe the challenge, you observe the the details, you can make a very quick analogy. If it's a wake-up call about mitzvot that I'm not doing, is it a warning call for sins that I'm doing? Category number one. Same thing with my refinements. My anger, my being jealous, being judgmental, patient, etc. You have to put a lot of emphasis on them into that cuz that's the main refinement that you are required to do. You're required to observe the mitzvot, but all your characteristics, if you don't refine yourself, you're missing the point. And the cream of the crop, I told you, are the ones who don't make sense. And when it doesn't make sense in a way that you don't understand how it happened, why it happened, how to find the solution, Now, I'm not telling you to give up on any situation. The whole point of the challenge is Hashem wants you to use your brain, get off your tuchis, dig deep down inside, ask questions, put options on the table. He wants you to work a little bit. That's why I don't appreciate when people run to a rabbi or some scholar, "Rabbi, what do I do?" Work yourself a little bit. Not you. I mean, I No, no. I cuz I said that and she came towards me. It looked like I'm telling her, "Work yourself a little bit." But, but Hashem says, "You work. You figure it out. You know how many times people come to me with a certain situation and I not that I'm some whoha, I read the the between the lines in a second and a half and I'm like, how can you not read it? You didn't figure it out what Hashem wants from you. So you have to understand that the majority of the challenges that you go through is Hashem speaking to you in a language that you don't understand. So the first thing don't get angry. Don't get disappointed. Don't get discouraged. Don't lose your patience. Understand figure right away. Hashem wants your attention. If Hashem wouldn't get your attention or want your attention, you wouldn't have anything going on in your life. All these triggers is Hashem making you turn around. Instead of getting angry, what do you want from me? Instead of getting upset, how can I do what you want? That's the name of the game. So why are the challenges? Cuz they help you grow. How to deal with it? I hope I gave you the minimum of the tools, but if you simplify the tools that I gave you, you'll understand. You'll see that half the difficulties and the challenges that you have will disappear. Because you'll understand A to which direction it's going. Has to be something. I'm not challenged for nothing and I can give you a million and one different challenges. I'll give you it again. I'll give you a challenge that for me that's a challenge. Not not a difficulty, not a test. I have some bad karma with traveling. I don't even know why. I always miss flights. I always come the last on flights. Something always going on with my luggage. It's it's doesn't matter what I do. It will always happen. I come to the airport 5 hours in advance. I can tell you by how things look if I'm missing the flight or not. I can tell you by No, no, I'm not joking. I I This is a I have a record. Always something happens. Always. I can't even It's tell you how much anything that has to do with traveling. There's a challenge here. Because has nothing to do with mitzvot. Something that I'm I'm missing a flight. Oh, what mitzvah am I doing? And it never makes sense. It never makes sense. So, here is for example, it might not be the best example. Here is a challenge, but it's mixed with some flavor of nisaion. Cuz it's it's a lot you have to be very patient with these situations. But why am I saying a challenge? Because in many of the cases, I don't even know how it got to this. So, what do I do again? I reverse engineer What is the message message is Hashem is telling me? And you know what? I always find message I always find these messages. And I understand. I'm not going to share with you every message that I understand, but I'm trying to give you the how my mind works. If you dive into my mind, and you know what? It will make you happy. It will make you calm and relaxed. It's not going to make you overwhelmed all day long. And I told you Tuesday, I deal all day long with a million and one things at at any given time. I juggle many things at the same time. I have many different hats that I wear. But I constantly have a certain thought process. It took me a lot of years not to get distracted with that thought process. But I I don't let the chaos that is around me affect me in any way. So, first of all, all the message is staying outside. No nothing goes into to to here. I don't cater the mess of the entire world because I know that 90% of the mess around me it's some background noise. So, it has nothing to do with me. As this is just these are the little tests your anger, your patience. They're like constantly little flickering tests. But hopefully I'm you're able to dive into my thought process to understand that a lot of the challenges in your life I can be handled like that. And the result is A, you you reduce stress. You're much more productive. You're much more What's the word? I was about to say fulfilled, but a different word when you're able to to go to jump over this challenge three, four, five times. Persevere. Persevere. Persevere. No, no, no, no. What's the word? No, no, no. No, I'm talking about when you how you feel when you I managed to accomplished. Yeah, cuz you put effort. You put effort. You fail once. One time you make it. One time you fail. One time you make it. After a certain amount of effort you accomplish and you go to the next level in the video game. And I did it. I did it. I picked up the oranges. I worked hard. That what was going to stuck in my mind. I got I worked hard. The hard work ripped fruit. I worked hard. Here's a lot of money. If I would work less hard, I would do the same job, less money. I'm already here. Do the job right. And put if you put extra, you'll get extra. So, when you understand that a large amount, 50 to 80% of the difficulties in your life can be easily gone like this and you move it on. Then suddenly your life is much more productive, you're much more effective. You are much more accomplished cuz you feel how you're going to another level and another level. I'm looking now at my all my kids. When my older kids were young, then I would lose my temper with them and my patience very fast. Now, the day before I left to America, I played with my 6-year-old football, soccer. And we were playing in the house. It was very cold outside, rain. So, we were in the house. You play soccer in the house, eventually the ball's going to go flying somewhere. So, sure enough, that's what happened. My my good boy, he kicks the ball and there was a cup on the floor. Cup went flying, every the whole wall, the floor, the couch, everything. Now, 10 years back, everybody run to the safe room. I was about to freak freak out. I wouldn't even have to even do anything. I would just look and everybody would run to the rooms, take a deep breath, I'm about to make a hole in the wall. So, and now my kid like kicked and it was all over the place and there was no reaction. I was like, "Okay, okay, nothing happened." And then So, my young kid was like looking at me like this, like, "Let's see if he's going to freak out." The older ones were like, "Huh, when we were young, that wouldn't happen." And I'm like, "Yeah, well, look how much white hairs I have now. Every white hair is every time you annoyed me and now I learned not to be annoyed." So, when I see that, you know what, a sense of accomplishment you get that like, "Wow, 20 years ago, I would turn the table upside down now from anger. Now it's like nothing happened. Go and sit down. Everything's fine. It's just clean the mess. All tough. No kind of clue. So for myself, when I see that I'm actually changing from my own understanding, so the accomplishment that that you you feel like I'm growing, I'm changing. I'm not the same person. Once this triggered my anger, now it doesn't. When I came first to back to Israel after I became observant, I didn't see my family like 13 years. So and unfortunately, I went through bad news. My brother-in-law died. So I went to the funeral and I went to and I stayed with my sister. And she saw me different. And she told me, "Wow, you're so different since you became religious." I said, "I'm not different. This is the 2.0 version of alone. This is the better version." You just need to understand that Hashem wants not the 2.0, the 6.0. Hashem wants a better version of you. He tells you, "This is who you are right now. You belong here." You have much more abilities than you think. You are much more talented than you think. You are using maybe 5% of your abilities. You're not even using your talent. You're not even using half of the power that I gave you to fulfill it to your purpose. You're really a couch potato. You're wasting your time. That's what Hashem would tell you straight out to your face. What are you doing? It's almost like a father coming to his child and here's a million dollars. Go and invest it. And the child's like, "I'm busy with this Netflix series. I'm giving you a million dollars. Invest So, Hashem is telling you, "I brought you to this world. What are you doing? Why are you Why are you passing your time like that?" So, if everything go is good, you numb. If things don't work out your way and you don't have the the desire, then you lose your your desire to do anything. So, somebody needs to wake you up. Hashem wakes you up, slapping you to the face every day. 15 different slaps. Wake up. Wake up. Wake up. Wake up. Wake up. Wake up. If you're a fool, if you're driven by your ego and your honor, then you don't see the message, you see the the wake-up call. If you have a little bit of sense, hopefully today I was able to introduce you to some thought process that when things happen, don't be affected by the chaos. Step aside for 1 second, 2 seconds, 3 minutes. You don't have to react. You don't have to come with the solution right away. I have learned throughout my life that a quick reaction is the wrong reaction. First think very well and then react. And I can tell you that this 3-second pause saved me in the last 20 years from a lot of problems. And you know how many times something happens, I pause, I don't react because I don't know if it's a test. I don't know if it's a challenge. I don't know if I did a sin or I'm doing uh something wrong. I don't know yet. Let me see how it rolls out. Let me see what's the next few things and I'm waiting curiously, huh, what's going to happen. I I I don't want to miss the opportunity because my time is running out. So, some here are very smart and are taking a lot of notes. If not, watch the I I I I agree and don't agree. I spoke to 2 hours now. It's hard to have it all here. No, no, I'm just saying it's good to write notes or review the video. I agree with you when you said it's here. You accepted everything that I said. Everything made sense. Everything sounded easy to to apply and I think it was pretty good. But don't forget that your friend Amalek when you go out of this door, he cools you down right away. And tomorrow you already 50% of what's in your mind was reduced. I always ask if you want to be productive. Excuse me. You want to be productive? Then before you even leave this room, you already have to have yourself some type of a plan. Like I told you yesterday because why? There is a force. It's called Amalek. Amalek is here to cool you down. He's waiting outside to cool down all the excitement. And some of the ways how he cools the excitement that is makes you forget parts of the of the talk. So you don't have it you will be like, "Wait wait wait a minute. The challenge it didn't make sense. Was that a test? Was that" You know what I mean? The Amalek he cools you down, he makes you forget so you remember the the topic. Now the fact is if you don't apply anything, you go back to square one. And your life didn't change. If you take that knowledge and you saying, "Okay, let me practically apply that." The next time something happens, by the way, you'll fail the next 20 times. But one time you'll get it. But you have to apply it right away. A mechanism I take it very serious. I don't let my mind wander. I'm constantly controlling my thoughts and my mind. Not so easy, but why? Because I understand that every frame is an opportunity. Which means that right now I have a certain scene that I'm dealing with. That's one opportunity. And if I should already gave me 10 that I'm juggling in the same day, obviously he thinks I can juggle that. Cuz that's how my life is. But instead of getting angry, I I just do what I told you for 2 hours. I step aside, I analyze the information. If I don't get any answer or clear answer, I the pause stays. I don't get angry. I don't get upset. I don't let it I don't let it feed feed. If you notice when it comes to anger, it feeds up. You start this much angry angry and then it goes. And then it goes. And then you said tell told her and told him AND HE SAYS, "WHAT?" NOW YOUR ANGER WENT HERE. Now he agrees with me. The what was like So the anger Ooh, from this it became this. That's stupidity. What? Leave it there. I'll deal with it in a few seconds when I made my calculations and my thought what's going on here. Now why would you want to apply that? Because I can tell you that most people they I see by people how they coming and ask me questions. They they don't even take most people don't take that to consideration that that's a big part of their life. That Hashem is looking at you all day long and testing you. And when you if you actually ever read the morning prayers the right way, then look what you asking from the master of the universe cuz that's when you open your day. I told you already, don't open your day with your smartphone. Don't go to your smartphone right now right away. Don't wake up with a with a smartphone. Where wake up with an alarm clock. The first hour of the day no smartphone. If you want to be happy, healthy, successful, reach your goals, and much more, First hour of the day, no phone. Last hour of the day, no phone. Rest of the day, deal with it. You start the day with a sham and you finish the day with a sham, and definitely not with the phone. Doesn't give you anything. The phone is a tool to help you if you have it's business or whatever. You don't need to check emails or Instagram at 2:00 in the morning. Waste of time. You're just wasting your time. So, I understand that when you wake up in the morning, Hashem already has a whole list of challenges for you. That's That's your That's your job. What are you going to be the challenges today? What are going to be the tests? Constantly. So, again, when you are familiar with the concept, then you you become professional. You deal with this, you deal with this, find solution for this, you don't get upset here, you're happy here. It's okay. Thank you, Hashem. Dee dee dee. But when you're not, it becomes overwhelming. It becomes overwhelming, and the problem is that when you don't get the point, then the challenge becomes stronger, stronger, stronger. It's like Hashem saying, "Hello. Hello. Hello." Hashem doesn't get your attention, it knocks becomes stronger. You don't get the message, then knocks will become stronger and stronger till you get it. And there's nothing wrong with you saying, "Hashem, I don't know what you want from me." Explain to me. It doesn't work, by the way. Hashem says, "Do something and you'll get it." And when I need a divine message, I do something I make a change. I repent, I look inside myself, what do I need to change, where was I wrong, how can I become a better individual, here I need to be a little bit better. And then the answer comes. So, next time you are uh uh facing a challenge, stop. Sof maseh umashevet tehila. It's the verse we read in the Lekha Dodi psalm on the we read on Yom Shishi on on Friday. Sof maseh umashevet tehila, the easy translation is think before you act. Because the the action that you did started with a thought. And you don't want to come and say, "Ah, I wish I would have done that. If I would have done this, it would have gone like that." So, think very well before you want to do something cuz in most situations in your life, you don't have a second chance. That's in most situations in your life. You can in a one second, one moment of anger, you do a certain sin that you can't reverse, ever. So, don't try to find sense find try to find sense. Sham, there's nothing sense making sense with a sham. Hashem wants you to grow. End of story. And he will put steps in front of you that you can grow through them. You are humble, you see that them that there's steps, and you grow on them. You're less humble, arrogant, you let your kavod affect you, you don't see them as steps, and they become aggravating, annoying, challenging, you you can't take it anymore, it's too much. The reality, a lot of people turn to me with questions and and and most of the time I I I don't tell it to the person, but most of the time I tell myself in my heart, "You needed me for that? You can't figure that out by yourself?" I know I'm not going to say, "Why did you waste my time?" cuz it's not a waste of time, but you you I look at a person and I feel like that you couldn't figure that by yourself? You had to come to me? What, I'm the wizard? You you came with a question, I'm the wizard, and I figured it out for you? How come I see it and you didn't? And the way I understand why you didn't see it cuz you only looking at yourself. I'm looking from the outside. And Adam or a at small. A person cannot see the inflictions that are on him. The other day my son told me, "You have a stain on your back." And I'm like, "Okay." He's like, "What? You don't see it?" And I'm like, "No. I can't see it. How can I see it? It's on my back." So, he's a smart toches, so he told me, "Then take the shirt off. You'll see it." And I was like, "Oh." Take your shirt off. Take your Yeah, yeah. Get get your Take your honor off a little bit. You'll see the stains that you have on you. But, the fact is I don't see the stains on me. I need you to tell me. And most people when they tell me the stains they see, it comes in an insulting way cuz people are not respectful. They just come and tell you the the bad. But, nevertheless, when people don't tell you, or in many of the cases when people do tell you, but you're too arrogant to accept it, then Hashem tells you. And you don't understand Hashem's language, so he tells you that in a way that he requires you to grow out of your own misery, to grow out of your own confusion, not to say, "It's too hard. It's too confusing. I I I don't have a solution. Why is this super It's too Stop outside for 1 second. Look at the Look at the challenge. You know that 50 to 80% of my challenges I don't even deal with them. I just stay aside and I'm trying to find the message. And then I just don't deal with the challenge. That's how I mark it as a challenge because it's not a mitzvah, it's not a sin, it's it's No nothing makes sense. And then eventually it it it figures out by itself. So, to conclude, challenges are good. Hashem is giving us steps in our life that we can climb on. When the attitude is positive towards the challenge, then the ease of dealing with it becomes much much easier because you don't look at it as an enemy, rather you're looking at it as an opportunity. You don't looking at the challenge as something that is you can't take anymore, you wish it would be over, you wish it you would get rid of it, rather you're saying, "Okay, I have an opportunity to grow right now. If I do whatever is required, I will gain a spiritual growth." Now, you might not recognize a spiritual growth maybe because you don't have a lot of them. And you only remember one a year ago. "Oh, that rabbi came to town and there was a shabbaton, it was inspiring and since then I do kiddush on Shabbat." Right? You have something, so you had one spiritual growth from one event and you remember it so clearly because it's one that happened one once a year. But really you can have five times a day spiritual growths. Where And the definition, by the way, of a spiritual growth that I achieved a certain action that didn't require necessarily something physical, it required a lot of work, a lot of effort, and the result was that I was able to overcome the difficulty. Then I reached a higher level. Yeah? And of course that cannot be done in one shot, it has to be done in small increments. So really, the next time something happens in your life, don't be in a rush to be angry, disappointed, don't don't just be passive and wait to see what Hashem is telling you, and you'll be surprised how much information Hashem is going to give you. And at the end of the day, your life becomes much more easier, much more organized, much more calm. There's some type of a seder, and there's also the excitement, okay, what's the next hint? Where do I need to go next? I need to go to the next level. I don't know where I'm going next. You think somebody's leading me? You think somebody's telling me what to do? Hashem is leading me. And he surprises me. I wake up with all these ideas. You think I invent these ideas? Hashem comes up with all these ideas, and he's like, okay, do this. Oh. So, you you have to understand how Hashem works with you. If you are a parent, see how you work with your kids. I look at my kids. I mean, I I take my kids uh upbringing very seriously. But it teaches me a lot. It teaches me my relationship with Hashem. How I deal with the kids, it teaches me how Hashem deals with me. So, I start understanding how I deal with my kids, what Hashem is doing to me. And he's doing the same thing with you. And the bottom line is Hashem only wants you to grow, to to benefit you. Hashem wants you to be able to be independent, spread your wings, be your own person, so he can look at you and say, "I did good." I did good. So, don't disappoint Hashem. Don't disappoint yourself. You have so much more to achieve. You have so much powers to actually do it. Hashem is giving you so much opportunities. Ignore the background noise of your life, of running after money and the mortgage and the rent and the and the nonsense and the bank is calling and this. These are all This is all background noises. And half of it is just tests. Your reactions. You understand the name of the game, and you go on the right track, you see suddenly life becomes a little bit different. Easier, more fulfilling, you're more achievements. You eat better, you sleep better, you're much better mood. You don't get angry at every little thing. I used to get angry from every little thing and be angry for hours. Couldn't let go. Till I understand not you, not you, not No, there's not one person in this world that is worth me being angry. That person is not born yet. And he will never be born because nobody should get me angry. Why should I get you angry? If I get you angry, something's wrong with you, not with me. And I'm talking about anger for something that is common denominator with all of us. But it carry a fair share, it was disappointment and being judgemental and many other qualities. So just remember when you go out the door, a molecular friend is going to is not your friend, but he's going to cool you down. So prepare for half the excitement to leave. If you don't practice it right away, then it won't work. You lose the points that you need to apply. And the faster you apply it and the more you apply it, you'll become better at it. The first it's not going to be so easy. First few times you'll be like, "I'm not getting anything here." And you're going to call me, "I want my money back." Yeah, but you didn't pay anything. "Okay, I still want my money back." First few times it might not work. Cuz then the yetzer hara is going to try to confuse you, but you have to be very precise. It's very Practically, it's pretty simple. Simple math and common sense. And the point here is don't don't You are not the factor here. You have to see yourself as one of the figures of the of the picture. Not as the main character. You are not the main character. In half the situations in your life, you are not the main character. I've been not too long ago to a to an event. The birthday was for the child and the mother made it all It's all it was all about the mother. And at some point I told her cuz it's a relative so I don't mind being uh chutzpah. I told her it's not your birthday. It's his birthday. Back off. What a mother. So, in many of your situations, not about you. When you realize that, 50% of your problem is disappear. Fear. When you realize uh this situation is not about me. I'm just the I'm now the background noise. I wish you great success because this challenge is not a simple one. You need a lot of sad that is my uh you need a lot of help from above. You need to have a sham on your side. Then you need to put a lot of effort. It this everything we talked about tonight it can only work with effort. It cannot work if you're lazy. If you're lazy, it won't work. You're back to square one. You need to move yourself out of your comfort zone. I shall will make it to you because he's going to bring you challenges every second. You just need to say one time in your life, "This challenge I'm I'm going to I'm going to deal with this challenge. Let's see how how I'm going to work with it." And I have guaranteed to you, follow the steps I told you, you'll see the challenge is now suddenly makes sense. Things help themselves. Things uh it fix themselves. You're getting the information that you want. And it like I told you, don't be disappointed if the first 10 times it doesn't work. You're going to get a once after a lot of effort. Then you pick on see then you pick on see, "Ah, I got I understood." You know those pictures that you look at them for 2 hours and you're supposed to see a space shuttle and you don't see nothing. You ever saw anything in these pictures? I didn't see nothing in these pictures. So, that's exactly like what I'm saying. You can sometimes look at something you don't see it. I never saw anything in these pictures. Not the space shuttle, not the nothing. I'm always the one that's like I don't know. I I I So, Hashem Hashem is showing you in this world that you're looking at a picture that you don't you don't know what you're seeing. That's how I see it. But, the more you practice it like any muscle, you'll get better, things will get easier. And the most important thing, you are fulfilling your purpose what Hashem wants you in this world. Hashem is just leading you to your purpose, leading you on your path. So, I hope I was able to give you some important tools and I wish for you to have great success. And that this new path you're going to walk on Hashem will allow you to master it so you can reach to a point that you control the rules of the game. And at the end of the game, you find your own true treasure and you win your own journey. And with Hashem I wish you all to reach to the journey of finding your treasure in the most easiest way. Enjoy the game. You only live once. Well, you live a few times. But, enjoy the game. You know what? When you put a smile on the on your face Now, let me just tell you one thing and then I'll let you go. You can go on a horrible vacation, nothing worked out, everything but you always remember that the you remember the good things. When you're looking back 20 years of your life, 30 years of your life, you don't remember necessarily the little the challenges. You remember the big events. And you mainly remember all the the good things. You come back from a vacation, the food that was disgusting, the beds was dis- everything was oh, it was so much fun. What was fun? You were complaining the whole two weeks. But, that's how life is. We're focusing on the small details and we complain and we whine and this is not good and that is not good. Looking at it in one big picture all you're going to remember is the good things, the good times. So make the good the times as good as possible, as much as possible. You change your attitude, suddenly everything changes in your life. And you see that really a sham doesn't go against you, the world doesn't hate you. Nothing is It's not that you're doing something wrong. My karma, my chuva, I can people come to me with all sorts of nonsense. No, sham just wants your attention. He just wants your attention and he just wants to be a mensch and he wants you to take responsibility and he wants you to work a little bit hard, to read the signs and do some effort to become a better person. That's it. So with Hashem, I wish for you success and I wish for you to find your treasure very easy and it should be clear to you and you should walk on the path of your tikkun of your rectification successfully and I'll take the opportunity to wish you uh much happiness in this process.