How Are You Not Afraid To Be Yourself?

Hi, this is David Alosky with our question and answer series. Hannah asks, "How you not afraid to be yourself in a firm world that is suffocated with extremes, do's and don'ts?" You got to make your own kind of music. Play your own special song. I had a whole tape of songs like this. Cuz it's all right now. I learned my lesson well. You see, you can't please everyone, so you got to please yourself. La la la la la la la la la la My general principle in life is you can't be wrong by being right. And just because everybody does something, you have to decide whether or not it's right or not. Now, I came to Eretz Yisrael, I was a Chofetz Chaim guy, we don't dress yeshivish. I mean, not the way that the world dresses yeshivish, black and white. We dress the way they did in Europe. So, I came to Eretz Yisrael, and I was dressed yeshivish. I had brown slacks and a tan jacket, blue shirt, nice blue tan tan tie brought it all together. Had my Hush Puppies, my white straw hat. And I couldn't get a chavrusah. They told me afterwards they thought I was a tourist. So, uh so okay, so I changed my outfit and uh started dressing black and white. And I went back to America and somebody says to me, "It's all there, but it doesn't look right." I said, "Why? What am I doing wrong?" Cuz you smile too much. If you want to be a real chareidi, you have to grimace. >> [snorts] >> I said, "Sorry." It says in Pirkei Avos, "Mekabel es hakol b'sever panim yafos." I drew my line of go along to get along when I have to sacrifice a value. A girl was in shidduchim, and she was working for Partners in Torah in the office as a secretary. She wasn't chas v'shalom learning on the phone with I'm from people. And she calls me up and she says, "Listen, uh the shadchanim say that if you're involved in kiruv, then boys don't want you." So, uh should I quit my job to be able to you know, just get a job like in a regular office? I said, "Are you doing good work?" Says, "Yeah." I said, "You're helping to spread Torah?" Says, "Yeah." I said, "My God doesn't punish people for doing ratzon Hashem by denying them their shidduch." I had a girl, she was already 23, 24, you know, in the frum world that's already like, you know, you know, 75. And uh she says to me, "The shadchanim say the problem is the way I dress." I said, "What do you mean? You dress very appropriately." They said, "Yeah, that's the problem." You should dress a little shorter, a little tighter, you know, you want to interest a guy. I said, "But you tell me you want to marry a ben Torah." They said, "Yeah, yeah, if you want to get a ben Torah, that's what you have to do." I said, "So, what'd you say?" I said, "If the only way I can get married is to sacrifice my tznius, I'd rather stay single for the rest of my life." I'm not going to drive people crazy, not myself, not my children, not my family, not my talmidim, because society decided what's crazy. Reb Nochum Weinberg used to say, "It's hard to remain sane in an insane world." So, you have to have the ability to know, am I making this decision because it's right or just because I don't want to? I don't want to. I had a daughter once that uh that had some uniform shirt and some kind of skirt, and she says, "I'm not wearing that. I don't care. They can throw me out of school." I said, "You understand if you get thrown out of school, another school's not going to take you, and it's really going to mess up your life." "I don't care. I won't wear that skirt." Okay, so that's ridiculous. If I'm going someplace where everybody's got to wear a hat, I'll wear a hat. When I when I sit down at the Shabbos table, full disclosure, I take off my jacket, I take off my tie, take off my hat. I usually stop there. And uh take off my shoes, of course, you know. But if I go someplace where they wear their hat and jacket with the homies, I'll wear the hat and jacket because it's not worth it to me to make a fight about it. That's not a value. But if it's something that's a value, I'll fight about it. Now, I don't care if everybody's crazy. Doesn't doesn't affect me at all. You got to be you. I got to be me. I've got to be me. [singing] Willing to fight to to uh I forgot the words. Willing to fly to and uh die. I've got to be me. That was one of the songs on the tape. So, you have to be mechazek yourself that you're not afraid. You If you can conform and it doesn't sacrifice any values, go for it. What do I care? Makes you happy, I'll be happy to do it. But if it comes to sacrificing things that are important to you, I don't do that. And so yeah, I always have a smile on my face. I saw a bumper sticker once that said, "Smile. Makes people wonder what you're up to." >> [laughter] >> This is David Alosky with our question and answer series.