Living With Emunah (Part 161): Strengthening our Spiritual Core

good morning top of the morning to everyone and welcome back to living with emunah our weekly sheer slash support group to remind ourselves of hashem's role in our lives that we're not alone as we spent the last several weeks i'm talking about no matter what level of be dude no matter what level of quarantine no matter what level of shutdown no matter what life throws our way a jew a human being is never ever alone we are with hashem all the time he is wherever we let him in and if we talk to him and lean on him and feel his presence and his love if we depend on him rely on him and thank him and protest him and object to him then we are always with him he is wherever we are found i want to thank our generous sponsors for the year dr xavier and bella morgan in memory of rabbi dr brian galby bharti ben nassan and remember excuse me abella's mother dr ellen shanzer who live the life of jewish community and hesed and today's particular class is generously sponsored by yvette and dr aaron calbum dear friends in memory of gene cohn in honor of her schlosrimchin was a beloved member of our community gene was a very special woman who had tremendous amount of lives with great faith as did her husband leon and were really pillars of our community for a very long time and uh we miss her and her neshama should have an alia through our learning together we're still going through this wonderful safer we do not know the author it's anonymous authorship as i mentioned a contemporary author who has many many volumes and i want to move over to a new parrot today in which he discusses the following he begins by introducing with the comment of uh rab stainman zettsall who said this we struggle we feel very far away from bitarchon it's very hard to live life in that way we're filled with doubt and uncertainty we are to a degree blinded to the absolute knowledge that hashem is involved in our lives it's hard you can't see him or feel him or smell him or touch him it's very very very very hard it's hard you know we have a concept that out of sight out of mind it's been very challenging during this pandemic there are people who are um staying home of course doing the right thing because they're in a vulnerable population and it's a challenge because they're out of the sight of others and therefore out of the minds of others we connect with and we relate to the people that we see and the people that we know are right in front of us and the people that we have validation and affirmation that they hear us while we're speaking that's who we connect with most and so hashem who's invisible hashem who unless you're really looking and looking hard you can't literally see him before our very eyes you can't hear him if you do something may be wrong with you you can't smell him you can't touch him so it's very difficult moreover there's not a lot of emphasis placed on working on this attribute you can go through 12 years of jewish education and more you graduate jewish high school you go to yeshiva two years in israel you go to jewish college you continue with jewish studies and you know what everything's about let's learn about the llama test the 39 categories of creative labor on shabbos let's go through the details of la shanhara let's analyze the psukim and understand how rashi and the ibn ezra and the foreign interpret this passage very differently let's follow and trace the development and evolution of let's investigate the origins of where did tashla come from you'll go through and you'll study mishnah gemara and navi and you've written every subject under the sun but did anyone ever talk to you about hashem you're in a relationship he loves you you love him what does it mean to be loved by him and what does it mean to express love to him and how do you know he's involved in your life hundreds of thousands of dollars of jewish tuition and years of jewish education and you come out with an incredible amount of information and you know knowledge and you know facts and you know people you know places no dates and you know rules and regulations but do you know hashem do you know him not know about him not that you know about him but do you know him do you know him are you invested in a relationship with him do you talk to him and do you feel and hear him talking to you necklace mode of strengthening who was a great goddaughter who died several years ago in mnebrac he says this is a weakness of our generation our ancestors those who came before didn't have this in their curriculum either in their curriculum in in the yeshivas and in iran and in baranovich and in the mir in the hasidis accords it wasn't part of the curriculum of the yeshiva they too went through mishnah and gemara and but they didn't need it in the curriculum you know why they lived and breathed it and they saw it in their homes you know the image of tevye fiddler on the roof of talking to god that's what it was like i remember not only my grandparents but my wife's grandparents who were european and survivors and the way that they spoke to akarjab the way he was a real presence in their life you would think if anyone felt alienated or existence if anyone had felt abandoned or given up and yet so many of the survivors felt hashem had accompanied them on their journey was responsible for their survival and while they may have had times in questions while they may have had challenges that plagued them deeply they at the same time felt extraordinarily close and it was a genuine and a real relationship and you could observe them having real conversations there was a true closeness that they had you know i i i think it was my friend stephen berg by stephen burke who wrote an article where he talked about that today's high school graduate can tell you on the possible what is the radace and what does the matus david say what does rashi say what does that say can give you 17 interpretations of every passage of tahilam and our grandmothers didn't even know what the words of tahila meant but our grandmothers cried when they said to hillam and our daughters don't feel so connected when they're in a moment of crisis to grab their telum so we have to move from the only speaking to the intellect to the experiential from talking about hashem to talking to hashem to developing this relationship with him and our generation this is not me it's or stainman we're very weak we're weak in this area and we need to improve we need to grow below we don't work on this we work on the 17 interpretations of the passage we work on the development of the and we work on we work on memorizing so what happens what happens people are living today without a basis without a foundation and if you don't have a strong foundation you know what happens to the building it collapses i'll give you a shameless plug from my whatsapp group we're on day 12 or 13 of our 30-day challenge to plank every day so far so good i'm there i can't tell you that i've been adding every day i've had a couple days of setback do you know what planking is planking is when you lean on your arms and you hold your body directly level as a plank so i'll say what's what's the big deal how hard is it to do that so i challenge you you could do it right now or when we're done probably do it when we're done or at least turn your camera off but i challenge you to do a plank and you will find when you engage your core your foundation your stomach your core and your back muscles you do a plank and you haven't ever done it before 20 seconds in your entire body will be convulsing you will wake up muscles you never knew you had as one of the members of our whatsapp group says he's now planked it's now he's grateful that he's up to a minute and a half of planking and he's down to needing only four minutes to get up off the floor afterwards so a plank is very very difficult we have a beautiful whatsapp group we offer a little torah inspiration to playing people post how long they've planked and 30 days 30 days of planking it will change your body now why is planking i'm not some exercise guru i'm the last person to be preaching fitness or teaching it but why am i taking it on and why am i encouraging of others in our mind body soul 30 day challenge this is one of my three groups because a plank results in a strong core and if you don't have a strong core if it doesn't create a strong spine and backbone you cannot stand up straight if you don't have a strong core a little wind will knock you right over and if you want to be able to withstand the winds of life if you want to withstand the pressures if you want to withstand when someone tries to push you down or life tries to push you down you need to strengthen your core it's not enough to have strong biceps not allowing to have strong pecs the muscles that you show off that people see your core is what needs to be strong it's your foundation it's what holds you steady it's what's going to hold you stable and what's true in the world of gashmias what's true physically your core is true spiritually our spiritual core set of stainmen the spiritual core is knowing there's a hashem talking to having a relationship that's the point of this all that's why we dive in and why we're going to hear the show friend why we shake the lululemon why we light the candles and why we put on that fill and why we're keeping kosher and why we're it's really it's the core and the source of everything we're doing so to have a weak basis to have a weak foundation to have a weak core you'll topple right over but a strong core will enable you to hold steady a strong core will enable you to be healthy and so we have to work on our core we have whatsapp groups for that too by the way unless you think that we've moved over to the world of fitness we voice app group to turn your phone off when you daven and we have a whatsapp group to record three things you're grateful for each day we have beginner intermediate and advanced three uh stages for each mind body and soul nine groups for the 30 day challenge brsonline.org slash ello not too late to join we're not even halfway through yet and you can still join this challenge and grow in them each and every day of strain that observes our statement how is it possible the jewish people are standing upright how are their observant jews how are they jews how are they human beings who have not toppled an appointment with christ this morning they've not collapsed on themselves when they have no foundation of beethoven i don't think i needed it but they don't have confidence that there's a hashem huh you don't talk to them it is nothing short of an absolute miracle that people who have such a weak don't collapse and fall over don't break their spiritual hip don't spiritually in decline it is nothing short of a miracle but that is the mission and challenge of our generation to wake up our core and to wake up those muscles and to do a spiritual plank every day to do a spiritual plank daily to be able to to be able to stay strong and to be able to withstand whatever life throws our way whatever life throws our way and so he writes the following and by the way if you're taking notes all my classes i've been asking if anyone's taking notes if you could share them with me they'd be an enormous help i'd love to have a written record of what we're learning together and it will enable me to share it in other contexts as well please email me reg at brsonline.org reg at brsonline.org if you happen to be taking notes i really appreciate it continues it appears in the market one of the questions that will all be asked on yamadin it happens to be that yom haddin is coming up the day of judgment rosh hashanah assays objects in the rearview mirror are much closer than they seem in this case objects in the windshield are much closer than they seem rosh hashanah is rapidly coming up and we will still try to figure it out by the time we get there so um rosh hashanah yamadin now the kumar here is not talking about the yamaden of rosh hashanah the gemara is talking about yom haddin means after 120 when we get upstairs and meet our maker when we get upstairs and meet our creator then we will be asked a series of questions we're going to be asked a series of questions and among them we will be asked yeshua see peace that's so film are scouts why the scouts they scout they look out and they scout out the territory they're looking out those are the scouts sipisa means to look out to hope to long to scout out cp said did you look for and did you long for yeshua for the salvation what is this gemma means come on a series of questions were honest in business and did you try to create jewish continuity i sacked the period of arivia and among the questions is to peaceably yeshua did you long for it did you hope for were you invested in the the yeshua see peace yeshua now what does that mean see peace yeshua by the way how do you fulfill the peace of yeshua how do we fulfill the obligation of to peace of yeshua i think it was we ask for the flowering of redemption that's when we can fulfill this commandment we can answer that question in the in the positive the affirmative if in fact we dove into every day so the simple understanding of yeshua is did you long for and did you daven for the salvation that means there's a pandemic it's gripping the world the globe the yadav and that it ends tia daven for redemption it means that there are battles it means that there are um there's tensions it means that there's anti-semitism there's people who hate jews do you daven for redemption for peace for an end to it all see peaceably yeshua do we long for and dewey daven for the end of all that and for a goo'ola but listen to the peli awaits the peli yo it's right in but it also appears in the basal levy and also appears in and appears in many places that the question of sipiso yeshua and the answer we give to it is not some global salvation it's not you know in the words of the navi that appear on the liberty bell that everyone will lay down their weapons and the animals will lie together and we'll be able to kumbaya with one another that's not that cp yeshua there's some global or universal redemption or salvation but rather the answer that question is it's not that we'll be asked in the heavenly tribunal or heavenly court did you long for it did you ask for it did you look for some global salvation that too ella is so you know what we're going to be asked after 120 we will ascend upstairs and we will appear before the heavenly court and we'll be asked that series of questions were you honest and did you have integrity were you committed to jewish continuity all kinds of questions and one of them will be hashem see peacefully yeshua the question will be asked when we get upstairs is when you found yourself in crisis when you found yourself in trouble did you call out to hashem did you turn to him did you look to him did you wait for him did you rely on him what was your go-to list what was your go-to behavior what was your go-to reaction what did you do when you were in a moment of crisis did it include turning tim and saying i need your help please step in here's what i need i know you're my partner i know you care you care about my children as much or more than i do you care about my well-being or health as much or more than i do i need you see peacefully yeshua the question will be asked when we get upstairs according to the people yo it's the best is not just did you long for some global redemption some worldwide salvation did you look forward to you the eschatological era of the arrival of the messiah but it means much more specifically and much more personally we will be asked when we get upstairs we will be asked when you were in a moment of crisis when you felt the pressure when the walls felt like they were caving in when you felt like you were in trouble or someone around you or someone you love was in trouble there was a health crisis or a financial crisis or a relationship collapse did you stop and ask for help from above see pisa did you look like that sophie did you scout did you look did you laugh yeshua for salvation from him did you only go to the doctor or when you were on your way to the doctor did you ask the ropheiko basaramali lassos did you ask the doctor of doctors to intervene did you only meet with the lawyer or on the way into the lawyer's office did you also ask god the greatest din in the world in history the source of all justice to intervene and defend on your behalf when you met with the accountant when you stepped into the crisis manager when you walked into the therapist when you made the appointment with the rabbi wherever you went and however you reacted and whatever the crisis is did you reach out to all the normal means or did you include among them not only the physical but the metaphysical did you also reach up and reach out did you reach to hashem see peacefully yeshua that is a question we will be asked on yamadin and though the gemaran shabba islamic is talking about after 120 the gemara is referring to when we get upstairs i would suggest that in this month of elul as we are counting down to our yom hadin rosh hashanah and yom kippur yemen that this is a question we ask ourselves to a gut check on our bitcoin do we only talk about god or do we talk to god do we have a relationship with him do we know the shepherd hashem raw elohzar the lord is my shepherd i shall not lack. we spoke about yesterday in the pasture class if you feel cold told that everything is good and everything is from above and everything is for by design then visa then you're going to go through life happy and you're not bent out of shape because fedex still hasn't found your shaytal and you're not so upset because you still didn't get your refund on the tent and you're not so concerned about what's going to be with the holiday seating or how it's going to work out or what will be the weather because you know that there's a plan and it's all meant to be and you're going to put in your effort and you're going to do your due diligence and you're going to take your initiative and you're going to do everything that you can and then you're going to let go and let god and when you do behold when everything is good i love that people ask me what's happening i say it's all good it's all good never better it's all good never better when your attitude in life is all good never better than the samastha how are vasana who doesn't want happiness our whole life is dedicated to that pursuit of happiness and how do you discover and find it when you live life bacholatov how are you all good never better what do you mean all good never better x y or z is happening or happened yeah and with it it's all good i have a lot to do a lot of stress on my plate a lot to get to not me people but nevertheless it's all good never better because don't just talk about god talk to god don't just talk about him in theory develop a relationship with him don't talk about the shepherd come to know the shepherd and to feel the shepherd's love see peace and yeshua we will be asked what did you do did you just go to the lawyer or the doctor did you just call the hotline did you just take the medicine or did you also involve him did you invite him into the room did you seek wisdom from him did you ask him for enlightenment and advice did you ask him to bail you out did you ask him to be your crisis manager you're a therapist did you ask him to be literally your savior you'll be asked when you get upstairs this book was obviously written in israel how did you react when you had a minus ba bank when you looked in your account and it was in the red what did you do did you scramble around did you raise funds did you borrow from family did you take a 17th job or did you also look up to above how what did you do when you had a health crisis were you filled with trust you put your trust in him that of that everything by it from above is by design that there is no coincidence there is no chance there is no randomness that whatever is happening is by design and lean on him to bail you out did you panic were you filled with anxiety did you collapse from worry did you become hopeless and helpless and despondent then you cannot answer to peace of yeshua in the positive or did you keep your calm and did you keep your confidence and did you keep your peace and did you keep your serenity because you knew now you believed you knew that everything's from above it's all good it's all good and therefore this we said yesterday the parish i won't repeat it but the great story of the rebel absorption the magnet of mesrich now the reber of zusha who lived a life of crisis and suffering and struggle and travails but when challenged by somebody how are you always able to be happy the maggot of measure sent me to ask you how can you be happy even when you suffer and observe said i don't know why he sent you to me i've never suffered a day in my life because when you live with bihola tov then you never suffer a day in your life you never suffer a day in your life my good friend matthew hackerman likes to quote his father of blessed memory who used to say when you love what you do you never work a day in your life when you love what you do you never work a day in your life and when you believe that everything is from above everything is from god then you never suffer a day in your life does that mean you never have hardship or travails that mean you never go through anything that's painful unbearably painful doesn't mean you don't go through loss of course you can go through all those things and the torah prescribes and designs a way to feel that pain to mourn to grieve to acknowledge to validate and yet with it all nevertheless to recognize and realize that it's from our father above that it's by design that's not random coincidence or chance that behold and therefore this that not to panic and not to collapse because we don't have a spiritual core to hold us up not to implode and not to collapse upon ourselves spiritually not to give up not to become hopeless or helpless but to realize that there is one above and so we will be asked we'll be asked after 120 when we get upstairs and we will be asked in a couple of weeks when we come before the almighty on yamaden indoor minion outdoor minion at home by yourself we will all ask and be asked see peace yeshua this past year how did you do on fantastic i'm so happy that you have 400 interpretations of tahilam and thirty divreitor on the parsha and you know exactly how tash luck began and i'm glad that you know the chauffeur 400 interpretations of the chauffeur blast you know the 39 malachos by heart beautiful all that information is great how's your relationship how's your relationship it's like what do you know about your spouse i could tell you their height i could tell you that i'd color their eyes i could tell you their hobbies i could tell you their interests i could tell you they're pet peeves i could tell you their education i get to that's great how's your relationship my relationship we barely talk i don't really feel connected i don't confide i don't listen to them but i can tell you everything you need to know how often do i counsel couples and they'll say one about the other i know them better than anyone in the world knows them i know to be i know them better than they know themselves that's lovely knowing someone's great knowing someone that's great that's academic it's theoretical it's conceptual lovely that you know them but how how else how good is your relationship with them you can know god but do you have a relationship with him and the answer the gut check the metric to measure how well we're doing in that relationship is this question yeshua when you find yourself in crisis when the walls feel like they're caving in in the moment that you're about to lose your breath when you are tempted to instinctively or intuitively react with panic or anxiety see peace yeshua do you then tap into your do you flex that bittako muscle do you look through the glasses that say it's all by design or do you turn with a sense that it's all random in order to acquire bitahon in order to grow in a relationship right how do you grow in a relationship not just academically theoretically or with information you know you don't have a relationship with someone because you got their resume in the shadow world there's these ridiculous things called resumes i've written about why i think they're ridiculous i think they're absurd i think the name resume is so demeaning and uh counterproductive i understand the idea that you've got you know a fact sheet about a person trying to make a off you need to know a little bit about them but the notion that it's a reason is if you're applying for the opportunity for them to date you but anyway so imagine imagine all i do is read the resume i don't have a relationship i've never actually met or spent time or felt an intimate connection or confided in the person but i know their resume by heart i could tell you where they went to school and i could tell you all about their siblings and i've called their references both their teachers their rabbis and now they give references of friends and peers i can tell you every piece of information about them everything about them i know their favorite food i know their favorite color i know their pet peeves i know everything about them that doesn't mean you have a relationship it's a case that after this how do we acquire an actual relationship so not just information and facts how do we cultivate and breed and build an actual relationship with hashem kasha it's very very difficult as the ballet mustard have written and now the adam quotes several ballet mustard who acknowledge this and they say foreign from an intellectual knowledge that there is a god to an emotional knowledge an investment and relationship with the god is the distance of heaven to earth it's farther than the distance from heaven to earth we put man on the moon we're trying to put man on mars but can we make man connect with god here on earth it's an even further distance it's an even greater challenge it's one of the great ballet musa writes the core goal or effort of a person to make amuna and bhitakhan and to cling to god and to trust in god and to have faith that god is here be part of our actual inclination and our personality to make them part of who we are not just what we know is challenge it's icker ammo it is the core of our effort of what we're trying to do like the distance between two intellectual things is the distance between knowing and feeling and believing the head to the heart is the farthest distance between any two things on earth it's so impossible it's so difficult it's so so difficult so that's where the introduction and now he's going to get into how to do it and that's what we're going to continue with next time what are some of the practical pieces of advice what are some of the practical methodologies that we could try to grow and cultivate and build our sense of bitarum yum yum every single day not just when we need it because it won't be there when you need it you know again you're trying to stand up against a big wind or someone runs into you if you don't have a strong core and you haven't been building your core you're going to get knocked over flat it's nice that then you're going to decide to start doing sit-ups and then you're going to start working out your core then you're going to start planking but it's too late you got knocked over what will prepare you for when that wind or when that person or when that object is going to bang right into you when you work out that core in advance and so whether you join my plank group or not whether you decide to stop drop and plank right when we're done or not whether you walk the plank with us which i promise you won't regret you'll regret it while you're doing it because you'll be vibrating and shaking and but you won't regret when you literally feel yourself standing up taller and you won't regret it when you feel your core is stronger and you won't regret it when you feel that you are more balanced and the same is true spiritually don't you want to stand up taller spiritually don't you want to feel more grounded more stable more balanced spiritually to work at that spiritual core is to work out to be tahoe in us every single day it doesn't come from intellect from knowledge from information it comes from exercising it and so here's your homework for next week talk to hashem every day talk to him every day his boy did this just talk to him talk to him like he's your best friend talk to him he's right in front of you talk to him in the words of the sitter of course you could talk to him with the words of tahilam but talk to him outside whatever challenge you're going through and whatever help that you need whether you're filling out forms to go to a grandchild's bar mitzvah in israel and the effort and obstacles they put in your way to be able to go make you want to pull whatever hair you have out left whether you're concerned for health or for finances whether you're concerned about preparing for the high holidays whether you've had it with do you have fatigue from this pandemic talk to him ask him for help ask him to bail you out ask him to feel your pain with you ask him that's the homework for next week is to work on it day by day to build that bitahon core to hold that bitahon plank by thinking about reflecting and meditating and most importantly by communicating with him don't just talk about god talk to god directly confide in him and trust in him even protest and object to him and you will feel your core growing stronger and stronger each and every day until next time stay happy stay healthy stay holy wishing everyone a wonderful wonderful day join us at nine o'clock tonight as we go behind the bhima with nachi gordon the founder of a meaningful minute a young man who left a career as a sports agent to build a career sending out a meaningful minute every day he's up to 30 000 subscribers it's really an amazing story i hope you'll join us nine o'clock tonight to hear about it uh we also have a new series that's beginning at brs at 8 p.m tonight where we are drawing from contemporary self-help books with a torah twist i'm teaching tonight at 8 o'clock a great book the art of the art the war of art the war of art it's a great great book join us at 8 o'clock tonight until then wishing everyone a wonderful day filled with grape you talk on work out your physical and spiritual core take out it take care of