Living With Emunah (Part 162): Don't Give Up on Me

good morning and welcome back to another installment of living with ammuna we come together on wednesday mornings to learn about study about much more importantly to try to reinforce our living emunah to feel hashem's presence in our life to lean on him and rely on him and turn to him and confide in him to be grateful to him to protest and object to him but to know that we are not alone we are never alone we're not at it alone there is no such thing as be dude there is no such thing as being quarantined alone we are always together with hashem he is always and forever in our lives i want to thank our generous sponsors of the series for the year dr xavier and bella morgan in memory of rabbi doctor brian gabby bhaktivinoda and the memory of bella's mother dr ellen shanzer who lived a great life of service to the jewish community ended up doing facet and we thank them for their incredible generosity i want to learn a piece with you today that comes from our good friend avitamar schwartz the bible a prolific speaker and writer in eretz israel today and many of the shirum can be found online if you look in the chat on the zoom i know there are people watching across several mediums and platforms right now but if you look on the zoom i posted the link to this uh source we're going to look at and study together and if anybody wants to if you're not on the chat i'm happy to send it to you privately offline and ravita ma schwartz is dealing with the following question the author of the bulva is dealing with the following question this mote shabbis we will begin to recite slichos we'll begin to recite salihos and with it we're going to say a sentence don't cast me away from before you i'll tash the hashem whatever you do don't give up on me don't throw me away don't discard me don't walk away from me i'm not incorrigible i'm not irredeemable i'm not a failure an underachiever i haven't given up on myself hashem we stand in sleekhorse and we plead al tashlekhini don't give up on me don't cast me away and the ruach your divine spirit al don't take it away from me don't take it away from me i live to be in your presence i live to feel your divine spirit and so don't cast me away and give up on me i'm not irredeemable and and the bilvavi is bothered and we'll address in a moment what you have in front of you if you're following along is only a part of the greater share let me give a little bit of a background to his question he's bothered by really a compelling question and i must confess and admit i'm embarrassed to admit that i never really thought about this until this year i've said this sentence for more years than i'd like to tell you but i've never really thought about what this sentence really means that's easy to have don't cast me away don't throw me away don't give up on me don't throw me out i got it don't take the ruach away from me let me ask you a simple question my friends did i think i had ruach do i think i have divine inspiration if i did i would pick the lottery numbers i know who would win the super bowl and who's going to win the election do i think that i have nevu a prophecy i have divine insight i can tell you what's happening in the world do i think i have ruach kodesh to the extent that i have to beg and plead from hashem the ruach and the ruach your spirit that rests on me don't take it away from me so simple understanding would be yeah maybe maybe this sentence is written for the most righteous among us maybe it's written for the greatest among us we just studied a little while ago wednesday mornings before this year we have a sheer immecialist they were up to the 97 98 sheer of mesilas asharam and we're up to the 11th chapter and it's a guide a 12-step program he says based on the talmud records that are one of the most righteous of our sages offered a 12-step program for how to achieve human perfection and he said one leads to the next we have to grow in those areas conquer those qualities and the end result is living our best lives the end result is being shelling being whole being complete being reaching our potential of who we're meant to be we began merciless hashem begins zehirus consciousness mindfulness caution don't just live life recklessly but look and think what will be the impact of what i want to say what will be the impact of what i'm about to do to be thoughtful in every behavior speech and action that's number one number two is reasons alacrity zeal enthusiasm don't walk away around lethargic don't procrastinate don't push off be excited have enthusiasm set goals make resolutions go pursue them and go achieve them and the third is nikeis which is the quality that we're up to in our study on wednesday mornings but if you follow all the way through beyond these three all the way through twelve and you get to the end of mesilas asharam you make it to the end of the magnum opus this wonderful save for messiest asharam it ends with a promise of ruachakodesh if you master mindfulness and then you master zeal and then you master nikiyas you cleanse yourself you purge negative qualities and behaviors and tendencies and distractions and you go on and on and on for the rest of the qualities it ends with you qualify for divine inspiration hashem will speak to you hashem will speak to you so the simple understanding of the sentence that we're going to start saying on silico's night and that really characterizes much of elul and the period hashem don't cast me away don't throw me away don't give up on me don't give up on me don't give up on me and don't take away the ruach so maybe this was written maybe it was designed for the person who's completed messily susham they finished the formula of rapin has been here they have ruach hakodesh and they're asking hashem you know that ruach kodesh that i achieved that i earned that you've granted please don't take it away but that's very hard to accept or believe because that's very few if any among us who actually earn that level so do we really recite in our liturgy a sentence that was only designated for the very few very hard to accept very hard to understand i think clearly and the bill bobby thinks clearly this has a much broader and more universal appeal it's speaking to a much wider audience it's speaking to every one of us hashem don't throw me away i know that i underachieved this year i know that i've mailed it in i know that i've gotten away with the minimum i know that i'm not who i meant to be i'm not who you believe i could be i know that i'm not living the life i meant to live but don't throw me away don't give up on me don't cast me to the side don't give up on me this is going to be my year i want it i save it i can picture it and i'm going to create it and if you believe in me i believe in myself that's the first half but what is don't take away ruach don't take away so he explains the following it's written a pure heart you created me with a proper spirit you prepared within me a pure heart laid to her baralia you created me with a pure heart left him every person has a ruach we all have a ruach inside us what does it mean that we have a ruach inside us is this like uh you know we've got ruach yes we do we've got about you who could sing the loudest and clap the loudest and who can make the khadar come alive what does it mean that we all have ruach we all have the ability to lead the kumjits to stand on the table and and cheer this miros and win the color war what's the ruach that every one of us have inside us so the villain the revello kramer of vilna explains you know what the ruach hashem put inside of us is the ruach is the spirit inside us and the spirit manifests itself in our ability to have free will the power of bahira the power of choice the power of not being predetermined or predestined the power of not having to assume a certain result the power of the ability to live in the moment and to look at our lives and to make choices to make choices but the kimono says that every day the attahara gets stronger and stronger and so i want to make the right choice for what breakfast to eat what lunch to eat what dinner to eat and what snacks to avoid i want to make the right choice but the eights are harder get stronger and stronger hungry i'm tired and those snacks look so good i want to make the right choice and guard my tongue and not offer the gossip or slander and not say those things the pope got in trouble this week i don't know if you saw the headline the pope got in trouble because he said and i quote gossip is a greater plague than covet 19. that was the pope giving muslims to the whole world the pope he got in trouble how could you compare anything to coven 19 and gossip and okay i'm not here to defend the pope i'm not here to quote the pope but the pope told the whole world he gave good muslim to the whole world and he said gossip is a greater plague my gafa worse than covet 19 that's the popes that's the pope's observation so the eight sahara grows i have a ruach i have the capacity to guard my tongue i have a capacity to stay quiet and hold it back but the it's a horror it's such a juicy currency to share that latest gossip and slander about somebody else and every example of the eight sahara we're not going to take the time but the ruach inside me is to do the right thing say the right thing look at the right thing go to the right place make the right choice i could sleep in a nat tab and i could wake up in davon with kavanagh i could skip the bracha i could say abraca and appreciate and thank god for the food that he's given me to eat i could be cruel or unkind or mean to another person or i could have self-control and not be envious or arrogant or angry just be kind and the ruach he placed inside us says the gong that ruach inside us is the capacity is the power of bahira of choice of free will but there's a battle there's a fight that's taking place between the eight sahara that urge that inclination that instinct that just wants to feed that appetite that temptation and the ruach the power of the bahira that tells me to do the right thing so which is going to win this is what the bill vavi says this is what the bill bobby says i'm not sure if this part's from the gra or it's his own but he says you know the ruach on its own can't defeat the sahara so potent so powerful so persuasive is that yet sahara it will take us down it's just so exciting to share the gossip and that bag of trader joe's corn drips is just so so enticing and to look at that thing on the internet and to go to that place and to sleep in and to mumble that ashiyat it's all so easy and it's also enticing the sahara is going to win it's going to defeat me the ruach on its own can't do it so how do i get my ruach to be able to persevere to triumph to win how do i live my best most disciplined life how do i reach for the stars and how do i become who i meant to be that ruach needs help that ruach needs help and how does that ruach get help the ruach get help by returning to its root where did the rock come from where do we have our ruach from that the power of free will the capacity to be disciplined and dignified the ability to choose how i want to respond and who i want to be the article i wrote last week was all about much of the frustration and the emotions tied to how people are behaving around us with kovid those who are more extreme and those who are more lenient and are intolerance of both we want them we need everyone to approach it exactly the way we do and it's so frustrating and it brings out such an emotional reaction from us what i wrote about are the things that we can't control we are in a world where it seems and it feels there is more and more we are powerless over there is less and less we can control we want this to end who wants to wear this fakakta mask and send our children to school with a mask who wants to be far away from people and not be able to hug a friend who wants to not be able to share a yanta we're living in a crazy time and we're powerless but with all the things that we can't control what we can control is ourselves we have that power we have that free will we have that capacity we have that competency we have that ability to control ourselves we can't control the people around us and what they say and how they behave on the choices they make but we can control how they make us feel we can control how we react we have that kawaka bahira and who put it inside us he said the animal doesn't and the animal part of us doesn't there's an animal an impulse an animal inclination an animal intuition and an animal instinct and that animal has an appetite the animal's hungry it eats it doesn't say did i pay for this is it mine is this now a good time will it make me fat will i still fit into these genes the animal doesn't think about those things the animal doesn't have that self-awareness the animal has an appetite for food or for any type of pleasure and the animal simply indulges that appetite anywhere anytime with anyone but the human being says yes i have that appetite yes i have that temptation to indulge it but you know what i have a power of bahira i have the kawak to overcome it i have the ability to triumph where do we get that from we got it from when hashem breathed life into us hashem put that ruach he took a deep breath within himself and like the glass blower who fills the glass and makes it expand with his own breath like the person who blows up the balloon who fills the balloon with their own breath hashem filled up our lungs he made us living animated beings he brought us to life with his own breath there's a peace of god in every one of us and that's what gives us our self-control our discipline our dignity that's what makes us reach for the stars that's what makes us believe in ourselves and who we can become that is the ruach inside us i've said this in many contexts i apologize if i said it here on the amunish year but this fastener says that's why we blow the chauffeur on the day that we coronate god is the king i can tell you as about okay and myself you know where you get the breath to blow the chauffeur if you blow the chauffeur from your voice box superficially you will fail you have to take a deep breath and produce the sound from the breath that comes from deep inside your belly we are drawing from the very breath that god first put in us the sound of the chauffeur is the affirmation hashem the breath you put in me the breath you believed in me the breath that you told me i'm capable and competent to be disciplined and to have free will and to make choices and to mold and shape and craft the life that i want and that you meant for me that breath is still there the blowing of the show for the sound of the chauffeur is the affirmation that original breath you put me it's still there listen to that sound hashem i'm producing it now and it's still there so i have a ruach i have hashem in me i have hashem in me but you know i can only defeat that yet sahara i'll only win that instinct that in that impulse it's so strong it's so powerful it's so enticing it's so overwhelming if i can only win i will only defeat it when i invoke my ruach my free will but not just the free will within me when i return my free will to the creator from which we came so let's read inside a little bit again you have it in the chat if you're on the zoom if you're on facebook or youtube i'm happy to send it to you if you're in touch with me where you could find it on bilvavy.net bilvavi.net every time my shorts above yes countless year i'm up there they're all so beautiful the core of violation for which we need to ask forgiveness each person according to their level their background their baggage to the level in which we made the mistake the answer is you know what we're asking for you know what we're begging forgiveness for this is going to change your entire rosh hashanian kipper when i just saw this and read this it's life-changing it's an entirely different perspective i hope i'm not over selling right now over promising but i'm telling you such a powerful insight he says you know what the core mahila that we're asking for is hashem i apologize that i tried to go at it alone i thought i could conquer the corn chips or the la shanhara or the internet i thought i could conquer the urge to sleep in i thought i could conquer that temptation that distraction that yate sahara i tried to go at it alone i thought i had what it takes i thought i was powerful i thought it was in me i thought i could do it i tried to do it alone below yeah i forgot to invite you i forgot to turn to you i forgot to partner with you i forgot to invoke you in my fight in my battle in my conflict but you know if you're trying to do it alone you'll never win whatever area of your life that you're trying to conquer you're not going to win you're not going to win the only way to win is to partner with our better self and our better self is our godly self to invoke that godliness that kawakadakira that spirit of free will the spirit of god that's him that's inside us don't cast me away from before you when i'm standing opposite the cabinet looking at the tempting snacks when i'm about to share the slander the gossip when i'm about to make the wrong choice and engage in the wrong behavior hashem don't cast me away hashem don't make me stand on my own don't make me confront this on my own don't make me think i can do it on my own i can't if all i am is an animal with an animal impulse and instinct i've lost i'm done i'm finished be with me help me realize the godly spirit that's him in me be a presence with me let me feel your support let me feel your pushing my back let me feel your encouragement let me feel your by my side and then i can conquer anything whether a person is going for a medical treatment and has to overcome the harshness of shalom of a treatment that they need whether a person is overcoming fear anxiety worry panic whether a person is overcoming the impulse to do or say or go to or look at the wrong thing don't throw me aside and make me fight this on my own because if i have to then i've lost even before the battle has begun foreign about in this world don't cast me aside don't make me be wandering don't make me be reaching and searching don't make me feel lost and on my own but in the moment that we're being tempted and the moment that we're trying to overcome the challenge and if hashem abandons us or casts us away or walks away in that moment we are finished it's over game over veruh is suggesting such a beautiful shot the second half of that sentence is not talking about the one who finished the 12 steps of repentance we're not talking about a person who has literal divine inspiration talking about every one of us talking about you and me that inside us is that there is that spirit it's alive and it's well if hashem chooses not to withdraw from us if he doesn't cast us aside or give up on us if he believes in us and believes in himself in us manifest through us then we're not alone then we can defeat that yet zahara then we can realize who we're meant to be then we can live the lives that we're meant to live we don't have to fly off the handle and get angry and be filled with rage and lose our cool we don't have to be envious and jealous of what the people around us have we don't have to speak the things we're not supposed to say or look at the things we're not supposed to look at or go the places we're not supposed to go we can become our best selves and live our best lives when when al-tash lacheni when you don't cast me aside and therefore the ruach the spirit of your kadusa of your holiness that's inside me that spirits that says yes i can i can be all i'm meant to be and that it's never too late to become the person i meant to become we have that power of it however there's a catch there's a catch you want to overcome the urge to sleep in you want to wake up and greet the day with excitement and do the right thing you want to overcome the urge to panic to worry to be filled with anxiety to be jealous to be angry to fly off the handle to overreact to somebody who's triggered you you know how you do it in those moments the way to achieve it hashem is with me in that moment in that moment so someone does something they trigger something and it's easy to happen particularly now during corona we're all living on the edge we're all frustrated we all have corona fatigue and it doesn't take much for the person to say or do or think the wrong thing for us to fly off the handle so how do we overcome that urge we're just on the edge and our blood pressure starts to rise and our and our pulse starts to quicken and the sweat glands start to pump and i'm about to overreact raise my voice yell say something i'm going to regret we're only benision in that moment we are facing a test it's a test it's a test what do you do you have to take a deep breath call it a shama talaqa renew the neshama with the neshima renew the neshama with the nishima renew the spirit with the breath and then say you know hashem you're with me right now and you know how embarrassed and humiliated i'd be if i fly off the handle and yell in front of you the king of kings i'm about to yell and scream and fly off the handle in front of you that's embarrassing it's humiliating it's shameful but moreover it's unproductive it's counterproductive you're right by my side this is all happening for a reason and there's a better way to react the spirit that says i don't have to yell i don't have to scream i don't have to get angry i don't have to raise my voice there's a better way to handle this don't take away that belief that i have that i can choose i'm not pre-programmed and it's not fatalistic and it's not predetermined and i don't have to become i don't have to react in that way i don't have to be that person i can be disciplined i can be dignified i can be sovereign over myself i can't have self-control that's all represented and reflected and manifested in the i have your in me so yes the animal part of me wants to fly off the handle yes the animal part of me wants to stuff my face at midnight yes the adam part of me wants to sleep in yes the animal part of me wants like gossip yes the animal part of me wants to be less than the best i could be but ruach there's your spirit it's inside me don't take it away what a new and beautiful interpretation what a strength it gives us to understand the sentence to understand the sentence that don't cast me aside don't give up on me god i know i haven't reached out much lately i know that i haven't been in touch a lot lately i know that i haven't realized your dreams for me lately i know that i haven't been the best i could be lately but do not give up on me don't cast me aside please i beg i plead another chance and why why should god listen because as long as i have the ruach as long as you're in me and i'm not just an animal and i'm not pre-programmed and i'm not predetermined that i'm not fatalistic as long as i still believe in the kawaha bahira as long as i still have free will as long as i still believe i can choose it's within me it's actually this week's parasha in choose life i can choose i can choose there are choices i don't have to get angry i don't have to get envious i don't have to be anxious i can choose we're living in a powerless and a world that we can control so much less and yet the most important thing we can kill still control the most important thing in our lives we still can control and that is who we are and who we want to be who we are and who we want to be like victor franco writes like viktor frankl describes even in auschwitz even the holocaust even under the nazis they could take away all of our external free will enslave oppress persecute but by choosing how we react and respond by choosing how we define ourselves even within that by invoking the ruach that we still have a godly soul and a godly spirit we still have a ruach then in man's search for meaning even victor franco victor frankel even in that circumstance don't cast me away even in that case and certainly in our lives as difficult and challenging as this period in corona is it's obviously far less and categorically different than the horror that viktor frankl and so many others went through and if they could choose to still embrace and hold on to and sustain and maintain that ruach so can we no matter how much fatigue we have no matter how tired we've grown the ruach don't cast me away don't give up on me don't give up on me i haven't given up on myself as long as we have free will and as long as we can make choices we can still become and lead the lives we're meant to but um in every in every um energy and every act that a person realizes generally and specifically but particularly when it comes to free will you need a very fine-tuned choice person has to have a high degree of self-awareness are you so arrogant to think that you're in control that you're in charge that it's all up to you do you think that you're on autopilot and everything has been pre-programmed or do you realize that everything we are and everything we have is unknown from hashem everything is and it could disappear any moment any moment you know how for many weeks or months of the ammunition i gave the example of lifting a cup of coffee successfully to our lips and even though we have the confidence to believe that that's something that's on autopilot nothing could go wrong until we drop it or spill it our muscles don't react the neurons don't control the coordination it's too hot it spills you know how i've given that example for several months well yesterday i was drinking my cup of coffee as i was preparing the pressure shear and slipped out of my hand and spilled all over my keyboard and my mouse and my phone it was fine at first i started to react and i said i've just given this example for like three months in the ammunition so you know the best part of giving me a moon a sheer is you have to live part of the amunisher so cleaned it up dried it off back to work roll with the punches no big deal meant to be from hashem and we appreciate that a simple maneuver a simple gesture lifting a cup of coffee to our lips it's not in our power don't be overly confident don't think that it's easy until it disappears until it goes wrong do you realize that even that was never up to you so you could have faith in the ability to lift a cup of coffee and you have faith in the pharmacist and your faith in the doctor you have faith in the lawyer and you have faith in in dr fauci and you your faith in whoever you have faith in we have faith in the people all around us and we follow the directive and the direction and we express that faith all around us all of that faith is there as an example and all that faith is just a model of the faith that we should ultimately have in the greatest which is the faith ultimately in hashem it's not us it's a false confidence we have real self-awareness would realize that we do the best we can we take our initiative we make our effort and we should be proud we should be proud when we take our potential and with our effort we accomplish when we achieve we deserve to be proud of what we've done but we need to realize that we're the junior partner in its achievement ultimately it's up to hashem and as many times as we successfully it's a cup of coffee all we have to do is drop it once and spill it on everything to realize how clumsy and incapable we are unless he wills unless he wills for us to remain coordinated if you remember hashem and hashem is with us everywhere and at all times then we would be incapable of doing the wrong thing in that battle between the eight sahara the animal impulse the animal instinct the animal desire the animal temptation in that battle between the animal and the discipline that dignified the sovereign we would win every time we'd never do the wrong thing we'd never say the wrong thing look at the wrong thing go to the wrong place think the wrong thing react in the wrong way lmi what happens khazal already tells us our rabbis tell us that when a person makes a mistake nicknasable we became morons idiots fools for a moment in that moment that we want to eat the wrong thing or look at the wrong thing or say the wrong thing or go the wrong place our mind for a moment suspended our logic and our thinking and we concluded erroneously there's no god there's no ruach inside me there's no consequence there's no accountability there's no ability to choose i'm done i can't fight these corn chips i can't fight the image on the internet i can't fight the juicy lush and hard it's just too good not to share we think that we can't fight anymore we've abandoned we've forfeited we've absolutely conceded in that moment in that moment we've forgotten hashem that is the voice and that is the influence of that's foolish that's foolish it's a joke hashem was not revealing himself through you in that moment because hashem were by your side if hashem were in your head and mind and thoughts and heart if you believed the ruach inside you you still had that power to choose and that power to reach and to stretch you had that power to be more godly then you'd never make that mistake so the very mistake is a reflection of a lack of faith in god and lack of faith in yourself so what's the antidote what's the answer and we'll pick up with this next time we'll finish this piece hashem don't give up on me don't throw me away don't cast me aside yes i've developed these habits these patterns yes i failed you and failed to live my best self but don't give up on me it's not over this is going to be my year i'm finally dedicated devoted i'm going to make it happen i'm going to overcome that voice of resistance if you haven't listened last week we gave a talk on the great book of stephen pressfield which is the war of art how to overcome the itahara resistance in our lives the formula to finally break through the resistance by going from amateur to professional hashem don't cast me aside because this is it i'm overcoming resistance i'm going from amateur to pro this is going to be my year and what's the method what's the strategy how do we get it done i need that i need to see you and me i need to know that i have free will i need to know that i have the power to choose i need a moon and hashem we need to believe in hashem but even more fundamentally we need to believe in ourselves because if we don't believe in ourselves and our ability to be like hashem then we're lost then we're gone and we've lost the battle even before it's begun so mr shem will pick up with this next time until then stay happy stay healthy and stay holy thank you for joining us as always please subscribe on our channel on youtube if you're watching or you're not watching about the shaytal update everybody knows everything going on in the goldberg's lives because listen to my she-room shape till update fedex has still not found the shaytan but they are now getting prepared to pay something so they are negotiating the price of the shaytan and that is the schedule update for you this morning have a great day everybody see you tonight i'm behind the bima be well