Living With Emunah (Part 175): Reading His Diary

[Music] good morning booker toe welcome back to our weekly living with emunah our weekly meeting our weekly support group our weekly effort to be makazik to strengthen one another to be able to truly live with that wounded feel hashem's presence in our lives to feel his love to lean on him to confide in him to talk to him to connect with him and to be able to grow in our relationship with him i want to thank our amuna series sponsors for the year dr abby doctors avi and bella morgan thank you so much for your generous sponsorship in memory of dr brian gabba rabbi dr brian galbet as well as in memory of bella's mother sumunu class is also sponsored by rhonda shoe violin commemoration of the year side of her beloved father sigmund shaffer thank you so much for that generosity and may his nishamah have an aliyah okay we continue to learn it's wonderful for beyond by ravichammer morgenstern we have been working on the media the quality really it's more than a quality it's a muscle it's a muscle that we commit to memory it's a lifestyle of devekas how we can connect with hashem in a way that we are clinging to him that we are connecting to him that we feel his presence no matter what's going on in our lives so we may be tempted to react with envy or jealousy we may be tempted to fly off the handle with anger or rage we may be frustrated by life by people by the world around us but with vacus when we cling to god we have nothing to worry about nothing to fear we know he's in the room we know he's watching what we're doing we know he's holding and lifting us up when we are aware of his presence it brings a tremendous sense and a state of calm it brings a tremendous state and a sense of confidence of confidence that everything is going to be okay not because it's going to happen the way that we want necessarily but because it's going to happen by design it's not random it's not chance it's not happenstance but rather it is going to happen by design i said yesterday in the parasha class i'm going to say tomorrow night we have a wonderful event on khasidus beginning at 8 30 tomorrow night with ramosha weinberger and reverend how to connect to our inner selves and i'll probably say this again tomorrow night but in our parsha when yaakov is telling yosef before he gives him the bracha the blessing and he says i want to share with you the greatest blessing i have and you know what that is means who shepherded me that my life is not just a string of chants and random events things don't happen by accident i'm not just a victim of nature everything is by design everything was choreographed and curated everything is organized and orchestrated from above he's the shepherd and i'm a sheep i'm in the flock i'm moving in the direction he tells me where to go and i go it doesn't mean i don't take initiative and it doesn't mean i don't make an effort and it doesn't mean i don't have free will and autonomy but in the end of the day when all is said and done and when that is over hashem is in charge i am a sheep and he is my shepherd but the the ravr by salvation who has a different interpretation that the word shepherd the root of that word shepherd is reya which means friend and he translates this passage differently well yaakov is telling yosef is halo kim you know god god who befriended me since the day i was born until this very day i have a lot of friends we all have a lot of friends we have acquaintances we have friends we have people who thought they were our friend we thought they were our friends we have others who we didn't even know all along that were really our greatest friends we have a lot of friends but you know who our best friend of the whole world is our best friend from the day we're born until the day we leave this world our best friend is none other than hashem he's our friend he's trustworthy he's reliable you can confide in him he's not going to share your secrets he listens without judgment and yes he pushes us and challenges us and yes he has expectations of us just like our real friends do but in the end of the day he is our friend shepherd comes from comes from friend god who befriended me he is our best friend we're never ever alone when he is in our lives when he is in the room could talk to him unburden ourselves on him challenge him express gratitude to him protest him the things we're upset about or disappointed in but he is our friend and he's always available we have friends they never have time for us we have friends we always have to initiate they don't reciprocate we have friends who we thought we were confiding a secret and they violated us and they shared it we have all kinds of friends but friends are human and friends sometimes fail but god is the ultimate friend god he's the ultimate roha he's our shepherd and he's our friend and he's with us on this ride called life but here's the key here's the precondition we have to invite him and welcome him in he doesn't show up uninvited he's not a friend who imposes himself he's not a friend who inserts himself he's a friend when we nurture the friendship when we develop the friendship and friendship like all the relationships in our lives they require what are the key ingredients to a healthy relationship healthy relationships need time healthy relationships need communication healthy relationships need effort healthy relationships need us to go above and beyond and to do our part to do our part so he is our shepherd as yasi says we say on sing on rosh hashanah in one of the great songs in the liturgy of the rosh hashanah that he we are his own we are as flock and he that you are our shepherd and it's not just you're our shepherd but hashem you are our you are our friend and we feel your presence and we cherish that friendship and we nurture it and we contribute to it and we're part of it so what we've been developing in this chapter on zvenga sir richard meyer morgenstern has told us that if you want to be able to rise to that level if you want to live on that plane if you want to live in that transcendent place then you need to acquire acquire divacus the ability to cling to stick to glue to attach ourselves to god how do you do it so number one step we talked about and developed is emunah if you don't believe god exists you're not gonna have a relationship with him if you don't believe he exists you're not gonna have a relationship with him i've said in this group countless times and unfortunately i find myself saying to people countless times who are going through hard times you know observant i shouldn't even say observant jews people of faith often feel a crisis when they're going through a hard time one of the things they struggle with is the relationship with god and now they're angry they're disappointed they're frustrated with hashem but not only do they feel those feelings then they beat themselves up for having the feelings how could i i'm a believer i have faith i'm a religious person and personality how could i be angry at god isn't that heresy how could i be disappointed how can i challenge how could i protest so i always say it's a story i learned long ago about a holocaust survivor who died i didn't know her but i was doing the funeral because i knew her children and when i asked was she an observant a religious woman her son-in-law told me she didn't practice but she was one of the most religious people i know i've heard that a lot so i said well what do you mean he said she was angry at god she had lost everything in the holocaust and she was always angry at god and i thought to myself that's a model of a religious personality that's his evidence but he explained he said you see you're not angry at someone or something you don't believe is real you're not angry or disappointed in a figment of your imagination you're not angry or frustrated with something that doesn't exist the very presence of an anger and an anger on the level of what you would direct to a parent who has failed you what do you mean mom and dad you know protect me what do you mean you abandoned me what do you mean you allowed me to be hurt what do you mean you allowed me to experience that pain when a person channels the level of disappointment and frustration you'd have with a parent towards god that in fact is an expression of faith not the opposite of it because what you're proving is you believe in god you expect it from god you want to connect with god now if you use all of that as a pretext to run away if you use it as a pretext to abandon a relationship with him then we got a problem but if you use that to nurture a relationship if every day you tell god why you're upset at him i would hope there are other components to the relationship too i hope the things to be grateful for but it means that what you are affirming is that god is not a figment of imagination that god is not some some fantasy god is real so real that you have feelings expectations frustrations so i share that specifically during corona i see we have friends who are joining who some i haven't seen in a while welcome back it's good to have you friends who are here every week people are going through a hard time they're going through a hard time some financially are in crisis in corona obviously businesses have been tremendously affected and impacted people's income has been affected but even those who have not materially been impacted are lonely or isolated we have loved ones who are suffering loved ones and declined mentally and physically we're struggling with relationships with children with loneliness with infertility there's all kinds of struggles so you can channel that into feeling frustrated with god and then angry at yourself for feeling it or you can be frustrated and use that to grow your amunah so that every day say god here are a hundred things i'm so grateful for but i gotta tell you what i'm frustrated what i wish you would do differently i gotta isn't that what prayer really is isn't fila hashem here's my protest what it what is refa'enu in the amidah what is the paragraph about healing if not a protest that one is sick i'm protesting it this one is struggling i'm protesting it make them better now you're the god of god you're the king of kings you're the omnipotent infinite one in the end of the day i defer to you i submit to you i surrender to you but if you're asking my opinion here's how i would run things here's what i'm protesting here's what my suggestion box to you god here's what i would do differently so what is prayer if not a series of protests prayer is praise it's requests but at times protests meaning i'm protesting that they're sick i'm protested they're suffering i'm protesting they're struggling is that drive me further from god no it draws me closer to him to vacus to clinging to sticking to connecting to god because when i pour out my heart and my cry my eyes and i channel all my feelings of why is that person or why am i going through what i'm going through and i wish and wanted to be so different then i'm not driven further i'm driven closer it means you're not just a checklist you're not just someone in theory you don't exist in the abstract you're not a figment of my imagination or a fantasy you're real and how do you know if someone's real do you talk to them do you make time for them that's the greatest evidence it's the ultimate affirmation that they are real so incorporating that even into our ammuna exercise is not only legitimate it's not only okay it's important now i'm not telling you that if you're happy and grateful you should find things to protest about but again isn't that what prayer is i'm protesting coronavirus i'm protesting iran's ascent i'm protesting israel's enemies i'm protesting about the people i know who are sick hashem i'm protesting i'm asking you to do things differently i'm expressing my frustration and i want to get closer to you through that feeling not be further away so number one is amuna i can't cling to and i'm not going to have devices with someone who i don't know exists so how do i achieve if i speak a lot about god if i speak to god please god thank god if i invoke god like yosef azadek whatever struggles we have in life they are unlikely as bad as yosef 12 years languishing alone in prison struggling suffering 22 years apart from his father from his family falsely accused thrown in a pit left to die sold to slavery yosef had a rough life rough rough life but he was able to reflect on all of it and say this was the hand of god orchestrating and organizing it to bring me to where i am number one and number two to never stop invoking god please god thank god with god's help if god wills to invoke god's name at every turn with every possibility because the more i talk about god the more i will see him the more i will feel him the more i will stick to him the more i will rely on him the more i will attach myself and glue myself to him that was all number one number two we talked about was his bone in us that we have to make time to think so much noise you have to be able to make time to think to exist to be to break through breakthroughs don't happen in a crowded space breakthroughs don't happen in a noisy brain breakthrough happens when we think when we make time to be when we are able to be contemplative and reflective and thoughtful all words which are out of vogue and people don't make time for now but we turn the radio on and the phone is buzzing and beeping and vibrating and the tv is always playing and everything's always going do we ever just just take a deep breath disconnect turn everything on airplane mode and just be and just think because that's where breakthrough happens so you want to talk about clinging to god what about if you never think about god if you're always running running running and you have motion sickness instead of momentum and instead of being able to be mindful of that which matters we are simply playing defense and putting out fires to whatever's thrown our way our inbox becomes our to-do list then you'll never make time for god how could you cling to someone you ever make time for how can you feel intimate connection with someone who you never reflect about so number two was his bonus person has to be thoughtful reflective contemplative which brings us up to number three and that's where we start today when is the most propitious auspicious time to be able to cling to god when is the part in the day designated for you to stick to god so we spoke last shabbos the joshua this morning i mentioned the lavais palace the notion that we should be dominating the whole day and we talk about this all the time in this group you've heard me say it a thousand times every wednesday morning i in fact can't believe you're back i just keep saying the same thing every single week i'm saying it out loud to myself i'm shocked anybody's listening but i guess we all need to be reminded so i thank you from the bottom of my heart for being here so i've said it a million times davanni is not just from the sitter and david is not just in shul boy have we learned that these last eight nine months it's not just in shul from the sitter with the khasen domini's from our heart but david is with our own words so davin on the way into the boardroom and the operating room and the courtroom you dabble when you put the coogle in the oven you put the kid to sleep you dive in it when you are in the gym in the supermarket we dove in with every activity we do hashem let this be successful hashem let this stream work and the technology not break down let the words flow from my lips let the coogle rise and cook perfectly let my child fall asleep and get the growth and the rest that they need let the conversation go let the negotiation be successful let whatever it's it's a moment it's a millisecond of time it's just a spark of a thought to hashem that not only am i living in the here and now with whomever i'm negotiating with or whoever is the doctor or relying on ge and the oven making my kugel come out but with every single thing i do every single thing i do hashem i'm also invoking and thinking about you i'm thinking about you so darvaning we daven really all day long but specifically we daven in the morning the afternoon and the evening avraham avina taught us that we start our day with daphne the beginning of a new day optimism hope faith promise the sun has risen and with it we turn to god and say there's so much possibility in this day i'm turning to you minh is the middle of the day god i'm in the middle of my day with chaos and hustle and bustle and busyness and yet i'm making time and finding time to connect to you a little bit for connection a quick connection because as the winds have set me off course i need to drop that anchor called minha and i need to reconnect to you and remind myself of what matters in fact it's called mench and hebrew means a gift because it's the gift i give it's the gift i'm giving you god it's the gesture it's the bid for connection even in the middle of a busy day and marv is at night yaakov taught us yaakov said at the end of a day now there's no longer any sun there's no longer any illumination or brightness there's no longer any path to know it's no longer filled with hope and possibility the day's over maybe it was squandered maybe it didn't go the way i had hoped maybe it was filled with a lot of hurt and pain and even under the cloak of darkness that god i can darven marav marav is the dhava the the faith even in darkness the faith even when it's hard to see where you are or why things are happening the way they are so cesaro victor meyer when is the time to work on to exercise to build our devecos muscle when we're davening in other words during this should come as a real surprise to you right during religious activities you should be thinking about god now why does venture miner have to say that while you're daving or you're learning torah or you're doing a mitzvah don't forget to think about god why does he have to say that he has to say that because sadly so sadly how many of us have lived lifestyles of doing mitzvos even darvening learning torah by rote by habit we're automated we're automated autumn we're just we're just going so we finished dominating we closed the sitter but we don't even remember one moment that we actually felt we were in the presence of the almighty that we were surrendering to him that we were pleading with him that we were grateful to him that we had a conversation with him so we walk out we've gone through the motions externally physically superficially we're putting check i learned the daffy me or i did my nakiomi or check i listened to that class it was playing in the background while i was doing something else check check next to davening check i sat in the sucker check i lit the candles check i put on the film check check check check check i'm a check jew not from the czech republic but i'm a czech jew that i'm a jew who lives off a checklist i'm a checklist jew check check check now i can go to the stuff i really want to do mahjong tennis golf can hit the buffet in netflix and check check check god took care of you to carry you i also have to take care of the kids so i did the laundry in the shopping and i cooked dinner i wasn't really thinking about the kids where i did any of that it was just check check check i have to do it so god you're like one of my kids you're just on my checklist you're just a burden and a responsibility i bear so check check check check check no no these religious activities are bids for connection they're not just check they're not just check check check they are hashem i thought about you i connected with you i interrupted my busy day to be able to make a connection with you we have become such creatures of habit and wrote we're just doing things out of pre-programming instead of being present instead of being mindful you know i i'd like to on my website the subtitle which probably means only something to me and nobody else but i put it there which captures every class i give every drush i give every article i write everything that i'm trying to live let alone communicate is towards a meaningful and mindful jewish life that's it that's it i think kids graduate 12 years of jewish education they know a whole lot of hamish and navi they've memorized some gemara they know what we call the adios clelios they know the the main principles but have they nurtured a relationship with god are they living a more meaningful and mindful jewish life will that carry them inform them and inspire them in their next chapter of life be it at college be in marriage be it in their profession of their choice that's what we're here for that's what all this is about it's a platform on the list of books that are unwritten in my head but one day i want to get to is that book towards a mindful and meaningful jewish life that shows that the entire system of jewish living from when we wake up in the morning and say mo da'ani till we say while we fall asleep and everything in between from the order we tie our shoes what goes in our mouth and out of our mouth keeping kosher keeping shabbos our awareness of time interpersonal relationships every aspect of jewish life and living is all a platform to promote a meaningful and mindful jewish life only we've begun to do it by habit and by nature and we forget to actually live it mindfully and meaningfully and we just live it check check check check check instead of being present and invested and engaged and transformed and informed and inspired by everything we're doing so number three of vegas you want to cling to god you want a relationship you want a connection with him then you got to invite him and involve him when you're doing the very activities that are supposed to be about him you have to do them as part of a longing and a yearning as part of an effort to be able to create a connection with hashem we're making a kesher you know i have a daughter in israel i have my marriage in israel but i have a daughter in her year in israel and she's my third who's gone to israel for the year all have gone to the same wonderful place so there's a language not only seminary girls yeshiva guys when you're in that stage of life when you're here in israel they'll talk about abba this teacher the girls though let's not blame the boys for this the girls abba this teacher he's amazing and i'm trying so hard to build a kesher with him he's so amazing he's amazing then they'll throw in some inappropriate not my daughter but they'll say he's the cutest i love him he's a mush he's amazing no they don't say that but they shouldn't say that but they don't say he's amazing that's what every rabbi and teacher in a seminary strives for is they don't want to be among the most influential jews or people's most beautiful people they want to be called amazing he's amazing and then that continues with and i'm trying to make a kesha with them what does that mean i'm trying to make a cashier a question means a connection so what does that mean you need their email address you want the cell phone number what's that what do you mean you're making a kesher a kesha means that i don't want to go through this year and just be a member of their class i want a connection i want them to know me i want them to know what makes me tick and i want access to them i want to go behind the scenes with them i want to understand them i want a relationship i want to be able to confide and rely and connect i want to kesha that's the feeling we should have hashem not only that he's amazing and he's awesome as in year of we have all of him and he's cute and adorable and a mush and all those things hashem is hashem is amazing i want to kesha with him i want to kesha with hashem because i want him to know me i want to know him i want to be able to confide and be vulnerable i want to connect i want to kesha with hashem how do you make that kesher well emunah his bonanus being contemplative and now tora tefila when you're doing here's a novel suggestion you ready when you're doing religious things think about god so when you're lighting the candles don't just be yelling at your kids and is everything ready and did you turn all the light off the fridge and like near shabbos and i lit and check check check but like take a couple deep breaths and disconnect from the weekday and think about hashem and dream of serenity and pray for your family and try to transform the atmosphere of the home to a place of peace and urine to connect to the shepherd as your best friend and now light the candles and say god you are the light of the world god you illuminate the world god i'm thinking about you when you're putting on that filling how many men have been putting on filling for decades and decades and decades and they're just two four six seven done strapped strapped around looked in the mirror between the eyes good to go but have you thought about what that's filling are i'm binding them to me and through that i'm binding me to you god i'm taking cowhide i'm taking an animal every part of the film is made of an animal from the cloth the parchment to the ink to the veins the sinews that are used to tie it to the leather straps it all comes from an animal so god i've taken the most bass lowly thing and animal that you created and i'm using it as a vehicle to connect to you we can transform the physical to be spiritual i'm tying this around myself i am binding myself to you god connecting to you i've got a solar dish on my arm and one on my head and i'm picking up the signal to connect to you how many people pause and think about that when putting to fill in on how many people even when learning torah at the end of learning the daf or the whatever the learning say how it is knowing that if one ox scores another ox who has to pay god how does that connect me to you how does knowing your blueprint for your world what you think is righteous and just for your world what you think should be the law that governs our world how does that connect me to you he imposed upon us i don't mean that in the negative pejorative way but he he provided us he gifted us a lifestyle from when we wake up till we fall asleep again beginning with how i tie my shoes in the morning and i wash my hands and i say god i have shoes to wear thank you i'm making mitza gover god i woke up i know it's in the sacrivena i have the ability to wake up in the morning and know it's day poke from god i can see just the mindfulness with the gift there are fifteen brothers go back to the beginning of sitter snippets and you could start listening and you'll think about bukha sasha totally differently ashiyatsa which we've talked about endlessly about going to the bathroom i have countless and endless opportunities during the day to think about and connect with you even within what we call the mundane secular activities making the kogo negotiating the deal going to the gym but specifically or certainly within the religious activities to think about god and that the religious activities were given to us why were they given to us god says be careful with what goes in your mouth and make abraham before and after and there are all kinds of rules about everything oh you're going shopping you can't buy clothing that has shatness you can't buy wool and linen mix together why because i want you to think about me while you're shopping i want you to think about me while you're at the mall i want you to be mindful and present and cognizant when you're choosing what to wear and what it says about you even then i want you to think about me i want you to think about me that's halacha that's judaism that's the platform a mindful and meaningful jewish life i've got to write this book one day so he continues with richard mayer and you know what's something that's very helpful that propels you to live this level of mindfulness throws in now a second obvious point and i say that not to denigrate him but i say that because it is obvious and yet we need to hear it that is how lowly and pathetic we are is that even that which is most obvious we most neglect and we forget and what is it so number one was don't forget to be religious during religious activity number one was don't forget to think about and connect to and bind yourself to god while you're doing something god asked you to do number one number two is try not to be doing anything else while you're doing it try to really be there hey yay shum one of my favorite divrei torah one of my favorites is when god calls motion on top of the mountain to give him the torah he says ascend the mountain be there what do you mean be there if he climbed the mountain where else is he and several say what god was telling moshe is i know at the base of the mountain you've got two million people they're emailing and texting and calling and what's apping you i know you have so many noble and important things that you need to be doing but you know what when you climb the mountain hey shum be there be with me don't be distracted couples go out to dinner and you see them on other sides of the table and each one of them is looking down and their thumbs are moving and you know what their diary is going to say you know what their outlook calendar their google calendar is going to say we had dinner tuesday night but they didn't you know they had dinner with their whole contact list you know who they had dinner with the whole whatsapp app that's who they had dinner with not the person sitting in the opposite side you go to the park and the mother the father are pushing the child in the swing but they're busy looking at the phone or talking on the phone or their mind is somewhere else and they think check spend time with the kid push him on the swing had the catch check but you didn't because if you weren't thinking about that child what they mean to you how much you love them and how connected you are to them then you weren't connected then you didn't connect with them then you weren't there to them i was pretty shy to sleep last night my little son so he's eight years old and probably every day for eight years i've said to him i can't believe you're here barak hashem we're beyond blessed from god we have six daughters and i was always grateful i never would have needed more and even if i never had a son god has been exceedingly kind and good to me so when we had the son that never expected and felt so blessed by it's a whole other story because we were actually told that it was a girl not a boy so i've said to him for eight straight years every day for eight years i cannot believe you're here so i was putting him to sleep last night and i said i cannot believe you're here and he asked me if when he gets married i'll walk him down the aisle i'll be telling him still then i can't believe you're here will i still be saying i can't believe you're here the point is i was putting to bed so you could lie in bed and be like check read a book to him or got him in bed or knocked him unconscious or packed in the melatonin and did what it took to get him out cold check now i can go on what i want to do now i can you know get into bed or turn on my ipad or draw my warm bath or go out and have my scotch and cigar check check check and now i turn to me or while you're putting your kid to bed be connected to your kid while you're out to dinner with your spouse there's nothing in the world but your spouse and while you're doing a mitzvah there's nothing but god you're never going to get to a level in a lifestyle of vegas if you mail in mitzvos if they are a burden and a checklist if you are not fully present if you're not mindful if it's not meaningful so it's hard it's hard and let me pause a moment to say that what i'm suggesting what which of my are suggesting is not easy it's not easy because there are thank god many mitzvahs a day many many mitzvahs a day the good news is they come in small bites they come in little increments so they're really little mini blitz moments of needing to concentrate little bids for connection so you make the ashiyata you make the baraka before the cup of coffee yeah dominant chakras stuff definitely takes a little bit longer but the few moments it takes to put on your filling the few moments to light the candles the few moments to do whatever mitzvah you're about to do if you're doing the mitzvah already then make it meaningful then be mindful because you want to get closer you want a connection you want a sense of intimacy you're not just mailing it in you're not just writing check she called mila sha'a masala made every word that you darwin and learn every word of davaning and every word of learning and every moment of listening to learning and participating is an ability to draw closer and closer and closer actually and the goal is to live a life where you see the light you see the light now again i don't want to scare anybody that like doesn't sound like a jewish thing do you see the light join me and see the light but oral key is a jewish concept god is a light and when you see the light so you don't see a cup of coffee you see god and you don't see a flower or a plant or a vista you see god and you don't see a beach or an ocean you see god and when you see a child or we see another person you see a survivor you don't see a human being you see god and when you see a car that can drive by itself you don't see a car you see god and when you see everything you see god the light the oral key to live with that level of mindfulness he's everywhere and i feel so connected and i just want to draw close that is the mission that is the goal that is the goal but the closer you cling to torah the closer you're clinging to god you know why because that is his diary somebody a dear friend of mine actually texted me a couple days ago his father died very young he was a kid in high school but he's moving and he was going through some things and he found a couple birthday cards that his father had written him and he couldn't stop cry this is a person who doesn't cry but he couldn't stop crying why he didn't bring his father back to life his father wasn't resurrected from the dead he misses his father terribly but you know what when he acts as something his father wrote when he accessed his father's card if you access your parent or your grandparents diary their artwork their gift then you've connected to them when you connect to their penmanship i don't know how we're gonna do this in the future we're gonna like go through the email archive to connect to something our parent typed you know it's a whole other world remember when there were correspondence that's why it's still important to write cards and to keep them in a shoe box and for the next generation to know that my parents wrote love letters to one another they loved each other they loved each other enough to write it out instead of typing it they loved each other enough to make it personal but anyway so he looked at this card and he felt so connected he he was with his father's father did come back to life by connecting to his father's penmanship and what he wrote what he underlined in the card and what he conveyed so similarly lahav deal when we study hashem's torah we're studying his card to us we're studying his penmanship we're studying his words we're studying his thoughts we're studying what he wanted to communicate and that creates a connection so the devacus clinging and connecting to his torah is clinging and connecting to him it's the same thing hashem's light is found most it's found in the grand canyon swiss alps it's found in the golan and the galil it's found on the harabayas hashem's light is found in all these places but you know where it's found brightest it burns brightest in his torah we study his torah we see the nuance and we decipher and we offer our own suggestion and we're blown away and we're moved by an idea we're inspired and we're elevated and we're enriched we have accessed the light of torah it's shining now down on us so the more that we learn that we daven and we do so without interruption and without distraction without noise with with a sense of diligence be ian with real depth and analysis and investigation with real curiosity and inquisitiveness with a real effort to cling to it we will deepen our reality our being a spiritual person you cannot be an ignoramus and be spiritual you can't at the root of the word spiritual spirit you have to have a spirit you have to be alive you have to be vibrant you have to be dynamic you have to be awake you have to be knowledgeable you have to study who is god and what matters to him and what is his vision of blueprint for the world and what is his expectation of me and absent all of that how could i how could i have a relationship with you you don't see a picture of someone in a magazine and you're like i love them i feel connected to them you know you lust for them maybe you don't love them you don't feel connected to them because you know nothing about them if you read a profile on them and you say wow now i know what makes them tick and boy would i love to be connected i want to kesha with them because they're amazing because i i've come to learn a little bit about them then maybe but the more you learn the more you know the more drawn you'll be the more you'll want to connect the more you want the kesha so you can't create a kesher you can't be davak you can't cling to god without trying to grow in knowing about him so what are you learning come to the ammunition great what else are you learning how else are you challenging yourself what are the book are you studying the parsha or are you relying on your kindergarten teacher who told you the partial stories but you haven't updated or become more sophisticated in your understanding of the parasha since then do you mumble the words of the sinner so you can put a check and close or do you study the words shameless plug for sitter snippets but if not that then something else that says i'm going to study and understand and comprehend what i'm saying because if i'm already making the time and already making the effort to say it it might as well make me feeling closer it might as well let me feel i'm communicating with another with someone else so which amir is saying what's was on the one hand fairly obvious but on the other we so desperately need to be reminded and told over and over and over again which is when you're doing religious activities be religious think about god don't be distracted don't have noise don't do other things be present recalibrate focus take a few deep breaths the neshama the nishima and reconnect hashem i'm about to light candles let me just take a moment and let me get into where i need to be because i'm lighting the shabbos candles you know you don't just want to light shabbos candles you want the shabbos candles to light up your house so the difference between lighting candles and the candles lighting up your house is you is you if you just light the candles check don now i can hit the couch with my magazine till shul's over until dominick's ended done got that out of the way then your house can remain a dark place then your soul will remain a dark soul but if you take a few moments and take a few breaths and you think about god my week that was my hope for this shabbos and the week that will be and the people who live in my home or have graduated my home but they're on my mind and god my relationship with you the source of all light please you god the source of all light illuminate my eyes and illuminate my world and illuminate this home in this family wow what a different candle lighting that is on a friday night that's true for every mitzvah it's true for every mitzvah that we do it's our mission it's our mandate towards a mindful and meaningful jewish life we'll be on bookshelves near you sometime i hope in this century if i can find the courage and the wisdom and the time and and worthiness to be able to put it together but to me it's missing it's missing from our education children and adults we have such an emphasis on the minutia and the details all which are really important but because they are a platform and it's so different i'll end by telling you this it's so different for example from from something like taking medicine so the doctor says you have this illness you've been diagnosed with this problem great take 3000 milligrams of this a day 200 milligrams of that a day so when you're swallowing the pills do you need to think about the doctor now when you're swallowing the pills do you need to think about the biotech or pharmaceutical company that invented it no when you're swallowing the pills do you need to think about the ingredients and the pills and be mindful and meaningful what the pills are doing for you no just take the pills because you got a problem pills are gonna make you better and maybe you're curious you'll be a more informed person if you learn a little bit about the chemistry behind the pills but you don't need to in order for the pills to take their effect on you but that is so different than mitzvos spiritual medicine spiritual nutrition and nourishment to the degree to which we're mindful and it's meaningful we're transformed and so if not me somebody's got to put this message out there that the reason we're engaging in all of this is not to restrict our lives it's not to give up or sacrifice in our lives but it's in fact to propel and promote the most meaningful and mindful lives something all of us crave because that's the greatest joy and satisfaction we're capable of more than the things and the possessions and even the experiences is the meaning the meaning that we are all looking for the meaning that we all want to find so until next time have a meaningful and mindful jewish life stay happy stay healthy stay holy see you tonight nine o'clock going behind the bema with jay feinberg ceo and founder of gift of life who has saved countless lives he is an exceedingly humble person who has an extraordinary story very excited to go behind the beam with him tonight 9 p.m have a phenomenal phenomenal day