Ten Minutes of Meaning (Part 108): Stop Thinking and Start Doing - Mesillas Yesharim

good morning good morning and beaucare tove to all welcome back to 10 minutes of meaning hold on just trying to get my recorder here to work there we go okay booker's up good morning to all welcome back to 10 minutes of meaning every wednesday morning we spend 10 minutes tapping into the mesilas asharam the great ramchair of ludsato gave us a framework of vocabulary a formula for how to live the best version of ourselves what are the character traits what are the uh what are the behaviors and lifestyle that we need to acquire in order to be our best selves we've studied the heroes mindfulness cautiousness vigilance how to be present and every thought and every deed and every speech we then move to zurich's alacrity zeal enthusiasm and now we've learned the kias how to purge from ourselves the type of distractions and temptations which sabotage our success which undermine our happiness i want to thank our generous sponsors connie and lenny grunstein in memory of hani's father mr aaron tambor ben yitzchak thank you to your generosity and a special thank you to today's particular sponsors susie and lenny presby and under the year side of lennie's father david ben khan since in honor of his 11th grade gamora sharon ida crown jewish academy who apparently are fans of the 10 minutes of meeting shir thank you so much turbo stromer thank you to the tal medium the students of that class what a great honor and a privilege okay we are finishing up the 11th chapter of messily and then again has been defining for us this quality of nikhias how can we purge from ourselves those temptations and those distractions how can we be present and vigilant how can we be thoughtful and mindful how could at the end of the day we say what a great day i said the things that were correct to say i made the right choices i was present in everything that i did niki is purging from ourselves moving over from the battleground to the conquered territory conquered territory still needs to be protected and guarded but it's no longer a daily battle and grind and we're trying to get ourselves in a place where we're no longer grinding and battling daily not to use profanity and not to eat the wrong things in an unhealthy way and not to gossip and not to slander and not to get angry and not to feel arrogant and all the qualities that um has gone through and the last one he's left off with we've been analyzing is honor is envy not to pursue honor and to be envious of others who seem to have more than we do rabbis are rabbis who have instructed and guided us continuously in the way of truth umru the rabbi's teaching pierce and ethics of our fathers love the work and hate the rabbinate now you may be wondering that's a message from me what in the world does that have to do with you hate uh love work and hate the rabbinate what it means here the rabbit is it doesn't mean the work of the rabbit the work of the rabbit i hope is very holy it's very sacred it's very meaningful i hope impactful it means any honor that comes with it any difference that people show you and rabbi's full prey you know very often rabbis meet with people and they say rap i thank you so much for your time your time is so valuable i always say my or our time is no more valuable than yours and this is what i meant to and want to be doing but the more people hear that the more that they can they can believe what's being said and so rabbanus hate the part of any authority any position of leadership it doesn't have to be a rabbi it could be the president of the school the shul it could be any position of authority or distinction which normally gets honor us hate that aspect of it love the component of it of the work to do take the work seriously don't take yourself too seriously odin our rabbis person should flay a carcass in the markets and don't market place and don't say i'm important i'm too important i'm a cohen it's beneath me nothing should be beneath us you're walking on the shore campus in the street you see garbage pick it up throw it out love the work what do you think it's beneath you you'd be too dignified it's beneath your honor that you're due the od and the rabbi saying baba basil always take on work even if it's unfamiliar to you and don't be dependent on the help of others there are people who are way too proud and they they maintain their honor and their ego and therefore they're unwilling to take a job which pays them less i deserve half a million dollars a year do you know who i am do you know where i went to school do you know the position i used to hold and now they therefore rely on the community and they're taking stukka and handouts and the rabbis say you need to get past your own ego it's not easy and i don't mean to minimize with great sensitivity and heart for those people who are struggling however and rather than enable or entitle others the goal is for a person to set aside the ego and to be able to do work never ever thinking something is beneath me it's too little i shouldn't be doing it here's the principle of the matter of honor honor is among the greatest obstacles that face man and we've seen that in our generation and in our lifetime honor on steroids because of social media where people want followers and people want tweets and people want posts and people want a spotlight and people want a bigger stage and because of that honor or the honor they get they think that they go viral they think that many people and they therefore have a very distorted sense of self-worth and we see that we see people who have tremendous notoriety feel empty inside because they may have a lot of honor externally but they have no pride they have no self-worth internally when it comes to who they are on the inside so this is the cloud this is the principle that honor what others say about us and what others think about us is none of our business it's none of our business we have to look in the mirror we have to carry ourselves with dignity we have to believe we're doing what's right we have to um be accountable to the almighty and to the most important people in our lives and what everyone else thinks about us it's none of our business and that's why honor is such a false measure honor is so fake and honor sabotages people's happiness and success when they have the honor and they're unhappy they numb themselves with all kinds of substances people in the pursuit of honor will sabotage the most important relationships with the people around them if you smart and how can we be a loyal servant how can we be of service to god to our spouse to our family if what matters most and we prioritize not them and not the well-being of our relationship and of being served service and our mission in this world but if we prioritize our own honor and our own glory and our own ego this is what our great leader david king david said it's a verse in samuel 2 that says that even if i became lesser than this and i became lowly in my own eyes that a person needs to realize that there's an almighty and he runs the show and we're here to serve him we work for him he doesn't work for us and therefore if there's a conflict in this world between what i want to do and what he wants me to do if there's a conflict of what's right to do i need to defer and i need to submit and i need to surrender to him it's about being marbek my life is dedicated our lives should be dedicated to increasing and promoting the honor of god of his kingdom of his place in all of our lives it's not about me it's not about us we're not the brand or the mission it's all about god it's all about his torah and its timeless teachings and if a person puts themselves too much then that conflict god says there's not enough room here for both of us you know what the true honor of a person is the true honor of a person is not measured by how many friends or followers how many likes how many people uh tapped into or watched the video or listened to the sheer that's not it yadia satora the emes it's our knowledge of torah it's our awareness of torah it's our living torah it's our embodiment of torah but rabbi says there is no honor other than torah as the verse initially says the wise inherit honor people are honored for their wisdom they're honored for their virtue they're honored for their character and those who pursue honor honor runs away from them and those who run away from honor honor runs after them so the only true authentic honor is the honor of virtue a value of character and of torah of wisdom and the one who's clean it's worth his while to cleanse and purify himself from the desire for honor and then we will succeed so again this chapter this meda this third quality in our formula the 12 steps towards self-perfection of the based on the talmud this third step of nikias is saying cleanse ourselves from honor the more that honor doesn't become part of the calculation honor is never part of the calculus or matrix honor is never part of what informs the decision i make i do what's right because of right and i try it's hard nikias is hard to purge for myself that that honor component and to make decisions that are right to make not the one that will bearing the greatest spotlight or the greatest glory but the thing that will bring the greatest glory to the almighty and help me fulfill the reason that i'm here if you want success in life in a relationship professionally personally in your community then it's never about the honor it's never about the ego it's about it's about the cause you know in good to great jim collins wonderful book about leadership the fifth level leadership the high level leadership is the person the leader the man or woman the ceo who makes it not about them but makes it about the company or the mission or the cause they're not the face it's not about them it's about the institution the organization it's about the cause and therefore in succession planning they're not worried about their legacy but the legacy of the mission of the cause and so as yet if we want success professionally personally religiously in any area of life then we need to learn to surrender our ego that it's all about god and it's all about the mission it's not about us and up to this point we've included many of the particulars of the virtue of cleanliness i just want to finish this chapter and we'll pick up the new chapter next week very exciting and a person shouldn't argue you know it takes tremendous effort to get to this level to purge even the temptation towards profanity or eating the wrong thing or anger or envy or any of these qualities says he testifies to us hundreds of years ago it's not as hard as it seems get started begin the journey and you'll realize that while it is a tall task it's not easy it's not impossible but thinking about it stewing in it marinating in it perseverating in it it's much harder it's much more difficult than actually doing it so how many diets have you thought about starting how many diets how many exercise regimens how many things have we thought about and we think about and it totally consumes us and distracts us just do it already start eating right start managing your time start conquering your anger start surrendering your ego stop thinking about it reading books about it and going to seminars about it and subscribing to newsletters about it and being in whatsapp groups about it all of them are wonderful as support but you got to just do it that question that i might start thinking about it and being consumed by it is much harder than just doing it as hard as doing it is kikashyase once a person decides on the goal and resolutely determines to possess the virtue leos mibaly amid set a goal don't just have a wish i want to wake up tomorrow humble i want to wake up tomorrow thin i want to wake up tomorrow smart i want to wake up tomorrow calm you can't just have a wish you got to have a goal and make a resolution how am i going to achieve it what's the path and how will i measure my way and how will i pause to celebrate the incremental successes that i achieve all he needs is to form the right habits and we'll regain it much less effort than we imagined and this is something that true hani sayon our experience will prove it so we are creatures of habit so much of our day is pre-programmed by the habits we have formed are we punctual are we on time can we maintain our cool or do we flip our lid all these are habits that we form so it says it's not easy changing a habit but stay true to it 30 days 40 days research disagrees however long it takes do it until you form the habit and then it no longer takes that level of mindfulness or effort it's simply part of the repertoire of who you are and once it's part of the repertoire of who you are eating right and speaking right and thinking right and getting enough sleep and being humble then you will see at least you'll see success in every area of life until next time stay happy stay healthy stay holy we continue 8 45 with living with amuna and tonight we're going behind the beam at 9pm with eli peli who is the founder and owner of magazine and the founder of the kharadi institute of public affairs the only charity think tank in israel it'll be a fascinating discussion with insight into that community looking forward see you all in a few minutes