Ten Minutes of Meaning (Part 110): Diligence and Focus - Mesillas Yesharim

good morning booker toes to everyone welcome back to our weekly 10 minutes of meaning so grateful that you've joined us as we try to work on ourselves try to perfect ourselves and prove ourselves and try to reach our potential using the formula of revolution of the great ram khal the author of the music the path of the just the path to perfection the path to self-actualization i want to thank our generous sponsors who sponsored this series for the year our dear friends lenny and connie grunstein in memory of hani's father mr aaron tambour arun ben yitzhak thank you so much for your generosity and for your sponsorship okay we have been studying and we're going through piece by piece this formula towards perfecting ourselves to bettering ourselves we started with the heroes how to live a life of mindfulness and caution how to be present in all that we do how to be thoughtful and mindful and conscientious not just say whatever comes to mind not just act on impulse and instinct but to be present and to be mindful to lead a more calculated life a more thoughtful life which doesn't mean having no spontaneity it doesn't mean having no excitement or enthusiasm it simply means being in control of our thoughts our speech and our action and once we have improved let alone master that we move over to this reasons resources is acting with alacrity zrez is a zeal jesus is unleashing our passion setting goals and making resolutions to achieve them and then we moved over to the media of nikhias nikhias has been a long long journey in which the ramkhan has described all the character traits all the impulses and instincts that we should try to get rid of move from the daily grind the daily battle to the conquered territory to look at unhealthy food and have no appetite for it to think about using profanity and have no desire to express ourselves that way to swell with anger but not allow it to be actualized and to never get angry or envious and he's gone through them one by one which brings us up to the chapter parakeet based chapter 12 what we're up to which has been talking about how do you acquire the media of nikhias how does one grow in that need in that character trait of purging from ourselves the bad attitude the bed behavior and he said the number one thing is what we spoke about last week the number one thing is that a person needs to review over and over and over and over again you can never let up you have to constantly be reviewing reading listening thinking put magnets put bumper stickers put post-it notes put things all over that remind us about who we want to be because the most important things and often the most simple things we take for granted we dismiss and we forget and we need to rather review over and over and over again what he called the hasmada a person has to be diligent and over and over in order to penetrate in order to break through we all know we're supposed to eat right we all know we're supposed to be calm and never lose our cool we all know these things and yet in that moment in the moment they overcome us we forget and therefore what's critical and what's key is to review over and over and over again by studying these words and these words a person is made aware of what we did not know and we will reflect and even what you don't find in the books themselves so you have an article you have a book certainly you're learning sephirah kodish you're learning our sacred words of our torah are very prescient words of our rabbis even what doesn't appear in the ink even what doesn't appear in the lines because you will have been awakened because the person will be thinking about that how often do you read a book and you close it for a second it stimulates thought you listen to a podcast you listen to a share you attend the conference or convention you have a stimulating conversation and later you find yourself thinking about it and the goal here is to be thinking about these things to paint a picture in my mind of who i could be i could be that calm i could be that happy with what i have i could be that individual who's in control over my desires my temptations my instincts i could be the ambitious person who sets goals and pursues them i can be that person who lives that way i could be that husband or that wife that mother that father i could be that ever hashem what will stimulate that thinking what will draw that picture what will set that goal and make us pursue it talking about it being part of it and i'll never forget for me my two years in yeshiva and israel attended karen biavna was certainly the growth happened by the conversations in the basement the messages that we learned the rebellion that we had the ground that we covered but in the dorm room the conversation with the guys late at night exploring life what's it really all about and who do we want to be what kind of shabbos table do we want to have what kind of life do we want to look like is there really a god what does he expect from us it was those conversations that really in my case at least transformed me and left an indelible impression on me and so this forum the words themselves be it obviously first and foremost primarily the words of our learning our secrets forum but also even if you're reading business books or productivity books or self-help books it's the words on the page that matter but it's the it's what comes out from between the lines it's what's in the margins it's what it stimulates to think to have a conversation with your spouse with your friend with someone that you trust a confidant and to think about these things a person's mind is around you're going to continue to think you're going to be stimulated and it's provoked and all the you'll reduce new understandings from the wellspring of truth so what it comes down to is if we want to advance we want to grow and we want to move forward in this formula of self-perfection of self-realization of being the best version of ourselves what it begins with and what it comes down to is thinking about these topics being present being mindful being aware not avoiding them and not dismissing them and not being too tired for them but let's talk about what life would look like if i x y or z what does the best version of me look like and now reverse engineering how do i get there how do i go to sleep at night where i didn't raise my voice i didn't lose my cool i didn't get angry i never felt envy i checked off the things on my list because my time management and my self-discipline i ate the way i was happy i kept my schedule the way i wanted to i followed up on the things i promised to i was punctual with everything i meant to how do i go to sleep at night where i achieve all those things i use the kind of language i want to i set aside time for total learning my dominant was meaningful and transformative how do i go to sleep at night check check check check check a big smile i lived the life i wanted to and i was meant to today how do we get there how do we reverse engineer that and the answer is it's very interesting we're going to finish this peric the whole parakeet base is tiny so the description of what of what nikias is of how to live that life of cleanliness where we purge the temptation it was a long long long discussion but the chapter that talks about how you acquire it's very short because essentially it's reduced to you know how you acquire it think about it read about it be focused on it that's how you're going to acquire it whatever you're focused on is what excites you and what are the things that are going to deter you what are the factors that undermine our ability to achieve that to move these areas that we can all agree are categorically bad no one's going to defend unhealthy eating unhealthy living unhealthy speaking unhealthy emotion unhealthy dysfunctional relationships so how can we move forward in advancing how can we move it from as we talk about the battleground to the conquered area the conquered territory so you have to know also not only what you need to do which is read learn think talk and and and be stimulated by it but you need to know the mafi what are the things that are going to deter us what are the obstacles that are going to knock us off course what's going to try to cause us to not focus and what are they him um so they are the very same things that we studied about long ago what were the impediments and what undermines acquiring the media of zahirus of mindfulness it's the very same thing and what it is is when we allow our lives and our heads to be filled with too much noise too connected to social media too connected to pop culture too connected with keeping up with the schwartz's too connected to if our mind is too clogged if there's too much noise if we're too divided and fragmented in so many directions then you can't focus on anything in the great words of greg mckee and the author of essentialism instead of gaining momentum you'll get motion sickness too many of us have motion sickness we're moving in a million different directions instead of gaining momentum in one so the mafi day that which takes us away from this character trait of the kias is when we're fragmented and divided is when there's noise that's constantly coming in and clogging when we have no space or margin to think a person as an ignoramus can't be righteous so another thing that one needs to do is is to gain knowledge is to be educated and informed it's to be sophisticated and advanced if you're going to remain an ignoramus then you're never going to be ambitious you're going to remain ignorant then you're never going to be righteous if you don't know then you can't do so if you don't know if you don't think strategically if you don't have the capacity for critical thinking if you don't understand not only what you need to do to get where you want to go but to be able to predict what obstacles will be in your way trying to block you from getting there then you'll never achieve anything but if you understand what the obstacles are and if you can set the goals and chart the path how to get there then you're going to be so much happier and fulfilled you're going to find meaning ef whoever doesn't know cannot achieve in the gemara's conclusion mem talmud god the learning is greater chaneville des mais de gemar there is debate what's greater learning or doing which is greater which is more important learning or doing and the gemara's conclusion is you know which is greater learning because it brings you to do you see what they did there which is greater learning you're doing learning because it brings you to but really which is the greatest is doing all of it is to get us to do not to hide in some ivory tower but to take all that learning and to execute so if you're going to go execute if you're going to go to work you're going to go to the gym you're going to go to life you're going to be in jewish community leadership you're going to have friendships if you're going to exist then you need to be informed you need to be knowledgeable you need to learn what are the deen and what are the jewish laws that dictate and regulate how we're meant to behave but more than that you need to understand psychology and you need to understand sociology and you need to understand biology and you need to understand the ways of the world the workings of the world to inform who we are and how we want to be so with that we conclude the third character trait of nichias the next week please god will begin the fourth precious how to live a life of not asceticism but you can't have anything unless you can learn to live without it you could have it but it can't define you first you have to learn to live without and now you've earned now you can afford to live with if you can't live without i need that dress i need that jewelry i need that watch i need that car i need that house i need need i can't live without it i'm unhappy i can't find happiness without it then you can't have it you can only have it once you've proven to yourself that you could live without the medications we'll continue with it next week until then stay happy stay healthy stay holy 845 and continue living with emunah tonight we go behind the bema with the great mayor kay 350 million views on his youtube videos he's a bowl of energy positivity it will wake you up even at nine o'clock tonight you don't want to miss it have a phenomenal day everybody