The Measure of Greatness | Mr. Charlie Harary

One of the greatest blocks to growth is our understanding of greatness. We misunderstand what greatness is. We all want to be great. We all want to be accomplished. We all want full lives that we're proud of. But we don't know how to get there. And so that lack of understanding prevents us from even trying. What is the measure of greatness? So I saw a great idea in a Sefer called Olam HaMiddos, from R’ Moshe Don Kestenbaum, and here's what he says. Sefer Shemos opens up by introducing us to two incredible women. The pasuk says, that the King of Egypt spoke to the midwives, They were called, their names were Shifra and Puah. Who were these people? So the Mefarshim say that they were Yocheved and Miriam, two of the greatest women of the generation. Yocheved was Amram’s wife, the wife of the Gadol HaDor, the mother of Moshe. Miriam brought back her mother and father, reset the Jewish people, led the women out of Mitzrayim. The two of them lived incredible lives, filled probably to the gills of Chesed and Chizuk. They probably have a litany of activities that Hashem could choose every second to call them by, to nickname them by, to refer to them by, but He doesn't. He calls them Shifra and Puah. Why? Because Yocheved would משפרת, she would physically beautify the children. When the babies were born, she would fix them up a little bit, brush their hair, clean them off, wrap them in that little swaddle, give them back to the mom. And what would Miriam do? She would coo at them. The babies were crying, she would go: Goo-goo-ga-ga. But, like, that's what Hashem chose? Really? Fixing the hair and the Goo-goo-ga-ga? Like, out of everything? So R’ Kestenbaum says something so brilliant. He says like this. We make a mistake. We think that the measure of greatness is based on the measure of the greatness of the deeds, because when we see people that are great, we are reminded and we learn of these incredible stories. Stories of incredible scholarship, stories of leading people. And we look up and go, Well, that's never going to be me. There's a ייאוש that we feel, there's a giving-upness that we know that I'm never going to ever amount to that. Now great things are great, but that's not how we measure them. HaKadosh Baruch Hu looks at two women and says: Trust me, there are few people to ever walk the face of this earth, who are as great as you, but let me tell you how I'm nicknaming you. Not on the big things you do. On the small things you do. You see, because the measure of greatness is measured by small things, by how you speak to your spouse when no one's home, by whether you spend time with your children, by how you daven when no one's looking, by Brachos, by whether or not you succumb to a תאוה when there's nobody around. Every day, me and you have the opportunity to do lots of little things. That's where our גדלות is set, by how we act when no one's looking, by how we act when no one's going to pat us on the back. There's no dinners, no honors, no stories. Just us and Hashem and a small little deed. And the more we do those right, and own those, the greater we truly are.