Turning Down the Job of a Lifetime | Rabbi Yonah Carlebach

When I was much younger, I was working in real estate for a big real estate company. However, I was in a position where my family was growing and I needed to increase my income. So I was looking through the Classifieds. At that time, if you looked for a job, you went to the Classifieds in the New York Times. I see a big ad from the Trump Organization looking for a property manager, which fit exactly what I was doing. So I called up and they gave me an appointment, and I was meeting with one of the lower level managers to see if I would, you know, fit their bill. As it goes in big corporations, you have to always meet, like, many, many different managers, and to see if anyone’ll find fault in you or if they all have to approve you. The day came, they said, Okay, we're going to set you up for an appointment with Mr. Trump. Mr. Trump was Mr. Fred Trump, who's Donald Trump's father. And he was an older man at that point. He was owning many, many, many properties in Brooklyn and in Queens. One of the big properties he had was on right off the Belt Parkway. It was a huge thing. I think it was called Trump Village. And there sits Mr. Fred Trump, surrounded by all his workers and managers and advisors, and he says: I like everything about you. We're ready to hire you. And just so you should know, that this lady, Caroline, is going to be your immediate supervisor, and she's going to be the one you're going to work with on a day-to-day basis, in close contact, in close quarters and so forth. Feeling very uncomfortable, so I went to my Rosh Yeshiva, R’ Shmuel Berenbaum zt”l. And I went over to him, I was going to ask him the question, how appropriate is it if I have to work closely with this woman from the Trump Organization? He says, וואס זאגט איהר? וואס פרעגט איהר? What are you asking me? So I asked him again the question, and he did the same thing, Like, what are you asking? And then he did it a third time. And I was very uncomfortable asking him. And then I understood, by him not answering me, I understood it wasn't even a question. Like, what are you asking? So I called back the Trump Organization. I said: I'm sorry to say, but this job is not for me. And that basically closed the door on that. It was very, very difficult to do that, because they were offering a lot of money and very prestigious to work for the Trump Organization, but למעשה, Baruch Hashem, I didn't take it, and afterwards, everything worked out much better. Ribono shel Olam is always paying back Nisyonos many, many times over. The lesson that can be learned from this is that anytime you come across any Nisayon, any crossroads, you should always think back to a person's Rebbe, What would his Rebbe want him to do? Which that obviously would be the Ratzon Hashem. And that's where R’ Shmuel was, he always did Ratzon Hashem, and we should try to emulate that same way.