(Way#18) HARNESSING THE POWER OF PHYSICAL PLEASURE: 48 Ways with Rabbi Aaron Dovid Poston

[Music] hey good day everybody welcome back to another episode of beyond the seven live from jerusalem with rabbi aaron david poston who's been teaching us the 48 ways to wisdom and today we got part 18 and uh i encourage everybody go back scroll through check every every one of these episodes out you cannot uh go wrong with learning ways to wisdom and each week has got a new angle and uh who else better to hear from than a rabbi in jerusalem so let's just jump right in rabbi poston good to be with you i know you stamped so late and we appreciate it and i am enjoying your class thank you dan and thank you for all those who are joining us now and later and yeah it was a great hug and we talked about that last week i believe and um so now we're number 18 of the 40 ways to wisdom we are in the middle of the counting of the omer the spherota omer and i mentioned um this idea in percy avoid chapter six mishna six and these 48 ways to wisdom is like a reenactment to a certain extent i mean we've incorporated into our lives the travails you know the the aliyah so to speak the the ascension towards the great revelation you have to become a vessel you have to become a cli a vessel and therefore it takes character development or instructions for living let's say that's not uh famous words by the way the book this series is based on the book the 48 ways to wisdom which again i mentioned is primarily uh in the perky vote um so i suggest like you did you know for people who are just watching this for the first time to go back at least see the first one and then choose i would say choose every one but choose whatever title uh gets your goats so to speak um just to tell you the title it's called always means to diminish is pleasure now just like to preface this idea it does not mean to diminish it entirely it means to diminish it somewhat and why would that be a way to acquiring wisdom so that's what we're going to talk about tonight now just to for those that are familiar that in the month of of which is the month in which the temple the first temple the second temple was destroyed and the night of unfortunately right now is a fast day it's a day of mourning in fact the nine days leading up from what we call rosh chodesh the beginning of the month including the nine the ninth of are let's say days of mourning or diminishing in fact there's a famous jewish expression right and when the month of enters we diminish our diminished joy which automatically means you should try to understand the the nuances of the words the wisdom of the words is that one really has an obligation and when i say an obligation we're talking about from a jewish perspective so hopefully those are listening here are interested in jewish wisdom and the bottom line is we're obligated to have joy right because if you're diminishing your joy just during the month of of there's a understanding between the words that you're obligated one should have joy throughout the year just during this month you diminish your joy so here too when it says diminishing pleasure man is created as a pleasure seeker i mean come on we you know we were all kids once so we know you know and hopefully we didn't lose that uh desire for pleasures in life for things of quality right vacation and comfort to a certain extent the question is what are we going to do with it so in other words we're going to discuss the jewish way is going to be the middle road as opposed to the hedonistic way right drink eat forever you know because tomorrow you're going to die right that's like just indulge in pleasures right and then you could take and i think we discussed this idea before we don't like bashing uh other religions too much we do get some enjoyment out of it but right and i think i'll just say the catholic church for example and wants to diminish certain uh pleasures that's you know we talked about this last week asceticism yeah sexual right so asceticism we don't believe you should go up on a mountaintop and just meditate and become a monk um it's about elevating this world we're using what is in this world for holy purposes so in order to gain wisdom we're going to discuss hopefully towards the end more of the source material but we'll get into the psychology and the philosophy behind it in the beginning okay so we like i mentioned all this is why we were created we actually created with so many senses right for pleasure god did not create us uh it's not a mistake it's not a mistake that he created us with these desires for this uh for this comfort comfort so we we obviously take uh um a great amount of investment in physical pleasures i mean people spend all kinds of money you know for for nice cars and nice clothes and you know i mean why not you sleep in your bed one third of your life you might as well get a whatever we'll have a very comfortable bed um so whatever we're doing in life hot a hot apple pie a good ice cream right a sparkling pool and a on a hot summer's day right i mean come on this is all it will it will stimulate our five senses this is what we are this is what we we involve ourselves with so just keep in mind if we're created for pleasure the question is how to control it how to not not control it i'm going to actually say maximize it in other words if you're just over indulged with pleasures you're probably not even enjoying it right the example will give you a case think about hot popcorn with butter okay that's just one example or a bag of chips for for some people it's ice cream whatever it is yeah do you really enjoy it right maybe the first scoop or the first how many pieces of popcorn are in that big box that you buy at the what do you call it the the movie theater right i don't know let's just take let's say i don't know a few hundred how many of those hundred how many of those popcorns did you really enjoy before you know it it's just going down your throat you're not even chewing it anymore shoveling it yeah shutting it down right so what we're gonna the roshiva taught us to be a connoisseur she's kind of sore are you thinking about when you have a glass of wine is it just drinking the wine to get drunk or is it you know to look at the color and then to sniff i mean some people they say i honestly don't know but i i would sniff a cigar okay but let's say you you know what you're doing when you're sniffing the cork okay so then you put it in the cup and you're looking at the i get the bouquet i don't know that's the word but you're you're looking at it swash around you're looking at the thickness of it the fullness of the body of it right and so then you're you know besides the color and the consistency so you may put something in your mouth but you don't swallow it i don't know what they do first right there's something that's awakening some uh the taste buds squish it yeah so this is right you look watching somebody who's a professional wine taster right this is how we should learn we should let me just tell you the title again harnessing the power of physical pleasure that's the title so it's when we say minimizing it we're minimizing to the point that it's not um we're not over indulging and we're not letting it pass us by but we're going to learn to be a connoisseur that's going to be harnessing the power of the physical pleasure and that's what god wants us to do okay now i mentioned already there's different schools of thoughts and just this is how i'm just going in the order of the book here so number one we mentioned that um um yeah this would be the christian view right the pleasures are a concession to our base desires and should be ideally ideally be shunned so that's not the jewish way on the other hand we took the hedonistic view that and that is overindulgent the question is what does the torah have to say and i already mentioned it's the middle road right so yes god did create us physically we are a physical being we also have a soul the soul is riding the body right who are you really you're really a soul and you're using your body right let's take for example a car right if you own the car anybody here owns the on the car i mean when you have a rental car you don't really care how you return it how clean it is but if you own a car you know i don't know if it's um you know i think in canada especially assault on the roads and maybe they build them to withstand assault damage but basically you need to have the car washed even the underbelly sometimes and um otherwise it's gonna rot away right and the inside of the car i mean i don't know if you're embarrassed if you have guests or you know other what you call riders or travelers in the car it's disgusting if you're not if you're not going to clean the inside of the car but eventually i mean it will just you know disintegrate and fall apart if you don't take care of it right you don't check the oil and change the oil or make sure there's water in the radiator better simple maintenance so we're here we're spiritual beings in a physical world there's a certain amount of maintenance that one has to take care of in order because that car is supposed to get you from point a to point b i mean unless you're there just to show it off and go up and down the strip and you know honk all kinds of weird hunks and jump up on your i don't know these shocks for for some other reason but usually usually the vehicle that you purchase is uh you want to ensure that you can get from point a to point b but if you're not checking the oil or checking the you know the water levels you know what i rented a car on pesach and it didn't have water in the um in the windshield wiper fluid so it was very difficult it was it was quite rainy usually on pa passover in in israel it doesn't usually rain but this year and very odd it rained a lot and so there's just no way to drive would get an accident god forbid um so in other words right from to get from point a to point b you have to maintain you want to have the physical pleasures you have to be responsible and that's what we're going to talk about in order to really get the most out of your physical pleasures there's a certain amount of control and responsibility okay minimizing minimizing them to a certain extent there is a very interesting idea when we ourselves and we eat fruit right so i know that rabbi kaufman likes to mention by victor miller i have quite a few books on my shelf actually i think i put a actually i did i i put a footnote uh what do you call it a marker i'm not going to refer to because it's quite complicated but the rabbi goes through when you look at a fruit why what are you thinking about you're thinking about the pleasure right the color let's take an apple or an orange right take an apple the color obviously there's some very dull yellow or green apples some of them are quite beautiful especially the red ones or even multi-colors right there's a little bit of this a little bit of that and you you cut it open and the seeds are just absolutely magnificent if you really think about the way hashem created the the natural world and just for your pleasure right it's only when it's fully ripe that it's ready to come off right only when it's the most colorful right if it's a again i'm not a botanist i don't know how everything works but usually when it's not yet whatever fruit it is it's not yet ripe it's not in its most beautiful color or level but once it's ripe and it's ready to come off it's like it's it's red it's so beautiful and so if you just marvel at it that the skin is just perfect in terms of you know not rotting or you know maybe animals won't be so attracted to it but humans are and the juices are flowing whether it's an orange or even an apple is quite um has quite a lot of water you know it can hydrate you you know so we do make brachos now why are we making brachos right we're showing baruch hashem blessed are you so what does it mean blessed are you it's a very i don't know either awkward translation like who are we to bless god what we're saying is the word is means the source so we're saying the source are you hashem you are the source recognizing hashem is the source and then he he gave it to us in order for us to again maintain the vehicle that's true but also for the pleasure so king david we know the story let me just pull it up i hope it's all good here right in the time of king david 100 people were dying every day due to a terrible plague and um he i i i have a source that he didn't institute it it says here that he instituted the idea of saying a hundred blessings a day the the messiah the tradition that i have was that it was always a jewish tradition but it was lost and he reinstituted okay it's not a big argument but to reinstitute something as opposed to inventing it or making it up um so there's a verse in deuteronomy chapter verse 12. so if you don't open to that real quick deuteronomy 10 verse 12 reads and now o israel what does the lord your god ask of you only to fear the lord your god to walk in all his ways and to love him and to worship the lord your god with all your heart and with all your soul all right so the word in hebrew with what does god ask of you so it's just if you're tuned to the word ma is the same letters or actually there's a silent letter aleph but so the word with what or what is not reinterpreted but has a deeper understanding this is what god requires of you may ah a hundred blessings right so this is an amazing idea from dave instituted measure for measure in order for the plague to be stopped that what we needed to do and i would recommend this i mean especially in today's world with we call plague the word o neg o which means pleasure and this is mute oneg the same letters in a trans what do you call it the a different order is nega negan is a plague so in order to right to stop a plague let's just say in order to stop negative things from affecting your life you could and should i like telling people what they should do but you know they should they should incorporate an attitude of gratitude and hashem will repay you right when you're i mean the curses in the torah right there's 98 curses that when the jews like the worst curse that we have is when we're not joy we're not full of sympathy full of joy when god gave us everything that's like you asked me what's the worst crime what's the worst sin a jew and again this is wisdom for anybody else right everybody else the worst crime one can have against hashem is not being grateful what he's giving you even if it's a little doesn't matter right you should still be grateful um so we i wanted to mention something else about this but i think i lost my train of thought we'll get back to it i'm sure it will come back um okay here here's here's another another idea let's say you're invited to a meal and it's a three or five course meal so what's the first course a little piece of melon maybe on a bed of lettuce and so you're coming to this person's house so the guest comes to your house and you serve him the first of five courses so he eats the melon or she and that's it he says okay thank you very much and walks away well wait one second do you have any idea what i have in store for you we're talking about four more courses i i don't know what they would be but you can imagine that they're much more healthier and full of all kinds of uh you know good uh healthy hopefully right uh things are going to maintain your body but you just opt out for this first little nugget of i don't know we'll call it an appetizer you wetted your appetite but that's it no this is this is what life's about it's about the five course meal become a connoisseur don't just you know eat a few jelly beans and walk out right this is this is the this is what life is about judaism says there's so much in store right you have 70 years for the average person 80 years if you're strong and we all pray anyway for people to live 120 it's not that we're really praying for people to live 120 by the way see moses he died on his birthday on the seventh of adar he was exactly 120 years old when he passed away what was it about moses moses was strong and healthy full of vigor to the last moment right he didn't die of old age that's for sure okay so when we pray for somebody oh yeah i'd may have answered him you should live until 120 what we're really saying we should have unders understand what we're saying is not that they should be living the last 20 years on a life support system or in a very uncomfortable you know painful existence it's quite the opposite it doesn't matter when you die but when you pass from this world you should have your wits you should have health good health you should be somewhat strong as strong as possible it could be and as healthy as possibly could be just like moses was when he passed away at the age of 120 okay so we're not really praying that someone should live 120 years we're really praying for the for the health of the person that as you get old you should have felt we're going to talk a lot about health because pleasure right there's there's obviously pleasures that could they infringe you know it could take away people's health we already talked about overeating we're talking about it we're going to talk about it a lot more okay so keep this in mind when it comes to judaism refusing to enjoy delicious permissible pleasures the only almighty created for us shows a lack of appreciation to the one who made them so he gave us the pleasures we're supposed to use them i mentioned in a controlling uh healthy way and there's another point um i know i'm gonna it's all gonna come to me as we as we go so i'm gonna continue and we'll get back to these these other points and i mentioned it's about elevating the physical world so those who are familiar with shabbat and the way jews celebrate shabbat is we eat nice food right and the word owning really goes with owning shabbat we are right the prophet says it right about owning shabbat so we know the prophets never could make up anything that wasn't already told to us right the prophet comes to reprimand or to remind us what we already know a prophet can never tell you something that your forefathers did not already know that was not written in the torah or was already part of the existing tradition that's another reason why i mentioned that king david reinvented or reestablished the the hundred brahmot and so the owning shabbat is so important so what do we do in shabbat right we dress in these you know hopefully clean our best clothes right there's actually a halacha a law that says now you can imagine today everyone takes hot showers but there's a luck and it says one should have a warm shot a shower on friday like before shabbat so look i lived out in the desert with bedouins for 13 years and they showered like once a year they like only during the rainy season which is very short did they even consider full full shower full bath otherwise they just cleaned whatever was dirty um listen that was their they were used to it i mean you could feel bad right because we but imagine the rest of us also i mean without having indoor plumbing uh running water people had to go down to a river or whatever it was it was not so easy so one should do everything they could to have a a refreshed feeling before shabbat came in obviously it's very healthy in other words from our perspective we look at the health side but it was refreshing there's a certain pleasure right you can i can stand in a warm shower for a long time i don't like cold showers but it could be for some people in the summer a cold shower was quite refreshing so we eat all kinds of delicious foods on shabbat right it's like go and buy the best challah the best bread right the salads in fact there's a whole argument between basham i am base hillel how do you prepare for shabbat now just keep in mind we generally go like hillel right then anytime there's an argument shamai says one thing hillel says something else we do say both are true and we always try to see both perspectives okay there's not a lesson in learning talmud or you know jewish thought but so shammai says on sunday go to the shrook the shook is the store the marketplace and buy the best meat buy the best vegetables and then on come monday look and you find something better buy that and eat what you bought yesterday can you imagine every day you're buying for shabbat you go to purchase it you give the money even on sunday monday tuesday lakovich shabbos kodish it's all for the sake of god i'm buying this for the sake of god i mean are you really like tricking yourself to a certain extent you know the meat you buy remember today we have fridges and freezers and all that stuff but back in the day so you bought the nicest piece of meat on a sunday i don't know really how long it would last without a fridge right or a freezer but like two or three days later you find a better piece of meat so now you're going to eat what you bought on sunday come to now comes thursday or friday you're going to even buy a better piece and then you're going to eat you know through the week this other stuff so imagine your whole life living as a shaman you live your life every single day remembering shabbat trying to purchase something for shabbat and that's the ishtar that's the effort you make and it's all for the sake of the pleasure of shabbat hillel says no you know what we're not on that level just wait till thursday afternoon or friday morning and then go and buy what you need for shabbat and that like i said we go like hillel and hillel makes a lot of sense also if only we were on the level of shaman he's admitting that probably is the best to live your life in fact we do count we actually remember shabbat all week long on the first day which we call sunday right uh we actually mentioned the living who were in the bait mikdash they would sing this song on sunday and then we would say the psalm that relates to sunday and every single day so every single day we at if you pray at home or you pray in the synagogue you're remembering what day it is towards the shabbat it's amazing right your whole life so there are breakfast it says in the church remember the shabbos day it doesn't mean only to remember it comes friday night there's a preparation through the whole week right your whole life is living towards this owning shabbat which is very interesting because what we're talking about here is that this world the very fact that god created us as pleasure seekers or uh with all the senses that are very stimulated by pleasure is because this is just like that little appetizer this world is an appetizer it is an incentive it gives you the incentive to look forward to the ultimate pleasure which will be the bliss of allah of the world to come after you know the resurrection of the day keep that in mind and the truth is shabbat itself it's such a pleasure that it really also keep in mind it keeps you focused on what the ultimate goal right the goal is the preparation for six days meaning the six days is this world what we do in this world what we accomplish in this world that will stay with us i'm talking about the positive things hopefully only that will stay with us forever in other words the ultimate shabbos the ultimate shabbos not only on a personal level that means after we die right we go into the ba the world to come shabbos is a taste of the world to come so you're tasting the the clean clothes i mean i'm not talking about eating it but you feel the clean clothes you feel when you're not running right your your cell phone is off your computer's off you you taped your light switches whatever you you cooked all your food you cleaned your house you made your bed and that's it everything is prepared and now you're just being you're just experiencing we'll call it at least the closest thing to bliss in this world in this physical world through the good foods and the company and the singing and the wine and whatever it is that you're you're sharing with other people giving to having guests it's just an unbelievable idea um just to quote what he mentions about this idea that our instruction instructs us how to properly use the material world in the kitchen the office even the bedroom now you can refer back to last week's class to serve as a bridge to the spiritual world right that's like the ultimate in judaism okay so here's a here's a nice quote but the physical world can entrap us this is where we have to have our safeguards have you ever picked up a bag of potato chips thinking you'll eat a few chips and before you know it i don't have to finish the sentence but guess what you feel sick to your stomach oh my gosh what happened how did you get lost in this bag of potato chips so physical pleasure it's true and it's it's an essential part of enjoying life but we have to know how to control it and harness it for a higher purpose so the next chapter he discusses is how to be a connoisseur which we alluded to this idea just like they called mindfulness it's a very popular word today right being mindful right not just sticking the hands in the popcorn or the chips and just swallowing these things home right and the key to enjoying physical pleasure is to partake of it as a connoisseur he goes through the idea of uh how to how how one would drink wine we would discuss that already um just try to imagine everything you're involved with you could be a connoisseur don't just let it go now i gave a class last week and on the it's called home to torah you can look it up it is about the counting of the omer what the basic message of the class was it was from the cleo car and but actually it's a the the author of the clear card but he wrote another book called the olos of ryan he explains we're not just counting time we're making time count right we're learning how important and valuable a time is because only that which is important to people count you count your gold you count your money you don't count the you know the the hay and the the straw things that are the shaft right you're interested in the grains you count anything that's important so time is so important you know so take whatever it is about time become a connoisseur of time become become a connoisseur of all pleasures in life um he just says as an example and pay attention to the you're eating a banana split i don't know the last time i had banana split maybe when i was a kid but you have here you know sweet soft whipped cream and there's cold chocolatey ice cream and you have uh sprinkling of crunchy nuts so this is like the recipe if you don't know what a banana split is uh with swirls of hot fudge topped on top of right the ice cream everything's on top of a banana wow delicious so it's if you become a connoisseur you'll you'll really just stop and take a bite of this in a bite of that you're not just going to gobble it down learning to stop and appreciate our pleasures is one of the reasons we recite the broncos before it's partaking of any food or drink i mentioned about rabbi victor miller he goes into i think it's a people called rejoice oh youth but i think he mentions this through so many of his farm many of his books this idea before you eat the you're making the brah look at it be just marvel over hashem's kindness to us and what he he wants you to derive pleasure from this world but again it's as a incentive to keep focused on what it's really about okay know that it's a means not an end right the the pleasure you have is just the means to what right so we we spoke about this guy who would come and eat your just your a brief small appetizer right when you have a five-course meal waiting for him right this is the the best is yet to come right don't think i mean unfortunately so much addiction and horrible habits have been developed but basically this idea of the best is yet to come is actually this encapsulates judaism's view of physical pleasure right materialism is just the appetizer of existence okay okay so physical pleasure is only the means to the end when used wisely it's a stepping stone to higher pleasures i i'd like to describe this world it's an illusion right it's not me who says it the zohar the holy zohar explains it like this we you know fake news is is rampant guess what the whole world is fake i'm not surprised when someone's oh this is fake news it's like guess what the whole physical world is just an illusion it's like a hologram uh that's the word hologram like it's um hashem caused it into existence for us to experience but he wills it into existence the real world is the spiritual world right like i mentioned before when you're full of gratitude the whole world changes right it's like you're wearing rose-colored glasses right the world treats you differently right when something let's say negative happen somebody says something not nice or even missing the bus or getting splashed right a car drives by a puddle you can reframe right refocus this is a lesson my wife says it didn't it wasn't um you're not a victim it wasn't caused to you it how does she phrase it it it's happening for you right when you wow what can i learn from i'm in a connoisseur of life what just happened here what can i gain from it what can i really what can i gain from getting splashed i cannot get angry i can just say thank god it could be worse i don't know a lot of things right this is a challenge for my anger for my gratitude for whatever it is i might have to go home and get changed before i go to that important meeting because i don't either muddy or wet or whatever it is um well this is just part of life and i can appreciate it that this is god had something else in mind and not to get on that bus for whatever reason okay and let me just mention his word for word so we mentioned physical pleasure is a means to an end when used wisely it's a stepping stone to higher pleasures when we enjoy beautiful things taste delicious food feel the warmth of the sun this is highly recommended for old people the older you are the more sun you need s-u-n okay and we tap into the pulsating energy that god's gorgeous world offers renewing ourselves and gaining the boost we need to tackle life's challenges so when your body's energized your soul is energized your soul is ready to soar this is the renault's words right so we all know and i'm talking about how one should try his bet their best to maintain health this is your vehicle right we talked about the car but this is your you know actually the next chapter is the car and the driver so it's an analogy to this idea i think i'm going to go through because i already kind of touched on it but he does have some great quotes here right if you abuse the car it'll start wearing down you're not going to be able to get to where you want to go of course the car is not more important than the driver itself right if you collect your family and you just spend endless time washing your car right there's some people out there they're just using the latest polish how many times a week do you need to polish your car well how much time could you be spending with your family so yes it's nice and pleasurable to have a beautiful car but you don't have remember we're talking about controlling and not over indulging that people have to use their time wisely there's no point in and maybe is if you're a car collector and you bought i don't know a 1956 chevy or something like that that has you know it's immaculate there's no scratch in here but look i think you have to learn to balance things out your family is really more important than than the car and i guess people have lost family over things like this right they're a little bit um addictive or okay so too the body and the soul the body is a vehicle to do the soul's bidding you are its driver and you have to be in control we all know that yeah right you have to be in control when you're driving right you need to care you need to take care of your body fueling it with nourishing food right you have to think about what you're eating giving it the maintenance it needs to run effectively don't abuse your body and don't oppress it either this is called this is what i'm going to sum up this is julian's judaism's view balanced discipline right god created us as pleasure seekers you do need the um the pleasure as an incentive but not only as a means not the end right and that's where idolatry kicks in right yeah let's say you had a great project a very difficult project whether it was a few hours or whether it was a few months we all feel the need to take a i don't know not a vacation but let's say a break a well-deserved break a reward right go out to a fine restaurant or you know there's some aspect of knowing that there's a reward at the end that's so important so you have to make sure there's a balance between enjoying yourself and over indulging don't get confused into thinking that the meal is the goal of it all enjoy the physical pleasure use it to refresh yourself my friends ask me they're always wondering i say makes friends students at what point can you vacation when don't you need down time shouldn't you vacation shouldn't you just go out and just enjoy yourself and the answer is of course yes the question is what is your motivation is it the means is it the end you just said i have to go to this ballgame or i have to go to the concert i have to go on this vacation or is the vacation a way of incentify incentifying is that a word yourself to keep working hard you deserve a reward you deserve a break you should take the time to recharge your batteries and taking a break sometimes you need to walk back two steps in order to move forward three and i don't mean in a negative sense of walking back two steps i mean of vacationing or relaxing what is your motivation for relaxing the motivation is to charge your batteries to feel existence just to feel it so you can move forward and create more existence right so the the main thing is not to get enslaved by it right you have to avoid abuse make sure to control your appetite and decide beforehand how much you're going to eat so there's a halal in the chocolate which describes the idea of not eating everything on your plate i know it may be difficult for some people it's a quote here about overeating so the rambam says that most sickness comes either because one doesn't eat the right foods or bitcoin or because one eats too much okay so we i think we're all familiar with both right when you're eating a how about the coke what is co before you drink the coke and maybe now is even more reason not to drink coke sugar water yeah what benefit what how's it helping your body first of all most of it it just goes straight down your throat you don't even feel okay i admit there are certain times that it can be quite refreshing right not summer day sure you just don't know what you've chopped a bunch of logs or you did a lot of work and you just want to you know replenish some sugar into your body but for the most part it's really not very healthy we know that so not eating the right foods can be damaging but also eating too much obesity we all know i mean they talk about all over america anyway i'm not so sure of the third world countries having a problem with obesity but certainly in america and other first world countries it makes you lethargic right it disturbs your functions it hampers your movements i mean you cannot accomplish so much so you have to think i'm i'm in the process of trying to slowly slowly lose weight i have a plan and it's working here's an analogy he gives like if you're um i think everyone has done laundry in their life right they put it into a machine you know that if you put too much the machine does not work properly right so think about your body i mean this is the same thing you you can you can feel you're becoming unhealthy so nip it in the bud right don't get to the point where there's no hope because sometimes people could get to that point of course there's always hope i mean you could do a that's i don't know what's called liposuction there are there are some extreme uh cures right but the they're not always the most healthy there's so many side effects um it's it's not it's not the first choice probably not even the second third but anyway um so we talked about the washing machine so too when you eat too much your stomach is like that wash it's not functioning it cannot possibly break down the foods properly in order to use them it's just gonna push them out and you're gonna it's just i think if you spend money your own money on the food just realize you're just wasting your money putting right down the garbage uh most of the food is gonna come out of your system without the body extracting um the the it's not breaking it down so it's not extracting the uh the energy properly so the shocking arc says that you should eat until your stomach is a quarter full although i saw two-thirds full but there's different opinions the mission of brewer that's the hofstra says that one should eat good food which he needs for well-being not for pleasure another the choice of the food you know obviously you're going to enjoy it hopefully but you should eat it for its um it's health value for your own well-being you should eat it only in order to strengthen yourself to serve hashem okay obviously it's enjoyable as well there's nothing wrong with that um there's something else i wanted to mention ah so there's a lot anyway one should try to leave over just a little bit of the the food on their plate just as a way of showing that you're not i mean look it's in-game very small amount and they they said if you want more you know so you don't have to leave it over the first time around but you have to measure the second time how much are they giving you or how much you're going to take and not to over indulge um [Music] what else okay just habits are very hard to break we know that um i don't want to give that much instruction it takes someone you have to be honest with yourself right if something is destructive or not people are living their lives doing destructive things and barak hashem if you have people around you who love you so then they um get involved right and they they try to tell you you're not seeing it but you're you're hurting yourself and you're hurting other people around you i forget what they call that it's a um there's a word for it when your loved ones come in confront you an intervention intervention thank you yeah oh look it's it's all about honesty you have to be honest with yourself uh for those who are not so the intervention is going to be uh used but the interventions only only going to have any effect if you're at least willing and open to hearing what these people who love you have to say so this is just about the um the extreme use of um you know and then you become habituated it becomes very very difficult to change we a lot of people let's say i should say a lot of many of us many of us you know will experience you know an emotional down and so we need we need some comfort food right so be careful it is true that god created us for pleasure right to experience pleasure but if you're running away from something you're not dealing with it on it's okay comfort food could be a time to reflect right but you're reflecting into that that pint of ice cream it's not gonna it's not gonna help you're gonna get sick so there you have to have some control here be aware of the body's tricks whenever you try to change your habit or rein in your indulgence and physical pleasures a little voice inside yells no this is oppressive it's unnatural i'm going to have a nervous breakdown right so you know it takes a tremendous amount of of honesty okay so now let's get into some of the sources that was the line that was basically the outline for the roshiva's book this may seem to contradict everything we're saying because it says in perkia vote in chapter 6 mission of four such is the way of torah bread with salt shall you eat water in small measure shall you drink and on the ground shall you sleep and a life of discomfort shall you live but in torah shall you toil it really sounds like if you want to accomplish a and we we mentioned that noah can also take on this level we discussed it in the laws of shemitah yeovel that mr rambam's writing but he gets it from earlier sources that even a non-jew can dedicate himself herself to a life of a king david said my portion is your portion i want to you know be i want to cling to hashem and that's it so this would be prescribed so what does this mean on a certain level now what it really means doesn't mean you literally have to eat bread with salt and live on the floor but it means you're willing to you're willing to forgo the pleasures of life for to accomplish this because these pleasures are distracting again we're talking about an exceptional person someone wants to be a torah scholar someone who wants to be a teacher someone who really wants to have this ultimate relationship with hashem it doesn't mean that they have to forego it means they're willing to forgo and that's really the the idea because if you're chasing you know you're chasing those pleasures you'll never chase you'll never really pursue this spiritual spiritual life okay so hopefully that cleared up in case anybody had any questions we all know it's a famous perky avatar but it doesn't mean um that you have to actually do it it means you have to be willing to um when i first became religious revoking miami beach told me that he thought i was going to excel i said he says because you're poor like not i might have had no money at the time that was irrelevant you're hungry like you know for the word of god you're you're not distracted with you past that point right i i was as a young man i was very distracted by all the physical pursuits i could say i've done it all really i've done it all so there was nothing and remotely interesting anymore i was so hungry i was the first one to debate midrash to the study hall the last one to leave my face never left the books and i was asking questions questions questions questions i was always involved in not debate but in in in discussion through our discussion and rook hashem and carried over when i came to eric israel so you can pinpoint this person like there's a certain poverty on the physical level right i don't mean really impoverished i just mean just not distracted by all those physical pleasures so i think there's a it's a plus right and i think that's what it's describing here i'm sure i'll just use the words here this is from the major schmool which is on perciavo chapter 6 verse 6 to 48 waves anyone who loves wealth and pleasure will be unable to attain proper understanding of the oral torah because it involves much discomfort and fighting sleep to acquire right you can read the written torah all you want you can go back and forth but the oral torah requires it's a mental exercise you really have to think about it deeply so there's um hill in in the laws of the rambam i would like to just quote what the rambam says this is in the laws of talmud torah the laws of learning torah chapter 3 6 and chapter 3 12. so a person whose heart inspires him to fulfill this mitzvah the midst of learning torah properly and become crowned with the crown of torah remember the crown of torah is 620. 620 there's 613 mitzvahs for the jews and there's seven for the non-jews all together right 620 which is the word for crown keep in mind that non-jews can also acquire and i know quite a few who are very learned and righteous individuals non-jews that can also acquire the the crown of torah the crown that fits their head okay and should not divert his attention to other matters and he should not set his heart on acquiring torah with wealth and honor simultaneously in other words it may happen like if you run away from honor it'll chase you you run away right i know about wealth a little bit right when you're not pursuing it sometimes the greatest deals come when you're trying to pursue a deal too hard uh man you could be greatly disappointed okay such is the way of torah bread with salt you shall eat water and smell measure you shall drink and on the ground you feel sleep this is what we saw already um and a life of pain shall live and the in the toe and in the torah you shall toil the task is not upon you to complete there's another perky vote that says right that you cannot free yourself from the obligation but you have to start you have to do something the task is not incumbent upon you to complete nor are you free to just desist from it so this is mainly towards jews but obviously even non-jews have to learn about the seven laws and it's quite extensive it's not just seven simple laws they're broken down into some say 66 some say more than a hundred but uh and even that's just for the non-jew what about he's also allowed or she's also allowed to take on additional mixes but you got to start somewhere if you have acquired much torah you've acquired much reward and the reward is in accordance with the difficulty there's another concept in judaism that the lefumsara agra according to the effort is the reward you want a great reward you have to make the effort right so this is in perspective what we're talking about not to do away with all physical uh pleasures but to harness them become a connoisseur whatever physical pleasures you're involved with know and be grateful that hashem has granted it to you it use it just to serve hashem that's the bottom line okay 12 says the words of torah will not have permanence by one who imply who applies himself weakly weekly w-e-a-k to obtain them and not by those who study while engaged in a pleasure lifestyle or eating and drinking in other words i've seen at all okay i've seen young men come from very wealthy homes the father sends them to yeshiva to learn and they arrive in the fanciest bmw the fanciest suits these people cannot learn they just can't i mean they have a certain aptitude of brilliant but there's something lacking it's the distractions right it's the over-indulgence in the physicality it doesn't mean that you could you know give it all up but he has to control it and maintain it on a different level than what he's used to torah will only be acquired by one who kills themselves to obtain it so there's a verse in numbers chapter 19 verse 14. if you want to read it in english i think we've talked about this verse before i'm sorry which chapter am i it's numbers chapter 19 verse 14. yeah i think we brought that up before 14 reads this is the law if a man dies in a tent anyone entering the tent and anything in the tent shall be unclean for seven days now on a i'm going to say on a contextual level we're talking about the laws of impurity spiritual impurity but there's a whole other level to this verse and it's been used for the last several thousand years by by jews explaining how important it is you want to learn torah torah is in the o hell we talk about the 10th jacob's tents right in the tenth of israel there's a tent so it's the only way to learn torah is to consider yourself dead and maybe this can lead into the whole idea of born again which i love the idea so we'll talk about another time this is the torah when a man dies in a tent what does it mean torah cannot exist except by one who gives over his life in the tents of the sages okay so this is basically going backwards you have to kill yourself to attain it you have to kill yourself you have to turn off your phone you're dead to the world i don't care what what's the word i don't know how many millions of dollars you can make in that hour right sorry you tell your secretary no calls this hour is dedicated to my learning torah and i'm dead anybody call tell them i'm dead i'm dead to the world unavailable beyond unavailable yeah yeah there's another great quote from the derek hashem this is otto the highest wisdom decreed that a man should consist of two opposites can you imagine god created us with a yetzera which is you know base and physical and the spirit which is unblemished and pure right just together which are his pure spiritual soul and his unenlightened physical body each one is drawn towards its nature right one is going up one is going down the body toward the material the salt with the spiritual they these two the two are in a constant state of battle a person in this world is in a state where his physical nature is very strong right at least the younger you are you're stronger you are since the and just keep in mind the older we get the physical body weakens and we do get more spiritual we do get more hopefully wiser right we should uh the clear car explains it that the older you get the the more you see the light at the end of the tunnel you know those people who have experienced a near-death experience they talk about a pure spiritual world where they see light at the end of the tunnel well whether we're conscious of it or not while we're alive right subconsciously we realize the older we get we're seeing the light at the end of the tunnel death and we're taking life more seriously we're taking time more seriously we're taking spiritual matters matters that really matter more seriously since the physical is unlightened and dark man exists in a state of great spiritual darkness darkness far from where he ought to be in his intimate relationship with god man must therefore make every effort to strengthen his soul to oppose the power of his own physicality and there by improve his spiritual condition and elevate himself to the spiritual level which is suitable for him so in other words let's just sum this up and there is a little exercise here i copied over here oh good um that to me to minimize owning does not mean at all not to have spiritu physical pleasure in this world it's about harnessing it maintaining it and getting the most out of it so make a game plan strata strategize a growth schedule according to what you expect to accomplish and then shoot a little for a little bit more in other words raise the bar so to speak and if you have to hire a friend i think they call them life coaches but let's say you have a good friend brooke hashem and you could ask him to be a nude nick so to speak and nick means a little bit of put some pressure on you to help you reach your goals right a real friend will help you so here is 13 points bullet points that we can end with so why is physical pleasure a way to wisdom why what what does it do for you number one to waste anything in life is foolish to waste pleasure is absurd in other words harness it use it for good okay number two the body this is like all the points we talked about but the body is like this is is to the soul like a car is to the driver keep the body feeling good so the soul can tackle what life is all about number three we live in a physical world make sure you get true lasting pleasures ravnoch also gave a whole series on what we call the five levels of pleasure i will maybe we'll do a series on that it's not for now but there are counterfeit pleasures that's what he you know the sheker the lies the illusions that's called counterfeit pleasure right fleeting moment we think it's forever versus the real long-lasting pleasures which are really spiritual of nature okay number four watch out and don't and you don't use material pleasures as a way of running away from life in other words beyond comfort food right escaping yeah escaping number five overindulgent actually drains self-respect so true number six to get the most pleasure out of life be full of vitality and purpose number seven savor your pleasures like a gourmet right eight translate all your pleasures into energy for living this is one of my favorite ones when you have a cup of coffee you feel good now how will you apply that burst of energy in others why are you drinking the coffee because you want to study another paragraph because you want to be awake to welcome the guest with a smile whatever it is what are you doing that what are you drinking that cup of coffee for how are you going to apply that burst of energy 10 to maximize any physical experience make sure to get the meaning behind it what is behind this physical experience 11 don't retreat from life but elevate it um beautiful 12 is wisdom is delicious flavor wisdom is so delicious in fact if someone is familiar with the gemara the way the talmud works the question is constantly asked is my time what's the reason now the word reason here and tom is actually flavor what's the taste what is the that the palette what is when i'm consuming that wisdom i'm getting that spiritual pleasure but it's it's affecting me on a physical level [Music] so he says wisdom is a delicious flavor translate the energy of a good ice cream cone into wisdom and the last one don't get lost in the bag of potato chips well rabbi you mentioned coffee i mean in this day and age young young folks are are hep on on energy drinks and i know you probably don't have them over there in jerusalem of course we do of course we do all right no um and i smelled the can it it smells like aluminum it smells horrible i don't know what it smells like i don't describe it on it's it doesn't it doesn't seem any like healthy it's anyway go ahead it's like a drug it's like a drug really like you mentioned coffee i do have a few cups every morning uh you know to kick start the day a little bit i'm almost like an old motorcycle you gotta kick start me a little bit but once i get going i'm usually pretty good but that's why i have that coffee to tackle what hashem's got for me for the day uh but yeah i i i know young young next generation are so behind me they just chug those things and it's almost like halfway through the day they've got to keep chugging more chugging more it's like adrenaline boost and and it's not serving the purpose i love the way you brought that out i love how you brought out today about overloading the washing machine i mean just think about it you know it's not going to function you're going to ruin the machine to boot let alone the laundry uh yeah and if we're stuffing our face full of potato chips it can't do any any better um i'm probably a little bad for a few snacks but i love it when my wife makes a nice apple pie something of that nature but beautiful session today rabbi okay so i enjoy we'll oh next saturday night yeah we'll we'll meet again next saturday night that's all right hashem willing so uh folks we're going to sign off for now we hope you have a wonderful week and uh until next week hashem welling we'll see you then [Music] me [Music] 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