What your TEEN really needs from you

okay good to be here as uh mrs pepsner mentioned this started what night you said 19 years ago so it started as a birthday party birthday celebration appropriate to the nine days so what kind of a celebration can we do for the nine days we can learn tiger it's always a good thing to learn and it started as an and then i guess other topics as well were added so i know that there was a poster that went out with the topics on it if people saw the topics or i could talk about whatever i want solve the topic but that's why you're here okay but uh before we get into the topic i just want to mention something about meshia we all know about the incredible love that our matriarch rahul has for all of the jewish people who are her children she is the archetypical yiddish and that she was made sinnefish not to be buried in madison which is the second holiest spot in the world by choice to be there on the side of the road where her children will be brought into gulas we're all uh familiar with the words of the of the navi who says that a voice is heard in rama but now rafa is crying for her children and the simple meaning of the verse is that when the eden were brought into gallus the first time in the bubble so they they came by the way where rahul is buried and she was able to be mothered off on them to shorten the galas and she continues to be motivated after him and on her children in valles but that that that's the simple meaning and the simple meaning on its own is already very very moving especially i guess if you're jewish mothers you can relate you relate to the muscle i mean more than i to me i've never been a jewish mother um i was raised by a jewish mother married to a jewish mother merit hashem i'm raising some jewish mothers but i've never been a jewish mother so you could relate to this more than i can but the love and the compassion the rahmanis that a mother has on children it's a special thing that that's okay so that's a simple chat that i'm going to tell you what the owl ship says he reads the he reads the pastic a little bit differently and it's based on dickbook and grammar technically the word shouldn't be me it should be because vacca actually means she makes others cry if it means she cries it should be rocho she's crying but means she's making people cry i gotta be attentive to the zoom people to admit them when they come in okay who's she making cries she's making her children cry why is she making your children cry so the al-sha says a martial like this he says there was a woman her child was sick and she brought the child to the doctor and the doctor said that he may not live through the day so she brought the child home and it was uh ed of shabbos came friday night they lit candles but then uh the candles go out and it's dark and you can't re-light them so it's dark in the house it's friday night it's dark and she can't see anything and she has her sick child with her and she can't see the child because it's dark and she can't turn on the lights and she wants to check on the child so how's she supposed to check on the child so it's a known thing that when a child especially a baby hears crying they start to cry you ever had a chain reaction at three in the morning the toddler wakes up with a nightmare then the baby wakes up and then the ten-year-old and then before you know it there's eight people standing in your room you ever had this before you can relate to this okay the trailer yeah the domino effect right because when a baby hears crying they start to cry so what does this mother do she wants to know if her baby's okay she wants to check on her baby she can't turn on the light so means that this mother is crying to get the baby to cry back so she cries a little bit at first she doesn't hear anything so she cries a little bit louder she doesn't hear anything and then she cries really really loud she doesn't hear anything says these are three types of tears each one more intense than the other one is the most intense one bitter bitter tears she doesn't hear an answer so it says that awful she refuses to be consulted she's inconsolable alba now for her children nano because they are not because they are not they're not what so according to the owl they're not crying she's crying to hear if the baby cries the baby's not crying so she she's inconsolable about the fact that she doesn't hear crying back salship explains also she cries every day that her children should cry back and if they don't cry back she's inconsolable that they're not crying the way she checks in on us the way she makes sure we're still alive is that we're still crying so you think to yourself two thousand years even in goalless how much more do we have left to cry you have to think about the fact we have we have a we have a mother ruffle and she has the compassion that a mother has on a child we are her children and she's checking on us to make sure that we're still alive imagine hearing imagine you're the child we are we don't have to imagine we are we are the children and someone who loves you like only a mother could love you like ruffle loves her children someone who is maestro nefesh in this world and in the next world it was my sign fish in this world she was making that fish in the next world she doesn't she doesn't get to be buried in the second holiest spot in the world all for what like a true jewish mother she's nice and that is for her children so you think about who are her children you you are her children so you think about a person okay she's an alamo emmaus you never met mama okay it doesn't matter the point is she's your mother she knows you you might not know her she knows you she has compassion on you she's worried about you she's she's deeply concerned about you and she's checking in on you to make sure you're still alive and how does she check in she calls out with a cry to see if she'll get a response just like that that's it very good couldn't have time did better count of time did better okay so let's talk about the topic speaking of parental compassion speaking of parental compassion what was the first topic why your kids need you yeah i think it was more specific than that teenagers yeah who do we have to work harder to have compassion on among all our children than our teams sail outside the rolling guys yeah you know there were once there were three simple yidden and uh it was pashas vallero in show they heard the korea about uh the al-qaeda but of roma vino brought gitzhak to the arcade so there was a few posture to eden and uh after the korea they were they were talking to each other they were simple jews so they were they were saying how how old was yitzchak by the akedah so one of them said well he says he was a a nar he was a boy was he was a kid he was probably nine or ten the other one says no no but then he carried the wood so he must have been strong must have been an adult i bet he was like 30. and the other one said no no he wasn't 30 he wasn't nine he was probably in between he was like a teenager they said no he wasn't a teenager so why why wasn't you talking a teenager he says because then to sheffield wouldn't be a sacrifice okay so let's why is it easy to have compassion on a baby and it's not easy to have compassion on it babies don't talk back yeah okay you don't have expectations we don't have expectations compassion you know the difference between dean and rashmi what's the difference between cassette or what we call khasid they're moving bringing in more chairs so let's give them a second so hassan would be that a guy walks down the street handing out hundred dollar bills whoever he sees he just hands them a hundred dollar bill rich poor whoever doesn't matter not even call a patient young anybody that doesn't have they don't even have to ask he just walks down the street he's handing hundred dollar bills to everyone that's called din or guru as he walks down the street and he's not handing out anything rafa is compassion walks down the street he sees people who don't look like like they need the help but then he sees somebody who looks like they need the help and he takes the hundreds that he was gonna you know that the balcasa gives to everybody he takes all those hundreds and he gives it to the guy who needs the help what's the difference has it is i give indiscriminately i mean is almost like a redundancy repetitive redundancy because by definition has it is the giver i'm giving because because i'm about hazel so i give then is i don't give a tantam i i withhold me as i give and that's why it's because it's a blend of hassan and din but i give judiciously din is judgment i give judiciously i give with a judgment what's the judgment i look who needs it the most so hassan is giving to everyone indiscriminately rachel is who needs it most so i asked the question why do babies get more compassion from us than teenagers it's f it's funny if you think about it because who needs more compassion the person who's in the most amount of pain everyone's familiar with the expression claim the kid that claimed that sores grace a kid degreases right but in our selfishness we think that that's only talking about the tsar gilbane but our own as parents stop a second remember when you were a teenager wasn't that long ago remember when you were a teenager grayson torres is the source of the child it's not just art saurus what so you don't have compassion on today's teenagers that's exactly what i'm talking about you know what so you're saying that you didn't speak to our parents the way our teams speak to us that's good you're making means let them talk however they want means for a second just for a second can you stop thinking about yourself you're a jewish mother think about mama raw think about your selflessness stop thinking about yourself stop thinking about the fact that these kids are disrespectful stop thinking about the fact they don't do what they're told let's just be empathetic for a moment a little compassion a teen is in a lot of pain yes i know we were also in pain but again you're minimizing you're rationalizing don't rationalize you know what it means to rationalize rational lies we don't want to hear don't do the rational lies write it down it's rational it makes sense you're right you're right it's not going to help us this is not helpful stop a second and start to feel with your heart don't be so motivated don't just think in your brain feel in your heart teens are in pain all teens are in pain because it's nice to hinder the head they're not children anymore they're not adults it's awkward adolescence is an awkward face then if you have a child who's a little bit sensitive a little bit sensitive anyone has sensitive children they're all sensitive that's why we are but but i said let's stop thinking about ourselves for a minute like like a little selflessness for a second four thousand years ago she was maybachter and she's still waiting by the side of the road so mama had also selfless 4 000 years okay we could be selfless for four minutes i know we're also in pain i know we also have our problems i understand but when we talk about the relationship between a parent and a child it's a clear one-way direction it's a clear one-way street we are the givers our children are the recipients we are there to provide for them not just food and clothing and scarlet and and camps we provide them with emotional support they do not owe it to us to provide us with emotional support is there a key of the aim yes there is and we'll talk about maybe what that means but that does not mean that they are responsible for your emotional well-being or to not be let's predict because they need to make sure that your feelings are protected it's a one-way street we take care of them we are there to provide them with their emotional needs they are not there to provide us with our emotional needs in fact it's probably one of the worst forms of abuse because it's so insidious because if you beat your kids or you abuse them otherwise it's more obvious that it's abusive but enmeshment where a parent uses a child to meet their own emotional needs doesn't look so terrible it's actually one of the most destructive things that a parent can do to a child so no our children are not there to meet our emotional needs we are there to meet their emotional needs let's think compassionately for a moment our teens are in pain and if i want to tell you something if you can't entertain that for even a moment please eva mitchell do not tell your teenage children to do anything ever again because it's an avedo of putting a stumbling block before the blind you hear what i'm saying no i'll spell it you mean physically you don't hear it or you don't understand put in here there was no such thing as teenagers in the olden days that was right they're annoying walk away they're not going to help but they don't get it that's it's in the omni letter so your hand up before captain it's in the book it's one of the letters that made it in the book i have no idea could you please repeat it again you know what my channel is my letters and i'll come back rabbi taub rabbi tao yeah i'm trying to i'm trying to process what you just said it's pretty big the concept could you repeat it again i'm going to repeat it there's like there's like 150 people here so i gotta wait till they get quiet thank you people on the zoo i said you need to be a little bit empathetic toward our teens who are in pain and if you can't try to put yourself into a mode of compassion for them then please do yourself a favor and with sadly no leaf means there's a prohibition don't put a stumbling block before the blind that means to cause someone to do an evader to set somebody up to fail morally if you don't have compassion for your team if you can't feel their pain then i'm asking you please don't ever tell them to do anything because you're setting them up to fail and there are much worse consequences of their failure than the fact that it will annoy you you are actually causing them to be over and keep it away so it's safer and better you should be mindful because the din is that a parent who is michael al-qaeda then your kids off the hook if you insist on it they're not so i'm telling you something if you don't have compassion on them please do not be over on leaf naive by causing them to fail and i'm going to explain to you why if you don't care for them and you don't have compassion and you're not sensitive to their pain why you are setting up to fail when you tell them to do things it is partial human psychology people don't care what you know until they know that you care if you do not establish compassion first nobody cares what you have to say you mentioned the amy letters which i don't want to talk i did that for eight years thank god i stopped but what if everyone who ever read those letters notice what's the first thing i did in every letter religiously what compassion how did that show validation now why do you do that why did you do the validation you have to why do you have to because do you hear what you're saying they cannot hear you can write the same exact answer it could be two three pages of very sound reasoning but if you don't first validate and i mean specific validation not just general like oh you sound like a nice person specific value where you say back to them things that show that you were listening reflective listening if you don't first do that your whole answer is worthless and that's when you're giving advice that they asked for how much more so if you're trying to tell them what to do and they didn't ask for it that if they don't feel validated if they don't feel that there's a connection a thread of compassion coming from you to them they can't listen now you're going to say well it's their problem whether or not we love them or care for them or like them and you can have that attitude we can see how it plays out in fact it's not a theory we do see how it plays out because we can see for ourselves the results of parents who stand on that holy war that jihad of cuba david and they insist it's not my problem my kid doesn't feel hurt it's not my problem my kid doesn't feel validated i told him what to do he doesn't listen it's his problem and you can you know there's an expression you want to be right or you want to be happy you say it a lot in marriage you can apply it to parenting as well you want to be right okay you're right you're right your kid's wrong where does that get you where does that get you so i'm saying the most compassionate person that the archetype of compassion when we're trying to think of a muscle to embody compassion what do we think of a jewish mother so i'm not even telling you to do something that's unnatural to you i'm saying tap into your innate rahmanis and i'm asking you again what i asked you five minutes ago how come it's so much easier to have compassion on a baby than it is to have compassion on a team should be it should be the opposite because compassion goes by who's in the most pain a baby's pain they're teething that's the most pain they have teething a teenager has real pain they have a big enough brain to start thinking philosophically they're like staying up at night wondering about life they start having deep questions they're socially awkward they're constantly all day forced to be in a peer group not of their own choosing so they're always jockeying for social position they're being graded absolutely literally graded constantly because they're in school constantly being evaluated and judged and told whether they're good or not good intense pressure they don't know who they are they don't have an identity yet it's very stressful being a team so i ask you another question why is it so much easier to have compassion on a baby that have compassion on a team when the teen is the one who really needs that compassion more than the baby that's part of my argument i'm saying if i if i listen to the people on the zoom i'm going to get a room full of 150 women talking because while i'm leaning in and listening to the zoom they're going to start breaking out and decide conversations i can't really what are we saying back there there's an interesting conversation going on oh when it gets to that point where the kid starts acting out then you know they're in pain yeah i'm asking how to figure it out five years beforehand you know what what i want to encourage everyone to do write down questions on these pages i would love to have this be more interactive but i see what's happening over here because we have noise and because the room isn't so controlled as far as sound so anytime people start talking i lose the room and it's it's not fair to people who are trying to focus and concentrate so unfortunately i would love this to be more of a dialogue i would like to be a free-for-all actually but i'm gonna say if you have questions write the questions down we'll get to the questions but for now let me just let me just tell you a few things and uh without trying to interact too much unfortunately i would like to do it more as a dialogue but i just i think the room is not conducive to it possibly if the sound doesn't allow for it does everyone notice that that that happens as soon as somebody starts talking everybody else starts talking and then what classroom of teenagers that's right okay go to the prince okay when a baby is born everybody is so happy everyone's so proud baby can't do anything and we have knackers from this from this baby in spite of the fact that they they really they don't offer anything they don't have no they don't they don't they're not making a contribution it's like i don't even know if i like you you know maybe grow up learn how to say a few words i'll take you out for coffee i'll see if i like it but babies just lying there what are they doing and yet everyone loves the baby and everyone's proud of them they've knocked us from the baby take pictures of the baby he's in this pose he's in that pose in the same pose so baby has one pose but i'll tell you what's right about it it's actually it's coming from a from a correct place it's actually not wrong it's not wrong that we have so much knockouts from babies for doing nothing it's actually right what's wrong is that we stop what's wrong is that some at some point would stop when we have knuckles from a baby who can't do anything it's actually the deepest spiritual truth which is that the ultimate is from the nisham the fact that you're able to talk the fact that you have certain talents the fact that you you know you do things well that's a circumstance of your goof of your body and your situation in the world but then there's the the shama which existed long before you were embodied before you came into the physical world and uh and that's there from the very moment that you're born and when a baby is born we're keyed into that to the idea that there's this this this being this entity called the nisham but we don't articulate it this way i don't think parents actually use these spiritual words some do but most don't but there's this there's this feeling where we're maybe subconsciously heed into the fact that this is a heavenly being this neshama this gift and because of that we're really really all intuitively in line with the truth that our child is intrinsically worthy unconditionally worthy infinitely worthy and and that's a deep spiritual truth because the neshama where does it come from that a child is intrinsically worthy unconditionally worthy infinitely worthy that comes from the neshama because that's what the nisham is nishama is intrinsically worthy unconditionally worthy infinitely worthy let me just explain what those terms mean intrinsically worthy means its worth comes from itself it doesn't have to go out and acquire something or accomplish something in order to have value the value is built in it's intrinsic that's the nisham unconditionally worthy means it cannot lose its worth there's no way it cannot be valuable the neshama is valuable that's what it is in fact that's what it means it's intrinsically worthy the two aren't declined and then the third thing's infinitely worthy how worthy is it can you put a price tag on the worth of inishama infinitely worth it there's no amount so the nishama is intrinsically worthy unconditionally worthy infinitely worthy when you look at your baby you see the shama whether you articulate it this way or not and therefore you identify this baby as being intrinsically worthy unconditionally worthy infinitely worth what happens they start to grow up and then you get distracted by the superficial conditions of embodiment the personality the talents the challenges strengths the weaknesses whatever all this stuff that is battle that is of this world that is temporary and you start to value them or the opposite based on those things based on those factors you know they've done studies that toddlers have great self-esteem and generally speaking around five years old self-esteem plumbings and the prevailing theory is that it coincides with school if when a child starts going to school all of a sudden they start being compared to others and their self-esteem plummets now if you send your child to school at five i guess the self-esteem plummets at five you send them to the you know the it gets earlier and early and earlier i mean i think now they send the kids to nursery school like two weeks old you know when the other time is that we're keyed into the fact that a person is really a soul and they get a free pass and everyone says how beautiful and wonderful they are well they die yeah very good so either the only time you get a break in this world is when you just came to the world or you just left it babies and dead people get a free pass everybody else gets mercilessly judged when our children are babies we're tuned into the truth that they don't have to earn our acceptance they have it unfortunately as they grow up and they develop personalities and and they start to do different things and they start to exhibit different strengths and different weaknesses all of a sudden we throw that out the window and we start we replace their true eternal identity of the shama with this new made up identity that has to do with matters of the body how smart they are how well behaved they are how whatever just stuff that you didn't use as criteria when they were babies in their friend so what's the real answer if the question is how can we tune back into the fact that your child is intrinsically worthy unconditionally worthy infinitely worthy how how do we do it we have no choice well how do we do it that's true what do we have to do we have to focus on the soul so with immense apologies i know that people don't like the spiritual talk i know and by the way where do i get the biggest pushback when i get when i get spiritual the froome crowds the froome crows don't want to hear if i'll quote secular psychology everyone off the top good very good when i start talking to show weird this is too lofty for me that is not practical and they start making arguments but but we'll get back to the cookbook we'll talk about the football but hold on a sec your child is in the shum not your child has a mishama your child is in the shum if that's not the foundation of your opinion of them please don't even try to is that okay yes he had a moment of uh teenage struggle right you know about his teenage struggle let's talk about his life i mean talk about trauma his brothers tried to kill him and the end they didn't kill him what they do they sold him into slavery i don't know which is worse he this teenage kid who was just told by his family that we hate you so much we want you dead i'm just think relate to it emotionally for a second then he he's shipped off to this strange land and over there what happens all of a sudden people start admiring him this teenager imagine this thrown away teenage boy rejected by his family and then he he shows up in town and all of a sudden everyone starts he's jaw-droppingly beautiful and everyone's giving him attention for his body and uh he has a master he's a slave so he has a master and his master's wife decides that she wants this boy now he's vulnerable he's emotionally weak talk about a a kid who's estranged from his family he was almost murdered by his family members so he's not just physically distant he's emotionally cut off from them and now he's getting all the special attention and now he has the offer of pleasure i'm not saying this is what's going through yes but it's mind i'm not here to psychologically analyze the obvious i don't think we're shy after that i'm asking you as a muscle to try to relate to it how you would experience it where you were completely rejected by your family and then you were put in the place of an assailant where you're getting attention and the offer of pleasure immediate gratification and think about that nassarian for a moment and you're a teenager by the way when i when i describe it like this doesn't sound like a bible story anymore does it sound like something that happened last week in brooklyn probably happening right now probably somewhere a jewish teenager who feels completely cut off from their family and who has the messiah being offered immediate gratification for something of this world because they feel cut off from from spirituality it's happening right now i'm sure i mean i know and uh so we know that he was tested i mean uh there's it's a much like us how tested he was when he went into the house did he have intention to sin or not he at least uh in his mind he said i'm gonna give in again it's far be it for me i'm not here to humanize the obvious in ways that are not for us to do i'm telling what the gemara says so he's he's about to sin at least according to one opinion the amounting and he refuses your mind with a chalice right that means he was strengthening himself with every fiber of his being to resist he was refusing and what what was the what was the turning point how did he have the ability to refuse very good okay i've heard this before be a moin he refuses he saw the image of his father in front of him des moines he refused how the yes of mattis of hiv yasip saw the image of his father in front of him so one meaning of that is that he was about to sin and then he saw an image of his father and he couldn't do it anymore he couldn't do it tell you another meaning he refused means he saw the image of his father in front of him what gave him the strength to refuse what gave him the strength to overcome this challenge when he saw the image that his father had of him when that became apparent in front of him then he was able to overcome when it flashed before his eyes how his father viewed him means his father's vision of him he was able to overcome in other words because this teenager knew that his father saw greatness in him his father saw perfection in him he had the strength to do the right thing the image that a parent has of a child is the most powerful tool that a child has to stand up to the challenges of life the identity that's given to a child by their parents not by strangers not by friendly neighbors or educators or the therapist it's all good very nice but the image of the parent that the parent has of the child that is what stays with the child that is what the child thinks of himself or herself you can go to therapy for years you won't get rid of that you'll be able to overcome it you'll be able to to circumvent it to get around it but the opinion that a parent has of a child that is the foundation of your entire identity and if that's your identity then wherever you go there you are i'm gonna repeat that wherever you go there you are you give your child their sense of self every situation they will ever be in is going to involve their sense of self so first and foremost before anything else you give your child should be a clear sense of self and if you're a jewish parent i would presume you would want them to have a sense of self that's based on tyro which means my true self is my soul which is intrinsically worthy unconditionally worthy infinitely worse oh but we tell them that we tell them that they're intrinsically worthy unconditionally where they're infinitely worthy then what's the point that why be good it sounds silly but people say that all the time but if you knew that you were perfect why would you care to do anything why would you even try anymore you just let yourself go no no it's better we'll tell them that they we barely tolerate them in fact we're disgusted with them we put up with them but if they work hard enough to prove themselves maybe they'll earn a place in our family and among humanity let's go with that that's a good approach right sometimes we have to hyperbolize things in order to understand what they are sometimes exaggeration is a helpful tool let but let's do apples to apples i'll exaggerate both i'll exaggerate both approaches and you tell me which one sounds more jewish one approach of course i'm exaggerating but for the sake of illustration i'm exaggerating one approach is telling a kid you're disgusting you you don't have a place in this family we barely put up with you but if you work really hard walk on eggshells to satisfy us then we'll put up with you that's one albeit exaggerated version of that of that approach then the other approach you are perfect you're intrinsically good you are god's creation you have nothing to prove you are loved you are supported no matter who you are no matter what you are you are our gift we will always be proud of you you tell me which one sounds more jewish i hope that's i hope that's not true and if it is you know every truth has a little joke this every joke has a little truth but it's really every truth has a little joke if that answer if that joke was a little bit true then i say we need a cultural revolution because if there's any truth to that joke and i'm hoping it was a joke we have a big problem we have a big problem in the froome community and it's not internet and it's not slias the big problem that we have with a bit let me finish it this is all you need to hear this is the only sentence you need to hear today the major problem in fact the only problem we have today in the firm community is that children grow up in our system in our families and our life's defender and they leave feeling bad about themselves that is our only problem that is our only problem somebody who gets a jewish upbringing should come out of it should enter adulthood saying you know what there may have been this there may have been that you know maybe uh maybe i can't read and write in english so well but i want to tell you something what i can tell you is because of my upbringing i feel good i feel strong i feel like an intrinsically worthy person i feel like that the infinite god cares about me watches over me and has knocked us from me that's what every jewish child should grow up and say about their upbringing and if one jewish child were out there saying i grew up in the fruit community and i feel bad about myself as a consequence that would be a hormone the fact that more than one are saying it we need a cultural revolution and i'm appealing to you because you're jewish mothers and if you don't have compassion who will i heard what you said about them about the the principles i don't rely on their compassion i rely on yours i do not rely on the compassion of people who whose job security depends on status quo i'm appealing to your maternal instincts we cannot allow another jewish child to be raised in our community and think that toyota says that they're worthless and if they have abusive parents at least let them grow up and say my parents were sick my parents told me that i'm worthless but hashem says that i'm infinitely worthy we need a cultural revolution and this is the one that could've this is it you're worried about permissiveness you're worried you're gonna you're gonna it's gonna be half cadence you're gonna you're gonna just fan the flames of the chutzpah you know what be my guest go continue doing it your way try the oppressive approach and see because if the church didn't come from that i don't know where it came from you're taking children you're telling we don't care about you we don't relate to you we don't feel your pain we have no compassion for you but now here's a thousand different things that you have to do every day in order to barely be acceptable in our eyes and you tell me that's not a formula for footstool that's where the look becomes from the people who feel unworthy and pressured and and they're lashing out if i treated you that way as adults you lash out so i just want to try to give this over we don't have a lot of time i want to try to stick to the schedule and there's salmon with pastel over there so did you see it by the way it was really good i mean i didn't eat it yet because i didn't want to mess it up before anyone touched it but someone saved me up make me a plate no i shouldn't say that in a room full of jewish mothers would be 50 plates but in the remaining little time we have here i want to try to give you are my ambassadors if you so choose to be i want to give you icees i want to give you a language for being advocates for the idea that our children are perfect and and i want you to tell your children that and i want if it comes up in conversation with your peers to tell your peers that and also if it might happen that an educator a school a principal might not really realize that your child has infinite worth and maybe you could articulately advocate for your child and tell the schools i don't want to get hung up talking about the schools again i want to tell you something i want to tell you something very cynical institutions have no heart have no heart an institution is a machine no you said isis it's time to have a bet make tall people short and short people tall a mice it is one size fits all and if you don't fit will squish you it will stretch you and if you can't put up with that then throw you out so institutions i don't have a lot of i don't have a lot of faith in institutions but i have faith in people especially jewish mothers especially jewish mothers and i believe that if jewish mothers can advocate for their children that we will have a cultural revolution where people will grow up and say that growing up from is the most emotionally healthy upbringing you could ever dream for why don't our children say that we want them saying that just but i'm not worried about the condition i'm appealing to your maternal instinct beside your your motherly compassion for your children we want our children to grow up and to say this was the most beautiful way that i could have ever wanted to be raised and the toyota made my upbringing more supportive we'll get to this i want to give you like i said i want to give you issues to be able to to talk about this idea father tells me he's walking by his 18 year old kid's room kid is home from yeshiva he was supposed to be working he got fired or he stopped showing up six or one half a dozen of the other whatever it was and he's sleeping all day and he's just he just sleeps just in his room sleeping and he's got a smartphone doing god knows what although we don't have to say god but we know what and it's it's not just 24 6 probably 24 7. okay we're talking about an 18 year old who's not thriving to put it mildly he's not thriving he's not yeshiva he's not working so he doesn't have any self-esteem from that he's failing in life he's sleeping all day now if the child had cancer god forbid this the discussion i'm about to tell you would not have even taken place but because he has emotional cancer so now it's a different story okay so what what's what's the conversation father walks by the room with the 18 year old boy he tells me the father tells me this he walks into the room and he says to the kid don't you want better for yourself i want you to stop for a second i'm going to hit pause on this story [Music] does everyone here you are jewish mothers i don't have to teach you this does everyone instinctively understand that that those words are a dagger or a knife now i also let me say i have compassion under the father i understand the father is in pain the father is frustrated and the father's afraid i think fear is the biggest thing we don't talk about this but when it comes to the target of bonding the biggest component really is the fear fear of what people will say fear of what my child's future will be fear of am i a failure fear is a big big part of it okay so i am compassionate to the father as well and i understand where it comes from when he when he sees this 18 year old who's doing the opposite of thriving and he says don't even want better for yourself but at the same time i'm asking you as jewish mothers take the side of the child okay your mothers mothers always take their children's side i want to know something do you understand intuitively how that is a dagger this 18 year old who can't even hold down the job that he was supposed to hold down it was set up by a favor of a friend of the father and you know he couldn't even hold that down he's family in life don't you even want better for yourself do you understand what a cruel question that is of course he wants better for himself he's not capable so the father tells me child's response is and it's very telling what the child response was he says to the father you're never proud of them see it's interesting don't you even want better for yourself the child says you're never proud of me see child understood what that what the words really meant don't you even want better for yourself really meant i'm so sick looking at you i'm disgusted i mean he didn't say those words but the child heard the translation he says you're never proud of him so father tells me i told him that's not true remember two summers ago when you were a counselor you're all laughing because you know you're already losing the argument when you do that that's like you know you never say you love me it's not true two years ago i told you two years ago right you're never proud of him never doesn't mean never never means not enough you're never proud of me so he says i was proud of you two years ago right which implies the opposite of proud for the past two years so the kid says and this just blew me away the father told me this the kid said it's so interesting how sometimes people are so capable of articulating their emotional needs and we don't hear them like the child said exactly what he wanted he made his emotional needs known but father didn't hear and he told it to me and then retelling it back to him i was able to help him to to hear it but initially he did it he says to the child i was proud of you two years ago and then the child said again marvelously articulating his emotional needs the child says are you proud of me now now do you understand the courage of the 18 year old who hasn't gotten out of bed yet to say to his father are you proud of me now do you understand how vulnerable that question is he's begging he's begging for parental approval and he knows the odds are slim that he'll get it but he needs a desperate he knows what his needs are like like a person in the desert screaming water water even though he knows the odds are no one's going to swoop down and bring him in water he says are you proud of me now says i told him no now in slow motion replay everyone here gasps because you understand that that's murder but in a moment again i have compassion i understand the father in the moment he didn't understand what was going on you know i'm telling you the story not to bash the guy it happened to him it's so that we can learn from it so when it happens to us on any level not necessarily that your kid is is failing in life but listen children articulate their emotional needs all the time even the kids who are thriving even the kids who are getting lots of uh validation who are who are called successes they also articulate an emotional need so i i want to i want to learn from this story so the kid says are you proud of him now the father says no i said to the father first of all on an emotional level i'm just so pained to hear that but let's set that aside as a religious jew just punish it from a theological perspective how did you dare to say those words because what does being a religious jew have to do with what i told my kid that i'm not proud of he said you don't know hashem is proud of your child how dare you not be proud of your child he says hashtag was proud of my what does this jump proud of my child this is for the laboratories here i said to this father i said then this this child who you used to have knocked us from when he was a baby when he was a toddler before he let you down what did you teach him when he was a little when he was a little child and he was a toddler what did you teach him how does every laboratory teach their kids when they're little hmm 12 took they will inherit the land forever nate sir matoy my sayordai the branch of my planting the work of my hands heir to be proud of hashem says he is proud of jews not because of anything they did to make him proud because of what hashem did in making them i see you other least part of the looks at every single jew and hashem is proud now is there another thing yeah that's another thing there's a second thing called i'm proud of your actions as well i'm also proud of your actions but that's secondary first and foremost the foundation is i'm proud of you not because of anything you did or can do or will do but because of who you are unconditionally unchanging hashem is proud of every single one of your children not because of anything they did but because of who they are when were you on the same page with hashem when your child was an incident then you were on the same page with hashem and you knew to just look at this baby and say i have unconditional pride and then they grew up and the unconditional pride was removed and replaced with judgment and rejection it's not jewish you want to do it do it don't do it in the name of what if the kid said why if the father said yes first of all first of all if the father would have meditated on a daily basis on his children's neshama he wouldn't have come to the point where he'd be placed in that awkward position of being asked that question it's your question what would you do it's rather like if you get to a point where a wife has to ask her husband do you even love me at that point at best it's good best case scenario it's going to be awesome the point is preventative medicine so that nobody should ever have to ask a spouse do you love me and no jewish child should ever have to ask a parent are you proud of me if your child had to come to you and tell you that they had tattered shoes they didn't have a bed to sleep in it that they haven't eaten in two days would you feel would that not shock you that you're not providing for your child of course it would so what about a child who's emotionally starving who hasn't been given validation today why aren't we horrified by that and i want to reiterate what i said earlier it's not just to make your kid feel good right now it is investing in their future because everything you teach them about who they are and about their intrinsic value and intrinsic worth that's the self concept they're gonna bring with them to every experience that they have in their lives when they're married and they decide what kind of treatment they're worthy of from their spouse it'll be based on how you treated them and what you taught them about how much worse they have when they go out in the workplace and they deal with office politics their level of self-esteem and self-respect that'll be based on what you taught them about their level of value we have the most powerful tool that no educator no rabbi no therapist nobody has we i'm talking about parents we have the ability to teach our children who they really are and that is the greatest gift you can give your child everything else is bonus then when a child is in a test like yes they'll be able to be a mawing to refuse because the ace of madison because he'll see in front of his own eyes what his parent but his loving compassionate parent thinks of him or her and understand what he or she is really capable of not because of guilt not because of pressure but because you taught them who they are the foundation of jewish education is not all of base it's not maidani it comes before that foundation of jewish education is you are a jew and you are therefore infinitely precious and beloved before everything else we all know about unconditional love now 20 years ago if i would be you know if this was this is the 19th year right so if i were here for the first year of it and i told everyone here about unconditional love a bunch of from people talking about unconditional love i would get scoffed at i promise you because 19 years ago unconditional love you know it's kind of like new age right what is that but today everyone understands come on unconditional love you got to love your kid unconditionally so i'm here to push the envelope i'm here to say that it's not enough that we have unconditional love for our children that we all know we have to have unconditional pride unconditional drive just like when they were babies you didn't just love them you were proud what were you proud of intuitively i'm telling you you were keyed into their neshama you were proud of their soul why did you stop to whatever extent that you stopped we all stopped to some level why did we stop so get back to it get back to it get back to seeing your child is in the shama get back to unconditional pride get back to the messaging that lets our children know that they were given the gift to be raised in a family and a community that makes them strong and confident that that enables them to take on the world to risk to resist challenges to accomplish anything okay pesto salmon awaits we're gonna take a break