Rabbi Kalman Flaks: Blessed Is He Who Removes Slumber From My Eyes’

Okay, shavua tov to everyone. So excited to be learning Torah together. Be shame kol Yisrael. We always try to learn. Thank you so much. Tod. Not just for the sake of us individually, but right, for the sake of the whole Jewish people. Um, and that's actually not just true for learning Torah, but for every mitzvah we do, if we remember, we can think be shame kol Yisrael. In particular during this time period of um of the Omer. What is up with the Omer? Of course, why are we not shaving on the Omer? No live music in the Omer because the students of Rabbi Akiva lo na hagu kavod zeh lazeh. They weren't weren't respectful one to another. Right? They were so Maybe the the Shem Mishmuel explains they had so much loved each other that they didn't respect each other. It's like the thumb doesn't necessarily say, "Oh, sorry." to the pinky. They felt so connected that they weren't respectful. That's one the Shem Mishmuel's explanation. And so this is a time we have to work on our Ahavat Yisrael. And we can do that obviously in the way we talk with one another and interact with one another. But even in the mitzvot we do bein adam l'makom, we can do it be shame kol Yisrael. So when wake up in the morning and I'm davening be shame kol Yisrael. I'm putting on my tefillin be shame kol Yisrael. I'm saying Shema be shame kol Yisrael. Um, I don't know. There's so many opportunities. Dozens and dozens of opportunities. Birkat Kohanim, be shame kol Yisrael. Whatever we're doing, be shame kol Yisrael. And in that way, we're getting our we're spreading that love uh throughout the whole universe. So be shame kol Yisrael. Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu Melech ha'olam shehakol nihyah bidvaro. All right. Thank you so much. It's been quite a while, but I'm excited. Let's get back into the siddur. Um, and we are continuing with Birkhot Hashachar. Okay? We're at the final frontier of Birkhot Hashachar. We've made it to the last brakha of Hama'avir sheina me'einai. Okay? So, I need you guys to be in this with me. I It's not one of those shiurs where I'm just going to tell you a speech which was prepared beforehand. We're learning it together. And just reading the words really and translating is already awesome. Cuz how often do we just run through the words of tfillah without thinking about it twice? So, just even go through it and understand the simple meaning is already a great madreiga. And hopefully, if we can, we'll bring a little bit more color, a little bit more light to the words of tfillah. Be'ezrat Hashem. All right? Last week we spoke about the importance of hakhana for mitzvot. So, right now we're being We're learning, but also preparing for the holy mitzvah of tfillah. Even tfillah is a double double whammy mitzvah. Learning and preparing for tfillah. So, let's do it. Be'ezrat Hashem. Barukh Ata Hashem. Elokeinu Melekh Ha'olam, Hama'avir sheina me'einai utnuma me'af'apei. Okay? This brakha is also from the Gemara in Brakhot daf sameekh. That famous brakha which most of Birkhot Hashachar is based in. And interestingly enough, the final closing blessing is about It starts off saying, "Thank you Hashem. You You are the source You are the source of all blessing. Hama'avir sheina me'einai." That you take sleep from my eyes. Okay? I see For some of us, it still hasn't happened yet. But in general, he wakes us up in the morning. Hama'avir sheina me'einai utnuma me'af'apei. And slumber from my eyelids. So, we're thanking God that we woke up in the morning. and then we have this double language of and he took away the slumber. So, first of all, what's the difference between sleep and slumber? Why do we need the double language? I think slumber is deep deeper. So, that could be you could explain it like that. Some explain it the opposite that she now is deep sleep. That's like when you wake up in the morning and you're up, but sometimes you're still kind of slumbering. You're nim nim the Gamara says, which means if they called your name, you would say, "Yeah, hey." But, you're still not 100% conscious. So, sometimes that takes a little while for people to get out of that slumber state. They may not be sleeping anymore, but they're still uh you know, not 100% uh there. So, we thank Hashem for hopefully by the end of uh this whole process of waking up, we're we're really awake. Right? I'm sure many of us have wondered, why didn't Hazal convey a bracha on coffee? On our morning coffee. You know, we love our morning coffee. Who doesn't? Or maybe some people don't. But, you know, a lot of people love their morning coffee. Shouldn't Hazal have given us a special bracha to thank him for our morning coffee? Before cups of Four cups of coffee. Some people. So, the Gamara says, maybe maybe this is it. Slumber, you know, you're still awake. But, anyway, you have your coffee, you're finally up really up in the morning. So, you can add that kavana when you say you could think about your morning coffee and thank Hashem for your morning coffee. There we go, right? For that alone, it's worth coming tonight. Okay. So, we thank Hashem for getting us out of our sleep and waking us up. Now, we're going to try as always to go a little bit deeper. But, on a most basic level, wow, I can sleep at least many of us and I can wake up in the morning, right? Some people better than others, but um that's an amazing thing. Right? And sometimes it even happens naturally without an alarm clock. Wow, right? I just went to sleep and somehow my body knows it has this built-in clock that knows when I'm supposed to wake up, and then the hormone switch, and suddenly my brain knows to you know to to to start waking up, and then more hormones come through me and I'm actually able to come alive in this amazing wonderful system. We take it for granted. We never really think about that. Well, what a bracha that Hashem allows us to sleep, to wake up, and to really wake up. So, that alone is amazing. Okay? By the way, in Rav Kook's beautiful safer Ein Ayah, which is deep deep teachings on tefillah, he says, you know, people don't really appreciate sleep. They appreciate it, yeah, we I'm tired, so I'm I need to go to sleep, right? But it's not just that. Rav Kook says that on a spiritual level, you're you we need to take breaks, not just as a rest in order to then change the world again, but spiritually we need we need to process. And what we can accomplish in our breaks, in our sleep, actually might be the main thing of taking all of what we experience and somehow processing it in our brain and making sense of it all, and it it goes that whole amazing system is is sleep. And it's a really spiritual amazing exercise. So, if Kook talks about how we should appreciate we should appreciate the fact that we can sleep and and we should not only look at a break as a as a tool of I have to I wish I could go 24/7, but I'm going to take a break. No, the break itself, sometimes has value. Yeah, you with me? Okay, very good. So, good. But, it still is strange. Why are we ending off this bracha, all these 15 brachas, with thanking God for sleep? It's a bit out of order. You know the right? We said, "Baruch atah Adonai pokeach ivrim." He woke us up, right? And then, we started talking about wearing our clothing, and putting our shoes on, and taking a walk, and then at the very end of it, we say, "Oh, by the way, thank you Hashem for letting me wake up." Like, wouldn't that have been made more sense to come earlier? It seems like out of order. That's the question which Rav Schwab and others ask. So, it could be, maybe, sleep here represents something. What do Chazal say? What's sleep? It's 1/60 of death. So, every time we go to sleep, we're really giving our soul to Hashem. And so, every time we wake up, really, what are we kind of symbolizing? Chiyas hameisim. You know, there are people out there that don't wake up in the morning. So, the fact that I woke up in the morning, that itself is a miracle, and it symbolizes not just um my personal waking up in the morning, but I'm thanking Hashem, maybe we could say for the end of the story, the chiyas hameisim, when all of the world, when all of Am Yisrael will have this awakening from its slumber. Right? Rav Schwab talks about this mahalach. He says, he brings us back to the first tardema, the first slumber. Who was the first being who slumbered? Who was actually put into a slumber. Adam Very good. Adam Harishon is up and then Hashem slumbered him and then took a rib from him and then gave that rib to to Hava. He made Hava from him. And so the Schwab says we were on one level of connection to Hashem and when we went to sleep God we we we we lost that level of consciousness. And all of world history is one giant reawakening getting back to consciousness. And the top of the top was when we got the Torah. Atarita, you showed us you opened up the seven heavens and we were mamesh understood God and we were awake, we were alive and we knew the purpose of life. But then what happens? You have these high moments, you're inspired, you went to that awesome kumzitz and you're going to change your life you have your kipper your What happens? We fall asleep again. Life life happens. And and we go back to sleep. And we're praying that Hashem should get us back to that state of consciousness, of awareness, of inspiration that we're all really yearning for. So yes, like always there's a simple level of we're just thinking Hashem that we're alive and we're not sleeping anymore, but also we're asking for the higher level of not sleepiness, which is consciousness, which is awareness of our purpose in life, which is d'veikus with Hashem. And maybe if that's true we're going to understand the rest of the t'filah because at first glance it seems like there's just kind of two random parts of this of this bracha which don't have much to do with each other. We started saying thank you Hashem for waking me up and then we say "And may be with your will that I do the mitzvahs and that we're going to go into it and that we don't sin and we won't be embarrassed, and we have good friends, and it's like, okay, what does sleeping have to do What does one one thing have to do with the other? But according to this Mahalach of Reb Shwab it's not really only about sleep. It's about being awakened to our purpose in life, to our true existence in life. And so the two really are connected. Okay, they're connected broches to the extent that if you hear someone saying this brocha, the first part of the brocha, you don't say amen. Cuz it's all one brocha. Yeah? Beautiful. So that's part one. Let's jump in with your permission um to the Yichud Ratzon. Do the Yichud Ratzon. Let's go through it. Just one introductory uh word. I was reading Rebbi Nachman, Rebbi Nachman of Torth, the main student of of Nachman of Breslov, and he has a sitter that is his commentary, which I love. And basically what he says is we see this is really the first time when we start having personalized prayers in our in our davening. It's a little where we sometimes feel a little disconnected. Why don't we feel so connected? Because we're just reading what some other rabbi said in his personal prayers. The Yichud Ratzon. And so we're copying him. But it's meant to be a sign where Chazal, when they were cover this brocha, are saying, "Hey Kalman, you should also do this." It's Obviously we should also after this year, tomorrow when we say this prayer, we're going to have amazing kavana for the rest of our lives, we'll always be so connected. But sometimes, you know, life happens, we're in a rush in the morning, and we just rush through it. So that might happen. But Rebbi Nachman says, "But don't forget the iker. The iker is that we're supposed to learn from this that we have to make our own personal prayers." And that just like the rabbis had their own personal prayers, they're reminding us that we also have to have personal prayers, and ask says Rebbe Nachman for everything. Some people are afraid to daven for the little things. Maybe you guys have heard of this, maybe you've experienced this, I don't know. You ever felt like I don't want to bother Hashem with that little thing? Because like I don't know, I don't want to lose my merits, I want to save my questions for the big things. And I don't you know, God's a busy guy, I'm not going to ask him for my parking spot, I'm not going to ask him that the coffee taste good. Like I you know, I'm going to save my request for the big things. Some people have that perspective. Rebbe Nachman says the opposite. He says no. The more details the better. Why? First of all cuz you never bother God. God's not He doesn't He doesn't get bothered. He wants us to be connected to him. The whole purpose of life is to be connected. The prayer's goal is to be connected to him. It's not to get the prayer, it's to be connected to Hashem. So the goal is to get connected to Hashem, as many prayers as possible. What does the Gemara say? A person should daven the whole day. That's the ideal. Every You're walking down the street, please Hashem let the let the light turn green. Please Hashem let the It turned green. hallelujah. There is a God. Unbelievable. As much as you can, daven daven daven. And says Rebbe Nachman, we learn this from this prayer. Right? That brings me back to a big question of davening. Why do we daven in the first place? Rav Kook famously asked this question. Doesn't Hashem know that I need health and I need to find my soulmate and I need children. I mean, he knows. So why do I need to go through the motions of praying? He already He can read my mind. Right? That's the famous question Rebbe Nachman and Rav Kook and all the great rabbis asked. And what's Rav Kook's answer? Whose prayer ultimately for according to Rav Cook? For us. For us. It's to change us. Right? The simple answer is no, God created a system in order to change him, you need to pray. That's the system he put into place. But the deeper answer of Cook says is no, the reason Hashem put that system into place is because by us praying, if we really pray, if we pray per- correctly, we become different people. If we really think about what the words mean, really go in into the words and let it penetrate our consciousness. And therefore we're a different prayer about person by the end of the prayer, and so we've transformed ourselves and now we're a vessel that's ra'ui to receive the blessing from Hashem. So prayer is for us. Yeah. So if that's true, So this is That's what Rav Natan Natan is telling us. Yes, we should really say this. But the goal is that it should remind ourselves at the at the end end of davening that I should go and beg Hashem for everything, just like we're about to start begging Hashem for everything. So let's start. Okay. Vihi ratzon, and it should be your will. Mil fanecha, before you. Psh, just that alone. It should be your will and we're in the presence standing for Hashem. Hashem Elokeinu v'Elokei avoteinu, Hashem our God and the God of our forefathers. Shetargileinu b'Toratecha. Ah, what beautiful language. What What does it mean shetargileinu b'Toratecha? What's the root of the word shetargileinu? Ragil. Ragil. Or hergel. Very good. So it's not just that we should do the Torah. We don't want to just do it. We want the Torah to become our ragil, our norm. We want our essence, our just the way we flow to be a total way of life. And our natural way of being to flow with words of Torah. And like all the stories about Rav Kook and all the tzaddikim that after they had a little wine on Purim, they would just flow with Torah and mitzvahs and halakha like it was just their natural way of being. Right? How could we do a shear and not mention Purim? So, that's the whole year we're preparing ourselves to get to that place where it just flows out of us. And that's the goal. That our natural way of being should be a total way of being. We shouldn't have to force ourselves into being a Torah way of being. But the truth is, we're not always there. So, we need a little help. And we call out to Hashem. Because we have this concept that in the way that a man wants to go, that's the way that Hashem is going to lead them. Right? The Gemara in Makkos. So, if a person wants to go down the good path, that's the way Hashem's going to open up all the gates. And if a person wants to go down the bad path, it's not going to go. But it should be our go-to. Our go-to should be in the ways of Torah and mitzvahs. That's the goal. Easy to say, right? But it's I think this consciousness of targilenu means to change our habits. That our natural habit should be a Torah habit. And we have to be realize that as we're going to say in the rest of the prayer, it's not always like that. Sometimes we have bad habits. And there's a great book. It's called uh Atomic Habits. There's another also good TED Talk called The Power of Habit. And I I'm a big I used to be back in the when they were popular into all these TED Talks. And the basic thesis of the book and the TED Talk is that don't try to change your thoughts. You could try, but it's hard. In any given moment. Rather, try to go through your life and develop good habits. And when you just start developing, choose these habits to focus on and just push yourself to do it and do it and do it and then it will just be natural. And just one it will be a domino effect. One thing will lead to another thing will lead to another thing. So, just one habit at a time, work on transforming yourselves. So, for example, person wants to, I don't know, start wants to exercise more cuz he's going to feel good and be with him to do mitzvahs. So, a person can write every Yom Kippur, be exercising more, you know, run. Very good. But, they the goal is to think how am I going to create this habit? When am I going to do this habit? When am I going to run every day? And literally map out from this time to this time from to walk to shul, to walk to the shear, and force myself one time, two times, three times until eventually it just becomes who I am. All right. And when we're in the moment and flowing through life, it's easy to get caught in with our bad habits. All right. That's just natural. This guy is Whatever whatever our bad habits are. So, the goal is when you're in a calm state, when you're not in that taiva moment. All right. So, then map out how can I map my life so I don't get tempted to get into the bad habits and so that I can flow myself into the good habits. And then once we've mapped it out, all we got to do is just follow through. Easier said than done, right? And hopefully we have good friends or maybe life coach or therapist that can push us through to help give us that chizuk to actually follow through on our commitments. But, the first thing is just think about how do I develop good habits, All right? And he talks in his book what his name but the author of Atomic Habits about if you want to let's say take you want to start learning guitar. So, you put the guitar in very visibly right next to you next to your couch. Don't leave it in your room. Cuz then you see it and you're going to be get into the habit of playing every day. If you want to cut out the the sweets and the extra sugar stuff. So, you got to get it out of your house, okay? Cuz if it's in your house, you're going to go back to your bad habits when you're in a bad mood, right? And you know, go for the Ben and the tub of Ben and Jerry's. All right, but if you don't have the Ben and Jerry's in the house in the first place, so then when you think ahead, then you can get yourself out of that little bad habit. So, it's about planning ahead to get into the Torah habits, to get into the holy good habits. Okay, so but it all really starts with all these nice the psychological tips. At the end of the day, we need Hashem. We need help from Hashem and we need when we dive in every day, we're we're developing the ratzone, the desire to go in the ways of Torah habits. The Torah techa. Torah techa not just Torah. Your Torah. To recognize when learning Torah because right now when we're learning Torah, you think I'm speaking. Hashem is speaking through me, I hope. Hope I'm saying, you know, holy things that I'm a vessel. And we have to be aware that it's his Torah. When we're opening up a safer, it's his Torah. He's talking to us. We're in relationship with Hashem with Torah techa. Your Torah, Hashem. Not just Torah. Yeah? Should I go in with Torah techa? The daf keenu mitzvah techa. And what does it mean? Okay, we do mitzvahs, but what does it mean to say the daf keenu mitzvah techa? Do the mitzvahs with dveikus. To attach. Attachment. So, what does that mean? Let's break that down. It's a nice word. Practically speaking, what's the difference between uh wrapping fill in stam or wrapping fill in with attachment, with the vakus? What does that mean? >> More kazak, more stronger. More kazak, okay, more intention, is what I'm hearing. What else comes to mind? So, the amazing safer which I mentioned a lot, it's called Bilvavi Mishkan Evneh. And the whole book is one big mussar shmooze about dvekut. Every action in your mind, in your life, always be in a state of attachment. But, what does that mean? What is attachment? So, long story short, right? It basically means your thoughts. You are where your thoughts are. If I'm thinking when I'm putting on that fill in, and that thought is going to lead to emotion, and then it will be a much more powerful mitzvah. But, if I'm not thinking about it, that's not dvekut, right? Because I'm not I'm just spacing out. I'm not connected. So, on a very simple level, we're begging Hashem. Hashem, our whole day is full of mitzvahs. I hope. Right? We we were zocheh to live in Eretz Yisrael. The Magain Avraham writes, every four amos in Eretz Yisrael is a mitzvah. It's like a kinyan in Eretz Yisrael. We actually live in Yerushalayim. But, are we aware of it? When we walk down the street, do we really How often do we think, "I'm walking in Eretz Yisrael after 2,000 years of exile to fulfill the mitzvah of living in Eretz Yisrael." Right? I mean, first time when you get off the Ben Gurion, you you're aware of it, but then life happens. So, dvekut is nothing uh esoteric. Nothing uh in the moon. People throw around these words. It's simply thinking of what we're doing. All right? I'm wearing tzitzit. Why am I wearing I'm wearing tzitzit. It's one of the cool things about being a tour guide. I just finished my tour. Have some Christians from Alabama and they're like, "What are those tassels?" And I'm like, "It's in the Bible. Fourth book of the Bible." And but, you know, the truth is I wasn't thinking about my tassels cuz I just wear my tassels, you know? But but I get to explain the tassels or the Western Wall or prayer. So, then it it's it's amazing. It gets me to excited about it, right? So, we should all be blessed have good friends from Alabama to remind us of what we're doing. But in the meantime, let's remind ourselves that we pray to Hashem that we should simply think about it. Think about it, which brings emotion, which brings the joy, which brings the energy in the mitzvahs. Okay? Let's keep going. Please God, don't bring me to sin. Don't bring me to aveira and don't bring me to avon. Again, we're recognizing that we can want, but at the end of the day, Hashem runs the world. Even when it comes to our sins and our mitzvahs, while we have free will, we need his help. We can't do it without him. So, don't bring us It's It's strong language. God would bring us to a sin? Don't bring us to sin. Would God have us sin? Maybe what it's saying is don't It's almost like if God's not helping us to resist our temptations, it's almost like he's bringing us there. It's almost like we have no shot. We need his help so much to resist sin. So, don't It's like It's like he's bringing us there he's not helping us. Don't don't bring us to that situation again. Maybe we could say that. Don't bring us to sin. Now, what's the difference between chet, avera, and avon? So, there's a lot of interpretations. Let's throw some ideas out there. Maybe we could say chet doesn't mean don't bring me to sin. It means don't bring me even to be around sin. Avera is actually a sin. And avon is a purposeful sin. A sin that we made it. But, I don't even want to witness sin. Right? Maybe you've experienced it. I've experienced this when I don't know, I've seen people being mechalel shabbos in front of me. And it just hurts. Right? Just It's like a a yucky yucky feeling to see that. Especially when they're God-fearing, they're from Jews, and they mess up. And actually it happened to me this shabbos. We just walked out with a with a negative feeling. And we don't want to be in that situation. We don't want to even be around a place where sin is happening. So, that's don't bring me to a sinful place. Maybe that's the intention. Another shot. Chet mistake. Don't bring me to a mistake. Like to miss the mark. Sometimes the language of chet is to miss the mark. And don't bring me to an avera. Avera is language of lavoir. Or in English, transgression. That's maybe you could say a low taseh. And don't bring me to an avon. Don't God forbid don't bring me to I do something purposefully. Cuz what's the What does the Gemara say? Avera goreret avera. One sin leads to the next sin. And the Gemara points out, the first time you do a sin, it feels horrible, right? But then you get used to it. second time, the third time, the fourth time. After a while, you do a sin, it no longer feel you The way we're built is we just get used to it. And uh it's no longer a big deal. Right? So, chet leads to aveira, which leads to avon. And so, Hashem, don't put us in a situation where we're surrounded by sinners. Put us in a holy environment. And hopefully that won't go down that domino path. Okay? That's what we're davening for. No aveira, no avon, and no and no aveira and no avon. V'lo aleinu nisayon. Don't lead us take us to a test. Wait a second. Doesn't the Mesillas Yesharim write that the whole purpose of life is a test? Hashem put us here to lift ourselves up. Nes is a language of left up, like a banner. In In In Chumash, there's a nes. Through the test, when we overcome the test, we become better. The Yoisel ben Tzaddik, when he overcame the test, that's what made him who he was. And the Mesillas Yesharim writes all of life Hashem puts us into our particular situations so that we can overcome the challenges. There's even a book, it's called Life Is a Test. Right? So, if so, if all of life is just, you know, a video game, so to speak, where our goal is to overcome the hurdles of sadness and sin and negativity and stick to positivity and mitzvahs and grab all those bonus point mitzvahs. It's all a big test, right? So, why would we say we don't want a test? Wouldn't we want the challenge, right? It's no fun Michael Jordan playing basketball against a 5-year-old. We want the test. We want a challenge, right? We want to grow. So, why we davening every day, "V'lo aleinu nisayon." Don't don't give a test. You hear my uh my my kasha? It's not my kasha. I'm I'm getting it from the muforshim that I I learned beforehand. What do you any any thoughts? There's no test, there's no growth. There's no test, there's no growth. So, my question stands. Why are we davening not to have a test? We should daven for a test, yeah? What do you think, Hanokh? I'm not so comfortable with the idea of testing. Mhm. But I am comfortable with the idea of having an insight into something, a new awareness that I didn't have before. Mhm. I don't look at it as a test, I look at it as something I have to improve in uh either way I'm learning or what I'm learning. But the insight So, we want insights. We want to grow, we want to learn. But you're saying we don't want the test, if I'm hearing you correct. >> what I'm what I'm comfortable Okay, good good. I hear. >> So, and and the word um today we have tiferet sheva um netzach. Yeah, okay. Tiferet is the word. It's I think it's the most confused word. I think we're going on a little bit of a tangent. We'll we'll we'll save that for after shiyur. >> about it at the end. Okay, great, perfect. We should talk about it later. But I want to stick cuz there's a lot to cover. Um perhaps we could say on a simple level there's tests and then there's tests. Okay? There's a natural test that Hashem gives every one of us who you are, who your family is, what your life situation is, and we can't really control it. And therefore, that is obviously that's our test. Right? I- I- I- I- if I'm in this situation in life, that's what Hashem wants for me to do. That's that's my challenge. Right? But then And tests which we put ourselves in. Okay? And that's the type of test that we don't want to get ourselves in. Something Sorry, that that is a natural level of test. That's what it came with the territory of being who I am. Right? But I don't There's a famous Gamara which says David wanted a test cuz he wanted that that to that growth and it didn't work out well. That's when the whole story of Bat Sheva happened. So, we never want to put ourselves into a test of situation. But honest, often times we do. We bring the the problems upon ourselves. We we can't blame it on Hashem. And so, we're And And that doesn't mean that we can't overcome the test. Cuz we have a principle in life, it's Siyata Dishmaya. Right? God helps us. God helps us with all of our challenges. But uh we're praying to God that he uh he shouldn't put us through a a challenge which is which is very very challenging and he shouldn't let us put ourselves into these types of uh situations. But as long as we're just going through life and doing what we got to do, we we we know that Hashem's with us and those types of test Hashem will help us handle. Perhaps we could I read a story, interesting uh story. There's a There's a woman who was a alcoholic. She came from a family of alcoholics. And uh she was uh always battling uh to be sober. And her way of getting over it was AA. She would go every single day to these uh beautiful Alcoholics Anonym- Anonymous meetings. And that's what gave her the strength. And um at a certain point she realized it was her stepmother had actually basically raised her. And then moved away some very far away and she never thanked her properly. And uh she knew deep inside that she had to go visit this woman and thank her and spend some time with her. But she was afraid. What was she afraid of? She'd go to a place without an AA meeting in somewhere in the middle of, I don't know, Wyoming and she would go back to her bad or her ways that she didn't want to go down that path. So she asked her friend and her friend said, "Listen, if this is the right thing to do, God will be on your side and he will guide you." Um and uh so she took the flight and she was struggling the whole time. It was very hard. She was very nervous. How's she going to spend a whole all these weeks without her meetings to support her? She meets her old uh you know, nanny and her nanny, what does she see? That her nanny happens to be hosting that particular month AA meetings. That they they needed the space. So in this random place uh they uh Hashem sent this woman that she should have the support she needed. She would have the strength to overcome her challenges. So as long as you're going in the way of Hashem and your ratzon is to do the right thing, God will do God will do what he needs to do to give you the support that you need. But it's not our job to put ourselves into test. It's our It's our job to limit the test as much as possible. You know. Sometimes it's it's life, you know. So so we we find ways to over to to strengthen ourselves to overcome those tests. Okay. Below you do vizayon. We don't want to be embarrassed. Sometimes when we fail a test, we feel embarrassed. Right? It's a natural. I imagine you had an urge, you were going to buy a beggar a coffee. You just wanted to do a good deed. And then you're like, "Nah, that guy I'd rather get myself a double latte. I'm going to get myself a double coffee." And then you see the other guy comes up and buys the uh buys him a coffee. You're going to feel embarrassed. Here I am you know just trying to serve myself and this guy is a tzaddik. We have a natural feeling of embarrassment when we see others doing great things and we feel like we could do that and we want to do that. So when we fail our test, we feel embarrassed. So they maybe they go together. Now after the fact as I think we've spoken about before, once we've been embarrassed, what do we say? Baruch Hashem. It's amazing to be embarrassed. Right? The Sforno Kadosh writes that if we knew how much getting embarrassed in this world saves us from being embarrassed in the next world from the pain of the next world, we would beg for busha's for embarrassments. Right? Because uh that's how God gets rid of our afflictions without physical pain. So after the fact we're thankful that we're we were embarrassed. But we don't want to purposefully put ourselves in a situation where we're going to be embarrassed and so we're asking God don't let me be embarrassed. I want to if I I'm going to overcome my challenges and therefore not be embarrassed, be proud of myself. Okay. Lo yehi bizayon. Ve'al tashlitenu yetzer hara. It's very interesting language. And God, don't let our yetzer hara reign over us. Don't even don't you make our evil desires reign over us. Like you God are going to make our yetzer hara reign over us. Very strong language. Again, I think it goes back to that concept of makos. In the way that a person wants to go, that's the way that Hashem's going to send him. So if you really want to do good and holy, he's going to open up the gates. He's going to lift up everything to allow you to uh to to do and to give and to to to to it achieve. But, if you want to go down the path of sin, he's literally going to open up the door for you. And he's going to help push the yetzer hara to allow you to do what you got to do. As a or you what Not what you want to do. Not what you got to do. And um so, we're praying, "God, don't let my yetzer hara reign over us." Yetzer means I have a push. Let me direct my desires for good. Let me direct my koachus. I have a lot of energy. I can get get it off in learning Torah. I can get it off in cooking. I can get it off in playing basketball. Or I can get it off in robbing stores and making fun All sorts of bad things. So, direct our yetzer, our desires for the good. Okay. The Very interesting. We pray every single day that get me back far from a bad person and from a bad friend. What's worse, a bad person being in contact with a bad person or being in contact with a bad friend? What do you guys think? Why? Why bad friend? Because it's more closeness. The friend is just some stranger. Right. I agree. In fact, that's what the mission in Pirkei Avot says. We're learning Pirkei Avot in there. He says one of the Mishnayot in the second perek, I believe it's Rabbi Shimon, I'm not sure, says, "What's the worst the midah that a person should avoid?" An evil friend or a bad friend. He also says that. He says be make yourself bad from a neighbor, a bad neighbor. But, then I want to be a Russia. Don't even associate with a Russia. If you know someone's a Russia, don't have anything to do with it. Right? Don't listen to Pink Floyd. Even though they have great music. I think one of the guys is pro-Israel, but what can you do? Most of them you don't want to associate with that. You know what I'm saying? I'm maybe in the oven. Anyways, the point is that I hope I don't get sued now. By uh by Roger Waters. In any case, um the point is don't associate don't be in the presence. Don't listen to the YouTube videos. Don't look at pictures of bad people. You don't want to connect it to the ruach of tumah. That's what Rebbe Nachman says. But all the more so, a friend. Truth is, sometimes it's a friend. He's not a bad guy. But together, it's not a good shidduch. It's not good chibur. So, Hashem, make me you know, if make me that I should connect to the people to the right people. Al titkaber. And uh like we were almost saying, when someone's a friend, they can be mashpia a tremendous amount. Right? When bad you when you have friends who are doing bad things, it's very natural to get pulled into that. So, we're davening every day, Hashem, give me the right friends. Give me the right people in my life. And like we started off saying, we're really reminding ourselves, Hashem, come and go to make the right friends, you know. Pushing myself to do the right thing. All right. Uh few more minutes. Let's finish up strong. Dov ben Chanoch ben Yitzchak ben Meis ben Tuvia. By the way, interesting question. Why do we pray that we should have not no bad friends, and we don't pray that we should have good friends. Wouldn't that be nice? Please, Hashem, give me good friends. Right? What we say, k'neged chaver tov. Aseh lecha rav u'kneh lecha chaver. Why don't we insert in the prayer a prayer that we should have good friends? I don't know. We can think about that. Maybe that it's as strong as having a good friend is, having a bad friend is is really dangerous. It's even worse. So So I don't know. I don't know. If we do the right things, well, it doesn't matter if we don't pray. Oh, we'll naturally make those friends. We don't need to pray for it. We don't need to pray for it. It'll happen. Where it's up it's up to us. Very good. Okay. Um the the keynote of and like Vegas we should want we should think about doing good. Think good and do good. Over my son told him. What's it mean told? Told literally means good. But says the Ramban, you know what it really means? It means first of all, complete. Why? Because every day God says by your local in the word key tofu. And God saw the first day it was told. The third day was told. The fourth day was told. Fifth day was told. The second day was not told because it was incomplete. It still was not finished. So we want my son told him. We want to finish the job. We don't want to start a mitzvah and then not finish it. Right? In politics it seems like some I don't want to get too involved but there's some leaders they know how to start the job and begin a lot of good holy projects but they don't know how to finish the job. Right? Show him a lick. Show him a lick. He started the job of wiping out the Amalekites. He didn't finish the job. He didn't know he wasn't the king. A king is someone who knows how to finish the job. He was out to tell me she will come. He'll be someone who knows how to finish the job. So, we want to be most inviting. We want to do it all the way with all our heart and we don't want to start mitzvah. I I myself have made this mistake. So, you can learn from my mistakes. Someone asked you Remember, I was going I was walking home from the hotel a few weeks ago and someone asked me advice, "How do I get to my friend Dave?" I got He got lost and he wanted to go to Dave Mason's house. And it happens to be a practice. I know Dave Mason. Like I know exactly who that is of all the people. So, I was in a little bit of a rush cuz I didn't want to come home too late for my wife and and guests and etc. And I told him go this way and that way and this way and that way. And then I'm like two I'm like halfway through my house. I'm like, "What did I do? Hashem gave me an opportunity to do a mitzvah, to be a good person the whole way. It would have taken five extra minutes. Why didn't I finish the job?" You know, Hashem gives you an opportunity, finish the job obviously within reason. But hopefully I'll have a chance to do chuvah. But when Hashem gives us a mitzvah, don't let somebody else finish the job for you. Go all the way. Good The second shot of good is what's not good. It's not good to be alone. So, what is good? When you're not alone, when you're connected. Connected with a Thank you. When you're doing a mitzvah with awareness, good. Okay, great. We have these and and we want to do we want to do this and we want to do we say Hashem force me. Straddle me in, you know. Literally force me to do the right thing. We're begging Hashem to put us in our place. That we should be subjugated to do to focus on the soul and not go off their our titus. And give me today and every day. Right, what does Rashi famously say? What does it say? Hayom. Hayom. Why does it Why does the Shema Dafka say today? Cuz every day we have to be like the first day. And we have to believe Hayom in the kol today the Messiah will come if we lift into our voice. Maybe we're davening. Hayom. I don't care about tomorrow. I don't care about yesterday. I only care about right now. Today I have one day. I have a couple of hours to be the best Jew I can. Hashem give me Hayom. Today. And every single day. We don't just care about today. We also want every day. We want to find favor in your eyes. We want Hashem to love us. What does the Ramam say? That what is How does a person express love of God? When he tells other people about Hashem. He does kiruv. That's how we express our love of God. Why? Cuz when you truly love something you don't want to just keep it to yourself. You want to tell the whole world how beautiful this is. That's love. When you And you care about that person you really really want to spread that everyone should love and it hurts you that someone can hate someone that you love. That's love. So, in the same way that that's our expression of love is that we want everybody that that to love Hashem. We're I'm We're hoping that Hashem loves us. We're praying Hashem, because you love us so much, everyone should love us. Since you love us, everyone we meet should be like, "Ah, he's got go. That guy's got him. That guy's got I don't know what it is. Something about him. He just he just shines the light of Hashem. He walks into the room, the whole place changes. So, we're davening, "Give me Give me him, that everyone who sees me should love me." Him, him, him, him, him, him, him, him, him, him, him, him. I can't hear. I'm saying it worked. Worked? It worked. Oh, it worked. Good. Okay, what's the difference between What's the difference between him, him, him, and him, him, my friends? Him means grace, him means kindness, and him means mercy. They seem kind of like the same thing. What's What's the difference between a him and a him and a him? Any thoughts? Him is definitely grace. It's undeserved. Oh, like a lotion of him. Him means for free. No, I I don't know why I love that guy. I don't know why I love a little cute kid. I just love him. He's just cute. He's just Me and that guy, I just I just vibe with him. I can't break it down to any specific, you know, thing. So, that maybe that's him. Although, Rebbe Nachman in his thick beautiful Torah and Likutei Moharan tries to explain there's a way to get him in Hashem's eyes. By learning Torah in at night and read the sixth Torah, you know, Ein Sham. There's a way to get him, but like like like Esther when she found favor in the eyes of of the king. But at the end of the day, we can try to get but it's indescribable. So we want to be that Hashem should just love us. So that's one level. Chesed, building on that way of looking at it, is a person who does deserve it. Meaning a little bit. We can never really say we deserve that God should love us, but we do things, so that's chesed. He does chesed, but we don't fully deserve it. And rachamim, what is what's the shoresh of the word rachamim? Rechem. Like a baby. Why do you love a little baby? Not because he deserves it, but out of mercy. You know, you see a poor kid and lying on the street, you have mercy upon them. So even though we don't deserve Hashem's rachamim, in the end of the way he's our father. So he hopefully rachamim, he has mercy. We're praying have mercy, even if I don't deserve it, have rachamim. You with me? Beautiful. Okay. Chen v'rachamim in your eyes everyone who sees us should just think, "Ah, I love being in that guy's presence." V'tikanenu chasadim tovim. Like we said, tovim, lasting chesed. Right? We don't want just Hashem to give us You know, what's the difference between um an apple and a lollipop? A lollipop, it's good, but it's not I wouldn't call it chasadim tovim. It's good in the short term, but in the long term, it's not so good. Right? Sugar's going to drop, and also diabetes, whatever. You don't have to give you the spiel. But apples, an apple a day, it's great, tastes good, healthy, good fiber. So it's real. So tovim means it's something that lasts. So Hashem, don't just give us something that's good for today. I want something that's really going to last in the long term. Okay? Baruch tiglin Hashem Baruch Ata Hashem You are the source of all blessing Hashem. Hasadim tovim Yisrael Amazing what we've done here. We started off I was just talking about waking up in the morning. God thank God for that coffee. And somehow by the end of this feel I'm not just worrying about me. Now who am I diving for? All of Yisrael Lashon rabim gomel Hasadim tovim Yisrael Right isn't that amazing? Ever notice that? We start off very self-centered but it's through the act of gratitude you actually learn to connect to the cloud and by the end of it you're not just diving for yourself. You're diving for all of Yisrael. And this by the way is exactly what happened. I'm sure many people who've done his his voided dues have experienced this. You just start off thanking Hashem and then you start talking about what you need and by the end of that smooth conversation you're diving for all your friends and that guy needs a shidduch and this guy needs this and this and you're diving for all of Yisrael. And if you haven't experienced that tonight at Mariv Hashem you should should experience that. Just just you know have that conversation and you'll see that your godly soul will naturally manifest itself from the the private the cloud. It will naturally if you're having a real conversation with the Baruch go and expand to praying for all of Yisrael. So maybe that's what's happening in this prayer. We start as a Yachid and then we go to the rabim. And we say and we're blessing Hashem for all the good kindnesses for all of the Jewish people. Starting just with the fact that I could wake up in the morning that meaning Hashem and then that's launching on us to to ask for all the little details in our life. And then recognizing that all of our lives are to be. So that I shall We should tomorrow morning in our showers have a little bit more and take if I would be very happy if even one sentence of our feel tomorrow is we say it with real real connection and should grant all of our prayers for us and all of Israel. Niggun please let him give us the right niggun. Shabbat >> Hey, bye. Hey, na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na. Hey, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.