(Way# 42) ACHEIVING PEACE OF MIND 48 Ways with Rabbi Aaron Dovid Poston

[Music] hey good day everybody welcome back to another episode of beyond the seven live from jerusalem with rabbi uh aaron david poston uh who has been teaching us the most beautiful uh series the 48 ways to wisdom and today we're on uh part 42 uh which rabbi poston has told me uh is about achieving peace of mind and this is exciting and timely for someone like myself always a great review and i so look forward to hearing what the rabbis got to share and i'm so thankful to hashem that rabbi poston stays up late in jerusalem to share with us the beautiful uh and timeless message uh in this uh section of the mishnah it's just beautiful material so let's jump right in rabbi poston good to be with you thank you and thank you for everyone who's uh tuning in and watching um shavuot i had a sore throat so i took a little bit of medications a little bit drowsy but this rather shame it'll all just blow over and okay so today's message this is number 42 of the 48 ways so for those who have not been watching they should know that this is uh based on mishna and perky vote chapter 6 mishna 6 the 48 ways to acquire wisdom 42 the way is in hebrew it's mamido al hasholo now mamido is to stand up on regarding peace uh the the roshiva of north weinberg in his famous book which is on my left shoulder 40 ways he titled this achieving peace of mind who doesn't want to achieve peace of mind tell me yeah who doesn't that well it's much deeper than just a uh a personal quest although everybody everybody in the world right you can even ask i don't know even though the worst of people right everybody thinks that they want peace the question is how to achieve it right so one of the most famous things about jews right it's a very famous thing how do they greet each other do they say hello no they say shalom they say not only did they say shalom they say shalom alechem which is very interesting because we could translate as peace upon you peace be to you that's a very nice greeting but it's much deeper than that because alaikem is plural right so what are you really saying i really desire there should be peace upon all of you not just you as the whole world which really ultimately is true but to your entire being because your entire being is not just your body but it's your soul and there's many levels of your soul that's right and i really truly wish peace upon you plural not plural is uh i mean it is true plurals in everybody but really peace upon your entire being so this is a very uh a deep a deep concept so what is shalom shalom is actually if i would ask you for drum roll please uh shalom is one of the names of god yeah it's not a word that is um you know there's certain words that we not only erase right there's certain names of god that are forbidden to erase so shaolin is not one of them but it is still a name that one would not be allowed to use in the bathroom in a bathhouse in a in a place that is considered dirty so that's a very interesting idea so what are you really saying when you say shalom aleichem peace to you that god's presence is his i'll just take i'll just translate the word shalom means wholeness completion perfection right should be upon you that's you're you're praying that someone should have an ultimate intimate relationship with their with their own perfection with god himself so what what you really want is that the person should have peace within himself right i mean this is like you think okay you're just saying it's it's a deep thing and you have to be careful where you say and how you say it and who you say it to um just as i mentioned that we have multiple aspects of our spiritual being just so people should know that there are five levels of our soul starting with the lower part which is the nephesh and then the ruach and then the neshama and then there are two that are not spoken about that much and it's a big question does this really apply to everybody i'm of the opinion that everyone has it even non-jews but it's a little bit of a um there's certain things that are holding it back and that's the the the the higher levels of the soul i believe i am of the opinion there's a major discussion um are the are the the soul of the jew and anand you exactly the same i don't want to get into that um but i i will tell you that i do believe that um because we we believe in converts we believe that a non-jew can become a jew the question is how and how what's the process and what happens at the end when they come out of the mikvah after a conversion do they now get impregnated with a new soul or is it in an existing soul that becomes unleashed uh the potential is always there so i believe of the opinion that the potential is always there and therefore the soul is always there and therefore those additional parts of the soul become i'm going to use the word unleashed i don't know if that's a good word but uncovered actualized actualize the great word and therefore the true potential truly comes out yes enjoy your coffee you imagine you know mentioned rib yokonan robiokina in the past we mentioned that he was the first one to say show malaikan to everybody so that's an interesting idea that even even to non-jews the gemara says even to non-jews he would say shalom first two and that really is a a deep desire for every human being to reach their full potential and therefore that's part of my i'll call it a thesis or my understanding um about the the soul of a non-jew as well okay so um the roshi begins by asking look when the world is in turmoil can a person still be at peace with themselves and the answer really truly is yes just like unfortunately we know that when the world's at peace there's still people at turmoil within themselves so a lot of times it's not about what's happening externally it's really all about what's happening internally and this is our ultimate goal to be come at peace with ourselves so um we're gonna talk about what we call an inner conflict right the strife that affects every one of us so before we do that i want to mention also why this is so important um the idea of i mean why should i be discussing why it's so important to have peace with yourself but there's a famous understanding in judaism and maybe a lot of jews when they're not so religious they don't really understand the spiritual world so much but they do make even in the secular world in the secular jewish world they they do sing this song as a song and i don't think maybe even religious jews are not putting as much attention towards it as they should and that's the song we sing i should say it's a song we sing they made it into a song but it's something that we all say constantly how many times a day i'm gonna guess wow 20 times a day we say these words i mean when i tell you oh yeah i've heard that before and in hebrew israel in english who makes harmony in his heavenly heights may he make harmony for us and all of israel say i mean so again in hebrew he who makes peace in his heights so the angelic forces the different forces even nature itself right everything that hashem made he ultimately is the one who grants peace and in the in the heavenly world and this i guess this is also something that maybe christians have a harder time with because they i think they believe i shouldn't say they all do because i don't really know that much about all the different 80 000 plus sects of christianity but the the one idea that they keep coming up with is somehow that there is a satan a satan who is a runaway renegade rebellious angel and that's just not a jewish concept okay out of control hashem has made peace in the heavenly heights so he truly has made there is no such thing as a rebellious angel they do have strife with each other but not with him and he's the one let's just use an example the word for heaven itself hashamayim is made up of two words ace and mine fire and water and i don't know that much i'm not a scientist right i don't know that much about how you know everything works in this world i to admit right but i do know a little bit that there is a thing called evaporation that it is caused through partly through heat and you have water that goes up and they become clouds and then something happens and then they come down as rain and it all depends you know on the temperatures up in heaven and uh whether it's gonna be a harsh rain a soft rain or no rain at all and then it comes down and the the the we call this the system repeats itself it goes around and around and around right sure okay so there's there's that's based on this idea of heav of fire and water hashem is the one who's ultimately in charge right i mean this is what we pray for we pray for rain pray for the right around the rain and the right amount of in the right places at the right time and in the truth is you know the in the prophets speak about this and the torah itself that if the non-jews don't send representatives during pace uh during sukkot is the time of judgment over rain and if they don't send representatives to you shall lion right that they will not see rain in its time in its place the right places at the right time so basically this idea of the heavenly world uh in the spiritual realms hashem makes peace it's just an example that i gave of fire and water in the physical world right so too um this is the waste and they're representative uh by different angels right there's an angel that oversees everything in the physical world each different elements so to speak so you have michael and gavriel the angel or angels over fire and water and yes they may have their own let's say competition i'm not even called strife whatever it is competition but hashem is ultimately in charge so we are supposed to imitate hashem now if he makes this peace in the heavens and what are we asking he who makes the peace above should bring the peace down below this is something that we aspire whether it's internally as well as externally it's just it's a very deep concept we're talking about peace of mind but we're also talking about world peace as well so it starts with ourselves right you have to have peace within yourself you notice i shouldn't say you know this but we all notice people who are internally going through such turmoil they bring it out they lash it out they oh yeah you know they they're on their sleeve yeah that they are in pain they make it obvious and how okay there's all kinds of ways but sometimes they try to inflict everyone around them you know when they say misery loves company is that the statement that as long as they're miserable they would like other people around them to be just as miserable or to feel their misery um well guess what hashem the opposite also it's true right so when someone is at peace i think this is my own experience around people who i know that can call them a room who are at peace with themselves um emanate that right and spread that love spread that peace and that harmony and that's that's how we're going to end so now we have another you know 45 minutes till we get there right because that's going to be uh so-called the end so one of the most famous questions are roshiva of noah weinberg memory should be blessed had always asked the students over and over and over again and you'll see it if you watch his his recordings his lessons do you know what you're living for you have to know what you're living for right if someone doesn't know what they're living for most likely they're in they're in pain they're in a constant conflict turmoil know what you're living for you have to have a purpose now one of the ways he helps us you know his students to understand well guess what once you can discover that and part of discovering it is what are you willing to die for like what's so important that you're willing to die for something now of course he doesn't want to make a whole army of jihadists and uh what do you call it you know martyrs but he wants you to understand that once you realize what you are willing to die for then choose that and live for it make that meaningful in your life right if judaism is the god is standing up for the god of israel right in this world that is full of ignorance or against anti-semitism or whatever it is right you choose is it ben noah right is it abortion is it is it the justice system right you choose right something that is important to you that you're willing to die for that so guess what make it your life's mission right it's not that's not that hard but it's uh it's going to it's going to help clarify for yourself and help you re achieve inner peace thank you um okay let's see um just on a very let's say an example of a more simpler idea of uh being conflicted right so you know when you're in in um with the word high school or even university or you know you have uh exams you have things you have to study for and they call crash you know when you're studying in a a procrastinated way because you know you have a deadline but you have so much things to do to go out and go bowling with your friends or to uh to go to a party so you're conflicted and you keep saying you know put it off put it off but if this is something meaningful for you to get a good grade to get a good let's say i'm not saying that if you do well if you even have to go to college to to have a a good a a good um a good job but let's just say right let's just say it helps so yeah let's just say so so you you know that this is going to make a better quality of life for you if you just sit down and study instead of going to the party but you you're torn what are you torn with you're torn with your your morals you're torn with what's important to you but really what it comes down to is your spiritual aspirations versus your physical need for what called fun or comfort or desire it is and we're going to get into that now because that's really what it comes down to um and how you're going to resolve that conflict with what's important to you so i'll just mention what he says the source of this battle is the conflict between two opposite forces the body and the soul he mentions that the body represents what we call the eight sahara yetzara for those who are not familiar is your base inclinations your physical desires and he mentions they gravitate towards transitory comforts and sensual pleasures that's what desires to quit he just wants to sit around and fantasize and drown in passions to procrastinate so the body says what is it you know what it says we all know what the body says give me some food right warmth a pillow okay so maybe some some ice cream okay and basically saying let me run away from the pain and just take it easy but we all really know what happens because you're going to face more pain anyway later on right what does this salt say on the other hand it desires meaning accomplishment permanence greatness reality and truth it wants the true pleasure that only comes through hard work and challenge now i have a few um ideas to talk about here we read this verse you know we've talked about this leading up to hanukkah but if look in proverbs chapter 20 verse 27 if you can read it for us proverbs 27 verse 27. verse 27 reads man's soul is the lord's lamp which searches out all the innermost parts now leading up to hanukkah i i don't know if in this these this series or other classes but many rabbis discuss this idea the so the man's soul the lamp of god the ner hashem the hashem is the nishmas adam so what is it about a flame it's constantly trying to elevate itself it's just right i mean even if you took it if you took a match and just turned it down i mean you're gonna burn your finger eventually right it's it's trying to it's again i'm not a scientist i just observe right you see the flame is trying to go up up up up up that's what hot air rises and cold air falls yeah always wants to do good it always wants to improve it always wants perfection this is the flame and this is what god gave us the the image well let's say like i'm creating god's image this is a right there is no like part of god god doesn't become parts separate from himself but this is image that god created within us that is godly that is like god keeping that in mind okay uh go to genesis chapter 2 verse 7 when god made man seven and the lord god formed man from the dust of the ground and he breathed into his nostrils the soul of life and man became a living soul now in the hebrew you would not notice this in english and that's why i do uh in many of my classes implore courage i'm not begging i'm telling you this is for your benefit to look at the hebrew to try to learn the hebrew but it says here the first word in verse is the love is there right it's a and and it actually um changes it from uh future future tense to past tense but that's a different lesson but so we'll put in past tense so god formed elohim was what is two years doing there it doesn't make any sense this word is spelled wrong if i was writing the torah and i knew hebrew i would never put you there but there are two yields there god created us with two inclinations he formed us um the famous verse if you want to read it in isaiah chapter 45 verse 7. there's another thing that i think christians battle with battle with um where does evil come from but god created evil re reach uh isaiah 45 7 7 says who forms light and creates darkness who makes peace and creates evil i am the lord who makes all these so he created evil so when he created us created already right we have within us the physical body which wants to pull us down and you have the soul which wants to go up it's a conflict okay so you don't belong in a mental hospital you're a normal human being if you have this conflict okay you're not born in sin right that's not what king david meant when he said that was born in sin okay that's a whole other lesson okay so god created us with these inclinations which give us free will which give us meaning when we make the right choices this gives us the reward that our god ultimately wants to give us when we make the right choices so this is explaining the the the conflict that we all have and and you don't need to invent a new religion to figure out how to deal with this conflict right there's judaism which is for the world right i say jewish so there are right now who i would call right they accepted the jewish religion they're not they're not jewish they're not you deem but they believe in the god of abraham isaac and jacob they believe in the god of israel because they accept that the torah was given to mount sinai this is one of the for those who are not aware and i'm not here to preach i am but that one of the seeming prerequisites to be called righteous gentile and there's there's ben noah you're ben knock whether you like it or not okay meaning you're obligated in the seven minutes the question is you want to go to heaven right you want to eternality you want your soul to to be fulfilled so within yourself resolve that conflict work it out you're going to have to work this point out is the torah from heaven do the jews have a mission says so notorious so once you accept the terms from heaven you accept that the jews have a special mission yes okay so you can help them along the way right they can use a little this little assistance right but basically you're going to to help them as opposed to harm them or hinder them okay so that is a major a major part of being a righteous gentile is to understand that i know that there is a special position for the jews as teachers as responsibility and uh and uh and the well called the layman right the the priest but you have the layman the layman are you guys and of course there's always going to be tension between the the teachers and the and the students but the students are what improve the teachings of the teacher right we discussed this before in percy about as well right the idea just in general the idea that they asked the rabbis who were who'd you learn the most from your own teachers your own colleagues or your students and the only answer is really we learn most from our students jews have a lot to learn and in their spare time i believe that the more jews should be involved in in knowing a little bit more about how to teach right especially people they might run into on the streets whatever it is right on the internet the streets uh being able to answer right it sharpens your own mind right it solidifies your own and that's also going to bring your own inner peace because you're going to work out the conflicts it's so important to work out the inner conflicts so you should have your own peace of mind i give every everybody not just the jews listening but everybody the ability to um to have peace of mind and that's really what that prayer is going back to the prayer that i mentioned that we say it right at the end of every one of our silent prayers it's going to be said at the end of the repetition which is only uh depends which day it is but on chakras or musaf or or mimka they're not not necessarily married except in your own silent prayer because there's no repetition at night at the end of benching which is the grace after the meals at kaddish which is said many times throughout the day the kaddish prayer it's not just set for the dead it said after completing learning so even before our we begin our prayers and at the end there's a kaddish depends this different different versions for sparty menachem nazim maybe even more uh in the shockers prayer in the morning prayer you're talking about the the in the afternoon prayer even the kaddish discovered the asking god to receive our prayers this is how it ends this these words right hugh makes harmony in his heavenly heights may he make harmony and this is just the art scroll version but it really means peace because the word shalom is used um it is it has to become real right we can imagine you're walking back three steps after the kaddish or after your own uh prayer and you're asking that god bring peace into the world right just the concept of peace anyway this which we call the 18 benedictions which are really 19 but that's also not for now um the last words the last blessing is for peace to bring that god should bring peace into this world it is the the ultimate it's the ultimate right and it's yes it does talk about world peace but it's it all starts with ourselves um inner peace um so the roshiva continues he says these two forces clash right with them with the body and the soul yeah we want to be tough but you know what we also feel like being weak we want to be great but we also we don't feel like making the effort like it's so much easier not to make the effort we want to be independent but you know what we cave in to show social pressure and we go with the flow this conflict conflict is raging within all of us constantly even when we're not fully aware of it so inner peace comes when we resolve that strife so now the next chapter heading is uh peace which is victory of the soul so just quote rabbi mati burger but this is really um actually it's in the older safari it's in the hosts for sephora kodesh it discusses the idea that when we think about who we are and i ask you are you a soul or you're a body well the truth is we're both but who are you really right who are you really who are you on the eternal level and the truth is you're really the soul because the body will come and go right and whether in this transmigration or another transmigration if you believe in reincarnation but we all know that the body will eventually die and we will have what we call we all have no one of the 13 principles of the jewish faith is that there is a resurrection of the dead and i do believe that the non-jews also have to believe that if they want to go to heaven okay it's based on the mission of sanhedrin but that's not for now but it's one of the key elements that i believe in a non-jew you want to go to heaven you want to have eternality also to believe that it stems from the spirituality that the torah emanates okay but that's not for now the idea is that we will have another body and it's not going to be this body during the resurrection of the dead it could be a culmination of will be a combination of all the things we accomplish spiritually it will those accomplishments will be that energy that light will be used to rebuild the body so that body will not look like this body and it may be a combination of several lifetimes of accomplishments that the soul used okay but that's also enough for now um i had a whole bunch of things i wanted to mention if you look in job 11 chapter 11 verse 12. chapter 11 verse 12 says but an empty man will gain understanding and from a wild donkey a man will be born now it's the last few words of that verse that we are like a wild donkey when we're born very interesting you know even by ben knock when do you become a bar mitzvah when do you become obligated in the midst vote right we know in judaism women this is the torah the the wisdom of the torah explains that women mature or much faster than men already by the age of 12 meaning the end of the eleventh year there they become responsible for mitchell's in this world the men a year later right the end of their twelfth year beginning of the thirteenth year right now interestingly enough when is it for non-jews so it's a debate i'm i'm i'll take the lenient opinion that it's probably around 25. now 12 13 uh there's an opinion that no it's like six seven eight nine whenever they already gain a certain level of knowledge of what's right and wrong but okay this is god's judgment and maybe uh it applies also to us in a bastion meshiac will let us know when he comes and the sanhedrin when they are put back together they'll let us know the truth um of course we want to teach our children at a young age that they're responsible for right and wrong whether they're jewish or not jewish of course um and it's based on schumann and levy shimon and ladies before the tour was given when they uh will call uh defended their honor of their their sister dina who was raped and they wiped out a whole city called now what gives the right right for them to do such a thing so going into the seven misses of the world one is um right immorality yeah well you could call it all you want sexual morality but the truth is they could have had a based in we're talking about this whole city one person might have been guilty of sexual immorality but guess what they had it they had um he was a prominent member of that society the king's son and uh they didn't hold the court they said no you know this is considered uh you know we're not going to deal with this right basically like they're doing in certain places hashem i think that america hopefully will come around because the justice system is still we all know it's corrupt but it's not as corrupt as it could have been as it as other countries are perhaps there's still uh you know some some hope there so everybody's been following some of the trials that have come out lately again there are going to be people who say it's still corrupt right for some reason but uh for those i think know that there is some hope that america is not totally corrupt and there is some there is some hope um okay so basically man has this like job describes man is like a wild donkey whether he's jewish or not jewish right and at some point you know the the brain tells uh the connections that could be made what's right and what's wrong hopefully additionally we have a good parents maybe the school system we can't trust the school system but you know depends you try the best you can to choose the best school you can um and you know eventually the person will become a upstanding member of uh society right that's all you can hope right whatever you as a parent give whatever choices you made for the school you hope that you made the right choice and they will also take some responsibility right in in directing the person towards a righteous lifestyle upward living yeah yeah um by the way just keep in mind that when man was created the words god saw that it was good it's not used right you have many times god said it was good but when he actually made man he didn't say that but not saying it on the sixth day but doesn't say it about man particularly so one of the ideas because god is not he's in charge he's in control but he's allowing you to make the choices so what you choose is going to determine whether it was good or not keep that in mind this is free will under judaism right god yes the ultimately the whole purpose of creation was for you to actually make those those right choices in order to receive what you choose yeah mamish okay another idea just keep in mind the day in judaism i know this is a something you have to get your head around but it begins at night that what we call a day a 24-hour period begins at night i know the word day can be used as a 24-hour period or just when there's daylight i understand okay so but we get used to the idea that the day begins at dawn at the daylight at dawn but in judaism a day again a 24-hour period called day begins at night and the idea that night precedes the day shows you there's work to be done there's that darkness means seems like there's distance from god seems like the body the physical has taken over totally and that is how we begin our life like job described like a wild donkey like a physical being a donkey is a very physical being in fact hamor the word khan more for donkey is actually means gosh means it means physicality so we begin that's how life begins seemingly just you know and then there therefore we eventually i guess we go towards the light right that's the idea that we inch our way into intelligence into morality into knowing and standing up for ourselves and hopefully resolving this conflict as we grow up i mean this is another reason you talk about children i think they call it adolescence right there's this whole it's a very interesting idea that god himself is a big secret many people don't know this even though we've already mentioned the idea of a bar mitzvah being becoming obligated it's true there's an obligation but the punishment will not begin until a after seven years until the age of 20. god is so graceful and he created us he knows we have this conflict forget about all the i mean you can't forget about it but we all know that you know and adolescence you know looking in the mirror at the pimples and all the you know the growth spurts and how it affects i guess with the qual like you know the the the shape of the body and how they think about how they look hashem knows you're trying to find yourself and he's extremely graceful and patient and allows you let's say on a on a supernal level of judgment to be overlooked right he's overlooking and therefore if you're let's say just an example and um so if someone is um thieving let's say a jew a jew is thieving let's say the age of 15 17 so he'll go to court if so he's caught and he'll be held accountable in this world by either paying back what he stole or in in the case of um where he denied it or he tried to hide it um so they paid double and there's different other examples where he managed to pay even four or five times the amount by a non-jew it's actually more severe but what i think is happening here is that when you're not caught so hashem is willing to overlook okay so by the jew so if he's not caught so there's no punishment in heaven is what i'm trying to say hashem is going to overlook it now of course you're responsible and and the repercussions are going to follow you in this world but at least in heaven there is this called a grace period if that's if that's a okay word to use um where you're not responsible for on a community level on a heavenly level until the age of 20. okay um did i go through it okay so the question now is the victory for the salt lake who's really in charge is it your body or your soul gonna be up to you okay um he mentions like i already said there's never any peace when you give into the whims of the desires of the body like for example when you lose your temper right you fail to stand up for your beliefs you succumb to lust or you flee from a challenge the feeling you experience is the numbing release from pain as you slip into the deadening clutches of comfort but this is only temporary right and you're going to end up feeling empty you're going to feel s i don't know like you're a loser honestly right you're going to feel depressed you're going to actually you could be angry with yourself so real peace is going to come from choosing to live as a soul and you're going to train your your body to desire what the soul wants ultimately your soul has to win your soul can never make peace with your body but the body can be conditioned to follow the soul like a horse whose power is harnessed and directed by its rider so i think did i give that example ready that like a jockey you think of yourself this is one of the things i wanted to mention and i think i skipped it but the idea is that you should think of yourself as a jockey a jockey is usually a smaller human being right shorter lighter whatever uh but nevertheless riding on top of that animal called the horse and this you know in that case but here we're talking about the donkey right that you have to be in control okay and that is what the first hopefully the first you know part of your life is about right back in the day people live 40 50 60 years old i mean back in the day i'm talking about in our times uh hundreds of years ago obviously thousands of years ago where it was a different story but now people are living longer so can you imagine a third of your life is just figuring out who you are today broke hashem i don't know if we're more advanced but we have more conflicts but um anyway the the challenge here is to get your body to be as excited about doing mitzvahs about doing the right thing as your soul is you know and maybe you have to come up with some schemes but whatever it is you that's going to be um the goal so in terms of let's say people who work out people who jog or people who weight lift and they enjoy it whatever it is but the beginning your body's screaming at you saying what do you want to kill me i can't do this right but eventually it's then there's like it's in sync right you almost can't start your day without that a certain amount of exercise or whatever it is that you've um convinced your body is going to be good for it it says in the medrash in esther raba 10 it says the wicked are dominated by their hearts while the righteous dominate their hearts now this is also i think a little conflicting with many christians people say you know my heart tells me i don't care what joy does i mean i do care maybe as a man it's a little bit like whatever but uh women are more you know in touch with their hearts but nevertheless we're not talking about the we're not strictly talking about the emotions okay so you have to dominate and in a certain sense even the word love claw in the in the um in the shema prayer right used to love god with all your heart and i said heart it really says hearts with all your hearts interestingly enough lip gloss it should have said with your heart plural with your heart with your heart but it says with all your hearts it's talking in a singular language and yet it's talking about you that you have also there's two bets the two bets also over there is explained that god gave you these inclinations so it's not that your heart is entirely bad you have to be able to distinguish again within your heart um you have this other inclination um but anyway getting back into this idea of exercise or you know training your body to listen so um it's only through willpower that you're able to eventually get your control yeah to uh to comply okay because you made a decision that you're you're constantly reassuring your your own self that there's a higher value of being healthy staying in shape and you're saying this is what i really want this is what i really right and you you have to use strategies so ultimately this is an integrated power the body and the soul working together in tandem to accomplish uh this meaningful goal okay um figure out what you want to accomplish overrule your body paint the benefits in glowing terms be excited about it you have to strategize how am i going to overcome this inclination that god gave me this is just part of life it's through discipline and constant drilling and the body's resistance will then sleepwear down and remember it will become your soul's willing partner i mean even king david he made he made his feet he by making the right choices by going to the bait midrash for example to the study hall he says that he his feet took him he wanted to go one place but his feet took him to the bay midrash right shifty shifty shifty he always wanted to sit in the house of god and therefore if he hadn't had any other desires it wouldn't work because he trained his feet so well that even without thinking as soon as he walked out his front door he ended up in the bait midrash beautiful that's going to be the goal okay peace through a cause now the idea here and that we've talked about the 12 steps of it doesn't matter if it's alcohox narcotics anonymous all the different self-help programs that work with the 12 steps so if you think about what the 12th step says having had past tense a spiritual awakening because remember i don't know i don't tell you to remember but the whole idea that the 12 steps is all about god and personal taking personal responsibility for your for your character that's really what it's about and faith because someone has ruined their life they went down the rabbit hole and they became addicted to something okay and they you know had to come to an admission they came to belief they started working on their character but at the end having worked those steps right as a result of the steps they are now free from this bondage and the 12-step program the big book of alcoholics anonymous describes it as a spiritual illness so it's a lack of spirituality it's a lack of spiritual direction it's giving in to the cravings of the body it's you don't you know any addict who's at peace with themselves no they're all conflicted heavily they know that they're hurting themselves they know they're hurting other people but at the end 12 steps says having had a spiritual awakening as a result of the steps what does it say it says we tried to carry this message to others of course to continue to practice these but this is very important because once you realize what's important and in in bringing inner peace how can you keep that to yourself i mean even abraham himself right think about when you he shared about god if i dan you and i we're we're friends it's fine right but i think you're the best guy in the world and we spend a lot of time together let's say you think i'm going to go around and tell all my friends hey man go spend some time with dan you know what's going to happen when they're all spending time with you you're going to have less time with me so when it comes to a human friendship i may have some reservations about sharing my love for you with the whole world because then there's less of you but when it comes to god it doesn't work that way right however i realized i'm going to tell the whole world about god just when i the more i say about god and the more i share about him and the more people come to him it doesn't retract it doesn't um subtract it's not going to lessen any of my time spent with him i mean he's infinite he's right but again this is not the class but basically when it comes to um a cause so you want to share that cause this cause avraham had and this this cause of let's hope hopefully by the you know the end of our own exercise that we have received inner peace we also want other people to to experience uh this inner peace that we have so of course we're going to want to share that whatever it is that we did in our own lives the processes that we went through to achieve this inner peace we want to share with others because again peace is god the name shame shalom we split we started off by saying shalom aleichem peace be on peace be unto you if we really mean it then we'll do everything we can to share whatever worked to resolve our own inner conflicts or own personal uh strife uh to share that with others and that's going to as the 12 steps do that keeps the person sober that keeps the person uh on the fence right so too when we if we want to keep our own inner conflict uh under rap so to speak in other words we want to be victorious it's a constant battle if you think that once you win that battle it's over oh my god i can sit back and relax you miss the whole point right it's going to be a constant struggle for life it's not a bad thing okay especially when you have accomplishments unfelt and you know that you actually have inner peace and you want to share this with others this is the greatest thing you can do to actually keep your own inner peace first any other conflict that comes up within yourself you already have the strategies you already have you know the knicks and the belt or the gun so to speak of how you accomplished it and it's a cons like a constant resource keeping the knives sharp so to speak keeping the gun ready to to approach your next conflict it's going to happen it's going to happen either internally or externally and that's pretty much um well i loved your jockey analogy uh because you got to steer you gotta you stay in control yeah so that's pretty much uh you know i'll just mention he says when you and when you inspire others you receive a wonderful byproduct of gaining additional dimensions of clarity strengthening your own confidence and further integrating your own wisdom right by unleashing unleashing another person's potential you have given him the best gift peace of mind and it really strengthens your own so that's that's today's lesson a little that's a beautiful rabbi yeah well i think it's so important uh and it's really where the rubber meets the road is involvement with others does it not and uh uh if you if you can achieve peace of mind you're gonna be a magnet out there folks you know people are gonna be drawn or attracted to you if you're uh if you have no peace of mind you're going to be repelling people away and not even realize it so if you're looking for you know better bonds of connection with others this is a very very uh key element uh having that peace of mind uh so that you're you're definitely clear and positive out there and make the world a better place and um you know uh rabbi i i wanted to mention about uh rabbi uria shuri's uh book on the practical applications for noahides he titled it brit shalom or covenant of peace and realistically it's a great work but in that respect it it trains us or teaches us in uh uh walking peacefully with ourselves in in hashem and with others and uh so that you're covering the gambit of our relationship with uh us and hashem us and ourselves and us and others and so um yeah very encouraging word and just to reiterate you know in today's world you have wellness there's a lot of seminars a lot the world you know whether because of the pandemic or in spite of it people are coming to realize truer meaning um it's not about the rat race people are losing you know losing their jobs or quitting their jobs or there's a lot of turmoil in the world and sometimes that helps people focus more on what's really meaningful and it brings out sometimes the best sometimes the worst but hopefully the best well i think you even you you grazed on a point that i i thought taps into the legitimate creative process uh of the of each person uh if you're at peace with yourself and you're making plans and you're taking steps toward it just like you you talked about training yourself in exercise or whatever the case may be um people can uh set goals set uh uh uh targets that they want to achieve and and and begin to take it bit by bit little by little step by step and uh achieve peace of mind in the degree of fulfillment and um yeah we want to encourage you all to be the best you you can be live your best life and um i think achieving peace of mind is uh when you truly feel whole within yourself and uh i think that that's what hashem truly wants uh us to have in in life is is is that wholeness and uh that's his greatness uh in everything that he's provided we need to be thankful and i find that gratitude goes a long way in achieving peace of mind have you any any comments on gratitude the benefits well i mean again that's his name uh i spoke many times about the benefits of of being grateful first of all for your own health um we spoke about especially saturday night they give this class they have medical clowns right just to laugh can be so helpful in in one's own recovery whether it's physical for sure emotional and spiritual there's no question about it the name jew i would have called the jewish religion i wouldn't i don't know i remember yehuda is named by his mother leia she assumed because of her own prophecy there was going to be 12 um tribes so there were four mothers right her rachel and the two handmaids she assumed they were all going to be equal in terms of the of the 12 tribes so when she had her fourth child she named him yehuda which is basically what the jewish nation is based on this name yehudah but which it's based on the word um means praise but gratitude it's gratitude i mean we just passed thanksgiving so i'll i don't want to digress i want to continue to start but i want to get back to that um about thanksgiving that the jewish nation is what i would call them the gratitude people the people that are making a hundred blessings a day right up and saying that means i am grateful but it also means i'm a jew right i am feeling great grateful that's what jew means like you know you have whatever name of the religion describes their belief system our belief system is based on gratitude yehuda is the grateful one right i mean leia is the grateful one but the name jew is embedded in the name and i mentioned king david didn't really institute a hundred broncos a day he reinstituted a hundred bucks a day based on it the puzzling that says what does god desire from you and don't read as in what but god requires of you a hundred blessings a day so the jews are walking around with a kippah and well for the women also whatever but saying blessings right before you eat after you eat before after you go to the bathroom everything everything deserves blessings and praise i would reform i would rename the jewish religion the grateful ones like you have the quakers the ones who shake right whatever it is the baptist want to go into the water but the jews are grateful so do i have an opinion on gratitude and uh yeah i have an i have a very strong opinion on um it's very good for you it's good for the world it's good for your relationship with god to know that you're totally dependent and and actually grateful and and that is the secret we talk about the the the 98 curses in the torah in deuteronomy one of the last one says all these curses come to you because i gave you everything and you were not not what not grateful you weren't happy you weren't grateful imagine god gives you and you you lack this sensitivity to have any a recognition of the good that was given to you this is this is a this is one of the biggest sins and you can tell that because of this this statement that they all these curses are coming to you because of a lack of a recognition of the good that was granted you you had everything so you asked me if i have any opinion about gratitude yeah i know you have a deep opinion i know you're doing lots of wonderful work there in jerusalem just i'm sorry to keep you interrupted just imagine the strife someone who is in an ingrate you can tell how upset and the negative feelings are emanating vibrating off their whole being as opposed to someone who is has a sense i mean just give a kid you know the kids in the synagogue we give them candies you can see how grateful they are they're just kids and you give them a lollipop and they're just skipping and you know if you ran out i mean okay hopefully they're they're not spoiled brats but just imagine when you have you watch the kids in the in the malls with their parents and this the kid says you know i see that in the window yeah and the parent could say we'll get on the way back or tomorrow or the greatest line is your grandparents will buy it for you whatever it is whatever the parents say to say no without saying no right it doesn't matter the kid goes into a conniption fit right i mean it's like imagine an adult like that right and that you know we don't all grow up so at the same pace so uh yeah it's unfortunate you've included that now rabbi from what i understand yeah you you've got coming up very shortly this i think this week maybe you're starting a an annual uh drive right for yibane uh uh uh is that materialized yet uh can i encourage everybody to check you out on ybane.com definitely definitely encourage everybody to uh at least in on the yearbook um shireen classes over the next few weeks there will be a link below uh for the drive but if they even if it's not there it's the end of the year people like to uh to give it's a time to give for financial reasons because they like what groups are doing what non-profits are doing such as year by night so look below there will be a link there should be a link you can put the link in um just to contribute and it's a tax deductible in most countries in most countries and um yeah there's always a way to give and we never turn away a good gift yes you're just a grateful person but uh we i want you to know how much we're grateful for for you sharing uh this series it's been a it's been a bit it seems like a long road we've been at it for more than a year on the 48 ways and we're near we're coming down the pipe we're we're really yeah we just finished number 42. so hashem willing is your schedule open for next week at the same time for 43 years yeah looking forward miserable if everything looks good and let's see what the topic is 43. fascinating with living be fascinated with living that's the title mit yashev libo the talmudo now how he came to that title i don't know i have to look at the chapter i haven't seen in a while but i would translate this as satisfied or resolving within your heart you're learning we'll have to understand how it comes here he translates here settle your heart in your studies how does that mean fascinating with living you have to come and tune in and i'll look forward to it rabbi i mean i i know that in this class this series often it was talked about acquiring wisdom and and often and repetitively it talked about acquiring acquiring acquiring and that phrase uh uh you want to be fascinated with living or get to that stage of what next week's lessons about acquiring is definitely a part thereof so that you you you you have that sense of worth you have that sense of fulfillment and uh uh that that also is uh uh um catchy out there people uh notice uh somebody who's beaming with the countenance uh uh so uh we invite you to come back next week for beyond the seven uh same time hashem willing uh but uh rabbi poston we encourage uh uh uh and are thankful for all that you're doing with yubine and uh all the messages uh you share and uh uh we wish you well this week uh shalom alaikum um thank you so much for today's message so till next week folks we're gonna sign off have a great day [Music] is