What Can We Learn From Our Past?

[Music] there's something that all of us say but very few of us actually take into consideration God is the king now presently God was the king and God will God will be the king now technically it doesn't make sense it should be past present future but it doesn't say that it says nowm is the king now and then it says Hashem was the king and Hashem will be the king anybody have a uh idea of why it says so why we're present then past in future no that's all that counts it's all that counts meaning the the now is that counts okay Beyond time is beyond time okay no what about you you have you have your hands raised basically the present is relevant to people now the present is relevant to people now okay no tell about what you did in the past or what you did in the future you have to just make sure you're doing the right thing now okay good so is like you're saying you have to have an understanding of what's going on now what's going on now but that still doesn't change the fact you should consider your past you should consider your past why some people say let past is past past is the what can I do about the past let the past be the past this is the wrong attitude why you need to know where you've been in order to know where you're going you need to learn from your past learn what worked learn what failed for you individually for your family and for your people we have a Torah that tells us things that happened in the past because we need to learn from them in order to know how we could change our present why because the only thing that is in our hands is the present like you said but if you don't look at the past then the present will never change and your future is a disaster waiting to happen now now some people don't really think too much about it they just do whatever it is whatever goes goes they don't think about what happened in the past what failed in the past what worked in the past they don't really want to learn from their parents and how they failed and how they succeeded they don't want to learn from their teachers and how they failed and how they succeeded they I want to learn from the tah and how they failed and how they succeeded they don't want to learn from the past they want to do everything based on their own diet based on their own blood problem is that's a very stupid person because you could learn a very painful lesson for free by simply looking at how it worked for somebody else but sometimes people will say okay the past is the past but maybe for me it's going to work I'll just worry about it when I get there what is that like one time a guy comes back from the King worried sees his friend say what happened goes I know the king lost his mind what happened what did he say to you he said to me that uh if I don't train this dog to pray he's going to kill me and my whole family he goes okay good so did you bring the dog goes no what do you mean bring the dog I don't know I can't train this dog to to pray so his friend says okay don't worry I'll take care of it friend goes to the king comes back with the dog go what' you do how'd you do it he said he gave me a deal what's the deal train the dog to pray he goes you're going to train a dog to pray listen I told the king what do you want he says I want my dog to learn how to pray I want my dog to learn how to pray I said no problem no problem two things number one I need 15 gold coins for each year I'm going to train him King says no problem I'll pay you two years in advance here you go you go second requirement it's going to take me 15 years to teach him how to really pray teacher matter really pray to be 15 years King says no problem you got it money is going to be given to you right now I'm looking forward to seeing my my dog pray so his friend says to him he goes so what are you going to do once 15 years passes and a dog doesn't know how to pray he says listen in 15 years either the king's going to die the dog's going to die or I'm going to die somebody has to die in 15 years so I'll worry about it when I get there most likely the dog's going to die in 15 years but even if he doesn't die maybe the king's going to die if he doesn't die then I have to die I'll worry about it when I get there some people act like this some people make very big moves today thinking that they're not going to have to worry about it and I'll deal with it once I get down the road and that's why it says as the first one if you start dealing with today as if it's the most important by looking at the past and making sure you make the corrections of whatever correction you need to make first then your future will look much better than it then your future will be something to look forward to but if you simply ignore the past then there's nothing to look forward as far as the future now what if you're always thinking about the past though if you're harping on the past then you're living in the past then you're not living in the future you're not living in the present and you won't have a future either you know in a business World a lot of kids would come to me and they say listen you know last month I made a deal for $100,000 you know last month I made a deal for half a million dollars you know six months ago I made a deal for a million dollar you know three years ago I made a deal for $2 million you know my response was every single time they told me that who cares what you did yesterday it paid the bills yesterday I need to pay the bills today today I need to pay the bills the only that's going to pay the bills today is a deal today not a deal six months ago six months ago is not going to pay today's bills I already spent that money I need money today go make another million dollar deal or go find another job why that's all that matters that's all that matters in the world if you're going to constantly think about what I did when I was 7 years old and what I did when I was 18 years old and what I did when I was 28 years old and what I did when I was 38 years old you're going to constantly live in the past and guess what not only your is your present going to be some disaster but your future is nothing to look forward to why you're not going to be able to pay the bills you're not going to be able to pay the bills you have to understand the past is only something to use for learning purposes meaning look at the past take the pieces that are valuable and use it for the present in order to change the future but if you're going to harp on the past you're going to count the money you're going to count the chickens that you already ate guess what you're going to die starving they're going to die starving why because you ate them already they left your body they became part of the soil they don't matter today today is what matters I could use some strategies from the past to help my today in order to improve my tomorrow but as far as banking on my yesterday how is that ever going to help anybody but unfortunately the Satan constantly tries to convince us to look at our past and live at our past and think that if we could have done something if I would have done something different then this would have been different and that would have been different this is like the uh the lotto the lotto joke you guys ever heard the lotto joke guy and his guy and his father go to the lotto store and or the deli they buy a lotto ticket jackpot I don't know zillion dollars and they go back in the car and they uh kid says to the father he's like Dad what are you going to do if we win the jackpot said first thing I'm buying a Ferrari I've always wanted a Ferrari you know one of fancy schmancy cars half a million dollars it's like all right Dad well listen I think it's a good purchase just make sure you buy this specific model but I get next I I drive next he goes heyy we'll see well at least I'm going to sit in the front with you goes no you're not going to sit in the front with me your mom is going to sit next in the front with me I'm not going to let you sit in the front with me your mom my mom I married her for 20 years she has to sit in the front he goes no ABA come on it's not possible how I went and bought the ticket with you I bought the ticket with you how is she going to sit in the front if I bought the ticket with you and they go back and forth and they start arguing goes son you know what get out of the car get out of the car they got into some imagination as if they won the car so the father says get out of the car the Satan tries to convince us to live in the past to live in an imagination as if we would have done something then something would have changed and something would have changed and this is the Satan fooling us into spending our time and our efforts on things that we cannot change you cannot change the past therefore the past is only there for you to learn from take the few pieces that are valuable and relevant to you today in order to change today in order to influence tomorrow and make tomorrow better than yesterday but if you harp on the past and count all of the mistakes you make and start crying about all of them without learning from them but just commiserating and telling everybody all the mistakes that you've made in the last 20 30 years then guess what you're never going to be able to move forward you're going to be manic de present and your future is going to be even worse than your past now [Music] sh [Music]