Rabbi Yom Tov Practical Spirituality: Individuality in Orthodoxy

chi'lan welcome to Asia tour practical spirituality overlooking the Temple Mount Jerusalem today we're talking about different types of Jews and as I look around this classroom I realize there's many different types of Jews though in my neighborhood it would be hard to know there's different types of Jews because everyone pretty much dresses the same and are expected to act more or less the same as well and and that comes from various things but one of those things that comes from with certain personality types generally rise into more controlling leadership positions administrative administrative type physicians and those types of those types of leaders are really good at amputating the uniqueness of individuals and just as a joke you know when you see when you see in the very observant community you know everyone like kind of looks the same especially the men you know the men really look the same and so the joke is that when we wear our Tallis you know it has the black stripes the reason it has black stripes is it's a barcode so God knows who's praying oh you know in a minute I'm choco Nouveau unfortunately this has become something that plagues the observant community in a big way because because it's just frankly hurtful I mean it's this whole idolatry over the word normal like you got to be normal cuz it or else you're not gonna be able to get married you know you gotta be normal it tell me has anyone ever met first of all a family where everyone in the family is normal it doesn't exist yet we're all supposed to be normal you know everyone's got to be normal so it becomes like it's horrific you know and there's nothing wrong with that kid in the family is a little different you know maybe it's pushing the limits a little bit please I make it as comfortable as possible for late comers to come to sit down anyway but normal normal is a joke normal is a joke and the unfortunately so many individuals are the punchline of that joke raise your hand if you ever felt I mean you're not on film rezian if you've ever felt like the punchline of the normal world and you the one who wasn't so normal anyone ever felt that way okay so not not a nice feeling not a nice feeling and and what's amazing about it is those not normal people are always you know I mean after that generation burns their books are always like these amazing people in history you know they're the ones who made the difference is it not normal ones I mean my claim to fame in life is two things and they're the same in what are the two things that are the same is that is that um having been out of the institutional institutions where all the invitations generally take place being out of eight out of educational institutions from 11 to 23 was probably one of the best things that ever happened to me and that is because because I'm kind of because I'm really unadulterated me more than most people I meet I mean a lot of people trying to find themselves and they think somehow I'm gonna be able to help them it's just cute you know okay we need to reverse all your education you know all the years of you being in some kind of mold of some society somewhere you know first we gotta get rid of that and so I'm we can't do that obviously but but there are ways and some of them are illegal to get rid of you're you're the stuckness of having been shaped and formed by people who knew nothing about you and the but the other thing that was really good about it is it led me to a more spiritual life because you'll notice that the most spiritual people that exist what are the most spiritual people who exist by the way I mean they don't exist today but they existed like 2500 years ago who are the most spiritual people that exist well maybe but not that philosophical prophets prophets are like really the most spiritual people that exist why because not only they have all the spirituality that someone might think a spiritual person should have but they've reached such spirituality that the aperture of their spirituality is such that God's decided this is a good this is a good address here for an up down message meaning spirituality gender you climb up here this person's climb so high the gods decided hey this is a good vessel for extra light which in a way if you understand prophecy it's just really like a power surge most of us don't get that power source also while you're climbing down up you're still dealing with the regular circuit breakers you know like this these lights for example are coming out to 20 but believe me the power plant they come from her isn't it 220 that's it like you know a billion volts and then by the time it hits the old city maybe it's million volts probably more than that two million volts and then by this I mean it's this region of the old city and probably this whole building actually wound up with it thing but but let's say this building gets it at ten thousand volts twenty thousand volts and then it steps down in our our converters to get down to 220 at each it comes down to 220 at each light so if you're a spiritual person you're still stuck here at 220 voltage working your way up the system whereas somebody who's in V somebody who's in the you can put that phone down yeah so somebody who's on the on the but when you get prophecy God's saying you know what to hell with all those circuit breakers meaning all those convert step-down converters and he just goes and just blows through them now what would happen to you right now at 220 if God suddenly gave you 10,000 what would happen to you the answer is you wouldn't make it you just wouldn't make it none of us would make it no one I mean probably known in the generation would make it I mean you'd be brushing your teeth on your forehead that evening you know you you and me you'd be gone if you even survived it in turn like if your heart didn't explode in the experience you know you if you survived it you'd be crazy for the rest of your life and so and so God wouldn't do that and those of you who are like oh god if you'd only speak to me you don't realize is that that's gonna be a ticket to the funny farm you know you get people all the time of the Kotel you know God just send me the message you guys like you don't want that message that would not look good here you know you know you want a trip to the laundromat or something you think you're gonna be able to stand during this jacket stand then I could hack it you know you can't stand while you're getting that anyway we used to note only two prophets and the whole history of prophecy and there were millions running around Israel at one point there are only two prophets in all of history who could stay standing during it one was Moses and the other was Samuel the Prophet Shmuel Hanavi there are the only two provinces we have a tradition that only two prophets were able to actually stay composed during that perfect experience and you see Moses didn't even do that hot Moses wound up glowing after a while and freaking everybody out head wear bag over his head whenever he was in public you knew that you know Moses used to walk around the brown paper bag on his head she's kidding wasn't perhaps I don't know what it was it was called the masa Bay and he walked him in with a bag on his head it just kind of reminds me of the beginning of our class of covering your head so anyway yeah but I'm sure he was wearing more than just a band no the inside joke for whoever was here before the video started now the we're not here about prophecy but what we knew what we do know about prophets especially the real famous ones is what was their occupation what was all the occupation what was shepherding yeah our own Shepherd gets coxae together yakko Moses Aaron Yosef David was a shepherd sure they were all shadows I mean everybody was I mean later he became like the head of the head of the what he called what was what's Joseph Bernanke what was his job today her name is Yellen she's in charge of that thing it's the federal the chairman of the Federal Reserve yeah later he became the chairman of the Federal Reserve but you started as a shepherd simple beginnings anyway the wasn't gonna say about chef oh where do Shepherds spend their time yeah and wilderness they spent all their time in wilderness so that was the other lucky thing I got was if I'm if I'm in Southern California which is like where the mountains meet the sea so every day I was either surfing 6 to 8 hours a day which is the kind of wilderness you're out on your own in nature and if I wasn't surfing I was mountain biking five six seven hours a day I was always out there on the trails if I was getting too tired I pull into a cave and meditated for a little while I was a little kid thank God had parents who didn't seem to care and care about that they cared about me they just didn't care much about about I guess where I was but then again we grew up like the safest zip code on earth I mean there wasn't a pedophile within ten zip codes of our house you couldn't even steal anything because by the time you get back to the inner city you were already in jail you know it was like we were far from where crime took place and the outer edge of LA where the ocean and the wake and that now it's meat you know there was just no crime at all so my parents said okay no crime so I guess we'll see you when we see you which is how I grew up my wife and kids are still start to get used to that now anyway there's there's different types of Jews and and with that whole subject that we just closed now was how our society's done its best to get rid of the different types of Jews in those years you can't help it I mean when you're shepherding yeah I still mountain-bike I'm out there I see all these Bedouin kids all the time they're always asking me for something and usually and the kids there I mean they're kind of trippy and super instinctual types you know we use better ones for tracking and stuff you know for infiltrator tracking super instinctual people yeah but they're but I always get a pretty spiritual sense from those kids I mean after they've had some water you know they they're kind of worried about water but after the water part they seem pretty spiritual you can't help it you're climbing spirituality the reason is is because the wilderness in Hebrew is called mid bar wilderness anytime your nature and mid bar could be forested it could be desert in the ocean the Arctic doesn't matter it's called mid bar and what's the word mid bar also midday Bear mid bears to speak but it's singular mid bear well who's mid not bear well your mid a bear you ever thought about it your mind is you know you're you ever heard that voice in your head truth is all you've ever heard is the voice in your head but everyone take a moment to hear the voice in your head listen the voice in your head what's my head what's the time I had a voice in my head that's the voice in your head you know you you think I'm teaching this class I'm not teaching the class I'm just sending out vibrations that you call English and then everyone I use hearing it your way it's your fault it's really your voice speaking in your head quickly translating everything I say into your voice that's all there really is is the voice in your head but people who live in society the voice in their heads not so pure because you've got a lot of influences hopefully some of them are good you've got a lot of influences that are part of the voice in your head so it's not necessarily your voice I meet a lot of people who feel like their intuition doesn't exist because because what's intuition is that's your voice saying don't go there or do go there or whatever that's your intuitive voice but a lot of people can't help but second-guess that voice because I got so many darn voices in their head from mommy and daddy and teachers and and advertisers and billboards and you know I mean you name it there's a lot of voices a lot of voices going on and so it's really hard to find your voice but this is the beauty of the wilderness you go to the wilderness for a little while you need like you guys probably all would need a few days at least before your voices start to say anything like you gotta hear the wilderness a little bit yeah you start to hear your voice after a while it's an important thing to hear your voice especially making big decisions you got your voice or at least have someone in your life that knows you so well that they're able to help you determine you know what's the right choice I feel like the fans on louder it's just getting worse and worse and it's you check out the sign I was on low before a minute just so loud can't stand it's still in low that's high the word maintenance mean anything to you it can't be maintained this thing it's slowly gotten louder over the last 10 years it just probably just belts or something they need changed and I have to do it myself better we're thick clothes so ok no anyway put back to different types of Jews God creates all of us different and we're all going to have to answer for that and the way I like to do it in a Venn diagram is like this you got you know the fact that you were born Jewish that's gonna come with a lot of details you're born Jewish but you're also born Jewish so you got Jewish and you wish the reason I couldn't have been diagrams is the way our society at least in the observant culture is is that they're trying to convince everybody that if you just be Jewish you can ignore the Jewish part because who you are is Jew and so like we're just gonna turn the you wish into Jewish and you know and then you know call it a day without you know your individuality without your personal self expression without your the without the contribution that you bring by your very essence and your unique self that comes and and and yet everyone's different every single person is different right now in my seminar I'm running a seminar at night for Israelis and and one of them he's been my constant use of example because he has 33 or 30 kids were three years old for you know about four or five hours a day he's a gun on how do you send a kindergarten teacher he's a kindergarten big Hasidic guy he's so cute so sweet he goes yeah and and he's got every day of his life is and his 30 kids and you and you wanna know something amazing is his father spent his whole life in debt running from debtors and so he didn't have much of a father because if you world money where's the most likely place you would go to get it is their house and so he grew up with a father non-existent constantly running from the people knocking at the door and so it's very sad and so he told me yesterday that he wakes up every day at 4:00 in the morning which really made me feel bad cuz summer ends at 11 and he doesn't live in Jerusalem so I'm like four in the morning what do you do it 4 in the morning he says I mopped the floors of the school and looks at the whole group and he says I'm not going in today he lives off from nothing how much you pay a guy to look after three-year-olds and when she came to mop the floor 30 shekels than I know they do you know earlier this week we spoke a little bit about getting caught in your narrative you know like he's way in his narrative big time and now he's with me at nights kind of questioning the narrative that he's in anyway but one of the questions I asked this sweet sweetheart of a man just the sweetest guy you ever met one of the questions I asked him was was you have 30 kids are you ever you ever had any two the same no they're all totally different every single one is just so different the reason I asked him that is because there was a man who looked a lot like me in the group who was sharing that he has cut and pasted from the community to the point R he has no idea who he is and then he says and then he says that maybe this gets really sad but then he says that his wife's also the father because if a man doesn't know who he is because he's been so busy being like everybody else well then he's not gonna be the man of the household either he's not really the man of the house and so she's had to take over for that and then I wanted the guy to share how he feels about all that and he couldn't I just couldn't get to the feelings you know I was pushing him to uh say cuz he was starting to put things in a second person he's like well you feel like and I'm like no no how do you you feel we always go second person when things get tight suddenly no no don't give me to use give me that how do I feel and then he kept saying will you feel like and then would give me another analogy of how someone might feel if you could somehow understand the analogy is it will how does that feel need to say who it all it feels like and there get another analogy and I'm finally looking at this guy like enough explanations you know of these sophisticated analogies or how someone might feel how queer like might like hypothetically feel well he's actually the one who and the answer is you feel dead inside you feel dead you feel alone you feel crushed but he couldn't say and I'm not gonna say facilitative so I kept trying and trying I'm like it has left no has definitely and then all of a sudden and this was like so I unpredictable some guy like across the room there's a whole room of people some guy in cross room just goes like and as soon as he catches his breath ah I thought the guy was gonna throw up I mean he was literally going into a panic attack and all rooms just like what is going on here and I was just watching okay here we go this is my training so there's like amazing to have this happen so I did you get trained for you know some decades you know you want something like crazy like this so and he just going and going and ever wants to know why so he finally can like get words out between the screams and get what are the words that he points to the guy who was speaking and he says that was my father he didn't exist it was just Jewish there was no you wish and I don't even know who I am because he was not able to give me Who I am neither he didn't have who he was he couldn't give me who I am and at which point I looked at this other guy who is talking in the beginning and I said Hashem God has sent you your son 20 years from now that's your kids how does that feel at that point is shut down all the lights and took the whole group into process I never even got back to that guy actually now that I'm thinking about it I never even spoke to that guy again tonight I'll pull him aside we're back together it's every night so tonight I'll pull em aside if I know what happened I have no idea I just turned the place pitch-black and then everyone process their own narratives to see where that's where their narrative has taken them and if that's a narrative they really won't want so random your narratives are so Man so the analogy I like is is that we're all born with hooks in our mouth every one of us is born with a hook in our mouth like like fisherman's hooks we all get the hook we're already hooked it's just a God has a really long line I think we're all like on we're all on the line right now but really it could be anywhere anyone here fish before any wooden fish yeah a little bit you fish now so what happens when you get a real whopper of a fish and he's to fight and what do you do with him at the beginning but I'm saying once he's really fighting you let him let him run but right you let out line yeah so what happens is you can they can break the line if the fish fights and you're fighting like that's not good tension because you're both fighting so there's a what do you call that conch let's outline it has that weird noise it's got some kind of gear that let's outline if you click it if you flipped it it lets out line let the fight it's art it's already hooked you can relax like you know I have a beard while he's fighting you know and let the fish do all this fight fight fight fight fight and when the fish is done fighting me is ran out of energy he's real limit and so we are all born with hooks in our mouths and God is going to reel us in every one of us and that's one of the big fears of death yes you know a lot of people are nervous about this conversation that's why they say there's no atheist in a foxhole cuz even if you don't believe in God I mean honestly like deep down hey welcome back is it oh good good just push those tissues on the floor tilt tilt the chair over or something you don't have to touch those I don't even know whose they are well you'd want to sit there I like looking at your dog when you sit okay I hope they're not allergic to dogs you're good right there's great I really love having a dog in my class I love it I love all kinds of weird things in my class but having a dog in class is great I like it when people bring their babies to least if they're girls because baby girls require your dogs extremely quiet oh so he's not a noise making sheep sorry sheep oh there's a seat right there please have they entered into like transgender dogs yet is there an issue like seriously why can't you decide your dog's a male anyway the perfect timing for my transgendered dog joke so anyway back to our class is some room I mean what I'm talking about nothing I know the subject we're all born with hooks in our mouths God's gonna reel us all in it's just he's letting out line right now no the truth is with you if you're in Jerusalem right now hearing a Torah class in Jerusalem he's not letting out lying you're there now there's slack cuz you've been coming towards the boat you're coming towards God's boat people who pray three times a day eat kosher learn to read they're hanging around the fishermen I mean they're hanging around God you know just hoping he likes shoots off a little you know an anchovy or something you know like you know he sees you down there he's like okay yeah you're just like so you know we're we're all hanging around the boat here you know Jerusalem is the you know the palace of the king you know you're we're hanging around this place but do we all know people raise your hands if you know somebody who's running for their life and with their behavior right now they're just going the other way anyone like that got people out there doing that oh yeah a lot of people doing that now do you think God's breaking a sweat no God doesn't break a sweat about people going against him or away from him why what's already in their mouth they already hooked now you might say well gosh I mean the guy's been doing it for like thirty years already she's been at this for forty years already and tell me what does 40 years mean to an infinite being nada nada it's not a light chicken gravy I'll tell you that it means nothing in Spanish God's not worried at all about people going the other way it just doesn't mean much even your own sins like you think you've ever done something wrong which is obviously going the other way he's letting out line for you to do it he has to arrange it and it feels so bad for God having to arrange your sins because how can you sin if you didn't arrange it he's running the entire show so he has to arrange everything you do wrong to good maybe that's like maybe that's a good enough reason to like stop doing it like like god I just don't know how see you for this one you know because it's not really going out you know out on a limb and you know and you're gonna have to like arrange and make sure I don't die and you know and make sure everything I'm trying to do wrong you know works out you know it's like the the famous Hasidic story of the holy birth the holy thief the holy thief who you know he always prays before he goes into someone's house to steal that he shouldn't get caught but I imagine it gives God Nava I'm sure God's not happy as a thief but like at least he prays before it goes in there you know anyway but but gods like God's orchestrating even the stuff you do wrong and and don't think if you did something therefore if you're doing something wrong don't think that you're like shocking God you think you do some wrong God just like I can't believe it I just can't you can't surprise God and by the way let's go like really philosophical here is it really wrong when you do something wrong how do we know it's really wrong we know it's wrong here and we feel the conscience we may know Taurus divine so it's going against the Torres that we know it's wrong we may feel it's wrong but via the an infinite being could it be that he just set up like arbitrary things down here not to do you know he's just like he's like hmm we got chickens we got we got lamb and we've got pigs eeny Meeny mom's gonna catch a tiger by the toe pigs pigs are out figure out who's this pigs are out God says pigs are out maybe there's some other planet and the galaxies out there that's got their own Tara chickens out it's an infinite be it's set up I know it set up the rules for this place so good to keep them very good to keep them very not good and for you for the world for anyone to not keep them but who says you know and that's why I'm saying that that that you think it's like a big shocker for God you had a hot dog at the Dodger Stadium it's really not good for you really not good for you but and you can't exactly shock God and God someone who created Dodger dogs sorry to mention dogs again but gods want to create a Dodger dogs now I suggest you go to Jess delicatessen it's on the ground floor level Glatt Kosher jefra hat nur is a friend of mine and he's got a deli down there one of the best things about his deli food not only is the food amazing but the but it's right next to a place that sells Kraft theater which has like every kind of craft beer you could ever want in the middle of a ballgame you know but you don't have to you're not stuck with lager anymore at a Dodger game so we're all born with a hook in our mouth and and it's ideal to hang around the boat it's not ideal to run but doesn't shock God God's outside of time so he doesn't really care how long it's been and God never breaks a sweat because the hooks already there and in the end he reels you in we're all getting reeled in and earlier I was saying in an atheist even an atheist they may not admit it but I promise you every atheist on their deathbed it's just like like now we find out now we find out and that's why they're not really this because they're still hedging their bets on the side of being good I've rarely met first of all to meet an atheist he's usually quite philosophical anyone who's quite philosophical automatically is smart and anyone who's smart knows don't betray your own feelings about right and wrong because you're never gonna get someone without feelings right and wrong so there anyway hedging their bets because they're listening to their their own compass even an atheist has an internal compass of what's right and wrong so then they're not truly living a sight like they're not living mathematically as atheists they're really living much more as agnostic because they've got that conscience inside and they're in everyone knows you ignore the conscience you're not gonna be happy you listen to the conscience you're gonna be happy what do you what do all psychologists agree that every human being wants to be happy so just do the right things and you will be happy which is a really easy formula but Prozac out of business just do the right thing I feel good about yourself feel good about yourself you tend to be happier not tie my moods moods are their own thing but you feel good about yourself you'll generally be happier so do the right thing and the funny thing is is every human being does the right thing and feels better the problem is as an hour later they do something really stupid but if you live in a society where people do the right things repetitively like living in an observant community like I do so I live in an observant community that's bolstered by right thing doers meaning you just kind of help each other because everyone's doing the right thing and you get to it almost becomes the part of the social fabric that our community does the right things helps you feel better about yourself I promise you I'm you know I've never done this as a scientific research study but I promise you I promise you that if you go to communities where people do the right thing versus a community where there's no real rules of behavior at all that you'll find happier people in general they'll hit all the well-being marks higher I'm not saying they're happy and just in though be happier these people have a lot of other tools they're missing especially the post-war Ashkenazic communities of black attitude have all kinds of other issues going on that are that happiness killers from everything we've been through which I could go into great detail about but not right now and but they'll be happy you're it'll be more well being anyway back to the hook in the mouth is God pulls you out of the sea and now he takes the hook out of your mouth so you could speak properly and God has a few questions for you question number one is I guess he asks you the easier one first so if you had a black hat and you have these babies so your first question is were you Jewish and then you you're like oh yeah and you like you like show them your stats how many times you said I mean we're just hundreds of thousands if not millions I don't know I wonder if anyone ever counted oh there is the on main book I bet has the stats of the average life's amines there's a book we actually have it in our house to call them ami only but it's called a book about one word it's a part of the title so anyway you know they it's really basically asking for your stats you know wearing your bar code shawl you know it's just your stats wearing the bar code shawl and the bar code shows the black lines on the tallest that's your bar code for your stats so anyway you know how many times did you say you Haitian a raba and how many times did you sing a Shabbos song and how many times did you say I'll knit Alachua diam how many times did you say but will not touch him and how many times did you say shamalia stretch now now it's not just gonna be quantity by the way it's also gonna be quality meaning you'll be checked free robotics you know and by the way all of us will have a large number of robotics no matter who you are myself who's like I'm like a big meditator and sadly I would say I'll have more quantity marks over quality as a committed meditator like I mean or to committed meditators is they don't skip it's not like I skip a day I don't skip i sat in utter silence today with you know serious focus on various things that are not for the essentials course and the and but I'm a committed meditator and I promise you quantity is gonna be quality in my prayers but will be asked all those questions and then after Jewish now if someone born looks like and raised in a community they look like me he'll start with the easier question but then they're gonna get nailed with the u.s. question and gods gonna say were you Jewish at which point the person who's being interviewed by God is gonna wish they could like strangle every min hell no min ha hell is someone from hell okay min ha hell means it means Jewish organ institution administrator principles you know Dean's they called min ha hell okay they're from hell and so when they asked him were you you wish they're all gonna want to strangle their min ha hell and and then God's gonna take the hook out of their mouths when they have nothing to really say for themselves over here because everything they were supposed to contribute didn't get contributed and you want to know what hell is hell would be God's showing you what you were actually created for hell would be seeing what you were meant to do in this world wouldn't that be hell that would be hell to find out what you were supposed to be doing but but wearing the garments of what you did do that would be scary that's why I'm so scared I'm scared man I'm at this point in my life you know most of your parents most your kids most you kids and most of your parents all you kids were 18 to 20 whatever I'm your parents age and I know my contribution I just don't know where it's supposed to be applied at this point you know like I mean couldn't someone else be standing here right now I mean you may be enjoying this class but does it really have to be me you know I could easily be doing this from a chair laughter just kidding I do not want to go skinny but I'm not contribution here but you understand like if it was that important what I was saying you probably not just be showing up in essentials you'd be proudly showing up I don't know in my Shabbos day I don't know you'd be like so like so if this isn't really the forum for what I have to contribute so what am I supposed to be doing right now I'm scared meaning if god forbid I'd died yesterday I'm pretty sure the screen of my contribution and the screen of reality the same the split-screen would be more or less the same I'm sure there'd be some of that leftover narcissistic Californian stuff where I was out doing something narcissistic when I could have been helped somebody but how well can a narcissist help somebody if he hasn't had a mountain bike ride and drinking an ice cold IPA so maybe I was supposed to be mountain biking I don't know maybe I'm not like too far look you can imagine me watching the split-screen we're like we're like I'm looking at my watch I'm like no but I can take one more loop over there or I could get back to work who's like loop because the Californians taking the loop yeah Californians go with the motto better to say sorry than ask forgiveness sorry better to say sorry than ask permission better to asks better to seek forgiveness than ask permission said how it is except that's not what we say we say sometimes it's better - sometimes it's better to ask forgiveness than seek permission now some of your thinking like that just does not sound like a good motto but it is a very good model when you're standing in front of some places hot tub and there's no one around so when the family comes home you're stark naked in their hot tub with all your mountain bike gear on their fins you just kind of like sorry so there is a time for it now the one thing about teaching this class for two-and-a-half decades is you stop carrying what you say and by the way I stopped ever since I've been observant I have more or less I mean with maybe a few exceptions stop poaching people's hot tubs okay I don't poach hot tubs at this point it doesn't look good with my look you know he's sitting in someone's hot tub yeah in the old days lots of poaching these days we're not poaching hot tubs which makes my brother really upset because he's still got the look where you can poach hot tubs he's very observant but he's you know clean-shaven regular looking guy um speaking of which I think I might have gone over time if I'm seeing rabbi Nick O'Mara and I did and just to let you know if you can stop this thing just to let you know rabbi Nikhil Meyer is grabbing NECA Meyers class is is the seven questions