Why Are People So Extreme?

so I'm welcome to practical spirituality at Asia tour here in the old city of jerusalem overlooking the Temple Mount today this question is why do people why are people so extreme all right people so extreme and the answer in general is extreme behavior comes from a couple things one of them is insecurity and another one is lack of knowledge insecurity lack of knowledge just going to both if I can be more extreme about things so it makes you more nervous around me meaning it's a it's a it's a dominance type thing if I can be more extreme about things like let's just say I'm one of these guys let's say in the Jewish world extreme might be that I wear my hat full-time yeah I got I can't ever take my hand off and my coat which you see I'm wearing neither my coat nor my hat but imagine that I gotta wear my hat I gotta wear my coat full-time now you are gonna be a little more nervous around me probably and and I'm gonna feel a little safer because I'm gonna be less approachable which means I'm gonna be less vulnerable in my world the more extreme you get the more the less approachable you are and that makes you somehow safer but of course you know are you saying hurt not safer at all you're just more protected ultimately but you're not safer because you can see the whole beauty of being someone who's safe is that you get to relax but someone like that are they more relaxed are they more uptight what's someone like that more relaxed or uptight way more uptight they're way more uptight so Safety's supposed to bring relaxation unless it's it's a unless it's a false safety if it's a false safety so it's gonna make someone more uptight and so one of the reasons why people go more extremes is to create more of a safety mechanism for them you'll notice also you'll notice people who are not very smart no offense to these people obviously because they are smart about other things they're just not very smart in Torah will sometimes take a more extreme path of Torah because at least it like okay I'm an idiot when it comes to Mishnah or halakha but you know I can't learn the Gemara but boy am i from you know like I'm really firm so it gives them it gives them a sense of safety in that but again they're gonna be totally unapproachable they're gonna be so nervous if they get approached because they there's the possibility of exposure is very high there especially in that scenario that I just painted so that's one of the things was insecurity and the other reason why going more extreme is is a popular thing to do is because of what I say that was insecurity and oh yes a lack of knowledge is if you don't know what you're doing but you're scared of God so then going being more extreme about everything makes you less likely to get in trouble in life let me illustrate that with a kind of a funny story my wife and I were like fresh Bali chuva in Israel so we didn't know a lot at all and we're visiting a Rocha Shiva's house for Shabbos the whole Shabbos we were staying there and this Rosh Yeshiva runs a program on just on Hill for Shabbos like he's a master pillow shop anyway my wife and I saw him breaking Shabbos like about three or four times throughout Shabbos and and we were just shocked that it was breaking Shabbos I'm really shocked so after Shabbos we have this whole discussion do we tell him or do we not tell him hey kids what kind of hoots buddies ball tubas you know I'm gonna tell this guy you know he's breaking Shabbos especially a Rosh Yeshiva who runs him an entire program on the hill Travis so I decided that it's the only right thing to do and if he's really a such a big rabbi then he can handle a little a little commentary so I went up to him after Shabbos and I said you know I saw you do a couple things that I have no studied in Asia tour you know and I would still like wet paint you know like a fresh you know you see nothing and then I happen to studied and Hilco Shabbos that uh you know there that are forbidden to do and I happen to notice you do them and and I just wanted to bring it up so he immediately pulls out show Sonora and he shows me like there's like one totally obscure rabbi compared to the majority rabbis there's an obscure opinion did I call the rabbi obscure sorry there's an obscure opinion that forbids this particular thing but as you see the show Honora and the remodeled say that's how you do it like that is how you and this guy's a master of a hill cause javis I mean we're talking to someone who knows he'll close Shabbos backwards and forwards and I'm like well why'd they teach me that obscure opinion and he said because you you don't know the process the halawet process yet and so it's better to teach you strictness now until you get your feet wet and learning and stuff until you can start to understand how to distinguish things and then later you can like start you can like start your freedom of movement because now you know what you're doing you don't know what you're doing now so people are giving you stricter opinions and so what I'd like to share with all of you is just an amazing point that I got from that besides the point of our class here is an amazing point I got from that is that knowledge is freedom in Halawa knowledge if you think of that story meeting my wife and I would have our hands tied behind our backs in that particular situation on Chavez where he was able to go ahead and do what needed to get done in that situation so we're he was the one who was free and our lack of hullick knowledge had our hands tied behind her back because we were holding by some stricter opinion because we know what we're doing because our ignorance so the more halakha you know the more free you get and boy did that become true when I studied coster's because my Smythe's in conscious him all of a sudden I like now I know how to eat when I'm traveling you know because they're with it if I'm in the north I don't always have our half-share iam here of yours alight so I can just go in the kitchen talk to Boaz or whoever it is and there you know Edo or you know Suzie in the in the kitchen you know and talk out what's in there and next you know that restaurant just turned kosher you know for my wife and I it was it was not our Hector but it became our Hector really quick you know because I would I know the distinctions of the foods inside his kitchen and how to do this and how to make sure my wife and I can enjoy our our trip up northern go out to dinner in this particular restaurant and so halakha knowledge public knowledge was freedom and the freedom to be more extreme or more moderate which one or moderate the moral of you know the more moderate you are we're looking you know the more moderate here and the less of love you know the more extreme you are in general this is someone with your shimmy or might some of yours from mine the less knowledge the more extreme so what we've done have yours or mine have no knowledge no no nothing you know I didn't do anything we're talking about people with your show might now the last thing there was one more thing I want to mention about about that taking those extreme positions two more things one is don't feel bad about extreme people because they give us all a middle ground extreme people are good even in pull up politics you got like stream left extreme right gives us a nice Airy to be in for normal people extremely observant people who are like doing all these home runs where you have extremely lenient people doing all these coolest it gives you an area to be in don't be upset about people like that gives us a place to live and and the last thing I want to share with you is is that that the point of whom Rose are to get you closer to God if you're keeping a homer that's not getting in close to God where you can literally demonstrate how it gets you closer to God that ain't your home run and the opposite is also true that if there's a homer that would get closer to God that is your homework this is important information you gotta hop this if you're involved in Qumran then aren't getting you closer to God drop it just drop it like a hot potato if you got to speak to a rub first like do a shameless robber or something to drop it because it's something more serious you can't just drop it because it's already like a knitter because that's what you've been doing go speak to a rub get a based in together get three from Jews to say much or locksmith door locks medulla but don't be anywhere near home runs we already know that someone who takes on not to drink wine and stuff like that like a nutter they have to bring a Corbin contest to the base of mink dish why why do they bring a sin-offering then weren't they getting closer to God the answer is God already made certain things forbidden certainly things permissible and you went and forbade yourself on things that were permissible which means you're not raising those sparks Kabbalistic lee because we're here to raise the sparks in this world and you miss that because you're astringent cease so stay away from whom rose unless that homers gonna directly perfectly align you with how cutters borrow because the point of your life here is to fuse with God and there are certain homers that each one of us there are things that I'm Homer dickham out like really Homer a dick about like you'd consider that extreme about me but I could demonstrate for you exactly why that is exactly my mitts foot is to go home run with that and then there's other things you'd see is like gee he's kind of lenient about that and I'd say to you like yeah that's because that is tha like that's love what do you want for me go open show Canora that's the Aloha well people aren't doing it like that I think because we live in a big yin Sahara boomer world today where everyone's trying to be firmer than the Schwartz's and you know but sorry I keep show canard I'm not playing games with the Schwartz's and playing that game don't get me closer to God at all and so I'm not going there cuz I don't do home runs unless they bring me closer to God the point of homers is to get you even closer than you already are with God to fuse your soul with your Creator I notice a question here are a point well both is both is that that anything that's a homer that affects you negatively you'll know it right away cuz you'll just you'll just feel out of it and you won't you won't you'll feel you this is taking you out of the zone and whereas there's when there's a woman that you know is yours is because if you do it you'll feel you'll feel particular sense of holiness in closeness to God you'll feel holy there and so as long as you're feeling that holiness that's probably your Cumbre will end up with that sell them everybody and please everyone join my club you can also join my club which is yom tov mediate club yom told me to club come show them everybody that's local Robin don't forget ice that tomorrow's switch