Shnayim Yomi - Vayelech - Dvar Torah - Rabbi Ephraim Ilyaguev

[Music] My friends, this is it. The first Shabbat of the year. One of the holiest Shabbats of the year. Arguably the the most special Shabbat of the year is Shabbat Shou. This is the Shabbat between Shan and Kipur during the This is the Shabbat where we read the special from chapter 14. It starts with the words. Return the Jewish people. Return to Hashem your God. Be close to him. Take with you words. Hashem said, "I don't need your gold. I don't need your silver. All I need is to bring words." What words? Confess. Say you're sorry. Because sorry seems to be the hardest word. Sometimes to say sorry a person really have to really have to overcome himself and say yes I'm so sorry I did it I'm sorry instead of saying what's wrong with that a person has to say I'm sorry I did something wrong I accept responsibility I accept that was my fault I accept the fact that I did something not appropriate and sometimes it's very very hard But that's what Hashem wants. Hashem wants us to bring him words, to bring him an apology, to bring him a confession, to be honest with ourselves and take responsibility. Tell him and please forgive us. forgive all our aot and accept our good intentions and accept our words as if we brought sacrifices instead of bulls. And this phrase actually serves as the foundation serves as the base that today that substitute the Qurban and we should really try very very hard to say the Quran to say the Qurban every morning every afternoon before M because the words have power what's the process of chuva chuva is not an easy thing it means changing ourselves and It's easier to learn the entire Talmud than to change one quality to change one difficult and unfortunate and unpleasant personal trait. It's very very hard. I heard recently from Rabbi Fran Waxman the following approach that instead of changing everything it just changed little bit every year. A person changes every year 1% imagine over the course of his life over the next 30 years, 20 years, 40 years, how much he could actually change. And if we consider the principle of compounding that each and every single change actually will trickle down and cause other things to change because everything affects everything. I want to share with you a personal story. Many many years ago, I remember I had very hard time getting up in the morning. I was struggling to make it to a minion. This is not my struggle anymore, but it used to be my struggle. And I know many many people find it challenging waking up in the morning. And it got to a point that a few times I used to work in a city a few times. I overslept and I ended up dinging on the train. I was going from Brooklyn to Manhattan. I woke up so late that I didn't even have a chance to pray at home. I had to pray on a train and then I had to figure out when to put on filling during during to do it during ma or during lunchtime. I really was not happy with this state of things. So there's one thing I don't know how I came up with this idea but it was a great idea. I spoke to a rabbi where I used to pray in the mornings at an early minion I think was around 6:45 and I told him rabbi would you please give me five minutes of your time before shah I want to have I want to learn with you let's learn mishnaba let's learn and he said let me think about it after a few days he got back to me he said yes let's do it and this minor change in my schedule this minor little commitment five minutes a today transformed everything. It transformed not only my mornings but also my career, my relationship with my children, everything because now I was one of the first 10 people in Minyan. I was learning Torah every day. All those five minutes were adding up actually were covering ground. It was great. I was learning also because I was there on time. I finished on time instead of going home. it didn't make sense for me go to go home. So I would go straight to the office and I would be one of the first people to come to the office. So it made me look very very good in in the eyes of my supervisor in the eyes of my boss. So my career actually improved and then because I was at work early I was able to leave early and spend more time with my family. Just think about how one little change could trickle down and affect and impact everything. So ra instead of just making major major major changes which is great if you're able to do it go ahead but if you feel like you're not able to do it just take something small and stick to it create a new good habit or approved an bad habit just this year commit to something small even if you change 1% over the next 20 30 40 years you can become let's Sadik, you can become a different person and you can really return to Hashem 100%. [Music]