Helping Others Makes You Healthier | Letter #18

Good evening and welcome to 30 letters in 30 days. Uh remember if you want the PDF to print out and follow along with, go to 30 letters30days.com. That's 30 for 30 and letters like letters L E T R S 30 again for 30 days dys.com. And there you'll find all the archives of all the previous classes as well as some other resources such as uh the Shabas the weekly Shabas table companion discussion sheets and uh also coming up soon there's going to be an initiative I just heard today about a new initiative to promote the study of 11 letters in 11 days uh starting from Nissen which is coming up um day after tomorrow. Uh and uh this is going to be a program that's going to be promoted in many of the girls schools around the world. So, uh keep an ear out for more news about that. All right, tonight's letter. Let's jump right in. Mikl, who is Mikl, who the RB refers to with these uh very grand titles. This is a rabbi who, as you're going to be able to deduce very quickly uh in the letter, uh at the time of the letter writing is in Romania. This is Yel Mikl de Bruskin and uh he was originally he was born in Nikolia. You may have heard of Nikolai. That's actually where the Debba was born as well. Um in uh later after this uh the period that this letter is written in he was in Kyifa in Eritis but at this juncture he's in Romania. Now uh Romania is an interesting place. Uh there's a long history of Jews in Romania. But let's just talk about modern history by somewhat of a I mean everything is hushka but from a historical perspective it was somewhat of an anomaly that so many Jews survived the Holocaust in Romania. uh Romania was uh was allied with the with the with the Nazis and um percentage- wise Romanian jewelry avoided extermination um at rates, it sounds morbid to describe it this way, but at rates that were like better than let's say in Poland where the decimation was was far far worse. I mean, I feel uncomfortable speaking in comparative terms about such unfathomable tragedy. But the point is that after the Holocaust, there was a disproportionately large community that remained in Romania. In fact, there were a quarter of a million Jews still living in Romania by the end of the Holocaust. Now what happened is they became uh communist and allied with the Soviets in some ways a a Soviet uh puppet but uh an independent state. So they didn't have the same severity as the Soviet Union itself and there was a little bit more freedom of movement. So the 250,000 surviving Jews after the war uh did leave Romania. uh the mo the majority of them did leave Romania until uh by the uh by the 80s I believe there's already I think uh 50 or 60,000 Jews in Romania. Um the chief rabbi of Romania who was uh was known as Rabbi Moses Rosen David Misha Rosen. He had with the Reb many times. In fact, he had a uh open door policy, so to speak, by the Reba to uh anytime that he wanted to speak to the Reb, he had access. And the Rebu was very supportive of him and his work in uh trying to keep Yiddish alive in a place that had been so um doubly affected by both the Holocaust as well as by communism. At any rate, Rabbi De Bruskin, who the this letter is to, was uh was in Romania at the time of this uh this letter. He was in a town called Breila, Romania, which now I don't know if there are any Jews there at this point. Um, but at some point it was a large Jewish community with multiple schools and and synagogues and that's where Rabbi Duskin is at the time of writing this letter of greetings and blessings in answer to your letter from the 16th of The second in which in which you write about your mood etc. Okay. Um I feel like I should fill something in here about his mood. The Reb writes which means etc. I don't know if Rabbi De Bruskin wrote the wrote this in his letter to the Reba or not. I'm going to state however a fact. Um and this is something actually that if you learn 30 letters in 30 days with us last year. So we did a letter last year which the Reb wrote to the community of Karabad in 1955 following a tragedy which befell the community where a Bakar a very talented and um very fine Bakar who was he was a mashpa he was a teacher to other Baham and uh he he was murdered by a terrorist and we read the letter that the Reb wrote to the community of Kabad to comfort them after that tragedy. Uh I will uh believe Neader get you the link for that letter that we learned last year and I'll put it in the description so that uh so you can watch it. I'm referring to YouTube. If you're watching on other platforms um you could search it up. The name of the class was in response to a tragedy. was actually was a Thursday night so it was a double header. How to receive the Debb's blessings and in response to a tragedy. Okay. So the name of that Bakar who was murdered excuse me was Israel de Brkin. He was the son of this So that's just a fact. Now from what I've heard, people commented that after the tragedy, the father was never the same as one could well imagine. I don't know if that's what the Reb is referring to when he says your mood, etc. I don't know if that's what Rabbi de Brushkin wrote in his letter to the Reba, but it is something that we know was an issue and um something that affected him and his emotional well-being for the rest of his life. So the Reb says, "In your letter, you write about your mood. Roman and therefore you're not able to do anything about the Romanian immigrants. Um what uh what is this talking about? So Rabbi De Bruskin is essentially saying I'm sorry that um because of his uh personal situation which he describes as his matru he's not able to help these uh these Romanian Jews who are trying to immigrate to Israel. Now, he has other issues as well in addition to his uh emotional issues, but he's writing to the Reb and and essentially explaining why he's not going to be able to perform these duties. Now, when is this so Kenyan mamosa vave kasha. If you look at this as a burden and hard labor, you know the old mushel, the old parable that all the rabbis at some point use when they're giving a sermon. I feel like a hack even to bring it up, but the well-known parable of the diamonds and the rocks, right? Sorry. A guy is walking up a hill or maybe he's walking down the hill and he sees another guy walking up the hill and he's carrying a big heavy bag of rocks on his back and he's frowning. He says, "Why are you frowning?" Oh, cuz I'm carrying heavy rocks. And he's passes another guy. He's also trudging up the hill with the same heavy load on his back, but he's smiling. Why are you smiling? Ah, because they're diamonds. Yeah, it's an old parable. The point is the Reb tells this uh you're saying that because of your mood, your emotional state, you're not really able to take on extra uh responsibilities. So the Debbis says something that's rather logical. I mean it makes sense if you think about it. Um why why am I making such a comment? because the deba could just say something is true for spiritual reasons and it doesn't have to make sense but this this happens to make a lot of sense. Um something is only going to give you additional um is only going to additional weight if you interact with it as a burden. In other words, who's to say that working with the Romanian immigrants isn't relief from your problems? Who's to say it's not therapeutic and healing and it's actually the best way to deal with your problems? You're saying, "I'm already so overburdened. How can I bring on more?" Well, that's because you're looking at it as something that's a burden. But if you would reframe it, then not only it doesn't have to be a burden, you could actually look at it as something that's uh that's helping you. So simple but so powerful. Okay. In contrast, if you see the matter as it truly is, and I love this word laas, if you see it according to its em, according to its truth, meaning to say it's not just a matter of glass half empty, glass half full, right? Because which one is it? Well, it's subjective. It depends how you look at it. But that Eba is saying no there is an objective answer here. There is there is a right answer. It's not just well you could view it as a burden or you could view it as something positive. Uh no it's much more than that. It's there's actually a right and a wrong way of looking at it. So in fact there's a true and therefore by inference you could conclude a false way of looking at it. Viewing it as a burden is the false way of looking at it. But if you see things as they truly are, this is actually something that will make you happy. This is this is a happy thing. You're able to help improve the lives of many Jews. And that furthermore regarding this it says it's not upon you to finish the job. Right? This is from Perkovves that you don't have to finish the job but you're not allowed on the other hand to say that you're free from even starting a lot of powerful stuff right here. So first of all, the Reba says this burden that you feel is here. I'm going to use a word that I I learned recently and I like it so I'm going to use it. Learned a word allostasis. So allostasis is basically your your your system and its ability to deal with stress. And there's a concept of alostatic load. So depending on what you got going on in your life, the challenges that you're dealing with, your allstatic load may be heavier. Um, and you get to a certain point where the alistatic load is too heavy and you can't function properly. That's when things start to break down. So we know some of the details of Rabbi De Bruskin's life and uh there are many things we don't know about his life but we know one thing that he lives in this world in the period of exile and if there's anything I know from living 48 years in this world in the period of exile it's that everyone's got problems. life is fraught with problems. Um, so I don't know how taxed out his alosatic load is, but he's writing to the Reb describing his matzah as being pretty serious and not allowing him to do his communal work. So I would assume that it's his allstatic load is pretty heavy right now. So the first thing the ever writes back and says, "Hold on, why are you assuming that this important work is just another burden that's maxing out your already uh very uh taxed capacities. Maybe this is the opposite." And if you would see the truth that you're helping Jews, you would see that this is actually a wonderfully happy thing. And maybe this could actually take away some of your alosatic load. Okay, so that's first of all. Second of all, what's with this perfectionism? Why are you creating more stress? Why are you thinking of it like something you have to finish? You don't have to finish. You're just not allowed to walk away from it. So, you don't have to finish the job. Yeah, of course you're stressed if you think you have to finish it. You don't have to finish it. You're just not allowed to walk away from it. So without letting him off the hook, the explains why this shouldn't really stress him. You understand? This is very important because the could tell the guy, "I know it's stressing you and I know you think it's going to you're going to die from the stress and that's the price we have to pay." I mean, the Reb could have said that. He could have said, "Yeah, I know. I know you don't have any room for this in your mind and in your heart, but it's too important to walk away from. So, I'm sorry. It's going to Yeah, it's going to it's going to bury you. But that's what's that's what has that's what has to happen. By the way, I would say that that's the attitude of this very much in the previous generation before the Debb's leadership where it was really about that type of masid snafish where you're going to do the right thing and you're going to get killed for it and that's that's what aided has to do, right? I think the Reba worked very hard to change that attitude to create a new understanding of msidnafish that uh in in the Debb's world you don't suffer for doing the right thing you gain from doing the right thing. So it's not like yeah I'm sorry I know you're stressed already you got a lot of emotional problems already but you're going to have to keep doing this stuff because it's important and you know if it kills you it kills you and we'll we'll find a replacement. That's not what the deba is saying. The deb is saying, "I know you're stressed. I know you got a lot going on in your life. this work that you're doing, if you look at it in the truthful way and you understand what it is and you stop being a perfectionist and you realize you don't have to finish the whole thing, not only will this work stop stressing you, I think you'll actually find that this work brings you some comfort and some relief. So then the Reb says o then if you shift your way of looking at it'll be easy to do this work according to your ability again we're not asking you to do more to do more than your ability just do a little bit gradual slow and steady nobody's nobody's rushing you. Nobody's rushing you here. You got you got time. Just just don't stop moving. You don't have to rush. Just just don't stop. I think it's but that's in general the deb's advice. Nobody's pushing you. No one's rushing you. Just keep moving. Keep moving. Keep moving. Line by line. It'll work out fine. Right. And you're going to go from one level to the next. Oh, that I was pushing us again. That was not pushing that I was telling you the truth. Just keep moving and you will go from level to level. You're going to go from the easy to the less easy. I love that. Not from the easy to the difficult trigger word. Difficult's a trigger word. You're going to go from the easy to the less easy, right? Incrementally. Nobody's pushing you. Just keep moving and you will be able to do more and more and it'll be in a way where you won't exhaust yourself. Again, the deb is not saying, "Yeah, I know this is going to exhaust you. Do it anyway." The is saying pace yourself and it's not going to exhaust you. I'm not asking you to burn yourself out. Ladies and gentlemen, contrary to what you may have been told, I'm speaking with the Lavator now. Lovich have never asked anybody to turn in a uh a report that they've reached burnout and that that should be your street cred. I got burnt out doing the yan. To the contrary, the is saying I don't want you to have burnout. Just take it. You don't have to rush. You don't even have to finish the job. you just can't stop. Okay? So, move slowly and gently and don't stop. And automatically, you're going to do more and more and more. Okay? And it's not only it's not going to make your life worse, it's going to make your life better. Okay? Now, that is getting into physical health. We were talking about mood until now. Certainly the doctor who treats you. Not only will he agree to this, [Music] he will encourage you, he'll he'll strengthen you to follow my advice. In other words, and this work that we're talking about is also going to bring you literal physical health. Not just that it might be a relief for you emotionally, it's going to actually improve your physical health. And that's in addition to following what whatever other instructions the doctor told you to do. It's interesting that yesterday was telling somebody what they had foot pain uh that they should give to daka and have more amuna and that will deal with the foot pain. And the doesn't mention any uh natural means of healing, which again, as I mentioned last night, maybe the guy already had that area covered and mentioned it in his letter to the Reba. But here, the Reba says both. that Eba says. In fact, I shouldn't even say both because last night it was a purely spiritual thing where you have to really uh invoke the metaphysical to believe that there's a cause and effect connection between the Debb's advice and the effect that the Debba was um telling the person it would have over here. Actually, it doesn't even take so much faith to understand it. There's more of like an emotional piece of advice and then like a a physical piece of advice. The emotional piece of the advice was if you have the proper outlook on this work, you're going to actually see that it's a happy thing and it's going to probably help your mood. Then the the more physical part of it is, and by the way, ask your doctor. I think he's going to tell you that doing this work is actually good for your physical health. It's like the story about when Tushkin's father, the accountant, Tushkin tells this story. This father, the accountant, was in the hospital. He had a massive heart attack in the hospital and the debas sent him a bunch of books to he was an accountant so he sent him books you don't get let the guy rest the guy's in the hospital convol why you sending him work in the hospital but after he came out he said saved my life I was giving up on life I said yeah this is it I guess I had a good run ready to check out and all of a sudden the ebba sent me work to do I said oh I'm still needed in this world so uh and it was literally it was healing for him in a physical Okay. So the deb says talk to your doctor and continue doing any any other things the doctor told you to do. Obviously do those things as well. But I think doing this work the doctor himself is going to back me up and say this is good for your health. Okay. Um since we're still in the month of where the whole month is increasing in joy. And also there's an idea of juxtaposing one redemption to another redemption. The redemp the redemption of porm which takes place in the month of and the redemption of the exodus from Egypt which takes place in the month of Nissan. So the the redemption that is telling that he should have is a redemption from all things that prevent you from serving Hashem with joy and gladness of heart. So you should report back good news about all of the above with blessings for good news that you should report good news in all of the above. All right, that's our letter tonight and uh we'll see you tomorrow.