Street Farbrengen Episode 112 - Stop Drifting.

Stop Drifting.

If you’ve been reacting instead of choosing — this episode is for you.

Zion Adar isn’t sentimental. It’s power. Mazalo gavar — your inner root is strong. That’s why 

the Rebbe pushed for making a hachlata on a birthday: not from guilt, not from “should,” but from strength.

We talk about the difference between floating through life and setting a mountain in the distant to reach. 

About how one real decision — made from your deeper self — changes the road you walk and the challenges you’re given.

You’re here because Hashem decided the world needs you.

The question is: what are you deciding back?

 Choose. Then Press play

Transcript

SPEAKER_05 0:00

Zucharya tonight is Zion Adar. The birthday as well as the end day of Myshrabaino. The Nasi of all of Israel. His birthday. Which means it's ours. Yours and mine. I want to walk out of here with both of us concretely making Haklatas for the next year in public, like the Rebbe requested on a birthday.

SPEAKER_00 1:22

That's true. And I definitely wasn't planning on having a chlata by the end of the night.

SPEAKER_05 1:27

Right. Well, that's why I'm mentioning that. Because I know that by the look on your face that you weren't planning. But why is it you think that the Rebbe says to make hachladas on a birthday? The only individual, as far as I know, in Jewish history who made a big thing about birthdays was the Rebbe. So maybe there's an exception somewhere that I don't know about. But in general, in Jewish life, it was a big novelty to do what he did and call for bringings and just making decisions for your life for the next year. Why do you think that is? How do you understand the Rebbe's direction on that?

SPEAKER_00 2:15

So my thought is that after a person does a geshman and nefish, and after a person reflects on what he's looking to accomplish in the next year, his goals, his focus, his um, you know, going more towards his mission and purpose, then once you have that more concrete, the best way to actually begin uh taking actions for that is by a concrete haklata to achieve that.

SPEAKER_05 2:55

That's not what I really ask him. I'm asking why does he say to do it on your birthday?

SPEAKER_00 3:00

Yeah, because the birthday, uh I don't know what was not clear about my answer. The birthday is the time that you are thinking about what you want to accomplish the next year, so you take concrete answers.

SPEAKER_05 3:11

How would you wait one second, one second, one second? Why is it that that's what you're doing on your birthday? Do it on uh every second Tuesday from that falls out on the third of the month. I mean, what's w why is it specifically to the birthday?

SPEAKER_00 3:29

Because the birthday is the day that Hashem decided that the world needed you and you're reminded of the fact that your mission started however many years ago then.

SPEAKER_05 3:42

Okay, I can't say that uh that's off base. There are other things but it's so I know that, but it's so um to me irksome. Um Okay. No, the icker is is that you're Mazaligovar, that the power of your soul is on the rise is strong on your birthday.

SPEAKER_00 4:09

And how does that connect to your hoclotus?

SPEAKER_05 4:11

Well, that's the whole How? What do you think? I don't know. You have no idea. No. Really? Well, what do you think it means your soul rise is on the rise on your birthday?

SPEAKER_00 4:25

Go on.

SPEAKER_05 4:26

No, I'm asking you.

SPEAKER_00 4:28

I I don't know.

SPEAKER_05 4:29

Well, let's take that apart for a second. What do you think the word your muzzle is power f is goiver? It's we'll say like a um wrestler is goiver on the other wrestler. What is the Nishama Goiver over on your birthday? Let's whip let's uh loop it back to what you said. Why is it and what is it that my my muzzle is goiver over what on the day that you're saying is that God said the world needs me and I have this mission here?

SPEAKER_00 5:17

Over the world. Goiver over the world.

SPEAKER_05 5:20

Over the world? Yeah, over the distractions of like Putin sit down and be careful because we're coming after you, because my muzzle is goiver. Which part of the world?

SPEAKER_00 5:30

If I mean not me. But no, over over your yeah, over your circumstances and Daladamos. Yeah. The things that distract you or challenge you or okay.

SPEAKER_05 5:47

What we say in in Limbavich town, you're Nevish the Bahamas, and you're goof, and you're but let's get more practical and more specific. Your doubts, your imposter feeling, your tail between your legs because you've failed in the past, your body seeped in a in a cauldron of I should, should, and should, as you know what that means, because you have shoulds all over yourself, etc. etc. That's what you're goiver on your birthday. So whoever says it's a good time to make chlatas. You don't make chakhlatas out of a place of weakness, you make a chlates out of a place of strength. Tonight's Zionad, which is everyone's in a sense, birthday, the Jewish people's birthday, right? Because the whole Jewish people is one with Moisha Rubina. So it's not coming out of so much an el O Russia to me, an El Russia Shanah, Hesh ben and Efesh. It's not groveling in your sins and your iniquities. I don't think that's what it is. Would you agree? Yeah. Okay, good.

SPEAKER_00 7:12

So is the epitome of power.

SPEAKER_05 7:16

Right. So assuming that we have in some back seat of our brain and our heart and our soul that we had feel this power, let's make a few hocletas.

SPEAKER_00 7:30

Great idea. You start, Ruven.

SPEAKER_05 7:34

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 7:37

But before uh but before you do, Ruvain, just because you brought up this topic and I'm assuming you're feeling this power, um, this mazzle power that uh that we have tonight, how do I access that? What should I do?

SPEAKER_05 7:57

You know, it's so interesting you asked that. You think that I feel the power? That was my question to begin with, or the way I scoped it and the way I understand Zion Adar. Since the Rebbe says you make hachlatah, you make these decisions on Zion Adar on the seventh of Adar, because mazaligavar, because you're in a place of power, you don't need to feel it. You need to make the hachlatas within the context of the Rebbe said that my muzzle is goiva. And making the following through itself connects you to the power that you're asking. How do you feel it? Because that is what Zionatar is all about, Moisha Rabinu. And he gives you the koyach, and the Reb is Moisha Rabainu.

SPEAKER_00 8:56

Okay. Okay, but well, I mean, I could challenge that a bit, but fine. I mean, you're still making it listen.

SPEAKER_05 9:04

If the shoe doesn't fit for you, then don't worry.

SPEAKER_00 9:09

But how then can you make hochlattas from a place of power? What does that mean?

SPEAKER_05 9:20

Make a no, you're a hochlata as a cale to the power.

SPEAKER_00 9:24

I heard what you said, but there's there's where the hochlata is coming from within you that you're desiring it to be a certain way. I I want to give you an example just because I know I see your face, it's so funny.

SPEAKER_05 9:38

Um I don't know what you just said. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 9:39

I know, I know, I know. We did a Street for Breagin many years ago.

SPEAKER_05 9:46

I forgot it, I can tell you right now.

SPEAKER_00 9:47

I I know you did, but it was on my birthday.

SPEAKER_05 9:49

Oh, brother.

SPEAKER_00 9:50

And I told you my haklata and you ripped it apart.

SPEAKER_05 9:53

Oh, that I remember. Because it was very coffee latte.

SPEAKER_00 9:57

There you go. Yeah. There you go. That's my whole point. So I was coming from an up from a place of nothing.

SPEAKER_05 10:05

Yeah, because you have changed since then. You were coming from a place of an intellectual bubble head.

SPEAKER_00 10:12

I I I got that.

SPEAKER_05 10:13

Okay, so now you're not that way.

SPEAKER_00 10:16

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 10:16

So I I'm just saying, you won't come up with some kind of like what was it again? I'm gonna I forget what it was. It was some like really wet noodle kind of feeling.

SPEAKER_00 10:27

Go go listen to episode like 20. Okay, okay, you've changed. I guess forged in steel. I'm just saying for those of us, and I'm putting it on the listeners obviously just because I want to believe that I actually changed. But uh why do you say that? You did. No, no, I know, I know.

SPEAKER_05 10:45

And by the way, I guarantee you it's obvious to listeners.

SPEAKER_00 10:50

Well, we we haven't heard any feedback about that, so I can't as far as you know. Well, I haven't, okay. Okay, but okay, fine. I I'm just saying though, the idea that that that whole that whole premise that you can make a hochlata from a place of weakness That's not a hochlata. What do you mean?

SPEAKER_05 11:14

A haklata means choice. Choice is power. I have to. I should, it's not a haklata, it's not a it's not a decision. So which kind of segues into if as you asked me to start. I am going to make a list of every challenge internally as well as internally meaning just within myself, and internally in reg relationship to the external, I'm gonna make a list of all those challenges. I'm gonna prioritize them, and then I'm going to make a strategy each one of how to um deal with that challenge. All only within the context of me. In other words, I can't change anybody else. Changing somebody else is like changing the weather and you can't do that. So that's my hachlata. And I'm gonna stick to those um decisions. And whatever is proper for me to get into detail, I'll be happy to send that list to you. And we can talk about it whenever you w wish to.

SPEAKER_00 12:57

I love talking about other people's challenges anytime. Yeah. Um that's beautiful. Thank you. That's uh okay. Okay, so that's that's your Haklata that will you're saying you're gonna make a strategy, you know.

SPEAKER_05 13:17

I'm gonna pray I'm gonna list my my my challenges, I'm gonna prioritize them, and I'm going to strategize how I'm what I want, what my objective is for those challenges, and how I'm going to get those challenges um what's the correct word, um completed or um responded to properly.

SPEAKER_00 13:43

That's really that's very good.

SPEAKER_05 13:46

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 13:47

Okay, good.

SPEAKER_05 13:49

I can do that when you're my age.

SPEAKER_00 13:54

What do you mean?

SPEAKER_05 13:56

I'm not sure what I mean actually. Well it's a combination of age as well as my experience. You know, I I I've made a observation for myself that when you get to a certain age as I have, you see a lot of um immaturity with people half my age. And you gotta give them, you know, a little rope because they're not as old and wise. Old and wise as me, yeah. Um and they have to go through their own journey, etc. etc. And what I realized is that the frustration was not because I'm judging them, it's because I was looking for them to be able to give me something. And then that I had to challenge what do I need them to give me something?

SPEAKER_00 14:49

What were they giving you?

SPEAKER_05 14:51

I'm talking about in a c in a context of no, they weren't.

SPEAKER_00 14:54

I know.

SPEAKER_05 14:55

I'm saying inspiration in a synagogue community, inspiration, uh, wisdom, um, mostly inspiration, support, whatever. And I realize that's like foolish. Um, I told you, I think, once, right? I had that experience when I spoke on a Friday night at Shoal. Did I tell you that story?

SPEAKER_00 15:22

Remind me.

SPEAKER_05 15:23

It was a really eye-opener for me. I think I did, but I'm not sure. So I spoke on Friday night. I don't remember the topic. I get very passionate when I speak there, and it's mostly Chasidis and um and whatnot. And it wasn't, I don't go into details, you know, I don't know, spherous or whatever, because it's not appropriate for the crowd and or the time. And I went from the bima where I spoke to sit down to my seat. Now in Orshlomo, when they Friday night, for some reason somebody decided in their wisdom there's no tables as there is shoppers morning. It's a circle. It's like it reminds me of like when I was in college in a in an alternative college where we used to sit in a circle and hold hands and I don't know, hum or something. But anyways, so it's all very nice.

SPEAKER_00 16:13

Might be the same intention.

SPEAKER_05 16:14

And I came probably and I came back to my seat, and there was a very well, I'm not gonna say who, a very well a man from a very well-known family name in Lubavitch who was visiting. So he's not part of the show. Approximately my age. And I was very sincere in what I gave. I spent time thinking about it, and I thought that I, you know, I I don't know if my delivery is good, but at least the intention was good. And but when I sat down, he turns to me. I've never I haven't spoken to this guy probably in 40 years. Right? He probably I don't even know if he knows who I am anymore. Because I say anymore in 40 years because he was like in the yeshiva world when I was in the yeshiva world. And he says to me, Did you understand anything you were talking about?

SPEAKER_00 17:08

Ouch. And yeah, we did bring up this story recently, actually.

SPEAKER_05 17:12

But okay. So and I looked at him and I thought to myself, first I thought to myself, you effing son of a bitch, why is it you said that? Like you know that it was a chep. Yeah. Right. And then I had this grand realization, this is the kind of culture which is not uncommon in Chabad, but probably in a in a similar way in other places, just dressed up in a different coat, that I didn't bargain joining when I came to this club called Chabad. And then I realized for the first time that's why I didn't join. And I used to beat myself up for not wanting to join. What's wrong with me? Because I don't want to be part of that crap.

SPEAKER_00 18:10

Yeah.

unknown 18:11

Right?

SPEAKER_05 18:12

How we get on to this? I don't remember. So I'm just reflecting on that story because making a hachlata making a decision has to come from within. It's there's a lot of myths we're all supposed to do. Let's assume we all do them, but we can do them better, etc. etc. And a hachlata is you're choosing to uh emphasize something in your life. It's not everything, right? Okay. Where does that come from? That comes from within. If it's gonna come from without, from the external, then you're not making a decision. You're being pulled by the ring in your nose by whatever is on the outside. And that's Mazali Govar. You know, one of the the opening line, I mean the opening line of Tanya, where it says, they give him an oath, the souls, before it comes down to to be a tsadik and not to be a Russia. The word oath comes from the same is made up of the same letters as saturated. Because how do you take a how does a soul take an oath about a world it knows nothing about, etc. But we so one of the the ways to kind of up the the explanation of or the context or understanding of the oath is you're saturated with the powers to do what you have to do here. It's not so that anything that takes place in your life, you have the powers to go to handle them. Right? Now, I may not feel that way, I may not act that way. Many of us don't, obviously. And we get very down, uh what are they called? Down tooth. What do they think? There's some expression. Uh downtrodden. What?

SPEAKER_00 20:15

Down trodden.

SPEAKER_05 20:16

No, no, no, no, it's down, it's something with a tooth. But anyways, what's the difference? Um, and we get wrapped up in our own little shtick, but from the Turtles point of view, from the Rebbe's point of view, uh, it's a place of decision. And you have the power to make a decision and stick to it. And it's it's becoming more and more clear to me, both because the environment I hang out in and because I guess because I'm getting older, um, that we tend to operate from the outside in. And that's not a good place to be in, or it's not a powerful place to be in. And the reason we don't operate in the place that we could operate out of, because we don't have these decisions that we made. We're just floating. We spoke about this a lot. We're just moving along. If whatever happens, I'll get I'll I'll deal with it. You're reacting. It's like the it's like the guy who buys a shovel the day after today, yesterday's storm. He's reacting. Why didn't you buy a shovel with the before you know three days when they before the you know, whatever. So it could be many reasons, but I'm saying that's and isn't that the essence of Adar and the essence of Purim? Is taking your own. I heard a line making choices is setting up your destiny. Now I know that's a hard time, hard thing to say to a from person who believes that your destiny is not in your hands, because you everything is God and so forth, but that's not. Entirely true because they have the story with um Shimshinagibur where the Gemara learns out in Saita that you're gonna go down the road that you want to go down. The Absta will work with the road you want to go down.

SPEAKER_00 22:17

Yeah. It's like the idea of uh like you ask Hashem for um strength, so he gives you challenges to bring out your strength.

SPEAKER_05 22:32

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 22:32

I'm saying you're you're choosing your road, and then Hashem is bringing you down that road that you're choosing.

SPEAKER_05 22:40

Why is that challenges?

SPEAKER_00 22:42

Um that's just the example that I'm saying uh see this from a this is not like a Jewish source thing. I'm saying this is just like what's floated around about like you're given the opportunities in order to strengthen the character aspects that you're actually.

SPEAKER_05 22:59

And that's a component of life, but which challenges are you given are gonna be different if you chose to go to college or if you chose or if you chose to go into into to learn how to uh be a carpenter, so and you're gonna make different people have different challenges. That's based on your choice.

SPEAKER_00 23:16

Yeah, I see that.

SPEAKER_05 23:17

So so the challenges will be commensurate with your choices. You have to some degree free choice.

SPEAKER_00 23:25

Yeah. So it's so that's the in but the interesting thing you said before is I mean, you're saying it now too, but the so the the hachlata that you're making has to come not from what's going on in your circumstances and situations in life, but it has to come from within, meaning it has to be guided by a deeper purpose and mission and not purpose.

SPEAKER_05 23:52

A deeper sense of self.

SPEAKER_00 23:54

A deeper sense of self. Mm-hmm. And then you make the haklata from there. So when you're saying your Haklata before, just to use it as the example, because you were so kind to share that with us, that uh that that's your Haklata we could hold you to now, that uh, or keep you keep you reminded of at the very least, that uh listing out your challenges, prioritizing them, and then coming up with strategy. You're saying that that has nothing to do with what's going on on the ground externally, it has to do with a deeper sense of self that this is No, obviously there's challenges in my life that's going on the ground. Yeah, no, no, I understand. But I'm saying you're choosing that Haklata based off of a deeper sense of self that you don't feel like you're taking the reins of your challenges.

SPEAKER_05 24:52

Well, let's go back. I'm not focused on the challenge part. Let's go back. It's more of the feeling, of course there's a challenge there, but it's more in the feeling of like we said before, what is the mean mazzelaghabur? So you think when you decide I'm gonna make a challenge, I'm I'm gonna make a ha uh a this a decision, you're going into the place of your muzzle is on the is be is expanding in power. Because where does it come from that you think you can make a choice? I'm not talking about a should.

SPEAKER_00 25:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:29

Talking about a choice.

SPEAKER_00 25:32

Yeah. From a I mean, from yeah, a deeper sense of self that you are not that I want to make this choice. Yeah, that you want to make the choice that you're not seeing realized currently.

SPEAKER_05 25:43

Right. So for example, I could I mean again, we're getting into the we can get into the minutiae, and I don't mean that in a negative sense, but the minutiae of Chasilis explaining where's Ratson, where's Midois, where's Seychel. But on a general level, I think most people most of the time, let's not talk about most people, because what do I know about most people, but uh for me, a lot of the times I make decisions from a place not of having made a decision. So that could that's like th throwing the ball up in the air. We don't know where it's gonna land. So it could be that I'll zone out because I um it's too I'm avoiding what really has to be done. It could be I do what I'm thinking should be done, whatever that means, right? Um so it's not coming from self. This is what I want, this is what I decide, and I'm gonna find the power, meaning the strategy of how to address the situation. It's cut it's it's coming more from what I want rather than oh my gosh, there's something happening in my life, what am I gonna do about it? Obviously, you're still dealing with your life.

SPEAKER_00 27:04

Yeah. But what do you want what do you ultimately want from your life is the first question that's being clarified by yourself, and then the haklata is bringing out deeper.

SPEAKER_04 27:20

It's connecting to it.

SPEAKER_00 27:22

Connecting to it, yeah. Yeah. Better way of putting it. Yeah. Okay. I hear that. Okay, so I gotta think.

SPEAKER_05 27:30

What do you mean you're gonna think?

SPEAKER_00 27:32

I have to you you want me to say a haklata, I have to think.

SPEAKER_05 27:35

Well, I don't know. You asked me, so if you I figured that you were uh I wasn't pushing you to make a haklata.

SPEAKER_00 27:41

Well, that's not how you phrased it in the middle.

SPEAKER_05 27:43

I know I gave up a long time ago. No, I wasn't pushing it. I was just saying that's what I th wanna do on this evening. I think that's um and it me it in a sense it means a lot, if it's true, to say that making the chlata, because the Rebbe says that that's your muzzle muzzle g maz mazali gover, creates a vessel for you to actually have the power to make this decision.

SPEAKER_00 28:15

Okay. I do have something. I do have something. Um I stopped writing. I stopped uh journaling, and I haven't done it in a long time. And both uh good, bad, and ugly, and just getting things down on paper, kind of the stream of consciousness, either in the morning or at night, uh, in order to just get things from the inside out, and then uh to hopefully get clarity from there. So that would be my hachlata.

SPEAKER_05 28:59

I didn't hear the hachlata.

SPEAKER_00 29:00

The would be to start writing.

SPEAKER_05 29:03

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 29:04

Daily or most days.

SPEAKER_05 29:06

What do you mean daily or?

SPEAKER_00 29:08

Daily or m most days.

SPEAKER_05 29:10

Most days.

SPEAKER_00 29:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 29:12

Uh maybe you want to make it more cool. Fine daily muhlat.

SPEAKER_00 29:16

Daily. Daily. Daily doesn't have to be for hours, but yeah. Daily.

unknown 29:22

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 29:24

Thank God it doesn't have to take up your whole day. Okay, good. Why?

SPEAKER_00 29:32

Because my inner um self has been stuck internally and hasn't been able to like get out. And that was one of the things that was very effective in the what do you mean by your inner self? Meaning like scripts and ideas and things that I had in mind that were playing themselves over and over were not uh are not effectively getting released. They're they're coming up over and over again, and writing is a good way of you know being able to move through those.

SPEAKER_05 30:21

Well, there's an idea. It's an odd idea, but I I I where it comes from, but there's an idea that because it sounds like what you're talking about is confusion is not being clarified. And writing clarifies confusion. Sometimes you can't say it out loud or whatever, and it's just by yourself, and there's no no one's judging, there's no one there but you, and the and the journal. Um that all of our inner fears, challenges, however you want to say it, are like little demons living in the basement. And there's two ways of dealing with those demons. One is to make sure that the basement doors got a triple bolted lock. But the more that you do that, the more screaming they and the more agitation these demons, these little gr gremlins are screaming in the basement. If you let 'em out and which is through journaling, then you've given them voice and they have no more need to scream and yell. Because that's what they're looking for. Yeah. Um isn't that what we are we're mostly doing whenever we're acting out, is we're just looking for our voice to be heard. And if someone hears it, we don't need to do it anymore.

SPEAKER_01 31:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:58

That's right.

SPEAKER_05 32:00

Sounds good.

SPEAKER_00 32:02

Okay, so you accomplished your mission for my mission? Your your desire for for the ninth.

SPEAKER_05 32:11

Um yes and no.

SPEAKER_00 32:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 32:16

Because when we come back and you told tell me that for the last week you journaled then you've accomplished your mission. And if I do what I have to do, then I accomplish my mission. Until then. Even though I just said what I just said, talk is cheap, isn't it? Um the real the real question I think you have to ask yourself is okay, so you'll write and you'll get clarity. What'll that do for you? What's what are you really looking for? See, that's the the on the the$20 million question. What am I really looking for? When I have just what am I saying? I'm saying I'm gonna list all of my challenges, mostly inner, in my life, and I'm gonna strategize. So what am I really after? I'm not even identifying what they are.

SPEAKER_01 33:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 33:23

I mean, I know the the top ones, but there's probably more. I mean, there are more that I haven't identified that are lurking around in the, you know, like I said, in the basement. Um what are we really looking for when we want to say Today's Cyan Agar Moish Rebano's birthday? Let's have a forbringen. Uh let's make hochlotas. Now I'm backing up on everything. And we're gonna make oklotas. What am I really looking for?

SPEAKER_00 34:03

Well, I mean, obviously that could be an individual, individualized answer. I understand that. No, but I'm saying I think that the general idea is if I'm not feeling that power, if I'm not feeling that, you know, you were saying that it has to come from a place of of knowing yourself, of of the the deeper sense of self that you're you're uncovering, is this is going to be a method by which to be in touch with that deeper self more so.

SPEAKER_05 34:39

So you're saying that I want to make haklatas so I can be in touch with my deeper self?

SPEAKER_00 34:43

I think that you get a sense of it from making the decision, but the ultimately that's what you're looking to do with all haklatas, is this is going to bring out or help express or connect me to that deeper self.

SPEAKER_02 35:00

Let me throw this out at you.

SPEAKER_05 35:06

I'm going, I'm gonna give you a little picture of little Ruvain before he called himself Ruvain. So I'm this like 18 and a half year old pitcher who thought I was King Schnitzel. I hitchhiked three thousand miles across the country, had some very interesting experiences, and when I got to Vancouver, I ended up going to a retreat, um, how should I put it? Where the guy in charge of this retreat, the the grand player was a guru. Okay?

SPEAKER_01 35:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 35:55

This was happening at the same time that I had just spent a weekend at a Chabad Shabbaton. So one Shabbat one weekend at a Shabbaton, and the next weekend with this flowing, lovely, wide-eyed, kind, beaming guru face. I did that too. Okay. And it was literally within a week or two from I don't remember exactly anymore, it was a long time ago, but one after the other. So, in a certain sense, I was in a place of choice. Am I gonna continue with the what I used to call them as the Kugel eaters or the meditators? The guru wasn't the Kugel eater, by the way.

SPEAKER_00 36:47

Just in case anybody had any questions.

SPEAKER_05 36:49

Well, you know, supposedly Chabadniks are meditators, right? Uh-huh. So where I'm going with this is the following. When I decided and there's a few steps obviously in time and space, but when I decided to turn around and go to Yeshiva and Morristown, that was clear choice with so to speak, you know, in the house that I my I had a fire in my house. We used to have at the front door, as you opened up the front door, as you got out the front door, there was a wall coming down the stairs, and there was this huge picture that I bought at some IKEA, you know. I think I bought it at IKEA, of this road that looks like is going for four or five miles in the desert. In it's actually in Arizona, and it there's a mountain in the in the distance. So when I chose to go to Morristown, that was my mountain. I decided fully, I'm dropping this guru thing, which by the way, I had been doing everything not Jewish from the time I was 15. And seriously not doing. I was doing Tai Chi, I was doing yoga, I was going, I was, I was, you know, I don't have to go through the whole long thing. Um, please, that's interesting. Tell us. I lived in a I lived in a commune um and so forth, and then I end up choosing between Kugel and Meditators, and I decide I'm gonna go to Morristown. Okay. That was a very can you can just can you feel that there was a very decisive, mission-oriented, that's one giving me the idea of the picture that was in uh the poster that was on on the wall of my house uh going out of my house. That was my mountain, that was my road. I was set on that road, and I dropped all the fun things that I was doing. I wasn't depressed, I was having a good time. Um I probably could have had a much even better time, so there were certain things that I didn't realize, but you know, um hindsight's 2020.

SPEAKER_00 39:13

Hindsight's 2020.

SPEAKER_05 39:14

What? Hindsight's 2020. No, I knew this. It wasn't hindsight. I knew it. I yeah, it was hindsight, but it was like I knew this long, long time ago. I used to lament all the time. Reuven, why didn't you become from like five years later and you got your good licks in, you know? So I was a young guy, I was 18 years old. Um I should have turned from when I was 50. Anyways, the Dal. Anyways, a couple Punim. That was a powerful moment. Now, I may not have wrote about it, or I may not have analyzed it that way, but I'm talking about from today's point of view. And looking back, that was a powerful moment that set me on a drive that I ended up three years in Morristown, a year in in yeshiva in in Los Angeles, a year, almost a year in Seattle, in some small outpost with a bunch of wacko teenagers from New York, uh, and that's the way you're gonna say it. And then I went into 770 and I got smika all because I made that decision not to go to the guru and to go the other direction. But I had something pulling me and it was decided it was a hachlata, it was a decision. And why I came out with this tonight is I was thinking about this. I don't live relatively, I don't live based on my age. I think you know that, right? Sure. Everyone treats me like an old fart. Really? I was like everybody. Well, I I've noticed it because well, they look at my white beard and they look at my white hair and whatever and my crazy face. And I was there was my landlord today was went and decided only many hours, whatever. He couldn't do the driveway until later in the day with his snow machine removal machine. And I started shoveling my end, sort of, and he goes, Why are you doing this? I'm doing I'm blowing the snow now. So I said, and and he was concerned like I was gonna drop of a heart attack, you know, like and I said, and this is a guy who's works who's in the IDF, you know, and I said to him, I couldn't get to the gym today. I wanted to get some exercise. Okay, people my age in the that I that I that keep asking me to join the Zeke Naianash don't live that way. Okay. So I don't live from from that, I don't live in that my age bracket. I learned that from the Rebbe, but I also it comes from me because as Clint Eastwood says, he's my mentor on this. Don't let the old man in. In any case, but it's not only physically, I'm doing new things I've never done before in my life, right? Making film, like what the hell's wrong? What like go retire somewhere and I don't know, drool in the back of the shoals while you do jitas or something. Okay. So and I realized that that's going back to that decision of turning around, and I was on the West Coast to go to Morristown was a f uh uh uh a real huge turning point, not only what I did in my life, but from the aspect of I had a set life goal. And once you become from and you think your goal is already set because you have your mitzvas to do, or maybe you think it's because you have to make money, because you're but when you get to a certain age, you realize either you have the money or you don't have the money. Okay, I can get some more. But it's not the same thing as when you have kids and khader and all this stuff, which is where I'm at. And I realized I should be having that same moment that I had La Havdil with the guru versus coming to Morristown and Crown Heights. I should have that frequently, those decisions, that mountain in the distance. And why don't we? And the Rebbe's whole Mahus is exactly that mountain with the road in the picture. Because and the re for the Rebbe that was and is Mashiach.

unknown 43:41

Right?

SPEAKER_05 43:41

Mashiach's the mountain. Yeah, one of my favorite songs. Somebody, I think Spotify gave it to me, but one of my favorite songs is You Are the Mountain. So that's why um I picked the topic for this evening. That's right. It was coming from.

SPEAKER_00 44:00

You're saying ever so but let me just clarify one point because it's very powerful what you're saying, but you're saying that you should constantly be making No, not making. You're in the well, you could be in that level of a decision.

SPEAKER_05 44:15

No, you should constantly have that mountain.

SPEAKER_00 44:21

And I mean that by the way, this is this is literally Purim. This is I know. That's why I said all of Purim, yeah. No, well you didn't. Yeah, I did.

SPEAKER_05 44:28

I said this is what Zion, Adar, and Purim is all about. That's the month of Adar. And someone said to me today.

SPEAKER_00 44:36

But but again, just go back to what I was saying, though. You're saying that you should be living from that place.

SPEAKER_04 44:42

Otherwise, you're just bouncing around like a leaf in the wind.

SPEAKER_05 44:48

I see that very clearly. Listen, again, I have the advantage of being I hate now. I'm contradicting my what I just said, but I have the advantage of being old enough to be able to say, for example, like this every morning I come to show, there's five or six guys, no matter how cold it is outside, standing outside smoking their cigarettes. Right? Every evening when there's a marav, there's but when I get there, there's a bunch of guys learning Broh Hashem. But before they learn go from learning to Marav, which is supposedly at a certain given time, they have to go out for a cigarette. Okay. And I'm thinking to myself, as an ex-smoker, by the way, I'm thinking to myself, they are so clued out what they're doing when they smoke. Clued out completely. Right? Physically, mostly physically, what it's doing to them. And the long, God forbid, the long-term consequences. But they're in a place of uh happy go lucky, let's get together. And sh well half the time, smoking is just a good way to go out of your office, go downstairs because you're not allowed to smoke in your office, and meet people. Yeah. And breathe. Because you're taking big Ironically. Ironically, yeah. So, but that's besides the point. So, and they're totally clued out. If they decided, independent of cigarettes, one day they read an article or they saw a movie or whatever it was, uh film, they decided I want to be the strongest and the most energetic, healthiest energy that I could muster up. And that was their mountain. Then they wouldn't feel the same way every time. Uh even if they went and did it about smoking between learning and Marav and in the morning when it's ten degrees below zero. And one of the guys is coughing like a eighty-year-old man already. I don't know if it's because of the cigarettes, but so I'm saying that's because we don't make in we're inner sacred decision making. Sacred in terms of ourselves.

SPEAKER_00 47:24

There was a joke I used to have with a friend of mine in college. Then when we're whenever we were faced with a decision to make a to do something kind of wild or you know, something that can have a consequence, we're like our future selves are gonna have to deal with the decision. We're gonna we're gonna have fun right now. We're gonna so that's the idea that you're saying that you're separating yourself from the decision of you're not in a place where you made a decision. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 47:56

You're living life just for the in a sense, whatever and and and I mean what the whole definition if you want not the whole definition, the characteristic of Kedusha versus Clipa is that Kadusha has a purpose, a mission, uh a function and an importance. And Clipa's the opposite. So if I can leave you with anything, I hate to sound like I'm like dying and going away, but um but if I can leave you with anything, that's the difference between a life that's fully lived versus half lived is when you have that mountain set up. Okay, so once a year or whatever, every six months you evaluate there's every mountain leads to another mountain. Right because once you get to the top of the mountain you see the bunch of other ones.

SPEAKER_00 49:06

Yeah, no, I I mean it goes to the point of you you were saying originally that uh it's being in touch with that deeper self, and we just don't realize how deep our selves really go. It's infinite.

SPEAKER_05 49:20

Right. But you're probably thinking of deeper self in terms of the things that you could do. But loop it back to what the Rebbe says, as you said, that I'm here on earth. That means by definition, I'm here as a hachlata. My whole essence is God's hachlata to have me here. God's decision to have me here. That is depth, and now you're gonna live your life with no with no depth of decision making. So you're abandoning your very core of what you are by definition.

SPEAKER_00 50:03

I was I was either at a Ferbrain or I was listening to something I'm I can't even remember now where. But uh the guy had a question of the fact that the Rebbe obviously puts in high yom yom about the 70 or 80 years that you're here to do uh a fellow yid a favor. And their question for whatever reason was, you know, should I really, you know, if I think that way, I'm afraid that like once I do that favor, I'm done. I'm gonna die. I'm I'm I'm off. And they said they were listening to a to a forbringin from the Rebbe. Again, I didn't see the source of this, but they were listening, and the Rebbe said that when a person does and goes into his life and fulfills his mission that he was put into this world for, you know, that 70 or 80 years, and he was put into that, uh he was put into the situation where he could fulfill that, and he fulfills that. Once Hashem sees that you have the ability to succeed, he gives you a new mission.

SPEAKER_01 51:04

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 51:05

So, like you were saying, a new mountain that's behind it.

SPEAKER_05 51:09

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So uh how are we going to evaluate the veracity of our decision making?

SPEAKER_00 51:24

Let's first uh see how we do like how we feel after we've accomplished it. You said this is a talk is cheap.

SPEAKER_05 51:32

You know, we now have to actually implement it, and then we're gonna be uh No, no, but you're making this in public, so the reasons we're making it in public is you have to be accountable. What?

SPEAKER_00 51:45

I'm I don't know. I'm thinking.

SPEAKER_05 51:47

You're thinking.

SPEAKER_00 51:48

What what what would you like to be accountable for for your come overcoming your challenges and prioritizing?

SPEAKER_05 51:53

No, you've made a haklata and I made a haqlata. So yeah. How are we gonna be held accountable to that halakhlata?

SPEAKER_00 51:58

We're gonna come back next week. We're gonna ask each other have we been fulfilling it and how it has how has it affected your life?

SPEAKER_05 52:06

And the week after?

SPEAKER_00 52:08

We could do it as long as it'd be boring as hell. So we'll do it privately, Ruben, but we Oh, you're worried about the audience? Yeah, I'm worried that they're gonna be bored. I'm not bored of your challenges and strategies of overcoming.

SPEAKER_05 52:20

Well, I'm not I'm not I never said that I was gonna say what they are.

SPEAKER_00 52:24

You did say that you actually did. You said you were gonna tell me the ones that were relevant for me to know.

SPEAKER_05 52:30

No, the ones that are proper for you to know. Okay. Yeah, but the other ones are the ones that the audience wants to hear.

SPEAKER_00 52:36

They're gonna have to just they're gonna have to use their imaginations.

SPEAKER_05 52:40

Um okay, so uh you should use Zion Udar. Like it says that they opened up the basket and they saw light, right? No, that's I'm mixing up two parts of the story, but they saw the whole house filled with light when Moish Rabena was born. So that's Zion Udar.