Teshuva: The Honesty that Leads to Forgiveness (Asseres Yemei Teshuva & Yom Kippur)

In this episode, we are learning the Nesivos Shalom on the Asseres Yemei Teshuva and Yom Kippur. 

If you want to follow along inside, it is in Nesivos Shalom Chelek Bet, on page kuf lamed tet (139). You can find a pdf of the piece here. 

This week’s episode is sponsored by Eli Waxman l'illy nishmas his father רפאל חיים עוזר ישראל בן הרב יוסף אליעזר ז׳ל. He was a truly loving father and B"H has finally come to Eretz Yisrael to his final resting place. May his neshama have an aliyah. Thank you so much to Eli for sponsoring this week’s episode. If you would like to sponsor an episode of the podcast, please email Rabbi Charnoff at rabbicharnoff@gmail.com.

Transcript

Rabbi Charnoff 0:08

Hello everyone. This is Rabbi Robbie Chernoff and you are listening to the Hasidist for Life podcast. The podcast where you learn a deep Hasidic insight every single week and explore how it can lead us to a more meaningful, vibrant, and spiritually uplifted life. in this week's episode, we'll be learning the Shalom Kipper. If you'd like to follow along inside, you can go to the show notes for a link to A PDF, but feel free to just sit back, listen, and enjoy the ride. This week's episode is sponsored by Ellie Waxman Li Eloy Nishma's Father Rafael Jaim, Ozer y of Blessed memory. He was a truly loving father, and bur Hashem has finally come to T Israel to his final resting place. May Aaliyah. Thank you so much to my dear Alud El for sponsoring this week's episode. Remember your sponsorships, our Make this podcast happen. If you would like to sponsor an episode of the podcast, please email rabbi chernoff@gmail.com or see the show notes for more details. Alright, with that, let's jump into the NVA Kipper. We are, we are of the additional volumes on Page, which is the name for the Esva in the first piece. Dear Hashem, to seek God out when he can be found. So quoting that same from mic, he starts off and says out when he's able to be found. Call to him when he's close. that this is talking about these days, the days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kipper, the chuva. Vi. Why is it specifically these 10 days, the 10 days of the Chuva? Why are these the days specifically where our Q can be found? Vin specifically when he's close, that specifically had said about these 10 days, Sikh got out when he can be found. It says, seek cut out when he can be found. I would've thought the passage would say, no. Always seek cut out, even when it's hard to find him. Even in difficult times, even in times of darkness, even in times of Hester, when's hiding his face. Why is the Sak framing it to specifically seek God out? When he can be found, it's easy for him to be found and when he is close it seems counterintuitive. DKA seek got out when he is far away, when he is hard to find. What's the AK trying to teach us by saying specifically to seek, got out when he's close and can, he can easily be found. We can understand this based on the behold, I am judging you on saying, I didn't sin, but says that he's gonna judge us on that. We say, I didn't. I the main judgment, it's not necessarily on the sin itself al, but rather after having done the sin, it's on us saying, I didn't sin. Hurray even worse than the sin and the damage that that person has done spiritually in and of itself. How much worse is it if the person doesn't feel how much damage they caused through their sin? And I feel like it's not such a big deal. I feel the same way as I sinned. If I didn't sin, I feel the same way. It doesn't matter. He says that's an even worse sin than this in itself. What he's saying here is it's a very, very deep thing. There are many times in life, all of us, when we sin, we make mistakes. Let's think about it in the realm of Vero, we have a close friend, a sibling, a parent, a spouse, and there are times in life when we make mistakes, when we sin. If you ever had the experience when somebody has hurt you and hurt you really, really deeply. They said something that just was like a gut punch that you never saw coming. You could never imagine they would say such a thing. They did something where you feel they stabbed you behind your back or maybe they slapped you across the face and it hurts so much. The only thing worse than seeing that person the next day is passing that person the next day seeing them and they're like, oh, hey, how you doing? As though nothing happened. You are like, are you kidding me? Really, you're gonna look at me and be like, Hey, how you doing? I, I don't understand. And, and that they look at you with this face of, what are you talking about? What's the problem? Like, what are you so bad outta shape about? That hurts even more. That hurts in such a deep place. You can. Okay. We were, yesterday. We were fighting, we were arguing. We got into a fight about something and I can't believe that he or she said what they said. I can't believe that they got so outta control that they actually let those words come out of their mouth. That they would take such a shot at me, that they would be so harsh that they would be so mean, that they could be so cruel and we're gonna have to figure it out. But that they would look at you in the face the next day and say, whatcha talking about? Nothing happened. I didn't say anything. What was such a big deal? It cuts so much deeper because it doesn't just mean that they hurt you. It means that they didn't just hurt you. In the heat of the moment, there's a feeling of, I don't care. I don't care about you. I don't care about our relationship. I don't care about your feelings. I don't care about the ramifications of my actions. I'm more interested in dealing with my cognitive dissonance and making myself feel good that I didn't do anything. That was such a big deal than to actually repair our relationship. Our relationship doesn't mean that much to me to have to deal with the consequences of my actions and actually try to repair what I, what I what I destroyed. That's what he's saying here. So often by a kish, bur we sinned by, we make mistakes. They're mistakes because we didn't know. We didn't play close enough attention in HAL or RA because our tva in the heat of the moment, our tva, overtook us, overcame us. It's been a whole year since La Kipper. It's been a whole year, and there are things that we said, all of these things, we said them and we met them. And hopefully I imagine anybody here in front of everybody who's here in the Zoom, everybody who's here listening on the podcast, I strongly suspect that in every single one of those, whether it was du, you in your mind, had an image of things that you've done in the previous year that you were genuinely committing to a Q Bur that you would never do again. And over the course of the year, we drift. We get farther away from Yom Kipper and we get farther away from the Nora Re and we get back into the regular drudgery of life and we go through Han and Kila and it's a long time til Hanukah and we slowly drift away kava when we're all the way back at EL of the next year. We're now an EL 57 85. We're much, much farther away we look back on those things that we committed to and we've slipped, we've sinned against the kbo in things that we genuinely wanted to keep. Because it's so far away and because all we wanna do is be good esen, we play tricks on ourselves. We play mind games with ourselves. Oh no, it wasn't such a big deal. Yeah. When I said I didn't mean in this situation. No. That was an acceptance of the rule. No, I'm sure you know, listen, we all know that everything has a Kula, so I'm sure that it was just like we give ourselves all of these explanations as to why when we go and we, we stray from the things that even we committed to do for a K per that a K per expects of us. Baseline. Hals baseline. Baseline. Elevated, elevated, elevated mitos, things that we're expected of ourselves and that expects of us. And we come up with all of these excuses, says the, based on this Isha, the worst thing. The worst thing we can do when we come to a K during the chuva, during Yom Kipper. And we're looking to do Chuva. Look at a Kash bur and say, I don't need to get so obsessed about that little thing. It's not a big deal. It wasn't really a sin. Yeah. Shall me, I have too. To rely on. I'm sure there's another opinion. Oh no. In, that's in that situation, a Kash Bur will understand, like, listen, whatever. And a Q burs like, well, you kidding me? Now it's the time to say you're sorry. Now is the time to dova and you're not even gonna bother. You're gonna say, you're gonna ignore that what you did. You're gonna ignore the ways that you hurt me just to make yourself feel better. You are gonna self-soothe by turning your back on me. Really? That's what he's saying. The biggest smack in the faces to say, I never sinned it all. And he goes on and he says. The reason for this is when it comes to the essence of the sin itself. Hamar, it says in one of the brahas that A, who put in beam's mouth. When Biam came to Curse Ka Israel, he turned the brahas into the, into brahas. And one of them says, doesn't see any, and he doesn't see any distortion in, in Israel is with him and the friendship of the kingdom with him and every all first have to deal with this. What does it mean that God doesn't see any sin? We all sin you Sins. What does it mean that God does? It's God's gonna lie. God's gonna show favoritism. God's gonna make us an exception. The Kamar says that, says that it's US Bar who lets us get a get outta jail free card. 'cause we're chosen people. No way. A Q Bur who is a show, it's a Dion ion that there's a day of judgment and there's a judge and he's going to judge us. You can't just say that he's gonna overlook it. So how can he say such a thing? How can the be such a that A doesn't Israel, he says. So explain it in an earlier piece in that par. Shamo. It's a beautiful, beautiful understanding of the pa. The way understands the PA is no, God doesn't see any sin in Israel and any distortion in Ami Israel when, when that person sins, but while they sin has, God is still with them. God is still inside of them. That even when the person is sinning, hooray, God is still with them. That even if the person in that moment, in the heat of the moment they eats a hurricane and attack them and was pulling them to do some Avera, to violate an issue in Ros or in Na or in Fila in Barcos or whatever it is, that's whatever the TVO was, and, and, and by HR overcame me. I lost. I fought, but I lost Libo when I did that sin. When I committed that of ERA mashed, my heart torn into pieces because I know I went against the Kash Bohu. Did IS sin a hundred percent. I sinned. But even while I was sinning, my heart was breaking because I knew I was going against the k the penal year. The little Jew inside of me was crying. Crying inside of me as I did the Avera, and again, I, I'm, I'm sure that everyone here who's listening has been in that situation. I hope not, but I'm sure that they have been. We're lo al, we committed Avera. And while we're doing the Avera, deep down, you know what's wrong. And the part of you that's real, that's tic, that's committed to a Kasper, knows that it just lost the battle and just feels destroyed. While your body may be celebrating, your heart is broken and crying. The pintle eat inside of you is crying. Because it's clinging to a K and it, it already feels bad even in the moment. On a situation like this where even when the person's doing the sin is with them, that's what the is talking about. Lo beat the gome that doesn't see and he sitting in, it's not that it's saying that aakash bur who is overlooking the sin. It's that a q bur who is looking deeper than the skin. Deeper than skin deep. And he's seeing the Jew inside that's crying. He's seeing the you inside that's broken. He's seeing the you inside. That regrets it. Even in the moment he's relating to that part of you. That's the es. It's not lying. It's not overlooking. Ku choose to see the emes of who you are. And thees of you are is a person who didn't want to fail, who only wants to be close to him, and yes didn't succeed. And yes, they are over keying them and yes, made a mistake, but that part of you, that's who he chooses to see and therefore. And therefore if it hurts you when they're doing this sin and, and, and they're in such pain when they're committing the. Or maybe there are certain times in life when the Yates is so strong that it even clouds my mind. I couldn't even see that it was wrong in the moment because I was so taken, I was so corrupted by the Y Zahara that I wasn't able to see the destructiveness of my action in the moment. But at the very least, a few hours later, the next day when I wake up, I look back and I'm like, oh my God, what did I do? How did I give into that peer pressure? How did I give into that Yates, sir? How did I give into that Tiva? And just you look back and like, how could this be? How could I have done such a thing on a certain level? Not every level, but on a certain level. Listen, you, you forced you to do it. You twisted your arm, mi overcame you. Then a person doesn't commit NRA unless. A spirit of stupidity comes into them. It's temporary insanity to do Avera. It has to be what? It may not be a valid, uh, excuse in court when we come to a Kaddish Bku, but it's temporary insanity and it has to be. If you know, if you are in your right mind, you know that a KD Bku said, this is us, sir, the king of all kings, the master of the universe, the creator of everything, the creator of you gives you your very life and your very breath. if you were processing in that moment that a said, don't do this. Don't do this or get up and go to shul, get up and put on Fillin. Get up and dovan chakras. When you have the fear of losing, I mean, whatever it is now, like the insane amount is now, whether it's like a thousand or $2,000 on a ticket to trail, right? If you're in there. So why do you have a ticket to clip stars? There's no excuse for that, but you're in at Coach Flowers. Have a ticket to RT stroke. And you are, and your flights at like six or 7:00 AM and your alarm clock goes off at two or three in the morning. You have a fear of losing money. You'd be crazy to hit this news button. You're not gonna oversleep. You get up and you run because we have a fear of the tangible loss of money, call the home air, the loss of the loss of the endless spiritual riches and, and, and beauty and glory of being close forever and ever. If we saw what we were giving up deeper than that, if we saw who we were going against, if we saw who we were hurting, could we ever sin, could we ever sin? It would be impossible. It wouldn't be possible. The only way to do a sin is you have to be under temporary insanity. And what creates that situation of temporary insanity? Maza convinces me that it's a good idea. Ah, it's not a big deal. Oh no, it'll be fine. Oh no, there's a cool, oh no, don't worry. Oh no, you're doing fine. Like, no, you weren't up this anyway in your spiritual journey. Oh no. You can say all the reasons. 8 million reasons. Deep down inside that pin is crying. Or afterwards you look back and you're like, I can't believe it. I can't believe it. I can't believe it. I dunno how it's possible. Temporary insanity overtook me. Again, it's not a valid excuse in court, not in, not in the corporate for Q, but to understand the only way we can sin is if we were crazy, we're crazy in that moment and so afterwards. Then, because the point in emphasizing that is not that, again, not that it's an excuse. The point in emphasizing that is to say, wow, I was in a moment of temporary insanity. My, my y Sahara made me crazy. But now that the Eat Sahara has passed and I'm sane again, I did something wrong and I need to do Truva. If I'm back in my right mind, I don't validate the insanity. I apologize to that person for having acted in such a crazy way. Again, back to the human realm, if I get upset with my friend, I get upset at a parent Ka Shalom. I get upset with my spouse, KA Shalom, and I say something and I, and we're fighting and everybody's getting heated, and I say something awful. You don't go back and say temporary insanity. I was, I, you know, don't, don't take it. So personally, it was in the heat of the moment you ever had somebody give you that excuse. It was in the heat of the moment. You're like, I don't care. That hurt. What you said was awful. I don't c. So then be a better person, be a bigger person. But if the person says, I'm sorry, we got crazy heated. It was the heat of the moment and I said something awful that I never should have said. I never should have allowed myself, it was in the heat of the moment, but I never should have allowed myself. I can't believe it. And I'm so sorry. Then we can start the conversation, then we can start the healing. You can dignify that something went very, very wrong in the conversation. That you would never do that under normal circumstances. But not to validate it, but to say this was not normal circumstances. It never should have happened, and even though it was because it was not normal circumstances, I'm still sorry and I never wanna let it happen again. Now I know I need to work myself that in those situations I can't open my mouth like that to you again. I can't believe I hurt you like that. I can't believe I said that. It gives it context. It allows me to then explain in retroactively what went wrong and why I wanna do better and who I wanna become. But all does it give context. And to say, now that I'm in my right mind, I would never wanna do that to you and I never wanna do that again. And the worst thing in the world then is continues on and says, or round six, seven lines from the bottom of the page. But if we turn to a, we say, I never sinned. If after Thera already goes away, the is already gone, the already leaves, it's gone. We still no longer feel bad and I still, don't, I have no, I have no repentance for what I did. I'm willing to forgive a lot of things. I'm willing to forgive you. It a heart attacking you. I'm willing to forgive you sitting. I'm willing to forgive you getting lost in the moment. But you turn around after all of that and you say, ah, what's the big deal? You spit in my face when you're back in your right mind, then we've got nothing to talk about because you don't care about me because you don't care about our relationship because you are more important to you than I am. You validating and you excusing, and you tending to your fragile ego. You're tending to your sense of self and you're dealing with your cognitive dissonance is so much more important to you than me, than we have a serious problem. So he goes on and he says, for this, and we've already given a bunch of als, but here's another one A to a person who sins against the king, and he goes against his cup of the cup of the king Il that aside from dis, from hurting the cover of the king and going against the honor of the king. So much worse than this. The worst thing in the world is that person comes before the king and then pretends like nothing happened, like we talked about before. That's a slap in the face. It's the worst thing you could do. Even worse than we did originally Again. Things happen. Sometimes people make mistakes, but if you care so little about me that you wanna validate it more than you wanna fix it, that's unforgivable at this. Okay. When the person actually went and did damage the cover of the king and went against the king, there could be all kinds of reasons to explain what happened in that moment, what was going wrong? The, the stress, the pressure, the mistake, the misunderstanding, whatever. It's. But to not care afterward. But what answer could there possibly be for him being totally calm and fine and not caring after the sin? How could that be? And even worse, let's say the king says, I can't believe what this guy did to me. I said, he's, he's a good friend. He's a trusted advisor. He lives, he's in my court all the time, and he calls him to the throne room. And can you imagine the guy just like walks into the throne, says, yeah, hey, what's up? he goes, he walks outta the throne and finds him in the hallways. He wants to go talk to him, and even then he won't ask him for forgiveness. He doesn't even have any sense that he sinned against him. That's the worst that he could ever do to the king, and that's what we're talking about. So says that next paragraph. That's the essence, that's the nature of this very, very special and unique time that we're in, in the Chuva. He says this is the time of seek out God when he can be found. Call to him when he's close. BA these 10 days. That aren't, they aren't really between Rosh Hashan. Kipper. They include Rhan. Kipper, meaning it starts with the first day of ary, the first day of Rosh Hashanah. That's the beginning of the s Chuva, and they conclude on Yom Kipper. That's the 10th day of the Chuva. Just to be aware, like we're already in it. We're already in it. It's not that there's 10 days in Rhan Kippur. We we're, we're already three days in. If you're listening to this, when this goes out on Song Galia, we're already on day three of 10. Like, this is time, it's time to get moving, but this is the time of year, these 10 days. What does it mean? This isn't to say only seek God out now during the chuva, to the exception and to the exclusion of times of he of God, his face and, and darkness and distance from. Sha these days, Rosh Hashanah these days, where is here, he's so much more present. He's come to us, he's right in front of us, the car, and he's so close to call Israel even more so now is the time to seek him out. We don't need to go and find him. God said, I'm here. I wanna work it out with you. I wanna talk it out with you, to feel in my heart the depth of my sin, and to try to appease the king yo even more than any other time, because now he's close. Because even during the days when he can be found and he's close, and we don't try to appease the king, that's the sin of. That's end up saying not only did I sin all year, but now that ABO who comes and finds me, wants to work it out with me, wants to resolve with me that which I did to insult him, that which I did to, to be dismissive of him, to go against him, to sin against him. And I look at him and I say, I dunno what you're talking about. That's the biggest sin there is. To squander the tremendous opportunity of this unique time of the year. That's the biggest al, that's what he's saying. That's what the says. Another of he says of this time. I think I understand the story. I think he's saying that even if you were to pass by, uh, like a purse full of money on the ground, he wouldn't even notice it because his whole mind is just, he's bitter and he's trying to think, and he's just focused on trying to get close to qba and fixing the, I think that's what the story means, means, but that's the zone that we're supposed to be in in these days. That's the space that we're supposed to be in in these days. It's an incredible gift that a is not human. Again. When I go against and I say something bad or I hurt in any way a loved one, I hurt a parent, I hurt a sibling, I hurt a friend, I hurt a spouse. Human beings were fragile beings. When somebody does something to hurt me deeply, I'm so hurt. I don't, I don't know how everybody reacts differently to being hurt by other people. Me especially, like that introvert part of me just totally takes over and I just avoid, I don't want anything to do with them. I turn away, I, I write them off. I'm done. I don't want anything to do with you anymore. That's my gut reaction. Everybody has their own gut reactions. I don't think any are better than the other. They're all bad. Everybody has their own way. We know, and we get deeply, deeply hurt. Whether it's to lash out, whether it's send angry text messages, whether it's to yell and scream, or whether it's to walk away or to shut down or to get distant. We're fragile. If somebody I care about hurts me, the whole, the whole reason it hurts me is because we're close. If I pass by a stranger on the street and they go, oh, you're such an idiot. I'd be like, wow, that person's crazy. I don't even know who they are. Why are they, why are they making nasty comments to me? I don't like reevaluate my whole life. If some crazy person on the street tells me that I'm an idiot, I just keep going along with my life and okay, The person's a crazy person, somebody I love, somebody I care about, somebody who I've let into my inner world and let me into theirs because of the bond and the uniqueness and the depth that exists between us. When a person betrays that and maybe even uses the information that they have and the closeness that they have in order to hurt me, I'm broken. I'm just, I'm so broken and I walk away. if you're gonna abuse our relationship, our friendship, our closeness. I almost let nobody in. I, I don't want, I don't want anything to do with you. We're fallible. We're human. Is not human all year long says, I love you. I care about you. You mean so much to me. We're so intimately loving and connected to each other. I created you. I know your inner thoughts. When you cry, you cry to me. When you beg, you beg to me. In your darkest moments, you turn to me in your happiest moments. You share with me. I know everything about you. and I've told you everything about me. You may not have learned it. I gave you my Torah, I gave you a shout on Ms. Josh and Soad. I gave you all of these ways to even get to know my own inner world as best as you can. We're so close and day after day after day for an entire year, every day, lo every day. Sometimes they're small and it's the accumulation of small infractions and the pain that we give to a Tish bark over time. Sometimes it's the big ones. We make big mistakes. K. Who could yell? We die. He could scream, we die. He could walk away from us. We die inside. Or he'd cut us off from the source of life, which he is. We die. We moish couldn't live without him. And not only does he sustain us and keep us going because he loves us and he believes in us, and he believes that we can turn it around and he wants to give us another chance, and all he does is want us to do chuva. All he does is want us to succeed. That's all he wants. Not only all of that. On top of that at Yin in the time that he sets aside for him to judge us. And he's told us when that time is. He runs to us and he says, you hurt me. You went against me. You were po on the cup of the, you went against the glory of the king. You're high of me stuff for what you did. You are deserving of death. But I'm coming to you and all I'm, I'm asking you, I'm begging you look me in the face. Answer one question. Do you feel bad? Do you wanna be better? Can you tell me that you're gonna try to be better? That's all I need from you. I need you to be real and honest. Honest with yourself that you did something wrong, honest to me, and admit that you did, that you did something wrong, and commit to me that you wanna be better and I'll give you all the chances in the world. 'cause all I wanna do is see you succeed. Even though I'm hurt, says kajo, so to speak. I love you and I care about you and you mean so much to me. I'm finding you. I'm coming to you. You hurt me, but I'm coming to you. I'm the judge, but I'm coming to you. All I need you to do is turn to me and say, Kajo. I'm so sorry. You're right. I sinned. I did wrong. I was overcome by the ihara. I made so many mistakes. I drifted. I made excuses. Please forgive me and help me do better. All I wanna do is do right in the coming year because I love and I care about you, like you love and care about me. That's it. It's the whole thing. And what's crazy is to a certain level, to a certain extent, it's as simple as that. We have a tremendous, tremendous, incredible gift in the Chuva. Who right now is he's Ro. He's able to be found. He's close, and he's come all the way here just to ask us to admit to him that we sinned and to grant us forgiveness if we apologize to him these days. Right now, it's a time to dig deep, to look back at the last 365 days because Las ki forgive us for all of our Simpson this year. Don't, don't start going back one year, two years, five years, 10 years. Don't start digging into the past. That's not healthy. To go back one year and to really examine our actions between now and Yom Kipper to open up the s part ing, to look at Asnu and look at what it means and learn the definition. And in my consider to write a couple of things that, what does asnu mean to me? What does banu mean to me? What does zanu mean to me? What does it mean to me? In what way do I feel I failed you Atco, to be honest, to be real. How did I personally violate these things? Where do I know that I failed to go through all of them and not to get down on myself, but to be real with myself so I can look to a kahu and say at each one of those things, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna make excuses. I'm not gonna say ate. I did them. Please, please, please, I don't deserve it. Please forgive me 'cause I love you and I never want it to hurt you and I never wanted to go against you. And all I wanna do is be close to you. Please, please, please forgive me and s waiting, waiting with KIPP waiting to dip us in the MVA to dip us in the mva. To have us come out pure cleansed and able to succeed. But the entrance fee, the entrance fee to that mikvah, the entrance fee to that day is just, I'm ready to be honest with all of my mistakes. I'm ready to ask for forgiveness, and I'm ready to commit myself to being good, to being close to you, to doing right by you. Now in the coming year should be to be able to have that level of honesty with ourselves. To know that ak, who knows, he knows us. Don't worry. He's been through a lot of generations of humanity. He knows we're just human. He knows that we're physical. He knows we make mistakes. And if he knows that, we can know that too. To admit to ourselves where we've gone astray and where we've gone wrong, to admit that to ourselves first and to have them the courage. To admit that we do make mistakes and to admit that, to Aku through that, to talk to him, to admit it to him on Yom Kippur, to cry for forgiveness on Yom Kippur, and through that, to repair that relationship to such an extent that through the glory of God, he comes down and he purifies us, that we have a clean slate. To be able with that clarity, with that purity, with that newness to be able to clinging to him. in truth, in consistency, in faithfulness for the entirety of the new year by all of us, everybody. Thank you so much for tuning into this week's episode. If you enjoyed the episode, please rate the podcast and hit the follow button and join us every week for a new episode. Once again, thank you so much to this week's sponsor and a reminder that you too can sponsor an episode of the podcast. Email Rabbi turnoff@gmail.com For more info or to share any thoughts, comments, or feedback on this week's episode? See you in the next one.