Jewish Inspiration Podcast · Rabbi Aryeh Wolbe

Welcome back everybody. It is awesome to share the next way of the 48 ways to wisdom to a magnificent maximized life So we started off the first we discussed was with study to learn learn learn Every day of life should be filled with learning number two was with listening Using our ears. We have two ears to listen Double what we speak, which is the next one already hots for time Everything you hear Verbalize it so that you can make it your own and then number four
We discussed was the Vinata live putting it into action Understanding of the heart many times. We know things in our mind, but we don't put them into action We know there's a speed limit, but we don't obey it when we put things into our heart we Put it into action and then we discussed way number five, which is with all live every day With awe be inspired Look at the world that God gave us. Look at the majesty. Look at the brilliance. It is incredible
I will tell you personally my wife as many of you know is pregnant and we went for our regular checkup and we had a the ultrasound and as you know, I'm an EMT and I learned I spent a lot of time learning about the heart and when you see I Started crying when you see the heart with the ultrasound Exactly how the right? Atrium the right ventricle the left atrium the left ventricle and all of the different it is unreal. It is
breathtaking we can live every day in awe and That's what the mission is telling us. You want to maximize life? Get some on your life That makes your life awesome and now we have number six number six is with fear now all is not to be Conflated with fear. So what does fear mean to each and every one of us? Everyone has a different idea of what fear and there's a mitzvah in the Torah to fear God. What does it mean to fear God?
Why do the sages include this tool in? maximization of life So we have to understand that fear puts things into perspective the word for fear means year Ah, your eyes the same as year a which means to see When you see something it puts it into perspective when we understand the relationship we have with God when we understand the responsibility we have to the Almighty it puts a perspective that's hopefully Sobering a sobering perspective on life fear of heaven all our deeds are written in the book
We call something we say you're at sham. I'm is fear of heaven someone who's a God fearing Jew a God fearing person Is someone who understands that I have accountability I have responsibility That does not mean fear does not mean that we hide under the table shivering and terrified biting our nails That's not what fear means fear means putting things into the proper perspective so we take Responsibility and accountability for every action for every moment, you know the yarmulke that we wear on our head
Comes from the word yareh malchah fear of God fear of the king That's why we have the yarmulke it the idea is supposed to put it in us into a sense of of awe of The Almighty's greatness, but also give us accountability We say in tehillim in Psalms We say she VT. Hashem linagdi tamid. We should put God before us at all times many times in synagogues They'll have a big banner with those letters Saying reminding us that every time we're praying we're not just praying
We are talking to the Almighty Creator of heaven and earth who's listening to our every word He loves our words and when we have that proper perspective it puts us in the right frame of mind What do we live for fear gets in touch with our? Mortality and death is the most potent fear either Mishnah tells us that it's better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of
Celebration like a wedding, you know wedding people can be frivolous people can be a little bit over excited Sometimes people drink a little bit too much at weddings what happens at our house of mourning you realize that one day we'll all be gone and It puts a sense of seriousness Into our day-to-day life that there's accountability and the clock is ticking every single day You know I always I said this as a not as a joke
But it's an idea that but it's a little bit a little bit too morbid But if you were to give a gift to a child when they're born, which has a countdown clock from 120 years 11 months 23 hours 59 minutes you start it at the moment They're born and you give to them as a gift and then suddenly they realize when they're 10 years old I only have 110 years to live at best
And when they're 20 years old, they only have a hundred years to live and when they're 30 years old They only have 90 years to live and it's suddenly that clock will help hopefully for every individual Realize that we don't have forever We don't have forever. I've spoken to over the years They asked me what do I do? I have a sibling. I haven't spoken to in many years I have a child God forbid someone has a child that they don't talk to
I've had people talk to me about these issues or a sister-in-law or brother-in-law that they've Excommunicated because they didn't invite them to their wedding They didn't give them a right gift or they didn't name their child the way they went whatever it is People get carried away and guess what? What a devastating thing it would be if a person leaves this world and never made peace If a person they'll just put it into perspective fear is important to remove senseless worries, you know the story they say about
A child was complaining every day. Oh, my tooth is hurting. My tooth is hurting. So the father finally takes him to the dentist and The child in the waiting room asks his father. What's that noise? I hear This like he says, oh, that's the drill when you have a cavity. That's the reason. Ah, it doesn't hurt me anymore It doesn't hurt me anymore. I sometimes when you have a bigger fear, right all the little fears fall away
You know one of the things we say every single day in the I don't alarm in the morning in the introductory prayers The morning we say Hashem Lilo era when Hashem is with me I have nothing to fear I have nothing to worry. I have nothing to worry other than the fear of Hashem. I have nothing else to fear. Why? because There's a a big perspective the little things. Yeah, so this didn't work out that didn't work
I don't have to worry about it as long as my big the big picture is on course when God forbid One has a harsh diagnosis the minute worries of money competition car insurance They fall to the wayside why because it's something which is far greater that suddenly comes up it puts things into perspective the little things that we have and we're dealing with a generation by the way, that is heavily heavily medicated for stress and anxiety and and and all of these different
Symptoms that are coming because we're not ready to have that big fear that will really knock away many of those little fears The psalmist King David had a brilliant son King Solomon King Solomon wrote Proverbs one of the things he writes in Proverbs is a stray a dumb if a head tamid Praise is the man who is always has this perspective who always is in fear of Losing opportunities think of the idea if you had the opportunity to invest in Microsoft on day one and
You didn't invest in Microsoft. You could have put $1,000 that thousand dollars could be today. Who knows how much? Imagine what an opportunity and now what happens you missed that opportunity. So there's only one benefit We mentioned this in the previous podcast Regret has only one purpose one good purpose and that is not to lose future opportunities To just sit there and sulk and be upset and sad and all I can't believe it and live a whole life with regret that
That's not healthy. But if you take it as a springboard that for new opportunities, you're not gonna miss out So an example for that is if God forbid we left this world and we realized uh-oh. I Didn't properly focus my life Instead of focusing my life on things that were important. I Invested my life in things that were unimportant or less important That should put a fear in each and every one us if you don't know what you're ready to die for
You haven't begun living. I've said this hundreds of times. This is a quote from Rabbeinuach Weinberg of blessed memory He says if you don't know what you're ready to die for you haven't begun living. I'll give you an example Oh, are you ready to die for our career? Most people not are we ready to die for our hobbies for skydiving or what? What are we ready to die for we're to die for our children. We're ready to die for our family, right?
We're ready to die for the Almighty. So why don't we live for that? if you know what you're ready to die for know what you're ready to live for and If I'm ready to die for my family, then I should live for my family. I should never miss a birthday I should never miss a graduation I should never miss a a softball game or a little league game Because I'm living for my family if I'm ready to die for them
I should definitely be willing to live for them and think of what are those values that we're ready to die for and let's live For them when a baby is born it cries It doesn't want to be here in this physical world. You see the baby is born after being in a Gestation and hopefully for nine full months the sages tell us the midrash tells us That the baby in the womb and the mother's womb is studying the entire Torah with the angels
It's living in a completely spiritual world. It says that the baby can see from one side of the world to the other What does that mean? That means that there's no interruption. There's no distraction. There's no physical limitations It's living in a spiritual existence Wow, that's a great place to be suddenly comes into this world trapped by physical limitations and Can't succeed the way it wants to so our sages tell us the baby cries Because it really doesn't want to be here What do we do?
we try to pacify it with a balloon and with a doll and with a With with a toy with whatever it is to try to do. It's okay. It's okay. It's okay But we're really we're not here to be here. We're here to accomplish. We're here to get things done And that's the fear that if God forbid life passed us by and we didn't attain those Achievements that were expected of us. There's a story. I'll end with this
There's a story that's told about a great sage who wrote a book and it was it's a masterpiece anybody who knows this book It's a masterpiece on Talmud study. It's like it's brilliant and when the rabbi Concluded the book and it was published. He made a very big party He said I want to tell you why I made this party when I was a child The teacher that the parents hired said I can't teach this kid. This kid is so a DHT. This kid is so
Restless so he overheard the conversation the parents were having that evening He heard here as the parents said, you know, let's just take him to the shoemaker and he'll teach him how to make shoes He'll be a good shoemaker He heard that and he had a shudder he says They're giving up on me. I have to show that I'm not I'm not gonna give up he says this book came from that night's dream where he had a dream and
He died in the dream and he comes up to heaven and in heaven. They say oh Where's your book that you wrote on the Talmud? It's me book I'm I'm a shoe. I'm a I fix shoes I'm a I'm a I'm a shoe repairman. I'm not I don't I'm not a an author. I'm not a scholar Like no, no, no, we sent you down to this world to write that book. Where is that book and
The rabbi picks up this book. He says this is the book. They showed me in that dream This is what I came into this world for I was brought here and many times we choose the easier route But it's not always the better route just one more thing when we talk about your ah, which is perspective You know the word for Shabbat. It says the karate Le Shabbat on egg. You should call Shabbat on egg a delight a
Delicacy that's what it's it's a pleasure Shabbat. You see there are some times that people would say now Shabbat is You know, it's difficult Shabbat. I can't drive Shabbat. I can't do this. I can't do that I can't so our sages tell us that it all depends on your perspective you can read the word on egg as a pleasure or if you Re-adjust the letters the iron if you take the eye in the eye and you put it to the end instead of putting it at the beginning
It becomes from an on egg from a pleasure. It becomes a nega a plague it all depends on how you look at it and Everything in life we can look at it in a perspective that is uplifting we can look at it in a perspective that is elevating motivating Exciting or we can look at it as like oh and you can see the same by the way anybody who has children knows that when you try to Take your children on a trip
So you'll have some children who are gonna be very excited and you have some children who don't want to go to that They don't want to go, all right, I'll give you an example an amusement park. I don't like amusement parks I don't like roller coasters terrified of heights and and and things that go too fast And some of my children like me my wife on the other hand She can't find enough thrill from those roller coasters and bungee jumping and all those crazy things
So some of my children love going to Six Flags and some of us have no business being there We don't we don't find it amusing. You don't find it entertaining, but that's all in the perspective It's all in the perspective. And if we change our perspective on anything in life, we can gain an appreciation and we can learn to Maximize every single day of our lives So that concludes way number six