Metamorphasis

If you have ever contemplated the first of the plagues, Blood,  you probably imagined water turning from a clear liquid into a red liquid.  Each of the plagues is a way for every individual to become that much closer to freedom.  Freedom from the bounds and limitations that 2000 years of Egypatian exilic thinking has placed on us.  I say 2000 years of Egyptian exile because it is known that all of the trials of exile were included in the Egyptian Exile.  The opening words of Sefer Shemos  include the phrase  הבאים .The word  הבאים  stands for בבל אדום יון מדי.  All Galus is included in Mitzrayim.  Each plague is an avenue for contemplation as to how to return to a healthy spiritual, emotional and physical existence.  A person can easily tell if he or she is locked into the toxicity of Mitzrayim.  Paroah's initial decree which embodied all subsequent decrees was enacted because of a fear that Am Yisrael might multiply and become an internal enemy.  Paroah says פן ירבה, a language of MAYBE, PERHAPS, UNSURE, DOUBT.  This is the root of Galus, individually and nationally.  When a person's entire existence is trapped in doubt.  Maybe God exists, Maybe he doesn't.  Maybe I'll be a success, Maybe I won't.  This thinking saps a persons vitality.

The response to Paroah's decree of a life of uncertainty was כן ירבה וכן יפרוץ ,  meaning Absolutely, certainly.  Geulah means living life just knowing, perhaps without being able to prove or explain, that god is real.  R' Yitzchak Vorka זי"ע, teaches that this is the meaning of פן ירבה.  When a person is in spiritual galus, he is in a period of פן ירבה , the פן(uncertainty and doubt, Safek) is overtaking his life.  Our response needs to be כן ירבה , to leave our minds at the wayside and proceed with the certainty that our hearts are filled with. 

So this is what's happening in the transformation from water to blood.  Not just color.  Water has the elemental structure H20, and is inorganic.  Although water is essential for survival, it is Inorganic, and does not contain the building block of physical life, Carbon.  Blood is organic.  The Plague of blood is an energy of transformation from an inorganic life to an Organic one.  As the Maharal explains in Netzach Yisrael, the state of the Jewish people in Galus, under the constant influence of Doubt and Uncertainty, is Inorganic.  Real life can't be developed from doubt.  May we all be granted access to the flow of unending certainty, simple faith, and redemption.

Happy Anniversary

 

Tonight marks the one year anniversary of my only experience as a male model.

It took place at a KFC extravaganza with some very special people at the Malcha Mall in Jerusalem.

The chicken was fried in the Deepest way possible, and so were we.

Mazal Tov to all of the special people who took part in this important night.

BRIDGING THE GAP

Rav Nachman said, " The world is a Narrow Bridge, and the most important thing is not to make oneself afraid."

There is so much that we know about this world.  Technological advancements have made endless amounts of information readily available at our fingertips.  The generation of the Midbar is supposed to return in the generation preceding Moshiach's arrival.  They were called the דור דעה, the Generation of knowledge.
This is our Generation.   We know so much about other people, about the world, about everything in the universe.  But we don't know anything real.  What's real is being set free from everything that keeps you from the hidden relationship you have with Hashem.  The more external facts I have about someones life, I feel like I know them and then I'm not alone.  

In order to serve God, we need to speak in whispers and do things that no-one else understands but that we know is right.  We have to be willing to be alone.

This is Rebbe Nachman's deepest teaching.  A Narrow bridge conjures an image of a walking bridge of wooden planks held together by think rope, suspended over a canyon full of fire, with the princess waiting to be rescued on the other side.

These type of bridges only have room for one person at a time.  This is the true state of the world.  We are all walking on a Narrow Bridge.  Even if we are surrounded by hundreds of "Friends" "Buddies" "Contacts" in order to really get somewhere, there will come a time when we need to muster up the courage and walk across the bridge.  ALONE.  Rebbe Nachman teaches, " והעקר לא להתפחד."  Don't be afraid to walk alone.

Only you can free the princess.

Brokedown Palaces

This Past Week, Yosef and Binyamin were strewn over one another, crying over the future destruction that would occur in their respective נחלאות (land inheritances).

The Lubavitcher Rebbe (R' M.M. Schneerson)* points out a puzzling thing.
Yosef and Binyamin each were to suffer future destruction.
Binyamin would endure the Destruction of the 1st and 2nd Beis Hamikdash in his נחלה, and Yosef was to endure the destruction of Mishkan Shilo.
We would think that Yosef and Binyamin would cry together, each lamenting HIS OWN future destruction. But that's not what happened. They cried for the others' future suffering

Why?

The Rebbe Explains (Likutei sichos 10 page 149). When someone bears witness to his own destruction, he cannot just sit and lament his sorrow and misfortune, he needs to do something to fix it. In one's spiritual existence, we cannot get sucked into saddness when we fall. The best response is to get up and move forward. This is the message of the Baal Shem Tov 's teaching on the passuk , סור מרע ועשה טוב. When a person is in a place of darkness, the easiest way out is by עשה טוב. This is echoed by Rav Nachman's teaching of אם אתה מאמין שיכולים לקלקל תאמין שיכולים לתקן. As easy as you broke it, you can fix it. Yaacov Avinu (obviously a talmid of the BESHT) follows this teaching after leaving שכם (not Nablus). He basically tells his family, " Okay let's take all of the idol worship and impurity that we have on us, throw it out, go to the mikvah, and move forward in life." But this is when we have destruction in our own camp. We can and we must fix it and move forward.

When you see that someone else is broken, the highest and deepest fixing for that person, is having someone to cry with them. This is related to the secret of Adam eating from the Tree of Knowledge after Chava, lest she be left to cry alone over her mistake. When you try to always be a fixer, even if you are successful, it could very easily become about "YOU". This is the amazing thing about real Tzaddikim. They fix the world, and every soul that needs help, but it's never about them.

The Klauzeberger Rebbe (Shefa Chaim, Y.Y. Halberstan), lost 10 children and his wife during the war. In response to his on brokenness, the Rebbe built Yehivot in the DP camps, and started Mif'al Hashas out of the ashes of the destruction that surrounded him. While immidiately getting to fixing the brokenness, the Rebbe became father, rebbe and therapist to countless boys and girls. Yet his approach was not one of a "Fixer." A boy who had been a top talmid before the war, came out totally broken, and disinterested in yiddishkeit and Hashem (which is understandable). The Rebbe did not like to see such a precious gem fall to the wayside, and tried speaking to this boy. The Rebbe didn't try to fix him, he didn't give him a "discovery" seminar and prove that Hashem really exist and therefore this was part of the plan. The Rebbe cried with him. The Boy cried with the Rebbe. They cried with eachother.

R' Shmuel Brazil explained in Parshas Nitzavim that there are two types of personalities.
חוטב עציך and שואב ממיך. There is one type of person, teacher, parent that will respond to your difficulties by giving you עצות a to how to fix your life.

Then, there is a second type of guidance, which is a שואב מים. He cries for you.

This month of Teves is a month of broken walls, and broken dreams. Instead of trying to fix on another, let's cry together.

*thank you RJM

Sufganiyot and Spies

Chanukah candles are lit until the time of "תכלה רגל מן השוק." Until all of the legs have left the marketplace.
I heard from R' Daniel Cohen (Rav of Yishuv Bat Ayin) that this is a guiding message for how to bring the light of Chanukah into or lives.

The lights of Chanukah are a protective spiritual layer that surround our inner purity. נר איש וביתו means each man and his own inner place.

רגל is the root of the word , מרגל or spy. A spy is someone whose whole job is to seek out the frailties, weakness, flaws and vulnerability in another person.

The lights of Chanukah, of seeing that there is something beyond nature, beyond beauty, beyond reason, can only warm our homes, our souls, when we stop seeking out the flaws and weaknesses in another person. לראותם בלבד. If we were stranded on an Island with one other person, we would look for all the good things in that person, no matter what the scenario, because without them, we can't survive. לראותם בלבד means to look at everyone as if it was only you and him in the world, alone.

ואין לנו רשות להשתמש בהם . When someone talks, are we just waiting for them to finish so we can speak? Are we already formulating a response while they are mid-sentence?
Seek out the welfare of others, and avoid the poisonous habit that we have seen in many of using people.

Everyone has dreams and hopes. לראותם בלבד. When we look at other people, try to see their נקודה of בלבד. That aspect of them that makes them unique.

May this be a Teves of Seeking to further the dreams of others and through that may we all merit to have our Collective dream realized.
את שיבת ציון היינו כחולמים

םכמה בגויים תאמין

We have found ourselves rich in goods, but ragged in spirit; reaching with magnificent precision for the moon, but falling into raucous discord on earth.

We are caught in war, wanting peace. We are torn by division, wanting unity. We see around us empty lives, wanting fulfillment. We see tasks that need doing, waiting for hands to do them.
To a crisis of the spirit, we need an answer of the spirit

Source

Gridiron Gevurah

Sometimes, the light really does come from the strangest of places!
The Sefas Emes teaches that one of the ideas of Chanukah is that we are learning how to raise up the holy spark that the Greeks had, and then lost. The NFL's shoresh neshama is the Coliseum, but there are certain moments of illumination that radiate from a place like that.

NEW YORK -- Keith Fitzhugh chose operating trains over a shot at a Super Bowl.

Some might wonder why Keith Fitzhugh turned down the Jets -- and a chance to maybe play in a Super Bowl. But ESPN.com's Tim Graham says Fitzhugh's decision shows why he's an ideal teammate. Blog

The free-agent safety turned down an offer to join the New York Jets to remain a conductor with Norfolk Southern Railroad and stay on track financially while helping support his parents in Atlanta.

"I've got something now where I know every two weeks I'm getting a paycheck," Fitzhugh told The Associated Press in a telephone interview Tuesday night. "That's what helps out the most right now. I don't knock the Jets at all. I highly appreciate them."

Jets coach Rex Ryan said the team was looking to sign a safety after Jim Leonhard was lost for the season last week with a broken shin and James Ihedigbo suffered a leg injury in New York's 45-3 loss to New England on Monday night. New York has only two safeties -- Eric Smith and Brodney Pool -- listed on its roster.

The 24-year-old Fitzhugh, who had stints in camp with the Jets the past two years, was contacted by the team but declined New York's offer to return.

"You don't hear this too often and some people might think it's not a good idea," Fitzhugh said. "Some people might think it is. I don't know. I just have to look out for what's best for me and my family."

Fitzhugh's decision was first reported by The Star-Ledger of Newark.

“

I know the Jets have a great opportunity of making the Super Bowl, and that's one dream that every child has ... But, there's a time when you have to think, 'Hey, you've only got one Mom and Dad.'

” -- Keith Fitzhugh

"To sacrifice what he did for his family is the most unselfish thing I've heard by a player in sports," said Daniel Rose, Fitzhugh's agent. "It's really impressive."

Fitzhugh's father, Keith Sr., is disabled and unable to work, while his mother, Meltonia, has been struggling to make ends meet.

"I know the Jets have a great opportunity of making the Super Bowl, and that's one dream that every child has is to play sports and make it to the Super Bowl or get to the World Series," Fitzhugh said. "But, there's a time when you have to think, 'Hey, you've only got one Mom and Dad.' They won't be here forever, and while they're here, you've got to cherish that time."

Fitzhugh went undrafted after an outstanding career at Mississippi State and signed last year with the Jets as a free agent. He was later cut and signed to the practice squad before Baltimore signed him last December. He re-signed with the Jets in the offseason.

"I was released three times. That's a lot," he said. "I just don't want to give up what I have now and say that I'm there for a couple of weeks and then I'm released again. Then, what am I going to do? It's really tough. It's the nature of the business."

Fitzhugh, who keeps in touch with a few former Jets teammates, has been working for Norfolk Southern Railroad for three months.

"I don't want to let them down or run from them because I got a shot for a couple of weeks," he said. "I just feel that that's not right at the moment. I'm looking more long-term in life right now than the short-term."

Fitzhugh said he has been blessed to work with his two childhood passions: football and trains. He also keeps close watch on his former team, to see if he still recognizes the defensive schemes Ryan is running.

"It's tough because I would love to say, 'Hey, I'm going to go out there and get it again,' but it's about a risk," he said. "Is it the end of my NFL career forever? I don't know. This is what I need to do right now."

Copyright 2010 by The Associated Press

Moby Dick Chanukah

If you read a recent front page story of the San Francisco
Chronicle, you would have read about a female humpback whale who had
become entangled in a spider web of crab traps and lines. She was
weighted down by hundreds of pounds of traps that caused her to
struggle to stay afloat. She also had hundreds of yards of line rope
wrapped around her body, her tail, her torso, a line tugging in her
mouth. A fisherman spotted her just east of the Farallon Islands
(outside the Golden Gate) and radioed an environmental group for
help. Within a few hours, the rescue team arrived and determined
that she was so bad off,
the only way to save her was to dive in and
untangle her. They worked for hours with curved knives and
eventually freed her. When she was free, the divers say she swam in
what seemed like joyous circles. She then came back to each and
every diver, one at a time, and nudged them, pushed them gently
around as she was thanking them. Some said it was the most
incredibly beautiful experience of their lives. The guy who cut the
rope out of her mouth said her eyes were following him the whole
time, and he will never be the same. May you, and all those you
love, be so blessed and fortunate to be surrounded by people who
will help you get untangled from the things that are binding you.
And, may you always know the joy of giving and receiving gratitude.

How do we approach Life?

If you want to build a ship,
don't drum up people to collect wood
and don't assign them tasks and work,
but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.
Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Yud Eikev- Yaakov Avinu

Yaacov Avinu is a simple Yid. He is a Jew that is connected to his heel.

The heel is anava, bitul. Anava is about realizing that there is good in another person and you dont have to be the best at everything. Only when you become eikv, Vehaya eiekev- then Tishmeun- only then will you be able to hear what people are saying.

Listen to your heel- the part of your body thats always hidden- your secret place that holds the mystery of how a yid feels about hashem, that noone else knows or understands. Listen to your heel. remember your secrets, how deep your connection to hashem is, even though all year its hidden, eikev tishmeun, it's time to listen. In a world where everone is in everyone else's business, shidduchim fall apart because people are nosy. facebook, sms, myspace, but theres no private space anymore, at the end of time all thats left is the heel. you dont feel the heel until theres something wrong. it's time to listen, to tap into to a place where no one but you and hashem have access to. This is why eretz yisrael is the reward in the parsha, b/c eretz yisrael is haaretz asher ar'recka, the place where you become revealed to yourself.

Its hard to look at our daily live and see that we really are serving hashem most of the day, b/c we dont feel it, so we think the relationship has evaporated.
V'haya Eikev- when your relationship with hashem becomes like a heel, desensitized with no feeling, Tishmeun- listen closely for the whispers that hashem is speaking to you into your life. davka when theres no sound.

Vhaya- is a lashon of simcha- sifrrei chassidus ask, what is the simcha here, of klal yisrael listening? The answer is a gevalt, Eikev is a reference to Ikvasa Demishicha, the last generation before moshiach in which we are living. Vhaya- the simcha is, Eikev- during the last generation before moshiach, when the darkness is so thick you can touch it, emes is hidden, and we are bombarded with filth and confusion every second,( what we struggle to not look at in one day, is more than people 70 years ago dealt with in a lifetime). In such a generation, Tishmeun- there will still be yidden who want to listen to hashem. Not Taasun- will do everything neccesarily, but tishmeun- will want to do everything.

Yaacov Avinu's strength allows us to remember what it is that we Truly want. Let's never forget it.

Inside Jokes

Yitzchak is Davening in the field. Rivka sees him and immidiately covers herself up. The Torah says Yitzchak was coming towards Rivkah. In the middle of Tefilas Mincha? Not "Frum"!!! If he's davening how can he be walking towards her?

What's really happening here?

Of all of the Avos, Yitzchak is the most enigmatic. He doesn't speak much, and represents a concept of quiet strength and holiness. Yitzchak is the Pillar of Truth that keeps us tied to Eretz Yisrael, as he was forbidden to leave. Yitzchak's relationship with Hashem isn't really detailed in the Torah as much as his Avraham Avinu or Yaacov Avinu's.

Yitzchak Avinu's essense is from "ותצחק שרה בקרבה". It is from this place of inner laughter. Like an inside joke between close frends. A hidden laughter that isn't for everyone. Like the way the Chosson and Kallah look at eachother at the Badekin, before she is covered over. The covering of the Kallah's face is a statement to the world that what these two share together, is unknowable by anyone else, and that only they can see the "covered" parts of eachother.

Yitzchak has a life of private jokes with Hashem. His blindness wasn't a physical blindness. It was a state of not seeing the revealed things in this world, only the hidden secrets.

This is how Yitzchak served Hashem. He could be in the deepest state of Dveykus and connection to Hashem, and it might appear to others as if he was taking a casual stroll in the fields. Everything was hidden. So was the Love between Yitzchak and Rivkah. They connected on the level of secrets. Their connection transcended anything external, therefore they married at an age when no children could be produced. This meant that they were connected to eachother's "secrets" not to the productive capability of the other.

Looking at her soulmate, Rivkah covers herself up as a matter of keeping the secrets between husband and wife. She is the only one connecting to Yitzchak's secrets and covers herself to conceal their deep connections. This is why Rivka was able to bring back the Holiness of Sarah Immeinu into the Tent of Yitzchak. Sarah Immeinu gave rise to the "Inside Laughter" which was Yitzchak's essense. Rivka Immeinu entered into that world of "secrets" together with Yitzchak and brought back the Neiros, Challah, and Cloud cover into the Tent.

This is how Yitzchak knows that it's really Yaacov under the garments of Eisav in Parshas Toldos. It says "הן ריח בני כריח השדה". (my son smells of the field). The Ozerover Rebbe teaches that Yitzchak's prayers in the field, when he first met Rivkah, The davening that was an expression of his inner secrets with Hashem, was actually a prayer for Yaacov Avinu. He Davened that he should have a child who also had secrets with Hashem. With Eisav, everything was "בפיו" (revealed). Yaacov was hidden in Shem V'Ever.

Therefore when Yaacov walks into his father, "wrapped" in Eisav's clothing, his essense hidden, Yitzchak smells the smell of the "prayer of the Field" "the prayer for secrets" from the fact that Yaacov has come in a way that concealed his true identity, by way of secrets.

My we all be blessed to recieve the brachos in secret, and share them with the people that really understand who we are.

May it be a shabbos of "inside laughter" and a restoration of the Lights in all of our tents.

Whispering Again

Cheshvan is an empty month so to speak. coming on the heels of Tishrei which is chock full of "spiritual activity" Cheshvan seems bare.

וירא אליו ה' there is no record of any dialogue, just a revalation. What is spoke here between Hashem and Avraham?

Everyone has 2 levels that they serve Hashem on. Public Service and Secret Service. Public service is what other people are able to see about your life, your relationship with hashem. Some people walk around with their eyes rolled to the back of their heads and want you to SEE how "spiritual" they are. People who are only public service people often need to tell someone their secrets. But how much do we really know about another person.

Secret Service is the level of looking clearly into someones life and realizing that there are so many hidden things that only they know.

Who can tell you what you share with Hashem?

Avraham Avinu's tent was open on all sides for people to see inside. But could anyone really know the depth of the love that Avraham and Sarah shared, the entirety of Avraham;s relationship with Hashem?

We often look into the open tent of others whether via facebook, twitter and think that the more "outside" stuff we know, the closer we become.

In truth these are only things that distract us from who the peson in front of us is.

יThis is why there is no dialogue in the beggining of the parsha. Hashem becomes revealed form within Avraham, from the place of the secrets that they share that no one else can understand. This is the meaning of looking for tzaddikim in Sdom. It means being convinced that there are people with secrets there and you just have to look harder.

to believe in Hashem means to have secrets with him that no one knows, and to be able to see that other people have secrets as well. -

סוד ה ליראיו

Mar Cheshvan is derived from the term מרחשת (Marcheshes) which means to whisper. What are we whispering?

Chassidus teaches that we are whispering all of the things that we were yelling on Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur. Then, we were davening and doing public tshuva, at the top of our lungs. During Mar Chashvan, we still are expressing all of those things, but only loud enough so Hashem is the only one who can hear it.

no matter where you find yourself right now, where you were last night, this shabbos, try to hear yourself whispering to Hashem. Remember your secrets. Remember that you are still telling Hashem " I love you." but now it's just for you and him.

Back in the Saddle

With the help of heaven I hope to be getting more involved in this blog. I am going to post some older ideas that I shared over the past few months. The concepts are still applicable.
I hope to be adding things as time goes on.