Alei Shur: Desire vs. Boundaries - Rabbi Guy Matalon

[Music] we started discussing the two inclinations to yet but we have yet to at all right the good inclination the etc and the bad inclination those two forces are in US and there seems there should be a tug of war between the two during your life should feel it daily basis not a daily basis that's a separate question we then discussed a Mishnah mich nine in pika vote in ethics of father said they asked limits bacala pursue a mitzvah run after mitzvah and run away from sin and the question is what does this mean that is to say why is it that thin pursues us and then we have to run away from and mitzvahs are running away from us shouldn't be the other way around that mistress should run towards us and same should run away from us make a life a lot easier on us there are guys who actually pursue sin right they just another sin okay so what causes us to feel it's a feeling that a sin is pursuing us that is what is it about sin that makes us feel like we have to run away from it because it's pursuing us something in us is giving us this feeling right there's something that attracts us to sin oh you know what it's called yeah it's our heart desire but desire for what pleasure so it's not the desired service the imagination of the pleasure we imagine what the pleasure is gonna be just imagine eating a bowl of ice cream right after eating a good piece of steak just like ice cream I didn't say sorbet that's not ice cream that's like ice with some food coloring okay ice cream it's got cream in it the imagination tries to convince you how great it's gonna be if you just did this if you did this it's gonna feel so great it's gonna be unbelievable it's gonna but in reality it's not great even if you follow it after once you do the sin you're not gonna feel that good about it right I told you that when I was in college I used to catch shoplifters so there was I might never forget this I was watching this guy they have a certain store that I worked for and he couldn't see me but I could see him clearly and he got around the corner max this is for you yeah and you saw the enjoyment of sticking this 67 cent mouthguard in his pants I'm gonna lay with it what's it and he goes out to store and I go hey buddy give me some mouth guard what how did wasn't that great wasn't that great the imagination is what inflates the pleasure to make us feel like this would be the greatest thing and or by Kaplan once I saw a video of his they spoke you spoke about Passover but I think there's this idea fits here it's for example when you think let's go camping and what's your imagination tell you that's gonna be great that's good fun and then you go there and well the tent that you brought doesn't have all the pieces so it's not really working out there's a lot of bugs and mosquitoes right and there's a big sign no fires and there's you can't fish in the leg cause you didn't buy in the end it's like ruin the whole thing's but the imagination sort of builds it up this would be great if we just wind and we could swim and then in the end it's the imagination is what causes you to feel that you can't really get away from the sin the sin is pursuing you it's all in your mind it's all in your imagination and if you carry out you realize that what the imagination promised you you're gonna get and what the outcome is there's gonna be a gap they're gonna be a big big gap okay so for example he gives the example that he gives here he says that this pleasure is not always just pleasure for example fashion no offense to anyone here who's in the fashion magazine but fashion people it like if you it gives us a feeling that if we don't follow fashion of how people dress out there then we're gonna be miserable everyone's gonna make fun of us it's gonna be we have to conform to society that's all in here it's all in here you don't have to don't have to you can wear a yarmulke outdoors right in public in different parts of the world it's not the end of the world and hungry you can walk with the yarmulke so the imagination is not going to convince you to do business the imagination is gonna tell you the following there's a puzzle in michl a Proverbs it says the lazy person says there is a lion and the roads on the road there's also a lion in the streets that's why he doesn't want to go learning Torah because it's dangerous to go out there dangerous I'll just stay home that's a picture that the imagination may dump right and then you have the consciousness our conscience wants to do the mitzvot and the imagination has to silence it right tells you the imagination says they're scared don't get out you do this just a and the kind of no I want to do this I want it learn Torah I want to go to class I want to stay awake but the imagination it's so silly just take a nap I just put the head on the pillow and cuddle take the blanket your little teddy bear what and leave the window open that the cold air comes in boom that's what the imagination does that's what the imagination does okay so we see that the Avera the sin is pursuing us and that is because the imagination and then you see that the Mitzvah is running away from you and that's also because of our imagination because our imagination is trying to pull us to go somewhere else so it appears that the Mitzvah is running away and you could see that this is the power of the imagination that a lot of the imagination governs the decisions that we make and you have to be very very careful so God made us love this world he put that in us the good life on the other hand we have the yetzer hatov and we have yet we need the yetzer Harper everybody wants to say like why did God put this thing in us this yetzer Hara this idea of the imagination that well the rabbi's teach us if we didn't have it nobody would build a home nobody would get married nobody would have children that's it nobody would do anything cuz why do you need to do it it's hard work it's hard work get married get married is hard stay married is harder right to build a house is hard to maintain the house is harder get a career but it's because the imagination is we'd like to have money we'd like to have a car like to have a house go on vacation right and people go through these things and they're enjoyable in themselves but they're difficult to do so that's the idea that we have this built-in desire that is affected by the imagination to get us to do things and that could also be to become a big rabbi because that might be where it's coming from so I come from days about though it's coming from yetzer Hara listen you need to make a living and you know these guys don't work too hard they just sit around and talk and you know read a book and tell the students and everybody tell a few jokes do that and I could even do magic hey the rabbi can't do that I'll be better than him it's like the joke that there was a guy said that if he would have the money the Rothschilds would have he would be Richard so they'd say why would you be Richard because I would give Hebrew classes I'd make more money on the side so you'd give magic classes so the world would not have been built society would not have been created for it wasn't for the atera we need that in order to build society in order to build this world as we know it okay that's what he says and that's why the it is called Tov my god it's called very good but this yet there affects our imagination and they work in us and they entice us to sin and it tries to limit maybe minimize them it's thought that we do why because the more meets what we do the weaker the entire get the more meets what you do the weaker your evil inclination is going to the greater a person is the greater its are very good but it's a different type of user heart in the beginning one of the things that the it's Aras trying to get you to do really really naughty things but once you get closer and closer then it's heart goes after different things there's a book called chefs miser the introduction he says something was very interesting to explain what David and what you're asking it says that the greater person is the greater deserts are hard but what does that mean sonic doesn't have the option to sin in the same way as I would write a righteous person if certain idea pops in his head do a particular sin he can't push it off by saying you know what we'll do it tomorrow you can't whereas I could just do it tomorrow right right down and the answer come back tomorrow cuz it's Shia thunder tomorrow but to a big fattie that's not gonna work he can't say we'll do it tomorrow cuz he's not gonna do it tomorrow so this yetzer is gonna keep attacking him even more so it's the it Sahar is stronger in that sense because it's got no room to negotiate who the answer are that's what that book I don't know how that got his bar what does this husband I don't know how he does the accounting but we know one thing that each person is judged according to his own standard at the level that he's in otherwise it would not be fair because I would say the standard is mush or a banal Joe if you don't make it to this level forget it no question is where was Joe last year and where is he today is he better yes could it be better if the answer is yes and you have to pay for that that is one was your protec what is your potential today are you meeting your full potential if the answer is yes you're good if you're not then get serious think you're gonna make goulash once daily sure says that the desire is coming from the imagination and he says the nations of the world what he says invented pleasures that have no reality to them the people pursue things that have no reality to them and this is only based on the imagination that's the idea and it's kind of like gravity gravity pulls you but there's nothing the pulling doesn't produce anything so you have this desire that is pulling you to do certain things but doing him one even if you do it you don't end up with what you imagined it's not gonna be what the imagination has sold you okay it's very important to keep that in mind but what about the Mitzvah does the Mitzvah have this gravity force that pulls you to do mitzvahs doesn't seem like it it seems like we are the ones that have to run after the Mitzvah to do it because the Mitzvah is something that we don't have a natural pull towards and if we had a natural pull towards it our lives will be very very different is that what people desire is the experience not the product and I don't think that that's the I think people are you know I'm only doing this assumption I'm for a child and don't look at me don't I'm not looking at you and and that's not listen listen we don't want pictures we don't want pictures you are describing edit this out too this time you're gonna be blamed for it so the Mitzvah does not have the power of the gravity and we should we should follow whether I'm caller ID sir I'm Kyle says that it is it should be the case that a person should only turn to his creator and that he would not pursue anything else but God in the same way that a magnet draws metal we should have that feeling that is it should exist and if you don't have it if we don't have it we see how much warped we are from our natural state so he continues and says that there should be there is the possibility and he says there is a magnetic attraction to holiness there is a magnetic attraction to holiness the kedusha but you have to be aware of inch one it's not something that will just happen through osmosis you know what a small sis's it's when you acquire some things through filtering I always when I taught at the University I taught a bible course and one of the students asked is there a way that I could know the Bible better to succeed in the class so I said yes take the Bible and put it under your pillow if you wake up in the morning and your neck hurts it meant it didn't work but if it didn't hurt them they probably worked and it's all in there through osmosis just through the pressure of the pillow I'll just go right in so we have a difference between a mitzvah and an Aveiro listen to what he writes cuz you're gonna try just try to understand before you start arguing with me max just try to understand before arguing the Mitzvah has true pleasure in it the experience of pleasure exists in the Mitzvah itself and whoever tasted this pleasure is drawn to mitzvahs like a magnet but the imaginations gravity pull attraction is trying to pull you away from the cottage borrow that is what is happening in us if you taste it if you experience mitzvot the pleasure of doing a mitzvah it is like a magnet you want to do it more and more and more but on the other hand you have a force a counter force countervailing force that pulls you away from the cutters borrow hole which is called the imagination it's trying to tell you you do these other things you'll get that pleasure also but that pleasure doesn't exist there spiritual pleasure is unending you can keep having it over and over and over and over physical pleasure has a limit whatever your favorite food is if I feed enough of it to you you're gonna get sick of it you're not gonna want it I don't care what it is whatever bodily pleasures are you gonna pursue you're gonna reach a point where you're disgusted it's enough I can't drink anymore I can't eat anymore I can't sleep anymore I want to go do something but but spiritual pleasure this is what he's talking about the pleasure of doing a mitzvah it's something that you could keep going and going and it's all limit to it you don't get tired you don't really get tired of the experience itself and then you desire to have it again and again and again there's a natural drug to it the imagination is going to pull you away from them to say you know this is much more pleasurable and this is really the difference between fun and happiness if you repeat doing something over and over and over it's gonna cease to being fun right going on a certain roller coaster it's fun first time second time third time after a while you get tired of it's no longer it's not fun anymore let's go do something else but happiness is something that is not dependent on the experience itself it is a experience that sort of lasts with you but forever because we're fickle creatures but it's different than fun because it's something that makes you happy you can keep doing over and over and over and it doesn't make you sad whereas with fun you just get the students tell me they have II know the followers of Avraham Avinu those who follow his path have the ability to enjoy this world and also enjoy the next world but the followers of Balaam bilam they end up in Gehenna and what have we learned that really in the path of the Torah and the mitzvahs we really have true pleasure if you really want to experience pleasure it's right here don't let bilham confuse you to think that they're the ones that are having fun this is where they're having pleasure maybe have fun might be fun is one thing but they're not having pleasure so in kedusha that's where we find ultimate pleasure and real fulfillment but in the town of Tomah of impurity and of physicality we don't have that possibility so if you started just tasting a little bit of the Torah a little bit of your relationship with the colors Baro who you will be drawn to it as a magnet but before before this if you've never experienced it the imagination is going to pull you towards the other side that's the balance between the intuitive and the answer if we would all pursue if everybody would run after the mitzvahs right every single person would only run after mitzvos then we would not have freewill in this world it would not we would not have freewill and then there was a varus would not have any draw because you couldn't convince people to do this stuff couldn't convince I get put Pig why why would I eat pay for what so I don't desire for this nothing so the Mitzvah is to pursue the Mitzvah even though the imagination is not drawing you to it that it appears that is running away from you then you should pursue it that's the idea the spirituality that's in the Torah is very fine whereas physicality is very very coarse and there's a difference between the coarseness of physicality and the subtlety of spirituality question comments feedback [Music] [Applause]