CHAZAQ's Torah Talks #184 Eli Goldbaum - Shalom Bayit, Shalom Divorce, Just Do It Peacefully

you had a hard day you could say something in a rough tone the person on the other side receiving that tone is going to respond accordingly we talk about the the concept of using I language instead of you language and it's an important communication tool so if I say to you you always do that so right away you put up a defense mode and if I change that type of a concept and a lot of the people that talk about sh talk about these Concepts because it makes a lot of sense that you know I'm bothered by something not you and it's you take the change of tone changes the whole conversation and if you take that type of a concept you could really change marriages in a very positive [Music] way and welcome to Torah talk kazak's program with special guest we have with us Mr Ellie goldbam all the way from BR shalam Alum how are you thank you thank you so much thank you for joining us and we're going to be speaking about Shalom bite Shalom divorce just do it peacefully but before we get to the topic if we get a little bit back on about yourself sure and the great work you're involved with as well thank you so much again for having me today it's a pleasure to be here and try to share the message to try to do things peacefully I think it's incredible for CLA so my background is I actually work in the healthcare field and about 12 years ago some got of my head they tried to work on a prenuptial agreement and I started explain to you a little later just the concept I started working with theum on it never really expecting to get a as and here we are couple of years later and it's amazing the Hamas we've gotten on that and from that I ended up doing a people found out that I mediate divorces and it's a it's kept me quite busy to say the least and bar more importantly I have uh successfully stopped quite a number of divorces and uh we got people to proper help and kept the shom b in the house and I think that that's a bigger accomplishment so uh again worked on the a a a curriculum for marriage good marriages to make good marriages great marriages so yeah keeps me busy right now so let's jump into it there's a couple and they're about to get married what do you suggest for a couple to uh before they get into uh this uh marriage agreement advice you give to them so yeah that's it's a great question so it's not really me that's suggesting this um like I said I worked with the gum and I personally got a tremendous amount of for the amount of time that these gum have spent on this agreement which uh if I could just give a give the a website you could actually download it it's free downloads We don't make any money on this this is not uh this not a business venture the name of the organization is yashar initiative y a s h J R initiative.org uhar initiative.org org and everything is on that website uh the actual agreement is on the website can be downloaded for free like I said just quickly we I worked with on this for quite a number of years until he finally felt that it was an okay agreement Hally uh he then sent me to David who has really taken a tremendous uh initiative to try to help us through the agreement get it to the next level uh went after that to for Sher and Lakewood who also jumped on it right away and again like I said old ASAS online uh there after I was sent we decided to go after the biggest pis in M who thankfully reads English and understands English and uh went through this agreement did not give us an easy time but bar we got is aama um glowing as and then came back to America got there SM the community Rabel has given me ASA it's interesting story which maybe one day I'll give you but uh the the the GMA behind disagreement then it really could make a big difference in keeping people's lives peacefully I think the month point that I'd like to just bring out R David the first time I met him said I believe that this will actually save marriages and if people understand what happens in divorce which may Will T touch on later on will realize that if you have a healthy place to go before there's all this interaction of people in the community and what not getting involved or the RAB other lay people and you have a healthy place to go to discuss the issues and whatnot and potentially get people to a healthy place before it gets ugly and dirty which unfortunately happens in some cases which we're working very hard to avoid um you actually could save marriages and I think that that's it's an important point that rold David said and I think it's it's certainly accurate and I've seen it in my work so could you explain to one that is not familiar with a prenup uh it's a document could you elaborate a little bit absolutely I think it's important to understand our PR agreement was was drafted as a totally um it's it's a it's really it's not a one-sided uh you know for the man for the woman it's more of a gender neutral agreement and the concept really is without going into the detail is to get people to acknowledge before marriage that in case there would be an issue we have an agreed upon B then that we're going to go to and deal with whatever it is that we have to deal with one of the protocols of the agreement is shom should be number one um to make peace in the home to make peace in the home if it's if it's attainable but if not like you mentioned before I'm big into Shalom divorce as well so if it's either shom of Bas and if if it can't be in there there some divorce should be done peacefully peacefully without a World War that's correct the damn image that people don't understand and it's it's incredibly painful going through a divorce is not only the couple the fames going through a divorce the parents the grandparents siblings I've seen communties children absolutely 100% so uh a marriage happens BR the couple gets married and uh they want to have Shalom bite they want to have peace in the home any suggestions any advice that you could give for for a couple whether it's a new new couple or it's a couple that's been married for many years absolutely absolutely so you we're touching on on what I what I ended up growing into we had a uh a uh Tish program I don't know was four or five years ago I was a round table discussion myself was the moderator and was on the panel wise and benki therapist Ro was on the panel and it came up in the discussion that you know there really is a need for good the good curriculum some kind of good curriculum that could be helpful in the mar mares we're not talking about difficult marriages we're talking about Good marriages every good marriage you know I'm married to quite a number of years I read through the curc myself and I learned from it and you know that the concept is to take a good marriage or make it into a great marriage make it better make it no reason everyone could use it you know I'm still learning we're all learning and we'll learn as long as we're we're alive and we're married and we're happily married we could always learn something every road you drive in there's always going to be a bump in the road especially on the day that's snowing so in marriage as well no matter how well what happens there's always bumps and things do happen correct so one one of the things we speak about I take the first first year of marriage everyone realize but first year of marriage is sometimes a little more challenging only because you two new people getting used to one another and even in the best situations it it sometimes can be a little challenging to get to know spouse and to get comfortable and familiar with a spouse so if you're able to learn certain tools and those tools could help you and make your marriage and your adjustment to marriage easier and as you grow in the marriage with additional challenges your children are growing older some children you we all know what the challenges of children some some some children do better in school some sometimes less well in school uh you potentially have sibling rivalries sometimes parents children uh shabas come up and you go to your parents and some of the nephews nieces uh could potentially cause uh certain issues between you and your spouse because it's her children your children whatever the case may be I'm sorry her nephews her nie that potentially enter you know they work together with your children but not as well as you'd like to and and and it causes friction and whatnot so we actually came out with a curriculum I worked uh it sort of came to me right after that video um I was speaking to a therapist name is Lisa tski who is a good friend of mine and she literally came to me with a cur culum like literally with a bow and tie and say Here's a curriculum so we worked on that for quite some time it's really her curriculum but we put a lot of time in C into helping her Mak it into a good curriculum it's actually we put it out into a book it wasn't the intention of it the intention was to really come out with a curriculum that we're going to train ra with teachers col teachers to give over this curriculum it's still something we'd like to do um the challenges people are busy and it's hard to find time to to go through the curriculum in a proper manner but uh the book actually came out I think about 2 3 weeks ago uh it's called me me and you what I wish I knew um I know it is available in some of the farm stores it's it's actually specifically to our community the from Community it's not a hash book it's simply taking some basic concepts which you maybe talk about some of the basic concepts of what uh I'll give you some some very simple example um the beginning of the book talks about a concept of getting to know yourself very often in order in order to be a part of a marriage I need to know myself so I could help my spouse help me so as an example if I don't know what I want that hot day work I come home and I use this as an example you know different people want to be treated differently at the end of the day at all day do me a favor leave me alone give me 15 minutes let me just get to myself and I need I need the Breather there are other people who want their wife to dot over them or husband to do over them and say you know like oh sh I feel so B you had a rough day and be interactive so if you don't know what you want how's your spouse supposed to know and very often we we we have this false notion and certainly when we get engaged I know I was there I there to my wife I think eight or nine times and I felt oh we really know each other so well and the reality is we you know we really don't know each other and certainly once we live with one another we start realizing that we didn't really know each other and we think that our spouses read our minds and and very often we ourselves don't know what we want even if our spouse read our mind you you wouldn't necessarily know what the spouse wants but you know we knowing yourself that's a very first uh very important point and then there's also the top of communication I've seen this many times where there's things that a certain uh spouse wants but they don't know how to communicate properly to the other side thank you yes it's communication is key key key to everything um how to communicate simple thing had a rough day wife comes home she had a rough day not the time to talk about it that doesn't mean we don't talk about it ever we talk about it in 50 minutes in an hour or two hours when things cool down you know so when when something is not going to be spoken in the right turn tone and the M you could say something we all do that we could you had a hard day you could say something in a rough tone the person on the other side receiving that tone is going to respond accordingly so one of the things I talk about often is is the concept of not I don't like to play defense no one wants to play defense so if if someone says something we talk about the the concept of using I language instead of you language and it's an important communication tool so if I say to you you always do that so right away you put up a defense mode and if I change that type of a concept and a lot of the people that talk about sha talk about these Concepts because it makes a lot of sense that you know I'm bothered by something not you and it you take the change of the tone changes the whole conversation and if you change the conversation that's how you that's how you uh I just you know on the way here was talking to somebody trying to help M bias and just explain to him his wife just needs words of affirmation constantly just give her what she needs give her what he he has a lot of ESS I said the same thing you're saying in a word of T is I showed him how he could go ahead and change the language to show it as an appreci ation that his wife did something good and if you take that type of a concept you could really change marriages in a very positive way U you obviously the book is quite voluminous it's not a small book but it has a lot of examples and whatnot how you could really work through some of the things on your own um some things you may want it write for yourself to even get to know yourself not necessarily you're ready to share it with the spouse at the time that you that you're writing it and you may be willing to share it you depending on where you're holding your marriage some times in an early part of marriage you're not comfortable with something and and over time you you be more comfortable maybe you speak to a rub or th not necess therapist even someone as a coach uh could be a class teacher College teacher in an early part of marriage but you know these are things that are important it's very important and you know we we really feel in today's society specifically we are in a very high tense Society the world is moving very quickly very um how many spouses both spouses have to work to earn a living today uh there's Rec a podcast I saw someone was talking about the AA tuition crisis and you're basically saying that in order for people of any size family to to survive you need to make hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars it's not really doable in most families unless you have two two spouses that are working and that just adds to to the trauma and the and and the difficulty of making a good shaomai and spending time I you know I personally uh it's not so easy it didn't happen in my early years but I try to have a date night once a week with my wife go out you know he doesn't have to be who knows where but you know we go out to eat supper one night a week and just it doesn't the most expensive restaurant I was actually talking to uh someone very involved in the therapy world so they went out to eat they spent $200 on the dinner my wife said to me I don't understand you spent so much money on the supper he goes an hour of therapy is way more expensive I'd rather do this you know so that's that is hilarious that is hilarious but it's very very very important I uh I I know many couples that took this upon themselves and their whole sh B has changed forever because there was a lack of communication a lack of time spent together and it's always busy at home and things are always happening so it's very important to go out quality time quality time is very important and not texting him on the phone and being busy that's another story we'll talk about that in a second but unfortunately there are cases where uh sha Bice they try this that and everything and it just doesn't work and just what you said texting I think it's important you said communication yeah communication means you give undivided attention if I'm sitting and talking to you and you're busy texting on the phone while I'm talking to you that's not undivided attention see I'm communicating I heard what you said I don't know I know when someone's talking to me if I was taking out the phone it just it became a it became normal in our society I was listening to actually someone who is not from talking about the the you go to a meeting and it used to be that before a meeting you sat around you spoke to one another and you gained the ability to learn communication right and and and proper communication today if you walk into a lot of these meetings no one's talking before Mee all on their phones and the second we start the meeting we start talking to one another even during the meeting correct and it's so you know it became something that in a sense we feel is okay and it's proper but really is not it's really it's really it's it's really against everything that makes any sense it's not respectful it's not it's not nice so if we could learn that art I think it certainly would help in communication and marriage and whatnot as 100% so I was saying before about you know a person tries everything and unfortunately it's not working out CL so we you have a whole tractate about divorce and uh as the topic was sham divorce just do it peacefully uh you've been involved with this uh what what do you suggest for a couple that unfortunately is going through uh the difficult time period of of separating and divorcing it's a very painful and fully loaded question say uncomfortable question but uh it's unfortunately relevant I think it's also it's beyond that I think it's also what is the role of people in the community what's the role of family and whatnot in that in that state I I think that being supportive just as a community we should be supportive to people but we have to be careful I I talk about this concept of TMI too much information people um I think we all are are prev to certain information on perhaps if we know someone going through a divorce and people come to us with a lot of information and sometimes when people give information or too much information it's indicative of a of a a very different story not necessarily getting the whole picture um I think it's incredibly important that people who are going through the divorces to understand that it's a very difficult challenge that they're going through they need people to have divorces support I'm sorry they need the support everything else but at the same time it really should be dealt with in a manner that doesn't increase the fighting right if I get people to me in the early stages and a lot of of late my name has gotten out there I guess I charge a lot of money I don't charge for my time so I'm you know I've had a tremendous amount of success in this area but to work with people and understand that you know a simple thing one of the things that attorney will typically advise and I actually got some crit criticism for saying this but I'll say it again anyway um they'll advise to go ahead and to put in a restraining order and sometimes the restraining order is necessary but I tell people if let's say you believe that that restraining order is going to cost you x amount of months or years till you're going to finish a divorce because ultimately it's not a gaka think to have restraining what to put against somebody and the person is going to potentially cause you to pay for it as a lack of a better term and if you think about that and say you know what let me weigh the pros and cons of this restraining water now I'm not talking about a case where there's a real need for it but it is a tactic and again I'll be clear on that it's not where there's a need for it of course you have to do what you have to do but very often it's a tactic that's used in certain cases and it's a gashaka feeling maybe the first minute you got a restraining order and you know the spouse is pathetic not get see the children or whatever the cas child custody and stuff like that and you end up paying for it in the long run and it's not only in this only in this particular Pro this point of the M of the divorce but in the bigger picture as well if we're able to keep cases from getting to be the next World War and I work a hours and hours to keep people calm and realize that there's a there's a method to my madness and that is to stay cool stay calm and to just be Maat which means to just give in on certain things in the initial stage for the broader picture I believe and I've showed it to people time and again I had to get that was done last Thursday and it's exactly what I told the guy when he called me after he finished he thanked me for getting it done and the person was helping out was a sister-in-law I said I want you to become my Advocate to help me in other cases that you told me it's not going to work my case is different and we have to be tough and we have to be tough and we have to be tough and I said I promise you that the quickest way to get from a point A to point Z which is where you got to get to which is the divorce is by going ahead and giving it on certain things and not making a big deal on certain things even though it's painful and he said I will be your Advocate anyone you have a a problem with this and I'm like he wasn't an easy case in the sense that he really didn't feel that I was giving them the proper advice he felt that certain things we have to push back and fight back I find that it's the oxygen a lot of the cases the fighting and why not is the action of the divorces and if we're able to do this in a peaceful Manner and that's really the concept of the prup and that's where I got it from the prenuptual agreement basically gets us to a healthy place it gets us to a place to deal with it before we have all the other people on the outside that potentially will give you their advice um one of the things I talk it's a very painful thing but it's a reality there are so many cases I deal with that it could be rotum late people or whatever it is that get involved on a case and this nothing wrong with me giving someone advice on something but my advice is only as good as what I've heard if I didn't hear from two sides I'm giving a one-sided advice and I can give people story after Story of cases that when I present side one it sounds like this is no question this is the way the case got to go um several cases that I've saved it in sh bias have come to me like that when they presented the facts everyone was saying divorce divorce divorce and then I heard the second side and I got a totally different perspective and you get the other side the other perspective and you start realizing there's two there's two perspectives here I don't only might call them sides and if we're able to go ahead and mesh those perspectives very often a we could potentially have a shom bias B if we certainly can have a shal divorce and it's just a matter of understanding that as painful as this is and I can't begin to tell you I'm time sitting in mediation people don't even begin to understand there is another side they only see their side they see their picture it's an emotional thing and and if we're able to cut out the emotion for one second and think for one second I do this with couples all the time I say I understand it's difficult because you're living in your reality but if I'm able to go ahead and just try put yourself into the other person's perspective try to understand where they're coming from and I've seen so many cases in peacefully because of that and that's that's really my goal and I think ultimately and probably most of the work that I do as much as I try to help the couples and and and get them through it I I see the devastation to children I I hear this all the time people come to me I'm doing this for my children I'm doing this for my children it is so painful to see how the children are getting destroyed you're not doing this for your children I understand some sometimes you don't have a choice and I think it's important to understand that and recognize that there are difficult cases out there there are difficult personalities there personality disorders um but in a lot of the cases things could be avoided and the kids suffer the kids suffer terribly through it and and it's some we have to stop as as CLA is you know I I talk about this concept we have enough people that hate us we don't have to hate one another we have to work together the community I think could be supportive but really if you're not involved with the case why are we taking positions in someone else's divorce it's between that couple why is it why is every case becoming a whole Community uh issue let's keep it as as as as simple and as as peaceful as as possible and I think that message could really reverberate in their commun community and try to get people to understand these professionals out there with the people don't understand keep the cool not get not get the fighting out there I think that's what wants from us to just do things peacefully do things of CH 100% there was an individual that got divorced and uh it wasn't unfortunately you know like it is sometimes it wasn't peacefully done and after many years he was you know thinking it over he told me he's like I just wish it would have just been you know better for the kids and for the the families this and that I always tell people that Shalom comes from the word Shalom peace comes for of complete and comes from which is a portion whenever there's only a portion of the story one-sided that's where there's and when there's sh the picture is full and there's shalom shalom B and again like Ellie goldbam tells us beautifully shalom shalom divorce let's do it peacefully and we have we have a custom on Torah talks which is a final message M for our broad audience oh wow okay so I I I'd like to just focus on something I've been talking about recently um people ask me all the time why is why they why our community has more divorce today there's there's a lot of divorces definitely I think every not just our community it's the world it's the world yeah so it's a it's a tough challenge I have a whole list of reasons that there are you know whether it's more divorce is percentage wise there's there's too much divorce going on so so there's one thing that I've keyed in on um not necessarily the only reason certainly not the only reason but I think a a as a BAL boss I I think I could talk because I actually have the challenge I I have a smartphone in a sense and I think it's something that um we we have to acknowledge that our generation is dealing with this I I spoke recently um at a Shai speech that I I speak quite often I I spoke about a a concept I think is an important concept concept um I was reading an secular book about the anxiety and depression of this generation the G world the non-jewish world is waking up that the the anxiety and depression is coming about from people kids watching all kinds of things on on on devices and I think that anyone who doesn't realize this is just in denial we all realize this is a challenge but it's a good babysitter and that's why we use it so this particular book started off with a incredible story of a kid who comes home and tells his father mother guess what I had this billionaire came to school and they were offering a trip to Mars and I want a trip to Mars this billiona came and explained to us we're going to take these children and set them to Mars we're not going to know how they're going to acclimate to Mars so we want to see how they'll acclimate to Mars we want to see if they're even able to come back to earth and acclimate properly to Earth is the body going to grow properly Etc and this kid says me my my friends we we won a trip to Mars and not only that you signed as parents you already signed consent consent form so so he starts the the the concept you know like we' ask this to anybody I don't know any sane person who would go ahead and send their children off to Mars as an experiment um but at the same time what he was trying to say is that's really what's happening with cell phones and what cell phones were is a bunch of billionaires as you could look online and find out that uh you know Facebook and whoever else I don't know all these these different companies who are all billionaires and all there from money were brought to Congress a number of years ago to explain why it is that their devices and whatever their apps are not causing this type of damage to the world and the world's starting to figure out that's happening but as back to our story so these billionaire is it basically took us all and made us this example and our children ourselves we're going into this world of space and we're going into Mars and we're taking our Our Lives getting taken over by these type of apps and whatnot and it's going up we don't know how we're going to come back are my kids going to come back my my children that are married are they going to come back that they going to be able to acclimate back in society or not and what not if you take the concept that he spoke about I think it's really what we're dealing with today and I think it's something that if we're serious about this I I said at that time I said we talk about cigarette smoking um you know we all know that cigarettes are dangerous are there people who smoke yes there are people that smoke but most people who are smart healthy people realize cigarettes are dangerous there's even a warning on the box of cigarettes so you say you know so we realize that there that it's a danger um drinking we don't let kids drink until they 21 or whatever the case may be the legal age do kids drink before yes but that's another issue and a major problem of sh b as well but um you know same thing with gambling there responsibility or what not so I think that people would honest with themselves and realize that these are things that are very dangerous to life so to go ahead and tell you don't have a phone it's a little different because I can live without a cigarette I can live without drinking I could live without gambling and bar I do my phone I need my phone so you know in a sense we make it into something that's goer but if we really believe deep down that this is a cancer that this is really dangerous this is destroying marriages it's destroying relationships it's destroying children it's destroying all kinds of things and I and I I just want to touch on another thing that I've seen constantly uh I ask this to ra all the time is who's who's giving has to our generation it's not necessarily the I know we're doing a great thing here I would like to give the proper ASA but I get the clips when I deal with people in divorce they always send these clips that they saw online of this person saying this and this and whatnot this is the people giving our children the ashas and and there's influences I don't even know what I'm talking about because I'm not involved with that world but that's who's giving has to this generation danger social media and I've seen it without a question and again it's way broader than just social media but with social media comes about the depression the anxiety the addictions Etc and and there's a lot to talk about on that topic so I think if I was to looking at to take this and to take everything we you spoke about and again I thank you for having me 100% it was an amazing Torah talk and very informative and very very very important Al if every person knows one two other people that are going through you know a difficult situation whatever it may be they should hear uh Ellie Gold Bam's important message uh Shalom B Shalom divorce uh just do it peacefully corre we want to thank you for joining us so much very very important messages and we want to thank everyone 8:30 p.m. Eastern Standard Time Tuesday nights kazak tour talks with special guest k.org chq.org glive special thank you to the various different platforms that host kazak tour talks with us shout out to our friends at Tor any time also a special thank you and shout out to our friends at Daily giving a dollar day really goes a very very far away daily giving.org we encourage everyone to check that out as well and the feedback has been amazing phenomenon and great we encourage people to continue please sending in the feedback uh future suggested guests uh for kazak Tor talks are welcome as well and we have our massive H campaign coming up please everybody get involved with that as well over 1,800 kids from public schools to just the last few years alone plus thousands more kids after school programs Su school programs about 20 different locations teens Vision uh programs and initiatives a youth center a lot of amazing things and it's just the beginnings so we want to do a lot more please reach out to get involved and once again thank you to Mr Ellie goam for joining us and shout out to behind the camera we should all be Shalom we should hear [Music]