Living With Emunah (Part 239) - Daven for Happiness

good morning boca toe welcome back to living with emun i want to thank as always our very generous sponsors of the series for the year dr xavier bella morgan a member of dr brian galbet and in memory of dr ellen shanzo this morning shear in particular response by simeon zachary schweiger the foolish lamb of jack schwager bennett marguerite shall have a complete refuse leima and by lisa lintz lisa george lincoln out of the earth sight of her father maurice lofman roshi dove ben eureka official shamash thank you very much for your sponsorship and generosity we are still in beyond richard meyer morgenstern who by the way happens to be in america right now very unusual he came in for a simcha a lot of videos and pictures going around he's in muncie of his time here in uh in america so uh we've been learning the section on simha how to be basin as the metric the barometer the measure of how much ammuna how well our amuna is a person who is overwhelmed overcome with anxiety and worry person who's fearful and paralyzed and debilitated needs to first of all again as we always say if it is uh to the level of clinical needs help there's nothing wrong there's no shame or embarrassment we're talking generally speaking a person who struggles with that needs to look in the mirror and say how's my relationship with the almighty how's my relationship with hashem am i am i including him in the equation do i see his role in responsibility do i recognize that i'm in his world do i surrender and submit to him and realize he's in charge or maybe the source of my anxiousness and worry made me the source of my fear or concern is because i've written them out of the equation i've written them out of the story i think it's really all about me where i think or subscribe to it's all about nature what's happening around me so simha is this great barometer i've spent many many months going through it and we're arriving at a peculiar time to learn about simcha because this coming sunday will be shivasabatama's we'll kick off the three weeks soon after will be rashford when the month of begins we turn down we lower the level of sinfa we never extinguish it is like the pilot life you're not alive you don't have at least some spark of simcha you can't extinguish it or turn it off altogether but nevertheless in the month of ab we limit it so what is simcha why would we sometimes raise it why would we sometimes lower it so we'll get to that he's going to address that let's get back to where we were we were talking about the micro moments of simcha we're talking about taking advantage of a minute of joy a good cup of coffee a good sunset a good conversation a good laugh a good smile a good joke a good danish a good whatever it is that micro moment of simha something well organized something that excites you something that you smiled so instead of returning back to your fabulous miserable complaining negative pessimistic attitude and filter and outlook say you know what i'm going to build upon that i'm going to package that i'm going to capture that i'm going to bottle that and it's going to i'm going to build upon it i'm going to build upon it i'm going to build upon it's going to compound the micro moments of simcha to use them as launching pads and launching boards to use them to be able to rediscover that sense of joy that sense of happiness within ourselves and sometimes we have to engage sometimes we have to use external stimulants of simcha in order to return to that inner satisfaction not substances that are illegal or dangerous talking about things in moderation but we already know that you can use external experiences rewarding ourselves with things that make us happy in a way which can at least pull back the layers of inhibition and unhappiness and allow ourselves to blossom with joy we're on page coup summa and this is where we left off this very very important insight which really sources itself in the safer which was written as a series of letters from someone a man to his son someone anonymous author from the late middle ages and uh he wrote a letter to his son they didn't have email then he actually wrote letters to his son and what were the substance the content of the letters you know if you write letters to your kids in camp every day on the email system what do you say every day i'm i'm yota with my wife i have to leora remind me i'm supposed to write my own but you know you fill in what's going on what happened in your day what did he do to say he said this is this week's parsha let me tell you all the mitzvos in that week's parasha let me enumerate and count and identify the mitzvah and that parsha meeshar mitzvah here is the root and the deeper meaning of the mitzvah here are some of the technical laws of the mitzvah so the he writes in several places he writes that after the actions follow the heart we have it all backwards we think that we wait to feel and then we act we wait to feel we wait to have a drive or an appetite we wait to have a feeling and then we act if i love you then i'll treat you with love if i'm happy then i'll smile if i'm hungry then i'll eat if i have a drive for intimacy then i'll act but it's a mistake says the secret the human psyche is actually designed the opposite when we start to act if we act then we're drawn to that that develops the appetite that elicits and that brings out the drive and the desire the yiddish expression which i won't say in the yiddish mostly because i don't know it but this yiddish expression that with the eating comes the appetite with the eating comes the appetite i'm sure none of you can identify with this but i'm you know by the seventh eighth day of pesach you've taken a ned there you've sworn up and down you'll never eat again you're done you're finished just a bite because it's a kiddush and one bite that's all i'll have it's all i need i'll never want to eat again i'm so full i'm about to burst i'm about to explode i'm about to die i never need to eat again the rest of my life so you make kiddush and you take a bite and what happens after that first bite what did you discover i have some room turns out i have an appetite turns out i am interested and what's true in the area of eating is true for all the senses and all the pleasure experiences that even when we think we're not interested that with the eating comes the appetite when we begin we find writes this about mitzvos don't wait to be inspired then i'll do the mitzvah do the mitzvah and you'll find it inspiring it will draw and promote a sense of inspiration a sense of inspiration and the same is true we've spoken about this already several times the same is true when it comes to joy and happiness don't wait to be happy then you smile start smiling again we've explained this anatomically physiologically when you engage the micro muscles of the face that are connected and wired to the brain it releases endorphins and and um and uh no adrenaline and you find yourself the smile creates the happiness not the happiness creates the smile so sometimes you have to do the little things give yourself the little pleasures the small joys in life so that now you are predisposed to smiling and feeling happy do the things that bring the happiness and then when you're happy you say ha taka i'm happy there's a hashem he's running the world everything's going to be okay it's going to work out everything's going to be for a reason we're going to make sense of this there will be a tomorrow we'll find our way through it whatever happens is what's meant to be if you smile or you sing when you put music on the year code and if you dance and if you speak language if you speak messages if you learn a vocabulary of a muna so you'll say what am i talking about amuna i don't know if i believe i don't really feel connected i'm down i'm out i'm feeling hopeless and helpless i'm going to start talking to muna hashem with god's help hashem thank god the answer is said you know why we build the moon when i speak a language of a moon a vocabulary vamuna then then i feel a muna in other words the more i talk about him the more i'll see him the more i'll feel him the more i'll sense him the more i'll submit to him then i'll be grateful to him from all be grateful to him you don't see this in any area more than love than love it's not our topic for today but in the area of love when it comes to love people feel if i love then i'll show love but it's the opposite love is not an adjective love is a verb act with love do loving things and you'll feel you'll be drawn you'll fall in love with the recipient the beneficiary of your love ahava the the root of the word love is have in aramaic it means to give love is not from receiving from getting love comes from giving when we give when we plant when we put a piece of ourselves when we invest in someone or something we fall in love with it we don't love and therefore we give we give and therefore we love us after the actions follow the heart follow the heart if tesla writes this famously in his essay on love his definition of love tesla there writes he knew a couple who were separated during the war and the child went with the father not the mother and when they were reunited after the war the mother struggled to be able to ever recover the level of love the father had for the child why because in those formative years of staying up all night and changing diapers and feedings and running and fleeing and protecting and davening and crying and being scared all of that giving and giving and giving and doing and doing and doing creates a bond and a love which you can't artificially recreate you can't recreate without it so naturally a mother has that more instinctively sometimes has the greater responsibility has literally carried that child and therefore for nine months of misery and discomfort and pain and some things that will never be recovered or repaired or or forgotten so all of that is giving nine months of giving and giving and giving creates a love that's why the destiny writes that who loves whom more do parents love children more or children love parents more so every child when you pose that question they enter into this big debate now we love you just as much and what are you talking about i love you more i love you more my kids when i put them to bed at night and i love you more i love you more i love you most you have that little back and forth but if desolates that we know that parents love children more than children could ever love parents why because particularly in those early formative years parents are blessing bless you parents are only givers and children are just takers a child's a baby all they do is take feed me diaper me pay for me protect me buy from me all they do is take by children i mean up to about 30 35. i don't know i'll let you know when i find it by children whatever age of children children are just takers and parents are just givers so you'd think children love parents more all you did receive you got you got you got you received and received and you received so surely they love parents more but they don't cesar of destler anyone will tell you parents love children more than children could ever love parents maybe then come close towards the end of life when the roles are reversed when all of a sudden children i mean this metaphorically are now concerned with changing parents and taking care of parents and are sometimes paying for parents and nurturing and loving and protecting and getting up in the middle of the night for parents when the role is reversed children can first begin to maybe feel the love the parent had for them i've told my children you think you know how much i love you you know when you'll first discover how much i love you when you become a mother when you have your child then you'll first begin to begin to understand how mommy and i feel about you parents love children work as they give so it's a verb it's not an adjective loving is what you do it's not how you feel this is a big lesson for shalom bias also people are very caught up in the feeling of love and feeling of love and romance and love and reading too many novels and watching too many start loving start loving and you'll feel love i'm not oversimplifying this communication and there's time and there's compromise and there are all kinds of really really important components of show and bias but the core component is that love is a verb love is an action love is what we do love is not how you feel which is why god can command us to love all the before shem are bothered how could god say love me how do you command love on demand everything is on demand today love on demand you meet someone you i need you to love me i demand that you love me the man that you love you can't demand or command love so some commentators explain hashem's not saying love is an emotion he's saying practice love show love do love act with love love is a verb love is a verb so this is the this is a theme throughout all of human psyches is who we are human psychology but also torah admits us that after the actions follow the feelings we have it backwards we wait for the feeling and then we'll act no start acting and you'll get the feeling the day the baby comes out maybe different from the mother who carried the baby for nine months but for the father you know this little wrinkled no responsive taker it's hard to love them yet you love them in theory you love them with anticipation for love so you're not taking care of them because you love them you're taking care of them and all that taken care yields love love is a primary primary example but it's true for all of the feelings and hirovich meyer saying it's true for happiness it's true for happiness do things little things little rewards little moments micro moments of simha do the little things that make you happy and joyful and then you will feel the joy and when you feel the joy now you're capable of understanding it in a profound in a deep in a more meaningful way not a superficial way i love shopping and i love dang but you feel it no more deeply meaningful well i'll tell you something very personal often i go to simchas in whatever mood i'm in or however i'm feeling but all of a sudden you're on the dance floor i don't know if you have this experience and because of the music and because of your dancing you get very emotional you feel very connected it opens you up and all of a sudden you can get very very emotional you could get emotional in a in a very um visible way because you didn't think you were feeling you didn't think you were in the mood you didn't think you were happy you didn't think you had energy the next thing you know you put on the music and then you're on the dance floor and all of a sudden what you're discovering what you're discovering so it doesn't have to wait for a simcha for a wedding for a bar mitzvah it could be true in your home until sunday but it could be true put on the music put on the playlist put in the playlist the atmosphere in the home we spoke about the atmosphere when you arrive at the shul school of the shiva the atmosphere the atmosphere we just redid our mix it's magnificent our numends make for our new woman's mikvah they are magnificent one of the things that we introduced we are inspired by others we learn from others is music in the preparation room music i'm not a frequenter of spas but my understanding is you don't go to the spa and it's silent there's music it's an atmosphere there's an ambiance it creates a certain aura and so music put on music use music use music and use movement and use singing and use smiling don't use shopping that's a very expensive one playlists are free but don't use um and speak the language speak the vocabulary speak that you're happy talk with happiness talk with happiness you know we live in a time in a world somehow people think it's a social commodity when you say how are you ah busy crazy busy you know what uh why not just say fantastic fantastic even if you're not again usually the person asking doesn't really care so it doesn't really matter what you answer it's just a social courtesy they're not really sitting down tell me how you're really doing tell me how's your neshama tell me what you're going through tell me i want to listen usually you're like passing by you're walking you ran into each other how are you are you going to really be so i'm fantastic i'm doing great the more you say that the more you'll be i'm doing great i'm alive i'm well the head cat the head count in my home is the same as it was yesterday i have a roof over my head i have my faculties fantastic i'm light years ahead of so many others the igram lazarus this will awaken us this will arouse us so the external exhibiting the simcha awakens and opens up and enables and and the blossoms the inner simhara again describes about elisha that alicia who was in pain because he was accompanied in his entourage with a russia he was exposed to wickedness and evil and it was bringing him down it was negative and it was making him hopeless and helpless and if you're disconnected from simcha if you have no joy and joy for life and simca then you're not really alive so what did he do get me a musician get me an instrument get me a speaker get me a playlist put on some music i got to break out of this funk put on some music through the power of music and movement and smile do you want to be around a negative person i i'm drawn to positivity i love positive energy and positive people it's contagious it's electric everyone's drawn to it hashem's the same way the shrine himself doesn't want to be around your negativity and pessimism and misery he wants to be around positivity hashem hashem doesn't hang around sadness and laziness hashem wants to be drawn to he hangs around his presence is felt palpably those who are those who have drive and energy and enthusiasm and ambition and excitement and excitement so we have to be driven we have to be driven don't wait don't wait for the feeling and act act and it will inspire and incite and bring out that feeling that feeling it's not happiness is not an emotion if you take anything from the last six months of happiness so happiness is not an emotion it's a decision factor said that's why the letters of the word basimha are the same letters of the word makshava because happiness is what you think it's what you concentrate it's what you focus same letters said of happiness starts in your head not your heart happiness starts in your head not your wallet happiness starts in your head not your hand happiness starts in your head not any physical sense it's the decision it's the attitude it's the focus will i look at what i have or what's missing but i look at what's going right or only focus on what's going wrong will i allow myself will i give myself permission or license do i make the decision to do the verb to do the happy things that will yield the happy feeling just like when it comes to all other aspects of avodah every aspect of spiritual growth because that's really our mission is to be involved in spiritual growth to be growing people to not be fixed and stagnant to not feel we've arrived and we're stuck emotionally so many people are they're as immature as they were they were 15 to 20 years old haven't grown haven't opened up haven't matured haven't flourished but that's so tragic it's so tragic to live the same year over and over again and call it a life to look the same dive in the same act the same feel the same we have to grow grow as people grow in our emotional development grow in our intellectual cognitive development grow in who we are avodah to be growing refursh i just told you about now i'll tell you a reverse was very focused on language swarm all about language and grammar so the letter i'm sorry sin the simcha the letter sin is interchangeable with it with a sadhik so it first says if you interchange certain letters that we have are interchangeable so a um a sin is interchangeable with sadi so the word simcha really is the word means to blossom to sprout to grow simcha is growth there's growth you feel basimha when you grow when you have a growth spurt you feel your basement you feel your basement and when you are basingha you're open to growing you don't grow when you're negative and down and out and miserable that's not what stimulates growth but stimulates growth they go together so back to richard meyer you have to ask a lot for it there's nothing in life that we get without asking hashem for help it doesn't come for free beautiful cups caffeinate with cavanaugh and our notebooks are almost done they're actually being produced right now and finally we're going to launch our little online that you can buy our cups and our notebooks we're not promoting a brand or making money we're promoting amuna promoting growth promoting simcha if you have other ideas of other other pieces of merch as they call it young people that we can provide that will inspire let me know so there's nothing hashem designed the world that you have to ask in order to get you have to dive in hard you could work hard you also created a world where we have to work hard where we have to show uh initiative take initiative but we also have to ask alludes to something which sounds absurd it sounds somewhat ridiculous it sounds ridiculous hashem i dive into you that you let me feel happiness make me happy diamond for happiness you want to know an even more absurd feeling but an appropriate one we're going to get to it soon instead of snippets hashem i'm dominant to you help me daven i'm struggling with my davening so hashem i'm dominating that you helped me davin we all say that every day three times a day you know when we say that every day three times a day i'm darkening to you help me davan it's how we start the amidah hashem hashem i hope this goes well it will go well if you help me make it go well so before i dive in i just want to dive and let you help me daven that's what we say every day it's a little little appetizer a little um what do they call that preview a little preview to the sitter snippets we're about to start the i'm very excited so tell everybody you know they should sign up and join us six minutes a day to a meaningful davening six meaning minutes a day to a meaningful amidah so we say it all the time hashem i'm dominating that you help me dauphin you wanna say even more absurd than that when we're struggling with ammuna and we're struggling to feel his presence to know he's there to live with confidence that he's in our life hashem davening i'm asking for your help to believe in you what you're only doving to the one you believe in so i'm struggling to believe so i'm going to daven to help me believe in you makes no sense except it does hashem is your father it does if it dominating is the key to open the doors to any blessing to any flow to any brit any brach any shepherd that we want in our life so that was where richard meyer he reminds us that even if we're doing everything we can right we're doing all the micro little we've got the playlist and we're dancing we're drinking the coffee and we're shopping a little bit we're eating our favorite food assuming it's healthy for us and in moderation we're doing well we're doing all the little things that should make us happy but i'm not feeling happy why aren't i happy i sit and i look and i focus my basim is on i'm smiling i'm engaging the micro muscles and i'm still not feeling happy why why am i so anxious why am i so unhappy so maybe there's one last thing that's missing do you ask hashem do you turn to him do you surrender to him do you tell him even with everything else i'm doing right it won't work unless you give the go-ahead i can't turn the key unless you unlock the door it won't work it won't work so i'm asking i'm dabbling i'm asking for i'm asking for your help let me in truth authentically feel real joy tetfila we've dominated for our children grandchildren friends people we know who are suffering struggling depressed having that they feel happiness and joy can't have it for ourselves can't ask it for ourselves we can't ask him [Music] because everything depends on simha everything depends on it that state of mind that frame of mind that attitude that approach to life that perspective everything else that we want will depend on it every relationship that we cherish i mean again it doesn't take rocket science to realize which will produce better more well-balanced children when they grow up in a home in an atmosphere where there was simcha or when there was anxiousness and misery and anger and complaints and negativity and pessimism which will produce healthier children with all the worry and fear and all the money we spend and all the investment in our children what are they experiencing carpool what are they experiencing on earth shabbos is it anger and yelling and frustration what do they experience at bedtime what do they experience when they're being stubborn now listen what are they experience not when things are going right what do they see when things are going wrong you're running late to the airport the flight's delayed are you stuck at the red light or the pipe bursts on the wall what do they see with all the money and all the investment and all the energy and all the time but how we react in the level of simcha in our homes the simcha in our homes that's what it's all about i won't say who but um recently bought hashem with a great supposed to make a wedding so a dear friend of mine who uh tested positive a couple weeks before before the wedding so i knew that he was positive he recovered thank god he had a very mild case and attempted to tell you who it is because he deserves the credit but i don't have his permission so a few days before the wedding i checked in with him and i just said i assume you can't make it i know that you were sick a few weeks ago that you tested positive and well you know it's okay it's the problem i'm just checking in so he writes back i just tested positive for being this simple for this wedding i wouldn't miss it for the world i'll be there right it was a great it actually put a smile on my face you know people like to write back lol or whatever it actually made me smile he wrote back just tested positive for excitement for coming to this wedding i wouldn't miss it for the world just tested positive just tested positive start by gibber my dear friend over here just tested positive for being bisenca it's got a great symbol so we got to test positive for being the simha we got to test ourselves so we test positive for being basingha if our home were tested for simra right you got a carbon monoxide detector and a smoke detector and this detector and that detector what about the simcha detector what would it detect in our home what would it detect in our carpool what would it detect at bedtime and dinner time and bath time and homework time what would it detect and travel time what would it detect the simcha detector would it find that we're basement or not so the last thing that we have to be doing the one other thing we have to do is daven stalin hard we have to engage the micro muscles and put on the music and move our feet and the basham toe of bissim it begins in our head we have to do the external things which will yield and bring the feeling at the end of the day you gotta die ask hashem every day let me feel this even when i do all of the right things let me feel basement let me feel basement let me be happiness and happy let me be joyful or just to the first paragraph we'll pick up with this next week because next week hashem will be in your shalam on sunday having a barbecue in the base of mikdash no fast no three weeks but if we're not if we're not next wednesday when we're back this section couldn't be more perfect hashem is amazing now the timing practice we've been learning this for how many months and we're up to indian how do you reconcile the pain for the khurban based on mikdash with all this about being bisimra and when are we up to it first wednesday of the three weeks there's no chance there's no coincidences there's nothing random in life there's nothing random in this world yes we'll start is the foundation of life this is the number one shadow question you should ask when researching today this is the most important um this is the most important detector you have to have in your home enough let's get real there's a hormone let's get real there's no base on mikdash and what's the consequence of that there's rising anti-semitism this rising anti-israel there are enemies there's hate there are pogroms and persecution and oppression and attempted extermination there's no base on niktas there's no we're still in a harsh exile how am i supposed to be happy in the simcha okay great you could go back to eritrea you don't have to take a test before or when you land back hashem but guess what when you show up at the kotel you look up you know it's still there a big gold dome not a base on it's not there still people throwing rocks down and pointing missiles at so how am i supposed to be what happened to being mitsaar what happened to wake up in the middle of the night tikka katsos about to enter the three weeks in the nine days and tish above how do you reconcile with that hashem will pick up with it next week but in this way you don't have to be mahmeer in the ten minutes of meaning we just spoke music also there are no coincidences we're up to the 19th parak and what was that talking about today hashem only loves you if you love his children abbas israel so i said you know you don't have to wait till sunday to start practicing abbas israel for abbas israel foreign have four weeks not three weeks but for toning down the simcha you don't have to be mahmeer and start now it's the opposite i'll tell you don't be mahmeer and not be now wait till sunday you don't have to wait for the three weeks to turn it down right now play that music play that funky music right now play that music and move your feet and dance and engage those micro muscles and smile and feel that inner simha and place your marshava bisimra and grow and create an environment where you can become the best and better version of yourself tonight behind the bhima 9 pm until next time stay happy stay healthy and stay holy