☎️ Thu Nov 21 | 9 PM ET | Rabbi Shais Taub LIVE call-in show

[Music] hey hey hey hey hey hey hey hey hey hey hey hey hey [Music] he hey hey hey he hey hey hey hey hey hey [Music] hi Welcome to our live Callin show by the way that's a little theme music there that's actually an original work that I commissioned for just such a purpose as this um you might have for those of you who follow the world of turntablism and DJ competitive DJs so there was a guy he won the the turntable competition I don't know at least 10 years ago uh named scratch bastard and yeah you heard me and he won by doing a like a turntable version of The Imperial March anyway you could Google Google it it's pretty interesting so I I contacted him and I asked him could he take some old records by the way do people know what these records are behind me people even notice that there are records behind me these LP I actually got these from my dear friend Kim K who may be watching or at least he'll probably watch on repeat on replay uh he is a vinyl collector and these are both the red and the yellow they're just two different presses of volume one is a a project of archiving traditional hdic Melodies specifically from the kabad community so is actually the acronym so these you see they're actually duplicates the red and the yellow it's the same picture it's the same same uh album name H but just I they pressed it red once and they pressed it yellow another time anyway so I sent scratch basted some hidic vinyl and I said what can you do with it and then he created this this is actually this is actually the one is called which is based on a verse I believe from the prophet Isaiah indeed you are you are a hidden God speaking to Hashem and saying you are a hidden God Hashem hides behind nature the predictability of Nature and instead of seeing the miracle the ongoing Miracle of existence it becomes in our own subjective view commonplace and therefore we don't see the godliness although the godliness is not only there it is everything so that's we'll do a little bit more here yeah you see this just took the the violin part from the and then he put it in the drums you put in the the base you hear you put in a little Baseline there see I'm wearing headphones so I really hear the Basse it's really thumping Bas and then here's the vocals you dropped in the vocals which is the paciic [Music] choir anyways that's that's a great deal of fun isn't it okay I have other uh music on my soundboard as well this is like okay children everyone sit in your place make yourself comfortable at your mat and we're going to have quiet time right now everybody just keep your hands to yourself no don't don't put your foot on your neighbor's don't put your foot on your neighbor's mat just relax there plenty of space to out okay that's if I ran a Kindergarten class and now you know what that would be like okay how many people do we have on with us 32 watching now okay so this is the third time we're doing the live call-in show um it's an experiment it's an experiment in this medium this format basically the idea is like this I make a lot of online content mostly the content that I care the most about is the long form content like lectures classes where I really get to get into an idea and explain it properly that's that's really where my heart and soul is I know I do a lot of short form content as well on social media but that's more like just the the teaser to get people hopefully to get them into the the funnel as they as they say um but my kids were really pushing me that I should do on here on YouTube this uh call-in format they were like you should do a call-in format you know like a I don't know if they said or I said like oh like a Dave Ramsey and they're like yeah I mean we're not going to talk about finances by the way I'm a big proponent of credit cards I I I have like 20 credit cards and and and that's tame I used to have a lot more and I'm a big proponent of Dan's Deals and shout out to Dan Alf who is a good friend of mine and one of one of my mentors and teachers in finance in the ways of miles and points so you know I could do a miles and points uh show actually I couldn't cuz I'm out of the loop but once upon a time I was pretty Savvy about that stuff I don't even know how to cash out gift cards I don't even know if that's the way the manufacturer spend today okay at any rate so um yeah my kids were telling me to do a call-in show and I was like uh I don't know it's going to be difficult technically technical part of it is you know technological part of it is hard um but here I am I'm running it myself I got my roadter back there with my my music on it and um we're live streaming on YouTube right now thank god without a hitch it's so it seems and my son yel set up the call-in Cent um through some type of I don't know software that I don't really understand how it works and um so here we are so we worked out the technical side and then the other hesitancy that I had was I said how are we going to get good calls how are we not going to just get prank calls Baba buy calls and um you guys what what age is the crowd out there do you guys know what I'm talking about is that very like Gen X specific as a reference I never know what demographic here is following me yeah so I said what are we going to do we're going to just get a bunch of people calling in saying Baba buoy which my kids didn't know what that meant but I explained it to them uh so then we came up with this system will you email first and then if it seems like you're an authentic person then we give you the call-in number so that's why we're not giving out the call-in number oh no no we are not telling that uh prized information of the secret call-in number we are uh yeah we're giving out the email info@ soulwords dorg so if you email us at info you can do it now right now someone will see your email I hope uh info I think my daughter tyel is monitoring the emails info soulwords dorg and uh if you have a question but I don't mean like Stomp the rabbi like a question like I always wondered what clothes will people wear when they come back in the resurrection like I don't really want to do that kind of stuff but if you have a real thing in your life that you want to talk about and you're willing to do it here publicly you know we don't have to say your first last name and your Social Security number you know you you could you could even make up a name if you want but you know we'll hear your voice and um if you want to be part of that yeah you could email info@ souls. org and uh then we'll we'll get back to you and let you know about the call in okay and tyel says yes Ty's live on the email Manning the email or womaning the email tyel is a woman tyo is my baby but she's also a mommy yeah she's my daughter but she herself is a mommy now so very proud of you tyel and thank you for womaning the email um okay what else well you is uh on the Google Doc this is the I'm revealing all the how the sausage sausage is made so to speak so how do I know what I'm supposed to do I look on this Google doc and I get instructions from my son um oh he's writing we can start with the first caller already what a helpful son thank you so much okay you s all uh could you put through the first caller please hello hello you hear me hi yes thanks for taking the time to answer my question no problem okay so what is this call about just so the people listening understand I don't have any prep I don't know what this is about so I'm learning as you all are learning at the same time okay what's the callout so I have a very strong need to feel understood um and to feel Val like my to feel that my experience is validated and my husband has a hard time with that he doesn't feel things as deeply Ash and I'm wondering um how I can how I can um experience that validation either from within myself or from Hashem well well that's amazing because you basically answered the question which uh is usually the most valid answer is your own answer but let me just unpack this for everybody else okay so first of all you have a a desire to feel understood um not to take away anything unique about you because we're all unique but that's a universal thing I think pretty much everyone universally wants to be understood so I'm just letting you not to take away anything from your uniqueness but I'm just saying I think everybody empathizes with that we want to be understood now what it means to be understood or what signals let us know that we're understood I think vary widely from person to person but the basic desire to be understood I think is 99.9% of of humanity has that desire now the second thing you mentioned is your husband is not as deep as you are and I don't know if you said emotionally but I think I took that sort of as the implication that when you said deep you meant emotionally as opposed to like like let's say intellectually meaning it's not like you want to talk about philosophy and he's not able to keep up with you it's like you want to talk about emotions that are very intense and he's not able to go to that level of emotional intensity is that correct it's actually both but now I'm only talking about so now I just made your problem worse okay so he's not I'm I'm just joking around all right don't we have to have a bit little bit of a sense of humor over here even though these are serious things all right so but let's throw it all out on the table and we'll deal with all of it because I think it's probably connected so you would like like to be understood not only emotionally but also intellectually there are things that you think about that are interesting thoughts that maybe even important thoughts and you would like to have him hear it and understand what you're saying there are also feelings that you feel which you feel deeply and you would like him to be able to empathize with what you feel and it's not that he's just correct me if I'm wrong but it's not that he's um refusing to do it it's not like he does it for other people it's just not his thing right right okay he would love to do it for me but it's yeah tell me more about that he would love to do it for you how do you know he would love to do it for you um because we talk about it and he tells me that and he is a really kind and loving person and he would do anything to make me happy that is so important let's say that again he's a kind and loving person who would do anything anything to make you happy let's say it a third time he's a kind and loving person who would do anything to make you happy you won the lottery you're a lucky woman so I'm so blessed you are blessed you are blessed and he told you I want to do this for you I want to do it I I I know what you're asking I'm trying to do it I can't do it so that's wonderful I mean the willingness to be there for you the way you want him to be there for you is I mean really that's everything and this is a totally different call that we're having than if the situation would be like someone calls in and says listen my husband is deep and he's on everyone's wavelength and he's able to validate and understand everybody but when I have something to talk about he's like eh I'm busy that'll be a totally different discussion right yeah right yeah okay so as you say you are blessed you have a wonderful kind husband he wants to be able to do this for you it's just it's not within his capacity okay so you sort of answered the question like I mentioned uh earlier but I'll say it again you answered the question you said is there a way that I could find this validation from myself or from Hashem and I think I'm going to go with your answer I think your intuition is right on um in fact I'm going to ask you to tell me about that like being that you do have a wonderfully loving and kind and supportive husband but you have these intense needs for being heard or understood on a deep level tell me how you might try to experience that within yourself or in your relationship with ashm um I'm not really sure that's why why I'm calling you I did try recently you know what I'm good at every single day with my my expertise at least I think I am is I'll get you to say it because if I say it I could be wrong it might be a smart idea but it not might not be the right answer for you but if I can get you to say it it's usually right so I'm just going to facilitate and I'll sort of give you prompts and I think I'll get you to say your own answer that'll work perfectly for you okay so anyways I was interrupting you please go ahead no yeah so I did start like a couple weeks ago to every single day have a conversation with SM not um asking for anything or not saying thank you for anything just saying how I feel and my experience um it's definitely helpful but it's not that level like I think that I need more skill or more tips on how to get where I want to get to okay so you attempted having a conversation with a gem and it wasn't you didn't feel like you knew how to do it well enough for it to be fulfilling that's sort of what you're saying it's awesome it is it's awesome I love it I'm going to keep doing it okay tell me about tell tell me more about what's working tell me what is working working about it so the things I whatever I say I know that like kasham understands that even more than I understand it like he understands my experience from the core of it and why I feel that way and how it's connected to everything in my past every little detail and why it's happening to me and how it's happening all those kind of stuff so that's very validating yeah um yeah so that's been working that part okay generally speaking the approach to success is to take what's working and to amplify it so you know there's an expression you should go from strength to strength and that what what that means is that success breeds success so if we could figure out a little bit more about what part of this is working and just sort of multiply it I think uh that would be the the pathway to having even more success with this approach so tell me a little bit more about this one of the first thing you said is that when you are having your conversation with Hashem one of the things that's gratifying about it is that you know that he understands your experience even better than you yourself understand it um is that an important is that an important idea to you yeah because right the same way that if I'm telling somebody else something but they don't understand the level of my experience like the depth of my experience then that leaves me like feeling like not not validated or understood right and here it's like to a level that no human being can even understand and and the difference between hashem's ability to understand you and a human being lack of ability to understand you is based on what the fact that what I mean I could give you some suggestions if you want like because a human being is finite and Hashem is infinite is that what it is or it could be just just illustrate that there are other ways of thinking about this yeah go ahead because H actually has that understanding he understands it even more than how I understand it why why does he understand it more so that's what because he has the full picture because he has what he has the full picture he has the full picture because right and like he's he's the creator of it like he he created all these things he has the clarity that I don't always have and even if I do have Clarity it's nothing to compare to you know so he understands your experience your subjective unique personal experience even better than you do because he has the full picture right right okay so that's in a way it's not just that he understands me fully it's even more than that it's that it's very humbling because I'm also coming to realize that I am not the expert I am not the ultimate uh Arbiter of deciding my own experience meaning among humans I'm probably the most qualified to say what my experience is like if you would ask me what do you have for breakfast this morning and I tell you uh a cup of coffee and uh well that's what I had a cup of coffee and you would say to me well what kind of breakfast is that you you should have a bowl of cereal and some uh eggs and I could say to you well maybe that's what I should have but that's not what I did have and I'm telling you I'm the expert in my experience so when it comes to human beings you are the expert in your experience nobody could tell you what you're feeling better than you can tell and report about what your own feelings are and yeah and and there's a certain right that there's a certain um stability that a person gains from from making that claim and understanding really you know I I I I do know my story I do know my life uh I I you know one of the things that's even worse than someone not understanding you is somebody deliberately misunderstanding you which sometimes they call gaslighting and kind of manipulating your own story like don't tell me what I lived I lived it right so there's a certain value in being able to say you know what I understand my story I've lived it I'm the expert in it and that's a very healthy thing to be able to to qualify yourself as the expert in your own subjective experience at the same time however flip side of that this is like the opposite but it's also important is to say and you know what at the end of the day although I understand my situation better than anyone else understands it because I'm the one who's in it at the end of the day I know very little and I'm just a finite human being and there's a lot about my own life that I don't know and can't know and it's very humbling and that humbling effect allows us to let go of a lot of the illusion of control where we think we know better we think we know what outcomes should be we think we we think that we have the right timeline for how things are supposed to proceed but when you remember hold on a second there's one who's an even bigger expert ERT in me than I am and that's my Creator then it humbles us and it allows us to have a certain feeling of curiosity about our own life you know that that the the expert the occupational hazard of knowing too much or thinking you know a lot is that you're no longer curious because you think you have all the answers and then you don't learn but when you're when you realize that there's so how much you don't know then you retain that Curiosity and curiosity is a great way to go through life it's basically like saying let me just show up and see what happens so I think there's an aspect of this conversation with Hashem that you can tap into where it's not only Hashem knows me and can validate me and understands my experience but there's something even deeper than that which you may not have been consciously looking for but it's the idea that and when I'm having a conversation with the infinite it humbles me because I remind myself of the infinite knowledge about my own circumstances which I fundamentally lack and that that's okay because I'm a finite being I'm human I'm a I'm a human I can't know everything I just need to show up for my own life and to experience it and sometimes things don't go the way that I think they should go yourself that you know what your reality is and not to let anyone Gaslight you about it but at the same time flip side is to also remember at the end of the day there's so much more that I'll never be able to know and therefore I'm just going to continue to show up for my own life with curiosity with and with humility does any of that resonate with you right yeah it's it does it very much does but sometimes it doesn't feel like so like practical because I'm not hearing like a person talking back to me right and validating that experience so that part is something I think that I struggle with yeah of like how do I find that or that piece with it yeah so I can give you one recommendation as far as missing that response where we normally think of a conversation as I speak and then I listen and when it's a conversation with Hashem we don't really experience that unless you're a prophet um so one thing I could recommend is like this the B taught that everything you see and hear is by Divine Providence Hashem orchestrated that that thing should happen and that you should be there and that you should see it and therefore every single thing that you are conscious of is by Design there's no mistake and therefore everything you experience is communication from Hashem and when you realize that then you start to see how you're being answered through your life like I got up this morning and as part of my prayers I was speaking to Hashem about this particular feeling or idea that I had and then what do you know I go I leave the house and I had this experience which seems to be like a response to what I had just been talking about so the the answer that's enlightening okay I'm glad that's enlightening and I hope that you'll be able to put that into practice and you know it might take a while to get really really good at it but Hashem is speaking to us all the time by the way I I I mean you are aware of the fact that creation itself is the product of divine speech you're familiar with this concept yes yes so blessed is he who spoke and the world came into being Hashem speaks the world into being and the 22 holy letters of of the olive base our 22 Elemental energies are building blocks through which Hashem creates everything the combinations of those Elemental building blocks create everything and therefore really everything is really made of letters everything is made of this code and everything is language it's all it's all communication right yeah so it makes life think yeah something to think about and also something to look for in actual practice to go out into your life and be ready to to to learn from every experience a lot of times we think of like a a learning experience is only something that's like well I had this challenge I had to overcome it and then I had a learning experience but the reality is every single detail is orchestrated from on high for some purpose Nothing Is Random so you're walking down the street and you know you see a red car drive by well I don't know if you'll figure out the meaning but there is meaning and maybe the meaning is just to remind you to reflect upon the fact that there's meaning in everything yeah yeah okay that was a really uh it was a very nice call I really appreciate you taking the time and being open And discussing your situation I hope uh you gain from it I hope other people gain from from it we have a lot of people waiting tonight still thank you thank you so much and have a great night so we have a lot of people still waiting so I'm gonna ask y to Y are you the one who runs the calls basically yeah am I speaking to the right person is it Mishi is it tyel is it who else is on my team over here I don't know it's my uh basically maybe it's Mali I I think it's like my married kids basically who run the production behind the scenes Okay so we'll get this more streamlined in the future as we go on okay somebody is up somebody's on the call you all can we put the next caller on the line I'm ready for the next caller hello you there all right I'm waiting for the next yeah hi you're on the hello yes you're live oh hi Hi how are you I'm doing well how about you very good very good I'm happy to be on the show excellent so what do you want to talk about new diversity something that I heard a podcast that you spoke about yeah and I wanted to talk about a little bit more okay let's talk about it I'm not a professional I do not know too much about it I just had a couple of questions about it okay I'm also not a professional I'm also not a professional but you no but I mean say you were talking about it so so I talked about better than me I the fact that I talked about it doesn't mean that I know much more than what I spoke about but go ahead we can have a conversation okay the the the short uh short hand of it is is that lately in the past like 30 40 years the world is coming a little bit into of a understanding of the part of the general population whatever number it is I don't know how much percentage it is that think differently communicate differently socialize differently than the rest of the typical part of the population yes and neurodiversity says what they're trying to say at least is is that till today civilization knew that there's a part of the civilization that doesn't communicate perceive the way the rest of the population does so they were trying very hard to make them that Minority join the majority um and you were speaking about what the uh people had to do called masking in order to be able to survive yes which means that I need to learn very quickly how to communicate and how to try and fit in in basically socially communication um etc etc yes so what what I was trying to understand and why I'm ask I'm trying to ask you even though there's a lot of different parts to it yeah is us as Jews okay especially from Jews okay it's not something that's going to say it's not going to say in the it's not going to say in but but besides the besides if there's a possibility that for thousands of years we've been treating a part of Claus in a way that is like almost like I'm not going to say um cruel but definitely made the other part of civilization we made them feel not only inferior we made them feel that or they're going to be like us exactly if not they could forget about ever having any kind of benefit of being part of the CL yeah um and and in some ways we subjected them to very different kind of treatments that they consider considered cruel yeah mean to say the minority the minority considered cruel for the past couple of thousands of years yeah so my question is if we see if we see in the world gave to the world and they opened up a whole new understanding of the of EQ of people's emotions and people's feelings and different kinds of ways of communicating of perceiving and these are things that the entire world all around the world no matter where you are different countries the books and the studies are all being done in every single language so it's a it's a it's a it's a gift from Hashem to the world yeah in the past 50 years let's say so why Jews especially um I'm not talking about the modern Orthodox or the conservative or the reform because for some odd reason because they're always so busy about the other person and inclusion and never excluding so they are the first ones that are going to be open to neurodiversity okay differences and accepting differences and accepting that even though for thousands of years why you want to talk about why the Orthodox Community has a unique challenge in accepting differences such as neurodiversity um I don't think that they have a problem accepting differences such as neurodiversity I think they should be the first one to say that you know what for the past couple thousands of years we were wrong and now we really need to start learning where we were wrong what we did until today why we did it because we had a fear yeah um or because or because we are we are Centric to our kinds our types so let's you had Israel versus B uh versus ASI versus versus missned or you know continuously continuously continuously but never was it in a cruel way it was just you're not my kind okay but in this part of Kus just as Thea civilization they was they were they were subjected to terrible terrible um fruity okay for thousands of years so to say you said about the problem where people leave claer people leave us because of this reason of what people are doing to to to them so they just leave us so who knows maybe if there's like millions of people over the many thousands of years that left us because of the way we treated them yeah why are we not the first people I just want to add on one more thing okay I'm done okay there's a lot of talk by us today you hear it over and over again my different part of my my other finger my other hand my foot my hand mean to say we reached the point we we we we understand that theam wants us to understand that as much as we have that feeling of you're not me you're not like me so I got to stay away from you but we really reached a point where we're starting understand that we're one so not only we should be the first because we might be making a huge mistake and we need to correct it but we should be while we are accepting this thing of is just like M and there's zero difference in the zero difference in why can't we apply it to this area too right I'm done okay all right so let me you you said lot of you made a lot of good points there so let me respond to that so first of all you're sort of observing what you think is a curious situation seemingly people who have Torah knowledge should appreciate this idea of neurodiversity I'm not sure that you were saying that or not but I'm saying that I'm saying that that people with to knowledge should appreciate neurodiversity and then it sounded like half of a complaint that it hasn't been that way but also maybe a um a challenge challenging the community and saying step up and let's let's start doing this so let let me just talk briefly about this because you bring it up and there's a lot of terms here which I'm sure that a lot of listeners didn't understand uh because some of these terms were Hebrew terms and not everybody here went to Yeshiva and knows those terms and then some of those terms were terms that are specific to uh psychology and that I'm not sure everybody's versed in those particular things okay um so let me just try to break it down in a very simple way without turning this into a whole uh one-hour lecture about neurodiversity in Torah and the uh current situation in the Orthodox Community let me just try to really super simplify it neurodiversity simply means that different people have different brains their brains are wired differently now within neurodiversity you have two basic categories neurotypical which means the way that most people's brains are wired and neurod Divergent those whose wiring diverges or goes away from what is typ iCal not better or worse just what's more common and what's less common okay and neurodiversity just means that there are both kinds and that they live in a society with each other and have to interact with each other and sometimes live in families with each other or marriages with each other and have to interact with each other that's what the neurodiversity means okay so Torah says that every single person's mind is different so from a certain perspective there really is nothing neurotypical from a certain perspective every mind is different every mind diverges from every other mind and this is the concept that the our sages refer to when they say that the mind of no two people are alike and it goes as far as to say just like no two human beings have exactly the same face even identical twins look a little bit different no two human beings have the same face so too no two human beings minds are wired identically they don't have the same way of thinking same thought process so in that sense Torah says that everyone is neuro neuro Divergent U furthermore just to amplify that concept there is a blessing that one makes in the presence of 600,000 Jewish people because 600,000 Jews left Egypt so that's considered a number that is like you know you have 10 which is a minion a quorum for prayer okay so 600,000 is like a number that equates the entirety of the nation obviously with uh with uh different generations with the reproduction you have more than 600,000 but the point is that that that minimum number of 600,000 could be more than 600,000 but that minimum number of 600,000 represents you have a whole nation a whole nation of people and when you observe such a a spectacle there's a blessing that you're supposed to make and the blessing is which means blessed are you Hashem the knower of Secrets why do you say that blessing so I say just explain that because when you see an entire nation of people and you real realiz that in that massive crowd every single one of those people's brains Works differently then you are inspired to be in awe of God who's the only one who could keep track of all the different minds and that's why we refer to him as the knower of secrets in that context by the way it's interesting because the previous caller was talking about how she seeks out validation for her unique thoughts and unique feelings and she seeks that out in her relationship with hasm so that's very uh related relevant to this idea of that hem is the knower of secrets that he's the only one who can meet each person where they are and understand them and get them because he made them so of course the Craftsman knows how the the uh The Vessel works the vessel that he designed and created all right so that's that's one concept that really Torah says we're all neurod Divergent all right now that's from one perspective from another perspective no we're not all neur Divergent there is s something called neurotypical and we find it even in Hala I'm say I'm using an example from Ala because when some Hala means Jewish law because when something is codified in Jewish law then it means it's speaking on the most practical level it's not speaking on an an abstract level you know there are different levels of Torah study and sometimes we speak on abstraction level sometimes we speak on in in higher worlds higher ples of reality where it's entirely spiritual entities but in Hala in Jewish law it's talking about um on the most practical level so in in in Jewish law you have a concept of butal that his mind that this individual's mind or this individual's opinion is discount counted well that's a terrible thing why are we discounting his opinion okay let me explain the context an example of where bottle D would apply in in Jewish law would be you have to make a blessing on food okay so let's say it's a potato you want to make a blessing on a potato B El are you who uh created the fruit of the earth and uh but let's say this guy wants to eat the potato raw and he wants to make a blessing on the fruit of the Earth but he's going to eat the potato raw so actually we say to him no you can't make that blessing because that's not how you eat a potato you don't eat potatoes raw he says no but I do we tell him okay you can you can eat it raw but you can't make the blessing that is made on eating potatoes because that's not the d That's not the norm de means the way but in this context it means the norm that's not the norm and we can't stop you from eating raw potatoes but you can't use this blessing which is the blessing on eating potatoes when you're eating it in the not normal way okay so even in Jewish law we do recognize there are certain things which are I'll call it neurotypical and things that are neuro neurod Divergent all right um as far as embracing those differences and being tolerant of those difference as and maybe even going to the point of celebrating those differences I'll tell you something interesting I posted a video a couple of days ago um I mentioned that there is great parenting wisdom in mishle the Book of Proverbs SCH King Solomon wrote a book of Proverbs and I quoted the verse educate the child according to his way even when he grows old he will not depart from it so I explained that what is King Solomon saying there he's saying don't educate the child with a cookie cutter lesson plan don't come into the classroom and say Here's what I'm teaching today meet the child at the child's level figure out how the child will receive the lesson and adjust adapt to make it fitting for who you're trying to teach and that's what it means Al according to his way educate the child not according to your way the teacher's way but Al according to the child's way and then the child will actually receive it and if the child really receives it then even when he grows old he will not depart from it in other words you can force somebody to be behaviorally compliant while you're watching them and standing over them but you're not really instilling in them their own internal sense of right and wrong if you're just sort of forcing it on on them however if you do it Al according to the person's unique wiring you speak to them in words that make sense to them and and in a style in a tone and with references and the whole milu is crafted to be supportive of the way this person best learns ah then it becomes their own and then you don't even have to check up on them to make sure they're doing it of course they're going to do it they own it now became integrated with them within them they're going to do it they're going to do it on their own without being reminded without being coerced without being bribed uh so that's that's that concept I put up a video about it and it was so interesting because on Instagram a lot of people I think at this point we're close to 300,000 followers barash on Instagram so I I was actually telling somebody the other day uh somebody asked me about something I said on Instagram and I said well you know that's not necessarily how how I would say it not the words that I would use if I were speaking to let's say a religious Jewish crowd but for the wider audience that's the word that's more understood I think that and so um and I said you do understand that the majority of the Instagram following is not Jewish she was like what it is you're a rabbi why are you making content for non-jews I said first of all I'm not making it for non-jews I'm not even making it for Jews I'm making what I like I'm making what I like and whoever shows up is welcome and I'm thrilled whoever shows up and likes it you know I don't get to pick who who Who's resonating with my content I I put out stuff that I like and we see who likes it all right so and I and so I told her I said you you have to know one thing the Jewish world is not that big if you see a Jewish account that has big numbers where like there's millions of views on a on a video which barash we've had many videos like that that had millions of views if you see a Jewish video has millions of views I promise you the majority of the views are non-jews because you're not going to get those types of numbers limited to the Jewish community so I'm saying this as an aside I had this video about educate the child according to his way even when he'll grow old he will not depart from it and it was so interesting a lot of non-jews who come from I I was I suppose a Christian background because they were aware of of the biblical verse uh they commented and said this is such a novel interpretation Al according to the child's way no it's according to God's way so some people were happy with it and they said this is so accommodating s such a breath of fresh air that you're being so accepting and tolerant other people were condemning they were like that's not what it means that's not what it means why why are you manipulating scripture to those people I said by the way you did hear that I literally read the verse ever I recited the verse in the original Hebrew not in some King James or any other translation I literally said the verse in the original Hebrew and translated word for word don't trust me trust anyone else who understands Biblical Hebrew the verse says educate the child according to the child's way in other words in a way befitting the unique capacity of the child you're trying to teach so at any rate some people still couldn't accept that and they're like no that's not what it means CU in my English translation of the Bible it says something different it's very frustrating to me but also humorous in a not such funny way but I guess you got to kind of kind of laugh at it that they're still insisting in clinging to their English translation of the Bible when I just literally read the original Hebrew of King Solomon and translated every single word and I'm telling them don't trust me as your translator ask anyone else who's fluent in Biblical Hebrew and they'll translate it the same way but at any rate get the child according to his way well right there right there you have a Biblical source for Education which is neurod Divergent friendly or neurodiverse meaning when you're educating someone whether it's your child or even let's say you're trying to have a conversation with somebody and you're trying to communicate with them that's a form of Education um Al dark don't say it the way you want to say it if you want to say it the way you want to say it then go stand somewhere uh out in an open field at night and say it as loud as you want and say it as often as you want but if you're talking to a person don't say it the way you want to say it say it the way they have a chance of actually hearing it so yeah I think this is a big concept that we need to become aware of as far as adjusting the way we deliver messages so that the recipient can actually absorb it um there's a few uh comments coming in in the chat and it's very hard for me to keep up with while we're flowing over here but uh I will just mention one more thing before we get to the next caller and that is that uh our previous caller spoke about masking and I do want to speak about that very very very briefly so a previous caller mentioned that sort of the mainstream or the the majority is causing pain to the minority and I want to kind of um push back on that I don't believe that there is widespread intentional systemic oppression in in any malicious way what I believe is there's obliviousness meaning to say the majority isn't purposely trying to hurt the minority it's that the majority is so comfortable in assuming that everybody experiences the life the same way they do that they don't even recognize that there's this minority that operates differently and because there's no recognition of that then the onus becomes completely on the minority to figure out how to fit in and that causes a lot of pain so I just want to explain I don't think that at least on any widespread level people are going around and saying how can I make life more difficult for neurod Divergent people I I don't think that's happening certainly not in the Jewish Community that's not happening not in any Community I've ever lived in nobody's saying how can I purposely make things harder for them how can I punish them by making life harder for them nobody's saying that what they are saying or probably more accurately not saying what they're not saying is how can I recognize the fact fact that there are people for whom the way we've set things up is really not AC not accommodating and that's what causes the pain that somebody who's neur neurod Divergent is forced to try to figure out the unwritten rules that everybody else seems to have already received in order to not become a social outcast and that's exhausting incredibly exhausting um and it leads to a lot of other issues of internalized self-hatred where you feel that your way your natural way of being is not acceptable and the only way that you're able to be accepted is by playing an act so that causes a lot of internalized self-hatred um and and uh it's also it's it's just deple eating people don't realize that for a nerd Divergent person who is constantly having to be on their toes through every interaction so just a trip out to the grocery store and back can be exhausting they can come back from a just a trip to the grocery store and even if you use the uh the what do you call it the automatic checkout the computer checkout which is a godsent for a lot of neurode Divergent people it's like I do not want the stress of having the have social banter Light Social banter with the clerk at the grocery store so just the fact that I can beep beep my own uh product at the what is that thing that checkout called where it's automated computerized whatever so for a lot of neurodivergent people that's a godsend but at anyway even if I go out to the grocery store and I use the computerized the automated checkout just being out and about in the world and trying to fit in is exhausting and how much more so being forced into an an environment where let's say there's an intense amount of stimuli like a wedding let's say where there's music and there's people coming at you and talking to you and a lot of different uh social formality that you're supposed to follow and be aware of lot lot of things to memorize and to to to respond to and yeah that could be really really depleting so for some people having to just function out and about with the rest of society they can do it they can do the masking like our previous caller referred to it and many people do use that term masking that is a fairly well accepted term they can do the masking uh some people can't some people can't do the masking and and um that's that's another whole challenge but some people can do the masking and basically uh not be socially rejected but they're exhausted and then there's another thing which I'll mention that we'll go to our next caller which is some people can basically do the masking and not get socially rejected but only 99% of the time and that 1% of the time when you slip up and you accidentally say something socially inappropriate that you don't even realize it's social inappropriate until a year later when you find out that people hate you that is traumatizing that is traumatizing so imagine living on the edge like of spilus like we say in Yiddish living on pins and needles constantly dreading will this be the social interaction that incurs some form of punishment and I won't even necessarily know it while it's happening so that's stressful yeah that's stressful okay so there's a lot more to talk about but let's talk to our next caller um if you can pull up the next caller I'm ready to discuss something new hello H hi hi okay this is more a um uh advice question I don't know if you um you want this on your um if that's what your intention is with the um question you can go wherever you want to go with it and if I feel like it's not something I can answer I'll tell you you know all right um make a long story short uh we've been married me and my wife for over 25 years um something happened we separated we weren't fighting and the separation wasn't close from fighting um there was an issue with our child someone got involved some therapist spoke to my wife saying that you really um if you really want to see your door again your your your marriage is toxic your house is toxic you should separate therapeutic separation um so we separated and thinking that this would be a couple of months each of us with alen therapists which I voiced my position too that you know we didn't have one therapist dealing with our marriage um the therapist really didn't communicate much and there was no communication between me and my wife the her therapist said that in order to heal totally completely you should cut off all communication and you'll be able to heal faster and we all thought that we're going to be getting back together again um after nine 10 months she decided you know she felt I guess she was prepared you know living by herself and everything else we have um Kara uh quite a few kids at home um and uh she said she wants a divorce there was no interaction there was no communication yeah never went to marriage counseling together and my question now we we've been in and out of B in the past you know year or so I know I seems to me there's no hope is there anything like still do I know I I someone gave me a book uh you know letters the Army letters and there was a lady over there that had I I don't know a dysfunctional husband for I don't know how many decades and he said if you never you'll never know if this marriage had no hope if you never tried it and you know that gave me push but that's my wife didn't read that letter so right and my I know there's nothing I could do to convince her I tried I wrote a letter saying listen a fixed marriage is better than you know a second marriage I think um and for the sake of our children and I think for our sake so let's give it a try you know if it doesn't work you could always get a get you always get a divorce there was no response to that I sent a couple of those letters so some of I have a voice inside I have some friend saying you know give it up already move on you know if you could move on and there's voice inside of me saying like we never tried you know like a divorce is like L last option and all the other options weren't tried yet yeah so is there anything for me to do or just accept reality and yeah that's that's a very painful situation I mean either way this or whatever way this ends up proceeding it's it's a painful situation I mean even in the best case scenario after everything you've been through right and your wife's been through it's uh not a not a happy story and the children that's the children yeah yeah so you know it sounds like there's a few things going on here um you know one is it sounds like you're a little bit confused about what exactly happened like you're not even sure if this was intentional if was this the plan or just this is what ended up happening is that sort of part of it you're like not even sure who's yeah I brought that up in and one I brought that up in the business session I said was this your was were you really painting for divorce and she said no yeah that was you know I I felt like you wrote in the second volume I remember reading that I I whenever I went to a a therapist session he asked me okay what's your goal you want to stay with the marriage you want to this I said no I want to help them I want to fix marriage you wrote in your book I believe in the second letter in in the second book that if you go into therapy without a clear direction of goal yeah you'll be taken anywhere yeah I did and I feel that my wife I remember speaking her right and and my wife I remember asking her before we separated I said what's your intention want to divorce you want this you said I don't know yet we'll see we'll see so I feel like she went into it without without aete goal let me just fill that in for people who are listening so they understand that reference you're talking about a book that's an anthology of letters columns that I wrote for Amy magazine and I I think I've written this concept a few times in the column and I've said it publicly Maybe 100 times which is that a therapist can help you to reach your goals but you have to know what your goals are and the job of the therapist really is not to tell you the meaning of life we have at least for Jewish people we have the Torah as our guide to what is considered a meaningful life and what are the proper goals to try to achieve and in the case that a person is trying to achieve these goals and is unable to reach those goals for whatever reason it may be helpful to speak to a therapist the mental health professional whatever variety to help you reach those goals but um if you don't come in with already a system of values a sense of what is right what is wrong what's a worthy Pursuit what's an unworthy Pursuit then you're a you're actually asking the therapist to do something that's outside of their purview that's not what it's for like don't ask the rabbi to be a therapist and don't ask the therapist to be a rabbi so at any rate you you're sort of boning the fact it seems like that it's possible you're not saying for sure but it seems it's possible that the therapists sort of steered this toward um divorce rather than reconciliation right yeah and that your wife just sort of went along with it so and and that may be what happened that may be the real question is for like you know a marriage is between two people and each person has free will and no one's a prisoner no one's a prisoner nobody can be forced to be in a marriage so right or wrong however it happened that your wife decided she's you she just doesn't have the will to be in the marriage anymore if that's the fact if she really has no will to be there anymore then it's effectively over anyway and divorce is almost just a formality at that point and it really there there there's nothing to save in other words if she were to say to you I would like to save this it would be better for the kids be better for me it would be better for you or even if she had some other random reason why yeah I would like to save this but I don't know how I don't see any way of doing it oh okay so then maybe we find someone to help us to figure out how to save it but when somebody is saying I don't want to save it I have no motivation to save it I really don't know what the response to that is it's almost like there is no response it's like it's over at that point so I I don't know get yeah like to get someone to speak to her or something like to give like to give it to give not to give it a try like that we should get help I'm saying like sometimes you'll have a situation like this where there'll be a separation and one party will say you know what here's the problem he does this and this and this and this and this and I'm not even considering nor alizing our relationship until he does this and this and this and this okay well you may or may not be able to do those things but it means there's a possibility of reconciliation but when someone says no there's nothing there's nothing I'm not asking you to do anything then it's over right then it's really because you don't have a partner you don't you don't have a partner for any type of project I mean you can just Kick the Can down the road and delay it and delay it and delay it but really you know if you don't have an interested partner somebody wants to be there then yeah the reality is the reality and in that case the sooner you are spiritually separated meaning not just physically separated living in two different places but spiritually separated through the divorce mechanism that is dictated by God's law in the Torah the sooner that happens the sooner both of you will be free MH so if there's nothing here to talk about anymore then the goal becomes Freedom as quickly as possible all right I shouldn't send people to talk to her anything else like that just give up I'm saying you could you might want to do one more round of clarification and have somebody ask to to ask her you know are there any concerns or demands or complaints and if she's just like no nothing I just don't want to be here right then then there's really nothing to respond other than okay so then right you know let's let's finish this off right for the best of both of us for the yeah to the best of both of you and even even in a certain way for their children yeah cuz their children are living in limbo right now so they're certainly aware of the lack of clarity how are they gonna I'm saying I see them suffering now but how is it going to be better for them after the divorce isn't just going to just get worse for them like now they have two homes they don't have a d they have two homes now anyway so there's no there's no Clarity and you know the hope is that if there's a divorce that both spouses move on in life in one way or another and reach some type of stability and obviously the ideal situation is the children are living in a stable home with both of their biological parents I'm not going to pretend for a second that that that that is not the ideal I will say it I will never stop saying it that the ideal situation is that children have both biological parents married to each other all living Under One Roof that is the ideal there no question but when that's not the reality then there are other scenarios that can also be stable for the children and sometimes parents getting divorced and starting a new life is actually more stable than a situation where there's no divorce but it's just sort of like we say not here and not there which is very destabilizing yeah okay I I hope you thank you very much I hope that thank you and I hope that you can get clarity as as quickly as possible and to act on that Clarity okay thank you okay has yeah thank you very much okay thank you all right thank you thank you so much all right so uh we have another caller in Q we've had a lot of callers tonight so we have another caller I think uh his name is Greg is Greg with us hey Rabbi how you doing thank God I'm good how are you doing all right so what's up so uh well all right so I got a one-year-old daughter she's beautiful she's perfect I got a h three-year-old son he's beautiful he's perfect he's a little speech delayed but he's doing great he's a three-year-old now he get a little defiant getting his own personality throwing Tantrums for the first time but you know comes with the territory he's a great kid uh I uh the first kid I wasn't really ready I was going through a hard time but I didn't tell my wife and and she kind of pressured me and I kind of didn't tell her the truth ended up having a mental breakdown when she was pregnant I relapsed on drugs and alcohol that I've been sober like almost five years and towards the tail end of that uh my wife like wanted me to get better she thought I was going to die maybe all kinds of fears so she kind of got me to have another kid with her and uh that was insane and people were like so you get an abortion all this stuff luckily thank God I got sober been so over a couple years and like uh again and my life is great and I'm happy healthy I'm a great dad we're happy but for the last like uh eight for a long time my daughter's only one but for a long time she's been bothering me to let's do it again I have a third kid now I'm like whoa like we're finally okay I'm a great dad I did some Financial damage when I was you know doing my thing and now I'm like and I'm like H Do Do I Stand My Ground this time and say like no we shouldn't have our kid or like do I just do it because kids are a blessing and she's a great mom and now I'm a great dad even though I screwed up what do you think wow so you've been through a lot I mean all of you have been through a lot um yeah insane I me very bad very very bad and now how how long have you been sober now two years about two years uhhuh and quality sobriety you feeling good yeah great I mean I uh I go to uh you know meetings 12ep program every day I help other people with problems I have a sponsor I very active in the community I uh I'm in therapy all that stuff so you're taking care of yourself yeah yeah I'm actually happier than I've ever been in my whole life to be honest and that's that's real a real gift because like you're saying uh you did some crazy stuff and you could have lost it all and uh Hashem was very kind to you yeah no by by by a lot of Statistics I could very well or should be dead yeah or at least not happily married with Children oh certainly not yeah I mean she was do I don't know like what she was really thinking if it was just a threat to get me back or whatever but she was getting the you know restraining order divorce all that I don't know you know if it was actually happening or she just was so desperate for me to get help um but you know I know for sure if I kept going on the path she was probably serious yeah she had no reason not to be when you were Act of addiction when you were an act of addiction there's exactly there's no reason not to be so I don't think it was just a threat I don't think it was like a tactic I think when you were an act of addiction that you really probably couldn't be around and it was uh yeah it was a safety issue but thank God you're telling me no for sure you're sober for two years and you're active in your sobriety and you're working daily on your sobriety so that's that's beautiful that's really wonderful to hear that because like you say statistically you're you're in the minority that unfortunately that's not the typical way this this story ends so what's the real question yeah I've been around a five been around five overdose deaths in less than two two years friends uh friends and connections and people I used with and all that stuff yeah wow so guys are buying from the same placees you were buying and they're dead not necessarily but you know similar circumstances some yes some no uh fting all overdoses heart attacks uh car accidents M murders um all that stuff uhhuh not necessarily overdoses but the whole lifestyle leads to various yeah yeah most mostly overdoses but the heart attack wasn't overdose so yeah the whole lifestyle it's all the same to me you know if you're if you're an alcoholic and and you drive off a cliff I consider that kind of like an overdose you know yeah that's right okay so at any rate thank God you are sober today and you are actively and I'm repeating this for the third time actively working in your sobriety and the reason I'm saying this so the people listening can understand the conversation that we're having is that if somebody just tells me they happen to be sober and they don't know why they're sober then it's just luck so to speak and I don't know when their luck is going to run out but when somebody tells me that they're in recovery and they know why they're sober today because they know what they did to work for that sobriety today then I'm fairly confident when they tell me that as long as I continue doing the things that keep me sober then by the grace of God I will continue to be sober and then I tend to believe people obviously people have free will and they could stop doing the things that keep them sober in which case their odds are not very good but you know uh we could all uh decide to just you know drive your car off a cliff God forbid so everyone has free will but when when somebody is in recovery and they take the recovery super seriously then I think that uh should count for a lot at any rate um so the real question is that your wife wants to have a baby yep a third third yeah and you're not sure about it yeah I'm just like well what I said to her is um I said you know I'm loving being a dad it's actually part it's a little bit of part of what's saving my life and I love it and I'm a great dad but I said bab why don't we just have a baby in a couple years we're a little more stable you know yada yada yada and she's like no you know I need them to be two years of part for work and for the things in the baby books and I want to do everything together and this is my plan she's very Tai also she she makes like a lot of money she's a very high ranking corporate officer um so she's like you know the money is not a problem even though I got my own money issues but we keep our money separate was a whole another thing but uh you know so she's just like you know I should get to decide because you screwed up your life so it should be my decision and I'm kind of like it's a team thing you know baby's going to be your 18 years it's not like painting a house you know I know look generally the way that we view children is that uh children are a blessing and therefore whenever God is ready to give that blessing we should be grateful for it there are plenty of people who want to have children and they can't do it they're trying everything they can and they just aren't able to receive that blessing and therefore people who are able to have children generally our approach is that we don't refuse that gift so I understand that there are extenda circumstances and yes in Jewish law the idea of birth control does exist and I am certainly not going to speak about it here on this show for one reason which is that this is something that should be discussed with your personal Rabbi who knows you and your circumstances and certainly there are dispensations for birth control it does exist um but I don't want to you know I'm in this public forum I'm not going to go into it but but I just want to say the general approach is that we view a child as a blessing and we don't say no to a blessing so I'll tell you this also if and this is this is sexist I'm going to admit that it's sexist if this would be reversed if the genders would be reversed and a woman would call me and say to me the woman would say you know I've got two years sober I'm getting my life back together things are finally stabilizing my husband wants me to get pregnant and I'm not sure I'm ready I would I think I would I would respond differently than I'm responding now I would be like makes sense understand makes sense you know because it's like at the end of the day she's the one who actually has to do it like she's the one who has to carry this pregnancy so you know the yeah right okay so it's understood why if a if a woman didn't feel ready I think I would be like okay if you're not ready you're not ready speak to your Rabbi and uh you know make sure that you're doing it uh in the most kosher fashion but if you're not ready you're not ready but when the genders are reversed and you're saying your wife's saying she's ready and you're not sure you're ready I'm not dismissing your feeling I'm not saying it's unimportant but what I'm saying is her Readiness is probably more significant than your doubt yeah that make sense I guess I not totally totally makes sense I guess it's just uh at a whole like I I know the burden is totally on her for the for the pregnancy and then also for the first like you know beginning of the child's life when it's breastfeeding when it's up all night when it needs its mother's nurturing but then you know I guess I just have I guess you know it's more about you know I just I just want to be there and be a good dad I don't want to screw any kid up I want to be responsible you know but then I look you know I look at some of my friends you know I have Orthodox friends a guy he's got seven kids he's happy his life's chaotic but he's like whatever it wouldn't have another way I got other friends who are now sober no I got friends who kids' lives were screwed up when their parents were using luckily I stopped using when my son was 14 months old my daughter wasn't even born yet their kid saw them and now you know I don't know I just you know I worry I want to be I want to do the right thing that's all I'm trying to do I guess a little selfish because I want to take care of myself too but you know so what what you're expressing right now is really a very Universal fear which we all have you know I have a parenting course it's a six week online parenting course which I offer it's a live course so it's not pre-recorded so it's not like you can just go download it from somewhere right now I do it maybe once or twice a year um not sure when I'm going to do it again probably I'll do it again soon in fact I'll tell you what if you email us you have our email so just email the office info at words.org and remind them to get you a free um a free enrollment to the next time we do the parenting course cuz I want to give that to you as my gift but in my parenting course the very first class one of the very first things that I talk about is the universal fear that we all have that we're going to mess this up and mess our kids up God forbid and that we just can't handle this so what I want to tell you is that's a universal fear not just people who who are in recovery um but that's a fear that we can overcome and we overcome it by realizing that there's a partner and that that's Hashem and that ultimately it's not about our ability because we're finite it's about hashem's ability who is infinite and it's a leap of faith but it's not just a leap of faith to have another kid it's even a leap of faith to have the first kid to have any kid to take responsibility for a human being at all is a leap of faith and that's what I think is that maybe you need to just take that leap of faith but again can you send me an email and just mention the parenting course and we'll send you yeah we'll make sure to get you enrolled for free the next time we run the course yeah thank you Rabbi that's really kind of you and uh you know definitely I don't call my higher power Hashem you know I just I well I guess I don't know what it is I but it's something it is the same idea you're talking about I me I'm in the care of something greater than myself that I don't fully understand but know that's been you know one of the most important things that's gotten me sober and uh but I can kind of see how that works the way with the kids and and then also it's really cool too you know I gotta tell you one of the things I've enjoyed most about being a dad is not on a daily basis I get to try to make different choices than my dad made I mean he he beat he beat me up pretty bad and you know I've never laid hand on either of my kids and uh you know it's such a beautiful thing to to uh you know have a different way and try to break the cycle and uh be sober and uh you know so I can talk to my wife about it you know I think she's kind of funny you know I was like Hey I what if I talk to a rabbi she's like yeah make it a make it a a religious Rabbi he'll tell you I have the baby tell her tell her she was right yeah yeah yeah she's like good she said go to go Toad and talk to talk to those people like yeah she knows how to pick them all right RAB yeah awesome thank you so much ra I appreciate your time man hey if you ever if you ever want to you know if you ever want anybody to uh you know talk on some conversation about uh addiction and and and Hashem and addiction and then and what it's like for somebody to go from like really dark you know Insanity to like uh you know with that change let me know I'd be I'd be happy to help out you know I I go talk to places I just got accepted into a master's and addiction psychology uh program which is pretty cool so amazing yeah let me know amazing where are you based geographically where are you I'm in Greenwich Connecticut on the border of Westchester oh so you're in the trusted area Okay amazing yeah yeah you're all right Rabbi well thank you so much man have a great night absolutely okay remember to send us the email and I'll get you the a coupon code to sign up for the parenting course I will I will thank you again my pleasure okay thank you so much bye all right well I think those are all of our calls for tonight and uh hold on a second yeah yeah so I want to thank all of our callers tonight who shared with us I'm really in awe of people's willingness to be vulnerable and to share their stories and I hope everyone listening is also feeling the same way that it's really just an amazing thing to hear a human being willing to talk about their life with openness and vulnerability and with honesty and I hope it encourages all of us to examine ourselves examine Our Lives um I mentioned last time that this premise of this these conversations this is something that I sort of do intuitively it's not like I was trained in this I'm not a therapist I think I make that abundantly clear I'm not giving mental health advice I hope that is abundantly clear I'm a rabbi and I have developed over the years a I don't know if I would call it a method but a certain approach to listening to people and talking to them and helping them to figure out their truth so this is something that I've been doing more and more even though I don't I hope this comes across the correct way I don't really want to do it uh it takes a lot out of me every time I talk to a person there's a certain connection to that other person and it's uh it takes a toll so I don't do this in a detached way in like a clinician's way of sort of just observing someone from the outside when I'm talking to someone about their life I'm fully connected and I'm feeling what you're feeling to the extent that I'm capable of feeling it and it's it's real for me I mean it really is real for me when I'm when I'm hearing your story that's that's my reality at that moment so I I I try not to do it too often we get a lot of requests for it um and I think a lot of times people think they assume that this is what I do all day they just sit and meet with people and talk to them about their lives this is not my my vocation this is not what I do for a living I I I do it a few times a week just because there's a lot of demand for it so I do it a few times a week and now we decided to do it on this live show I'm kind of hoping what will happen is that when people watch this live show and they see what I do I'm hoping some people will watch it and be like oh that's all he does so I don't need to do that I don't need I don't need to go schedule an appointment with this guy that's all he's doing I could do I could do that myself which you know what you can you can do it yourself you don't need to schedule an appointment with me at least not with me maybe you need somebody else but not me okay um that's what we got for tonight for this week I'm wishing everybody a very calm and tranquil shabus yeah all right let's play should we do the outro music should we let's do the there we go [Music] [Applause]