3 Things Tell The Truth About A Person (Choosing Friends)

0:06One of the best pieces of advice that the sages tell us in Orchot Tzaddikim is that before you decide who your friends are, before you decide if you're going to make somebody a friend, not an acquaintance. Everybody has acquaintances. People you give high fives to, people you see once in a while, people you go to school with, people you work with. Those are acquaintances. I'm talking about a friend. A friend is somebody that you share personal things with. A friend is somebody that you call when you have a problem. A friend is somebody who's going to help you move. That's how you know if somebody's your friend. If he's going to help you move, she's going to help you move, that's your friend. But if you need to move and all of a sudden nobody wants to answer the phone, everybody becomes busy, guess what? They weren't your friends. They were your acquaintances. Doesn't make them bad people, just not your friends. You get to know a lot about people when you're having a bad time. So the Ramban says, before you decide who you're going to pick as a friend,

1:06You have to test three things. How does he act after he drinks a little bit of wine? Koso. How does he act when he loses a little bit of money? Kiso. How does he act when somebody makes him angry? Ka'aso. Koso, kiso, and ka'aso. Yochid Tzadikim says, if you want to get to know somebody, you want to get to know them when they're vulnerable. When everything is good, most people act normal. But once somebody has had a couple of drinks too many, the truth comes out. Liquor comes in, truth comes out. That's what the Gemara says: "Nichnas yayin, yatza sod" (wine comes in, secret comes out). If before he had a few drinks, he was always nice, but all of a sudden, as soon as he had a couple of drinks, he starts talking about anti-Semitism, he starts talking about things that are a little strange, things that are not normal. Guess what? That's who he really is. What he says, what she says, when they're drunk, that's who they are. So the next day, when I say, listen, I'm sorry I said such and such, I was just drunk. No, no, no, no. Don't be sorry. That's you.

2:22You just hide it really well without the drink. Don't be sorry, that's who you are. I'm sorry that I didn't know this, and I had to see it after you drank. A person who starts losing their mind and starts seeing things that are awful when they're drunk, that's actually how they really feel. Unfortunately, if that feeling is not a good one, they have to work on themselves. Another thing that you learn to get to know people is how they act once they lose a little bit of money. When I was in the stock market business, all we had was money. Some people are so poor, all they have is money. Now the clients loved me when we were making money. I had some clients that called me their best friend. They asked me for not only financial advice, they asked me for marriage advice, they asked me for business advice, every advice possible. We were making money, I was like the Mashiach. The minute we lost a little bit of money, all of a sudden, every curse in the book came out. Every single curse. Like they had a book, a dictionary, you're this, you're this, you're do-do-do-do-do. I said, how many curses do you know? How do you know all these things? They asked me not only for financial advice, they asked me for marriage advice, they asked me for business advice—every advice possible. We were making money; I was like the Mashiach. The minute we lost a little bit of money, all of a sudden, every curse in the book came out. Every single curse. Like they had a book, a dictionary, you're this, you're this, you're do-do-do-do-do-do-do. I said, how many curses do you know? How do you know all these things?

3:41What happened? Once you lose a little bit of money, the truth comes out also. You put some money in front of people, they'll tell you who they really are. When two guys are starting a business, two women are starting a business, a husband and a wife are starting a business, everything is good. Why? They're both really excited about the same goal, the same aspiration. They both feel like, oh, this is going to be a winner. We're going to build this together. Oh, I love you. Oh, I love you. You're my best friend. You're my best friend. Oh, everything is good. You buy little keychains and half a heart for her and half a heart for you. Everybody's great. Guess what? Once that business makes a bunch of money, all of a sudden it's like, yeah, by the way, that heart, I didn't mean it. Can you give it back? Give me that. Why? I work harder than you. You don't deserve half the business. You don't deserve half the business. You deserve, ah, maybe 10%. 10%. Once there's a lot of money involved, ooh, wah, all of a sudden the friendship changes. Same thing if a lot of money is lost. Kiso, a person behaves very, very differently. Once that business makes a bunch of money, all of a sudden it's like, yeah, by the way, that heart, I didn't mean it. Can you give it back? Give me that. Why? I work harder than you. You don't deserve half the business. You don't deserve half the business. You deserve, ah, maybe 10%. 10%. Once there's a lot of money involved, ooh, wah, all of a sudden the friendship changes. Same thing if a lot of money is lost. Kiso, a person behaves very, very differently.

4:41But it's their true version of themselves once there's a lot of money involved. And last but not least, kaas. What does a person do once they lose their mind? Once they get angry? How do they behave? Some people, they get angry and they're strange. Why? Because you're not really sure what's going on. They're very quiet. Some people are this way. They get angry but they don't say a single thing. Those people can either be decent people, not a problem, or very dangerous. They’re going to be a serial killer. We’re not really sure. Why? Because they’re very quiet. They don’t respond. They don’t respond at all, but you talk to them and they don’t respond, but then eventually, they explode. Other people, they explode at any little thing. They curse, they yell. Other people, they break stuff. They’re violent. Point being is that when you see somebody angry, you get to see a certain version of that person that's not so pretty. And the Gemara says in Masechet Shabbat that if a person gets angry, it makes him less of a human being. But if he expresses his or her anger with violence,

6:04if they hit somebody, if they take money that they have, and they're upset because the guy lost, he counted the money that he has. He has, I don't know, 300, and he saw that earlier today he had 320. He lost 20; he's not happy about losing 20, and he gets so upset he just decides to throw the money in the air. You know, some people get crazy; they just do stupid things. Otherwise, some people, they gamble and they lose a small little hand, they end up going on tilt and flipping the table. He throws money in the air. He takes a pen, he takes a pencil, he takes a hammer, he takes a remote control, he takes a phone. The phone makes him upset because the battery has run out. The phone makes him upset because he got a text message from his wife saying to go buy some groceries, and he's really tired. The phone makes him upset because his boss has sent him a text saying, "You're fired." He takes the phone and throws it. The Gemara says in Masechet Shabbat, page 105b, that person needs to be viewed as an idol worshiper. Yes, again,

7:21the same idol worshiper we've been talking about for the last little bit of time, that HaKadosh Baruch Hu despises and finds disgusting. Why? Why does Hashem find somebody that expresses their anger in a violent way disgusting? Because, Rabotai Yekarim, somebody that expresses their anger that way, Being angry is one thing. Expressing your anger in a violent way is something completely different. The Gemara says that once you express your anger in a violent way, that means that the Yetzer Hara, the Satan, has taken control over you. Today he tells you to throw your phone. Today he tells you to kick the car. Today he tells you to punch the window. Today he tells you to kick the door. Today, he tells you to do something that's not so nice to your wife. You hit her in the face or something like that. Tomorrow, he's going to tell you to do something else. And the next day, he's going to tell you to do something else. And the next day, he's going to tell you to do something else. And since you already have become a slave to him, the Gemara says, it's only a matter of time before the same Satan, Malach HaMavet, tells you, go and worship J.C. Penney. Go and worship Jesus. Go and worship Buddha. Go and worship some idol, meaning that that anger will lead you to the idolatry that Hashem despises. Therefore, it's already despised as it is now. Even a good guy, even a good person, can get angry. It's very normal for a person to do that, especially when they don't know how bad it is in the eyes of Hashem.

8:41meaning that that anger will lead you to the idolatry that Hashem despises. Therefore, it's already despised as it is now. Even a good guy, even a good person, can get angry. It's very normal for a person to do that, especially when they don't know how bad it is in the eyes of Hashem. But there's a famous story where one of the Chassidim in Eretz Yisrael used to visit jails. And one time he went to a jail to visit different Jewish prisoners. And he saw that there's someone who's religious, has a life sentence. And he talks to them, how you doing, how they're treating you, and so on and so forth. And the guy tells him, he goes, Rabbi, you're probably wondering why I'm here, right? The Rabbi says, no, I already know why you're here.

9:41He goes, you heard? He goes, yeah, yeah, I read your file. In the file, it says you killed your best friend on Yom Kippur. He says, yeah, that's right. He goes, that doesn't shock you? He said, obviously, it shocks me, but I don't know why you did it. He says, listen, you know how it says in the Torah, someone that gets angry, that Gehenom takes control of him? He says, it's true. He goes, one day, on Yom Kippur, Went to pray. We were praying all night. Then we rested a little bit. We prayed in the morning, the whole afternoon. And then there was about an hour and a half break. It was an hour and a half break in the afternoon. So my friend and I went back to my house. So we went back to the house and we started talking, chit-chatting about soccer. He likes Yerushalayim. I like Haifa. Next thing, we get into an argument, and he curses my mother. i said, "Wait one second." I went into my room, I took my gun, I shot him in the face. Because at that moment, when he cursed my mom, it wasn't me anymore. At that moment, it wasn't me. The fact that I'm friends with him since we were kids, we grew up together—25, 30 years. We're best friends. I love him. I miss him. I cry about him all the time. But at the moment he cursed my mom...

11:03Just something, the screw came out. Something came out, I got so angry, I just, I don't remember what happened. Meaning that even a person who is religious, even a person who is really nice, even a person who is normally a calm person, if they do not work on controlling their anger, in the most difficult times, they could fall. literally become a massive failure for eternity. Now talks about it extensively about how a person could literally lose everything, lose everything as a result of anger. talks about that even if the person knows a lot of Torah, if he allows himself to express his anger in a violent way, starts yelling, screaming, cursing, all of the wisdom that he gathered his entire life, even if it was as much as Moshe Rabbeinu, is gone. Once a person starts expressing their anger and

12:13a negative way that's yelling, screaming, cursing, breaking stuff, anything that he ever learned in his life goes in the garbage. Even if he was a prophet, meaning someone that speaks to Hashem, like Moshe Rabbeinu, prophecy is gone, the Gemara says. Why? Because the moment that a person gets angry, The wisdom escapes him. And what's wisdom? What's Chochmah? Chochmah is Torah. Chochmah, the real Chochmah in the world, is called Torah. And as soon as a person gets angry, they lose that Chochmah, and it has to be replaced by something. What is it replaced by? It's replaced by something other than God, other than HaKadosh Baruch Hu.