Rabbi Yaron Reuven: The Danger Of Imagination | Torah Warning

0:03the imagination can lead a person to the worst places in the world once he starts looking at places he's not allowed to look at. Because once a person allows himself or herself to look at other people's husbands and other people's wives and simply something that's not his, that imagination will start working. That imagination leads to immorality with self, wasting seed. It leads to promiscuity, it leads to a lot of horrible places. Now, in the beginning, when he's just a kid, he doesn't think it's such a big deal until he watches the movie Tikun HaBrit that we made and realizes that it's a horrible mistake that only gets bigger over time. But if he doesn't have the fortune to watch that film, like some of our students that are teenagers and literally have transformed their lives as a result of realizing the mistake they were making, and he continues with this addiction, eventually that wasting seed leads to promiscuity with other people. And the promiscuity with other people

1:29gets worse and worse over time. Why? Because, as Rabbi Yochanan said in Gemara Masechet Sukkah, there's a small member in a man's body. One who satiates it will always be hungry; one who starves it is satiated. Meaning, that the more you feed this imagination that leads you to promiscuity, the more you feed it, the more hungry you'll become. Once he is promiscuous with one person, he'll want to be promiscuous with more. He'll feel like he needs more. She will feel like she needs more. The Gemara in Masechet Sanhedrin says something horrific about the female body that's promiscuous, that that makom is never satiated. It can never have enough. A woman that's promiscuous literally will never have enough. to the point where she'll become desperate and do anything and everything, including other species. The sages were as clear as day with their language and what they said, and didn't just make extreme statements for no reason. We see this in society.

2:51Men and women that were not taught the proper mussar, the proper morals and ethics, the proper hashkafah, are quick to become promiscuous. And it's not promiscuous with just having a boyfriend right before they get married. No, it's literally complete levels of insanity. Now, if a person allows himself to look at all of these things, the movies, the pornography on the internet, all that filth, all the garbage that's out there. He himself, she herself doesn't realize that they have just become addicted to something worse than crack cocaine. They think it's fun. They speak about it freely. They're proud of it even. When do they become miserable?

3:51when finally their senses come to them and they realize that all of this promiscuity has ruined their chances of a normal relationship because now he wants somebody that's like he saw on the screen. But in reality, it's not gonna happen. She wants somebody like She met that one time in that one place for five minutes, but that's not gonna happen in reality. They want a constant taboo, but that can't happen in a real relationship. They want excitement all the time. It's not possible in a real relationship. They want things that are products of the imagination. And this leads them to a life of misery, because even if they marry someone they theoretically love, they're still not happy because they may love that person emotionally, but that's only when they're in front of that person and everything is working right. But the moment things are not right, or if there's an argument, or there's some type of other emotional shock,

5:13loneliness of depression or some other thing, immediately they go someplace else, and many times they cross the line. And many times that crossing the line becomes even a worse condition than they started with, getting to a point of even thinking about suicide. And this is actually one of the things that one of the women that did a Teshuvah story with us, which B'Shem will publish soon. She said she has talked to several of her friends that have actually crossed the line and cheated on their husbands. And she said almost in every case they become suicidal. In every case they become depressed and almost in every case they become suicidal. Because it's not just that they did something terrible to someone that they care about. It's that they know they can never do it again. And that makes them even more miserable. And this is one of the things that the average person doesn't understand. Because if a person allows their imagination to control themselves, to control their life, that imagination

6:30will lead a person to jealousy. And the Torah, the Holy Torah, has taught us multiple examples of where this imagination leads a person. The Mishnah in Maseches Avos, chapter 21, I'm sorry, Mishnah number 21 in chapter 4, says, Rabbi Elazar Hakapar says, Jealousy, desire, and honor remove a person from the world. What does it mean to remove the person from the world? Aside from losing eternity and going to Gehennom and Kaf HaKela and all these horrible places after he dies, the Mishnah is referring to losing their world even here, living a life of misery here. And several of the examples of literally losing both are across the Torah. And Rabbi Ovadia in Anaf Etz Avot brings a few examples. And he says, just from the beginning of the Torah, the serpent...

7:31The serpent was given a gift among all of the animals. Hashem created the serpent as a speaking creature that was the most beautiful out of all the creatures out there and also was walking like a man and had arms and legs like a man, in order for this serpent to be the king of all of the animals. But this wasn't enough for him. He wanted more. wanted more, and the Gemara says that he wanted to marry Chava. And the Bereishit Rabbah, chapter 20, section 8, says that after he convinced Chava to sin and to entice Adam to sin, Kadosh Baruch Hu punished him because his whole goal was to get her to get Adam HaRishon to sin so Hashem would kill him, so he could marry Chava. So when Hashem punished him, what was the first thing that he did? He says, "I created you so you could be a king of all the animals and the beasts in the field, and you shall walk erect. However, now you will slither on your belly.

8:53two angels came down from Heaven and cut off the serpent's arms and legs, and his screams were heard around the world. Further, HaKadosh Baruch Hu says to him, "I said that you shall eat and drink food that's fitting for people. Now, because you made them eat this fruit, the forbidden fruit, you shall eat dust all the days of your life." So the serpent wanted just a little more, and he lost everything, including what he had. Cain was jealous of his brother Hevel because, as the Pasuk says, Cain was born with one twin that became his wife in order to reproduce and populate the world. And Hevel was born with two twins, two twin sisters. And that time was the only time in history that it was allowed for a brother to marry a sister because there were no people in the world. So Hashem had this exception made only at the creation of the world. And Kayin was with one sister, and Hevel was with two sisters, two wives. Kayin was jealous. Kayin was jealous that his brother had two wives, and he wanted all of the wives to himself.

10:20Why should he have any of the wives? I'll have all three wives. He wanted the entire world for himself, and the Midrash Rabbah Bereshit says that Hashem not only punished him that he ended up losing his position in the world, that instead of gaining the world, he had to wander the earth for the rest of his life. And HaKadosh Baruch Hu put a mark on him, on his forehead, which would eventually lead to him getting killed. What was the mark? Some say that the mark was a dog. Some say it was a certain sign on his head. But Bereishit Rabbah says, according to Rashi, there was actually a horn. There was actually a horn on his head. because he acted like an animal, what he did. So Hashem made him look like an animal in so many words. Put a horn on him. And that horn was the reason why he was shot dead by his grandson, Lamech. Because he thought that he was an animal hunting. So his jealousy of wanting more than what was given to him led to his complete loss, even of what he had.

11:42Korach was jealous of Eltzafan ben Uziel because he wanted Moshe to appoint him instead of Eltzafan. Instead of accepting the din shamayim, the law of Heaven, he went to war with Moshe. And instead of gaining, having the extraordinary wealth that he had, a great position that he already had, everything that he had was good. Instead of maintaining everything that he had, he chased after something extra, and he ended up losing everything, including his life and his eternity, as the ground opened up and swallowed him and all of his followers. Doeg was one of the heads of the Sanhedrin. He was an extraordinary Talmid Chacham in his 30s. Both of them were some of the great sages of the generation. But both of them, in different time frames, were jealous of David HaMelech. Because of their jealousy of David HaMelech, instead of being happy with the extraordinary gifts that Hashem gave them, to be extraordinary Torah scholars, to have everything you could possibly want, they were jealous of David HaMelech. Doeg was jealous that

13:10David Hamelech was always right about Halakha. Everyone was paskening like whatever David said. Not because he was the king, but because he was right. That wasn't good for him. So what did he do? He said lashon hara about David Hamelech. The Gemara in Masechet Sanhedrin says that when Hakadosh Baruch Hu eventually punished Doeg, He sent three angels. One, to cause him to forget all the Torah that he's ever learned. The one thing that was good about him was that he had Torah. Hashem had to remove that. Two, one angel to burn his soul and the other one to spread the ashes everywhere. That's how harsh his punishment was that all began with jealousy. Achitophel, he was Bat Sheva's grandfather or father actually. So he literally was not only close to David as far as a colleague, he was related to him. He was a father-in-law. But his jealousy of David led him to go against David HaMelech by trying to get Avshalom, David's son, to kill him. When he realized he's wrong, he committed suicide.

14:37instead of gaining something, being happy that he's connected to the greatest King, to the Sage, to G'dol Ha'Dor, he was jealous of something small, he lost everything. Same thing goes with Bil'am, Gehazi, Avshalom, Adoniyahu, Uziyahu, Haman, literally, one after another. This is all, Rabotai, is what we learn from our Sages, and the Torah tells us, this could all be learned from the wayward woman, a woman that's an adulteress. In the Torah, in Parashat Nasso, there is a section in there that talks about the Ishah Sotah, the wayward woman, the woman that committed adultery and cheated on her husband. It says what happens to this woman

15:38if she drinks the water at the Beit Hamikdash, she blows up and dies. So she loses everything. But if she doesn't drink the water, and she simply admits, yes, I cheated. So what happens? She still loses everything. She just doesn't die, because she's no longer allowed to be with her husband, since she cheated on him. And she's also not allowed to marry the man that she committed adultery with. so either way, she loses everything. Why? She wanted more than what she was given. So when a person does not allow their common sense to control their imagination to a certain extent, is bound to go to the worst places you can possibly imagine. They will certainly never have shalom bayit. They'll never have a good marriage. They'll never be happy with whatever they have. Because if she's looking at her friends and her neighbors and what they have, she'll always be unhappy with her husband. Why? Because somehow the grass is greener on the other side. She's going to look at how her friend or her sister or her cousin, her husband just bought her a present. Her husband just bought her a new refrigerator. Her husband just bought her a new car or a new house.

17:07But she didn't get a new house. She still has the same house since she was married 20 years ago. She didn't get a new refrigerator. She's still using the same one from 10 years ago. She didn't get any jewelry. And she doesn't put things into perspective that her friend or sister or somebody else is perhaps... well-off, or they're newly married, or a million and a half other reasons of why she got what she got. No, no, she just wants the same thing as other people. And that jealousy leads her to have just a little bit of hatred and resentment towards her husband, even though he didn't do anything. What did he do? He didn't buy her a new house? if you had to buy your wife a new house every time she wanted one, you'd have literally more property than Donald Trump. You'd have more property than major corporations. You can't buy a new house every time you want a new house. If you had to literally comply to every whim that somebody in your family wants, you'd have to be a trillionaire. So she doesn't put that into perspective. What did the husband do? He didn't buy a house? Okay, he didn't buy a house.

18:24He didn't buy you a car, but you have a car. He didn't buy you jewelry, but can't afford jewelry right now. Or it's not time to buy jewelry. Or there's other things that take priority. She doesn't put that into perspective. The only thing that she puts into perspective is that her sister got it. Her friend got it. Her enemy got it. Somebody else got it. And instead of only looking at what she has, she looks at what somebody else has. The worst is when people look at celebrities and they get addicted to watching their lifestyles, and then they think that they could live like those celebrities. I remember a story came to me years ago where a couple, I only knew the wife from childhood, whom I hadn't seen for many years. and her brother came to me crying, asking me, like, what do you do in such a situation? The marriage is between a sister and a husband is literally in shambles. I said, what happened? Did he cheat? He goes, no, no, the guy works like a dog. He's the greatest. He's fine. He's great. I said, okay, so what's wrong with the marriage?

19:42He says that his sister is so addicted to living the life of a celebrity, she starts imagining herself as if she is a celebrity, and has taken the life savings that they have, which was somewhere in the neighborhood of about $50,000, and instead of buying them a house, like they were planning on saving to buy a house, she went and she bought a bag. A bag that she saw one of her celebrity heroes have, she bought that bag, a $50,000 bag. Now again, if you are a billionaire, you want to spend $50,000 on a bag, it's a waste of money, but you can. You have billions of dollars. Your interest per day is more than that. But when you have a net worth of $50,000 and you don't even have barely enough money to finish the month, and you spend $50,000 on a bag, or even $5,000 on a bag, you are a sick person. And unfortunately, this is becoming a norm in society where people are spending every single penny that they have, and they borrow money that they don't have even a way to pay for, which is a sin, by the way. You're not allowed to borrow money you have no way of paying back. It's considered stealing. But needless to say, people are doing this not because they need these things and sometimes not even because they want these things. It's because they're trying to be somebody that's in their imagination, like who they saw.

21:11There are entire businesses built on this type of premise, taking advantage of people's low minds. You have people making videos, you know, "The best place to vacation." You know, a vacation of $1,000 versus a vacation of $100,000. And you'll see a video get literally millions of hits. Why? Because people want to see what is a vacation for $100,000 like? Or let's compare a house, a house for ten thousand versus a house for ten million. And millions of people would watch these videos, simply curious, what does a ten million dollar house with one hundred million look like? Planes, a plane for a dollar, a plane for a billion dollars, whatever it is. And you'll see millions of people tuning in. Even though they know they'll never be able to buy this billion-dollar plane, they don't need to buy this billion-dollar plane. Even the company or a person that owns it doesn't want this plane anymore. And the best use of that plane was simply for that video, which is surely not worth a billion dollars, not that or the yacht or any of the other stuff that people get for that kind of money. But all it's for is simply to show off. But the people that are watching the video,

22:35They want to imagine, what if I had this plane? What if I had this yacht? What if I had this house? What if I had this? What would I do? Nothing. You're still going to sleep. You still go to the bathroom. You still eat. You still put your pants on one leg at a time. Nothing changes. And the more a person lives in this imaginary state, the more they're going to be miserable. And the reason why they become miserable is Because at some point reality sets in. At some point reality sets in when he realizes that that girl that he's looking at, he's never gonna have her. He's never gonna have her. Why? She's married. She's not interested. A million and a half other reasons. The Gemara in Maseches Sanhedrin says that there was one guy that one of the, another girl She wasn't interested. He went to the doctor. He said, "Doctor, I'm dying." Doctor said, "Why are you dying?" He said, "Because this girl next door doesn't want to marry me." He said, "All right, let me talk to the Rabbi." "Hey Rabbi, my patient is dying. He's a Jew." He said, "Okay, why is he dying?

23:53Should we say Kaddish? No, no, he's still alive. Okay, so what's the problem? He wants to marry this girl. Okay, so what's the problem? She doesn't want to marry him? No. Okay, so let's find somebody else. No, no, no, he has to have her. So, can he, maybe she could show herself to him? The rabbi says, let him die and not see her. Doctor comes back to the patient. He goes, "Listen, patient, sorry, rabbi didn't go for it. You're still dying? Yeah, I'm still dying. All right, let me go back to the Rabbi. Rabbi, listen, he's still dying. He's dying even worse than yesterday. So maybe he could talk to her. For what? What is he going to talk to her about? No, he could talk to her about how much he's dying over her. Rabbi, he said let him die and not talk to her. We don't have conversations between boys and girls just for the sake of desire. they talk either for the sake of getting married or because they're already married. Otherwise, there's no reason for them to talk. You should talk to your husband, not your neighbor. Your neighbor comes over, tell him my husband's not here, bye, click, the end. Why? Platonic relationships are unhealthy. They become atomic relationships. Same thing with women that go into the business world.

25:16make sure not to make friends that are the opposite gender or ones that are attracted to the same gender. But needless to say, this guy came back to the doctor. He says, "Listen, doctor, I'm dying." And the doctor says, "Listen, I'll go back to the Rabbi." He said, "Rabbi, the patient is still dying. You weren't willing to show her to him. You weren't willing for her to talk to him. But maybe, maybe, just maybe, they could talk. You could put a wall. You could put a wall. And he's on the one side of the wall. And she's on the other side of the wall. And then he could just like, you know, talk to her through the wall. You won't even see her. Just talk to her. Just hear her voice. The rabbi said, "For what is he going to talk to her about? About how much he likes her and he wants to marry her." But she said, "No. No. Yeah, but maybe he could just, you know, get relief out of it by hearing our voice. The Rabbi said, let her die. Let him die and not talk about Yisrael. Why? We're not here to fulfill your desires. We're here to protect our children. We're here to protect our people.

26:25there's no such thing as a platonic relationship. There's no such thing as permitting all types of sick people to fulfill their desires because of their sickness. Your sickness doesn't have to become my tragedy. And one of the things that happens here is that people are consuming more and more ideas to fulfill their imagination. They're watching these videos, they're watching these shows and they start living vicariously like all of these different celebrities, all of these different abominations, all of these different literally monsters, spiritual monsters that are just infecting people's minds and All of a sudden you have an entire society agree that pronouns should no longer be used. Why did nobody bring this up for the last several thousand years? Several thousand years, no one brought this up. Now it became like a must. Several thousand years everyone knew what's a male and what's a female. Now all of a sudden people don't know.

27:44Several thousand years, everyone knew pretty much the basics of humanity. Surely there's flaws, surely there's wars, surely there's all types of issues, but in general, people know basic things. All of a sudden, no one knows anything anymore. This all comes from imagination. People allowing their imagination to run their life. And when they allow their imagination to run their life, they also allow their imagination to ruin their life. And they get impressed by all types of things, whether it be buildings or royal palaces or actions or inventions. They see this new AI as an extraordinary tool, which is right. It is an extraordinary tool and I would love to have more people on our team that know how to use it in a positive way to bring more Torah to the world. But the people that don't know how to control their imagination, they see it as the culmination of one of the movies they saw 20 years ago of how the computers took over the world. And they think how the computers are somehow going to now build robots, and the robots are not going to want to be robots anymore, and somehow they're going to become a new segment of the civilization.

29:04Robot kids are going to walk around, they're going to go shopping, they're going to have relationships, maybe even have some little baby robots. All types of stupid things that people think they have. Why? Because they saw movies. They've allowed the fairy tales of all types of other sick people to enter their minds to the point where they think it's real. People actually believe this. And I'm not just talking about people that have never learned Torah, people that don't know what Torah is. Those, obviously, they have a lot of other sicknesses. I'm talking about religious people, people that know a little bit of Judaism, know a little bit. They ask questions: "Rabbi, so do you think this new AI thing is dangerous?" Yes. Why is it dangerous? I mean, there's certainly bad things you could do with everything. You could do bad things with a knife. You could also eat with a knife. You could do a lot of bad things with anything. But why is it dangerous? Oh, you know, this AGI, how, and some people are saying it's in the next two years, you're gonna have this whole thing for robots, and they're gonna come, and maybe it's gonna be like the movie, like the Terminator, and how they're gonna make ships, and they're gonna shoot people. Stop watching movies. Stop watching other people's imaginations.

30:20if it's not written in the Torah, it doesn't exist. Oh, you're being close-minded. No, no, no. You're being close-minded. You're shutting down your mind and you're allowing somebody else to infiltrate your mind. He's replaced, their imagination has replaced your mind. My imagination has substance. Has me controlling it. And that's unfortunately one of the things that leads to a lot of problems. Because when a person does not allow themselves to control their mind, their mind can go anywhere. There's a few places that this can be applied in. One, if a person allows his imagination to control himself, to control him or her, they start looking at people

31:20not as people, but as a number that they measure up against some type of standard, imaginary standard. So if they're in the business world, they would look at things like I used to look at things when I was in the business world. I don't have time to waste. I was making $3,500 an hour or so, $3,300 an hour. So for me to go meet somebody, There had to be a reason that's much more valuable than that few thousand dollars. Why? Because the way I looked at a person is that if I can make more than that per hour dealing with you, it's worth it for me to deal with you. If not, then I have to go find somebody else. So you start looking at people, and literally after years of doing it, years of doing business and doing lots and lots of billion-dollar business or so, You start looking at people, and within seconds, tell you, "Oh, yeah, that guy's got a million and a half dollars in the market, probably about two million dollars in real estate, and maybe a couple hundred thousand dollars in liquid." That guy, he probably has a million dollars negative net worth. He has no money whatsoever, but he's looking for a job. That other guy, he's the boss. But he also has. And you start looking at people and how much they have and how much they don't have, and you start realizing that you forgot the humanity.

32:44And this happens when people are so infatuated with their business, so infatuated with their job, so infatuated with their success, they forget the humanity aspect of it. They forget the people part of it. I heard a successful, monetarily successful business person say just the other day, if you want to succeed, look for the products that help people that are self-conscious. Meaning, people complain about stuff. People complain about being fat. People complain about acne. People complain about, I don't know, whatever. Whatever people complain about, find products for what people complain about. Whatever they don't feel confident about, find a product for that. Now, although that is a valid business advice, it's sad It's sad that this has become the norm, because you're not looking at, oh, go into business so you can help people. You're looking at, look at people's flaws, and then try to cater to that flaw. Instead of looking at it from a human perspective, which is, I'm in the business, so yes, one, I need to make a living, but two, I need to help people.

34:14They're not looking at it from that perspective. They're simply looking at, where is the flaw in society now? Go there. Go there. That's how you can make money. Now, this is not a new reality. This has always been the case. This unfortunately is a part of the flaw of humanity. But when a person looks at, allows their imagination to run their life, If they're obsessed with money, they'll start looking at people that way. They're also going to be very jealous people, because anytime they're going to encounter anybody, and they say, "Oh, somebody else," their neighbor, their friend, whoever it is they encounter, they say, "Oh, listen, yeah, we're having a... Get together at my house. Why don't you come? And the person says, no, I'm sorry, I'm going away on vacation. Oh, vacation. All of a sudden, the accounting head went on his head. Vacation? Where's he going on vacation? How much does vacation cost? Where are you going? Now, he doesn't actually care where he's going for, you know, to be happy for him. He's trying to figure out how much it costs. Oh, yeah, we're going to, I don't know, we're going to Hawaii. Oh. Oh.

35:38Hawaii, Hawaii, I checked on Hawaii. Hawaii is $6,000 a ticket. Why, you going by yourself? No, no, I'm taking the family. Whoa, family, how many kids do you have? He has five kids. Whoa, you're spending, what, $40,000 on just tickets? Yeah, well, you know, well, that's hotel. Hold on a second, hotel. He's doing accounting. Wait, so wait, you're spending $50,000, $100,000 just to go to a vacation? Hold on a second. Did I ask you for any money? Did I borrow the money from you? Like, what do you care how much money I'm spending on vacation? But that's what happens. That's what happens many times. People are so infatuated with money. and materialism, they forget the human aspect of it. They forget that it's none of your business. They forget that you should have never asked in the first place. They forget the fact that you should be happy that somebody else is successful. They forget the fact that literally all of this stuff is completely unnecessary. If he's going on a vacation that costs $100,000, apparently he can afford it. And if he can't, he's stupid, so you should feel bad for him.

36:51If you're jealous of the fact that he has $100,000, then you are partially a heretic because you believe that Hashem gave him what belongs to you. And what happens is, Rabotai, is that when a person develops this type of personality, it's not only that they become a person that is very difficult to like, to such a person that's jealous and always looking and counting your money and things like that, but it actually becomes a problem with their relationship between them and Hashem. Because they're never going to be happy with whatever Hashem gives them. Because they're always going to look at somebody else. And what ends up happening is that Hashem is going to give them what they need to eat. Hashem is going to give them what they need to sleep. Hashem is going to give them what they need to live in. He's going to give them whatever they need. But they're going to forget to even say thank you to Hashem and almost feel like, I can't believe Hashem has only given me this. As if Hashem owes them something. I can't believe that this guy has... All that and all that Hashem has given me is this. What? You're complaining about what Hashem gave you? Because He gave more to somebody else? Did you say thank you for the air that you breathe? Did you pay for it? No. How much would you pay for it if you ran out of air? If you were drowning right now, how much money would you give for one breath, one little breath of air? How much would you give?

38:21Guess what? If you were the richest man in the world, with a trillion dollars in the bank, you would give that trillion dollars for one more breath of air. And you have many breaths of air, every single day, for free. Did you pay Hashem for the hearing that you have? Well, guess what? The person that's deaf, deaf, can't hear. If he had a trillion dollars in the bank and he told him, "Listen, I need that trillion dollars just to fix your hearing. The only way to fix your hearing is with all of the money that you have." He'd give that money in a heartbeat. Just to hear one more time. His kids say, "I love you." His wife say, "I love you." Her husband say, "I love you." One time. To hear a prayer, to hear Shofar. One time. He'd give all the money to hear one time, but you get it for free. Did you say, "Thank you for that?" Oh no. It's supposed to be that way. It's supposed to be that way. A person that has 20 restaurants, best chefs in the world, but he has diabetes or some other disease where he can't taste any of the food. If you told him, "Listen,

39:39I can cure your illness, but it's going to cost you all 20 restaurants. You're going to lose all 20 restaurants, but for the first time in your life, you're going to be able to eat again like a regular person. Guess what? They'll give you all of it. They'll give you every single restaurant. Just give me my life back. What? All that for the food? No, it's not the food. It's to have life back. A person that can't eat like a regular person doesn't feel like he can live. all the money in the world was not going to make him happy. Like one simple meal that he could taste without being worried about his life. I know an Avrech that was born with this condition. And it's so severe, he has to have a cath... a... catheter is constantly in his arm, is to give himself shots every single day and he has like an emergency, an emergency needle, for anytime the sugar goes up drastically in a short period of time. He literally has to give like an emergency, like somebody dying. If he doesn't get it, he dies. The kid's maybe 25 years old. Thin, looks healthy, strong like a bull, but he has this condition. And

40:54every meal, he has to think 50 times of whether this or that, all types of, can't eat, can't act like a normal person. You tell that person, listen, give me all the money that you have. Give me whatever you have just to have a normal life. He'll give it to you. Why? It's not for the food. It's to have life back. But you have it. Did you say thank you? Do you appreciate it? The reality is that when we're jealous of other people, after we followed our imagination, it's only because we are ungrateful for what we already have. And when a person is ungrateful for what they already have, then certainly they don't deserve any more. And needless to say, even if they got more, they would be ungrateful for the more they got. This is one of the downfalls, catastrophic downfalls of being a person that lives through their imagination. In today's society, people complain about the media day and night, of how the media is feeding them all types of lies, while they're replacing that media with a different form of media.

42:19they're complaining about the CNNs and the Fox News and whatever other New York Times. They're complaining about them, that they're liars. Now, they're right, they're all liars. But guess what? How do you know they're all liars? Because somebody else from a different form of media, independent media, yeah, right, independent, they replaced them. on the YouTube and the Rumbles and all other types of media, they're replacing them. So you replaced one set of liars with a different set of liars. Why? Because you are not allowing yourself to see things clearly. Instead, you're living your life based on other people's imagination, other people's interests, other people's craziness, in so many words. So you don't want their craziness anymore. You don't want their agenda anymore. So you replaced it with somebody else. Somebody else usually is jealous of the first one.

43:38So the guys that are now telling you about all these conspiracies and all this nonsense that they sell you about how the whole world's gonna end and how there are aliens and how the government is hiding something, as if it's all new news, it's all old news. Anyone finding out right now either is an infant or is stupid. It's all old news, who cares? care about things that matter. People spend an extraordinary amount of time arguing about whether the earth is flat or not. extraordinary amount of time determining whether aliens exist or not, extraordinary amount of time whether the government stole this amount or that amount. Who cares? What is that going to do in your life anyway? The earth is flat, the earth is round. Who cares? How is that going to make you a better person? How is that going to make you a better wife, a better husband, a better employee, a better boss, a better human? How? How is that going to make you anything? If you're right or if you're wrong, you're still in the same place. You can't leave it. Or they worry about the aliens. Why? Why are you worried about the aliens? Because even if they came and they wanted to take somebody, it wouldn't be you. They would want to take somebody that did something with their life instead of just wonder about aliens all day. Or the best yet, the government is corrupt.

45:03Welcome to society. Governments are supposed to be corrupt. That's why they're there. It's a bunch of people that want to justify their corruption through making it legal. What's new? It's nothing new. Oh, but the corruption here, and he really, who cares? What is that going to do for you if you know that he did this and he did that and he stole this? Can you get any of that? Can you do any of that? No, it doesn't make a difference to you. Oh, but you have to vote for him. You actually still believe that your vote counts? With one demented person after another in office in the United States over the last 20 years, you still believe that your actual vote counts? Literally, you have some of the most brilliant minds in the world in society today, and not a single one of them is even running for office in the last, I don't know, at least 50 years. You still think your vote counts? People spend enormous amounts of time arguing about this position and that position. Who cares? How is that going to make your life any better? You're living in imaginations.

46:21you're imagining that your opinion counts in politics, even when you're not a politician. You're imagining your opinion counts about finances, even though you barely have a net worth that's enough to be middle class. You're imagining that talking about your neighbors is somehow going to smooth out the situation. You're imagining all types of things. Live your life. Make something of yourself. Be somebody productive that helps society. Do something useful. Instead of living in an imaginary world, a world full of jealousy and animosity that really has nothing of value to offer. Somebody meets you for the first time, all you can talk about is every conspiracy theory under the sun. You can't, can't be, business can't be done with you. You can't be hired. No one would want to marry you. And needless to say, have kids. Literally, you're a danger to society. But you still think that the world is at fault. It's important for a person to know that if you allow your imagination to run your life, it will ruin it.

47:46Now, of course, if a person allows that imagination to go into the way they look at people sexually, this could lead to some of the most awful places. As I said before, it could lead to promiscuity. It could lead to all types of horrible things, but there are times where it could lead to places that people could never even imagine. Now, if you ask the average rabbi, especially young rabbis, If it's good to go to the mikveh. Now, of course, a woman that's married, a Jewish woman that's married, must go to the mikveh once a month. That's fulfilling the family purity laws. If she's not married, she cannot go to the mikveh, it's not allowed. But a man can go to the mikveh whenever he wants, but he doesn't have to. It's good for purity, it's good

48:46for a person that wants to purify themselves. If you ask the average rabbi, "Is it good for me to go to the mikveh?" An average rabbi that's young is going to tell you, "Yeah, of course, you should do it." Even do it a few times a week. But if you ask a more experienced rabbi, they're not going to tell you it's good right away. They're going to ask you, "Who? Who wants to go to the mikveh? And why? Why 'who'? Why 'why'?" Because it all depends on the reason of why you're going to the mikveh. And there were a few times over the last few years that I've told men that they should not go to the mikveh, ever. Not only they shouldn't go to the mikveh, they should never go to the mikveh. In one case I told a few people not to go to the mikveh because they told me about all the immodesty that goes on in that mikveh, how people use that place as a place to socialize instead of a place to purify. So if that's the only mikvah that they had in that community, then certainly they should never go there. But in other cases, I've had, unfortunately, the situation, a few times it's happened, where men that had attraction to the same gender asked me if they should continue going to the mikvah.

50:07In some cases, they were married. In other cases, they were single. In all cases, I told them, never ever go to the mikvah. "No, but isn't that purity?" No, it's not purity. Not for you. For you, it's putting yourself in front of a test that you cannot handle. You are not allowed to go to the mikvah. For you to go to the mikvah is a sin. It's 100% a sin from the Torah for you to go to the mikvah. Why? You have, unfortunately, an imagination that's damaged. and that damaged imagination is going to cause more harm than any purity you could possibly gain out of that mikvah. So, the more experience that a rabbi has, the more he can give advice. But that experience also requires an imagination. Because you can't just assume that everything is by the book, that this law applies to everyone, this recommendation applies to everyone, this custom applies to everyone. You have to understand things based on their circumstances. This is also the reason why for all of the people that think that AI is somehow going to take over the world of Torah, it can never happen. Because even if you could program an AI's algorithm or AI's code,

51:29to give you the answers, they can only answer superficially. They can never answer answers based on specific circumstances that require a relationship with people, an understanding of people, and different things that a computer can never do. Now, when it comes to the world of Torah, we're not saying that imagination is bad. In fact, imagination is required in order for you to achieve big things in the world of Torah. Because if a person goes into the next segment, that the Chazon Ish says that its adversary, the intellect, loves the intellectual side of reality and favors the scales, covets the laws of mathematics and reasoning, and is drawn to the rules of research, that reality check, that intellect is critical but is either more destructive than imagination or very very healthy. Meaning, if you have imagination and a person is in a situation where he sees a woman that's not his wife, it's somebody else's wife.

52:59or she's not married, but he's already married. If he allows his imagination to control his life, he's going to try to commit a sin, because he's thinking about all the imaginary terrible things without thinking about reality. But if his reality, his intellect comes in and says, wait a minute, hold on a second. You're about to make a sin. First and foremost, do you realize that this is a daughter of Hashem? You're going to do that with that? Number two, do you realize that you're married? Your wife that gave you her entire life, brought kids to the world, she sacrificed her body. Each time she gives birth, it literally breaks her body from inside. If a man understood the amount of suffering that a woman endures just to bring birth, just to bring a child to the world, They literally kiss their feet every single day just to say thank you for one kid. Their organs are in different places in the body. She has to wait for them to come back into shape. It takes a year and a half to two and a half years in a normal condition. They gain weight, they lose weight, they gain weight, they lose weight. They go up, they go down. They're constantly, you know, the hormones are all over the place. What does she do that for? For you. She's not obligated to have kids. You are.

54:28She may want kids, but she could have had kids with anybody. She doesn't need you for that. On top of that, she takes care of you in all types of ways. She cooks, she cleans, she works. Whatever she does, she's for you. And you're going to go, what, and abandon her because of some zona? That's what you're going to do. That's the reality check. But in the reality check, you're like, "Wait, hold on a second. So you're going to do that," and you realize that at some point... It's very possible and even likely that Hashem is going to make sure that your kids find out that that's what you did. And maybe your five-year-old kid, your ten-year-old kid doesn't know all the things that he needs to know in school. But he's going to know if his father or the mother is a liar, is a cheater, is a bad person. And guess what? He will continue knowing that as he gets older. When people ask him about his parents, he's always gonna have to start the conversation with, "Oh yeah, they got divorced." Oh, wow. Wow, how did you handle it? And he's gonna constantly have to answer how he handled it, how it traumatized him, how he was only 10 years old or 15 years old when his parents got divorced.

55:52and it changed his perspective on life. And it changed his perspective on marriage. And he doesn't believe in marriage anymore, or he does, or he wants to be better, or he wants to be worse. And literally, that one act could change that kid's life forever. Do you think about that? Do you think about that before you went with the person that treats themselves like a garbage pail? Everyone's allowed to touch? Do you think about that? No. Do you think about the fact that that person could very well be married to somebody else, and the same exact thing will happen on the opposite end. So when a person has a reality check-in, it could contain the imagination and put it in the right perspective to get you away from bad things. But it's not always the case. because if you have someone that has the guts to use their imagination for good things, he wants to build something that has never been built before that could be for the good of society. He wants to say things that will help society even though no one wants to say them. He wants to tell people the truth about the Torah.

57:18While very few people are willing to do it, because it may cost them donations, it may cost them popularity. So they don't want to say it, but he wants to do it. Or he wants to go and finish the entire Talmud Bavli in one year. When the average person says if you finish it in a lifetime, it's already a big deal. But he wants to go do it in one year. He wants to do it in 52 days. He wants to do it in a ridiculous number. he wants to do things that the average person simply doesn't even think about. He wants to do it. If the reality sets in, he will never do those things. Why? Because he says, listen, I want to build a ship. A ship that does all types of wonderful things that help society. And people are going to tell me, oh, what ship? What are you doing? It's too expensive, it's too much, it's too this, it's too that. He says, I want to tell people the truth. I want to help them with the truth of the Torah. No, come on. It's not going to get you the donations. You're not going to be popular. No one's going to invite you. No one this, no one that. I want to learn a lot. I want to make my life just learning to the point where literally I eat and breathe Torah. Oh, come on, but how are you going to eat? How are you this? And they bring you all of these realities that are their realities.

58:45And those realities are the realities of lawyers. You know what the reality of a lawyer is? Lawyers are known as deal breakers, not deal makers, because they bring such realities many times and destroy deals. Sometimes you need a lawyer in order to remind you of things that the imagination simply went too far on. But many times, and I would say even more times than not, lawyers are the ones that bring a reality that's completely antithetical to any imagination whatsoever, where they destroy it. And sometimes people have friends and family that are those types of lawyers. You tell them that you want to build something that's completely innovative, never been done before, and they tell you, nah, come on, you're crazy. Go get a regular job and do what everybody else does. Be a sheep. I want to say such and such. Oh, come on. Why do you have to always stand out? Just say what everybody else says. Oh, I want to achieve such and such. Ah, it's too much for you. It's too much for you. How do you know what's too much for me? Did they ask you what's too much for me? And unfortunately right now we have

1:00:02many people being taught by such people, such family members, such friends, such leaders that are these types of people where they limit, they limit everyone that's around them because of their reality. Their reality, they assume is everybody else's reality. I remember when we first started giving lectures, One of the things that drove me crazy at the time is when I would speak to different rabbis and ask them, why don't you tell your community, or in the speech that you had, about how important keeping Shabbat is, and it's not just a suggestion, and if they don't keep Shabbat, they're considered the equivalent of an idol worshiper? Why don't you put things in perspective for them? Nah, come on, listen. They didn't go to religious school. They don't know what keeping Shabbat is. They can't keep it. How do you know they can't keep it? Do they have some big sign on their shirt saying, "I can't keep Shabbat"? Do they have a resume that says, "I can do everything except keep Shabbat"? How do you know they can't keep Shabbat? Why do you assume that they're spiritually retarded?

1:01:23Why? Why do you assume that no one except you can do it? You can keep Shabbat, but they can't. You can learn Torah, but they can't. You can keep kosher, but they can't. Why? Because they went to a public school, or they didn't get the right upbringing, so therefore they have to stay that way? Why don't you tell that to every single success story in anything in history? How do you explain them? How do you explain the fact that you have our Torah still alive 3,334 years after it was given to us, despite the pogroms, the inquisitions, the enemies from within that we've had? How do you explain that? If everyone was like what you describe, spiritually ba'al emum, spiritually deficient, then why did Hashem pick us if we can't do anything? Why did you choose? Who gave you the right to choose what we can do? And that's one of the things that would drive me insane. They would tell me, "I'm not telling them because they can't handle it." Why do you think they can't handle the truth? Why do you think they can do a lot of other things but they can't handle this? Why not? Why can't they handle this? And this, Rabotai, is very important for a person to know that you need your imagination.

1:02:53you need your imagination because at times, the reality that will surround you will try to destroy you, will try to limit you, will try to disable you from being as successful as you can be. And there are times where that imagination will be like the imagination of the serpent. it would literally be a venom that kills the most venomous creature. So how do you know the difference? In short, it all depends on what the purpose is. What's the purpose of your imagination, and what's the purpose for that reality? And to delve into those two, we're going to have to tune in next week. We continue this series and continue building up our imagination in a healthy way and our reality to coincide just as healthy. Thank you very much for learning with me. May Hashem bless each and every single one of you and b'ezrat Hashem, we'll learn more later this week.