What It Means To Get Yourself A Rabbi? (10 minutes)

0:01It says, meaning that every person needs to get himself a rabbi. Now, what does it mean to get a rabbi? Okay, so everybody goes to the mikveh. I said, there's a rabbi there? That's not necessarily your rabbi. He's a rabbi, of course. What is a rabbi to you? It doesn't necessarily mean he's your rabbi. If you're making somebody your rabbi, that means that he is your consultant for everything. ...are on the same wavelength as you, and some people are not. You have to, you know, talk to the person and see if this is someone you can connect with. Because just because somebody has a beard, a hat, and a suit, it doesn’t necessarily make them qualified to be your rabbi. They could very well be an amazing rabbi, but it doesn’t mean they are the right one for you. It’s similar to making any woman your wife—it doesn’t make any sense. You must consider this carefully. You need to talk to the person, see if you get along with them, and make sure they understand you. It’s important to find someone who truly aligns with your values and perspectives.

1:04are on the same wavelength as you, some people are not. You have to, you know, talk to the person and see if this is someone you can connect with. Just because somebody has a beard, a hat, and a suit doesn't necessarily make them qualified to be your rabbi. They could very well be an amazing rabbi, but it doesn't necessarily mean they could be yours. It could be someone completely different who is meant to be your rabbi. So, it's our responsibility to find ourselves rabbis. It's not their job; it's our job. their job is obviously to monitor the congregation, try to help whoever comes, and what they do is extraordinary. This is my next point, but it's our job to find ourselves a rabbi because they don't know if we already have one or not. They don't know if we're ready to actually have one or not. Most people look at rabbis as something very superficial. They look at them as someone at the synagogue, and they see them maybe once a week on Shabbat when they go to the synagogue. He's a nice guy, and you say hello, and you try to respect him. But when anything goes wrong, you yell at them. You know, they look at them as almost like janitors or something like that. It's very, very wrong how people view them, but that's just the reality. But the point of what I'm trying to make, aside from our responsibility to get ourselves rabbis, where we can talk to them, text them, email them, go meet them, talk to them about things that are very, very intimate, aside from that, what all of us need to do is start realizing why...

2:04when anything goes wrong, you yell at them. You know, people look at them almost like janitors or something like that. It's very, very wrong how people view them, but that's just reality. However, the point of what I'm trying to make, aside from our responsibility to find ourselves rabbis, where we can talk to them, text them, email them, go meet them, and discuss things that are very intimate, aside from that, what all of us need to do is start realizing why Are we under-appreciating all of these rabbis? Now, even the big rabbis that you see in the world, even the ones that you see on YouTube and on Facebook, and all of these people go through very, very similar things just like any other local rabbi. Rabbis in today's age are the most underappreciated piece of gold you could ever imagine. The best example that I thought of over today and the last few days is quite reflective of this.

3:05that I think is really extraordinary about it, of what people don't realize, is that a rabbi can never have a bad day. If you really think about it, they're not allowed to have a bad day. And I don't mean that they never have bad days, but they can never show anyone that they are having a bad day. Because people, if you're a rabbi, come to you every day. One, after another, after another, after another. And what do they come to? They don't come to you saying, "Hey, Rabbi, I just won the lotto. I wanted to give you half of it." No, never. Never in history does that happen. What do they come to you with? "Rabbi, I just lost all my money. Rabbi, my wife is cheating on me. Rabbi, my kids are having problems in school. Rabbi, I have this problem. Rabbi, this one's dying. Rabbi, I'm dying." You know, problems. Tzagot. Rabbis have to be a source of strength and comfort, regardless of their own struggles. People come to you every day. One, after another, after another, after another. And what do they come with? They don't come to you, "Hey, Rabbi, I just won the lotto. I wanted to give you half of it." No, never. Never in history does that happen. What do they come with? "Rabbi, I just lost all my money. Rabbi, my wife is cheating on me. Rabbi, my kids are having problems in school. Rabbi, I have this problem. Rabbi, this one's dying. Rabbi, I'm dying." You know, problems. Tzarot. Tzarot all day, that's all they hear, is tzarot and tzarot and tzarot, and problems, and problems from all walks of life. If you want to really, honestly, I think that somebody should make some type of movie about this, just recording one rabbi's phone calls or conversations for one week. Just one week. If anyone...

4:22listens, watches this movie of just listening, not responding, not interacting, just listening to the phone calls that any of these rabbis get each week, I bet anything that that person not only does teshuva, but from that point on will never ever say anything bad about any rabbi. Because when you really realize what they go through and what they have to do all day, it's something extraordinary. They're not allowed to have a bad day. What are you going to say? So if somebody says, listen Rabbi, so and so has the machala, they have the disease, they have cancer, lo aleinu. The doctor said they only have a few months. What does the Rabbi say? You know, I'm having problems with my parnassah too. Oh yeah, I know. My so-and-so, I know also. What is he going to say to you? He can't. What is he going to say? He's not a psychiatrist that is going to tell you, "Oh listen, maybe if you meditate and pay me an extra $300 an hour, maybe it will go away." No, the Rabbi is going to try to give you some solid advice. Pray to Hashem, be closer to Hashem, do things that are going to be meaningful in your life, and lead you towards spiritual growth.

5:28be conducive to your life; spend time with them. He's going to try to teach you things that you can take with you for the rest of your life, not just for that one particular meeting. I'm talking about real Rabbis. I'm not just talking about anybody with a beard. If it was just about anybody with a beard, you'd call me a Rabbi already. Well, I'd say I'm not a Rabbi. I'm not even 1% of a Rabbi. But the point here is that when you think about these special people, that they go through so much, And it reminds me for myself, the reason why I even had the thought of this is because I thought about my business days when I had all these employees. I remember when we were at the top, there was one thing different than when we started falling. The one big thing that changed is that when we were at the top, there was never one employee who ever knew I had a bad day. They wouldn't know; they would see me mad or not mad, but as far as knowing what's going on in my life, it never happened. Never. You do your job, I do my job. If I'm upset about something or not, people stay away. They're just minding their own business. They do their own thing. But the difference was that once things started changing in the company was when I started making friends. When my employees became my friends. And that was one of the biggest mistakes. Because once you share these stories with people, initially it feels good, but then they forget that you're their boss.

6:55They forget that every time they cash a check, you're the one who's giving it to them. So the relationship changes drastically. What happens is that when they didn't know if I'm having a bad day or didn't even know why something was bad or not bad or good or anything, things were one way. When they started knowing, it only went downhill from there. The rabbi is very, very different. He can't ever do what I did. Obviously, the Torah teaches him not to. But the point here is that he is never even going to think about sharing his problems because some of the big tzaddikim, when you hear some of these stories, you hear, for example, stories about Rabbi Yosef. There was one night, one Friday, that a woman came, waited, and she's saying, I have to speak to the rabbi, I have to speak to the rabbi. But the point here is that he is never even going to think about sharing his problems because with some of the big tzaddikim, when you hear some of these stories, you hear, for example, stories about Rav Yosef. There was one night, one Friday, that a woman came, waited, and she's saying, I have to speak to the rabbi, I have to speak to the rabbi. It's Friday. It's a challenging day. Come back on Sunday. No, no, no. I have to talk to him now. Long story short, she wouldn't leave. Finally, they spoke to the rabbi. They let her in. They permitted the woman to enter. And then they observed the rabbi cry with her. So it wasn't that she was just crying; he was crying with her. They were both hysterically crying.

8:23That's a rabbi. That's why Rabbi Ovadia Yosef was Gadol Hador, Zichrono Levrachah. It wasn't necessarily just the immense amount of Torah that he knew. It wasn't just the fact that the stories they tell about him are only a quarter of the real stories that actually happened. But it's the fact that he lived it a thousand percent of the time and he felt what you felt. So when you have a connection with a rabbi... he's going to cry with you. When you feel sorrow, he feels sorrow. When you're upset, he's upset. When you're losing, he's losing. And that's the difference between a rabbi who is just there for the lectures and one who deeply cares about his community. But obviously, to develop a relationship like this takes time. You have to be honest with them. You have to stay in touch with them. You can't just expect that if you call this rabbi twice a year, right before the holidays, and ask him for a bracha, that you're going to have this relationship. You have to work at this, just like anything else in life. But the...

9:24minimum that we can do is start thinking about rabbis a little bit differently. When we see that, you know, we only see them once a week or a couple of times a week if we go to the shul more often, and we see them and we just see just a small part of their life. We see them giving a little lecture. Sometimes we like it, sometimes we don't like it. We see some people playing with their phone in the middle. We see some people completely not paying attention. We sometimes ourselves don't pay attention. We do all of these things. No one ever asks... What's going on in his life? And no one's generally going to know. And I can tell you that some of the problems that we're going through are the very same ones that they're going through. But I saw one time a picture, one of these pictures they put on the internet, and they have a picture of a lion. And it says the difficult part about being at the top is that no one asks if you're okay. In this context, we can understand the importance of being supportive and empathetic towards those around us, regardless of their perceived status or position.