The Jewish Mind

Link to Trailer: https://www.facebook.com/TheJewishMind/videos/1684241958259263/ Link to Written Notes (available until March 15, 2017, after which you can request them at TheJewishMind@icloud.com): https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/4614078/17.%20Yithro%205777%20-Because%20My%20Insides%20Don%E2%80%99t%20Feel%20the%20Way%20Your%20Outsides%20Look%20-Reconciling%20Ourselves.pdf THE JEWISH MIND’s pu...

One of the greatest challenges that people face is the struggle of us being a Divine Being having a Physical Experience. The outcome of us being primarily a Divine Being having a Physical Experience, and not being a Physical Being having a Divine Experience is in the different layers of the journey from our spiritual inspirations to our physical success. Were we to be Physical Beings having a Divi...

There is a unique difference between the person who is naturally affluent and the person who is unnaturally ‘loaded’. The difference stems within the core of their soul, in which one is the embodiment of oneness, peacefulness and calmness, and as his affluence grows, his calmness grows. For this individual, the naturally affluent person, affluence fits like a tailor-made suit. The core of the pers...

There is a powerful truth about mankind, that at our very core we cannot withstand the glare of honesty. There is a sobering saying amongst our sages that says, “A man knows in his soul the bitterness of his heart,” which speaks of a man knowing the truth of who he is and where he spiritually and morally stands. In very large measure, our generation fails to live up to the generations of men who w...

I am awestruck how the further that communicational technology takes us, the less clarity we have of what is true and what is not true. Today, every civilian has unprecedented footage of the frontline of combat, and every voter has at their fingertips unprecedented power of research on any candidate, and the one thing that we don’t have is clarity of truth. The story of the Middle East is another...

“Feelings,” is the word that brings us at times such joy, and at times such pain. At times we feel so gifted for our frontal cortex opening up for us a plethora of feelings unavailable to any other creature in the universe, and at times, we feel so cursed by our capacity of feelings, and wish that we could be nothing more than an intellectual droid. In the mystical teachings of Chassidus, the gift...

In many spiritual teachings, and in the mind and hearts of many, the goal of life is to cleanse and open our hearts so that we may experience in our lifetime true love. Some have been hurt, either in their own relationships or through the divorce of their parents, and in order to protect themselves they have decided that they don’t believe in true love. Others simply don’t feel that they have the...

This week’s and last week’s Torah-portions speak in great detail about dreams. First we read of Joseph’s two dreams of how his brother will bow to him, the first dream speaking of bundles of straw and the second dream of stars, the moon and the sun bowing to his bundle of straw and to his star. Then we have the dream of the wine-merchant with the three baskets of grapes on his head, and the baker...

Darkness manifests itself in the human experience in a very personal way within him and around him. From the moment that Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge, they have internalized evil, darkness and temptation within the human being. No more would some outer creature, such as the serpent, be the one to arouse within the human thoughts of temptations. Rather, from then on, the voice of tem...

There is so much to be said about true wealth. In Jewish teaching our sages are quoted for saying, “There is no poverty but for in the mind.” A simple way to understand this is through a story that my friend once told me about life in the Shtehtle. So, the rich man buys a new hat for two ruble, and a year later sells the hat to a poor man for one ruble. At the end of the day, how much did each man...

“Ladies first,” is what a gentleman says, however, is it what a gentleman believes? Let’s put away the political correctness, and let me say that no one is recording our thoughts to have them suddenly appear on social media when we decide to run for president… So, please, let us both be very honest with our thoughts now. What I have found in discussion with many men is that when a man says, “Ladie...

One of the larger issues that our generation is dealing with is the lack of fulfillment. Looking at the amount of prescriptions that are being administered for depression, including the medical prescriptions for pets for healing depression, one can understand how far-reaching this struggle for the experience of fulfillment is. In this lecture we are going to explore Judaism’s solution for this mod...

The modern issue to be dealt with in this lecture could best be defined in the lyrics from a movie my youngest son enjoys, called, Alvin and the Chipmunks. Here are the lyrics: 'Cause you're hot then you're cold You're yes then you're no You're in then you're out You're up then you're down You're wrong when it's right It's black and it's white… So, what is up with these bi-polar experiences that s...

The modern issue that I want to have meet Judaism in this lecture is the issue of exhaustion. One of the sayings of Tony Robbins and his colleagues of motivational speakers, which most intrigues, and then alienate, people like you and I is the saying, “Have a dream that makes you want to get up in the morning!” ------ Here is a link to the written notes of this lecture, which will be available unt...

Studies have shown that one out of five people suffer from loneliness. Studies show that it is a human need to have communication and connection, and that experiencing loneliness is our human-ness letting us know that it is not having its needs met. This lecture is going to take us to the mystical teachings that reveal the source of Separation Anxieties, Abandonment Anxieties, and the feeling of L...

Understanding Jewish Nirvana Let us begin by defining what Nirvana is. (a) In Buddhism: a transcendent state in which there is neither suffering, desire, nor sense of self, and the subject is released from the effects of karma and the cycle of death and rebirth. It represents the final goal of Buddhism. (b) a state of perfect happiness; an ideal or idyllic place. Jewish Nirvana, as we will learn,...

Taking a look at the recent decades, we find people, and especially American Citizens, leaning forward, backward, to the left, and then to the right, in trying to find inner-balance. There was the hippie decade, the mercenary decade each trying to find inner-balance, which breeds inner-purpose and fulfillment. There is the rush to the physical, the spiritual, the disciplined, the free-spirited, th...

When we look for a precise example of what it means that “Happiness comes from within, and can never truly come from without,” I think that a perfect example for this would be the polar opposite experience of happiness, which is loneliness. For starters, there is a huge difference between a loner and the feeling of loneliness. The loner doesn’t feel lonely, and often feels irritated when he can’t...

In this lecture we are going to discuss what I call the Non-Medical Bipolar Disorder, where it comes from and how to overcome it. By Non-Medical Bipolar Disorder I am referring to the average person’s shifts between feeling empowered and inspired to be able to overcome all obstacles and succeed, to the weakened feeling of, you can’t fight city hall, that feeling that there are superstars amongst u...

There is a very defining verse in the book of Job (-5:7) that reads, “Because man is born for trouble, but flying creatures fly upward.” Rashi, the classic commentator of the 11the Century, explains the verse as, “Because man is born for trouble: For it is impossible that he should not sin and receive trouble as punishment for sin. He is not like the flying creatures-the angels and spirits-who fly...

I am one of three siblings. My older brother was born 16 months before me, and my sister seven years after me. My brother and I are as different as night and day. He is blessed with social skills, a keen understanding of the authority hierarchy, and how to play them. Me, not so. Therefore, I spent my most formative years being asked again and again, “Why can’t you be like your older brother?!” Bei...

This Shabbat and Sunday are the two days of Rosh Chodesh (beginning of a month) of the Jewish calendar month of Elul. Elul is the final month of the Jewish annual cycle, bringing us straight to Rosh Hashanah -The Jewish New Year. This month is called in Jewish Law and in Jewish Mysticism as the Month of Compassion. I remember hearing the Rebbe, of righteous memory, talking about the concept of com...

I want to talk about how both sides of the political isle have sadly bastardized the divine selfless experience of compassion into a subhuman political selfish experience of compassion. One side of the isle is accusing the other side’s infinity to liberal compassion as the crutch of eternal enabling, while the second side fires back at the right-wing’s tyrannical lack of compassion as being with t...

The Talmud states that a person would rather have one measurement of his own than nine measurements of another’s. Another teaching states that in Egypt we ate, “Bread of Shame,” and only once we received the Torah, and with it a Cause and Effect relationship with G-d, that, “If in My statutes you will walk and I will give your rains…,” have we begun to eat Bread of Honor. These teachings lend to o...

Many view life as being made up from positive or negative events, however, in truth, life is made up of positive or negative energies. While there are sweet and bitter events, it is our energy in which we receive it and react to it that will create whether it is a positive or a negative event. The famous Torah-event that exemplifies this concept is the story of Joseph. The story doesn’t read as ju...