Yearly Archives: 2007

Back to Echo Base

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(Screenshot from Star Wars: Battlefront for PC)
I’ve always enjoyed snow. The blanket of tranquility that comes from looking out your window and watching it fall onto the trees is something that I love. It remind me of playing in the snow as a kid and sledding with my own kids.
We’ve got tons here in Chicago. It takes forever to drive anywhere. I spent about an hour cleaning my driveway when I came from from work the other day. I took a look an hour later and we had another inch. All this snow, cold weather and me dressed in earmuffs, gloves, and a hat reminds me of being in third grade and seeing the planet Hoth from The Emipre Strikes Back for the first time.
I couldn’t resist playing Star Wars Star Wars: Battlefront on my computer the other night. It’s awesome! I hadn’t sat down to play in over a year, but it was great. I, of course, went straight to Hoth. The feeling of flying a snowspeeder and taking down an AT-AT is great. Like a childhood dream come true. A little fun never hurts!
Rebbe Nachman teaches: It is a great mitzvah to be happy always. Strengthen yourself to push aside all depression and sadness. Everyone has lots of problems and the nature of man is to be attracted to sadness. To escape these difficulties, constantly bring joy into your life – even if you have to resort to silliness” (Likutei Moharan 2, 24).

C’mon, Get Happy!

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(I hope someone gets this posting title)

Gut Chodesh. I usually have to remind myself that happiness should be a given. Adar just happens to be a month when it’s easier to receive the natural simcha that is available to me all the time.
Rabbi Akiva Tatz defines happiness as the natural expression of your neshama doing what its’ created to do. I don’t let myself have fun enough. I often let most aspects of my life become way too serious. I hope to work on this during Chodesh Adar and loosen up a bit.
Here’s a small list off the top of my head of things that happened during the past 36 hours that made me happy:
My kids being themselves and showing their personality
My wife laughing
My 4 yr old uberdaughter who lastnight started singing along to Hafachta
My 7 yr old uberson wanting to share something he learned on the parsha
My wife being happy soley because I am happy
When I read that Rav Nosson Tzvi Finkel zt’l, the Alter of Slabodka, would say that “he did not have a Yeshiva-one unit of hundreds of students, but rather he had hundreds of individuals.”
Being around good friends
Seeing our 4 month old smile for no reason what so ever
Eating my wife’s grilled chicken Caesar salad
Rav Hirsch writes in THE NINETEEN LETTERS that, “Happiness decreeded in accordance with compulsory, external standards ceases to be happiness.” (Second Letter)
What make you happy?

What I think about when I’m freezing

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It is cold. this past Shabbos (and most of this week so far) is the coldest weather I have ever experienced. I was cold like this once before, back in the winter of 1984. I attended an NCSY shabbaton that was, for some reason, held on a camp ground in Eureka, MO. I only remember two things from that Shabbos: freezing and meeting Lenny Solomon. Anyway, back to the post…

This is how my mind works most of the time:
As I walked out the door Shabbos morning to go to shul I carried my 8 oz cup of hot coffee. It stayed hot for about a minute and a half, then became Iced Coffee. As I finished it and threw the cup in the garbage I thought about how funny it is that an 8 oz cup of coffee (literally a ‘cup’) is really not the standard size for a cup of coffee today. All thanks to Starbucks. Prior to 1997 there were only three cups sizes you could buy coffee at a Starbucks:
Short (8oz)
Tall (12oz)
Grande (16oz)

Then it was decided by the powers that we were not drinking enough coffee. The ‘short’ size was eliminated and the ‘Venti’ size (20oz) was added to their menu. Short be came obsolete and was replaced by the now industry standard of a 12 oz cup (‘Tall’ in Starbucks-speak).

As I continued my walk to shul, I thought about paradigm shifts and how our values, standards, and goals can change with a thought, something our spouse or children say to us, or something we read. I then remembered one of my favorite stories.

The story below, from Am Echad Resources, was written by Howard Schultz (chairman and chief global strategist of Starbucks). This article is excerpted from a speech he delivered, and is reprinted courtesy of Hermes Magazine, Fall 2001, a publication of Columbia Business School.
From AM ECHAD RESOURCES:

When I was in Israel, I went to Mea Shearim, the ultra-Orthodox area within Jerusalem. Along with a group of businessmen I was with, I had the opportunity to have an audience with Rabbi Noson Tzvi Finkel, the head of a yeshiva there [Mir Yeshiva]. I had never heard of him and didn’t know anything about him. We went into his study and waited 10 to 15 minutes for him. Finally, the doors opened.
What we did not know was that Rabbi Finkel was severely afflicted with Parkinson’s disease. He sat down at the head of the table, and, naturally, our inclination was to look away. We didn’t want to embarrass him.
We were all looking away, and we heard this big bang on the table: “Gentlemen, look at me, and look at me right now.” Now his speech affliction was worse than his physical shaking. It was really hard to listen to him and watch him. He said, “I have only a few minutes for you because I know you’re all busy American businessmen.” You know, just a little dig there.
Then he asked, “Who can tell me what the lesson of the Holocaust is?” He called on one guy, who didn’t know what to do — it was like being called on in the fifth grade without the answer. And the guy says something benign like, “We will never, ever forget?” And the rabbi completely dismisses him. I felt terrible for the guy until I realized the rabbi was getting ready to call on someone else. All of us were sort of under the table, looking away — you know, please, not me. He did not call me. I was sweating. He called on another guy, who had such a fantastic answer: “We will never, ever again be a victim or bystander.”
The rabbi said, “You guys just don’t get it. Okay, gentlemen, let me tell you the essence of the human spirit.
“As you know, during the Holocaust, the people were transported in the worst possible, inhumane way by railcar. They thought they were going to a work camp. We all know they were going to a death camp.
“After hours and hours in this inhumane corral with no light, no bathroom, cold, they arrived at the camps. The doors were swung wide open, and they were blinded by the light. Men were separated from women, mothers from daughters, fathers from sons. They went off to the bunkers to sleep.
“As they went into the area to sleep, only one person was given a blanket for every six. The person who received the blanket, when he went to bed, had to decide, ‘Am I going to push the blanket to the five other people who did not get one, or am I going to pull it toward myself to stay warm?'”
And Rabbi Finkel says, “It was during this defining moment that we learned the power of the human spirit, because we pushed the blanket to five others.”
And with that, he stood up and said, “Take your blanket. Take it back to America and push it to five other people.”

I made it to shul and forgot about being cold. I remembered the blanket and for the past four days have been opening my eyes to chessed oportunites.

Carpool Conversation

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The following conversation occurred a few days ago as I drove my 4 yrs old daughters’ carpool home from school. We had just dropped off our first passenger and were in route to drop off the second one when my daughter said…

Uberdaughter: Abba, (name withheld) left something in the car. We have to give it to her, it’s a mitzvah.
Me: That’s right, Uberdaughter. It’s the mitzvah of Hashovas Avedah, giving something back to someone who lost something. We’ll have to write you a ‘mitzvah note’ for school.
2nd Child/Passenger (soon to be dropped off): I get a ‘mitzvah note’, too.
Me: O.K., you can tell your mom when I take you home.
Uberdaughter: Oh no!! I get the mitzvah note, because I saw that (name withheld) left something. The person who sees a mitzvah and yells about it is the one who did the mitzvah for real-life and gets the mitzvah. Hashem says so.

All right, while my daughter did use some ‘hashkafic literary license’, what she said holds some truth. It actually reminded me of a great story published in the book Gut Voch, by Avrohom Barash.
The story, from page 68, titled “Everything Counts” follows:

The sister of the Vilna Gaon would often collect tzedakah for various charitable causes together with a friend. At one point the two agreed that whichever one of them would pass away first would come to the other one in a dream and relate her experiences.

When one of them left this world, she kept her word and appeared to her friend. “Tell me,” she asked, “what is it like in Gan Eden?”

“I am not prepared to tell you everything,” she replied. “But one thing I can say: everything is calculated minutely. Do you remember that one day when we were collecting for an important cause and you saw a woman across the road whom we could approach? You raised your hand and pointed her out, and I crossed the road and spoke to her. You will receeive reward for lifting your finger to point her out, while I was rewarded for having taken the trouble to cross the road and go over to her.”
My daughter was on target.

Thoughts on the Superbowl

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The drawing above of a Bears helmet was done by an outsanding 7 year old boy currently in first grade, my son.

If I were a sports fan, in theory, I would be torn about the upcoming game between the Colts and the Bears. I dedicated almost eight years of my life to the Jewish community of Indianapolis. I, now, currently reside in Chicago. For me, it really doesn’t matter who wins… I’ve never been too into sports.

For my son, well, it’s a different story altogether. His love of the Bears has grown over the past year. He has ‘subliminally’ been showing his team pride over the past few weeks with his drawings and colorings of the weekly parsha. First it was Yosef’s me’il that was colored blue and orange. Then it was a Bears blanket that covered Paro as he slept and dreamed. Most recently it was a picture of two Jewish slaves working in Egypt, wearing Bears jerseys.

As I said, I’ve never been too into sports. But I keep up with the scores, watch some of the games with him (and let him explain things to me) and try to bond with him. It’s important to show interest in what our kids are interested in. My neighbor is a huge Chicago sports fan (Sox not Cubs). I have observed the special bond he has with his oldest child when it comes to sports. I know that I cannot make myself into a sports fanatic, but I try to use things like “da Bears” as a way of bonding with my son. My son is wise to me. He knows that I’m not as into it as other dads, but he’s cool with it. He sees that I make the effort and I hope there is something to be said for that.

An observation: In a city devided by baseball like Chicago it’s nice to see people rally behind one common goal…the Bears. There is a lot that I take away from such unity, even on a gachmius level.

Note: I do enjoy watching the XGames!

A moment of reflection

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There was a time when I couldn’t imagine not posting for over two weeks. It’s not that my life is so exciting or that I have so much to say, it’s just that I had a lack of free will when it came to blogs. Things have changed for the better.

I didn’t start out planning not to post, but things came up like family, rubber bands, work, and freezing cold temps in our playroom/computer room.

During my ‘break’ from posting two things transpired. Firstly, as of the beginning of January, I have posted more than 100 times on blogger. For me, as someone who enjoys writing, but hadn’t kept up with it in years, this is a milestone. I look at it as over 100 journal entries!

The second thing that happened was much more humbling. My sitemeter went over 10000. I am blow away that my little blog has been viewed more that 10000 times. I was floored when my first posting even got any comments.
Thanks to all of those who take time from their day to read and comment. It means something to me. On with the postings…

Expanding Rubber Bands

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(Picture taken at the Museum of Science
and Industry in Chicago on 12/24/06)
In my previous post, , A Simple Jew commented: Have you found a positive action to replace the “negative” action of checking your e-mail so often?
The most obvious result of “Rubber Band Mussar”, in my case, is a more focused day in the workplace, more quality time with my family, more time to open a sefer, and an understanding of the difference between what I want and what I need. These, in and of themselves, are positive actions, however they are secondary.

The most obvious positive action is ….Awareness.
I’ve quoted this before, but in second chapter of Mesillas Yesharim it states that:
THE IDEA OF WATCHFULNESS is for a man to exercise caution in his actions and his undertakings; that is, to deliberate and watch over his actions and his accustomed ways to determine whether or not they are good, so as not to abandon his soul to the danger of destruction, God forbid, and not to walk according to the promptings of habit as a blind man in pitch darkness.
No one wants to be a robot (although the life size Robbie the Robot pictured above was pretty cool), or a slave to habit. I sure don’t! The awareness of my addiction to checking email has, ironically, helped to stop me from acting robotic and doing things simply by rote. However, it’s more that just being aware of the choice I make to go or not go online. It’s a learning process and I am becoming much more aware of my behavior in general. It’s not so easy.
Example:
Last week my wife asked me to go bring in some milk from the car. I “stopped for a second” to check my email on the way and found myself sitting at the computer for 15 minutes. It was 32 degrees outside and the milk was fine, but that’s not the point. My wife asked me to do a simple thing and I let myself get distracted. That’s the point. I should not have touched the computer when I had something else to do. I could have used a rubber band then (of course now everyone at home is ready to shoot rubber bands at me thanks to my new mussar exercise). Things that so natural are the things that I often don’t make conscious decisions about.
With that being said, after being Torah observant for 19 years, I find myself doing some things by rote and it bothers me. I try to keep myself in check most of the time, but an automated Shemona Esray here, the conditioned response of an “amen” there, a half-hearted “Gut Shabbos” to a stranger just to be yotzai for saying “Gut Shabbos”, well…it adds up. It’s something I’m not true happy with, but at least I’m aware of it. I find myself these days being much more careful before I speak and aware of how best to use my time.
Like I wrote, no one wants to be robot. Not when I come to email (and the urge to read email is totally in full force after a posting goes up) and certainly not when it come to my Avodas Hashem.
Mediocrity is my enemy. Becoming comfortable with my Yiddishkeit not only pushes me away from Hashem, but from a chinuch aspect, it’s like the black plauge. Our children pick up on everything we do (I’ll write more about this in a future post). I remember listening to the lady at the post office say that her mother mumbled the blessings on Chanukah, and thinking that this is not how I want my children to remember their childhood and our Torah observant way of life.
As mentioned before, I have found myself become much more aware of everything I do. I find myself questioning if it’s “what I really need to do right now” and thinking about my actions. I recall certain thoughts and feelling I had when I decided start wearing a yarmulka in public. How careful I was about my manner of speech and behavior. Sometimes I feel that I have become too comfortable with who I am and my yiddishkeit, and it worries me.
When I wrote my previous post I really didn’t think that this rubberband thing would end up making me really examine my actions so much. I’m happy that I’m able to grow from my blogging, and in this case, with the help of several comments.
Last night I heard something that really made me angry. Well, at least I was aware that I could have become angry. Without missing a beat, I stuck my hand in my pocket and felt my trusty rubber band. Later my wife commented that she was actually surprised that I wasn’t more upset. Awareness of my actions saved me from losing my cool, this time.
Yet again, later that night, I went to check my email and realized that I stayed online longer that I needed to. Each opportunity is a challenge and a battle, but that’s alright. I fight, fall, and get up again.
Over the past few months (especially in the summer) I’ve felt that my ‘hobbie’ of blogging and reading other blogs has taken up a major amount of my time. I can say now, since I’ve become more mindful of the little things I do, I feel a new found sense of freedom about my hobbie. It’s important to realize what I am a slave to.

Stretching my own Bechira Point

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(from yotophoto.com)

I have a tendancy (read urge) to check my email constantly. This is a major problem for me because it takes away time from other things I should be doing. I’ve tried only checking it at designated time, but I often slip up. It’s been driving me crazy, because I have no problem not eating any dairy for several hours after I’ve eaten meat. I have no urge to turn on light during Shabbos. Yet, I’ve struggled to not go online and check email for periods of a few hours. My Yetzer gets the bets of me.

Over the past few weeks, though, I’ve been slowly working on this. It has resulted in less time spent online (which is not a bad thing) and has been a good exercise in adjusting my own bechira point. At age 36, I have found myself, again, changing aspects of my behavior, I’m proud to write (it should be chizuk to anyone who needs it to change even the most mudane aspect of their personality).

For me things like going online (and other actions that are potenial unproductive and suck away my time from right under my nose) are really ‘pareve’ issues that I often fool myself into thinking don’t matter much and don’t require that much bechira to begin with. This is not the right way to think. I admit that I need to work on this.

The method I’ve been using was based on something I read a few years ago in Alan Morinis’ book Climbing Jacob’s Ladder. The book tells the true story of a man who grew up non-observant and his journey towards self-discovery that takes him to Rabbi Yechiel Yitzchok Perr, Rosh Yehsiva of Yeshiva of Far Rockaway, the tradition of mussar, and towards a Torah observant life.

Mr. Morinis writes (page 47) that after his initial meeting with Rav Perr he asked the Rosh Yeshiva for a mussar practice to work on. Rabbi Perr said “Well, what you can do is get a rubber band that’s big enough to fit around the palm of your hand. Keep it in your pocket, and when you feel impatient or angry, slip it on. No need to do anything more, just put it on.”
I decided to use this technique to me more aware of when I felt the urge to go check my email. It hasn’t been easy. It has help me become much more conscious of the choices I make. Not just checking email, but how I speak to others and being patient.
I’ve been keeping a chart of my progress and tracking the times that I’ve wanted to check email. Here’s last weeks:
Monday: No work
Tuesday: 9.:25, 10:04, 3:28
Wednesday: 11:36, 2:31
Thursday: 10:18 (no rubberband, 3:47 (no rubberband)
Friday: 11:45 (no rubber band)
On Tuesday and Wednesday last week I put on the rubber band. As you can see, by Thursday, I felt that I didn’t need it. It just sat in my pocket. It’s a great feeling knowing that I can change.

Pareve Coke Blak à la Uberdox

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I admit, I like Coke Blak (or as I call it among my friends ‘Coke BlakHat’). I tried it right when I got the “ok” from the cRc and the OU. I actually was the first to ask the cRc about it. One problem…it’s dairy.

This make it difficult for someone who eats/drinks Cholov Yisroel to enjoy this great drink.
This wasn’t an issue for me Shavuos night, as we ate dairy. The extra jolt really helped during my night of learning.

But I’ve often thought how much I’d enjoy Coke Blak with my chulent on Shabbos (or even in the chulent for a turbo charged treat).

I’ve found that taking a 12 oz can of Coke and adding an 1-2oz of black coffee give you about the same taste. And you can enjoy it with fleishigs!