Category Archives: lessons

Two of my favorite stories

Story number one:

A regular preppie teenager walks up to a punk rock teenager with a Mohawk and asks him ‘What’s Punk?’.
So the hardcore-punk teen kicks over a garbage can and say ‘That’s punk!’. The preppie teen proceeds to kick over another garbage can and says ‘That’s Punk?’ The punk kids looks at him, smiles, and says ‘No that’s trendy!” (Overheard during a late night high school party way back in 1988)

I love this story because it shows that it’s not only our actions that define us, but our attitude when we perform those actions.
We, Baruch Hashem, can give meaning and emotion to what we do. Mitzvah performance or our level of external frumkeit isn’t meant to be something ‘trendy’. To follow the crowd without thinking about what or why you’re doing something isn’t always the best plan. Plenty of people, myself included, fall into the trap of doing mitvah-related actions by rote or as another trend once in a while.
To put on Tefillin, make a bracha, hug your kid, learn a pasuk, say a kind word, clean for Shabbos, or braid a challah can be an empty action…or a meaning experience. It’s all about what you do and how you doing. By “how you do it”, I mean what kavanah you ascribe to your actions. Do do something with a sense of simcha is a wonderful thing. It’s actually pretty punk these days.

Story number two:
When Rav Dessler came to America in 1948, he met up with his son, Nachum Velvel in New York. Rav Dessler asked his son who had help him during his years alone in America? His son mentioned several people in New York along with Rabbi Eliezer Silver, the head of Agudah Israel and the rav of Cincinnati. Rav Dessler said, “We must thank him.”
His son offered to place a telephone call to Rabbi Silver, but Rav Dessler wanted to show personal hakaros hatov to Rabbi Silver. Nachum Velvel and his father then took a nine hour train ride to Ohio, arriving at 5:00 am in Cincinnati. Then went to Rabbi Silver’s home and waited on the porch to meet Rabbi Silver as he left his house for davening.
Rabbi Silver met his two guests when he woke up and they all went to shul and then back to the Silver’s for breakfast. After a bite to eat, Rabbi Silver said, “So, Rav Dessler, what brings you to Cincinnati?” Rav Dessler said that he had only come to show appreciation to Rabbi Silver for all he had done for his son.
Rabbi Silver thought about this and again asked, “So, Rav Dessler, what really brings you to Cincinnati?”
Rav Dessler said that he had no other purpose that to show hakaros hatov. Rabbi Silver asked, “Rav Dessler, what can I do for you?”
Rav Dessler, for a third time, repeated that he only wished to show gratitude to Rabbi Silver in person.
Rabbi Silver finally gave up and muttered, “This must be mussar.”
(Paraphrased from the Artscroll biography of Rav Dessler, by Yonoson Rosenbloom)
This is one of my favorite Rav Dessler stories. It embodies, what I think is the best of the mussar movement. I’m not even on the same radar screen as Rav Dessler, but I can relate to this story. My actions need to be in sync with how I live my life. This is what Rav Dessler (or any Adam Gadol) is all about. A simple “thank you” isn’t enough sometimes. We need to go out of our way (in Rav Dessler’s case he went nine hours out of his way) to do the right thing and put your money where your mouth is.
To show gratitude or do a chesed to a spouse, parent, teacher, or even a child who needs to be acknowledged is the right thing. For Rav Dessler, he felt he had no choice but to travel to Cincinnati. For me, walking across the street or just to the livingroom can make a big difference to someone. We have know idea what effect our actions can have on others. Have a great day!

Quick thought on Ki Teitzei

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It says in Devarim 22:3 “…and so shall you do with any lost article of your brother that may become lost from him and you find it; you shall not hide yourself.” Rashi says that you can’t cover your eyes and pretend that it’s not there.

We have a halachic obligation to return something that a fellow Jew has lost. That’s pretty easy to understand. The end of this pasuk say that we have a separate mitzvah not to “turn a blind eye to a lost object” (to use the words of the Sefer haChinuch, Mitzvah # 539).

During the entire year, and of course, during Elul, we are given an uncountable number of mitzvah opportunities. I wonder if I really see these mitzvah opportunities as gifts from Hashem or do I pretend they are not there?

The best I can do is keep my glasses clean and look for what Hashem, in his infinite Chessed, has given me.

The typically pretentious blog posting that most people won’t read, but I’ve been wanting to write for quite some time

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OK, I know, it’s a long title. The truth is that this posting has been brewing in my press pot of a long time. I hope that my few readers will allow me to go in a slightly different direction just for one posting. Rav Yisrael Salanter’s final two midos are coming very soon.

Fact: Whenever I post a comment on my own blog, the following message appears in my Hotmail inbox:

The sender of this message, neilsharris@hotmail.com, could not be verified by Sender ID. Learn more about Sender ID.
From: Neil Harris
Sent : Monday, August 21, 2006 9:57 PM
To : neilsharris @ hotmail.com @hotmail.com>
Subject : [Modern Uberdox] 8/21/2006 09:57:46 PM

Could not be verified by Sender ID?!? What’s this all about?

Hotmail doesn’t recognize my email address when I post a comment to my blog. You’ve got to be kidding.
During Elul, it seems that introspection is about as commonplace as the ads for a new Sukkah in any great Jewish newspaper.
Not recognizing yourself is usually a bad thing, right? I’m not so sure about that. If one approaches the Teshuva process and is successful, then we change who we are. If we change ourselves, then not recognizing who we once were is a great thing.

As I reflect on the the past year (along with everyone else) I can divide the year into two different sections.
1) Life before moving to Chicago vs. Now living in Chicago
2) Life before blogging vs. Life as a blogger

Both sections share very common elements. In the moving to Chicago arena, I’ve been given an opportunity to start fresh in terms of who I am, and what identity I make for myself and my family. While we moved here knowing a few people, it’s really an open book.

The blogging arena is also much the same. By posting on a blog you reinforce your own identity. Or create a new one.
Plenty of people have very solid and legitimate reasons for blogging Anonymous. I greatly respect that.

I chose the other path. I use my name. I’ll be honest, one reason is that I want to be heard. I don’t mind saying this, only because I could have just as easily written this posting in a journal and kept it on a shelf (I’ve, in fact, kept journals for years). As a result of blogging I’ve been able to write more in the past four and a half months than I’ve written in the past four and a half years. This is a major accomplishment for me. Another reason is that using my own name helps keep me in check so I write as truthfully as I can and I don’t use my blog to slam others or go off on them for whatever reason sounds good at the time.
I do wonder if people who read my blog have some image of me that isn’t quite who I really am?

Cute quote time….
“I am not who I think I am; I am not who you think I am; I am who I think you think I am.” (I heard that it was written by Goethe)

I’ve thought about this line many times since I started my blog. It totally applies to the blogosphere. Bloggers blog about different things. Each blog reveals a little about someone. Some blog about personal issues, others about d’vrai Torah, others about their family, others about social issues. We all have something to say.
One blogger, who I respect and admire for their quality of writing, Torah knowledge, and overall menshlikeit mentioned to me “that what we blog is not who we are, but what is at our essence”.
Just think about that statement for a second…

Let’s take my blogs’ name. It’s is really a humorous label. It’s a phrase that I hadn’t seen used before and I thought it was catchy, in light of the fact that we live in a generation of people trying to Uber-Frum themselves in the eyes of others. In the 12th chapter of EYES TO SEE, (thanks to my friend in Atlanta for turning me on to the book when it came out) Rabbi Yom Tov Schwartz writes about the “Selectively Pious” Jews out there who pick and choose different aspects of Bein Adam L’chavero and Bein Adam L’makom to observe. Both types of Mitzvos are of equal importance. I try to bring that out in what I write about.

Remember when you first created you blog? I do. I debated about what to write for the blog description in the “settings” section. I finally settled on “ideas about Kehillah, Hashkafa, and Avodas Hashem”. Pretty general and not too creative. What I didn’t realize then was that Kehillah would end up referring to the online community and bond that bloggers create.
So back to my problem with Hotmail…Why won’t it verify who I am? I think the answer is that neilsharris at hotmail.com doesn’t refer to the real me. It’s just an address. And not even a physical address. You can’t Maquest an email address. It doesn’t reference where I am or where I live. While devarim or words (written or spoken) reveal one’s machshavos or thoughts, an email address reveals nothing. It’s just something on a screen that can be deleted. I find this lesson to be great mussar for myself. What I think of as my identity isn’t really an identity at all.
It’s Elul, and I need to figure out who I am and where I am.
Reb Nachman writes in Likutey Moharan that “You are wherever your thoughts are. Make sure your thought are where you what to be.”

If interested in buying a copy of EYES TO SEE, it’s available at most seforim stores or online here.

What I think about when I’m feeling down…

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The picture to the left will be explained soon…

First, this posting is really an expansion of something I wrote here about things not working out the way you want them to. I’m, B”H, in a great mood. But, I’ll be honest, there are times when I’m not. This happens to all of us at one time or another. It’s sad, but true. Sadness, or atzvus, at times gets the best of us. We fall into a funk, or get depressed. That’s the worst. Rabbi Akiva Tatz once defined depression as “the despair of falling into an inability to act.”

To fall into the pit of thinking that we have no choices left is a terrible yeter hara. In a way, it’s the opposite of having free will. The truth is we can control how we choose to react to any given situation. It’s just, sometimes, we forget the we have a choice. Of the road in front of us seems too long and dark.

When I do feel down, I look that the picture that you see on your screen. I did the design and layout several years ago. I keep a framed copy of this picture on the bookshelf. Most people don’t look at it twice. Occasionally, a curious guest will ask me about it. It’s actually based on something I heard during my high school years, said in the name of Rav Yitzchok Hutner z”tl.

Rav Hutner, based on the Maharal, took a look at the words “adam” meaning man and “meod” mean very or more. Rav Hutner explains that after man was created on the sixth day, it says in Beraishis 1:31: And God saw all that He had made, and behold it was very good, and it was evening and it was morning, the sixth day.
Not just “good” but “very good.” The word “meod” seem to imply that something is beyond measurement. For example, most cars can only go to a predetermined top speed. The size of a house is based on the number of square feet in a lot and also how much money one uses to build the house. A computer is capable of holding only have so much memory (although that seems to change every other week). Rav Hutner said that people are not like this. We can grow beyond what we even imagine. When it comes to a person, our potential for greatness is limitless. It’s “meod“.
When I’m feeling down this is what I think about. My potential is beyond measurement. I just need to push myself.
Once, while taking the subway to Brooklyn on an erev Shabbos I stood in front of someone wearing a T-shirt made by “Champion” (the company is really know for their sweatshirts). The back of the T-Shirt had the following printed on it: IT TAKES A LITTLE MORE EFFORT TO MAKE A CHAMPION. What mussar!!! I think of this T-shirt at times, as well.

Music also cheers me up. Especially the Moshe Skier Band’s treatment on the classic Hafachta.
Speaking of Jewish music, blogger buddy, A SIMPLE JEW, had a great posting up yesterday. Take a few minutes and check it out, here.
Have a happy day and a great Shabbos Kodesh!!

Geting Organized…

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Here’s an excerpt from an e-list newletter I subscribe to by written by Maria Gracia, from Get Organized Now!

Set a Time Budget

When it comes to making purchases, most people have an idea in their minds of what they’re willing to spend. You probably wouldn’t walk into a shoe store and say, ‘I will buy that pair of shoes no matter how much they cost.’ If the salesperson says the shoes cost $400, most people would not buy them. That’s because when it comes to making purchases, people set a budget in their minds of how much those shoes are really worth to them.
But what about when it comes to how you spend your time? Do you sometimes spend more time on certain tasks than they’re really worth? For instance, when it comes to cleaning your home do you spend an hour a day doing so? Two hours? Three hours? More than three hours? Is dusting really worth that much of your time? What about your other projects and appointments? How much is that time worth to you?

We all get the same amount of time each day–24 hours. At least 8 of those hours are allocated to sleeping. So, we all have approximately 16 hours when we’re awake.

By setting a time budget for certain activities, you will always ensure your time is being spent on what is most important to you, your family and your future.How much time are you willing to invest with a spouse or loved one? How many hours will you allocate to working, cleaning, exercising, eating or watching television?

Before doing anything, ask yourself how much time you’re willing to invest. Write those time investments down so you’re able to reference them regularly. Then, stick to your time budget.

Time isn’t an unlimited currency, so be sure to spend it wisely.

End of article.

For more ideas, feel free to check out the Get Organized Now! website. The monthly newsletters and blog are interesting.

My thoughts:
I’ve found that reading blogs and writing my content can take up a lot of time. With Elul around the corner and I know that I need to start craking down. Time is an element that we can mekadesh, or make holy. In fact, from what I’ve read and been told, Rav Soloveitchik was very into this concept of people being able to mikadesh certain days and physical objects. As I’ve posted on a few other blogs and, at least two emails to fellow readers, a close friend of mine and someone whom I look up to, mentioned to his son, on the occasion of his sons’ Bar Mitzvah, that “how we spend our free time defines who we are”. As I’ve been posting on my blog over the past 4 months, I find myself constantly thinking about that quote, if not every time I go online. So far the only thing I’ve figured out is that I need certain times set aside for online use at home. When time is up… I need to walk away. Time budgeting might be an answer. Any thoughts…

By the way, my name is Neil Harris, and I’m a Bloggaholic.

Using what Hashem gives you

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The follow was posted on the Areivim list by SBA and I felt it important to post here after getting permission for the orginal poster. A feel good story doesn’t hurt once in a while.

Paul Guez, Denim King, Bounces Back From Cocaine, Bankruptcy
(Bloomberg News) http://tinyurl.com/nxr74

“…Guez had unloaded the inventory on the Value City department store chain, owned by his friends, the Schottenstein clan of Columbus, Ohio. Following the sale in 1992, Guez got a life- changing proposition from patriarch Jerome Schottenstein, then 66. “I was broke, basically, and he says, `Paul, I would like you to participate in a charity. You have to pay $100,000,”’ Guez says. The charity was to pay for a new English translation of the Talmud, the sacred Jewish text. “I’m sure he knew I was broke,” Guez says of Schottenstein. “Then he sent a rabbi to make me sign a contract for $100,000. My wife exploded laughing, `Like from where?’ I didn’t know from where, but I did it.”
The “where” turned out to be the Schottensteins themselves. Soon after Guez agreed to make the donation, Jerome Schottenstein gave him an order for 12,000 pairs of jeans for Schottenstein’s Warrendale, Pennsylvania-based American Eagle Outfitters Inc. — enough to cover Guez’s donation. That was followed by an order for 650,000 pairs. To finance the product, Schottenstein lent Guez $500,000. “I didn’t even have a bank account,” Guez says.
After Schottenstein’s death in 1992, his son Jay sold Guez 1 million shares of American Eagle for $12 a share when the stock was trading at $16, even arranging a line of credit to finance the $12 million purchase price. The stock soared to more than $70 by 1999, making a now sober Guez wealthy again. “The family strongly believes the more you give, the more you get,” Schottenstein spokesman Michael Broidy says. “Good things happen if you do good things.”

A Letter in the Yated

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Below is a part of a letter to the editors of the Yated. It is titled “WHEN THE CITY COMES TO THE MOUNTAINS”, and discusses the problems that sometimes come up when we go upstate.

The formula for this problem is more or less as follows: The people living here are not used to the ‘givens’ of life in New York City. Mix that with the frustrations of a massive increase in population, a measure of various preconceived notions, a dash of hatred, and a pinch of some really foolish behavior, and you’ve got a recipe for disaster. (If a reader does not agree that a chillul Hashem is a disaster, then this letter is not for him.)
So it’s not hard to understand why it irks people waiting fifteen minutes more than usual in Shop-Rite to see someone in front of them continue to add items to their grocery cart. And it’s not hard to imagine the reaction of the year-round drivers when one of the thousands of extra cars crowding the streets stops in the middle of the road to let somebody on or off, (which itself is an issue that is a problem in many communities all year round and should be corrected).
It is probably a bit hard for a city person to have a feel for the problem because he doesn’t have an idea of how different it is when things are quiet around here. Thus, he does not know how much, what goes on during the summer, makes a difference to the country folk. It is well known to those frum Yidden living here year-round that the friendly faces that might greet them from behind a local sales counter during the winter months can be expected to become cold and unwelcoming in July and August. During the winter, you do not have to watch so that you are not accused of cutting the line, whereas during the summer, if you are not careful, it could easily happen.
If I were to try to compose a list of the possible situations where the danger of this problem lies, it would probably be too long for this column, let alone this letter; but I know that anyone who has a heart to care about it also has a head to know where to be careful.
Again, I’m not coming to write an essay about the gravity of chillul Hashem; I’m just trying my luck at helping raise awareness of the fact that there is a serious issue here during the summer which is worth bearing in mind.
I do want to share one final thought which I found to be powerful. Even though a person does not usually have control over anyone but himself (and possibly his family), it is very likely that with one genuine act of kiddush Hashem, he can make a positive impression upon an outsider which outweighs and outshines the negative ideas that may have been conceived thorough the actions of others – the same way a small ray of light can overtake a room full of darkness. May we be zoche to be the ones who reflect the light and the sweetness of the Torah to the eyes of the nations.Sincerely wishing everyone a great summer.
P.S. If any good comes out of this letter, it should be a zechus for the Yidden in Eretz Yisroel.
Concerned
Sullivan County, N. Y
The suggestion highlighted above is so simple, yet powerful. I’m constantly reminding myself that I have no idea what impact I can make on another person. As the media and the world turns its’ eyes towards Israel we need to remember that our neighbors, co-workers, and people we see in the street are watching us, as well. If interested, I’ll be happy to email the entire letter to anyone interested. Good Shabbos and thanks for reading.

Thoughts before Tisha B’Av

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Tehillim 145
19. He does the will of those who fear Him, and He hears their cry and saves them.
20. The Lord guards all who love Him, and He destroys all the wicked.

I, along with others, said these words last night at a community-wide event. Hundreds of people gathered in a large congregation in Chicago to daven for Eretz Yisrael. It was touching to see so many Jews together. Some with hats, some with ball caps (Cubs and Sox), some wearing shorts, some with their children. All of us as an Am Echad. The two pasukim above really hit me as I was davening. I remember last year on Tisha B’Av night saying kinos and thinking about Gush Katif, and our people leaving their homes and soldiers crying as they took citizens out of their own shuls. For all I know the soldier and the citizen are fighting together right now.
I’m worried about this year. I’m worried about people being injured and killed. Our people, my people crying and hoping Hashem hears their cry.

“Dear Hashem,

I thought I was strong and my Yetzer Tov was strong. I thought I would not give into the evils of my generation. I thought I was above being sucked into the vacuum of the Sitra Achra. I was wrong. The stronger I am, the more attached to my creator I think I am, the stronger my Yetzer Hara is. The Yetzer Hara makes me think that I’m not susceptible to being deviated from attachment to Hashem. The Yetzer Hara only has power over something I can see. I have to know when to turn away. If I stumble it means that I’m being challenged. If I am challenged that means that I have to power to get up again. This is what my creator wants. It is a war. I must not forget. When I think the enemy is weak is when I am attacked. Hashem, I love you and know that you will help me. I daven to make the Yetzer Hara my slave, for me to control it. I know that if I do not help to rebuild the Bais Hamikdash, it is as if I have destroyed it.”

This could have been said after the first or second Temples’ were destoyed. It could have been said by someone surrounded by idol worship, immorality, murder, or baseless hatred on all sides. By someone who gave into their Yetzer Hara, even if only once. It could have been said yesterday. Try as we might, we need Hashem now more than ever to protect us from our ememies. Those that surround the borders of Israel, and those that surround the borders we make for ourselves.

Victor, the janitor of a shul I use to daven in, once told me that you’ve got to have a thunderstorm before you can see a rainbow. I hope that’s the case. May our Galus end with song, dance, and victory.

Some Postings Need No Title

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“I write not because I have the strength to write, but because I do not have the strength to remain silent.”
-Rav Avraham Yitzchok Kook zt’l

I came across the quote last night. I had copied it from somewhere and scribbled it in a journal way back in 1994. I wasn’t planning on posting, but I decided that consistency is a good thing, even if it means writing when I don’t feel like it.
It’s been a long week. Primarily due to the matzav in Eretz Yisrael. I’m worried, just like everyone else. Then, there’s the shadow of the Three Weeks hanging over Klal Yisrael. Finally it’s been a long week for for me blog-wise. I read over all of my postings and I feel that I probably take myself too seriously. That was not my intent. There is a more casual side to me.
Ever see the Beatles’ movie HELP? It’s great. The best part is the blurb on the back of the box about the flick. It states that the Beatles made the movie at a period of their life when they didn’t take themselves too seriously. While I enjoying posting about Rav Yisrael’s 13 Midos, it’s taken a toll on me. It’s like Elul in July.
I’ve been thinking a lot about the whole Ir Miklat-unintentional murder deal that we’ll hear in shul this Shabbos. Like most people, I try to relate the parshios to my life. As I’ve gotten older I think some of my core-personality has gotten misplaced. Maybe I’ve unintentionally “killed” my fun-loving-humorous-go-with-the-flow self, and I’ve been exiled to an Ir Miklat of my own design. I hope that’s not the case.
If I killed someone by accident, and retreated to an Ir Miklat, I’d never sleep. How could I when I know that my freedom would be dependant on the death of one person… the Kohen Gadol? Who would sleep?

“When a man learns that just as he broods over himself so does G-d yearn for him, he is at the beginning of a higher level of consciousness” (Rabbi Steinsaltz). This quote appears at the end of an article written by Rav Moshe Weinberger. You can read the entire article here. It’s well worth it.

Good Shabbos

Overheard at the Shabbos Table

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Note: My next posting will continue Rav Yisrael’s Salatners 13 Midos- #3

During Shabbos lunch the conversation turned to local day camps. When asked how camp was going, one child commented that things were good, but their seemed to be rivalry between the boys what attend one day school and boys from another day school. The source of the rivalry centered around haskafa, learning, and mitzvah obeservance. Several people, inlcuding myself, commented that it’s ashame this has to happen during the Three Weeks. The camp director, as reported by campers at the table, also made a similar comment to the entire camp.
My wife, in her infnite wisdom, said, “Why shoud we only be sensitive to this during the Three Weeks?”