Don't Mess with Blessings

True story as heard from the person it happened to:

Mesila here, the Baltimore based organization that coaches struggling families with the financial skills and encouragement to get them out of crisis, poverty and dependence, was available for consultation in a certain neighborhood.  This person went to speak to them.

He showed the rep his papers with information about his and his wife's income and their expenses and at a certain point the Mesila rep said: Stop right there.  "Blessing is found in that which is concealed from the eye," says the Gemara.  I do not understand how you are not in debt.  According to what you showed me thus far, it makes no sense.  So let us not delve any further.

***
I'm impressed! Here's an organization that is all about budgeting, making rational decisions, and not relying on miracles.  But when encountering someone whose financial situation does not make rational sense, i.e. considering his income and expenses it makes no sense that he is not in debt, the Mesila person was willing to bow out.  Sometimes, you need to leave things alone.

a previous post about Mesila here

Ask Not What Your Job Can Do for You

I came across this line which I like, "You need to work where you add the most value."

 

People pursue careers or lines of work for various reasons.  Money, of course, is a major factor.  Then there is the location and how much travel time will be needed, what the hours are, what the work environment is like, what the benefits are, and what you like.

 

The Chovos HaLevavos says work in a field you are drawn to and are good at (see here).

 

This line that I like adds another perspective.  Rather than, or in addition to, seeing which profession is good for me, I should see where I can make the best contribution.  I daresay that often or usually, this is synonymous with a field I am good at.

When Talk is Dangerous

Tehillim 73:15 אם אמרתי אספרה כמו הנה דור בניך בגדתי
"If I said, "I shall tell it as it is," behold I have made the generation of Your children into traitors."

Rashi: Said Asaph, “If I said in my heart to tell everything as it is, all that His people say about this, I would make them into traitors and wicked men."

Metzudas Dovid: If I say it the way it is, i.e. whatever it is that I think, then the talking will incite even those who are your children, i.e. those who believe in You, for when they hear what is thought, I will make them into traitors which is why I won't talk much.

I heard someone say, based on this verse, that the trend to discuss all our frum society's ills out in the open is the modern day version of "es iz shver tzu zayn a Yid" - it's hard to be a Jew.  How many Jews are being turned off to frum life when they hear about all the crises and social ills we are suffering from?

Back in the early 1900's, when shomer Shabbos Jews sighed over the hardships of being religious, they lost their children who were not interested in living a hard, religious life.  These days, why would someone want to belong to a society which has a shidduch crisis, tuition crisis, parnassa crisis, housing crisis, drop-outs, those who keep "half Shabbos," Kiddush clubs and alcoholism, drug addiction, mental illness, shalom bayis problems and molestation problems? Sounds quite unappealing!

Some editors and askanim pat themselves on the back for "breaking taboos" and (supposedly) dispelling stigmas by airing issues that used to be kept quiet.  Are we gaining or losing thereby, that is the question.  What would they say if they knew that just one person was turned off to Yiddishkeit because of this openness?

a related post

No Title

A girl a year out of seminary gets married.  She is in the middle of pursuing an education for a profession, so she can support her husband's Torah study, and has two years of schooling to go. 

Mazal Tov.  She has a baby ten months later.

Ten days after the birth, she is back in school.  Five days a week.  All day. With travel time.

It's bein ha'zemanim, husband can help with the baby.  Grandma can help out.

Two months after the birth, the baby is at a babysitter all day.  First at the morning babysitter, then at the afternoon babysitter.  The father takes his baby from one sitter to the other.

I will restrain myself.  I think the facts speak for themselves.

related posts:

here

here

here

here

Heavenly Accounts

From an article by Mrs. Krohn:

An elderly man who had kept Shabbos in the early 20th century was interviewed by his grandchildren about the challenges he faced.

"Zeidy, it must have been so hard for you to keep Shabbos in those years," said a grandson.

The grandfather smiled and said, "It wasn't difficult to keep Shabbos; it was difficult to earn a parnassa."

Since the grandfather did not view Shabbos as a hardship, this enabled him to merit to raise generations of frum descendents, for as R' Moshe Feinstein would say, the reason earlier generations lost their children even though they were shomer Shabbos was because the parents would complain, "It's hard to be a Jew," when they lost their jobs yet again in order to keep Shabbos.

Interestingly, in the same article, R' Chaim Pinchas Scheinberg z'l is quoted as saying that the money a person spends on any mitzvah will not be deducted from the amount that is granted to him for his yearly expenses (source: Ritva, Shita Mekubetzes Beitza 16a).

A New Career

Azriela Jaffe wrote an article in Ami about a man in her community, Steve, who was working as an accountant and hated it.  His wife told him to find something that would make him happy.  He eventually spoke with an appliance repairman, George, who was friendly with his in-laws, who invited Steve to join him and be shown the ropes.

George did not ask for any money as he trained him for six months.  Steve went out with him every day and watched how George did his job.

Steve says George loved what he did and loved the idea of setting someone else up (the highest level of tzedaka according to the Rambam) in business.

Steve opened his own business and has been doing what he enjoys for 29 years.  In addition to training Steve, George also trained his son, and son-in-law, both appliance repairmen, as well as eight non-Jews.

Steve in turn has trained a young man in Lakewood and is helping someone else.  "Like George, I don't want any money from them.  I get nachas out of seeing my pupils become successful.  George was very proud of me, and I am very proud of them."

-- That George was so bighearted as to train others so they could support themselves honorably, is inspiring.

-- What I find just as moving is that many people consider a white collar job like accounting to be superior to a blue collar job like appliance repair.  In shidduchim, a girl or woman are far more likely to be interested in an accountant that an appliance repairman.  I give great credit to Steve's wife for encouraging him to do what makes him happy, rather than insisting that he remain in a more "honorable" profession, sitting in an office.

-- I'd like to know whether Steve always loved working with his hands, fixing things.  Why did he choose to spend years on a college degree and studying for the CPA? The Chovos HaLevavos says work in a field you are drawn to and are good at.

-- Common wisdom is that you need not only an undergraduate degree but a graduate degree in order to make a decent parnassa. Steve spent six months and no money learning a profession he loves which apparently supports his family and supports many others in this line of work.

Following the Law

There was a news item about illegal housing no longer being tolerated anywhere in Rockland (the Monsey area). "An upcoming plan expected to debut in late April will crack down on health, housing, zoning and fire code violations in each of Rockland’s five towns."

This is a disaster for many home owners and landlords as well as their tenants.  To make an apartment legal costs a lot of money and then, I am told, property taxes, which are already high, will be even higher.  Presumably, that will make rental costs even higher.

In discussing this with someone I said, but do we believe that Hashem designates our finances for the coming year on Rosh Hashana? Do people really think they have to help G-d out by having illegal property? Does Hashem have no other eitza but to provide them with money in this way?

Well, what about the smuggling and illegal activities that Jews did back in Europe? That is how they survived.  One could have asked the same question, did they have to do things illegally to get what Hashem designated for them? 

Apparently, in Europe, when the laws were skewed against the Jews, and in the Soviet Union, against the citizens in general, the normal hishtadlus entailed doing things illegally (smuggling, black market, illegal activities).  But under normal circumstances, one would not be allowed to do this.

Making Money

Ami magazine has a column which features a successful businessman.  He is interviewed and is asked how he got started, what was the best advice he received, how he handles stress, etc.

Many of the people interviewed are chassidishe fellows (occasionally yeshivish) who formed a business from scratch and are making lots of money, without any advanced schooling and degrees and sometimes without much English. I get a kick out of it.  They have guts, they work hard, they love what they do, and they demonstrate that parnassa is from the Aibershter.

More on Mothering

A frum female doctor living in Israel, who is the mother of 13 children (7 of whom are married now), wrote a book about the tough choices she had to make between her family and her career.  While training to be a doctor, she gave birth to six children.  During her residency she had three more children.  She says she could not have done it without her husband and quite honestly says, "I am not a role model for anyone.  It was a terrible life.  It meant splitting myself into pieces, missing all the siyumim and siddur parties and so many milestones in my children's lives. 

In a Binah interview she goes on to say, "The most important thing a woman with children can do with her life is to be a mother ... Your children only have one mother, your husband has only one wife.  Had I known what this choice entailed, if I could it all over again, I would choose differently."

During the six years of her residency she would light candles by herself in the hospital, away from her family's Shabbos table.  She would leave her house at 6:35 a.m. and be gone for 30-40 hours. 
Her 3 1/2 year old son once said to her, "No mother does this to her children, no mother!"

While in medical school, she and her husband consulted with R' Shlomo Zalman Auerbach z'l to ask him whether she should continue or quit.  He told her to continue since he felt she could perform a real service for the frum community where there were hardly any frum, female doctors.

She says that her children definitely suffered.  They wanted her at their school events.  Every mother was there, but her.  "I lost out on happy times with them.  Those precious years are gone forever."

The interviewer asked her what her adult children think of her, are they proud of her and feel pride in her work.  She said, "No, I don't think so.  I think what's most important is to have a real mother who is physically present.  But at the same time, they know that I do what I do l'sheim shomayim." 

As to a previous comment, "It is not "at his wife's expense" if she is willingly and eagerly supporting him to learn because she truly yearns for her husband to become a great talmid chacham, and is fully ready to sacrifice for that worthy goal" - when a husband goes off to learn, knowing that his wife who just gave birth will be traveling over an hour each way with two babies in order to interview for a job, whether she is fully behind that decision or does it because she feels it is expected of her, does not change the fact that his learning is at his wife and children's expense.  How he is able to learn with a clear head, knowing that his kimpeturin, nursing wife is spending the day in this way, in preparation for leaving her babies to be raised by others, is beyond me.

When it is only the adults affected by the decision, that is quite different than a decision that drastically affects the children who are brought into the world and are made to suffer for Torah study.  When in our history were mothers separated from their babies for the sake of Torah? Husbands have separated from their wives, like Rochel and Akiva for the sake of Torah, but not mothers and their young children.

No Career!

Continued from previous post

The only public speaker that I can recall saying it the way it is, is Rabbi Zecharia Wallerstein.  He quoted the pasuk about Sarah being in the tent, in response to the angels asking Avraham where she is.  Then he went on to say, "I can’t say it at Ohr Naava or I’ll lose nearly everyone, but the man should be out working and the woman home taking care of the house. No career! No guy should say he wants five or whatever years of support from his wife. What is his Torah learning worth if it’s at his wife’s expense?"

And the children's expense. 

I remember the shocked look on someone's face when someone suggested (facetiously, but to make the point) that mothers who opt not to raise their kids because they're busy working should give them up.  There are women out there willing to raise them ...

We used to hear the story of a gadol (it's hard to know who it really happened with) who was consulted about the chinuch of a person's young child, say a two year old.  The rabbi said, you are two years too late.  Chinuch begins at birth and before.  Maybe they don't tell this story anymore.

An Upside-Down World

A kimpeturin of Lakewood has a baby less than 5 weeks old.  She also has a 22 month old toddler.  She goes to New York to interview for a job in her field.  Why? Is she a new immigrant in dire need of supporting herself? Is she a single mother? No. It is because her husband is learning. 

She is not the first, not the last.  Plenty others do the same.  So what else is new ...

A woman writes to Binah magazine about being a kollel wife with three children and a full-time job out of the house.  She has a nightly walk with a neighbor and tries to get to sleep early.  I read this several times and wondered where her husband and children fit into her life. 

She thanks her husband for being Mr. Mom (not her phrase).  He gets the children ready in the morning, takes them to school, packs lunches and snacks, often cooks supper, shops for groceries, bakes and braids challa, and has cooked for Shabbos several times.

To borrow a term from R' Yosef, the son of R Yehoshua (Bava Basra 10), "Olam hafuch ra'isi" - I saw an upside-down world.

Yes, women have worked throughout the generations. The Eishis Chayil of Mishlei works.  Yet, it was a rare situation in which husband and wife switched roles and the mother traveled to support the family while the father raised the children and ran the home. 

A mother wrote that she received a note from her seven year old daughter:

"Dear Mommy, if it's not too hard and if you're not working, could you listen to me read for five minutes? We get points for this in school, and I only have one stamp.  Everyone else has a whole card already. Love ..."

And we will keep on reading "courageous" articles about post-partum depression, sad articles about the rise in divorces in the frum world, and disconcerting articles about children and their myriad of problems. 

Mastery or Mystery

I'm reading Mastery by Greene, which illustrates how to become a master of a subject or field of interest with examples of people famous and obscure.  The claim is that mastery lies within each of us, should we choose to develop it.  And you develop it with years of hard work as an apprentice under a mentor.

As I'm reading this, I read an article in a recent Mishpacha magazine about a frum English fellow who is considered the "king of comedy" in the mainstream media.  This is rather extraordinary, of course, since the mainstream media and its comic productions aren't quite the environment we would expect a frum Jew to thrive in.  In any case, he had no intentions of becoming a producer or having anything at all to do with the entertainment industry.  He was an intellectual who was studying, of all things, 17th century Christian theology, in Cambridge (not that he believed this theology).  So how does someone doing graduate work in an obscure academic subject become king of comedy?

He was looking for a job and a friend suggested he look at the want ads in a certain paper.  He saw that the BBC was looking for a comedy producer and he applied and was accepted.  His first week on the job he met an old childhood friend and they did a show together which made his friend a star and made him a star producer.  Just like that! No years of study, no apprenticing under a mentor, no honing his skills and being faced with failure and having to persevere.  Simply a completely new field that he stumbled across in which he was and is wildly successful.  He has found his passion.

So what the moral of the story is, I don't know.  Who needs a book on mastery and years of perseverance when a fabulous job one never dreamed of, could fall into your lap? Ah, but who says it will ...

For those who have always had a interest in a particular field, the guidelines of how to become a master are pertinent. 

The Chovos Ha'Levavos says to choose a profession by what you are attracted to and for which you have a natural talent.  But then there are the life stories which I periodically come across in which a person ends up with a job or hobby which was completely unexpected and delightful nonetheless.

Finding Your Passion 2

Hamodia magazine had an interesting article (July 27, 2011) about the exciting work of Rabbi Dan Roth, director of Torah Live: click here to see website.  He provides multi-media presentations on topics in halacha and hashkafa in an engaging way.  He saw that students today who spend their free time texting and using other gadgets were not interested in a traditional shiur, so he decided to use the same media the kids use, to teach them.

As I've written previously: click here, I find it fascinating to read about people who have found their passion, whether they do so as a child or teen or unexpectedly later in life.  R' Roth had been learning Gemara full-time in kollel and there was a Torah topic (Pirkei Avos) that he wanted to write about.  He didn't think it was right to leave his Gemara learning to do this. 

He asked Rabbi Dovid Orlofsky for his advice which was: "בּן עשׂרים לרדוף Age 20 is for pursuing; בּן שׁלשׁים לכּח age 30 is for strength (as it says in Pirkei Avos 5:25).  Martial arts experts are able to break slabs of wood and concrete with their bare hands because they know how to focus all their energy into one point.  Your twenties are meant for exploring various life goals and options, to learn what you like and what you're good at.  By the time you reach thirty, however, you are expected to know enough about your strengths and character to be able to strip away everything else and focus all your energies and abilities into your unique talent.  That's what strength means."

R' Roth had just turned thirty.  Inspired by what R' Orlofsky told him, he spent the next three years writing a sefer on Pirkei Avos.  Then he got a job teaching OTD youth.  The class was a disaster with the students ignoring him.  This prompted him to present material in today's language, via computer, and it was a big hit.

He says, "This is my life's calling.  It drives me day and night.  I feel a responsibility to help as many Yidden as possible get clarity about Hashem's Torah.  My biggest dream is to increase k'vod shomayim in the world.

"Hashem gave each of us natural talents and abilities that we have to use in avodas Hashem.  A few years ago, when I was in kollel, financial and family pressure for me to get a job was mounting, but I couldn't figure out what I was going to do with my life.  I literally couldn't sleep at night, wondering what my next step would be.  I never had any idea that I would end up doing anything like what I'm doing today.  Hashem guided my every step."

Do You Want to Become a Truck Driver?

A woman wrote a letter to Hamodia magazine complaining about an article in which a rebbi, wanting to spur on his class to learn, rhetorically asked them, "Do you want to become truck drivers?"

The woman's husband is a truck driver and so of course she took offense at her husband's source of livelihood being regarded derogatorily and used as a negative example of what would become of the children if they didn't shteig in learning.  What would a child of a truck driver feel if he was in that teacher's class? She went on to say that her husband earned an honest living and used his truck to do chesed too.

Yaakov, upon fleeing from Esav, put a circle of rocks around his head.  The question is asked, if he was afraid and wanted to protect himself, what about the rest of his body? If he relied on Hashem, then why surround his head and if he did not want to rely on supernatural intervention, then he should have protected his entire body!

The pasuk in Tehillim 128:2 says, "yigi'a kapecha ki sochel ..." - when you eat the labor of your hands, you will be happy and it shall be well with you.  You can earn a living in one of two ways, by doing manual labor which leaves your head free to be involved with Torah or by using your head so that you are completely involved in earning a living.  The pasuk is telling us that when you work with your hands, leaving your head for other things, it will be good for you both spiritually and materially.

When Yaakov left for Charan he knew that he would have to deal with the crooked Lavan and there were "wild animals" to contend with even before he got there.  So he put stones around his head to demonstrate that his mind is off-limits.  The head must be protected.

Jews take great pride, and rightfully so, in our intellectual accomplishments.  We are represented in fields of intellectual endeavor in numbers that way exceed our actual physical numbers.  For many of us, white collar jobs are the goal to strive for and not only because many of them provide good salaries but because as intellectual people, it is beneath us to work with our hands. 

This is a modern day phenomenon since there were numerous Ashkenazic Jews in Europe who worked with their hands for a living being tailors and shoemakers and numerous Sefardic Jews who worked as silversmiths and in other crafts.  We have stories of how some recited Mishnayos or Tehillim as they worked.

And yet, try presenting a shidduch idea of a man who is a plumber or electrician or in construction as compared to someone who is an accountant, lawyer or architect ...  Perhaps we need to rethink our priorities.

Topsy-Turvy World

I've been noticing an ad in a frum publication for a seminary with a line which says:

"Parnossah Program prepares our talmidos to share in the responsibility of building a Bayis Neeman.  Areas of study include Graphic Design, Interior Design, Shaitel Machering, and Culinary Arts."

I find this disturbing because at the wedding, the husband hands the wife the kesuba in which he commits to supporting her. It is his responsibility to pay the bills, not hers. She is under no obligation to "share" that responsibility and I sure hope that the seminary doesn't tell the students that it is! A Parnossah Program is not a term that belongs in a girls' seminary program or ad. Let's stop turning our girls into boys, our wives and mothers into men.

Furthermore, since when does building a Bayis Neeman consist of working at graphic design, sheitl machering etc.? In the good old days, when people said, "Mazal Tov! May you be zocha to build a bayis neeman b'Yisrael," they weren't euphemistically saying,"We hope you get a good job with good pay!"

Why not say it straight: We provide courses such as Graphic Design etc.? I don't appreciate the disguising of the message which is actually, "Want to work? We provide courses."

I think it is up to our girls' mechanchim and mechanchos to convey the message that a girl's ambition should be to be a Yiddishe Mama, devoted to her home, her children, to creating a Yiddishe atmosphere.

A Solution We Don't Hear About

Despite the endless articles and speeches about the "shidduch crisis" and "economic crisis," we have yet to hear the Chofetz Chaim's solution: grow a beard! 

Here is what the Chofetz Chaim says:
(published in his sefer Kuntres Tiferes Adom ch. 1)

“If one lets his beard grow...one can certainly expect that Hashem will provide him with a fitting marriage partner, an intelligent and G-d-fearing woman, who will be a helpmate during his life (as our Sages say: ‘If one has merit, she will help him’), and they will be privileged to raise a generation of upright children in whom he can rejoice as they sit around his table...his marriage should be pleasant, that Hashem should provide them with their livelihood, that they should be privileged to have upright children, and that he should experience a good life with the wife whom Hashem has designated for him...

“On the other hand, if one does not place his trust in Hashem and he turns from the path of the commandment, surely Hashem will not desire to treat him well.

“Instead of the love and favor he hopes to gain by trimming his beard, eventually it will turn, G-d forbid, to bitterness and poison through lack of livelihood and other prevalent causes, because Hashem’s blessing will not rest between them.

“Sometimes it will come to the point where he has to wander far away to find his livelihood, and then, what benefit does one have from this [temporary] joy?

“In fact, all this is explained in the holy Torah sources, that by standing firm to fulfill Hashem’s commandment, one is privileged to raise a generation of upright children”.

Parnassa Boosters and Detractors

This is a list of 20 factors affecting parnassa compiled from "Sefer HaMidos" by Rabbi Nachman of Breslev:

1. Lack of trust in Hashem vs. Trust in Hashem

2. Cruel to others vs. Compassionate

3. Lewdness vs. Shmiras HaBris

4. Alcohol vs. Spiritual Awareness

5. Disdain of Torah vs. Respect of Torah

6. Foul Speech vs. Clean speech

7. Desecrating the Shabbos vs. Honoring the Shabbos

8. Failing to repent for old sins vs. Teshuva

9. Sadness and depression vs. Happiness

10. Ingratitude, especially to Hashem vs. Gratitude and Prayer

11. Stinginess vs. Charity, especially a full tithe

12. Idol worship, blasphemy vs. Strengthening faith in Hashem

13. Immodesty vs. Modesty

14. Anger vs. Patience

15. Judging others severely vs. Judging others fairly

16. Dishonesty vs. Integrity

17. Arrogance vs. Humility

18. Infidelity vs. Honoring one's wife

19. Domestic strife vs. Peace in the home

20. Instigating hate vs. Making peace between people