9. Reb Nosson on Noach: How Well Do You Know Yourself?

At the banks of the Bug River in Breslov, Rav Shlomo Katz learns a Likutei Halachos of Reb Nosson on Parshas Noach — a teaching that asks one piercing question:

If you’re still getting to know yourself, who are you judging when you judge yourself?

Standing beside Reb Nosson’s resting place, Rav Shlomo explores the depth of “אל תדין את חברך עד שתגיע למקומו” — not only about others, but about oneself.

We don’t yet know our makom, our full place or story — across lifetimes, struggles, and moments of light — so how can we condemn the unfinished soul we’re still discovering?

A moving Breslov journey through self-compassion, divine patience, and the lifelong work of Azamra — finding the good even within ourselves.

What is The Teachings of Reb Nosson of Breslov with Rav Shlomo Katz?

Reb Nosson of Breslov, the beloved disciple of Rebbe Nachman, carried his Rebbe’s light into the world with boundless devotion. Through his writings, prayers, and letters, we are given a path to live with faith, joy, and strength even in times of struggle.

In this series, Rav Shlomo Katz learns from Reb Nosson’s Torah, weaving together his fiery commitment, his guidance to his children and students, and the timeless invitation to run not away from Hashem, but toward Him. Join us in tasting the sweetness of Likkutei Tefilot, Likkutei Halachot, and Reb Nosson’s letters, and discover how his teachings still burn in our hearts today.

Okay, so I want to show you, as you could see right behind us, this magical, magical view. This is the Bug River, the בוג as it's called, the בוג river. There are a lot of stories about them crossing this river, traveling in this river. This played a big role in the community here of Breslov.

You know, the בעל שם הקדוש actually says about the בעל שם טוב, one of the reasons why he wanted to reside in מעז'יבוז' is because it was also off the בוג river and he'd always have fish for שבת. You know, big, big considerations. We think like a פרומ, you know. What are our considerations? And if you're if you're near a place that has fish for שבת, that's that's what that's what matters.But רב נתן is the person that we're here for right now.

רב נתן, I always say if I had a, you know, the ability to speak to one of the צדיקים that were, that that were on this trip, I would most definitely want to talk to this צדיק that's resting right over here.

רב נתן שטרנהרץ. That was his last name. He actually had a last name, שטרנהרץ.רב נתן had guts.

You know, I told you he was a חסיד of רב לוי יצחק מברדיצ'ב. But he felt, he sensed that there's something else, a different calling. And he finally came here and he had so much opposition with רב נחמן. So much opposition.

הן מבית, הן מחוץ. Also from, you know, from from home and not from home, coming from everywhere. There was so much opposition. And when he heard the Rebbe's תורות and especially that dream that he had that we learned about seeing a certain image and knowing that this is home, so רב נתן would walk around here late at night.

There's a story that רב נתן was walking על גדות הנהר, ממש on the river banks. It could be that it was literally right down here after realizing that this צדיק that he met, רב נחמן, the great grandson of the בעל שם טוב, is something else. He would scream, he would say like this, he'd say it in Yiddish: ברסלב בוער אש, הבער אותה בליבי. In Breslov, there's a fire that's burning.

הבער אותה בליבי. There's some kind of a fire going on here. Burn it in my heart.

הבער אותה בליבי.So, a number of years ago, a beautiful, beautiful melody was written to these words.בברסלב בוער אש, הבער אותה בליבי.

בברסלב בוער אש, הבער אותה בליבי.

בברסלב בוער אש, הבער אותה בליבי.

בברסלב בוער אש, הבער אותה בליבי.

הו, הבער אותה בליבי.

הו, הבער אותה בליבי.In Breslov, there's a fire, burn it in my heart. In Breslov, there's a fire, burn it in my heart. In Breslov, there's a fire, burn it in my heart. In Breslov, there's a fire, burn it in my heart.

Oh, burn it through my heart. Oh, burn it through my heart.My ברכה to all of us right now, that we cut through all the שטות that's become around the light of the צדיק. not to get confused when they start talking ברסלב, but just to focus on the תורה of רב נחמן. That's it.

And nothing else. And I know that due to many reasons, that the lighter, the brighter the fire is, the more it's gone, which means you get blinded. And a lot of very good intentioned people that get caught up in stuff that are completely not important. Even on this little banner that you have behind you, a letter from רבי ישראל מאיר גבאי, the one that's restoring all these places.

You look at the bottom, some חסיד was in here, wanted to add the letters נ נח נחמן מאומן. Another חסיד came in and crossed it out. These are things that for us, they they don't, they just don't matter. What matters is the, is the fire.

The fire of רב נחמן. That's the fire. And like he said, האש שלי תוקד עד ביאת המשיח.רב נחמן said about רב נתן, if it wasn't for my נתן, no one would even know who I am.

רב נתן was the one that had utmost מסירות נפש to make sure that his Rebbe's teachings get out to the whole world.

We're here today, we could tell רב נתן and say to the צדיק, אשרך, it kind of worked. The teachings of the Rebbe are in the whole world, in the whole world. And we should be praying that we don't get confused by anything else other than the teachings of this מעין, of this reservoir of wisdom and of דעת.בברסלב בוער אש, הבער אותה בליבי.

בברסלב בוער אש, הבער אותה בליבי.

בברסלב בוער אש, הבער אותה בליבי.

בברסלב בוער אש, הבער אותה בליבי.

אוי, הבער אותה בליבי.

אוי, הבער אותה בליבי.

בברסלב בוער אש, הבער אותה בליבי.

בברסלב בוער אש, הבער אותה בליבי.

בברסלב בוער אש, הבער אותה בליבי.

בברסלב בוער אש, הבער אותה בליבי.

אוי, הבער אותה בליבי.

אוי, הבער אותה בליבי.Okay, so let's learn for a few minutes. We're right by the צדיק. Open up the booklets.

We're going to learn. Anyone need an extra booklet? We have things, right? If you could please open up to page fifteen. Page fifteen in the booklet. This is a piece on the פרשה, פרשת נח, from the ליקוטי הלכות.

ליקוטי הלכות, רב נתן took the שולחן ערוך. He took all the הלכות and he wrote a פירוש based on רב נחמן's ליקוטי מוהר"ן explaining the פנימיות, פנימיות, inside of the inside of each one of the הלכות. And we, there's also, that was taken from this. A lot of the צדיקים said if רב נתן was not a חסיד of רב נחמן, he would have had the largest court that ever existed in חסידות.

This is the kind of cup we're talking about, the kind of brain we had. So they say רב נתן could have been the biggest רבי in the world. But he was completely, completely מבוטל, self-nullified. He was completely, had ביטול in front of his רבי, רבי נחמן.

And when רב נחמן passed away in 1810, רב נתן still lived for a while, never became the רבי. No one ever referred to him as the רבי. There was only one רבי. And the whole, the whole job was living the תורות of the רבי, living them to the highest.

But every word רב נתן says is based on something in ליקוטי מוהרן.So the שאלה that we have to ask ourselves over here, and it's something that רב נתן stressed quite often, was, do people think that they really know themselves? Do people believe that they really know who they really are? And do I need to really know who I really am? C is, is it possible to truly, truly know who you really, really are? When we think of describing ourselves, even to ourselves, it's mainly based on emotions. When we try to give a little, paint a picture of who we are, what is it usually based on? We think it's פנימיות because we're talking about emotions, those are inside things, but it could be that 90% of our emotions are just triggers that have to do with something on the outside. What about non-emotional, self-inner definition of who we really are? Does that even sound like it's possible? Right? A definition of who we are that isn't based on what I think is the פנימיות. Right? So what what would what would what would we be left with? Or where would we start? Okay? Where would we start with that question if someone asked you, tell me a little bit about yourself? What would be the beginning of that answer? I am a piece of השם.

Because that's the only thing I could really work with in the beginning, and that's what I know to be אמת לאמיתו, and it's something that each person in this room can say. That's דברים השווים לכל נפש.After that the layers begin. I'm this kind of sensitive נשמה. I'm that type of a person.

My parents, I see these certain מידות in them, they always trickle down to me. But in the beginning, beginning of it, what can I start with? That which I know to be אמת לאמיתו that has nothing to do with anything that I did. That's where it starts with. In this small piece from רב נתן in ליקוטי הלכות that has to do with the פרשה, רב נתן says he shows us how far we are from understanding that to be a true reality in terms of getting to know ourselves.

I mean, if right now if I asked everyone in the room, does anyone here feel they don't know themselves? So if someone would raise their, most people wouldn't raise their hand because there's this expectation that by now in life, I should really have figured things out. I don't know, to me when I meet people that are in their 70s or 80s and they realize that there's something new about them that they never knew before, and they start living that way, to me, that's the greatest example of someone who's open enough and who's letting השם run his show, showing him that it could, you're still alive, it means there's more that you have to get to know about yourself. That's what it is. You and I are still alive right now, it's only, it means, kind of like this famous story, that there is more for you to discover about yourself.

Not just about השם, not just about the world. There's more for you to discover about you. And רב נתן says that's the יסוד in אמונה that we have to understand that should give us a lot of קיווי in terms of our עבודת השם. Look inside.The פסוק that he's referring to is וְאַךְ אֶת דִּמְכֶם לְנַפְשֹׁתֵיכֶם אֶדְרֹשׁ.

This is speaking about after coming out of the תיבה.

חז"ל have a very hard time understanding what this פסוק really means. The פשט is וְאַךְ אֶת דִּמְכֶם לְנַפְשֹׁתֵיכֶם אֶדְרֹשׁ, if you kill someone, then you're חייב מיתה. There's a statement about killing someone.

That it'd be okay to kill an animal, right, after, after the story of נח, we're then we were, we were allowed to start eating animals, but it was still a ציווי to say don't think חס ושלום that means you could חס ושלום take a human life. The language is את דמכם, your דם, I will be דורש for your נפש. You'll have to pay for it if, God forbid, you take someone else's דם.So this is ליקוטי הלכות. The title here is אין לאדם לדון את עצמו לחובה.

כי גם את המקום עצמו אינו יודע. A person should not judge themselves a כף חובה, which means on the scale of, the opposite of כף זכות basically. How would you say that?

כף חובה. Shoshana, how would you say כף חובה?

כף זכות we know, judging yourself favorably.

כף חובה? With judgment. No, but you could have good judgment like, no, like, like, like negative judgment, let's say for now, harshly.So רב נתן says like this. The זכות to learn these, this תורה next to where his, where he's buried.

צריכין לדון גם את עצמו לכף זכות.

A person must judge themselves favorably.

אף על פי שהוא יודע מכאובי נפשו, even though a person knows the pain of his own soul, meaning that which he caused his pain to be and so forth, וריבוי פשעיו כי עצמו מספר. And even though a person knows, I'm not such a צדיק. I'm not going to pretend to be such a צדיק right now.

So a person, even though he knows that he was holding wherever he was holding, רב נתן says still, you have to לדון את עצמך לכף זכות. So notice what he said. Usually, you would self-persecute yourself, but based on what? What would you, why do we self-persecute ourselves? What is it usually based on? Our own expectations. Our own, that we don't meet our own expectations.

What else? Guilt? Mistakes. What else? Ego? Ego, very big one. What else, what else do we, do we, do we judge ourselves unfavorably over? Over everything you said that that defines who I am. You see if I don't really— What's that? Like knowledge of myself that— Others too, you're saying.

Myself. The fact that I know myself. The fact that I think that I know myself. Ah, that's the point of this whole teaching.

Exactly. I usually judge myself based on some kind of picture that I drew. And I said to השם, this is me. And of course you want me, if I were God, I'd hate this person.

So I might as well, you know, play God right now. So you and I are on the same team. Let's judge this person לכף חובה because that's, that's the right thing to do. So look what he says here.

There's something so brilliant.

אף על פי כן, nonetheless, צריך לקיים גם בעצמו. A person has to מקיים a פסוק we usually say about other people. What do we usually say about other people?

אל תדון את חברך עד שתגיע למקומו.

We say that about other people. Don't judge people until you've walked in their shoes, until you've reached their spot. Right? Because you don't know what someone else is going through. So you never, like I once saw that that that a great line, every person you meet is struggling with something that you have absolutely no idea about.

So this is going to sound pretty far out, but it's the same exact thing רב נתן says over here.

אף על פי כן צריך לקיים גם בעצמו. You have to do this to yourself.

אל תדין עד שתגיע למקומך, כמו שצריכין לקיים בחברו, אל תדון את חברך עד שתגיע למקומו.

Don't judge yourself until you've reached the מקום, your מקום. Meaning, who's, what's your מקום? When you're six feet under, afterwards maybe you can start judging yourself, but then it's too late because we don't do that anymore, right? But רב נתן, I think השם should please forgive me if I'm not מכוון to the right, to the right way over here. But based on another teaching we learned earlier this year, since we never are ever, ever going to be in a person's shoes, because even if I have a similar experience to someone— Someone's looking for her. Yeah, she just walked out.

She knows, she knows. She's pulling a יוסי. This is what יוסי does here, honestly. We end up looking for יוסי every trip.

דווקא here in ברסלב, he actually finds like, he goes out here. She's, what a זיווג.

ברוך השם.

כי בוודאי גם מקום עצמו אינו יודע.

Because really, you think you know yourself. You think you've reached a place, this defines the real me, whether it's based on any, whatever, any type of achievement or non-achievement, you— saying, this defines my מקום in the world.

רב נתן says, you don't really know who you are. Because you're a work in progress too.

So who are you judging? What are you judging? You're judging an illusion. But you've made yourself into that illusion and you מזדהה, you identify yourself with that which is not really your מקום.

רב נתן says that is absolutely אסור to do.כי בוודאי אינו יודע מאיזה מקום נמשך. A person doesn't really know from what place he is drawn from.

What do you think that means? Well, the next few words will explain to us.

וכל מה שעברו עליו בכל הגלגולים. You see, we show up to this world and we're like, oh, what I see right now is exactly what's happening inside, right? The whole operation system is just based on from the moment I was born in this world, dealing with this world. This set of parents, this family, this surroundings.

רב נתן says, where you getting, what are you, that's not what we believe. You show up in this world, you have a lot of different things you've been carrying, a lot of פקלה from way back. Elana was talking about באבע yesterday, באבע might have been the last round. Maybe.

I don't think so. Not to freak you out even more, but I'm just saying, there's even, you know, there's, there's more. Some of us in this room are certain that we're from the time of חורבן בית שני. Other, other eras of the, you know.

We've had enough pogroms, we've had enough moments where we've been killed על קידוש השם throughout our history to know that it could be from any different place.

רב נתן says you are judging yourself based on how you interact with this round. Do you know what you're carrying with you? Sorry I know. Oh wait.

You know, and all of the above, you know. So much more.So when חז״ל say אל תדון את חברך עד שתגיע למקומו, he's basically saying you know when you can judge yourself? When you've figured out every גלגול you've been through, everything you've been carrying, all the פקלה you've been through, then when you have the קומה שלמה, when you have the full picture of your נשמה, maybe then there's time for proper judgment. Has anyone ever reached anything close to that in this, in this גלגול?

קל וחומר on other people.ומאיזה מקום, not just this, ומאיזה מקום נמשכים עליו היצרים הרעים והמחשבות רעות שלו. And this we should, השם should please help us remember this.

You know, each of us deal with our own יצרים and different bad מחשבות in different way. Whether they're impure thoughts, קנאה, jealousy, which is a very impure thought, any type of תאווה, whatever it is. Fame, money, all, everything.

רב נתן says you think you understand exactly why you have every תאווה that you have? Why you have every single bad thought you have? No one really understands the cause for every negative trait that we have inside of us.

But we attribute it to this, oh, it's because that happened when I was a kid.

מחילה from all the shrinks in the room. Obviously, I'm not trying to bash anything, I'm just trying to give ourselves כוח right now. Oh, it's because you were lacking that, or because that person said that to you at a certain age.

רב נתן says you think that's the only reason why you act, why you act? And if that didn't happen, you would have been a געוואלד and everything would have worked out perfectly. You're carrying so much, so many triggers from previous generations that are causing you to think, act, respond, or not respond in many different ways.על כן, middle of this paragraph, אסור לייאש את עצמו לעולם. And therefore we keep on coming back to this point in Breslov that therefore a person should never ever despair themselves, no matter what, forever. You know, this is really, I'm sure you agree with me that the times that we're hardest on ourselves is when we realize we didn't learn from the mistake the first time, and we repeat mistakes.

Not so much when we make a mistake. We make a mistake, we're kind of okay with that. But when are we not okay with something? When we didn't learn from a mistake and we actually have the חוצפה to repeat a mistake.

השם ישמור עלינו.

How bad, how hard we get on ourselves, right? What are we working with? What system are we aware of that we're working with? Therefore רב נתן says it's absolutely אסור to מייאש yourself forever. Why? Because you're still in the process of dealing with a lot of previous processes as well. It's a lot more going on than just what's in front of you.

כאשר הזהירנו אדמו״ר זכרונו לברכה, like our רבי.

רבי, רבי נחמן, warned us כמה פעמים בלי שיעור, that a person he warned us many, many times, כי צריכים לקיים גם בעצמו.

אל תהי בז לכל אדם. You shouldn't, you know, בז comes from this language of ביזיון, לבזות, to disgrace. So it says in פרקי אבות, it says in the מדרש there, sorry, no, it says in פרקי אבות, don't disgrace any person.

And we always think that that means any person.But yourself. And all the different types of yourselves as well, all the different people you've had to be in this world and in previous worlds.

אל תהי בז לכל אדם, רב נתן says, don't מבזה all the different previous struggles you've had to go through in this world. Whether it's different גלגולים.

Like basically, when I learned this, I thought like he was saying, don't ever read your one of your diaries and laugh at the person that was struggling with what they were struggling with.You would say that. That was deep.Yeah, I just want to see if it can be even like a little bit more שמיצער, a little bit deeper. What's that?Can I say it in a different word?Yeah, please. Oh, by the way, what Jackie just said, I always want people to do.It was about having compassion for your past self, even if you come really far and you have changed a lot.

Don't judge the person you used to be for the mistakes that she used to make. Have compassion for that person too. Give her a hug, because she's also strong and she was struggling a lot.And she's still alive. She's still part of what's going on right now.

אל תהי בז לכל אדם, רב נתן says, don't ever, you know, have compassion on all the different versions of you, because whether you like it or not, even though you've grown out of certain tests, that person with all the implications and confusions is still חי וקיים in you. And it's still happening right now as well.And you need those past parts to be who you are right now as well.Absolutely. That's like hopefully all, hopefully this teaching and all these teachings should lead you to a place of הודאה on that which you thought was impossible to be thankful for. Because when you're in it, you can't, it's very hard to be thankful.

When you're in it and you think that what you see is what you get, which is not a Jewish, that's not a יידישע concept, it's very, very hard to be thankful for that. But when you're looking at it in the context of what was brought up right now, then to be thankful for it, you raise up the whole experience of every level of גלגול, every level of complication, you you lift it up when you're thank, when you're thankful for it.How, does that mean in simple terms that the challenges that you're struggling with are challenges that your past גלגולים have struggled with and it's still a struggle in your נשמה?יכול להיות, it could be. It's definitely possible, but it could also be a new struggle. Like it doesn't mean necessarily that what you're struggling with, you've struggled with in the past.

The only thing that, the only difference is, is that there's one נקודה that each of us have to do a complete תיקון on in this world, aside from all the other הלכות we have to keep and everything. There's always one thing each of us has to fix, that's our main נקודה. And some people say that that is actually the same thread through each generation, that your נשמה is here to correct and you have to keep on coming back to correct that one thing.Okay. Wait, Ilana, are you, based on what Jackie said, it's clear clearer now? Okay.I just think I'm overthinking it and that's probably not.Probably not.My same word, self-sabotage.Self-persecution.Like what you asked before the question, I don't remember the question, but what I wanted to say was self-sabotage.Uh-huh.

I think it's, yeah, no, but it's, it's the same כוונה. It's the same משפחה.Pattern, not a...It's the same משפחה.Self-sabotaging.We're all proud of you, Ilana. Just so you know.Okay, look what he says here.

כי צריכים גם לקיים בעצמו, אל תהי בז לכל אדם.

רב נתן says, שלא לעבור על איסור שפיכות דמים חס ושלום. That you shouldn't be over on, how do we usually translate the concept of שפיכות דמים? Murder. There's a thing called, we see it a lot in this today's day and age, character assassination.

רב נתן's very big on that.

He's saying you're more than just this one character. Do not assassinate a previous character that you had to play, that was part of you.But what, but what, but that makes sense because the way I was thinking before is that somebody said have compassion on previous generations, it's almost like speaking לשון הרע. on those past people. And לשון הרע is on yourself, right? So when you מבזה someone, absolutely you're killing them.

You're saying לשון הרע on your past generation. Yeah, so you're killing them, you're killing yourself, right? You know, I I experienced this last week. My brother and I were playing a wedding in ירושלים and in, oh my god, that that hall that overlooks, remember that place we, yeah? Point, right right. So someone came up to my brother and I after the, I don't know, I think I told you, I told you on שבת.

So they came up to my brother and I after the meal and he wasn't, clearly, if he comes up to my brother and told him the following, he's not fully with it. But he came up to them and he was saying to them, "You know, you're really good, you're you have groove." And he was say, the way he was standing, I ממש saw מקום המקדש right in between him and my brother, right between the two, right? And thank God, my brother, we were surrounded, a bunch of friends and the musicians. And he said, "You know, but there's just there's one thing. I'm trying to put my finger on it and I I don't want to say what's missing.

Forgive me, I don't want to say what's really missing." And he said, "You you have a beat, it sounds good, the musicians are good, everything, but you're you're missing, you're missing soul," he says. So, my brother said to him, "שכוח. You're the first person to ever say such a thing to me." And I said to him, I looked at him with eyes of רצח, I said, "And you're also the last." I know his brother, he definitely has soul. We have, ברוך השם.

Everyone in here has heard my brother sing, my brother's a, the point is I I saw רצח, not for me. I saw that when you מבזה someone, at that moment, you are you're killing that person. A disgrace?Now, now, the point here is that tell we know that. But why are we okay when we do that to ourselves? Why is that not just as חמור as a חמור, as a, why, why is it? Why is that like בסדר as long as it as long as it didn't go out on somebody else? So in Breslov, maybe Reb Nosson saying, burn this fire in my heart, is that it takes a fire to internalize a lot of concepts that we knew were important that we treat other people with, but that it becomes just as important that I take care of my own נשמה in this world.

It's one of the fires of רבי נחמן. Take care of my נשמה. It's very tricky to be here. There are clear instructions here how to take care of my own soul and not to do it in a haughty way and to do it in an authentic way, to not get confused also by having too much כף זכות all the time and letting myself off of everything as well.

When it's done, when this עבודה is done לשם שמיים, the ריבונו של עולם shows you exactly when there's space to also you tell yourself, "I could have done that so much better." And the judgment ends right then and there. The guilt, it does not paralyze. It's normal, healthy.

רמב"ם, תשובה guilt.

You you work with it and you move forward too.כמבואר שם בתורה, now in the end of this first paragraph, שאל תהי בז לכל אדם, הוא איסור שפיכות דמים.

רבי נחמן teaches, when it says, "Don't don't disgrace any person," it's referring really to murder, to murdering them, to murdering them, their character, to murdering their concept of who they think they are. All that Reb Nosson says is really put back at it, it's it's placed in front of you about you.על כן, bottom paragraph.

גם לבזות את עצמו ביותר עד שיוכל ליפול על ידי זה חס ושלום הוא בוודאי איסור חמור, כי הוא איסור שפיכות דמים שאסור גם בעצמו.

You cannot do this to yourself.

כמו שכתוב, and it becomes to the פרשה now, שופך דם האדם. That means, Reb Nosson says, it's talking about when you spill your own blood to yourself.

ואך את דמכם לנפשותיכם, I'm demanding you to look at your own blood, to look at what you're made out of and to not kill yourself.

That's how Reb Nosson's learning out this piece.

ודרשו רז"ל, הוא מובא בפירוש רש"י, לרבות השופך דם עצמו.

כי צריכים לדון את עצמו לכף זכות, כמבואר בתורה עזמרה ליקוטי מוהר"ן.Why is it so important again to judge yourself favorably like is written famously in the תורה of עזמרה in ליקוטי מוהר"ן? That's רפ"ב. Why? And this is again, comes back and nails this back home.

כי מי יודע את מקומו. Who knows where they really are? Who knows where they've been? Who knows where they really are right now, at this second? Do we really know? So what do we know? Like what do we know about ourselves if that's the case based on this teaching, just to finish the last point?

ועיקר שלא יתיאש את עצמו מן הצעקה לעולם. Reb Nosson says, but the most important thing is, don't ever despair yourself from the scream forever. What kind of scream is this? What's that? I'm mortal.

Well, that's one, no, that really is one way of looking at it. What's another way of looking at it for right now? What scream are we talking about? Silent scream is definitely one of them.

התבודדות is definitely one of them. But there's a, what's that? As in an internal scream? Well that's the silent scream we've spoken about, but the the further...

Needing השם. Sorry? The need. The need to scream to השם to ask him, please reveal to me a little bit more about who I am, as certain as I am about myself, and as much as I've worked on myself. Reb Nosson says, don't despair yourselves from believing or by thinking that you don't have a need to do that.

Every person, as long as they're alive, the נשמה is waiting for the body to allow that scream to take place.Show me a little, please, as certain as I am about myself. And as much as I've done a lot, even people that are not in a bad place in life, the things are working out. We're not, you know, התבודדות is not just for נבכים. Sorry to burst anyone's bubble.

התבודדות is ממש not for נבכים.

נבכים are those, נבכים are those people that think that that's what it's for.

התבודדות, this צעקה, this screaming, as long as you're alive and your blood is flowing, it means there's more for you to get to know. Reb Nosson says what we are here to do in this world is to scream out to השם to ask for help to define who that person is more and more.

Now the more that that becomes your practice, the less כף חובה, judgment, you'll be doing on others, but specifically, definitely on yourself. Not that it doesn't, again, doesn't mean the more you're going to be able to cop out smoother, more smoother. It just means that the sense of how to just be אמת and authentic becomes more and more real and more revealed to you.הלוואי we could attach ourselves to these words of the צדיק that we're right next to right now and truly enjoy the unknown. Enjoy the fact that we're still, even though I know it's freaky, some of us are already grandparents in this room.

Well now I'm a grandparent, now I'm going to start to figure out who I really am? Yes. You're still alive, it means yes.

ברוך השם. Those of us that have little children, no, oh my kids needed to see that they have strong figures in front of them.

Yeah, the strong, you know what the strongest figure your child needs to see in front of them? Someone that's still excited about עבודת השם. That's the strongest figure your child will ever need to see in front of you. Who's someone that's excited about עבודת השם? Someone that knows that there's more. There's still more.

עדיין, right?

ברוך השם שעדיין לא הגעתי למקומי. I'd be here. The חבר'ה over here, says it's Zvilender, if you've got to למקומי. So since the חז"ל say, אל תדון את חברך עד שתגיע למקומו, like Reb Nosson is saying, don't judge yourself until you've come to your מקום.

What does that mean? It means there's still more. And that excitement brings שמחה, it brings הודאה, it brings gratitude. These are key pillars in the תורה of Reb Nachman. This is just a מעט מן הים, it's just a drop in the sea.

But you could imagine learning תורות like this, you would also spend hours and hours here in the forest, going down to the river banks, crying, screaming, laughing, cracking up.So that's what we're going to be doing right now. Not not all of that. I'm saying we're going to, no, I mean if that's what happens, then that's good. But the thing is like this, the thing is like this, there are some חבר'ה down there I saw, some Ukrainian men, and that's why I don't want everyone going dispersed over here because there's not, it's very easy to get lost over here.

Let's have luck finding Miriam. We've been looking for Yossi many times like I said. But to take a few minutes by the water, מקומך. Think about how how how much you think you know yourself, how well you know yourself, and how much it's okay to admit that maybe you don't.

And that that's not threatening. It's actually a like a שחרור. It's a little bit of a leaving of a certain Egypt, of a narrowness, of a narrow way of of of viewing your whole world and your whole life, and invite compassion on every person of your previous past, both in this גלגול and previous ones, to invite more and more compassion on them. that person.

Those experiences, because all of those people are still alive in each.