Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
In this shiur, Rav Dov Ber Cohen teaches teshuva as the third of five paths toward genuine spiritual vitality. Far from a season of self-punishment, he presents teshuva as a joyful return, an act of c
The Rabbi Dov Ber Cohen Podcast explores Jewish mindfulness, emotional mastery, relationships, and real inner avodah.
In each shiur, Rabbi Dov Ber shares practical Torah wisdom for navigating anxiety, deepening connection, strengthening emunah, and living with greater presence and purpose.
Rooted in Chassidic depth yet grounded in everyday life, these teachings are experiential, honest, and transformative.
If you’re seeking clarity without pressure, growth without guilt, and spirituality that actually changes how you live - this podcast is for you.
Okay, we're on number three. We're going through the five paths of creating true spiritual vitality, enlightenment and greatness. And don't forget that your soul is full of love and joy. Your soul is pure, it's connected, it's full of love and joy, vitality, playfulness, compassion, everything you want, you already have. Judaism is not a path towards enlightenment, Judaism is a path to reveal that you're already enlightened. It's all there, you have it all in your soul. So you just have to reach your soul, you have to connect to your soul. Just like we said, the sun is always shining and the sky is always blue. It's just that many days there's clouds in the way so you can't appreciate the blue sky and the sun. It's always there. Your soul is so full of immense vitality. And that's why your body and your ego aren't and they're heavy and they're pulling you down and that's where the dopamine addiction comes from because I just want to feel alive. Now why do you want to feel alive? It's actually coming from a good place. It's coming from a good place. Your soul is so alive, your soul is so deeply connected, but because your body and ego is so heavy and selfish and consumerist and dead, it needs these peak experiences to feel something and it's actually coming from a holy place. So our sages tell us a crazy thing, that even your most sick, dirty, immoral desires are actually coming from a holy place. They've just been filtered down through your ego and your physical desires and so they're coming out not okay. So the example they give is if you have pure mineral water, this perfect pure mineral water, but you pour it through a pipe but the pipe is very muddy and dirty inside. So the mineral water picks up the mud and dirt and so when it comes out into the cup or the vessel it's dirty and muddy. It's not the mineral water's fault, it's the vessel. So your vessel is a bit dirty, your mind is a bit dirty, your, we're a bit, it's a bit dirty. And the sages teach that every single time you do something that isn't good for your soul, then you create more dirt actually. You create dirt on your soul. Now do you damage your soul? Can you damage your soul? No. Souls are undamageable. So if you eat pig and you smoke weed and you tattoo your face with a swastika on Yom Kippur whilst driving your car with your non-Jewish girlfriend, you didn't damage your soul at all. Nothing, no, not at all. But you covered it up a lot. Covered it up a lot. It's covered. It's full of... so the mashal, the analogy we use is of a light bulb. Your soul is a thousand watt light bulb. Started to speak about this yesterday, your soul is a thousand watt light bulb. And the more mitzvot you do, the more you pump up your light bulb. Now it's a two thousand watt, three, every mitzvah you do is pumping up your spiritual vibration, your spiritual power. Did you say the Shema this morning? Did you smile whilst you said the Shema this morning? Like what an amazing opportunity to do a mitzvah d'Oraita and I'm doing it besimcha, I'm so excited. I get to say the Shema, put on tefillin, pump up your soul. When you do a not good thing, you cover up your soul. You don't damage it though. So imagine the light bulb and I paint a small layer of paint on the light bulb, a small black paint on the light bulb. Is the light bulb still a thousand watts? Yes. Is it still perfect and pure? Yes. But only nine hundred and fifty watts of light is coming out. And then I eat more pig and then I chase more money and women and stuff and I'm just covering up my light bulb until for some people you've just got such a thick layer of mud and shmutz and paint on your light bulb that no light is coming out of your light bulb. Is the light bulb damaged? No. Is it still shining? Yes, just covered up. Covered up. So in our mashal, the analogy that we've been using, your body ego has a speaker and your soul has a speaker. The first session we did was let's turn down the noise of the body ego by stop feeding it the whole time and identifying with it. The second session we were doing was let's pump up the sound of the soul through mitzvot. Imagine that you have this speaker playing amazing music but it's covered in blankets. So it's playing very loud music but now it's covered over in blankets. So it's the same idea as the light bulb with the paint. The light bulb with the paint and the speaker with the blanket. So the blanket is muffling out the sound of the speaker, so you have to remove the blanket. You have to remove the paint and remove the blankets. And how do you do that? It's called spiritual path number three, teshuva. teshuva. Tshuva. Now, Tshuva should be the most exciting, wonderful, amazing word you hear. What an amazing opportunity. Some people translate it as repentance, but it means to return. Tshuva means to return. When people hear the word Tshuva, many people feel very heavy. Uh-oh, I've got to beat myself up, I'm bad, I've got to beat my chest. Judaism teaches it's exactly the opposite. An amazing opportunity to be pure and clean again. What an amazing thing. That's so nice. Imagine you cheat on your wife, God forbid, but you could do something where she literally not only forgave you, but forgot it even happened. It's just gone. It's an amazing thing. Judaism's amazing. And does God make it hard? Does God play hard to get? No. Hashem's like, dude, I love you, just whenever you're ready, come. So there are two parts of Tshuva. Firstly, it's not hard, and God wants it, and you want it, and everyone wants it, and it's good for you. It's so good for you. So if God forbid your child goes off the Derech, and he's living in Tel Aviv with his non-Jewish girlfriend and his drugs and his everything, imagine he calls you up one day before Shabbat and he says, \"Look, Dad, I messed up, can I just come home for Shabbat? I miss Mom's chicken soup and you know I like it when you read...\" What would you say to your son at that point? Absolutely. No, son. No. Yes. Come, son. And you know what, don't even be embarrassed. I love you, come. So the son comes, he's sitting there, he's got his tattoos on his face and he's like... and he falls asleep on your lap like he used to, and you're like, \"I love you, son.\" And then he goes back to Tel Aviv Motzei Shabbat, and you're like, \"I'll take whatever I can.\" That's how a healthy father sees his son. So your son calls you at two o'clock in the morning, \"Dad, can you come and pick me up? I messed up again.\" You go and pick him up every time, just keep picking him up. Now, there might be a time when it's actually better for the son not to pick him up, that might help him learn and I'm not saying that's not true, but whenever the son wants to come, he's home. So Tshuva is, it only takes one minute. It just is the yearning to return, it's the yearning for returning. That's what Tshuva is. It just takes one minute. Now, let's say the son comes home. That's it, he's done Tshuva, he's home, he's returned, he's come home. Now he has to fix his ways as well. So many people think Tshuva is, \"I'll just stop smoking on Shabbat and I'll say more Tehillim.\" So for many people Tshuva is some external actions. \"I'm going to pray more, I'm going to get up earlier,\" and that's cute. It is cute, but that's not what Tshuva really is. That's a very low level. It is better than nothing. But Tshuva is, \"I'm going to work on my character traits that are covering up my soul.\" I have some character traits. My jealousy and anger and pride and arrogance and laziness, that's covering up my soul. So I'm going to work, that's a higher level of Tshuva because all of the bad things you do in your life is just because you've got bad character traits. You only speak Lashon Hara because you're jealous of other people. You only are angry because you have a big ego. Whatever it is. So the physical actions are a symptom of a character flaw. And even the character flaw are a symptom of a lack of Yiras Hashem, which means awareness of God and awareness of who you really are. So Tshuva goes deeper and deeper and deeper and deeper. So yes, there's a whole process once the son comes home, he's now got to stop smoking weed and he's got to start doing the right thing. But the initial thing is I just want to come home. And the second main, main, main, main, main point of Tshuva is people think it's saying, \"I'm bad, I'm bad, I'm bad.\" But it's not. It's saying the opposite, exactly the opposite. It's saying, \"I'm so good, I'm a pure, beautiful, shining, holy, radiant being of divine light. I am full of love and joy and I let myself down.\" So you feel bad about letting yourself down, but you have to feel good about yourself in order to feel bad about letting yourself down. I think I told you this story, it often happens. You guys come, Foundations guys come, you're doing whatever you're doing, and then six months later you're kind of in Yeshiva and you're wearing Tzitzit maybe and you're keeping Shabbat and you're feeling much better about... life's good. I come into Yeshiva on Sunday morning and one of you guys comes up to me looking terribly down and upset and... and he's like, \"Rebbi, can I speak to you?\" I know exactly what's about to happen, by the way. So I sit down in the Beit Midrash and say, \"Speak to me.\" And they say, \"Well, you know you said we have to remain normal when we do Tshuva, when we come more, just be normal? So it's one of the guys' birthdays last night and you always tell us just be normal, go and have a few beers. So I went and had a few beers. And then someone had some weed. And I haven't smoked weed for six months, but you know it was a birthday...\" And then I had a few drinks, I smoked the weed, and then there was this girl there, and you know you said blah blah blah. Anyway, I woke up this morning, and I know she's going to get hurt by this because she was probably into it, I just used her for my own stuff, and I've just really hurt this amazing Jew and I just feel I'm just an animal. I hate myself. I thought I'd come so far. I've been in Yeshiva for six months, I've refined myself and keeping Shabbat everything and I haven't. I'm just the same animal as I used to be. I'm so upset. At which point I say to them, Baruch Hashem. Baruch Hashem. And they're like, what Rebbe, how can you say that? I messed up, I let myself down. I'm like, this is great! Why is it great? Because six months ago he would have done that and then not been upset about it, showed off to all his friends about it, and then done it again the next night. The fact that you feel disappointed in yourself for doing that shows how much you've grown. So at this point, you have to feel good about yourself that you feel bad about yourself. I feel good that I feel bad about myself. When people say, you know Rebbe, I have this habit that I do a lot which I know you're not allowed to do in the Torah, and I slipped up last night, you know. I say, yeah but you slipped up seven times a day six months ago. The fact that it even bothers you that you slipped up, that's amazing, because your friends aren't thinking about that, they're doing whatever they're doing all the time. So it's a positive thing when you feel bad about yourself for your mistakes. But then don't beat yourself up! Don't then say, that's the biggest Yetzer Hara. The biggest Yetzer Hara is you're like, oh why did I do that. Now there's two extremes. If you mess up completely and you let yourself down and you don't even feel bad at all, that's not good, because you won't grow. But if you feel so bad that you're beating yourself up and I'm such an idiot, what's wrong with me, I let myself, that's very unhealthy. Very unhealthy. So there's this middle ground, it's called Charatah in Jewish. Charatah means remorse. And there's a difference between guilt, shame, remorse, guilt, shame, beating yourself up and remorse. Remorse is this deep feeling of pain that I let myself down, from which I then motivate myself to do better. What was that word again? Charatah. Remorse. It's a useful pain. Beating yourself up is not useful. So Rebbe Nachman speaks about this all the time, there's a nefilah, there's a fall, you mess up, but then there's a nefilah min hanefilah, a fall from the fall, which means you then just beat yourself up and you get depressed and whatever. And Rebbe Nachman says whatever you do, don't fall from the fall, get up from the fall. That's what teshuva is. Just people seem to think teshuva is beat myself up again, I'm such a, what's wrong, that's not called teshuva, that's called beating yourself up like an idiot. Don't do that. So how do you clean the mud off your soul and take the blanket off the speaker? The Rambam says very clearly, and people say different orders, but the first thing is admit it, own it. Just own it. Well it's my dad's fault, it's his fault, it's their fault, you would have done it, just own it. So I did it, I did it, I own it, I admit it. Number two, regret it. Actually maybe number one is stop doing it. Number two, just actually regret it, feel like ow, that hurts when I let myself down. Now how long do you have to have remorse for? How long do you need to and not beat yourself up, but how long should you feel pain and disappointment for? So the sages teach us one moment of true full ow, oh gosh, you're done. How do they teach us that? Because they compare Yom Kippur to a mikveh. Yom Kippur is a mikveh in time. Just like the mikveh purifies you, Yom Kippur purifies you. How long do you have to be under the water in a mikveh to be pure? A moment. But you have to be completely under. So if you've got one little finger sticking out, you're not under. You've got one little hair out, you're not under. So one moment of being completely under the water of a mikveh, you are now pure. Which so they teach us, one moment of true disappointment in yourself, which is painful, you're done. You just cleaned the thing, baby, you cleaned that lightbulb. You're free, you're free, you're free. Now we do say as you go... God bless you, we do say as you become more conscious, you become more aware how bad what you did was for you. So you can go over it again, but not as a \"I'm gonna beat myself up for the rest of my life.\" So I run a course that helps people get ready for Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, and Sukkot. Online course. And I got a phone call from a woman on the course, a 52-year-old Rebbetzin. A religious woman. And her kids are all in yeshiva, and she very religious, and she became religious when she was about 20. And now she's 52, amazing holy holy woman. Wrote book, amazing woman. And she called me up crying. She's like, \"Rabbi, how can I ever forgive myself for what I did when I was a 19-year-old secular girl?\" So do you know what I said to her? You don't need to forgive yourself for that, because it wasn't you. It was a 19-year-old secular girl. You're a 52-year-old religious woman. You were doing what 19-year-old secular girls do. Now it wasn't the best thing to do, fine, and not good for you. But you did teshuva, so not only should you not feel bad about yourself for the 19-year-old girl because it wasn't you, you should actually feel good about yourself for who you are now. I feel good about who I am now. And you gotta understand, it's very important, the yetzer hara is very clever. When you put yourself down and say \"I'm bad,\" you're kind of giving yourself permission to carry on doing that, because \"That's what I did, I'm just that, I'm just a bad guy, so I'll just do that more, and I enjoy it anyway.\" The yetzer hara's very clever, messing with you. But when you put yourself up, \"That's below me, it's just below me. Come on, I'm still running around chasing that all the time, it's like sad.\" I'm chasing physical pleasure and ego, it's just... I just don't, I'm not interested in that anymore. It's an amazing thing. So teshuva is very powerful, teshuva's very powerful. You're taking off anything that's covering up your own soul, the voice of your soul. But then that's also returning you to your Father. Not that Hashem ever stopped loving you, but if my son's living in Tel Aviv and doing all that stuff, it's not great for my relationship with him. I still love him, but there is distance. So the word for a sin in Hebrew is aveira. Aveira means to crossover. La'avor et hakvish means to crossover the road. Avarti dira, I change... I moved house. So the word for sin in Hebrew means distance, really. I've created distance. So how do you deal with that? You do teshuva, you just come back, just cross back over the road. So how do you do teshuva? Not by saying you're bad, by saying \"I'm so good. I'm so good, and that's so below me, I just don't want it.\" Purifying... You're just purifying, purifying, purifying, cleaning away the schmutz. Yes. How do you actually implement that? We just said it. First you admit it, you own it. Second, you sit there on your own, a personal accounting with yourself and feel like, \"Ow,\" and talk to Hashem, and say \"Hashem, I messed up. I did... I own it. I messed up. I see how bad this is for me. I'm very upset with myself. I'm in pain.\" And the final step is, and I'm committing to not do it again, or at least I'm committing to put in the effort to not do it again. So for example, you should do teshuva. If you get angry, you should do teshuva. You shouldn't get angry, that means you've got a big ego. But you can't then commit to never get angry again. You can't say, \"Right Hashem, I commit...\". But you can say \"Hashem, I'm committing to work really, really hard on not getting angry.\" You can't commit to not doing all your vices again. You can't say that. But you can definitely commit to doing better. And Hashem's cool with that. You gotta remember, we learn this when Kayin... Kayin and Abel. Kayin gave his wheat to Hashem, Abel gave his sheep. Kayin didn't really mean it, so Hashem took Hevel's sheep. Kayin gets very upset... v'nafal panav, very upset. Hashem doesn't get upset with him. Hashem doesn't say \"Well, you deserve it, you're bad.\" Hashem says to him, \"Just try better next time, dude. You messed up, just do better next time.\" So Hashem's very much like that. He's like \"Dude, you did...\" and you gotta remember, true punishment in Judaism is self-inflicted. Hashem's not out to get you. And you know this just personally in your life, the reward for doing the right thing is \"I feel good about myself. I have self-respect. Other people respect me. I have good relationships.\" And the punishment for doing the wrong thing is \"I just... I'm not proud of myself, and I have less good relationships.\" So it's not Hashem is rewarding and punishing you. And that's what we say Heaven and Hell is, by the way. What is Gehennom? Gehennom is a cleansing process if you didn't do it when you're alive. If you didn't do real teshuva when you're alive, then your soul is going back up with schmutz on it. So Hashem says, \"I want you to come into Heaven,\" and you all will by the way, we're all gonna go, we're cool, whatever that means. \"But you can't come in if you've got schmutz, so I'm gonna put you in the car wash.\" spiritual car wash I'm going to wash off all the shmutz from you and it's a bit painful. Bit painful. I used to play rugby, mud all over my knees and I'd go home and my mom would scrub the mud off my knees. It was a bit painful. Ow! Oh! Ah! Eeh! But it was good for me. So the sages actually teach if you're on a very, very high spiritual level you can enjoy Gehinnom. You can enjoy the pain of getting cleansed, just like you enjoy the pain of the rip of going to the gym. You can still be besimcha in Gehinnom because you're like, wow, this is actually good for me. Now, it would be very painful, so don't, you shouldn't want it. It's not a good thing. So just do teshuva here. Yes. So when you do teshuva, is there an ideal version of where you should be or is it the best? Very important point. Many people make a big mistake when they're doing teshuva and they say, I'm here and a tzadik is here, so this is my teshuva gap. Why am I not a tzadik? That's a big mistake. You need to say, I'm here and really I could be here. I could have been this, I could have done that. That's your teshuva gap. You shouldn't feel remorse that you're not perfect, especially as a ba'al teshuva, by the way. So you shouldn't beat yourself up for not being perfect. You should beat yourself up for not being as good as really you could have been if you'd put in a little bit more effort. You knew you were doing the wrong thing. That's a healthy teshuva gap that you should be doing. So teshuva is an amazing thing. Teshuva's cleaning. It's cleaning, it cleanses. That's why the Gemara says Yom Kippur's the happiest day of the year because you leave Yom Kippur pure. As long as you put in a little bit of effort you're pure. It's gone, it's done, you've done it, I put it behind me, it's gone. Be'ezrat Hashem. That is number three. Tomorrow kickboxing, Thursday parsha, Sunday number four. Shabbat Shalom.