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“Know Your Children with Rav Shlomo Katz” is a series about the everyday holy work of raising children with heart, patience, and honesty. Join Rav Shlomo in learning from the sefer Da Et Yeladecha by Rav Itamar Shwartz, author of Bilvavi Mishkan Evneh, and explore how Torah and Chazal guide us in building a healthy, loving connection between parent and child.
This isn’t about perfect techniques or quick fixes. It’s about creating a foundation of truth, learning to really listen, and finding the right “funnel” so that what we want to give actually reaches our children. Each shiur is meant to be practical, gentle, and encouraging, and something you can take home and live with.
Good morning everyone Shavua Tov. Thank you for being here. The month of Adar is sponsored, the learning for the month of Adar is sponsored by the Aron family l'iluy nishmat Levi ben Yosef; by the Silvers בסי פיגא בת ישראל; and by Raziel and Leah Hershkowitz ישעיה שלום בן יצחק אייזיק; by the Finns לוי יצחק בן ירוחם חנן זלמן; and for the shemira of all of our chayalaim hatzadikim; for the refuah shlema of some of the chayalaim: דוד נתנאל בן איילה אהובה; and for the refuah shlema of טוב שמואל בן אביה-נוה אברהם and אברהם יעקב בן דבורה פייגא בתוך שאר חולי ישראל. Amen.
Also, if you could just have in mind my sister-in-law is in labor right now so to daven for a leida kala for מלכה בלומא בת רבקה ציפורה פרומית, that's my brother's wife. Okay, we could pass these around to everybody. Thank you. I don't even have to say that today's triggering.
All these shiurim are triggering. It's not even something I have to mention. However, there's an eitza, there's a very challenging eitza that we're going to be hearing from the Mechaber today, a challenging one because I don't know if anyone's up for it. I don't know if I'm up for it.
But we'll see it, we'll see it probably very very soon. What we've come to in the learning that we've been doing is that the hashka'ah, we mashkia in our children's emotional development is not a luxury, it's a must. That's we've kind of really come down to the heart of that in the last few shiur, definitely last week's shiur. Deciding to be mashkia in our children's emotional development is not something that we leave for guidance counselors, teachers, or psychologists.
If need be, that's what we need to do after, but as a shlav rishoni, zot omeret, as the initial outset in terms of us looking at who are we as parents and what did Hashem have in mind when he created the concepts the concept of parent parenting, of parent and children, from the outset mamash, from the beginning, it's that yeah, there seems to be a tall order here. There's machshava dibbur u'ma'aseh. There's the action I have to make sure my children have everything they physically need. There's the dibbur, they need to hear words of love as well.
And there's the machshava aspect as well, which ties in very much to the hashka'ah rikshis, the machshava aspect is thinking thoughts of love for my children, doesn't just mistakem is not just saying okay I walk around I send good vibes. It's not what we're talking about either. But a hashka'ah v'hitpatchut harikshit, the investment in the emotional development of our children is of on the most important place of I think, I believe, what this sefer and what the rav is trying to give over to us. Obviously, he didn't write a whole sefer to make sure it's important, we understand that it's important that sandwiches are in the tikim.
That's not why he's going to write this sefer, and he's also not going to write a whole sefer so that we are clear that we have to say words of love to our children. That could be mesukam, that could be summarized in one statement. Rather, it is exactly what we got to right now. I feel like now the sefer is actually really starting.
There's a lot of different hakdamos we can do for today, but I think that's enough, I think that's enough for right now. If you look at the we're going to be starting on daf lamed gimmel binyan nechona on the bottom over here, but look at the paragraph before that because this we didn't get to last time.
כל הורה מבין מעצמו, every parent understands from their own, שלא שייך להלביש את הילד עם אותם בגדים או נעליים במשך שלוש שנים. So we understand on a on the most materialistic and important and essential level, we don't we don't dress our kids with the same clothes for the for three years when they're children and they're in stages of development.
It's funny when I was a kid there was like I don't know, maybe it's a different era. I had a pair of weekday shoes and a pair of Shabbos shoes. Yeah, that's not so much the world where I don't know that that's where we're still holding today. But even then, those shoes for our children, they baruch Hashem are growing, they're in a state of growth so when we know it's very clear to us that when they're growing physically, צריך להתאים את המצב, you have to get new you have to get larger shoes.
מכיוון שהילד גדל, the kid is growing, והבגדים נעשים קטנים עבורו, the clothes that did fit them it was good, it was right for the time. Af banefesh, but in the soul, צריך להעניק לילד בן שנתיים בעניין של הרגשות שמתאים לו, בגיל שלוש בעניין הרגשות שונה, v'chein halah. How many of you are bechorim, bechorot? OK, so right, so there is that classical statement that all the mistakes were basically done on us, you know, through us, v'chulei, and then they realize the second, I don't think I don't really buy that that much, but we know and we see it with our own children what they, this is the, this is the satan, this is the trick that the other side says. If I knew exactly how to give my child what they need when they're five and now they're, now they're eight and I'm still giving them what I was giving them when they were five, what does it say about what I was giving them when they were five? Listen really closely.
What does it say about what I gave them, what I provided for them when they were five and I'm still giving it to them when they're eight? What does it say about what I was giving to them when they were five? Too much? Wasn't effective? When they were five? No, it was what they needed. It could be it was exactly what they needed. But because now I'm in a new shlav in parenting, the age has now gone up, so what does it come, what does it try to, unfortunately, the dark side, what does it start to, start to tell me in my mind? The fact that I'm not giving them, I'm not, I don't know yet what to give them now at this age, what does it start to tell me about my whole parenting? The whole thing was messed up, you don't know what you're doing, v'zeh sakanah gedolah. And that's a very, very big place where a lot of parents fall into in terms of self-persecuted thoughts and bad negative, negative thoughts, negative thoughts about ourselves and what we've done for our kinderlach.
It's not true. It could be that that which you're giving your child at eight, which is what you gave them at five, is definitely not what they need at eight, but those shoes fit when they were five. It was right. Yachol lihyot, I don't know, it could be, probably was.
When they're older, that which I gave them when they were younger is just not shayach, it doesn't mean that there's anything messed up about you, it just means we need to be open to the notion that you're not supposed to know how to do something you never did before. I want you to think about that line. There is no expectation on any of us to know how to do something that you never did before. And even when you do it with the first one, it may not be matim for the second.
Oh, that's already, yeah, that's, I'm trying to not overwhelm us but it's true that that perfect mahalach you had for the bechor is the worst thing in the world that child number two needs. Maybe it's great for three, but for four again, we just don't know these things, right? But before we do all of that, there's the concept that's called ein habayshan lamed. I'll give you an example. Someone, someone came, maybe I shared this on Thursday, I don't remember, but someone came to schedule a meeting from outside the kehilla and it was a really pleasant meeting, a very sweet man, young man, who wanted to know how to become a mashpia, how to start teaching.
They feel a passion about it and they want to start teaching and get experience. And we're talking for a while and then after a while, we were talking about, you know, learning from experience v'chulei. So he said to me, but I know, but before I start, I need to get experience. How do you get experience in teaching? By teaching, right.
By establishing credit. How do you do that without doing, without establishing credit? How do you establish credit without establishing credit? There's no end of kol zeh. But in parenting it's the same exact thing, the same exact inyan. Spousing.
Spousing. How do you know how to work with your spouse on the concept of kedushas habayis, kedushas hayachasim? By. There is not stam that the Gemara says אין אדם עומד על דברי תורה אלא אם כן נכשל בהן. That the only way we could actually be, what does it mean לעמוד על דברי תורה? In yeshivish terminology, it means holding.
Holding. I'm holding, I'm there, I'm in a place that I could grab and say I'm doing okay. But generally speaking, and you can't think of this l'chatchila because it's a little bit dangerous, but a person only stands, they own divrei Torah only once they failed because then they know what doesn't work. Remember the famous story about a person that gets lost in the forest and he doesn't know where to go and he finds someone that's been there for a while and he says, you know, the guy says, what, what road should I go to? And the guy answers back, he's like, I'm not sure, but I...
I definitely know that way you shouldn't take because I was there. Right. So in our lives process of elimination definitely is something that we have to be aware of especially in the techum of chinuch. We're not meant to know exactly what to do.
You're meant to learn, observe, be open with bitul to the notion that maybe our gut, our kishkas are not always right and maybe that shitah that I learned in a shiur is not necessarily exactly what this child wants either or needs either. We don't know. But it's a humbling lesson. Is there anything more humbling than parenting? Most humbling thing in the world.
Before we were parents we have these visions, this imagery, we have the description, we know more or less I'm going to be, oh my table's going to look like that and then when it's not like that you freak out. Tzrichim p'tichut. we need openness and bitul to the obvious reality that Ein Habayshan Lamed and all you've got to do is be open to giving it your best shot, your best, best shot. So when it comes to emotional development of a child, how are we supposed to know how to do these things without losing our minds? How are we supposed to know? So first we go back to a basic tenet of faith of this sefer.
I call it a basic tenet of faith of life but definitely of this sefer. And it sounds silly what I'm going to say but it really is of the bottom line in a lot of the areas that we have to remind ourselves when learning this sefer. And it's the, to me, it's the most important thing. Hashem didn't make a mistake with the children that He sent to your home.
That's not a mistake. Hashem did not make a mistake. Hashem didn't make a mistake that these children are your children and Hashem didn't make a mistake that your children's parents are you. It's both, alright? This is very important.
You'd be thinking like what's, what's the chiddush here? Trust me. When you really internalize that statement you approach the avodah and a shiur like this differently. Now what's more important? That Hashem didn't, to believe in, that Hashem didn't make a mistake by giving these kids you as parents or that Hashem didn't make a mistake by giving you as parents these children? Sorry? Both. Yes.
I don't know. I don't, for the sake of our learning. In the emet of emet it's both, obviously. But we'll see.
We'll see. Because so now let's see with that hakdamah let's see how he points us to a direction and like I said in the beginning of shiur a very irritating eitzah that's going to happen soon. I don't know if anyone's up for it. Should I just leave now? Yes.
No, not at all. This is what, this is where we're at. Ma laasot?
ולאחר שהוברר לנו כי ההשקעה בתחום הרגשי היא אכן חיונית after it's been clear to us that investing in the emotional development is definitely essential. Chiyunit is more than essential.
It means it's a must, like it needs to be.
אף יותר מתחום העשייה even more than sandwiches in the lunchbox.
וכל הורה חייב להעמיד זאת כיעד וכנושא בביתו each parent must place this emotional development as a ya'ad. Ya'ad, you know what ya'ad means? Destination.
U-kenosei be'veito this is a subject, must come up in the house.
נשאלת השאלה כיצד עושים זאת? Ah, I love him. Now the shaylah is yofi, you proclaimed this is needed. But I am more interested in and we are too as well as tell us how.
Tell us how you think Rav Itamar Schwartz, the Bilvavi Mishkan Evneh tell us how you think this is done.
אכן ברגע שההורה מפנים the moment the parent internalizes שההשקעה בבנין עולם הרגשות של הילד הינה יעד מרכזי וחשוב זו כבר התקדמות חשובה מאוד שעשויה לסייע לו רבות להשיג את המטרה. You have to believe in it. Zot omeret you must believe that as on you as a parent this concept of working on the emotional buildup of your child is very, very important and like I said before and that you are up for the task to a certain extent and I'm saying to a certain extent because because it is clear that we live in a world thank God with so much more help that's coming from the outside so to the best of your capabilities you are up for the task.
He says first of all that already means you're halfway there knowing that this is a ya'ad merkazi that this is a this is a very important this is a destination mark in the home that you're building. Now many people don't can't they don't have the koach to go there. They're so exhausted by the olam ha'asiya. Think about it.
How exhausted are you after a whole day? Let's say you know I remember one of the most weirdest things is what when we made aliyah us young kids were already in a school that we got home at 4:30 or 5:00. We come to Eretz Yisrael. The long day was Tuesday where you finish at 1:15. Most days were finished at 11:50.
I'll never forget this. 10 to 12. My mother is sitting there like wondering what what what's the story now like camp all year long camp all year long. This was before there was massive amount of chugim.
It was like one chug every three weeks or something not like we have today where there's two chugim every half an hour to run to with carpools. Back in the day it wasn't it wasn't this much. So we're exhausted we're exhausted sometimes by two sometimes by four and definitely by seven and then the kid comes into the room and now it's time when everything calms down and goes like oh olam ha'regashot time olam ha'regashot time are you kidding me right? These are real things but if I believe that this is something that is part and parcel with everything that I visualize and understand in terms of the gift of being a parent he says that's already a shlav mitkadem. That's already you're already in a good place before you even do anything.
Meaning if you acknowledge that this world of emotions is not something that should be left for the teacher or the chug or the therapist to be dealing with lechatchila but lechatchila it's you that's already a shlav mitkadem. I say the same thing about believing in Hashem and Torah doing putting it first and saying lechatchila they're going to take care of it I send them to a religious school it'll be it'll be nourished through them. God's not that shallow that God can't be that shallow that he gave you children in order to know who to send them to to talk to them about God. Lechatchila there's something in the way that you speak about Hashem the Torah and Eretz Yisrael lechatchila that is coming from that that was designed to come through you and yes the supplements Baruch Hashem and there are many come afterwards.
Now he's going to go with by ages. Be'gil ha'rach. What's gil ha'rach? So what ages is it? What what are we talking about? 2 3 4 5 mashehu kazei let's say 3 to 5.
בגיל הרך יש להורים זמן שיחה יחסית ממושך עם הילדים.
You actually talk a lot more with your children when they're younger.
וזאת מכיוון שבצורה טבעית הילדים נמצאים בבית יותר זמן. Kids it's simply because kids are home more at those ages.
כל אחד לפי עניינו.
One of my kids that is at a shlav that they come home for a little bit but kim'at every day in evening they're out with with good things with a great chevra and snif and all these things. And this is a kid that was with us like day and night when they weren't out as much and this is like okay adapting to this new shlav in life and it's a beautiful thing that they're out but when they were younger there was so much more time because they were home so the the the conversations which naturally bless you which naturally lead to some kind of an intuition to binyan olam ha'regashot was more it was more there it was more available. It was in front of us most of the time. Agav באופן טבעי ככל שהילדים יותר בוגרים הם נמצאים פחות בבית.
I know it's impossible to imagine this when your kids are like three and and five or one and two one and three you can't imagine how could I exist in a world that they're not going to be here all the time? They're not. They eventually are not around all the time right Zahava? They're all still home all day? Oh really? Okay. Again each with the with their own setting right? But sometimes it happens that kids go out. And especially I remember another thing we made Aliyah.
In LA, I was nine so when we first made Aliyah, so obviously I couldn't, no one hung out outside. You didn't go to walking to a friend's house. I lived in an area that I don't know maybe my tmimus was like no it was very peaceful and loving. I didn't know it was an area called Hancock Park in Los Angeles, Highland Avenue.
We never went to anyone's house alone even with our family we didn't walk at night besides Shabbos, besides Friday night no one walked anywhere. Come Eretz Yisroel my friends come to pick me up Friday night, Gishas Shevet it was called. The Shevet, the Bnei Akiva Shevet gets together. Where? There was a central area.
And they come to pick me up at 9:00 PM on Friday night. My parents are freaking out, mah ze shtuyot, what is this? Okay, when are you coming home? And my mom's like okay so 9:30, mashu kazeh, right? Like we're leaving at nine, be home at 9:30. The kids are laughing. All these kids, they're also Anglo kids, they came a bit before me.
Well okay, when are you coming home? I can't be home later than 11:15. 11:15 for a ten-year-old, nine ten-year-old?
לא נשמע כדבר הזה. Here it's a little bit different or at least it was. It still is, right? I was once in a meeting with a family that made Aliyah from France and they never knew where their son was and they were asking like me and the yoetzet like is this normal? And then the father said I think he took the line להיות עם חופשי בארצנו literally.
Mamash. Mamash. Nachon. Okay, so be-ofen tivi, ככל שהילדים יותר בוגרים הם נמצאים פחות בבית ופעמים שהשיחות עימהם הולכות ומתקצרות, because naturally let's say it's many cases children are home less as they grow up.
ולכן איכות השיחה צריכה להיות גבוהה יותר. So therefore because it's less time that they're home that means the quality of the conversation when they are home has got to be larger, bigger, deeper, more. Now he says like this: כל הורה יכול לבדוק בביתו מהו נושא השיחה שלו עם ילדיו. It's triggering because he's saying over here every parent can check to see what is the topic that you're discussing with your child.
ניתן לעשות זאת באמצעות ניסיון פשוט. He says you could try this very simple test at home.
על ידי הנחת מכשיר הקלטה בבית למשך כמה שעות. Place a recording device in the home for a few hours.
ולאחר מכן לשמוע את מהלך השיחה שלנו עם הילדים. And then listen back. But I just want to say something. If you know that it's there the whole time and you're trying to check yourself like that, it's not going to work.
It's like Rebbe Nachman says about hisbodedus. If you learn that אשרי האיש האישה, a praiseworthy is the person that eventually is able to shed tears when they speak to Hashem and that's what you're trying to get to the whole time, Rebbe Nachman says that even if you end up crying in hisbodedus, you're kind of cheated. These things can't be totally conscious. So if you know that there's a recording device in the house the whole time and you want to be proud of yourself so you're very much mitakesh to make sure you speak words that would make you sound a very proud and responsible parent afterwards, you're not fooling anybody.
So what does he, I mean, I don't know exactly how this would work unless you told your spouse or you told someone else: place a recording device in my house sometime this month in an afternoon, right? And at a certain point you're not thinking about it all the time. Then you'd listen back afterwards without it being in a state of thinking there's a recording device right now capturing the words that I'm saying. So I'm not sure exactly how this would work but it doesn't even matter right now because look what he's going to say.
ברוב המקרים נגלה.
He's saying I'll tell you what will happen when it's subconscious. When you're subconscious, you know it's been being recorded and you're not aware of it he says I'll tell you what you'll probably hear. Be-rov ha-mikrim, not always but most of the time we will find out שההקלטה מכילה בעיקר פקודות רבות. Pkudot.
Yeah. Yeah. It'll mainly capture demands and commands. Yeah, more or less instructions.
Really, not really instructions. Kids want instructions, but they hear more do this and without instructions. Aseh shiurim, do homework. Kach et hayalkut, take your backpack.
Sader et hacheder, clean up the room. Ve'od kahena vekahena. And a lot of those things. We're going to...
you'll hear a lot more of those things.
ואף בחלק היותר חינוכי, and even when it comes to the more educational realm of the conversation, יתכן שנשמע שם התעניינות קצרצרה ביום שעבר הילד בבית הספר או בתלמוד תורה. So he says like this: what's the first thing we ask our children when they come home? It's the right question: how was your day? How was school, right? How long is that conversation, how long is that interaction? Maybe a minute? Five? Fine? What'd you say? One word answer. Maybe, like so how long on a timeline is that interaction? Bekoshi, bekoshi.
And then he says, ve'im nish'ar zman, if any time is left, נשמע את ההורה מספר סיפורים לילדים. Maybe we'll hear parents telling children stories, דבר חיובי מאוד כשלעצמו.
פחות או יותר זהו המבנה היום יומי שקיים ברוב הבתים. In most homes, this is the structure of interaction and exchanges, verbal exchanges between parents and children.
So how much... how much was covered? How was your day? Which is a very good question to ask, although I once heard... I once heard Rabbi Jacobson say... I mean, I heard him many times say gevaldt things, but this one really struck me.
There was a... there was a Nobel Peace Prize winner named Isadore Rabi. Anyone hear that name? From him? From YY? He said a gevaldt thing. So they asked...
I forget what... I forget in what field he... he won. I don't remember, lo zocher, you can check in.
So they asked him, what was the secret... what was it like growing up at home? Like what was your secret to your chinuch? He said when I came home, my mother always asked me, Isadore, did you ask any good questions today? And that... that... I do that sometimes when I remember.
It's a very great... it's a very good shitah actually, to... to think about how we are framing... yeah, like how we're framing to our children what to us means kedai, like successful and, you know, did you ask any good questions today? Eina bayshan lamed, right? Eina bayshan lamed.
Did you ask any good questions today? Okay, so let's say we covered... let's say we covered the how was school, how was your day thingy. Kid has no koach to answer most of the time anyway. Sometimes they actually want to exchange...
they want to share something, but the kid generally speaking doesn't have so much koach to answer that kind of question. And then you... he says over here, the kid will end up hearing some stories that you're telling your children. He's very optimistic that we sit with books or stories with our...
to our children during the day. Maybe when they're like three to five, they have bedtime stories. I don't know when that ends. But he says more or less, this is the structure in terms of the exchange between parents and children.
Ata tavin, but let's understand, שהמטרה שלנו היא לשלב בשגרה, is to incorporate in the routine את התפיסה של עולם הרגשות. He says this is an amazing thing. He says olam haregashot. When do we usually acknowledge olam haregashot of a child? Let's think about it.
When is it usually spoken of? Usually when they're sad, that's first of all, and when someone comes and calls them a name or they get embarrassed. So again, we're in responsive mode, right? When it comes to olam haregashot. Lo yachol lihyot. That's not a healthy development of nurturing our child's emotional development.
If I'm only on the reactive end, זה לא יכול להיות, because it can't be that that's really natural. We have to believe in what we naturally want to share with our child. Emotional buildup cannot be only reactionary. Lo yachol lihyot.
So what he's saying over here, the purpose of what he's putting into us is leshalev, is to integrate into the routine that's happening every single day בניין של עולם הרגשות, is the emotional buildup and development of a child. This can mean many, many different things. You know, we could go anywhere with this. He'll share how he sees it, but this could be...
this could take us anywhere. But just like I don't need to be convinced that I have to לשלב בתוך השגרה של הורות... to make sure that there's sandwiches for my children because that's a given that they need that in order to lehitkayem, I have to believe that my child's emotional development and build up is needed in order for them to be'emet lehitkayem, in order for them to be. And who was this placed on as a chiyuv and a responsibility? On me.
And that's awesome. It's also, I would say, awful, like full of awe, but it's like yirah vafachad, you know? Yeah. What about children? I'm imagining my children, none of them live at home. So you have to be able to find a conversation like, "Oh Ima, I have something to tell you" and then like wait, right in there? Like if your kid calls you once or twice a week, I mean I have some that I speak to more than that, like you know to find the...
what does it say? The right time? Right, so the age you're speaking about, the chiyuv is more on the child, not on the parent. On the child, yeah. The age that you're referring to, when children are already out of the house, married, children, whatever, thirties, forties, fifties, that already that chiyuv falls more under the child under kibbud horim. Sorry? You'll give us your Torah kids bezrat Hashem.
But you know that when does chinuch end? Never ending. When does the mitzvah of chinuch end? Bar mitzvah. This is a very interesting topic. Very interesting topic.
Is she wrong? Technically bar mitzvah. I'd say never. Let's go, no no, saying never is what ke'ilu like a child never wants to hear that their parent feels like their job is to always mechanech them. They don't want to hear it.
And remember yourselves, when you were young parents, it's the last thing you wanted to hear from your parents as well. Most fights and frictions happen when children become parents and the grandparents are still under the assumption that the mitzvah of chinuch is still on them to tell their children how to mechanech their grandchildren. It's a horrible balagan. No no no.
The mitzvah and obligation of chinuch that parents have upon their children can either be up until they are bar and בת מצווה מצד הדין or which is frightening to think about that, but it's also the reality of life, it's just the natural reality. Huh? As long as they're home. Or as long as they're home. But even as long as they're home, that's also very...
it's a very interesting thing. Telling a child that's in their early twenties but still live at home that you have to act a certain way in this house is not the mitzvah of chinuch, it's just the home that you are intent on making sure stays intact. Doesn't fall into the mitzvah of chinuch. It's very different.
So therefore what we're speaking about over here is much more geared as he began speaking about gil harach, which is even like a very young age, but let's go over here basically from the time the child's born till like they're a teenager. Let's just put it into that category. And it keeps on changing. What they need changes very fast in those years as well.
It's like the shoes. It's exactly like the shoes, nachon. Nachon, but interestingly when do they when do shoe sizes stop? Fourteen. Fourteen? It's very interesting.
Like around like fourteen, it's like it's more or less what what's... it's very interesting. But that's a very important thing just mitsad how we refer how we approach the mitzvah, chiyuv of chinuch as parents, it's really these ages. It's really these ages.
Kidei as a mitzvah of kibbud horim his whole life. His whole life, even after their parents take off, there's a mitzvah of the inyan of honoring your parents, the kavod of your parents. But in terms of chinuch, it's really around over here, it's around here right now. So what he's saying over here is that while they're under, I hate to use this word jurisdiction, but while but it is that, while they're underneath your watch, okay? That's really what it is.
What we're what we must attempt to establish is that feelings and emotions are not just safe to be spoken about in a daily routine, but they're encouraged. Not to not like when you go sometimes to to see someone, see a therapist, and they poke at certain things to try to, you know, in a good way, to try to get things out of you. That's not what we're speaking about. We're not talking about shitot over here.
But what we're speaking about is that somehow throughout the shigra in a routine, part of the daily grind in the house is the emotional aspect and not just once every two weeks in certain cases when some when your kid's chubby and one of the girls called her shmena or one of your children don't know yet how to speak Hebrew properly and they make fun of their a word they said, you know. I remember I it's amazing how like We could remember these things forever. I remember something right now as I'm saying this. When we made aliya, I knew Hebrew to the extent that I knew Hebrew because my dad did speak to me in Hebrew, but of course there were certain words I didn't understand or I didn't know exactly how to say them, or I thought I knew how to say them.
There was one day in fourth grade where the parent where the teacher asked us all to tell the class what do your parents do. So when it was my turn, I said, listen to the words, I said אבא שלי משחק עם הפסנתר. Right? Exactly. That's what half the class did right also.
No, it's okay because it's funny. I laugh also when I think about it. What does that some of you I realize don't realize what that means. Meaning my father's a musician, he plays or I think I said mesachek im haccordiyon because that's really his weapon of teaching was the accordion, as we spoke about with your siblings on Shabbos.
My dad got my dad was till today, till today in Raanana. He was your teacher also. I was in the choir. Accordion? Yeah.
So I said הוא משחק עם האקורדיון but that sounds like he plays around with an accordion, right? He plays around with whereas really it should have been hu menagen accordiyon, like he performs, right? And I remember till today like the smirks and the laughing and everything like that. I came home I probably cried about it because anything that you know, if you laugh at my father you're in my eyes you're toast. You're done. If you dis my abba consciously or subconsciously, sorry, I'm not anywhere near a chasid, tzaddik, anything here.
You're toast, right? So there's an emotional buildup. So then I come home and should that be the only time that a kid has that emotional okay oh now we now we discovered your emotional build? No, ma pitom. It means so much more than that. Now we have to we have to develop for ourselves, what does that mean that our tending to our child's emotional development is not only reactionary? Like what does that look like? That looks different in every single home and I'm sorry, there's no clear answers for this because each home has their own set of emotional development, emotional buildup, both mizad the parents and mizad the children.
But the goal is should be shaveh in every home. Do you understand the difference what I said right now? The goal of establishing this as a shigra in the routine should be shaveh in every single every single home should have this as a yaad. How it's developed in every single home is very different. Very, very different.
And therefore this is a shlav in the book where I'm like we'll give over how he explains this, but to not chas v'chalila think that this is the only way that it happens, because in every home it's different. Every child comes and and within like we said before and within every home there if you have four kids it's four sometimes it's four different ways of how it's nurtured. It's very serious stuff. Very serious stuff, very important stuff.
So are even eight? I'm sorry? So are even eight, because each parent does it differently also, right? Yeah. Right, or even eight. Well, okay, so this brings me to something that I was going to say for later but that's the problem that it shouldn't be eight. It should actually be in a case of four children, if each child needs four something else, the parents have to be on the same page.
So even though sometimes it is true that, okay, abba deals with this like this and imma deals with this like this and then each kid has its own thing, זה יכול להיות מאוד מבלבל, like it could be very, but that's another it's part of what we're learning. I'm sure Elana speaks about this as well. You could tell me if I'm wrong, Sarah, but I'm sure that it's a one of the most crucial things in this like especially in this area. Like it's okay if a father wants to give a kid cocoa pebbles, when maybe it's not okay, but you know what I mean like if that that's not what we're talking about, like oh he wants to give unhealthy food and the mother gives healthy food.
But when it comes to approaching the emotional development of a child, it's true that each parent can bring something beautiful to the table that the other maybe can't, but how they approach it begadol should be aimed to be coming from the same place. It's feels so vague. Vague? Vague. Like you can't give us exacts because we're all different and every kid's different, but we have to do it but it's not like a checklist, but you have to kind of intertwine it all.
Some tips, please. Right. Sorry. How about scheduling? Wait, wait, what do you mean? What does that mean? Scheduling, like a certain time in the day or or that's too heavy? I don't know.
Maybe. Maybe for you, who am I to say? I don't know. Maybe. What's that? Bedtime.
Bedtime's a good time for that. Right. Well, I mean, there's something to that because you're not looking each other in the eye, start. They also say the best times to have these conversations are when you're driving.
Yeah, it's because he won't fall asleep? It's not too intense. No, like a ten-minute touch. You don't feel like this is emotional ten-minute time. When you're looking at each other, it's so much more intense, and it's embarrassing to share something personal.
Interesting. Well, you just have to be ready when it happens. Right. Which is when you don't know.
And you're late out to work. Exactly. My favorite is as I'm going to shul. Like, right when I'm leaving for shul.
You guys know what I do for a living? Right then and there. Of course it's vague, I mean from the outside, he's not going to make it vague. He's going to be very exact. My point in sharing what I'm sharing now is that I've noticed already when it comes to these things is that he's offering an opinion.
He's not saying this is Torah misinai. And therefore, I want to avoid people's difficulty with hearing something like this and saying it's Torah min hashamayim, because it's Torah min hashamayim for a certain person. But you have to go back one more shlav. I have to say it again.
Hashem didn't make a mistake. Zot omeret that within you, within each of us, is the ability to know, to figure out a way how to provide this healthy structure. V'alef. Sorry.
If you tune into it? Yeah. If you're here, it means you're already tuned into it. If you're coming to this shiur, that means you're already tuning into it. So you have to give yourself more love and kavod.
Like, you know what? I could do anything this morning, Sunday morning, after a crazy Shabbos. I'm not saying it was crazy, just Shabbos. Lehafech. You're in it already.
Baruch Hashem. Nekudot tovot. Nekudot tovot. Okay.
So again, כיצד עושים זאת כיצד נבנה בפועל את עולם הרגשות של הילד. Kefi shehuvar lael, like we already explained before.
הורה שסובל מליקויים בעולם הרגשות האישי שלו יהיה לו קשה מאוד לבנות דו שיח של עולם הרגשות עם ילדיו ותחילה עליו לקבל טיפול מגורמים מקצועיים על מנת שיוכל לפרוץ את מחסום הרגשות שלו עצמו. I love this paragraph.
I hate it and I love it. Zot omeret, I love I hate that it exists, but I love that he from the world that he's coming from is first saying like this. What basically what did he just say here? Say a parent has to take care of themselves before that, emotionally, if they're not in that place fully... And on a deeper level, what did he just say over here? That's the pshat.
What's the omkus of what he said over here right now? Do you know how important you are? Do you know how important your own world is? Do you know how precious your own world is? Your own world. We're not comparing it to whose world is more precious, yours or your children's, although on a plane, you actually do learn that they do compare it. Right? Davka on planes you learn whose life is more precious, you or your child's. You know what I'm talking about? So, what do they tell you? Put yours on first.
Why where's that Torah coming from? If you're not healthy, you can't... so it's bediyuk otah nekudah. It's exactly the same place. It's not talking about whose is more important, but it's acknowledging that your safety, your healthy brain, your healthy emotional state of being is a prerequisite in order to truly learn how to approach, to develop your child's emotional state of being.
It doesn't mean you have to become a fixed product, a perfect outcome. No one is like that. Anyone that thinks I'll go get that fix while I'm pregnant with my first, as if like that's the time while you're pregnant to work on emotional development, right? It doesn't work like that. Like, going to get fixed, I hate that terminology.
However, what I think... Think what he's saying over here is becoming aware of your own machsonim, your own blockages, is crucial for approaching the emotional development of your children. I was just going to say, I feel like what we're discussing in the Rabbi Nachman shiur on Thursday is that's the behind-the-scenes work that you can then apply to this. With emes.
Yes. 100%. Little plug for Thursday morning shiur. I think also part of this is, I mean I speak for myself but I think often as women we can neglect our own physical needs in service of our children's physical, emotional, whatever needs, not realizing that we're I don't know I say this all the time but since having kids the biggest thing I've learned is how fragile I am and it's been very humbling, but if we don't eat enough or drink enough or get enough sleep, it directly impacts our own navigation of our own emotions and then our kids' emotions and I think it's one of those things that's so simple and foundational and basic and yet something that we need to remind ourselves of all the time in our lives and as we're taking care of our kids is that form of putting on the oxygen mask for ourselves and support and encouragement from your spouse in this area.
100%. Your time. Your time. 100%.
Legamre. It's part and parcel with what he's saying over here. Sorry, your hand was up? No, that was much more important. Okay.
We won't belittle what you have to say right now. No, it's just like he mentioned Ilana and sort of exactly what he's saying here. She starts off her class by saying that if there's no shalom bayis in a house then you can't do chinuch habanim and that's like a basic. So you have to work on yourself first sort of like exactly what he's saying before.
So this would fall under this would fall under the same category. Why why is I just want to understand how is that not an important thing what he just said. Not to belittle what she said but that's no, it's the same shalom bayis obviously. Yes, yes.
Yeah, of course. It's b'vadai that was. No, but this is a very very important this these are very important things itammar we would love to attack the thing that it needs that visibly the most attention, a child in a state of emotional frenzy. It's easier to work on other people.
100%. But what we really really want is to know the emes. Thank Hashem now mah la'asos now it's in there. We want to know the emes of this whole story called parents children.
We want the emes of it. What's the emes of it? The emes of it is that my child is not here for to show me what I need to work on. That's not their purpose in this world. However, and people sometimes get confused with this, however a basic prerequisite of this avoda has to be detecting where I am chasum rigshi where I am emotionally blocked.
Or triggered. Gam vegam the whole thing. Yeah. Like I need to I need to work on detect now you'll say oh oh why well I already have I already have kids I never did this.
You're not the most people don't do this before they it's it's not a thing that we take a Lamaze class before we go into labor, we take driving lessons before. But what's the difference between the two? A parenting class before. But you know what all the parenting it wouldn't have been parenting class. It's not a parenting class.
It's like theory lessons and not getting on the court. Yeah no but Daniella it's not a parenting class that that is needed over here before you become a parent. It's not it's not a parenting class. It's an emotion it's just your own thing but but there's a catch 22.
Do you know do you know catch 22? It's not all but this definitely do you know when you usually realize that you're chasum rig- how does a person realize they're chasum rigshi? When you're trying to do it to someone else. It's when in front of them there's this these creatures that are that are constantly this is when you this is when you notice it. You can't notice these things. You don't notice these things when they're not pulling at these places in us.
That's why I'm saying it's a catch 22 meaning so then trust the process like they say in Philadelphia with it was a basketball team that that stunk for years and they called trust the process with the rebuilding of the Philadelphia 76ers. Trust the process that Hashem created. Hashem knew exactly what he was doing when he made it clear to us that you usually notice these things and approach them once it's in front of you. It doesn't work any other way.
You could have all all the shiurim about kedushat eretz yisrael before. How to live it in practice and not in theory. What'd you say? What it's actually like. What it's actually like.
Like Rav Bravender used to say this a lot. He said the one thing he regrets about like, not regrets, but he like wondered how come they never, you know, Rav Bravender grew up in Bnei Akiva in Brooklyn. And he said that the one thing they never told us when we were talking about moving and making Aliyah in Eretz Yisrael is that not everyone here is Jewish. And how do you deal with that? He brought it up in an amazing gathering that I went to about I think close to five, maybe more.
I'm just really trying to avoid saying six and seven right now, years ago, in the hotel that's on Rechov Keren Hayesod, the Dan, I think it's called the Dan Panorama. A meeting with Rabbi Riskin, moderated by I think Rabbi Jeffrey Sacks. And he brought that up, he's like the one thing they never really spoke to us about was that there are non-Jews in Israel, like how do you deal with that? So a lot of the things that we are excited for towards that goal of building a home and dating and all these things, even if someone told you about these things that have to do with children, can you remember yourself before you were married in the mind you had regarding your approach to Chinuch and these things?
זה לא היה עוזר.
זה לא היה עוזר.
It wouldn't have been helpful. It wouldn't have been helpful. You have to deal with what you have now in front of you. Yeah.
One thing that when we say that there's everything's Meduyak, like we're either parents of the kids, the kids are our kids, but at the same time, is that it's Meduyak that the kids were given to us so we can develop also, not in terms of just the Chinuch things, but through them we learn who we are, we learn how to work on ourselves. Nachon. What's the even though that's Emet, what's the danger in what you just said? What do you think about it? It's true what you said. That's an inevitable Emet, but what could be a danger that I could derive from that? If you take yourself out of the Chinuch status.
Like if you lose yourself. One is if you take yourself out of the more responsibility place, there's another thing also, you can never put that on your child. No one should ever put that concept on their child. The child should never grow up in a home, I mean even though that becomes clear to all of us once we're more or less out of the house, I fixed my parents or things like that, that can't be given over, that shouldn't ever be given over to a child while they need to be first.
They do need to be first. They need to feel like they're first before your own thing. So even though it's 100% true what you're saying, that's part of the design, 100%. It's also what Malachi says we're going to read in the Haftarah of Shabbat Hagadol.
He says what it means when it says והשיב לב אבות על בנים ולב בנים על אבותם. This is a messianic concept when it's happening in harmony, this parents and children that it becomes just one big Tikkun Vechulei. Halevai, B'ezrat Hashem. There's also unexpected things.
I was just reading all the parenting books, thinking about technology and the fights we had over iPads and movies and I saw this morning in Be'er Sheva that the Gur Chassidim Assur'd AI Legamre. I'm so grateful that my kids aren't little now and I don't have to deal with that because I'm addicted myself. So it's just all these new things are coming up and there's no way you can prepare yourself for all these eventualities. Many of us in the room still have little children.
Good luck. Yeah, thanks. Shavua Tov. Thank you.
Okay, I'm sorry, I have to, I know it's a little bit of a cliffhanger, I have to pause here, B'ezrat Hashem we'll continue, okay? Should be good news for Am Yisrael this week. Amen.