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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.
We're learning in the month of Shevat l'iluy nishmat Levi ben Yosef בת יפגא בת ישראל l'iluy nishmat שמעון בן משה צבי בן מרדכי חיה רחמה בת רב אלתר נתן נטע and anonymously for the refua shlema of שרה בת רחל פייגא מלכה אלכה בת פרל שושנה יונה בת אידל Hila bas Ilana and Yisrael ben Adina. The week is sponsored by Gila and Goel Jasper in memory of Goel's Aba Reuven ben Shmuel on his 8th Yahrzeit. His Yahrzeit's on the 8th of Shevat. And today Sunday anonymously in honor of Shlomit Weinreb and the entire cast of her new musical for women, Home, who are taking the stage tonight beginning the run of the powerful and holy production David the Serving King.
May everyone who merits to experience it feel embraced and inspired by David Hamelech's words and guidance as we are living the unfolding Geula. That's a gevalt sponsor. That's a nice way to start the week. Okay.
Let's give these pages out. Everyone's so far away. We should move up over here. Move up.
All right. I'll move up. All right. Yofi.
Today's shiur is going to be something mamesh. It'll be very it'll be something mamesh because today what we're learning in today's learning in a direct continuation from the last few weeks that we've been learning, after acknowledging that the love that we have and display and give to our children is never shalem. And that's a normal thing. It we would love for it to be shalem complete perfect the and and not only is it not shalem, their ability to receive our love from them also has its limits due to many different inyanim due to many different things.
Now we're going to start to approach and say well how can we make it as as good as it can? How can we be aware of certain things that maybe we'd rather not be taking such a close look at? And how can we make it to be as shalem as it could be. Now there are many different ideas behind this there are many different thoughts I'm sure you'll have and I'm sure many different opinions will come up and surface in today's shiur like like it has been with this series about know your children because we always we always know the real parent always knows there's never enough Torah there's never enough davening and there's never enough eitza and counsel that I could receive. We always want to be better. We always want to improve this.
We always want to go veiter with this and we're not only speaking about children with parents that have children living at home, this is also about parents, this one today specifically could really really much very much relate to when your kids are already out of the house. So this is really דברים השווים לכל נפש and it's also for those that don't have children yet because you know what to already anticipate to a certain extent to a certain extent. So let's start from chashivut. We we mentioned this at the end of last week shiur.
We're on daf chaf vav as you see in front of you in Da'at Yeladecha by Rav Schwartz the author of the Bilvavi Mishkan Evneh. Daf Chaf Vav.
חשיבות הביטוי המילולי של האהבה. 'Honey do you love me?' 'Of course I do.' 'But you never say so.' 'But you know I do.' You know that kind of that kind of dibur right? You know.
So we think that's only with between between husbands that have gone astray. No. It also shows up everywhere in our house and in our lives in a very sneaky way but a way but but but once you notice once once these things come to the surface it's quite clear what's going on over here.
נוסף על כך שהאהבה אינה מושלמת.
So further to the addition to the fact that love is is not complete במקרים רבים האהבה אינה גלויה. The love that is happening is not revealed וההורים אינם טורחים לבטא אותה בגילוי כלפי ילדיהם באופן ברור ומוחש כאמירה ברורה או מעשה ברור שמבטא אהבה גלויה. Parents don't bother to express it b'giluy in a revealed manner the love that they have they don't take the time to express that which may be transpiring inside but they're not saying it in a way that is very sensible and tangible as a clear statement or as a clear act that's only about showing and expressing love in a in a revealed way. In the depth of it, the lack of love being revealed to our children, it stems from the same reason that the love bichlal that we have for our children is not shalem like we've been speaking about the last few weeks.
Not to repeat it too much. Harei lefaneinu, he's gonna point out for us two concrete problems that we find regarding the love we have for our children or the manner in which the love is given over to our children.
הרי לפנינו שתי בעיות מצויות באהבת הורים לילדיהם. What's the first one?
ראשית אהבה אינה מושלמת, that we got.
ומלבד זאת אהבה אינה גלויה בבירור לילדים. And that love that even though it's not perfect but it exists, let's say it's ninety-five percent k'mo shetzarich. Quite often that love isn't clear to the child. Now go outside the text for a second, I'll ask you an honest question.
Do you want to punch him in the face right now? Everyone's okay with what he said? I'm not. I'm the only one that feels a shtikel threatened? What'd you say? I don't hear you, I'm sorry. Even if they do, do you still want to punch him in the face? What'd you say? It's the reality. My reality.
Okay. So I don't want to I hate punching people in the face when they tell me what I know is true. Sometimes it happens, no? That I want to? That you do. No, I'm kidding, I'm kidding.
I'm kidding. Baruch Hashem. What could irk a parent that reads these words? What does it trigger? It does, it should trigger something. What does it trigger? Triggers me.
Guilt. Really, you can never be good enough. K'ilu, so you're gonna tell me that it's gonna be like this forever? Like, right, like k'ilu I'm always gonna just keep on like playing this game of trying to catch up and then I'm told like it's not enough? That's a very triggering thing. What else does it trigger? Guilt.
Guilt, definitely. Yeah, guilt. Guilt's a big one. However, the fact that he's bringing this up in a shiur and to us means you're not crazy.
Chanan Ben Ari has a new song called אני לא משוגע יחידי, right? So אני לא משוגע יחידי, I'm not the only I'm not the only crazy person. That means you're also all crazies, don't worry. Yeah, this is a wild thing to juggle. This is a wild thing to make sense of.
So we have to understand this in a much deeper way with patience for ourselves. What's a what's a more triggering word? Guilty or patience? I can't even tell anymore. Patience for ourselves, that one is just demashu. Lo le'amin.
Patience for ourselves. Let's have - sorry? Compassion for ourselves. That's a much better word. But the pathway to compassion has got to go through patience.
Ein ma la'asot. Next paragraph. Bederech klal, tofa'ah zot, this phenomenon, נובעת מכך שההורים עסוקים תדיר בפרטים הטכניים של גידול הילדים. What are we mainly busy with when it comes to raising children? Like what consumes most of our time when it comes to our - feeding them, laundry, always - technicalities.
No, no, he's saying - technicalities, technicalities. Dehinu, he just said it. Look, דהיינו התפקוד היום-יומי הכולל כביסה, they knew, he knew you were gonna say it, which is laundry, ochel, nikayon, bigud, clothing, ושאר הדברים שיכולים להתפרס על פני כל היום כולו, and all the other things that pop up during the day, all different types of things that come up during the day.
אכן אף שרגש האהבה בנפש אינו חולה במשך היום כתוצאה מכל העסוקים הללו, the love you woke up with doesn't fade away because of all the technicalities you have to be busy with.
אולם מכיוון שהרובד היום-יומי של החיים הוא תעשייתי. You know what ta'asiyati means? Industrial. What's roved? Layer. Aspect, layer.
Because the day-to-day life... It sounds so funny when we say this, it's very much based on an industrial relationship. It's a roved, ha-roved ha-rigshi. By most parents, the emotional layer תופס חלק קטן בלבד מהחיים.
It only grabs a very small chunk of your day. The emotional giving and feeling and expression.
לכן אין גילוי של אהבה כלפי הילדים. So someone can say to you, "Do you love your children?" "Of course I do." "Do they know that?" "Of course they know that." "How are you so sure they know that?" "What do you mean? They show up in the morning, there's food ready for them, I have clothes ready for them, I worked on their homework with them," ve-chulei and a bunch of other reasons, bless you, a bunch of other reasons in your mind where you're saying, "If that's not love, I don't know what is." That's part of love.
But that doesn't cover up for all the other things that need to be expressed. But he's not to make us feel guilty, he's pointing out that which we all fall, be-ezrat HaShem we all fall into this. You know why? Because you also have parents that are exactly the opposite. Right? And then those kids resent their parents later in life.
"You didn't set me up for life. You didn't prepare me. You didn't make me look like a mentch when I went to school. You didn't take care of...
I was wearing dirty clothes. I didn't even really have food." Like all those other things. "Yeah, but didn't you know how much we would snuggle?" "Yeah, but Mom, I came late three hours every single day to school because we wanted to snuggle." Meaning... we didn't talk before shi'ur, she just now...
So you understand, you have the other side, you could read this and be like, "Now what? Now the avodah is, if the food happens, it happens. If they find clothes, it's nice, if not, it doesn't really matter." There's literally a meme that says, "If I had a butler and a maid and a chauffeur, I'd be the greatest parent in the world." Because something always has to give. Right, bidiyuk. Well, so that's why we're attacking this, like, face on and saying, "If something always has to give, let me make sure that I know, or I'm more aware of where I'm giving, what I'm giving into.
Let me at least be aware of it better." Right, so that's... But the dugma you just gave fits into Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Right, if a parent didn't give the basic needs to the child, then the upper level doesn't really mean anything. And you can't get to an upper level unless you have basics in life.
But so here the question is, what is the basic need? Well, there's the physical baseline and emotional baseline. So the things we're talking about are filling the physical, but not maybe necessarily the emotional. But do they need to be there too? That's the thing, they need both. You need both.
Yes, you need both, but you have to be aware that in one area you could claim 100 percent perfection. Which area is that? Basics, technicality, industrial. I could actually measure that and I could know that I've... That's an area that I could actually do a check.
I could. And most of us kind of do that when we send our kids out in the morning, or later in whatever stage they're at in life. That's true. Those aren't easily measurable though.
I feel like... Sorry? It's something that's much more easily measurable. Much more easily measurable. Right.
Therefore, we take the things that we could measure and we could be like, "That defines," because something I could measure, I use that as a definition for something. That's not, zeh lo zeh, that's not it. It's like the song from Fiddler on the Roof. I was thinking of...
I'm not holding. What is the... this whole class... The song "Do You Love Me?" Oh, oh, yes, yes.
It's between a husband and a wife, but it's exactly that. He says, "Do you love me?" and she says, "For 25 years I've washed your clothes, I've made your bed, etc. etc." and he says, "But do you love me?" Right. I thought you were talking... there's another song with the words "do you love me".
You know? Not Fiddler on the Roof? No. Do you love me? Do you love me? Now that I can dance. Right. HaShem yishmore, oy-vey.
A lot of things are popping up. Also a classic. Also a classic, yeah. Don't know that one.
It was on the radio one time I heard it. Yeah, before... I heard it on the radio. This is a really...
it's... I'm happy we're laughing at it, but I know that inside there's definitely a ratzon where, when we come to the realization that perhaps we have perfected that which could be measurable and we could live under the assumption for many years that that is providing the kid everything that it needs. Quite often it's due to the fact that maybe we didn't have that... the parents neglected them when it came or not neglected it just wasn't enough money in the house.
So when it came to clothing or food everything was on a much much lower level of whatever and there was such pain and resentment towards that. So when the parent then that kid becomes a parent so you know the famous line I'm not going to do any of the mistakes my parents did to me so they don't in that area right? They do plenty of others but not the ones their parents made right? Not the ones their parents made. Yeah. So I'm just I keep thinking maybe I'm getting ahead of where we are with him but I just keep thinking of you know teenage children or children of certain personalities that you try to express your love you know saying it or hugging them and they're like ew imma why are you being so weird? Right right right that's a whole parsha yeah we have you know our ages and it's such a it's such a salad a beautiful salad because we have from one and a half to sixteen and it's and even and we have sixteen and fourteen and the way even between the sixteen and fourteen year old the way that by one it's like stop and by the other you can't get enough חנוך לנער על פי דרכו.
I see this with a lot of families like you know so it's very interesting. I want to move forward a little bit. Can I just share something so I stop choking? So when my husband was in the hospital and I was in the hospital with him all the time what was the first thing I did was I bought underwear for the kids because so that they would have clean underwear because I didn't know where the next laundry was going to come from. Yeah but that but that that instinct is is there meaning that's not again I don't want what you said it should be very clear to us that that instinct should be the instinct that we all have but that still should never be as a cover up for or like keilu that also takes care of what the other dimension that we're speaking about which is means have you mastered the art of knowing how to express verbal or even physical love to your child? Now I know that Elana has a shita regarding how often you should touch your child did you get to that with her? What was it? Maybe four times an hour? Yeah.
And then you get to the end of the day and you're over time. Well maybe maybe you don't know. You have to really see you have to flow with your kid you gotta be you gotta be checking in all the time it's lo pashut but I know that Bina shared that with me also. That's a very important inyan.
That's a very big thing when you're with them. Yeah don't follow them to school. Yeah when they're around. Okay.
You know what's going on Purim and the no Purim is in the air I tell you it's mamash really there. No makeup? No no right no makeup time meaning when they come home from school like five hours I missed four I missed twenty no. I think right? Azvu zeh. Azvu zeh.
Okay. So second to bottom paragraph בדרך כלל הדבר שתופס את רוב הזמן במשך היום בבית הוא הגידול הפשוט שכולל בישול ניקיון like we said that which like really takes up most of the time at home is the simplest things you have to do at home not simple but meaning that which has to happen like cooking and cleaning v'chulei ואפילו העזרה בלימודים לילדים and even help with children with their homework פעמים רבות נעשית ללא כל הבעת רגש מיוחד you don't have to express any love or emotions when you're doing these things when you're cooking when you're cleaning when you're helping for homework when you're doing all those industrial needs you're not doing anything over there וכאשר הילד אינו מבין תרגיל בחשבון and when a child doesn't understand some kind of a mathematical equation and my kids have mastered the ability to make me feel like an idiot in that in this parsha and then Zahava who's usually here Zahava is like the rebbe of my children in this department because they all go to her to Zahava Weinberg and feel smart אנו מסבירים לו כיצד לערוך את התרגיל ובזה מסתיים העניין. Abba how do I do this? How do these fractions work? If I know it okay you do it like this. Got it.
Next ובזה מסתיים העניין I don't need to I don't need to express in those in that feeling of a need emotions. I don't need to do that. I could. Kid's not interested in that at that moment the way that you think they may be interested in then.
Kamovan.
כמובן שכאשר נשאל כל הורה we'll ask any any any parent מדוע הוא או היא משקיעים כל כך הרבה עשייה then what do you why are you investing so much? Why are you working so hard in the home? Why are you putting so much to make sure your kids have what you think they need?
התשובה תהיה שאהבה לילדים היא המקור לכך. It's coming from love. It's all coming from love.
I wake up early in the morning, I prepare the sandwiches. It's all coming from love. The makor, the source is love ve'hahochacha lekach and the proof is שעבור הילד של השכן איננו מוכנים להשקיע כל כך הרבה זמן ללא תמורה. There are exceptions.
Lisa was my neighbor and did a lot for my daughter, meaning and still does. But the the friends, you know, the kid next door, you're not going to spend that much time with that kid if they need if they need something like you want for your own kids. You love them, but the love obviously doesn't demand of you to put yourself out there for them. ulam ka'asher nivdok האם האהבה הזו היא גלויה או נסתרת התשובה לכך היא ברורה זו אהבה נסתרת.
This is very important. You will say that it's coming from love. Now like I'm doing all those things because it's rooted in love. That's where it's coming from.
And now the question is tell me, do you think this love that you're talking about which is the source of how you're why you're spending so much time taking care of a million things in the house, do you think that's revealed or is it hidden? So there's two ways obviously there's two answers. What's what's one of the answers? What's the reason behind the answer of yes? Why would I say yes it's revealed love? No, no, revealed, meaning that that it's shown. Why would I say that it's shown? Because what else is it? What? nachon. Yeah, what do you mean? Why else? Isn't it clear? Why else would I be doing this? Well, it's clear to you.
It's clear to you why you're doing it. I'll tell you a story. There was a guy last week in the shul I mamash had to rip him up a little bit in a good way. And and then I and then I I thought I I wasn't certain if he knew that I mamash love him and that his wife was begging me to do this as well.
That's another story. So I said to him, do you know how much I love you? So he didn't answer me but he was freaked out by it. So then he said to me, he texted me, like what prompted you to ask that question? So I said because I realized that I'm under the assumption that we're so close that you would understand and act like what happened with us to be one coming from love. But maybe that's just an assumption and I should really I wasn't asking like oh, do you know how much I love you? I was really like wondering like do you know? I should have said do you know that I love you? Not how much I love you.
That would have been better. But what I was really coming from was like it's my avoda to make sure that like very similar to parenting there are a lot of hashva'ot between this gig and parenting all the time. You I it could be clear why else would I invest my time with you? Of course it's coming from love. Yeah, who's it who's it clear to? And is it אהבה נסתרת או גלויה? nisteret.
Well maybe that's the thing. It needs a berur. I don't know. He's saying over here that quite often I would say maybe if we put percentages on it maybe 90% of the things that we do for our children is coming from love that is concealed, that is nistar because it's very unless you have some kind of thing going with your kids that they feel your hug while they bite into the sandwich you made for them three hours after they left the house.
Otherwise it's pretty nistar. I feel like it's almost nistar on both sides like you say we do it because we love them but we do it because we're a parent and this is what parents do. Like yes maybe from the root of the root all these basics come from love but like I know sometimes I'm making a box food because I need to make a box food. Not thinking how much I love them and that's why I'm making No, no, no, for sure, for sure.
But the most I'm not saying this to make you feel better, most parents aren't buttering up the pita and saying I love my kids once in a blue moon if I make a homemade something or other because I know it's my kid's favorite food. Okay, that's right. I mean one thing that definitely helps is that when you put a little petek in the in the food says you know abba imma love you something like that. That's that's nice.
And not only like when you're forced to do that when you go into asefat horim. As they're older, they realize the things that you've done for me, how it was out of love and how it's helped me move forward. Oh my god, I have to tell you this. I had this experience when I was returning a rental car in Yerushalayim.
My car broke down, I had a rental car. And somehow you always end up paying more than whatever was agreed on, no matter what, right? It doesn't matter, you could have not even driven the car and you give it back, it's like, "No, no, it's been here in the parking lot the whole time." ken aval aval, right? And it was Friday afternoon, it was hot, Friday afternoon Yerushalayim. I still had to figure out a way to get back to Efrat. And I realized that there was a song that came to my mind from Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur: אדם יסודו מעפר וסופו לעפר בנפשו יביא לחמו.
Now I always understood that to mean that we came from dust, we're going to dust, and while we're here through our nefesh we work so hard to bring my bread, right? To work so that our loved ones could have what they want. And then I'm standing in this, it's the rental car place right, it's on Rechov David Hamelach. Do you know where it is? Right across from the little gas station that they have down the corner. It's Friday afternoon, I'm crossing the street, I'm in front of what's it called, Rav Anunu was living for a while, the YMCA, right? And I start crying my eyes out thinking about my father and all the years that he worked really hard just to make sure that we had everything we had for Shabbos or whatever.
And then I thought about my mother also and all the days she went to work. She was, she always worked when we were growing up, different offices. And it's suddenly there are, it's true, but I was thirty-five. I wasn't five, and I wasn't ten, I wasn't fifteen.
You know, it's when it's on you, you know, when you're in that situation you're like, "Wow." And then if you daven and you say, "I hope my children know how much I worked for them," that's not good either. But, "I hope my children know how much love, how much it was all stemming from love." That, yeah, you know, that's a very deep tfila, that I hope my children know how much all the stuff that we do is stemming from love. So Hashem says, "You really want, you want that tfila to work?" Of course I want my children to know that everything I'm doing for them, every single thing is coming from love. Okay, so you could either daven for it and bank on a miracle that that happens, or there's things to do.
There's actual avoda to do to make sure that that's what's transpiring on the day to day. And that is avoda, lo pashut. But that's what we want. We don't want to wait till they're thirty-five or thirty and then they have a bunch of little kids at home and then, "Oh wow, my parents." We want it to be already while it's happening.
That's the avoda. So turn the page. Besides for four hugs an hour or the four touches an hour, besides telling them, "Here's how much because I love you," what, what, what do we do? That's why you came to shiur. I've been coming to your shiur for twenty years.
And you're a great mother, all the zechut of my shiur, and a great wife and a great friend. lama? Because, because we're so patient, you don't have patience at all. We're so busy with the tachlis that when they need us emotionally and legamre, or we don't know how to be there. That, that's why we're here.
Okay, I'd love to. Yeah, I know. v'af, top of the next page: שברוב הפעמים האהבה ידועה להורים עצמם אולם במקרים רבים הילדים אינם זוכים להרגיש את אותה האהבה, like we been saying. You could know it, your kid could not know it, and it's very the merchak, the distance between the two could be painful.
בכדי להמחיש את הדברים נתבונן במשל מחיי הנישואין, so let's go to marriage to understand this better.
האם די בכך שבני זוג נשואים ידעו בלבם שאוהבים אחד השני או שהדבר זקוק לביטוי מילולי? If it's so clear when it comes to spouses the need to verbally express love, or not even verbally. Here's not saying, no he is saying verbally over here, he is saying verbally miluli, but I think it's not only verbally, it also is in other areas as well where the art of expression. There are plenty of men that are very lovey-dovey and the wives it's not in them to be verbally expressive as well.
So it's both. Shnei hatzdadim.
כאשר אישה יודעת שבן זוגה דואג לפרנסת הבית עורכת הקניות ובבית יש כל טוב עד שלא חסר לה מאומה מבחינה גשמית האם היא תסתפק בכך? A woman that knows that her husband is taking care of the parnassah of the home and he's in this case he's doing the shopping and at home there's everything that they need mibechinah gashmit. Clothes food.
Let's say he even does the laundry okay? I know. Davar nadir but still. Is that enough for what's going on in the in the in the wife's neshamah? Lo pit'om. Ein sikui.
That's not enough.
כמובן שחיי נישואין תקינים דורשים שהקשר בין בני הזוג יבוא תדיר לידי ביטוי מילולי. It's clear. I'm just laughing because but this is definitely a women's thing much more the need to want to have constant verbal communication all the time.
But you need a certain level of of communication that's not just instructions of who's doing what but also to stop for a second and be like wow it could have been home I I this didn't have to be this home metziyut. I could have been alone chalilah or chalilah with someone else. You need to have that verbal expression of like you know in Hollywood you know I'd marry you today like how many couples actually say that after like after five six years of marriage? It's a beautiful thing when it's said. But those are like very important verbal expressions that play a very big role in a what he calls chayei nisu'in tekinim.
Tekinim it means like it's on it's working it's flowing it's good.
כמובן שחיי נישואין תקינים דורשים שהקשר בין בני הזוג יבוא תדיר לידי ביטוי מילולי כאשר הדאגה לפרנסה הינה חלק טכני בלבד ממחויבותו של האיש כלפי הבית. Husband you want to be applauded that you're working so hard and you're bringing money home? You asked to do this. You signed on this.
We have witnesses that this is what you want. Basically what you're doing is fulfilling an obligation. Yeah we shouldn't be any too many shkoachs. I tell that to men a lot quite often.
It's an obligation. It's not a it's not like oh you became such a geshmak. You're supposed to be doing this.
והחלק המהותי שהאישה מצפה מבן זוגה בחיי הנישואין הוא לפתח את הקשר והדו שיח הרגשי עמה יום ביומו ואינה מסתפקת בדו שיח על דברים טכניים בלבד.
How often have I heard from couples we've become roommates. We've become roommates we've become associates and we get along and the business is thriving. What's the business? The industrial zone of family so and so. Thriving it's working it's working really good.
He's saying over here to not listapek to not be satisfied just by going back and forth with technical pieces of information. That ratzon for that to not be all is very important and very healthy. And when it comes to a relationship between husband and wife we understand that to be to make a lot of sense. Nachon? No one's like shocked that that needs to happen between husband and wife this this like whole world of like communication and speaking about much more than just errands.
That's because you're in a shiur with women. You can't tell this to the guys they're all going to crack up. Why? Because they don't want to talk. But they have to.
You don't listen to the men's shiurim do you? Or recorded them. Right but the ones not not all of them right? Bediyuk. Bediyuk. Those are never recorded nachon.
לעומת זאת כאשר נבחן את הקשר בין ההורים לילדים. That even he said even if it exists the kesher nafshi between parents and children, it's nowhere close to where it needs to be. So it's pretty since you're looking for tachlis over here, and we're all looking for tachlis at this point, the question is like this: are we willing to admit that he's kind of right sometimes? Are we willing to admit that he's kind of right a lot? A lot. You know the entry to anything when it comes to Tikkun HaMiddot or especially when we speak about Chasidus is bitul.
I have to litbatel and say everything that I think I know to be a truth and right and that I'm holding, let me for a few minutes pretend, even start with pretending, maybe I don't know it that well. Maybe I don't. Or there, maybe I'm open to the fact that what I thought was how I'm doing with parenting, without being too hard on myself, but what I without what I thought was right and the manner in which I've displayed my parenting at home to my children, it's been okay, but maybe in these areas this is why Hashem really gave me these neshamos, not only to make sure they have the things that they need when they wake up in the morning, but much more than that because and this seems like there's a demand here to become super mom, which is you barely got to sleep more than two hours, three hours straight at night, three hours straight, halevai, but I'm saying you've barely had four or five hours of sleep, you're exhausted from Shabbos, it's Sunday morning, and yet Hashem says but you could do this. You could do what? Sandwiches, clothes? I got that.
No, you could do sandwiches, you know, you can send them off in a manner that displays love. Great song to listen to is the song Yeladim of Eviatar Banai.
כל בוקר אני קם מוקדם להכין לך את הבוקר לסדר לך את התיק על הגב. So he speaks about technicalities, but then he sends it off ותמיד תלך בשדות של אמת שדות של something veyofi, meaning he describes a send-off in the morning.
Now it's hard to do this every morning, but in a certain way to adapt this into the way that just gets woven into all those natural things we're doing anyway goes a long long way. He's not coming up here with new chochmas, he's pointing out a reality, and he's pointing out that our children need that they need more emphasis of ahava gluyah as opposed to ahava nisteret. That's not enough. Can't be ahava nisteret.
Can't be I know it's really rooted in love that's why I'm doing everything, it's got to be ahava gluyah, revealed love. And then add on to the thing when you have more than one kid, חנוך לנער על פי דרכו, you've got a lot on your plate. But don't you believe that Hashem knew what he was doing when he sent you the kids that you have? It's emuna here, you need to plug in deep deep deep into emuna. Hakadosh Baruch Hu knew exactly what Hakadosh Baruch Hu was doing when he gave us each child that we have and believe that within us is the arsenal to give the kid much more than maybe what they got until today.
Machsan, your tik, yeah what you have.
יש לך את זה. Tools. You also said otzar, harav.
Treasure. Yeah, better. Machsan is more like a machsan with weapons. Yeah well, sorry.
No no no, it's Purim, I'm telling you. I'm telling you, it's all there. Look and now he's going to go to more tachlis.
כל הורה צריך לבדוק את עצמו האם קיים בקשר שלו עם הילדים מימד של תפיסה רגשית? Is there an emotional thing going on between me and my child? Is there something more than just technicalities?
שבא לידי ביטוי באופן תמידי בשיחות שלו עם ילדיו.
Conversations that you have with your children. How often do you have conversations? Not just I love you, a conversation with them.
בדרך כלל הדבר קורה רק כאשר מתעוררת בעיה רגשית אצל הילד. When do we generally have conversations with our kids? When we see there's some emotional outburst going on ומתייעצים עם איש מקצוע and I consult with a professional שממליץ לפתח עם הילד שיחות שידברו על הצד הרגשי שבו and then I receive instructions from from some professional that tells me how to develop conversations with a kid to address the emotional outburst.
אולם כל בר דעת מבין שעדיף לא להזדקק לכך רק לאחר שמתפתחת בעיה ועדיף למנוע זאת קודם לכן. It is not good to for instance it is not good to speak about the need for mental health once someone from the kehilla was hospitalized. It's not good to bring up chalila which we need to suicide awareness once you come back from visiting a family that's sitting shiva over having been the korban for such a thing. So too that's a that's a dramatic thing but in terms of a healthy way of living your life it is not advisable to wait for a meltdown and then receive counsel from the outside to begin to develop sichot nefesh with your children.
You want a tachlis Danielle? Ein baya. Do one sicha that's not based on anything it's not based on filling a need that you could detect in your kid about a specific need and more I say this to myself too. Just a sicha. Now a conversation.
Now it's true some kids will be like abba lo rotza ein li koach I don't want to, right? That that's okay. Put it out there though. Don't don't push them. If that's not where they're at there's no inyan to say I'm gonna push you until we have this sichat nefesh and then my and then what if you take them out? You take them out, you talk over fries.
Yeah, yeah, yeah that's the one-on-one dates happen like twice a year. The 10-minute conversations they happen I feel like they happen a lot more when the kids get a little older. Like my oldest we have mamash sachmashim. It's amazing but my seven? Ken beseder.
Again each in their own age. Each in their own where they're at. Where they're at. But he says עדיף למנוע זאת קודם לכן.
Preempt. Don't don't wait until there's an actual real need for this. Make it part of their experience growing up. And I know what you're thinking.
אין לי זמן אין לי כח לזה. Where am I gonna fit that in? No. The question is where you gonna fit all the other things that you think are important. You want to feel a shtickle guilt everybody? Me too.
Cheshbon out that you're gonna take a tenth of the time where you're doing thumb Olympics and dedicate that to your children. You know how much time you'd have? I know it's it's insane. A tenth of the time of thumb Olympics is gonna be dedicated to sichat nefesh with your kid. By some people that means you have to go on a vacation to accumulate the meaning for the tenth of the time of thumb of scrolling if you just took a tenth of it and dedicated it towards that you'd have a lot of time.
I read that mamash in a parenting course 10 minutes one-on-one undivided. Right but you're saying 10 minutes. That means that you only scroll 100 minutes a week. I check my screen time to tell you how much I'm scrolling.
Nachon? It's crazy. It's insane. It's insane. And we're all in it.
All of us are in it. Everyone's in the parsha. Pa'amim bottom we're gonna end with this.
פעמים שהקשר בין ההורים לילדים לקוי עד כדי אבסורד.
Sometimes the connection between parents and children's is lacking, it's something blemished there to absurdity.
ההורים משקיעים במסירות אין קץ בסיפוק צרכי הילד.
יש אימהות המקפידות על כך שבכל בוקר יהיו הבגדים של כל ילד במקומם ואף ניתן לראותן טורחות שעות מאוחרות של הלילה לכבס, לתלות, לייבש שהכל יהיה מוכן.
אולם כאשר הדבר נוגע בהשקעה בקשר רגשי ישיר עם הילד לעיתים ההורים אינם משקיעים אפילו אחוז אחד מההשקעה הפיזית.
Somehow he says over here based on percentages sometimes you don't even You don't even go for you don't even use 1 percent from the 100 percent of 1 percent regesh corresponding to the hundred in in bashva'ah comparison to the 100 percent of the tzrachim. And again because those are things that are easy I hate to I'm sorry to say this but I've learned it by myself like feeling way too good about the mornings that I do morning or sandwiches I feel way too good about myself in the morning. Shkoiach. You took a pita out of the freezer right and we feel men feel so geshmak.
It's like amazing right? Amazing. I could give parenting courses. Ze lo. And I'm sorry and and on a regesh level mamas sometimes feel way too amazing too about all the all the things that they're able to do also in technicalities.
See I had to say the first thing first to say the second thing obviously. What what we're pointing out is like we should just be happy that these are the things we're investing our time with trying to trying to seek trying to be better and trying to understand the avoda the role the role play here is so important and to notice that sometimes quite often there could be a tremendous amount of love that's that that exists and it can be completely nistar. It's like that quite often with friends. It's like that with teachers and students like the example that I gave you earlier with the someone here from the shul.
But when it comes with friends or with or with other relationships beseder it's okay. It's okay if the love is not always fully revealed. It's okay. They know it's there somewhere.
When it comes to parents and children it's not okay. It's not okay that that love that exists remains benistar. That's not okay. And therefore we a few eitzas that he began giving over here point out to first of all you have to you have to be willing to accept that that's you have to have bittul to accept that that's that's a truth.
And you also have to realize that that doesn't mean chalila that I'm a bad parent. God forbid and that my and that Hashem made a mistake by giving me by giving my kid this parent. You know that's a horrible thing to think. It just means baruch Hashem we have the opportunity to delve into avoda that's worthwhile delving into.
It's worthwhile. Yes. And I think you mentioned emuna before. I think like as opposed to the sandwiches where you make a sandwich and it's done and and that's it you could be doing all of this 100 percent and your kid's not necessarily giving you the feedback that it's working right your kid's still you know yelling or giving you attitude or silent or whatever else and having the emuna and the bitachon that like the investment that you're making is gonna pay off while balancing that with being able to like do a cheshbon hanefesh and and make sure that your your investment is actually appropriate for the child.
It's true it happens sometimes. When you're so busy with the other things that we can actually get done it creates this constant state of tension. Oh you hear that all the time I was too busy paying the bills I was too busy okay what what are you investing in though like what what's shaveh to invest in? And right having the emuna and bitachon that investment in this is gonna is really gonna mashlim hatemuna of of the home that I want to build and what I want my children to remember when they build their own homes as well you know I always ask like like imagine what kind of soundtrack your kids will will play for someone to describe the home they grew up in right? Imagine if like like for some kids it'll be like what's that that annoying family that would always sing together the von Trapps right. And he didn't show his love like in the sound of music he is the most strict father in the world shalama somehow they knew.
You're going you're married to Yoni I know I know it's like humble parenthood. No for some people it's the it's Metallica's nothing else matters or Metallica's what else what do they have like sad but true or things like that like crazy things. And they also did covers of lullabies which is hilarious. Covers of lullabies.
Yeah with the voice. What we want more than anything is that whatever that niggun the child ends up choosing to be the soundtrack of their experience growing up would be one where there's passionate love that's expressed. That's what we want. That's what we want.
That that's the great if there's one thing we daven for is that whatever that niggun is whatever the song is that they choose it's one where like. Real love is being expressed and felt in the home, not like, oh I know you love me, but you couldn't show it. Not that soundtrack. I know you love me and you did more than you could have ever imagined.
And we're trying to push ourselves here. So Be'ezrat Hashem, we'll continue this next week. There will not be shiur on Thursday, but we'll continue this next.