We should all have a keen awareness that we are going to die. As a matter of fact, in his now famous Stanford commencement speech, Jobs himself attested to the reality that death is the greatest motivator. Judaism tells us that we should all view every day as if it is our last day. God forbid this should be but if it were, how would we want to have lived that day. What I believe was Steve Jobs' intent was to not go on living even though I am about to die would be quitting. That is something that we should never do. He understood that regardless of how much time he had left he needed to move forward. This is something that we all need to be real with. Every day is another opportunity to accomplish. Regardless of how old we are or how tired we have grown we must never give in to the desire to coast and rest through our lives. Retirement is a luxury that should only be a release from having to earn a living but not from living. Every day ask ourselves what am I going to accomplish today and what do I want to achieve in the future. Each day brings a new step towards our destination in life. That destination is unknown and can not be quantified in regards to a specific level of achievement or financial stability. The destination is the culmination of our entire lives, the summation of a continuous and consistent series of small but grand steps. Don't worry about wether that future will exist or not, that is nothing more than an excuse to do nothing. FYI, the yacht was subsequently released.
Steve Jobs commissioned a yacht to be built prior to his death. That yacht was not finished before his demise and was recently impounded due to a financial dispute. In Walter Isaacson's biography of Jobs, the late Apple CEO is quoted as saying that, "I know that it's possible I will die and leave Laurene with a half-built boat, but I have to keep going on. If I don't, it's an admission that I'm about to die." Steve Jobs actually has quite a number of profound statements to his credit. However, this is one that albeit the intent is accurate the actual wording is incorrect.
We should all have a keen awareness that we are going to die. As a matter of fact, in his now famous Stanford commencement speech, Jobs himself attested to the reality that death is the greatest motivator. Judaism tells us that we should all view every day as if it is our last day. God forbid this should be but if it were, how would we want to have lived that day. What I believe was Steve Jobs' intent was to not go on living even though I am about to die would be quitting. That is something that we should never do. He understood that regardless of how much time he had left he needed to move forward. This is something that we all need to be real with. Every day is another opportunity to accomplish. Regardless of how old we are or how tired we have grown we must never give in to the desire to coast and rest through our lives. Retirement is a luxury that should only be a release from having to earn a living but not from living. Every day ask ourselves what am I going to accomplish today and what do I want to achieve in the future. Each day brings a new step towards our destination in life. That destination is unknown and can not be quantified in regards to a specific level of achievement or financial stability. The destination is the culmination of our entire lives, the summation of a continuous and consistent series of small but grand steps. Don't worry about wether that future will exist or not, that is nothing more than an excuse to do nothing. FYI, the yacht was subsequently released.
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I am never surprised by the logical inconsistencies that are constantly thrown out by those that oppose any mention or discussion of God. Dr. Lawrence Krauss, a well known skeptic and proponent of a Godless world posted an article on CNN today entitled; "Why must the nation grieve with God?". Now to be fair to his article, there are actually points to which I agree. It is extremely insensitive to proclaim to know why the children from Newtown died in that tragic attack. It is beyond the ability of anyone to know these things. To say that anyone who does not turn to God is unable to fully love is also quite absurd. However, Dr Krauss' emotional anger seems to have allowed him to make a similar error in judgement. To ask how an intelligent deity could act rationally and allow such things to happen clearly shows that one doesn't understand the nature and essence of an intelligent and infinite Deity. To ascribe attributes such as callous to a Being that has no emotions is as silly as the previous fallacies. An infinite Being is precisely that, infinite. It has no emotional response to the world such as we do. The only thing that we can be clear on is that if there is a Creator that is Infinite then what we know just by our being here is that Creator is a giver; from the fact that we were given life. The gift of life that we were given is for us to choose how to live and how to act. To ascribe acts of cruelty to such a being would simply negate the very nature of our free will. This is something that requires a tremendous amount of thought and focus which is beyond the scope of this platform to truly understand. However, the logical flaw that struck me in the article was this statement of callousness. Why is it any less callous to state that there is no God? If there is no God than there is no soul. If there is no soul then these innocent children whose lives were stolen are simply that; lives that are stolen and ended. Why is that no less heart wrenching to a suffering parent? Why is it that to speak about God is insulting to one who doesn't believe in God but to tear away the existence of the eternal is justified because it is simply rational science? "All the world’s religions - so many of them represented here today - start with a simple question: Why are we here? What gives our life meaning? What gives our acts purpose? We know our time on this Earth is fleeting. We know that we will each have our share of pleasure and pain; that even after we chase after some earthly goal, whether it’s wealth or power or fame, or just simple comfort, we will, in some fashion, fall short of what we had hoped. We know that no matter how good our intentions, we will all stumble sometimes, in some way. We will make mistakes, we will experience hardships. And even when we’re trying to do the right thing, we know that much of our time will be spent groping through the darkness, so often unable to discern God’s heavenly plans." President Obama addressing the community of Newtown CT I am sure we have all been moved in some way or another since this horrible incident occurred on Friday in Newtown CT. Whether it was being on the verge of tears simply thinking of the loss and pain the families must be in or well up with emotion when hearing the acts of courage and heroism on the part of the teachers one can not help but be stirred at our very core. When I read the words that President Obama spoke above I was again moved. I was struck by the clear profound insight that one paragraph had regarding our human existence. How we all ponder the purpose of life. How we all yearn to have meaning. How we so desperately want to make sense of it all. And how we all desire greatness and know that we are not living up to our potential. How truly sad it is that these questions only come to the foreground of our mind when tragedy strikes. There is so much confusion and frankly, anger in the world because of how little we are focused on these issues. While the President struck a chord with these words his continuation I'm sorry to say fell short. While his purpose was to comfort and the content as it went on certainly aimed at that, it did little justice to the ideas just presented. President Obama went on to say that the only thing we can be sure of in this world is the love we share with each other. While that love is something that we all need and need to focus on to get through this world it is not the only thing there is nor is it the only thing we can be sure of. If that is true then we are left to live with the emptiness of never knowing what life is about, never knowing how to truly achieve greatness. Let's not allow these precious souls to have perished for nought. Let's not stare at the news and wallow in our shock and sadness until the awareness subsides and think about life only when the next tragedy strikes. Let us get that clarity that we so desire, find the answers to what we are living for and reach for greatness. On friday I flew up to San Francisco in the morning on a quick turn around trip to perform a bris in the city. Every aspect of the ceremony was beautiful. The home was in a lovely picturesque area of the city. The mother and father spoke meaningfully about the baby's name and the family history. The guests were all visibly engaged in the entire moment. When the ceremony was over the father called a taxi for me so I could get back to the airport in time to make the early flight back to LA for shabbos and chanukah lighting. I was extremely anxious to make sure I wouldn't miss that flight. Even though there was plenty of time, I had to be concerned about luggage cut off times. As I am sure is obvious, my bris equipment is not able to be taken as a carry on. However, once I was in my taxi I ceased being in a rush. I will remember this taxi ride for some time. The driver, who's name is Gabriel, asked me right away if I was coming from a bris! I asked him an almost assumed assessment if he was Jewish which he was indeed. He then proceeded to tell me that he was brought up with virtually no Judaism and had almost no connection at this point either. We then embarked on a rich discussion about meaning and identity and living a life unexplored. After telling him the story of Rabbi Akiva, I encouraged him to realize that it is never too late to begin exploring his own identity. Ironically, it is only now that I see an interesting tie to the bris itself. The grandfather of the baby and I had a discussion about keeping one's mind active in later years by learning new ideas. Gabriel told me that he didn't believe in God and that he chose to live his life by the "Golden Rule". What was most fascinating to Gabriel was when I told him that the only reason he believes that he should live by the notion that we should be kind to one another was because his people taught the world that notion. Besides the fact that without an absolute arbitrator of right and wrong the notion is ludicrous because the very idea of right and wrong would be so subjective I wanted Gabriel to understand the sheer joy of knowing that his identity as he sees it now is directly a result of his being Jewish. At first he was shocked. He wondered wasn't it the Greeks that taught us about empathy? Interesting, not if one looks at what Aristotle thought: "There must be a law that no imperfect or maimed child shall be brought up. And to avoid excess in population, some children must be exposed. For a limit must be fixed to the population of the state." (Aristotle, Politics, Book VII: ch.16) I encouraged Gabriel to begin a new journey in his "explored" life and uncover the richness of his heritage. Too often our "enlightened" society convinces us that because we are so cultured and advanced we don't need those backwards ideas of religion while in the same breath glorify the ancient civilizations that molded our world. Yet without the influence of our ancient religion the world would never have embraced our accepted "golden rules". Thank you Gavriel for being an angel of a driver. Yesterday, I wrote this email to some friends/fam. I thought I'd share it with you as well, I'm going to begin writing up what I take away/learn from class and share it. Thanks for teaching me, Rabbi, I feel like I am in a clearer mind set as a result!! Hey guys, As some of you know, I attend a class with my rabbi every Monday night. My rabbi always tells our class to relate what you're listening to in class to your life, and learn from it. Many times, I'm amazed at how much I take away from the class, and I always form my own ideas/opinions as a result of the lesson. This past class was particularly interesting, and I thought I'd share what I learned. I think it applies to all of us a little bit, and hopefully you do to. The topic last night was based partially on the story of the birth of Esav and Yaakov, and also a bit from David and Goliath. That said, here's what I came away with: There are times in life, for most it's at work/school, where we are so frustrated and annoyed. We think to ourselves, "please get me through this day and get me home". Yes, sometimes work or a class can be very difficult, but think about that for a second, we are literally praying to get through the day; only to go through the same struggle again the next day! Unfortunately, by praying to get through the "same old" day, we forget that we have the capability to do so much more with our lives. Now, I'm not saying quit school or quit your job, we need to learn and we need to earn a living. What I am saying is that everyday is an opportunity to think about new ways to better ourselves. We can get up every morning and try to make that day better than the previous. Unfortunately, some people are intent to just put our noses down and continue "living", just to get through the day, or the week. Life is an amazing gift, don't squander it! We all have the opportunity to be great in our own way, but we must be willing to change our outlook on life, and work for it!! I challenge everyone to take 5-10 minutes a day and think about what they can change in their daily routine to enrich their life. I'd wager you come away with some interesting ideas for yourself! Also, I think I'm going to continue to write up my thoughts and ideas from my class. Let me know, and I can share them with you as I go. Just thought I'd share what I have been learning and applying to my life. Love you all. When I used to give my grandmother a blessing that she should live to 120 she would give a gasp and exclaim "God forbid". I would get so upset at her. Why wouldn't she want to live that long? I am convinced that most of us have this gnawing dilemma that we struggle with; we all wish we could live forever and yet at the same time worry that we would get bored with living or worse end up despising life. Yesterday the oldest living person died at the age of 116. Her name was Besse Cooper. She was a school teacher from Georgia. She was quoted as saying that her best years were when she was in her 80's! She loved to read and work in her garden. So much of life is spent trying to reach a certain plateau that we often forget that every day is a pleasure just to be alive. When we forget the joy of simply living then when we reach that point in life we wonder "now what?". If we learn to take pleasure in the moment, enjoy the here and now then when can never get bored with anything life has to offer us. Besse had four children, eleven grandchildren, thirteen great-grandchildren and two great-great-grandchildren. There is a commandment in the Torah that prohibits us from standing by idly while another is suffering; "don't stand on the blood of your friend". It is interesting, in American law there is no law obligating a person to help another nor can one be held accountable for not helping with the exception of a very specific cases such as one who's job it is to protect individuals; e.g. a police officer. In contrast however, Judaism obligates us to help another in need. It is only this obligation that forces us to take responsibility and act. True there will always be those individuals that act selflessly when the moment calls for it however sadly they will be the exception. When we know that we have an obligation, when we know that there will be real consequences only then will our actions reflect these values. Without that reality it is inevitable that we will continue to hear incidents of people standing by while another suffers or tragically dies. Today's front page of the NY Post features a photo of a man in the NY subway about to struck and killed by a train. The person not only refrained from helping, which may very well have been futile, but had the sensationalistic urge to capture the moment with a photo. This "Instagramism" approach to our lives is an entirely different problem however it is a natural outgrowth of this neutral almost voyeuristic approach to our surroundings. We are not merely spectators to our world, Judaism says clearly that we are caretakers. We are responsible for all those around us and to be responsible means we must, we have no choice, other than to stand up for any that are in both physical, emotional or spiritual danger. We all know we need goals in life. That is obvious. Without goals then we are merely drifting through life and going wherever we may be led. Hence the proverbial; 'going down a river without a paddle'. However, having goals is not sufficient. We must realize the paramount necessity to have one overlying goal for life. Something that our entire existence is tied to. Something that unites all of our endeavors in this life. Without having the clarity of understanding what the goal of life is; without knowing what we are living for then whatever temporary goals we have will become the goal of our life. If we are in school, then the goal of life is simply to graduate. When we graduate then the goal of life is to pass the bar. Once we achieve that then our goal in life is to get a job. The means of living become the end themselves. Even though we may have a paddle in our boat that is not enough. We better make sure that we have a map as well. |
AuthorThank you for visiting my site. I am Rabbi Denbo and I live in Los Angeles with my amazing wife and seven incredibly beautiful children. Archives
September 2017
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