Wednesday, December 28, 2011
Diary of a Music Nerd: Mr. Money
Sunday, December 25, 2011
Happy Birthday Arbitribe!!!
Thursday, December 22, 2011
How The Kvetch Got Over December
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Latkes and Lucid Dreaming, a Symphony in Three Parts
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Life 101: How to Deal
Today is actually a pretty exciting day for me in relation to Arbitribe and my blogging career. December 7, 2010, was the first time I ever blogged, on this blog in fact, though the name and concept of Arbitribe was still a few weeks off. It’s interesting to think about how much has changed since then, blog-wise and in my own life, and I’ve been doing a lot of reflection, especially about this time last year. The months of September, October, November, and December are months of great import to me; it seems that some life-changing event happens to me during those months almost annually, an event that will then set the tone for the following year and beyond. However, in 2010 I had five such moments, all within those four months, not the least of which is the founding and official launch of Arbitribe. In the end, those paradigm-shifting incidents all turned out to be positive things, but like everything in this world, there’s the other end of the spectrum to consider: February and March have historically been awful months for me. Some of the most awful things to ever happen to me occurred then, the worst of which would have to be contracting my kidney disease.
This train of thought is starting to remind me of Sign Language and The Learning Curve, which is good because that’s kind of where I was going with this. In those posts and the discussions held in the comments under them, a lot was made over the complete lack of control we have in our lives on a metaphysical level, and so the best thing to do is to control your reaction to an incident and how you let it affect you and your life instead of seeking to control the situation itself. There’s some real wisdom in that and it’s a practice that everyone would do well to adopt, but there’s another side to all of this that I only briefly touched upon in response to a comment under Sign Language and I think that it’s time I devote an entire post to this subject. Today’s lesson: hishtadlut, or as I like to think of it, rigging the odds.
I know most of our readers are familiar with the concept of hishtadlut, but just in case, a little background. A core concept in Judaism is that we believe that God personally oversees all of our lives and has our best interest in mind. However, when confronted with a situation of whatever nature, we have to put in effort on our end to make it work and God will meet us halfway; we’re not allowed to simply sit back and hope God works it out for us. That effort is called hishtadlut.
Now, I know a few months ago I was going on about letting go and realizing that we don’t really control much in our lives and how that can make it easier to roll with life’s punches. That really only applies in a last resort situation or in certain other circumstances though. Hishtadlut is the step that comes before that. Jewish custom and common sense dictate that stuff isn’t just going to work out for you if you aren’t proactive about it, and we are actually discouraged from relying on a miracle. Getting out there and making things work out for you is an integral part of making things work out for you. Surprise! However, it is also true that you can rig the odds as much as you want and things still won't go your way, and that’s where Sign Language comes in.
I seem to be the resident storyteller, so I’ll tell a story to illustrate. I had a meeting with my career counselor at 11:00 AM on campus this morning, and given the ever present traffic that plagues the Van Wyck, I figured that if I wake up by 9:30 and get out of my house by 10:00, I’d be able to get there, park, and get to the building in time for my meeting even if the traffic were to be awful. Since it was an important meeting, I set two alarms and asked someone to wake me up at 9:45 if I had somehow managed to sleep through both. My trying to ensure that I would be awake and out of bed in time to leave by 10:00 was my hishtadlut. On a Jewish level, going to sleep at 2:00 AM and just assuming that God loves me and will have me woken up in one way or another in time to leave is not something we’re supposed to do. It also would have been terribly irresponsible of me from a rational standpoint to behave in that way.
In the end, unfortunately, I slept through both my alarms and the person who was supposed to wake me forgot to do so, so I gained full consciousness around 10:00. I threw myself out of bed, got dressed, wolfed down breakfast, and still managed to get out of the house by 10:15. I thought I was a total boss, but then I hit the Van Wyck in the rain and ended up taking an hour to make a 25 minute drive and I showed up to my 11:00 meeting at 11:20. It was at that point that I realized that I did everything I could to get myself there on time and I was still 20 minutes late, so it must be that on some cosmic level I was not meant to get to this meeting on time, no matter how good my odds were. That acceptance is what I was stressing in those two earlier posts.
The duality of active vs. passive in life is a very tricky thing because there is a subtle line between the two and it is often difficult to determine where exactly it is. The important thing is that there is a place in life for both, and leaning towards either one when it is not the time to tap into it is a dangerous thing. I spoke extensively a few months ago about how psychologically unhealthy activity is when it is time to be passive, and passivity during a time of action can have potentially disastrous life consequences as well.
There’s a famous Jewish joke in which there’s a terrible flood and everyone evacuates except this guy who decides that he has such faith in God that he knows He’s going to save him. When the flood gets so bad that it covers the first floor of his house, the guy moves upstairs to the second floor. A rowboat passes, and seeing him, the passengers shout out, “Hey! Come on in, we’re evacuating.” The man replies that he has faith and he’s going to wait for God to save him. The flood forces him to move up the top floor of his house, at which point another boat passes his window and the passengers call out to him to get in and flee. The man again replies that he has faith and he’s going to wait for God to save him. When the flood forces him onto the roof of his house, a Rescue Squad helicopter catches a glimpse of him and flies over. A crewmember announces over the megaphone that the squad is leaving and this is his last chance to get out before the flood drowns everything, and the man repeats his familiar refrain. The chopper flies away, and a short while later the man drowns. When he gets up to heaven and meets God, he cries out in sadness,” What happened down there? I had so much faith in you and you didn’t save me” to which God responds, “What are you talking about? I sent you two boats and a helicopter!”
The joke has a certain humor to it, but it’s a pretty good example of what I’m talking about. That man was too passive in a situation that demanded action and he lost his life for it. Most situations we find are not super drastic like that, but are still important enough to warrant a little advanced preparation and maybe a plan B. People always try so hard to take a bad hand life deals them and turn it into a royal flush, but I don’t think they realize that in many situations you can just stack the deck so you get dealt a royal flush to begin with. And what happens if you get a bad hand anyways? Fold and try again next time. I’m a big proponent of balance of all things in the world, and this subject kind of plays into that concept very nicely. Being passive or active all the time will only get you halfway there.
So somehow this turned from a post about hishtadlut into a discussion of one of the many dualities of life, but that’s cool with me. Both points are important, relevant, and something I could go on for hours about. I kinda went all over the place there though, so I hope everyone followed my runaway train of thought. If you didn’t, that’s what the comments section is for. Really what all of this, Sign Language, and The Learning Curve come down to is knowing the approaches available for use in dealing with the situations life throws at you and when to use them, and on that note, I’m off to write my philosophy final paper. Let the good times roll.
Song of the Day: Reflections – Mutiny Within
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
The Lonely 6-Foot Rabbit of Faith
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Scrawled Walls in Brooklyn
I think we’ve all seen pictures of signs yelling about Zionist conspiracies or that video of the nice lady barking about how the Jews are hoarding all the money. Thankfully, these seem to be coming from a minority of the OCCUPYers. But it's all happening at once, and I can’t help thinking that whoever is spray painting and stabbing has been watching that video too… and that they might have been caught by now if the cops weren’t being held up making sure the OCCUPYers don’t riot.
Wednesday, November 16, 2011
Matchmaker, Matchmaker, Make Me a Match
Preface: It is likely that I will offend many people over the course of this post, as it centers on a very delicate and sensitive issue. Know that this is not my intention, and I have made an effort to tone down the sarcasm (if not the cynicism) in an attempt to be respectful. I therefore ask that if you show me the same courtesy. If you disagree with my opinions, keep in mind that they are only opinions; I invite you to share yours respectfully in the comments section below, and we can engage in a calm and rational discussion of ideas. The purpose of this blog is not to inflame or offend, so please don’t take it as such. In addition, I am speaking purely from the guy’s perspective, seeing as I am in fact a guy. I imagine there are plenty of horror stories that women could tell, so one of you should start a blog and write them :) Lastly, this is a spiritual sequel to (stereo)typical, so I suggest you read that first to understand some of the references.
Okay, so last time I put up a real post (i.e. not part of my Diary of a Music Nerd column), I spoke at length about how we perpetuate our own potentially inaccurate stereotypes through what essentially comes down to really bad PR. This time, in direct contrast to that, I’d like to get down to brass tacks, as they say. What I’m about to discuss is a real world problem that absolutely exists, as much as people would like to deny or minimize it, and is completely and totally 100% irrational, as much as people want to justify it. Therefore, without further ado, “Tzvi’s Thoughts and Musings on the 21st century Jewish Matchmaking Process,” or, in short, “Why I Can’t Stand the Modern Shidduch System.”
This isn’t a new topic for me. I wouldn’t say that I’m an outspoken critic of the system, but people who know me know that I don’t like the idea of marrying for practicality instead of love. I think that “well, it could work” is not a good enough reason to spend your life with someone. Granted, the practical aspect must be there because no matter how much you love someone, you’ll be hard pressed to create a life with them if you’re totally incompatible personality-wise. However, that in and of itself is an entirely separate discussion. Maybe I’ll do another follow up if I feel the need, but it’s not really my focus right now. It was important enough to include here though, because it provides the context for what I’m about to say.
Since the beginning of Arbitribe, I’ve brought up many incidents involving my post-high school yeshiva to try and illustrate a point, all of which served as examples about things in the Jewish world that make me angry, and the one I’m about to tell one is no exception. Towards the close of the yeshiva year, right around when everyone gets back from Pessach break, just about every yeshiva makes a big push for their guys coming back for a second year. The ones who want to come back will have already made that decision earlier in the year, and the ones the yeshiva doesn’t want back (like me) would be left to their own devices, leaving the undecided to be persuaded to return. Generally the rosh yeshiva will call on the rabbis to corner the guys they’re closest with and have a “friendly chat” about coming back, because hey, food needs to get on the table somehow. However, my yeshiva went one step further, bringing in a well respected rabbi and public speaker to give us that “friendly chat” en masse. The speech took an hour and change, but it can be summarized in a single line: If you don’t go Shana Bet, no one will want to marry you. The first time he dropped that line I actually snorted and fought back a laugh, because wow, this guy is so out of touch with reality it’s scary. Only in later years after many an experience did I learn that what was actually scary about that speech was that he was right on the money, which brings me to my point. Let’s talk a little bit about prioritizing.
I’ve actually taken a look at certain shidduch applications before, out of sheer curiosity, and the amount of utterly useless information required is astounding. In fact, the application from our favorite Jewish matchmaking site is pretty tame by comparison. It makes sense to want to know some things about a prospective date, but to try and know a person from a piece of paper is ridiculous. Some things you can only know from meeting a person, and to refuse to even meet them because they didn’t go Shana Bet is incredibly shortsighted. Imagine that that happened and then turns out the guy didn’t go back for another year because he stayed home to take care of his dying father or something like that. They don’t put those kind of stories on the resume, people. Sometimes you just have to suffer a potentially fruitless date, or several, to really get the picture.
Another pet peeve, one that I touched upon last time, is the overemphasis on physicality. Yes, I truly believe you must be physically attracted to someone in order to have a romantic relationship with them, but to reject a guy because he's 5’8” instead of 6’2” is ridiculous. Are your priorities really that out of order? A guy could be everything you ever wanted sans the blonde hair and you shut him down? Stupid.
All of this is troubling, but the biggest problem in my opinion is the fact that there are so many things that people are concerned about that are just objectively not important. This is something I encounter a lot in the metal community, for example. There are people who won’t talk to you if you listen to metalcore or think Megadeth is better than Metallica. These things simply should just not interfere with your overall relationship with a person. In that same vein, not going out with someone because he’s an Islander fan, doesn’t like waffles, or wears a black velvet kippa instead of a knitted one just doesn’t make sense to me. Those examples sound ridiculous, right? The sad thing is that they’re all COMPLETELY TRUE STORIES! There is a person I know that goes with each of those bad date stories, and the waffles one was actually a girl getting rejected, believe it or not. Things that people base dating decisions on are abnormal. You’re never going to marry a perfect person, so it's better that his flaws include sports team allegiance and headwear choice instead of alcoholism and domestic abuse.
People are always saying stuff about the shidduch crisis, but let’s be honest, we’re doing it to ourselves. There’s a man I know who is too old for the dating game but is still single because he had his standards set so high and his priorities so out of order for so long that he missed all the opportunities. He’s turned that around now, but the selection is obviously not as vast as it could have been 20 years ago when he should have been meeting people. Any issue can be worked around if you are committed enough to the other person and to the relationship, and you can learn to love someone even though they’re not the sculpted Adonis you really wanted. People who go into the experience expecting perfect are deluded and will be sorely disappointed. Then again, I guess that’s exactly what the problem is; people expect their potential partners to be hand-tailored to their specifications, and they don’t budge on anything. That’s a surefire way to stay single. The shidduch crisis is because we can’t get our priorities in order. If you can’t find the man for you, maybe it’s time to lower the unattainable bar you set and take a chance on someone. The things people put so much stock in are just not important; it’s the quality of a person that counts, not her choice of breakfast munchables.
On a happier note, as I write this sentence, Arbitribe has a total of 9,998 total pageviews, so if you’re reading this, YOU might be number 10,000! Congratulations to us! We’re throwing a party, and you’re invited. Until next time, I'm outta here. Midterms await!
Song of the Day: This is the Life – Dream Theater