Episode 78 - When you recognize God runs the show, your tests will end.

What does it truly mean to be wealthy? Drawing from the timeless wisdom of Pirkei Avot (Ethics of the Fathers), we explore the profound truth that real richness isn't measured by bank accounts but by contentment with your portion in life.

This episode delves into the transformative power of genuine gratitude – not just occasional thankfulness, but the profound recognition that we have exactly what we need for our current stage of growth. We share personal stories of how shifting perspective allows us to see ourselves as "trillionaires" who have won life's lottery, appreciating everything from our functioning senses to our relationships and opportunities.

Life inevitably presents us with tests – business fluctuations, relationship challenges, and personal struggles – but these become opportunities for growth when viewed through the lens of trust. The remarkable truth is that once we master a particular lesson and demonstrate we can handle resources responsibly, those specific tests cease. Just as we wouldn't continue quizzing children on basic addition after they've mastered it, the universe moves us forward to new challenges once we've integrated certain truths.

The ultimate freedom comes through recognizing who truly "runs the show" – not by surrendering our autonomy, but by acknowledging the perfect balance required to progress spiritually and practically. Each conquered challenge makes us stronger and more prepared for the next level of growth.

Ready to transform your perspective and find true wealth through contentment? Listen now, and discover how to become what the Yiddish tradition calls a "mensch" – a fully realized human being who navigates life's complexities with wisdom and peace. Share your thoughts with us and join the conversation about finding richness in what you already have.

Transcript

Welcome to The Trust Factor

Speaker 1 0:00

Good morning everybody and welcome to the Trust Factor. This is the podcast that guarantees your success when you implement its divine, age-old teachings. What is the summary, my friends, of everything that we've been learning over the last few podcasts? The summary can be found in what we call the Chapters of the Fathers or the Ethics of the fathers. It's a spectacular tractate or section of the Talmud that addresses what the key, fundamental practices are for human beings to be able to achieve very high levels, very high functioning levels.

Speaker 1 0:37

In Yiddish there's a word mensh. Mensh means a human being, a man, a person. How do you become a mens Mensch? How do you act like a solid individual?

True Wealth: Being Happy With Your Lot

Speaker 1 0:48

Many of those teachings come out of the book called Pirkei Avot, the teachings of the fathers, and in there you may have heard many, many times the saying who is rich? Who's the rich person? How do we define a rich individual? And the answer to that is someone who is happy with his lot in life. You've heard this before. But what does it mean and how does it apply to trust? And how does it apply to what we've just been talking about over here with regards to having to work for a living? And the answer is it applies perfectly. Somebody who is happy and content with the amount of money and the assets and the material wealth and the relationships that God has given him in this existence at any given point in time throughout our lives. Anybody who is happy, truly content and and embraces and understands with full, absolute clarity that I cannot have one more dollar or one less dollar in my bank account. It needs to be exactly what it is in order for me to achieve the highest levels of success that I can in this world. Anybody who recognizes that has the holy grail. My friends, you are considered the wealthiest person in the world.

Living as Trillionaires Through Gratitude

Speaker 1 2:10

You know, oftentimes I have a good friend and client who we often speak about life together and he's a lot older than I am. I shouldn't I hope he's not listening because it may not take that well, but the reality is he's a lot older than I am. He's a lot more mature and a lot more experienced. But we have wonderful conversations together and almost every time we get together we remind ourselves and it's not something that we do by design where we say, hey, let's remind ourselves. It's our conversations often are a review of the wonderful things that we have in our lives, the great things that we have to be grateful for every single day of our lives, which obviously includes our wives and our children and our, our parents and our and our businesses, and and the opportunities that we have in our health, and all the wonderful things that we have today that we've been given and that we acknowledge. And oftentimes, almost every time we talk, we end up saying the same thing we are trillionaires, not just millionaires or billionaires. We're trillionaires, we've won the lottery and we acknowledge that. Recognizing it makes us, confirms for us, the gratitude that we have for all these wonderful things that we've been given. It fills your heart, it gives you clarity and there is nothing more important than the attribute of gratitude, my friends, because if you want to talk about figuring out how to trust God and have a relationship with him, this is it Reviewing what you've had, reviewing what you have and being grateful for every single thing.

Speaker 1 3:44

Relationships reviewing what you have and being grateful for every single thing. Relationships, the children you have. Do you know how many people operate this entire life? They're not granted one child. They try and they try and they spend untold fortunes and they rack their brains trying to go from specialist to specialist to bring one child into this world, and yet so many of us have two and three and five and eight and ten children.

Life's Rollercoaster: Business and Relationships

Speaker 1 4:06

Who guarantees you a child right, your health, that you're functioning, that you're capable, that your eyes work and your ears work and your senses work and your taste buds work and all these wonderful things? Who says you're entitled to it? But when you stop and you appreciate it and you think, what would life be like if I didn't have my taste buds? All these delicious foods, all these colorful and different tasting and spectacular experiences, when you go to fine dining restaurants or when you try out new, new recipes or you try a new ingredient for the first time, what if you didn't have God forbid your taste buds? Do you know how miserable your life would be? There's a reason why God made everything taste different. There's a reason why God made these beautiful, colorful fruits and vegetables Because it's an experience. It is a joyful experience to have good tasting food and if you don't have your taste buds, it's terrible, absolutely terrible. That's among all the other senses that we take for granted, my friends. So who is the one who is really rich in this world? It's the one who acknowledges that everything he's given me up until this point in my life is exactly what I need to succeed. And if you haven't seen that and experienced it enough in your life, where you know that one day you're on top of the world and the next day you're struggling, you're scraping right, and it could be in business and it could be personally One day, your relationships are on a high and you're connecting with everybody and nobody's got problems with you and everything is running smooth.

Speaker 1 5:31

And you got connecting with everybody and nobody's got problems with you and everything is running smooth and you got no problems with anybody. And suddenly, before you know it, you look back and you go. What happened? What happened? How did everything just fall apart? I'm fighting with this one, I'm fighting with that one, I'm fighting, everybody's fighting with me right now. Everybody's picking on me.

Speaker 1 5:43

What gives it happens to all of us? Business You're riding on a high. You're making more money than you've ever made before. You got people lining up to get your service or your product, whatever it is, and you can't fill the orders and, thank God, money's rolling in and things are good and you're vacationing and you're buying gifts for family members or whatever it is, and you're living large, wonderful. Suddenly, before you know it, there's tariffs, or there's high interest rates, or there's COVID or there's who knows what. There's a million and one things and suddenly business comes to a grinding halt, or it's difficult, or it slows down to a point where now you're saving and you're stretching and you're holding suppliers at bay and you're doing all these other.

Speaker 1 6:22

What's going on? It's a roller coaster of life, but at any given point in your life, when you stop and you say it's perfect, it's absolutely perfect, it could not be any better, then you have absolute peace of mind. That is the ultimate demonstration that you know with certainty that God runs this world. When you get to that point, my friends, life changes. And it says it right here. It says it actually quite clearly. It says, based on these reasons that we had just spent the last few podcasts discussing, there is an exception to the rule that people must be busy with earning a living.

Speaker 1 6:59

What's the exception? You hear this. He's about to tell you that if you don't want to be caught up with tests and if you don't want to be caught up with occupying your time so much trying to earn a living, then there is an exception. Okay, you ready for this? Here's how it goes. The exception is that if you don't want to be busy with earning a livelihood and these tests, a person has to reach a high, such a high spiritual level that the two above mentioned benefits of giving an effort no longer apply to you. Hashem will free him. God will free you from these burdens.

Transcending Tests Through Trust

Speaker 1 7:35

If you choose a life where you recognize that these are all tests, you recognize all the things I've been asking you to recognize all the last at least two or three, maybe even four podcasts. Recognize who runs the show. Recognize who's responsible for your living. Recognize that you are in the perfect zone of balance to be able to receive and to have a relationship with him. Once you've accepted and seen his hand enough times that you've built a high level of trust. I'm not just talking about okay, you know, I acknowledge that he runs the world, I acknowledge I see him in my life sometimes. No, I'm saying the highest level you can get to, which means that you're in a zone where you know these things to be true. There's no longer a belief, there's no longer faith. This is knowledge and trust that you know, as you know that you have hands and fingers and you can identify your fingers and toes the same way. You know that is the same way that you know God runs this world and it's all perfect when you get there. There's no test anymore. My friends, it's done, it's over, and I've told you this in the past. This doesn't just apply here, it applies in every aspect of your life.

Speaker 1 8:44

Life is a series of tests and our job is to pass these tests. So once you've passed the test where you've said God, I recognize with clarity I know you run the world, I know that you're in charge of my income. I know why you're distracting me with all this work. I know I see it clearly and therefore I'm going to impact positive change to make sure that I'm doing the right thing instead of distracting myself with the wrong things, so that I don't have to be tested, so I don't have to be preoccupied. You don't have to worry about me, god, because I've demonstrated to you that when you give me leisure time, I use it well. When you give me money, I use it well. When you give me relationships, I'm a contributor to that relationship. I am a positive influence on myself and my environment and on the world. When he sees that, then the tests in that arena. Stop. There's no point in continuing to test you.

Speaker 1 9:36

You take a child and you teach them basic arithmetic and you teach them that one plus one is two and two plus two is four. And you teach them to add up until ten and you recognize that they can do it and they've aced every single test of counting between one and ten or adding and subtracting between one and ten. How long do you be rated for you, don't you move on? You recognize this child has achieved perfection in that arena. We don't need to continue to belabor it. We're going to move on to the next stage, whatever it may be multiplication and division. We move on, we grow, we get stronger, we get better. We use the lessons that we had in our, in our life previously, that were challenging for us, that we've perfected and we utilize them to be able to improve our life going forward as we grow.

Growing Beyond Conquered Challenges

Speaker 1 10:19

So, my friends, that's exactly the same thing God is saying once you've passed this test and you show me that you've reached a high level in a relationship over here, where you know and you trust it's no longer believing in faith then that test comes to an end, not to say there aren't going to be other tests.

Speaker 1 10:37

Our whole existence is a test. But now you know the secret recipe, now you know the trick when you defeat it, when you conquer your test and there are ways to know if you've conquered it but when you've conquered that test, then it's done, done and dusted. You put it in a drawer and forget about it, and God does the same thing. And he says next and every time you reach that higher level, you achieve more and more, higher and higher greatness. My friends, my blessing is that that applies to every single one of us. Every day, reach for the highs, and once you get them, you'll have satisfied the requirement and you'll have grown that much more and you'll be facing new and improved challenges to be able to make you an even better, stronger individual. Have an amazing day, my friends.