#58 The Gift of Stuttering with Moe Mernick
“Stuttering is just a part of who I am.”
Listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts or your favorite podcast platform. You can also watch the interview on YouTube.
BIO:
As the COO of Partners in Torah (a nonprofit ed-tech platform), Moe is spearheading a digital transformation, strategic partnerships, and global expansion. Previously, he was the Founder & CEO at Winfluencers, the Head of BizDev for Hometalk, Strategy Consultant for Deloitte, and Regional Director for the Lauder Foundation. He holds an MBA and Rabbinical Ordination, and published his first book, The Gift of Stuttering (Mosaica Press, 2016). He also teaches Daf Yomi (daily Talmud class), produces inspirational videos, and gives lectures to audiences worldwide. Moe lives in Israel with his wife and children.
EPISODE HIGHLIGHTS
0:00-6:00: Opening Remarks
6:00-10:00 Journey of Life
10:00- 20:00- Writing his book, from an actor to writer, namesake (Moses), stuttering class, faith and stuttering shift
20:00- 27:00- embracing diversity, becoming a better presenter and person who stutters, taking a leap of faith
27:00-42:00- Transcending Stuttering and what it means to Moe, trust in faith, challenges in life growing up with a stutter, advice for those who stutter, putting on a “show” and creating an open conversation
42:00-57:13- Closing Remarks
RESOURCE LIST
MORE QUOTES
“This is who I am. My stutter, my family, my life, my bank account, where I'm from. These are things that I can't change. How can I become happier with who I am? And that led me down a more spiritual journey.” -Moe Mernick
“Leading a happy length, loving the people that we are is one of our greatest challenges of society today. Everybody seems to be leading a better life than we are, whether they're better looking, they have more money, their families, their trips, their jobs, everything. The way we scroll through to everybody else's filtered lives. Our life always dims in comparison, and therefore I don't hold back.” -Moe Mernick
TRANSCRIPTION:
Uri: Right there we are. Good morning, everybody. I had to have like more than the average cup of coffee this morning to be with one of the most energetic and awesome people that I know one of my dear friends, role models, heroes . So my name is Uri Schneider and we're in for a big treat today. MoMA Anik is a bit of a legend.
Uri: Our good friend, our shared friend Hillel Fuld. Featured mode today as one of his featured profiled people on the planet, Moe has done so much, but it's important to recognize that a lot of that would have seemed to be impossible just a few years ago. Mo if you could just mute while I'm giving you this embarrassing intro, could it get a little reverb?
Uri: Yeah, so Mo is he's the outgoing outgoing, energetic teacher leader, husband, and father, and just. Incredible address for inspiration and leadership in so many places, he's spearheading a digital transformation and strategic partnerships and expansion of partners in Torah. He's a founder and CEO at Windflow answers the head of biz-dev for home.
Uri: Talk as a strategy consultant for Deloitte. And he also was a regional director for the Lauder foundation. He has an MBA. He has ever been in coordination and he published his first book, the gift of stuttering. I'll tell you a little bit of a backstory there. And he also teaches a daily Talmud class in Duff, yummy and produces awesome inspirational videos on a daily basis, giving lectures to audiences worldwide.
Uri: And he lives in Israel with his wife and kids. It's a big treat. The backstory is that I met Mo when he was writing his memoir and it was just a manuscript and he said, Someone told me, maybe I should ask you about this. I don't know. I got this thing going here that I'm putting together. Do you think it probably, there's probably no audience for this, right?
Uri: And I'm like, I guy writing a memoir about his journey growing up with a stutter. I think the world needs to hear that story. And then Mo honored me to write a few pages or a few words at the beginning. So I've got the forward in there, check it out. You can get it on Amazon from Zika, press the gift of stuttering.
Uri: And I think it's really cool that at the beginning of this week, which is national stuttering awareness week in the States and a month focusing on better speech and hearing month. It was featured on the stutter UAE, the United Arab Emirates, community of people who stutter, featured most book. So Mo it's a big treat to have you thanks for joining us.
Uri: And as I always say, what would you like people to know that maybe they don't get from the bio or they don't know about you
Moe: such a treat to be here. Thank you so much for having me this podcast is years in the making from the first conversations that we had. I credit you a lot with me actually publishing that book was very vulnerable.
Moe: I was getting started and I was unsure. And I was, I spent a couple of years writing down a bunch of notes of what it was like to grow up with a debilitating stutter, but what it was like to be afraid to speak what it was like to. Be worried about living life, who would ever want to go out with me? What kind of job would I ever get?
Moe: How would I be a dad? If I can't tell bedtime stories, what would life be like? And I journey that over a few years, I wrote down that story and then we sat down. I remember that first meeting that we had is anybody going to want to read this? So it's so nice that brought that up and I credit you so much.
Moe: Thank you for that confidence and that, that vision for what the book was able to do. And now it's been about five years since it's published and. It's a privilege to be able to transform those many years of tears, of anxiety, of stress and to try to shed a bit of light for others, many others that are going through that journey about what life is able to be like and what the journey is able to look like.
Uri: So what's what's something thing that was surprising either about what evolved from putting that book together at first, he thought would there even be an audience? You put it out into the world. At one point I know it was hard to get your hands on it because it had moved quicker than some expected.
Uri: I don't know what a publishing episode or addition you're up to, but what was something either that surprised you as an outcome of the book or something that just evolved inside of you? Since you put the book into the world?
Moe: Something super important to realize is that every one of us. Every one of you watching this, whether it's a stutter, whether it's something else, we all have challenges in life.
Moe: And it's really built into the DNA of what the world is all about is that it's designed with challenges included to help us become the people that we're supposed to be. Like any great athlete, anybody trying to build a company, anybody trying to do anything meaningful built into that experience is going to be challenged, help that become the best reality that it's able to become.
Moe: I recently took up yoga and the amount of stretches and the pushy it's so difficult, but the very difficulty that we go through is actually built in to help that reality be as awesome as a Canon. But I learned so much. By opening up myself with vulnerability. When you can, if you look at me, you don't necessarily see it.
Moe: But once I open up my mouth and we'll get back to how I'm speaking right now, without a stutter, perhaps we'll talk about that. But in one-on-one conversations, that comes up a lot. Once I open up about deep challenges that I have. And anger that I have had difficulty leading my life. So often I find with people that I'm speaking with is that will be mad as well.
Moe: And the conversations jump into be much deeper. This of course happens in personal settings. One-on-one conversations, more socially. But it even happens professionally. So in business meetings or presentations or conferences that I've gone to in business and technology with startups, so often the conversation would quickly go past all the initial pleasantries and the facades that we build up around ourselves and just get deep right away because just like I'm going through hell.
Moe: You are too in your own way. And let's really connect outside of the weather.
Uri: If you think back to I guess the earlier chapters of your book and growing up and what that was all like, and then you look at yourself now can you just give us a taste of like, How much of today seemed impossible how far you were from even envisioning some of what you do on a daily basis and how people know you today and how you're speaking sounds pretty freely today.
Uri: What was it like for you at up to what age was it? Because I like to give, an honest and open look at, there are people out there that are in there. They're seven they're, eight they're 15 they're 18. And they themselves and their parents are wondering like, What's in the store and I love to not pontificate or be really fluffy about anything's possible, but I love to shed a light on the stories of how things evolve and how, what seemed impossible truly can open up with with a combination of good fortune and good luck and good mazal and also of course taking some steps forward.
Uri: So if you could just shed a little light, like how far you are from where you were, even in what seems possible.
Uri: I think you're still on mute.
Moe: Thank you. When I was about five or six years old, I grew up in Toronto and that's when I began to stutter. I'm from a family of eight kids in my family. I'm the fourth of eight kids. None of my siblings. I had a stutter. My parents didn't have a stutter. So I think the initial go-to was okay.
Moe: Most got a little stutter. It'll probably go away like many kids that begin to stutter just goes away, maybe with mode two, but after a year or two, the stutter wasn't going away. And I was getting into first grade in the second grade, I began to go to speech therapy. At that point, from what I recall was that I really couldn't talk that much.
Moe: And I was afraid to do so I was laughed at, in school, which made me even though I'm more naturally extroverted, I liked talking to people, being laughed at being made fun of made me just not want to talk and acquired me down a while. And I remember that feeling of just wanting to say things, but being too afraid to say them, the teacher asking a question in class first, second, third grade, knowing the answer to one thing to answer.
Moe: But it's not worth it. What if I say it's not worth the class laughing at me? I remember vividly, I think first grade, I just, I can picture it in my mind. The absolute horror, knowing that the teacher's going up and down the rows of the class to read something from the textbook. And it's going to be my turn soon, and there's not a chance in the world that I'm going to do it.
Moe: And what do I do and trying to strategize, how am I going to get out of this classroom? What am I going to do? I cannot read and choosing to go to the bathroom, but when do you choose to go to the bathroom? Can't be out for 30 minutes, maybe five minutes. So these are things that I remember in the early days.
Moe: And then I started speech therapy and speech therapy. I started with multiple therapists, I think initially I remember. When it was looked at as weight, too clinical, like I hadn't problem. Like they would just solve it. I remember going through a couple speech therapists early on and not really connecting with any of them and not feeling welcomed, not really feeling valued and.
Moe: There was something about it. Even as a young six, seven year old kid, it didn't work. I had another speech therapist afterwards, which I had for multiple years and of course the speech therapy. Then I was going to shopping malls and making phone calls and spending hours and hours, homework doing phone calls and recording these phone calls, at that age.
Moe: Throughout elementary school, sixth, seventh, eighth grade, early teenage years. Had you told me then that I'd be doing nearly anything that I'm doing today? I probably would have laughed at you. There was not a chance in the world that I'd be doing a webinar that I'd be speaking. First of all, that I'd be speaking that I'd be smiling.
Moe: That I'd be even an iota of trying to share a story with others that might maybe perhaps inspire somebody else. It was a living hell, how would my story inspire anybody? And I'd be married to a wonderful woman that had five beautiful young kids, great job. Like these are things that would not have seemed to be at all possible.
Moe: Agree.
Uri: So what if you could go back, what was that? What was that turning point? You write about it in your book. What kind of opened things up for you to take some steps forward and then make that shift to turn a corner? So I'll
Moe: tell you first a funny story. When I was about 14, I don't know why. I probably do know why actually I really wanted to be an actor.
Moe: It was like my dream to be in front of the camera. Now it probably just looked like a happy place to be, being an actor.
Moe: It seems shallow say that, but as a 13, 14, 15 year old kid, I just want it to be in movies. And I was way too afraid to get a speaking role, even though that was my real dream. So I finally convinced my mom to sign me up at a background agency, which meant I'd be an extra, I'd be the guy in the background of who knows what.
Moe: I remember my first role, I was like super excited. I got to skip school, being a movie and get paid for it. Three grade drinks altogether. So I began and being like many movies and television shows, and that was a great way to get started, to meet a lot of people. My big. My big. So to say my seven seconds of claim to famous, like being between Lindsay Lohan and Megan Fox for seven seconds.
Moe: And that was like my time to shine, but it was great to meet other big actors like Drake and Russell crone and celebrate. It was just, but when I got to see backstage without going through names is that many of my idols that I looked up to many of the starters, many people that I had, like just the most tremendous respect and even jealousy for they weren't.
Moe: Too happy Billy from the camera either. There was like a lot of, and I remember thinking wait, don't these guys have it all. Like they've got things. They could speak, like life skills. And that got me started on a deeper journey, not just a journey of how to speak a little bit more fluently because I was on that journey for awhile, but it was on a journey to discover happiness.
Moe: What can I do to be a happier person? What can I do to be. More comfortable in my own skin. This is who I am, my stutter, my family, my life, my bank account, where I'm from. These are things that I can't change. How can I become happier with who I am? And that led me down a more spiritual journey.
Moe: Even at that teenage years, 15, 16, 17. I wasn't exactly an all star kid. If there's a Q and a for us, happy to talk about this some more, but I went through about three or four high schools and I wasn't exactly doing all that great stuff. I was an angry, rebellious teenage kid in part due to my stutter and really being upset about it.
Moe: Not doing well in school and what I began to discover, which really helped me tremendously was an element of faith. Hey, I think about my one Hebrew name we call my name is Mo, but Mo is really short for one Hebrew name moshed Moses. And in my teenage years, I began to think more about my namesake, the Moses from the Bible, arguably the greatest teacher throughout history ever.
Moe: And I know that you and your dad have an amazing podcast. All about Moses. Moses had a stutter. Moses had the greatest teacher in history had sputter. He was a leader. He did some pretty cool stuff in his life. And I began to think, wait, like this stutters a part of who I am. This is a kicker, which I'll stress.
Moe: It I'll start. The stutter was something that I was hiding for years. I was too free to talk. I was too freaky. Where's that I'm out. I didn't want people to know I was too embarrassed by it. I would avoid situations. The inflection point at about the age of 16, 17 was recognizing that this is a part of who I am.
Moe: I stutter. It doesn't define me, but it's a part of me once I began to accept that reality, that my life includes a stutter. It's not going away. That's when I started to finally live life. I began to think, God, you gave this to me somehow. It's meant to be. I began to become more of a believer with more faith.
Moe: This isn't random. A part of my life's mission in whatever way is going to include this thing called a stutter, which helped me begin to embrace it. This is part of my package and my story and how can I lead life? With it, I'll tell you one quick story, which like helped drive this home at about the age of, I think I was like 16 or 17 and I took a break from life.
Moe: So to say, and I took a one month full on speech therapy program without going through the name. It was like full time one month. This is I'm going to get rid of my stutter. And it was like, school was like five, six hours a day of class and then five, six hours a day. But like homework, it was a full on full month.
Moe: And I was expecting this to just. Rid myself of the stuff. I was really excited cost of a lot of money and right towards the end of this course of literally putting my life on hold for a month. I still stuttered. And I remember sitting in my class with my speech therapist with Laurie and I just began to cry.
Moe: Cry. I was there. The other students left. I was there after I was just crying and crying, thinking to myself, I'm too old for it. Like I, I'm not a kid anymore. I can't do this anymore, but it's not going away. And this is my last attempt to get rid of this.
Uri: How old were you at that point?
Moe: I was like 16 or 17 years old at that point.
Moe: And I was just crying. What's my life going to look like I'm finishing high school on. I started going to college dating, like this is, this can't be anymore. And she reinforced what I had been believing more and more on face died. And she said, Oh, you're great at sport. Or do you do all these like lives?
Moe: You got all this stuff going on in your life. That's great. You also got a stutter. It's a part of who you are, but it doesn't mean it's a part of the package and you've got a great package begin to embrace it a little bit more. I remember sitting down and this is, I remember that conversation. This is going back many years.
Moe: And I remember that I remember walking out feeling like I might've just dropped, who knows how much money on this course, but what I took the most from this course. Was it nothing to do with the way that I speak, but it has everything to do with the way that I think, and that I'm going to start talking once again.
Moe: Again, combining that with faith of somehow this has meant to be, and this is who I am. I'm going to talk, or I wish we knew each other as a kid. Like when I was younger, I wish I'd gone to you or your dad, because I feel like I would've gotten this earlier. This element of embracing the stutter is Eleanor embracing myself, being happier with who I am, this whole notion of like vision of transcending, stuttering, something that I only start to grow into.
Moe: In my later teenage years, but this was a complete paradigm shift. I am going to live my life and you know what I started to do, I being more comfortable with myself, I started conversations with new people. My name is Mo I have a stutter. I just want to let you know that in advance. And if it would come up, that's my stutter.
Moe: Thanks for your patience. I appreciate it. It was in theme changer, game changer.
Uri: How remarkable, because you came to it at a certain time. And it's interesting because no one can push somebody to do something they're not ready to do. You could take the horse to the water, but you can't make them drink.
Uri: So I think so much of what people experience is other people are ready for someone to change. But the person isn't ready themselves. And I think that the beauty of that story with Laurie is like, she knew the right thing to put in front of you at the right time. And I think as parents and as educators and as therapists and as friends, we need to be thoughtful.
Uri: What does the other person ready for? So clearly that was the right thing for you. But then you say something that I hear often is I wish I knew this earlier, or I wish I had such and such therapist or experience or this or that now, obviously with a faith based. Foundation. We know everything that happens doesn't mean that everything that happens is good, but it's for the best.
Uri: And if it could be better, it would have been better. So obviously this has meant to be for you looking back what if you could look back and give that 12, 14, 16 year old self some message, some offering that you would have been ready to hear? What would it sound like? What would that encouraging message be?
Uri: That would be appropriate for that. Preteen or teen,
Moe: the thing about this a lot around, so thank you for asking. I can state now with confidence that if I could go back in time and choose, have a stutter or don't have a stutter.
Moe: I would choose to have a stutter. And I say that because I, in hindsight, and now with the way that I lead my life, I see my life being so much more meaningful. My personality traits, the sensitivity that I've developed to other people. The patients that I have with other people, which impacts the way that I'm a dad, a manager work in so many interpersonal things that I did the ability to see things and appreciate my blessings and appreciate other parts of me that others take for granted.
Moe: I see now with so much confidence, the person that I've become. It's a big result of that stutter. I also see the woman that I was blessed to marry. Also as a result, I know how intrigued she was by my ability to have adversity in my life, such as this, and to be happy. And we spoke about that. It's not like our second and our first or second date, because I was just like, you've got to know, I've got to start.
Moe: This is who I am. It's embarrass. It comes up. It's going to be a part of who I am. And her telling me that this is like she was more attracted to me because of my stutter, not in a weird way Oh, it's so cute. He can't say his own name, but in a way of that, my wife understood that she was looking for a life partner who would be able to face adversity.
Moe: With positivity to face the first city in a way that is going to help us grow through the experience and not hide from it because of life is going to include that in all of our lives. And I credit the way that I'm a dad also to so much of what I've done and you know what interestingly, and you can touch on it.
Moe: Is that the way that I'm talking right now? Because I stutter more often than this, but I've developed my passion for acting, as I told you about before, during my teenage years. Drama performance. The way I speak now on video is really ACTIC. I use my hands, the way my intonation of voice. I've learned almost how to sometimes circumvent that are in these conversations, but one-on-one, I do stuff much more.
Moe: I also found that at work, when I'm giving presentations to companies or meeting with investors, the way in which I've learned to speak. Almost in this more dramatic way to overcompensate for the stutter and to sometimes circumvent the stutter. Has actually helped me be a better presenter on stage professionally as well, which is wild.
Moe: And I've given talks to hundreds of people over a thousand people. And it's wild because again, I'm from a family of eight kids, nobody likes to public speak. I'm not from that kind of family, but this passion that I had to lead life and to find ways to do what I love to do with my stutter has helped and embedded in me different kinds of unique ways.
Moe: And it's wild to see that. When I was younger, of course, I didn't understand this, but what I would tell myself and what I would tell each of you listening, whether you yourself have a stutter, whether you're a speech therapist and you're working with clients that have a stutter parent of somebody stutters or somebody who's totally just randomly seeing this online on Facebook or somewhere else with no connection to stuttering.
Moe: The challenges that we have, I believe are 100% perfectly designed for us to help us become the greatest version of ourselves, if we can embrace that reality, that whatever it is that is included in our lives. Is there for us is not random and it's not even bad as hard as it is, but somehow use that to transcend it.
Moe: Not overcome it. I'm not using old cause we don't overcome the things with it, embracing it, learning how to grow through it. Life can become that much more meaningful. I can go back and tell myself anything when I was younger. I could tell any of you here in this video. Everything is really for the best.
Moe: And if we can embrace the reality that is in our lives, things that we don't decide, but that are clearly, they're a part of who we are
Moe: help us become significantly happier, not just in this far off destination in the future, this elusive destination that we don't even know what that's going to look like, but a part of the journey itself. The journey can become damaged. Beautiful tip.
Uri: Wow. There's a tremendous amount of resonance that I'm feeling, not just through the sound waves, but if you're resonating with this drop your likes, drop your comments, your questions Mo what you said and just listening to you.
Uri: It hits something very deep for me. Not only because of your passion, but the message is so universal. So it struck me was whether you have a faith based model or not, most of the most important things in life require a leap of faith. So when you're ready to get married, if that's something you're going to do it, doesn't add up on a spreadsheet.
Uri: You can't balance the columns that it's just compellingly, clearly everything is buttoned up. And if it is, I would question that as well, but it takes a little bit of, I think it's a good idea. We're going to, we're going to give it a go, having a child is not something that you do, statistically mathematically with an accountant.
Uri: It's a leap of faith that I have no idea how to raise a kid, but I think we can figure this out. So I think in a beautiful way, what you're saying is also really helpful because as a family of eight and for any parent out there, like you're looking at your kids and you want to line up, what's going to be the map for their success.
Uri: What's going to be the ramp. That's going to get them to launch to the life of sparing them, unnecessary hardship and getting them to a destination of great delight and success and satisfaction and meaning and connection. And I think it's fascinating to just think, as a younger person in a family of eight kids, the only one with a stutter here you emerge as this sought out international speaker and leader it's it's astonishing.
Uri: How so often things are non-linear they don't add up and they're not predictable, but the idea of leaning in, I was wondering if you could share what transcending stuttering means to you. I think we've reflected on that in our conversations. And I've thought a lot about it with my good buddy, Dan Greenwald, who, by the way, if you're a speech language pathologist today, Dan is giving an amazing workshop for speech language pathologists on the courage, muscle and story watch, which are very complimentary to Dan growing up with a stutter and how he like Mo got to a point where he realized it's a part of me.
Uri: And it might be less of an obstacle and more of a launchpad. So you were talking about, it's not a narrative of overcoming, but you used the word transcending. So what does transcending stuttering mean to you?
Moe: Thank you I'll answer with a story. But before that, I'd like to show you something that's very meaningful to me. So in the book that I wrote, it's called the gift of stuttering because at the entire, my, my mantra is really all about embracing the challenges in this instance, it's the stuttering, but it's really all the challenges in our life as a real gift.
Moe: In a faith based model. They're willing to see that in that beautiful way, but I was able to be blessed with having the current president, Joe Biden, sign this book as well. And, I gained so much strength realizing early on that there are those in the world who had significant challenges with their speech, but have gone on to do tremendous things in their lives.
Moe: And the people that we've become through the speech has helped us become those people, who we are. And I'll help shape this with just a story that happened with which blows my mind. Now I'm a dad We were swimming together with my kids. My son was running back outside from the pool.
Moe: He slipped and hit his chin on the stairs. Rushed him to the to the emergency area. He needed stitches on his Jennings about six years old and he was crying a lot. But he wasn't just screaming. When the doctor came at that big needle to give him the stitches. First, there's a big needle to freeze the area.
Moe: My son started to express mommy. Daddy, tell him to stop crying, to tell him to stop. I remember feeling like the worst person in the world can I possibly not told the doctor to stop so that they're in, was telling my son you're awesome. You're amazing. Don't get any, gotta know when you're done.
Moe: You're good.
Moe: I almost passed out myself from all that, but I was able to go the next day. I sat down with my son. I said, can I ask you a question yesterday? When a doctor is giving you the needle? And you bang me, you bed, mommy in the bed. Does that tell the doctor to stop? Let me explain something to you. The doctor needed to put this really big needle into your chin so that he could freeze up the entire area, which would then allow him to theory carefully put about six stitches in there to help your chin heal forever.
Moe: If he did not do that. It would be dangerous and you have a very big scar for the rest of your life. I know it was painful, but with that understanding, do you think that I should have told the doctor to stop? Should I have listened to you to tell the doctor to stop my six-year-old son? And he thought about it and he thought about it.
Moe: He said, no, I'm glad you did it. Tell the doctor and stuff. And after this episode, I began to think. In our lives. We all have these things too. I remember getting so upset about my stutter and screaming. I was taught there's something, some sort of something called a creator, God, higher power, whatever we call him.
Moe: And I was like, if you make this thing, stop painful. It's
Moe: wrong. And I've realized that just like my son, when he was getting his stitches, did not understand why he had to go through it, but he trusted us and he hugged us and we hugged him. And ultimately he knew that we would never do anything wrong to him. So to the more I've become faith based and deeply rooted in something that recognizes that everything really is for the best.
Moe: And I began to see that even when I'm crying and I'm begging for things to stop, because they're so hard. If they're not stopping, realizing they're ultimately for my best, the stutter for so many years. And now I can see how the person that I've become is really a blessing and a result of that pain. And with other challenges that I'm going through in life is full of challenges.
Moe: I'm going through challenges today. There are a lot of things that we go through in life, not just each, but ultimately that reality of appreciating and embracing that adversity, recognizing deeply that these things are meant to help us become the people that we are that can truly help us become so much happier and lead so much more meaningful lives.
Uri: So transcending stuttering, if you could capsulate it based on that story, which had me in tears, what would you, how would you frame that? You're the master of the craft
Moe: because it's transcending that challenge when we're going through pain. We're so focused on that pain. We're so focused on the suffering.
Moe: I'm not getting political, but right now in Israel, We're under barrage of rockets, my kids and I were in the bomb shelter the other day. Like it's really hard, it's it we're super full. There are so many things happening that it were. So in the challenge itself, we do not have the ability to see anything above how difficult and challenging life is.
Moe: If we can transcend beyond that specific struggle and see things as a part of a greater purpose. We may still feel that pain because it is painful. We're not avoiding reality, but we're transcending the initial gut reaction of feeling that pain. It is able to help us leverage that pain and drive it for a greater purpose than cost.
Uri: It reminds me of the classic story. Person walks down the hallway and they look in the little people, the room and they see another person and the person is leaning over the other guy. And the guy who's being leaned over is being pushed and prodded and yelled at. And the guy he's sweating bullets and he's in his turning red.
Uri: And the person looks at the people. Paul says, let's go rescue him. Versus, I don't know, he's actually paying for it. That's his coach. It's a gym. He wants to be pushed to his limits. He wants to sweat. He wants to feel sore when he's done, because when you feel soreness, that you're building muscle.
Uri: And I think it's unique, the Jewish, spiritual perspective that you're bringing has a universal application. For anyone of any orientation or any background, but I just want to highlight that the idea of taking a spiritual path here is not to suggest this is some sort of punishment from God, but rather it might be an unpleasant uneasy, uncomfortable, uninvited, really rough, really challenging ordeal.
Uri: But to recognize that somehow through that sweat, it's meant to build something. There's something that's going to emerge from this that needed some sort of it wouldn't have otherwise come into the world. So when someone, like you says that it always shakes me up. If I could go back and say what I want to have gone through this challenge or what I've wished to take a pass, which pill would I have taken if I could go back in time and they offered me the pill.
Uri: And I think there's also, it's fair to say. Some people have ambivalence and people have mixed feelings about that. But even the thought that we would choose in hindsight to choose, to have some hardship is such an encouraging message for any of us and all of us and each and every one of us is facing something.
Uri: We got the mountain that we got to climb. And for us, each one of us it's Mount Everest. And to realize in hindsight, you know what, I would accept that challenge again, because there was something that I got through the toil, through the grappling and wrestling with it. I think it's fascinating. I would love to ask you two questions.
Uri: One is you talked about how the persona that you have. In some ways was born out of, or strengthened and reinforced by the fact that you found out that when you were dramatic and really onstage in performance mode, the words actually came out with more ease. And then you actually, that may have helped you develop that into the public speaker, inspirational, passionate person that you're recognized for near and far, in any way, do you feel when you're doing that, do you feel like you're selling out? Like it's not really you, that it's a performance. That's not the authentic self because I just want to highlight a lot of people in therapy can learn and master clinicians can tell younger clinicians, it's not rocket science to help someone speak with what looks like fluency or to help someone whose horse suddenly have, a clearer sounding voice.
Uri: The magic is can you bring it into real life? And can you bring it into real life in a way that feels authentic and whole, and not in a way that feels plastic or forced or like they're selling out. And a lot of people on the other side who have different challenges in speech and hearing, they feel like, yeah, I could perform as if I don't have such and such difference.
Uri: I could do that. I could put on that suit, but it's not me. And every moment I'm doing it, the gain is the world is seeing what they want to see. But the cost, the tax I pay is selling out and not feeling like I'm me. I just want it to be me. So I was wondering when you were talking about that, if that's a piece that you feel is authentically part of you or there's a piece of you that feels like you're putting on a show,
Moe: deep question.
Moe: Very deep question. One of the very important things. After many years of speech therapy throughout my teenage years was that I didn't want to speak in certain ways. That really felt in authentic, in a sing song or in other kinds of things that just, I just, I didn't want to spend the rest of my life talking like that.
Moe: And one of the ways that started to help me a little bit was actually being more open with my stutter, talking about my stutter, much more in conversations. So that helped mitigate a little bit. Cause there was less thing anxiety around. What if I stutter? What's he or she going to think about me?
Moe: They already know that I stuck and that helped your question now is even beyond that. But sometimes when I do certain things to circumvent the stutter, sometimes when I give large lectures, I'll be open with the audience and I'll be like, ah, that at Javier for three seconds. That was me switching a word and changing it.
Moe: Cause I knew I was going to start. I'll be open about that sometimes, but it's become a part of what I do, but those who I'm close with and those that I'm, like I started with them, I started with them and it's a certain, it's a certain deep connection that we have that I. That stuttering really exists.
Moe: And of course, everybody has to find what works for them. Like I, it's a very personal thing. It's a very personal thing and what I do not do, and even why I hesitate doing a podcast like this is because I don't want any of you watching this to say Oh, it's easy for mode to say, cause now he's in his thirties and he's.
Moe: It's easy for him to say, cause he doesn't seem to be stuttering. Now that's my biggest concern, which is in the book. You don't hear any advice from me, how not to stutter. It's not a matter of how not to, I don't give advice on how to be more fluent. I don't. That's why I hesitate doing these videos because it's, it becomes funny sometimes the way that I.
Moe: That's
Uri: funny, just to explain the irony of talking about being open about stuttering and for so many people, the irony Ruben chefs, who we were privileged to spend a Shabbat together with Rubin. Ruben talked about this, the paradox that very often, when you're more open about something, anything in particular stuttering, the power of it, the strength of it, the manifestation of it actually physically goes down.
Uri: The toll it takes on you. It goes down. Of course you can't will yourself into that. You're grappling with I'm just going to accept it. I'm going to accept it and it's going to go away. You're going to go away. Okay. Except that you gone now, you're still here. You can't the paradox. And the other way around is the harder you try to hide it.
Uri: The more, it tends to push its way up to the surface. The
Moe: first, sorry, the first time I sat down with your dad, I remember this, there was a, it was on the upper West side. It was years ago. Phil is one of my greatest role models like everyone. So there was like the first time we sat down and I was like, Phil, I just want to say, you may have heard from early, I've got stuttered is I was like very old is who I am.
Moe: It's what I do. A little bit later, I was like trying to get a word out and I'm stuttering. There's my stutter. Just want him to come and introduce itself. And I remember your dad like just gave me like the greatest smile in the world. He was like you just made this entire conversation so much more comfortable.
Moe: Like the whole dynamic of being open about it, of expressing what it is that's going to happen. And of course for somebody who has less exposure to people who stutter the dynamic of encouraging that open conversation creates so much less awkwardness that might happen later on. So I still do this now with certain people, we're having a webinar now about this, but I really encourage.
Moe: And when people call me for advice I encourage this a lot to be open about the stutter. The more comfortable we are with ourselves and our stutter is the more comfortable other people become with it. Also, whether it's a date, a job interview, meeting new friends, going out the group of people, whatever it is, being able to be open about it.
Moe: Eases up so much of that tension. And then yes, hurry. As you're saying, sometimes people will stutter less, but the goal is not to stutter less. The goal is to be more comfortable speaking and being ourselves and whatever manifestations can come up. That is great. But that is really what I highly encourage, but I highly encourage, what happened?
Moe: I'm
Uri: sorry, please. No, just want to say we're joined by some really special friends. We don't always have. Our dear friends show them Goodman. Who's popping in some great questions and also of course, a bunch of other good friends and fans and family of yours. So drop your comments and your likes, especially if you want to hear more from Mo we're going to wrap up in the next few minutes, but maybe we'll be able to pack in a little bit more, but what Moe just shared was a truth bomb that is worth repeating.
Uri: And I think it's such a subtle. And sophisticated point, but it can be such a simple way to make such a massive difference, which is being open. Doesn't mean you allow yourself to be put down, being open means you allow, as my father said to Moe on the upper West side, To make things comfortable. You take away that glass wall, this unspoken elephant in the room.
Uri: In whatever way you can, in your own family, in your own community, in your own relationships, finding a way to be open is often a door opener. Not. When that puts you down, but when that actually opens things up I did want to ask you, since I am in the room sometimes, or I've heard you give a class that daily Talmud class, or stand up and give an important speech as you were completing the entire Talmud, a seven and a half year project of daily page at a time, and you get up there and you did some really impressive stuttering.
Uri: And I think for some people they'd never seen you stutter like that. And. I know that, that I take out the camera because of, I want to share it with your family so that you can have this for posterity or speaking at your child's breasts. And there's another part of me that always gets really excited when you actually stutter, because as you said, it's this weird thing that you talk about stuttering, but most people don't hear you stutter.
Uri: So I was just wondering, and you've given me permission to share that with certain people who find it very encouraging, because to know. That you get up there and that you still have those moments and there's sometimes very public. I was wondering if you could give us the inside story on that. What is that like for you this day, your mom or Nick, as you said, people look at you and they're like this guy's married, he's a father, he's got traction.
Uri: And of course we all have challenges and we're all evolving. But what would you share about the real inside story to the degree that you would be comfortable to share about that and how you deal with it?
Moe: I'm I'm you brought that up and what are you referring to for those of you that might be watching this a couple of months ago, I celebrated a seven and a half year completion.
Moe: Of studying one page of Talmud every day 2,711 pages of the Talmud that takes about seven and a half years. And I celebrated a big completion and I gave a talk which was supposed to be about 10 or 15 minutes. I think it took me over 30 or 40 minutes to get the words out. I, as early licensed, I stuttered really well.
Moe: It was a really good deep stutter, and I could have avoided it. I could have skipped the speech, made it shorter. There were things that I could have done to make that less. And I didn't. And
Moe: for me, If I was 15
Moe: and I was looking at somebody who was 34 and I saw that he's not just fluent. Always. I was told when I was younger and speech therapy also about these legends who somehow somewhere have a stutter, but like now they don't like, they don't really start her now. Now they're fine. It's okay, great to tell me all the great things that they're doing right now, but really they're good, I purposely often don't hold back his stutter. I don't pretend to stutter. That's an important point. I don't fake it to put on a stutter and that's conscious, but I also don't hold it back. And if any of you want to see that video or please feel free to share with anybody the
Moe: leading a happy length, loving the people that we are is one of our greatest challenges of society today. The degree of low, self-esteem what we do to ourselves, the way we scroll through social media. It's grant tick, talk to whatever other dozens of platforms that there are. Everybody seems to be leading a better life than we are, whether they're better looking, they have more money, their families, their trips, their jobs, everything.
Moe: The way we scroll through to everybody else's filtered lives. Our life always dims in comparison, and therefore I don't hold back. The star that allowed that to come out. And then others to catch a window into just how much this is a part of me in the challenging, in my challenges today. But to recognize that the smiles that we have and the meaning that we can incorporate into our lives with our families and with our professions, with our personal passions and hobbies, that it all can be included into one together with the struggles that we do have.
Moe: And I specifically there during that talk. And we'll allow that to come out and to shine. As I wasn't speaking in an overly dramatic way and make it raw. It was raw meat and authentic and totally uncut in a way in front of.
Moe: Huh. And if there's one message that I can really leave us all with, and I know that wasn't, this isn't like a package speech. I'm just trying to share some really meaningful thoughts as we end it's that every single one of us is designed in such a beautiful way. The package that we all have is really perfect for us.
Moe: Happiness is not an if when, but how, but it's a decision we can make today. To be happy with who we are with what we have right now with who we are with how we look with how we talk. It's not a, when if when and the older I get and the more people that I need that might on the outside, I look like they're super duper successful and popular and everything else.
Moe: They could be the least happy people that I know. And what continues to reinforce is the message to happiness is a decision that we have, if we can appreciate that life has meaning and purpose and everything we have is for a reason. And we're going to track we're doing what we're supposed to be doing, leading leading a meaningful life that we could be deeply happy with who we are while going through the struggles that we're going through.
Uri: I'm going to share something brief. And ask you to consider as I'm sharing, if you want to do a quick Encore with the story, if you have time. Yes. If not, we'll save it for another time, but I'll just share. If you have questions that were not answered in today's talk. If you have curiosities that were sparked by anything, anywhere throughout the entire world of better speech and hearing or anything to do with stuttering awareness and understanding and supporting and being an ally, you can go to Schneider speech.com/ask.
Uri: There's a form there. You can put your name in, or you can do it anonymously, ask any question you want. And we will try our best, both my father and I and the team and some of our esteemed guests to try to address those questions over the course of the coming days and months. So feel free to pop your questions there.
Uri: And if you're a speech, language, pathologist, or person who stutters checkout transcending, stuttering the podcast, also check out Schneider speech.com/tsa. You can sign up for free emails as well as cohort growing. Communities. I want Mo to just share what I think is one of the most incredible stories in the book.
Uri: And again, I just want to make a plug for the book from mosaic oppress. This manuscript is something extraordinary. It's something really special. And it's called the gift of stuttering. It's a book and it's no other, so moment it's book the gift of stuttering. This is one vignette from that book, but it's one of many.
Uri: So if you could just share that little vignette about your Oprah.
Moe: Sure. This ties up so much of what we've been talking about. As much as you hear me now, speaking, sometimes I have a certain command on the language of English. So while we're talking. Not only am I speaking more dramatically, but also I do word switching a lot.
Moe: I change words. I maneuver my way around with the words and I switched things all the time, which oftentimes can help me navigate to talks like this. For me though, speaking Hebrew is really challenging. I could technically speak. A lot of Hebrew, but I don't have as many synonyms that can roll off my tongue.
Moe: If I'm about to stutter, I don't have as much confidence in the language. And therefore, when I say certain things or speak in Hebrew, I'll stutter significantly more. This comes up a lot in Jewish circles. And specifically this comes up a lot in synagogue when reading at the Torah. Now I'll give you one quick story about this reality.
Moe: The Jewish version or really the Orthodox Jewish version of a bachelor party, right before we get married, the broom was like called up in the synagogue to make a big blessing. And then the guy reads from the Bible reads some verses from the Toro. I for years, and even during adult years, I did not want to ever get that blessing.
Moe: Even when you hear me talk like this, I would sometimes avoid going to synagogue or not going up or slipping out when they were reading from the torque is I did not want to get that blessing. Cause this is one I could give a talk in front of a thousand people in English, and then I'd go to synagogue and hide and not want to say that Hebrew blessing because I probably thought her a lot.
Moe: Anyway, it's just the dynamic that still exists today, but this was the big blessing that I was supposed to make right before I got married. And I decided I'm not going to avoid it. I'm getting married. I'll try to say that blessing. And I'll probably stutter, but like everything I worked up in my mind for years it's okay.
Moe: I'll just stop. Everybody's there. It's a big family event. My wife's family and my extended family. And it's every whole lot of people, they call me up to say this blessing over the Bible, over the Torah. Hands are sweaty. Palms are wet. I'm like shaking a little bit. And I go, wow.
Moe: Super nervous. I'm about to say the blessing. And right before we see the blessing, me look inside where the guy's about to read from in the Bible. And there are six Hebrew words right there that completely blew my mind was like the greatest prophecy that I've ever had in my life. And I think about it to this very day.
Moe: Yeah,
Moe: opened up the tour and showed me. And here's your Hebrew lesson for the day? The words were as follows. The
Moe: first four words were, and God said to Moses, you remember from earlier in the talk, my one Hebrew name is moshed, which is Moses, the first four words. And God said to Moses. What if we tell him two more words in Hebrew, Al Tiera in English, that means do not fear there. I am shaking at the Bible, worry that I'm going to stutter and people will laugh and it's going to be really embarrassing right before I get married and what's life going to be like, and God's message to me right there was do not fear I got you, but that did not mean.
Moe: That it was going to be easy. It did not mean it's going to be smooth because it was not easy. It was not smooth. And it's not easy today, nor is it smooth today, but do not fear means I've got you. I'm taking care of you. It's for the best there's meaning and purpose behind it. I do fear and I try to remind myself of this all the time.
Moe: With the stutter in other areas of life, if you really truly believe that there's meaning and purpose here in this world, that our lives are for some sort of big reason than we could possibly imagine. And we're being taken care of. And there shouldn't be any fear. There shouldn't be any worry. It could be hard and really hard and cause us to cry.
Moe: And it could be really difficult, but we shouldn't have fear. And that message sticks with me to this very day. And it's really the message. And thank you, Mary, for reminding me of the story to share it with you. Our T rod do not fear with the stutter and any other challenges that we're going through.
Moe: It's meant to be perfectly designed as a gift for us. The gift of stuttering, a gift for all of us to help us become the greatest people that each and every one of us are able to.
Uri: As always fuller and more inspired than I was before we started talking. And the reason I love that story is that it's a reminder for all of us and we're all living through challenging times. And as the Psalmist, David says, all of life is like a narrow bridge. And the important thing is not to fear, not to be driven by fear.
Uri: And as humans, Dan Greenwald loves to say, this fear equals opportunity. Many of us hit a point of fear. We turn around, we run away. That's that animal based part of us that runs away from things that are scary and things that might be dangerous. We certainly should take care of ourselves. But at the same time, when we hit a place where we feel some Pang of fear and it's not life-threatening, but it's the fear of exposure.
Uri: It's the fear of this is the frontier of my comfort zone. To really remind ourselves that at the edge of our comfort zone is where we face our fear and we can open the door of opportunity to go through the other side. So I love that story from a faith-based point of view, from the timeliness of looking at the world and seeing the messages, and certainly looking back into the past and seeing how everything has been lined up that in the moment we probably didn't like it.
Uri: We didn't want it. We didn't get it. It made no sense. It felt like someone was out to get us. I hope for all of us, that we have the courage and that we have the support, whether it's a friend, whether it's a professional guide, whether it's a community or all of those things, to just stay strong and stay the course and be yourself.
Uri: And ultimately the world will love you. And we need to get your wife on next time because the story of her being endeared to you. Through that authenticity where you thought it might've been a knock against you, it actually became an asset. I think it's so beautiful. So hello to all of the friends that are watching, please give your likes and your shares.
Uri: This has been one of the most Epic and enjoyable conversations yet, and I look forward to many more with you and our entire audience. So drop a like and subscribe on transcending, stuttering, the podcast. And we look forward to speaking soon and maybe we all share good news health. And safety and wellness individually and collectively around the planet.
Uri: Blessings to all.