The Classically Abby Podcast - January 09, 2023


Ep 1 ｜ I'm Not Judgy, I'm Looking Out For You.


Episode Stats


Length

42 minutes

Words per minute

159.01933

Word count

6,817

Sentence count

438

Harmful content

Misogyny

44

sentences flagged

Toxicity

2

sentences flagged

Hate speech

29

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In this episode of Classically Abide, I introduce the concept of the podcast and give a brief overview of what you can expect moving forward. I also talk about how the show will be divided up into two segments: Classic Living and Faith Talk.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 Hello, Classic Crew, and welcome to the first episode of the Classically Abbey podcast.
00:00:15.040 I'm so excited to be recording here and doing it for the first time completely unedited. So
00:00:21.720 if you don't know, usually on YouTube, you're able to just kind of talk and if you make mistakes,
00:00:26.140 then you'll re-record things and you'll edit them. And it's very different than just sitting
00:00:31.760 and talking and knowing that you can't cut anything out, which is stressful for a YouTuber.
00:00:37.680 It's just like a new thing that we're doing here. And I'm very excited about it, but I'm also kind
00:00:43.160 of nervous. So we'll see how it goes. Welcome to my kitchen. That's where we're filming. I hope you
00:00:49.020 like this background. Who knows if it will change, but that's where we're starting out. And I wanted
00:00:54.080 to tell you guys a little bit about what this podcast is going to be. So this podcast centers
00:00:58.560 on classic living and traditional values, navigating the modern era as a traditional woman, as well as
00:01:04.760 conversations with other people in this space. So I'm going to be kind of alternating episodes
00:01:11.080 where I will be doing my own content, which I will describe in just a minute, kind of the segments
00:01:17.340 that we're going to do over here, as well as interspersing those with episodes where I interview
00:01:23.200 women and men who are in this space and who kind of want to talk about traditional values
00:01:28.260 and all of the stuff that we like over here at Classically Abbey. So I'm really excited
00:01:32.760 about that. This podcast gives strength to the women who reject the modern narrative of womanhood 0.95
00:01:38.560 and instead embrace real femininity. So that's the concept of the podcast. I'm really glad you're
00:01:45.580 here. And before we get further into today's episode, if you aren't already subscribed to my podcast,
00:01:51.520 make sure to subscribe so that you can get updates every time I post a new episode. And if you aren't
00:01:56.600 subscribed to my YouTube channel, make sure to subscribe and hit that notification bell. So I'm
00:02:01.120 very excited to have you here. I probably have said excited like 15 times. I need to relax.
00:02:08.980 One other thing I want to mention is I would love if you would consider heading over to my
00:02:13.040 sub stack where you will get access to a ton of exclusive content, including my weekly exclusive
00:02:17.880 articles, my book club, my movie club, and submitting questions for this podcast. So I used to do a
00:02:25.180 live stream Q&A on my YouTube channel, but I recently decided what I'm going to do kind of to
00:02:31.060 replace that is if you are a premium subscriber on my sub stack, which is only $7 a month or $70 for
00:02:37.940 the year, which means you get two months for free, then you can submit questions. And each episode,
00:02:43.020 I will respond to a couple of questions from you all. So it's a really great deal. We have a really
00:02:49.480 great community of women over there, and I think you'll really love it. So go ahead and check it 1.00
00:02:53.800 out. It's classicallyabby.substock.com. So let me tell you a little bit about how the show is going
00:03:00.840 to be divided up. So every episode, we will start off with an intro where we catch up. It's kind of my
00:03:07.200 version of the scoop. If you follow me on YouTube, you'll know I've done episodes of something called
00:03:12.220 The Scoop, where we just kind of chat about what's going on in the world, what's going on in our lives,
00:03:15.680 stuff like that. Then I'm going to follow that up with the main portion of the episode. That might
00:03:21.460 be something regarding classic living. It might be regarding something about motherhood. It might
00:03:26.240 be something that's going on in the zeitgeist, but it's going to be kind of the bulk of the episode.
00:03:32.360 Then we're going to move on to our faith talk. So I haven't done quite a lot of this on my channel,
00:03:38.920 and I miss doing it. I've done it before, but not as much as I would like to. And now we're going to
00:03:44.600 bring that back into focus. So I am a religious Jew, in case you didn't know that. And I really
00:03:50.980 like talking about faith and our journeys and our relationship to God. So this week, at least,
00:03:58.500 and we'll see how it goes moving forward, we're going to go off of the Torah portion or the Parsha.
00:04:04.260 And you'll see where we go with that. And then lastly, we'll finish off with subscriber questions
00:04:09.920 and answering questions from those premium subscribers on my sub stack. So that's what
00:04:14.240 you can expect from each episode. And then on the episodes where I'm interviewing people,
00:04:19.880 then there might be kind of shortened versions of the intro. The main portion would be the interview,
00:04:25.560 and we might skip the faith talk. But at the end, we would do a subscriber question
00:04:29.800 that I would pose to the interviewer, and we would discuss it together. So that's going to be
00:04:35.400 pretty great. And as you can see, I've got my laptop in front of me, so I can reference all of
00:04:40.020 my notes because it's a little different doing a podcast. I hope that this is something you guys
00:04:46.360 enjoy. It's a little bit different for me. So let's get into it. First thing I want to talk about
00:04:53.720 is what the main topic of today is going to be, which is why I encourage women to be classic. 1.00
00:05:00.520 So I talk about being classic all the time. And what I mean when I talk about being classic,
00:05:06.240 I want to kind of explain that a little bit. But why do I encourage it? Why is it so important?
00:05:12.440 So many people get offended when you kind of tell them that there's a better way to live,
00:05:18.260 and they think that it's coming from a place of judgment. And I'm here to explain why it isn't.
00:05:23.360 So that's going to be the main portion of today's episode. But if you like the podcast and you're
00:05:31.140 enjoying it, make sure to share it with your friends and family. So let's get into the life
00:05:35.820 updates. If you're new here, I'm married with a nine-month-old baby. I will be married for
00:05:42.020 five years in May, which is crazy. I can't believe time has flown by that quickly. And my son is the
00:05:49.860 cutest. We call him Mr. Baby over here. What will we call him when he gets older? I don't actually
00:05:55.620 know. Mr. Boy, perhaps. Especially as we have more children, then that baby will be Mr. or Mrs. Baby.
00:06:05.880 And we'll have to kind of figure out the names for what we call him and them. So if you didn't know,
00:06:14.120 I also keep the identity of my baby under wraps. I mean, I don't show his face on social media and
00:06:20.120 I don't use his name because he didn't consent to it. And also the internet is a terrible place
00:06:25.360 and people hate me a lot, so they don't need to hate my son. So I decided not to share that
00:06:30.460 information. So that's why I call him Mr. Baby. But I love being a mom and I love being a wife.
00:06:36.000 I used to be a professional opera singer. If you didn't know that, that's where partly why I chose the
00:06:42.380 name Classically Abby because I was a classically trained opera singer. And I moved away from that
00:06:47.460 partly due to COVID. That just kind of stopped a lot of the performing stuff that was going on in
00:06:54.780 the world. But even before COVID, it wasn't going to be my full-time career because I wanted to be
00:07:01.120 able to devote my time to my family. And being an opera singer is really not conducive to that.
00:07:07.100 You're traveling all the time. You're just away from your family. And it's just too hard.
00:07:12.380 And I didn't want that. So I ended up doing content creation, talking about the stuff that
00:07:17.860 I'm really passionate about. I feel that this is my mission to talk about classic living and
00:07:23.840 traditional values and modern femininity and helping women find their place in this world
00:07:30.880 that's telling them all of the things that they should be doing that will only lead them down a
00:07:34.940 path of unhappiness. I've been a content creator for about three years now. And that's kind of my
00:07:41.840 background. So one of the things I want to mention today, if you're watching, is my hair.
00:07:49.080 So I used hot rollers today. I've been trying to figure out kind of my daily schedule. Because
00:07:57.340 let's be honest, having a routine with a baby is very difficult, especially because babies change and
00:08:03.660 grow so quickly that as soon as you get used to one rhythm, everything changes and that rhythm is
00:08:09.320 no longer relevant. So Mr. Baby crawls like crazy nowadays. And he is just getting into everything.
00:08:17.580 So trying to even sit down to do my makeup, do my hair and film is the whole process. It's almost
00:08:23.880 impossible. So I just recently had a discussion with my mom because she comes over and helps for
00:08:30.260 about an hour every day and said like, OK, here's what we can do to actually make this time the most
00:08:36.460 effective. And so I sat down this morning and I decided that hot rollers were probably the easiest
00:08:41.340 and most effective way to get my hair done quickly so that I can sit down and film. Well, this is what
00:08:46.920 we're left with. I'm feeling very, very Texas. So I'm not I'm not mad at it. I like it. But it's
00:08:54.320 it's pretty intense. And I showed it to my husband. He was like, yeah, you look like you belong in Texas,
00:08:59.200 but I like it. So that's where that's where my hair is at. I film facing my pool. So that's reminding
00:09:07.800 me that we just got our pool fence installed. And that was a great move. Right. Because if you have
00:09:13.080 little ones, it's very dangerous to have just an open pool. You don't know if you can always keep
00:09:18.440 eye on your children. You want to make sure that they're safe. And for us, since we host a lot of
00:09:22.780 meals on Sabbath, we wanted to be able to host them in our backyard at our table. But when people
00:09:29.400 come over with their little kids, they can't really just relax because the kids could have
00:09:33.820 like a dangerous situation. So we just got this pool fence installed. We're very excited about it.
00:09:38.160 It's not the most beautiful thing in the world because what pool fence is, but it is also really 0.82
00:09:42.340 helpful just to allow us to relax with our friends. And that's really the most important thing.
00:09:46.380 Another fun thing that happened this week. I had my siblings over last night and we played
00:09:53.400 Jackbox, which was a lot of fun. So I don't know if you've heard of Jackbox TV. I think you can get
00:09:59.100 it on a few different gaming services. It's party games that you play on your phone and everybody
00:10:06.500 kind of uses their phone as a notepad or a template or something like that. And we played some games.
00:10:12.960 It was really fun. We had a great time. And I recommend checking out Jackbox TV if you are
00:10:20.020 interested in something like that. We love board games. We love party games, things you should know
00:10:24.840 about us. We love all sorts of games. So if you like strategy games, we like those. If you like
00:10:30.900 party games, we like those. And Jackbox is just one of those really easy party games.
00:10:36.700 So last but not least, my husband and I took a trip to Miami just recently between
00:10:42.940 Christmas and New Year's. And we learned some interesting things. And maybe I'll do a future
00:10:49.040 podcast episode on this about how to travel with someone who maybe you don't necessarily 100% agree
00:10:57.400 on your travel style. So some people love to like run out and go and see absolutely everything that
00:11:05.080 they can in a new location. And some people like to relax and just kind of do a beach vacation.
00:11:10.080 And some people enjoy the feeling of living in a new place, not touring in a new place,
00:11:17.180 but living in a new place. So I'm pretty flexible when it comes to how I take vacations. I probably
00:11:23.540 could enjoy any vacation that I took. So if it was like a touring vacation, I might like that. If it
00:11:29.020 was a beach vacation, I might like that. But my husband very much enjoys the third kind, where you feel
00:11:35.440 like you're living in an area where you don't get in your car to drive anywhere. You just get a hotel
00:11:40.500 and you or an Airbnb and you enjoy where you are. You walk around, you get to know your favorite cafe
00:11:47.120 if you're there for three or four days. Like it's just like you're living there. And it took us a day
00:11:52.900 or two to remember that because it had been such a long time since the two of us and now Mr. Baby
00:11:59.060 had gone on a trip together that we almost didn't remember what our travel styles were.
00:12:06.120 And so by the end of the first couple of days, we were both a little bit grumpy, just thinking like,
00:12:12.320 why are we not having as good of a time as I know we could? And once we realized, oh, it's because
00:12:17.200 we're not doing the travel style that we enjoy together, then we were able to shift our plans
00:12:25.320 and say, okay, so we're going to cancel these like long drives we have planned, these tours that we
00:12:30.300 want to go on. And instead, we're going to just hang out around this neighborhood. And we ended up
00:12:38.100 having an amazing time. So if you are like struggling with the travel, with traveling with someone you love
00:12:47.160 and you want to have a good time, but it's just like not really working, consider having a discussion
00:12:52.120 about how to make that better. Because it may be that one of you is having a great time because
00:13:00.280 you enjoy the sort of vacation you're on while the other person is totally not into that kind
00:13:04.660 of vacation and is feeling like it's a waste of time. So have a discussion and then maybe you'll
00:13:10.080 be able to figure out how to make the most of your trip. So that was just, I didn't mean to give a
00:13:15.480 piece of advice. It was usually I'm like just kind of catching up and telling you things, but I felt
00:13:20.100 like that was relevant. So now let's get into the main portion of today's episode, which is why I
00:13:27.000 encourage women to be classic. So often, as I mentioned earlier, people think when I'm talking
00:13:33.980 about being classic, that I'm coming from a place of judgment, that I judge people who aren't classic, 0.98
00:13:40.280 that I sit over here and go like, you're dumb for not doing what I'm doing. That's wrong. The truth is 0.99
00:13:48.160 when I'm talking about being classic, it comes from a place of wanting people to be happy. I know that
00:13:56.260 that's almost hard to picture, but really when I'm talking about being classic, it's because I know
00:14:01.240 that being classic and maintaining traditional values leads people to live happier lives and be,
00:14:09.200 have more meaning, have more purpose. The truth is that women have gotten more anxious and more
00:14:15.180 depressed since they have lost their meaning and purpose. I feel really passionately about this.
00:14:20.600 I read this article and I'm going to, I know what I'm going to do if I, oh gosh, I forgot to mention
00:14:25.300 my hard drive with all of my work on it has been broken by Mr. Baby pulling it down from where it sits.
00:14:32.680 So I have to try and get all of my information off of it. But on that hard drive is an article
00:14:39.320 that I am really passionate about because I've, it's written by a colonel. It was written in like
00:14:45.680 the fifties or sixties. And I think it was written in the sixties because it was post sort of like the,
00:14:51.220 it was the beginning of, of feminist ideology starting to pervade women's ideology. And the 0.98
00:14:59.960 interesting thing about that article is that it really talks about how women have been divorced
00:15:08.640 from their meaning and purpose as wives and mothers. And because of that, there are more
00:15:14.000 anxious and more depressed because they don't have the clear picture of what they are for.
00:15:20.820 So as we've told women that motherhood and being a wife is just kind of like a choice,
00:15:27.040 something that you don't have to do that some people want to do, but it's just like
00:15:30.400 something that's been forced on you by the patriarchy. And really your meaning comes from
00:15:34.280 everything else. Women have actually gotten more anxious and more depressed because 0.99
00:15:38.500 they're making bad choices that are leading them away from the choices that would give them
00:15:42.980 meaning and purpose and fulfillment. The truth about it is that as women have, here's the real
00:15:52.740 thing, right? There's a very small percentage of women, 1%, 2% that don't actually want children, 1.00
00:16:03.740 that don't want to have children, that don't want to get married, that are happier doing something
00:16:10.000 else. But the narrative is that half of women want that. That like you, it could be a 50-50 shot with
00:16:18.720 you, that perhaps you will want those things, perhaps you won't. That is the biggest lie that feminism 0.93
00:16:26.400 has told women. That it's like, maybe you'll want those things, totally incorrect. 99% of women want those 1.00
00:16:37.420 things. And when we give women this picture of like, oh, well, you'll see, it really leads women down a path 0.99
00:16:45.700 of making poor choices, making bad decisions that make those huge, important life goals of being a wife 1.00
00:16:54.360 and being a mother more difficult to come by. As you are putting all of your energy into a career that
00:17:03.340 may preclude you meeting the right guy, or may preclude you having children, you are really ending
00:17:12.380 up making choices that are pushing you away from the things that you need to do to feel good about
00:17:18.520 yourself. And not only good about yourself, but have purpose in your life. I'm not saying that careers can't
00:17:26.640 be fulfilling. But they are not going to bring you ultimate fulfillment. Right? I love my job. I love what I do.
00:17:37.820 It brings me meaning and purpose. And I really, really like it. But if I had to choose between this job
00:17:46.420 and being a mother or being a wife, this job wouldn't even come close. And the problem is,
00:17:55.720 is that we've positioned it like, oh, they're equal. If you are super successful in your career,
00:18:03.560 you may not need to be a mother and a wife. And it's just incorrect.
00:18:08.760 One of the things I've been thinking about is when we make being a mother and a wife a burden
00:18:19.620 rather than a gift, then women had to find their meaning in other places. Right? And when I say 1.00
00:18:26.180 that being a mother and a wife is a burden, that is not an exaggeration. We're talking about Betty
00:18:30.440 Friedan. We're talking about The Feminine Mystique. That's the book that she wrote. And in that, in this
00:18:37.060 ideology, feminists told women that men get to go to work. They get to leave the house where you have to 1.00
00:18:43.640 stay chained, back at home, raising the children. Instead of saying men don't get to work, men have to work. 0.75
00:18:53.620 Right? The picture that we have in 2023 and when the show came out, I don't remember the exact year,
00:19:02.840 but I'm thinking of Mad Men. Right? Mad Men is the exact picture of like what feminists think was 1.00
00:19:10.660 wrong with the 1950s. Right? Men get to go to work. They get to have a party. They get to sleep with
00:19:14.720 their secretaries. And the women are home alone, depressed, raising the kids. That is false. That is
00:19:23.280 not real. Men have to work to support their families. Now, does that mean that the men,
00:19:29.860 that all men hate their jobs? No. But if men had the opportunity to stay home with their kids and
00:19:34.840 their wives, I think a lot of them would love to do that. I mean, look at kind of how things have 1.00
00:19:41.360 played out since COVID. We have many, many people choosing to work remotely because they'd rather be at
00:19:48.380 home. And men have to work, not get to work. Women have to get to, women get to take care of the 1.00
00:20:02.020 children and take care of their homes. And some of them get to do some work as well. And all of this
00:20:09.240 is a grass is always greener thing of like, I'm sure some men look at their wives and think, oh, 0.99
00:20:15.140 I wish that I got to stay at home and take care of the kids all day. And some women look at their 1.00
00:20:18.740 husbands and think, oh, I wish I got to go to work. But the truth is that we have different roles.
00:20:25.140 Now, those roles can change in specific situations, but generally women would like to be at home with 1.00
00:20:30.900 the kids, even if we're told that like it's a prison. As Betty Friedan wrote, women who adjust as 0.96
00:20:39.460 housewives who grow up wanting to be just a housewife are in as much danger as the millions
00:20:45.700 who walked to their own death in the concentration camps. They are suffering a slow death of mind and
00:20:51.600 spirit. Yeah. I mean, this is where so much of this feminist ideology started. So all of these 1.00
00:21:01.220 feminists who say, no, it's all about what women want to do. If a woman wants to stay at home, 1.00
00:21:07.880 then she can. If a woman wants to go to work, then she can. 1.00
00:21:13.300 They don't really think that. They don't really think that. They think that we live in a patriarchy,
00:21:20.260 that women are constantly victims and men are constantly oppressors. And there's no way to 0.88
00:21:26.780 break out of that. And if women had the opportunity to go to work, they would. But women have to be with 1.00
00:21:33.540 their kids. No. Women get to be with their kids. I think the reason I'm talking about all of this
00:21:42.840 is because as we encourage women away from those choices that will bring them joy and happiness and 1.00
00:21:51.680 goodness to their lives, we're also leading them away from making the choices that would bring them
00:22:04.240 ultimate happiness and joy. I think being classic is important. And the reason I tell women to be 0.97
00:22:13.300 classic because I want to see them be happy. Okay. So now I think we have a question here of how do
00:22:30.360 women find meaning and fulfillment before they have children and get married? This was something I 0.66
00:22:37.380 struggled with as I was talking about, you know, the two things that I always talk about for women
00:22:42.380 is being a wife and being a mother. Now, again, I don't think that you can't work. I just think you
00:22:47.320 have to have your priorities in line. And I think you have to understand what comes first. I think that
00:22:53.520 one of the things that gets me is women who talk about going to work rather than being at home with 1.00
00:23:00.600 their kids if they had the option. There are women who have to work because they need to help support 1.00
00:23:05.120 their families. And then there are the women who want to work. And so they hand off their kids to 1.00
00:23:13.600 someone else that I'm not, I'm not as much a fan of. I think that women, if they have the choice to 0.99
00:23:19.360 be at home and can be at home, they should be, they should be at home with their, with their kids.
00:23:24.880 Now, if their kids are in school, then great, use that time and work. But if your kids are at home,
00:23:31.880 then what are you doing by choosing to do something rather than raise your children? The ultimate,
00:23:39.760 the thing that's of ultimate importance.
00:23:46.840 But women who are not yet married and who don't have children yet, they still have value. I did a whole 0.75
00:23:53.420 video on my YouTube channel about this. They're still really important. So what do they do well
00:23:59.940 before that happens? How do they find meaning and fulfillment? Through constant bettering and
00:24:07.760 improvement of themselves. And by spending time with friends at that same era of life.
00:24:14.360 By moving toward a goal, but also appreciating where they're at. I think we often, if you,
00:24:21.260 if you tell people that they need to be working towards something, they have to like, in their
00:24:25.940 heads, hate the place that they're at. And that's just wrong. You can say, I'm happy where I'm at.
00:24:34.180 And also I'm going to make choices that will eventually lead me to where I want to go.
00:24:41.400 So there's very much meaning and fulfillment and joy to be had before you have children and before you
00:24:48.140 get married. But you have to make the choices that will lead you in the best direction. And that's
00:24:53.000 why I tell women to be classic. Because if they don't line up things in the right way to bring them 1.00
00:25:02.920 towards those things that they're aiming for, then they're going to end up not getting the things
00:25:09.600 that they truly need and want. One of the things I don't like about this ideology, this feminist 0.99
00:25:18.980 ideology is that as soon as women are put in the position of having to choose between motherhood 0.99
00:25:23.340 and work, they feel guilty when they realize that motherhood is more important to them than keeping up
00:25:28.980 with the feminist narrative. There's a reason that women make less than men. And it's not because 0.99
00:25:35.860 there's a wage gap. It's because women choose to do different jobs or let or not work. Women choose 1.00
00:25:44.520 to be at home with their kids. But then, and I've talked to so many friends like this, and I struggled
00:25:50.480 with it. There's a feeling of guilt that you're not being a girl boss. And instead, you're just you're just 0.97
00:26:00.100 being a mom. That's a really poisonous worldview and outlook that we've put on women. 1.00
00:26:11.780 So at the end of the day, being classic brings contentment because you love what you were made
00:26:19.740 for and you make choices in line with your purpose. And that's a beautiful thing. So that's why I
00:26:26.660 encourage women to be classic. That's why I encourage women to embrace their femininity and 1.00
00:26:31.060 why I encourage people to engage with traditional values and have traditional values because traditional
00:26:37.420 values are built around how people work, how people are built. They're built around how people
00:26:46.060 are built. But what I mean is traditional values are traditional for a reason in the sense that they've
00:26:52.380 lasted so long because they work. Because people were meant to be that way.
00:27:01.500 So with that all in mind, let's move into our faith talk for today. So our faith talk for today is going
00:27:10.540 to be around the Torah portion, which is called in English He Lived. In Hebrew, it's parashat
00:27:17.700 Vayechi. This is the last parasha of Bereshit of Genesis. And I personally love Genesis. I love our
00:27:27.680 forefathers. I love Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. I love our foremothers. I love all of the stories
00:27:34.860 because the characters and the people in the Bible are just so real. Nobody's perfect. They are all real
00:27:44.040 human beings who make real mistakes, who deal with real tragedies and real struggles, just like we do.
00:27:51.140 And they're there for us to learn lessons. They're not supposed to be people that we look up to and
00:27:56.800 say like, well, they were perfect and I'll never reach that. We're supposed to look up to our ancestors,
00:28:02.840 to the people who created our faith, who were there at the beginning and everything,
00:28:07.520 to see how we can learn from them and grow. So in this parasha, in this Torah portion,
00:28:17.120 Jacob is dying and he calls Joseph to him and he has him bring Manasseh and Ephraim,
00:28:25.420 Manasseh and Ephraim in Hebrew. And he gives them a blessing. But if you remember,
00:28:32.360 he crosses his hands or at least puts his right hand on the younger sibling and his left hand on
00:28:40.300 the older sibling. So he gives the firstborn blessing to the younger sibling, which is a repeat 0.98
00:28:47.400 of what happened with him, where Isaac gave the younger brother, Jacob, the firstborn blessing.
00:28:57.060 And after that happens, he kind of gives the 12 tribes their stories of like what's going to happen
00:29:09.880 to them and what they hold, what their futures hold. So following that, Jacob dies. He's brought to
00:29:21.540 Israel to be buried and to Canaan at the time. And the brothers come to Joseph and they say,
00:29:31.100 please forgive us for what we did. Please don't hold it against us. If you remember, the brothers
00:29:35.700 sold Joseph basically into slavery, and then he ended up rising the ranks in Egypt. And Joseph says,
00:29:41.060 of course, I'll forgive you. And then Joseph himself dies. And that's the end of the first book of the Torah.
00:29:48.300 But what's so interesting about the Torah and Genesis is the sibling rivalries, the marriages,
00:29:59.800 the relationships with the children and between them. We see so much family strife, right? We've got
00:30:08.080 Esau and Isaac. We've got Jacob and then his story with Rachel and Leah.
00:30:18.300 Right? That's the marriages that he has to deal with. And then Bilhah and Zilchah as well. They're
00:30:23.500 handmaids. We have, you know, Ishmael and Isaac. We have, or rather it's Esau and Jacob, excuse me,
00:30:35.800 from before. But what's so interesting about it is that so much of the story of the Torah shows
00:30:43.820 family strife and that it's simply built into the structure of the world, the way that these families,
00:30:54.020 even from the very beginning are built, are built to have these, these family struggles.
00:31:01.940 Siblings are not getting along. Younger children get firstborn rights. Marriages are not going smoothly 0.98
00:31:13.400 and uncle relationships don't work out well either. There's quite a bit of struggle that's built into
00:31:23.220 and baked into the Torah. And as people who are traditional and who look to marriage as such an
00:31:31.180 important part of our lives, we might think when things are stressful between spouses or when things
00:31:39.020 are stressful within families, you know, parent to child, that we're doing something wrong or that
00:31:47.600 we're failing or that this isn't a godly, a godly way of approaching our families.
00:31:58.280 But if you look to the Torah, you'll see that that's not the case.
00:32:05.340 If you're struggling with that, it doesn't make you a worse Christian or a worse Jew. It just means you
00:32:12.220 are going through the same things our forefathers did. And you also have to navigate it.
00:32:17.600 And luckily, you have a blueprint for kind of how to do it or what not to do.
00:32:24.040 The people in the Torah are just that. They're just people.
00:32:28.180 They aren't any more than we are or any less. Now, of course, in some ways they are more, but
00:32:33.580 they're also just humans. And yet we learn from them and look up to them because they did amazing
00:32:40.360 things despite also going through trials and tribulations and making mistakes.
00:32:44.600 It's important for us to know that God understands your familial struggles because he created the
00:32:51.960 world in this way from the very beginning. Families are not supposed to be perfect.
00:32:59.780 We can strive for goodness. We can strive for perfection. And I put that in quotes.
00:33:06.660 But even from the very beginning, that wasn't the way things were built. People don't always get
00:33:14.540 along. People don't always make the choices we would hope they would. And that is part of being
00:33:23.400 alive, is navigating these relationships that are so absolutely important.
00:33:29.420 But it doesn't make it worse. It doesn't make you a bad person to have those struggles in your life.
00:33:42.180 Just makes you part of the way that God created the world.
00:33:48.160 So you're not alone. And I don't even mean from the sense of you're not alone because there are other
00:33:53.860 people you know who are going through it. I mean it in the sense of you are not alone because God
00:34:00.100 built this in, like he baked it into our world. He baked it into the way things work.
00:34:07.200 So it's up to us to work through that, but it's also up to us to understand that it's okay when we're
00:34:12.780 going through it.
00:34:13.340 So that is it for our faith talk. But let's hop into our last segment for today, which is our
00:34:22.980 subscriber questions. So let's start with this question. How do you feel about stay-at-home
00:34:30.820 husbands if the woman's job allows them to be more than financially stable? 1.00
00:34:35.460 I would say that when it comes to kind of who goes to work and who stays home,
00:34:48.260 you always have to understand that the most important question is how is the family going
00:34:54.420 to be provided for? If that means that the mother is the one working and the father is the one at home, 0.81
00:35:00.900 that's okay. That's how I grew up. My dad was a stay-at-home dad and my mom worked and that was
00:35:07.220 how our family needed to be structured. But if that doesn't have to be the case, if there's a situation
00:35:13.800 in which the husband could make enough for the family to survive and do well and the mom could stay
00:35:22.460 at home, then that, in my opinion, is the ideal situation. I think it's generally better to have
00:35:29.220 the mom at home for everybody's sake in the sense that women like to be at home with their kids. 1.00
00:35:34.960 They enjoy their children. And fathers, I think a lot of men need to feel like they're providing
00:35:41.840 for their families. And the children benefit from having a mom who's home. So if you can make that
00:35:51.420 work, I generally try to advise people towards that direction. But if that's just simply not going to
00:36:00.700 happen and that's not the case, then you have to do what's going to provide for your family.
00:36:05.480 So if the woman's job allows the family to be more financially stable, 1.00
00:36:12.160 then maybe she needs to work and the husband can stay home. 1.00
00:36:16.840 But I would say in any other case, having the mom at home is a better situation if it can be managed. 0.80
00:36:28.620 Next question is, as a new mom to two and a working mom, I'm struggling with what I thought
00:36:34.220 this journey would look like and what it is. I am loving my babies and I'm struggling with the fact
00:36:39.680 that I have to work. I work two days out of the home and one day from home. I am luckier than so
00:36:46.140 many people. I currently have a nanny for two days. I still feel so torn. I feel like I'm never fully
00:36:53.200 present as a mom because there is always work to do. I'm a professor, work never stops. And at work,
00:36:59.040 I feel bad I'm not with my babies. Logically, I know that good children have been raised and raised
00:37:04.380 well in all kinds of families. But still, I feel like I'm not being the best mom by not staying home.
00:37:10.520 I believe in traditional values. I want to homeschool one day. My husband works overtime
00:37:15.660 all the time to make me stay at home one day. And still, I feel guilty. It doesn't make sense.
00:37:21.760 How do you manage the expectations you had of motherhood to the realities?
00:37:24.940 That's a great question. And I want to say I get it very much so. Because I think that
00:37:35.120 for me, I'm constantly trying to balance motherhood, wifehood, content creation,
00:37:43.360 community involvement, all of the different things that I do. The work-life balance is real.
00:37:50.040 Even if your work is homemaking, it's real. Just trying to get everything done with a toddler
00:37:57.480 that's running around is very, very hard. But I think one of the things, first of all,
00:38:05.180 you're doing absolutely everything you can to be at home with your kids. So I would not feel guilty
00:38:10.360 at all if I were you. Like, you are doing everything right. Your husband working as hard as he is,
00:38:17.980 I mean, what a blessing, truly. The fact that you're able to be at home with your kids as much
00:38:24.200 as you are, a really, really wonderful thing. And you're not doing anything wrong by trying to make
00:38:32.500 it a situation where you get to be home with your kids. And you're not a bad mom for not staying home
00:38:38.780 when you can't. I mean, there's so many amazing moms out there that have to work. 1.00
00:38:48.100 I mean, that's the most important thing is getting food on the table, making sure there's shelter,
00:38:52.260 making sure there's those things that you all really need to survive.
00:38:55.960 So one of the things that I've found is that is helpful, is that I always feel like I need to be
00:39:07.080 really, like, directed with my son. That if I'm not paying full attention to him and, like,
00:39:14.160 Montessori-style being with him and working on his development and making sure he's, like,
00:39:19.740 learning to be independent with my involvement, that I'm, like, not being as good of a mom as I
00:39:23.800 should. And the thing that I always remember is for generations, for thousands of years,
00:39:32.660 women had the children at home and the children were not getting directed attention. They were 1.00
00:39:38.080 just there while the mom was trying to get everything done. And the way that they learned
00:39:41.880 was by watching or participating. And so it's not about us as moms always needing to put our entire
00:39:49.720 focus on our kids. It's about us as moms having the kids learn by being a part of the daily routine, 1.00
00:39:58.720 by being part of the daily actions and all of that. If you're putting your kid in front of a TV so you
00:40:03.460 can get things done, maybe not the best move. But if you are having your child just kind of be around
00:40:10.440 while you do things, I think that's great. Like, that is the most positive thing, is having your baby
00:40:16.640 help you while you do things. And yes, it might slow things down, but that's not the big thing.
00:40:23.700 The big thing is that the baby's with you and learning. You don't have to feel bad for
00:40:31.680 not being the stay-at-home mom you wished you could have been. And as far as managing your expectations
00:40:41.820 of motherhood, motherhood is really about
00:40:46.340 doing your best to raise this little person and bring them to the best person that they can be.
00:40:54.720 And what that looks like is a little different for everybody.
00:40:58.540 You know, for me, like I mentioned, it's about having my son watch what I'm doing and participate.
00:41:03.880 But for you, that will look different because what you do each day may look different than what I do
00:41:11.000 each day. If you are being an involved mom and you are putting your children first and you're
00:41:19.400 prioritizing, I think that you're doing everything right. And managing those expectations really comes
00:41:26.900 down to, like I mentioned, knowing how motherhood was dealt with for thousands of years before it 0.96
00:41:36.320 became like this really intensive project where people either outsource the project of motherhood
00:41:44.340 to somebody else so that they can go out and work and do their own thing, or where you as mom have to 0.99
00:41:51.700 be like in it all day, completely focused on your child. Being a mom is about being there for your
00:41:58.760 baby, but in the sense that they're learning along with you, alongside you. That's my answer for that
00:42:09.820 question. And that is today's episode of the Classically Abbey podcast. I hope you guys enjoyed it.
00:42:16.460 Let me know your thoughts in the comments on YouTube or head over to my sub stack where you'll be able
00:42:21.640 to comment on my post. I'm so glad you're here and make sure to subscribe to my sub stack newsletter
00:42:27.920 so that you can submit questions for future podcast episodes to my YouTube and to this podcast wherever
00:42:34.840 you listen. Thank you guys so much for being a part of today's episode and we'll chat in the next one. Bye.
00:42:51.640 Bye.