As 2022 ends, let’s ALL be grateful for the existence of Meir Kay! Courtesy of MeirKay.com.It’s the last blog post of 2022, a sometimes scary, sometimes INCREDIBLE year that I will never forget. What better way for me to end the year than raving about Meir Kay, a Jewish internet personality who I am convinced may be an actual angel. Does that sound too cheesy? Well, I mean it! I should warn readers that I am probably going to geek out in this post the more I talk about this man. I will try to not be too annoying and reduce excessive use of exclamation points, but I can’t promise anything.
Let me begin by getting a little deep and talking about something we all need in our lives: simha (Hebrew for “joy”). I know, that sounds like a total cliché, and we’ve all heard the same old phrases.
“You only live once! Be happy!”
“Life is short. Be happy!”
“Life sucks sometimes, but we still need to be happy because we only live once! Don’t forget that!”
“You only live once!”
“You only live once!”
“Again…you only live once!”
A little annoyed? Yeah, me too. How many times do we try to practice these mantras but fail? We’re only human. Life is indeed a fickle [curse word] that can disrupt our lives. Our days are going great, but then something happens which puts us in a terrible mood. I remember speaking with my therapist not too long ago where I tried to comprehend why I, a chatty Kathy, act so on the outside at public events, but on the inside, I get so anxious and lonely, lonely to the point where I don’t feel like I have self-worth. My therapist encouraged me to try something new: every day, look at myself in the mirror, and say, “I’m OK.” That’s all we need to tell ourselves, and it’s YouTuber Meir Kay’s main motto. This man personifies true, untethered, celestial simha. What a delightfully happy, positive soul to walk this earth. What would I like for the holidays, you may ask me? Clones of Meir Kay to get me through my day!
Meir is a Brooklyn native, as well as a director, producer, and motivational speaker with over 322,000 YouTube subscribers and close to 82,000 Instagram followers. He is also the host of The Great Day Podcast with Meir Kay, currently at close to 100 episodes. His videos are a combination of scripted and non-scripted sketches. Some are humorous, family-friendly comedy sketches, such as Evolution Of Jewish Music (which, I’m assuming, is a spin-off of YouTube’s iconic Evolution of Dance video) and 19 Types of Shoppers You Meet at the Supermarket, but the majority of his videos are more serious than that. They remind us of the humanity in life and the capability we have to practice tikkun olam (“repair the world”) in our lives. If someone is in danger, lend a hand and help. If someone is hungry, offer some food. “Choose kind,” another mitzvah (“good deed”) we should believe in more.
“I believe we are all connected and every stranger we meet is a potential friend, so I always try to get to know people’s stories and hear what they have to say,” says Meir on his website, MeirKay.com.
What I love about Meir’s videos is how they don’t try to pull on your heartstrings too much. These aren’t sad or overly schmaltzy stories. As demonstrative a filmmaker he is, Meir knows how to keep things realistic in his art. The acting is always natural, while the moral of every video is manifested at the end. In Kids decide between helping the Homeless or Ice Cream, a video with over 27 million views, Meir gives some children one dollar and sees whether they’ll use it for ice cream or donate it to a homeless man seated nearby. There is a beautiful part where a little girl gets some ice cream. Oh no. But no, she doesn’t eat it. She rushes back to the homeless man and hands it to him.
There is also Eating Twinkies With God, a scripted short about a little boy who takes twinkies from his fridge, runs to the park, and shares them with a woman sitting beside him. In I’m Jewish and He’s Muslim, Meir and an Arab man hang out in New York City for the day, exploring one another’s cultures. They don’t fight. There’s no talk of war or religion. They trust one another because they understand that fighting is futile. The moral of these videos is abundantly clear: we can all be a little kinder on this planet.
We can be kinder, but we can also bring out the inner child in strangers we don’t know. Meir is like the best friend who cheers you up when you’re having a bad day. His talent in uplifting people – people he doesn’t even know walking around the Big Apple – is more than remarkable. If Meir wants to start a Water Balloon Fight With Strangers, he’ll do it. If he wants to instigate a Dj Dance Party on the NYC Subway, he does it! And you know how the people react? Well, they may furrow their brows at first (“Who is this strange fella?”), but then they smile. Even the most bad-tempered souls of New York City will grin from Meir’s energy. He brings us out of our “funk,” our sullen, fatigued moods that we sometimes get into.
In addition to his hilarious and motivational videos, Meir is also the founder of Super Soul Party, a non-profit dedicated to creating safe spaces for individuals experiencing homelessness. In fact, homelessness is a huge theme in Meir’s videos. Just this year, he spoke to CNN about his Super Bowl parties he began throwing for the city’s homeless. In 2017, he struck up conversations with people on the sidewalks and invited them to his own party at a penthouse in Manhattan, complete with Patriots jerseys, food, and several large TVs. (You can watch the first party HERE.) Since then, this act of hospitality has spurred people from other cities in the country to host their own Super Bowl parties – called “Super Soul Parties” – for the homeless. This year, Orlando’s Exploria Stadium had over 100 homeless people in the stands.
“We use the Super Bowl as a way to get people’s attention,” says Meir. “But really what happens is the magic, when people are able to reconnect with themselves and with the community so that they’re able to rebuild their lives.”
With Super Soul Parties, individuals don’t just get to watch the game. Meir has expanded his mission to aid these people by providing hygiene products, haircuts, the opportunity to speak with mental health professionals on site, and so much more.
For Meir, there is humanity in everyone. Take High Five New York, for example. In this short, he high fives random people in New York who are waving their hand to get a taxi. How do they react? They laugh. It might look like they’re having a bad day, but Meir knows how to bring a smile to their faces. Meir is a metaphor for perpetual empathy. I mentioned at the beginning of this post that I think he may be an angel. I’m deadly serious. I’ve researched many Jewish new media artists throughout the year. No one compares to Meir. This man is unreal.
On this closing note, I hope you check out Meir’s videos and learn from him. Understand that no matter how tough life gets, no matter how cruel people may be, hatred won’t solve anything. Together, let’s make kindness our New Year’s resolution.
Follow Meir Kay on YouTube and Instagram.
THE GREAT DAY PODCAST WITH MEIR KAY is available to listen to on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
To learn more about Super Soul Party, visit SuperSoulParty.org, or you may visit Meir’s website, MeirKay.com.