For example, while a man should have a fixed place for davening, Rav Miller thought it good to visit other shuls to learn from the positive attributes of their individual styles.
For example, some shuls emphasize a lot of melodious davening, some emphasize loud enthusiastic davening, some emphasize slow quiet heartfelt davening, some emphasize organized decorum...in Eretz Yisrael, men in Moroccan shuls kiss each other on the cheeks while wishing each other "Shabbat Shalom" after davening on Shabbat night.
(Maybe they do in other countries also; I don't know.)
Anyway, with an inborn interest in other cultures (my unfinished college included a good chunk of Anthropology), Rav Miller's approach innately appeals to me.
In addition to the purely religious aspect of observing different groups of frum Jews, I found myself naturally attracted to how Jewish women from different cultures handled common situations.
And this proved extremely beneficial too.
The Unexpected Yet Mind-Expanding New Cultural Conventions
Because this message permeated every aspect of American culture, I accepted it in the way one accepts that the definition of pizza includes cheese.
(Imagine my surprise and bewilderment when my Moroccan mother-in-law served us a food she insisted on calling "pizza," yet not only contained no cheese, but was decidedly fleishig, with hotly spiced ground beef topping the tomato-sauce-covered dough. I think it's called lachmajun in Moroccan Arabic.)
But my decades in Eretz Yisrael taught me something completely different.
In general (individual exceptions may exist), Russian and Israeli women feel no conflict between being a doctor and being a mother.
Meaning, there's no perceived existential conflict between heading the burn ward at a prestigious hospital and lovingly tending your baby at home.
(I actually first noticed this with an Iranian-Jewish woman in America, who was a wealthy & successful professional, but an extremely attentive and child-oriented mother too.)
I don't think it ever occurred to them that being a highly educated successful professional clashed with the skills and personality necessary to care for babies and small children.
Of course it doesn't.
They delight in and coo over babies, as if it's the most natural thing in the world — and it is.
A Sampling of Some of the Jewish Women who Show Us the Way Out of the One-Dimensional Box
Sure, they can pay for someone else to do it if they're busy or tired.
But there's no general idea of: "I have a doctorate, gosh darn it! Why should someone like ME be washing breakfast dishes?!!"
In fact, Israeli and Russian women take pride in their housekeeping skills, whether they're teenage girls living with their parents, university students, or wives and mothers.
To them, cleanliness and organization is the sign of a competent civilized person. They ENJOY living in a neat, clean environment.
And really, they're absolutely correct.
Eventually, after I was married with children of my own, an extended trip back to America introduced me to extremely wealthy Sephardi women (raised by immigrants to America), some of whom were successful professionals in their own right and some with a high school degree married to a successful man.
I was surprised at their devotion to their children and to their cooking. (Okay, not all of them cooked. But all of them were very child-oriented and especially with their elementary school-aged children, really seemed to enjoy spending time with them.)
They utilized live-in housekeepers to make life easier and to enable them to focus on chinuch and positive relationships (because they weren't too exhausted or overwhelmed by piles of laundry to prioritize their chinuch or relationship — no criticism intended here, because I myself have been too overwhelmed or exhausted to prioritize chinuch & relationship at times).
One hired nannies for family simchos so both she and her twin toddlers could enjoy the simcha.
Overall, it was a really nice and validating dynamic to witness.
Silly Plaid Pants Apparently Do Not Conflict with a Doctor's Lab Coat
Many American doctors play golf.
What does wearing silly plaid pants while hitting a little ball into a hole have to do with examining a sore throat or performing surgery?
Does one cancel out the other?
Can you not be good at both?
Can you not enjoy both?
Why do feminist attitudes force women to be so one-dimensional?
Thank God for Getting Real and Dropping This Pompous Madness
It can even be the best solution.
But the attitude of "I'm above changing diapers!" or "Caring for a toddler is simply not for someone of my stature or education!" is really weird and unhealthy — but only once you think about it (if you were brought up in a society that promoted this weird and unhealthy mindset).
It's disturbing how easily women who suffer from superiority complexes and dysfunctional attitudes took over the culture in America and managed to convince everyone else that their pretentiousness, combined with a lack of domestic competence and maternal warmth is the norm.
As you can tell, I resent this false dichotomy being imposed on since birth — especially since in the first second of my first child's life, I immediately fell in love with him and discovered that — even with sleep deprivation & other stress — babies are actually fun, interesting, and lovely to be around. (Although colicky babies...not so much.)
The actual caring for babies was often enjoyable, though it could be stressful and exhausting too. But it wasn't always either good or bad, but could go either way, depending. (But it wasn't overall the awful, demeaning experience portrayed by feminists.)
And I was even more surprised to discover an innate knack of caring for them (though I still needed to learn a lot practically along the way).
And I'm very grateful to Hashem (and all His Russian and Israeli shlichim!) who showed me the way out of a limited one-dimensional mind into an expanded multi-dimensional mind.