Category: teshuvah (Page 1 of 2)

#BlogElul: Sharing our Secrets #takeaseatmakeafriend

August 25, 2013 / gurevitzr

The video presentation above (if you are reading this via the email feed, click on the title above to be able to view the video on my blog) deeply touched my heart. So much shared humanity to be found on a website of people’s secret sharings. Then I had a thought. When I take quiet time to sit on Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, or the days inbetween, how honestly do I reflect on my own self, and my own stuff? Sometimes I can get there, but sometimes I, as I’m sure we all do, just barely scratch the surface.

So how about this as an exercise this year. Take a little stack of postcards. Or it could be post-it notes. Imagine that the destination of what you write on those cards is a place where no-one will ever know that it was you who wrote the message. And then think about the ‘secrets’ of your own life that could be shared. They may be things that cause you embarrassment. Or perhaps it is something that is painful. Maybe its a little cute, if not altogether the highest expression of humanity. And maybe its something that you haven’t been willing to own up to … until now.

Whether you choose to submit your secrets to the project website or not, take a look at what you have written throughout the 10 days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. What can you learn from them? How might you inspire someone else who read them? If you shared them with God, how might this lift the weight, instigate a change, or lead to a reconnection with someone in your life?

If you want to post on Frank Warren’s site, go to http://www.postsecret.com or follow the site’s postings on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/postsecret

Blogging Elul 5771: Reflections on our enemies

September 7, 2011 / gurevitzr

Today’s blog entry is by student Rabbi Lisa Kingston. Lisa was our rabbinic intern this Summer. She is a fourth year student at Hebrew Union College, New York. She delivers her Senior Sermon next Thursday morning during the morning service at the college.

Psalm 27:

The Eternal is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear?

The Eternal is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be terrified?

In my very guts came evil to gnaw and consume me,

But these my troubles, my enemies, stumbled and fell.

Though an army encamp against me, my heart will not fear;

Though war rise up against me, even then I will keep faith.

During the days of Elul it is traditional to read Psalm 27, an affirmation of God’s help and protection when enemies surround us. Today, we may understand it as a plea for God’s help in dealing with the enemies within us. These are the demons of our own true self who frighten us away from living the lives we want.

I think one of the largest demons that can consume us is self-doubt. A friend of mine is studying to be a psychologist and she told me of an interesting conference she recently attended. Instead of wearing traditional nametags, each person in the room was asked to write their biggest fear and wear it upon their chest. One might assume participants would share silly things like a fear of heights or spiders, but people took the exercise to heart and shared what really unnerved them. They shared fears of failure, fears of being a fraud, fears of not being able to help people in the way they hoped, fears of letting down family members, and fears that they were not worthy of their success. We all share fears like these even when we appear confident and successful.

Don’t worry, you wont be asked to wear the badges of your fear publicly this year, but Elul is the time to try to name and face your fears. When you arrive to Rosh Hashanah services this year, try to have at least one fear you want to address written on your heart. Identifying what holds you back can begin your steps to teshuva.

Blogging Elul 5771: Finding full humanity

September 2, 2011 / gurevitzr

Today’s blog is by Rabbi Debbie Young-Somers, a colleague in the UK, and one of the Rabbis of the West London Synagogue of British Jews – the founding synagogue of Reform Judaism in the UK. She is a regular on ‘Pause for Thought’ – a faith-based message featured on BBC Radio 2. Follow Rabbi Young-Somers blog here.

In large part Ellul is here to give us time to consider our relationships with each other and heal them, so that we might more fully return to ourselves and to God on Yom Kippur. Sometimes this may mean making a direct approach to someone and acknowledging that what you said or did was wrong and/or caused pain and apologising for this fact. Today, however, purely by chance, I was reminded that sometimes it’s also about having very normal day to day exchanges and experiencing and being open to the full humanity contained in them. It was a very small thing really, but one that was the perfect start to a busy day and a busy shabbat. When I don’t have time to make challah (special bread for shabbat) I tend to end up buying it in our local Arabic shop Solomon’s, which picks up 2 boxes of challot, bagels and rye breads from a kosher bakery in Hendon every Friday. During the last month I’ve apologised to them for buying such good smelling bread when they are fasting, and they have grinned appreciatively. This morning I asked how Eid had been for them, and at the end of the conversation, the sales man wished me Shabbat Shalom. Of course this isn’t going to change the world. But it changes my immediate surroundings, and brings a humanity to what is otherwise a very sensible business venture for them and a wonderful convenience for me. Building slowly slowly on trust between individuals, perhaps we can, step by step, create a sense of comfort and joy in our beautiful differences which are, after all, what make us human and interesting. So while during Ellul we look to improve the relationships that are perhaps more meaningful and long term, we can also take the opportunity to explore those relationships that are more functional, and instil in them human warmth and encounter, building local community, and appreciating our differences. Shabbat Shalom

The Weiner Saga – what it can teach us about ourselves

June 7, 2011 / gurevitzr

There’s a lot of online chatter, blogging, tweeting, and more about Anthony Weiner’s use of the social network to communicate with women via lewd photo. If you need an update on the full story, here’s a piece in the NYTimes, and another on The Huffington Post.

So, I want to get my 2 cents in? Well, yes and no. I don’t think I have much more to add to what has already been said about the unbecoming behavior, the lying, the damage to Weiner’s family (and, particularly, his wife) and friendships, the analysis of his confession, etc. etc.

But I want to look at another aspect of the chatter online. Because expressing our disgust, our disappointment, and our judgment, while appropriate, is the easy part. Especially when it involves a public official or celebrity. The much harder part is to look at our own lives and ask ourselves some of the really tough questions that emerge from stories like these.

Unless you happen to hang with a particularly angelic crowd, how many of us can say that we don’t know someone among our friends, our congregation, or community, who has done something deceptive or foolish in their lives? How many of us can look in the mirror without feeling embarrassment for a poor judgment of the past? Whether it was behavior while drunk or high, a lie that had consequences that we’ve never owned up to, an email that should never have been sent, a touch or a kiss that betrayed the trust between committed couples, a full-blown affair or a criminal act … Weiner can be a painful reminder of our own faux pas, or remind us of the pain caused by a friend or family member who did something to cross the line.

I remember that, as a very young child, perhaps no more than 6 or 7, I had a teacher who supervised a sewing activity with my class each week. We had learned different stitch styles and were making a bookmark. One week, I made a mistake. I was so embarrassed by my mistake that, instead of going to the teacher for assistance, I tried to fix it myself and created a big knot in the middle of my fabric. Then I panicked. I thought she’d be furious with me if she saw the mess I’d made instead of getting help when the problem was still small. So I started to feign sickness right before her class, and my grade teacher would allow me take some time out in the fresh air and miss her class. After a couple of weeks of this, they caught on. When the confrontation finally occurred, the teacher was mortified that I’d been too afraid to ask for her assistance; with one snip of the scissors she removed my knot and helped me get back on track. We had a great relationship from that point on.

Ok, so its a pretty innocuous example, but I offer it more for symbolic value. What Weiner did was very human. He messed up. Yes, he should examine what created his desire to exhibit such behavior in the first place – that is different from my accidental stitching mistake. But what followed is where the commonality lies, and is not at all uncommon. Once we’ve messed up, we’re embarrassed and ashamed. We’re fearful of what people will think and say. We’re fearful of the consequences. And so we do things in a vain attempt to try and control the situation. This usually involves a lie. Sometimes its a total cover-up lie (no, I didn’t do that; my account must have been hacked), and sometimes its a lie disguised as a partial admission of a lesser crime to try and divert attention from anyone discovering the true depths of our deed. When it looks like we’ve got ourselves into an almighty knot, we try a different strategy, perhaps feigning illness – ‘I wasn’t in my right mind’; ‘I was under a great deal of stress at the time’, ‘I hadn’t gotten over the death of my father’ …

Only when we find ourselves cornered and out of options might we finally come clean and confess. And we tell people how truly sorry we are. And its not a false confession. It might look that way, because it looks like we’ve been lying and were hoping to get away with it. Would we have confessed if we hadn’t been found out? Probably not. But the lack of confession until there was no other choice does not necessarily indicate lack of authenticity. We are ashamed, we are embarrassed, we hate ourselves for our poor judgment and the hurt we have caused to people we care about, the trust we have lost, and we are disgusted by our flaws and inadequacies that have caused so much harm. It was all those feelings and emotions that led us to try and cover things up in the first place – out of our desire to nullify the harm and make it all go away. Hindsight is 20/20, as they say; we did not have the foresight to consider how much worse we were making the knot by our avoidance.

What is true of ourselves also plays out in our dealings with others. When someone you love is guilty of an act of hurt, or poor judgment, how do you respond? When they show true remorse and want to do whatever they can to bring some healing to the situation, do you push them away or do you try to make a path for them to do teshuvah – return/repentance? There are no easy answers; sometimes we have to separate ourselves from an abusive or narcissist personality. Sometimes we need time to mourn what has been lost – love, trust, friendship – before we can forgive. But it is always worth taking a breath and a step back and asking ourselves if there is any room for compassion alongside our judgment of the sins of another.

Rabbis, as with all clergy, find ourselves engaging pastorally with people in every aspect of life’s journey. We seek to help those who have been hurt by another to find peace and to heal, and we seek to listen and help those who have sinned to do the inner work of true repentance, taking responsibility, but also the ability to heal and to move on rather than to carry the weight of their error forever.

So, yes, Anthony Weiner has messed up and, yes, he has more work to do. But there’s a spiritual lesson here, and its a lesson that requires deep contemplation … for each and every one of us.
Rabbi Rachel Gurevitz

How to ensure your Yom Kippur isn’t an epic fail

September 15, 2010 / gurevitzr

Rabbi Donniel Hartman published a thought-provoking piece this past week entitled ‘Yom Kippur: Why it doesn’t work outside of the synagogue’ . He argues that Yom Kippur has been a profound failure as a force for change within individuals and communities who spend the day in synagogue. He notes, ‘The passion, seriousness, and devotion which accompany many of us throughout Yom Kippur, peters out into a form of amnesia during the break-fast meal as we return to our behavior of yesterday.’

Hartman goes on to say, ‘The problem with Yom Kippur in the synagogue is that it is too complete and comprehensive. It creates the myth of putting all of one’s life and behavior up for judgment, where we confront every one of our failings and repent for them all. The list of sins in the vidui is too extensive to have any impact on the life of a real person. For a prayer, and within the isolated environment of the synagogue, it is fine. As a force for facilitating change in real life, the comprehensive nature of our service makes it impossible to be a significant factor in everyday life.’

I think he’s right about this. One of the reasons why I, and others, have used blogs and other events and programs during the month of Elul, is to provide vehicles to help those who want to engage more deeply in a spiritual practice that can help us to really work on aspects of ourselves that we want to change. It simply isn’t possible to just show up on Yom Kippur and expect anything of great meaning or significance that will have any lasting impact on our lives or our community to happen in those 24 hours.

But while I’ve been focused on preparing, reviewing, and taking time to reflect on aspects of our selves in advance of the day, Rabbi Hartman’s proposal for the day itself and what happens afterwards, is also sage advice:
If Yom Kippur is to be the force that our tradition aspires it to be, it must cease to be the end and culmination of the process, and instead serve as its beginning. The purpose of the all-inclusive lists cannot be to ask an individual to review all of his life, but to create a menu from within which every individual can find one dimension, one quality that they can commit to working on.

As a Rabbi working in a large Reform congregation, one of my roles is to lead the congregation through the liturgy of the day. And there is a great deal of liturgy. There is a place for the almost constant rhythm of words and music maintaining the momentum of mood and focus but, as a congregant, I do not recommend reciting all those words and all those pages along with those leading the service. To do so leaves no room for the kind of work that Rabbi Hartman advises we simply begin as those words bring our failings and weaknesses to the surface.

When something appears on the page that resonates with an aspect of your self that you want to work on, take time to sit with it and consider how you will try to do things differently – don’t worry if the congregation moves a few pages ahead; you’ll join in again with the rhythm when you are ready and, in so doing, you’ll help to provide the pulse of the prayer that hums in the background as someone else in the room takes some time out for introspection and private prayer.

For me, a walk is an important part of the day too. It can be quiet, alone time, to continue to look more deeply at some aspect of teshuvah that has risen to the surface for you this year, or a time to meditate, or sit under a tree and make space for a deeper awareness of the Godliness that is all around us, inspiring us and encouraging us to reach toward our highest self. But it can also be walking or sitting with a partner or a friend. Some of my most meaningful Yom Kippur experiences have involved reflecting out loud on the things that I am contemplating, with a non-judgmental witness who listens, and then asks me to bear witness to their struggles.

For others, some time on Yom Kippur is for being spurred to commit or recommit to important work in this world. At B’nai Israel, our early afternoon discussion provides a forum for some of these themes – this year, on our engagement with Israel.

We also have a new Afternoon service that will provide space and meditative opportunities, when we stop with the words on the page, and invite congregants to take themselves to that deeper place of honest and authentic introspection.

But the question still remains… what will come next? Donniel Hartman’s invitation – to choose one thing that you wish to work on and commit yourself to it over the coming weeks and months – awaits your RSVP. But, like the rhythm and hum of the prayers on Yom Kippur that provide the vessel of a potentially meaningful day but do not provide the meaning in and of themselves, we need to create vessels for ourselves to make our commitments into realities. It might be to commit to a nightly written reflection, or a morning prayer to begin each day with a kavannah – an intention, or a calendar where one marks off days or tasks that we have set ourselves to help us fulfill our commitment; perhaps 30 minutes of meditation, examining our trait and creating greater mindfulness as we go about our daily activities. Choose one thing, and choose a vessel that can help provide the structure you need to make this Yom Kippur a meaningful one; meaningful because it was about so much more than just surviving the day – it was the day that the turning began, for this is the true essence of teshuvah.

7 Tishrei. Have a little faith – returning again to the writing of Mitch Albom

September 25, 2009 / gurevitzr

Return again, return again, return to the land of your soul

Return to who you are, return to what you are, return to where you are,

born and reborn again.

(Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach)

Mitch Albom speaks to me. Not directly – we’ve never met. But he speaks to me, and to many, many others too. He is a talented writer, and I have found his books to make some of the deepest experiences and questions about the meaning of life accessible in a way that helps me figure out what I want to say and how I want to say it. This year, my Yom Kippur sermon (which will be posted at our congregational website next week) is framed by excerpts from his new book, ‘Have a Little Faith.’ The book is actually on shelves on Tuesday, the day after Yom Kippur, but I received a pre-publication copy and, once again, Mitch Albom has written a book that deeply to speaks to me and, I’m sure, will speak to millions of others.

Nine years ago I read ‘Tuesdays with Morrie.’ As I looked through my High Holyday files, I found a creative service that I had compiled for Shabbat Shuvah, the Shabbat between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, weaving excerpts from that book with the prayers of the morning liturgy. One excerpt jumped off the page again; the words of Morrie Schwartz, z’l, as a meditation on the 10 days of return:

“The truth is, Mitch,” he said, “once you learn how to die, you learn how live.” … Did you think much about death before you got sick, I asked. “No.” Morrie smiled. “I was like everyone else. I once told a friend of mine, in a moment of exuberance, ‘I’m gonna be the healthiest old man you ever met!'” … Like I said, no one really believes they’re going to die.” But everyone knows someone who has died, I said. Why is it so hard to think about dying? “Because,” Morrie continued, “most of us all walk around as if we’re sleepwalking. We really don’t experience the world fully, because we’re half-asleep, doing things we automatically think we have to do.”

On Rosh Hashanah, the shofar sounded: Wake up, you sleepers! Are we living each day, awake to the realization that the blessing of this moment might not be tomorrow? Are we driving along the highway of our lives in automatic, or are we noticing the scenery, the people we encounter along the way, taking time to explore the side streets and the neighborhoods as we journey on? Have we returned, and tuned in to our innermost essence, who we really are?

“Be compassionate,” Morrie whispered. “And take responsibility for each other. If we only learned those lessons, this world would be so much better a place.” He took a breath, then added his mantra: “Love each other or die.”

Shabbat Shalom, v’gmar tov – a good fast

Rabbi Rachel Gurevitz

Elul 29. Reflections on a month of soul-preparation

September 17, 2009 / gurevitzr

Tonight is the last night of the blog before Erev Rosh Hashanah. For those who have written, read or contributed, I hope that it has provided an opportunity for daily pause and reflection and that this year’s Rosh Hashanah, 10 days of repentance, and Yom Kippur, we are able entered more mindfully and more centered as a result of these daily moments of reflection.

Last Saturday night, when our local communities joined together for a staged reading of Merle Feld’s ‘The Gates are Closing’, we learnt about 10 individuals and the pains, losses, guilt, silences, and fractures that each character carried from the lives they had lived up to this moment. From the perspective of the audience it was so powerfully evident that no-one who begins to reflect on the parts of their lives that need healing and the places where teshuvah can help them reconnect, re-center, and drawer closer to a God-presence in their lives when they enter a synagogue sanctuary on Yom Kippur, can possibly hope to complete the process in a 25 hour period. We need time to contemplate, to speak healing, forgiving, or confessional words to others, to God, and to re-commit ourselves to aiming toward new patterns of behavior in the coming years. The month of Elul provides us with the gift of this time, if we choose to accept it.

But while these days are Judaism’s annual invitation to return, the possibility is always there. If we are open to God’s comforting Presence, accompanying us and holding us as we find the courage to do the difficult work of teshuvah and growth, we will find that the gates never truly close.

Over this past month Sh’ma Koleinu – Hear Our Voices, has received more than 500 visitors. The blog will be continuing into the New Year, not on a daily basis (although a kabbalistic reflection series is in the works when we arrive at the Counting of the Omer, after Pesach), but there will be more coming between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, a weekly reflection just before Shabbat, and festival reflections throughout the year. An invitation to share teachings, practices, and reflections remains open – we continue to strive to expand the number of voices represented on these pages, so please do send in pieces that you’d like to contribute.

Wishing everyone a Shanah Tovah u’m’tukah – a very Happy & Sweet New Year,
Rabbi Rachel Gurevitz

Elul 26. Sorry, Again

September 14, 2009 / gurevitzr

Today’s blog entry is a cross-post from Tablet Magazine. Marjorie Ingall writes a wonderful piece, subtitled, ‘There’s no sure way to raise kids who apologize and accept apologies’. How do parents help their children to say ‘sorry’, and learn forgiveness of others? The link below will you take you straight to the article.

Sorry, Again

Elul 24. Psalm 32 – A guide to teshuvah

September 12, 2009 / gurevitzr

Over the past three weeks, our Shabbat morning Torah study group has been studying psalms that reflect on themes of forgiveness. The first of the three we studied, psalm 32, has a particularly contemporary resonance to it, offering what today we might label a psycho-spiritual teaching on forgiveness that offers much food for thought. Here is the text of the psalm:

Psalm 32. Of David. Maschil.

Happy is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered over. 
Happy is the man whom the Eternal does not hold guilty, and in whose spirit there is no guile. 
When I kept silence, my limbs wasted away away through my groaning all the day long. 
For day and night Your hand was heavy upon me; my sap was turned as in the droughts of summer. Selah 
Then I acknowledged my sin to You, I did not cover up my guilt;  I said: ‘I will make confession concerning my transgressions to the Eternal’–  and You, You forgave the iniquity of my sin. Selah 
For this let every one that is godly pray to You in a time when You may be found;  so when the great waters overflow, they will not reach him. 
You are my shelter; You will preserve me from distress; with songs of deliverance You will surround me. Selah 
I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you shall go; I will give counsel, my eye being upon you. 
Be not as the horse, or as the mule, which have no understanding; whose mouth must be held in with bit and bridle, that they come not near to you. 
Many are the torments of the wicked; but he that trusts in the Eternal, mercy encompasses him. 
Be glad in the Eternal, and rejoice, you righteous; and shout for joy, all you that are upright in heart.

Some of the observations and points of discussion in our study group were:

What is the meaning of ‘happy’ in the opening line? When we have a committed a wrong, does confession to God and true teshuvah lead to happiness? Some thought that ‘relieved’ might be more appropriate; but others recognized more of a joie de vivre – a spiritually-ground joy in living that can emerge from true teshuvah as we allow ourselves to recommit to positive living rather than forever being trapped in the depths of our own remorse.
In verse 3 we see what, at face value, seems to be a contradiction; when I kept silence my limbs wasted away from all my groaning… But when we are aware that we have done wrong but hold back from speaking with those we have wronged, or even offering up our feelings of deep remorse in prayer to God, our guilt can have a real psychological and physical impact on our body and soul it can literally ‘eat us up.’
The psalm enjoins us to do teshuvah and experience God’s mercy and presence as we work through our guilt and inner torments. The horse, who is guided by our lead via the bit and bridle, is contrasted with the free will of humanity, containing both the yetzer hatov and the yetzer hara – the inclination to good and to evil. What is the source of our internal steering mechanism? When we stray from our path, acts of teshuvah, tefilah, and tzedakah (in the words of the High Holyday prayer, unetaneh tokef), can help us find our way back into God’s embrace. There is surely a deep, spiritual joy that can emanate from finding our way back home again.
Several times we see the word ‘Selah‘ after a line. Difficult to translate literally, it is perhaps best interpreted as ‘Pause and consider’. Psalm 32 offers a contemplative text that we can use as a gateway to our own teshuvah process as we move ever-closer to the New Year.

Rabbi Rachel Gurevitz

18 Elul. Teshuvah Walks

September 6, 2009 / gurevitzr

By Rabbi Goldie Milgram

During each of the “Days of Awe” between Rosh HaShannah and Yom Kippur 2000 I planned to take a teshuvah walk.

What is a teshuvah walk? Some years ago while on a retreat with Rabbi Shefa Gold and Sylvia Boorstein, we were doing Buddhist meditation walks. This is done so slowly that one becomes aware of how conscious it is possible to be with each centimeter of one’s foot when stepping down and lifting up. Time slows down, the present becomes everything, the step gone by is not important compared to the one in which one is engaged.

An active quick mind is not always advantageous, this can lead one to leap over the opportunity to hear the ideas, needs and feelings of others. Such leaps can have adverse consequences. So it occurred to me a few years ago, that when one is going to meet another person as part of a process of doing teshuvah (the returning of healthy energy to a relationship) that a meditation walk might be a good form of preparation.

My method is to study a great work on teshuvah each day. Then to head to the neighborhood where the teshuvah encounter is to take place, though not to the precise location. Next I take a sacred phrase and chant it softly while walking ever so slowly. My hope is to prepare myself so as to arrive as carefully prepared as a vessel that has been made ready for use on the altar in the temple of old.

The text I chose for Day One is by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz: “Time flows in one direction; it is impossible to undo or even to alter an action after it has occurred and become an ‘event’, an objective fact. However, even though the past is ‘fixed’, repentance allows one to rise above it, to change its significance for the present and the future … It is the potential for something else. “

Rabbi Goldie Milgram, Reclaiming Judaism as a Spiritual Practice: Holy Days and Shabbat,
Jewish Lights, 2004; more information available at reclaimingjudaism.org. Used with permission of the author.