Shalom BAI!
Hodesh Tov, a good new month of Elul to everyone. This is a month of return- from the shore, the Poconos, to school, to reality. As a way of centering your own intentions for this month of return, I invite you to read Ilene Wasserman’s beautiful reflection on Elul that she shares below.
Additionally, we offer Psalm 27 throughout the month of Elul and through Simchat Torah and the new year, “Achat Sha’alti, One Thing I ask of you, Adonai.”
If you could ask God one thing and get an aswer, what would it be?
Click here for an inspirational melody to this Psalm composed by Chava Mirel. (Yes, recorded in her car, and it’s chill inducing!)
Shabbat Shalom
Hazzan Harold
An Introduction to the new month of Elul by Ilene Wasserman
“Look with your own eyes and you will see.” Psalm 91:8
Mindfulness sustains wisdom; wisdom sustains compassion
Each year, I greet Rosh Hodesh Elul as if I am reconnecting with a close trusted friend. I want to just cuddle up with a warm cup of tea and with the greatest of discipline, do an accounting of my year… where have I been, where am I and where am I going? Have I done enough? AM I enough? Where have I fallen short – not because of any ill will or intention – rather because another may feel that I have? A friend heard me leaving a new year’s message and asked me – why are you apologizing? You did not do anything. I responded – How can I know that without asking? And while I can ask that question of others, I am probably the person who is the harshest judge of myself. Sound familiar?
I have been reading Simon Jacobson’s 60 Days: A Spiritual Guide to the High Holidays. One of the stories that particularly spoke to me was that of Rabbi Mendel Futerfas who tells of a great lesson he learned from a tightrope walker while serving in a Siberian prison.
The rabbi asked the tightrope walker about the secret to his art. The secret … “Always keep your destination in focus. You have to keep your eyes on the other end of the rope. But do you know what the hardest part is?
The hardest part is when you make the turn. Because for a fraction of a second, you lose sight of your destination. When you don’t have sight of your destination, that is when you are most likely to fall.
“Rabbi Jacobson adds that, “When the time comes to make a turn and for a moment you cannot see where you are headed, you have to have your destination in your mind’s eye.” He goes on to say that “real focus is not physical, it is transcendental. Real focus is your relationship with your Divine mission.
“When Miki Young, z”l was taking her last breaths, she was hoping for us to know her soul and to share the teachings of her soul – not necessarily her accomplishments – the “this and the that” but her Neshamah.
These days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur offer us time – and a focused opportunity — for turning and as we are turning – for suspending the focus we take for granted – and for pausing, noticing and reassessing. My hope for you, for me, for all of us, is that we can REturn – to what is core for us – to what is our unique Divine mission – and I would add – our unique partnership with the Divine – to be fully in relationship with each other.
