Choosing to Decide & Deciding to Choose

Have you noticed that there are a LOT of decisions to make? And I don't mean just the big ones either. Have you been down the oral hygiene aisle lately? Do I want fluoride in my toothpaste? Tarter control? Whiter teeth? Cavity protection? Gum treatment? Twelve hours of minty freshness?

And then there's the paper goods aisle? That's an utter nightmare! Do I want one ply or two? Now they have three, also! Ultra soft or ultra strong? With lotion? With aloe? With Vitamin E??Quilted, rippled, 1000 sheets...angels, puppies, teddy bears and smiling babies--it's all too much! It's option overload and in the end, you know what? It all goes down the drain one way or another! And with all these choices, which, might I add, we are fortunate to have, is it any surprise that when it comes to the bigger, more meaningful decisions in life that we stand in a stupor unable to move in one direction or another?


Now I think back to the mazes of my early childhood. It was so simple back then to find the part that said "start HERE," locate the "FINISH" sign up ahead and travel via crayon accordingly. Sure, it was scary to think of a page full of purple mishaps, but there really were only two options: move closer to completion or get stuck. Not like today. Now there are 623,954.7 options! We don't always progress in a linear fashion and for many of life's decisions, we don't even know what or where the "FINISH" sign is! There is a delicate balance between acting recklessly and not acting at all. There is a fine line between foolishness and cautiousness. When we are overly cautious, we are stagnant, and that is foolish.

Sometimes it's our own stagnancy that encourages us to make a move. We might grow uncomfortable enough with the current status quo to pursue something (or anything) outside of our "comfort zone." Sometimes it's a gentle nudge from a loving other to get off our tuchus and make a decision. Sometimes, still, it's the stagnancy of others. We see so clearly from the outside how uncomfortable someone else might be in what they deem their own "comfort zone." We see so objectively that this person is neither sinking nor swimming, that this person is barely even treading water. We genuinely want more for those we love and then we can look inward and see the stagnant puddles of muck that have built up on our own journey's path.

I am blessed to have many loving others I can look toward with admiration. I've friends and family who have shown incredible levels of courage and faith. They have taken great leaps and risks to pursue their paths with vigor and zeal. They make it look graceful, and perhaps, I do, too. I, too, have taken some pretty hefty leaps. I greet each morning with vigor and zeal; I close each night with courage and faith. It is because I have so very much that I strive for so much more. I really do want it all and why shouldn't I? For some time now I've felt I am on the cusp of something so very big. I am spiritually, emotionally and to some extent intellectually aware that I am on the threshold of my dream. It is as though I have arrived at the proverbial three doorways and there is the booming baritone voice of the game-show host bellowing, "And which will you choose? Door number one? Door number two? Or door number three?"

Do you open one door up a crack, just to see what's inside? Or maybe you barge on in, tossing caution to the wind. I am contemplative. I think, I talk, I explore and when the time feels right I ask the questions I do have. I am self-aware enough to realize when I just don't know. I am not inhibited at all in asking G-d for help and guidance. I have many mentors and ten times as many options. The tricky part is deciphering the exact moment at which I've passed the point of fruitful contemplation and entered into the realm of stagnant hesitance. Divine Providence has it that just as soon as I began to cross that threshold, the phone began to ring off the hook. Opportunity was on the other line in the form of conversations with strangers, conversations with friends and even conversations with family. Support, encouragement and inspiration comes in so many beautiful shades.

As I think more about this time of year, about the darkness inherent to the upcoming month of Kislev and about the joy and light of Chanukah, I cannot help but think of how this all relates. A spark needs proper kindling and a nurturing environment in which to flourish as a hardy and vibrant flame. The human spark needs love, connection, education, relationship... The time has come to stop asking"when" and start saying "now." It's no longer a matter of asking "where," but a matter of starting HERE. I will not be overcome by option overload. I will begin today by choosing to decide and deciding to choose!

Rosh Chodesh Kislev: Only Through Darkness Can Light Shine Victorious

Long before there were weblogs and Facebook, long before I knew how to turn on a computer at all, I kept track of all my memories and correspondence the old-fashioned way: a pen and paper. I began keeping a journal when I was eight years old. I wrote almost every day in a spiral notebook, followed by another spiral notebook and several dozen more spiral notebooks. One of my greatest pains years after moving across the country was finding out that in the many disasters that surrounded our life in and eventual sale of my family home in Massachusetts, ten years of my journals were destroyed and lost. Nonetheless, after I left home, I continued to write. Pen and paper were almost always my first choice, but eventually, computers took over, and two years ago I gave into the lure and luster of blogging-- of having a permanent, seemingly indestructible location for all of my thoughts. Now, after the recent and sudden death of my second laptop, even more of my writing is lost in the abyss of words said and forgotten. Yet, this blog remains...and more importantly, that which is real and truly important is never lost or forgotten!
This Thursday marks Rosh Chodesh Kislev, the beginning of the new month. Kislev is a month that falls during the darkest part of the year. At least here in the northern hemisphere, the days are short, the nights are long, and the darkness and cold can penetrate your very bones. And yet, Kislev is also the month in which the festival of Chanukah falls, one of the most joyous celebrations of our Jewish year. It is on that first night of Chanukah, the 25th of Kislev, that I celebrate my Jewish birthday. This year will mark my 28th year on this little blue planet, and I pray, please G-d, for many more!

As I was sifting this evening through a few of the spiral bound volumes that made the exclusive cut for what I was willing to ship 3,000 miles across country this past summer, I found a letter I wrote on my 23rd birthday to my former 13-year-old self. It's not necessary to share the entire thing, word for word. The gist was a message telling 13-year-old me that it would be OK. That I would be OK. At thirteen, I remember everything seemed so BIG. I felt so small in that, so powerless. Even at 23, telling that frightened 13 year old to 'keep her eye on the prize,' did I truly know what the prize was? I knew at 13 and at 23 that I lived in a world of darkness. I thought at 13 that I wanted some easier way out of that. I knew at 23 that what I'd really wanted was a way in. At 23, I could already tell my decade-younger self that things would get worse before they got better. What I did not know yet, was just how amazingly grand they would get. I had no awareness of how big that prize truly was and how very worth it in the end of the darkness it would be to finally, palpably feel the light shining upon my face. I did not know that there is great comfort in being so very small in the realm of something so much bigger.
Today, I am almost 28. I am wise enough to admit that I know very little. I am optimistic enough to say I have much yet to learn. I can flip through crumpled pages of faded words and mourn the verses that are long since forgotten. The Truth in it all remains regardless. It can be written in pencil, pen, or in typeface-- through blood, sweat and tears. That which I knew to be True at 13 and at 23 and still today and G-d willing tomorrow is what really matters.

First Night, 2010

Almost 28 years ago, two days before the darkest day of the year in the northern hemisphere, I was born. That same evening, Jews everywhere lit the first candle in their Chanukah menorahs. What is the significance? I believe now it is that we are all here to be a light in this world of darkness. I also believe that for a very long time, I went about that mission in an exhausting and ineffective way. You cannot light a room by taking away darkness. You must infuse that darkness with your light. 
Ten years ago, at 18, I boarded a plane headed to northern Idaho. Talk about darkness, this time of year the sun goes down there before 4:00PM! Ten years later, with G-d's help, I live a life of spiritual, bodily and emotional health. It's not effortless nor is it meant to be; it is, however, meaningful and no longer exhausting. I rest peacefully and wake full of vigor and a gratitude that would not be palpable were it not for the darkness I experienced. No longer do I struggle against the natural state of the world around me. More importantly, no longer do I struggle against my own natural state. For I am not a person who struggles with sadness or melancholy. I am not a person who hides beneath a shadow. I am a person of great joy and great light; the struggle ended as soon as I became unwilling to stifle that. The joy began when I allowed my light to emanate from within me, completely uninhibited by fear or doubt.
I've been learning from a Chassidic discourse , Victory of Light, given by the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson. In the introduction he highlights the following:

"...darkness has a purpose. It is an unnatural condition. It is an aberration that exists to awaken our infinite essence, which has the power to transform the darkness to light (page 18)."

When I think about it, even on my birthdays, my parents would always dim the lights as they carried in my cake with its candles all aglow. They, like all good parents, did not want me to ignore the darkness. They did not wish to shield me from its existence. They did want me to appreciate the light, and it is so much easier to appreciate those tiny little flames in a dark, dark room.
Whatever this time of year may symbolize for you, I pray that we all find warmth, light, and joy. May we all merit to shed a little light in a time of great darkness and to celebrate the many blessings we are fortunate enough to obtain.

Beloved of my Soul...

So here's the deal. This is it. G-d and I are in a relationship. We have been for quite some time, but it's complicated. So complicated, in fact, that Facebook can't begin to categorize it let alone describe it. Sure, it came with a proverbial owner's manual: you may have heard of it, it's called the Torah...
Texts upon texts have been written, studied and reviewed to try and better understand it. Men of great stature and minds of great capacity have sought to describe it. At best, when it comes to understanding and describing the one of a kind relationship we share with G-d, analogies must suffice. Rather than saying what it is, we must relate what it is like. 
My relationship with G-d is multifaceted and my service to Him is complex. It can at once be like the love a child feels toward her father and at the same time, like the reverence of a servant toward her master. I express my love through mitzvos; that is my service to G-d. That is my party-line connection straight to the Source of my purest joy, greatest comfort and overall serenity. And yet, my service is complex in and of itself. There are mitzvos I do out of desire and pleasure, like that child to her father. And there are mitzvos I do out of obligation and commitment, like that servant to her master. That does sound complicated indeed!

Av Harachaman: The Merciful Father

I will begin with a parable. The father carries his infant into the exam room. He holds this child close, gently in his arms. The child looks lovingly at the familiarity of his father's face and without realizing what is happening, or why, he feels a sharp and sudden pain. He has been given a vaccine. Instantaneously, those eyes just filled with love now well with tears and the infant begins to cry. Just as immediately, he looks to his father for comfort, and is soothed by the same loving arms that carried him into the exam room in the first place.

Wait a minute--was this compassionate father not the very man who knowingly carried the infant into the exam room where he would get a shot? Did he not know it would hurt? Did he not foresee that this helpless child could no more understand the reason for the pain he would endure than he could resist the urge to cry out so in that brief but shocking moment of agony?
And yet, the compassionate father brought his son to this place knowing he would experience the sting of the needle, knowing he would cry out, knowing full well that shots are scary and hurt--all because he wishes to protect the boy from something much more painful and severe. He cannot tell the child in a way that he could understand why he must endure this act. He cannot even prepare him for the pain he will experience. He cannot take the hurt away or even feel it for him. All he can do is continue to hold the boy gently and close; all he can do is be present in his moment of distress and draw him near in comfort. He can also have the clarity and understanding that this, too, is for the good--that even though it hurts in this moment, it is an act of genuine love and compassion.
The boy will not remember the pain of this shot nor will he likely remember many of the scrapes and stings of childhood. He will, however, remember for all time the feeling of running into his father's open arms. In that, he will have peace. In that, he will feel comfort.

Draw Your servant to Your Will

I've often loosely equated the difference between my relationship with G-d prior to becoming observant versus after becoming observant to the difference between dating to fall in lust versus dating for the loving commitment of marriage. In the former scenario, everything is hunky dory so long as the feelings are intense and positive at all times. In the latter, the reality that emotional intensity ebbs and flows is made tolerable by the realization that the reward is far greater than effort required to move gracefully through a gentle current or a tidal wave.  

Every relationship has its own unique character. That character is defined by and comprised of the two separate entities uniting now as one. That character is not measured by what you do in the moments of intense infatuation. It's not even necessarily measured by what you do in the moments of intense distress. It is, in fact, measured by what you do in all the seconds, all the minutes and the hours in between. It's what you do when maybe no one else is looking. It's what you do when you're tired or hurt or afraid. It's what you do when you actually don't feel like doing anything at all.

Likewise, my service to G-d is not consistently an act done out of joy and pleasure. There are times my soul feels as if it is on fire and I long for the depth of that connection. My prayers are heartfelt, my eyes are open and my intentions are holy and pure. There are times I am tired or busy or distracted. My soul feels like it is on the back burner and my prayers feel a bit detached and forced. My eyes wander to the pile of things I've decided are more pressing in that moment, but it is in those very moments, nonetheless, that I do pray. 

It is in those moments of distance, detachment and distraction that I know how much those prayers matter. It is like that brief conversation in which you put down what you're doing just to say, "I'm here. I'm thinking of You." You may really be thinking of the dirty dishes in your sink, but the fact of the matter is, you put the sponge aside, dried off your dishpan hands and picked up the phone to make the call. If there is meaning and value in a mitzvah done out of joy and desire, how much more so is there value in one done purely out of obligation and unfaltering commitment. In those moments, I almost always find that action precedes motivation. Just as seamlessly as my feelings seemed to waft away in the hustle and bustle of this material world we live in, the very act of slowing down to an utter halt and reaching out from so deep within seems to bring me right back to center. And once again, that fire is burning at full force; even scrubbing kugel off the bottom of a baking dish now takes on more meaning.

A Perfect Service

"Every Jew must serve G-d both as a son and as a servant." (Tanya of Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, chapter 41)

And so this relationship with G-d, in all its complexity, in all its depth, and in all its vital potential is, at the end of the day (and in every moment between) a glorious and graceful balancing act. It is a delicate dance of feet intertwined with the physical world we live in and the G-dliness we strive to infuse it with. We are the vessel; He is the abundance with which we overflow. We are the moon; He is the sun by which we are visible. Together, we have the power to illuminate the darkest nights and the most dismal days. With G-d, we are never alone. At times our very souls are on fire! Through mitzvos we connect--out of love, in joy, with pleasure and a burning desire. Sometimes, the flame burns so very low and can seem to all but extinguish. In those moments, through mitzvos, we connect--out of commitment, out of obligation, maybe out of habit. And in those moments, our longing is so real we cannot even detect its very presence. We are at once the child seeking the comfort of our loving Father's arms and the servant honorably fulfilling our Master's will.

Yedid Nefesh

Every Friday night, as we welcome the holiness and sanctity of the holy Shabbat, we sing a truly beautiful song, Y'did Nefesh, Beloved of my Soul. Shabbat is a time of intense holiness and strong connection to G-d. Many have the custom to sing this again toward the end of Shabbat during seudah shlishis, the Third Meal. As Shabbos comes in each week, our souls are very much alive with that longing for G-d. By Saturday afternoon, as the hours fade and the sun begins to set, we become acutely aware of the pending split between the holy and the mundane. It is in that crucial hour that we sing again, from the depths of our being, knowing full well that the Heavenly gates are wide open. We are comforted by the beauty and passion of these ancient words. And yet, for the many eons that have passed since these words first poured from praying lips, the meaning behind then remains truly timeless:
I cannot ask that I never feel pain, hurt or fear. I cannot ask to comprehend why and when I do. I trust that everything is from G-d, and everything from G-d is good. I merely ask in times of distress for the comfort of my Compassionate Father's arms.
I do not expect to always feel a joy, radiance and vivacity in my service to G-d. I do not expect that my emotions, intentions and actions will always coincide nor that my energy will always maintain the same  level of intensity. I trust that when I feel distant, He will draw me near. The essence of a true and complete love is inherently beautiful and surprisingly simple: companionship. And...
....to him  Your friendship will be sweeter than the dripping of the honeycomb and all taste.

Beloved of the soul, Compassionate Father, draw Your servant to Your will. Then Your servant will hurry like a hart to bow before Your majesty. To him Your friendship will be sweeter than the dripping of the honeycomb and all taste. Majestic, beautiful, radiance of the universe my soul is sick for your love. Please O G-d, heal her now by showing her the pleasantness of Your radiance. Then she will be strengthened and healed and eternal gladness will be hers. All worthy One -- may Your mercy be aroused and please take pity on the son of Your beloved, because it is so very long that I have yearned intensely to see the splendor of Your strength, only these my heart desired, so please take pity and do not conceal Yourself. Please be revealed and spread upon me, my Beloved, the shelter of Your peace that we may rejoice and be glad with You. Hasten, be loved, for the time has come, and show us grace as in days of old.

*English Translation of Yedid Nefesh taken from Chabad.org