This week’s Torah portions, Nitzavim (standing) and Vayelech (and he went) detail the covenant G-d makes with the people of Israel before Moses passes along his leadership prior to his death. When looking at these portions in the context of the Jewish calendar and the upcoming High Holidays, we can glean some inspiration for our self-reflective work as we plan to “stand” before G-d, our community, and ourselves.

The text describes a warning: when the people of Israel are aligned with their covenant with G-d, there will be blessings, and when they turn away from their covenant, there will be curses. The text uses different versions of the Hebrew root word “shuv,” which translates as “turn” or “return” – an interesting coincidence in light of the approaching holiday. At this time of year, we are asked to do “teshuva.” While this is typically is interpreted as “repentence” the word originates in the same root word this portion uses: to turn/return.

When G-d addresses the nation, the text details the diverse members of the larger community that are being addressed: from leaders and officers, considered highly ranked in the group, to the woodcutters and water-drawers, the lowest rung of society. It has highlighted by commentators that not one person is left out of this covenant, regardless of their social standing or assumed worth.

In reading this, I thought about how when I started a meditation practice, I was hoping it would foster my higher self and help me get rid of sides of myself I disliked. I wanted the “leader” in me to step forward and the “woodcutter” in me to go away. As I practiced, I realized that I spent a lot of energy running away from parts of myself that could not be separated from the whole of who I am.  My attempts at turning away again and again from the parts of me I didn’t like just fueled my frustrations and intolerance of who I am in comparison to who I wanted to be. After some time, my practice took on a different focus that is much more in line with the description this portion offers: whatever and whoever is within me, I make space for it all. I do not distract myself or avoid the parts I dislike in favor of the things I prefer: I am dedicating my practice to include all sides of myself. In doing this, I have found much healing and compassion within myself.

We spend so much of our energy trying to prop up those sides of ourselves we value while ignoring or avoiding the parts that we dislike. What if we took the time this holiday season to re-establish a covenant with all parts of ourselves? What if we turned to address and acknowledge each part of the whole package of who we are? Perhaps this type of teshuva or returning would bring us closer to atONEment and make space for blessings and peace in return. My kavanah (intention) for practice is to sit in openness for all parts of ourselves. We can gather up the pieces of ourselves that we love as well as what we dislike and stand together in one-ness, recognizing that all of our selves are necessary, from the high priests to the water gatherers.

What is the nature of teshuva (often translated as repentance or return)? How does this process begin?  How do we ourselves take steps towards being our best selves, and how do we create the space for others to do so?

One immediate response might be that which Maimonides, the Rambam, suggests in his Laws of Teshuva: to identify all those things that we did ‘wrong,’ to articulate and enumerate them, to confess to them (vidui).  From there, the Rambam says, we can begin to do the work of not repeating such actions and behaviors.  We can begin to do the work of return–returning from ‘wrong’ behavior to our best and highest selves.

In his work Likkutei Moharan, Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav offers an alternative approach.  Rather than beginning from the ‘wrong,’ he suggests, the seeds of teshuva begin with an identification and acknowledgement of what is right and good.

‘Know!’  he writes ‘You must judge all people favorably.  Even if you have reason to think that a person is completely wicked, you must search until you seek out some bit of goodness, some place in that person where he is not evil.  When you find that bit of goodness and judge the person that way, you may really raise him up to goodness.  Treating people this way allows them to be restored, to come to teshuva…‘

Here, Rabbi Nachman offers a gift for those of us who struggle to let go of grudges, to see beyond the frustrated personality traits of relatives, to open our hearts to people who have hurt us in the past.  Sometimes, Rabbi Nachman acknowledges, full forgiveness is too hard to achieve in one go. And yet, this does not need to discourage us entirely.  Even taking one step, seeing one good element in another human being, is a worthy exercise, because our small step will help enable that person to change.

This is an amazing claim!  The very opening of our heart towards another human being helps create the space for that person to move forward in teshuva, in return towards her best self!  The process of teshuva, therefore, is not one sided, it is not solely about me doing my best to make amends, do teshuva, seek forgiveness from people I have hurt, work towards my better self.  Nor is it reciprocal, with one person seeking forgiveness and another granting it.  Rather, the process of teshuva is dialectical and dialogical: it happens through the steps forward of the one who wants to change, and the belief on the part of another that the person has the potential to do so.

Rabbi Nachman does not stop with this tremendous idea.  He goes on to encourage us to do something even more challenging: to extend this position of open heartedness, of kindness, of belief in the goodness of a human being to ourselves:

“You have to search until you find some point of good in yourself to restore your inner vitality and attain joy.  And by searching for and finding some little bit of good that still remains inside of you, you genuinely move from the scale of guilt into the scale of merit.”

For those of us–including myself–who can be our own worst enemies, Rabbi Nachman’s words ring loudly.  Many times, we fail to acknowledge the goodness in our own work, our own capabilities, our own choices. Rabbi Nachman offers a beautiful practice—the practice of identifying one small good thing about ourselves—as a tool for releasing these patterns, which painfully prevent us from granting ourselves forgiveness, from becoming our best and highest selves

Rabbi Nachman then beautifully suggests that this behavior, the identification of the good in ourselves and in our souls, sends our unique melody out in to the world, blending the notes of our individual music into the symphony of humanity.

With wishes for a new year that is full of seeing the good–in our world, in our friends, families and colleagues, and in ourselves.  And may this goodness lead to renewal, return, and joyful songs.

Here we are in the Days of Awe, between Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur. The books of life and death are open. This is the time, we’re told, that the gates to heaven are open. Teshuvah (returning/realigning/repenting) is most possible now. It’s a good time to meditate, I think. We can watch our own shifts and resistances and desires. We can take some time to reflect on what we love and what’s difficult for us, to see where we are in our worlds. 

I’ve been thinking about how we read the story of Jonah on Yom Kippur. In reading a lot of interpretations and drashes on Jonah, I keep coming back to one thought: Jonah is super unlikeable. And, Jonah is just like us.

In the story, Jonah’s prophesy is unwanted and resisted. God tells Jonah to go to Ninevah (probably to tell them to repent), and Jonah says no. He’s not interested in being a prophet. He doesn’t want people to think he’s crazy, and also, he’s scared. Of all outcomes. So he purposefully goes in the wrong direction: he goes west when God tells him to go east. When there’s a storm, sent by God, to sink the ship he’s tried to escape on, he goes to sleep in the ship’s hold [Can't we all relate to that? We're in the midst of a storm in our lives and all we want to do is crawl under the covers.], then asks to be tossed off the ship and is swallowed by the fish.

After praying and getting released from the fish, Jonah reluctantly goes to Ninevah, tells the people to repent… and they do! They totally listen and the city is saved by God, and Jonah is not happy. There’s more, but it’s the same thing. Then it ends. It’s a mysterious story. There’s no real change in Jonah’s unlikeability. He doesn’t seem to have redeemable qualities, just familiar ones.

Aviva Zornberg’s theory about Jonah resonated with me. She asks what exactly Jonah is resisting, and finds that he’s completely uncomfortable sitting between life and death. Jonah can’t acknowledge that no one has any security, that life is uncertain. Zornberg says that it’s unbearable for Jonah to recognize that we’re not firmly in life or death; we’re somewhere in between. She says that Jonah is “deeply allergic” to standing in uncertainty, and it’s actually an unbearable position for any human being. Except that this is exactly what life is, standing before God, in between life and death, always.

In the story, we find that Jonah would rather die, and asks for it, than stay in this in-between, of life. When Ninevah is saved, after he fulfills his prophecy, he is disturbed because this is also uncertain. His perspective might be that God is showing that nothing is for sure. Jonah thought the people would ignore his prophesy and be punished, but instead they all repented and saved their lives. This doesn’t make any sense. It’s frustrating. In a logical world, where Jonah, and probably all of us, would feel more comfortable and safe, evil people would be punished, good people rewarded. But this is not the world.  

This sounds a lot like the kabbalistic concept that the world is broken, and the path is messy.

On Yom Kippur we pray the al chet- the prayer with all the sins, it’s usually translated as sin, but it really means missing the target. So teshuvah is returning to the target, returning to the path. It’s also what we’re doing in meditation. We have a target in mind: focusing on the breath, a prayer, sitting in awareness, awaking our hearts and minds to compassion and kindness. And then we misstep, we miss the target and we return again and again and again. We distract ourselves often because we, like Jonah, feel completely uncomfortable with our human-ness, with standing before God, sitting between life and death, and when we run away from that reality, we misstep. We make mistakes, and we hurt ourselves and others.

We can use our meditation practice, especially in this time of the Days of Awe, as an invitation to sit in that in-between. We can recognize our uncertainty and be gentle with it. Here’s an opportunity to not approach this intellectually and not think about it, but to feel what it’s like to return, to practice teshuvah, to allow our practice of returning be a reminder of what it feels like to sit in uncertainty, to feel what Jonah felt, but not to run away.

Somehow Jonah’s story is a little bit inspiring in that “what not to do” way. We learn that resisting and running away may lead to our worse case scenario, and sitting with the way things are often changes our perspectives and strengthens our capacity to practice teshuvah, returning and realigning with our true and best selves.

May we all have meaningful and sweet new years.

This week’s Torah portion is Toldot, and Rabbi Sheila Peltz Weinberg gave a really great drash on it during the retreat I was just on, and I wanted to try to repeat what she shared, because she spoke directly to why we practice Jewish meditation and not some other form of spiritual practice.

Judaism, thankfully, has some lasting and beautiful structures- Torah, prayers, holidays, mitzvot, etc. And our task seems to be to take these structures seriously, but lightly; we have so many precedents in our history of going deep inside ourselves (see: Zohar, Hasidut), and also to look outside of ourselves and our structures for insight, perspective, challenges (see: Maimonides, the entire Jewish meditation movement). So, we’re held by these structures, but for sustainability, survival, and in the spirit of learning and growing as individuals and as a people, we have to be open and find what works.

Now, this week, we read Toldot, Jacob and Esau are born after fighting each other inside their mother, Rebecca, and Isaac re-digs the ancestral wells in search of water. Sheila’s interpretation of the digging of wells is what I’d like to share:

Isaac is digging the wells of Abraham, finding along the way contention, conflict, and then rehovot, spaciousness. In digging the wells, all of which lead to water, Isaac goes through a lot, eventually getting to a place of non-adversarial flowing waters… The question comes up: “why not skip all of that contention and conflict and just dig new wells?” and Sheila’s answer was threefold: “1. there’s water there!, 2. we know where they are!, and 3. they are our wells!”

This is part of our spiritual path- we know there are deep insights within Jewish practice and study, we have the structures at our disposal, and maybe more importantly, it’s ours! After my whole schpiel about what is Jewish about meditation, I usually just say that if I bring my whole self and my whole heart to my practice, and I’m Jewish, then my practice is Jewish. It feels genetic to me, this ache of connection and the clear feeling that I feel at home in a Jewish context. Even when I considered myself Buddhist and wasn’t so interested in being Jewish, I said the shehechianu when I saw the Himalayas for the first time. Sometimes I’m in conflict and contention with my Jewish roots and contemporary interpretations and even the idea of God, but this feels like the right path, and this is my well, and I’m thirsty.

A fun Yom Kippur game my family and I played on Rosh Hashana is to ask yourself (and your family/friends):

If I were being described to someone in one word, what is the word I would least like them to use? The most?

People usually only take a few seconds to name the words, and they are usually very loaded. I said the way I would least like to be described is “bland.” I said I would like most to be described as “multi-faceted.” Other negative terms family members said were, “selfish”, “hypocritical”, “boring”, and “annoying”. Positive included “visionary”, “funny”, and “clever.”

I was fascinated with the game because in each case, the person who said the bad term had a visceral response when they imagined being described as that thing. When I think of people describing me as “bland” I feel it deeply in my stomach and I think “Oh god – please let it not be true.” But of course, the fact that I am so afraid of it implies that I think it might be.

The next interesting question is – what if it is true? What if this thing we dislike so much about ourselves – our selfishness, our blandness, our annoyingness – what if they are there for a good reason? What if they are holy pieces of ourselves? What if they are understandable reactions to things outside of our control?

In my case, I think I am worried about being bland and forgettable because I am beginning to work really hard at NOT working (a paradox if there ever was one). For a lot of my life, I thought that entertaining and taking care of people was the route to love, but it became exhausting and inauthentic. I am trying to hang back a little more these days – and doing less tap dances to win people over. It definitely feels more authentic, but also scary. Will people see that I am cool, or will I come across as boring? My rational mind says that cool recognizes cool – but venturing into new territory and breaking patterns is hard.

Anyone want to share their favorite and least favorite one-word descriptions of themselves? What do you make of your choice?

Alison always makes fun of me for posting such dark blogs. I say – it’s Elul! It’s in the air! I hope you find it interesting.

Like Alison, I too read a crazy story the other day that had to with Teshuvah:

(Babilonian Talmud, Avodah Zara 17a)

It was said of Rabbi Eleazar ben Dordia that there was no harlot in the world he did not have relations with. Once, upon hearing that there was a certain harlot in one of the towns by the sea who accepted a purse of gold coins for her hire, he took a purse of gold coins and crossed seven rivers to reach her. As he was with her, she had flatulence and said, “As this gas will not return to its place, so will Eleazar ben Dordia never be received in repentance.”

He thereupon went, sat between two mountains and exclaimed: “O, mountains, plead for mercy for me!” They replied: “How shall we pray for thee? We stand in need of it ourselves, for it is said, “For the mountains shall depart and the hills be removed!”” He exclaimed: “Heaven and earth, plead for mercy for me! They, too, replied: How shall we pray for you? We stand in need of it ourselves, for it is said, “For the heavens shall vanish away like smoke, and the earth shall wax old like a garment.””… He then pleaded with the Sun and moon and the stars and constellations to plead for mercy on his behalf but they all gave the same answer.

Said Rabbi Eliezer, “Then it depends upon me alone!” Having placed his head between his knees, he wept aloud until his soul departed (he died). Then a bath-kol (voice from heaven) was heard proclaiming: ‘Rabbi Eleazar ben Dordai is destined for the life of the world to come!’

Now, at the risk of sounding blasphemous, I don’t particularly think visiting harlots is that bad a sin, but How R. ben Dordai “repented” is amazing. It’s like he suddenly GETS that he isn’t who he wants to be – that he has lived a life he is ashamed of.

He is desperate. He begs ANYTHING and ANYONE to help him – and nothing can. Nothing is firm enough for him to grab onto – even mountains, even the sky – there is no “there” there in any of it. Everything is too busy taking care of itself to take care of him. He feels utterly and completely alone.

Haven’t we all been there? Those moments in the middle of the night or crying in public, times of literally hitting the bottom of our reserves, with nothing we can do except cry out for help? I know I have. I’ve cried on more subway lines in more cities than I would care to admit. I’ve spent nights curled in fetal position, feeling nothing but the raw pain of a rejection, of early losses, of disappointment or self-loathing.

I think the story is right to point out the transcendental quality of those times of utter desperation. I think in those times when we feel completely helpless, we have no choice but to let go of our illusion of control, and hang on for dear life. That is the Teshuvah of the utterly broken hearted. I think those moments strengthen our empathy and make us wise. Somehow, I think they connect us to the wounded, pulsing heart of the whole world.