Tag Archives: blessings

Blessings and More: TorahCycle Vayechi

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HerTwelveTribesWe’re brimming over with gifts, especially this time of year. Even my peers who have forsworn No more stuff! can’t help ourselves. There’s always one more bottle of wine or limoncello, or a delicacy of salt, vinegar, or baked goods to exchange. Our cupboards overflow with abundance, all the while we’re trying to empty out, bringing donations to food banks and sending old favorites to thrift shops and new wearers.

We love exchanging gifts and blessings, sharing our things and thoughts. But in the parlance of corporate-speak: Is this their best and highest use? How can we best of what we bring to the world promote growth and healing, for ourselves and others?

We recently celebrated Hanukkah, lighting one more candle each night eight times, celebrating the miracle of abundance and light. On that last evening of bright light, some of us felt an undertone of sadness shadowing the joy of celebration. It was an echo of the Game of Thrones refrain Winter is coming…, a warning that light can be subsumed by dark forces, and that we need to move beyond rituals to keep it alive. It’s a reminder of our responsibility to continue the memory of an ancient miracle with the hard work in our daily lives.

Rituals matter, and help reinforce soul commitments. But actions of observance and the rhetoric of prayer can be hollow if they are not backed up with kavannah, deep intention, the rest of the year. Our daily choices and actions are the biggest miracle we can conjure. They’re generally a lot less fun to practice, and without the fun of celebration and presents, lights and good cheer, it can be harder to conjure the energy to stay on track. Many a person trying to give up smoking, rich foods, or alcohol can backslide when results are slow and temptations are more abundant than rewards and changes.

This week’s reading is all about Jacob blessing his sons. It’s a chance to remind yourself of all the strength and goodness you carry within you, all the assets that will sustain you when hard times and darkness come, as they will, or a chosen goal seems so very far out of reach.

Next week we will begin Exodus, the book of being in and then leaving slavery. Mitzrayim, the pace of constriction is a chance to up the ante on yourself. But now, this week, is a wonderful time to remember all the abundant blessings with which you have been endowed. They’ll not only sustain you but help to liberate you.

As you greet the new year, take some time from the nachos and bowl games to do an inventory of the tools and gifts you have at your disposal. They’ll help you reach your goals, whatever they are. On any given day they might help you earn a living, find a sweetheart, or heal an old wound. Think about your intellect, your emotional intelligence, your adaptability and your willingness to work and help. Your spirituality and your physicality. Your heart and feelings. Your senses of humor, compassion, generosity, and curiosity. Think about your genetics and your karmic assets. Each is a blessing that will help you grow into the you that you want to become.

The Harvest of Our Lives: Sukkot 2014

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sukkot 2014At the end of the day, what do you talk about, you and your soul? Do you get into the existential Why am I here? stuff, or do you think about how you’re doing with your chores, whether they’re simple things like chopping veggies for dinner or deeper tasks like taking a karmic inventory?

In the quiet of the day, what’s the conversation between you and you?

There’s a great holiday that starts this week, early in the Jewish calendar year and at the very end of the Torah cycle. It’s called Sukkot, from the word sukkah, which means booth. Traditional folks build covered shelters, as simple as a frame tented with fabric or wood and a canopy of thatch, harvest stalks, and reeds. They eat and sleep in them. The more observantly elastic take part of each day to meditate outside and share a meal with friends in a less formal sukkah.

The observance is a powerful mirror of the Passover holiday we celebrated six months ago.

Way back then we chose to leave mitzrayim, the narrow place, the symbolic land of constraint. We left slavery and went into the unknown. Now, after reaching our symbolic goal (and a new year), we take time to harvest the blessings of the land, give thanks, and take stock of the insights from our journey.

I’m not always a good practicing Jew. But I cherish the way Judaism organizes the year, the way it moves us inexorably through the cycles of self-examination and growth that so many of us profess to want to partake of.

I frame this writing on the weekly turning of the scrolls because I think that somewhere along the way someone got it right. That there’s a story here, and it’s a good one. That there are paths and processes and journeys that we go on. Spiritually. Emotionally. Intellectually. Physically. That what takes place in the material world happens in parallel in your soul. And if you pay good attention to your process you might learn something that’ll help make it easier/kinder/gentler and also deeper/more meaningful/spiritually valuable. If we all did that, this place would be happier/sweeter/more joyous. And all our paths would be paths of peace.

So if you and your soul aren’t talking, if you don’t think you’re here to learn/grow/improve and to find/create greater goodness and compassion, then what are you doing? Does it teach you or satisfy you? Energize you and open you?

I hope so. If not, then get on with figuring out what’ll give you the same bang for your karmic buck.

As we sit amidst the harvest of the season–the squashes that will sustain us this winter, the aromatics that will flavor our soups, the apples and pears that will sweeten our winter evenings–we give thanks for not only our liberation but for our arrival in this place of safety. Our ability to have perspective and quiet time. No more scrambling and searching and wondering. We have arrived.

At this turn of the seasons, in the oasis of whatever sukkah you choose, take a sweet moment to have a good heart to heart with your higher self. There is simply nothing better.

See What’s Coming: TorahCycle Re’eh

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Re'eh 2014The weather here has been crazy lately. Only the occasional Just f-ing too hot! But more than toasty far too often. What’s been strangest has been the mugginess. A thickness of air that makes your lungs work harder. And now, after some cleansing rain, the crisp scent of autumn.

We’re responding ambivalently. Not wanting to let go of a summer that always seems to begin too late and be too short. But also noticing that some mornings it’s just a little cool. Apples and pears are winking at us from the farmer’s market stalls. Strawberries saying good bye. And while we’re crying Too soon, too soon, there’s also an inner part that recognizes that the time for change has arrived right on schedule.

I feel this way when I drive to the coast. That moment when you smell how the air has changed. That salty under taste and shift in the wind. The edge of transition, imminent and welcoming. We’ve been preparing so long. It’s almost time.

This week’s reading talks about life in the Promised Land, the building of the Temple, and three annual pilgrimages to it. The holidays commemorate the exit from slavery, the giving of the 10 Commandments at Sinai, and the harvest festival. These correspond to a conscious re-birthing, defining the rules of daily life, and gratitude for the bounty that we’ve earned.

We’re still six weeks from the Jewish new year. There’s big potential for processing this time of the year, and a very conscious process of doing so that starts in about ten days. Yeah, yeah we’re supposed to be conscious each moment of each day. But identifying these special times, the holidays and their pilgrimages, real or metaphorical, helps keep us honest. They set us up to experience the shift as more than just a turn of the calendar page and the naming of dates.

Most of us are hard-wired for autumn and January 1 as transition times. Like students and teachers readying their school supplies, we’re subliminally getting ready for a shift of season. We don’t know how its gonna be when we get there and then. But we’re curious. And so very very close. We can see, smell, and taste it in the air, our food, and our daily attire, as well as on the calendar.

We’re not just curious about what it be like there. But how will we, I, me will be like there and then. What new parts are going to emerge, perhaps parts I’ve been nurturing and cheering on to step up and do better, take more responsibility. And also curious how older parts of my nature will shift around, find new ways of relating to one another, maybe even take a back seat.

The weekly readings get their names from their first word. This week’s Re’eh, means “see.” It comes from the choice between blessing and curses, and the designation of two mountains in the promised land to represent them. This is a great time to “see” how you’re doing as you prepare for the coming transition. To prepare yourself to choose the life of blessings that you so deserve.

All Those Gifts!! : TorahCycle Vayechi

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Her Twelve TribesOur inner selves reflect different aspects of who we are, or like to think we are. Our lover. Our banker. Our artist. Our bargainer. Our internalized parent. The proverbial inner child. The manifestor and the needy one.

This week Jacob blesses his sons with what range from character assessments to hopes for their future. Individually the blessings are interesting; as a group they encompass a useful and hopeful set to build a future upon.

What’s the point of blessings? It’s great to be smart, attractive, or athletic. But beyond making life easier or happier, what good do blessings do?

Blessings are somewhere between the best hits of elementary school (understanding things like how weather works), and the best of adulthood (falling in love, appreciating music, poetry, or wine). The discerning and savoring selves: your brain and sense of wonder dancing happily together. They’re also teachers and guides.

Blessings help you become clearer about who you are and what you’re here to do. Blessings help you get on with life with less fuss and grumbling.

Note: Blessings aren’t like shopping. You can get better or worse about using and appreciating your blessings. But you can’t trade them in for new or different ones, like you might a car. They’re gifts, not assets. They should inform your ability to do your karmic homework.

What you need to do more/less of, and when to start or stop doing so, isn’t a secret. Probably not to you. Certainly not to your guides, or even your friends and family (many of whom would be happy to tell you). Instead of waiting for an instruction manual, say Thanks and use your gifts. You’ll figure it out.

We don’t always use our blessings wisely. We get too ambitious, overshoot the mark. Or are too cautious, don’t try as hard as we should.

We have small triumphs, like mastering a new techno toy. And larger ones, like a better job or happier relationship. And we screw up. We learn from our failures, and sometimes get luckier than we ever though we could or even deserve. Favorite lines from Joan Baez, Life’s a thump ripe melon. So sweet and such a mess.

Blessings are what get us from one melon to the next. They’re somewhere between home base and everywhere you’ve always wanted to go.

I’m calling 2014 The Year of the Grand Experiment. Manifesting my lists of how I’d want to live if all my blessings were happily working synergistically, and I were truly honoring what I tell myself is important. Baseline reality: choices around time, money, food, and stuff. Deeper: spiritual practice, creativity, and emotional growth. Winnowing the cupboards and expanding the soul.

What a great week to meditate on your blessings. Don’t focus on things that come with worldly acclaim. Think about aspects of self that make you happiest to be you, and that offer clues and challenges about how to live your evolving life.

The next parts of Torah are about how to free yourself from what constrains you. Take some time now to think about how your blessings can illuminate the journey to your personal promised land.