To the Stars and Back - Our Quest for Connection / Part 3 of 7

Time walking the journey of life makes clear that managing in the world asks us to stand in the “breach,” in the tension, in the paradox between our individuality and our universality. And yet, the breach, the tension, and the paradox also ask us to stand between our own needs and the needs of those around us; between our finite physical selves and our minds and our spirits that reach beyond what we can actually do in the time and space we occupy; between our dreams, our hopes, our visions, and the reality of the details of daily living and of the physical path we walk.

Once we begin searching for both our inner unique self and our universal self, the questions become more practical. What helps us in this process? What hinders us?

Perhaps you have experienced a deep need to be heard, or a time when you could not learn from others but needed the space and the silence to hear your own inner voice. Deep listening, to ourselves, to our ancestors, to the texts we hold sacred, to the Earth and the stars, to G!d – deep listening can connect us to our inner truth. Judaism teaches most fundamentally Sh’ma – hear – something we can only do if we listen. Pauline Oliveros, in words of hope for the third millennium of the common era, writes, “I pray for deep listening in the new century – listening alone – listening together – listening to others—listening to oneself – listening to the earth – listening to the universe…helping to create an atmosphere of opening for all to be heard, with the understanding that listening is healing. Deep listening in all its variations is infinite. Deep listening is love.”[1]

Deep listening can lead us to broader understandings and visions. Standing in the breach can become more manageable when we find and maintain a vision, see some kind of Big Picture before us, and find ways to remain connected to that vision or that Picture. The development of such a vision generally evolves over time as our life changes. Although it generally doesn’t pop up fully fledged overnight, it may start like a thunderbolt, making us acutely aware of its birth. Or, it may very slowly emerge, almost without our awareness, and we may find it difficult to pinpoint the birth moment.

Either way, the early stages of our vision may be as fragile as a premature baby. Imagine the first time you performed a ritual, tried a new task, spoke a new language, or did anything else you’d never done before. Whether or not it felt awkward or powerful, it nevertheless was something new and different. Only many, many repetitions of that act will make it feel integrated and a part of whom you are. With time and our nurturing, our fragile sense of our Big Picture can grow stronger and more mature and one day it will stand securely on its own. If we hold on and don’t let go, if we trust that inner core, we will gradually shed our fear and our insecurity and grow stronger. So, too, it is with our most intimate connections to our hearts and our souls, and to the universe.

But life of course is much more than a vision. Alongside our sense of our wider goals and the direction in which we want our lives to be going stand the myriad details of life. We must get up, get dressed, have breakfast, wash up, and get to work or otherwise get on with the day. We must call the phone company. We must plan for our old age. We must change the diapers. We must pay our bills. We must wash the floor, the clothes, the dishes. We must feed the cat and take out the compost. We must call our cousin and care for our father. We must send a birthday greeting. We must deal with a bitter co-worker. We must confront the personal issues of our family members. We must….

Sometimes the details are joyous. Sometimes they are dispassionate. Sometimes they are excruciating. Sometimes they are heartwarming. Sometimes they are annoying. Sometimes they are peaceful. Sometimes we must engage with the details and sometimes we have a choice about how to respond – both physically and emotionally. Evaluating when the details are important and when to let them go because they are impeding our progress forward is an important and legitimate process. There are situations when we need to engage and make a difference in the world. But there are other situations that just don’t matter enough, even if at first they seem important: the misunderstanding with the transit employee, the driver who cut me off, the lack of a thank you from a friend or family member for a gift I sent. Does getting upset about these things help me move forward with my vision and engage with my Big Picture or does it just take up energy I could be using more constructively? When stated like this, away from the emotion of the moment, the latter seems the obvious answer. The critical piece is always in the moment. The bark of a tree may respond to the growth of its trunk by stretching or by cracking, and if it cracks, a diversity of patterns of fissures and ridges may emerge. We, too, develop varying patterns depending on how we respond in the moment. Finding ways to keep the balance between the details and the vision is a daily tightrope walk that can smooth the pathway of our journey through life and help to keep us calm and focused.

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[1] From Prayers for a Thousand Years: Blessings and Expressions of Hope for the New, Elizabeth Roberts, Elias Amidon, HarperCollins Books, 1999, p. 55.

To the Stars and Back - Our Quest for Connection / Part 2 of 7

Each of us searches for our identity amid a sea of human faces. Who are these people around us? How are we connected to them? How much do we overlap in our experiences of life? The questions are complex and the answers not obvious. In my work as a hospital chaplain, visiting patients no matter what their religious persuasion, their country of origin, their cultural background, or their diagnosis, I find both moments of profound connection and moments of total lack of connection. Sometimes the inability to connect feels related to a religious or cultural difference and sometimes it seems totally personal – someone may be so angry about their disease or their life that they cannot let anyone anywhere near them. And sometimes it is something within me.

In an attempt to quantify our connections, researchers have developed a set of “universal human emotions,” experiences they believe are common to human beings independent of race or culture or any other factor. Evidence from a variety of research suggests that emotions such as happiness, anger, fear, sadness, disgust and surprise are shared by all human beings, no matter what their culture. One of the ways this was tested, as reported in a recent edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, was by having people of different cultures respond to the sounds of expression of emotion and react to them.[1]

Not everyone agrees with this list of universal human emotions, pointing out that both emotions and language are complex, and some question the list of English words. If I say I am sad, or if I cry, you may or may not understand what I mean, even if we speak the same language and have a similar cultural background. Even if we live in the same home! Add into the mix differences in languages and meaning and culture, and precise translation may be nearly impossible.

Reviewer Peggy Rosenthal tells us how Angela Alaimo O’Donnell, in her book of poetry Saint Sinatra and Other Poems, plays with the complexity of language and its multiple layers of meaning, stating that “Language is as incarnational as Christ himself, the Word made flesh.” Through her poems about saints both officially canonized and of her own making, O’Donnell “is conceiving of a new sainthood in its core New Testament sense of a “holiness…that is available to anyone” – any one unique human. Rosenthal wonders, “is poetry of God or of the devil…or merely human.” O’Donnell, of course, does not give answers, but at the close of the last poem in the book, she makes explicit the poem’s vision of poetry as sacramental, and invites the reader:  “Here. Take. Eat.”[2]

Considering the possibility of language being incarnational adds another layer of complexity to our understanding of our universal connections. Yet our efforts to comprehend and articulate these connections continue in a variety of ways. One, spearheaded by Anna Wierzbicka of the Australian National University, has been through the development of a Natural Semantic Metalanguage, which attempts to identify basic concepts, such as good, bad, and want, that are found in all languages.[3] To get to what we truly share in common – the concepts of good and bad, for example, as opposed to what our cultures consider to be good or bad – we have to get to what is most fundamental about life. Only then can we have a chance of conceptualizing our universal humanness, beyond our 23 pairs of chromosomes and the presence of our specifically homo sapiens physical features.

Poetry may or may not be divine, the list of universal human emotions may or may not be accurate, and the Natural Semantic Metalanguage may or may not succeed, but all are powerful attempts to find our common connections within and between traditions. For some reason, we seem to keep trying. Our hearts keep pulling us toward articulations of the universality of being human. At the same time, on the flip side of the coin, again and again, our religious, cultural, and modern traditions and teachers, through stories and through teachings ask us to become ourselves. They lead us and prod us and encourage us to find and express the uniqueness of our own selves. Jewish tradition, in Mishnah Sanhedrin 4:5, teaches that, “One human was created alone … to declare the greatness of the Holy One, blessed be He, for people mint many coins with a single mold, and they are all similar to one another. But the Sovereign, the Sovereign of sovereigns, the Holy One blessed be He, stamped every human with the mold of the first human. And not one is similar to any other.” Judaism, of course, doesn’t have a monopoly on the paradox of our universality and our uniqueness. Each of us has 23 pairs of chromosomes, but a unique set of genes on those chromosomes makes us who we are. Each of us, through the vehicles of the language and culture we know and that are familiar to us, is asked to express our uniqueness in our shared role as human beings.

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[1] “Cross-cultural recognition of basic emotions through nonverbal emotional vocalizations,” by Disa A. Sauter, Frank Eisner, Paul Ekman, and Sophie K. Scott, PNAS 2010 107 (6) 2408-2412.

[2] “Beatifications,” in America, October 17, 2011, pp 24-25.

[3] “Language and Metalanguage: Key Issues in Emotion Research,” by Anna Wierzbicka, Emotion Review, Vol. 1, No. 1 (Jan. 2009) 3–14.

To the Stars and Back - Our Quest for Connection

Part 1 of 7

Every evening before going to bed, I step outside and look up at the night sky. When I can see the stars, the sense of seeing into the distant distance and distant time invariably fills me with awe. Recently, with Reb Zusya, Plato, Buddha, and other ancient and modern sages on my mind, I’ve realized that when they stepped out into the nighttime air, they saw the same stars I am seeing today. Among these and many other teachers, I have found a common thread about our need to find ourselves.

In the world to come they will not ask me, 'Zusya, why were you not Moses?' They will ask me, 'Zusya, why were you not Zusya?’ Reb Zusya of Hanipoli

Doubt everything. Find your own light. Buddah

The true profession of man is to find his way to himself. Hermann Hesse

Know thyself. Plato

And you? When will you begin your long journey into yourself? Rumi

The stars we share and the unique light within our hearts – the two are universal; they are both opposite and interconnected, and therein lies the tension.

In so many wisdom traditions, teachings about the need and importance of finding and following our own unique path in life are found. In religious terms, the Name we worship wants us to become ourselves. Outside the religious and spiritual world, in the self-help section of the real or virtual bookstore or library we can find myriad programs to help us become our best selves. Could it really be that no matter where we are coming from culturally, an inner drive is urging us to find out who we truly are? Could it be that we all feel the need to become and be ourselves? Could it be that this is our personal human mission in life?

Perhaps.

Self-discovery and self-actualization are not simple concepts. If they were, we wouldn’t need so many teachings! In my limited experience, it is a lifetime journey to discover who I am and to allow my unique gifts to shine forth in the universe. It is a journey along which I have had many and varied teachers. It is a journey with many bumps, ups and downs, wrong turns, and backtracking, but that moves me ever forward into new territory.

Day 49 of the Omer

On this last day of counting the Omer, this seventh day of the sixth week, which gives us seven full weeks, we consider Malchut in Malchut - Leadership in Leadership, the ultimate in leadership.


Tonight, or some clear night soon, I invite you to step outside, lie down on the ground on your back, and look up at the stars. When you do, you will see celestial bodies that have been where they are for billions of years. You will gaze at a night sky that people have been gazing at since the beginning of human kind. Perhaps you will see constellations. Perhaps you have learned names that we humans have given to these pictures made of stars. Perhaps you are familiar with the Big Dipper, or the Pleiades, the Seven Sisters, or Pegasus, the Winged Horse. If you identify Ursa Major, the Great Bear, you are seeing a constellation thought to have been named 5,000 years ago. We are looking back into human history as well as the history of the Universe when we gaze at the night sky. Feel your smallness. Then feel your connection. Know that you are a part of something so much larger than yourself that its size is beyond our comprehension. Know that mystery remains in the Universe. And know that you are important. And when you have gazed long enough, I invite you to get up and go inside and begin a new beginning, be ready to receive the gifts that came from the mountaintop and from the sky, the gifts that remain in the trees and the rocks and the birds and the moon and the flowers and the water and the stars, after all these many, many millenia.



Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.

Today is forty-nine days, which is seven weeks of the Omer.




And so we reach the end of our counting together. I thank you for walking this journey with me. I couldn't have done it without you. May your Shabbat be restful, your Shavuot meaningful, you Memorial Day healing, and your long weekend joyous. May you find the strength and the peace and the insight you need. May you be blessed on your journey through life.


Todah rabbah - thank you,


Katy

Day 48 of the Omer

On this penultimate day of counting the Omer, we consider the attributes of Y'sod in Malchut, Bonding in Leadership.


When we look up at the sky on a clear night, we see a milky section of the expanse of stars, what we have dubbed the Milky Way, which we all know contains no milk and is not a candy bar! It is, rather, our view of the galaxy in which we live - a rotating group of gases and dust and hundreds of billions of stars bound together by the force of gravity. When we stand outside and look skyward, the Milky Way looks like it is far away, but actually we are about 2/3 of the way outward from the center of the galaxy. Amazing is our galaxy, and every other galaxy in the Universe. Amazing in its size, in its many, many member parts, in its diversity, in its contained energy, its age, its future, its past, its mystery.


To look at the families and communities of which we are a part, bound together by forces stronger even than gravity, to see them as we see the Milky Way, as if from the outside, can give us a glimpse of what is amazing about them, and such a glimpse can give us hope and strength and a sense of security and understanding and vision, and can help us move ever forward, with spirit, with joy, and with hope. 



Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.

Today is forty-eight days, which is six weeks and six days of the Omer.

Day 47 of the Omer

Today we reach the fifth day of the seventh week, and we focus on Hod in Malchut, Humility in Leadership.

In gazing at the stars, we often see "stars" that are not really stars. At times, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn shine in the evening, night, or early morning sky near the horizon, and to the naked eye they look exactly like bright stars. In fact, these "stars" are planets, and the light they seem to give off is actually the result of their illumination by the Sun. Unlike the Moon, they appear as dots or "stars" because of their greater distance from the Earth.

In exhibiting leadership in our personal and professional lives, we can't always be the source of the light, we can't always stand out. Sometimes we must allow the light of others to illuminate us and give us wisdom and strength. Sometimes we must reflect what comes from others. Sometimes we must hold our uniqueness in our hearts and blend in. Always, we must understand that our ability to lead is a reflection of the Divine.


Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.

Today is forty-seven days, which is six weeks and five days of the Omer.

Day 46 of the Omer

On this fourth day of the seventh week of counting the Omer, we turn our thoughts to Netzach in Malchut, Endurance in Leadership.


Our Sun is a star, and by star standards it is no big deal. There are many other stars that are similar to it. But for those of us here on Earth, it is the Sun that counts, it is the Sun that makes life possible.


One could say that the Sun is middle-aged. It is about 4.5 billion years old, and it will continue to burn hydrogen for another 5 billion years or so. In terms of a human life, or even all human life, this is a fantabulous amount of time. In terms of the evolution of all life on Earth, it is somewhat less so. But it is only because of this long existance of our star that life had time to evolve. Evolution took time, and the Sun gave it time.


It takes endurance and longevity to be a leader. It takes patience. Becoming a leader doesn't happen overnight, and remaining a leader requires maintaining ourselves through all the tough things that happen in a day or a week or a month or a year. We have to stay at it to see the fruits of our efforts, to let our "babies" evolve and change and grow. We have to hang in there and burn brightly for what might sometimes seem like a fantabulous amount of time.


Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is forty-six days, which is six weeks and four days of the Omer.

Day 45 of the Omer

Today we consider the Divine Attributes of Tiferet in Malchut - Harmony in Leadership, as we reach the third day of the seventh week of the Omer.


The stars are in the sky all the time, during the day and at night, we just can't see them during the day because the light of our star, the Sun, is so bright, not because it is so big, but because it is so close to us, a mere 93 million miles, or 8.2 light-minutes, away. Only at night can we see the stars, and the darker the night, the more we see. If the full moon is shining, it diminishes our ability to see the stars. If there is light pollution from a city, it diminishes our ability to see the stars. And of course, a cloud cover gets in the way of our seeing the stars. Everything must be in the right balance for us to see a star-studded night sky.


We need to keep ourselves in balance, too, in order to maintain our ability to lead - ourselves, our families, our communities. Being in balance through getting enough sleep, keeping night and day separate in terms of how we use them; being in balance through eating what keeps our bodies healthy, in the right amounts, no more no less; drinking enough to keep ourselves hydrated but not so much that we float away - all of these are physical ways of keeping ourselves in balance and harmony, but they impact our spiritual and emotional well being as well. Letting ourselves take care of ourselves, in body and in spirit, helps us stay in balance, so that we can see the stars, so that we can dream and have the physical and emotional and spiritual wherewithal to carry out our dreams.



Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is forty-five days, which is six weeks and three days of the Omer.

Day 44 of the Omer

On this second day of the last week of counting the Omer, we focus on Gevuarh in Malchut - Restraint in Leadership.


The amount of energy involved in the Big Bang was so unbelievably huge as to be beyond our comprehension. Today, the brightest events in the sky - those releasing the most energy - are supernovae, or exploding stars, which also involve an unfathomable (though significantly smaller) amount of energy, so much energy, in fact, that they may outshine all the stars in their galaxy. Even if we can't see a galaxy from Earth, we might be able to see a supernova in that galaxy. When a star explodes, either a black hole or a neutron star forms. 


Both the Big Bang and supernovae bring about the creation of something new.


What are the sources of our creative power and energy? How do we utilize this energy? Creativity requires restraint on our part, keeping our processes focused and directed. And when we are focused and directed, something new can come forth, and then our power and our energy give us a positive and inspiring kind of leadership.



Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is forty-four days, which is six weeks and two days of the Omer.

Day 43 of the Omer

Today we begin the last week of counting the Omer, and all during this week, as we count the last seven days until Revelation, we focus on Malchut - Leadership, beginning with Chesed in Malchut, Lovingkindness in Leadership. And this week we focus on the stars.


When we look into the night sky, we see only a tiny fraction of the stars in our galaxy, and there are billions of other galaxies out there that we also can't see, each of which has billions of stars. All the matter in that distant space beyond what we can see and in those stars and galaxies that we can't see formed in a way that is hard for most of us to even begin to understand - what we call the Big Bang. And it has kept on cycling and cycling and cycling, stars being born and living and burning up, and elements cycling and cycling and cycling through the universe, through all that time, and eventually into us, you and I and the other person. We are basically made of stardust.


We can't say that stars have feelings. They don't show kindness and they aren't really leaders. But it is that difficult-to-understand event of the Big Bang that led, after about 14 billion years or so, to us. And so we are here. The Big Bang is the ultimate leadership moment. It provided the building blocks of life.


There was another, incredibly minuscule by comparison, big bang of sorts when each of us was born. It was big in terms of the impact on our parents' lives, and we have been moving outward from the moment ever since. We are each a mini expanding universe. We are leaders in our own way, and when we remember how tiny our big bang was by comparison to THE Big Bang, perhaps we will remember to be kind, to show lovingkindness, even as we continue to move outward. And we may stop to wonder, for what unique effort are we providing the building blocks?

Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is forty-three days, which is six weeks and one day of the Omer.

Day 42 of the Omer

As we reach the end of the fifth week of counting the Omer, we focus on the Divine Attributes of Malchut in Y'sod, Leadership in Bonding.


As I walk through the woods today, I am suddenly struck by the dead trees. They are dead, certainly, and yet they are home to so much life. Most readily visible are the bracket fungi I see on some, forming small shelves all the way up the still-standing tree trunk. Farther along, I see the remains of a tree so thoroughly decayed and integrated into the forest floor that it is barely recognizable as a fallen tree. I'm on a brisk walk today, so I don't stop to look, but I know from past  observations that dead and decaying trees are home to myriad small six- and eight-legged creatures. And I can see holes in some of the trees, signs that woodpeckers had gone search of their dinner here, and I hear one of the busy birds hammering in the distance.


Trees are a critical part of the ecosystem in which they are the dominant plants, but not only when they are alive. As the dead trees decay, everything in them cycles through the ecosystem, giving needed nutrients and energy to other organisms.


What does it mean to be a leader? In many ways, it means to give to others what they need. As we allow our gifts, our words, our deeds, our resources to enrich others, to be the nutrients and the energy they need - whether in ways readily visible and apparent or not - we not only bond with those around us, but we model how to be a healthy part of our family and community ecosystems.



Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is forty-two days, which is six weeks of the Omer.

Day 41 of the Omer

On this sixth day of the fifth week of counting the Omer, we consider Y'sod in Y'sod  - Bonding in Bonding.


Some trees are covered with large, bright, decorative blossoms in the spring - magnolias, flowering dogwoods, cherry trees, flowering crab apples. These and others we plant in our yards and parks so we can enjoy their showy blooms. We plant oaks and maples and beeches for shade and spruce and fir for their gracious shapes and evergreen needles. The pine trees we complain about their thick pollen and the needles we must rake in the fall. If we take time to notice, we can see the maples covered with tiny reddish flowers and the oaks covered with light green in the spring before the leaves open. The flower are there. All these trees, all trees have some kind of structure - either flower or cone - that produces seeds; we might not notice them if they are not the reason that we are interested in the tree. But they are there. And they are crucial for the ongoing existence of the trees.


We, too, have flowers. Some of our flowers are bright and big and showy, and everyone sees them and appreciates them. And some of our flowers are small and not so easy to see. They just come along with us, perhaps unnoticed by others, but still very much part of who we are, and crucial to our ongoing existence and well-being.


Bonding in bonding. Holding everything within ourselves, and honoring it all, for all of it together makes up who we are. Our obvious gifts, our less obvious gifts, our obvious short-comings, our less obvious short-comings - bound altogether, they make us who we are, part of the sacred creation.

Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is forty-one days which is five weeks and six days of the Omer.

Day 40 of the Omer

On this 40th day of the Omer, we focus on the Divine Attributes of Hod in Y'sod, Humility in Bonding.

Every year that a tree grows, a new layer or ring of wood forms around the trunk, just under the bark. A tree generally produces one layer of wood each year, comprised of two rings of slightly different colors. The light-colored section is the spring and summer growth. The darker, denser wood is the fall and winter growth. The alternation of the light and dark make the rings visible. When a tree is cut down, we can count the rings of the stump, and find out how old it was at the moment of cutting.

We can also get the general idea of how old a tree is by hugging it. Martin Buber made the idea of an intimate relationship with a tree famous in his book, I and Thou, when he spoke of having an I-Thou relationship with one of these impressive plants. We can count the tree rings, or we can put our arms around the tree and see if our hands with touch on the other side. If the tree is way too big around for this, we can hold hands with our friends and see if together we can encircle it. When we hug the tree, when we engage with it, we enter into relationship with the tree, and, in Buber's words, it "ceases to be an It."

The same is true with our relationships with each other. We can count the wrinkles, the pounds, the errors, the false steps, or the grey hairs, or we can put aside our superiority and put our arms around the ones we love and enter into relationship. We can experience humility and love, humility and bonding. 


Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is forty days which is five weeks and five days of the Omer.

Day 39 of the Omer

On this 39th day of the Omer, we reflect on Endurance in Bonding - Netzach in Y'sod.


The fall foliage in New England is stunning. Bright reds and oranges and yellows take one's breath away. In the Midwest, where oaks predominate, the colors are more subdued - yellows, yes, but softer shades of burgundy, salmon, and coral, and much less commonly the brilliant scarlet, crimson, and tangerine that we see here. 


But no matter what color the leaves turn in the autumn, sooner or later they all fall to the ground. Left behind are bare trees, less interesting, at first glance seemingly lifeless.


But the trees are still alive. They go dormant to survive the winter, but they are alive. We can take the opportunity of the lack of leaves to focus more closely on other parts of the tree that we might not notice at the height of summer - the bark, the pattern of the branches, the shape of the dormant buds. And, as my mother would say, without the leaves on the trees, we can see into the woods and get a better view of the landscape. We get a whole different view of the forest. We can see the trees. And it is the trees that make the forest.


Endurance in Bonding. Sometimes our loved ones are clothed in the brilliant beautiful colors of a New England autumn. Sometimes they wear the quieter colors of the oak forest autumn. Sometimes they wear the many shades of green of the spring or the summer forest. And sometimes they seem naked, like the deciduous forest in winter. But if we look closely, we will see the dormant buds and the bark of our loved ones. And we will see the trees that make the forest in which we live, and that will be a Divine gift.



Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is thirty-nine days which is five weeks and four days of the Omer.

Day 38 of the Omer

On this third day of the sixth week of the Omer we focus on Tiferet in Y'sod, Harmony in Bonding.


Biomes are large geographical areas of the world, each with distinctive plants and animals that are adapted to the particular climate and geography of the area. Forest biomes include tropical forests, temperate forests, and boreal forests, also known as the taiga.


I love these words: boreal, taiga. Boreal - of or pertaining to the north. Taiga, from the Russian. Both words carry a sense of mystery as I think of those vast cold wildernesses that stretch across the north - Canada, Alasak, Scandinavia, and Siberia; forests of pine, fir, and spruce, and accompanying moose, bear, wolves, deer, hawks, and other animals.

The northeastern United States where I live now was once temperate forest. The forest returns where farmland is left fallow. Much of the Midwest where I grew up was once prairie. And so it is from place to place - a certain type of ecosystem is, or was, predominant, before the land was tilled and subdivided and cross-sectioned by highways.

Harmony in Bonding. Every biome contains the plants and animals and other organisms that are suited to the conditions of the area, and as long as it is undisturbed, a balance and a harmony is maintained over time among all those living things.

In our lives, we, too, work to maintain harmony and balance between ourselves and those around us. Sometimes we find ourselves swinging too far in one direction, and circumstances may soon force us to swing back toward a middle ground that keeps us more in balance. We find at times that we cannot do everything. We are finite. Just as any one spot on Earth is home to only one biome, so we, too, can be home only to a limited number of relationships, in order to maintain ourselves in balance. 

Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is thirty-eight days which is five weeks and three days of the Omer.

Day 37 of the Omer

Today we consider the Divine Attributes of Gevurah in Y'sod, Restraint in Bonding, as we count the 37th day of the Omer.

I think of the majestic redwoods of the Pacific coast. They are so tall that it is impossible to see their crowns, and some are so big around that a car can drive through the middle. How do water and nutrients climb to the top of these trees? I think of early spring in New England, and the buckets - or plastic tubing - attached to sugar maple trees, catching the rising sap. How does the sap flow against the force of gravity?

The upward flow of water and nutrients is an amazing feat of biological engineering found in all vascular plants, including flowering trees and conifers. The xylem (the wood) is made up of cells connected end-to-end to form long tubes. A major reason the water flows continuously upward through the xylem is that as water molecules evaporate from the leaves, the water in the xylem is pulled upward to take the place of those evaporated molecules, and thus it continues on and on in a continuous stream. Forces of binding hold the water molecules together with such strength that they keep on rising, always able to resist the force of garvity.

What forces of binding and bonding hold us to those we love and care for, despite other forces that could break apart our bonds? What is it that restrains those forces that could break our bonds? What is it that keeps us in powerful connection, what causes our bonds with the Divine to remain strong, despite pulls and tugs that would turn us away? Our restraint, our ability to resist the forces that would pull us away from our journey with and toward the Divine keeps our bonds, and our hearts, intact.

Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is thirty-seven days which is five weeks and two days of the Omer.

Day 36 of the Omer

Today we begin a new week, the sixth week of counting the Omer, and for this first day of the week we consider Chesed in Y'sod, Lovingkindness in Bonding.


During this sixth week, trees will provide our inspiration, beginning with oak trees. Growing up in the Midwest, I learned about "oak openings." Oak openings occurred as a result of fires that in the past regularly swept across the prairie land of southern Wisconsin, where I lived as a child. In some areas, the result of these fires was a prairie that wasn't a totally open vista. These prairies were park-like savannas groups of oak trees, or oak openings, scattered throughout, and with areas of shrubs, as well as the more familiar grasses and other flowering plants. The oaks and shrubs survived the fires and kept on growing, but since most trees couldn't survive, the fires kept the area relatively open. 


Lovingkindness in bonding. Once, oak openings were common. In Wisconsin alone there were 5.5 million acres. Now there are less than 500 acres. It was an ecosystem that depended on wildfires. The combination of wildfires and oaks, shrubs, and various plants created this unique ecosystem.


What kind of bonding in our lives creates a unique situation that is something greater than the sum of its parts? When we come together with others in deep and significant ways, we bring something special into the world, this is the kindness that emerges as a result of our bonding. These are the gifts that result when we open our hearts and our souls, and precious gifts they are.



Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is thirty-six days which is five weeks and one day of the Omer.

Day 35 of the Omer

On this last day of the fifth week of counting the Omer, we experience Malchut in Hod - Leadership in Humility.


The majestic mountains of the Himalayan Range; the tiny particles of silt that settle to the bottom of a slow-moving river. They are so different in size, but they are both part of this One Earth. They are both part of a slow-moving cycle of change in rocks that has been going on since the formation of the planet. They are part of something much larger than a particle of silt or even a range of towering mountains.


We, too, are part of Something much larger. By remembering our connection to something beyond ourselves, by allowing ourselves to go with the flow and not think that we are something special because of our grandness or that we are something insignificant because of our smallness, but rather that we are part of G!d's amazing universe, when we are able to do this, out of our humility will emerge leadership, for through our humility we make the Divine manifest in the world.

Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is thirty-five days which is five weeks of the Omer.

Day 34 of the Omer

Today is the 34th day of counting the Omer, and on this day the Divine Attributes in our minds are Y'sod in Hod, Bonding in Humility.

Slowly, over thousands and thousands and millions of years, tiny bits break off Earth's rocks and are eroded away through the action of wind and water. These tiny particles are washed down streams and into rivers, lakes, and oceans, where they settle to the bottom. Layer after layer after layer of sediment settles to the bottom of nearby and distant rivers, lakes, seas, and oceans. As the layers build up, so does the pressure. Over time, the bottom layers slowly turn into rock - sandstone, limestone, shale.


Time. It takes time to form the incredibly strong bonds that make up rocks. And it takes time to build relationships. We need to think of the big picture, to know that it may take years, even a lifetime, for relationships to grow and deepen and strengthen. We form bonds with our children even before they enter this world, but the nature of the relationships change over time. With others, it may take longer, but still, there are changes as the years go by. If we expect too much, of ourselves or of others, the bonds may loosen rather than strengthen. It takes humility to form strong bonds and healthy relationships with those we love.

Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is thirty-four days which is four weeks and six days of the Omer.

Day 33 of the Omer

Today is Lag B'Omer - the thirty-third day of counting the Omer, and we focus on double Hod - double Humility: Humility in Humility.


The nutrients in soil are invisible to our naked eye, but they are critical for healthy plant growth. Nitrogen, potassium, phosphorus, calcium, sulfur, magnesium - all these nutrients, and others as well, are used by plants. Potassium keeps plants generally vigorous, sturdy, and healthy. Nitrogen stimulates leaf and stem growth. Phosphorus is important for germination and growth of seeds, and also for flower and fruit production, as well as root growth. And so it goes with all the thirteen nutrients that plants absorb along with water from the soil. All of that flourishing from something we cannot see.


What are our hidden "nutrients"? What do we give to the world to help promote healthy growth within us and around us? These are qualities that are most useful and meaningful when they remain in some sense hidden, when we allow them to come forth at the pace and in the time and place that they are needed, for what they are needed. This is our truest humility, humility in humility, when we allow our gifts, our nutrients, to be absorbed into the world naturally, in a way that brings about the germination, growth, and blossoming of "flowers" in the world.


Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is thirty-three days which is four weeks and five days of the Omer.

Day 32 of the Omer

Today, the fourth day of the fifth week, we consider the Divine Attributes of Netzach in Hod - Endurance in Humility.


The day is hot and stepping barefoot into the icy stream is first a shock and then a relief to my body. I feel the smooth surfaces of a whole stream bed full of stones as I walk slowly through the water. Bending over, I pick up a few small stones and run my fingers over their smooth surfaces. They are rounded, without rough edges, the work of many years of being tumbled downstream by the force of moving water. I wonder where these stones have traveled on their journey; I wonder what changes the world has seen since they first began to be smoothed as the water tumbled them against each other, over and over, slowly chipping off tiny bits of the rock's once-rough edges.


As we endure the dark times between the light, life can make our edges sharper, or it can make them, and us, smoother and softer. We must choose life day after day after day in order to maintain our humility and grow rounded and smooth to the touch, in order to allow the waters of life to do their holy work on our spirits. 


Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is thirty-two days which is four weeks and four days of the Omer.

Day 31 of the Omer

Today, the third day of the fifth week, we consider the Divine Attributes of Tiferet in Hod - Harmony or Balance in Humility.


Balance exists in the rock cycle, among solid bed rock, boulders, rocks, sand, silt. 


In the Earth, everything is in motion, even if the motion is so miniscule as to be beyond our perception without machinery of some kind. Rocks change, and they move. Plates of the Earth's crust pull away from each other or push against each other. The pressure builds up until, abruptly, two plates slide past each other. Earthquake! A sudden centimeter of movement and the pressure is relieved. 


At some fault lines, strings of volcanoes are outlets for moving rocks. Magma, hot molten rock, spews forth from deep underground, a volcano in action, splendid and awesome in its power. It hits the atmosphere, cools and forms solid rock. Solidified deposits of flowing lava may form, or if the volcanic eruption is explosive, ash or larger lava fragments may be hurled into the air. All are igneous rocks. Most of the Earth's crust is made of basalt, a heavy, dark, igneous rock, formed from the cooling of hot magma. And so it goes, the cycles of rock, the cycles of pressure build-up and release, the cycles of heating and cooling, always keeping the Earth in balance. Sometimes spectacularly, sometimes unobtrusively, but always change to keep a balance.


We, too, need to stay in balance, and that requires change, for we live in this constantly changing world. We must change in order to stay in balance, and changing requires humility. It requires us to know that we are not always right, to recognize our limits, to know that we must always be in process, and to know that we are not in control. It requires us to recognize the Divine in our world.


Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is thirty-one days which is four weeks and three days of the Omer.

Day 30 of the Omer

For this 30th day of the Omer, we focus on Gevurah in Hod, Restraint in Humility.

The sand is soft beneath our bare feet as we walk along the beach. It is firm near the water where it is still wet from the waves that alternately cover and uncover it. Higher up the beach the sand is dry, making it harder to walk as our feet sink in with every step, searching for firm footing.

Thinking of sand as a myriad of tiny rocks is difficult. How many times was a thick slab of sandstone been broken apart in order to create these tiny grains of sand, as numerous on a single beach as the stars in the sky? A beach in Bangaladesh extends for 75 miles - how many grains of sand shift alternately seaward and landward on that amazing stretch of shoreline? What is the journey of a single grain?

In our community of human beings, we are each like one grain of sand on a beach - as insiginifcant and as critical to the whole. Our humility comes in understanding our insignificance, and our restraint and discipline, too, for we are each just a grain of sand, and to think of ourselves as a boulder is to misuse or to lose the spiritual power that comes with acknowledging our insignificance.

Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is thirty days which is four weeks and two days of the Omer.

Day 29 of the Omer

During this fifth week of counting the Omer, Hod, or Humility is the Divine Attribute that travels with us all week. As we have each week, we begin with Chesed or Lovingkindness.


The ground beneath our feet provides the inspiration for us this week. Whether rock or soil or sand or mud, all are related, and all these materials cycle continuously from one form to another. Rocks - sedimentary, igneous, and metamorphic - are broken down by water, wind, growing plants, chemical reactions, and other forces. Large rocks break up into smaller rocks, which break into even smaller rocks, and eventually into small pebbles, grains of sand, or even finer, into mud. Wind and water carry these particles from one place to another. Tiny particles are compacted and cemented together to form sedimentary rocks, which are changed by heat and pressure into metamorphic rocks, which may melt and then cool into igneous rocks, which, under conditions of heat and pressure, become metamorphic rocks. All three kinds are broken down again, and the cycle goes on, in so many variations and permutations, throughout time.


Moving rocks and mud and sand make up the crust of the Earth on which we stand. How often do we notice them? They are voiceless. Their role is great, but they do not speak, except in the sound of being tumbled by gravity or moving water or wind. 


How often do we listen to the silence of the rocks? How often do we hear their presence?


Are we willing to be so silent? What does it take to be kind to a rock, or to the soil? Can our hearts be so open as to realize their importance? 


During an avalanche or an earthquake, we are frightened by the solid Earth. We notice the rocks and soil. On the shores of the sea, we enjoy the tiny, tiny rocks. We notice the sand. What about the rest of the time? At every moment of every day, the solid rock beneath our feet is holding up our homes and our streets and our airports and our trains and our hospitals and our offices and our electrical poles, and so much more. It is a kindness without intentionality. The rocks have no awareness of what they are doing. 


Would that we, too, could be kind 24/7/365 without thinking or being aware of it. That would truly be Lovingkindness in Humility.

Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is twenty-nine days which is four weeks and one day of the Omer.

Day 28 of the Omer

Tonight begins the last day of the third week of counting the Omer - each week this year we are completing a week as we begin Shabbat, and starting a new day of a new week as we end Shabbat. It provides a lovely rounding out of the week, and it means that we are always focusing on Leadership - Malchut, when we get to Shabbat. This week it is Malchut in Netzach - Leadership in Endurance.


No single flower comes to mind today, rather simply the notion of "flowerhood." We enjoy flowers so much because of their beauty, but it is for reproductive purposes that flowers have evolved. In among the colorful (or not) petals and sepals are stamens - male reproductive parts, - which have sacs filled with pollen within which are the male cells, and one or more pistils, female reproductive parts, which contain ovules, which will become the seeds. These are the key reproductive parts of the flower. Without them, it wouldn't matter how beautiful the flowers were, they would be pointless from a functional perspective. Think of the most beautiful flower you can imagine. No, its primary function is not to please your eyes, but to provide for the continuity of the plant species. 


And yet, flowers are beautiful, and their role in bringing serenity to human beholders is not without meaning.


Leadership in Endurance - there is something to be learned from the hidden parts of flowers. They get something done: reproduction. What do we get done that is lasting? If we turn and look behind us, what do we see? What did today bring? What did yesterday bring? What will tomorrow bring? Every single day something is in the trail behind us. Our endurance, our going forward day by day, is, in some way a measure of our ability to persevere. What are the signs of leadership that we see in our lives?


Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is twenty-eight days which is four weeks of the Omer.

Day 27 of the Omer

On this 27th day of the Omer, we focus on the Divine Attributes of Y'sod in Netzach - Bonding, or Stability, in Endurance.


Monarch butterflies migrate slowly northward each spring and summer. Their migration is tied to the flowering of the milkweed plant. Milkweed rely on butterflies, moths, bees, ants, and wasps for pollination. Foraging insects land on the milkweed flowers and unwittingly gather pollen on their legs. As they wander from flower to flower in their foraging, they deposit the pollen on other flowers. There the pollen grains germinate, which leads to the fertilization of eggs and the growth and formation of fruit pods filled with seeds.


The milkweed plants depend on the insects and the insects depend on the milkweed. Some  insects, including the larval stage of monarch butterflies, feed exclusively on milkweed, and are totally dependent on them.


We, too, form strong bonds with others, and these bonds help us endure through days both harrowing and joyous. The bonds we share with family, friends, and co-workers make a difference in our lives. They ensure that we have someone to turn to, both to celebrate accomplishments and important milestones and to hold us through dark days, painful moments, and heart-wrenching events in life. Our enduring bonds with others sustains us and help us endure and persevere.


Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is twenty-seven days which is three weeks and six days of the Omer.

Day 26 of the Omer

Today we reach the 26th day of the Omer, and we focus on Hod in Netzach, Humility in Endurance.


Some flowers are hard to find. Think about grasses. There are so many different kinds. Those we plant to create our lawns we keep cutting and cutting, and we never see their flowers. But the lawn grasses are just a few of the grass species of the world. Walk through a wild meadow or the remnants of the prairies that once blanketed the Midwest and West and you will see many different kinds of grasses, and if you look closely at the right time of the summer, you will see many, many tiny flowers, and some time later, myriads of seeds. These flowers don't need to be bright and big and showy to attract insects or birds to pollinate them. They let the winds sweeping across the wide open spaces do the work of pollination. And as long as we don't plow the grasses all under or dig them all up, they will survive into the next generation and the next and the next.


Where is our hidden-ness? How can our hidden-ness be our humility and our strength? How can our humility help us maintain ourselves, our families, our communities, and our planet? 


May we be as hidden as the flowers of the prairie and meadow grasses and as enduring as they have the capacity to be. May our hidden-ness help us to survive and to thrive. May our hidden-ness help us to continue doing the holy work we each must do. 

Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is twenty-six days which is three weeks and five days of the Omer.

Day 25 of the Omer

On this 25th Day of the Omer we consider Netzach in Netzach, Endurance in Endurance - double Endurance!


The flowers of the night-blooming cereus open only at night. The flowers of the four o'clock open only in late afternoon. Neither of these is the norm for flowering plants. Most flowers with which we are familiar open and remain open until they fade and the fruits begin to form, or they may close up at night and open during the day.


A flower that blooms eternally - a green plant whose flowers endure forever is one not likely to succeed, for it will bear no fruit, it will produce no seeds for new plants. In short, it will not reproduce. Flowers are meant to be ephemeral, that is their role in the cycle of a plant's life - their very short-livedness helps them bring about the endurance, the survival, of their species.


We, too, are short lived, in the scheme of things. Imagine all the human beings who have ever lived on this planet over the generations upon generations upon generations. It is hard to wrap our minds around that thought. We are each such a tiny spec in the history of human kind. And yet, our lives are so important to us!


What will it take for our species, and for the planet to endure, to survive? What role can we - single grain of sand that we each are - play in helping to keep the human race going? 


Just as we are each so small, and yet so important, so too, are each of our actions and deeds so small, and yet so important. For double Endurance, we need to pay attention to these small daily occurrences, and do our best to follow in G!d's footsteps and bring the Divine Attributes into being on this planet.


Baruch atah Adonai Eloheinu melech ha'olam, asher kid-shanu b'mitzvotav, vitzivanu, al sefirat ha'omer.

Blessed are you Adonai our G!d, ruler of the universe, who sanctifies us with mitzvot and commands us regarding the counting of the Omer.


Today is twenty-five days which is three weeks and four days of the Omer.