The Show Must Go On by Rivki D. Rosenwald Esq., CLC, SDS

Life C ach The Show Must Go On

By Rivki D. Rosenwald Esq., LMFT, CLC, SDS

Dum, da, dum, dum…

The big moment you’ve been waiting for, or perhaps dreading, is almost here.

You are deciding, am I in or am I out? Am I ready for another year? Do I want to work toward the mission I was brought here to dedicate myself to? And then your Supervisor is deciding if you mean it.

Kind of like the toughest interview you’ve ever prepped for.

The good news is you’ve had a month

of reminders to focus on it. The month of Elul is the get-ready month. Lectures, parshas, prayers all move us toward it.

And the men have even had at least an extra week to add in some formal prayers called Selichot. Or maybe it’s possible that they’re more distracted so they need more reminders to do teshuva? (Sound like any man you know?)

Either way, there’s that extra prep time.

Then there’s this great big added gift. Good, bad, or otherwise, we get to pack up all our sins, mistakes, foul thoughts and behaviors and launch them far out into the waters for the fish to devour and for us to walk away free and clear.

Honestly, not much of a meal for the fish but a real coup for us!

And then we get another 10 days after the New Year holiday to just keep doting on improving.

And after that, are we through, finished, kaput? Have we done all we can to ensure an awesome year? Absolutely not.

Honestly, not much of a meal for the fish but a real coup for us!

We dress up in our “Sunday Best,” so to speak. Pure white ,actually! Almost like an angelic bride at her wedding… We go to the wedding hall, which usually is our shul. We finish our smorgasbord at home. And we basically settle in for an extended ceremony where we bond with our Groom. We make all our commitments and get ready to start out on the road together in the fresh new year. We don’t even have to prove anything. We just need to commit to do better. And we’re already celebrating a few days later.

So, get ready for the holiday of the cleansing, the recommitting… That moment when we wipe the slate clean and try again.

Yes, it might be daunting, yet we need to recognize that it’s a gift.

Let’s embrace it.

There’s nothing like a second chance, a do-over. We get to catapult ourselves forward more successfully. We should look back and learn from the past, but we must remember not be burdened by it!

So tada! It’s showing up this Sunday night for you. Let’s stop and think: How am I showing up for it?!