4 minute read
Sacred Time, Healing Hearts
October 2024
Temple Kol Tikvah
This year has been one of communal mourning and anxiety. We have watched in horror as news of terrorism comes out of Israel, and we have experienced a communal trauma like none other in recent memory. Every day, we may go about our normal activities --- grocery shopping, oil changes, paying bills, walking the dog --- but this sense of loss and fear undergirds everything. I have often found myself overwhelmed by a normal-looking to-do list, unsure why I cannot check off the boxes. The reason is clear: We are not going through life as normal but rather carrying enormous emotional burdens on our backs, even when we are not actively thinking about it.
The High Holidays are, at their essence, about how we spend our time. Have we spent our time doing good things, or have we sinned? What are our goals that we are working toward, and are we using our time to do that? And although God is eternal, our lifespans are limited, and any day they can be cut short, so what are we doing with the time we have? These questions have become ever more complex in a year when external events are pressing on us. The trauma we are feeling about the war with Hamas and the rise in antisemitism weighs us down and slows us down. It may feel like we're moving through honey instead of air. But this is not an individual shortcoming. This is part of processing the grief we bear. These emotional burdens take our energy, and we need time to process them. The time we take to just be and to sit with this trauma is needed for us to go through our everyday lives. Sometimes we get so caught up in trying to be efficient that we lose sight of what is important. We read books and articles on productivity with titles like "Getting Things Done," and the goals are to check items off the checklist ever faster. But as we do that, items seem to pile up. This is especially true when our emotional energy is drained. Perhaps we are too focused on the finish line and not focused enough on the list itself. In Pirkei Avot 1:15, Shammai tells us to make our study of Torah a fixed practice. That is, if there's something important to do that actually fills our soul instead of draining it, make it a regularly scheduled fixed thing, rather than saying, "I'll get to it when I have time." We need to make time for things that will support us through these difficult times. We need to be filling our cups and feeding our souls — trying to race to the end of a to-do list will do neither of those things. During the High Holidays, we obsess over time. We pray our names are inscribed in the Book of Life and that we will continue to enjoy the fruits of life for at least one more year. We acknowledge that we come from dust and to dust we shall return, and what we do in that little time in between is precious. In this time of great difficulty, let us go back to those things that are important and choose to spend our time on that. Let us lighten the load and acknowledge that we are in need of an emotional respite. And above all, let us be kind to ourselves and treat our lives and the lives of those around us as precious. May we all be inscribed in the Book of Life. Shanah tovah.
