Shanah Tovah!
If you joined us for Rosh Hashanah day one, you likely witnessed or participated in the first aliyah, which concluded with an assignment. I was asked to send a brief reminder of the specifics of that commitment.
In short, those of you who came up for that aliyah are taking responsibility for preparing and training for the surprise marathons life will inevitably throw at us. Even if you didn’t come up for that aliyah, you are more than welcome to voluntarily take on this commitment.
Your commitment is simply that sometime between now and Yom Kippur, you are to identify your “training regimen”
- What it will be?
- What it will look like?
- How often will you train and on what schedule?
- What practice(s) will help you be more prepared for life’s inevitable tests?
- How will you strengthen your relationships?
- What will you do to cultivate gratitude and joy?
- How will you deepen your spiritual life?
- How will you practice asking for help?
Choose one or two things. Don’t try to train for everything at once. Then create a reminder of your commitment. The reminder might be a word or phrase written on a piece of paper and placed in your wallet or taped to your mirror. It might be a note on your phone, or a daily or weekly practice written into your calendar.
Whatever you choose, make it something you will actually see and return to. Because Judaism understands something important about human beings: We forget. We lose sight of our intentions. We need to be reminded, again and again, of the person we want to become and of the work we want to do.
So let this aliyah and this spiritual marathon training program be your first step.
When the next test comes—and we know that it will—may we be able to say, like Abraham:
Hineini. Here I am, I’ll run this marathon as best as I can. And since we enter this moment together as a community our response is Hineinu, Here we are.
I wish you all the very best in developing your marathon training regimen and I am very much looking forward to being together in community for Yom Kippur.
Kindness & Shalom & Shanah Tovah & Gmar Hatimah Tovah,
Rabbi Darby