Elul 26/September 17

When I work with wedding couples, I employ a pre-marital counselling tool known as Prepare. During my sessions with each couple, we explore multiple dimensions of their relationship; we identify strengths and weaknesses, discuss personality traits, family dynamics, expectations, hopes and dreams; we practice healthy communication and conflict resolution skills. In these sessions we get ready, “Prepare”, not for the wedding itself, but for the day after the wedding, and every day after that. We prepare for their marriage which, we pray, will last for the rest of their lives. During the month of Elul, like a wedding couple nearing their wedding day, as individuals, couples and families, we have the chance to prepare for the Days of Awe that are rapidly approaching. We are called upon to look into the mirror, to identify our strengths and weaknesses, consider our personality traits, family interactions, our expectations, hopes and dreams. While it is true that during the month of Elul we prepare for the High Holy Days, in truth we are really preparing for the day after and every day after that. In truth, we are preparing for the rest of our lives. Are you prepared?

(Rabbi Gersh Zylberman)

Elul 24-25/September 15-16

In respect for Shabbat, the Jewish day of rest, we will not be sending you an Elul thought tomorrow so that you can be at rest from your email and other social media. So please enjoy both of these thoughts today!

Shabbat Shalom!

Elul 24/September 15

Today’s Elul Thought, our last Shabbat before Rosh Hashanah, is a meditation to help you get ready for Shabbat and the High Holy Days, thanks to Cantor David Reinwald! Just click the link below, press play on the screen that pops up, and enjoy the 6 ½ minutes of relaxation and inspiration!

http://tinyurl.com/hineiniCDR

Elul 25/September 16

Tonight, we will recite Selichot, the series of penitential prayers.  The Selichot service is traditionally held late in the evening, when our resistance to change is low and our sense of vulnerability is high.  It is done on the Saturday night immediately prior to Rosh Hashanah (unless that Saturday is less than three days prior).  Selichot serves as the final push as we approach the Yamim Nora’im – the Days of Awe.  If we have not started thinking about the work that we have to do during these days, now is the time.  A thought as we enter Selichot . . .

THE OTHER?

So often, when speaking about forgiveness, the focus is on the person who has offended you.

It is as if to forgive is to somehow accept his/her behavior, to move on, and forget

What if the offender does not change?

What if the offender has died and reconciliation is not possible?

What if the other is no longer a part of your life, yet what remains from your encounter with that person still lingers on your soul?

If our focus is on the other, then our chance to forgive is potentially compromised

To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.

Tonight, try not to focus on “the other.”

Rather, focus on yourself.

Forgiveness does not spontaneously bubble to the top, covering up or erasing all wounds

It involves intention, purpose, vision, and work.

It has to be discovered; an expectation of another side to the pain and sense of personal diminishment.

(Rabbi Alan Litwak)

Elul 23/September 14

The Olympics are coming to LA in 2028!  This is big news for our region.  I remember the 1984 Olympics.  I was so fortunate that I was serving as a Camp Rabbi that summer at Camp Hess Kramer, and the entire camp was privileged  to  attend an Olympics soccer match, held at the Rose Bowl.  Truly, it was an unforgettable experience.

One of the things that makes the Olympics so special is the they occur only once every four years.  (Since the Summer and Winter Olympics alternate, we actually have Olympics excitement every other year.)

Athletes around the world prepare literally for years in order to earn a spot on an Olympics team.  No one achieves the level of excellence required without intensive preparation.

In a way, for Jews, the High Holy Days are our Spiritual Olympics. It always surprises me, therefore,  when our people expect something “big” to happen on these special holidays if they haven’t adequately prepared for them.  In fact, this is what the month of Elul is all about.  It is prep time for our Jewish Olympics.

How can we prepare?  Here are a couple of  ways that Jews have prepared for the High Holy Days for several centuries: One tradition is to sound the Shofar each morning.  Now, there is something that will get you right into the Holy Day spirit! Another custom is to read Psalm 27.  You may find this meditation will help you get focused.

For some of us, pulling out recipes for our favorite Rosh Hashanah foods is a must.  For others, a trip to the cleaners with our Talit is de rigueur.  Still others are making sure they have yahrzeit candles in stock for remembering loved ones on Yom Kippur.  And, of course, attendance at S’lichot services will surely get us to the right place.

These days, many people will take the opportunity to read an Elul gem sent via email from their synagogue—a short thought that moves us along the path of teshuvah/return.  

I know one person who can’t conceive of Rosh Hashanah arriving without first completing a trip to Sephora…and that’s ok, too.

(Rabbi Stephen J. Einstein)

Elul 22/September 13

In his TED Talk, “The Psychology of Your Future Self,” Harvard Professor Dan Gilbert explains the phenomenon of the “End of History Illusion.” He explains that humans think that at any given moment in our personal development, we are finished developing. We believe that our taste in music, our favorite vacation, our level of extroversion, etc, will stay relatively stagnant for the rest of our lives. At the same time, Professor Gilbert explains, we understand fundamentally that change happens to us at every age, but we don’t imagine it is happening to us as fast as it is. Our illusion of what we imagine the future will hold can get in the way of our own progress.

In Judaism, that is why we have T’shuvah. We acknowledge that our imaginings that we cannot change is a human failing. We are changing every day, every moment, and our tastes and styles develop as much as our ability to make ourselves better. If we deny our own ability (or according to Professor Gilbert, our inevitability) to change, we prevent ourselves from taking the steps necessary to embrace the T’shuvah process and turn ourselves into the future selves we know we can be.

(Rabbi David N. Young)

Elul 21/September 12

In Deuteronomy (30:11-14) we find the following teaching:

“Surely this Instruction (Torah), which I enjoin upon you this day, is not too baffling for you, nor is it beyond reach.  It is not in the heavens, that you should say, ‘Who among us can go up to the heavens and get it for us and impart it to us, that we may observe it?’  Neither is it beyond the sea, that you should say, ‘Who among us can cross to the other side of the sea and get it for us and impart it to us, that we may observe it?’  No, the thing is very close to you, in your mouth and in your heart, to observe it.”

Which Mitzvot are “in your mouth and in your heart”?

Are there Mitzvot that you’d like to be doing that are in some way “beyond your reach”?

Which Mitzvot would you like to bring into your life in the year to come?

(Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker)

Elul 20/September 11

U’netaneh Tokef is considered one of the most challenging prayers of the High Holidays.  Many have a hard time with its simple reading, that our lives are not really determined by the choices that we make, but our fate is “written on Rosh Hashanah and on Yom Kippur it is sealed.”  Yet, the core of the prayer really comes near its end.  Acts of prayer, righteousness and repentance impact the path of our life.

The Reconstructionist Machzor offers this interpretive U’netaneh Tokef, which captures the essential task of Teshuvah, to evaluate our lives to find the places we might make a change:

Let us ask ourselves hard questions

For this is the time of truth.

           How much time did we waste

In the year that is now gone?

Did we fill our days with life

Or were they dull and empty?

           Was there love inside our home

Or was the affectionate word left unsaid?

Was there real companionship within our family

Or was there a living together and a growing apart?

           Were we a help to our mates

Or did we take them for granted?

How was it with our friends;

Were we there when they needed us or not?

           The kind deed: did we perform it or postpone it?

The unnecessary gibe: did we say it or hold it back?

Did we live by false values?

Did we deceive others?

Did we deceive ourselves?

           Were we sensitive to the rights and feelings

Of those who worked for us?

Did we acquire only possessions

Or did we acquire new insights as well?

           Did we fear what the crowd would say

and keep quiet when we should have spoken out?

Did we mind only our own business

Or did we feel the heartbreak of others?

           Did we live right,

And if not

Then have we learned and will we change?

(Written by Jack Reimer for “Kol HaNeshama: Machzor L’Yamim Noraim, Prayerbook for the Days of Awe” Reconstructionist Press, 1999, page 346)

(Rabbi Daniel Treiser)

Elul 19/September 10

As I reflect upon my most recent visit to Israel, I was struck by the fact that we visited the coastal town of Akko in the same day that we made our way to Yad VaShem, Israel¹s official memorial to the Holocaust. The crashing sounds of relentless waves dancing in the shadows of light and dark, the obscuring clouds and the small rays of sun fighting to be seen... all of it framing a memory of 6 million souls who perished in a sea of hate. Yet, as I wandered the waves of the memorial, I could not help but recall the lighthouse I saw in Akko that morning. The lighthouse, and the reminder that we can all shine a light into the darkness...each and every one of us can do our part to bring light to pledge "never again." We all can be that lighthouse, right? With the rising tides of darkness all around us it seems we need more lighthouses... Who will commit to being one in the year ahead? Who will stand up to the sea and the darkness in 5778? Who will do more than just remember?

(Rabbi Brad Levenberg)