🎶Be easy, take your time, you are coming home to yourself, coming home to yourself.🎶
We have gathered at the appointed time to bless the creation of this world. Yet as we gather, we continue to witness the devastation and despair that hurricane helene has left in its wake. And the Israeli govt is expanding its war, destroying homes and families and so many lives that represent entire worlds.
and here we are. Some of us feel rage, anxiety, or fear. Some of us are feeling discouraged, lonely or even uncertain what to feel. And some of us are feeling grateful for this opportunity to gather with beloveds or excited for the possibilities that can come as the new year is finally upon us. And i am sure that there is a mixture of some or all of these feelings.
whatever and however you feel is just right and is welcome here. may it be so that this ritual, this spiritual technology that we have been gifted with, gives you just what you need right here and right now.
🎶Be easy, take your time, you are coming home to yourself, coming home to yourself.🎶
Here we are.
Just at the edge of the confluence of the upper and lower waters, in the midst of its ever changing nature. Its destruction is evident in the hurricanes, torrential rains and flooding that is being experienced the world over, with greater frequency as the climate continues to change. It can also be a healing mikvah, a babbling brook, a quencher of thirst.
Be like water, they say.
I caution us to know what kind of water we are mimicking.
We have wrestled so much over this last year. We’ve wrestled with governments and their leaders, institutions within and outside of our community demanding accountability for the thousands of people murdered for land that can’t be owned —- because it belongs to Gd. And here we are.
Some of us have wrestled with the healthcare system, fighting for our lives, holding on to see another day.
Some of us have wrestled with housing that wasn’t secure, some with fridges that barely held enough to survive. And yet, here we are.
Some of us have been wrestling with each other. Bumping up against one another forgetting that grinding to dust is not the ONLY option. for if we bump just right, we can make some beautiful pearls. But in our righteous pursuits to make this world more just, we have chosen to be right above all and in the process sometimes forgetting the folks we are trying to move’s humanity.
Sometimes forgetting our own. Well, Prophet Isaiah reminds us that
Lest we get caught up, Isaiah says, don’t forget about those instructions that we’ve been gifted to help guide and illuminate our way.
We can’t hate our kinsfolk y’all. I know sometimes it is easy to lose sight of this, but that ain’t the move. The Torah is clear, we can definitely call our people in, providing them with compassionate accountability, but we can not incur guilt on their account.
Ain’t no need for you to be missing the mark in the attempt to help someone else not to err. But you CAN love em. And, this requires you to love you first.
Love yourself enough to know when to hold em, when to fold em and when to walk away. Everything ain’t a fight and Everyone ain’t your enemy.
Love yourself enough to learn your traumas and triggers so that your responses are less historical and more attuned to the present moment.
Love yourself enough to find what REALLY fills you up and do it often! What brings you joy? What helps you remain in your dignity? What allows you to remember elohai neshama shenatata bi tehora hi, that you were created with a pure soul? Whatever that is, tap into it.
Love yourself enough to find what will sustain you, in times of ease and in times of upheaval. What calms your nervous system? What grounds you? What reminds you of your humanity? What gives you insight into your divinity? Whatever that is, tap into it.
and as you love on yourself, you might find it easier to love on your fellow without the vengeance. without the grudges. Without the hate. In alignment with the best parts of you, drawing out the best parts of them. Touching the spark of goodness that lives deep inside of each and every one of us. Which legit might be REALLY hard to find. But its worth doing our best to seek it out.
follow my commands.
your wellbeing will be like a river.
Your justice like waves of the sea.
It is possible for us to turn and return to this way of being. And it is necessary. What we do here, affects our beloveds in Palestine, in Lebanon, in Israel.
Now, this goes for all the different ways I know we have collectively showed up everywhere all at once, with our various theories of change and tactics.
AND it goes for the way we act and interact with each other.
The work of liberation requires us to let go of the ways of the oppressor.
Let go of the need to be right.
Let go of superiority, especially that moral kind.
let go of defensiveness.
Let go of thinking there is only one way towards liberation.
Let it all go, so that we can with conviction, declare
שְׁאַבְתֶּם מַ֖יִם בְּשָׂשׂ֑וֹן🎶
Mimainei hayeshua
Shavtem mayim b'sason
(Words adapted from Isaiah 12:3)
We will draw water in celebration
From the wellsprings of liberation
tonight, the portal is open for us to dip our toes or immerse our bodies in these waters.
So let the waves wash over you.
Taste the goodness from this well.
Allow yourself the opportunity to be bathed in them.
Be like water they say.
like the waters of liberation.
שְׁאַבְתֶּם מַ֖יִם בְּשָׂשׂ֑וֹן🎶
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