By Betzy Lynch in La Jolla, California
This past Shabbat we read the Torah portion Re’eh. It begins with a remarkable invitation from Moses, speaking on behalf of G-d: “See, I set before you today a blessing and a curse.” This invitation is a profound understanding of human free will and our relationship with the Divine.
This powerful message coincides with Rosh Chodesh Elul. This Thursday evening begins the final month of the Hebrew calendar and our preparation for the new year. Elul calls us to begin the deep and complicated work of cheshbon hanefesh, an accounting of the soul. There is no time to procrastinate. We cannot wait for Rosh Hashanah or Yom Kippur to begin. We must start now!
Here’s a short poem to get us started.
Elul’s New Prescription
What if blessing
is not only what happens,
but how we learn to see
what happens?
Elul arrives
carrying no eraser.
Our mistakes remain.
The mistakes of others remain.
And so do the layers
we have built around them
anger polished into a lens,
hurt carried until it colors
everything we see,
stories repeated so often
they begin to feel like truth.
Perhaps cheshbon hanefesh
is not only an accounting
of what we have done wrong,
but of what has clouded
our seeing.
What if Elul offers us
a new pair of glasses
lenses from the Divine,
not to make pain disappear,
but to help us see more clearly:
I am more than my mistakes.
You are more than yours.
And what happens to me
does not have to determine
what comes through me.
Re’eh. See.
Because clearer vision
changes our choices.
A word can become
a doorway or a wall.
A reaction can deepen an existing wound
or soothe it just enough
so it can begin to heal.
And as the unconscious blur
that has clouded our choices
and reactions
begins to lift,
we discover the Divine spark
within us, asking:
Now that you can see,
what will you choose?
This is the work of Elul.
A new prescription for our lenses.
To look again.
To begin now.
And perhaps,
with clearer eyes,
to recognize the blessing
before us,
within us,
and the blessing
we can choose to become.
May the introspection of Shabbat and the compilation of Elul allow us to enter the new year with clearer eyes.
Shavua Tov and Chodesh Tov,
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Betzy Lynch is the CEO of the Lawrence Family JCC.