Spread Our Light

 We are an incredible People.

This past weekend, we were traveling with our kids when my sister in law called.

"We're out of power. Can we stay at your house for shabbos?"

The severe weather caused power outages in some neighborhoods. After confirming that my block did not lose power, we assured her that she was welcome to stay at our house. Baruch Hashem we have space and try to have the guestroom prepared so it is always ready for sleepover guests.

"One of my friends was supposed to stay with us for shabbos. Can she sleep at your place too?"

Of course, we told her that would be our pleasure.

She also told us she and her husband had planned on eating out for the Friday night meal at someone in their neighborhood and was wondering if we had any food in our fridge to help fill in for their shabbos meal. They had some challah and dips, so did we perhaps have anything else?

Since I was traveling, I did not cook any food for shabbos. There was a small portion of leftovers from Thursday night's dinner, but that wasn't going to cut it. We had packaged sliced deli in the fridge which they said would be just perfect.

But that wouldn't feel like shabbos.

We called a couple of neighbors.

And that's where the magic began.

It was just 30 minutes to candle lighting. But that doesn't matter when you have awesome neighbors with huge hearts.

My sister in law, her husband and shabbos guest had a full, delicious shabbos meal, not just deli and some challah.

It didn't matter that my neighbor had a house full of her own guests for Shabbos Chanukah.

She was happy to share her hot, delicious shabbos food on a moment's notice.

We are an incredible People.

And when we have an opportunity to share, to give to someone who doesn't have, we do it with a full heart.

On Chanukah, we take the little light we have and continue to ignite many flames, one candle each night, until our menorah is fully illuminated.

In life, we use the good we have and share it with others. We ignite hearts with ahavas yisroel, spreading light and warmth with our kindness, first to one person and then by sharing stories like these, we light up the hearts of all Jews who feel so blessed to be part of a Nation like ours.

Let's continue to spread our light. Let us act with chessed to those in need and then share those stories as far as we can so the entire Nation feels so blessed by these heartwarming experiences!

Happy Chanukah!

Thirteen Years

It's been thirteen years since I wrote this post. Thirteen years since the day my older brother Mordechai and his wife became parents to their (second) son on the day of my brother Shalom's yartzeit.

We held our breath for eight days until we heard the name they chose for this baby. They named him Shalom Baruch after the uncle he would never know. What a comforting feeling to know that someone would carry on the name of our brother was niftar at 15, before he was old enough to get married and have children of his own.

He wasnt the first to be named after Shalom a"h. My own son was born a little more than two months before and was given the same name. But he was the first and only boy to be born on the day his namesake was niftar.

Thirteen years.

I think about how much has happened in this little boy's life. Little milestones. Smiling, rolling over, crawling, baby teeth, waking, talking...

Other, more significant milestones. His upsherin. His first siddur. His first chumash. His first gemara.

And now...his bar mitzvah.

There's so much that happens in the first thirteen years of a child's life.

The second thirteen years are also pretty life changing.

Reaching the milestone of teenage hood and label of teenager. (I hope those years will be smooth for him!)

Growing up, maturing, learning and expanding-on the inside and outside. In ways that are visible and ways no one can see or know.

There's the possibility of marriage and the hope of starting a family too.

There's so much growth and change that happens in the next thirteen years of a child's life. It's the years they slowly transform from child to adult.

But what happens after that? What happens in the thirteen years that follow?

How much change actually happens then?

Am I stuck in my ways?

Am I changing and growing, learning and developing, stretching my muscles to do things that are hard for me?

Am I open to change the patterns I know need to change?

Are you?

As long as we are alive, we can. We have the time at this very moment to switch gears. To do something different. To make a move.

If we want to change patterns, if we want to look back in thirteen years from now and be proud of the person looking back at us in the mirror, we need to take a step, any small step, in the direction of change.

Find a book on the topic that you struggle most with.
Look for a lecture.
Commit to finding a therapist that can help you.
Ask a friend, "What is most annoying about me?"
Ask a family member, "If I could change one thing, what would you want it to be?"

Be brave.
Be bold.
Be courageous.
Be daring.
Be the change you want to see in your life by taking a step to change.
Do it now.

May it be a zechus for Shalom ben Chaim Nosson whose 17th yartzeit is today. 

To read the story behind Shalom's tragic and sudden death, click here. 

To Magnify-The Nine Days

So, the nine days are coming and I don't think I took even one minute in the past two weeks to think about this time of year, what it means and what feelings should be coming up. I've just been so busy. My thoughts have been occupied with all the things I need to do to fulfill my responsibilities towards my family-and none, not even one thought was about the pain of galus and the tza'ar hashechina. How crazy is that? Probably super normal for a galus mom.

Maybe this is why we shift from the three weeks to the nine days in this way, from less intense laws of mourning to stronger ones. In case we were too busy with life during the beginning of the three weeks, we now have a reminder that there really is something to think about. There is something to be feeling during this time. We need to phase into a new level of thought so we can arouse our souls to get to a place of feeling the pain of galus without outside tzaros and crazy painful stories in the news and in the world!

Maybe this is why we mourn in reverse. Maybe it's because Hashem is waking us up to His pain-first with a soft tap, then with a light knock (the nine days) and then with a loud shout (Tisha b'av), saying, "Helllooo! I am in pain! Feel my pain with me!" And maybe we should be feeling the pain more intensely as time passes. Because as the time does pass and we acknowledge that we are still in galus, the pain should also intensify. It should hurt us even more because, like, hello?! Are we still here? How is it that we are still here? Are we ever going to get out?

After all these years, will it ever happen?

As Jews, we believe it will. That's what shabbos nachamu is all about. The prophecies about the destruction came true, and so we believe (and ask Hashem to help us continue to believe) that the prophecies about the redemption will also be fulfilled. We just don't know when it will happen so that makes it so hard. And that's where the challenge to continue to believe takes place!

I feel like its somewhat easier for me to feel pain-because I went through my own loss. So I take my emotions surrounding the death of my brother and connect them to the bigger loss of Klal Yisroel during the time of the churban.

I lost one brother and it was so incredibly painful; it still is, when I let myself feel it.

During the destruction of the bais hamikdosh, every Jew experienced multiple losses. So many Jews died of starvation and thirst. Mothers consumed their babies! The devastation was enormous. I try to magnify my loss a hundred times over to feel what took place during the churban. 

But there's more. More I want to feel. Not just my own loss magnified (because that's kind of a selfish sort of pain), but I want to connect to what we had.

That clarity, that holy connection to the Source of all life, I want that.

When I was in the holy land, Eretz Yisroel, I was able to connect to a piece of that. And the clarity I felt there, the connection I felt at the kosel as I cried tears of yearning and tears of closeness, that was a galus connection! That wasn't even what real people experienced during the time of the bais hamikdosh. 

So whatever connection I did feel, can't be compared to the clarity and closeness a Jew could experience during the time of our bais hamikdosh. If I want to grasp a piece of whatever was felt during the time of the bais hamikdosh, I need to take my clarity and dveikus-and magnify it a hundred times over- and then I can try to imagine a tiny crumb of what the Jews experienced before we were sent into galus.

I want clarity? I want real closeness? Any connection I've ever felt is only a galus experience.

I can yearn for more. 

I can daven for more.

I can arouse my soul to experience pain-pain that whatever closeness I've ever felt in my entire life on this earth has no comparison to the closeness and connection to Hashem of all those years ago.

And then I can start to yearn for moshiach.