Today I took a long walk. It is part of how I prepare for the high holidays. During that walk I listen to birds and I pour my own heart out.
Sometimes it is the words that come from the depth of my being. Sometimes they are the words about being outdoors in nature. Here are a few of today’s offerings:
Kol ha’olam kulo, gesher tzar me’od.
V’ha’ikar lo lefachda klal.
All the world is a narrow bridge.
The central thing is to not be afraid.—Rabbi Nachman of Bratzlav.
Please G-d, let me not be afraid. Give me the ability to embrace life. Give me the ability to reach out. Give me the ability to lead. And follow. Help me to pray. Help me to teach. Help me to convey the beauty of Your creation to all I meet. Help me to be kind and caring. To my family. To my community. To the world. Help me learn patience. Help me to be more like You—gracious and compassionate, loving, slow to anger, patient, full of lovingkindness, forgiving.
Then this one, also from Rabbi Nachman as sung by Debbie Friedman:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8N3tybnduQQ
Rebbe Nachman’s song:
You are the One, for this I pray
That I may have the strength to be alone.
To see the world, to stand among the trees,
And all the living things.
That I may stand alone and offer prayers and talk to You;
You are the One to whom I do belong.
And I’ll sing my soul to You
And give You all that’s in my heart.
May all the foliage of the field
All grasses, trees and plants,
Awaken at my coming, this I pray
And send their speech, my thoughts and my prayers will be made whole,
And through the spirit of all growing things
And we know that everything is one
Because we know that everything is You
You are the One, for this I pray
I ask you G-d to hear my words
That pour out from my heart; I stand before You
I, like water, lift my hand to You in prayer.
And grant me strength, and grant me strength to stand alone.
You are the On to whom I do belong.
And I’ll sing my soul, I’ll sing my soul to You
And give you all that’s in my heart.
You are the One, for this I pray,
And I’ll sing my soul to You.
Debbie Friedman based on the words of Rabbi Nachman of Bratzlav
It is a hard song to sing, with a range that is too big for me. But I hear it in my head—and I appreciate the opportunity to be out in nature, alone, just as Nachman and Thoreau suggested.
Then I was surprised by another song. Really symbolic of the season of turning.
Return again, return again, return to the land of your soul.
Return to where you are. Return to what you are. Return to who you are.
Born and reborn again.
Reb Shlomo Carlebach, z’l sung by his daughter, Neshama Carlebach
http://www.neshamah.net/2009/08/return-again-neshama-carlebach.html
I hear this in Neshama’s voice. She sang at the pre-ordination concert at the Academy for Jewish Religion the night before my ordination. Her father was a gifted singer/songwriter who made all of our prayers skyrocket to heaven but for years I have not sung his music. I know too many people personally caught by his magnetic personality and his wandering hands. This year Neshama has done a great amount of teshuva around this very topic after the #MeToo movement. https://www.timesofisrael.com/neshama-carlebach-writes-about-her-father-victims-and-being-molested-as-a-child/
Can I sing those songs again? They are buried deep in my soul. Can I sing them publicly? Time will tell. But this is teshuvah. True, true returning.
And very, very recently she married one of my dear rabbinic colleagues, Rabbi Menachem Creditor, who amongst other things wrote what will be the themesong of my year talking about covenant. Olam chesed yibenah—Build this world on love.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHp-jcPlKIY
I wish them both mazel and much, much love.
Then I wound up in Lake Michigan, a full mikveh immersion singing this Hashivenu
Turn us back to you, Lord and we will return.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zy5nV9pwZ9I
And Adonai, Adonai:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DS1WYRmMCaQ
This is my Bat Mitzvah portion, the reason I became a rabbi, the verse I wrote my thesis about, the first book I wrote and the most important verse of the season. G-d taught this verse to Moses to teach us how to ask for forgiveness.
Then my family sat outside on a beautiful early fall, late summer day and wrote a family mission statement and individual positive heshbon hanefesh.
Ready or not, here I come. Hineini.