Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Day 75
“The course in which human life moves is, like the orbit of heavenly bodies, an ellipse, not a circle. We are attached to two centers: to the focus of our self and to the focus of God. Driven by two forces, we have both the impulse to acquire, to enjoy, to possess and the urge to respond, to yield, to give.”(Man is Not Alone pg.146)
These words from Rabbi Heschel put the human dilemma and the path of being human so beautifully, forcefully, and so bluntly. Man is Not Alone was published 70 years ago, yet we seem to have forgotten, never learned, ignored this important teaching. Many people feel adrift precisely because we in a heavenly orbit, an ellipse which has two center points instead of a circle which only has one. We are constantly being pulled towards both of them and this is the essence of being human, as I am understanding Rabbi Heschel today. At issue, is whether we will continue to live in the orbit like a heavenly body or are we going to leave this orbit and turn ourselves into less than being human?
I am hearing Rabbi Heschel call out to us to not take the focus of self for granted, to not be so sure of what “the focus of self” actually entails. We have become enraptured with the idea of acquisitions, possessions and enjoyments. We are making this enrapture our sole focus of attention, getting it by any and all means. Whether we are enriching ourselves through using ‘slave’ labor by not paying living wages, enriching ourselves by taking advantage of the vulnerabilities of another person, enriching ourselves through theft and robbery (of all kinds-criminal and non-criminal); our society today is enamored and focused on obtaining as much as we can for our self and using this amassing of wealth and stuff to be powerful and ‘secure’.
The “focus of our self” has become the center of the circle we live in rather than one point of the ellipse and herein lies the roots of our current situation. The anger and hatred, the power grab and mendacity make sense to people who see human life as a circle. There is no God, no Higher Power/Consciousness, no Ineffable One to be acceptable to- just self and “it’s my life and I have free will” goes the thinking for people who’s focus on themself becomes the point in the circle that everything else revolves around. We see this politically, with some people focussed on their taking of power for their own sake, to propagate the lies they have been telling themselves to everyone else, to get people to believe that Jan.6, 2021 was a day for Freedom Fighters and Protectors of the American Way (meaning whiteness and prejudice/hatred towards anyone not with their way of whiteness)!
Personally, we stop looking at our own actions critically, we only see what someone else has done and we are just ‘getting ours’ as the saying goes. Putting ourself in the center of the circle, we need everything to revolve around us and to get that to happen, we will do just about anything. People will tear down the reputations of anyone who stands in their way of getting what they want, of making sure that their self is served above, before and beyond the needs of another person(s) and they will do everything in their power to prove their “rightness”. Rabbi Heschel is reminding us that making human life into a circle with the self in the center and wanting everyone/everything else to revolve around my/our self is going to imbalance our individual lives and our world itself. He is gently, this time, disturbing us so we go back to living in the ellipse and leave the circle of selfishness once and for all.
In recovery, this is our goal, to live in the ellipse that Rabbi Heschel describes above. We have lived in the circle, we have seen the destruction, the ruin, the harm, the pain we have caused by thinking that we could and should move from the ellipse to the circle, from putting us in the center where humanity and the physical world should be. We are in the process of making living amends for these behaviors, we are acutely aware of the damage we did to ourselves as well as to another persons(s). In recovery, we are searching for ways to improve the equilibrium of the ellipse and ensure we keep both centers in sync and in motion. We do this with a daily inventory, taking responsibility for our errors and our successes and being transparent and truthful.
I have been searching for the equilibrium the ellipse can bring and I know how illusive it can be as well. I am aware of when I have made the focus of my self the center of a circle rather than the foci of the ellipse and I have made and continue to make the amends for those moments. I also am aware that in my recovery, these experiences are truly moments rather than the pattern they were prior to my recovery. As I celebrate 35 years since my last arrest, 35 years since I heard God call me, or as I like to say hit me with a baseball bat, I am so grateful for the people in my life who have continued to stand with me and help me get back to living in the ellipse rather than in the circle. I am also grateful for the people who continue to make their self the center of the circle rather than the foci of their ellipse because it gives me pause and an example of how I do not want to be. We all will, at times, move for the foci of the ellipse to the center of the circle, sometimes it is necessary to do this because we have been so out of measure through denigrating one’s self and we have to remember to return to our natural state, the two foci of the ellipse. Stay safe and God Bless, Rabbi Mark