Daily Life Lessons from Rabbi Heschel
Day 287
“Entertainment is a diversion, a distraction of the attention of the mind from the preoccupations of daily living. Celebration is a confrontation, giving attention to the transcendent meaning of one’s actions.” (Who is Man pg. 117)
As I immerse myself in Rabbi Heschel’s wisdom above, I am struck with the understanding that our confrontation with our actions is a gift from the Universe, from God to help us grow, learn, improve and deepen our connections to self, to another(s), to God/Universe. Whenever we take the time and put in the effort to confront our actions, to give attention to the “transcendent meaning” of what we are doing, we have reason to celebrate. Whenever we confront the demons we live with, the demons that entice us from outside of our selves, we have reason to celebrate. While confrontation is not the same as ‘winning’, Rabbi Heschel is affirming the power, the strength, the courage of our confronting these demons as reason for celebration. I watched with sadness Liz Cheney’s defeat in the Wyoming Primary. While we hold so many divergent views, I admire Ms. Cheney’s stance for democracy. Of course she voted with Trump most of the time he was in office, she is a Republican and he was promoting the conservative values she holds near and dear. Yet, when it came time to pay attention to the Constitution, to pay attention to the orderly transfer of power, Liz Cheney confronted Trump, his sycophants and the entire Republican power structure. Liz Cheney, in her concession speech, celebrated her confrontation, spoke of how she and we can “climb above” the lies and deceptions of Trump and his mendacious followers. Liz Cheney is a hero for taking the road less traveled by the Republican Party in the last 14 years, the road of celebration, the road of confrontation, the road of paying attention and giving serious consideration to the “transcendent meaning of one’s actions”.
Confronting oneself is also a cause of celebration. Yet, we are usually only seeing where we are falling short, or being told where and how we fall short. We see the world as a competition, as a battleground, etc and we are constantly measuring our insides by someone else’s outsides, we are constantly comparing our self to another self and this is how we come to isolate, to seek escapes, to engage in entertainment as “a diversion, a distraction” because it seems too painful to confront these demons that are attacking us from inside and out. It doesn’t seem to make sense that we can win any battle against them so we quit, we quietly go about our business, escaping whenever and wherever we can, through alcohol, drugs, gambling, sex, work, mindless entertainment, our devices, etc. We are diagnosed with different “mental disorders” that are made up for the benefit of Big Pharma and the Psychiatric Community to validate their existence and charges, one sees the TV ads for better living through chemicals and there are very few visits to a Psychiatrist where medication is not prescribed! While in many cases these pills help lift a person out of the deep hole they are in, they are not magic bullets, they do not take the place of confronting our demons with the belief/hope that we can, like Jacob in Genesis, prevail against them. Rabbi Heschel’s brilliance above can strengthen our resolve to confront the demons, to realize and pay attention to our ability to climb above our current situation and make things better, brighter and stronger today, tomorrow and each day after.
We are able to climb above our current morass, our current situation, when we confront the lies, the indifference, the deceptions we have been telling ourselves and listening to in another(s). We are able to see the long-term effects of enjoying entertainment and jettisoning celebration. We need to choose to celebrate, we need to enjoy the long-term effects of our actions that promote goodness, kindness, truth, love, justice, dignity, compassion, and mercy. More tomorrow on this!
We begin our recovery journey precisely because we have been confronted with the long-term effects of our actions, either internally or externally. For some of us it took getting arrested by law enforcement to realize how arrested we have been by our indifference, our obliviousness, our choices to escape, our decision to engage in diversions and distractions. For some of us it took the call of family finally being heard to realize our imprisonment. For some of us it took a “dark night of the soul” to realize how our self-imprisonment has/had imprisoned so many of the people we said we loved. In recovery, we are confronting our demons of self-loathing, self-deception, and willful blindness each day.
Transcending my inner demons and inner crap is a daily, moment by moment experience for me. While I am much farther ahead in my celebrating as Rabbi Heschel defines it above, I know that I am not THERE yet. I am constantly engaged in “climbing above” my hurts, my sadness, my inner lies and inner demons to be able to have a positive impact on and with my family, friends, community, world. Truth is the greatest and most wonderful experience I celebrate. Unfortunately when confronted with lies and mendacity, indifference and betrayal, I still fail, at times, to “climb above” the traps these situations and people lay for me. I still react/respond with volcanic proportions and watch how these deceivers joyfully cheer my errors and use them against me and mine. I am a work in progress and celebrating the awareness while committing to use it better this week than I did last:) God Bless and stay safe, Rabbi Mark