Ghosting God, Ghosting Self
Day 105
“But my words, like silent raindrops, fell and echoed in the wells of silence”. These final words of verse 4 of Sound of Silence are reminders to We the People on this 7th day of Elul, this ‘Shabbat’, that compassion and mercy are in the air, they are so prevalent in the the spiritual realm at this time of year for this very reason-Don’t let God’s Words, the words of the prophets “like silent raindrops” fall into “the wells of silence” ANYMORE!
We the People are a week into this period of GRACE that God provides us so we can allow ourselves to be embraced and enveloped in “arms that might reach you”, and engage in the learning that Torah(the Teaching) avails to us, the learning and being that the entire Bible gives us freely. The question that is on my mind each and every day: “how am I taking advantage of the Grace that God gives me?” Not as an entitlement, rather as a gift that I am supposed to use in the manner, the intent, the spirit it is given in. God’s Grace during this month is for We the People to RETURN, to GET RID OF THE SCHMUTZ of this past year that is still hanging on to us, and to leave the “echoed…wells of silence”. Is this really too much to ask?
I am asking questions in the body of this blog because I am trying to make the point crystal clear: DON’T GIVE INTO THE SILENCE our RATIONAL MINDS KEEP TRYING TO OVERCOME US WITH! Don’t give into the noise of the liars and grifters of course and, as I am experiencing this Elul, this year, I realize the silence that is so loud, that is practiced by so many people is a Cancer that kills. It kills the connection between people, it kills the knowing “I owe” because of the aid and help, sometimes life-saving help, that a person did for me and I don’t want to be reminded of this fact. Silence, like cancer, kills the basic goodness of being that we all are created with, it kills the living into the spirit of God’s Will even though one is living into the ‘letter of the law’ and can rationalize the wrong-doing, the forgetting of the debts we owe, using ‘the courts’ to declare spiritual bankruptcy and believe our debts are discharged-WRONG!
Hence the NEED for this month of Elul! Each year the Torah is read from beginning to end, each year we read the call of the prophets, each year we celebrate the Holy Days, each year we succumb, hide in “the wells of silence” because we the people are too afraid to face Truth, to engage with “the person in the glass” as the poem goes. And each year, the gift of the Rabbis and Sages is this month of Elul. In Israel and in the U.S.A. the “wells of silence” are deafening, they are ringing in my ears and, I pray, in yours as well. This month, this “Shabbat” day of Elul is for us to regenerate our spirits, to gird our loins for battle with the forces inside of us and outside of us that want and depend on us living in “the wells of silence” so they/we can do the dirty work, the power grabs, the grifting, the taking of freedoms away from We the People. Another question: Are We the People going to continue to allow this to happen?
“An unexamined life is not worth living” according to Socrates and “an examined life is painful” according to Malcolm X and BOTH ARE TRUE. This is the reason, I believe, that the forces of compassion and mercy are so prevalent right now, to mitigate the pain(not erase it) and to buoy our spiritual knowing that we the people have to engage in examining our lives. I have been doing this since 1987, during the month of Elul and on a daily basis. I have found things from years ago that I just did not either think about or dismissed as okay ways to be. I send out my T’Shuvah and don’t worry about the responses. I keep repaying the debt that I have incurred over the years from the people who have and keep helping me to the best of my ability. I am sad that some of the people whom I have helped do not feel the same AND, I experience the reciprocity of generosity from so many different people, places, that the sadness is very small, and, in full disclosure, still there. While I have never done ‘sad’ well in my younger years, I am getting very comfortable with the experience and hold no resentments nor angers. I am just sad that so many people are so pathetic, in need of divine pathos, they cannot see the very actions they are taking would have meant their demise-Stephen Miller, et al and, more importantly, you and me. Elul gives We the People the opportunity to go back, to pull ourselves out of “the wells of silence”, to take “My words” and no longer let them “like silent raindrops, fell”. Rather take the “My words” as delivered by “My prophets” and use them to RETURN, to FIND YOUR AUTHENTIC SELF and jettison the FALSE SELF you have been reveling in and get out of the pig sty of jealousy, hatred, elitism, power-grabbing, money-grabbing, etc all to get out of the knowing YOU OWE! I OWE and repaying the debt is a joy and life’s mission for me, one I have continued to engage in to this day.
ACTION STEP: Make a list of how you fall into and play around in and pull yourself out of “the wells of silence”
GOD BLESS and Stop Ghosting God, Ghosting Self, Rabbi Mark