(Originally published in January 2021) For the Israelites, true redemption from slavery was not just a removal from danger and suffering, but a movement into relationship with God. (Click image to read more)
SHORT ESSAY: The Stages of Redemption (Parashat Va’era) Read More »
Where are they inside you, those abandoned parts of your own self? Invite them in and offer them some bread. This is the divine call of redemption. (Click image to read more)
WOW (Word of the Week): ואיו, “And Where is He?” (Parashat Shemot) Read More »
(Originally published last year) “And he [Moshe] looked and behold the bush was ablaze with fire, but the bush was not consumed.” This vision speaks of a place of invulnerability inside each of us that can withstand any blaze. (Click image to read more)
SHORT ESSAY: To Not be Consumed by the Blaze (Parashat Shemot) Read More »
What if, the next time you are sad or hurt or angry, you paused and reflected on the essential aliveness of these feelings, the way they feel intense and living inside you . . . .? (Click image to read more)
WOW (Word of the Week): ויחי, And He Lived (Parashat Vayechi) Read More »
This week’s parsha begins, Vayechi Yaakov, “Yaakov lived,” but it is a parsha about Yaakov’s death. In this meditation, we work on expanding our notion of aliveness in two ways: 1) As Yaakov had a very difficult life, but still vayechi, still loved, so we experiment with seeing our most difficult emotions as manifestations of
MEDITATION: On “Chayut,” Aliveness (Parashat Vayechi) Read More »
Goshen is the land of connection, the place where we arrive following all the strife of the book of Breishit, a place where we can glimpse the possibility of real connection and coming together. (Click image to read more)
WOW (Word of the Week): Goshen (Parashat Vayigash) Read More »
On that day, the earth shook with sorrow/ and the farmer who was seeding, paused mid-row (Click image to read more)
POEM: The Great Cry (Parashat Vayigash) Read More »
In this meditation, we explore the emotional complexity of the first scene of the parsha . . . (Click image for more)
MEDITATION: Glimpsing Goshen: the Land of Connection (Parashat Vayigash) Read More »
חלום פרעה אחד הוא
Pharaoh’s dream is one.
(Click image to read more)
WOW (Word of the Week): אחד, One (Parashat Miketz) Read More »
(Originally published in December 2020) The Chanukah menorah is a kli, a vessel, to hold the oil or the candles that bring light into the world. Light needs a container. In order for blessing to enter this world, it needs a container. In the book of Kings (II Kings 4), when a destitute woman
SHORT ESSAY: Becoming a Vessel (Chanukah and Parashat Vayeshev) Read More »