The Longest Night - Erev Rosh HaShanah 5775

(Video of this sermon as it was delivered at Temple Shaaray Tefila of New York City can be seen by clicking here, scrolling to the second-to-last video available, entitled "High Holy Days 2014 8:30." The sermon begins just after the 1:00:00 mark of the service. Or to hear it as an audio file, please click here.)

It was the longest night of his life. Even for a man who’d been on the run for 20 years—years of sleepless nights teeming with fear and dread—this was, by far, the most difficult. Having fled for his life from enemies both known and unknown, with the entirety of his family and every possession he’d ever amassed, longing for just a glimpse of clarity, some semblance of resolution in his life, he escorted them all to momentary safety on the other side of the river. Back on his side, he was left alone, where he lay down, and tried to sleep.

Tried, I say, because the pursuit of sleep was futile, and even he knew it. The frenzied tempest of terror swirling in his head was one he was all too familiar with; it whipped up anew each evening as the sun descended in its course. But this night would make every night before it seem as a restful luxury.

Jacob, a man tormented by the deceitful deeds of his past, by wrongs committed against both his brother and his father, was all alone. And yet, our text tells us in the very same breath, a man came upon him and wrestled with him until the rise of dawn. In their epic steel cage match, the back-and-forth of a fight straight from the action movies, the man wrenches Jacob’s hip socket, leaving him with a limp for the rest of his life. But Jacob is the victor, refusing to let the man go until he blesses Jacob, which he does. His blessing comes in the form of a new name—Yisrael—because, as the ish says, “You have struggled with God and with human beings, and you have prevailed.”

Who was this ish, this man? For many, this man is an angel of God, deduced from the explanation of his new name, as one who has struggled with God. For others, this man is none other than his twin brother Esau, whom Jacob had swindled out of his birthright for a bowl of stew, whose identity he later assumed so he could steal their father’s innermost blessing meant for the oldest son; whose dignity and self-worth Jacob had trampled upon with utter disregard; the very same man whose threats had sent him running all this time; the man he would confront the following day, for the first time in 20 tumultuous years. Still another interpretation is that of a bat mitzvah student of ours a few years ago, who opined that the man might have been Isaac, their father; that in Jacob’s enduring guilt at from having stolen the benediction, he sought to right this wrong, demanding a legitimate blessing before letting him go.

Fascinating. Perhaps true. But the text is clear. Jacob was l’vado, left alone, to himself. And it seems to me, as it does to many of our sages, that Jacob was wrestling with none other than himself. It seems to me that Jacob was grappling violently, with every fiber of his being, at the crossroads of his life, in a dark night of the soul, struggling to deal with all that he had been, all that he had done, all that he had experienced. Jacob, I believe, was engaging in cheshbon hanefesh, the accounting of the soul we are charged with doing at this time of year—taking stock of who he was, who he wanted to be, and how he would begin to narrow the gap between them.

My friends, especially this year, we are all Jacob. As individuals, as Jews, as Americans, as citizens of the world. And let us be frank: 5774 was a very, very long night. It was restless and fitful, traumatic and fraught, disturbing, disquieting and very deeply upsetting. And all of us—each and every one of us—carried that with us, bearing that weight upon our shoulders, as we entered through shaaray tefila, the gates of prayer, this Erev Rosh HaShanah. And so I feel we owe it to ourselves to emulate Jacob, to wrestle with and explore the year together, to begin our own collective cheshbon hanefesh, so that, like our flawed, imperfect forefather, we too can prevail in this new year of 5775.

So where have we been? 5774 found us glued to our TV sets, perhaps as never before, the bad news seeming to come in endless waves, filling us with outrage and anger, sadness and disbelief, frustration, desperation, and, perhaps worst of all, numbness. We watched as the least productive government in our nation’s history, worse by leaps and bounds than the infamous “Do-Nothing Congress” of the 1940’s, grew somehow even more polarized, more obstructionist, more dysfunctional, when we wondered how that could ever be possible. We endured the bickering: over security and spying, immigration, gun control, and increasing the minimum wage, while the abyss between the haves and have-nots continued to widen.  

We zoomed out from domestic concerns to see that things were even worse overseas than here at home. We heard the hemming and hawing of world leaders as tens of thousands were killed under Bashir al-Assad’s oppressive regime. In Africa. we saw one militant group attack an upscale Nairobi mall, while another kidnapped 280 girls from a Nigerian school, intending to make them sex slaves, their education seen as blasphemous, while in their warped view of faith sex trafficking is condoned.

And yet, somehow it all feels like a distant memory, from far longer ago than just a handful of months. It all seemed to dissolve quickly in the rearview mirror, as school let out, the kids went off to camp, and spring gave way to the Summer of Our Discontent.

It began on June 12^th, when Naftali Fraenkel, Gilad Shaar, and Eyal Yifrach—3 Israeli teenagers—were kidnapped by terrorists as they attempted to hitchhike home. Hopes for their safety, for their possible return to their families, were dashed when their bodies were discovered in a field northwest of Hebron on June 30^th. Retaliation followed swiftly, and the cycle of violence continued to escalate, as Israeli air strikes on Hamas targets in Gaza commenced and the rockets fired from Gaza multiplied. And just as Naftali, Gilad, and Eyal were laid to rest, a Palestinian teenager, Mohammed Abu Khdeir, also just 16 years old, was kidnapped in East Jerusalem, and then beaten and burnt to death. Perhaps most shocking, most upsetting of all was that the murders of these four children were greeted with a sickening display of glee: Palestinians and, yes, Israelis alike celebrated the pain inflicted upon the other, with politicians and leaders and clergy on both sides not only having incited these heinous acts, but even going so far as to claim responsibility for doing so, and with pride. “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth,” seemed to be the cry from everyone, forgetting the prophetic warning of Doc from West Side Story that such a rationale would only leave the whole world blind and toothless. And before we knew it, it was Groundhog Day all over again. Hamas’s rockets kept coming, fired strategically from amidst the homes, schools, hospitals, and shelters of the innocent and unarmed, turning all the citizens of Gaza—especially their children—into literal human shields for those who seek to kill as many of Israel’s citizens as possible, ultimately to wipe her completely off the map. The air strikes gave way to a ground operation, increasing the death toll on both sides. In response, anti-Semitism once again reared its ugly head all over the world, most especially, though unsurprisingly, in Europe, in acts ranging from the thinly-veiled to the shockingly overt. Perhaps the most terrifying discovery of this latest chapter was that of an intricate network of underground tunnels connecting Gaza to various sites inside Israel’s border; tunnels constructed from cement and electricity supplied by Israel herself, in the name of improving living conditions in Gaza, when it was under no obligation whatsoever to do so. These tunnels, Israeli intelligence would soon learn, were to be used in a massive Hamas operation of mass murder and kidnapping planned for today - Rosh HaShanah 5775. Thank God above, and the Israel Defense Forces here, that these tunnels have been destroyed. And yet, as the summer’s clashes finally came to a halt, for however long that halt will last, we are left to wonder if an actual end will ever be in sight.

Then the focus of the world shifted abruptly, as Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 was shot right out of the Ukraine sky, killing all 298 passengers and crew members on board. As international inspectors fought through red tape and obstruction to try to make sense of it all, we heard the stories of families ripped apart, of brothers and sisters, sons and daughters, fathers and mothers who kissed loved ones goodbye, never to see them again, reminding some of us of what happened here in our beloved city just over 13 years ago.

We looked up through those empathetic tears to see the rise of ISIS, the so-called “Islamic State,” targeting the Yazidi people in their ruthless efforts to “purify” Iraq and her neighbors of non-Islamic influences. And then we saw the devastating grief of our own American families, those of James Wright Foley, a freelance war correspondent during the Syrian Civil War, and Steven Sotloff, a Jewish journalist from Miami, the grandson of Holocaust survivors, both beheaded on video, for all the world to see. And once again, the specter of another armed conflict, of more American servicemen and –women risking their lives on the ground in Iraq, is very real and very scary, yet another thing that keeps us up at night.   

And when our focus circled back around to our own backyard, we watched the powder-keg of racial tension ignited by the police shooting of yet another unarmed black teenager, this time in Ferguson, Missouri, when Officer Darrell Wilson shot and killed18-year-old Michael Brown. In the days and weeks that followed, we saw the non-stop coverage of the protests and rioting, the police brutality and teargas, the deployment of the National Guard by the governor. And we were confronted with the sobering truth that when it comes to race relations in our fair republic, we still have miles to go before we sleep.                

And just when we had had enough of all the bad news coming from every corner of the globe, just when we couldn’t possibly take any more of it, then came word of Robin Williams, one of the most beloved actors and personalities in our history, taking his own life, giving in to the engulfing darkness of depression. As a nation shattered by his death recalled their favorite and most meaningful Robin Williams moments, we prayed that perhaps some good could come from his passing, slowly beginning to peel away the stigma and shame associated with the disease of depression. In these ways, and many others, may his memory be for a blessing.

The 18^th century rabbi Simcha Bunim of Peshishka is credited with a simple, yet wonderful teaching. He taught that everyone must have two pockets, with a note in each pocket, so that he or she can reach into the one or the other, depending on the need. When feeling lowly and saddened, discouraged or disconsolate, one should reach into the right pocket, and, there, find the words: "For my sake was the world created." But when feeling high and mighty one should reach into the left pocket, and find the words: "I am but dust and ashes."

My friends, in so many ways, 5774 was a long and excruciating night of the soul. And so, it seems to me, what we all need is a nechemta. A nechemta is a consolation, a source of comfort to conclude a difficult or upsetting passage, a warm blanket for just such a cold and sleepless night as this past year. We need it, don’t we. We’ve been forced to reach repeatedly into the pocket that tells us we are but dust and ashes. We’ve been beaten down emotionally by an onslaught of negativity, an endless reel of hopelessness playing again and over again in our minds, asking if there is any hope for tomorrow, yet fearful of receiving an answer; leaving us both desperate for the release of sleep, and yet terrified of what dreams, or nightmares, may come. For our hearts, for our souls, for our general well-being, we need to know that the sun will rise tomorrow, that its rays will gradually banish the darkness, if only for a while, that it will be a new day for each and every one of us. We need to know, if only for a moment or two, that the world was indeed created for us. And when we turn off the news and look around us, we can see that there is plenty of hope to comfort us and light our way after all.

There’s the story of Peter Frates, former captain of the Boston College baseball team in 2007, diagnosed at the age of 27 with ALS. But rather than let his condition define him, he girded his inner strength and set out to conquer his disease, saying in a recent interview, “For me, it was, ‘Okay. Here’s what we’re dealing with. Let’s go to work.’” He earned an audience with the Food and Drug Administration in Washington in March of 2013, where he said to them, “I ask of you: let’s speed up the process, let’s work together, and let’s make this disease a thing of the past.” Two months later, he married Julie, whom he’d met 8 months before his diagnosis, walking her down the aisle despite normally being almost entirely confined to a wheelchair. Over the summer, a friend of Pete’s introduced something called the Ice Bucket Challenge, to raise awareness of ALS and funds to find a cure. Suddenly, athletes all over Boston, then all over the country, then celebrities and everyone everywhere, even former Presidents, began to take part. The result? As of September 17^th, the Ice Bucket Challenge had raised over $114 million towards eradicating this terrible affliction. And, by the way, Pete and Julie welcomed a baby girl, Lucy Fitzgerald Frates, into the world on September 1^st. Pete’s father John said that her birth was “the perfect ending to the miracle month of August.”

There’s the story of Austin Hatch, the 19-year-old college freshman from Indiana. At the age of 8, Austin survived the crash of a plane piloted by his father, in which his mother and two siblings were killed. Eight years later, he was once again the lone survivor of another plane crash which took the life of his father and stepmother, leaving Austin in a medically-induced coma. This brave young man, a 6’6” high school basketball star, suffered such a traumatic brain injury that he literally had to re-learn how to walk and talk. Keeping his parents close to his heart all throughout the long and difficult recovery process, he said, “I can hear their voices in my head when I face a difficult situation. My dad and mom raised me to be an uncommon man. The uncommon man gets up at five in the morning to go work out, to get stronger, when no one else is. It takes an uncommon man to do that when no one is looking.” Asked by Maria Shriver what answer he had come up with to the question, “Why me?,” he told her, “The time that you could spend wondering and thinking why me?,’ that’s time that you could've spent working your tail off to get better.” Securing a full scholarship to the University of Michigan, his late mother’s alma mater, he was able to fulfill his lifelong dream of playing basketball for the Wolverines just a few weeks ago. On July 25^th, he tweeted, “"Y do bad things happen 2 good ppl?" has no answer. What we should ask is "what do good ppl do when something bad happens 2 them?”     

And then there’s the story of you. Of each of us, of all of us together. Chances are, you have come through something difficult, something challenging, something deeply trying at some point in your life. In the past month or year or decade, every single one of us here tonight and everyone we know, has endured, has made it through something, whether it’s an exhausting bout with cancer, the mending of a broken friendship, or the conquering a personal fear. I can’t tell you how often I’ve sat with many of you in my study and found myself saying, “You are so much stronger than you think you are.” And that’s the truth. Certainly stories like those of Peter Frates and Austin Hatch can inspire and motivate us to reach our highest potential. But let us not forget that we too–each and every one of us–have tremendous strength within ourselves to nourish our souls and others’ as well.      

In the morning, Jacob is blessed. The mysterious ish gives him the new name of Yisrael, because he has struggled with God and with humanity, and he has prevailed. Having found the strength within to make peace with himself, he comes face-to-face with his brother Esau, falling into a tearful embrace that is probably my favorite part of the entire Torah. Following this beautiful reunion, we read, Vayavo Ya’akov shalem ir Sh’chem, “Jacob arrived at the city of Sh’chem shalem, whole, complete, at peace.” For all he has been through, all that has haunted his dreams and his waking life, every troubling thought that kept him up at night, and even the wrenched hip socket he now hobbles upon, Jacob has arrived on the other side of the river shalem, whole, at peace, with a renewed hold on life, and a hopeful outlook on whatever the future may bring.

On this Rosh HaShanah, may we be as Jacob our patriarch. May we be honest with ourselves about where we have been, as individuals and as a community, even as we struggle to make meaning of it all. When we feel much more like dust and ashes, may we remember that, for each of us, for all of us, was the world created. May we know in our heart of hearts, in our most difficult hours, that hope is always there, that hope never dies, that the darkest hour is just before the dawn. And may each of us, all of us, enter through the gates of this new year like Jacob, like Yisrael, shalem—whole, complete, and at peace, with ourselves and each other.

For, like Jacob, we will prevail.

Now let’s go to work.

AMEN.  

Outdone - Rosh HaShanah 5774

(AUDIO: To listen to this sermon as it was delivered at Temple Shaaray Tefila, please click here.)

When my brother and I were kids, we used to do radio shows in our basement. (Hey, we were suburban.) From bar mitzvah gifts and elsewhere, Adam had actually put together some decent studio equipment, considering his age and it being the early 90’s--a microphone, a CD player, and a double tape deck so we could use our cassettes and still record everything. Whether these radio shows were just the two of us, or one of us with a friend, we tried to make it a real experience, even though we knew no one would ever listen to it. That meant song introductions, sports updates, pretending to be special guests, and even bringing in a speaker phone so we could call in from the other line to win imaginary trivia contests. And, of course, what radio show would be complete without commercials? For those we used the real thing, a collection of old radio and TV spots for different products called Tee Vee Tunes. One of the ads we liked to use was for Ken-L-Ration, and I’m sure some of you know still remember it. It goes like this:

“My dog’s better than your dog, my dog’s better than yours. My dog’s better cause he gets Ken-L-Ration, my dog’s better than yours.”

The next verse is the same, hammering home the point with further assertions that my dog is faster, and smarter, than your dog. And we know why.

Every so often this catchy little jingle will pop into my head. And I find myself smiling and laughing at the memories made in our little basement studio in Yardley, Pennsylvania. But the laughter and the smile fade, as I realize what so often triggers that childhood flashback. It’s that never-ending competition of our lives, and it seems like it’s everywhere we look.

You’ve seen it, haven’t you? The ads on TV? One of my favorites is for Burlington Coat Factory, where a child’s birthday picnic is turned into a battleground of the self-satisfied. “Her outfit looks great,” the woman says, “but I saw it at the department store for $96.” Cool Mom responds, “I got one just like that for $38 at Burlington.” But that’s not enough. Not anymore. 20 years ago, maybe. But not today. And so she continues, “and this outfit for my husband, and play clothes for the twins.” Enough, right? We got the point now, right? Wrong. “I saved so much, I got backups,” and flashes those backups pretty much right in the other woman’s face. The kicker? The slogan: “Brag about it.” “Brag about it.” That’s the slogan. And doesn’t that about sum it up perfectly. (Watch the ad here.)

How about these flash-mob wedding proposals, custom-made to get a million hits on Youtube? Cause there has to be a story, right? Can’t just take a girl out to a fancy dinner and get down on a knee anymore. Now there has to be an intricate plot, a ruse of sorts, with many moving parts and several people in on it. It has to be public, and it has to be big. And why? Because the bigger it is, the more it must mean. I’m not saying a proposal shouldn’t be thought out, planned, and done right. It should. But there’s something very wrong when we confuse the magnitude of the production for the depth of feeling. And the worst part, I think, is that we fall for it. In reading the story of one of these crazy proposals, I saw the testimony of a parent, who had shared the tale with his daughters and told them, flat out, that this was the kind of thing they deserved to have one day, that anything less would not be acceptable for his little girls.

How about Sam’s bar mitzvah? You saw this, right? Almost 900,000 people have. Bar mitzvah kid wants to have his moment and be announced formally as he comes into the party? That’s fine. Want to have him enter to his own number? Okay. It’s his moment. But hiring an entire troupe of professional dancers to do a special number? Spelling out his name on the stage with 15-foot electronic letters? Lowering a humongous cake from the ceiling and having him appear from within to join the routine? It’s so far over the top, you can’t even see the top from there. And don’t forget, as the note below the clip tells us, to change your viewing quality to HD, if desired. Wouldn’t want to miss that. And yet, once again, we eat it up with a spoon; Good Morning America brings Sam, and his dancers, to Times Square to re-enact the whole thing, and extend his 15 minutes. After all, it was the number one trending video at the time. When I think about how much those 2 and a half minutes must have cost, never mind the rest of the affair, and all the good places that money could have gone instead, I’m left shaking my head.  

It used to be about having the nicest home, the priciest car, the latest technology, the coolest gadgets and gizmos. It used to be about “keeping up with the Joneses,” about “he who dies with the most toys wins.” Now it’s about outdoing, outperforming, outlasting, outsmarting, out-everything everyone. It’s no longer about the Joneses; it’s about the Joneses, the Goldsteins, the Hanrahans, the Patels, the Changs, the Schafers, and the McManuses. And keeping up with them? Why, to be an also-ran? Forget about it. That won’t do. Not anymore. Now Charlie Sheen is our unlikely prophet, where everything is about winning, and winning big. Now it’s about being so far ahead of them that they’re all left in the dust. But not too far ahead. Because, if no one’s around, who’s going to hear us when we “brag about it”?

Winning. It’s why, I think, we love sports. However each game is scored, it is quantifiable, measurable, and when there’s a winner, there’s a number, a statistic to point to, that proves the outcome, and is written into the record books. To be 1^st place, the champion atop the medal stand, the king of the hill hoisting a trophy, looking down below upon rivals gleefully crushed along the way—this is the ultimate quest of the athlete. And for some, when that quest becomes a holy grail, there is literally nothing—no laws, no morals, no ethics—that will stand in their way. We saw it this past year with Lance Armstrong and Alex Rodriguez and Jewish former-hero Ryan Braun, all for whom it wasn’t enough just to cheat and then to lie about it; it was taken to a whole other level with angry accusations and even threats to those who challenged their credibility. 

But it certainly doesn’t end with sports. We drive like it too, don’t we. Doesn’t matter where we’re going or how much time we have to get there, we’ve got to be first. We pretend we’re NASCAR drivers, weaving in and out of lanes without as much as a look, forget using turn signals. We either don’t know or don’t care about the danger we constantly put ourselves and our loved ones in. When we’re stuck in traffic, when a lane is closed, when letting someone in or, God forbid, an alternate merge, won’t make a 5-second difference, we gun it, scratching and clawing to claim, if but for a moment, those precious few inches of road. Cause letting someone get there first, that would be losing. And in the immortal words of Ricky Bobby’s dad in Talladega Nights, “If you’re not first, you’re last.”

Quality, it seems, is dead. We’ve sacrificed it at the altar of “bigger, faster, stronger,” with a choir singing “My dog’s better than your dog” in the background. Quantity is everything. Less isn’t more, the car commercial reminds us. More is more. And, really, how can you argue with that?

Abraham didn’t.

Every year on Rosh HaShanah we hear the haunting tale of Akedat Yitzchak, the binding and near-sacrifice of his son, Isaac. It is terrifying for anyone to hear, all the more so for parents. And every year, we find ourselves angry all over again, dumbfounded to the point of incredulity: how could a God—our God—actually desire this of Abraham? How could Abraham even consider going through with it? How is it possible that the founder of our faith came within inches, knife raised in the air, of cutting his son’s throat? Suddenly all of his deeds and attributes—his bravery in leaving his homeland, the rescue of his nephew Lot; the hospitality shown to guests who turn out to be angels, the sheer chutzpah of challenging and bargaining with God for the souls of those in Sodom and Gomorrah—all of it seems to fade from the picture when the camera’s focus is on a man ready to take his own son’s life.

For us, calling this text “difficult” is an understatement of, well, biblical proportions. It shakes us in every fiber of our being. It cuts to the very essence of what it means to be a human being. If this is a test of God, we say, surely Abraham failed. Surely a man who dares talk back to God regarding the lives of strangers in Sodom and Gomorrah, yet who utters not a sound, nor bats an eyelash to this outlandish demand, has come up terribly short.

But for our sages, the rabbis and scholars of our tradition, this is as simple as it gets: Abraham is The Man. Such a loyal, devoted servant of God is he that there is absolutely nothing he wouldn’t do for God. Nothing. Even if it meant offering Isaac as a sacrifice. Even more than this sheer exaltation, some of our sages are, in fact, jealous of Abraham! Would that they could be so deeply loved by God to have had that asked of them! How, they wonder, could anyone be as fortunate as Abraham, to have received such a level of providence? “How easy it is for you,” they would say to us, “to sit and wag your fingers at him! You should be so lucky!”

And so I wonder: what if Abraham was so obsessed with being the best, the wisest, the closest to God that no request was too large or too small to enhance that image? What if there was nothing that could keep him from figuratively shouting from the mountaintops as he did, “My God’s better than your God!” What if the Binding of Isaac is a red flag of warning melodramatically waved in our faces each Rosh HaShanah? What if it’s the ultimate cautionary tale, almost satirical in its hyperbole, asking us, “Do you see what happens when we make winning—being the greatest, the biggest, the best—into the worst kind of idol?” What if this is the real reason why we read it twice a year? What if we’re not as far removed from Abraham as we like to think we are, after all?

Well, then, we've got to turn it around. And we've got to turn it back.

Many of you know that t'shuvah, usually translated as "repentance," has "turning" and "returning" at its Hebrew root. And the shofar is very simply the alarm clock for our souls. So on this Rosh HaShanah, this turning of the new year, let us be moved to turn away from the pettiness, the competition for competition's sake, the obsession with "anything you can do I can do better." Let us turn away from these vainest of pursuits, because they satisfy nothing, and couldn't be further from what makes our lives worth living. Let the blasts of the shofar wake us up to what truly matters, to push the reset button on our perspective and our priorities.

How? Cheshbon hanefesh. Cheshbon hanefesh means "accounting of the soul." It's what we're supposed to be doing this time of year, taking stock of where and who we've been this past year, who we want to be in the year to come. Now, the word "cheshbon" in modern Hebrew means the bill or the check, so that at the end of a meal in an Israeli restaurant, you would say "Cheshbon, b'vakashah," "Check, please."

Well, today, on Rosh HaShanah, we get the bill, the cheshbon, for the year. It is the ultimate performance evaluation, only this time the job is our lives, and the boss is, well, The Boss. And this work of cheshbon hanefesh, of the accounting of our souls, requires us to be honest with ourselves: what am I really doing with my days, with my hours? More importantly, why? Am I spending 20 hours a day in my office or at home with my kids because there is some societal voice whispering in my ear that "that's what a GOOD lawyer/doctor/manager/agent/parent should do"? Is it to satisfy the needs or appease the criticism of others that we have projected upon ourselves, keeping a tally of real or imagined "billable hours"? Are we sacrificing the quality of our lives for quantity, risking the resentment of others and, worse, ourselves, in trying to be who we aren’t? Or do we do what we do because we love it, because it is meaningful, satisfying, and fulfilling, for ourselves and those around us? Are we striving towards reaching our highest potential, aiming to achieve our own personal goals, or those we feel others have set for us?

When we confront these questions honestly, re-calibrating our lives, we can begin t’shuvah, the turning--or returning--to our most authentic, and best selves. This is what Maslow meant when he put the idea of self-actualization at the top of his hierarchy of human development. It means satisfying, if not transcending entirely, our deficiency needs. It means pursuing a value in the world beyond merely ourselves. It means being more concerned with what we're really doing, who we really are, than trying to be what we think society wants us to be. And it means moving from conformity, from trying to fulfill the expectations of others, to autonomy, where we do what we do because it fills our lives with meaning, with purpose, and, ultimately, with happiness and contentment.

The sacrifice of quality over quantity isn’t yet complete. Even as we’ve raised the knife, like Abraham, ready to strike, there is still the opportunity to intervene, to prevent it from taking place. There’s still a moment left to stop the loop of Annie Oakley from the speakers singing, “Anything you can do, I can do better.” There’s still the chance to take it all back, to turn away from being the best by comparison, and turn toward the best versions of ourselves, the most fulfilled, most purposeful people we can be. That chance is called cheshbon hanefesh, a true accounting of our souls. That opportunity is called the rest of our lives. And it can start today. Right here, right now. But only if we’re ready to pay the bill when it comes.

AMEN.