American Mussar

21st century Jewish spiritual practice for an authentic and meaningful life

Don’t Let Your Spirits Be Crushed in 2022

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Don't Let Your Spirits Be Crushed
Feeling the weight of the world? Ask for help

As I sat down to write, I wondered: “What I could say to wrap up 2021, and provide some guidance as we approach 2022? Covid is once again exploding, and I find myself at a bit of a loss.”

Last week in “Jewish Wisdom for Coping with a Pandemic,” I asked people to share how they were coping. It was nice to both share where I am, and to hear how we all are doing. You can see a video recording here. Overall people are doing ok, but some like me are struggling to some degree.

I had an intuition to look to the Torah for inspiration, so I opened the Mussar Torah Commentary, edited by Rabbi Barry Block, and read this week’s chapter, written by Rabbi Joshua Mikutis. Rabbi Mikutis highlights that the part of the story where the people did not listen to Moses because “their spirits were crushed by cruel bondage.” (Exodus 6:9). AHHHH – that phrase resonated with me. While my spirits are not exactly crushed, I am feeling a bit fatalistic about the Omicron surge. I read on.

In the story, Moses’ initial efforts to bring liberation did not start well – Pharaoh answered his first request with scorn and further oppression The Israelites now had to make bricks without straw, and some were mad at Moses. When Moses turned to God for help, help was provided in the form of his brother Aaron who spoke for him. Whether or not you would turn to the Divinity, the principle remains – it is critical to ask for help. With Aaron’s assistance, Moses carried on with his work, and ultimately our people were freed.

The pandemic is a long haul struggle. As we head into 2022, we have choices. We can allow ourselves to be crushed by the unfairness and unpredictability of the pandemic, or we can reach out to others to help us get through. And, we should not underestimate the mental health toll of this continued stress and isolation. The pandemic gives us opportunities for both self care, and to be there for others.

I can acknowledge the feelings of loss, without getting buried by worry. And most importantly, I will be turning to the people in my life, and to my spiritual practice, to help me get through. Because at the end of the day, it is about carrying on. We still get only one life, and I’d like to make this one the best I can.

I’m curious, is there a role for spirituality in your life, and is it helping you cope with the pandemic? Please reply and let me know. As always, I’ll answer every comment. 

Jewish Wisdom for Coping with a Pandemic is a drop in group that meets every Thursday at 4 Pacific. You can sign up for our email list to get notices, or check out previous meetings on Youtube.

Practice Mussar Order To Change a Bad Habit

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practice mussar order
Let there be light: The first step in creation

Recently, I taught a class where we discussed how to participate in the traditional Elul practice of preparing the the High Holy Days. I asked everyone to think of something they want to change about themselves.

One person shared that they are always late, and really want to change. It was clear from the sadness on their face that being late was painful to them, since they knew the impact it had on other people. With their permission, I suggested a practice to help change their persistent bad habit. The soul trait to practice is Order.

Order is one of the most powerful soul traits. The Hebrew is Seder, as in the Passover Seder. On Passover we use a guide book to help us recreate the experience again and again each year. Here is how each of us can practice Order to change a bad habit.

**************** Here’s a way to Practice Mussar Order ****************

  1. Pick one habit you’d like to change. We’ll use being on time as an example
  2. Choose one example of this habit, and focus on changing only that. In our example, you would pick one upcoming meeting to be on time for. Don’t try to be on time for everything, just try to be on time for one meeting one time.
  3. Put that meeting on the calendar, and write down of everything you need to do in order to be on time. Put those things on the calendar too.
  4. Continue to focus only on future instances of this meeting, using the same process until you are regularly on time for it.
  5. Pick a second circumstance you’d like to be on time for, and use the same process

For example, first focus on being on time for a weekly zoom class. Don’t worry about being on time for other things yet. After a few successes, you’ll use the same process to be on time for your Friday lunch with a friend. Lasting change happens slowly.
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What is spiritual about setting a goal, and a list of steps? Has this post devolved into self-help tips?

Think of the creation story in the book of Genesis. The first day there was light, the second sky, the third dry land followed by plants. We are shown an example of an orderly creation of everything. The Divine did not create plants before there was light. In fact, one Jewish teaching says that Torah existed before the creation, and was used as a blueprint for the universe. While I don’t believe that literally, The Torah as blueprint is a powerful metaphor illustrating how important planning is, and how creating Order is a holy activity.

Like all soul traits, Order exists on a spectrum. You may be disorganized like I am, or you may plan so much that it is hard to be spontaneous. There are no right or wrong answers, but there is a right approach, which is to be mindful, and seek to grow.

Mussar gives us the gift of bringing spiritual awareness to “ordinary” moments in everyday life.

How does Order show up for you? What is one habit that you can change by practicing Order?

Please comment below – I’ll answer every one.

Image by Tim Sullivan Sullny Photos

Three Mussar Practices To Get Rid of Mom’s Stuff

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get rid of mom's stuff
My Mother’s Jewelry

My mother died on May 9, 2020 of Covid. Although she lived on the other side of the country, we were close, speaking several times a week. She was my spiritual mentor, and constant supporter. I was not able to travel home to visit her grave or take care of her things until over a year later. It was not easy to get rid of mom’s stuff.

This week marked an important milestone, when I had to dispose of her jewelry. After my wife and daughters picked what they wanted, there was a lot left. Mom loved to dress well, and loved her jewlery. After we are gone, most of the things we leave behind have no owner, and no purpose. The thought made me sad. I had no attachment to these things of hers. I felt bad getting rid of them, but keeping all this stuff didn’t seem like the right thing to do either. Three Mussar practices helped me get rid of moms stuff.

Mussar Practice 1: Honor

The Ten Commandments teaches that we should Honor our parents. But it does not say that we need to Honor their things. As important as these things were to my mom, I don’t need to keep them just because they liked them. At the same time, I would not be honoring her memory to just throw them away, or to have them cluttering my house. In fact, it would be giving her too much Honor to keep something I do not like. 

Mussar Practice 2 Gratitude

Decluttering expert Marie Kondo teaches that when something does not spark joy for us, we should thank it for its service, and give it away.  And in that sense, I am immensely grateful to my moms jewelry for giving her so much joy over the years. That was her joy, and not mine. The best way I could honor her memory is to find someone else who would wear and love her things. I lovingly packed her jewelry back into its box, put my hands on top of it, and thanked it for all the joy it brought her.

Mussar Practice 3: Generosity

Alan Morinis describes generosity as “a movement of the soul that erupts when you are pierced by the recognition of your direct connection to another soul.” When donating moms jewelry collection, I tried to do so wholeheartedly, imagining someone finding a necklace and bracelet that they absolutely loved. While I will never meet this person, we will still be connected. 

get rid of mom's stuff
Elaine Marcus, fashonista till the end

Nothing can replace the people we’ve lost. Judaism provides a good structure for grief, but as far as I know there are no direct teachings on what to do with your parents stuff. 

I hope these three Mussar practices are helpful to you in your own grief journey.

How did you approach this issue? Let me know below. I answer every comment. 

Jews and Asians Were Both Shocked By Atlanta

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jews and asians
Whether or not we speak up is a choice point.

Last week I asked an Asian friend of mine how she was after the racist killings in Atlanta. She was in shock. “I never thought I had to join a Facebook group to stop racism against Asians because I thought the racism against black Americans was a much bigger problem. But just week an Asian woman was attacked in San Francisco, and a car stopped to yell at me because I was walking on the wrong side of the road. It felt racially motivated.”

I was reminded of the story of Leo Frank, a prominent member of the Atlanta Jewish community, who was convicted of murdering a 13 year old girl who worked in his factory. The evidence was more than flimsy. The papers ran inflammatory anti-Jewish rhetoric. After the Governor commuted his sentence from death to life imprisonment, a mob broke into a hospital where he was recovering from an assault, and lynched Mr. Frank. (You can see a horrible picture of his body on the link above), It was a terrible shock to the Atlanta Jewish community, who had thought themselves fully accepted. “After Frank’s lynching, Jews who had lived in Atlanta since its founding felt their sense of security was destroyed.“
I really felt for my friend, her sense of shock that she too could be targeted. I think she is feeling what members of the Atlanta Jewish community 100 years ago after Leo Frank’s lynching. White supremacy destroys lives, and it is trying to destroy our sense of safety and community. Jews and Asians, people of color and allies live with this reality.
All of this brings us to the topic of this week’s Jewish Wisdom Gathering: The Choice Point. A choice point is an opportunity to exercise free will, to choose in the direction of doing good, or doing not good. When it comes to the anti-Asian racism, we have two choices. We can take action, or we can ignore it.
Doing nothing is the status quo – we may feel bad about what happened, but we have bigger fish to fry. Perhaps you feel that now is a time to circle the wagons, and take care of our fellow Jews or just our family. This is not the Mussar way, and it is not the Jewish way. We are instructed to proactively look for opportunities to create a just world. But what to do? The size of the problem is overwhelming.
Here are a few simple choices you can make to support the Asian community or to be an anti-racist:
  1. Reach out to Asian friends or acquaintances. A simple text saying “I”m thinking of you with all the racism directed as Asians going on. How are you doing?” I can’t begin to tell you how appreciative my friend was that I asked last week. This option has the added bonus of building relationships and community
  2. Don’t be silent if someone talks about how sexy or exotic Asian women are. That stereotype helps perpetuate violence against Asian women.
  3. Raise up stories about Asian Jews. Here are six examples from the Jews of Color Initiative.
What choice will you make?
Do you agree with the comparison I’ve made?
I’d love to hear your thoughts.
Join us for Jewish Wisdom For Coping with a Pandemic each Thursday at 4 Pacific time for free on Zoom. Please sign up to get the password.
Photo by Jason Leung on Unsplash

I Woke Up and Thought “I’ve lost my faith.” Mussar helped me recover it

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I woke up and thought “I’ve lost my faith.”

It was a few days after the January 6th insurrection, and I just felt useless. So many people I know seem to think it was ok, or not a big deal. A minority, but enough to shake me.

I didn’t even realize I had faith until it was gone. What a lonely and alienating feeling. 

Not all of us have faith in the Divine, yet I hope we all have faith in something that makes us secure. As you’ll see below, this type of faith is the soul trait of Trustworthiness, which is what we explored in this meeting of Jewish Wisdom For Coping with a Pandemic. In the meeting, I shared the amazing experience I had just a few hours later that helped get me back on track. You can see for yourself in the video I shared.

Sometimes it takes just a little reminder to help us find ourselves, and sometimes we need help. I reached out to my friend and sometimes mentor Rabbi David Jaffe. He asked, “What do you need to focus on for your journey? Once you know that, you can share with your community from a place of authenticity.” He helped me focus on the soul traits of Trustworthiness and Anger for this weeks teaching.

It was a truly special gathering, which is why I am devoting a blog post to it. We covered:

  • What I saw in the Institute For Jewish Spirituality Daily Sit that helped me recover my faith
  • The connection of growing seeds to trustworthiness 
  • A secret teaching: when everyone was in break out groups, I shared an analogy about having a firm tent peg in the ground, a peg that was loosened for all of us on the January 6th insurrection
  • People shared the prayers they wrote inspired by a poem by Rabbi Pam Wax.

Yes, I woke up and thought, “I’ve lost my faith.” I’m so thankful for the American Mussar community that helped me process this experience.

You are heartily invited to watch the video, and share your reaction below.