How can we take the fire of Elul and keep it alive within?
Many of us have made kabbalahs or undertaken resolutions throughout the days of Yamim Noraim. Now what?
Somehow it feels as if every year we start out on such a spiritual high but then… we fall back into our ways and disappoint ourselves. It is as if no matter how hard we try we end up doing the ‘same old same old.’
One important way for us to continue climbing our spiritual mountain is to reframe. We look at ourselves and we look at those around us thinking that change is impossible. Can we really transform ourselves? Why try if we end up failing?
A mother called me with her daughter on the line. The young girl had started school and despite her hope for change, old habits were creeping up on her. After just a few days in the classroom, her knapsack was once again a mess. There were crumbs and crumpled papers at the bottom. Squished raisins, crushed potato chips, and broken pencils took up space.
“My teacher is angry at me. She asked me why I can’t take care of my things. I really want this year to be better,” she said.
I could tell that she had been in tears.
Together, we came up with a plan. We decided that each night her mother would help her get organized until she would be able to help herself independently. They would go over the night’s work, be sure that there were sharpened pencils and working pens, and clean out any garbage and unnecessary papers.
“I feel as if I can do this,” she said hopefully. “Maybe this will be my best year!”
We made up that she would call me at the end of the week. One whole week of trying hard to get a handle on her disorganization would be the start of a new way of discovering confidence and self-assuredness.
At the end of the week, the child called me with her mother on the line.
“So, tell me, how did it go for you?” I asked.
“Terrible!” she responded.
“Terrible? Did you just say terrible?”
“Yes!”
“But what could be terrible?” I questioned. “Did your mother check your knapsack every night with you like we had planned?”
“Yes.”
“Did you clean out your knapsack together and check your supplies? Did you make sure that you had your homework prepared?”
“Yes,” she answered softly. “But my teacher was still angry at me and when she looks at me I can tell she doesn’t like me.”
“Why would you say that? What happened?”
Her response floored me.
“Because…my teacher thinks I’m still the girl from last week. She didn’t see anything I tried to do. She doesn’t think I can ever change” she said sadly.
One of the greatest impediments to change is believing that one cannot change. We think that we are stuck in a behavior, or that others are caught in a bad habit and they will never budge. Our vision is compromised. We limit ourselves. We limit the people around us.
If we would remove the judgmental voice from our heads, we would free ourselves to climb. If we would recognize small acts of change in others, we would encourage them to grow. Instead we expect failure. We allow negative talk to take over our minds. We lose the ability to shine, and to see how others are attempting to transform themselves, even in smallest of ways.
It doesn’t matter if it is a spouse, a child, or oneself – as long as we do not try to grab onto the first bit of trying to make a difference, the moment is lost. We are stuck in yesterday.
Even if we may stumble and fall, it is okay. As long as we pick ourselves up and start again. We are not expected to be perfect. After all, we are all human. But Hashem does want us to try to make each day better. To know that ‘sheva yipol tzaddik – a tzaddik falls seven times.’ But after the fall, do you have the power to shake off the dust and rise again?
Open your heart. Sometimes we are hardest on ourselves. Allow for mistakes. Know that we are not perfect. But at least try. Try to live better, grow higher. Otherwise we remain ‘the girl from last week.’
