Jewish women talking about Torah and the lived experience of our Judaism.
However Close You Think It Is, It’s Even Closer
TC: Hi! I'm Tonia, and you are listening to the first episode of Season 3 of Human & Holy. It's so good to be back, and I can't wait for all of the amazing topics that we have planned for this upcoming season. I'm ready for the raw, real experience of Yiddishkeit, and I can't wait to take you along with me as I speak to women and explore topics in Torah and Chassidus that lie at the heart of our Human & Holy selves.
Today's episode is a celebratory episode in honor of Yud Tes Kislev. Before we get to it, let's hear a word from our sponsors.
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TC: I wanted to start this season with a farbrengen. I mean, that’s what we traditionally do on Yud Tes Kislev. But also, because in a farbrengen, you hear a chorus of women’s voices, bringing Chassidus to life. Today we’re going to tell the story of Ki Karov. How the teachings of Chassidus are so close to us, and so accessible. What you’ll hear is that Karov- close, does not always mean easy, but it means it's possible, and it already belongs to us. The wisdom of Chassidus is not simply a part of our toolbox that sits alongside all the other wisdoms of the world. Learning Chassidus does not give us access to tools that are outside of us. It only gives us an awareness of our inner powers, our kochos, that we all already have within our souls. Join me for a Yud Tes Kislev farbrengen, where we weave together women’s voices from the past season, and allow them to carry us forward, as we begin again.
[Musical Interlude]
ALISA FELLIG
Excerpt from “Only this Moment Belongs to Me”
TC: I want to revisit that moment for a second. When you saw the foot come out. And you were speaking to Hashem and talking to Him through this experience. Can you walk us through that a little bit? Was there a conscious decision that you made? Was it sort of like the moment carried you and you had this adrenaline of trust? How did that happen?
AF: I don't think it happened at all like in the moment of adrenaline. I feel like there was so much hard work put in. I had been learning Shaar Habitachon, and Shterna Ginsberg’s book, Your Awesome Self, every single morning for seven years over and over and over again. With others ,like Hayom Yom. And not, you know, how do you eat an elephant one bite at a time. Like not taking these concepts on in a major way. But really meditating and applying little by little into my life. In little moments of seeing Hashem in the moment. Like even something so simple. I would be sitting at my garage, and it's not opening. And I'm like jamming the button. And I'm like, pause, “Hashem’s got this.” Like just little, little, little things of building up this. And I call it a muscle, because I don't know what else to call it. Of building a relationship with Hashem. It's not an aggressive experience. It's almost like a feeling in my body of being a vessel versus being proactive. It's like receiving, receiving G-d. It's a feeling in my body that I worked at over time. And there's like a hunting down, which is a proactive experience, but the actual experience of G-d feels to me like a receiving experience, the feeling in my body is like a surrender, almost, I would say. Recede, surrender. It's hard to put words to feelings, you know? That's very much what my experience was. And it was little, little, little, little bits that I had been working towards a relationship with G-d.
[Musical Interlude]
Tonia: Little moments. Years of learning and integrating in bite sized ways to bring her to this moment: where everything was crumbling around her, and Alisa allowed herself to be held by Hashem.
Devori Nussbaum describes Daas as a felt sense of Hashem’s reality in your body.
In Perek Lamed Hey of tehillim, Dovid Hamelech says: כָּ֥ל עַצְמֹתַ֨י | תֹּאמַרְנָה֘ יְהֹוָ֗ה מִ֥י כָ֫מ֥וֹךָ? All my bones will exclaim: who is like you G-d?
What does it feel like for our bones to experience Hashem’s presence? What makes it possible for us to arrive at Daas, to be in the midst of a difficult experience and feel calmed by Hashem’s presence?
[Musical Interlude]
DEVORI NUSSBAUM
Excerpt from “Until You Feel in in Your Bones”
DN: In Tanya, it says that my G-dly soul is surrounded by my animal soul, which is surrounded by my body. And that's where I identify as my animal soul, okay? But, really, truly, my G-dly soul manifests inside of my conscious thoughts in my mind, right? And then it can trickle down into my heart. It can move down. Whereas my animal soul starts, and my body has emotions and experiences, and then it moves up into my head to interpret and make sense and stories about it, right? So I'll have an experience of feeling emotion. And then as a child, as a toddler, whatever, when I'm developing, and then I'll develop a thought process to explain that feeling.
So I want my mother, she's not available. I feel abandoned. And then I'll make a reason why I'm abandoned, “Oh, my mother doesn't love me anymore.” That's just a very general example. But we do that the whole time. Because in order for us to feel safe, we have to make stories about things, then we can have control and predict them, and we can understand what happened. But most of the stories we make up are absolutely false and not based on anything in reality. They're just based on like a need to have an answer and not having so much information.
G-dly soul consciousness is I learned information. I actually learned from the sources of the Torah, the reality that I am never alone. Hashem is always with me. Hashgacha Pratis, everything is divinely meant to be. Everything that I experience here and see is an opportunity for me to grow and learn. Our souls are deeply connected with each other. And there is no stories when it comes to our souls. Our souls are confident. They're light. They're joyful. They are expanded.
So when I see another person, all I see is their joy and their light and their love. And I don't see all the stories about like their low self-esteem, and their annoying things, and what they do, what I like about them and I don't like about them. So I just can relate to them as an open pure kind of soul. So in order for me to actually feel that in my body, it needs to have an impact on my middos. It has to have an impact on like my emotional state that's embedded in my cellular memory. So I have to start by first of all learning that information. I have to start by actually understanding this logically, right? Which would be in my Chochma, in my Binah.
My Chochma, actually, which is so interesting, because Chochma is Koach Ma, the power of what. It’s the power to be open and curious and to stand in the face of whatever I'm experiencing and say, “Wow, look at that!” So it actually has some things that are very in line with similar to Da’as in a sense, it's open and curious, which just kind of stands and it watches the emotions and it's like, “Oh, wow!” But it doesn't have a story. Chochma doesn't have a story. It's just this open and curious place. It's also bittul. When I say bittul, the definition I'm using is that it doesn't have preconceived notions of how things should be. So it's not coming from the glasses of how I perceive myself in the world and how people perceive me. It's just- “I’m open”. “I don't know.” “I'm curious”, “Wow! This is interesting.” I don't have an emotional story behind it.
And then I have Binah, where I understand something. I learn a new piece of information. I understand it logically. It makes sense to me. And then my Da’as is where I really – How do I feel this in my body? If I really knew that every single second of my life that God was watching. He loved me. He was holding me. He was connecting with me. He was guiding me. Talking to me, communicating me through every single second of my life. How would I feel? If I really knew that, how would I feel? And to spend time thinking and asking that question, if this was a reality for me, if I really experienced this as reality, how would I feel? Do I want this to be my reality? Do I want to walk through life feeling these feelings? And to spend time actually noticing what would I feel. Feel it in your body. Focus on that feeling. Deepen and expand it so that you feel like it spreads throughout your whole body and really have a visceral experience of it. That is transformative. That's really transformative. That's not just like – In the words of the Alter Rebbe, like vain fancies in the mind of like, “Oh, wow! It's so inspiring. I know Hashem is everywhere with me.” But then when I missed the bus, I'm like, “Oh, no, this is awful.” That's how we live a lot of the time. We live with this big gap between what I know. I could be so inspired.
But this is also what it talks about in Tanya. We can be so inspired by things. We can be davening and learning and feel, really feel this and then the next minute it goes away. And that's okay. That's also okay. That's the service of the one who struggles. That's a service of the average person is that, and it doesn't mean that that moment when you really felt it wasn't true, because it was true, because it’s the best you can do, and it does have an impact, even if it's a tiny amount, tiny amounts over long periods of time create big amounts, and it starts to really change the way you see yourself in the world and experience yourself in the world on a very deep level.
[Musical Interlude]
Tonia: Sometimes, Hashem asks us to be open to a more G-dly reality when circumstances seem to be out of control, but what about when someone in our life seems to be out of control? How can we see or experience G-d’s reality then?
Rochel Holzkenner speaks about her experience with Chapter 31 of Tanya, where the Alter Rebbe talks about not only resisting judgment of the people who we perceive as failing: but to actually respect them and admire them for the effort they expend in their lives.
To look at them and experience Daas of Hashem’s reality. To see How precious they are, and how engaged.
[Musical Interlude]
ROCHEL HOLZKENNER
Excerpt from “How to See Each Other More Softly”
Rochel: One of the challenges that I experienced growing up was having a father who struggled, and struggles till today, very deeply with emotional and mental illness. And he is a wonderful, sincere person. A baal teshuva. And gave us so much. But of course, there was a lot of challenges that come from having a parent that struggles with mental illness. Things that I actually didn't even realize at the time growing up. You just take what you have as being the norm. But looking back, seeing how it did and how it impacted me.
And a year or two ago, I mentioned to my mashpia that I felt like I am lacking something emotionally. Like, I feel like there's a part of me that's emotionally shut down. I could stay in my head. But my heart – It's just hard to access things with my heart.
And she said to me, "You're holding on to resentment. You need to completely forgive anybody that hurt you growing up." And I said, "I do. I’m not upset about it anymore. I’ve worked it through. And she was like, "No. Working it through is different than really forgiving with a whole heart."
And she was like, "Why don't you spend time every night literally meditating on the fact that your father did the best that he could with the tools that he had?" And I did that. And when I went to bed, I closed my eyes and thought about how deep of a struggle it must have been for him. And like everybody, sometimes we know what a person's struggle is. But we don't really know. We don't really know all the ramifications of that struggle. And how much he gave me despite that emotional handicap. And it was a very difficult, but deep meditation with a lot of rewards. Just like all of these push backs, all of these mental exercises, they're so hard. They fly in the face of instinct, at least for me. But it's so rewarding on so many levels. Both in terms of our own emotional vibrance and, of course, how effective we could be in relating to other people. And when appropriate, helping them to grow.
TC: I want to ask you – First of all, thank you for sharing the example of your father. It's something I think that a lot of children experience. Any children who have had challenges in their life due to a challenge that their parent had to be able to really recognize that the parent did the best they could. I’m wondering- has it changed the way that you interact with your father? Has it changed the way that he interacts with you, this work that you've been doing?
RH: Absolutely, absolutely. The Tanya says compassion releases love that's been locked. And this is really all about compassion, about opening your heart to feeling another person's pulse, another person's heartbeat. And just like I don't want to be judged. I want another person to understand and to treasure the effort that I’ve put in my accomplishments despite the challenges. I want to be in tune with that when it comes to another person so that the love that's kind of trapped in a cage is able to be released.
We say in the davening, L’Yaakov asher pada es Avraham. So the Alter Rebbe interprets that. Maybe it's the Baal Shem Tov that originally said this. I don't know. But that the Yaakov, compassion, can release Chessed, which is represented by Avraham, when it's locked. Which is also another beautiful premise that we do have love and respect for another person. But we need to access it and be in touch with it. And compassion is the key to unlock it.
[Musical Interlude]
Tonia: What happens when we are looking at ourselves and judging ourselves for the struggles we experience that seem ridiculous in comparison to other people’s struggles or trivial or unending, despite the effort we’ve poured into it? Zisi Zirkind shares how we can see our own struggles through G-d’s lens, too.
[Musical Interlude]
ZISI ZIRKIND
Excerpt from, “It’s Not My Fault, But It Is My Responsibility”
Basically, the whole point of this is to say that I'm able to accomplish something extremely awesome, even though I was created extremely flawed. I think just in that first line, at least, this is what resonated with me, is this point of ‘Ach Ani lo asisi es atzmi’. I did not create myself. And what that does is it creates a degree of separation between me and the negative parts of myself, where I'm not responsible for who I am.
This is a line I heard from Rivka Marga Gestetner in Mayanot. She said, and it was very profound and was really powerful to me. She mentioned at a farbengen, she said, “It's not my fault, but it's my problem.” It's not my fault, I am this way, but it is my problem. I still have to deal with it, because I still have a mission that G-d gave me. So, from this viewpoint, from this vantage point, how does something look different? Right? So let's say there's something. I'm going to talk first in avodas Hashem. I think it applies even further.
TC: Yeah, everywhere.
ZZ: In our Avodas Hashem. So there's something particular I'm struggling with, or many things I'm struggling with, but let's say there is something particular I'm struggling with. We know we have free choice. Technically, I'm able to make the choice. I think, the free choice lies not so much in the action of when you actually have the choice, but in your reaction to the
last time you met with the struggle. If I think it's my fault, I struggled, right? So how do I react? I messed up. I was not successful. I don't know. Give me an example of something that's hard.
TC: Why don't you share something?
ZZ: Okay. I'll give an example. I find, a very hard thing and I can give an excuse and say, since becoming a mother, but it's not true. I've always struggled with this, even at times when I was really immersed in spirituality, I always had a hard time with davening. I struggled with just feeling connected during davening and actually doing it. It's hard for me to just say the word sometimes. Let's say, I don't daven. So, I can say, I'm a terrible Jew– Everyone I know davens. Like I have the time. I could have davened. Instead, I chose to do something else. Or, you know, I could beat myself up, even now. I think in this stage of motherhood, actually, davening is difficult, because you never know when you're going to be interrupted.
So I can say, “Oh, come on, you spent 10 minutes on your phone this morning. You could have davened in those 10 minutes.” You're just really bad at this. You just really don't care about that. That's one way I can speak to myself after I failed. Or I can say, it's not my fault that davening is really hard for me. This is the way that I was born into the 21st century, really fast-paced world, where sitting and focusing and taking the time to talk to God, and Hashem is not very obvious and apparent, and the words aren't prescribed for me. It's like, all these different factors that come in and make it really difficult for me to daven, then take into consideration.You know, and like I said before, oh, and maybe my baby's going to come and start pulling on me in middle of shmoneh esrei. There's all these really – it's really hard to daven, and it's not my fault that it's really hard to daven. And so I didn't daven today. It's not okay, but it's not like I'm a terrible person, because I didn't. That's normal. I'm not a perfect Tzadik. I'm not supposed to be able to be perfect at this. But It's still my problem. What can I do? How can I make davening something that I can maybe next time, it will be a little better for me, a little easier for me?
I can say, from that viewpoint, I can say, maybe I am just going to commit to doing Baruch Sheamar, Ashrei, Yishtabach and Shmoneh Esrei everyday, which I can do in seven minutes, if I'm being really speedy. 7 to 10 minutes. That is doable for me right now. It's doable for me, even if I wasn't so busy, but just what my headspace is – I'm just not interested in doing it. That's something I can do, even if I'm not interested. I can force myself into doing that. From the perspective of I'm a terrible Jew. I'm never going to come to this conclusion, because this is not perfect Jew davening. This is flawed Jew davening.
First, when I come to this realization, I'm a flawed Jew. Hashem made me this way. I'm able to then think of the solution in a practical way where I can actually be a little bit more mission-oriented, instead of it all being about me and identifying with it so deeply, so that it just stops me from actually getting anything done. I've noticed, just on a totally not religious sense, I think our world pushes us so much to identify with things and to make everything we're doing a huge part of our identity.
I think, sometimes that's damaging. When we identify something, we make a big deal about failing. We don't make a big deal about doing it well. When we create that degree of separation, we're able to make a big deal about doing it well and brush aside the failing. Then we stay, we actually keep on doing it, because we like feeling good. We like to be feeling like we're doing it well.
TC: Yeah, So interesting, because this thought process is coming in response to how to utilize bitterness of self in a way that propels you to growth. Immediately, when you hear that you think like, “Oh, my gosh.” It's basically about being self-critical, and seeing yourself in a low state. That line that you shone a flashlight on, that line that I have not created myself is the huge difference between a bitterness that's productive, and one that keeps you in that negative loop.
It's like,all these things may be true. I may be failing in all of these areas. Okay, that is not something that I myself have created. Like you said, that identity point, I think, is very powerful that my identity as a Jew, or a soul that wants to connect to God does not come into question, because I'm struggling to pray in the morning. What comes into question is just, what am I going to do about it? There's this struggle. There's this failure, but then, what am I going to do? There's no question of identity.
ZZ: It doesn't define me that I failed at this. Because again, it's not even in my control.
[Musical Interlude]
Tonia: We all have flaws that we did not create. And we also have circumstances.
Challenges that Hashem gave us that are more painful than we can bear.
Fraidy Yanover, who experienced tremendous loss in her own life, on how to approach the painful circumstances of our lives.
[Musical Interlude]
FRAIDY YANOVER
Excerpt from, “Instead of Why, What Now?”
TC: What advice would you give for someone really living in that space right now? Someone listening who's living in that space of pain, challenge, directed at them from God? How can they find direction through the tears? How can they find purpose through the pain?
FY: I'm moved to say call me. I know, that's not the answer you're looking for. So we'll go beyond that. But don't hesitate. Don't hesitate to reach out. There are two things I'd like to say. One is, allow yourself to experience the pain. There is no need and no call for martyrdom when a challenge presents itself, when God sends a challenge in our direction. He intends for us, created human beings, to experience the pain, the mourning, the loss with every fiber of our beings. But we are blessed with intellect and consciousness.
So maybe, maybe – And I know that a wiser person than me would, perhaps, challenge this, but maybe a suggestion. While you feel and experience the mourning, and the challenge, and God should protect all of us. Please, God. There should be no challenges that hurt. Just challenges that allow us to grow in our relationship with God without pain. If one is experiencing challenge, while you are allowing yourself to really be in that space of emotion, and pain, use the blessing of your head to begin to seek direction and the what of the challenge. Maybe this is why our heads and our hearts are separated by a neck which can turn in a different direction, because my emotions will overwhelm me, and my emotions are real and strong, and no one can deny you your emotions and the way you are experiencing your pain.
But see if you can't give thought to the what, and the direction, and the purpose. Because in the challenge lies your next move, lies your next journey in life.
[Musical Interlude]
Tonia: We had the great honor of hearing from someone in the throes of this experience. Chana Wasserman had her life upended overnight when her parents were killed in the Surfside building collapse.
[Musical Interlude]
CHANA WASSERMAN
Excerpt from “How to Look Grief in the Eye”
CW: I don't think there's ever answers when it comes to tragedies or losing people you love. It's just the greatest loss when it happens. And every day after, it will always be that. And there are no answers that will take away that loss, that will bring them back. And so, for me, it's been – I am doing exactly what – It's almost like this is my service to Hashem now. Like, in my human life, in my human experience, I am having – Like I'm surrendering myself to His plan, His unfolding. And there is no – Like, I feel abandoned by Him in so many ways.
I just feel like He forgot about me. Like He forgot about our family. Like, this doesn't make any sense. How can this be? And then I'm also knowing, knowing very, very deeply that there is no way for me to get through this without Him. Like I don't have the human capabilities to get through it. I have to turn to Him and say, “You need to help me. You need to find a way to get me through this and get my family through this.” So it's also like these two opposite feelings towards Him. It's so complicated. It used to be so simple.
TC: It's such an interesting dichotomy that you're expressing, like simultaneously feeling abandoned and also carried. This is something that is so human to at once be experiencing something that makes us feel completely abandoned. And on the other hand, to know that God is carrying us. It's so painful. And I’m just like this is what it means as your soul to be in a body to experience such tremendous concealment, to feel so alone and empty. And yet to also have this part of us that feels connected and full within the experience of abandonment and suffering. It's like how do those two things coexist? But they do.
CW: I think, also, in the belief in Hashem, and in the belief that a soul lives on, and there's another realm in that belief, there's hope. So, without the belief, there's no hope. And without hope, there's no life. A life without hope is the walking dead. And I've done that. I've been doing that for a very long time. And it's not a life. Hopelessness drains the lifeforce, because where's the purpose? And so in the abandonment and in feeling like I was forgotten in the bottom of a dark pit, finding the belief and saying, “Okay. So there's a God. And there's a God who runs the world in a way that I will never ever understand. I will never agree with this. I will never see how this needed to happen. But there is a God who is unfolding the world and our lives. And if I believe in that, and if I believe in other realms, and I believe in our Neshamas, then I believe that my parents are not here physically, but they are eternal. So that's my hope. My hope is what I am clinging on to with everything that I have. That everything we read and have learned is real and true, and it's being tested. It's really easy to accept when everybody we love is in this world with us alive and breathing and with us, then yes, I can accept everything. And then you take them away in this crushing, traumatic way. And I'm standing in middle of my life, and my life is a wreckage, and I'm suffering. And what's my choice? And so, okay, okay. So this is real. This is real. We have a Neshama. And there's more to this world. And there's meaning. And my parents are with me, and they're with my brothers, and they’re with their grandchildren, and they will be here forever. And one day my day will come like everybody else, and I'm going to go and I will – There is more. There is more to what we see. And that's my choice. That's my hope. That's the belief.
[Musical Interlude]
Tonia: Something so striking to me about what Chana shared is her presence in her experience. Hashem sent her on a journey she could have never expected, and somehow, she is holding both enormous, crushing pain, and a powerful hope.
When Rivky Kaplan learned a sicha of the Rebbe about the moon’s diminishment, she describes herself as relying on her accomplishments and to-do list for her sense of worth. What would it look like if we could all be fully present for the experiences of our lives? For the pain and the hope? For the tragedy and also, for the renewal?
[Musical Interlude]
RIVKY KAPLAN
Excerpt from “Human Beings, not Human Doings”
RK: We have become so accustomed to judging ourselves and judging others, by our accomplishment. You know, like they say, we’re no longer human beings, we’re human doings. I think what Hashem was telling us with this message, with the moon, is like simply being there and aligning yourself with what I want of you is absolutely good enough, period. And I think that we struggle with that so often where we don't gift ourselves with the ability to just be present, because we say, “What am I accomplishing? I'm not knocking anything off my list. I'm not being productive.” And Hashem says, “Are you in the sky during the daytime exactly where I want you to be? That's good enough.” And if it's good enough for God, why can it not be good enough for us?
And for whatever reason, it's like so elusive. And very much like the moon, you kind of think you've figured it out, and just then you begin to wane again. Every full moon is kind of followed by a diminishment. And every diminishment, of course, is followed by a growth. And this is my opinion why the Rebbe talks about it third, is because I just think it's the hardest one to sit with. I mean, I speak for myself, but I don't think I only speak for myself when I say that we struggle with simply being.
Now simply being doesn't mean, like, becoming a couch potato. And you know what? Sometimes it's really just a mindset. You could be super productive. But being present in that productivity is also the gift of being, versus just trying to get it done for the sake of moving on to the next thing so that you can then mark that off your list so that you can be considered within your own critical little police man that hangs out there, or others, the way they judge you or not, you can show them that you've proven yourself in that regard.
And then also extremely moving part of the story is that after all these pacifications, God realizes that what he's asking of the moon is difficult. It's not an easy place to be.
For me, the truth is the struggle is in quieting the inner critic and telling myself, if being is good enough for G-d, then it's got to be good enough for you, on a regular basis. Because I would have the tendency to push, push, push past what's healthy, because that's what's considered like being productive. And if you're productive, then clearly you're valuable. And if you're valuable, then it just goes on. The rhetoric just continues and kind of spirals out of control.
TC: I love that. The basis of being is basically accepting that you have nothing to prove. Like really deeply accepting I have nothing to prove. And therefore it's safe for me to just be. And specifically as a mother, in the way that you're saying, that means just being with my family even if I'm not doing anything productive.
RK: Exactly. And it's a real struggle. You know what the truth is? I remember having – This is like years ago, but I'll never forget this. I had guests. And they were like a bit of high-maintenance style guests. I had a number of little ones. There was a lot going on. And obviously, I'm going to prove myself as a hostess. Otherwise, what am I worth? And so I did. I outdid myself. And then as the guest was leaving, she didn't mince words. She's like, “You are so stressed and not present.” She like, said that straight up to me.
TC: Thanks for having me!
RK: Right? But you know what? It was such a valuable lesson. Because basically what she was saying was it would have been much more valuable had you lowered your expectations and actually sat with us at the table and been available to connect with. And I was like, “Wow!” I mean, obviously, the comment hurt, like I go back to that, like when I want to just do one more thing, or like buy the little hostess gift, or do this. I was like, “No. It's going to stress me out. And then I'm not going to be able to be there.” And that's really what they want. And I think – you see that for yourself. You know, you go to somebody's house and they're so busy chachkeing around you. You're like, “I didn't come from that. I came to be with you.”
I think our spouses, our children, our friends, our students. Sometimes you could give a class and you get so caught up on your PowerPoint and on your worksheets and making them so graphically attractive. But you're not actually there. And I think that's the struggle of being is recognizing like that's what they want, they want your essence. And sometimes you crowd that out with all your accomplishments. And the struggle is to get back to being okay with being. And it's really silly, because that's all they want. So really, the person who's not okay with that is the one in the mirror. Because if really all your spouse wants is you and you're busy putting together who knows what kind of dinner. And then by the time he comes home, you're too distracted or too flustered or whatever it is. Don't worry, It's been a long time since I made that mistake. You understand? Really, it comes back to we are the ones, or I am the one that has a hard time with being able to accept that.
And that's why when Hashem offers this atonement offering, I sort of feel like, “He recognizes that it's not going to be easy. He recognizes that this diminishment thing is going to take a lot of work.” And to some people maybe it comes more naturally. I think for those of us that were maybe gifted with this doing muscle, it comes a little bit harder. But I have to tell you, that since I've learned the sicha, I've pretty much never missed saying musaf on rosh chodesh. Because that's when you talk about this. And for me, it's just like a very tangible way in which I connect to Hashem holding my hand, being with me through this journey.
[Musical Interlude]
Tonia: When we speak about a woman’s beauty, do we speak about a beauty that we create through doing something? Or is it something more related to our beings — to the way our beautiful, physical selves are just expressions of who we are? Let’s hear from Basya Weunsch.
[Musical Interlude]
BASYA WEUNSCH
Excerpt from “You Are Not a Mannequin and Other Lessons in Jewish Beauty”
TC: We have both been speaking a little bit in the abstract. When we say this is what beauty is, what is this beauty that the world considers to be beautiful? And where are we trying to find your definition?
BW: Okay. So, when you find Torah saying beauty, they're usually talking about a person. And it's hard for us to really know what that means. Their face shone, or they say about Yosef that he was so handsome. Or like Dovid, King David. Even when it talks about the foremothers, it says that they were so beautiful.
BW: In Eishes Chayil, when it talks about the Jewish woman, it praises her for all these different things that she does. And one of the things that it says is that sheker hachein, that beauty or- It gets very tricky translating all of these terms, because they're so mixed up in English and what we hold these terms to be, because v’hevel hayofi. Okay, so sheker hachein is beauty is falsehood or like pleasantness is falsehood. And v’hevel hayofi and it's disgusting. Or it's, what's it called?
TC: It's nothingness.
BW: It's nothingness. Yeah, it's low. The beauty. But a woman who fears G-d should be praised. That's what it says about beauty in Eishes Chayil. But when it talks about all of the foremothers, when it talks about Sara, Rivka, Rochel and Leah, it says every single one of them, it describes their beauty, and it goes into their beauty.
The difference is between when it's talking about the beauty of the mothers and when it's talking about the beauty that is sheker, the Hachein, the the is very important, because it's not saying Sara’s chein, or Rivka’s chein, or Rochel’s chein, or Leah’s chein, It’s saying the beauty, beauty, just the beauty. That beautiful abstract thing. That's beauty. That's beauty standards. That's like a notion of beauty. It's not beauty in its essence.
When it's talking about Sara’s beauty, then that's beauty. That's beauty that's real. That's beauty that's worthy of praise. When it's talking about each of the individual mothers’ beauty, then it's real beauty. And that's the beauty that we would look for. And that's the beauty of a Jewish woman is not HAchein, like your beauty is you as you go to mikvah. Like not with any of these treatments. Not with any of these polishes, and lotions. No makeup. No glitter. No Spanx. None of that. Without all the things. That's the beauty that it's talking about is your beauty. That's you.
TC: That makes me so emotional. Hachein, the beauty, conjures up the image of like an object or a thing as opposed to like, Basya’s beauty. Like when someone says your beauty, it doesn't feel like they're talking about your looks. It feels like they're talking about your personhood. It's a whole different definition of beauty, which is that it's a beauty that like emanates from within you as opposed to a beauty that's completely separate from you. It's like nice eyebrows as an object. Nice body as an object. As opposed to you, beautiful you.
BW: Yes. And I really find that people now are becoming more cognizant of that. So instead of saying, “Oh, you're so tiny.” Or, Oh, you're what's it called looks amazing.” So like in perspective, like you're glowing. Or you look so beautiful. You look so yourself. You look radiant. That's different. That's like saying that's how they describe it when they say Yosef was beautiful. He was so beautiful. They're not saying like Yosef had perfect teeth. It's not how they're describing him. It was like some abstract strange, that's the measure of beauty. No. It was he emanated beauty.
[Musical Interlude]
Tonia: We’re coming full circle now. When Shimona Tzukernik spoke about experiencing Hashem in a visceral way, she spoke about upping our physical experience of Hashem’s beautiful Mitzvos. How can you experience a Daas within the beauty and joy of your yiddishkeit?
כָּ֥ל עַצְמֹתַ֨י | תֹּאמַרְנָה֘ יְהֹוָ֗ה מִ֥י כָ֫מ֥וֹךָ
This Yiddishkeit is so beautiful that all your bones will exclaim:
who is like you, G-d!
[Musical Interlude]
SHIMONA TZUKERNIK
Excerpt from “A Somatic Matan Torah”
ST: The wellsprings have to flow outwards means, that let me immerse myself in learning to the extent that it's going to radiate outwards, and shift my heart. And, the other side, I think is if I can bring joy. Hiddur Mitzvah’s there for a reason. You make it beautiful. Imagine there was no Hiddur mitzvah. It's like just okay, “Get it done. Next.” But we make it beautiful and that brings joy. One of my favorite verses in Tehillim is: “A beautiful sight gladdens the heart and good news strengthens the bones”. That's a somatic verse. So, when we look at beautiful things, when we dress in beautiful and refined clothes, we’re shifted. Certainly, when people hear good news, they feel strong. The limbic brain is activated.
TC: That's a beautiful suggestion of Hiddur mitzvah, as a way of creating a more beautiful physical, visceral experience of mitzvahs to really engage all your senses, and that's something that I was recently thinking about because I was learning about AI, artificial intelligence and the whole concept of living in a Metaverse and people not going to parties anymore and sending themselves. I'm thinking that mitzvahs will always keep us rooted in our senses, when everything could possibly be transmitted to us through sight.
If we ever do wind up living in a Metaverse where most things happen on our screens, which I mean, we’re already kind of living there. But the more we get immersed in that world, I think the more mitzvahs are going to ground us in our physical experience as human beings. You have to go out into a physical sukkah and be sweating. I mean, I'm from Texas, so it's hot on Sukkos.
You know, Sweating, mosquito bites, you have to feel that experience in a physical way. People are pushing each other to go out into nature to feel things, to touch things, to look people in the eye, and it's like Tefillin, leather straps. Shabbos candles, the feeling of the wooden stick, the match. You know. All these things are really physical experiences, that like you said, they strengthen your bones.
ST: I wrote an article about that exact –it wasn't about AI and the Metaverse, because this was like 20 years ago, and the world has changed so much since then. But I interviewed Mel Lichtenberg. The Rebbe was quite involved in his work. He was the director of Pret for a while and now he runs an art school, art and trade. I'm not exactly sure in his role. His story is written up in my story, but he was speaking in a very interesting way about the three sons of Noach, Shem, Cham, and Yaphes and how Cham was chumrius and visceral. And Yaphes was aesthetic beauty and Shem is the name of Hashem in the tents of Torah and how, to be Jewish, you actually have to have all of that.
As he was talking about it, he said they used to do, it was very popular performance art, where the artists would perform and engage the audience in the performance. The audience became part of it and he said, Yiddishkeit is G-d's performance art – isn't that amazing?
TC: Yeah.
ST: Like, You go into the sukkah and we're all in this artistic, creative endeavor, and you submerge in a mikvah, and there's someone else there, and then there's the evening with your husband. And you know, it's like this – all of life becomes this interactive, artistic endeavor.
TC: Actually, I really feel that. I identify with that a lot, that Yiddishkeit gives you this – gives a magic to life, it really does. There's a certain magic to the way we are continuously revisiting the same experience. I felt that this year with the Seder, but you're revisiting it in a deeper way. And it's like, imagine being invited by a master artist to this interesting meal where every single food represented something else and had all these deep rich life lessons. We would see it as that magical, immersive experience and Yiddishkeit is exactly that.
[Outro Music]