MY PHONE DOESN’T KNOW ME AND I HAVE QUESTIONS, TOO By Rabbi David Kosak *If the size of the video is incorrect, please click the box icon in the lower right corner of the video after you hit play to make it full screen. My phone and I are going through a breakup; it claims it doesn’t recognize me anymore. It all started on August 29th, the day Bell’s Palsy hit my face. ... Read More
“Maybe the most important teaching is to lighten up and relax. It’s such a huge help in working with our crazy mixed up minds to remember that what we’re doing is unlocking a softness that is in us and letting it spread. We’re letting it blur the sharp corners of self-criticism and complaint."
As many of you know, I am currently contending with Bell’s Palsy, an idiopathic form of facial paralysis and associated symptoms. Although its causes remain largely unknown, multiple generations of my family have succumbed to a bout with it. Apparently, this is now my turn.
It was during a family vacation to some long-forgotten destination—could have been the Poconos. Maybe I was five. There was a kid’s pool and a much larger pool for the grown ups, where my older siblings were swimming. I must have looked bored or lonely when an eight year old girl with a toy submarine befriended me. It was yellow painted metal with geared wheels, so when you pushed it, the four-sided periscope on top rotated.
Recently, the night air has been thick with the screams, yips and growls of coyotes. The howl of a coyote is a frightful, layered thing, ranging from plaintive to threatening; it contains both complaint and assertion. Lying in the dark, my sleep already disturbed, I endeavored to unravel the complex score of this canine symphony. Doing so reminded me of Karl Haas.
There’s a powerful line of connection between loneliness and solitude, with one major difference. Solitude tends to be an intentional act by which we allow ourselves space to befriend ourselves, while loneliness is the emotional state that arises when our solitude feels uncomfortable. Yet we need both to teach us.
This past week, a dear friend of mine who is Muslim reminded me that this Shabbat coincides with the Islamic holiday of Ashura. For Sunni Muslims, Ashura commemorates the day that Musa (Moses) parted the Red Sea for the Israelites, using a staff that Allah (God) provided him, allowing the Israelites to escape their bondage to Pharaoh. Many Jews are probably unaware of when and how narratives from the Torah appear in the Koran, yet there are many such instances.
