Rabbi Jill’s Latest Blog Posts
Waking Up: Am I Present? Am I “enough?”
Welcome to the third day of Journey of the Soul. We* continue with this week’s kavannah (intention) Waking Up Journey of the Soul: Making the Omer Count On day one, we wrote of God’s call of Ayeka (Where are you?) to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3:9) In response to this question …
That Kind of Day
There’s one line that always has me gasp in recognition. In the excerpt from “Snake Talk” from the Traveling Jewish Theater the author details the many difficulties of one day: “The ground opens up, the wind blows, a branch hits you in the head, you trip on stones, you twist your ankle, your heart breaks, …
“We Are All Just Walking Each Other Home”
A favorite poem, by Lawrence Tirnauer* for anyone who (sometimes or all the time) is challenged to get a full night’s sleep – accompanied by an amazing quote by Ram Dass. Whether we are meeting in our mind’s eye in the middle of the night, or in real life, we need each other on this journey “home.” …
“How is Your Heart?”
I recently read a lovely teaching about the “disease of being busy” by Professor Omid Safi from Duke University. He wrote that when asked “how are you?” so many of us reply with choruses of “I’m so busy…I’m crazy busy…so much going on…” He shared that there is a Persian and Islamic custom that instead …
Siri and I: We’ve Been Friends…(evidently…)
True story: I was talking to my husband Ely the other day about the candidates for the November election. We were sitting at the dining room table, my Iphone next to me. All of a sudden Siri (the Iphone “assistant”) just started answering me! She said “I don’t understand” and then she repeated the …
A Hidden Wholeness
Parker Palmer, the great educator and philosopher writes about Thomas Merton’s statement: “..there is in all things…a hidden wholeness…”* And he goes on to quote Mary Oliver, the poet: “This is the first, wildest, and wisest thing I know…that the soul exists, and that it is built entirely out of attentiveness.” In our tradition, the Kabbalists …
Go Forth With An Open Heart – Lech Lecha*
Go – Go with a free heart, with open palms, with no expectations; Trust – That what is shown to you is exactly what you need to learn, even though at first glance, it may not seem so… Be – In the mystery of what is unfolding before your eyes; Know – That real truth …
“We Can’t Allow Ourselves to Fall Into the Pit”
July 21, 2014 Today, I was fortunate to be on a conference call with an individual who spoke to my heart and my head and helped me remember and re-commit to what I have always believed: violence can never be the solution to resolving conflict or creating real lasting change. I have been asked by …
