Finding the Good: Parshat Vayechi

Today is my oldest son's birthday. This week's parsha (also spelled parasha) — Vayechi (Genesis 47:28 - 50:26) — was his Torah portion for his bar mitzvah, and he and I spent months examining and re-examining it, talking about it, occasionally arguing about it. He chose to speak about whether or not Yaakov was blessing his sons or rebuking them, and what exactly constituted a rebuke. He also chose to avoid speaking about how the legacy continues of the younger son receiving the older son's blessing (much to my younger son's consternation). You can read the full text of his d'var Torah here.

Last year, the part that stood out for me was the passing on of one's legacy — knowledge, wisdom, beliefs, hopes, and dreams — from one generation to the next. Of course that made sense: my eldest was claiming his place in our community, accepting the legacy I and others were handing down to him.

And this year? This year a different part spoke to me. That's as it should be. That's why we read it again and again, year after year. The text doesn't change, but we do. Where we are in our lives a year later allows us to see messages that we weren't ready to hear a year earlier.

This year's gem is a short phrase that Joseph utters when his brothers beg his forgiveness after their father, Yaakov, has been buried. The brothers are worried that Joseph might still hold a grudge against them, and they send Joseph a message saying that their father (allegedly) instructed Joseph to forgive his brothers. And Joseph responds by claiming that he is no substitute for G-d, and further, in part:

וְאַתֶּם חֲשַׁבְתֶּם עָלַי רָעָה השם חֲשָׁבָהּ לְטֹבָה

And you intended evil upon me but G-d intended it for good...

For many of us, our lives are filled with a succession of adversaries. Some are small and easily overcome. Some are lifelong struggles that, G-d willing, when we look back in our final days, we'll see that we finally triumphed against. Overcoming the messages from my childhood (particularly the notion that no matter what I did, or who I became, I'd never be good enough) was a big one. Dealing with my depression, which I did actually liken to the yetser hara — the evil inclination as an adversary — here, was another. Coming to terms with having chronic physical illnesses is yet a third.

It's so easy to cry out, "Why me? It's not fair! Haven't I had enough?" It's even easy to look at others who have battled (or are still battling) cancer, loss of limbs, loss of their entire family in a tragedy, or other horrendous experiences and write off our own as not worthy in comparison. But pain is pain. Loss is loss. We're not in a competition. And I'm wondering if there's more to be learned from the adversaries I now face.

Somehow, I drew the genetic straw that gave me physical limitations that are sometimes severe, and a few even life-threatening. I can imagine speaking to them, to the genetic code, to the physical health legacy passed down through my biological ancestors, and saying to them, v'atem chashavtem alai ra'a, Hashem chashabah l'tovah. You intended me harm, but G-d has intended it for good.

And some day I will look back and see, clear as day, what the good was, and why this obstacle is so necessary to my growth.

Shabbat shalom!

Counting What Counts

Image: Flickr/Christine Urias

Last night, while at a small and lovely New Year's Eve party with friends, we counted down to 2015 three times. Once, at about 10:30pm, to King Julien's (Madagascar movies) New Year's Countdown on Netflix. Once, at 11:00pm, to one of the local news stations that airs the New York countdown in real time. And once at midnight, local time. At the first two, I felt a bit like I was playacting. At the third, I had to blink back a few tears.

"You can never have too many countdowns," said Sharon, one of the hosts of the party.

She's right.

What made the first two countdowns seem insignificant had nothing to do with the discrepancy with local time. They seemed insignificant because I didn't allow them to have meaning. Only the third met my criteria for being "real." Which means I'm missing out on a lot of potentially meaningful moments. It's time to change my criteria.

We celebrate a lot of transitions in Judaism. Marking time with lit candles, with specific prayers and blessings, we don't just wait for meaning to hit us; we carve meaning into the fabric of our reality. And sometimes it feels like playacting, and sometimes it's a deep, heart-wrenching shift from what was to what can be.

We're not wired this way. Left to our own devices, the days blur into one another, weeks into months into years, with the occasional lit countdown ball or birthday greetings to remind us that another year as passed, another year we've walked the earth, another year gone that we could have made holy.

As it says in Tehillim (Psalms): "Let us then know how to number our days, that we may obtain a heart endowed with wisdom. [...] Oh satisfy us in the morning with your kindness, that we may be glad and rejoice throughout all our days. Cause us to rejoice as many days as those wherein you have afflicted us, the years wherein we have seen unhappiness." (Ps. 90:12, 14-15).

It's a mindful act, to attend to each day. It requires thought, focus, intention. Each evening deserves its own countdown, that "there was evening, and there was morning" — a new day, a new chance to start over, a new opportunity to be the person we are each intended to be.

We don't just wait for meaning to hit us; we carve meaning into the fabric of our reality.

My days used to be ruled by to-do lists, responsibilities and obligations to others, a never-ending litany of tasks like laundry and dishes, tasks that seemed to benefit no one in the long term, yet still needed to be done. Work was predominant in my life, and the fact that others were waiting, counting on me, was the only taskmaster I could hear, driving me on to the detriment of all else.

This year — this day — is an opportunity to change that, to attend not only to my work, but to the rest of my self: my physical, emotional, intellectual, social, and spiritual needs. It's a new year. It's a new day. It's a new now.

Let the countdown begin again.