| Our world feels extremely hard to navigate at the moment. News keeps coming at a breakneck pace, and it is often difficult to tell when we are supposed to act and what we can only bear witness to. Many are struggling with holding the pain and fear of both themselves and others. My heart right now is hurting especially for all those who are living in fear in Israel and our neighbors here with family there. This includes the Shlichim from Israel who just this week arrived to work at the various JCC camps. These young people add so much to our camp communities, and I want to recognize the challenges and sacrifices they face to be here. I hope we can be a home away from home in our daily lives for these Shlichim and for all those in distress. By working together, we can ensure that no one has to feel pain alone. Right now some of us may feel almost magnetically drawn towards consuming all incoming news, sometimes to the point of feeling overwhelmed. Some of us may also be caught up in a flurry of activity, trying to help others and feeling frustrated with our limited circle of control. Some may feel a great instinct to withdraw but may not know how to take care of ourselves without burying our heads in the sand. Many of us wish to hide, but don’t know how we could do that if we wanted to. No matter where you fall, the current moment may feel like too much, too fast. As this week comes to an end, I’m reaching out to advocate for a personal pause. Through building a moment of rest into our days we do not shirk our responsibilities towards the world and others, but we instead prepare ourselves to live more fully in the world, even when it feels like it is falling apart. What does a personal pause look like? Participants in our restorative programs, such as Tai Chi, yoga, or sound bathing, often describe it as feeling like everything melts away and you recenter in your own body. You’ll know that you’ve found your personal moment of rest because you’ll feel it; your nervous system will relax. Our sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems have opposite but complementary roles that can help us deal with the push and pull of life. Your sympathetic nervous system carries signals that put your body’s systems on alert, and your parasympathetic carries signals that return those systems to their standard activity levels. When you take moments of rest, instead of going through life with a frayed nervous system, your nervous system will be appropriately active and ready to both engage and relax. The personal pause can look like many things, but what they all share is a reconnection to yourself, your body, and the current moment and space you are inhabiting. Rest relies on intentionality; instead of a reaction or a habit, the moment of pause is a practice you turn towards. It’s important to notice what rest looks like for you and to disregard what you might think of as the “right” or “wrong” way to find rest. Rest can be solitary, in community, sitting, standing, moving, in nature, at home, through activities like cooking or sewing, or in quiet meditation. For those struggling to find what works for them, I often recommend turning to a guided program or to prayer at a house of worship. Sometimes resting with others like this can help us co-regulate when we are struggling to find that peace within ourselves. Sometimes people feel guilt or defensiveness around the idea of turning to a moment of rest when things feel so intense and what is happening in the world is so profound or impactful. I’d like to remind our community that increasing our own sense of panic and pain does not decrease the pain or panic of others. I believe that instead, building an intentional and individualized pause actually allows me to be there for those I care about. Building connections and community bonds is the foundation of a resilient community, and this can best be achieved by those who have found self-insight around their own practice of rest. This Shabbat, we may not all be resting together and our moments of pause may look very different from each other. Yet, I encourage everyone to lean into the spirit of this weekly ritual. May we each find a moment to breathe our own air, to return to our own bodies, and to build our communal resiliency one pause at a time. Rose Mallinger read the prayer for peace every week in her congregation, Tree of Life. The prayer concludes: “Let love and justice flow like a mighty stream. Let peace fill the earth as the waters fill the sea. And let us say: Amen.” |