...But blessing can be so much more! How do we use blessing to bring more peace to the world? How do we bless in ways that are more expansive and imaginative than Isaac was able to muster? How do we outwit the jinni?
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Road Trip Harvest
We were overwhelmed by the sheer force of nature. Big skies. Sudden storms. A night of driving under the chupah of the Milky Way, hundreds of miles from the nearest electric light, with the lunar eclipse unfolding over our left shoulder.
Read moreSuch Stuff As Dreams Are Made Of
So although I’m drawn to the mystical, I am quick, I fear, to pooh-pooh the woo-woo, as it were. If I experience something transcendent, I soon douse the experience in a bucket of cold water. But there are times when the mystical is so pressing, that it’s really hard to explain it away. Which brings me back to the dream about my mother 19 months ago.
Read moreThe Mikveh of Elul
There is recipe for dissolving. It is, as any cook can tell you: mix with water. When we immerse ourselves in the mikveh, we dissolve back into a greater Oneness. But how much water do you need? Too little, and you end up with something lumpy, and that's not what we're looking for...
Read moreAt the Rebbe's Gay Tish
And then the participants began to roll in. Like Chasidim would pour into Bratzlav or Berditchev or Lublin, to spend the Jewish holiday at the shtibl and table of their favorite rebbe. Instead of Yisroels and Motls and Shmuels, we instead had Davids and Steves and Marks and Sams – several of each, in fact. Instead of gabardines and shtreimls we had shorts and tank tops and, by the pool, nothing at all.
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