A couple of nights ago, the Perseid meteor shower reached its peak. It happened to coincide with the first day of Rosh Chodesh Elul—the 30th of Av, the last day of a month that has carried us through the deep brokenness remembered on Tisha B’Av and toward the consolation, possibility, and love of Tu B’Av.
And now we are on the second day of Rosh Chodesh Elul and the first day of the month of Elul. We are, quite literally, between things.
There is a piece of Jewish wordplay about Elul that I love. Read forward, the month is Elul. Read backward, it becomes lulei—לוּלֵי—which means “if not,” or “had it not been,” from Psalm 124.
I have been thinking about what it means to read Elul backward.
In some ways, that is how I have approached this whole period of transition at Kadima. I started at the end. Once I knew I would be leaving, I could look forward to an envisioned, lovely last day and work backward to each today, mapping a trajectory toward how I hoped things might go. From that vantage point, I could see more clearly what I needed to do next at each step.
Upon reflection, I realized that I learned how to do this long before I knew it was Jewish. When I was a student at the University of Florida, I took a class called Advanced Management with Dr. Michael Schwartz, of blessed memory. I laugh at how simple and how impactful his class was, remembering that his primary textbook was Stephen Covey’s Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.
One exercise he led us in has stayed with me for decades. He asked us to imagine our lives twenty years in the future. What would a life well lived look like? Then we worked backward: fifteen years, ten, five. Until finally, he asked:
What will you do this week that puts your life on that trajectory?
I didn’t know it then, but that exercise was part of what eventually led me back into my Jewishness and to Judaism itself, and, almost exactly twenty years later, to rabbinical school.
This is what I think Elul asks us to do: read our lives backward. Not to get stuck in the past, but to let the life we hope to have lived clarify what we do now.
Rambam writes in Hilchot Teshuvah that human beings have reshut—the capacity to choose. We are not simply carried along by circumstance or destiny. We have the ability to choose the direction of our lives. Jewish tradition gives us practices throughout Elul to help us remember that.
We hear the shofar.
Not just once, but traditionally almost every day of Elul, and then on Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur.
The shofar interrupts ordinary life and asks us to wake up.
In Sephardi communities, selichot—prayers of repentance and forgiveness—begin at the beginning of Elul, sometimes in the middle of the night or very early in the morning. The tradition is not simply telling us that we have something to regret. It is asking us to get up and pay attention.
Teshuvah is not just regret. Teshuvah is the possibility of resetting a trajectory.
We may or may not be ready to wake up. After all, the world is terribly hard. Horrible, terrible things have happened that leave unhealed, stubborn wounds. Horrible, terrible things are happening right now. There are good reasons to not want to wake up yet.
That’s okay.
Elul is an invitation—an open invitation to an open house—not a mandate to perform spiritual readiness, now, now, now. Come when you truly can, and stay as long as you’re able. And if you choose not to come yet, we will miss you and be lacking because of it. We will want to know why you were unable to come, so that anything we can do to make it more welcoming, more accessible, more cozy, we will do.
But know that it may not be perfect. It may not be just right. It may be hard. It will likely involve some work.
Thank G-d.
Something that has awoken me to the importance and ephemeral nature of this season is the knowledge that something dear to me is ending. There is grief for me in that.
The end of summer. The end of a Jewish year. The end of having “young kids.” The transition of relationships. The end of a chapter of my life. The end of an era for a community I love.
I am leaning into the idea that my grief is an acknowledgement that something has truly mattered to me.
And since the public announcement that I am leaving Kadima was sent, I have felt a surprising freedom in how I lead. At the first in-person gathering I led—this past week’s Shabbat in the Park—I felt completely present. I noticed people I didn’t already know and made a point to connect. I felt prepared. I was, frankly, on my game. I have experienced myself in other work tasks, meetings, and Torah study lately as having more clarity and precision.
Part of what changed is that I know the end is near.
When I stopped imagining that I had an unlimited future in this role, I became more present to the time I actually have. There might not be another opportunity. That has made each conversation, each moment, matter more.
And in a little over five weeks, Yom Kippur will ask us to do something similar. Jewish tradition treats Yom Kippur as a rehearsal for death: fasting, white clothing, vidui, and the repeated confrontation with the question of who we are and how we have spent the time we were given.
The rabbis teach: Repent one day before your death. We don’t know which day that is.
So: today, then.
That isn’t meant to frighten us. It is meant to clarify. The knowledge that we will not be here forever can make us more fully here now.
It has for me in this season.
And perhaps that is the work of Elul. We look backward so that we can see the trajectory. We notice where we have been going. We allow ourselves to grieve what is ending. We envision where we want to go. And then, when we are ready, we choose a next purposeful step knowing it will not take us to a rigid “there.” It will be our wholehearted contribution to the creation of the tomorrow we wish to live in.
That is also part of the work of Reconstructing Kadima, together. We don’t yet know exactly what Kadima will look like five years from now, or ten, or fifty. We don’t need to know. But we can begin by envisioning the community we hope to be and working backward.
The practices we choose now will become the trajectory of the future we collectively create.
We don’t control everything that happens to us. We don’t get to choose the past. We don’t know the future.
But we do have reshut—choice.
We can choose our next step.
So, may I suggest an Elul practice this year that feels true to the Torah of my life at this moment: Start at the end. Work backward. Then come all the way back to now. What present action best sets up your future self to live in that vision?
And if you aren’t ready to do that yet, that’s okay. The shofar will sound again tomorrow.
For the open invitation of Elul has come. Onward.
Shabbat Shalom and Chodesh Elul Tov,
R’ David
PS — An inspiring offering that accompanied me as I wrote this week’s dvar Torah was the brand new Ways of Awe, a fabulous new High Holidays podcast from Kadima’s very own Maia Brown and Shelby Handler. Listen wherever you get your podcasts and save the date for a local community celebration on Saturday, September 19, 7pm at Jack Straw Cultural Center! Shkoy’ach and chazak u’baruch!
PPS — Shabbat in the Park was so fun last week! For the 30ish folks who came, it was so lovely to be with you, your delicious potluck items, and the oys you released and the joys you brought us all into. Here are a few pictures below for your enjoyment. I want to apologize to anyone who had trouble finding us (we were between the playground and the wading pool at some reserved tables). In the office, we have made an effort to ensure that exact park locations get communicated in the future – save the date for Elul Havdallah on 8/22 in Woodland Park and a bonus Shabbat in the Park on 9/4 in Volunteer Park!
And now we are on the second day of Rosh Chodesh Elul and the first day of the month of Elul. We are, quite literally, between things.
There is a piece of Jewish wordplay about Elul that I love. Read forward, the month is Elul. Read backward, it becomes lulei—לוּלֵי—which means “if not,” or “had it not been,” from Psalm 124.
I have been thinking about what it means to read Elul backward.
In some ways, that is how I have approached this whole period of transition at Kadima. I started at the end. Once I knew I would be leaving, I could look forward to an envisioned, lovely last day and work backward to each today, mapping a trajectory toward how I hoped things might go. From that vantage point, I could see more clearly what I needed to do next at each step.
Upon reflection, I realized that I learned how to do this long before I knew it was Jewish. When I was a student at the University of Florida, I took a class called Advanced Management with Dr. Michael Schwartz, of blessed memory. I laugh at how simple and how impactful his class was, remembering that his primary textbook was Stephen Covey’s Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.
One exercise he led us in has stayed with me for decades. He asked us to imagine our lives twenty years in the future. What would a life well lived look like? Then we worked backward: fifteen years, ten, five. Until finally, he asked:
What will you do this week that puts your life on that trajectory?
I didn’t know it then, but that exercise was part of what eventually led me back into my Jewishness and to Judaism itself, and, almost exactly twenty years later, to rabbinical school.
This is what I think Elul asks us to do: read our lives backward. Not to get stuck in the past, but to let the life we hope to have lived clarify what we do now.
Rambam writes in Hilchot Teshuvah that human beings have reshut—the capacity to choose. We are not simply carried along by circumstance or destiny. We have the ability to choose the direction of our lives. Jewish tradition gives us practices throughout Elul to help us remember that.
We hear the shofar.
Not just once, but traditionally almost every day of Elul, and then on Rosh HaShanah and Yom Kippur.
The shofar interrupts ordinary life and asks us to wake up.
In Sephardi communities, selichot—prayers of repentance and forgiveness—begin at the beginning of Elul, sometimes in the middle of the night or very early in the morning. The tradition is not simply telling us that we have something to regret. It is asking us to get up and pay attention.
Teshuvah is not just regret. Teshuvah is the possibility of resetting a trajectory.
We may or may not be ready to wake up. After all, the world is terribly hard. Horrible, terrible things have happened that leave unhealed, stubborn wounds. Horrible, terrible things are happening right now. There are good reasons to not want to wake up yet.
That’s okay.
Elul is an invitation—an open invitation to an open house—not a mandate to perform spiritual readiness, now, now, now. Come when you truly can, and stay as long as you’re able. And if you choose not to come yet, we will miss you and be lacking because of it. We will want to know why you were unable to come, so that anything we can do to make it more welcoming, more accessible, more cozy, we will do.
But know that it may not be perfect. It may not be just right. It may be hard. It will likely involve some work.
Thank G-d.
Something that has awoken me to the importance and ephemeral nature of this season is the knowledge that something dear to me is ending. There is grief for me in that.
The end of summer. The end of a Jewish year. The end of having “young kids.” The transition of relationships. The end of a chapter of my life. The end of an era for a community I love.
I am leaning into the idea that my grief is an acknowledgement that something has truly mattered to me.
And since the public announcement that I am leaving Kadima was sent, I have felt a surprising freedom in how I lead. At the first in-person gathering I led—this past week’s Shabbat in the Park—I felt completely present. I noticed people I didn’t already know and made a point to connect. I felt prepared. I was, frankly, on my game. I have experienced myself in other work tasks, meetings, and Torah study lately as having more clarity and precision.
Part of what changed is that I know the end is near.
When I stopped imagining that I had an unlimited future in this role, I became more present to the time I actually have. There might not be another opportunity. That has made each conversation, each moment, matter more.
And in a little over five weeks, Yom Kippur will ask us to do something similar. Jewish tradition treats Yom Kippur as a rehearsal for death: fasting, white clothing, vidui, and the repeated confrontation with the question of who we are and how we have spent the time we were given.
The rabbis teach: Repent one day before your death. We don’t know which day that is.
So: today, then.
That isn’t meant to frighten us. It is meant to clarify. The knowledge that we will not be here forever can make us more fully here now.
It has for me in this season.
And perhaps that is the work of Elul. We look backward so that we can see the trajectory. We notice where we have been going. We allow ourselves to grieve what is ending. We envision where we want to go. And then, when we are ready, we choose a next purposeful step knowing it will not take us to a rigid “there.” It will be our wholehearted contribution to the creation of the tomorrow we wish to live in.
That is also part of the work of Reconstructing Kadima, together. We don’t yet know exactly what Kadima will look like five years from now, or ten, or fifty. We don’t need to know. But we can begin by envisioning the community we hope to be and working backward.
The practices we choose now will become the trajectory of the future we collectively create.
We don’t control everything that happens to us. We don’t get to choose the past. We don’t know the future.
But we do have reshut—choice.
We can choose our next step.
So, may I suggest an Elul practice this year that feels true to the Torah of my life at this moment: Start at the end. Work backward. Then come all the way back to now. What present action best sets up your future self to live in that vision?
And if you aren’t ready to do that yet, that’s okay. The shofar will sound again tomorrow.
For the open invitation of Elul has come. Onward.
Shabbat Shalom and Chodesh Elul Tov,
R’ David
PS — An inspiring offering that accompanied me as I wrote this week’s dvar Torah was the brand new Ways of Awe, a fabulous new High Holidays podcast from Kadima’s very own Maia Brown and Shelby Handler. Listen wherever you get your podcasts and save the date for a local community celebration on Saturday, September 19, 7pm at Jack Straw Cultural Center! Shkoy’ach and chazak u’baruch!
PPS — Shabbat in the Park was so fun last week! For the 30ish folks who came, it was so lovely to be with you, your delicious potluck items, and the oys you released and the joys you brought us all into. Here are a few pictures below for your enjoyment. I want to apologize to anyone who had trouble finding us (we were between the playground and the wading pool at some reserved tables). In the office, we have made an effort to ensure that exact park locations get communicated in the future – save the date for Elul Havdallah on 8/22 in Woodland Park and a bonus Shabbat in the Park on 9/4 in Volunteer Park!
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