Receiving Blessings from Curses

In rabbinical school we are told to preach from our scars, not from our wounds. To expose the tender and vulnerable parts of ourselves, but not risk reopening the hurt before it has healed. It is scary to show our scars, those memories of pain. Today I bear some of my scars for the first time, with the knowledge that they are no longer wounds for me.

The first time I thought about dying I was 12 years old. I was too young to understand depression, and yet I was experiencing it. I did not know how to talk about it, so I didn’t.

I started writing poetry as a way to cope with this sudden sadness. Everything I did not know how to say, I wrote. Even now, sometimes I don’t know what I’m feeling until I write.

Surviving depression is like surviving any disease: it is part determination, part modern science, but mostly luck. I know how lucky I am. I know not everyone is so lucky.

With years of therapy and medication, I recovered, and have been in remission for a decade. I still put in the work to maintain my health, but the wounds are far from fresh.

I sometimes wonder who I would be if I had never had depression. Would I still be a poet, if sadness never inspired me to write? Would I have such a zeal for life, if I never knew the possibility of losing it?

After a long illness, Rabbi Milton Steinberg wrote, “[Stepping outside for the first time, the] sunlight greeted me. ... It touched me with friendship, with warmth, with blessing ... how often I had been indifferent to the sunlight. Preoccupied with petty and sometimes mean concerns, I had disregarded it. And I [thought], How precious is the sunlight, but alas, how careless of it we are.”

I feel this way all the time. The warmth of the sun, the pitter-patter of the rain, the chirping of the birds, the softness of a cat, the harmony of voices singing, the sweetness of ice cream, the soft stare of a deer who permits me in her presence. When a friend of mine said, “No one would wish for depression,” I understood what she meant. Depression stole years of my life and almost killed me. Yet part of me argued: would I otherwise see such beauty in the mundane?

There is a gift that those of us who have brushed up against death carry. I know some of you treasure this gift as well. The gift of gratitude. It is not ours alone, and not all of us accept it. But it is a gift I hold dear that I want to share with you.

The years I was sick I struggled to truly live. I was too focused on putting one foot in front of the other. My life was without excitement, desire, or hope. I think everyone here has at some point felt those feelings.

Even if we aren’t clinically depressed, we may not be truly living. We might not be able to appreciate the light.

A brush with death may awaken us to the beauty and finitude of life, but sometimes by then it’s too late.

Yom Kippur is meant to wake us from this slumber. The ram’s horn warns: do not stumble through life wasting your days, alive but not truly living.

For a long time, I didn’t think I’d make it to this age. Each year feels like stolen time, and I feel so lucky. I don’t want to waste the time I’ve been given. As I asked last night, what are we going to do with our one wild and precious life?

Most of the time the luck feels like a blessing. But sometimes I’m struck with survivor’s guilt and feel unworthy of this blessing. I have friends who were not so lucky, who died by depression, or another illness. How can I pay back the privilege of this life I’ve been gifted?

As I think about those dying in Gaza, I’m reminded how random it all is. Who will live and who will die? It is not fate. It’s pure dumb luck.

We must not let our dumb luck consume us with guilt and stop living as a result. Let us see our lives as the blessings they are and truly live.

This summer I was arrested while demonstrating in support of food aid for Gaza. As I sat in a jail cell with other rabbis and cantors, I thought of the blessings in my life. How lucky was I to only lose a day of freedom when others have never been free. How lucky was I to only have a day without shelter when others have no home at all. Most of all, how lucky was I to be alive, to have the ability to do anything at all.

Last night we recited the shehecheyanu prayer. Blessed are You, Source of Life, who has given us life, who has sustained us, who has enabled us to reach this moment. What will we do with this moment?

Even with this gift of gratitude, it doesn’t always come easily for me. Sometimes I forget, I get stuck in the redundancy of life.

A few weeks ago Ze’evi and I took a day trip to Rehoboth. The sun was shining and the ocean waters warm. We waded into the sea, tentatively at first, and then released our toes from the sand and let the salty waters carry us. As we lay there, I found my mind wandering to work, to traffic, to petty worries. It wasn’t until I noticed my brows furrowed that I asked myself, what are you doing?! You are wasting this moment.

I took a deep breath. I noticed the way the sun’s rays still kissed my skin even through the ocean’s cover. I noticed the crickle crackle of energy of sea life whispering in my ears. I noticed how easily the ocean held me, lifting me up and cradling me like I was something precious.

In Hebrew, gratitude is not a single word, but a phrase: hakarat hatov, which literally means recognizing the good. We sometimes experience gratitude as a sudden wave sweeping over us, like Rabbi Steinberg emerging from the hospital. More often we experience gratitude as a form of noticing. When we walk through life with our heads down, it is impossible to notice the beauty surrounding us.

Our prayer Mah Tovu is one example of the power of noticing. When the prophet Balaam came to curse the Israelites, he looked around and saw beauty. He opened his mouth to curse them, and blessings emerged instead. When we notice the good, our curses can turn into blessings.

I don’t mean to trivialize difficulties, or romanticize suffering. Some curses don’t feel like blessings, especially when we’re in the midst of it. Sometimes it’s impossible to see the silver lining when the storm is raging. This too is part of life.

As the writer and activist Parker Palmer says, “If you tell a depressed person, ‘Why are you depressed? It’s a beautiful day outside, go feel the sunshine and smell the flowers,’ that will leave the depressed person feeling even more depressed.” In our Book of Psalms we have the line, min hameitzar karati Yah, anani vamerchav Yah – from a narrow place I called out to God, and God answered me from an expansive place. When we are in the midst of suffering, we are not in the space to recognize beauty. We need to move from the narrow place to the expansive place before we can appreciate the light.

Someone recently diagnosed with Parkinson’s expressed that after an initial depression, his disease gave him a new outlook on life. Every conversation, every interaction, every action felt precious. He knew his time was limited, and that made every moment momentous. The curse remained, but new blessings emerged.

The good is there, waiting for us to receive it. While suffering itself is never a gift, it sometimes heightens the beauty of goodness, as it has in my life. The gift of gratitude is given to us all, regardless of the lives we’ve lived. Please, don’t wait until it’s too late before you start living. When we notice ourselves moving through life without awareness, simply putting one foot in front of the other, let us remember this gift of gratitude. Let us look up to recognize the beauty in the mundane, the goodness that surrounds us. We are so, so lucky to be blessed with our one wild and precious life. What will we do with those blessings?