A Month of Healing
Pesach ended a week ago, yet I’m still trying to find routine and normal sleep schedules for myself and my family. It was a beautiful holiday with unique opportunities to experience freedom as we are slowly climbing out of Covid restrictions. Freedom from something is only the first stage of freedom. Because you can’t experience true freedom until it is clear where you want that freedom to take you. That is the time we find ourselves in right now. We are smack in middle of a journey towards our higher self, the part of ourself that has the clarity of who we are and where we want to be. The part that understands that the means to bridge that gap takes a concerted focus and effort in refinement of oneself in order to see the Divine in others and in the world around us. Iyar carries a certain duplexity. On the one hand, it seems void of holidays, especially coming off of the heels of pesach. And yet, Iyar is experienced as one long holiday, turning inward each day, growing and preparing for receiving the Torah. Iyar is referred to as a month of healing, encapsulated in the phrase Ani Hashem Rofecha, I am Hashem, your Healer. After the Jews left Egypt, God sent down the mannah beginning in Iyar because latent within this month is healing. The Jews needed to heal from the wounds of slavery both physically and mentally in Mitzrayim. The mannah infused the nation with the ability to move forward, to revive, rehabilitate and rejuvenate themselves. When the Jews ate from the mannah, they ingested that healing. And this regeneration and recalibration is where our spiritual work lies right now. May this month’s journey bring each of us closer to our goals of healing and refinement, both individually and collectively. And through that work may we merit to see the complete redemption quickly in our days. Chodesh tov!