These last few weeks marked an incredibly important time in Jewish practice, the highlights of which are Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year, and Yom Kippur, known as the Day of Atonement. This time, particularly the latter holiday, is often viewed as a solemn one and traditionally involves a daylong fast, refrain from daily activities like bathing and applying lotion, and a focus on repenting for one’s sins, among other topics. Over the years, however, I have come to love these holidays and feel immense gratitude for the opportunity they provide.
This time of year centers around an idea known as teshuvah, which is usually defined as “repentance,” but more literally translates to “returning.” Many have also described teshuvah as a process of cultivating self-awareness about the impact of your actions on others and the world and then taking steps to repair, heal, and commit to transformation for the future.
A notion of “returning,” begs the question… returning to what? This question reminds me of something I learned from Kay Pranis, a renowned leader and trainer of peacemaking circles and an immensely influential teacher for me. In a workshop I attended with her a few years ago, someone asked about the term restorative justice and what we are “restoring” to, sharing discomfort with the idea of simply restoring to a time right before a conflict or harm has occurred, given how broken and unjust our world is. Kay replied that her understanding, drawn from Indigenous teachings, is that we are, instead, restoring to our core self or true self, which is good and whole.
For me, being challenged to do teshuvah means constantly striving to return to that wholeness within. It certainly does not suggest perfection in doing so. Indeed, these holidays come up every year in the Jewish calendar and no one is exempt from observing because they have suddenly achieved or completed teshuvah. It is a lifelong process.
It also reminds me how critical it is to separate impact from intent. These holidays compel us to respond to our negative impact, acknowledging that what we do affects others and we all make mistakes. We are expected to shift our behavior over time, to cease actions that are harmful. But we are not expected to stop making mistakes altogether. I know in the past year I made many, some of which I talked about in my last newsletter. I know I will have others to account for this year but I sincerely hope these won’t be the same ones as before. At the very least, I can commit to taking steps to repair as soon as I identify those missteps.
At the same time, we are not punished or written off for making these mistakes; there is an implied recognition that they do not necessarily equate to having bad intentions. We are not bad people just because we do hurtful things. In fact, admitting our wrongs and working to correct them is celebrated. It requires the often uncomfortable work of self-reflection and accountability but that is viewed as sacred work.
Whether or not you observe these holidays, I hope the principles behind them offer insight into how we may get better at practicing relationality, healing, and transformation in our lives. These holidays may only come once a year, but to me, they are a model for work we should be doing all the time. And at the root, I believe they are an affirmation of the capacity to change ourselves and, in so doing, to fuel positive change in our communities, our workplaces, our country, our world.