Spiritual Renew

Gab started her junior year at the University of Hartford. 

Bec started her freshman year at JWU. 

Fall is about to start. 

We started a new phase of a project at work. 

We are starting budget season / planning for 2016 at work. 

We are starting the celebration of Rosh Hashanah – start of the spiritual New Year.

We all know that on January 1^st, we will be ringing in the New Year, tossing out personal goals that we may or may not follow through on and hanging up new calendars to tick off the days of the year.  That date has a significant physical aspect and is celebrated very much in the public’s eye.  By contrast, Rosh Hashanah is primarily spent in religious services.  As part of the liturgy, we liken this season to opening up the book of life on Rosh Hashanah, atone for our sins, then on Yom Kippur, the book is sealed with our fate for the upcoming year (“…who shall live and who shall die…”).  That is some serious stuff, and that is why for the one time of the year, more Jews go to services than any other time of the year. This New Year’s holiday is not celebrated the same as the one where we change our calendars.

Napoleon Hill, in his book “Think and Grow Rich”, spends time talking about the importance of faith in the 500+ successful people he interviewed before he wrote the book.  He does not, in particular, prescribe following any one religion, but instead refers to an Infinite Intelligence and as the reader, you can interpret as you wish.  His point is that success has a component of faith, or simply put, a spiritual aspect.  Affirmations and meditation, along with prayer, are ways to tap into this higher, cosmic power.  There are many religious beliefs that teach, via meditation, you can reach into yourself to find this source.  Eckhart Toll, Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan, and many other spiritual leaders and writers, while belonging to organized religions, believed in this approach to spirituality flavored by the faiths they follow.

Rosh Hashanah, for me, is a chance to seek some spiritual renewal, to reach inside myself, to meditate and to pray.  We tend to the outside of our bodies, maintaining our appearances and working towards making our outer shell last for as long as possible.  This is the time of year to focus on what is inside.  Just like the outside, we should tend to our insides every day and live our lives with more internal reflection and a sense of spirituality.  Maybe, that is the lesson I will take away this holiday season.

For all those celebrating Rosh Hashanah – May you be inscribed in the book of life and have a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year.