Today, Yom Kippur, Jews around the world will ask in worship for forgiveness—not for theological sins such as disbelief, but for ways in which each person and the community as a whole have failed to hold to the highest ethical standards of honesty and compassion.
What would it look like to atone for the ways in which you have failed to live up to your best self?
Trees were cut to build a walkway so that people could enjoy the woods. Everything has a cost—even the food we eat comes at the expense of the lives of the plants and animals who nourish us. There is no other way to live.
How do you give back in proportion to what you have been given?
Is this a picture of stillness and peace, or a picture of headlong motion? What does a fisherman see looking at this river? A kayaker? A fish? You’ve probably heard the saying that you can’t step twice in the same river. But really, no two of us sees the same river, even at precisely the same moment.
How might you see things from another’s perspective today?
My father used to sing the old song “Look for the silver lining whenever clouds appear in the blue.” This always confused me as a child, since clouds very often do have silver-grey edges. But perhaps my childish failure to understand “silver lining” wasn’t so far off. Maybe, rather than trying to remember that “somewhere the sun is shining” we’re better off seeing the beauty in the clouds themselves.
Where have you found unexpected beauty?
Today marks the equinox, the point of balance when day and night are the same length. For deciduous trees, this balance point in the cycle of growth and dying back is a moment of great beauty, the time when their colors shine the brightest.
What balance point are you at in your life? How do the transitions allow you to shine?
