Rosh Hashanah Energy

Had a really great davening this year on the second day of Rosh Hashanah. (The first day I spent being attentive to ND. The second I left her with U and just davened.)

Every year I'm challenged by davening with a community. I'm easily annoyed by many judgmental thoughts about wishing I was with some other ideal people I imagine, or thinking that not enough people in the room are serious about davening or what-have-you.

But lately I've been doing a lot of very intentional inner work of trying to find more that I have in common with others, of being more accepting, of seeing that most of the things I see when I begin judging are just an outer mask of that person's inner self, of understanding that I need others and that others need me.

Last Sunday I heard a replay on the computer of a class that was given on the phone about energy healing. I wasn't sure how much I would take from it, but it turns out that I took quite a lot in retrospect. Oddly enough, just that day I was feeling tense and antsy for a number of reasons including that ND was sick and I had wanted to get out more. So knowing that I had Labor Day off I resolved that I HAD to get to the woods alone at some point. This is a huge and driving need for me at times.

Well, during that energy healing call, early on, the speaker was describing how energy worked and felt and started to say ways that you can really feel it. At one point, before she finished her sentence, I just knew she would say you can feel it in a forest. Suddenly it made sense to me just what I experience there... the power and healing acceptance that I feel amidst the trees.

So on Labor Day I did go and I felt and understood the experience differently than I had before. A few times I just stood and felt it and laughed at the chipmunks that played so noisily. After all, they don't have to be in awe of nature if they're in it all the time! So cleansing.

Rosh Hashanah as I stood to daven, I imagined that I was in a forest and that all the people were trees around me. Some were more rooted than others, more deeply involved in the davening. Because I was closing my eyes and feeling it so deeply, I didn't need to spend my time looking around the room deciding who was davening right and who wasn't. I imagined that some of the trees were very thick and rooted, and some were just saplings, and that this was a result of depth rather than age. But again, I didn't decide who. And when children, or even adults, chattered nearby, I translated the sound into that of chipmunks playing because they forget to be in awe.

When I finally came out of it all, I was just a little self-conscious, wondering if others were thinking about why I was standing during parts of davening when I didn't have to etc. (I intentionally stood near others who also stood for extra parts.) But it didn't really matter. Besides, the main comment I got from people was just that my suit looked nice.

Fine. I can't see so deeply into them. They can't see so deeply into me. And yet between us all, there is something.