Creating a Vessel

Esther Leah Korik

A

fter 24 hours at our school shabbaton, I felt in tune with the shadows that were settling in.  Weeks of preparation and anticipation had culminated in high inspiration that had peaked earlier that Shabbos day, and now we were just filling the time until Shalosh Seudos and Havdalah. As a responsible 11th grader at Bais Yaakov Mosdos in Cleveland, Ohio, I wasn’t going to skip the last workshop, but I didn’t expect to get much out of it either.

Mrs. Miriam Barkin, the 12th-grade mechaneches, was waiting for us as we wandered in. She exuded a calm, radiant energy that contrasted with our sleep-deprived states.

“You all know the famous quote from the Chovos Halevavos, ‘Tefillah bli kavanah k’guf bli neshamah,’” Mrs. Barkin began, easing right into her presentation about tefillah.

But of course. Almost every teacher worth her salt had drilled that concept into us in their quest to get us to concentrate better, to look inside the siddur, to think of the meaning of the words as we davened. Without kavanah, I was taught over and over again, my tefillos were futile.

It wasn’t very effective. All these lessons did was make me feel guilty that I blew it after I woke up from another daydream in the middle of Shemoneh Esreh.

Here comes another speech about our potential, and how we don’t pass muster, I thought.

“I’m sure you all know what it means literally, that davening without kavanah (concentration) is like a body without a soul,” Mrs. Barkin continued. “But let me tell you something: Tefillah is so important that even if you daven without kavanah, at least you created a guf (a body)! And b’ezras Hashem when you daven a strong tefillah with kavanah, it will pull all those ‘bodies’ you created up to the Kisei Hakavod. Girls, keep davening no matter what.”

Wow, that’s refreshing — what a positive take on that concept, I thought, sitting up in my chair. She took that same line, but totally turned it around.

Mrs. Barkin’s lesson was a flash of light as the day faded to night — though I couldn’t have known then just how powerful and relevant it would prove to be to me.

Fast forward 20 years. Two children are home sick. Laundry is piling up; so is the mess. I’m weeks behind on a work project, and the deadline is looming. Despite all efforts to the contrary, my adorable two-year-old has taken to napping by day and playing by night. My second grader is struggling in school — eye doctors, kriah specialists, tutors, exercises, Ritalin, switching schools; the suggestions come from all sides, the solution elusive.

In the world at large, there’s a war going on. Hostages are desperate for rescuing and soldiers for protection — and I’m drowning.

I need to daven.

Hashem, please help me!

“Shema Yisrael Hashem Elokeinu Hashem echad.”

I really feel the words as I daven them.

Hashem, You’re the only one.  Nothing matters besides You!  Please send us Mashiach.  We’re living in crazy world.  The Arabs are nuts. Just last week I shuddered when I passed a tractor — I’m traumatized from these Arab tractor drivers. I can’t believe they’re still working here. But my neighbors can’t proceed with their expansion plans, because there are no workers — and we’re also getting tight in our apartment. Real estate is crazy high in this neighborhood, and I love my neighbors, do I really need to move? Can I afford to… oh no, I forgot to pay that credit card bill….

“Shema koleinu Hashem Elokeinu,” I find myself mouthing the words as I snap out of my thoughts.

What?!  How did I get here so fast?  Did my mind wander again? accuses the voice of disappointment, shame, guilt, and lost opportunity. I have so much to daven for, but I can’t even concentrate for five minutes?!

What good are the words if I’m not feeling or concentrating on them as I say them? Tefillah bli kavanah k’guf bli neshamah — what am I doing?

But then, like a starburst, I hear Mrs. Barkin’s calm voice from her Shabbos workshop. All is not lost; I didn’t blow it. I created a vessel. I can continue, I will try again, and Hashem will accept my tefillos, past and present. Mrs. Barkin’s words are a lifeline.

Newly confident, I return to my siddur. I have faith in my ability to daven once again.

Esther Leah Korik is a freelance writer who works in human resources. She lives in Beit Shemesh with her family.

Stepping Up to the Plate

Helen Shere

The scene: 2011, a large classroom in New York City packed with desks, each occupied by a young woman leaning forward attentively, notebook open and pen in hand.

“Now let’s look at the root of the word emunah,” an elderly rabbi says from his seat behind a large wooden desk at the front of the room.

I am 19 years old and sitting in the front row, listening to Rabbi Meir Fulda a”h teaching his Jewish Studies class at Stern College, his soft voice full of gravitas.

“The root of the word emunah is aleph-mem-nun sofit — otherwise known as the word amen. What is unique about this root, and what can it teach us about faith?” Rabbi Fulda asks.

The word emes, truth, is made entirely of letters that can stand on their own two “feet”: aleph, mem, and taf, he explains. Rav Fulda then notes that sheker, falsehood, is made entirely of “one-legged” letters that cannot stand alone: shin, kuf, and reish. The mashal, of course, is that the truth always stands on its own merit, while a lie will eventually topple over.

“But what about emunah?” Rabbi Fulda asks again.

The room is silent.

Amen, the root of emunah, starts the same way as emes, with the aleph and mem standing on their own “feet.” But that last letter, that nun sofit, has only one leg and cannot stand unsupported.

“Ladies, this is the crux of real emunah,” Rav Fulda concludes. “Faith takes hard work. Emunah is based in emes, but for it to flourish you must do the work to hold up that nun sofit yourself. Nobody can do it for you.”

Rabbi Fulda pauses to drink from the glass of water on his desk. The room fills with quiet sound as students scribble their notes. I lean back in my chair, taking in this simple yet profound teaching.

Soon the class ends, and I thank Rabbi Fulda before packing up my bag and heading to dinner in the dining hall. The semester is over a few short weeks later, and I never see Rabbi Fulda again.

The scene: 2018, a small, windowless consultation room in a doctor’s office in Indianapolis that smells like Lysol and bad news.

I am 26 and sitting at a narrow table next to my husband, notebook open and pen in hand again — except instead of college notes, this is a log of all the treatments we’ve tried in pursuit of having a baby.

A knock at the door.

“Good to see you again,” the doctor says as he enters the room.

Soon, we’re discussing which treatments have almost worked and our options for future attempts. There aren’t many left. The doctor describes one treatment that is highly invasive and seems risky.

“Do you think this has a chance?” I ask.

The doctor studies me for a moment before replying.

“It might. We’d have to have a lot of faith, though.”

I glance down at my notebook.

All of a sudden, I’m back in Rabbi Fulda’s class, looking at the letters aleph, mem, and nun sofit. I hear his voice reminding me that I need to hold up my own faith. I nod once, and close the notebook.

We agree to the treatment. Eleven months, one miscarriage, and a pregnancy later, I find myself propping up my emunah in between feedings and diaper changes with our miracle baby.

The scene: 2024, an expansive boardroom with floor-to-ceiling windows and an A/C cranked too high. The room is filled with directors and executives wearing their best suits, milling around a central table laden with a catered non-kosher lunch.

I am 32 and meeting my boss’s boss for the first time. I nervously touch a finger to my sheitel to make sure it’s in place — my goal is to blend in as much as possible.

“Look at this spread!” someone says, and everyone starts digging in.

I hang back from the line, watching my coworkers load their plates with vibrant salads, fragrant pasta, and fine charcuterie. The kosher protein bar I carry in my briefcase seems laughably inadequate in comparison.

As the line dwindles, so does my willpower.

I don’t want to look weird by not eating, I think. And if I take out this protein bar, people will stare. Maybe I can just take some of the cheese, or some olives? The crackers are probably fine.

I step up to the line, pick up a plate, and then reach for the silverware. A butter knife glints up at me from the table, long and sleek and… looking a bit like a nun sofit.

And from over a decade ago, I hear Rabbi Fulda’s voice: Nobody can do it for you.

If I don’t support my own emunah and my own observance, nobody else will.

I put the plate down quietly and reach for a glass instead, filling it with water. I join my coworkers around the table and open my briefcase to take out my kosher lunch.

Helen Shere is a program manager who lives in Cleveland, Ohio, with her family.

To Overcome

Rabbi Yosef Sorotzkin

E

ver since I can remember, I dreamed of going to Eretz Yisrael to learn in Ponevezh Yeshiva. When I was finally old enough to pursue my dreams, I headed to Eretz Yisrael. But the road to Ponevezh was a bit more complicated; due to a combination of circumstances, I made a stop in Knesses Chizkiyahu in Rechasim first. The yeshivah was not a good fit for me, on top of the fact that I really wanted to be in Ponevezh.

I always knew, though, why that detour was necessary: because it offered me the opportunity to bask in the glow of Rav Elya Lopian, the mashgiach of Knesses Chizkiyahu. Rav Elya was much more than a mashgiach. He lived in the yeshivah, and his influence was felt round the clock. His aura of kedushah was tangible, yet he was so human, so relatable. During seder, Rav Elya would sit among the bochurim, learning with the energy of a young talmid despite the fact that he was in his nineties. You could gain from watching Rav Elya learn as much as from his shmuessen.

One day, someone came to Rechasim from Yerushalayim to talk to him about an urgent matter. He went about trying to get Rav Elya’s attention, but no matter what he did, it was all in vain; Rav Elya kept on learning, oblivious to this visitor’s antics and oblivious to all of us watching him in awe.

Ten years later, I had a lunchtime chavrusashaft with a yungerman in his home, which was halfway between my yeshivah and his. His wife would take advantage of her husband’s presence at home and leave him with the children so she could do errands. There were days when this was very distracting, and I was facing a dilemma: On one hand I enjoyed our learning, and I didn’t feel comfortable criticizing this yungerman on how he was handling these distractions, but on the other hand, I felt I couldn’t continue this way.

And then the image of Rav Elya, engrossed in his learning and oblivious to all distractions, flashed in front of me.

Let me try that, I thought.

Before long, I was able to detach myself from the disturbances and continue learning like the disturbance was outside and had nothing to do with me. Thanks to Rav Elya’s example, I was able to enjoy a chavrusashaft with this choshuve yungerman for many years.

One image of Rav Elya stands out above all others. A bochur used to go to Haifa too often, and Rav Elya admonished him about the shemiras einayim issues one inevitably encounters on such trips.

“I know how to handle the yetzer, the Mashgiach shouldn’t worry,” the bochur responded.

Rav Elya saved his response for an iconic shmuess in front of the whole yeshivah.

“I’m ninety-one, blind in one eye, with one foot in the grave,” he said. “Whenever I step out, the yetzer begins to whisper in my ear: Elya look, Elya look.” Then Rav Elya thundered, “And a twenty-year-old bochur in the prime of his life is foolish enough to tell me he knows how to handle the yetzer?!”

Rav Elya was a powerfully built man. From time to time, he’d share with us tales of his strength from his youth. For example, when he would tire late at night, he would stretch out his arms and ask bochurim to hang from each arm to get his blood flowing and give him another hour of vigorous learning.

But he was now in steep decline, looking every bit of his 91 years. Yet when he cried out in anguish about the folly of this 20-year-old, the walls shook. He suddenly shed 50 years as he bellowed his sheer astonishment mixed with anger and dismay. Rav Elya was the embodiment of an ish milchamah, on the warpath to teach us brash, overconfident youngsters to fear and respect the yetzer.

It was one of the most powerful scenes I have ever witnessed. To this day, I can close my eyes and experience it again and again — and I have done so with talmidim in my yeshivah over the years.

From time to time, a bochur will share his anguish in discovering his yetzer; even without chalilah acting on it, just harboring a yetzer can be disturbing to the innocent. When a bochur confides his struggle in me, I share with him the lesson Rav Elya emblazoned onto our consciousness.

“The yetzer is embedded in our flesh and blood — even the greatest are not spared,” I say, and I share with him the shmuess of Rav Elya. “Our job is to fear and respect the yetzer and to develop methods to battle him, for this is a battle we must wage until our dying breath.”

Rabbi Yosef Sorotzkin is the rosh yeshivah of Yeshivas Me’or Eliyohu in Telz Stone. He is the author of Meged Yosef al haTorah.

Stepping Stones

Esther Rabi

“IF you pick up one piece of litter,

pull one weed, and say one nice thing every day, you’ll leave the world a better place,” Mom always said.

I agreed with her and was pretty good about doing those things, until I became completely absorbed by raising my own family. My own house was such a mess that I stopped noticing things other people would pick up. Weeds sprouted in such overwhelming numbers that pulling one a day wasn’t going to make any difference. And the kids demanded so much attention that I didn’t take much notice of other people. I could only look in wonder at neighbors who were pillars of chesed while raising families as large as my own.

How did they do it? I knew they had abilities I didn’t — they were naturally sociable, while I was not; they were extroverted, while I was introverted; they had spare cash, while we were frugal; and their kids adored being independent and grown-up, while mine were clingy Peter Pans. I gave up trying to be like them and put all my energy into my own daled amos. I was still jealous of what the women around me were accomplishing, but it felt completely beyond my bailiwick.

And then, after 25 years of being overwhelmed, 25 years of exhaustion in which I’d enjoyed exactly one night of uninterrupted sleep, the baby went to gan. For a few hours a day, I could eat without sharing, nap when necessary, and converse without interruption.

But before I could begin to make a dent in my gargantuan sleep deficit, I was diagnosed with a stage 3 melanoma.

I’m going to die before I even have a chance to enjoy the nachas from my life’s work, I thought in despair.

Nothing less could have gotten me out of bed for the 3:30 a.m. bus to the Kosel. I needed to talk to Hashem even more than I needed to sleep.

IT

was still too early to daven Shacharis when the bus reached the Kosel, but that was fine with me. I wanted to be alone (at least, away from the kids), to pour my heart out and plead with Hashem to spare my life.

I must have looked as miserable as I felt, because a Yerushalmi woman handed me a business card that read, “Smile! Hashem’s in charge!” I smiled at her in a wobbly way. Then I began to organize my thoughts so I could talk to Hashem without distraction.

Or so I thought. Someone else had a different idea. An older woman was collecting all the seforim that were lying around. After she’d collected a hundred or so and stacked them onto four chairs, she realized she had no way to schlep them to the bookshelves. She needed someone younger and stronger to help her, and it dawned on me that I was that someone — especially since I recognized her as my mother-in-law’s friend, Chana.

Using the chairs as wheelbarrows, I dragged the stacks of books to the back of the ezras nashim and helped Chana sort and return them to the shelves. When we’d finished, she looked around and smiled.

“There! There’s no place that I can’t make better with a little effort,” she said.

She was right, I realized suddenly. And she’d put her finger on the flaw in my train of thought that let me off the hook when it came to doing chesed. I didn’t have to take in foster children, like one neighbor, or host tens of seminary girls for Shabbos meals, like my cousin. I just had to look around and see what I could do, with the little time and energy I had, to make things a bit better.

T

hese days, I picture Chana’s face, alight with satisfaction as she looked around at the now-tidy Kosel area. Improving my surroundings doesn’t delight me the same way; I’m all too aware that whatever small progress I make in the constant battle against chaos will be nullified — a new weed will sprout, and baruch Hashem, the seforim will soon be scattered all over the Kosel plaza again. But Chana’s glow of pride in our small accomplishment was enough to inspire me to notice little things that I could do — one thing a day — to make the world a better place.

I can pick up a plastic cup from the floor of the lobby. When I see someone without a smile, I can give her one of mine. When I see a little boy playing with a drone, I can write his phone number on it so when it flies out of his sight and then loses power, he might get it back. And so I do.

It’s been almost five years since my melanoma was removed, and I’m not in the hospital for tests, treatments, and checkups as often as I used to be. But when I was, I asked the hospital clowns to teach me their simplest routines and where to get the props that are easiest to use, and I’ve been using them to cheer up cranky children on buses. I can do it because it takes so little time, effort, and money, those lessons from Mom and Chana encouraging me all the while.

Five years. That’s almost 2,000 days, almost 2,000 times that I did at least one small thing to make the world a better place. Two thousand times that I’ve reminded myself that small is not just a stepping stone to bigger and better things, that small is a great destination in and of itself.

Esther Ilana bas Golda Rabi is a writer, editor, and translator who lives in Jerusalem.

Self-Disclosure

Dr. Meir Wikler

R

ecently, a middle-aged man came in for his final therapy session after an extended course of on-and-off sessions to help him deal with his post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms.

“Let’s review your experience in therapy,” I suggested, asking him to share which of his original goals we’d met and which we hadn’t, what he’d learned over the course of our time together, and where he saw himself now.

He responded in great detail, citing the highlights, key insights, and most useful tools he had gained from our work together.

“You really saved my life,” he concluded.

Whoa, I don’t hear that every day, I thought.

After he left my office, I wrestled with some unwelcome twinges of pride.  And then I comforted myself with the cherished memory of my brief encounter with the legendary baal mussar, Rav Shlomo Wolbe ztz”l.

One summer in the early 80s, my family and I spent a few weeks in Eretz Yisrael in an apartment on Rechov Sorotzkin in Yerushalayim. Someone told me that Rav Wolbe was the newly appointed mashgiach at the Lakewood East yeshivah, which was right across the street from us. I jumped at the golden opportunity to meet this adam gadol, and visited the yeshivah.

“Where can I find the Mashgiach?” I asked one of the bochurim.

He pointed to the front row of the beis medrash.

I approached Rav Wolbe and said I would like to ask him a question. He closed his Gemara, got up from his seat, and walked out of the beis medrash while gesturing to me to follow him. Once we were outside, Rav Wolbe explained apologetically that he never answers questions in the beis medrash during seder.

I introduced myself and explained a little bit about what I do. Then I said, “I don’t, chas v’shalom, have the attitude of ‘kochi v’otzem yadi,’ I know I don’t deserve full credit for anything I accomplish, and I fully believe all healing comes from the Rofeh kol basar. But every now and then, when I offer an analysis, interpretation, or recommendation that really hits home, I struggle to control niggling feelings of pride. What can I do about this?”

Rav Wolbe looked off into the distance for few moments, lost in thought. Then he turned to me and said, “I’m sorry. But I cannot help you with this. You see… I have the same problem.”

Rav Wolbe had studied under the famous Swiss educational psychologist Jean Piaget, he told me, and when he would use some of Piaget’s methods in counseling sessions with bochurim, he encountered the same struggle.

Rav Wolbe smiled at me, wished me hatzlachah, and walked back into the building. And I remained standing on the sun-drenched steps, awestruck by his humility and candor.

It’s been more than four decades since that fleeting encounter. I write and speak often, and it’s not uncommon for my family or friends, when invited to review an article draft or a speech outline, to encourage me to “smooth over” one of my stories or to leave something out in my recounting because they feel it does not make me look good. But I maintain that honest self-disclosure has its place. I have it on the highest authority — that of none other than Rav Shlomo Wolbe.

Dr. Meir Wikler is an author, psychotherapist, and family counselor in full-time private practice with offices in Brooklyn, New York, and Lakewood, New Jersey. He is also a public speaker whose lectures and shiurim are carried on TorahAnytime.com.

Comic Relief

Shelley Kay

You’ll be working with Chava.

 Five simple words. How could they inspire such fear?

I’d first met Chava in the school lobby. She was in her wheelchair, grappling with a feeding tube; I was leaning on the wall, fighting morning sickness. I still recall my first, automatic reaction: Don’t stare. She’s expecting you to. And my second, which makes my face flush, even 18 years later: Don’t look. It’s probably bad for the baby. (Remember Yaakov Avinu’s spotted sheep?)

Chava was a severely disfigured, disabled, and extremely bright teen. I was a newlywed and working as an aide at her high school, and that first day, as I walked into the little room where I would take care of adjusting oxygen, suctioning, and myriad other tasks, I was scared stiff.

Until she winked.

As a 20-year-old struggling to make sense of life in the US, far from family and friends, I felt entitled to the occasional pity party and entire tub of conciliatory ice cream. Yet here was someone who was truly tested in almost every way — she couldn’t walk, talk (no voice box), eat, or use the bathroom, and her face was covered in enormous scars and boils due to her rare condition. Her back curved in an upward arc. So did her almost ever-present grin.

I am hesitant to talk about ever-present grins because they conjure an image of a sickly sweet modern-day Pollyanna you can never really connect to. Nothing is further from the truth: Chava didn’t ignore her challenges, she simply used them as sources for her greatest gift — incorrigible black humor.

I’ll never forget when the fire alarm went off when we were alone on the sixth floor — and the elevator stopped working. We didn’t know it was a drill; for us this was the real deal. The real deal with a 95-pound teen and an electric chair that weighed only slightly less.

I was in a total state of sweaty panic, rapidly calculating our options, but Chava remained super calm. She wrote, Go down, you’ll probably find some burly men outside to run up and get me. If they don’t come, I’ll wait for the firemen. And if they come too late… think of the insurance payout!

That was Chava, always finding what to laugh about.

I’m stuck in this body anyway, she wrote when I asked her about it. I’m going to have to rely on lots of people for help. I may as well be a fun task, not a pest.

I couldn’t help but grin, in awe of this tiny, shriveled frame that held such greatness.

Fast forward 18 years. My second son came soon after his older brother; my third, a gorgeous girl, waited a decade to make her debut. She is delicious, with all the fixings — long lashes, ringlet curls — and she is sick. Extremely, life-threateningly sick.

There are numerous hospitalizations, ambulances, oxygen tanks, blood tests, and moments of hope dashed cruelly on the rocks of reality. Yet I am still able to laugh through it all. I laugh at the dumb comments people make, at the foibles and idiosyncrasies of hospital staff.

Last Chanukah, after a crew of Santa and his green-clad helpers burst in to the hospital room to cheer us up and ceremoniously hung two large stockings above the bed, I told my mother, who called to ask what she could bring, “Stocking stuffers.”

People marvel at my ability to find the humor in any situation. But the credit isn’t mine; I never would have used my humor in these circumstances if not for one inspiring individual who taught me to find laughter in the blackest moments. You see, to quote a very wise young woman: With such a sick child, I am going to have to rely on lots of people for help. I may as well be a fun task, not a pest.

Shelley Kay is a freelance writer and copywriter specializing in branding and web design. She lives in London.

Shining Bright

Shoshana Goldman

I

was 13 years old and the finality of being kicked out of school in the middle of eighth grade made me want to implode. My close friend — a “bad influence”  — was expelled at the start of the school year, and the administration assumed I was on that same trajectory and put me on probation. And then in December, a little before midwinter break, a girl told the school I had opened a social media account for her. I had nothing to do with it, but for the administration it was the straw that broke the camel’s back. No one wanted to hear my side of things; as far as they were concerned, this was a good way to get another bad influence out of their hair.

I remember sitting in the lab, waiting for my mother, sobbing uncontrollably. After what felt like an eternity, she picked me up and brought me home. Sitting, sitting, sitting, on my bed twiddling my thumbs, nowhere to go, nothing on the horizon. I couldn’t stop thinking about the unfairness of it all.

What am I supposed to do now? What will be with me? What high school — what seminary — what boy will want me?

My life was messed up, as they say. This was four years after my parents’ absolutely horrific divorce, and neither parent had interest or emotional energy for me. And now the school didn’t care either. I was in a black hole, and I couldn’t see a way out.

Suddenly, my bleak thoughts were interrupted by the ringing phone. With nothing better to do, I picked it up.

“We really miss you in school,” said the kind voice at the other end of the line — my eight grade teacher. “How are you?”

“You know, hanging in there,” I stammered.

“It must be so hard sitting at home all day,” she said sympathetically. “I really miss you. Would you like to go out for pizza tomorrow afternoon?”

The next day, we sat in the pizza store and spoke for a while. Boy did I have what to say about my expulsion: It’s not fair, why am I the korban, it’s not right, that sort of thing. As I spoke, I could feel my face turning redder and my heart racing, and soon I was crying. Tears pooled in my teachers’ eyes, but she said nothing and allowed me to continue talking and crying.

“It’s not like my life is great now. My parents are divorced, my mother’s an emotional mess, I’m raising my seven-year-old sister, and my father’s out of the picture. School was the only safe haven I had in the dysfunction that is my life. And now my future is ruined, my life is ruined. What school will take me in the middle of eighth grade?!” I sobbed. “This is so messed up.”

All the hurt and anger spilled out — and then I turned it all on myself.

“Why am I so dysfunctional? Why do I have to cry about everything, why can’t I just move on?”

I was so distraught, the only sound in the car on the way home was my sobbing.

My teacher pulled up in front of my house and offered one message before I got out.

“You’re right, this is unfair, and it’s so hard,” she said. “But you’re wrong that you’re dysfunctional for crying. Rav Eliyahu Eliezer Dessler says that tears are the sweat of your neshamah — crying means you’re working hard. We want life to be easy, but here’s a shocking revelation: it isn’t.”

She paused, and then said with conviction, “Never stop using your tears to connect — to yourself, to those around you, and ultimately to the One Who we all desire to have a connection with. Those tears are your biggest strength, and all that hard work will pay off one day, because it will build the strongest muscles.”

Eight years later, I sat in the kallah chair as my chassan was escorted toward me to the classic Od Yishama. He covered my face with the veil — and suddenly, the tears began to flow. Soon I was heaving, and shaking, and my heart was racing and wouldn’t stop.

Is this real? Am I getting married now? Will my life, once and for all, be normal?

I was so overcome, it was hard for me to get down the aisle to my chuppah. Tears streamed down my face, unchecked even as I tried to stop them.

And then I heard a voice in my head: Keep crying, tears are the sweat of your neshamah. It means you’re alive and working hard, building muscle as you enter this new stage. You’re about to build something so beautiful. You got this.

I took a deep breath and walked down the aisle to my waiting chassan. Tears flowed unchecked through the chuppah, until he broke the glass — and mazel tov! The tears slowed, and I smiled, slow and wide. I spotted my teacher in the crowd, and as I walked back up the aisle with my new husband, I leaned over to embrace her, and I whispered in her ear, “Thank you for everything.”

In giving me faith in myself even during some of the most challenging parts of my life, my teacher gifted me with the ability to work — really work — through it all. She gave me everything.

Shoshana Goldman is a teacher in the Midwest.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1042)