40 Days Elul Practice: Mussar Mindfulness, Day 3 Of Tishrei

40 Days Elul Practice: Mussar Mindfulness with Rabbi Chasya, Founder & Director of The Institute for Holiness: Kehilat Mussar. 30 minutes of a teaching and guided meditation with silence. Today is day 3 of Tishrei, where we practice Yishuv Da'at, a settling of our thoughts to prepare for the 10 days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the High Holy Days of the Jewish tradition.

Transcript

Welcome to our practice.

We'll begin in one minute.

Please allow yourself to sit and settle and arrive to stillness.

Wonderful.

We are set to begin together.

I am delighted that you are here.

Welcome to the Institute for holiness.

He left me,

Sir.

I am the founder and director of a hustle or else Steinbauer and we are in the middle of the 40 days a little practice moose our mindfulness.

We began this journey together on the new moon of the Hebrew Jewish month of a little and we continued in this practice through Rosh Hashanah,

The Jewish New Year.

And now we are in the 10 days of to shoo between Russia Shanna and Yom Kippur,

The day of a tome.

We are live streaming on Facebook,

LinkedIn and YouTube.

And I am just delighted that you are here.

You are also welcome to join us via the zoom link.

So today is the third of t-shirt.

We are now in the new Hebrew Jewish month.

It was the new moon of t-shirt on Russia Shanna.

And now we are in the middle of some intensive work that we've prepared for for the first 30 days during a low.

So what is this practice of moons?

Most are mindfulness,

As you may recall,

The first week we worked on self forgiveness.

The second we worked on forgiveness of those,

Particularly someone close to us that we have an easy relationship.

The third week was someone that was an acquaintance,

Someone that we might not even know who is a neutral person,

And that we still have to forgive or seek out forgiveness.

The fourth week was looking at one difficult relationship,

Someone that we have a trying relationship with that we wanted to work on.

It's like hot on forgiveness.

So we are now in the fifth week of this practice.

And now we are posed between life and death.

We have it in our tradition that Russia Shanna is the Yom Hazikaron,

The day of remembrance.

It is when God is mindful of us,

God remembers us.

It is very much part of our tradition that this is the association.

And with that,

We have this sense that there are those written in the book of life,

Those in the book of death and the majority of us in between.

And we,

Through our acts of practice and growth and mindfulness,

Doing tikkun hamidot of really working on our Musar practice to balance our midot so that we can be of service to others and God,

That we are doing this work of what we call teshuva,

Of returning,

Of repentance.

And of course,

With sadaqah,

Of giving acts of righteousness often associated with charity,

Giving money when we can or our time and energy.

And of course,

There is always with that those acts that we do with tefilah,

Of praying.

And this right here in your personal practice right now,

Self-care is a form under what I would call a tefilah,

Of this mindfulness.

So before we jump into our practice,

We are going to go ahead and cover our kavanah,

Which is of course very important to this practice.

So I'm going to share the screen with you.

Thank you for your patience.

So you will see before you a purpleish green.

So you see here,

Before doing acts of caring for the self,

We say this is something I'm doing to strengthen my own soul in order to be of benefit to others in the future.

So this half hour that you are dedicating to your practice is an act of caring for the self.

And this is doing it so that we can strengthen our souls so that we can really be of service to others.

Before doing acts of doing acts for others,

We say this is something I'm doing to strengthen my relationship to others.

So that can be a better conduit of God's good to others when they need me.

This is also part of the practice and that we're working on forgiving others and self forgiveness,

Self honor and compassion.

It's the only way we can offer honor and compassion to others,

As you probably know now from our 40 days a little practice together.

Finally doing acts to strengthen your relationship with the divine.

This is so central to what we're doing right now.

This is something I'm doing to strengthen my relationship with Hashem the Creator,

So that I can be a better conduit of God,

God's good to others when they need me.

So we're going to hold this kavonot,

These intentions when we move into our practice today.

So before we move into the practice,

I just want to share a few words,

Which is that in this practice together,

We come to see ourselves more clearly that that is part of the mindfulness.

And that we really allow the lived in the moment experience to teach us about who we are,

Instead of the stories we tell or the narration or anything that might go on.

Okay.

So during Rosh Hashanah during this 40 day Elul practice,

We really started to pay attention to what were the thoughts,

Emotions,

Sensations in the body that really kept returning,

Doing their own form of tushuva,

The returning to get our attention.

They were calling for care.

And if you recall,

I taught you about the concept called treifdaat.

It is this concept of the torn mind.

It's what we would call in Buddhism,

A monkey mind.

But in particular,

In most our practice,

The treifdaat is a gift from God that is seen as calling your attention,

Because often you're ignoring these thoughts,

Avoiding them or pushing them away.

And so they're calling,

They're doing this to shuva,

They're returning and returning these thoughts,

These emotions,

These sensations in the body,

Often the thoughts are lodged in right,

You can feel it sometimes in your low back and your stomach and your chest,

Your throat.

These are calling for your compassion,

Your nurturing,

Your nourishing.

Okay,

It's a gift in some ways.

So during these 10 days,

We're meeting today,

On Thursday,

And we're going to meet three days next week before the Day of Atonement before Yom Kippur.

And we and these 10 days are going to sit with this torn mind with this treifdaat,

But cause it to slowly move to what we call yeshuvdaat,

A settling,

A beautiful settling.

I'm going to share some words about this yeshuvdaat from one of our teachers,

Rabbi Alan Liu,

Zikron Livrechah,

May his memory be for a blessing.

He says in his famous book,

This is real and you are completely unprepared.

The truth is you're somewhat prepared with this practice together,

Taking refuge in community in the Musa mindfulness and then God.

So he says this word yeshuvdaat is a noun from the Hebrew word yeshav,

Meaning to sit,

To dwell,

To inhabit.

And daat is awareness,

Consciousness,

Intellectual,

Emotional,

Meditative,

Intuitive,

And all the above.

It's all bound up in this concept of sitting.

The word yeshavdaat is a transitive form,

L'Shev,

Meaning to cause someone to sit or dwell.

In the plain English,

It means to settle.

So yeshuvdaat here,

The ad means to settle the mind.

It is a settlement,

A habitation.

It's where we have set down a foundation.

It's not only the physical act of sitting and quieting the body,

Which we do in sitting meditation.

It also suggests the whole principle of taking a break from the activities of the day-to-day living in order to fully inhabit our lives.

Okay.

So there's something about this concept of inhabiting our lives that we kind of run from on a daily basis.

And this is part of the practice is to return to this.

So I want to recall,

And I'm going to bring up a text,

Probably not this session,

Because I want to leave enough time for a really good sitting together.

But maybe one time next week,

I'm going to bring up the text from last week's Torah portion,

Where seven times the verb and idea of shav,

Of shuv,

Of tashuv,

Of returning is there again and again and again.

We're being called out.

We're being signaled.

Okay.

There's a voice coming from both within and from without.

And our tradition is lined up.

We're here and we're ready.

So what do we say here?

I want to just quickly touch on the story in the Torah,

Where we lose touch of the sense of that we are souls.

Okay.

We lose this touch if we're not really engaging in regular daily practice and we feel overwhelmed,

Stress or overburden.

And so often we get the question of how do we find our way back?

And that's what we're doing right now.

Making sure in these 10 days,

How do we find our way back to heaven,

Right?

And heaven,

Meaning to mindfulness,

To being in the present moment,

Right?

This is where we can locate that spaciousness,

That relationship.

We can be present and actually sense and know God.

It's only in the present moment.

So there's a story in the Torah about someone getting their nefesh back.

And they in,

In,

In,

And he uses the word advisedly someone because that someone in the Torah is actually God is a Hashem.

After the six days of creating the world,

The Torah says of God,

Yes,

Shava Vayina fash God ceased.

God stopped.

Okay.

And Vayina fash re nefesh God's self re-insolved God's self.

That's incredible.

Think about that for a moment.

God was so busy creating and working those six days that he ceased,

That God ceased and re-insolved.

We have to come up with a new word in English because there is no,

There is no equivalent.

Okay.

Vayina fash.

And that is what we're doing right now in this practice.

This is what we are doing these 40 days of practice every day when we practice this most our mindful and sit together,

We are ceasing,

We are stopping and we are practicing with re and solification.

If I want to come up with this whole new concept and word,

This re nefesh,

Okay.

We get back to heaven.

We get back to this relationship with God by stillness,

By doing nothing.

Okay.

We reconnect with that nothing that gives life meaning by stopping.

The Torah has another word for this and it is kadusha,

Kadosh,

Holy,

Holiness.

And we know in our Musa practice that this is our whole life practice.

We're always on the derek,

On the journey toward holiness,

Towards being here in the right and now.

That's the only place we can be in relationship with others fully and with God.

So with that,

We are going to practice our Musa mindfulness of thoughts and in particular paying attention to those that want to revisit us again and again in our sitting practice.

So come to an upright and comfortable position,

Please.

If you need to stand,

Please do so.

If you have chronic pain or low back issues,

Just stand or do a walking meditation,

Listening.

You're welcome to lie down,

But keep your eyes open so that you don't fall asleep.

For the rest of us,

Please root your feet firmly into the ground,

Really setting a place for you between heaven and earth,

Upright dignified position.

You are created in the image of God.

Your sitting should feel like it at ease,

At one.

Let your hands rest in your lap or on your heart,

Wherever you feel most embodied and take three deep breaths to arrive.

Shut your eyes if you feel safe or lower your gaze.

We begin by allowing our in-breath and our out-breath to come to the same amount of time without forcing,

Without struggling or controlling.

Allow yourself to gently arrive,

Recognizing slowly whatever it is going on with you in this present moment and allowing it,

Noticing if there's any sensations in the body that are calling for your attention.

Maybe there are certain motions lodged in your muscles and your chest,

Stomach,

Throat,

Even behind your eyes.

Noticing any thoughts that keep returning and have these past 30 days or more.

Notice if you're planning for the future or thinking about something in the past.

The practice is to come back to my voice,

Come back to your breath in the present moment,

Come back to your breath in the present moment,

But while still being aware as a witness to your thoughts,

Emotions,

And sensations in the body that are part of this kind of très fdà,

Très fgùf,

Très fgùf,

Très fgùf,

These torn emotions,

These torn body,

Torn mind,

Whatever is calling for your attention.

This is the time now in the 10 days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur to ask yourself,

Where does my mind go?

What are the loose ends?

What have I left undone or any unfinished business that is pulling me away from my relationship with God and others in the present moment?

It's pulling me away from even myself of presence.

Allow yourself time after our practice to even journal about what might be left undone for you.

What is visiting you during these 10 days?

From time to time,

You will hear me go silent with you to spend some time in stillness and in silence with your practice.

You need that worry.

My voice will return and I will guide you again.

It is our practice and our tradition to know that the nature of God is to forgive.

God telling in the Torah,

I will be what I will be.

You would have a meaning to be is this absolute presence.

And an absolute presence is the ability of both acceptance and forgiveness.

Dancing intimately together with ease,

Honor,

Compassion,

Understanding and wisdom.

And perhaps you even felt a glimpse of this during Rosh Hashanah,

This absolute presence,

This acceptance and forgiveness.

And it has to begin with us.

One of the most difficult practices during the season is self-forgiveness.

We are so hard on ourselves.

Part of our spiritual curriculum,

Our practice is to learn how to be kind and softer with ourselves.

Remember in our practice that this turning,

This teshuva merely changes the way we see things.

It is an internal turning.

We are able to see things as they are and this makes all the difference.

What would happen as we reflect on our practice now,

Instead of running away from any perceived weakness,

Any criticism,

Either of ourselves or others,

That we actually took ownership of them.

We allowed them to inhabit,

To visit,

The poet Rumi,

Wonderful Sufi poet,

And his wonderful poem about welcoming the guests into the house says,

Even welcome the ones that we think that we don't want or should push away.

Because he reminds us that they might be making room for some greater delight.

If we allow ourselves the attention and presence of what we are having the most trouble with in our thoughts and our emotions and sensations,

We actually send a beautiful message to our brain and soul that we are here to hold it all.

There is space and it begins to calm not only our nervous system down but calm any reaction.

Like we noticed in this practice,

That is the beauty of it and learning over time that thoughts,

Emotions,

Even sensations in the body have their moment and then they fall.

And to know that we have the space between the match and the fuse,

We do not have to act on it.

We will take the next few moments,

A few minutes in silence,

Allowing the space for whatever is to be welcomed as a visitor.

I will ring the bells when it is time for us to meet again in our virtual room together in our sacred community.

I will go on mute now to silence practice.

Thank you.

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Or by an emotion or sensation in your body.

Slowly and slowly open your eyes when you're ready.

Come back into this space together where we meet from all over the world.

Thank you.

Thank you for your practice.

Thank you for taking refuge in community.

I have a mosquito that wants to visit me.

See,

We're allowing all the visitors,

Even the ones we think we don't want.

Thank you for your honoring and taking refuge in God and our Torah and Dharma and Musa mindfulness.

We're grateful for you joining us today.

We always close with our practice of reading the prayer that Jews traditionally say before the bedtime Shema,

Our central prayer that we say two times a day.

And so we have here,

We say this paragraph right here,

You'll notice starting with here any I hereby forgive.

And what is so key,

Especially during the 10 days,

But all the practice daily in our lives is I encourage you to take the hashbonne Hanafesh,

The accounting of the soul journal.

And before you go to bed tonight,

To write down any of those thoughts,

Or emotions or sensations that are calling for your loving attention.

And to know that you're also not your thoughts,

But you can general on this and become to more mindfulness.

And you'll be able to notice in your words,

Thoughts and speech,

How you treated yourself and others and your relationship with God throughout the day.

And you'll know more clearly,

Which is all about this practice,

Knowing more clearly who you are,

You'll know more clearly your behavior,

And in particular,

Who you should forgive and even forgive yourself.

And that will come out in your nightly journal,

Just five minutes at night,

You have to limit it.

And that will lead towards behavior of beating yourself up,

Which is not the practice.

I hereby forgive anyone who is angered,

Or provoked me,

Or sinned against me,

Physically or financially,

Or by failing to give me due respect,

Or in any other manner relating to me,

Involuntarily or willingly,

Inadvertently or deliberately,

Whether in word or deed,

Let no one incur punishment because of me.

Let them forgive me,

Please,

God help them.

And more importantly,

Let God help me forgive them,

Whoever it might be.

And that we learn to let go so that we can actually really engage in one of the most important acts of self-care,

Which is a full and healthy good night of sleep,

Which is really coming to a form of stillness,

Really of that Shavat Vayin Afash,

Of ceasing,

Of stopping and re-soulfication.

So with that,

I thank you.

Today we were blessed to be sponsored by Bonnie Bereskin in honor of me,

Rabbi Hasia and the Institute for Holiness Kehilat Mossar.

She wants to thank the Institute for all the teachings and what it offers to the world.

She is one of my students.

And so we are grateful for your sponsorship,

Bonnie.

Thank you.

And thank you to all of you who have offered donations during this time,

Either daily or at the end of the practice.

We are grateful to you so much.

Thank you again for your practice and joining today.

We do meet again.

B'zvat HaShem,

God willing.

I'm just going to confirm because the days are a little much now.

We will meet on Sunday,

September 12th,

God willing,

At our regular scheduled time of 1.

30 PM Eastern Standard Time,

10.

30 AM Pacific Standard Time,

8.

30 PM Israel time.

God bless you all.

I wish you Shana Tovah,

G'mar Chateimat Tovah.

I look forward to practicing and being together on Sunday.

Take care.