Handling the "Small" Stuff

Here in Yerushalayim there is a buzz in the air. You see it, you feel it, it’s tangible. It’s the buzz of busy, busy, busy. Purim is coming and Pesach is around the corner. Just mention these two holidays and women become agitated and nervous. They moan and they groan, “There is so much to do.”

Purim? Pesach?

I think to myself, “How am I going to get through tonight’s dinner? How am I going to get through today?”

How does one get through anything?

It’s funny because threats of terrorist attack won’t shake my desire to want to live in Israel, but entering a supermarket will.

Shrugging my shoulders in acceptance to a messy room is more challenging than cooking for fifty.

Smiling at a stranger is by far easier then smiling at my husband when I am tired and feel overwhelmed.

Keeping calm when you have an adorable but cranky child whining at you as

you try to make yourself a cup of coffee is more challenging than keeping calm in an emergency.

So yes, Purim and Pesach are coming, but maybe you, like me, are asking, “How am I going to make it through the day, today?”

In this week’s parsha, Teruma, Hashem tells Moshe, "Speak to the children of Israel, and have them take for Me an offering; from every person whose heart inspires him to generosity, you shall take My offering (Shemot 25:2).”

“Hashem,” a woman cries out. “Why is this so hard? So difficult? I’m doing this all for you and I can’t!”

And it’s so true, we can’t. Not with the big challenges and certainly not with the little ones. This is why Hashem tells us, “Take from MY offering.” Not give, but take and take from Him.

Turn to Hashem to help you even in those moments of life’s challenges which others might think are small-like getting dressed or having dinner ready, but to you in this moment, feel like insurmountable mountains. And the truth is, they are.

Finding holiness is so much easier in the world of the spiritual than in the world of the mundane. But our job here in this world is to take the mundane and make it holy. How? By turning to Him. By filling yourself up with so much good and so much beauty. Inside outside. Like the aron, the ark, which was covered with gold on the inside and covered with gold on the outside.

Nurture yourself, physically-with nutritious food and exercise. Yes, rest when you can and stop for a second or even two! Feel a soft texture or smell something pleasant. Wear something pretty.

Nurture yourself spiritually-with prayer, classes, doing whatever it is that connects you, mentally and of course socially. Look at beautiful scenery, do art, write, play or listen to music.

It’s holy work, working towards consistency; to nurture yourself and beautify yourself both from within and from without. Each person is a holy ark, housing a holy soul.

So take from Him to give to Him and feel good about it because all the work that you do is huge.

Many blessings. Shabbat Shalom and Chodesh Tov,

Elana