Barely a few weeks ago, we didn’t just remember the Exodus. We were asked to see ourselves as though we had left Egypt. Lirot et atzmo, to imagine it as part of us. This line has always called out to me. It is a reminder that: Memory isn’t passive in Judaism. It’s active, alive, arriving. Memory creates a kind of pressure in us. An ongoing request from the past on our present. Today is Yom HaShoah, and we’re asked to remember again. But not in the soft, distant sense. We light candles. We say...

By the time you read this, you might already be elbows-deep cleaning and kashering a cooking pot. Or sweeping under furniture and finding unexpected Cheerios. Or feeling the low-key internal panic about meal planning. That’s how this season goes, right? Passover has this power to take up mental, physical, and spiritual space, not just on our counters and in our cabinets, but also in our bodies and minds. It holds both the past, the present, and the future all at once. There’s memory, there’s...

Later this week, we’ll enter the Hebrew month of Adar. The Talmud teaches us to increase our joy during this month. מִשֶּׁנִּכְנַס אֲדָר מַרְבִּין בְּשִׂמְחָה When Adar begins, one increases rejoicing. This seems unfathomable at this moment. How do we find space for joy right now? Should we even do that? Can't I just feel what I want? The answer is yes to all of it. And, I think there are some powerful lessons in our Tradition to help us navigate this tension, especially in ways that honor...