Welcome to Soulful Jewish Living: Mindful Practices for Every Day with me, Josh Feigelson.
I’m grateful you’re here, and I hope you benefit from our time together.
If you’re not a football fan, you might need an explanation of that clip. It was one of the more famous plays in NFL history, a hail mary touchdown pass from Green Bay Packers quarterback Aaron Rodgers on the very last play of a game against the Detroit Lions in 2015. It’s known as the Motown Miracle.
Jews have our own long history of suffering. But Lions fans can certainly commiserate. And as a lifelong Lions fan, it still pains me to hear this call.
The game happened on a school night, and it was way past my kids’ bedtime. My wife was out, and though we were generally sticklers for bedtime on school nights, the kids and I were having way too much fun. This was going to be a big upset—the Lions were to beat their arch rivals, the Packers.
And the thing is, my kids went to bed thinking that’s exactly what happened. Because on the play just before it, the Lions actually stopped Aaron Rodgers and time ran out. We hooped and hollered, and then I snapped off the TV and told them to run upstairs and get in bed.
But after I turned off the TV, it turned out there was a penalty on Detroit. And Rule 4, Section 8, Article 2 of the Rulebook of the National Football League states that a period can’t end on a penalty by the defense. That gave Rodgers and the Packers one more chance, which turned into the play you just heard—and which meant I had to deliver the bad news to them the next morning.
“Boker tov, good morning” I said. “I’ve got some bad news: The Packers won.” Which they couldn’t believe and, frankly, devastated them. (Kids—and plenty of grownups—can have a crazy strong relationship with their sports teams.)
I’ve always been a little worried that I traumatized my kids a bit in that moment. Because waking up to bad news sucks. And while I took a rip the band-aid off approach, today I wonder what would have happened if I had helped them prepare for it a little more—maybe with a little meditation, some deep breaths, the soothing music our audio editor Rob puts on when we hit the meditation section of the podcast… It might have helped.
This is the fifth episode in our series on mindfully engaging with the news. So far we’ve talked about noticing our urge to turn away from difficult news, the concept of the second arrow—that is, the suffering we cause ourselves in how we react, the practice of being firm but flexible, like a reed, rather than rigid like a cedar; and, last week, the practice of Shabbat mind.
Today I want to start putting the pieces together and thinking about proactively cultivating a mindful approach to the news—i.e. Doing better than I did at helping my kids with the news of Aaron Rodgers’s Hail Mary. And I actually want to bring us back to the phrase from Deuteronomy that we started this series with: lo tuchal l’hitalem, don’t turn away from things you’d rather not see. One way to understand that commandment is as a check on our negative impulses.
Like, we know, or we assume, that there’s going to be news we don’t want to hear or see—and so we have to actively overcome that. It’s kind of a defensive posture towards the news and the world, as though we’re saying to ourselves, “Okay, okay—I know there’s going to be difficult stuff, but the Torah tells me not to look away, so I won’t.” It’s kind of like how we might relate to exercise, or eating our vegetables: I don’t want to do it, but I will because I know it’s good for me.
But there’s another way to understand this idea, and that’s as a positive invitation. Lo tuchal l’hitalem literally means, “You’re not able to look away.” There’s a part of us—maybe it’s that caring, compassionate, concerned part, the part that knows it’s interconnected with the rest of the world—that truly isn’t able to look away. It wants to look, it wants to know. Yet we allow another part to overtake that, and to turn aside from facing reality. But when we finally do face reality, we actually feel better—and we even wind up taking action that is caring, compassionate, concerned, and maybe even courageous.
What if you thought about the news like this? Not that it’s bombarding you with all the things that are wrong with the world, but that it’s giving you opportunities to care about the world? If we can do it mindfully, using all the tools we’ve talked about, maybe we can turn the experience of engaging with the news from something we have to cope with to a source of opportunity to help repair the world we live in..
So here’s a meditation practice to help. Cue the music.
It puts together a number of pieces we’ve talked about in this series.
Begin by finding a good posture for yourself. Awake and aware. If you’re sitting, try to sit just a little more upright.
Imagine your spine as Jacob’s ladder, a sulam mutzav artza, grounded in the earth, v’rosho magia hashamayma, and your crown reaching up towards the heavens.
Take a few good deep breaths. With each exhalation, see if you can bring a little more relaxation to your body. Allow your mind to settle.
If it’s comfortable for you, allow your awareness to center on your breath. Note the rising and falling of the belly. Feel the air coming in the nostrils and out through the mouth.
See if you can find a place of groundedness. Notice if you’re holding on tightly–in your body, in your mind–and try to bring some ease and softness there.
Feel the support of the chair or the cushion, the support of the earth beneath you. Find your roots.
Let’s try to bring back the image of the reed that we talked about a couple of weeks ago: rooted, grounded, strong, but not rigid. What does it feel like to be that reed now?
As you think about engaging with the news, can you do so with this sense of firm but gentle attachment: Not holding on desperately, but with a sense of confidence?
As thoughts or sensations may arise, can you notice when judgmentalism may be creeping in–and can you meet it with hesed, compassion?
If you notice a sensation of imbalance—in the news, in yourself—can you recover your own internal sense of balance and equanimity? Your own sense of shleimut, wholeness, and shalom?
Like so many important things, this is both profoundly simple and incredibly difficult. And that’s why we practice. We come back to it again and again. Noticing with hitlamdut, mindful self-awareness and curiosity. And then gently returning to our kavvanah, our intention, to be like that reed—grounded, connected, and supple.
May our practice support us in engaging with the news, and with the world, more mindfully. And may our engagement with the news help us and all beings to be safer, happier, and more peaceful.
Blessings for the journey. Know that I’m on it with you.
ENDING
Thank you for joining us for Soulful Jewish Living: Mindful Practices for Every Day, a production of Unpacked, a brand of OpenDor Media, and the Institute for Jewish Spirituality. This episode is sponsored by Jonathan and Kori Kalafer and the Somerset Patriots: The Bridgewater, NJ-based AA Affiliate of the New York Yankees. If you like this show, subscribe, share this episode with a friend, give us five stars on Apple Podcasts. Check out our website, unpacked.media for everything Unpacked-related, and subscribe to our other podcasts, and check out the Institute for Jewish Spirituality. Most importantly, be in touch–about what you heard today, what you’d like to hear more about, or to dedicate an episode. Write to me at josh@unpacked.media.
This episode was hosted by me, Rabbi Josh Feigelson. Audio was edited by Rob Pera and we’re produced by Rivky Stern. Thanks for joining us.