Counting the Omer: Day One of the Healing Journey

Uncategorized 3 Minutes

Tonight is the first night of the counting of the Omer, a spiritual practice designed to help us in our healing journey from the liberation of Passover to the revelation of Shavuot. For the next 49 days we will reflect upon the ways that G!d’s Light shines through us and into this world. The extent to which our world is not yet perfect reflects the ways in which we ourselves are not yet healed. This practice of tikkun (healing/unification) is intended to help is unlearn the intergenerational trauma that we acquired in Mitzrayim (the narrow place of our ancestors’ slavery). 

To understand the deeper complexity of this Kabbalistic (Jewish mystical) practice of healing, called “tikkun hamiddot”, click here. Briefly: the world can only be healed if we do our part. G!d’s Sacred Sparks of Potential are implanted inside of everything and everyone, as Energy Centers that our rabbis called “sefirot“. Because everything that is true in one language is also true in another, this Kabbalistic principle is called in the scientific realm the energy of the atom. G!d’s Powerful Energy is everywhere and in everyone: all that remains is for us to awaken and remove the veil that keeps us from recognizing the Divinity that is implanted inside of everything and everyone.

To learn more and get a great app that can help you count, please click here. I will be drawing upon this resource but adapting it to align with my Restorative Judaism approach, and like last year, I may post some of these on this blog but not every night. To follow the daily count (and a much more regular set of posts) please consider following Reform Judaism of Atlantic Canada: Decolonizing Judaism in Mi’kma’ki and Beyond on Facebook as I post about all 49 nights.

Blessing for the First Night of the Omer

Tonight is the first night, as we seek to integrate the ways in which the Love that is inside us radiates out into the world. Let’s take today to reflect upon the spiritual unification of chesed of chesed: the Love that is within all Love. In other words, let us get better at being loving.

On this first night of the Omer, I seek to unify the Sefirah of Chesed with Chesed, which is to say the Essence of Loving-Kindness or Compassion with the Loving-Kindness and Compassion that is within me and within this Universe.

Blessed is the Eternal One, Source of Love, Whose Breath of Life fills the Universe and radiates through us, who makes us holy with mitzvot and has enjoined us to count the Omer.

Spiritual Exercise for the Counting of the First Day of the Omer

I recommend starting an Omer Diary or Journal if you would like to truly enter into the spirit of this healing practice. The spiritual exercise for the first day of the Omer, to accompany this blessing, so that the words that we recite are aligned with our internal spiritual work is to reflect upon the following questions:

Who taught us to love? Who has shown us compassion when we have felt unworthy? Let’s send them Love and gratitude… 

Who do we struggle to love? What in  hem reflects something in us that needs to be healed? What in them might be wounded so that they are so difficult to love? 

If we try to send Love and Light and prayers to them, what comes up inside of us that needs to be healed? Let’s send Love to those parts of us that are in pain and needing healing… 

Can we visualize Love and Light flowing through us from those who taught us to love and feel safe so that the Love and Light flows from them through our broken parts and heals us so that we can extend that sane loving kindness and compassion to those who are too wounded to feel lovable? 

May tonight’s first night of the Omer bring healing Love and Light to us all and through us to our world… May the Spirit of loving kindness enter us and radiate into this world…

This musical meditation on the priestly blessing by Elana Arian can help us become instruments of Love, peace and unity in this world.

Published by Rabbi Dr. Nachshon Siritsky

This blog was first started when I was known as Rabbi Nadia and when I worked south of the colonial border, in what is known as the United States. I served as a rabbi of several large and small synagogues across Turtle Island (North America) before moving the beautiful unceded Mi'kma'ki (colonial name: Nova Scotia, Canada) where I work as a social worker. I also support a growing group of Jewish communities that are part of The Chavurah Collective: Decolonizing Judaism in Mi'kma'ki and Beyond and use this personal blog to post services that I lead, and which are open to anyone interested in joining. As a second-generation Holocaust survivor and someone who identifies as nonbinary and transgender, I feel called to create a world free from hatred and prejudice. I understand the closet to be a metaphor for the ways that colonization/society has wounded us through intergenerational trauma that manifests in intersectional ways. I believe in the universality of spiritual teachings across traditions and their alignment with contemporary psychological theory. As I transition from serving as a pulpit rabbi to becoming a community rabbi, I've maintained this blog as a platform to share my theology and connect with others, especially as part of my personal sense of Calling to advocate for "tikkun olam" (=the healing of the world). Canada's recent commitment to begin a restorative justice process of Truth and Reconciliation has inspired me to reflect upon the ways that decolonizing one's self can lead to restorative justice and a global healing: this blog reflects my effort to distill these insights. Just as the fringes of a prayer shawl hold its holiness, I believe my greatest contribution lies in guiding others home and towards wholeness. Having exited my gender closet, I have continued to emerge and am committed to doing what I can to help others become who they were created to be. Engaging in the sacred work of beginning to decolonize myself, I seek to share these insights with others and to advocate for the equal rights and healing potential that I believe is what G!d wants for us all. Through this blog, I hope to inspire healing, insight, and empowerment, inviting others to find their voice and path. Thank you for joining me on this journey.

Published