12-12-12 and Moving into the Consciousness of Gratitude and Giving

mayan calendar

My flight for Newark, NJ, took off almost an hour and 45 minutes late. Or maybe it was on time. The exact moment of flight was 12:12 p.m. EST on 12/12/12. The world did not end. In fact, in that moment I felt everything was beginning anew. And a huge wave of gratitude swept over [...]

Defining Kabbalah: It’s All About Receiving

Kabbalah involves conscious creation and the law of attracton.

For a long time I struggled with how to define Kabbalah. I’d talk about the different major books, like the Sefer Yetzirah (Book of Creation), and the major teachers, such as Abraham Abulafia and Isaac Luria. I never failed, however, to mention the definition of the Hebrew word itself – kabbalah. And as my study took [...]

When and How do You Experience Joy?

When recently have you experienced pure joy?  I had to ask myself this very question as I watched a recent episode of Oprah Winfrey’s new Lifeclass. Leave it to Oprah to get me thinking. In this Lifeclass she showed several episodes of the Oprah Show when people experienced “joy rising,” including one I wrote about [...]

God is the Giver, We are the Receivers (Part 2)

As I wrote in yesterday’s post, we must give as well as receive. The two are integrally connected. Indeed, when we give, we open ourselves to receiving. We also become “like God,” since God is the Giver and we are the receivers. We, therefore, move closer to God, reducing the separation we tend to feel [...]

God is the Giver, We are the Receivers (Part 1)

One of the major premises in my work, both my writing and teaching, revolves around the need to give as well as to receive. The two are integrally connected. Indeed, when we give, we open ourselves to receiving. Yet, we don’t want to give in order to receive. When we give, we make room to [...]

Focus on Hope, Faith, Giving, and Miracles

The winter holiday season offers us a wonderful time to focus on hope, faith and miracles. Chanukah revolves around the idea of miracles—a small band of Jews fought against a large army while trying to preserve their religious freedom and won. They had hope and faith and a miracle occurred. Plus, during the rededication of [...]

Why It's Important to Give Gifts

Two weeks ago I attended the San Francisco Writing for Change Conference. There I met an amazing woman: Cami Walker. She authored the book 29 Gifts and started 29Gifts.org. Cami lives with the diagnosis of Multiple Sclerosis. While she suffers from many of the symptoms and for a while could hardly walk, she now mostly [...]

Is What You Want "Good" for You?

The other day I read something interesting: According to Jewish teaching, two types of “good” exist. There is objective good and subjective good. When we desire good things and long for good things and try to manifest good things in our life–or things we perceive or judge as “good,” fall into the category of subjective [...]

Accept Where You Are and What You Have

Much of the time, we are consumed with desires. We want to have something different than what we now have. We want to be something different than what we now are. We want to go somewhere different than where we now exist. Although God created us in such a way that it is natural for [...]

How to Find Answers to Important Questions

question sign

I’ve been asking myself the same question over and over again. Sometimes I ask it in different ways. And I keep searching for an answer. I realized yesterday that I keep getting the same answer over and over again, but I don’t ever really “hear” it. Or I don’t quite “get it.” Sometimes we have [...]