Wednesday, January 1, 2014

Running and Returning

3...2...1...Happy 2014!

The truth is, I really don't get that excited about New Year's Eve.  (Who spent it on the couch watching "Finding Nemo" with a high school buddy?  This girl.)  As my father is fond of saying, "If you've seen one ball drop, you've seen 'em all."  Nevertheless, I know this time of year does energize many people, particularly when it comes to one long-standing ritual:  making New Year's resolutions.

My feelings about New Year's resolutions have run the gamut, ranging from, "Fun!" to, "No, thanks!"  Now, I approach them with a more tempered attitude, which I could label, "Proceed with caution."  It's not that I think January 1st-inspired goal setting is inherently a bad idea, but I do think it can lead to feelings of negativity if not approached carefully.  How many of us have ever set a goal, fully intending to march toward it in a linear fashion, only to fall short and then feel like a complete failure?  I cannot even begin to count the times when I've thought to myself, "EVERY YEAR I say I am going to be better at X or accomplish Y, and yet, here I am saying that AGAIN.  Why haven't I gotten this right yet?" (In other words:  "There must be something wrong with me.")  Needless to say, this line of thinking is not particularly motivating. 

Setting New Year's resolutions is a lot like the process of teshuva, and since that is such an important idea in Judaism, it's not surprising that our tradition has a thing or two to say about realistic self-improvement.  In Chasidut, there is an expression called, "ratzo v'shov," literally, "running and returning."  The idea is that nothing in life is a straight shot; rather, everything proceeds in a back-and-forth movement.  We sleep and awaken; day becomes night; rain gives way to sunshine.  According to Rebbe Nachman, understanding this to-and-fro pattern of the universe is essential to proceeding successfully along the path of teshuva.  

"Ratzo v'shov" explains why a person sets a lofty goal and then inevitably stumbles along the way to achieving it.  When the person realizes that she/he has not succeeded in the way she/he wanted to, the person feels despondent and demoralized.  It is only when she or he understands that progress is meant to be incremental and that facing struggles is part of the journey, that the person becomes ready to try again.  Rav Ephraim Kenig gave a shiur based on Likutey Moharan 6:4 in which he explains:

"When a person ascends so high in his spirituality and feels so close to G-d (ratzo, running), he needs to know that he is still far and has not attained G-d, as it were.  On the other hand, the idea of shov, returning, is when a person is in the lowest of depths, feeling like nothing, thinking he will never get up again.  The Yetzer HaRa says, 'You should know yourself already.  You will never change.  You will just keep making the same mistakes over and over again.  Why even try to get up?'  It is here where G-d says, 'I am with you in this place, let us ascend together.'"

This concept of ratzo v'shov is essential to making healthy resolutions, particularly ones that pertain to recovery.  I frequently meet people with eating disorders (and parents of people with eating disorders) who express a fervent hope that the path to recovery will be linear.  Despite everyone's best intentions, I have never met a single recovered person who has actually had a smooth, linear path to recovery.  Whether one calls them, "slips," "bumps," "relapses," or something else, rough patches are part of the process.  That's just the way it is--but this isn't necessarily a bad thing.  No matter what obstacle causes you to stumble, you are never back at square one.  And even in those low places, there is something to be learned and strength to be gained.  The key is to ignore the negative voice that says, "You will never be better than this," and instead tune into the voice of Hashem, which says, "I am with you, take My hand. You can do it."  

As we set goals and strive to meet them, let's keep in mind that it's normal to trip and fall--but it's possible to trip, fall, and still get up and reach the finish line victoriously.  In 2014, may we find our stride in the rhythm of ratzo v'shov and use it to propel ourselves ever forward, to our better selves.

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