My mom never let me go to bed angry at her. If it could not be mitigated with a funny face, she insisted on talking it through. Now that I don’t live at home, hurt that hasn’t been sufficiently addressed is sure to come up in our annual pre-Yom Kippur chat — which she ensures we don’t miss.
I often roll my eyes at my mom’s stubborn refusal to let our hurts pass quietly. But I also know that it is perhaps her greatest gift to me, both in my personal life and in my activism.
The ability to engage with and confront our pain, regardless of how uncomfortable it is, is a muscle that must be strengthened through practice. It requires commitment.
The Kotzker Rebbe said that, “there is nothing so whole as a broken heart.” This idea is part of the spiritual core of justice work — similar to the idea of tikkun olam, a commitment to repairing the brokenness in our world. This year, in particular, we experienced too much heartbreak and devastation — personally and societally. Hiding from it, letting it fester, or clinging to it so tightly that we have no energy to do anything else makes it impossible for there to be room to grow. Seeing it and engaging with it offers us the possibility of making space for something else on the other side of it.
From within the brokenness is where the real work happens.
Simone Zimmerman is the Director of B’Tselem USA and co-founder of If Not Now. www.btselem.org
