My Grandpa Abe almost never set foot in a synagogue, but the one time of the year when he took pride in climbing the steps of the bimah was on Yom Kippur Eve. It was then that he played the mournful melody of the Kol Nidre on his bass for our whole congregation to hear. … Continue reading Kol Nidre
“You’re one of us,” Nelson said. I looked at my friend, equally surprised by the compliment and bewildered by the spin of his words. I had accepted the epithet, “gringa,” long ago; I knew I wasn’t really one of the Afro-descendent or indigenous Chachi people, the two ancestral groups living in that region of the … Continue reading Nelson
On really hard days, if I’m lucky, the theme song to the children’s show, “Arthur,” pops into my head. “Just believe in yourself,” a voice sings, “Well, that’s the place to start…” I smile, feel refreshed, and keep running up hill, ready to face my demons and what felt, just a moment before, like the … Continue reading You Don’t Have to Believe in Yourself
I once read the Tao Te Ching from cover to cover in a single afternoon. Sucked in and mesmerized, I had no words; simply, the truths of the Chinese classic resonated with my soul. This is how it is to flow with the universe. I emerged from my office as if to another world, my … Continue reading Between Terror and Enlightenment
Do you crave someone who has all of the answers? A teacher who will step in and tell you what to do? Or, at the very least, someone to offer guidance, to tell you when you have strayed from your path, and when you are back on? - I have often wished I had such … Continue reading Life with No Teacher
This picture is from 2004, the year our middle child was born. I am looking forward, and I am looking back. That is the essence of this blog, the Emerald Shaman. What essential pieces of our humanity have we lost moving forward, and how do we recover them? How do we reconstruct them in new … Continue reading Looking Forward, and Looking Back
Last month, I brought home from my daughter’s Bat Mitzvah reception three plants wrapped in foil. Since our apartment is small, I left them on the balcony. I thought it would be a good way to let Nature take care of the plants and not to have to worry much about them. After a few … Continue reading Seeing Healing
How do you break up with a narcissist? How do you get rid of that toxic person in your life? Earlier in history, these might have been mere self-help questions, but now they concern the whole country. How do we, as a nation, break up with Donald Trump? How do we let go of our … Continue reading Breaking Up with a Narcissist – Advice for Our Country
One day in Tai Chi class, my instructor said something that surprised me. When you’re experiencing a lot of Yang energy and everything is going strong, he said, expect Yin to come along. In other words, when you’ve been flying high for some time, expect to come down. When life is easy, expect it to … Continue reading Growing through Up and Down
The other day a reader on Facebook contacted me. He wanted to get a professional philosopher’s take on a question. “What do you think…,” he asked, “of the meaning of existence?” “Well, that’s a big question,” I could hear my own advisor answering in my head. In academic philosophy, we are trained to be very … Continue reading Asking the Big Questions
