As the year begins to slow and turn in on itself, winter approaching, I wonder: where have I been?
Then, I get another email from 10Q: The vault is opening!
Do You 10Q? is a site I've joined for three years now to reflect on the year past and look ahead. It's based on the reflective practices of the High Holy Days of the Jewish year.
You have ten days to answer one question each day about the year past and the one to come. At the end of the questions, at Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement), you have time to reflect on your answers and save them. At the end of that time, as they say, "the vault closes." Perhaps you don't think about this again until you get an email in the fall of next year, and you can review your answers from past years and reflect anew. There's no cost and I commend it to you.
Also recommended, a book I learned about from my dear friend Fran Rossi Szpylczyn and am reading for the first time this year: This is Real and You Are Completely Unprepared: The Days of Awe as a Journey of Transformation by Rabbi Alan Lew.
As I continue to walk out of the place where my Dad died in March, and live in the liminal place where my Mom is, it's good to stop and be still, to spread the flotsam of days away and think of the time to come. What will the year bring? Who will I be? How will I change, and how do I want to improve?
May your year be sweet, friends.
