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For a while I’ve been staring at my guitar as if she were an enemy.

   It often happens to me after I record an album that I suddenly feel like I need to hibernate. I get the feeling that I will never write another piece of music again.

  I have to admit that this feeling is made more pronounced by social media. If I don’t get the likes I want or if I’m not getting the response that I had hoped for. I will sink into a depression of sorts. It makes me so angry that this happens because I know that is not the initial reason for my creating.

 I have been writing poetry since I was 8. I have been writing songs since I was 17. I have made seven complete albums.

 I did it, not to sell albums or to get people’s approval. I did it because it was the way I expressed myself, got through the pain of dating, unrequited love, the loss of my father, loneliness and other things.

 Then when I started to study prayer my writing shifted.  It did not become less personal, because in my opinion, prayer is extremely personal. However it became a way for me to pray and to understand the divine and to help connect others to prayer. Prayers were a puzzle and I wanted to put the pieces together in a way that illuminated and made them more relevant and meaningful.

When I go back to my original reason for writing, it does not really matter how many people listen to it or praise it or publish it.  It is just my way of expressing myself. If I let social media and comparing shut me down, I am denying one of my own true beliefs. Art for it’s own sake is, holy, vital to the life of a soul. Even if that soul is my own.

  I would love one day for my music to resonate and for more people to listen and be moved. In the meantime I have determined that to stop for a perceived lack of interest would be sad at best and at worst a bad example for others who continue to put heart and soul into what they do.

 May we go on creating because are souls are here to that.

      Wishing everyone love and inspiration,

     Cantor Rebekah Mirsky

​As the election results were coming in I began to panic.
I had the distinct feeling that life as we know it would change and not for the better.
When the results came in I leaned in my husband and cried and then was silent for the rest of night.

When I woke up in the morning I knew that I had to go to work. I work at Beit Teshuvah which is a treatment facility for addicts. I was thinking I would wear black…

And then I realized that I couldn’t. I don’t have that latitude. I am a member of the clergy and my job is to be a light in the darkness. I am called upon to be a beacon of hope. So .. I put on a red dress (this is called contrary action) and I sat down with my first client.

Never have I been so grateful for my role. Never have I been so grateful to be of service.
If you are cantor, a rabbi, a teacher, or a counselor, right now, consider yourself blessed.
You have the unique opportunity to impart your wisdom, your values or love and kindness, justice
Mercy, to the people you serve.

Synagogues and Jewish institutions are ever more important as places of safety and places to be yourself
and to learn how to treat others.

Yes, something real as happened and it is also true that we can love harder, stand by what we believe in and be imbued with yet a greater sense of purpose. This means encouraging people to stand up for what they believe in and to pursue the justice.

I love the month of Elul, the month before the High Holidays.
I like to take the time to examine, to renew, to discard all the elements of my life that I forget to look out on a daily basis..

This year I took up gardening. It’s a tactile reminder that we have to pull out weeds ( toxic people) or they take over.
We have to water (self care and hydration) more often then we think we need to. We have to cut and trim leaves (daily maintenance) and sometimes we have to throw away the plant and start from scratch (quit a job, leave a relationship)

My garden is really just a few herbs and some flowers on my porch as I live in an apartment. However, it is my garden and I really am quite proud of it.

This month of Elul, take the time to tend to your garden.
Allow yourself to take tender care of your soul, your mind, you heart. This includes, unfinished business, the little voice that tells you that something’s not quite right. Love yourself and everyone around you enough to do this. It’s totally worth it.
You are beautiful and your life is profound.

1/7/2015

I had posted earlier on Facebook that mother’s day is a very loaded day. While it is a secular holiday, in some ways I think it would be better as a spiritual holiday because we have so many issues around the role of mother and motherhood.

I myself am grateful for my own mother. She is the one I can openly brag about my accomplishments with.
She is the one that I can torture with my tales of woe because she cares that much. She is the one I got my best qualities from and ( sorry mom) some of my worst.

If we did this right everyone would tell me how they are feeling about any aspect of this day. Please enjoy a song I wrote for my mom just weeks after we lost my dad.

I welcome all comments.