family relationships Archives - Rabbi Sharon Sobel

“Oh My Aching Back!”

Growing older may bring its share of aches and pains, but it also invites us to discover deeper meaning, embrace new possibilities, and appreciate the blessings of each day.

My cousins from Connecticut are visiting me in Chattanooga this week, and we are spending a few days together in Nashville as well. My cousin and I have always been exceptionally close, more like sisters, and having them here has been an extraordinary gift. There is something irreplaceable about spending time with family, sharing stories, laughing together, and enjoying one another’s company.

All three of us lead active lives. We exercise, try to eat well, and care for our health. My cousins are retired, and I am approaching that chapter myself. We still have plenty of energy, enthusiasm, and curiosity, though our bodies occasionally have other ideas!

Nearly every day, one of us remarks something along the lines of: “Oh, my aching back!” or suggests, “Perhaps we should rest before dinner.” Activities that once seemed effortless may now require more time, patience, and perhaps an afternoon nap.

We laugh about it, but beneath the laughter is a recognition that growing older brings both blessings and challenges. Our bodies carry the experiences of decades of living, working, raising a family, traveling, celebrating, and enduring difficulties. They remind us that time has passed, even when our spirits feel youthful.

Rabbi Richard Address, founder of Jewish Sacred Aging, explores the spiritual dimensions of growing older. In his essay The Courage to Flourish (February 25, 2026), he writes, “Judaism teaches us that as long as we live, we seek meaning and our place in this world.”

This week’s Torah portion, Noach, offers a compelling illustration of this enduring search for meaning and purpose. Noah is 600 years old when the Flood begins (Genesis 7:6). Whatever we make of the extraordinary ages recorded in the Torah, the message is striking: Noah’s age does not diminish his responsibility or capacity to act. At an advanced age, he becomes central to the possibility of a new beginning.

Our opportunities to contribute, discover, learn, and begin anew do not disappear as we grow older. Our roles may evolve, our priorities may shift, and our bodies may require greater care, but our capacity to live meaningful and purposeful lives remains. Perhaps this is why Jewish tradition invites us to begin each morning with gratitude, recognizing that every new day brings possibilities, regardless of our age.

Two of our morning blessings, for example, take on deeper meaning as we grow older. In Modeh Ani, we thank God for restoring our souls and granting us another day. Asher Yatzar, allows us to express gratitude for the remarkable functioning of our very human body. As we age, we become more conscious of abilities we once took for granted and more appreciative of the extraordinary gift of another day in which to live, love, and contribute.

Yet, the Jewish understanding of aging extends beyond our individual experiences. It also speaks to how we honor and care for one another. The Torah teaches, “You shall rise before the aged and show deference to the old; you shall fear your God: I am the Eternal” (Leviticus 19:32). For younger generations, this means recognizing the wisdom and experience of those who preceded them. For those caring for aging loved ones, it means offering compassion and assistance while honoring their dignity and independence.

We also recognize that not everyone experiences aging with good health, financial security, or the comfort of close family relationships. Illness, loneliness, and loss can make later years particularly difficult. As a sacred community, we have a responsibility to ensure that every person, regardless of age or circumstance, continues to feel valued, connected, and supported.

Spending these precious days with my cousins has reminded me that growing older is not simply about acknowledging our limitations. It is about recognizing what truly matters. We may navigate stairs more cautiously than we once did, become more discerning about how much we fit into each day, and recognize the importance of rest. Yet, we are so fortunate and blessed to have another day to explore, another meal to share, another story to tell, and people we love with whom to share the journey.

Perhaps that is one of the gifts of growing older: learning to measure the richness of our lives not by how much we accomplish in a day, but by the meaning we find in the moments we are given.

When we awaken tomorrow morning, may we greet the day with the gratitude of Modeh Ani, mindful not only of the gift of another day, but of the opportunity to make that day a blessing.

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Sharon L. Sobel

Elul As a Training Camp

Elul gives us time to prepare before the High Holy Days are even on the close horizon. Like training for a race, the goal is not simply to reach the finish line, but to be changed by the journey.

Two of my brothers are marathon runners. Running, however, has never come naturally or easily for me. It is hard on my knees, aggravates an old back injury, and, truthfully, I much prefer cycling. But running has one great advantage: it is portable. You can do it almost anywhere.

In 2015, my brother Ezra convinced me to train for my first half-marathon, the Publix Gasparilla Distance Classic in Tampa, Florida. He promised to do it with me, and my cousin Heidi joined us as well. When I crossed the finish line, Ezra immediately texted our siblings: “Sharon did it! She feels lousy and broken but she crossed that finish line!”

I returned to Gasparilla every year until the pandemic, sometimes running, sometimes walking, sometimes training diligently, and once, regrettably, barely training at all. Ironically, that was the year I achieved my best finishing time. It was also the year I developed a stress fracture in my femur and spent nearly a month on crutches. Ouch. Lesson learned.

These days, I walk the races. It is kinder to my back and knees, and I still have the challenge of preparing for something that requires endurance. This year, I plan to walk the Gasparilla 5K, 15K, and half-marathon. Which means I had better start training now!

And that is precisely why I am sharing this with you today.

Today is the first day of the Hebrew month of Elul, the month that leads us toward Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the Days of Awe (in Hebrew, the Yamim Nora’im). Elul reminds us of something I learned the hard way at Gasparilla: we cannot expect to arrive prepared for something simply because the date appears on the calendar.

The High Holy Days ask something of us. They ask us to examine the year that has passed, to consider whom we have hurt and where we have fallen short, to recognize what we need to repair, and to decide who we hope to become in the year ahead.

That kind of work cannot be accomplished simply by walking through the synagogue doors on Rosh Hashanah.

Elul gives us time to begin an intentional preparation process before the High Holy Days are even on the horizon.

Each weekday morning during Elul, we blow the shofar. The shofar calls us to attention: Wake up. Pay attention. We recite Psalm 27. Then, the Saturday evening prior to Rosh Hashanah, we turn toward Selichot, toward forgiveness, repentance, and repair. These practices are not rituals for ritual’s sake. They create space for questions we may otherwise be too busy, too distracted, or perhaps too reluctant to ask:

Where have I been fully present this year, and where have I merely gone through the motions?

Whom do I need to forgive?

From whom do I need to seek forgiveness?

What am I carrying that I no longer need?

What deserves more of my attention, my gratitude, my courage, or my love?

And perhaps most importantly: Am I listening closely enough to hear the answers?

Most days when I walk my training miles, I follow the same route. I do not wear headphones or listen to music or podcasts. What do I listen to?

I listen to the world around me and within me. I hear the sounds of nature and the rhythm of my feet against the pavement. I listen to the thoughts that surface when I give them enough quiet to emerge. Ideas for teaching, writing, and speaking often come to me along the way. And I notice things I might otherwise walk right past, sometimes beauty growing out of something as ordinary as a crack in the sidewalk.

My daily route may not change, but when I pay attention, I have.

Perhaps that is part of the invitation of Elul.

We do not enter a completely different life when the Hebrew calendar turns toward a new year. We return to many of the same people, the same relationships, the same responsibilities, and even some of the same struggles. The question is whether we can encounter them differently because we have learned to see more clearly and listen more deeply.

Elul gives us the opportunity to practice.

And unlike my ill-advised half-marathon for which I did not train, there is no prize for getting through the Days of Awe quickly. The goal is not simply to cross the finish line.

The goal is to be changed by the journey.

Ways to Prepare During Elul

As we begin this journey together, Mizpah offers many opportunities for reflection, learning, contemplation, and renewal:

Join us for Erev Shabbat services in our beautiful historic sanctuary. Beginning this evening, and again on August 28, we will incorporate poetry, readings, meditations, and commentary from the Reform Movement’s Mishkan HaLev: Prayers for S’lichot and the Month of Elul to help ready our hearts and minds for the High Holy Days.

Spend some time with Mishkan HaNefesh, our High Holy Day machzor.Explore its readings, poetry, commentary, and study texts. Sometimes a familiar prayer, encountered slowly and outside the context of services, can speak to us in an entirely new way.

Study Torah with us on Shabbat morning, in person or via Zoom, every Saturday from 9:15 to 10:30 am. Our conversations are lively, thoughtful, engaging, and everyone is welcome.

Join us for our Selichot Program and Service, Saturday evening, September 5th at 6:30 pm: “Seeing Ourselves, Seeing Others: Two Short Films, One Meaningful Conversation.” We will watch two short, evocative animated films by Hanan Harchol and explore together questions of judgment, forgiveness, and teshuvah, followed by Havdalah and our beautiful Selichot service.

Read something that invites reflection. A few suggestions:
- Golden: The Power of Silence in a World of Noise, by Justin Zorn and Leigh Marz
- On Repentance and Repair: Making Amends in an Unapologetic World, by Danya Ruttenberg
- Zen and the Art of Running: The Path to Making Peace with Your Pace, by Larry Shapiro, PhD
- This Is Real and You Are Completely Unprepared: The Days of Awe as a Journey of Transformation, by Alan Lew

Explore Jewish ideas and contemporary issues. The Shalom Hartman Institute offers articles, webinars, lectures, and discussions that encourage critical thinking about Israel, Judaism, and key Jewish issues. ReformJudaism.org offers wonderful resources for learning about Jewish holidays and customs, Torah, prayer, and Reform Judaism. The Religious Action Center provides resources on social justice from a Reform Jewish perspective. You can also learn more about the Israel Movement for Reform and Progressive Judaism and the Israel Religious Action Center, its social justice arm.

Listen. Music can sometimes open a door that words alone cannot. As we approach the Days of Awe, listen again, or perhaps for the first time, to Barbra Streisand’s Avinu Malkeinu, Max Bruch’s Kol Nidrei, Y’varech’cha by Jacob “Spike” Kraus, Avinu Malkeinu by Josh Nelson, Hayom T’amtzeinu by Noah Aronson, or Pitchu Li by Julie Silver.

You do not have to do everything. Choose one thing. Read something. Listen to something. Study. Pray. Walk. Sit quietly. Have a conversation you have been avoiding. Call someone. Ask yourself a difficult question and give yourself enough silence to hear the answer.

There is no single way to prepare.

There is only the invitation to begin.

May this month of Elul give each of us the courage to pay attention, the patience to listen, and the openness to discover something new, even along a path we have walked many times before.

Shabbat Shalom!

Rabbi Sharon L. Sobel

Happy 17th Birthday, Sarah! An Open Letter to My Niece

March 3, 2014

Dear Sarah,

Happy 17th birthday! It seems like just yesterday – and also like forever – that you came into our lives. But really, you have been with us now for six-and-and-a half years: from the time you were 10-and-a-half.

Your mom and dad, my brother David and sister-in-law Marilyn, were so excited when they told us about you. “Sarah loves people.” They told us. “She’s so warm and friendly and she’s looking to be loved. She wants a family and a place to call ‘home.’ We can’t wait for you to meet her.”

Sarah with David and Marilyn on one of their early visits with each other, prior to their becoming a family. — Sarah with David and Marilyn on one of their early visits with each other, prior to becoming a family.

You moved in with them on December 21st, 2007. Everyone was so excited! You are their only child. They had been “Big brother/Big sister” to others, but never had a child of their own. You chose them to be your parents and they chose you to be their daughter. All of us could not have been more thrilled when you became part of our large family!

Most of us don’t have to make this choice in life. We are born into our families of origin, our families of birth. We grow up with our birth siblings, parents and grandparents. But your life circumstances did not turn out that way. Your story is yours alone to tell. But your life led you to us, and for that we all feel so eternally blessed.

In many ways, your kind of story is one that has been part of our Jewish tradition for thousands of years. We have many tales in our Jewish history where people longed for children of their own, but were not able to have them. Our bible shows how people prayed to God asking for children to come into their lives. Some were blessed to eventually give birth to children of their own. Some found a way to use surrogate mothers to bear children for them. And of course, adoption has always been part of our Jewish culture. When a parent adopted a child, they would bounce the baby on their knees and name that child. Those two acts together would embody the ritual of adoption. Bouncing a baby on one’s knee symbolically represented the physical care and nurturing that parents would now bestow upon the child entrusted to them. The act of naming symbolized the idea of “ownership” or acquisition. When I bestow a name upon someone, that person is now a part of me, it belongs with me, that person is now “my family.”

Children represent continuity for the future. You will carry on our hopes, our dreams, our aspirations after we are no longer alive. You will inherit a legacy of family keepsakes and traditions and imbue them with your own meaning and your own values. And you will keep our memories alive, long after we our gone. Our children, our tradition teaches us, are our guarantors.

Sarah, I’m writing to you on your birthday, because I want you to remember all those things. And above all, I want to remind you that you ARE a special person and have many gifts to offer. You are so very loving, gentle, kind and caring. You have an uncanny ability to relate to young children. Your love of animals knows no bounds – whether it’s caring for your beloved Greyhound, Sweet, or your pet chickens, or a wounded bird. Your heart has the capacity for tremendous empathy and love.

And in turn, you are loved by so many others. Your mom and dad love you to the moon and back. And we, your extended family – your aunts, uncles and cousins, also love you and care about you and want to see you happy, healthy and successful.

My mother, aka, "Bubbie," David, Sarah and Marilyn, the day Sarah's adoption became official. — My mother, aka, “Bubbie,” David, Sarah and Marilyn, the day Sarah’s adoption became official.

Bubbie (my mother), was there to celebrate with you when your adoption became official on April 2, 2008. She was SO thrilled to have you join our family and to sign the “Zeved Ha-Bat” (“Gift of a Daughter”) adoption covenant that your mom created to commemorate that moment:

“Zeved Bat – Gift of a Daughter” Certificate, Creating a Covenant between Sarah and David and Marilyn.

In this covenant, your parents promise to take you as their daughter, to love you every day and to keep you forever.

You promise to take David and Marilyn as your parents, to love them every day and to keep them forever.

The three of you promise to celebrate the flow of the seasons and the passages of life with your family, your friends and one another, as well as to care for one another always.

I remind you of these words, Sarah, because sometimes, we take family for granted. Sometimes, it is easy to forget to show love to the ones who love us the most.

Loving a child unconditionally means accepting who they are as a person, helping them to overcome any obstacles in their life and guiding them toward a life of love, success and fulfillment. Sometimes, loving a child means setting boundaries and saying “no.” Loving a child means helping them to achieve appropriate educational goals so that they can take care of themselves later on in life. Loving a child means understanding their pain, their frustration as well as their joys and hopes and aspirations. Loving a child means laughing with them, celebrating with them, crying with them and putting band-aids on their boo-boos (or sitting with them in hospital ER’s at all times of day and night).

Loving your parents means accepting that your parents want what is best for you, even if you don’t always recognize what that is. Loving your parents means recognizing that they are people too, with feelings and emotions. And sometimes, it means remembering that “it isn’t always about you.” Loving your parents means that the covenant you signed at the time of your adoption is a three-way partnership: the three of you need to work at your relationship each and every day to show each other how much you love each other – even when you are upset. Loving your parents means learning how to be patient and learning how to breathe. Just like they are trying to be patient and learning how to breathe too.

Sarah, you might be your parents’ only child, but your dad has three brothers, two sisters and you have seven Sobel cousins. Your mom has one brother and one sister – and you have more cousins on that side as well. Your extended family is even larger. You have also reconnected with some of your birth family. The circle of people who love you and care about you is large.

When you are happy, we are all happy. When you are sad, we’re all sad. When you’re in pain, we’re in pain.

The journey of your life Sarah, will be filled with many twists and turns, as you know only so well. There will be smooth sailing at times, as well as rocky patches. Sometimes you’ll encounter bumps and curves that you don’t expect. But through it all, you have each other – your mom and dad, and your loving extended family. We are your guideposts along the way. We will help you steer your course. And through it all, we will always be here for you, loving you with open arms and full hearts.

Sarah, as you celebrate your 17th birthday, we wish for you wisdom and strength and the maturity to make healthy decisions. We wish you laughter and joy, success and fulfillment. Most of all, we wish you a lifetime of love, health and contentment. May you and your parents continue to be blessed by the richness and beauty of your loving relationship with each other!

I am so glad that you are part of our family!

Happy birthday, gorgeous! I love you lots!

Auntie Sharon