Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

There are three reasons why I would rather herd yaks in Ethiopia in the summertime than be a rabbi on Yom Kippur. The first reason is fairly obvious:  rabbis have to work really hard on an empty stomach. The second reason — you can’t complain about how hungry you are because it would appear “un-rabbi-like” — makes my top three because the “I’m hungrier than you are” game my family plays each year is one of the great joys of the holiday.

But the third and most important reason yak herding seems more appealing than presiding over a Yom Kippur service is that the pressure to give a meaningful sermon to people who may set foot in your synagogue only once a year must be enormous. Imagine facing hundreds of flawed and famished congregants — including the one who was sitting next to me, texting someone other than God throughout the service — and having just 20 minutes or so to convince them to make meaningful, permanent changes in their life. Not small changes like “Hey, wash your car more often” or “Add more vegetables to your diet,” but dramatic changes like mend the broken relationships in your life, become more connected to Judaism, replace materialistic tendencies with spiritual ones.

And, as a rabbi, all you have at your disposal to induce these hard changes are words. Unlike professional organizers who attempt to tame life’s chaos with tangible color-coded folders and sophisticated filing systems, our rabbis must find words, analogies and stories so compelling that not only will we nod our heads in agreement when those words are spoken (as we all do), but we’ll also take those words and turn them into concrete actions back in our real worlds (as most of us don’t). Words so profound they stay with us throughout the entire year. Words so inspiring that congregants cannot help but act on them.

You might be wondering why I am discussing Yom Kippur when the holiday was in September. It is because this year, as I sat listening to the profound words of my rabbis, I vowed that this Yom Kippur would be different. This time my Yom Kippur vows would stick. But if I wanted a different outcome, then it was clear that I would have to adopt a different approach. As it turned out, this new approach came to me while I was watching a television show.

A couple of months before the High Holy Days, I was watching an episode of the popular sitcom “Modern Family.” If you have never seen the show, all you need to know is that what is “modern” about this family are its characters: Jay Pritchett (Ed O’Neill), a well-to-do grandfather who is married to a voluptuous and much-younger Colombian woman (Sofia Vergara) with a precocious son; Jay’s gay son, Mitchell Pritchett (Jesse Tyler Ferguson), who is raising an adopted baby with his partner (Eric Stonestreet); and Jay’s married daughter (Julie Bowen), who parents a classic self-absorbed teenager, one “smart” tween and a goofball younger son.

I don’t recall the specific details of the episode that proved to have a huge impact on the way I approached Yom Kippur this year, only this message: People are capable of changing 15 percent. That single line summed up why my numerous past High Holy Days resolutions — I will call my mother every day; I will always keep my house clutter-free; I will never gossip; I will always be the perfect wife, mother, sibling and friend; I will celebrate Shabbat every week; I will never be late; I will do yoga daily, even though I find it boring; I will learn the lyrics to “American Pie”; I will double … no, triple! … my charitable contributions — always went unfulfilled. My all-or-nothing approach was why I was inspired by the words spoken from the bimah yet was never able to change my ways. My Yom Kippur vows required me to change my life 100 percent or not at all. And I suspect my all-or-nothing approach to Yom Kippur specifically, and Judaism in general, is typical.

I recently read “Devotion” by Dani Shapiro (Harper), a book that deals with Shapiro’s struggle to figure out where Judaism and Jewish practices fit into her life. She tells this story about purchasing a mezuzah in the Venice Jewish Ghetto:

“As the woman wrapped it up carefully, packing it into a special box for our journey home, I felt paralyzed. How could we buy only one? We needed to buy — here I started counting all the doorways or our home — at least fourteen. If we were going the mezuzah route then we needed to put one on each and every doorway except for closets and bathrooms. And who would affix it to the doorpost? Did it need a special blessing? Where would I find a rabbi? Which side did it go on, anyway? This was the way it had always been for me: all or nothing, I realized, invariably led to nothing.”

So this Yom Kippur as I sat listening to my rabbis, I gave their words a “Modern Family” twist. Instead of making “all or nothing” Yom Kippur resolutions, I made 15 percent resolutions. I will call my mother 15 percent more. I will gossip 15 percent less. I will make Shabbat dinners 15 percent more. I will increase my charitable contributions by 15 percent. I will spend 15 percent more time with my family and friends.

Did it work? I think I am at about 10 percent … which is better than nothing.