Introduction:
I wrote this poem a while back and forgot about it. When I wrote it, I was in the mood to write but I was absolutely exhausted. So I wrote it with my head leaning to my side on the table and my eyes closed, periodically opening them to see I was still writing on the paper...
Today is Wednesday before Chanukah, and I came across the poem and read it again. I then realized it was not a coincidence that I came across it right before Chanukah. Chanukah comes in the deepest state of winter where we are surrounded by darkness and coldness, and we go into physical and spiritual hibernation. We gather ourselves with all our might just as Chanukah comes and bring light into our sleepy, dark state of almost nonexistence. I had to write this poem half-asleep to show that it is precisely out of the state of so-called sleep when we give up on controlling everything the way our logic dictates, that Hashem lets the ideas flow forth. Hashem is constantly hiding and revealing Himself to us and accordingly, we experience ups and downs. We should accept that there are things beyond our control and that living according to Hashem's will is the best assurance for success. It was beyond logic for the Maccabees to fight against the great Greek army, but they knew it was the right thing and their call, so they trusted in Hashem and were victorious. The rest is history, the kind of history we should strive to repeat. May we believe in our call and in fighting for truth even when it seems against all odds.
Shiviti Hashem Lenegdee Tamid
Trying to picture and grasp what Hashem means to me, I picture Him all around me and within everything. Hashem is before me in the sense that He was here first and he is the reason for my existence.
There is sweetness to just being before Hashem and being able to relate to Him on a personal level and carry out a conversation with Him. It is true that he speaks so much more gently than myself and that sometimes I don't hear His answer but I am always heard and that is no less important.
I ask to be, not to be alone but rather to be included in Hashem's all inclusive oneness and allness.
It's fun to just be included in Hashem's reality, it's better than being 'in charge of my own faith'. It's an illusion to always be in control and it's an illusion to exist outside of Hashem's existence. Like a small particle in a machine which, when separate from the machine is alone, is worthless alone, and yet when working with, and being part of, the machine- it is essential to the whole machine. Being outside of existence is not being at all. Hashem's existence is all. Existing on one's own is in essence nonexistence in the most nonexistent way possible.
'Shiviti', I hold Hashem's will always before my eyes as a way of determining my own will. 'I' am my will and my will is Hashem's will so in essence I am giving up my self to Hashem. Letting go of the ego and including it in Hashem is what living on Kidush Hashem, the sanctification of God- is. I am but a vessel for Hashem's will and kingship to be revealed in the world, and the 'I' is just a way to reveal his allness which 'I' am part of.
By not being, I'm actually as real and existing as 'I', without the 'I', could ever be!!!