Holiness and Goodness

Smiling woman with long blonde hair wearing a blue top outdoors.
03/13/2018 | Rabbi Bonnie Koppell |

  1. With your attention on the person, repeat to yourself: “Just like me, this person is seeking some happiness for (his or her) life.”

  2. With your attention on the person, repeat to yourself: “Just like me, this person is trying to avoid suffering in (his or her) life.”

  3. With your attention on the person, repeat to yourself: “Just like me, this person has known sadness, loneliness and despair.”

  4. With your attention on the person, repeat to yourself: “Just like me, this person is seeking to fill (his or her) needs.”

  5. With your attention on the person, repeat to yourself: “Just like me, this person is learning about life.
    Open your eyes and let’s learn about life together here today.

    <1> Hornby, Nicholas, How to Be Good, NY:  Riverhead Books, 2001, p. 92

    <2> Hornby, op.cit., p. 94

    <3> Hornby, op. cit., p. 142

    <4> Hornby, op. cit., p. 156

    <5> Cohn, Rabbi Edward Paul, “From Where I Stand”, quoted in The American Rabbi, High Holy Days 2002/5763, p. 194

    <6> The American Rabbi, Fall 2000, p. 18

    <7> Kushner, Harold S., How Good Do We Have to Be?,  NY:  Little Brown and Company, 1996, p. 181

    <8> ibid., p. 177