Yom Kippur brings joy to the Creator, and in turn, the Creator gives that joy back to all of us.
Yes, that’s right. On Yom Kippur. A holiday observed by an entire day of no eating, drinking, or bathing. It doesn’t sound joy-filled or fulfilling, but that’s the point. It creates the perfect condition for the practice of calling on positivity even when the physical looks and feels suboptimal.
But let’s back up, let’s set our consciousness now, long before the long day unfolds. Preparing for Yom Kippur requires physical preparation, to be sure, but holding a vision for how we want to close this potent moment can help us fortify our inner state.
Because here is what usually happens. By the time we reach the final moments of Yom Kippur, most of us are running on empty, quite literally. We’re tired. We’re hungry. And somewhere in the back of even the most devoted mind, a quiet little voice has started its own liturgy: I just want the fast to be over. I just want to shower. I just want to feel like myself again.
There is no judgment here, many people who have observed Yom Kippur have been there at least once. What I am proposing here is instead of dreading or even planning for that discomfort, invite it.
Neila, the closing service, the very last stretch of Yom Kippur, is the peak of the entire day. It is the moment the gates are said to be completely open to us. And it arrives right when we are most likely to be depleted and ready for it all to just be finished. But this isn’t an experience to white knuckle ourselves through.
The Rav taught us, again and again, that the most important connections in our lives are precisely the ones where our consciousness is usually waning. Where our attention has drifted. Where we’ve mentally checked out just before the most important thing happens. Understanding this, we can actually look forward to that time when we just want it to end… and see it as an opportunity for even deeper connection.
Climb Toward the Peak, Not Away From It
Think of the day ahead as a climb. If you spend the whole ascent thinking only about how tired your legs are, the mountain will break you. But if you climb knowing there’s a view at the top unlike anything you’ve seen, if you can already picture yourself standing there, the fatigue and the discomfort become part of the success.
So I want you to visualize it now, before you’re in the thick of it. Picture yourself in those final moments of Neila. Not drained and waiting for the shofar. Picture yourself standing in the most open, most connected space of the entire year, wide awake to it, having saved your deepest presence for exactly this. That is the version of you that the fast is preparing. Hold onto that image. Let it steady you when the day gets long.
The hunger and the exhaustion are not obstacles to the connection. They are the door that clears the way for it. Here are three things to hold onto when the physical discomforts start to get loud:
1. Remember that “The End of Chaos Is Already Here”
I was reminded recently of something the Rav said in one of his final lectures. It was a private moment, just the chevre gathered close with him. And someone asked a question that has stayed with me ever since. We speak so much about the end of pain, of suffering, of death. The end of chaos itself. So someone asked, simply: When, Rav? When will we finally see it? Will it happen in our lifetime?
And the Rav answered, “The end of chaos is already here.”
He went on to explain that though the end of chaos is here, we can’t see it because we need to earn the ability to see it. How do we do that? It was here the Rav pointed to Rav Avraham Azulai, who taught that the only thing standing between us and the perfected world, is for us to learn to get along with one another. It’s easy to say. It is much, much harder to live. The perfect world is already here, we simply haven’t yet earned the eyes to see it. And what earns us those eyes is not a grand mystical feat, it’s the daily, humbling work of choosing love over judgment.
2. Prioritize the Three Kinds of Love
Rav Ishmael taught that there are three kinds of love: love of oneself, love for the Creator, and love for one another. A world without chaos doesn’t rely on just one. It asks for an ever-evolving cycle of all three. Love for ourselves means offering grace when we stumble, treating ourselves with compassion and respect, and seeking to be our best every day. Love for the Creator is necessary for that self-love and constantly seeking connection with him is part of that work. And finally, love for others.
Now this is not a sentimental love. The love that opens our eyes to the perfect world is active, radical, and just outside our comfort zones. It’s a willingness to understand another’s point of view, instead of judging them. It’s choosing to be like the Creator in moments of discord and conflict. It’s softening toward a person you struggle to forgive. We don’t need to operate at this level every single day, even holding the intention for this level of love can change our view.
3. The Only Gate That Can Close
Traditionally, Neila is understood as a desperate prayer. We lift our voices to the heavens and beg the gate to stay open just a little longer, please, don’t shut the door between us and the Creator. It’s a beautiful, poignant image. But the kabbalists teach that this isn’t really what’s happening.
Neila is not a moment to shout upward. It’s a moment to go inward. Because the gate we’re so afraid will close was never a gate in the upper worlds. There’s no door up there capable of obstructing our prayers, our longings, our reaching. The only gate that can ever come between us and the Creator is the one that exists inside our minds. That’s the gate. And, extraordinarily, only we hold the key.
So when you arrive at Neila, and you feel that sense of desperation creep in, take a breath and open even more. Open to the full experience knowing that your connection gains strength with every minute. You’re not petitioning some heavenly gatekeeper to have mercy, you’re seeking to open your mind, unlock your own heart, and to invite the divine to come in.
What to Reach for When You Get There
Now we return to the present. The day has not yet arrived, but we have just visualized ourselves at the end of the climb, taking in the incredible view at the top of the mountain. For the next few days, we’ll prepare our fast and prepare our prayers, but I’d like to invite you to add one more ask to your list.
This year, ask for the ability to see. To see the perfection that already exists in everyone and everything. To hold that level of connection to the Creator not just for the closing moments, but in every second of the year ahead.
Ask to know, in your bones, through every ordinary Tuesday and every hard conversation and every situation that looks like nothing but chaos, that there is the Light of the Creator, and there is only the Light of the Creator. And to have the eyes to see it.
In all things. In every person. In every challenge you meet.
The perfect world is already here. The gate is already open. All that’s left is for us to open the one inside ourselves, and the fast ahead is exactly how we get there.
May you have the most meaningful fast yet. May you arrive at Neila stronger than when you started, and may this be the year you finally see the beauty, love, and connection that has been here all along.
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