High Holiday Sadness

The "High Holidays" are always a happy time. There is nothing better then feeling totally crappy for everything you did wrong, really regretting and wanting to change into a better person, setting new practical goals, "casting" your sins away, and if you've done it right - getting forgiven and being inscribed in the book of life for another year.

What's the problem with that, nothing really. The problem is feeling it. I just didn't feel it this year. I wasn't able to connect to anything, most of the time. I wanted to be crying like the others, regretting like the others, etc, but I when I wanted to feel like that, it felt like my heart turned into a stone. I think a part of me was afraid to feel all the bad stuff because inside I knew that I would have totally lost it and broken down, and then I would have been embarrassed. In front of who? All the other blubbering jews that are able to connect to all this??

Don't get me wrong, I do feel bad for all the loshen hara (gossip, and speaking ill of anyone) that I said, and all the other nasty little things that most people without blinking an eye at it. But during Viduy (sort of like a confession, but that's not the right translation of that word, it's really more like a meeting with myself, holding myself accountable for all the things I know is wrong, but did anyway), I just couldn't feel it.

I really should have learned more this year before Rosh Hashanna. Had a better knowledge of what was going on, maybe then I would have connected better, maybe. That usually helps, but this year, well last year, everything got away from me. Plus, last year I was really davening (praying) for something. This year, I had nothing to pray for, nothing to feel undeserving for. Because what I wanted to change was me, but in order to do that, I had to really let go and want it. I had to face the ugly part of me, and I didn't want to own up to that, at all. That's probably why I didn't allow myself to connect to any of this year. Who wants to face that?

Bad me....