Delight

MAZELTOV TO YOU! AND ME!

I Have a Job to Do – To Provide Joy!

Once you have a job to do, everything falls into place. At least that’s the way it is for me. If I just have time on my hands with no particular purpose in mind, then the demons set in. Sometimes a host of characters come out to remind me of my failings, what I should have done, what I could have done. At other times I find myself in the middle of a familiar internal drama, experiencing feelings of loss, blame, and disappointment that I’ve had my whole life.

A while back, receiving an invitation to my cousin’s wedding in California evoked an uncomfortable inner drama. What set me off was realizing that I didn’t have any real reason to attend that I could think of. I was just one of many relatives; I didn’t see myself as essential. That fact kept me from feeling entitled to spend the money needed to go to California, cancel an Enchanted Self workshop already scheduled for that weekend, cancel clients, etc. Sure, I’d see some cousins and we’d have the opportunity to spend a happy day together, but I saw most of these cousins frequently at other occasions, closer to home.

Yet something nagged at me I really felt bad! Again and again I almost canceled my workshop. I wouldn’t understand why for several years, until I attended another wedding, a religious one.

The most shocking moment occurred immediately, as soon as I walked through the door. Complete strangers stopped me and said, “Mazel Tov!” (May your stars be lined up in your favor!).

I couldn’t understand it. They didn’t know me. I didn’t know them. I barely knew the people who were getting married. In fact, I had come to the wedding as a courtesy and to experience what a religious ceremony was like. “Mazel Tov,” I forced myself to say back because it seemed the polite thing to do, even though I felt almost affronted and even a little offended to be addressed so almost personally by strangers.

Later, when I described this experience to a friend who was religious, she smiled. “The celebration was for all of you,” she explained. We’re all connected; one person’s happiness is another person’s happiness, just as one person’s tragedy is another person’s tragedy.”

I didn’t need to know the bride and groom well to be part of their shared milestone. Just by attending, I was acknowledging that a good thing was happening in my community and therefore to me, and so I deserved to be congratulated. I wasn’t simply an invited guest, but an active participant—a member of the community celebrating together.

What a profound insight! This is a very different orientation from the one I grew up with. Thanks to her explanation, I came to see the way I had been greeted as an affirmation of ties that connect us to each other. I also saw immediately why I had fretted so over my cousin’s wedding years before! My heart had known what my mind couldn’t get itself around at the time: I was essential! What an indescribably warming thought.

After the ceremony, the band began playing. It was time to dance. The women took their places on the women’s side of the hall, while the men gathered behind a barrier on the other side. I usually enjoy dancing and was eager to join in, but I was also anxious. At most weddings and Bar Mitzvahs, this is when I’d experience anxiety in the pit of my stomach, a queasy uneasiness. As the circle began to form, I’d stand with the others, wanting so much to let myself go and join in while worrying that I wasn’t a part of things. That’s when the old demons visited me, the ones who say, “Take a good look at yourself—you’re too fat, you’re too old, and you’re trying too hard. Who’s going to invite you to join in the dancing with them? Who would want to? Look, they all know each other much better they than know you. Look how much fun they’re having. Look how awkward you feel. It’s always been this way, since you were a little girl, the same old story. Some people just don’t luck out. You never have and you never will.”

Yet at this wedding, where I knew virtually no one, I was remarkably free from this anxiety. Though I expected them, the demons never arrived. Instead, I felt totally at ease and confidant that, no matter what I did, I wouldn’t be rejected, and indeed I wasn’t. The women welcomed me. Whenever I broke into the circle, I was given a helping hand and accepted in a very companionable way. We danced for a dizzying 40 minutes, then 50, without a break. And with each passing moment, I felt more and more connected to everyone else in the circle.