From: nelson@titan.Kodak.COM (Bruce D. Nelson)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.jewish
Subject: A Rosh HaShana sermon
Date: 14 Oct 92 01:50:46 GMT
Organization: Eastman Kodak Company

[Sorry if this is a repost - original posting may not have propagated
properly due to header problems in our Pnews.]

The following is the prepared text of the sermon given by Rabbi Susan
Gulack at Temple Beth Am, a conservative synagogue, in Henrietta, NY
(near Rochester) on the second morning of Rosh HaShana 5753.
------

In 1966, one of the foremost experts on polygraph machines (lie
detectors) tried a unique experiment.  On morning in his office, rather
than hooking his lie detector to a person, he attached the electrodes
to the palmlike leaves of a plant.  His initial printout from the plant
matched similar ones he had recorded when testing people at rest.  He
knew an individual under stress, frightened or agitated, would cause
changes in the meter readings of the polygraph.  Could he produce a
similar response from plants?

He proceeded to water the plant to see if there was a  measurable
impact on the polygraph,  There was no significant difference.  Perhaps
the analogy he hoped to demonstrate had no basis, he thought.  However
he decided to escalate the experiment and precipitate stress by
introducing a cup of hot coffee  and dipping the leaves of the plant
into the scalding liquid.  Again the reading did not register  any
significant change.  He fantasized about what act he could perform to
trigger a response in the plant if that was, indeed, possible.  He
considered finding matches and actually burning the leaves.  As he rose
form the chair to execute his idea, he notice the readout on the
polygraph moving frenetically.  In subsequent experiments, he
demonstrated repeatedly that his violent visuallizations affected the
foliage and plant life around him.

We could conclude from these studies that all living things communicate
with each other through intelligence or morphogenetic fields.  The
implications are staggering.  What each of us learns has the potential
of becoming a message to all humankind and, perhaps, to all other life
forms as well.  Each life has profound significance.

A new question now arises.  If we want to be happy and support a
universe that nurtures such and endeavor, what data would we want to
feed into the human collective?  What would we want to engender and
reinforce?   What gifts of awareness, what deeds, would we want to give
our children, our friends, our lovers, our parents, our community,
humankind, the animals, the plants, even the rocks.

If visualizing can make such an impact on a plant Kal V'Homer, how
much the more so can it make a change in our lives and the lives of
those we love.  We read today and yesterday the awe inspiring
paragraphs of B'rosh Hashana Yicateyvun, on Rosh HaShana it is written
and on Yom Kippur it is sealed; who will live and who will die.  The
question is who does the writing?  Judaism teaches us that we are
partners with God in creation.  If we are that we are also empowered in
the shaping of our own lives.

Let us take a moment to reflect on what we want for our selves for the
coming year.

Barry Neil Kaufman in his book, Happiness is a Choice, from which the
plant story was also taken, shares some lists that people have
written.  The Idea of asking people to write such a list came from an
elementary school teacher who shared the results of a revealing survey
of her third graders.  The pupils put trips to the amusement park, the
latest LEGO set, space travel, dolls that talked, a new bicycle, longer
gym periods, no more home work and a fanciful array of video games.

High School students, when asked the same question responded that they
wanted to be popular, to have a boy or girl friend, to excel in sports,
to get a drivers license, to have longer vacations, to have attractive
clothes and to get into a good college.  One student said that she
wanted an exciting life.  Another indicated he wanted to "time
travel."  A similar study of college students revealed desires to have
a car, any car so long as it had wheels, to have sex or more sex, to
get good grades, to have less coursework and more friends.

A group in their mid twenties indicated new wants at the top of their
lists.  A meaningful relationship, a better job, more money and a
comfortable apartment headed their concerns.  People in their forties
focused on still other concerns and issues: they wanted better
relationships with their spouses,  more respectful children, increased
job opportunities as well as increased financial security, less stress
and more personal time.  The wants presented by people in their sixties
revealed new priorities:  Health security respect from others and a
meaningful role in their community.  Sporadically, words like peace,
comfort and even Happiness appeared.

When the surveyors asked some of the list makers Why they wanted a new
bicycle or a driver's license or a better Job or more respect from
their children or improved health, the indicated always that those
events or items would make them happy.  They sought happiness as the
end product of all their wants and striving, yet had failed to mention
directly this critical concern which underlay all others.  If we work
so hard to make money, to have a relationship and to beautify our
bodies because we believe any one of those accomplishments (or others
we might itemize_ would bring us happiness, we are clearly pointing to
the ultimate feeling or experience we seek.  Why then put mountains in
our way?

We can choose to arrive at the goal of happiness now, to make it a
priority in our lives.  How we respond to situations around us in not
written in stone, rather we can choose our reactions.  We can choose to
be connected to our feelings and to be rooted in a sense of gratitude
and peace.

Barry Kaufman gives several shortcuts to happiness in his book.  The
first is to make happiness a priority,  not an end product as described
by the list makers above.  Make the choice to be happy with who you are
and what you have now.

The second shortcut is personal authenticity, opening ourselves to be
as enchanted by the world as a small child and to admit to ourselves
what we really feel.  This also means letting go of behaviors and
friends who limit us and want us to be something we are not.

Shortcut three is Letting go of Judgments.  Judgements about people and
possibilities limit our thinking and what we might try to accomplish.
With the very best of intentions we try to use judgements as powerful
tools to help safeguard ourselves and those we love.  We fail to
attempt things we think of as impossible because we have prejudged
ourselves as failures.  Much of the Kaufmans work has been with
families with special children.  He share numerous stories of children
who have grown lightyears beyond what medical science said they were
capable of because of a willingness to suspend judgement about what was
possible.

The fourth shortcut is being there in the moment.  My husband noticed a
change in my behavior after I read this book, and it was because I was
making a conscious effort to put this chapter into practice.  I have a
tendency to do to many things at once.  I tend to think about what
still has to be done while I am talking with someone or doing something
else.  The result is not only an erosion of the quality of
interactions, but also missing relevant information and the pleasure of
the experience  Kaufman says that Unhappiness does not exist in the
present moment!  Though at first glance this statement might appear to
be preposterous, the underlying insight creates this shortcut.
Unhappiness exists only as a reflection or regret about the past or as
an anticipation or worry toward the future.  It does not exist right
now, in this moment... If we stay in this moment.

The fifth shortcut is being Grateful.  By making happiness the priority
we realize that we have much to be grateful for already.  Yes I may be
happy when the budget is not so tight, but I am also happy now.  I have
a warm and wonderful relationship with my husband, we have a roof over
our heads and food on the table.  We have many blessings to count in
the friends we have and in our families.  Kaufman says, we can cut
through all the misery by turning our attention to being grateful.  In
spite of all the catastrophes that might occur, we can find in little
and big was bottomless wellsprings for our thankfulness.  Gratitude
then becomes the shortest of all shortcuts to happiness.

The final Shortcut encompasses all the others, Deciding to be Happy.
Deciding to prioritize happiness, to be authentic, present, grateful
and non judgemental are, in essence, just different ways of deciding to
be happy.   By deciding to be happier and to dispense with our
unhappiness, we acknowledge our  capacity to choose our beliefs and
feelings as well as to take a directorial role in guiding our responses
to events and people  with a clear and conscious intention.  Changing
ourselves by decision reminds us that we can go directly to the
experience of happiness and love.  We can create a reason, like
gratitude, to put ourselves in such an internal place. or in a manner
of speaking, we can claim the experience we want.

I wish for all of us as we write ourselves in the book of life in the
coming year that we should write ourselves in for happiness, for
gratitude and for peace.  

Shana Tova.

Rabbi Susan Gulack



--
Bruce Nelson                            | Phone: (716) 726-7890
Rochester Distributed Computer Services | Internet: nelson@kodak.com
Eastman Kodak Company                   |
Rochester, NY 14653-5221                |
Newsgroups: soc.culture.jewish,soc.culture.polish