Still, Small Voice in Elul

I was born 5 and a half weeks early - today, “moderately preterm”, my mother recalls how doctors at the Texas teaching hospital hovered over her during final laboring, casually debating my survival stats. With no dedicated ‘preemie ward’, I was brought home within days and tucked tight beneath a warming light – I slept soundly, barely cried. My early arrival anointed me as the extroverted Leo FireSign in the Hebrew month of Av – rather than the intended Rosh Hashanah eve of Elul. An early memory of crouching behind my mom’s skirt at a social gathering personified a mouse’s squeak, not Leo Lion’s roar.

The biblical quote ‘kol d’mama dakah’- “A still small voice was heard” from Malachim - Kings, adorned my homemade birth announcement; my parents intuited it would befit me, and I was quiet, blessed with a rich inner life of creativity and imagination. While I loved my still, small voice, my teen years brought a desire for what seemed of higher social currency – a magnetic outer voice. Scanning the self-help section at a Grand Central Terminal bookstore on the commute home from school, a book caught my eye - “The Confidence Quotient: 10 Steps to Conquer Self-Doubt”. I gently and steadily coached myself to inhabit the voice of teacher, actor, and ultimately, leader.

“Kol D’mama Daka” – still, small voice describes God addressing the prophet Elijah mountainside. Even as God could be still and small, loud held greater allure, because while God’s quiet voice was heard, this is an isolated incident of soft, impactful voice. For example, this week’s Parsha, Ki Tavo spotlights Moshe addressing the people of Israel as charismatic, bold authority figure: “command[ing] the people, saying, ‘Observe all of the commandments that I command you this day’” A litany of directives, and consequences for breaching them. "Pay attention and listen, O Israel!” Ki Tavo reads as an ancient playbook in performative leadership – “carry a big stick” “the buck stops here” -what we associate with confidence. One might assume Moshe always possessed this verbal agility, but a rewind to Moshe encountering God at the Burning Bush presents otherwise - a scared, cowering man proffering a laundry list of excuses for opting out:

• “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?”
• “What will I say to them?”
• “They will not believe me”
• “They will not listen to my voice”
• Finally, pleading - “I am not a man of words”
  

Burning Bush Moshe almost missed his call to leadership - mired in self-doubt - what we today term as future forecasting, “anticipatory anxiety” – a cascade of WHAT Ifs as to whether his voice could be heard. In his book Be Still and Get Going, Rabbi Alan Lew suggests that Moshe’s “WHAT IFS” were a harmful stillness - a paralysis holding him back from his potential. How many of us miss our own inner callings, held back by WHAT Ifs – manufactured fears of our own making? Hebrew has many different words for fear, with nuanced meanings and valences. Lew posits that Moshe was steeped in PACHAD - the afraid of tightened throat, conjuring worst-case scenarios.

In contrast, seasoned-leader Moshe is infused with NORAH, a word for fear that Lew names as “overcome[ing] us when we suddenly find ourselves in possession of considerably more energy than we are used to”. We might experience NORAH at a wedding or birth; in nature; in a synagogue sanctuary. What Moshe experienced in receiving the Ten Commandments, on Mount Sinai. The shiver of Norah signals that we are at a precipice of something wonderfully expansive, and it’s time to take the leap.

Our extroverted culture leads us to incorrectly conclude that outer voice has elevated value - STILLNESS can be a potent tool for self-actualization, to becoming the best versions of ourselves. Differentiation between pachad and norah helps us to reframe “still small voice” as an extremely powerful and transformative QUIET that supports us in moving through the “What’s If” clouding internal clarity. This frame of pachad and norah stretches the span of mighty and effective voice far beyond leadership, tiktok influencer, social butterfly; it is what coach Tara Mohr names as “Playing Big” - the clarity and acting upon inner knowing, stepping into the unique calling that each of us has, right-sized, individualized and tailored for us.

We are in Elul, leading up to the HHD, termed as YAMIM NO’RAIM – days of awe - with “Norah” –expansive, awesome FEAR - baked into the season we are invited to embrace “still, small, voice” as a precious toolkit for introspection - rituals and practices supporting relational repair. Last week, over 250 Central congregants showed up for one another in-person and online in Elul Circles, a methodology designed for active listening. Participants relayed the deep, transformative impact of simply sitting still, witnessing and hearing others’ intense emotions in approaching the high holidays, naming both their PACHAD/fears and aspirations for transformation in their relationships:

• The anticipated PACHAD of rejection, to say I’m sorry to a loved one
• the imagined PACHAD of shaming or embarrassment, to send a condolence card even if months late,
• the constricting PACHAD of loss for words, having that tough conversation with a parent, child, sibling, spouse, friend, colleague
  

Our Jewish practices for High Holiday preparation remind us that no matter how loud we are in our daily lives, our quiet, still, clear inner voice is right there waiting to propel us forward toward expansive NORAH, the biggest, authentic version of ourselves that is filled with vibrancy and energy – in Elul, and beyond. In this rarely sleepy city, I treasure early morning weekend walks; in the calm, I gain clarity. Where will each of us take up the charge of Still Small Voice this Elul season? What practices will support us in being heart-led? As we lean into the quiet, we can trust that we will hear the messages that we need to hear, becoming the compass leading us to deeper connection and relationship.