My Birthday Wish for You

On the 21st day of the Hebrew month of Tamuz, I celebrated my birthday. On that day, I was informed by one of my patients that one could give brachot (blessings) to others on his Hebrew birthday. Now I’ve heard of Chassidic rebbeim giving brachot, and Holocaust survivors, and brides and grooms on their wedding day giving brachot, but I had never heard of an average person giving a bracha to others on his birthday. I began reflecting on what kind of bracha I would give to another person, and that reflecting led me down an interesting path.

Recently, I watched baseball’s All-Star game in the Kansas City Royals’ stadium. I lived in Kansas City while studying at Cleveland Chiropractic College, so I’ve always had an affinity for that team and their stadium. So while I was touched with nostalgia to watch the game, I was also intrigued to learn the biography of this year’s all-star game MVP, Melky Cabrera. Cabrera has bounced around to a number of teams. He began with the Yankees, but got into some trouble. He was traded and had to overcome his addiction to alcohol to gain his new team’s trust. Cabrera played for the Royals (called by one newspaper “the purgatory of baseball”) before being traded to the Giants and being selected as an MLB all-star and the game’s MVP. Cabrera’s unique voyage from baseball’s top to bottom to top again spun the gears of my mind.

Another recent experience got my wheels spinning. I reconnected, via Facebook, with a classmate of mine from Chiropractic College whom I had not spoken to since 1984. After catching up and hearing about his practice, his family, and his successes (including his meeting LeBron James during the Heat’s finals victory), he said, “You know, Jeff, you’d be proud of me. Every Tuesday evening, I learn Torah with a Chabad Rabbi.” I was so touched that this long-lost friend’s recollection of me from over twenty years ago connected me to learning Torah; I was really pleased to see the effect I had on my classmates and colleagues.

In sharing these stories with my oldest son, who just ended his latest job search to secure a new position with a non-profit organization, he mentioned how much this connects to one’s job search. When building a resume and interviewing, he told me, a job seeker needs to “connect the dots” and make sense of all the stops along his career journey. Interviewers, he said, want to see that one’s story makes sense and that a candidate has both confidence and ownership over his individual story. We discussed the upcoming parsha of Matos-Ma’asei that delineates B’nai Yisrael’s 42 stops in the desert over their forty-year journey. Chazal teach that we can learn from this parsha the importance of knowing where we have been as we head to where we are destined to go. Furthermore, the Zohar teaches that when a soul reaches the celestial court at its life’s end, the soul is asked if it has achieved “shlaymut”—wholeness; essentially, did the soul accomplish its mission on Earth.

These teachings, this parsha, these recent experiences, and this discussion with my son solidified for me what I would bless another with on my next Hebrew birthday. Wholeness, the quest for each soul on the planet, is related to “connecting the dots” and making sense of the vastness of one’s personal experiences. Melky Cabrera could only regain his elevated position after battling his demons; my classmate from Chiropractic College connects with his Judaism and with me by extension in order to bring wholeness to his life; my son and millions of job seekers make sense of their experiences as they procure new jobs; B’nai Yisrael needed to reflect on their many stops in the desert before they could enter Eretz Yisrael. My birthday bracha to others is this: may we all be zoche (merit) to see very soon the interconnectedness of our experiences, may we understand how all of the different “pit stops” in our lives have led us to where we are now, and may we gain the clarity to see how where we have been and where we are now will lead us to where we are meant to be. If you like this bracha, make sure to find me on the 21st of Tamuz 5773.