advotproject

[advotproject]

Anxiety

On a recent trip, I became riddled with anxiety.

I couldn’t sleep, I couldn't eat, and I started to drown in the “I could have, I should have, I would have. Why didn’t I? I can’t. I want to.” 

It got a little out of control.

It ruined the vacation, not only for me, but for my family as well. The thing about anxiety is that she doesn’t ask permission to come hang out. She appears uninvited and rips through you with no rhyme or reason. She becomes a voice in your head, a knot in your stomach and the reason your eyes stay wide open and make your nights sleepless.

A good friend told me that anxiety is our bodies telling us that we need to do something. Anxiety is here to push us into motion. Anxiety is a calling card to pay attention to things you might have on the back burner or shoved behind the closed door.

A different friend said: “Your heart will crack open with anxiety because the things inside have to come out.” 

I don’t know about that. 

I do know it took me a while to get back into balance. I know we need to take anxiety seriously. We must listen to her and do something so that she does not come back harder next time. Anxiety does not like it when we do not pay attention. I say this as a person who is not often visited by anxiety, but when anxiety comes, she comes with a vengeance. I really don’t know how people tolerate her on a regular basis.

“Ms.,” he said. “I have been coming to your class since 2015.”

The class is an anger management class that I teach at Homeboy Industries.

“I have been in and out, locked up and out again. This shit is slow and hard.”

“Yes, it is,” I say. 

Someone says, “That should be on a T-shirt about life. ‘Life is slow and hard.’” Everyone laughs. Then someone adds, “‘Anxiety is a motherfucker’ should be on the back of that shirt. Life is slow and hard, and anxiety is a motherfucker. Kinda’ sums it up, Ms. Doesn’t it?”

I smile and say, “Not really. You know, between the slow and the hard is beauty and joy.” 

“Okay, now you are talking like the self-help books,” he said to me.

“What do you have to say about anxiety, Ms.?” He waits for me to answer.

“She is a motherfucker,” I say. They all laugh. I typically don’t swear in class. My students do that more than enough. 

They are surprised by my answer. 

“Ms, what about anxiety? What can we do about it?” he asked again.

 “What do you do about it?” he asks. 

“I listen to her,” I responded.

“Don’t go doing that, Ms. Anxiety is like a bad Homie who comes to visit you, makes you feel like shit and then leaves you to question your fucking existence. My advice is ignore that fucking Homie. Know you’re better than that. Know you’ve made choices that have nothing to do with the Homie. I don’t know. Be careful of the Homies that pull you down.”

“No, no,” someone said. “Anxiety is the good Homies coming to say, ‘Motherfucker, get back on the path. Don’t stray. Do the right thing.’”

They all wait for me to weigh in on this.

“I’m getting anxious from this conversation,” I say and laugh. “I’m not sure if anxiety is good or bad.” I pause. “She is kind of a constant that comes and goes,” I tell them.

“Honestly,” I add, “sadly, I don’t have deep advice. I do know that we must listen to her.”

“Fuck that!” someone says. “Ignore it! Say, ‘Hey, I see you. I got you,’ and then figure out what the fuck you’re gonna do about all of the shit, then fucking go do it. It’s like the dude said. Life is fucking slow and fucking hard. That’s the T-shirt. Life is hard. Life is slow. Goddamn anxiety! She is a motherfucker.”

I stand there and think to myself: I don’t have deep wisdom about all of this. I wish I did.

I tell them how I, too, struggle with sleepless nights. They find that hard to believe. I promise them I do. Oh yes, I do. I share with them that I try to breathe, to meditate.

I do all the things they say will help. I’m not huge on medication, but some people swear by it. “What I do know,” I tell them, “is to lean into the people that are close to me. I know that I am lucky to have a village that I can cry, kvetch and share my burdens with.” I teach my class what the word “kvetch” means. They say, “That’s Jewish for bitching. It’s like ketchup and bitch together,” someone says.

I add, “The people who love me remind me of who I am, they tell me that I am more than that annoying anxiety bitch who comes to visit.” 

Again, they love that I use a curse word.

My beloved older brother, who is my safe place to fall apart and the collector of my tears, always tells me, “Nomsalach, remember what John Lennon said, ‘Everything will be okay in the end. If it is not okay, it is not the end.’

I share this with my students. They think that’s funny. Funny and deep.

I tell them to breathe and talk to someone who loves them.

I tell them to think of one thing they can do to take action. Action might not make anxiety leave, but it will definitely make it harder for her to stay.

[advotproject]

Legacy

My late father was the director of a sleepaway camp. He is a legend at that camp. Somewhere in the early 70’s, he moved the camp to a new location.

Til this day, fifty years later, we still call the camp “the new camp,” and we call the old camp “the old camp,” even though the old camp is now a development of condos and not a camp anymore. Recently, I was at the annual fundraiser for our beloved camp. I was overwhelmed by what my father’s actions and dreams had accomplished. I felt his presence that night and wondered if this would have made him feel content. Funny thing about legacy, we want it but don’t always have the privilege to see it or

experience it in its glory. 

“Ms.,” she asked me. “What is a legacy? My case manager told me I should think about what kind of legacy I want to leave behind me.”

She added, “I dunno. I don’t want to leave nothing behind. I want to be here, now, and tomorrow.” 

As usual, my students are more profound than I could ever be.

“Girl, think about how you want to be remembered,” someone said.

“What would you want your kids to think about when they think about you?” someone asked. 

“Nothing!” she said. “I want to be with my kids. Don’t want to NOT be with them. Don’t want them to fucking think about me. I want them to be with me,” she said. “You hear me? I want to be clean. I don’t want to be locked up. I want to be present. That is my legacy, being here!” 

It got quiet.

She looked at me and asked, “Ms., can that be my legacy?”

“Your legacy can be whatever you want it to be. It is yours!” I answer.

This woman was locked up for a long time. So much time lost. So much time to make up. I get it. Who wants to imagine not being here when you have been away for so long? After class, the woman came up to me.

“Ms., I can’t have no legacy ‘cause I wasn’t here. I just got out.”

She is so beautiful. Real. She IS a legacy of her own.

“Your legacy is happening right now. Don’t worry about it. It happens from the dreams you have and the people you love.”

My father had great dreams. He had ideals. He wanted things for other people. He had deep beliefs. His beliefs have lived on and grown to become so much bigger than I am sure he could ever have imagined. In the crazy way life works, I have the privilege to witness them and see my children live to be part of his vision. So it is with legacy. It turns into what we cannot imagine.

“Ms., can I have a simple legacy? Does it have to be big?”

I look at this woman. She has lived through so much and is trying so hard.

She is living proof that we are more than the mistakes we have made and that a legacy is what we choose it to be.

“You are your legacy. You are living it by just being you. I want to be like you,” I tell her. 

“Ms., stop playing. That is shit talk.”

“No,” I say. “It is legacy talk.” 

“I guess I have one now.” She smiles.

“Yup, you do.” We share a long hug.

 Happy holidays, friends!

Live your legacy. Be present.

Please know it is so much simpler than we make it out to be.

Let 2023 lead you to who and what you want to be, and be proud, even if you make some mistakes on the way. 

That is your legacy.

[advotproject]

Seasons

My office is in the building where my three children went to preschool. Last week I spent a long day working and finally left the office at 7:30 in the evening. As I was leaving the building, I saw there was a meet and greet and welcome for new preschool parents. Standing outside in the courtyard was one of the teachers who taught all three of my children from age two until they went to kindergarten. Around her were about 50 young, new parents. They looked excited, worried, and nervous all at the same time. As I was walking toward the exit, I waved to the teacher who was my daughters’ teacher. She leaned over to a group of moms and said, “I had all three of her girls. She was pregnant when she brought the first one in.” I added, “I was breast-feeding when I brought the second one in.” I couldn’t resist. I walked over, pulled out my phone, and showed recent photos of my absolutely stunning three grown girls. Oh, the seasons! They come. They go. Time stops for no one.

To be honest when I look at the photos I am not sure how I got from A-to-Z. The young moms look at my phone in disbelief. I remember when I was their age and my girls were little, I would look at people who had teenagers and think “My kids will never grow up. I will never live to see my children become teenagers.” Honestly? I thought I would be buried with a diaper bag. So many years I schlepped that big bag around containing diapers, extra clothes, snacks, art supplies and what not! Now I walk into stores holding my phone that has a little pocket in back where I keep my credit card and my license. It has been over a decade since I had to carry a diaper bag.

“Ms.,” he said. “I feel like the transition home is worse than jail. I’m supposed to be free but yet I’m still locked up. They check my bag when I come in. They frisk me down. This is not what I thought it would be.”

“Well,” I said to him “What is the place called?” He tells me the name of the place. “No, no, no,” I say to him. “What did you just call it? A transition home?”

“Yeah.,” he answers. 

I said, “It is a transition home. You are in transition. This is not going to be forever!”

“You’re damn right, Girl,” he says to me. “Ain’t nothing forever. Everything got a timestamp on it!”

Ten years ago, Zev Yaroslavsky, then LA County Supervisor, funded a program in a lock up facility in Malibu. Every Thursday I would drive up the coast to the detention camp, me and my bag of puppets and theater supplies to serve a group of young men. That is where The Advot Project was born.

Ten years later I have trained ten facilitators to implement our Listen-Act-Change curriculum that began a decade ago as Relationships 101. We are in six lock up facilities, serving youth in more than ten different groups. We are in community centers, after school programs and high schools. It is hard. It is demanding. It is amazing. It is exhilarating and wonderful. Like being unable to picture my children’s development, I couldn’t imagine The Advot Project’s growth. Every time I stepped into one of the detention facilities, my life changed a little. I changed. I have had the great privilege of seeing youth turn their life around, change their destiny, and become.

On October 30th, we will be celebrating a decade of impact at the Kirk Douglas Theater in Culver City in a presentation called, “Step into the Light.”

For 10 years we have been giving youth tools to step out of the shadows and into the light. I hope you will join us for an evening filled with the joy of hearing, seeing, and experiencing our magnificent youth: Listen! Act! Change! Join the ripple.

With deep appreciation for your support and partnership,

Naomi Ackerman

Founder / Executive Director

[advotproject]

Mistakes

We all make mistakes. We all do things wrong. We calculate things in a way that later

we realize should've been different. The question is, what are you to do when you realize you have made a mistake?

I didn’t make the best plans this summer. Nothing went the way I thought it would

and/or wanted. I miscalculated some things. I made a few mistakes, nothing huge, no

one is hurt. But these are things that keep me up at night. These things make me

anxious and, to be honest, sometimes the stupid silly mistakes make me feel like a

serious failure. I ask myself “How could I have not thought about that? Why did I do

this? How did I not know?” 

It’s funny how one wrong choice about something not that important will erase years of accomplishment. It will erase the prizes and the acknowledgements. It doesn’t matter how good or talented I know I am; when I make a wrong choice or a mistake, even something trivial, I immediately feel like the biggest loser alive.

I work with people who have made very big mistakes.

I work with people who make mistakes that are irreversible.

I work with people who had to pay very high prices for the mistakes they made.

I am inspired again and again by the massive sizes of their hearts, the humility and the

ways they deal with their shame regarding the mistakes that they made.

I am a sucker for accountability. What I love the most about my students is the way they

own their shit. It leaves me in complete and utter awe again and again!

Many of my peers will not own the silliest of their mistakes. They will sugar coat,

gaslight or pretend they didn’t happen. Then, there are my brilliant students who, in

complete transparency, share their stories, share their business, hold their truths and

share them. 

“I am my worst enemy, Ms.” he told me.

“I have so much trauma and then I did all this stuff. I get in my head and it’s not pretty.”

“Well,” I say, “it doesn’t need to always be pretty.”

“Oh, Ms.” he tells me, “This is motherfucking ugly as ass.”

“So, let it be ugly” I say.

“Ms., I go hating myself.”

“Well, sometimes we don’t like ourselves. Sometimes I really don’t like myself either

and I hate the mistakes I make” I tell him.

“Ms.” He looks at me, “Seriously? You are not supposed to like your mistakes. If you did,

then they wouldn’t be mistakes. Do you know anyone who likes their mistakes?” he

laughs.

“Ms., you told us that our mistakes do not define us,” someone said.

“True,” I say,

“So, why you go hating your mistakes?” she added.

I smile.

I speak often about the need to be accepting of other people’s mistakes. How we must

not judge them and look at the whole story, not just one page of that story.

 Circumstances matter. I don’t talk enough about accepting our own mistakes and letting go of the “coulda shoulda woulda.” Instead, think and focus on how now you will do things differently.

“The problem is those damn mistakes eat you. They burn and sting and you really can’t

do anything about dem feelings, except maybe down a bottle of tequila.”

“Girl,” someone says out loud “that don’t do shit!”

“Well,” I say, “you need to let it burn, sting, and feel like shit and then it will sting less and burn a little less and you will feel better every day that goes by.”

“I will never get over what I did.” He said “My mistake is part of me, it sits here on my

shoulder and is just there. I did it, it was wrong; it doesn’t matter that I was high and

gang banging. I did a bad thing, it was wrong and that wrong is now my friend, a friend

that taught me the most important lessons in life, and I try to find gratitude in that.”

I let that sink in for a moment.

“I think that is the work. Find the lesson, learn from the mistake” I say.

“Ms., you need to be grateful for the mistakes and don’t hate yourself because of them,

love yourself because you survived them.”

I look at this man. He has tattoos across his face. He was locked up for three decades.

He is wise and kind and I absolutely adore him more than I can say in words.

I know society will not be forgiving.

I doubt many people will have the privilege of time with him and/or have the chance to

hear his profound manifesto.

People will judge him by his mistake. What a darn shame.

He is so and I mean so much more than anything he did in the past.

He is gentle. He is intelligent and so incredibly, incredibly generous.

What a terrible, huge mistake to not give him the space and chance he not only deserves but has every right to.

[advotproject]

In Place

The last few years have been crazy. Throughout this pandemic, life has been stressful and intense. So many days nothing seems to be right. I have so many questions. Am I living in the right place? Am I a good enough mom? Why am I doing this work? Why have I made the choices I have made, and on and on and on. 

Then there are these moments. I'll be sitting in the car. My kids are all good. The route that I am driving on happens to be beautiful. Things at work are working out and there's a feeling of contentment that everything is exactly the way it is supposed to be. Everything is in place. 

The feeling doesn't always last for long, but when it's there, there's something so calming about it. It's not happiness or elation. It is a composed, relaxed feeling of things coming together. And then there is insight into why things happened. Suddenly everything that made no sense makes sense. What I love the most in those moments is the understanding of why I had to go through that. 

“Ohhh,” I think to myself, “That happened so this could happen. Now I get it …” It is looking at the puzzle and seeing all the pieces fit together. Everything is in its place.

The thing about things being in place is that we get greedy. We want things to be in place for good. The truth is in order for things to be in place there has to be a lot of motion prior. Things actually need to move around. There inevitably has to be confusion and some distress in order for things to fall into their place.

“Ms.,” she said to me. “Sometimes it feels like my place is in the camps.” (She meant the LA county probation detention camps.) “I can’t find my place on the outs.” (Outs is what they call the outside world.) This was said to me by a young woman years ago.

She participated in my group multiple times because she kept coming back to the detention facility, the “camp.” It didn’t help that she was always sent back to the place she came from, a place that was not caring, loving, or safe. That place was filled with drugs, crime, and chaos. This place, the camps, took her freedom but also gave her shelter and food. The world can be a really messed up place sometimes.

Another student of mine struggled desperately when she finally graduated high school and started at a local community college. “I can’t find my place,” she told me.

And then she cried “I feel so out of place.” I remember my heart sinking when she told me that. I knew her days in that college were numbered.  

“I don’t know what to do, Ms.,” she said. “How do I find my place? How do I get things to be in place?” 

I felt incredibly guilty with her struggle in college. We pushed hard for her to go there. I wasn’t sure we prepared her enough. 

One of my mentors told me, “It’s not your place, Nomi, to feel guilty. A fish out of water has to figure out how to swim!” 

“What?” Frustrated, I said to her, “They are out of the water! A fish out of water can’t swim.”

“Nomi, as a creative person you are thinking small. Find a new source of water. Renew. Evolve. Find your new place.” 

In this life of mine, I have been lucky to have been pushed hard by mentors that make me think out of the box and sometimes beyond my understanding. Finding your place means you might move to another place or you might feel out of place until that place is your place.

I see so many displaced kids. They don’t belong. They don’t “fit,” primarily because they have never been loved unconditionally. I think loving and being loved makes you belong and, ultimately, makes a place become your place. I see youth that don’t have food, don’t have clothes, don’t have the basics. I mean the basic things to feel safe. If you don’t feel safe, you cannot feel in place. The truth is for things to be in place, you do not need a lot. It is not about huge success or money. Being okay is enough for things to be in place. Really? Okay is enough. Okay should be enough.

“Ms., you know why this is my place?” she asked me. “Cause here I can dream. You feel me? When I sleep, I can dream about all the things I want to do.” She smiled at me.“Can’t you dream when you are not here?” I asked her. “Nope,” she says. “My mind be busy thinking about what I got to do, who is behind my back and I can’t find my dreams.” She laughs. “Here, they come to me.”

I think about what she says. Not everyone who is locked up feels like that. I love that in that place, a place that to me is depressing and harsh, dreams can come to her. I have to say that some of the places The Advot Project is working in right now are far from a place anyone wants to be in. I cannot imagine any dream coming to anyone there, but that is a different story. 

When she said that to me, I put my hand around her and said, “You can always dream.” 

She looked at me. “Yeah, guess so, Ms. Just need to keep people out of my head.” 

“That’s right,” I tell her.

After a few weeks of everything being in place in my world, I get a text that one of my daughters, who is on a summer trip, tested positive for Covid. Just like that. Things fall out of place. “It will be okay,” I tell her. We work our network. We get everything in place for her to be as comfortable as she can be. I remind myself that it could be worse, and that okay can sometimes be enough.

I know how fragile this world is. I also know how unkind the world can be. I have learned and am reminded every day how lucky and privileged I am. My work teaches me to keep things in proportion and have perspective in the deepest of ways.

In the moments in time that things in my life are in place, I thank God again and again. I know how lucky I am. For this, I am deeply grateful.

Things cannot be in place all the time. So, for those of us who are lucky to have things in place, enjoy it when you have it. Be grateful. Do not take it for granted. But seriously, when things are in place, know you have been blessed.

[advotproject]

Magic

We all want magic in our life. We want things to miraculously happen. We want change to be bestowed upon us by the whoosh of a hand or the drop of a hat. This past month, magic came to visit me multiple times, unannounced by simply showing up and making my heart sing. 

It started in a place that I know to be magical called Creative Visions. Creative Visions is run by goddesses whose magical power is in their beautiful intentions, their support, and their faith in people doing the work. Did I mention love?

Oh, so much love.

Earlier this month, I had the privilege of attending an event there. At the end of the event, totally unplanned, they gave a former student of mine who was there with me a platform to be seen and heard. What can I say?

It was magic. As I was leaving the event, I was thinking that magic happens when you have an open heart. Magic happens not when someone else does something for you, but when you are an active part of the spell.

Magic is connected to faith and being open to taking a chance.

It also became clear to me that day that vulnerability and magic are best friends. When you open yourself and are vulnerable, that is usually when magic shows up to save the day.

The month has been filled with culminations at all of our sites.

To say it was magical would belittle the courage and beauty of our students.

It wouldn’t or couldn't come close to describing the magic of the kid who had never participated previously and who read an amazing, very personal poem about himself. Or the flash mob where the girls danced in the middle of the show, or the Spanish-speaking English learners doing an improv scene in English.

And Probation not only did everything we asked for but then they did some more by decorating the gym and blowing up balloons.

I could go on and on. There was fierce magic in every one of these culminations. Then again, for me, theater is always magic.

“Sometimes when I was locked up, Ms., I’d think me I need some magic to get out of that fucking hole,” a student once told me. “I would dream of a lady who would come and get my ass out of there. I kept thinking of this. I’d pray for a miracle to make dem bars go away.” He became quiet.

“Years I kept thinking about the magic. Then I did the work, I connected to my faith and I used the time to do better, be better. I made the magic, Ms. Me and God. We made the magic happen.” It got very quiet in the room.

“You were horny, Man. That’s why you were dreaming of some magic lady.”

Everyone laughed.

“You are magic,” I said.

“Me and God, Ms. Me and God,” he said.

My students’ faith in God never ceases to amaze me and humble me at the same time.

This past week I dropped one of my daughters off in Yosemite. She is going on a two-week adventure there. After we said goodbye and she was off with the group, I took a few hours to walk around the park. I truly think nature is God’s magic. It is here to remind us every day that the impossible can be possible.

I took in the breathtaking nature around me.

I hiked up to a waterfall and somehow ended up on the path to the chapel.

The chapel was locked. I sat on the stairs and just looked out to the spectacular Yosemite Mountains. I sat for a while thinking about the magic of this month.

I took a long, deep breath.

There is a lot of work to do. So much magic to create.

I close my eyes. I breathe in the sweet smell of nature and I pray.

I pray for the magic.

I pray for strength.

I pray for the magic of faith when there is no reason to believe.

I pray for optimism because you have to be optimistic to believe in magic.

I think of W.B. Yeats who so wisely said, “The world is full of magic things, patiently waiting for our senses to grow sharper.”

I sharpen my senses and take in all the magic around me.

[advotproject]

A Lot

I am an emotional human. I have big emotions. I care a lot. I do a lot. I live a lot. I react a lot. I love a lot. I give a lot. I can hate a lot. I can be a lot…… 

Yeah, people have said I can really be a lot.

I was recently visiting someone who is sick. I was struck by how different they are than what I was told they are. This friend sadly is terminally ill. That, in itself, is really a lot.  

Her spouse is a friend of mine. The spouse was very dramatic, sharing the current situation of the sick friend and how they are doing at this moment. When I got there to visit, it was much less intense and extreme than I had been told.  I told my sick friend I was happy to see that they were doing okay and that I had understood that things were much worse. My friend said, “Yeah, she can be a lot,” referring to her wife.

“She projects her feelings about my illness onto my illness.” She laughed. “It’s a lot, but it’s okay.” We both laughed and then cried.  

Funny what we make into reality. Our fears make more of what is or what isn’t.

We create unnecessary drama when it is not there. 

Maybe we need drama. Maybe it serves something else we need. Even I, who am a known drama queen, will admit the drama is never really

about what the drama is about. It comes from so many other emotions and things going on.

One of the biggest lessons I have learned from my students is the non-dramatic way they tell me the most dramatic things as a matter of fact. 

This is what happened to me. This is what I am doing. 

No drama, just “saying it how it is” as my homies tell me. The things they tell me could make me have over the top reactions, major drama, hyperventilate, lie on the floor, not function, reactions. 

“Ms., when they took my kids…”

“Ms., I was locked up for 38 years…”

“You know, Ms., at that time, I was strung out on drugs…”

“I was homeless for a few years, living on the streets…”

“They stabbed me and then shot me…” 

My students have given me the biggest lesson in humility. 

Man, what humility. They have given me perspective. A lesson in what is really important.

In class I was leaning on the table and it broke. Everyone laughed, including me. It was dorky and funny. It wasn’t a big deal. One of my favorite students stayed after class. 

“Ms., you really okay? You looked scared when the table broke.” She looked concerned. 

“I’m fine. Nothing happened really,” I add laughing.  “It was kinda funny.”  

“Yeah,” she said. “Sometimes when we hurt, we say it’s funny or we laugh, but for real we are in pain. You in pain, Ms.?” she asked me.

I look at this beautiful woman. Her neck is covered in tattoos.

I know for a fact her kids do not live with her. She has suffered in her life more than six people put together. I look at her and I think of a sentence I heard somewhere. 

“People should be given tools to manage their trauma rather than be punished for actions they did as a result of their trauma.”

She looked sad, so I asked her, “Are you okay?” 

“I got a lot going on,” she tells me. She is quiet. 

I wait. I have learned not to push, not to pull, but to wait quietly for them to tell me.

“Ms., it’s a real lot.” 

“That’s okay,” I tell her. I don’t know how God is always good to me and gives me the grace of time when someone wants to tell me something.

She shares with me that she is expecting again.

She tells me she is scared.

She tells me she has not been clean long enough to have another baby. 

She tells me she cannot tell the father. 

She shares a lot with me.

I listen. I am careful with what I tell her.

We sit near my car. I share phone numbers and websites. I tell her she has options.

Thank God we are in California. I tell her that when things are a lot, you need to divide and conquer.

“What does that mean?” 

“You divide and separate. You look and process each thing that is going on. Don’t try to figure everything out all together all at once.” 

I then tell her, “You know how in English you say ‘one day at a time’?” “Yeah,” she says. 

“Well in Hebrew we say ‘yom yom shah shah.’ That means day by day, hour by hour.”

She laughs out loud. “Ms., that is dope. Nothing can be a lot for one hour.” 

“I am not sure about that,” I say. “It took me less than five minutes to fall flat on my ass.”

She smiles. “Yom yom shah shah.”  Then she says, “Look at me speaking me some Jewish!”

Sometimes we can deal with a lot by a little diversion.

It doesn’t make things go away, but it can give us a breather. When there is a lot going on, a breather is sometimes all you need to make the “a lot” manageable.

“Tell me another word in Jewish, Ms.”

“It’s Hebrew,” I tell her.

“Ani yecola.” I teach her.  I explain that it means ‘I can.’

She says it and thinks that the way we say “c” is funny.

We sit quietly and I tell her I have to go.

She looks at me and says, “You made the ‘a lot’ a little less.”

“Good!” I say.

We hug.  I leave. 

As I drive into the LA traffic, I think of all the things that are sitting heavy on my heart and I try to make the “a lot” in my life become a little less as well.

[advotproject]

What if I told you?

One of my friend’s children is not well. They are suffering from severe anxiety and depression. I love this child to no end. They are incredibly special, wise beyond their years, beautiful, kind, and loving. They are also sensitive, with a heart that holds extraordinary love. That love-filled heart is a heavy burden for someone so young, and it is hard on them, oh so hard. I adore the mom more than I can say in words. She is a woman who listens with exceptional attention. On any given day, she can make anyone feel good. I hurt for the pain and fear they are walking through. I know that this is temporary. I know there will be light after this darkness. I believe in them more than words can express.

I recently sat at a culmination of one of our groups and listened to the students read their poetry. The writing prompt was “What if I told you…” 

The students got up and read their work. One by one, they blew me away with their honesty, humor, and vulnerability. As I listened to them read, I drifted off and thought of my friend’s child and how I wanted to say to her, “What if I told you that I know your future is bright?

What if I told you that you are insanely wonderful and I know you will pull through this? 

What if I told you that this is not going to be forever? What if I told you that you were loved to no end?”

A 17-year-old girl stood up. She was beautiful and sweet. She was also 34 weeks pregnant. She was proud and confident and she read a beautiful poem about wanting to end the cycle of single parenthood in her family. She wanted to be the best mommy she could be and she ended the poem with “What if I told you that I am afraid to be a mommy?” Then she added, “What if I told you that I am happy to be afraid?”

I sat with that on my way home. I called my friend. I try to tell her all the things I want to tell her so there will be no what if I didn’t tell her. 

The pregnant young woman is about to graduate. She told me she worked really hard to finish school mid-year so she would be done before the baby came. Ah, “What if I told you, you are brilliant?” I thought when she told me that. 

Then I told her, “That was really smart.”  She looked at me and said, “I know.”

The next day, I was inside a lock up facility. They call it “the compound.” Inside the probation camp, there is a jail inside the jail. It really doesn’t get any darker than that. The guys there all did horrible things. What if I told you that I am sure that horrible things were done to them?  

I tell a story and they make art.

We were sitting around one table drawing, and there were two cleaning people under the table next to us scrubbing the floor. There was a moment when I got up. There was a pause because I went to get something. In the most delicate of moments, the three guys started to gently, oh so gently, speak quietly in Spanish to the man and woman who were scrubbing the floor.

I don’t know what they talked about but in this crazy, cold room, where the metal stools are fixed and bolted to the tables, in this dark room where there is not a ray of outside light, just a stark fluorescent glow, there was the most human, deep connection. 

There was care, humility, and grace between the guys and the couple who were cleaning.

What if I told you that although the system tries to throw these kids away, I believe they are worthy.  My team and I tell them this and make them say it every week.  

I hope they hear us and hear themselves.

I ask the boys to draw their hearts and what’s inside them. One of them draws himself behind bars. Above the heart and around the heart are four faces, each with a bubble coming out of the mouths, saying something simple and funny. 

“I miss you. Come home.”

“Good luck in court. I love you.” 

“Just a couple more years and you got this.”

“These people, Ms., you see them?”  He points to the faces around his heart. “They hold my heart together.” Inside the heart he drew a huge crack. On one side were all the good things: family, homies, and his mom. He also drew the sun. On the other side were all the bad things: hatred, a broken heart, betrayal. He tells me the bad sometimes is more than the good, but he tries to let the sun on the good shine stronger.

What if I told you that my heart was touched when he shared his heart?

“Ms.,” the other one looked at me and said, “My heart is empty.” And he looked away.

“What would you like to fill it with?” I ask him.

 He looked at me. “Ms., don’t go asking me all them feeling questions.”

“Okay.” I tell him. And it gets really quiet.

What if I told you that the strongest feelings are sometimes in the quiet?

On the way home, I think again about my dear friend’s kid and of all things I think, feel and want to say to them.  I realize that I really don’t need to say anything.

I need to be. I need to listen. I need to wait patiently for them, when they are ready to actually tell me.

[advotproject]

Fear or Love

In a recent film called Tick… Tick… Boom!, about the life of the great Jonathan Larson, the question that is asked becomes a theme: “Do we do things out of fear or love?” If you haven’t seen that movie, I strongly recommend it. Actually, run to see it. It is brilliant and Andrew Garfield is absolutely stunning. 

I was listening to the music from the movie and thinking about the question. Fear or love? Am I doing things out of fear or love? As I shepherd my second child towards her driving license, I can tell you I love her dearly, but I am so fearful about her driving. I worry about her driving as a new driver with all the other drivers on the road. While I love her to pieces and I recognize that driving will give her independence, every part of my body is afraid of what could happen, what might happen. 

Fear or love? Interesting to put those two words in the same sentence.

I’ve learned a lot about fear and about love from my magnificent students. The love they have for their people, their community, even the gang, is incredibly impressive. The fear that comes with that love of theirs breaks my heart into a thousand pieces again and again.

Fear or love? Working and raising erratic, hormonal teenagers has taught me an important lesson about the short distance between love, hate, fear, and excitement. Love and fear. The drama in my girls’ high school years has shown me that you can hate someone today, love them tomorrow, and vice versa. Maybe it’s not about loving and hating or being afraid. Maybe it’s more about what’s between them and not wasting the time to make the distance greater, but keeping it smaller.

Ironically, I have learned in this life of mine that we are incredibly afraid of what we love, and I have seen too many people fall in love with what they are afraid of.

Years ago, I was working in a girls’ lock up facility that is now closed. Recently, this facility has been in the news because of a horrible sex scandal that was going on there. This does not surprise me. Reading about it in the LA Times made me sick. While I do not know the specific girls who were brave enough to come forward, I do know so many exactly like them.  I was not there when this was going on, yet I feel guilty, sad, and horrible because shit like this SHOULD NOT HAPPEN! Period. In that same facility they used to send girls to the SHU, pronounced "shoe,” which stands for Security Housing Units. The SHU was a form of solitary confinement where they would be in a room, locked in closed quarters, alone. The nickname for it was also the “box.”

Since my time working there, the SHU has been banned and is no longer allowed, thank goodness. I remember a young woman telling me “Ms., I love the box. But I am also afraid of it.”

This girl was so young. I think it is a much bigger crime that she was detained in that facility, far more serious than any crime she could have ever committed.

“Tell me more,” I gently asked her. 

“Well, I’m afraid to be alone, but I ain’t gonna lie. I also love being alone without all the females around me.” She adds, “You know Ms., I have lived with fear since I can remember. In my first foster home I remember telling myself, ‘Girl, you better love this fear and figure out how not to let it beat you.’ Right then, I decided to love what I am afraid of. The bitch is, sometimes I fucking am afraid of what I love and that ain’t good.”

I remember looking at this child. She was 14 at the time. This was one of the first girls’ groups I taught. I asked her, “What do you do in the box?” “I dream, Ms. I make up songs and I breathe ‘cause I am alone and that is good. But after a while I sometimes get lonely, and then the depression finds me. You know, Ms., everything can turn to shit if you do it for too long.”

“That is very true,” I told her. “I am really sorry,” I added. “I am sorry that they did this to you.” She looked straight at me in shock.

“Why you go being sorry? You didn’t do nothing, Ms.” She was confused.

“I am sorry, because I care about you, and I don’t want you to be afraid.” 

Her eyes got a little teary. “Fear is love, Ms. Don’t worry.”

I worry, Sweet Girl, I thought to myself. Oh, how I worry.

And because I had nothing wise to say I remember sitting quietly and putting my arm around this child so that maybe, just maybe, that day she felt more love than fear.

Eight years later, I am sitting watching this movie and I hear this song.

“Cages or wings? Which do you prefer? Ask the birds Fear or love, baby? Don't say the answer Actions speak louder than words.

What does it take To wake up a generation? How can you make someone Take off and fly?

If we don't wake up And shake up the nation We'll eat the dust of the world Wondering why, why?”

I think of that girl and wonder what happened to her. Did she finally find the love that would ease her fear? Was she one of the girls who, out of fear, closed her eyes and let the people who were supposed to be taking care of her do what they wanted to her? I am incredibly afraid for the youth who are detained in the facilities we work in. I love them; however, now I don’t have direct contact with them because I have an amazing team that works with them. As always, it is my students who teach me the important lessons in life. 

Face your fears with love. Try not to be afraid of what you love.

I add to that prayer. Yes, pray a lot. Pray for yourself. Pray for others.

I truly believe that someone is listening. 

Sometimes it might be you just listening to yourself but that, too, is enough.

Fear or love? What moves YOU forward?

[advotproject]

Goodbyes

I have spent decades of my life saying goodbye to people I love. Family, friends, my parents, and, now, my children.

My oldest graduated from high school and is on a gap year abroad. I have now said goodbye to her twice. It is great to see her spread her wings and there is a feeling of contentment that she is ready to embark on her own journey, but, at the same time, it is not easy to watch her fly. Her flight is absolutely glorious, but it means that she is no longer my little girl and is turning into a spectacular young woman. 

 In Hebrew, when you say goodbye to someone, you say “Le’hitraot” which means “until we meet again.” I know, of course, that my goodbye to my child signifies “until I see you again,” which hopefully will be sooner rather than later. But every time she leaves, I know I am saying goodbye to a chapter of her life and a chapter of our life together that is over. There is something absolutely beautiful about this and yet it makes me feel a little sad. 

 My students constantly share with me the struggles of saying goodbye to their old ways. Goodbye to the gang, to the drugs, to the hustle. They say goodbye to so many things that, although they were not good for them, were once home. It really is not easy. Even the most successful ones tell me how every once in a while the old life calls them back. It is familiar. It is comfortable and, many times, it is a fast way to make money.

 “I ain’t gonna lie, Ms. I could make the rent for my spot in a hot minute if I did other stuff.”

“I know that,” I say. 

“No shit you can,” someone said from the back of the room, “but you ain't gonna do that ‘cause you don’t want to lose your kids and go back to the slammer.” 

“You said goodbye to that life, Girlfriend. Adios, arrivederci, au revoir, auf wiedersehen, bye-bye, cheerio, good day, good-bye, goodbye, sayonara, so long! THAT life is over, done, caput! You hear me?”

I was impressed with the many ways they knew how to say goodbye. I was going to add “shalom” and tell them about “le hitraot,” but decided to stay quiet instead. 

I saw that this was going to get them talking.

“You can say hello again to your old life when you have changed and are so strong that it is as if you are meeting that life all over again. And then I’ll tell you what will happen. You will be surprised that that was ever your life, and that you did that shit to begin with.”

Hello and goodbye. Beginnings and endings. Old and new. My daughter is growing and changing. Every goodbye is hard not only because she is leaving but also because she is becoming more and more her own person and ending her chapter with me. Each hello is incredibly exciting because of who she is turning into. I am so proud. I am so insanely lucky that I almost don’t feel right about feeling sad about her being gone.

“Our goodbye to that life is so we can change. You can’t change if you don’t say goodbye. You can’t change if you go back.”

“Are you stupid? If you go back, you didn’t change.” There is a lot of chatter in the class.

“No,” someone adds. “You can go back and be the change. Ms., didn’t someone important say that?”

“You just did.” I laugh and teach them the word and meaning of “le’hitraot.”

“Walking away doesn’t mean you can’t go back. It means you go back, and you are different, that you aren’t doing your old ways, but maybe, just maybe, you can help other people change and to change the place you came from.”

“I got it! I got it,” he tells me. He pulled the quote up on his phone. 

"’Be the change you wish to see in the world.’ Mahatma Gandhi said that, Ms.” He looks at his phone, laughs and adds, “That Mahatma dude is a fucking cute motherfucker with his little glasses and bald head. I would totally put a tattoo on his head, a peace one not a gang one.”

I can almost feel Mr. Gandhi smile in his grave from the thought of this big tatted ex-gang member pulling his quote up from the gods of Google and becoming impressed, inspired, and motivated by it. Not sure that he would want a tattoo, but, nevertheless, I think he would be content.

He looks at the class and tells them, “If we want to stop the pain and the trauma that happened to us, we must say goodbye and come back changed, strong, and willing to work hard for our kids and our community.”

Someone from the back of the class asks, “Hombre, te postulas para presidente?” (“Man, are you running for president?”)

I say, “He is not, although he could. He is being the change he wants to see in the world.”

He smiles at me and says, “I wish I could say hello to that Mahatma man, Ms.”

“You just did,” I tell him. 

As clichéd as it might sound in that moment, we were the change.

[advotproject]

Decisions

I had to make a difficult decision. It sucked. I made the adult, responsible decision. 24 hours later, I was intensely sorry. Sorry that I made that decision, sure that I made the wrong decision. Of course, if I had made a different choice, who knows if I would not have regretted that choice?

Choices and possibilities are a main theme that we teach our participants. We invite them to think, to assess, and make wiser choices. I know I made a smart choice, but the regret and anxiety that came with the “right choice” was almost too much to bear. This feeling made me think of something a brave student shared in class. He said the second he made the choice that landed him in jail for 30 years, he knew he made the wrong choice. He couldn’t change that choice. From that moment, things happened fast and then he was locked up, alone, drowning in regret.

In my regret, I had the privilege of being surrounded by amazing friends, friends who listened to me, to my irrational and irate rants, friends who supported me, and heard my “should have, could have, would have.” Frankly, my girlfriends are the superheroes of listening.

 “I sat alone with my actions and all I could do was get angry,” he told us in class.

“Angry at the world, angry at the police, and plain angry. I was mad at everyone but myself. I spent 10 years being angry, so angry that I got myself in more trouble, got myself more time.  I had me so much rage and I didn’t know what to do with it,” he added.

 Me, on the other hand, well, I wasn’t blaming anyone for my choice. I just felt like shit.

A wise member of my team observed this and said, “You know, Nomi, in our Listen-Act-Change curriculum, we need to teach participants how to deal with their choices, not just how to make them.”  I love this woman to no end, and she is right. Alas, how do we teach to be at peace with something you did and regret or wish you did differently?

 “You know, Ms., the chaplain told us that we can’t change what we did but we can change what we do. I decided to make good of my time.”

Seriously, he did just that. He finished and got his high school diploma. He then studied religion online at a community college and got ordained as a chaplain himself.

“I believe, Ms., that God has a plan. Things that happen have a reason.”

I remember smiling when he said this and not saying anything. I am cautious with the “Things happen for a reason” sentence because sometimes I feel like it can be a cop out. But in this case, he was so sincere. “I don’t know if things happen for a reason,” I said.  “I do know that things that happen hold lessons for us, really important lessons to remember and grow from.”

“Ms.,” he smiled back at me. “And who do you think is the teacher of those lessons?”

And he pointed up, indicating to  God.

A man who was in jail for 30 years because of a split-second choice he made at the age of 15, who is now filled with faith and love, and is totally over his regret.

 How do we live with the hard decisions? We live through them. We hurt through them. We learn. We grow. We inhale. We exhale, long and deep.

We sit in the sadness and perhaps the loss, and if we can, we should surround ourselves with love, support, and someone who will hold the regret with and for you.

It’s good to give the burden to someone, even for just a little while.

Most of all, we need to be patient. Peace will come, but it will take as long as it needs to take.

 “You know, Ms., for years I was mad. Then I was sad. I tried desperately to fix my decision. I seriously made everyone around me crazy, especially myself. Then God found me. Then I accepted what I did. Ms., then you know what I did? I changed my attitude and I decided to focus on beauty. Because beauty heals the heart.” He smiled at me and the class.

  In the crappy shit-ass mood I was in because of the decision I had made, on my way somewhere, I stepped into an elevator. Standing there were three young men, all dressed up, excited and happy.

“Where are you going?” I asked them.

“To his wedding,” they answered in unison and pointed at the taller one.

“Best decision of my life!” the taller one said. The other ones patted him on the back.

“Mazal tov. Enjoy!” I said as they got off. When the elevator doors closed, I started to weep. These young men were so happy, excited, and simply beautiful.

Their beauty touched my heart.

 We cannot change decisions we make or turn back time.

We can only look forward and take in the beauty.

There is beauty all around us. We just need to make the decision to see it.

[advotproject]

Kvetch and Smile

I kvetch and I moan. I talk a lot about the things that are hard. Work, fundraising,

raising teenagers, and life in general. Many of my writings highlight the hard.

Because, man, it IS hard!

But then there are days, or simply moments, when things are good, simply good.

We got the grant. My kids behaved. Someone was kind to me. Things worked out.

Things fell into place. I feel okay. I feel good.

Sometimes, it can be something as simple as the clouds in the sky deciding to put

on a brilliant show or seeing a sweet photo of a baby or just plain life being in the

place it needs to be. When that happens, sometimes I literally stop everything. 

Stand still without moving to take it in, trying, actually, to hold the good. 

If I have learned anything from my students, it is to know how insanely lucky 

I am for all the good I have in this life of mine.

Holding onto the good doesn’t make the bad goes away, but it does remind us that

the bad can have a pause, and in that pause, it is the good’s turn.

In my anger management class, one of my students, in a very angry way, said, 

“Ms., I take these classes. I get the certificates, but I’m still mad as fuck! I don’t

understand!” I looked at him, smiled and said, “Anger is like a tire. You can’t get

one that will never have a flat, even in a fancy Jaguar. Every tire has the possibility

of getting a flat. What we do in these classes is create a toolbox from which you

can take out tools to fix that tire. I cannot help you stop getting angry, but I can fill

your toolbox with tools to manage that anger. Does that make sense?”

“Totally. Totally makes sense, Ms., although I’d be happy to have me the Jaguar. I

think that flat must be fine!”

In that same class, an absolutely brilliant soul shared with us her painful story and

how, after multiple domestic violence disputes with her baby daddy, the one time

she actually did something to him, he called the police. Her baby was taken away

from her and now it is bad. She said out loud to us, “This is bad,” but then she

added, “Here and there in the bad, comes some good.” With tears rolling down her

cheeks, she said, “I hold onto the tiny thread of good to remind me that the bad will

not be forever.”

Then she added, “The shitty, fucked, FUCKED up thing about the good, Ms., is that

the minute something bad comes in, it’s like a crashing plane going into the

ground. That goddamn good goes away so fast. What the fuck can we do about

that, Ms.? What?!?”

I am quiet, and I think how a word, an unexpected comment can collapse my most

brilliant moments. Then I say, “Maybe the trick is learning to let the good and bad

live together and somehow not cancel each other out but selectively give each

other space to coexist. Not too good, not too bad. Like here and here.” I

point to the two sides of the room.

“You know,” she says, “I try to do that, but it’s hard not to let one take over.” And

a different student answered her, “Mija, it is like the shadows and light coming

through that window. The sun can be brilliant (the window is kind of near or

maybe under a train line) and then that motherfucker train goes by and the sun is

gone. We moan and complain, and then the train is gone, and we are like pigs in

shit enjoying the sunlight again, thinking that motherfucker train will never come

back and then it does. Life is a series of trains coming and going. That’s just the

way it is. Catch the sunshine when it is here,” he tells her.

“Sometimes it feels like there are only trains,” she says sadly.

“Well,” he says, “cariño, nada podrá detener ese sol, en algún momento llegará.”

(“Darling, nothing can ever stop that sun. At some point, it will come.”)

And believe me, this man has seen more trains than most.

And just like that, as if the sun was listening, it shines at a brilliant angle and an

angelic light comes through the room. 

My heart is filled with the promise of possibility amidst all the pain.

Merry Christmas, friends. May 2022 be filled with more sun than trains. 

May we have the strength to wait for her to shine, because, as my student wisely said,

“en algún momento llegará.” At some point, she will always come.

Happy, Happy New Year.

Be safe. Be healthy.

Hold the good with the bad and find the balance.

Your sun is right here.

[advotproject]

Epic

I planned a special weekend with my kids while I was attending a film premiere. I booked a hotel room for the night and I had my kids join me. I thought we would spend some quality time together and have a fantastic weekend. But, there was not one thing about this weekend that went as planned.

The hotel was a dive and incredibly sketchy. The weather was bad and even if we had wanted to swim, the pool was disgusting. I would say the weekend was an epic failure. I was so upset. In my head I created a perfect picture of how we would hang out in the hotel, sit in the Jacuzzi, get along and create some memories together. I have been missing having time together with my kids who are growing at lightning speed. Since my oldest left at the beginning of this year, I feel that time is running out on me. When you experience epic failures, all your other failures, sadness, and any hard feelings you might have seem to come to the surface. If you’re lonely, you feel even lonelier. If you’re missing someone, you miss them more. And if you are needing something, when you experience an epic failure, the need becomes absolutely urgent.

As the weekend progressed, everything that was sitting heavily on my heart started surfacing to the top. When we got into the car to go home, I started crying. My kids were a little shocked. “Are you crying?” my youngest asked, surprised. As the tears rolled down my face I said, “Yes, totally crying.” Although my two kids felt bad, they also found this incredibly funny. “I am disappointed,” I said, not really sharing the mountain of things that were surfacing to my emotions. Epic failures are epic, because they pull all of your emotion into the failure and epically make you feel like a larger than life loser.

“It was bad,” she said. “It was hard, Ms., just too fucking hard!” she added. My students don’t usually use words like failure and success. It’s more like it worked or it didn’t work. They also don’t talk about their feelings the way I do. Yet they constantly ask me if I feel them. “Do you feel me, Ms.?”

“Oh, I feel you.” I say. “I understand.”

This particular student was allowed visitation for the first time after a long time with her kids, but it was a disaster. She had been incarcerated. The facility she was in was very far, so they couldn’t visit. Her cousin had custody of the kids who were little and they didn’t remember her. She was so excited that she ran to them, but they ran to the cousin. She got mad. The kids cried.

“It will get better, Girl,” another student told her.

“When the shit is bad, the good news is it can always get better. You’re their mama. It will get better. Your kids just need time.”

Another student said, “Ha-ha! We need time after we do time.” And then my beloved student who sat in jail for 41 years (yes, read that again-- forty-one years!) said, “Don’t be afraid to take the time you need for the time.”

No words of failure, only hope for better.

No use of the word “epic.” Just the use of the words “time, patience, and feelings.”

Those are the words they use. Today. Next time. One day at a time.

“Ms., it was a big deal to me.” she said.

“I know,” I say. “It must have been disappointing.”

“I got very angry,” she added, “so I yelled at my cousin, and then she got pissed at me.” I shared with her that I got very disappointed over the weekend I had and that I sat in the car and cried in front of my kids.

“What did they do?” she asked me.

“They laughed at me.” My class thought that was hilarious. We all laughed.

On my way home, I thought about my epic failure. I thought, maybe it wasn’t as epic as I felt. I guess it is all about perspective.

The following week, my student shared that her next visit went much better than the first one. She thanked everyone for all their advice and she said,

“The bad time makes you better for the next time.”

“Yes,” I tell her. “It kind of sucks, but it’s true.”

“What about you, Ms.? Did you rearrange your disappointment?”

Rearrange my disappointment. That is the most amazing way to look at things.

I looked at this woman, who has truly had her share of epic everything. Yet she chooses to rearrange her feelings, her disappointment, her attitude, and believe in a better tomorrow.

“Because of you, I have. Thank you,” I say.

“You’re crazy,” she says.

“You are epic,” I reply, and I teach her what epic means.

She smiles.

“Epic. That’s me.” she says.

“Epic success,” I add.

“Yup,” she smiles, and seems just a little happier, and a lot prouder.

It was an epic class.

[advotproject]

Know

I recently participated in a remarkable course through USC called Community Arts -- Healing & Social Justice. It’s been a while since I’ve been a student.

It was wonderful, incredibly exciting, very interesting and somewhat burdensome, burdensome because it was an intense course. Four Sundays for five hours each time. I adore the professor who is teaching this class. I have known about him for years. He is an expert in this field and is deeply connected to the work. He is so incredibly good at what he does, he really, I mean REALLY, knows his shit. 

He gave us an exercise for homework. We had to create or take an image in our community of something that makes us feel safe and something that makes us feel unsafe. There must be at least one million things I could have taken pictures of for both. There must be at least one million more images online that would or could paint the images of the things that keep me up at night, or the things that bring me solace. Somehow, I went totally blank and could not think of anything. Nada. Nothing. 

I was driving in the car with my middle daughter and told her about the exercise. She looked at me shocked that I didn’t have an answer. “Well, that’s easy. Take a photo of the car. You always say how unsafe you feel when we drive. I mean, seriously that’s a no-brainer. And for the safe one, take a picture of the Sukkah (the hut we sit in as Jews to celebrate the holiday of Sukkot). You love the holidays. You love being Jewish. Geez, Ima, what’s wrong with you? This is easy! Wish my calculus homework was this easy!”

I wasn’t sure how she knew exactly what to tell me. I felt that what she suggested was perfect. Of course, when everybody started sharing their pictures, I started second guessing myself. I find it amazing how easily what we know to be true can be shifted and turned into what we think we don’t know!

Knowing. 

Owning what we know. 

Letting ourselves know.

Sometimes I see a kid and I know.

I know they can make it. 

Maybe it is my faith. Maybe it is intuition.

Maybe it is simply my will.

“Ms., I don’t know what to do.”

“Yes, you do,” I say. 

“Fucking hell,” she says. “I don’t know what to do, really.” 

I push back. 

“Yes, you do.” 

“Ms. Tell me. Tell me what to do.”

“I can’t,” I tell her. “This is your choice, and you have to make it.” 

I fervently wish I could tell her what to do. This is a tough one. 

She is pregnant.

She also got into college.

She is the first in her family to graduate high school. 

She is no longer in a relationship with the father of the baby.

“Ms., I don’t know what to do.”

“It is your choice,” I tell her.

There were 1 million things I could say to her. They were 10 million other things I didn’t want to say. This is a loaded topic. Various colleagues of mine have strong opinions about this. I believe a woman has the right to choose what works for her, her body, her life, her being. 

As a mom of three, I know that once that kid comes into this world it is a lifelong commitment. No one has the right to force someone to make that commitment.

I tell my students all the time that they are the experts on the subject of themselves. No one else can be in their shoes and know what is right for them. And while I think advice is important and sometimes helps us, deep down in our gut most of the time we know what to do. We just need the courage to listen to that voice.

On the next phone call, I tell her again, “This is your choice.” 

“I really want someone to tell me what to do,” she answers.

“This is a huge decision.” 

I asked her why she wants someone else to make this decision.  

She said, “So I’ll have someone to blame when it sucks.” 

We went back-and-forth. I supported her not knowing journey. I took her to places where she could get information.

I told her it will suck and it will be amazing.

I will not write here what choice she made because it could be used the wrong way by people who have an agenda on this subject.

She made the decision that was right for her. She made the decision that she had to make.

“I know what I need to do,” she said. “I have known from the minute I found out.”

“I know,” I said. 

“I had to walk the path to what I know.” She laughed.

“That’s okay,” I said. 

“You know, Ms., I just need to listen to the voice inside me and trust it.”

“Yup,” I said. “That’s a hard one.”

“Why is it so hard?” “Because we trust ourselves the least, when we really should trust ourselves the most.”

“Well, I have done some shitty shit in my life. I am not sure I’d trust a bitch like me.”

I laugh and say, “Trust the you inside who isn’t connected to the shitty shit.” 

“How do you know there is a me that isn’t connected to the shitty shit?” she asks.  “And I ain’t all shit.”

I look at her. I am quiet.

I see her. 

I make sure she sees me see her.

“I KNOW,” I say. “I simply know.”

She laughs and says, “Well I ain’t fucking with what you know!”

“Perfect!” I say, hoping I remember with conviction not to fuck with what I know either.

[advotproject]

I Am

I am a half breed. I was born in the US but lived most of my life in Israel. After moving back to the US, I have lived here for the past 15 years. In Israel, I was always considered SO American. 

When I moved back to the States, everybody always told me I’m SO Israeli. To be honest, I straddle these two worlds, sometimes with ease and grace, and sometimes in a clumsy, very sloppy way. When I first moved back to the States as an adult, I was struck by how absolutely Israeli I was and was amazed by how I am NOT AMERICAN at all. However, recently, I have become aware of how American I have become. And how now there are certain “Israeli-isms” that actually piss me off and drive me insane.

I am a half breed. I was born in the US but lived most of my life in Israel. After moving back to the US, I have lived here for the past 15 years.

In Israel, I was always considered SO American.

When I moved back to the States, everybody always told me I’m SO Israeli. To be honest, I straddle these two worlds, sometimes with ease and grace, and sometimes in a clumsy, very sloppy way.

When I first moved back to the States as an adult, I was struck by how absolutely Israeli I was and was amazed by how I am NOT AMERICAN at all. However, recently, I have become aware of how American I have become. And how now there are certain “Israeli-isms” that actually piss me off and drive me insane.

I think the most important thing I have come to realize is that there are some things I am and a handful of things I am not.

There’s a lot of things I so want to be and things that I simply can’t be.

I try to find the balance and peace among all of these things because, as the serenity prayer goes:

Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,

the courage to change the things I can,

and the wisdom to know the difference.

Ironically, I am in the business of change. I tell people they can be whoever and whatever they want to be. That was something my parents told me again and again when I was a little girl. “You can be anything you set your mind to.” A smart therapist once told me “It’s a big burden to be anything.” I remember not really understanding exactly what she meant then. I think now I do.

We can’t be everything. It’s too hard - actually impossible.

We can be what we can be. We can be who we are and the things that we can’t, we simply cannot be. The trick is being OK with that.

“Do you really think I am gonna graduate, Ms.?” she asked me.

“I am absolutely sure you will.” I nod.

“I ain’t ever finished anything in my life,” she said.

“You finished my class,” I say. She laughed.

I met her when she was in her teens, locked up, young, and very angry. They wrote her off. She was affiliated with a particularly violent gang. Her family was gang royalty. That is not something you walk away from easily. In the lock up facility they predicted she’d be in county (jail) in a year.

I said maybe not.

They said I was naïve.

When she got out, it was impossible to get her transcripts to her school - so much red tape. She got kicked out of school and then kicked out of another school.

She went in and out of Juvie.

We were in touch and then we lost touch.

Then, out of the blue, she texted me.

She needed a recommendation for a job.

I hadn’t spoken to her in a few years.

I told her I need to meet with her a few times, and we need to get together before I can write her a recommendation.

We went out to lunch.

We took a walk in the park.

We sat in a garden and played with her son.

She blew me away.

She cut herself off from the complications in her life.

She lives in a small apartment with her grandmother.

“When I had my son, I knew I could do better,” she told me. “I stopped all the stupid shit, Ms. Oh, and guess what? You were right, I finished high school, got me a diploma!”

“I told you.” I smiled.

“How did you know?” she asked.

“I didn’t, but I knew you had to hear someone say it out loud so you would know that you have the option.”

“No one ever told me that I can do shit,” she said.

“Well, obviously you can.”

“Yup, I sure can. I’m gonna go to college, too, but not now. Now I can’t. It’s too much and it ain’t me, but later, Ms., later.”

It was kind of far where she is living now.

In the car on the way home, I was incredibly content thinking about how well she is doing – impressed by what an awesome mom she is even though she has absolutely no role models for parenting.

I heard again in my head how with such ease she told me that right now college isn’t her. She is taking care of her kid, she has a job, and college will happen later.

I think about being anything and being everything and how hard I am on myself for the things I am not.

Maybe like my sweet student - it simply ain’t me now.

Maybe it will never be me.

I think how no one, absolutely no one, ever thought this kid would become who she is now.

I realize that we can become, we can change, and life is dynamic.

There is always later, even though sometimes later can be too late.

But hey…

Better late than never!

[advotproject]

Feelings

One of my children is on the quiet side, she is very different than me.

Sometimes when we are driving to here or there, it can be a little unnerving.

I feel like I am on an uncomfortable first date. She sits quietly. Sometimes on her phone, and sometimes looking out the window.

Me? I am babbling and talking about everything under the sun.

Trying to make conversation. Trying to connect with her. My interactions with her evoke so many different feelings. I know she likes the quiet. Not sure why I can’t just be quiet.

There is such a distance between what I know I should do, and what I actually do.

I am trying. Really trying. I know that it is me trying so hard that is the biggest problem. I am  incredibly proud of who she is. I love that she’s so dramatically different than me. The issue is that I don’t know always know what to do about that.

I feel horrible that I sometimes push her, and then she gets mad.

She will say “Ima - you’ve said that seven times,” or “you asked me that already.”

As my children get older they need me less. My feelings are mixed.  

Happy to be getting my life back, to do my own thing. Sad to see them move on. Exhilarated to watch them become. A little gloomy about them leaving. Excited for their lives without me.

So many mixed emotions. I am trying to process these emotions and feelings and figure out what I’m supposed to do with them. 

I stopped the car to let her off. She coldly got out, closed the door and did not say goodbye. Actually she said nothing and walked away.

I sat there annoyed, a little hurt. I sat and watched her walk away and thought about something one of my students told me about getting clean from drugs.

He told me that one of the reasons to use drugs was to numb all the feelings. “I got all these feels, didn’t really even know what they were.” He added, “Once I got lit (high) they changed, the feelings they went away. Dem feelings, they become something else.” Then he told us,

 “When I went to therapy…”  God bless Homeboy Industries that gives my beautiful students the opportunity for therapy and guidance. He continued, “The therapist told me that I will find answers in my feelings. I thought she was fucking stupid, but then I started to feel and listen to what I was feeling.” He added,  “I hate my fucking baby mama, and that’s cause she is a bitch.” He laughs, “Now, I know I hate her. Those are my damn feelings. She ain’t nice. I fucking hate her. I don’t gotta fight with her. I just stay away from the bitch, and hate her without the fighting.”

Everyone laughed.

“Okay.” I say to him, not loving this narrative, but going with it.

“No, wait Ms. hear me out.” He said, “If you hear your feelings, they tell you stuff. I ain’t gonna lie - I hate my ex. Those are my feelings. I heard my feelings. I except them. Now I don’t get mad at her. I just hate her without getting mad. I used to think my feelings control me Ms. Now? I get me control from understanding how I feel.”

I remember thinking in that moment how profound that is.

I think of my kids and try to figure out how can I get myself control from understating how I feel.

I was sitting in my car and actually laughing out loud just thinking of that.

And my feelings were a little calmed. I need to find control from understanding how I feel.

Not let the feelings control me.

A woman in that class said, “I got no control – I got me so many feelings. They got them a world of their own. They come at me like crazy fucking bullets from an automatic machine gun. All I do is try to dodge dem bullets. I don’t understand how you get you control. That therapy shit don’t work for me. If I let my feelings loose, they come back to bite me in the ass, fucking hard!”

“Girl…” my feelings student said, “Your problem is that you are trying to dodge them. Let them feelings hit you. Let them touch you. Feel your feelings.”

I remember almost falling off my chair.

“Ms. You must have done a lot of therapy right?” I nod, laugh and say, “Oh yes, lots of therapy.”

“Didn’t they tell you to feel?” he added.

“Well actually,” I say. “Therapy is talking about the feelings, so you can understand them a little better and live with them at peace.”

The female student says, “That’s bullshit.”

“No,” I say “It’s a choice, and it’s super hard work.”

“See,” the feelings student said again “you control the feelings.”

They went back and forth. We got into a deep discussion about therapy.

The pros, the cons, and why therapy is vital for healing and recovery from the big stuff, and the little stuff.

I watched my kid from the car meet up with her friends.

She was cheery, chatty and smiley.

She looked like a totally different kid then the one who got out of the car without saying a word to me. I felt relieved that it is me not her.

I realize that in the car when we are together it is the space where she can have her feelings.

All her feelings, no filter no control – however she needs or wants.

Not a beautiful metaphor, but I guess I am a little like the garbage disposal of her feelings – I know from walking through the fire of her two sisters, that that is a little what parenting teens is about.

“You know Ms. I did drugs so I wouldn’t feel. Then when I was locked up, I pretended not to have feelings, so people would think I am strong and the shit. Now, I feel, I cry, and I am. That is fucking life and it’s a blessing.”

I drive away from where I dropped off my kid.

I think yet again of my students who somehow always teach me and make me so much better at all I do.

I stop at the light and I listen to my feelings and try to hear what they might be saying to me.

[advotproject]

Pain

He was incarcerated for 30 years.

He is one of the kindest, sweetest, most gentle men I have ever met.

He is deep. He is insightful. I absolutely adore him.

When I leave my room after a Zoom class and my eyes are teary, my kids know he must have said something profound. They know about him. I can’t imagine what he was like thirty years ago or what he could have possibly done that got him incarcerated for that amount of time.

His English isn’t great, even now. I don’t know any details or what got him in trouble. I am sure there must have been many things that led up to whatever happened to him then.

What I do know is what is now. Now, is what matters.

He was released from incarceration. He is my student.

He is incredibly important to me. He currently lives with his two sisters.

In class he constantly shares the complication of the relationship with the three of them. The whole family living together consists of his two sisters, their husbands, their children and him.

His stories make me laugh, hard. As someone who has two sisters herself, I find his predicament funny. He desperately does not want to take sides and gets in trouble when he tries to be the peacemaker between his two sisters.

He is damned when he does anything, and damned if he doesn’t do anything.

Thirty years he was away. Thirty years of relationships with his sisters lost.

He tells the class how hard it is for him to see one of his sisters suffer. She is having issues with her husband. He tells us, “I want to take away all of my sister’s pain. I see how hard it is for her.”

I say softly, “What if it’s not your job to take away her pain but to just sit with her in the pain.” He tears up. “Wow, that is deep,” he says.

“I spent so much time away. I had a lot of pain. I decided when I get out I will not have pain and I will take my family’s pain away. I caused them so much pain.” He adds. “I had a lot of time to think about all this, Ms., a lot of time.”

I take a breath, thinking about what to say, not sure I have anything to say.

He continues, “When you have lost so much and had too much pain, everything is good, the flowers, the sun, food, my family. The good is taking away all pain.”

I see people nodding.

“My sister has so much good, but she lets her husband make it all bad. This is sad.”

I smile. “I have a feeling it is so much more complicated than that,” I say.

I picture these siblings together trying to make up for lost time, pretending to know each other even though the last time they were together they were young teens and now they are in mid-life. I think of my own siblings. There are four of us. I am the youngest. I feel incredibly lucky to have these three older humans there for me.

I tell him. “You know, recently something really shitty happened to me. I called my brother and I sobbed and sobbed on the phone, snot coming out of my nose sobbing.” They all laughed.

“You know what he did? Nothing! He listened and said, ‘I’m sorry Nomsie. I really am.’ He told me what he thought about the situation, gave me some advice, and then we hung up. To be honest,” I said, “I am not really sure what he said, but he just let me cry and be where I needed to be. He actually told me that I need to be sad about this, really sad.”

“What?” my student said. “He told you to be sad? He is a little loco (crazy).”

“No, he is actually really smart. If your sister is in danger, make sure she is safe, but if she is sad, it’s okay. Let her be what she needs to be.”

“AHH, this is too hard,” he says.

A different student chimed in, “Man, when you are locked up, you have the pain of being away. When you get out, there is the pain of being here and…”

Someone cut him off. “The pain inside is the pain of missing life. The pain on the outs, it’s the pain of living life. Those are different. Man, live your life with the pain and love it ‘cause you know the other pain is the shit, and you got nothing you can do about it.”

I sit with that advice in my head after my class thinking about living life with pain, loving pain, not being able to comprehend being locked up for decades and the pain of that. I don’t think I will ever be able to understand being locked up even though I have been hearing the stories about it for almost a decade.

“Ms.,” he told me in the next class, “I have been thinking about pain, and I think there really is the pain inside when you are locked up, and the pain outside when you get out. The pain that is horrible pain, and the pain you can live with. And then, like you said, the pain we need to sit with. The pain is different. The death pain is a level that is up here. (He raises his hand outside of the Zoom screen.) and there is pain here. (He puts his hand on his heart.) and then there is the pain of seeing someone you love in pain. I am trying to separate the pain and know the difference.”

Then one wise student answered and summed it up for us all.

“Stop trying so hard. You are out. You are here. That is what matters. There is some pain you can’t do anything about. Some pain is like a mother fucker and doesn’t leave you. That pain becomes like an extra leg. You learn to walk like a weird dog and that turns into your walk. Then there is other people’s pain. You gotta be careful not to let that be heavy on your heart. Dude, you got freedom. That is joy. Joy is a painkiller, so focus on the joy.”

And I say no more.