What is the happiest day of the year?
We each may have a different answer to that question.
I’ll leave you to discuss and ruminate.
Our Sages teach us that Yom Kippur is the happiest day of the year.
I can imagine that is a surprising answer.
When we think about Yom Kippur we think about fasting, and being hungry. Perhaps the long hours sitting in a service are uncomfortable and maybe it’s hard to become inspired.
Doesn’t seem to be the happiest day at all.
But we are taught that if Yom Kippur only came once in 70 years, or once in a lifetime, we would be so joyous and appreciative of the opportunity to have the energy that we can access on that day.
And here we are blessed with Yom Kippur every year.
How do we access what is available to us on Yom Kippur?
The Talmud teaches us three principles:
If someone did you a small favor, regard it as something big.
If you did a little nothing nastiness to someone else, that should be considered in your eyes a large, egregious deed.
And finally, if someone did something really big and bad to you, perceive it as something small.
What message is being taught with these three principles?
What is a favor? It’s a Mitzva!
If we worry about our own needs - that’s physicality.
But if we worry about someone else’s, that’s spirituality, it’s eternity. We are concerned about taking care of another and that can have the most positive eternal impact.
So if someone does a nice thing to you, even if it seems small, thank the person profusely, they have stepped out of themselves and seen you!!
That’s huge.

Now let’s consider that itty bitty nasty we did to another.
We may think, hey no big deal, that was a minor slight.
But it is incumbent upon us to view that hurt we inflicted on another as a big deal, because we have no idea what painful chord we may have touched. We can never know how deeply we may wound another.
If we make a big deal about pain we have caused to another it will make a deep impression on us and we won’t repeat that mistake again.
The last statement is the most complex.
If someone did something really bad to you, see it as small.
This doesn’t mean we have to slough off nasty behavior or just plain ignore it and be a doormat.
Rather we can make that nasty action small, not let it get blown out of proportion to the degree we can’t get over it.
It’s ok to have hurt feelings, but if we keep it in proportion we recognize that another person doesn’t control my life.
I will choose how to manage the actions done to me.
I have power over how I react.
The message is that even if the event was painful we can make the choice to live bigger, to live with Gd, to live like Gd.
Because we mess up all the time and we know that after Yom Kippur we are going to mess up again. But Gd as a loving parent doesn’t hold the grudge.
A person who behaves this way, a person who lives above and let’s go of the hurts that were inflicted upon them gets a guarantee.
A money back guarantee!!
Gd, will react in kind and overlook the worst sins.
It is so special in Gd’s eyes when we can let go of the ill that was done to us.
Is there no more propitious time than the days before Yom Kippur to search in a strained relationship in which we were wronged and make the decision to let go of our anger or grudge?
To make such a decision capitalizes on the spirit of goodness and Gdliness which resides in us all.
On Yom Kippur we will beat our breasts in remorse and then we will probably go back to our ways.
Gd knows it. But He loves us nonetheless for showing up.
Gd knows who we really are.
The question remains-
do WE know who WE are?
We have to know our inner greatness, our true capabilities.
The Alter of Slabodka, influential Torah leader of the 19th century bases his entire philosophy on this tenet. The Alter, which in Yiddish means the Elder, focuses us on the greatness that resides within us all. He celebrates the fact that we are great and have incredible inner strength.
Now is the time to tap into our strengths, look into ourselves and acknowledge we are bigger than the hurt that was inflicted upon us.
Each and everyone of us has that spark, we can access it and become “bigger״.
The goal of these days which lead up to Yom Kippur is not to do better things, but to believe in ourselves more.
So Yom Kippur is unexpectedly the happiest day of all. It’s the day we shed our outer trappings and connect to the real US, the greatness within us, the Soul that is US.
When we believe in ourselves and make that soul connection, that’s the purest kind of happiness of all.
(These lessons were shared by Rabbi Neuberger from Baltimore).
If I have caused pain to anyone here, I consider it a very serious grievance and would welcome the opportunity to repair. Please connect to me privately so I can apologize meaningfully.
If you have done anything to hurt me, I am striving to make it small and keep it in perspective, because I truly love you all.
May the upcoming day of Yom Kippur, which begins this Sunday night, be one of connection, introspection and believe it or not…happiness.
Shabbat Shalom and so much love!!