The Life Waiting For Me: A Letter

This essay was workshopped in The Layers Writing Workshops.

Dear Hashem, 

You know everything that I have been through. 

You know that when I was 15 and struggling with deep mental health challenges, I had to drop out of high school. You saw how I could no longer continue being in school and pretend to be a typical teenager. You understood that I lived in a world that told me that I didn’t deserve love and that I had to fight to find my place. 

You taught me that my life was worth living and helped me make the choice to begin to heal. I reached out for help that I didn’t think would come. I began therapy, joined support groups, and began my journey of deep inner work. Slowly, the clouds of depression began lifting and I could see how there could be a future for me in this world.

I began to find what I was passionate about, the things I was capable of doing, and work that others would hire me to do. I started working as a nanny, a teacher, an executive assistant; finding ways to be useful- giving of myself from what I found within.

At the age of 23, I made Aliyah all alone, ready to start again in a new country. I came with a job I could do from Israel, knowing that this land was where I belonged. I gave it my all. 

I tried. I failed. I lost my job and looked around to see what might be next. I found new work that inspires me and gives me permission to show up with my whole self. 

As I breathed through each of these moments, only You know how hard I worked to show up for life. How lonely and trying it was to do it on my own.

But I did it. Because I knew there was a life waiting for me to live. 

Now, I have something more to ask. 

Today, I’m hungry for life. I want to live with my newly discovered passion. 

I’m sitting in awe of how as I open myself up to more, You are showing me what’s next. 

As I spent so much of my adolescence surviving and not thriving, there were medical issues that were not getting the attention they needed for me to be OK. As I began dealing with them and investing in myself and my health, I found that I had more space and more courage to take the next steps in seeking out opportunities for growth.

Therefore, two weeks ago, I wrote a new ending to my schooling journey by picking myself up and getting my GED. I did it so I could move on and get the education that I needed to do the work that I want to do in the world. It was time to close the door of inner self-doubt. I had no plans for what would come next.  

The next day, a new door opened, and I got an opportunity to apply to University and begin working towards my undergraduate degree. 

This is a story only You could write, Hashem. I am so grateful and I’m choosing to say yes to the story that we are writing together. 

Today, I choose to invest in my future, because I know it is what You want from me. 

For now, I am seen in ways that allow my exiled parts to return.

I am loved in ways that tell me that it is safe to love back. 

I contribute in ways that I know that my value is in my being, not in my productivity.

As I learn what it means to be a woman, to live in cycles, I embrace and trust them. 

As I learn what it means to be a soul, I nourish my body and create space for her to heal.

As I learn my place in the world, I know it is not to be small. 

I’m ready for so much more. 

I have built a home, it is ready to be filled with a family.

I have learned my strength, it is ready to be used to heal others. 

I have done what I once believed impossible. 

Hineni, here I am. 

As I take stock of the blessings abound, I know I should say it’s enough. Dayenu. Instead, I ask that You, continue blessing me. 

Bless me with wisdom as I study. 

Bless me with the partner with whom I will build a family. 

Bless me with the fullness of life that You have created for me. 

Bless me that when I sit in the power of my soul, she feels safe to come gushing forth. 

Bless me, that as I take this step, I am dancing with You into my future. 

In gratitude and love,

Rivka Mazal