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Each year during the High Holidays, we ask ourselves: Is the person we see in the mirror who we really want to be?
Mirrors help us see ourselves clearly, and Judaism teaches that there are mirrors all around us. Other people can be our mirrors, as long as we approach them with open hearts. As we read in Proverbs (27:19), “As face answers to face in water, so does one’s heart to another.” The Chernobyl Rebbe offers that the Torah is a mirror, giving everyone the opportunity to see themselves reflected within it (Me’or Eynayim, Parshat Shemot).
Mirrors also help us see what’s in our rearview. The High Holidays ask us not just to look at our past year but also to make sense of it, to analyze it, to learn from it. This type of reflection requires time and intention. That’s why we begin the High Holiday season a full month before the new year begins, with the contemplative month of Elul.
Self-reflection—looking honestly at ourselves and our past choices—needs to be balanced with compassion. We are often our own worst critics, hyper-focusing on everything we’ve done wrong and everything we wish we could fix. That’s why we do this holy work of reflecting together, in community—to remind ourselves that we are all flawed, that we are all trying to improve and to grow.
With 5783 entering our rearview mirror, may we all find the time and space to look at ourselves and our past choices clearly and compassionately.