Coping with Illness

Pass the frozen orange around. Have each person hold it until they can’t hold it any longer. 

Placing an orange on the seder plate is a widely observed contemporary Pesach tradition. A common story circulates along with this ritual, which goes something like this: a Jewish woman is studying to be a rabbi. An old misogynist rabbi tells her, “A woman belongs on the bimah like an orange belongs on the seder plate.” So what does she do? That year on Pesach, she puts an orange on her seder plate.

The only problem with this story is that it’s false. The tradition of putting an orange on the seder plate actually originated with feminist scholar Susannah Heschel. While visiting Oberlin College in the early 80s, Heschel was introduced to a feminist haggadah that included a ritual of putting a piece of chametz on the seder plate to represent our need for including lesbians in Jewish spaces. Heschel felt that to put bread on the seder plate would be to accept that queerness violates Judaism like chametz violates Pesach. So instead, she put an orange on her seder plate that year. To her, it symbolized the fruitfulness of Jewish life when gays and lesbians are able to contribute. The oranges also had seeds which had to be spit out, which teaches us to repudiate homophobia in Judaism.

Heschel wrote, about the story about women not belonging on the bimah, “The typical patriarchal maneuver occurred: my idea of an orange was transformed. A woman’s words are attributed to a man, and the affirmation of lesbians and gay men is erased.” 

On Tu Bishvat, the Jewish New Year for trees, the orange is associated with the Kabbalistic realm of Assiyah—the world of bodies, action, and our relationships with ourselves. Oranges’ tough protective peels symbolize kelipot, the ‘shells’ or ‘peels’ that surround our soul and prevent us from connecting with the divine light. Hopelessness and heartbreak cause our souls to hide from love, to isolate themselves from community and refuse help when it is offered to us. In order to live fruitful lives, we must peel away the kelipot from our souls, even though doing so leaves us vulnerable. Through radical vulnerability, we not only allow our souls to heal, we become a blessing. 

But why a frozen orange on the Seder table? The affirmation of queer Jews is still here, as is the Kabbalist meaning of vulnerability. But through freezing our seder’s orange, we add a new layer of meaning to this rich ritual: uplifting the people in our lives who struggle with mental illness.  

Holding frozen oranges is a common coping skill among those who struggle with their mental health. Many people with disorders like anxiety, borderline, and PTSD practice holding something very cold to distract themselves from extreme stress or overwhelming emotions. Holding cold things like frozen oranges is also an excellent grounding skill for those who are having flashbacks or dissociating. When holding a frozen orange, it’s hard to think about anything other than how cold our hands are. They have the power to put us back in our bodies when we feel like we’re watching ourselves from far away. Tonight, we hold a frozen orange in our hands to experience the world around us more fully, to feel our feet planted firmly on the earth, and to feel more connected to each other. 

Frozen oranges don’t melt the same way as ice melts. Holding an ice cube in our hands is a fleeting experience—within minutes, sometimes seconds, the ice cube melts away, and we are left with a feeling of wet emptiness. We can hold frozen oranges for longer without hurting our hands or melting the ice away, but the experience is more subtle than that:  if we hold them long enough, we can feel them change in our hands as they start to thaw inside. Like winter slowly becoming spring, the frozen oranges we use ground ourselves and distract from acute distress quietly remind us that transformation is possible. 

Even among communities that struggle together, mental illness is all too often a private, lonesome struggle. The stigma around it ensures that people who are struggling stay quiet. Mental illness and its stigma make us feel alone, and lead to us isolating ourselves out of hopelessness and shame. So often mental illness is considered a personal problem—a chemical imbalance at best and a character defect at worst, when in fact most mental illness is caused by environmental factors. The medical care and social supports we have access to, our housing status, the quality of air we breathe and water we drink, the care our communities provide, the adversity we face as children, the trauma we survive: all of these factors cause and worsen mental illness. 

The seder asks us to relive the trauma of slavery and the bitterness of oppression, not to wallow in our misery but to heal the wounds these traumas left, by imagining liberation. Tonight, we welcome vulnerability and encourage all of us to accept our brokenness and the brokenness of our world, so that together we may heal. 
 

After seven months in Gemini, Mars enters Cancer on March 25th, embarking on an emotionally-charged journey in this protective water sign. Leaving behind the extra-barbed battles in the comments section, now our fighting words come from the heart.

Mars will sidewind through Cancer without pause for the next several weeks, helping you to flex your emotional courage. As your instinct toward protection is dialed up, what you cross swords (or claws) for is also deeply felt. The gift of this cardinal water sign is its ability to plunge into the full breadth of the emotional spectrum: so feel it all. 

Ugly crying as self-care, mama bear energy, acting boldly on intuition — these are your missions if you choose to accept them. 

The shadow of this transit is a tendency to cling when it’s actually wiser to relax your vice-grip. If a challenging situation is draining your resources without reward, consider scuttling back into your shell and moving to calmer waters. 

As much as the coming weeks will have us advocating for cultures of care, we need to bring this compassion to ourselves first. Instead of waving off a day of moodiness, probe the origins of the storm cloud. It may point you toward an area of your life that needs some extra TLC. 

Finally, if a situation calls for vulnerability, dare to show the world your softness. In a world of facades and filters, sincerity is a radical act. Bedazzle your kleenex box and take it everywhere you go.

God, full of compassion, dwelling as uplift and within, grant perfect rest under Your sheltering Presence, among the holy and pure who shine with heavenly splendor, to the soul of our dear one who has gone to his/her/their reward. May the Garden of Eternity be his/her/their rest. Please, Power of Compassion, shade him/her/them in the shadow of Your wing forever. May his/her/their soul be bound in the bonds of eternal life. May Adonai be his/her/their inheritance, and may he/she/they rest in peace. And let us say, Amen.

Clip source: The Shomer Collective

Your yadaim, or hands, hold stories, with every act of care written into their skin.

This ritual invites you to honor the sacredness of what your hands do each day: hold, soothe, feed, lift, clean, create. Take a small amount of oil or lotion and warm it between your palms. Close your eyes and feel the life pulsing beneath your skin. Whisper: Blessed are these hands for the tenderness they give, for the comfort they bring, for the love they carry.

Let your fingers trace one palm, then the other. Feel the ache, the warmth, the quiet energy. If you like, stretch or shake them gently, releasing tension.

Your hands are extensions of your heart, the bridge between intention and action.

What You Receive: A soft moment of appreciation for yourself and your body. The reminder that care is not only something you give, it’s something that flows through you.

Hineni means “Here I am” in Hebrew. In Jewish tradition, it’s a word of presence and readiness, offering yourself fully, with openness and attention, to what life or the divine calls you to. Spiritually, saying Hineni is an act of surrender and connection, a sacred acknowledgment that you are awake, available, and willing to show up with your whole heart.

Begin where you are.

Before you can care for someone else, you must arrive within yourself. This ritual is about presence, a simple returning to your own heartbeat before you reach for another’s. “Hineni,” the Hebrew word for “I am here,” is less about geography and more about soul. It means showing up imperfectly, fully, and honestly for this moment.

Find a quiet place, or pause wherever you are. Feel your feet rooted into the ground beneath you. Breathe slowly. With each inhale, whisper softly: Hineni. With each exhale, feel the weight you carry settle gently into the earth.

What you may notice is subtle: a stillness beneath the noise, a reminder that before doing, there is being. This ritual teaches you to meet the present moment as it is, not fixed, not judged, simply noticed.

What You Receive: The peace of arrival. The spiritual grounding to begin your day with clarity and calm.

Caregiving is sacred work. It asks more of your heart, your patience, and your spirit than almost any other calling. You hold, you comfort, you anticipate, you endure. And in giving so much, it’s easy to forget that you, too, deserve tenderness and care.

This collection of rituals was created as a gentle companion for those who care for others: parents, children, partners, professionals, friends. Each ritual is a doorway back to yourself: to breathe, rest, connect, and renew. These practices draw inspiration from Jewish rhythm and spirituality, not to teach or prescribe, but to offer an ancient language for your very modern heart.

You don’t need to be religious to use them. You just need a willingness to pause. To remember that tending to your own spirit is not selfish, it’s what allows you to keep showing up with love.

Take your time with these rituals. Try one each week, or move through them as you feel called. Let them build on each other, layer by layer, until they weave a tapestry of compassion for others, and for yourself.