Bay Area JHC Kol Haneshama – Classes 3 and 4

By Susan Esther Barnes

Last weekend, I attended days 3 and 4 of the Kol Haneshama class series given by the Bay Area Jewish Healing Center. The purpose of the class is to train volunteers to work at the Jewish Home in San Francisco with people who are approaching the end of life. The class is also open to people like me who don’t live in San Francisco, and who will be using what we learn in our own community.

I was glad that, after breakfast together, we started Saturday morning with Shabbat services. We were told we were welcome to bring a tallit, so I wore mine, as did the rabbi leading the service, and a couple of other people.

Saturday was all about loss. There were two activities that particularly stood out for me that day. For the first one, we were each given 16 post-it notes: a set of four each of four different colors. On one color, we were asked to write one activity that is important to us on each of the four post-its of that color. For the second color, we wrote four roles we play that define us. On the third color, we wrote the names of four people who are important to us, and on the last color we wrote four physical objects that we own that are important to us.

Then, we were asked to select one post-it of each color, and to place it in a bowl. At first, I didn’t know what the activity was about. I thought maybe the trainer was going to read out loud a selection of the things we had written. Foolishly, I picked the four things that were the most important to me, and put them in the bowl.

We were then asked to look at what we had left, and I began to realize that what we were being asked to do was to imagine what it would be like if we lost some of the things that are important to us – activities, roles, people, and things. The activity was helping us to see what kinds of things people lose when they become ill and/or elderly, and to imagine what that would feel like.

Next, we were asked to pick four more post-its, of any color, and place them in the bowl. This time, I chose more wisely. I held on to the things I had left that I would least like to lose. Once again, we spent some time contemplating what we had left.

The trainer then announced that he was going to come around and take some of our post-its. This was the same trainer who did the photo activity with us on the first evening, and similar to what he did at that time, when he gave different numbers of photos to different people, he took different numbers of post-it notes from different people. At least one person was left with all eight remaining post-its, and at least one person was left with only one.

Once again, he asked us to look at what we had left. He asked us, “Is it enough?” and someone else answered what I was thinking, “It has to be.” All in all, it was a sad and sobering experience to contemplate being left with so much less than I have now, especially in terms of activities and roles.

When the trainer asked what it was like when he said he would take some post-its rather than allowing us to pick them for ourselves, I told him, “I was thinking, ‘That’s too bad, I used to like you.’”

The other activity that stands out for me was at the end of the day. Each of us were asked to think about someone we knew who had died, and to write on an index card three things: Something we regret, something we would like the person to know, and something we wish for the person. On my card, I wrote to my grandmother who died in 1983.

One by one, we stood up and read what was on the card, then dropped it into the bottom of a ceramic pot, while the other members of the class said, “Amen.” Once everyone was done, together we all put dirt into the pot, planted a houseplant in it, and watered the plant. The plant is going to be brought to the Jewish Home, where most of the people in the class will be volunteering.

What surprised me the most about this activity is how emotional I felt, even though it has been so long since my grandmother died. She had the same disease as Katharine Hepburn, so that her whole body shook all the time. It always seemed to me it must be hard to sleep in that situation. My grandmother always seemed so strong, self-reliant and capable, it had never before occurred to me to wish for something for her. What I wished for her was the ability to be still when she wants to be.

One other thing that struck me about day 3 is that we were told that our lunch hour would be a silent lunch. I took this to mean that none of us would speak during the lunch break, yet several people from the class spoke to me. After I ate, I left the building and took a walk around the grounds, which include lovely paths like the one picture at the top of this post, but I found myself spending more time than I would have liked feeling annoyed because people had spoken to me. When I returned to the building, again, people from class spoke to me even though the lunch break was not yet over.

When class resumed, we were asked what the experience of the silent lunch was like for us. At the risk of alienating various people in the room, I spoke about how frustrating it was to me that so many people spoke to me, when I had been anticipating having a chance to spend the hour in silence.

Later that afternoon we had another, 15 minute, silent break, and once again someone from the class spoke to me during the break. Believe it or not.

So Saturday was focused on ourselves and on loss. Sunday was focused on serving others. We did some text study and learned a bit about listening skills, and did some roleplays of what we would say and do when we were visiting residents at the Jewish Home.

The best part of the day, for me, was a video of Jewish Home residents, centered around a performance they put on of songs they had written. The documentary started filming in the week before the performance, which had been scheduled to be on September 12, 2001, adding an extra dimension to it because of the September 11 tragedy.

As you can see, day 3 was much more impactful to me than day 4.

Worse, I’m afraid I won’t be able to write about the classes on days 5 and 6, because I came down with a nasty intestinal flu, and was unable to finish the class series. I don’t yet know what that will mean to my potential future as a volunteer.

Bay Area JHC Kol Haneshama – Class 2

By Susan Esther Barnes

Thursday night, I attended the second evening of the Kol Haneshama class series given by the Bay Area Jewish Healing Center. The purpose of the class is to train volunteers to work at the Jewish Home in San Francisco with people who are approaching the end of life. The class is also open to people like me who don’t live in San Francisco, and who will be using what we learn in our own community.

I arrived early, and used the time to walk the labyrinth on the grounds of the Mercy Center where the meeting was being held. I had never walked a labyrinth before, and I was curious what it would be like. This particular labyrinth is in a beautiful setting, surrounded by bushes and trees, as well as chairs and benches. Unfortunately, it is a little too close to a road and parking lot, which led to traffic noise interfering with an otherwise idyllic setting.

I found the experience of walking the labyrinth to be a bit distracting. On some of the longer stretches I found myself thinking about one thing or another, but then I felt interrupted every time I had to make a U-turn to continue to follow the path. As a result, I didn’t find the experience to be either restful or helpful. I found myself thinking I would have preferred to just sit on one of the benches to think.

When I walked into the gathering area for the class, I realized that, when I arrived for the first class, I had felt like an individual walking into a room with a bunch of other individuals. Walking in the second evening, I felt like a person walking into a group of people of which I am a member. This tells me the trainers did something right the first time, to help us to feel like a group.

After dinner, one of the trainers talked for a while about silence, and then gave us an opportunity to just sit in silence for a while. This allowed me to experience what I had found myself wishing for when I had been in the labyrinth earlier.

Next, we were asked to think about an experience that we found to be spiritual, to write down what the experience was, and to write what was spiritual about it. Everyone then shared what we wrote, and we discussed spirituality in general, as well as how diverse our experiences were. One thing we had in common, though, was a sense of awe.

We were reminded that what is spiritual for one person may not be for another, and that even if two people say the same activity is spiritual, each one may find different aspects of that experience to be spiritual. For example, what I find spiritual about Chanukah may be lighting the candles with my husband, while for someone else it might be the smell and taste of latkes.

Toward the end of the evening, we broke up into small groups to discuss what the class experience has been like for us so far. One person asked whether it was intentional that we weren’t asked to introduce ourselves to the class, and weren’t asked to tell each other what brought us there.

I let her know I found the experience refreshing to allow people to form a picture of who I am based on what I say and do, rather than what labels I may put on myself if I were asked to introduce myself formally.

The trainer said it was intentional, and is done that way partly because, when we walk into a room as a volunteer, we may know very little, if anything, about that person or their background. We need to be able to do our work despite this lack of knowledge, knowing that in some cases, even the person we are visiting may not be capable (due to language, physical or mental reasons) of telling us about themselves.

Next up will be two full days – Saturday and Sunday – with the class. I was pleased to learn that Saturday morning will include a prayer service, as well as Havdalah at the end. I’m sure the weekend will be tiring, but I’m hoping it will be energizing, as well.

The Benefits of Overreaction

Words by Susan Esther Barnes
Photo by Alan Schweigert

We all have mental images of ourselves, ways that we define ourselves and our actions. “I’m artistic,” “I’m logical,” “I have a good sense of humor,” etc.

One of the things I tell people about myself is that I tend to overreact to things. Until recently, I thought that was a bad thing, but recently I have reconsidered.

It’s true that sometimes my tendency to overreact can get in my way. Sometimes, I am so surprised and dismayed by something that it seems my mind has ceased to function. My head is filled with white noise, and I, who revels in the use of words, feel incapable of forming any coherent thoughts, let alone translating those thoughts into phrases or sentences that anyone can understand.

This issue used to be a common problem for me in my first marriage. My (then) husband would say something (usually it would be something critical of me, or something threatening our relationship), and then would follow it up 5 or 10 seconds later with something along the lines of, “Why are you just sitting there? Say something!”

The truth is, when I am upset or very surprised, there is a nonverbal internal process that needs to take place before I can do anything else. The amount of time this process takes varies depending on the situation. If the surprise is bad enough, during the initial few seconds I am literally incapable of forming words in my head, let alone choosing which ones to express. My ex-husband never understood this.

Another one of my charming tendencies is that if I am hurt and/or uncomfortable, I want everyone else around me to feel hurt and uncomfortable, too. When I was younger, this led to me saying things that I very quickly came to regret.

So the next thing that happens, once I am capable of speech again, is I have to examine my feelings. Am I angry? Do I want to hurt the other person right now? If so, then I need to consider very carefully what I am about to say, because I don’t want to say something I’m likely to regret. This evaluation can lead to an even longer period of silence.

Over time, I have learned that this is a good time to say something like, “I’m sorry, I’m having trouble thinking right now,” in order to clue in the other person about why I’m just frozen there with a blank look on my face.

All of this requires a good amount of patience and understanding from the other person. If they’re going to be around me a lot, they’re going to run into this behavior from time to time. And, because it drove my ex-husband so buggy, for a long time I thought of this as a bad thing.

It has recently occurred to me, however, that these overreactions of mine have a couple of distinct advantages.

First, when I’m surprised, my inability to process words pretty much guarantees that I won’t unthinkingly snap back with a hurtful comment. Initially, I can’t speak at all, and in the process of trying to find and form words, my filters become engaged, and I have time to consider the possible downside to what I might be about to say.

Second, I have found that if I allow myself to become immersed in whatever my reaction might be at the time, eventually the perceived crisis loses its power over me. I find that after I have expended my initial overreacting burst of energy, I am once again able to think more clearly about the situation. I can re-evaluate whether or not things are as bad as I initially perceived them to be. I can start to plan how best to cope with it.

And, I have found, that rather than stuffing my feelings inside where they can rise up and surprise me in unpleasant ways at seemingly random moments, in my overreaction and recovery process I have expressed and then dealt with those feelings in such a way that once I’m done with an issue, I’m done. I don’t need to re-examine it later. I can move on.

So, although I don’t like the feeling when I overreact, and I have empathy for other people close to me who occasionally have to be discomforted by being exposed to my silent, blank-faced nonverbal process, in the end I think the benefits may make it worth it.