Resource Category: Rosh Hashanah

Rosh Hashanah is a powerful and transformative holiday, from the inspirational and poetic prayers we recite to the powerful and incisive blast of the shofar. This experience, however, cannot be fully embraced in a safe and healthy way without preparation. We encourage you to take time to fully embrace and engage with your past in a healthy and honest way. It is only by building better selves that we can build a better world.

U’neTanah Tokef and Suicidal Ideation

One stanza in particular stands out as uniquely highlighting an aspect of life to which anyone who is struggling with suicidal ideation can connect: Who in good time and who by an untimely death. To die by suicide is an inherently untimely death, and it can certainly feel sealed for people struggling with it. But like any other death or negative change in circumstance listed in this prayer, that decree can be averted with righteous actions. Yet the righteous action taken to prevent an untimely death might not be the actions of the person whose death is predicted. It might be your righteous, selfless act that makes the difference.
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God has Made Laughter for Me

By Ze’ev Korn, LCSW, MSW, EdM | On Rosh Hashanah, Jews around the world will read the same section of the Torah. It is the story of the birth of Isaac, or Yitzhak in Hebrew, whose name means laughter. What a way to begin the new year, with the gift of laughter and humor being brought into the world. While everyone has experienced the pleasure of laughing, I (and I imagine others) have also known the experience of losing one’s sense of humor.
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The Nature of Change: A Guided Meditation for Tashlich

Listen to our guided meditation to elevate your Tashlich experience, and bring a sense of acceptance of change into the High Holiday season. The Tashlich ritual is an expression of repentance, acceptance and forgiveness for how we mistreated others. But we must also forgive ourselves for the ways we mistreated ourselves, releasing those misdeeds and letting them flow down the river.
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Mental Health Tashlich Blessing Card

תשליך/Tashlich is an expression of repentance, acceptance, and forgiveness for how we mistreated others. But we must also forgive ourselves for the ways we mistreated ourselves. Check out our blessing card, perfect for your Tashlich experience.
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Rosh Hashanah 5783: Der Shiker is Nisht a Goy: Der Shiker Iz a Yid

Over the summer I read a wonderful book. It’s called Undelivered: the Never-Heard Speeches That Would Have Rewritten History. The speeches are divided into categories. The first group were speeches that went undelivered because they were thankfully unnecessary. General Dwight Eisenhower prepared a speech apologizing for the failure of D-day: Thank God, it was never delivered. Richard Nixon’s aide drafted a speech swearing he would never, ever resign from the presidency: that too was unnecessary. I then tried looking through the book for an unnecessary Jewish speech: But all I came across were the words of historian Simon Schama. There are no Jewish unnecessary speeches. He writes, “Jews essentially communicate through agreed mutual interruption.”
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High Holiday Liturgy Viewed Through the Lens of Depression

Imagine for a moment you live with depression. It is not a family member or loved one who has depression — you are the patient. You are suffering. You are in so much pain and your brain is so ill, you have thoughts of suicide. Next, consider the liturgy of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur: We are commanded to “choose life.” Teshuva, Tefilla and Tzedakah, repentance, prayer and charity, are your ticket to the Book of Life for another year.
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Being Written for Life

On Rosh Hashanah it is written, and on the fast of Yom Kippur, it is sealed. . . This piyyut (liturgical poetry), the Un’taneh Tokef, is perhaps the most famous of all the liturgy of the Yamim Nora’im/Days of Awe. It tells of how our fates for the coming year will be written in the Book of Life. That book, we are told, is opened during the High Holy Days, and we read it together with G-d. What is written? Our lives. We look back at pages we have embossed with our deeds and misdeeds, active and passive. And we ask G-d to help us write a better page next year. For G-d to help us cope with all the hardships and blessings that come our way: flood, famine, plague, restlessness. To write us for life, for a good life.
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Mental Health Rosh Hashanah Seder and Simanim

On Rosh Hashanah, it is a tradition to eat simanim, foods that are symbolic of blessings you would like in your life in the new year. Over time, different communities have added different foods to this list and given each one of them specific symbolism. Infuse your year with mental wellness with our mental health simanim!
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Shofars and Semicolons: Struggling with Suicidal Ideation on the High Holidays

Rosh Hashanah is an exciting time of year. It’s a chance to reflect on our past and set our intentions and goals for our future. This opportunity for growth and achievement can be thrilling. But for people who didn’t think they would make it to the new year — because they were struggling with suicidal ideation, survived an attempted suicide, or went through a traumatic experience that left them emotionally drained — entering the synagogue and facing the prospect of a new year can be overwhelming. In those moments that feel daunting, we need to reorient ourselves, breathe, and pause. In other words, we need Rosh Hashanah.
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