Are We Real?
Oct 06, 2026
If you’re new here, welcome.
There are a lot of new names on this list lately, and I’m so glad you found your way here.
And if you’ve been here for a while, maybe think of one person in your life who would love these weekly emails and send this to them. Better yet, invite them to join the list so they don’t have to keep borrowing yours.
Now, onto the existential crisis currently being led by my four-year-old.
My son Deeds has lately been asking if we’re real.
Every evening for weeks, he’s asked some version of:
“Are you real?”
“Am I real?”
“How do you know we’re really real?”
As opposed to what? I finally asked him.
“To people in a story,” he said simply.
Umm.
He’s four.
And then last week before bed, I caught him scribbling, left-handed, into a little notebook.
When I told him it was time for sleep, he gently closed the journal and told me he had just finished writing the first chapter in his book.
Your book?
“Yes. The book about my life.”
As I’m wondering where my kid gets this, he continued:
“Morah told me that Hashem has a Book of Life that He writes about us. So I’m writing my story, so Hashem knows what to write about me.”
Oh.
Wow.
As I sit here at my desk getting ready to launch Vessel, thinking about all the clever promotional emails I could send you, I realize there’s probably nothing I can write that will top the insight I just got from a kindergarten kid.
Because how often do we mistake our stories for reality?
The stories we tell ourselves about our days.
About our relationships.
About who we are and what we’re capable of.
Stories about not being good enough. Smart enough. Strong enough.
Stories about people leaving.
Money not staying.
Stories about how this is how it has always been, so this is how it will always be.
It’s adorable when we’re writing chapters at four.
But tell yourself a story long enough and eventually you start living inside it.
It becomes true.
That’s terrifying.
But it’s also incredibly liberating.
Because if stories are written, they can be rewritten.
Beliefs can change.
And the lives we build around those beliefs can change too.
This is actually so much of what I spoke about in my new podcast episode with Heather Parady last week — consciousness, belief, perception, and the stories we write about ourselves without even realizing we’re writing them.
We end the episode speaking of Vessel and why it's a foundation for what we're hoping to do in this world.
Registration for Vessel is officially open.
Vessel runs only once a year, and the cohort begins Motzei Shabbos, October 17.
It's open to both men and women, (and spouses join free).
Vessel is an opportunity to look at the narrative you’ve been living inside and ask:
Is this actually true?
Is this still mine?
Is this the story I want to keep writing?
With the simple joy and audacity of a four-year-old holding a notebook and deciding he gets a say in what comes next.
As we step out of chag season, with the blank page of a new year in front of us, what story do you want to tell about yourself now?
Borrowing from Deeds and his persistent little question:
Are you ready to become more real inside your own life?
Are you ready for a new story?
Come write the next chapter with us.
-----
Because Vessel only runs once a year, if you’ve been thinking about joining us, this is the moment.
And if someone you love came to mind while reading this, forward it to them and invite them in too.
Join the Mailing List!
Life happens in little bits. Learn to love the little bytes.
