From the Belly of the Whale
Sep 07, 2026
Did you know TYH has a women’s magazine?
It's new!
And it’s full of really beautiful, thought-provoking content for the Yom Tov season. You can access the whole thing for free online, download a copy, and if you’d like to order a bulk amount — also free — to hand out to your kehilla, you can reach out to them here.
Somewhere inside this issue is my first magazine submission in about a decade.
It’s been many years since I was asked (and agreed) to craft a piece of writing for publication.
Which is funny, considering what I ended up writing about.
I think there are certain callings we know are ours long before we're actually willing to answer them.
Sometimes we answer.
Sometimes we run.
Sometimes we convince ourselves we’re just “not ready yet.”
And sometimes Hashem has a sense of humor and sends us directly into the belly of the whale anyway.
When TYH asked me to contribute, I was secretly dreading it.
And also really proud to have been asked.
And then I stressed over what I wanted to write.
I was right in the middle of preparing to teach the first module of hypnotherapy training, and so I naturally kept coming back to the idea of the Soul's Journey.
But you know.
Make it Yom Kippur.
Enter Yonah.
Not the Yonah you learned about as a kid.
Yonah through the lens of the Vilna Gaon, who understands his entire journey as the journey every one of us is called to take.
A soul is sent here with a mission.
We forget.
We resist.
We run in the opposite direction.
We find ourselves in places we never intended to be.
And eventually, if we’re lucky, we stop fighting the journey long enough to ask,
What am I actually here to do?
Upon reflection, there's something a little too perfect about being asked to write this piece after years of keeping that particular side to myself in reserve.
The writer in me had been running from that call for some time.
The editor in me is rereading the published piece with a critical eye and thinking of seventeen things I would change if I had just one more round with it before publication.
But the evolving soul in me is also kind of laughing.
Because this is clearly part of answering the call as well.
Not waiting until I feel completely ready.
Not polishing myself into perfection.
Not demanding certainty before I make a move.
Just accepting that this is where I am in the process of becoming and letting myself be seen even here.
Especially here.
The belly of the whale, indeed.
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Spread the message. Answer the call. Whale not required.
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