Music and Judaism with Rabbi Neil Blumofe

Rabbi Neil Blumofe is the senior rabbi at Congregation Agudas Achim in Austin, Texas, and has been part of that community for 26 years! Rabbi Blumofe and I talk about how music can help facilitate community and spirituality. If life is improvisation, then Judaism is jazz. And sometimes rock 'n roll. We also talk about forgiveness, belonging, what makes something sacred and how forgiveness is possible at any time.

You can learn more about Rabbi Blumofe's work here: https://theaustinsynagogue.org/rabbi-neil-f-blumofe/

Transcript:

[00:00:00] Sarah Cavanaugh: I am Sarah Cavanaugh, and this is Peaceful Exit, the podcast where we talk to creatives about life and death.

I'm so excited to share my conversation with Rabbi Neil Blumofe. He's the senior rabbi at Congregation Agudas Achim in Austin, Texas, and has been part of that community for 26 years. Rabbi Blumofe is a musician, and we pull on this thread of how music can actually facilitate community and spirituality. And we talk about all sorts of other stuff too, belonging, the Jewish faith, what makes something sacred, and how we can all connect to our own preciousness as humans.

Welcome to Peaceful Exit.

[00:00:54] Rabbi Blumofe: Thank you, Sarah. I appreciate it.

[00:00:55] Sarah Cavanaugh: I hear you're a fan of jazz.

[00:00:59] Rabbi Blumofe: I produce a monthly series of jazz at one of the clubs here in Austin, so we're highlighting the music and life of Quincy Jones this evening.

[00:01:07] Sarah Cavanaugh: Oh, fantastic. Do you, how often do you do that? Once a month.

[00:01:11] Rabbi Blumofe: Once a month?

Yeah. So, uh, I, I usually focus on a different jazz artist each month. So, uh, uh, Quincy just passed away, so we're, uh, we're honoring him and it'll be very nice to be able to. Explore some of his life and some of the impacts he's made in the music industry.

[00:01:29] Sarah Cavanaugh: Yeah. Is there anything you've learned about him?

[00:01:32] Rabbi Blumofe: So many things.

So many things. I mean, I knew his work in originally with arranging for like Frank Sinatra and Count Bassy. Uh, but you know, the ways that he was very active from the, from the early sixties through the, just a couple years ago. I mean, his work with The Wiz and I didn't realize he actually. He didn't discover, but certainly pushed Michael Jackson in a, in a way, in the way that he worked with hip hop and rap and all the amazing stuff.

It's just really an amazing, uh, possibility of what one can do with life if one imagines itself.

[00:02:07] Sarah Cavanaugh: Incredible career.

[00:02:08] Rabbi Blumofe: Indeed.

[00:02:09] Sarah Cavanaugh: Yeah. So how, speaking of careers, how did you become a rabbi?

[00:02:14] Rabbi Blumofe: Well, we only have an hour or so, right,

[00:02:17] Sarah Cavanaugh: right.

[00:02:19] Rabbi Blumofe: Uh, the

[00:02:20] Sarah Cavanaugh: nutshell version,

[00:02:21] Rabbi Blumofe: no, it's, I'm just joking. Um, it really synthesizes a lot of the interests that I have, and I really feel that to live in the world, to be a force for good is very important to me, to help folks realize their human potential, their holy potential.

And all of that is just encapsulated in being able to do and get to do the work that I do.

[00:02:44] Sarah Cavanaugh: So was religion a big part of your childhood?

[00:02:47] Rabbi Blumofe: Well, it's an interesting question because I think we could probably discuss and parse what religion means. Mm-hmm. Fair. Uh, certainly expectations of being Jewish, uh, were important.

However, you know, my, I lived in a very non-Jewish suburb of Chicago. We had to travel quite a bit to actually get to a synagogue. So on one hand, lessons were imparted to me, and on the other hand, practices were given to me and shown to me. So it was quite a navigation of not imbibing something that was just given to me handily, but really rather making a conscious choice to be able to pursue the aspects of so-called religion or identity or spiritual practice that I thought were important.

[00:03:33] Sarah Cavanaugh: So are you saying that to pursue your spiritual practice, you had to make a big effort because it was far away or because it was not a part of your family of origin or?

[00:03:42] Rabbi Blumofe: So I had a Bar mitzvah, which is, you know, a rite of passage for a young, uh, boy or girl for 12 or 13 years old. And it was a pretty dreadful, chaotic affair.

Uh, everything that went wrong went wrong, and I, as a impressionable young 13-year-old felt that, uh, um. Uh, I had hit a dead end spiritually in that way, so I kind of took a time out until I was about 18 or 19 years old and, uh, began to learn again on my own way and with my own, um, understanding of ways in that were positive and affirming and non-judgmental and, uh, and forces for good.

So my first entry into spiritual practice or Judaism was through music actually. So I learned. Much about liturgy and creativity and poetry, and it was only a little bit later on that I decided to leverage that with the rabbinic work that I do.

[00:04:39] Sarah Cavanaugh: So how does music relate? You said you're a jazz fan, is. Is Judaism more like jazz or is it sometimes rock and roll?

[00:04:49] Rabbi Blumofe: Well, I'm sure it's a lot of things to a lot of people. For me, life is mostly improvisatory. We make big plans and we never know what's gonna happen. There's a Yiddish saying that says there a human plans and God laughs and uh, and I think that that's true and when can prepare a lot for the chart of the music, let's say jazz wise.

And then you get up there with an ensemble and everyone has done their own preparation or lack thereof, and you kinda have to make the best of it every time.

[00:05:17] Sarah Cavanaugh: I love this idea that death is like jazz. Everyone does it a little bit differently.

[00:05:24] Rabbi Blumofe: That's so true.

[00:05:28] Sarah Cavanaugh: So you said in your pre-interview that you help people consider their own preciousness.

That's an interesting choice of language. And what does that mean to you?

[00:05:38] Rabbi Blumofe: Well, it's, it's a, it might be a term that could be from the Hebrew, which is called ula, which means a treasure. And when the divine, if we wanna get into this language, I could speak about it differently if you prefer, but the divine is, oh, I

[00:05:53] Sarah Cavanaugh: love, I love language.

Okay. However you wanna talk about it. So

[00:05:56] Rabbi Blumofe: the divine speaks to the children of Israel and says, you are my treasured people. Or my chosen people, which can get hackneyed and bent out of shape about we're chosen and you're not chosen. That sort of thing. That's not what I mean, but I think everyone has an innate preciousness or treasure to their life, and if people can reclaim that or realize that, I think our world would be a lot better.

In other words, I don't think the sula or the treasure is limited to a particular person, a particular community, or a particular practice.

[00:06:29] Sarah Cavanaugh: You include all people? Of course, yeah.

[00:06:32] Rabbi Blumofe: Everyone has an innate sense of sula or treasure. I, I think it would be a very troubling thing if one said these folks have, and these folks don't have an emphasis is put in Judaism about recognizing the treasured ness of who we are, uh, both individually and as a community.

And I think that that can be. Certainly the case for anyone in any constellation of belonging that they choose.

[00:06:59] Sarah Cavanaugh: How would you characterize the word sacred? Is that a word that you use or is it, or is there some Hebrew word that is similar?

[00:07:08] Rabbi Blumofe: Yeah, so I think sacred represents both, and I'd love to hear what you have to say about this too sense a sense of holiness or set apartness, but also a sense of scariness.

There's, um, a consequence to actually dabbling in the sacred. It's not, that's just set apart because I'm gonna do something pedestrian with it. It's something that's set apart to involve my full senses or to involve a recognition that what I'm doing has consequences. And I believe that sacredness is not just reserved for priests or rabbis.

In fact, I think the sacredness is, uh, found and latent in all that we are. I think that if people can recognize that with our preciousness comes a sacredness and comes a sense of, uh, awe and a sense of measurement, a me a sense of taking stock. I. And a recognition of mindfulness, even if you will.

[00:08:07] Sarah Cavanaugh: Yeah, I agree.

And uh, one of my interviews was really about everyday awe and how we find the sacred just in the, in the small things. There's also a really wonderful photographer who used to teach his students to find something within a 10 foot radius. And oftentimes those were macro photographs of just the smallest thing.

And I just love thinking about that. Um, you know, finding something beautiful within. Within your proximity. We don't have to go searching for it. It's right here.

[00:08:38] Rabbi Blumofe: I agree. And it doesn't even have to be material. It can be something of a gratitude practice that you can tap back into or an experience that we once had that can help define us.

[00:08:49] Sarah Cavanaugh: Yeah. Yeah. So shifting gears a little bit, as someone who talks about death all the time. I appreciate that. Yom Kippur, the holiest day is devoted to considering your mortality. And first, can you just say a little bit about what is Yom Kippur?

[00:09:09] Rabbi Blumofe: So we have our New Year celebration in the fall, and that is recognized by a holiday called Osh Hashanah, which means the head of the year.

And then 10 days after Rosh Hashanah is Yom Kippur, which means the Day of Atonement. Or the day of at one meant. And interestingly, we sort of inaugurate the year first, and then we turn our attention not only to each other and community, but then we begin to consider the face-to-face sacredness. And I use that with both a generous and a foreboding term of standing before God and considering our mortality, considering who we are and what we are.

Our tradition teaches that if we enter into Yom Kippur without making it right, let's say with the people around us, we're not actually adequately prepared for Yom Kippur. Yom Kippur is being in the chamber between us and God, or what's called in Hebrew panim El panim, or to face and really recognizing perhaps this is our last day, or have we done everything that we would've liked to have done?

Or what are the hanging threads? That are still in our power to shift,

[00:10:25] Sarah Cavanaugh: and that relates to relationships. It also relates to where you are in the world and the choices you make.

[00:10:30] Rabbi Blumofe: Yom Kippur is allowing us to be direct in the most essential questions that we may have and that we may be afraid to ask any other time.

Who am I? What is my power? What is my might, what is my purpose? So Yom Kippur is really a day reserved for that. We dress in a garment that's called a kittle, K-I-T-T-E-L, which is, uh, just a simple white garment, which is what we are buried in when we die. So nobody's trying to outdo each other with the more fancy suit or dress or whatever.

The idea is that we're all the same and that we're all on this journey together. And in the middle of Yom Kippur, amid all of this backgrounding of, of mortality, there's a memorial service called ker. Uh, the ker service is when we access our beloveds of blessed memory, or those with whom we've had a relationship, maybe a fraught one, who are no longer walking this world.

And about eight to 10 years ago, I decided to pivot from just a regular sermon that I would give, and I decided to really own or appreciate that moment for where people are. So I've turned it into, uh, meditation. Rather than talk about death, I have done guided meditations or visualizations where people travel to meet the people that they need to meet in that moment.

[00:12:01] Sarah Cavanaugh: In a way, it's going to meet your ancestors.

[00:12:04] Rabbi Blumofe: Exactly. It's exactly what it is.

[00:12:06] Sarah Cavanaugh: In Peaceful Exit, we talk a lot about forgiveness because many people are seeking it or wanna be able to forgive someone else before they die. Um, sometimes they're contending with it after that person has died. What does the Jewish faith say about forgiveness?

[00:12:22] Rabbi Blumofe: That it's possible at any time, and that ideally we do it when we still can. However, if there's an ability to do it after someone's death. There's a way to do that as well. And there's a way to, uh, help heal a relationship or help move, um, the soul of a person who might be trapped in our own sense of, uh, unease or um, incompleteness.

And if we can feel more whole in receiving forgiveness or granting forgiveness, that soul can actually make a better journey back to the eternal or to the infinite.

[00:13:04] Sarah Cavanaugh: So in the Catholic faith, you might confess that you did wrong to this person and then you would have some kind of, um, repentance. Mm-hmm.

Is there a repentance in the Jewish faith?

[00:13:15] Rabbi Blumofe: Not in the same way. It's not a quid pro quo. I don't give out like three shamas and two other prayers and, you know, uh, but the idea is that I think that there's a self-awareness and the process of forgiveness in Hebrew is called tshuva. Which means to return again, and most simply, I guess, that we know that we've repented and that we've forgiven, is that if we are in a similar situation, that we won't make the same mistake.

There's an idea of recognizing what we've done. There's the courage of being vulnerable and disclosing it to others, and then there's the will of changing one's behavior or mindset.

[00:14:00] Sarah Cavanaugh: I love that. Yeah. Yeah. So I've read your congregation being described as traditional or conservative. What does that mean in this context?

[00:14:11] Rabbi Blumofe: In the, um, world of, uh, denominational Judaism, uh, that our synagogue would be more of a centrist synagogue, that we would have our prayers in Hebrew. We would have a traditional observance of the holidays. And unlike, let's say Orthodox synagogues, we believe in access for everybody. So men and women have, uh, equal roles.

They lead prayers, they have leadership. Anybody can read our sacred texts. So we'd like to think that we're. Ensconced one foot in the traditions and in the ways that we teach our children. And in the other way of, uh, including and enabling access for anyone curious, anyone new, anyone, um, who desires, uh, a pathway forward.

I want to lead a community that I myself would wanna be a part of. So access and non-judgment is very, very critical to me. And without it, I don't think I could if I'm just keeping the flame for a couple of people. I, I, doesn't it, I, I, I wouldn't have the inner fire to do the work that I do.

[00:15:21] Sarah Cavanaugh: Thank you for the work you do.

It's really important to me that faith leaders have open arms.

[00:15:28] Rabbi Blumofe: Having been in the community that I'm in for 26 years, the smartest and the sweetest. Part of what I get to do is to know people pretty intimately, and it's not so I can collect information on them, but it's to know them and I think the purpose of life is perhaps to.

As the famous song goes is to love and be loved in return. That's a nature boy, by the way. So the idea of allowing ourselves to be vulnerable to people who we trust and in turn to receive the vulnerability of others and to honor it as holy. And to honor it is sacred. None of us gets out of here alive, and none of us can do this alone.

So the fact that we can depend on each other, while we may not always agree with each other, is to me, what I try to do and what I think. At the end of the day, the purpose of life is

the greatest.

Is just to love and be loved in return.

[00:16:52] Sarah Cavanaugh: Are there death or losses in your life that have shaped how you think about grief?

[00:16:57] Rabbi Blumofe: There are. My mother died in 2011 and my father died in 2012. So it was a fairly uh, um, compressed period close together. Yeah. And uh, I seen the graves of my parents all the time because they're buried in the cemetery where I, that's our synagogue cemetery.

So sometimes I'm there two or even three times a week, and there's a Jewish tradition of putting a stone or a rock on the monument stone, everyone knows, which is my parents' graves, because it's got mountains of stones on it, just from all the times I've been there. And it's, you know, it's sort of a ritual, you know, I'll finish a, a funeral or I'll finish an unveiling of something and then people are like, oh, should we go see your parents now, rabbi?

I am like, yeah, let's go see my parents. So I, I stand there and I give them updates on things. And it's in a way weird because I speak to them now more than I used to. That's a, a very strange thing for me, but it's a. It's an important thing and, and I'll say something maybe a little bit more controversial or maybe a little bit more oversharing, but I don't know if you have children.

I have three. I have three as well. And they're older, they're out of the house and letting them go is a form, not the same, but it's a form of the leave. Taking is a form of death. And to have them out in the world, I don't know, ages us in a way or has me humble in a way that. That it's not like my parents, but it's certainly something that is, uh, moving that I perhaps can't just name that the vulnerability and the fragility and the, and the ways that I'm subject to whatever they do is ever present for me.

[00:18:39] Sarah Cavanaugh: Once a parent always apparent.

[00:18:42] Rabbi Blumofe: Right? Yeah. And you know, there's only so much you can worry about your kids, but

[00:18:46] Sarah Cavanaugh: well, there's a lot you can worry about your kids, uh, which is why we meditate and pray a lot,

[00:18:53] Rabbi Blumofe: right. Right. And you know, and then they decide to tell you what they decide to tell you, leaving out certain details that you find out later.

But I'm not saying again that that is a scarring thing, but it's certainly something that allows me to be hopefully more humane and personable and ideally more, um, gentle with people no matter where they may be and what they may need.

[00:19:18] Sarah Cavanaugh: And I think there's something about sharing an a human experience.

So I've lost my mother. You've lost your mother. There's something about that that connects our spirit in terms of knowing what that kind of pain feels like.

[00:19:34] Rabbi Blumofe: For sure.

[00:19:35] Sarah Cavanaugh: Speaking of that pain, spiritual connection and grieving, first of all, what are Jewish funeral practices and then what happens after the funeral?

[00:19:47] Rabbi Blumofe: The body is received and immediately there are volunteers that are called SCH or guardians. And these are folks who are with the body or certainly in the presence of the body, always the denomination conservative or traditional Judaism. From my community, we really, um, discourage cremation. So there's a burial and there are.

Liturgy and Psalm selections. Uh, there are people generally who speak about the person. I would speak about the person as well. And, uh, there are certain rituals involved with, uh, Jewish funerals. Generally, people who come are there to escort the body to the sacred landing place, and then after the burial, they begin to take their focus of attention to the family, to the mourners themselves.

And the mourners have either a cut of an item of clothing or a ribbon to show that their hearts are broken and that they are officially mourners. And there are con, um, concentric circles of mourning. The first is the seven days of mourning called Shiva, which is the Hebrew word that means seven. And that's generally when people stay home and people bring food and people come and maybe tell a story or listen to a story about the deceased.

And then the next stage is the next 23 days where people begin to return to the community, come to the synagogue, come to one of those prayer services and recite the mourners, Kaddish. And then there's a really intimate connection for the next 11 months of people coming to the synagogue and remembering and saying The Kaddish or the mourners, Kaddish again.

So there's a real gentle. Sense of acknowledgement that you're coming upon these particular milestones and rather than everyone paying attention to you for a day or two and then going back to work, there's a real sense of as you would have fractured your arm. God forbid, your heart is fractured and it needs some time to heal.

And the only thing that can heal it the best is time.

[00:22:04] Sarah Cavanaugh: I do love the Jewish traditions of honoring that, the longevity of, of that healing. I wanna ask you about suffering because it seems like there's so much suffering in this world. It's overwhelming, and how do we accept the reality of what is happening and still stay hopeful as this world changes?

[00:22:26] Rabbi Blumofe: That is a timeless question. And you know, it's, I've tried to teach the Book of Job over and over. I don't think I'm very successful with it. But the question of suffering or. Or just being broken apart and having a real sense of being able to move on, I think is an important one. I do wanna illustrate maybe with a brief story, can I do that?

Yes. So this is a story that perhaps Ellie Wezel told. He received the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1986. He, as a youngster was. Interred in the death camp Auschwitz with his father. So he tells the story that these very poor prisoners in this death camp were, you know, ravaged from day to day to night to day.

And ultimately they wanted to put God on trial for crimes against humanity. And Eel tells the story that over a series of overnight they assemble. Cases for and against God being guilty for crimes against humanity. They put together, uh, a court in Hebrew that's called AB Baine. And over some time, you know, people dying and taking their place.

And ultimately the core people who are left present a verdict of is God guilty of crimes against humanity. And this is a very Jewish answer, so I want, I wanna just sort of, so you know, do, yes, maybe not. There's been compelling cases made on both sides and they open the, the jury opens up the verdict and it says, we find God guilty of crimes against humanity, comma, it is now time for the evening prayer.

And I think the reality or the acknowledgement. That it is not gonna be okay, but to try to act as if things are gonna be okay, and perhaps with our own determination to make holy moments out of our every day, um, that things at least in moments will be okay. Um, and to have bonds of friendship like I do in Austin, and that the Austin community is well known for these.

Interst stitched bonds that go across communities, that when something is wrong and something happens to one community, we all hopefully, uh, open up and are with that group, not only to mourn or be sad, but to act for the betterment of that group and the betterment of our, of our city. And I'm not pretending that that always works.

I don't know what other choices we have.

[00:25:20] Sarah Cavanaugh: You do a lot of interfaith work in Austin, so how do you connect that community work to your faith?

[00:25:28] Rabbi Blumofe: The platform that I have of leading a community allows me to meet other people who are doing similar work. Sometimes it's appropriate to bring people home to, you know, have a play date and to host things and that's great.

I. And really stoking people's creativity, curiosity and ideas of what constitutes, if you will, a beloved community and encouraging people to do their own work. 'cause it's an endless supply. It's really the same reason that I do the jazz work as well. It's, you don't have to have language necessarily, and I think language sometimes gets in the way, as beautiful as it may be.

I think if there's a diverse group of folks who can listen to something that is from somebody's soul. Both written and performed. We get into a very different place very quickly, and we don't have to keep explaining things to each other.

[00:26:19] Sarah Cavanaugh: So it's a way that our faith communities can bring us together versus separate us,

[00:26:24] Rabbi Blumofe: for sure.

Yeah, for sure. And I think music is a really good way to do that. Food is an excellent way to do that.

[00:26:29] Sarah Cavanaugh: So what does Judaism say about what happens after death?

[00:26:35] Rabbi Blumofe: There's a gift giving and gratitude for the body that we've inhabited that should return to the earth. The Hebrew word for human is Adam, like a DAM, or in Hebrew, Adam.

The Hebrew word for earth is Adamah, A-D-A-M-A-H. So the connection between the human and the earth is obvious in the language, Addam and Adamah, but it's the soul, which is the interesting part is you may know from the book of Genesis. This humunculous or this lump of clay, the Adam becomes the vibrant Adam after God either kisses this creature or as it says in the Hebrew instills within, breathes within this creature, ruach Elohim, which is the divine breath.

Or the divine wind. And to, to me, that's the soul. And ultimately the divine soul finds its way back to the divine realm. And hopefully with the lessons and the best practices and the good deeds that we've all tried to do in the world encoded upon it, and it becomes part of the gestalt or the Infinitude of the world from which to be drawn.

[00:27:52] Sarah Cavanaugh: So it's not a place,

[00:27:54] Rabbi Blumofe: we don't have a place, no, we don't have a place. We've certainly been influenced by heaven and hell and all of that. But what I prefer is. Like a spiritual DNAA re encoding of the divine after the life that we've lived with. Its pleasures and its pain.

[00:28:12] Sarah Cavanaugh: And that brings me to legacy because in this western culture we often think about money, title A building with your name on it, but you're talking about spiritual legacy and we're really trying to expand that definition.

If you were able to determine your own legacy, what, what would that look like to you?

[00:28:31] Rabbi Blumofe: The book of Proverbs says that your success is not measured in your children, but your success is measured in your grandchildren. So I guess for me it would be raising, God willing, who knows, but a generations of groups that to come who would be as careful and is intentional about their own lives and would honor their tradition as hopefully I have taught the people around me to be.

So often, and I'm sure you get this too, people will say, you know that thing you said to me 15 years ago? And I'm like, Nope. And they'll say, well, that made such a huge difference in my life. And, and I think that kind of sparking is very, very important, uh, with the people that we care about. And hopefully, again, if it's not with the merit of grandchildren, it's with close friends and the generations of friends that follow.

[00:29:25] Sarah Cavanaugh: I love this idea of sparking. What do you, what are you sparking?

[00:29:29] Rabbi Blumofe: Uh, you're sparking interest, curiosity, self-worth, courage to ask a question. Courage to be authentic. Courage to express oneself in a way that that might be different than the norm. Uh, allowing oneself to live more fully or fearlessly, but also to do no harm in the process.

To allow oneself to recognize the, the goals that are more important than, as you said, material, uh, wealth that is left. I. And I have no illusions about any of that. I don't live my life thinking that eventually the synagogue is gonna be named after me. I think that after a couple of years, even though my photo's on the wall, people are like, oh yeah, I remember that guy.

Oh well, and that's okay. I'm really okay with that.

[00:30:16] Sarah Cavanaugh: What does a peaceful exit mean to you?

[00:30:19] Rabbi Blumofe: The ability to have tied up or untied what we need to tie or untie. The ability to know that you're cared for, the ability to know that you're gonna be okay. Uh, I've been around a lot of death and I know that the end is not peaceful, you know, in terms of the, the, the final moments of what the body does.

So I don't think about it in that way, but in the way that ultimately moving from this plane of existence to a plane beyond this existence, that things are gonna be okay and that you are not. It's gonna hurt, perhaps, or be in pain.

[00:31:02] Sarah Cavanaugh: What music will be playing

[00:31:04] Rabbi Blumofe: for me when you're

[00:31:05] Sarah Cavanaugh: going? Yeah,

[00:31:08] Rabbi Blumofe: that's a really good question.

Well, nobody's asked me that before. Um, well, if it were soon, it would probably be some of the jazz that I've pres presented and produced over the years. Some of the really beautiful. Orchestrations that Gil Evans did with Miles Davis in the late fifties is really some of my most favorite music. Uh, there's a strong deep connection I have with Chopin and his NOC turns, so maybe those, and you know, and if somebody wanted to come and be vulnerable and sing something in my ear, I would think that that was adorable and think that that would be okay too.

[00:31:47] Sarah Cavanaugh: I love that. Is there anything you haven't shared that you would like to share?

[00:31:53] Rabbi Blumofe: Can I ask you a question?

[00:31:54] Sarah Cavanaugh: You may,

[00:31:55] Rabbi Blumofe: you have devoted your time and effort to this. Um, where does this come from for you?

[00:32:01] Sarah Cavanaugh: I grew up in a family that never expressed their grief of losing. My brother was an infant when he died, and I.

This work came very organically in the last 10 years as I realized that I had not been able to process my mother's loss because I didn't have any language for it or any traditions that really honored it. And I became very curious. And about that time I was in a group, uh, we were a learning collective and a friend leaned over, she was 82 and she said.

I don't know what I'm gonna do at the end of my life. I have no idea. And I said, well, let's find out. And what ensued was the most incredible conversation with, um, at first just women, but now we are open to any gender and we are, um. We have small cohorts and conversations around what are the most important questions we can ask each other, uh, about our lives and about the end of our lives, so that we can make clear decisions ahead of time when it's not too late, we're not incapacitated, and in doing so, and embracing our mortality, accepting our mortality.

We are able to live fully every moment. And it's kind of circling back to the first part of this conversation where you were talking about the sacred being, you know, everyday sacred. And, uh, appreciate not taking anything for granted, being steeped in gratitude for not knowing when we're gonna be here or not be here, but also to build those relationships while we're here.

And, and I love the image of tying and untying. That you shared

[00:33:45] Rabbi Blumofe: for sure. You know, there was one Yom Kippur several years ago, and something happened in the blink of an eye that I felt in that moment okay with dying, that it had, it happened at that moment, it would've been fine. And something changed and shifted in me, and I don't pretend to feel that way all the time, but I can access that feeling again, and I can feel it and speak to it from a place of.

Uh, experience and a place of curiosity and a place of having been somewhere before. And I don't pretend to say that everything's gonna be all right for anybody, but perhaps the bulwark or the foundation of a mystical experience is that you feel it and that you want to transmit it again to others. So perhaps in my prayers or my teaching, or my writing or my music.

That is what's at the center of it all as well. And so I've been internally grateful for that moment in time and I think it's informed everything that I've done since then.

[00:34:53] Sarah Cavanaugh: It's important to imagine a peaceful exit, even though there's no guarantee, but unless we imagine into. We dream of in the world we dream of.

You know, it's almost like the science fiction of death, let's imagine into that and come together around each other to support that, whatever that looks like.

[00:35:13] Rabbi Blumofe: And if we can access for each other moments of calm and moments of feeling, uh, oceanic and something bigger than ourselves, I think that that's a value add for each other as well.

Hmm.

[00:35:28] Sarah Cavanaugh: Beautiful. Thank you so much for joining me today.

[00:35:33] Rabbi Blumofe: Thank you.

[00:35:38] Sarah Cavanaugh: Thank you for listening to Peaceful Exit. I'm your host, Sarah Cavanaugh. You can find me on Instagram at @APeacefulExit. And you can learn more about this podcast at peacefulexit.net. Our senior producer and editor is Katy Klein. Our sound engineer is Jeff Gall. Additional support from Cindy Gal and Ciara Austin.

Original music provided by Ricardo Russell, with additional music and sounds from Blue Dot Sessions. If you'd like to support our show, please follow us on Spotify and Apple Podcasts, rate and review us wherever you listen. It really does make a difference. And as always, thank you so much for listening.