Rosh Chodesh Shevat–the Buds Beneath the Surface

The power of this month is believing in the things we can’t see with our own eyes.

As the women of Klal Yisrael, Rosh Chodesh is a special Yom Tov for us. It’s a time when Hashem infuses the world with renewed energy, each month with its own special koach. 

Just as the feminine luminary, the moon, waxes and wanes every month, we too experience cycles— on various levels. In the spiritual/emotional realm, we have moments when we feel like a mere sliver of light in the sky—dimmed, depleted, and barely visible—but we draw hope from knowing that very soon we will experience renewed fullness and radiance.

Every time the moon completes yet another cycle and the new month arrives, this power of renewal becomes accessible to us—but on the basis of our aspirations. We need to understand and appreciate what each month’s potential is in order to access it. In this special Renewed Radiance series here at Between Carpools with Shiffy Friedman, we draw a short, powerful insight from each chodesh as a guide toward evolving into our most radiant self. Gut Chodesh! 

Mazel: bucket (d’li)

After a season of frigid days and long nights, we welcome the month of Shevat with anticipation and relief: the buds of spring are almost on the horizon! But while Shevat is when we celebrate the rising sap in the trees (according to Beis Shammai, this already occurs on the first of Shevat, not the fifteenth), this is not yet the time when the blossoms are visible to the human eye. 

This, dear sisters, is the koach of Shevat: to celebrate the buds of geulah even when they’re still in potential form. 

As women (dating all the way back to our creation from an internal organ), we have the innate ability to see that which is hidden beneath the surface, deeply internal, concealed from the eye. Emunah, faith in the process, is a uniquely feminine attribute. It is a koach we’ve inherited from Miriam Haneviah, who encouraged the women in Mitzrayim to pack their tambourines while they were still in galus because she deeply believed that very soon they’d have reason to rejoice. When women would complain to Rebbetzin Henny Machlis that they’ve been davening so hard but “nothing has changed,” she’d say to them, “Can you feel the world moving under your feet right now? Big things are happening; you just don’t see it…”

This is the month when we peel away the layers in order to unearth the potential, and celebrate the geulah that is to come. By choosing to see those buds even when the tree still looks so barren and skeletal, we infuse our being with hope.

With this understanding of the spiritual propensity of Shevat, we can appreciate why the mazel of this month is a d’li, a bucket. In times of yore, the bucket was used to draw water from the wells. But what was the way to fill it with this life-sustaining substance? By lowering it down, down below, into the pit. Often, davka when we’re at the cusp of salvation the challenge becomes most intense. 

Dovid Hamelech expresses in Tehillim (30:2), “I will exalt You, Hashem, ki dilisani, for You have drawn me up…” In this passuk we find reference to the word d’li, bucket, and its function, which alludes to the process of salvation: First come the most acute labor pains, and then comes the birth. 

This is our time, dear sisters, to tap in to the koach of this month: the power of seeing potential that has not yet blossomed, believing in the buds that are soon to sprout. It is the power of hope.

Here’s how to maximize the potential of this month:

1.

Reflect on an area in your life where you’re in “winter” mode. Whether it’s a child whose challenges seem so overwhelming, our struggles in marriage, with parnassah, shidduchim… The tree looks barren and haggard, with no fruit or buds in sight. Things feel frozen and stuck, like one long stretch of night.

2.

Every morning of this month, take a moment to zoom in on this skeletal tree. True, to the human eye it appears that no change is taking place. You’re investing untold effort into this, all to no avail. Perhaps you’ve even given up trying… See this tree, the hopes and dreams you once had for it. Visualize yourself peeling away the surface layers, layer by stubborn layer, until you spot the sap rising within.

3.

Chazal tell us that tefillah is the fruit of our relationship with Hashem. It’s how we bring it to life. And so, let the relationship bear fruit this month by engaging in heartfelt tefillah regarding this “tree.” “Hashem, I believe there’s a geulah happening under the surface. I know You’re moving worlds from up Above. Help me see change in this area. Please bring the buds to life!” 

If this “tree” is a person in your life, such as your child, access your koach as a woman, especially as a mother, to look into their eyes or think about them and see the potential hiding within. What may be the strengths that lie beneath the surface? How can what seems so challenging today turn into their greatest asset tomorrow? The more we see the buds, the more they grow…

This Shevat, let us look at all these barren trees in the landscape of our life, their revival seemingly so unthinkable, and scratch beneath the surface to notice the rising sap. Remember, “Man is like a tree in the field.” As gaunt as the tree looks from the outside, the geulah is on the horizon! 

In lashon hakodesh, Shevat is an acronym for simchos and besoros tovos. May it be a month of hope and salvation for us all! 

To hear a free, soothing moon meditation on the topic, request it at info@lahavinitiative.org.