October 10, 2008
By now, many of you have heard about what is called “The Last Lecture” by Randy Pausch.
For those of you who have not, it is an actual lecture, and a subsequent book, by a professor of Computer Science who recently received a prognosis that his pancreatic cancer would leave him with less than one more year on this earth.
Put in this new perspective on life, Randy Pausch wanted to impart a message of life-meaning to the next generation. He spoke in front of a packed crown at Carnegie Mellon University, and answered the following question:
“What wisdom would you try to impart to the world if you knew it was your last chance?”
Listen to this lecture if you get the chance, and think about your goals for the coming year. Listen to Randy’s reflections, and see if anything speaks to you.
Randy passed away on July 25, 2008, and learning from his lecture is a great way to pay him tribute.
Check out this lecture either on YouTube, or as a free download from Itunes.
Another lecture by Randy Pausch on Time Management is great to listen to as well.
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Posted by eimatai
October 10, 2008
Over Yom Kippur, I was struck by one line of the Vidui prayer where we are meant to reflect on sins that we as individuals and as a community have committed over the past year.
“For the sin we have committed before you in throwing off the yoke.”
I never really thought about this line so much in the past – I had always focused on more specific things that I could think of in very practical terms.
What does it mean to throw off the yoke? It means we have shirked responsibility. It means that we had a duty to do something, and we neglected it.
I began to think about some of the major problems facing the world – genocide in Darfur, man-made global climate change, terrorism, hunger, natural disasters – and the list simply didn’t stop.
I started thinking nationally to both America and Israel, wondering what I should be doing to influence the outcome of the upcoming election, and what I could do to work towards peace for Israel and her neighbors.
I thought locally about the community I lived in, and the people who I saw every day who might be in need of help or assistance in some way – my synagogue, my neighbors, my friends and family.
That’s not a yoke, that’s hundreds of yokes! Do we really need forgiveness for not solving every woe in this world? Who is not guilty of throwing of one of these countless yokes?
“It’s not possible to do everything,” I told myself, but it’s imperative that I do something. Throwing off the yoke is unacceptable. We don’t need to carry every yoke, but we need to be thinking about what need there is out there in the world, and how we can best fill it.
Shana Tova.
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Posted by eimatai
