Just before the last Shabbat of the Jewish year 5782 Raizy and I (separately, in separate cars) listened to the car-radio, not only that, but we happened to listen to the same radio station and hear the same piece of a radio show… this doesn’t happen often.

They were discussing the widespread electricity blackout on Puerto Rico after Fiona came through causing major flooding. This is while the island is still trying to recover from the devastating impacts of Hurricane Maria. The person speaking on the radio talked about the huge sums of money that were poured into strengthening and rebuilding the power grid, which – in this person’s opinion – could have been better used to pay for solar panels on home rooftops, since Puerto Rico gets so much sun, individual homes would not be as dependent on a centralized grid and instead generate their own electricity. That’s the piece we both heard on the car-radios – independent of each other.

TBH, we are not power grid mavens, we don’t know the pros and cons of centralized grids vs. individually generated power and we have no idea of the extent or limitations of solar panels on homes. But we both realized there is a big life message in this.

Too often we’re too overly reliant on the big grid, Jewishly as well. We rely on the rabbi, our families, the community, we expect them to generate our religious energy for us to plug into. There’s a lot of power in that. But (whatever the optimum reality in Puerto Rico) it is also important for us to generate our own spiritual energy.

Look, I’m not advocating we go off the grid. Everyone knows how invested we are in fostering, building & strengthening Jewish campus community. And regardless of how it works with electricity, we are stronger and better when we are interconnected with each other. We believe very much in the benefits of a Jewish communal “grid”. But its unhealthy, unwise and unsustainable to rely on that power alone. It is so important that we find ways to generate our own power, find our own inspiration.

Another expression of this concept can be found in this post “This is My G-d… the G-d of My Fathers“.