I hate rollercoasters. But I went on one recently because my kid asked me to. Afterburn at Carowinds in Charlotte, NC with six, that’s right, SIX inversions.
We boarded the coaster, put the over-the-shoulder harness in place, buckled the extra safety belt which was just like an airplane seatbelt, and then the thing hissed. Then the floor dropped away. Then it started moving forward and my kid said, “Mom, I don’t want to do this anymore,” to which I replied, “Good to know.” And then we were leaving the landing pad of the ride and pulling out into the sunshine. And I thought how much I did not want to do this either. I told myself the things I had told my child: You can do anything you hate for two minutes. And, if It weren’t safe, I would not let you go on it.
I did not want to do what I was doing. I was afraid. I was afraid of not being in control and of getting hurt and that my body would feel feelings I did not like or enjoy. I was afraid most of all something would go catastrophically wrong and on a roller coaster I do not enjoy seemed like a useless way to die.
I made a quick decision on how to handle this situation as I was flooded with fear and a deep desire to not be where I was. I closed my eyes and I held on tight, the braces keeping me in. And then, oddly enough, I prayed—or maybe I hoped out loud or made a wish—that nothing terrible would happen. But thinking about what could go wrong did not help me, so I closed my eyes tighter and focused on my breathing. After about forty-five seconds of being shipped around and hurled all over the place, I tried to relax a little. That did not last long because I was soon upside down and it is hard to stay relaxed while upside down with your eyes closed, hoping you’re going to survive the next ninety seconds or so of your life.
The ride ended, we exited, my kid was overjoyed at doing this very hard thing and away we went.
But I keep thinking about it. The moment I return to again and again was when the machines hissed and the floor fell away.
I might ordinarily turn here in this article to a discourse on fear or yirah. The Hassidic masters would say that all fear of anything is in relationship to the fear of God. And we can be free of some of the human stuff of anxiety and worry by turning it all over to The Divine.
But here’s the thing: It’s been a hard year. And I am not in that place with God where I am willing to give anything over. I’ve seen things happen in my own life and the lives of those around me. The random experiences which swept me off my feet. These experiences have left me with questions about how exactly existence works. What are the rules? Are there any rules at all? God often is an answer to those questions, and I am not willing to accept the mercurial nature of our lives and God in the same breath.
I have a spiritual direction client who focuses deeply on an internalized sense of sanctity. He does not understand God as a force from the outside but rather as an experience from within himself. What is unusual is how thoroughly and exclusively internal his sense of The Sacred is and how not God-centric but rather self-centric his understanding is. He acts as if it all depends on him and yet also feels deeply that knowing himself is knowing something Sacred and beyond himself.
Maybe God is not out there at all in the randomness but maybe God is in here in the response to whatever comes at us. I know, this is a binary set up for a mental exercise—is God external or internal? My experience is we largely understand God as an outside entity or force. What happens if we let that thinking go?
When I sat on that roller coaster and made a wish to the universe to be safe, and I closed my eyes and tried to comfort myself with logic, it was me affirming things I knew were true instead of putting my thoughts towards all the things that could go wrong. In the end, instead of finding the roller coaster scary, I mostly found it unpleasant, and unpleasant was easier to manage than scary. We can all do things that we hate for two minutes.
On Rosh Hashanah, I had a new gig. I have been living in Charlotte for a year after thirteen years in a small community on the coast of Georgia. In this year, I have built a life for myself and my child. Some of that meant scrambling for rabbi gigs here, there, and everywhere. I landed at a non-traditional High Holy Day prayer experience with a Jewish startup called “The Ruach.” Think megachurch rock band meets Jewish liturgy and you’ll start to get the picture. I was their spiritual leader. I have led High Holy Day services for fifteen years. But, I was a bit nervous because this is enough different that my inexperience left me uncomfortable.
In addition to the expected tasks of offering iyyunim or insightful teachings during the service and reading Torah, they also asked me to sing the Janowski version of Avinu Malkenu. You might know it as the Barbara Streisand one. And I would be singing with a violist who plays with the Charlotte Symphony. I felt so much pressure to get this right and I was scared I would mess it up. In the week leading up to the holy days, I kept returning in my mind to the roller coaster as I felt awash in fear over this solo performance.
The day came, and as we made our way through the service, I kept peeking ahead at what was next. I realized I was bracing for singing this song. I said to myself, okay, it is coming and you’re going to do great. I had learned on the roller coaster that I could find comfort and even confidence in what I told myself. And that this was touching my own internal sense of the Sacred. It was time. I invited the violist to join me on the raised platform. My knees shook and he began to play. I heard the hiss of the machines in my head and saw the floor give way. And we were off. I looked at him, I listened to the music, I let go and just tried to enjoy the ride.
And when it was over, it was just over. Like the ride, while I had done something big and scary for me, for the rest of the world, my fear and my anxiety seemed to have no impact.
I am still making sense of all of this. To journey in courage feels fundamental to the human experience and yet is often so invisible. But I feel like this shift to feeling more deeply connected to the Sacred within, instead of attempting to understand the mystery of God out there, will bring some peace to my life, knowing that relying on myself is entwined with and not separate from leaning into something deeply and profoundly Sacred.