14 Elul 5786 – 27 August 2026

It’s time to change your filter.

This morning I received one of those ubiquitous notifications on one of the too-many devices that are set to tell me important things that I better not forget. This one was from my smart thermostat admonishing me to change my filters for my HVAC system. Honestly, I am inconsistent at best in responding to this reminder and doing what I need to do to keep my HVAC running at its highest efficiency. Today, however, I’m happy to say I actually changed the filters … and was gifted with a thoughtful metaphor for the “notification” those of us in the Jewish community receive this time every year to do the same.

We are each a construct — physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual — that is built to realize the same goal that our “HVAC” system does for our house. As the world around us throws heat, cold, moisture, and dust at us … our system is there to cool us, warm us, and keep us as pure and clean as possible. As well-built and intuitive as the system may be, it still gets clogged up doing the work that it’s constructed to do. Hence the notification — the reminder that we need to change the filters so we run at our peak efficiency.

This month of Elul and the upcoming 10 Days of Teshuvah serve as our filter-changing window and exercise. If you’ve heard or read me say it once, you’ve heard or read me say it 1,000 times: Teshuvah is about returning to our clearest, most authentic core selves and values. While we are built to live and thrive in the world — our filters get dirty and clogged, and they need to be reset. Don’t ignore this important New Year notification! Pay attention to it and take some of your precious time and limited energy to get back to, to remember, to realign with your essence, your source, and your truth.