another reason to love living here...

Today was a yom iyun at Neve Yerushalayim. I heard the most
powerful speakers, and now I don't think I can ever speak
LH (loshen hara-gossip, slander, malicious or not)
again (yeah, right..oops, is that LH?)

A capsule of what I learned:

1-If you want to know whom you have decided to be,
listen to the words you decide to say.

2-The key to not speaking LH is
being an anav, a humble person.
Anava doesn't come from seeing how small we are.
Anava comes from seeing H's greatness, His greatness in others
and His greatness in ourselves.

3-Every Jewish neshama comes from the Kesei haKavod because
our purpose is to reveal the greatness of Hashem. We do this by
honoring what is important to Him. What is important to Hashem?
The greatness of every single Jew, including ourselves.

4-Abusing our speech, abuses our humanity. Learn the glory
of the power of speech. Use it to reveal our greatness.
Say kind words, use soft speech, make a sincere apology,
and create bonds with powerful, building statements.

We have a lot of work to do, but the good news is, we can do it!

I can be nothing less than incredibly grateful that learning on
such a level in the Place where we have clearer insights is
available to ME-it can only be zechus avos, that I am here.

Something to live up to. Please read Unburying & Rebuilding.
Go with your greatness.
May we merit to have Tisha B'Av become a Yom Tov this year.