Temple of the Stranger x Judaism Unbound partner in bringing you a new podcast for this new year: “Survival Guide for a Spiritual Wilderness: The Torah of Miriam” Transformative teachings of living Torah from our ancestor Miriam to help us navigate the spiritual wilderness of this political moment, and the spiritual wilderness of our personal lives with creator and host, R’Jericho Vincent.
In a time when many feel alienated from traditional Jewish spaces, this series serves as a spiritual home for listeners who seek to connect Jewish ancestral feminist wisdom with our own svara (moral intuition). This limited series podcast offers a radical, fresh path to engage with Judaism to help us navigate the spiritual wilderness we encounter in our communal and personal lives. Start your year with your heart tuned to “Survival Guide for Spiritual Wilderness: The Torah of Miriam” with inspirational stories, modern Jewish philosophy, ancient Jewish wisdom, Goddexx, and meditative exercises that we can integrate into our daily lives.
Survival Guide for a Spiritual Wilderness is a part of the Judaism Unbound family of podcasts made possible with support from Lippman Kanfer Foundation for Living Torah.
Last week, I got onto the subway here in New York, and as the doors closed with a chime, my entire body clenched, waiting to see: Am I going to have a panic attack again?
About a year ago, I was riding the train home from a ceremony I’d just conducted on the upper west side. It was a Saturday night. The train was packed. Suddenly, somewhere in a tunnel in midtown manhattan, we stopped. Trains stop briefly all of the time. So we waited a minute, two minutes, five minutes. Nothing. We were crammed into this sealed metal car, frozen, a couple dozen feet underground. Now, I have pretty severe PTSD so my limbic system can be a little vulnerable. I ended up stuck on that train underground for an hour. Thanks to a very kind stranger next to me, I managed not to have a full blown panic attack, but the experience traumatized me, and since then, whenever I get on a train, I start to panic.
Have you ever had a panic attack? You might know– it’s a pretty shitty experience. Zero out of ten, would not recommend.
My new terror of subways has been a giant pain in the butt. I’m a New Yorker with two kids so I have to ride the train all the time. And also, by the way, did I mention that I’m a rabbi? I’ve felt a lot of shame that despite all of the psychospiritual tools I practice and that I teach to thousands of other people, I haven’t been strong enough to heal this thing. And that shame, of course, puts more pressure on me, which has made my panic attacks worse.
I’ve worked with a number of different therapies and I’ve made a little progress on my subway panics, but sometimes I still struggle. And last week, I’m on the train, the doors have just closed, and I start checking in with my body—- is this going to be okay?
Am I going to end up starring in a viral tiktok of person-on-new york subway-having a screaming, fainting, total-meltdown?
And then I remember the ancestor Miriam, my people’s survival guide for any spiritual wilderness. So I turned to Miriam and I said: Please save me. Don’t let me get lost in my terror.
And then I sighed. Because I know that Miriam can’t save me. Miriam doesn’t save people. What Miriam does, is she walks with us when we’re in a spiritual wilderness— when we’re feeling lost and disempowered. She walks beside us, she bears witness to our experience, she loves us, nourishes us, offers wisdom to help us take the next step and then the next through the wilderness, and she reminds us that we’re stronger than we know.
So I turned to Miriam again and I said: please, Moreh Miriam, Survival Guide Miriam, be with me in this suffering.
When we look out at the world, a lot of us are feeling like we’re in a spiritual wilderness right now, globally, nationally, communally. And plenty of us have pockets of spiritual wilderness in our personal lives– be it a struggle with panic attacks —or anxiety, or depression, or difficulties with finances, career, health, relationships or something else.
The wisdom of Miriam is Kabbalah, part of the mysterious mystical tradition of the Jewish people. This lineage of Miriam is independent from patriarchy and xenophobia. I don't know if we've ever needed Miriam more than we need her right now.
Miriam just may have the spiritual vitamins you are looking for to nourish your soul.
Subscribe now and come along with me as we embark on this five episode exploration of the five-fold wisdom of Miriam that will support us in the wilderness of this moment. And please, share the news of this podcast with your friends, your family, your feed. I'm Jericho Vincent, your local feminist trans Kabbalistic rabbi, and I'm so excited to take this trip with you, guided by the ancestor Moreh Miriam. This is a Survival Guide for a spiritual wilderness. I'll see you on the path.