Past, Present, and Facebook

“It is the past,” wrote one of my 226 ‘friends’ on my Facebook page.
 
My ‘friend’ was referring to the photos I put up on a whim of my wedding, which took place pre-teshuva. After a few hours, I removed them from my page, upon exchanging analytical messages with my ‘friend’ and some self-critique:  Why, oh why, was I putting them up to begin with?
 
I know why — I was going for shock and awe.
 
I got what I wanted: A chain of gushing compliments as well as a long line of those who hit the ‘like’ button. The comments were from the two camps in my life: People who knew me pre-teshuva and those who have known me only with a tichel on my head and cholov yisroel in my refrigerator. The latter group went wild with dramatic statements of disbelief that we once looked like THAT. So young, so pretty, so clean-shaven (this would be a reference to my husband, just in case you’re wondering).
 
I’ve had to untag photos of myself in my goofy college days or in shots showing a bit too much arm, posted by my pre-teshuva ‘friends.’ I made them disappear because they weren’t exactly modest, either in behavior or dress. There are some I decided to save simply because they’re not incriminating and they capture my carefree young self. But when I look at them, I experience a wave of conflicting emotion. On the one hand, that’s me – just twenty years younger and light years more clueless. On the other, I feel a twinge of melancholy. Not for the long-gone late night pizza parties, but for the aveirot (sins) I did without realizing, for all the hours I wasted away in front of the TV, and for the carols I sang with my non-Jewish best friend as the snow fell outside.
 
In Rabbi Shalom Arush’s book Women’s Wisdom, he writes: “Rebbe Nachman teaches: ‘The main aspect of repentance (teshuva) is to subdue the negative outlook and to choose instead a positive outlook.’ We see something incredible here, how Rebbe Nachman is teaching us something that totally contradicts what the majority of people think—that the main aspect of repentance is to be broken and depressed, etc. G-d forbid. Because the evil inclination tells a person that repentance means to see the evil inside herself, and to be depressed and sad. But the Torah teaches us that the exact opposite is in fact the truth…”
 
Rebbe Nachman gives us the green flag to be upbeat about ourselves no matter our past. We can be happy and do teshuva with a smile, not with self-flagellation. I cannot undo the past but I can look back on it and accept that every photo on my Facebook page is simply part of Hashem’s building-block plan to lead me to the truth.
 
I can now thank G-d that I’m a walking dichotomy trying to weld both sides of my reality into a solid whole.  It’s part of my soul’s tikkun. So I stop berating myself over how I once lived my life and instead smile about it. I smile when I see those old photos, and while I’ve got a heck of a long way to go, I know I’ve come quite far already.
 
I want my 226 ‘friends’ – both camps of them – to know how much I’ve changed.
 
Instead of wondering how my peers from temple youth group will take it when they discover what’s become of me (several became Reform rabbis), I hold my cyber-head high with pride that I have chosen a path that they’ve either not yet discovered or have opted not to take. And maybe – just maybe – a spark or two will be ignited in their neshamot (souls) by a photo of my newly-shorn three-year-old, sporting his first tzitzit and kippa. And a huge smile.
 
“It is the past.” Indeed, it is. But Baruch Hashem, I got the message. It’s one I ‘like’ and am happy to ‘share.’