Omer Calendar

click below to enlarge

See how counting the Omer can become a mindfulness practice.  See also the description below from the Velveteen Rabbi.blog:

The kabbalists of Jewish tradition developed the idea that these seven weeks are a special time for focusing on a set of seven sefirot, seven divine qualities which we share with God: lovingkindness, boundaried strength, harmony and balance, endurance, humility, roots / foundation, and nobility / sovereignty.

I like to think of these qualities as facets of a gem, and during each week of the Omer, a different facet is held up to the light. Or perhaps, lenses / facets of a prism. Shine white light through a prism, and the seven colors of the rainbow emerge. Shine divinity through the prism of these seven weeks, and these seven qualities come into new focus.

And because there are seven days in each week, we rotate through the seven qualities each week, too.

Today is the day of chesed she'b'chesed, lovingkindness within lovingkindness. Abiding love, abounding love, lovingkindness and compassion which overflows our hearts and spills into the world around us. May we embody this quality as we move through the world today, on this first step toward the wonder of the revelation at Sinai.

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If you're looking for Omer-counting resources, here are four wonderful books for counting the Omer: one by Shifrah Tobacman, one by Rabbi Min Kantrowitz, one by Rabbi Jill Hammer, and one by Rabbi Yael Levy. Rabbi Levy is at Mishkan Shalom, and each year she sends out daily Omer teachings via email and Facebook -- you can learn more, and sign up, here: Count the Omer with Us from Passover to Shavuot. And the spiraling map of the Omer count which illustrates this post was adapted from the one I found here: Counting of the Omer | Temple B'nai Abraham -- but I added the color-coding and the indications of which qualities are ascendant on each day. Here's a printable pdf if you want it: ColorfulOmerChart[pdf]

Source: Velveteen Rabbi blog

Counting the Omer with Amichai

INVITATION FOR A JOURNEY,
FROM AMICHAI LAU LEVI of Storahtelling


Dear friends,

I want to invite you to join me on a journey that began yesterday, during the first day of Passover, online.
I am counting the Omer - 50 days from Seder to Sinai, from slave to soul, from midnight to dawn. This is a personal journey but I want to invite you to count with me and join the journey. Please read the rest of this note and join me on Facebook or Twitter to make each day count more on our journey to a mountaintop of more meaning, reflection, more mindfullness.

see you on the road!

love and liberation

Amichai



SINAI 5.0 COUNT UP
50 days to live your lover
3/30-5/18/2010



WHAT: Hear Ye: there's this intriguing judeo practice I am reigniting- the Count-Up from Seder to Sinai, slave to soul - in 50 Days. The traditional way you do it is simply count, aloud, each night, for fifty nights, from the first sunset of Passover until the eve of Shavuot, the holiday of Revelation. Known as The Counting of the Omer, this practice was originally used in Biblical times for scheduling the barley harvest - Omer is Hebrew for barley.

Over the centuries Jews became writers in Hollywood and the counting evolved into an abstraction. The farmer's tool became a practical but complex and mystical tool for disciplined self reflection and personal growth. a bit elaborate. As a religious child and teen I never quite got the point and often forgot to count within the first week, shrugging it off. In recent years I was tempted but kept forgetting.

This year I'm back, determined to use this count-up as useful technology for refocusing mindfulness, embodied discipline, a sacred daily practice in the art of being more present, and more loving. (and more hairy. One of the things one does during the counting is not shave. I forget why but will find out soon. I may trim my neck a bit but here comes the Big Beard, just like Sting and the Rebbe. Good thing beards are back.)

WHY EXACTLY? I'm doing this count up as a reminder to be more present. I like rituals and love all mythic journeys that chart old paths and new milestones in the mundane maps of life. And i need help to refocus. This year I want to embody some of the visions and ideas I've been 'thinking' of - and I want to focus on real change in the way I live and love in the world. Each nights' count will be a commitment to this process and vision for change. I don't just want to sit around the Seder table and chat about freedom. There's work to be done. I will start by recharging this ritual reality. night by night. and I invite you to join me.

Night 1 celebrates the Exodus from the narrow reality of the Mythic Egypt - the psycho-spiritual reality of being enslaved by forces of habit and force. Night 50 symbolizes the completion of the count - and arrival at the top of Mount Sinai, where the sky opens wide for new revelations of free will and real love. Something fabulous will happen that night - real, virtual, other. TBD.

WHERE AND WHEN: i'm taking it outside - not just the beard - going public with commitment and accountability for each day's counting, to be reported by midnight each night of the 50 on my facebook page and brand new twitter account, created with this task in mind. Each day i'll count, share an image, write a brief thought about the word of the day, my task, my intention, process. Each day i'll focus on making each day count. more. I'd love for this to become a conversation. What intention for more love and focus can many of us create, what impact? what's waiting for each one of us on the summit of Sinai and along the way?

Like she said - climb every mountain. I want to climb towards the mountaintop, and I got work to do to get there. Step by step, here we go: a pilgrimage towards Sinai, towards The Divine as Lover - within, and in the world, in so many ways. 50 days to live your lover. and.. go.

WANT TO JOIN? check it out online, daily:

On Facebook
On Twitter


please join, add comments, count with me!

Amichai

PS. lots of sages are posting remarkable resources, links and more info on the Omer Counting. see some of them here, including Iphone App and the Homer Omer Calendar:

http://www.neohasid.org/omer/iphone/
http://www.ritualwell.org/holidays/countingtheomer/
http://homer.jvibe.com/Welcome.html