I love this so much and it came at such a perfect time for me. I’m a Reform Jew so my experience has been very different from Tova’s, but I am still struggling to reconcile the parts of Judaism I believe in with the parts I don’t.
porcelainplumApril 6th, 20154:15 PM
What a gorgeous way of reconciling your past with your present. I think everyone has some part of their past that feels ugly in some way and it’s easy to lump that entire period together and try to forget about it. I agree that it’s worth it to examine each moment individually and connect to the positive parts. Just because it wasn’t always perfect doesn’t mean it was worthless. Thank you for this reminder!
kiki_dianeApril 6th, 20155:18 PM
This is LOVELY. As someone who grew up with no religious affiliations at all, this is really eye opening. Thank you Tova and Esme!
susiApril 6th, 20155:23 PM
Thank you for making this.
meghanjApril 6th, 20155:38 PM
BEAUTIFUL and RESONANT learning to reconcile your whole life! sometimes things are so complicated that you can’t come to any answers about them! thank you for your story! living mine too.
ra99chApril 6th, 20156:07 PM
Although I have not grown up in a hasidic jewish community, i’ve grown up in a semi-religious family. I also go to a secular school where we are taught to question everything. I think of myself as a woman/girl of science, yet i sometimes catch myself praying and thinking about religious texts. I then have to ask- why can’t the two exist in tandem?! There have been beautiful parts of my religious upbringing, and lessons i can thank for making me who i am today. Why can’t i take those parts of my religion, and incorporate them into my modern life? Balance is key, and i think as i continue to grow up i’ll find that i can pick and choose whatever pieces of my background and identity that i want.
This piece is so relevant at a time when many people (at least those who live near me!) are being brought up on no religion at all; It can be hard for those of us who have religious backgrounds to find our place in the world and community.
Thank you tova (and esme!) for the beautiful article
Naomi MorrisApril 6th, 20156:45 PM
wonderful tova <3
AbbyApril 6th, 20157:11 PM
I went through something similar when I left Christianity and discovered things about it that I didn’t know in college. Although I wasn’t in a super religious household, it was hard to hear that a lot of the things I had been taught since I was a kid were not true. Thank you for making this, it’s beautiful!!
Also, I’m just curious about the having to sleep in your sister’s bed because you left your light on thing? I’ve never heard about that.
mangachicApril 7th, 20155:50 AM
In Judaism because Sabbat is the day of rest, switches can’t be turned on and buttons can’t be pressed-no turning on or leaving on the TV or light or radio or riding in elevators. That’s why there are things like shabbat elevators-elevators that open on every floor in a building so no buttons need to be pressed. So the author left her light on in shabbat which meant she couldn’t be in the area with the light. I’m a reform Jew so I may be a bit wrong on the specifics :)
AbbyApril 7th, 20152:06 PM
Thank you, that was really helpful!!
tovapearlApril 7th, 20152:56 PM
Hey Abby!
According to Halacha (Jewish Law) there are 39 categories of activities prohibited on Shabbat (you can read about it here: ). These prohibited activities are commonly referred to as “Muktzah” ().
There may be some activities that aren’t “Muktzah” / Jewish Law doesn’t prohibit, but they still might be prohibited (according to Chassidic customs) because they take away from the “Spirit of Shabbat.” So the example of the Shabbos elevator managachic brought up is correct although generally a Chassidic Jew would not go into an elevator on Shabbat, even if they were technically allowed to according to Jewish Law because it could be argued to be against the “spirit of rest”. Chassidic Jews are known for their strict adherence to customs in addition to the Law. Many Orthodox Jews use timers for lights and ovens in their homes, which is a little less common in Chassidic communities. Once Shabbat starts, the lights, oven, etc. cannot be touched or adjusted.
So as far as the light goes it’s actually pretty simple! I just can’t sleep with the light on in my bedroom – a purely personal thing! – if I would forget to turn off the light before Shabbat it would have to stay on until Saturday night at nightfall.
Hope that clears it up for you. I’m so glad that so many people from all backgrounds were able to relate to this piece <3 <3
xx-amApril 6th, 20157:24 PM
Thank you so much for this. I’m going through something similar and this really hit home
Ajb1011April 6th, 201510:20 PM
I LOVE this! So beautiful and definitely timely for me during this week of pesach. I too am always at a crossroads between a strong religious upbringing and a more secular, liberal one. Growing up, I went back and forth between days at my Modern Orthodox father’s house and my reform mother’s house. When I came back from weekends with my dad, my friends would be dumbfounded by the number of miles I had to walk- to my uncle’s for shabbos dinner, shul, and my bubbe’s for lunch. On the other hand, I would pretend that the members of the Chassidic shul my dad belonged to were not gawking at my non-tzniut-ness and my insistence to sit on the men’s side of the sanctuary.
It’s nice to see that I’m not alone in my journey to integrate the best parts of each lifestyle to forge my own life <3
TerezalApril 6th, 201510:44 PM
This was so beautiful Tova thank you so much for sharing, and the art is gorgeous Esme
steviencksApril 7th, 201512:57 AM
I live in a very conservative Christian household, which although I do tend to distance myself from it the older I get, I find myself reevaluating what my faith means to me – how it can be restrictive and comforting at the same time, how I struggle to articulate to others the complex nature of my relationship to my church, from completely renouncing it’s oppressive traditions one day and returning back to church the next. Anyways, great article Tova and love the illustrations esme! xxx
smashley_simpsonApril 7th, 20152:31 PM
This was so brilliant- I have been a reader on here for over a year now but am only registering now (I wonder if it’s obvious what film I took inspiration from for my username) and everything I have read has been inspiring and/or so relatable. This is no exception. Although I didn’t have the same experience as you did- some of our feelings and breaking away from faith overlap. And a lot of the time I find myself angry at the faith I used to have but I think that in some ways there are good things that came from it and some good childhood memories that don’t have to be tainted by the bad. Thanks for writing this! And your professor was so profound! She said what she did perfectly. This really helped.
LolaNicksApril 7th, 20152:49 PM
OH wow! This is timely. I recently wrote about my experience of losing faith and how it has totally messed my confidence and when I was writing this mini essay out…I wrote about how me and my sister would always fantasize about what our lives would be like if we weren’t religious and it always spoken about with this “george and lenny” glaze to it. I felt so silly when I wrote it out that I never felt gutsy enough to share with all the world. Thank you ROOKIE MAG for being so bloody wonderful, seriously every time I visit here, I feel lifted in so many ways xxx
pasteldaisiesApril 7th, 20154:52 PM
my relationship with faith is something i find hard to be vocal and resolute about and i related to this on so many levels. it was so comforting to realize that our personal truths and lies are meant to be constantly evolving and it’ll never be easy to distinguish one from the other but that’s okay; we’re okay.
beautifully told and beautifully illustrated, thank you tova and esme <3
SatsumaConsumerApril 8th, 20158:25 AM
I really loved this. I grew up in a religious family, and many friends in a religious community, and I found it really hard to reconcile the trust and love I have for my parents and community and the general sense that everyone had been lying to me and misleading me I had when I left the religion. I’ve never seen anything addressing that sense of disconnect before. Thank you so much for sharing your experiences!
glittersystemApril 8th, 20156:57 PM
TW in this comment for mention of child sexual abuse. It isn’t graphic.
This was great to read!
It’s also very timely for me; although my religion hasn’t given me issues like this (I was brought up secular and now I choose not to label my faith beyond “I believe in a god”), I was a victim of child sexual abuse between the ages of 11 and 13. Now I’m in therapy for it, and it’s difficult for me to really come to terms that I have fond memories from that time in addition to the traumatic ones. I even have good memories with the person who hurt me. It’s good to see other people learning that things don’t have to be black and white; it gives me hope that I can get to that point too. Sorry for how personal this was!
jenni_beeApril 10th, 20155:55 PM
I’ve grown up in a legacy (direct descendants of pioneers) Mormon family my whole life and I really needed to read this right now. These are the same ideas I’m struggling with as I distance myself from the religion that has always been such a strong part of my culture and identity. I love where I come from, but where I come from was also a really hard place to grow up in. And finding out that things you’d been raised on aren’t true is heart breaking; I’ve never felt so betrayed before. This was such a beautiful handling of such an isolating experience. I feel so much less alone after reading this. Thank you so much
ari_ellaApril 28th, 201511:42 PM
thank you
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22 Comments
I love this so much and it came at such a perfect time for me. I’m a Reform Jew so my experience has been very different from Tova’s, but I am still struggling to reconcile the parts of Judaism I believe in with the parts I don’t.
What a gorgeous way of reconciling your past with your present. I think everyone has some part of their past that feels ugly in some way and it’s easy to lump that entire period together and try to forget about it. I agree that it’s worth it to examine each moment individually and connect to the positive parts. Just because it wasn’t always perfect doesn’t mean it was worthless. Thank you for this reminder!
This is LOVELY. As someone who grew up with no religious affiliations at all, this is really eye opening. Thank you Tova and Esme!
Thank you for making this.
BEAUTIFUL and RESONANT learning to reconcile your whole life! sometimes things are so complicated that you can’t come to any answers about them! thank you for your story! living mine too.
Although I have not grown up in a hasidic jewish community, i’ve grown up in a semi-religious family. I also go to a secular school where we are taught to question everything. I think of myself as a woman/girl of science, yet i sometimes catch myself praying and thinking about religious texts. I then have to ask- why can’t the two exist in tandem?! There have been beautiful parts of my religious upbringing, and lessons i can thank for making me who i am today. Why can’t i take those parts of my religion, and incorporate them into my modern life? Balance is key, and i think as i continue to grow up i’ll find that i can pick and choose whatever pieces of my background and identity that i want.
This piece is so relevant at a time when many people (at least those who live near me!) are being brought up on no religion at all; It can be hard for those of us who have religious backgrounds to find our place in the world and community.
Thank you tova (and esme!) for the beautiful article
wonderful tova <3
I went through something similar when I left Christianity and discovered things about it that I didn’t know in college. Although I wasn’t in a super religious household, it was hard to hear that a lot of the things I had been taught since I was a kid were not true. Thank you for making this, it’s beautiful!!
Also, I’m just curious about the having to sleep in your sister’s bed because you left your light on thing? I’ve never heard about that.
In Judaism because Sabbat is the day of rest, switches can’t be turned on and buttons can’t be pressed-no turning on or leaving on the TV or light or radio or riding in elevators. That’s why there are things like shabbat elevators-elevators that open on every floor in a building so no buttons need to be pressed. So the author left her light on in shabbat which meant she couldn’t be in the area with the light. I’m a reform Jew so I may be a bit wrong on the specifics :)
Thank you, that was really helpful!!
Hey Abby!
According to Halacha (Jewish Law) there are 39 categories of activities prohibited on Shabbat (you can read about it here: ). These prohibited activities are commonly referred to as “Muktzah” ().
There may be some activities that aren’t “Muktzah” / Jewish Law doesn’t prohibit, but they still might be prohibited (according to Chassidic customs) because they take away from the “Spirit of Shabbat.” So the example of the Shabbos elevator managachic brought up is correct although generally a Chassidic Jew would not go into an elevator on Shabbat, even if they were technically allowed to according to Jewish Law because it could be argued to be against the “spirit of rest”. Chassidic Jews are known for their strict adherence to customs in addition to the Law. Many Orthodox Jews use timers for lights and ovens in their homes, which is a little less common in Chassidic communities. Once Shabbat starts, the lights, oven, etc. cannot be touched or adjusted.
So as far as the light goes it’s actually pretty simple! I just can’t sleep with the light on in my bedroom – a purely personal thing! – if I would forget to turn off the light before Shabbat it would have to stay on until Saturday night at nightfall.
Hope that clears it up for you. I’m so glad that so many people from all backgrounds were able to relate to this piece <3 <3
Thank you so much for this. I’m going through something similar and this really hit home
I LOVE this! So beautiful and definitely timely for me during this week of pesach. I too am always at a crossroads between a strong religious upbringing and a more secular, liberal one. Growing up, I went back and forth between days at my Modern Orthodox father’s house and my reform mother’s house. When I came back from weekends with my dad, my friends would be dumbfounded by the number of miles I had to walk- to my uncle’s for shabbos dinner, shul, and my bubbe’s for lunch. On the other hand, I would pretend that the members of the Chassidic shul my dad belonged to were not gawking at my non-tzniut-ness and my insistence to sit on the men’s side of the sanctuary.
It’s nice to see that I’m not alone in my journey to integrate the best parts of each lifestyle to forge my own life <3
This was so beautiful Tova thank you so much for sharing, and the art is gorgeous Esme
I live in a very conservative Christian household, which although I do tend to distance myself from it the older I get, I find myself reevaluating what my faith means to me – how it can be restrictive and comforting at the same time, how I struggle to articulate to others the complex nature of my relationship to my church, from completely renouncing it’s oppressive traditions one day and returning back to church the next. Anyways, great article Tova and love the illustrations esme! xxx
This was so brilliant- I have been a reader on here for over a year now but am only registering now (I wonder if it’s obvious what film I took inspiration from for my username) and everything I have read has been inspiring and/or so relatable. This is no exception. Although I didn’t have the same experience as you did- some of our feelings and breaking away from faith overlap. And a lot of the time I find myself angry at the faith I used to have but I think that in some ways there are good things that came from it and some good childhood memories that don’t have to be tainted by the bad. Thanks for writing this! And your professor was so profound! She said what she did perfectly. This really helped.
OH wow! This is timely. I recently wrote about my experience of losing faith and how it has totally messed my confidence and when I was writing this mini essay out…I wrote about how me and my sister would always fantasize about what our lives would be like if we weren’t religious and it always spoken about with this “george and lenny” glaze to it. I felt so silly when I wrote it out that I never felt gutsy enough to share with all the world. Thank you ROOKIE MAG for being so bloody wonderful, seriously every time I visit here, I feel lifted in so many ways xxx
my relationship with faith is something i find hard to be vocal and resolute about and i related to this on so many levels. it was so comforting to realize that our personal truths and lies are meant to be constantly evolving and it’ll never be easy to distinguish one from the other but that’s okay; we’re okay.
beautifully told and beautifully illustrated, thank you tova and esme <3
I really loved this. I grew up in a religious family, and many friends in a religious community, and I found it really hard to reconcile the trust and love I have for my parents and community and the general sense that everyone had been lying to me and misleading me I had when I left the religion. I’ve never seen anything addressing that sense of disconnect before. Thank you so much for sharing your experiences!
TW in this comment for mention of child sexual abuse. It isn’t graphic.
This was great to read!
It’s also very timely for me; although my religion hasn’t given me issues like this (I was brought up secular and now I choose not to label my faith beyond “I believe in a god”), I was a victim of child sexual abuse between the ages of 11 and 13. Now I’m in therapy for it, and it’s difficult for me to really come to terms that I have fond memories from that time in addition to the traumatic ones. I even have good memories with the person who hurt me. It’s good to see other people learning that things don’t have to be black and white; it gives me hope that I can get to that point too. Sorry for how personal this was!
I’ve grown up in a legacy (direct descendants of pioneers) Mormon family my whole life and I really needed to read this right now. These are the same ideas I’m struggling with as I distance myself from the religion that has always been such a strong part of my culture and identity. I love where I come from, but where I come from was also a really hard place to grow up in. And finding out that things you’d been raised on aren’t true is heart breaking; I’ve never felt so betrayed before. This was such a beautiful handling of such an isolating experience. I feel so much less alone after reading this. Thank you so much
thank you