Like many in our community, we have been glued to our phones since October 7th, scanning for updates, and especially lately, as the war has ramped up, checking in with Israeli family and friends.
In our experience, such calls often run a predictable path:
Canadian family: (concerned) Are you okay? We just saw the alert in your area!
Israeli: (calmly) Actually, that’s not really very close, about 4 km away. We are just visiting with friends.
Canadian: (increasingly concerned) 4 kms? There could be shrapnel! Shouldn’t you still stay close to the shelter?
Israeli: (laughing) That is so Canadian. It's all fine, don’t worry so much. Yihiye tov.
That last phrase, so ubiquitous in Israeli culture (David Broza turned it into the title and catch phrase of one of his popular older songs), is usually expressed with encouragement and sometimes with a slight impatient tone. In the latter case, it is as if the answer is, and must be, so obvious that we should just calm down and "un-bunch" whatever it is that has knotted us up.
However, for us, perhaps because we find ourselves so far away, "Yihiye tov" does not offer the intended assurance that all will indeed be good. For our Israeli friends and family though, "Yihiye tov" often seems to suffice. So we ask ourselves, how do Israelis seem to get by at times like these, relying on those two simple words? How do they put those words into helpful action.
A recent zoom meeting organized by Ohel Children’s Home and Family Services, helped illuminate the philosophy behind the Yihiye tov" mind set. The workshop focused on ways to manage anxiety and featured Israeli therapists such as Dr. Naomi Baum (coauthor of Isresilience) and Eli Rothstein from Kav L’Noar. There was discussion about some common practical strategies such as maintaining routines, being physically active, staying in touch with supports, and limiting our consumption of social media or news coverage. But a couple of more abstract ideas stood out.
Based on the writings of Viktor Frankl (psychologist, author and Holocaust survivor), the speakers described how our responses to events offered an important choice. They posited that especially in the most challenging conditions where we cannot change our circumstances, our decisions about how to behave or think are critical to building and maintaining resilience. Two paradigms were offered, the first based on hope; the second on control.
- Dr. Baum encouraged participants not to think of hope as something that would be granted like a gift or a wish. Instead, consider hope like a muscle that needs to be exercised. We must each tend to our hope and put energy into exploring ways to develop and maintain it. Working on hopefulness therefore becomes key, albeit challenging.
- Eli Rothstein emphasized the importance of finding ways to take control, especially when we feel helpless. While it might not be possible to change events on a macro level, there are never-the-less positive ways to respond. One wants to be able to reflect back on such experiences with a perspective that we handled the situation as best as we could.
While neither of these ideas offer specific prescriptive actions, both foster a sense of resilience. They also seem to be mindsets common among Israelis. Consider some of the choices that released hostages described making during their captivity: finding ways to keep shabbat like Daniella Gilboa and Omer Shem Tov; saying the Shema like Keith Siegal; helping other hostages like Emily Damari; and like the late Hersh Goldberg Polin z"l, meditating on and sharing ideas that fostered strength, “He who has a why can bear with any how”.
For our family, these heroic decisions and personal actions, made and taken during desperate times, helped illuminate the ‘Yihiye tov’ mindset. Its not about knowing that things "will all be good", its more about finding ways to be okay within yourself.
So now, that is how we try to cope from so far away, while Israelis and those living in Israel, like our son, face additional ferocious criminal assaults on civilians. That is how we try to carry on when he tells us about taking cover under a rock during a missile attack so close he described feeling his bones shake. That is how we endure while he offers comfort to a shaking young family while they hide together under a bridge as they feel the percussive effect of missiles landing nearby.
It isn’t easy, and sleep can be a scarce commodity, but we try to tell ourselves Yihiye Tov; Bezrat Hashem, Yiheye Tov.
