Birthday Reflections

by Rabbi Debra Smith

As I enter my 73rd year today, I am reflecting back on the trajectory of my life in the Jewish world.

Years ago, my mother gave me a mug that I still have. It says, “Love what you do, do what you love.“ That quote has shaped my professional Jewish journey over the past more than 30 years. The mug still sits in a cherished place in my breakfront, where I can see it every day.

Somewhere in the middle of a very successful, fulfilling, and lucrative career as a family therapist and licensed clinical social worker, I got a “calling.” It was a calling that became more insistent over time and pulled at me like an invisible thread. The calling was from Hashem, who had a different path in mind for me than the one I was happily pursuing.

I was “called” to work and partner with Hashem in order to fulfill my life’s destiny. I started little by little to return to Judaism through the process of my children’s Hebrew school education. I learned the Aleph Bet from my younger daughter and returned to services on a regular basis. I began to teach Hebrew school and eventually became a Jewish educator and worked at the Jewish Education Association of our local Federation. I was passionate about my Judaism, and I slowly came to realize that I needed to become a rabbi – it was my life.

I approached seminary after seminary for admission to their rabbinical program and was turned down again and again. Finally, I found a mentor who opened her seminary to me. After a year of discernment, when she asked me why I needed to do this, my answer was simple: I’ll die incomplete one day if I don’t.

Five long years later, at age 62, I received Rabbinic Smicha and concurrently, a Masters Degree in Jewish Studies. I knew that special day and every day since then, that this path was right for me.

I am so grateful to those who believed in me and supported me. Above all, I am grateful to The One Above for continuing to “call” me and never stopping. Where would I be without this life I have created? I’d be incomplete! Every day, “I do what I love and love what I do.”  I am grateful to my mom for that mug that she gave me all those years ago. On this my birthday,  I am especially grateful to God for granting me another year of life to continue to “Do what I love and love what I do.”