Perhaps, you’ve been wondering where I’ve got to the last couple of weeks.

The short answer is, I burned out, and I’ve been taking an extended break offline during ‘chochmas’, to work on re-energising mind, body and soul.

As part of that, I’ve begun doing the vision exercises in Meir Schneider’s book, Vision for Live, HERE.

His approach, and his story, have been very helpful, to trying to grope my way towards finding more balance between the panicked, fear-stoking ‘olam hadimayon’, aka the imaginary world online, and my real life, which is actually still doing pretty good, BH.

Yah, I know Trump kidnapped Maduro and took over Venezuela (incredible, that this is meant to be a serious headline in the so-called ‘real world’.).

I know, that Esav and other enemies are all over the place, up to their little tricks.

But what I know way more, is that Eretz Yisrael is actually booming at the moment, and the country is blossoming in a million different ways – even in YOSH, where I have lost count of the number of new farms and settlements that have gone up in the last few months.

The country is blossoming, and the headlines do not reflect the reality, not at all.

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As part of my reboot, I took 10 days offline to just focus on ‘real world’, and try to overcome a serious case of eye strain, that came about from trying to share so much information all the time, in a mad rush, like the world somehow depends on it, or something.

BH, I realise this is more of that ‘dimayon’ that I am trying to tackle now in my dalet amot, and I am trying to slow down, smell the roses more, balance, and stop getting pulled into other people’s ‘stress’ and dramas, that are mostly also based on dimayon and a blurry way of seeing the world.

Or to put it another way, I am working on developing some real eyes of emuna, and that is much harder work than you might think.

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But anyway, as part of the time off, we headed off to Mizpe Ramon for a bit, and the Ibex are all over the place there, thanks to Beresheet Hotel’s blurring the line between ‘wilderness’ and ‘tourism’.

What else changed in the last few years, is that most of the fast food places in Mizpe Ramon are now kosher.

I was discussing with my husband why that is, and part of the reason is that the frum population of the town is exploding.

But that’s only part of the reason.

The other part of the reason, is that the last few years, between Covid 19 lockdowns and Gaza Wars, most of the non-Jewish tourism has dried up here.

Which is actually fantastic news.

Because now, instead of pandering to tourists who eat traif and travel around on Shabbat in their coaches to all the tourism sites, any place that really wants to make parnassa has to deal with the full-time residents and local tourists.

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The people who stay in Israel, don’t tend to travel abroad for their holidays and are happy to go to Mizpe Ramon for a few nights, tend to be frummers.

In a million small ways like this, the Gaza War has actually helped Israel to wean-off the crusading tourism trade, and to start to cater to the locals.

To the frum locals, who keep kosher and shabbat.

We saw the same thing up North a few months ago, with a lot more kosher options and shabbat flexibility appearing up there, as the tourism industry gets to grip with who their core patrons are actually going to be, going forward.

It’s a beautiful thing to behold.

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So, here’s where I’ve got to, with what I’m doing here on the blog, with God’s help.

Still two translations from the Rav a week, wherever possible, BH.

FYI, the Rav has said precisely nothing about the incident in Bondi, and has been undergoing some serious medical treatment for the last month and a half which I hope has now ended, and been successful.

After this post, I will translate a couple of interesting snippets from the Shivivei Or two weeks ago, and stick them up here.

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Apart from that, I am planning to slow down a bit, to continue to write, but not to do it in the same ‘mad rush’.

That’s just playing into the olam hadimayon, and the mad pace of fake news, and manipulated headlines, designed to keep everyone stuck in panic and jumping to whatever tune the Evils try to play next.

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I am still doing my research, but with more discretion.

And I want to focus way more on Ha-good than Ha-bad, with God’s help, as I keep getting pulled back into that crud, no matter how hard I try to stay out of it.

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Bottom line: I think probably all of us need to take a serious pause for breath, re-evaluate what we are doing with ourselves, and especially how much time we spend online, engaging with ‘Candace’ and other BS, and try to put more of our focus on our real life relationships, and looking after ourselves and our loved ones, than breathlessly debating more stupid headlines.

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I don’t care that Trump kidnapped Maduro, honestly.

I am not playing that game, and if you still are, it’s a shame, because there are so many more useful and beautiful things that could be taking up your headspace.

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So, that’s where I got to, in my two week break.

I am really hoping God is going to help me stay above all the crud online, and to continue trying to share more practical Breslov teachings here, that I’ve found helpful, and that maybe, you will too.

No doubt, I will fall back into the crud at some point, but hopefully not for long.

Tachlis, I am trying to limit my time online to maximum three hours a day now (remember, I don’t have a smartphone…) so my eyes won’t get buggered from all the scrolling and blue light.

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In the meantime, I am starting to rediscover some hope and optimism about the future again.

Things are much better than they look, than how they are being portrayed online.

At least, for frum Jews in the Holy Land.

Redemption sprouts precisely when it seems the seed has totally rotted away, and there is nothing left.

If we’re not at that point already, we are fast approaching it.