Tikkun Nissan

It's the 24th of Elul, "Tikkun Nissan", we're fixing those things we can still fix from last Nissan (21 March - 18 April, 2015). Nissan is the month associated with the sign of Aries and the planet Mars ("Maadim"). Mars is your energy, your "koach", your "Chi" (life force), it's your Yetzer - neither "tov" (good) nor "ra" (bad), but simply the impetus, the get up and go, the raw energetic "Ummmph" a person needs to do anything at all in this world.

Nissan is when we inaugurated the Tabernacle, it's the time of the Exodus from Egypt, it's a time of energetic rebirth and the raw power that accompanies newness. It's about INITIATIVE - taking initiative with courage. The Tribe of Yehuda is connected to Aries. Yehuda is about overcoming discouragement and accepting the mantle of leadership. So too in our own lives we allow discouragement to tell us others must lead and we must follow, because (as Yehuda himself did after the incident with Yoseph being sold into slavery) we've made mistakes and feel unworthy. 

When you allow life to take the initiative, you become reactive. Did you lose your individual initiative somewhere along the way? Has the world beat you up so badly you feel like "it's no use even trying"? Are you discouraged? Today's energy is to fix discouragement and re-energize your individual initiative so that you may boldly go where you've never gone before - to the next level! Chazak, Chazak! Be strong and of good courage!