Mazal tov and its meaning for New Year’s resolutions

The Writer and Screenwriter Leticia Wierzchowski, author of the book “A Casa das Sete Mulheres”, which was adapted by Rede Globo and became miniseries which aired in 2003, wrote an unpublished text for CLAUDIA:

So, once again, we have a brand new year ahead of us with all its possibilities for transformation and renewal. A year when we can change everything or just start over in another way. Or go forward on the road we were already on, advancing to new frontiers.

I make lists –grocery stores, errands to do–, I write my novels following lists on stepladders, moving forward scene by scene in the story I want to tell. A new year is like a new novel. That euphoria and anxiety of the blank page…

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And the next thing I know, here I am making lists once again. But I confess that, when sitting on the sofa at my beach house, with my pile of dreams, thinking about everything that this 2018 could bring me in a beautiful and unusual way, what I really remembered was a conversation I had with Guershon Kwasniewskirabbi at Sibra, a synagogue not far from my home in Porto Alegre.

I am not of Jewish origin, although Guershon’s last name and mine are very similar. I had gone to the synagogue one afternoon in October to research a book I am writing.

Anyway, I went to see Guershon, who received me kindly, and asked him for some explanations about one of the pillars of the Jewish religion, circumcision, which is always performed on boys on their eighth day of life.

Conversation goes on, conversation comes, Guershon explaining to me the rites and sayings of the ceremony, until we reach a point already at the end, the time when the rabbi wishes the baby newly circumcised – and therefore newly entered into the Jewish people – may he be lucky in this life. Good luck, in Hebrew, you may have heard it around, it’s mazal tov.

“Mazal tov”, says the rabbi, and they all repeat together to the little child: “Mazal tov!” I thought it was nice to wish luck to the little one who is starting life, and then Guershon explained to me that the expression means luck, yes, but not only that. Luck, my dears, is not so simple.

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mazal is an acrostic of three other words: one of them means place🇧🇷 Luck therefore depends on where you are. The second word of the acrostic means time🇧🇷 Luck depends on the time in which you live. And finally, the third word that makes up mazal is study🇧🇷

So, the luck afforded by the Jewish religion is neither random nor trivial. It depends on the conjunction of these three factors to be realized. Place, time and preparation. It’s a luck in which we act too, and not just the divine.

We cannot be sure that we will be, in this 2018 that is starting, in the exact place where we should be; We don’t know if this will be the time of our dreams, our desires, finding love or carrying out that professional project, but one thing depends – yes – on us: we need to be prepared for our dreams, we need to be ready for our wishes, aligned with our project, of tidy drawers for the changes we aim to make. We have an important role within the imponderable, a fundamental role, and we cannot escape it.

I confess that I have been thinking a lot about that conversation with the rabbi in recent months. It’s so easy to complain that we’re unlucky, that this and that. But are we prepared for everything we desire? Do we do our part, that one third of the mazal tov?

And here, now, sitting on my sofa, with the afternoon sun descending on the sea on the beach, I know that I don’t need to make lists for 2018. I’ve been preparing for months for this year that just started and I hope that you will too.

I tear a single page from the lined notebook with the list I intended to make. And I only write one word: mazal tov. For me, for you, for all of us.

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