“Hashem said to Abram, “Go for yourself from your land, from your relatives and from your father’s house to the land that I will show you.”
(Bereishit, 12:1)

Ok folks, I think it’s time I cheered up a bit and started getting excited. I am leaving in exactly 5 weeks. I’d be lying if I said that the last few weeks have been an easy time for me. They’ve been pretty hard actually. As much as I don’t like to be the subject of my own experiment, a part of me finds it fascinating to delve deeply into the events of the last month or so and interpret them – or try to.

To be honest, I would be more concerned if this whole aliyah thing had been plain sailing all the way. I think it is normal, even healthy to be struck down by self-doubt and panic. Let’s face it, no one of completely sound mind and body would choose to make aliyah these days – it does work in your favour to be a tad off centre to begin with (big tick for me!).

A few weeks ago I inadvertently got involved with someone. To say I have been avoiding romance’s evil eye all year is the understatement of the century. When I made up my mind earlier this year to return to Israel permanently, I said to myself (sub-consciously of course – I haven’t quite got to the stage where I am talking to myself) “time to put on the love blinkers SGD”.
Of course I can hear you know-it-alls out there in cyberspace going, “Ahhhh, but you can’t control that kind of thing! Love comes when you are least expecting it.” Well – love might be too strong an emotion to use, but very strong feelings/powerful emotional connection/extreme attraction could all be appropriate substitutes.

The question I have been plaguing myself with is this: why has this person come into my life NOW? Whose idea of a cruel and twisted joke was this? I can see the headlines now: “GIRL SET TO HOP ON PLANE TO OTHER SIDE OF WORLD MEETS GREAT GUY. HEARTBREAK IMMINENT.”

I am not exaggerating when I tell you that I have spent the last few weeks in a totally discombobulated state (I have always wanted to use that word in a sentence!). I have been grinding my teeth at night again (something I have not done since I was about six) and my appetite has gone out the window (ok, every cloud has a silver lining).

So what happened that I was able to turn the corner and get back on the road to aliyah? Well, a few things. I was speaking to my brother the other night and despite the fact that we are really close, it is not often that we talk about our respective love lives. Still – my bro is one insightful cookie. He said; “you’re just like me – you wear your heart on your sleeve and you give too much of yourself, too quick.” Well thanks, Dr Phil umm, I mean Dr Rich.

He also reminded me of how long I have had this dream to live in Israel and that I owed it to myself to give it a go. “No one is saying you have to stay – but you do have to go”. I realised that once again I was falling into my old ways; my own self-created safety net if you like. It’s easier to back out of a plan than go ahead with it and fail. It’s easier to blame a third party on the eventual failure of my own actions than face my fears head on and deal with them.

I got off the phone and I sat and thought for a long time afterwards. I don’t think I came to any ground-breaking conclusions, but there was definite seismic activity going on in my brain. I went to bed and had one of those “dead sleeps” as I call them. Those nights where you remember nothing, not even nodding off to sleep the night before. When I woke up, I felt like a ten ton weight had been lifted from my chest. I sat up and said to myself (ok I admit it, I actually said this out loud – but I’m not crazy, I swear!) “I deserve to live my life on my terms finally.” I don’t even know where that came from to be honest; it seemed to float out of nowhere. But I understood it completely and utterly. For far too long I feel like my life has taken a path according to other people’s hopes and dreams. I have so many of my own!

Something else very profound happened this week as well. I went to shul this Shabbat and realised that the Torah portion was Lech Lecha – the parashas in Bereishit (Genesis) where G-d commands Abram to leave his home and seek out the land that G-d will show him (i.e Israel).

As I read through the parashas, I was struck again and again by the incredible parallels in my own life at this time. Leaving your home, your friends, your extended family – and of course – your own parents is scary stuff. Even Abraham – our great patriarch - was scared that he wouldn’t have friends once he got there! (I am very blessed in that I do have amazing friends and family in Israel whom I adore). Abraham’s journey to the Land of Israel is not an easy one. He is tested again and again.

I think what did it for me though was the realization that even if things had worked out with said guy, the fact remains that there is something fundamentally missing for me in this country – in all countries, except Israel.
It’s not something I can easily define. I am really not all that religious, although I may be a card-carrying Zionist now, I certainly was not brought up with that as an influence and no amount of logic could explain why I would want to give up my home, great job and leave my family and friends behind. At least in Israel I will be around lots of people just like me (i.e. other meshugenahs!)

Above all, I realised this: the first thing I must do is “get my house in order”. I need to lay down my hat and call it home. Only then will I be at peace and only then will my true destiny be able to knock on my door and say, “welcome home.”