We begin this year with a silent Shofar, and it can be more thunderous than the sounds we are used to hearing. It’s that KOL D’MAMA DAKA – The small thin voice from within, that many of us are so terrified to hear it, that we defer to the ever-intensifying chatter of the world just to drown it out. It has an uncomfortable message for us but the truth is, it’s really the greatest compliment in the universe. It’s saying, “We are way more and much better than we think we are!”

This is a transcript of a daily one-minute video I posted this week as we begin to approach Rosh HaShana. One minute is not enough time to do justice to what is packed in there, so I thought it would be worthwhile to expand upon it a little bit.

Yes, we begin this new year on a Shabbos and the Halacha is that we do not blow the Shofar. However, that does not mean that the sound of the inner Shofar is not accessible. In the depth of the silence there is something called, “KOL D’MAMA DAKA – The small thin voice” (from within). Maybe some would call it the conscience and others the whisper of the G-dly Soul. There is profound truth and wisdom embedded in the heart of every person. King Solomon tells us, “Deep waters of council are in the heart in the heart of a man”.

HASHEM “breathed the breath of life” into the nostrils of mankind making us G-dlike beings. It is no mistake that the “anniversary” of that sublime event is the 6th day of creation (Yom HaShishi), when man was made complete, crowning the creation with new and awesome potential. It’s also no mistake that on that same day in the calendar we recreate the drama of that moment by blowing a Shofar.

The KOL, that thin small voice is continuously messaging us, individually and collectively. It can only be perceived, though in silence. This may explain the psychological need for a lot of the nervous energy and constant chatter of the world, sound and fury signifying nothing.

I once heard from Rabbi Doctor Avraham Twersky at a Torah U’Mesorah convention on Shabbos that there is a psychological phenomenon that a person does not like to be locked into a “no exit” situation with someone that they do not like. I remember wondering that you don’t need a degree in psychology for that. Then he continued explaining that this syndrome is amplified and intensified if the person that individual is trapped with is himself. OUCH!

It has become stylish to turn up the volume and fill in every moment of quietude with sounds and syllables to quell the uncomfortable silences. Just the opposite would be most curative. When one of my children or anybody else I am giving some amateur guidance to on the dating process comes back from a date, rather than asking, “How were the conversations?”, I will ask them to recall, “How were the silences?” Were they very comfortable or painfully awkward?

As it turns out, this message of the KOL SHOFAR on Rosh HaShana and the KOL D’MAMA DAKA are the same. HASHEM and we are revisiting the original intent of the creation. Everything is being measured by its POTENTIAL. The good news is that we have enormous potential and the rough news is that we all have enormous potential. When a teacher writes in the comment box of the report card in coded language, “Chaim has potential”, we know what that means. By definition potential is not yet actualized.

When my beloved grandmother was exiting this world, I was sitting by her bed and taking notes. She was partly out of this world and yet, still here saying profound things, “Potential, potential, potential” and then “Diabolical, diabolical, diabolical!” Years later I heard that the Arizal says that what shocks and knocks a person out of this world is that they are shown a picture of who they could have become. That small thin voice within is whispering, “We are way more and much better than we think we are.” POTENTIAL – POTENTIAL -POTENTIAL!