Is Big Brother watching you? Are you watching Big Brother? A lot of people apparently are.
Someone had a great sense of humor and an even greater sense of irony when they named one of the earliest reality shows, the precursor to Big Brother, "The Real World." Just like the real world, isn't it, to take 6-8 very photogenic twenty-something young adults, most of whom have already hired agents to promote their careers, give them a big, beautiful house to live in, plenty of food, no jobs to go to, even a hot tub, and see to it that they don't have a care in the world! Sure, that's how everybody lives!

What did the show consist of? Talk, constant talk, endless verbiage about all the most important topics of reality: clothes, make-up, sports, music, how I see you, how you see me, how I feel about you, how you feel about me, what I said about you, what you said about me… Hours and hours of self-absorption: me, me, me.

The social science pundits call the current crop of young adults, like the people on the show, the "Me Generation," people so self-absorbed that they think their every whim should be catered to, that their every idea constitutes the deepest wisdom, and that their every decision is correct without reference to the past because obviously, everyone who lived before they arrived on this planet was a complete idiot. Whether parking in spots reserved for others because normal rules can't be meant to include them, or pushing their way to the head of every line, or insisting that their children are absolutely perfect and can't possibly be a behavior problem in class - it must be the teacher - they shout the same message: they are the only ones who count. Just ask them! And each year it even seems to get worse: more selfishness, more self-absorption, more me, me, me, me, me.

We laugh about these foibles of ours. We even write satirical versions of Biblical psalms about our "me-ism" like this one called "The Psalm of the Incessant Shopper:"

The Lord is my personal shopper, I shall always want more. He leadeth me to Neiman Marcus, He giveth me energy for shopping, He restoreth my credit. He guideth me to make restaurant reservations. He sendeth me right past K-Mart for mine own sake. Yea, though I walk by Target I shall not go in, for Thou art with me. Thy fashionable clothes they comfort me. Thou preparest diamond jewelry before me in the presence of mine envious enemies, Thou hast anointed my face with Chanel, My checkbook runneth over. Surely designer clothes shall follow me all the days of my life, And I shall dwell in the house of Lord & Taylor forever. Amen.

It's not enough that we adults are so self-impressed. We also teach this nonsense to our children. One of my colleagues in Colorado, Rabbi Raymond Zwerin relates,

The other day, parents came to our religious school and announced that they were letting their nine-year-old decide whether he would attend fourth grade this year. "We're teaching him to make his own decisions." The mother said it with such a straight face that I knew she was serious. I wonder what she would do if her nine-year-old decided to steal candy from a store, dig holes in the carpet, beat up his sister, call his parents names, throw rocks at their car, or take a loaded rifle to school. [Rabbi Raymond Zwerin, The American Rabbi, Fall, 1999, pg. 14.]

To which I would add, if these damaging decisions can be made by a nine-year-old, how can we, as parents, leave them to our adolescents who can now become pregnant or impregnate someone else, are exposed to drugs that can kill them, and alcohol, and are driving cars or soon will be? How can we be so stupid? How can we allow our kids to remove themselves from the religious school programs that will help provide moral guidance just as they turn thirteen and will need it the most?

There's a French version of Big Brother called "Loft Story." Like the American counterpart on which it is based, it is phenomenally successful. Julia Kristeva, a leading French professor, intellectual and psychoanalyst is "one of the few French intellectuals to applaud the … success of France's first television reality show." ["Correcting Her Idea of Politically Correct," NY Times, July 14, 2001, pp. B9, 11.] She believes that the show has something important to say to us about our insane "me-ism," our over-emphasis on making decisions that we're ill-equipped to make alone or that are based on little more than personal whim. Loft Story, Kristeva says, ["Correcting Her Idea of Politically Correct," NY Times, July 14, 2001, pp. B9, 11.]

… responded to people's needs. Parents wondered, "Why do my kids need this?" It's because [at] home they cannot express what they feel about life, about sex, about their friends. There is no conversation to absorb the psychic malaise. "Loft Story" provided a photograph of a society that has neither ideals nor ideology, where there is no longer family, church, or political groups. There is a need to express this malady of the soul, even in this rudimentary form. "Loft Story" provided psychic relief. [Ibid.]

In other words, we are horribly disconnected from others, locked inside of ourselves and our own "me-ism." We don't have the tools to even discuss many of the things that disturb us, or to make many of the decisions that are beyond the ability of any single "me." So we hurt and our kids hurt. Sometimes they hurt themselves, and sometimes, as in the current rash of school massacres, they hurt others.

A book called Bowling Alone by Harvard professor Robert Putnam explores how we have become disconnected from each other and from ourselves. He finds that:

	- America has become less social in the last thirty years, resulting in the demise of the core social value of trust.
	- In the 1970s we entertained our friends 14-15 times a year. By the late 90s we were only inviting our friends over 8 times a year, a decline of 34%.
	- Picnic going has been slashed nearly 60% between 1975 and 1999.
	- Those Americans who usually eat dinner with their families declined from 50% to 34%. [Dr. Ian Russ, The American Rabbi, High Holydays 2001, pp. 19-20.]

These are not just meaningless statistics. They disclose societal changes that can even contribute to our mortality. Professor Putnam finds that:

	- Those who are socially disconnected are between two and five times more likely to die from all causes compared with matched individuals who have close ties…
	- By moving from a community with little positive social activity, low trust, few volunteers and little community activity to one with high social capital, the gain to one's life is almost as great as quitting smoking, increasing one's chances of good health by 40-70%.
	-As a rule of thumb, if you belong to no groups but decide to join one, you cut your risk of dying in the next year in half. [And if that's not an incredibly powerful argument for joining the Temple and staying a member., then I don't know what is!] [Ibid.]

Fortunately, our connectedness doesn't seem to be missing, just misplaced. Story after story emerged from the recent terrorist attack about how people put their own needs aside to help others. People connected with total strangers, often performing acts of true heroism. People who were not directly involved immediately came forward to help. So many people rushed to give blood that many had to be sent home. The response simply overwhelmed the capacity to accept it. One positive effect of the recent attack on our country is that we have seen that some of the barriers dividing us can be broken down. As we passed through the Valley of Death we began to reach out to one another.

We must also be sure that our grief and our rage doesn't blind us to the difficult task of separating the guilty from the innocent. Every woman with her head covered according to Muslim practice is not a terrorist. Every man whose skin tone and facial characteristics mark him as coming from an Arab country is not a murderer. Several hundred innocent Arabs and non-Arab Muslims are among those who were in the World trade center and cannot be found. But for those who applauded the terrorists, I hope that a suitable punishment is found, including deporting them back to the countries they fled to take advantage of the blessings of a free America.

Dr. Putnam may very well be right that entertaining more, going on more picnics, eating dinner with our families, and joining and becoming active in the Temple is good for our health. But we all know, as does he, that much more than that is needed.

Isn't that why we're here, to try and find what that is, to try and find some of the answers to our life's mysteries, to try, as impossible as it seems, even to give some meaning to this horible tragedy?

What does Judaism say about curing our rampant "me-ism," about becoming more connected, both for its own sake and to help us make the difficult, confusing decisions we need to make so many times every day of our lives?

Believe it or not, we need to become more "me" before we can become less "me." One of the main tools we Jews have always used has been our learning, our wisdom, our Torah:

	… the essence of biblical myth (says Rabbi Mordechai Gafni)… is "Live Your Story," … the song only you can sing, the poem only you can write, the way of being in the world which is you and you alone.
	… [when] we ask to be written into the book of life… it is not we who are asking God to inscribe us, but God asking us. "Please, this year, write yourself in the book of life…" Live your story.
	God [invites] us to become both the authors and the heroes of our own tale. Every incident, relationship, residence, and experience is part of the plot. The essential question is whether you will be the hero of your story - or, tragically, a minor character in your own drama. [Rabbi Mordechai Gafni, "Live Your Story," Tikkun, March/April 2001, pp. 33-36.]

Will you be a hero, or a minor character? The philosopher of religion, William James, put it very beautifully when he wrote to his sister, Alice, in 1878:

I have often thought that the best way to define a man's character would be to seek out the particular mental or moral attitude in which, when it came upon him, he felt himself most deeply and intensely alive. At such moments there is a voice inside which speaks and says, "This is the real me." [Cited by Rabbi Roger Klein, The American Rabbi, Fall, 1999, pg. 67.]

What does Judaism call "being the real me?" Kedusha, sacredness, holiness. "Our goal is never to escape our stories but to make our stories sacred." [Gafni, op. cit., pg. 36.] Are we being the real me, being a hero of a sacred story when we shop incessantly, or when we take the easy way out, abrogate our parental responsibilities and let our kids do whatever they damn well please, or when we say totally absurd things like, "I'm not using the Temple much, so I think I'll quit. I can afford to belong, but I'll just buy High Holyday tickets once a year and leave the support of the Congregation to young families with children who are far less able to afford it?"

In the quiet, inner places of your heart where only you can go, answer honestly: Don't you yearn to feel like a hero, to do things that are not only expressive of who you really are but sacredly important as well?

That should be the question we ask ourselves throughout these High Holydays. The search for an answer should be what occupies our attention and our energy. Look inside for the real you, unclouded by the cultural noise that constantly shouts the siren song of the lowest common denominator. Connect to the larger community of the Jewish people and the world beyond by finding out who you really are.

Let me leave you with some inspiration for your journey in the person of a remarkable woman named Rose. Her story was told by one of her fellow students:

	The first day of school our professor introduced himself and challenged us to get to know someone we didn't already know. I stood up to look around when a gentle hand touched my shoulder. I turned around to find a wrinkled, little old lady beaming up at me with a smile that lit up her entire being.
	She said, "Hi handsome. My name is Rose. I'm eighty-seven years old. Can I give you a hug?" I laughed and enthusiastically responded, "Of course you may!" and she gave me a giant squeeze. "Why are you in college at such a young, innocent age?" I asked. She jokingly replied, "I'm here to meet a rich husband, get married, have a couple of children, and then retire and travel."
	"No seriously," I asked. I was curious what may have motivated her to be taking on this challenge at her age. "I always dreamed of having a college education and now I'm getting one!" she told me.
	After class we walked to the student union building and shared a chocolate milkshake. We became instant friends. Every day for the next three months we would leave class together and talk nonstop. I was always mesmerized listening to this "time machine" as she shared her wisdom and experience with me. Over the course of the year, Rose became a campus icon and she easily made friends wherever she went. She loved to dress up and she reveled in the attention bestowed upon her from the other students. She was living it up.
	At the end of the semester we invited Rose to speak at our football banquet. I'll never forget what she taught us. As she began to deliver her prepared speech, she dropped her three by five cards on the floor. Frustrated and a little embarrassed she leaned into the microphone and simply said, "I'm sorry I'm so jittery… I'll never get my speech back in order so let me just tell you what I know."
	As we laughed she cleared her throat and began, "We do not stop playing because we are old; we grow old because we stop playing… You have to laugh and find humor every day. You've got to have a dream. When you lose your dreams, you die. We have so many people walking around who are dead and don't even know it!
	There is a huge difference between growing older and growing up. If you are nineteen years old and lie in bed for one full year and don't do one productive thing, you will turn twenty years old. If I am eighty-seven years old and stay in bed for a year and never do anything I will turn eighty-eight. Anybody can grow older. That doesn't take any talent or ability. The idea is to grow up by always finding the opportunity in change. Have no regrets. The elderly usually don't have regrets for what we did, but rather for things we did not do.
	The only people who fear death are those with regrets."
	At the year's end Rose finished the college degree she had begun all those years ago. One week after graduation Rose died peacefully in her sleep. Over two thousand college students attended her funeral in tribute to the wonderful woman who taught by example that it's never too late to be all you can possibly be.

It isn't too late for us, either. Wouldn't you like to be so important to others, not just to yourself, that people will continue to be inspired by you even after you die? You won't get it from your golf swing, or your wardrobe, or even from being buddies with the children who need you to be their parents, not their friends. You will get it from finding out who you really are, and by living your story as the hero of a sacred saga, which indeed it is.

Are you watching Big Brother? Go ahead, if you want to see what the real world is not like. The more important question is: Are big brother and little sister, our sons and our daughters, all those to whom we really matter, watching us? Only if we become real enough to deserve being watched. May that be our goal in this New Year.