Starting tonight, I will observe the Jewish day of mourning called Tisha B’Av, or the ninth day of the month of Av, in my own way. I will appropriate the significance of it –– commemorating the many tragedies that have affected the Jewish people throughout history through fasting and prayers –– and I will shape it to make sense in my historical context.

I will light a memorial candle for ALL the victims in the current crisis in the Middle East. Just before sunset, I will eat a hard boiled egg dipped in ashes as a symbol for the mourner, then I will fast for 25 hours, and I will read from the traditional Book of Lamentations. I will continue my prayers for peace, although much more intently, because I will know in my heart there will be millions of Jews around the world who will be crying out at the same time as myself for an end to this suffering. To all suffering.

One way to help me achieve this spiritual time out will be to NOT open Facebook for the duration of Tisha B’Av. For whenever I do, I get tempted and find it impossible not to dive into the glittery, colorful ocean of graphic and verbal debates and accusations about who is at fault, who started, who is using too much force, or the wrong or unfair weapons or tactics. I get sucked in. Like a well meaning, peace seeking California dude surfer, I get sucked into a vortex of bad karma stuff that leaves me feeling like I am suffocating. Drowning. And I need to breathe to live. I need hope.

I will try to be yogic about it: to seek some kind of transcendence, if only momentary, for something that does not make any sense at all: human suffering as it is inevitably brought on in wars.

Where did all those great yoga sayings go, anyway?