Where does the word “hagshama” come from? Let’s look at the hebrew! Hagshama shares the same shoresh (root) גשם as geshem (rain). 

What does rain have to do with hagshama? Imagine you and your values are a rain cloud. When we hagshamize (actualize) on our values, we take our beliefs that make up the clouds and transmit them to the Earth in the form of rain. Only once the rain falls can the Earth grow lush, green, and beautiful. 

“But we are only one small and humble youth movement,” you might say, “and I am only one small and humble person. How can I, as a single raindrop falling from one small rain cloud, impact the Earth in a meaningful way?”   But if we do not become rain, if we cling to our values without hagshamizing,  we will only fester in the rain clouds of our gloom. It is easy for us to say that our despair is good and right. That our despair is a realistic and reasonable reaction to the atrocities of our world. That no matter how much it rains, the Earth will never grow. Yet what is the purpose of a rain cloud that does not become rain? It has no purpose at all. Holding values without taking action serves no purpose but to make us despair. 

We, like the rain clouds, have no choice but to become rain. We have no choice but to believe that each of us has a raindrop-sized patch of Earth that we can water and nurture by actualizing our values. We have no choice but to believe that when each one of our individual raindrops comes together as Habonim Dror North America, the patch of Earth that we can water is greater than the sum of our raindrops. We have no choice but to believe that if we water our humble patch of Earth, our rain will return to the water cycle and have ripple effects outward. If we continue to become rain  all over this Earth, our little cloud might just develop into a monsoon that will change the world! 

By Zandra + Kaela