Page 22 - Issue 25

seminar at Kibbutz Eshbal. Aside from spending quality
time together and going on a lovely tiyul, we reflected
on the topic of shituf and how it meets and challenges
us individually and as a collective. I understood that
real shituf is rarely felt just because actual structures
like a shared kalkala system or shared apartments
may exist. Rather, it’s how we as individuals choose to
build and relate to these systems vis-a-vis one another
that can define and bring shituf to life. This is
something that seems obvious on paper, but takes a lot
of work in real life.

While I don’t have a messima of my own quite yet, I can
already say that my life feels more whole now that I am
part of the movement here in Israel. To have had
elements of kvutza, shituf, and messima meshutefet in
my daily life when I was a member of the Mazkirut
Artzit to then suddenly feeling like they had slipped
through my fingers in the blink of an eye due to the
coronavirus was, to put it simply, jarring. Those
months being states or even oceans away from my
chevrei kvutza and without experiencing shituf in a real
lived way left me eager to have meaning, purpose, and
shared experiences in my day to day again. Although I
am just getting started with my life here, I feel like my
time in Israel thus far has already answered much of
what I felt I had been missing and has given me new
experiences that I hadn’t even previously considered. I
know there are challenges that lie ahead, many of
which involve the work of shaping our shituf and
messimati lives, but these are also challenges that
bring me a lot of excitement and are a big reason why I
chose to make Aliyah.