Saturday morning our Galil (rising 8th graders) campers led a heart-felt service based on the middot, rachamim (acting with your heart).
By Ari F. and Jacob F.
We are campers in GB1. This service, we are focusing on rachamim, or acting with your heart. We have seen various examples of acting with the heart in and outside of Harlam. Does anyone have a grandparent who makes a ton of food? Or do you ever go to an activity you don’t like just to be with your friend? At camp, we all act with our heart many times each day. We all act with our hearts individually but we also do it as a community. In the Birkat Hamazon, we say harachaman. This is another way of saying rachamim. One sentence is “Harachaman hu yishlach lanu b’racha merubah babayit hazeh, ve’al shuchalchan zeh she achalnu alav.” This means harachaman, bring blessing on this house and on this table that we have eaten upon.” Even when we eat, we remember that we should act with our heart. In the end, just remember to keep acting with your heart.
By Jonah W., Ethan S., Jack B. and Jack S.
Acting with your heart at camp could mean many different things. We each have to choose what it means to us. At meals sometimes you might want more food than you have. This means you might take less of some foods so others can eat, too. You can show rachamim by thinking of others. Acting with your heart could be giving up your spot at fun period so someone else could do something they really like. Another example of rachamim or acting with your heart is this past week many people had poison ivy in the bunk. We were given a small bottle of calamine which is a poison ivy lotion. Instead of just one of us using it, we had to ration out the amount in the bottle. We thought of each other rather than using the whole bottle ourselves.
By Sam, Sophie, Kaitlyn
The middah we are focusing on is rachamim, acting with your heart. At camp rachamim is very important. To us rachamim means…
Including a friend.
Cleaning up at nikayon.
Sharing your dessert at dinner.
Or helping a friend who is homesick.
Helping someone can bring light into a bad day. The Yotzer Or prayer resembles rachamim because it is about bringing joy into someone’s day or life. So please remember that acting with your heart can make someone else’s day, as well as yours.
By Jacob, Brendan and Harrison
This week we are acting with our hearts. We acted with our hearts by helping our friend achieve a major goal. This relates to the Israelites because they both show courage. Also, God shows rachamim when God split the Red Sea for the Israelites. We also showed rachamim when we helped the kids who got stung by a bee on the Galil hike. We helped people get calmed down because it was some people’s first time getting stung. Rachamim, acting with your heart, can sometimes be hard, and sometimes it can be easy if you look for a way to do it. We hope you will find a chance to act with your heart.
By Ariel, Anna, Jess, Jenny, Zoe and Aviva
Over the years, it has always been clear that our two girls bunks have been divided. Despite this separation, we have had the courage to act with our hearts and bridge the gap between our bunks. Whether it has been giving a compliment on Shabbat or hanging out on the porch during rest hour, we always made room in our hearts for each other. This is especially important since this is our last year in junior camp and next year in K’far we will all be together in one bunk. We challenge you to think about what friendship means to you while we each take some time for silent prayer.
By Ariel, Campbell and Sadie
We’d like to share with you Sadie, Campbell, and Addie’s camp survival guide! A lot of things come to mind when you think of acting with your heart. What you might not know is acting with your heart could completely change someone’s day. From complimenting someone’s outfit, to helping someone through a problem, acting with your heart can change someone’s camp experience for the better. Camp friends last a lifetime, and acting with your heart can create that friendship. So our overall camp survival tip is to act with your heart because it will improve camp and lead to friendships that can last a lifetime.