Spirituality-like a sixth sense

Name: Carolina Wahnish

Family is important in my life, and also friends. Everybody is going to be on this earth for a certain amount of time, so you do whatever you want to make your life quality. Whatever you are passionate about, teach it to other children or other people. Even if they aren't interested in the same things, at least they'll get exposure.

Formal prayer I do in temple on Saturday mornings. I also pray formally on big holidays — Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. But other than formal prayer, I consider prayer as something like a hope — like an inspiration. I don't think that by praying anything is actually going to happen. It's just something to keep you going. When I go to bed, I go over the things I did during the day, and those things that I hope will happen. It's kind of like I'm going through thoughts in my head.

Let's say I have a goal — like right now I'm taking the SATs. I pray the night before, just to say that I hope I do well. Let's say something bad happens. Like five years ago, my grandpa died. First, I cried for a whole day, and that's letting your emotions take over, which is fine, because it's pouring everything out. Then I calmed down. And this is the way I prayed: “Please if there is a God, or if You do have those capacities, please, I hope You do take care of him, wherever he is.” Whether my grandfather has an afterlife, or whether he's up in heaven, or whether he is still under ground and nothing even happened after he died, I just hope that everything is OK with him. Sometimes I'm just too tired and I don't even pray at night, but when there are a lot of things going on and I do decide to pray, I just say, “God, bless my grandpa.” It's just kind of a way of remembering him.

I pray to God, but I use it as a symbol. I have no idea what God is or what God's capacities are. So I kind of just pray to God as a concept. Sometimes I say, “God, please ...,” but it's really me that's saying it.

I finished Hebrew School in seventh grade. After your bat mitzvah or your bar mitzvah, you don't have to go to Hebrew School anymore. There is a Hebrew High, and that's where I do go. Apart from that, you can be a part of the Madrikhim, which is a teachers’ aide program. You help the younger children. Basically, at least one time a year I do a lesson. I help the children. I give them snacks. That's temple-based.

And then out of temple, I've been a volunteer at a battered women's shelter. Nobody knows where it is except the people in the group. Women who have been abused by their husbands go there for shelter, and take their children. We played with the children while the mothers were at the meetings, or just helped take the children off their mother's hands. You were helping somebody that had been through a lot. I didn't know what their problems were. But just by looking at the kids, and by the way they looked at you, you knew that they were having fun.

I guess spirituality for me is just having some kind of hope. I have a lot of friends who say: “Oh, I don't even believe in God anymore,” or “I have no idea of what God is, so I'm just going to lose hope and forget it. I don't have a religion.” That upsets me. It doesn't mean that you have to believe in God. There are different religions, just like there are different opinions. I'm not even sure myself what God is. But I just think of God as something that's always around you. Spirituality is something inside of you, like a feeling, a sixth sense. Prayer is whatever inspires you to make the best out of your life. That's your own spirituality. And it's not the same for everybody.

About the author

Birthplace: Buenos Aires, Argentina
School: Ridge High School,
Basking Ridge, New Jersey
Religion: Judaism

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One-on-one with God

January 1, 2000

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