In this self-recorded story, we hear from Celia Behar about her feelings of belonging in Israel and how that contrasted with the Otherness she felt while in the U.S.
(In addition to the audio, we have video below the transcript)
Auto-generated transcript:
[00:00:00] Hi, I’m Celia Behar and I am a therapist and a life coach in LA. I’m going to share a little story about being Jewish. I grew up in a really, really white town. And so everyone had blonde hair and blue eyes. And when I moved there, I felt like I really stood out. All my friends went to church and we went to synagogue and they didn’t know what kosher was.
[00:00:22] And they didn’t understand really my humor or, you know, why I didn’t celebrate Christmas and things like that. And I. As much as I had friends in my hometown and growing up I never really felt like I was accepted or connected. And I think that that has translated through most of my life. Unless I was really surrounded by other people that understood what it felt like to be Jewish.
[00:00:54] My grandparents both were immigrants. They came in through Ellis Island on both sides of my family. My father’s side is Spanish Jews and my mother’s side is from all over the place. It was a revelation to me when I got off the plane in Israel when I was a child and realized that I felt home there.
[00:01:18] That it didn’t matter who I was there, if that makes any sense. Like I never felt judged or anything like that, just accepted and safe. And it’s something that I recognized more and more as I grew up going back and forth between America and Israel. That I felt just unbelievably connected. It’s an experience that I can’t really describe. I wish I could. And I tell other Jews to go there all the time. I mean, I tell non Jews to go there too, cause it’s a beautiful place with beautiful people.
[00:01:50] But it was a thing where I would look around and I’d think I see myself in that person. I see myself in that person. Oh my gosh. I see myself in that person.
[00:02:00] And then I go back to Connecticut and I’d feel really isolated. And that was something that really stuck with me my whole life. And I just was able to take my daughters to Israel and visit my family. My parents live there and my sister and her children and their children. And it was really amazing to watch them have that same experience of being able to look around and see themselves in other people which is not usually the case even now, even here.
[00:02:33] And just that feeling of otherness that you feel in America, especially. I can’t really speak for other countries, but certainly in America and certainly in the South where I’d spent a decent amount of time, you felt the otherness and in Israel, I felt like we were all one. I just, I, again, I wish I could explain it better, but I kind of can’t it will always be home.
[00:03:00] And I’m, I am so proud to be Jewish. And that doesn’t mean that I always agree with the Israeli government because I certainly do not. But I am a hundred percent proud to be Jewish. I am not ever going to hide it. I’m not. Go and, and I never have I don’t really identify with the religious aspects of being Jewish, but culturally and ethnically, I certainly do.
[00:03:23] It’s in my literal, literal DNA. And my grandparents escaped situations and their parents escaped, you know, the Holocaust. And took, obviously they were able to get out as well. Not my entire family, but luckily because they were able to get out I’m here. And I think about that a lot. I think about people who died to allow me to be Jewish and be here.
[00:03:50] And we’re not going anywhere. And it is so important to me that Israel exists because. It’s such an overwhelming feeling what’s been going on in the U S right now. And that otherness coming back and that reminder of, you don’t really belong here and thinking, well, where would I go? But I’ve known for years where I would go my, my whole life.
[00:04:15] I I’ve always known because I’m lucky enough to have grown up, you know, with Israel being there. So that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. Am Yisrael Chai. And I also hope that we can create a Palestine and that there can be peace. I I really do. But I, not at the sacrifice of the state of Israel sorry, I don’t think that they’re mutually exclusive.
[00:04:38] I can want both things. And I do so all my love to everyone out there that feels that otherness and just know you’re not alone because you’re not.