Promoting Shabbos

ultimateskier

I haven’t been a teen for many years and I have never been a girl so I cant say my own experience will be relatable for girls. Honestly I don’t know how a girl should enjoy Shabbos.

What I enjoy is the Davening, Shabbos food, zemiros and divrei Torah, learning on Shabbos without any interruptions, the peacefulness of no phones and computers, the knowledge that that this is a special day that we get to spend with Hashem and bask in His glory and try to tune in to that. I would say that Shabbos is an acquired taste and one must tune into the Shabbos frequency to be able to enjoy it. If you live a shallow life all week Shabbos will not speak your language. You will be missing your phone the whole day. A person has to work to become a Shabbos Jew. Nobody likes to hear it but to enjoy any part of Yiddishkiet takes work, both working on the spiritual and not being such a physical person. Learning takes work. Mitzvos takes work. Davening takes work. The more physical a person is the harder it will be to taste spirituality. I hope that I am being helpful to you.

Appreciation of any aspect of Judism, being frum is something that has to be incorporated way before high school days.

We have grandchildren who attend a certain Chassidishe yeshiva and every Erev Shabbos all the students meet in a special room called Oneg Shabbos where they learn a new song/zemiros, hear a nice story to share at the Shabbos table and get dvar Torah to share at home. In addition there are other handouts they receive which will keep them occupied over Shabbos,which include questions and stories to read and share.

For the ladies annual party, the boys all did some crafts as a Challah dekel, challah board or other crafts which was presented to each mother. The children look foward and are excited for Shabbos. It is a pleasure to spend Shabbos with them and the Seuda can stretch for as long as we want without devorim betailim,nonsense. Throwing halachos and not do lists is not the way to present Shabbos. Unfortunately, improvement is needed is the area of Shabbos appreciation. Recently, when sitting on the porch close to Motzei Shabbos i overheard children calling who was first for the computer once Shabbos was out. ……and we can’t blame schools as chinuch begins at home. Schools and yeshivos are for content subjects!!!

ultimateskier: BUT IT’S NOT.

Do you not do anything on Shabbos? I know I do. The only way I can see it being solitary confinement is from the technology angle, and if you can’t detach from tech for 26 hours then you’re in worse shape than I’d think.

On Shabbos, I

-read

-go to friends

-take walks

-fress my head off

-have DMCs with my family (okay, so they’re not ALWAYS so deep or meaningful- so shoot me)

-babysit

-have a whole load of fun

No, I don’t email or text or write (okay, so the last bit is a bummer) or watch TV- but I still have fun.

Is your point that people don’t see the beauty of Shabbos or that they get turned off by Shabbos? Those are two completely different things.

Anybody who is teaching about Shabbos as lists of halachos and not as a beautiful experience is doing it because it’s his job-he’s a halacha teacher. I don’t think Shabbos is as underappreciated as it may seem, and I don’t think that if it is, it’s for the reasons you think.

Shabbos is one of my favorite days of the week (arguably, my week is divided into Shabbos, Sunday, and school days, but you know what I mean)- it’s a day to detox, to forget about school at least temporarily, to focus on my family, and to just focus on the more important things in general.

You definitely do not have to spend Shabbos alone! Go to a friend’s house after licht bentching and shmooze.

If you live in an area with younger children, you could think of organizing some activity for them and be the madricha. My daughter is part of a shmiras haloshon kabbalos Shabbos program. She has a class from the local school a few grades below hers and they get together to say kabbalos Shabbos and she usually plays a game with them and learns a little about shmiras haloshon with them. Her class loves her and wants her to continue next year.

In the afternoon she helps out at a tehillim gathering for girls. They say tehillim together and someone could say a short story related to the parsha or some other topic of interest.

My other daughter is a madricha for Batya, which is like B’nos in America. They have an activity on Shabbos afternoon for a couple of hours.

It is so good for the younger kids to be busy (especially during the hours that their parents would like to take a nap) and doing something other than just playing.

If you live not far from friends, you could chip in together and buy a few games and spread them around to each others houses. Go over to one friend each week and play games over there.

Shabbos is a great time to relax without pressure of doing homework, going to school, being at school early in the morning, etc, etc. Part of it is looking at the cup as half-full (it’s really overflowing) but unfortunately it sounds like some of your friends look at it as empty, so we have to start somewhere.

Hatzlacha with finding ideas to increase Shabbos appreciation in your area. It’s a terrific idea.

I want to add that any madreigah of ruchniyus and appreciation for Shabbos will not come at once. I think start with the basic and non spiritual idea that it is a day of rest. An opportunity to relax and take a break from the rushing and hustle and bustle of the weekday. Eventually work your way up into appreciating that the rest is a spiritual rest. We stop doing creative work so that we can focus on Spirituality and on the fact that Hashem created the world.