I lie in bed listening to our fighter jets fly out to Iran, and the gap between inside and outside the home never felt greater.

Outside my home, historic, world-altering events are taking place even as I write.

The Iranian regime, which cast its shadow of death and terrorism across the region and the world since the 1970s, is falling apart.

Its leader, who oversaw the slaughter of tens of thousands of Iranians in the very recent past, is dead.

The heart of the murderous network that darkened the lives of Iranians, Israelis, and other Middle Easterners for too long is finally, finally, exposed and vulnerable.

The Iranian people have an opportunity to forge a new and freer future for themselves.

The rest of us have an opportunity to discover what kind of Middle East we can share without the Iranian regime’s pernicious and systematic hatred fueling terrorism, proxies and brainwashing throughout the region.

It’s a tectonic shift. A revolution. A miracle…

…and it seems to belong to a different reality than the one I am experiencing inside my home.

Inside my home, we’re not shaping history; we are fielding “I’m bored” complaints and looking for ways to keep occupied and happy while stuck together indoors.

Inside my home, we’re not fighting heroically for a better future; we’re looking for ways to pass the time in the bomb shelter.

Inside my home, we’re not removing strategic threats from the region; we are struggling to remove uncertainty from our children’s minds.

This gap can feel…disorienting. Confusing. It might leave us thinking that we are nothing more than spectators, helpless to affect the grand unfolding drama.

But the amazing truth is that we are so much more than that.

Yes, we are not the ones audaciously flying out to risky missions over Iran right now, we are not the ones heading to Israel’s borders as reserve soldiers to bolster our defenses. But by doing what we can to keep on going on, by keeping our sanity and safety inside the house while others go out to fight for our future, we are doing our part, holding our own little front, inside the bigger whole.

We who are sheltering at home are not the main players here. Our soldiers are. Our pilots are. Dedicated and self-sacrificing people like my beloved brother-in-law, called to duty yet again as a reservist, are the true heroes. The Iranian people, who have the opportunity to shape their future but must take it and run with it, are the ones standing at the crosshairs of history, the ones whose decisions will make the greatest impact.

But we do have our own role to play. And in doing it well – in taking care of our families and the people around us, in keeping up morale, in being disciplined about not spreading false or potentially dangerous information – we hold our own positions in this battle, enabling others to fight the bigger battles for our sakes.

On Shabbat morning, in shul, I felt helpless. I currently have to use a wheelchair due to a badly broken leg, and when the siren went off, I didn’t know what to do with myself. A kind stranger took control, wheeled me to the relative safety of an inner wall, and stayed with me, chatting soothingly, until my husband found us.

Later, I made an effort to speak with people around me happily and confidently, focusing on the positive.

And I thought, whatever kindness we can extend to others right now, be it in deed or tone or word, goes straight into our shared resilience.

And this is not a small achievement. This is part and parcel of what makes today’s breathtaking new dawn possible.

And this is also the spirit with which I hope we can animate the new Middle East we might be blessed enough to see emerge from this experience.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)