Parashat Ki Tisa — 2026 |
In 2026 no one waits in silence. When something hurts, a screen lights up; when something frightens, a message is sent; when something feels empty, it is filled with information. Time no longer weighs on us — it gets covered.
A man leaves home early, earphones in, news and podcasts pouring a constant voice into his head. He leaves no space. On the tube, in the office, in the bathroom, in bed — always something speaking. Silence unsettles him. He would not say it like that. He would say he is busy, productive, informed, that he cannot stop. But he cannot stop.
When his mother falls ill, he organises, calls, manages, sorts everything out. He does not cry. He does not sit. He does not stay. He opens more screens. When his partner asks for presence, he promises time — then checks his phone. When he senses that something in his life does not fit, he switches projects. He does not wait. He replaces.
His phone is his calf. Not because he worships it, but because it soothes him. It does not ask him to change; it asks him to consume.
One night the power goes out. Nothing works — no signal, no data, no music. At first he panics, paces, gets angry, stares at the dead device. Then he sits. Breathes. For the first time in years he hears his own body — the exhaustion, the sadness, the anger, the fear, all at once.
Nothing is fixed that night. He does not convert. He does not glow. But something breaks, and something remains open. Since then he begins to leave the phone outside the bedroom, to walk without earphones, to delay his replies, to stay when something is uncomfortable. Not always. Sometimes he goes back to the calf. But now he recognises it. And sometimes he chooses not to melt the gold. That is where his return begins.
A question for you: with whom do you truly need to build — not talk, not plan — and which ego would you have to loosen in order to weave a shared body without claiming the centre?