Rosh Chodesh Iyyar

It’s Rosh Chodesh Iyyar.

We’re starting to (maybe) recover from Pesach and all that it entailed in each one of our personal lives. We’re wishing to make space for the avoda of Sefiras Haomer.

As the inner secrets of Torah become more well known, our attitude toward sefirah has changed. In the past sefirah meant to work on bein adam l’chaveiro, as the talmidim of Rabbi Akiva passed away because of their lack of respect for one another. (And we shouldn’t forget that. Any personal development that we do should be focused in the area of Bein Adam L’chaveiro.)

These days, many people are connecting to the seven sefiros and the powers that are inherent in the 49 days that we count – the interaction of each week’s midah meeting each day’s midah.

Each week is governed by one primary sefirah, and each day within that week blends it with another. So instead of seven traits, you get 7 × 7 = 49 combinations—like “Chesed within Gevurah” or “Hod within Tiferes.”

The idea is that each day highlights a specific inner quality to refine. Over the 49 days, you systematically work through all combinations, gradually developing a more balanced and complete character in preparation for Shavuos.

The word Sefirah is related to the verb lesaper, which means to “express” or “communicate.” This implies that the function of a sefirah is to express a certain attribute. One one level, it is the expression of how Hashem reveals Himself in this world. But as we are each our own little world, it is also how we express our middos to the world around us.

It’s a lot for us women who are trying to find the things that we hid in some cabinet that we stuffed it into on erev pesach.

But, I have an idea that I think might be feasible.

I created a simple chart with each day’s middos for you. You can right click and download it.