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I was asked to print my Woman of Valor speech, and I am happy to do so as May is Mother’s Day and my mom’s birthday (May 10th, Izzy’s Bar Mitzvah date).

I want to dedicate this award to my mom.

Last week, your rabbis were at the CCAR with 460 colleagues. We were asked in a session to think of 2-3 experiences that changed how we thought. Then, to turn to our neighbor and share.

I want to share with you.

To my surprise, the first thing that came to my head was a girl I was friends with in middle school, Anissa. We didn’t go to the same school, I knew her from temple. Believe it or not, I did not love religious school. There were 6 kids in my class. You would think that we would all be friends, but no, there was a mean girl, and I always felt left out, stupid, and isolated, until Anissa befriended me. She was so cool, so self-confident and asked the deepest questions. She was artsy and unique and she chose to spend her time with me. Suddenly, I always wanted to go to Sunday school. I was beyond happy, I looked up to her, I loved her.

Then one day we were hanging out outside of temple walking down the sidewalk and she turned to me and she tried to kiss me. And I shoved her away. I don’t remember what I said, but I remember just feeling shame afterward for my reaction. If it had been a guy, I would have smiled and said that I wasn’t interested in that kind of a relationship with them. But I pushed her, this girl who I loved, who saved me from the isolation of temple. I apologized, and we stayed friends, but it was never the same.

Now, why am I sharing this? I am standing up here today as a woman of valor. The Proverb is an entire alphabet of praise implying that the woman of valor has every positive attribute.

I don’t. I am so far from perfect.

But what I do have is an eagerness to learn. And some of my best lessons have come from my mistakes. Those times when I failed. Those moments that I still relive in my head.

Before Anissa, I didn’t know that I knew anyone who was not-hetersexual. She taught me that, no matter how much I know a person, I don’t know what they are going through. That no matter how much I feel in tune with someone, they have their own song to sing. I learned that even the people I love the most have things I don’t know about them. And, the biggest lesson I learned, was to respond from a place of love. That we can be compassionate even if we don’t comprehend.

I became an advocate for the LGTBQ community. But it wasn’t the last time I said the wrong thing or reacted the wrong way.

The second thing I listed as changing me and how I think about the world is my mom.

My mom is really the person responsible for molding in me an open heart. Whenever I came home from school saying something she disagreed with, and remember, I grew up in the city of churches – so that happened a lot, she would greet me with curiosity. She would ask me questions, and they would open up new ways of thinking. She helped me to really see the divine in everyone, no matter how different they were from me. And she helped me to see the Divine in myself. She told me I was smart. Would tell me the story of my birth like it was the most miraculous thing that ever happened. And when I told her my dreams, she only ever encouraged me.

And I mean dreams in both literal and figurative ways. When I told her I wanted to be a rabbi, she simply said, “that makes sense.” Like it was the most normal pathway a female engineering student could have chosen. And when, as a kid I would have recurring dreams where I had magical powers I was squandering, she listened too,

And maybe I wanted to share this failure from my childhood because both of those dreams are still within me and have become intertwined. I want to be a rabbi, I know I am a rabbi, but I don’t feel I have fully realized what that role can be. I have all this power, this responsibility – and sometimes, like in my childhood dreams, I feel I am squandering it.

Yes, you heap upon me an entire alphabet of praise. And I feel so good about my accomplishments and about the meaning I’ve given to lifecycle events, how I’ve changed Beth Am and Miami and even the reform movement in some ways and all of that. And yet, our world is so so broken.

There are so many who don’t have anyone telling them that they are loved, that their lives are miracles. So many that are even being told the opposite, not just by family, but sometimes by those who claim to speak on behalf of God, and even by our government.

And it’s happening on my watch.

In the woman of valor poem, the woman sees her work is rewarding and toils on into the night.

I, too, see my work as rewarding, I do toil on into the night probably more than is healthy.

But she also seems to have it all together, and I certainly don’t.

But you all know that. You have all seen me mess up, learn, and grow and have loved me anyway. In sermons I have felt comfortable sharing with you about my existential crises including almost quitting rabbinical school, about my first period, about falling for a guy because we both were willing to drink from a bucket of backwash, about my grandparents, my kids, my friends, my passions, and yes my accomplishments, and yes, my failures.

I know I am not the only woman of valor who thinks maybe she falls short. In high school, my friend Jill’s mom sewed me an orange skirt because she knew it was my favorite color. When I brought it home, my mom started crying. When I asked why she said that she felt she was failing me, as she was not the kind of mom who sewed clothes for her kids, or even cooked dinner for that matter. And I told her that she was better than that, because she showed me that I could have a career and work and sing and bowl and still be the best mom. I bought her this woman of valor necklace I am wearing today.

So, thanks mom, my woman of valor. And thank you all for this honor.

Rabbi Rachel Greengrass