A TRUE CALLING
Pursuing Spiritually Fulfilling Work
Can Make All the Difference
By Sharon Boorstin

In the United States today, it's not uncommon for women to change careers; in fact, it's been said that some move through as many as seven in a lifetime. But what about switching to a career that combines work with spirituality and earns you a paycheck while deepening your connection with Judaism? Such a career change can be the fulfillment of a lifelong dream—or the discovery of a "true calling."

Laura Sari Geduldig, 33, is a Certified Personal Co-Active Coach, aka a "life coach," in the San Francisco Bay area. Geduldig (www.gotherecoaching.com) helps people find new paths in their lives, whether it's a relationship or a career.

"Lots of women have a dream and want to switch careers, but people are all too eager to talk them out of it," she says. "Even the voices in their heads tell them not to do it. Especially when it's a matter of going from a career that's approved by society—like a lawyer or a businessperson—to something more obscure. To find a career that is more spiritually fulfilling, it's often a matter of first understanding who you are as a person."

Alissa Stern, 40, of Bethesda, Md., went to Harvard Law School and worked as a lawyer specializing in dispute resolution for six years. Today she weaves talleisim (ritual prayer shawls) and other Jewish religious items such as challah covers and chuppot (marriage canopies) through her company, jewishweaving.com, a high-tech venue for an age-old operation. Stern began weaving in college, but the catalyst to turn her hobby into a business was the tallis she fashioned for her nephew's Bar Mitzvah three years ago. "It was an incredible spiritual experience for me to weave a religious item that was intensely personal and lasting for someone," she says. "When I decided to be a stay-at-home mom after my second child was born, it seemed to make perfect sense to weave them for at least part of a living."

Alissa Stern

Handwoven of wool, silk and cotton, the talleisim that Stern produces are custom-designed and kosher. By request, she can even include the traditional blue thread in the corner fringes that is dyed with a substance made from a snail that appears only every 70 years; she orders the thread from Israel. The talleisim cost from $390 to more than $1,000, depending on their fiber, size and design. In the three years since Stern started jewishweaving.com, she has woven more than 40 talleisim, ranging from one based on the tallis that Charlton Heston wore in the The Ten Commandments to an all-black "power tallis" to one whose design resembled the mosaic floor of an ancient synagogue.
Since Stern devotes her days to her (now) three children, she works at her loom from 9 p.m. to midnight. She designs and weaves most of the prayer shawls herself but relies on several weavers she has met online to help her in a crunch. "The community of weavers is incredibly collegial, much more than the legal community I've experienced," Stern says. "Weavers freely share advice and experiences, including the mishaps."

She adds: "In the legal setting, everything was tense, people were competitive, and the directive, at least in law firms, was to win. With weaving, the goal is to create something beautiful and meaningful."

Stern also finds her new career more satisfying on a human level. As a dispute-resolution lawyer, she once helped groups of people solve big problems in such farflung spots as the Middle East, Latin America and the Ukraine. Now she enjoys the way her Jewish weaving business allows her to connect emotionally and spiritually with people on a one-to-one level.
"A customer asked me to put a trim of letters on his tallis, but when I asked him which letters, he said that the letters would come to me in a dream—and they did!" she recalls. "Ordering a tallis is not like ordering a table. The client brings you into a spiritual quest that they want the tallis to facilitate, and the tallis maker becomes part of that journey."
Stern is especially excited about a community tapestry weaving project that she has launched at a Jewish Community Center in East Hills, N.Y. "Everyone from kindergartners to senior citizens will be involved in everything from the sketching of the designs to the weaving itself," she says. "Weaving is a beautiful way to unite members of a community through creative expression."

For the past two and a half years, Trudi Arshon-Rosenbaum, 58, has been the marketing and community-relations director for The Summit at First Hill, a Jewish in dependent- and assisted-living facility that's part of the Kline-Galland Center in Seattle, where she grew up. It's a far cry from her first jobs, as a flight attendant and then a ticket agent for American Airlines in Tucson, Ariz., where she raised her daughter and lived for 24 years. "Working at The Summit has been like coming home," she says. "It has reconnected me to my roots and to my Jewishness."

In her youth, Arshon-Rosenbaum's link to the Seattle Jewish community sprang from two sources: the Conservative synagogue to which her family belonged, and the deli that her grandparents owned. "Everyone who was Jewish went to Glazer's Delicatessen," she says. "They all knew my family and we knew all of them."

When Arshon-Rosenbaum married a Jewish man in Tucson who didn't belong to a synagogue, she missed her bond with the Jewish community. "We joined a temple when our daughter was born, and that gave me my family," she recalls. That sense of Jewish "family" became especially important after Arshon-Rosenbaum took an early retirement from American Airlines and, as she describes it, "My husband took an early retirement from our marriage."

As a single mother, Arshon-Rosenbaum needed a job. A friend who owned a skilled-nursing facility and retirement-apartment complex offered her a job as the apartment manager. Soon she was overseeing lease agreements, remodeling and activities programming. "I walked in knowing nothing, but by giving me the support and the confidence, my friend started me in my new career," she says.

When the company was sold, Arshon-Rosenbaum worked in marketing for a retirement home owned by a national company. Corporate upheaval and what she describes as "anti-Semitic sentiment" forced her to leave. "The anti-Semitism was a catalyst for me to get an ad-sales job at the Tucson Jewish Post," she recalls. "I found it comforting to work within the Jewish community, so when I saw an ad for the opening at The Summit in Seattle, I knew it was meant for me. I felt as if I'd come full circle."

At The Summit, Arshon-Rosenbaum's main responsibility is placing clients in the 102 independent-and 24 assisted-living apartments, but she finds herself involved in the residents' lives on a personal level. "Sometimes it's hard on me when they fail, but working with seniors and their families is enormously fulfilling," she explains. "I give an extra hug and feel that what I'm doing-making the elderly more at ease, getting them into an environment where they can be happy and function-is a mitzvah."

Arshon-Rosenbaum has been surprised by what working with the aged has taught her about Judaism. "It has made me understand how our faith cares for its people during the important moments of the life cycle."

Just how satisfied is she in her job at The Summit at First Hill? Consider what she often repeats to herself: "I say, 'Okay, Trudi, this is it. I'm going to work here until I'm 70, then I'm going to move in.'"

Audrey Korotkin

From lawyer to tallis weaver, from airline employee to community-relations director at a Jewish home for the aged-both were career changes that deepened each woman's sense of Jewishness. Audrey Korotkin, 46, however, made perhaps the greatest career leap. The former radio reporter and marketing expert for the horse-racing industry is now a rabbi.

"I grew up in a non-observant household," she says. "When I married a man who converted to Judaism and we started taking Jewish education classes at our synagogue, I didn't have a clue." Korotkin's horse race–marketing job in Louisville had ended shortly before her marriage, and she was exploring new career possibilities. "Rabbi" was not one of them.
"Our synagogue, Temple Shalom in Louisville, needed help with marketing and PR, so I volunteered to swap my skills in exchange for Hebrew lessons from the rabbi," she recalls. "I fell in love with Judaism-the language, the ritual, the history. At some point along the way, I woke up one morning and said I have to be a rabbi. Judaism is what I should be doing, not just in my spare time, but every day."

It's one thing to want to become a rabbi, another to put in the required five years of study and training. Especially when you're in your thirties. Korotkin says that the most difficult part was leaving her husband for the first year of study, in Israel. "Don was running a business and couldn't drop everything and come with me. So there I was, only five years married, and suddenly I'm living without my husband. I was miserable until I got back to the States and back to Don."

While Korotkin was in Israel, her husband moved them to Cincinnati, to a house near the Hebrew Union College campus where, upon her return, she thrived. "I did well in my studies, and after winning a battle with breast cancer, I stayed on to teach," she says. "I considered pursuing a teaching career there." A rabbi who had been one of Korotkin's mentors told her about Temple Judea Mizpah in Skokie, Ill., which needed a rabbi. "They hadn't had a rabbi for some time," she recalls. "He said they needed someone to take care of them."

It's unusual for a person to apply for the position of solo rabbi at a congregation unless he or she has three years of field experience. Nevertheless, Korotkin applied for the job. "From our very first set of meetings, it felt wonderful on both sides," she says. "We all knew it was going to happen." Korotkin has been rabbi at Temple Judea Mizpah for four years now. "The experience has brought me back to my original reason for becoming a rabbi—to be a part of congregational life."

Korotkin points out one of the advantages of her new career over her previous one. "As a journalist, I found myself on the outside looking in. I was telling people's stories but not impacting them. As a rabbi, I'm impacting them," she explains. "In Judaism, we're a little nervous about saying this is a 'calling,' but for me it was. Becoming a rabbi was a spiritual decision, something I just needed to do."

If, after reading this, you feel that you too would thrive in a new career that intensifies your sense of Jewishness, consider the advice of life coach Laura Geduldig, who says it's not like finding a job on Monster.com. "Focus in on your interests, what gives you satisfaction during your free time or what you always dreamed of doing." But how? "I'm a believer in connecting with one's self through meditation, Yoga, walks on the beach, journaling, talking to a therapist or a coach," she says. "In times of transition, it's helpful to have a lot of support. Once you get clarity on what direction you are heading, the next step is to point your toes in that direction and start moving.

"Create large arching goals, such as where you want to be in six months or a year, and then break them down into weekly or daily action items that will move you closer to making your dreams a reality. Most important, don't give up!"

Sharon Boorstin is the author of Let Us Eat Cake: Adventures in Food and Friendship (Regan Books/HarperCollins).