Tuesday, July 11, 2017

The Forever Letter Writing What we Believe for Those We Love by Elana Zaiman

The Forever Letter Writing What we Believe for Those We Love by Elana Zaiman  will be published by Llewellyn Worldwide this Sept 8.
Elana Zaiman is a rabbi, chaplain and writer.
A long tradition this one of rabbis in the family of Zaiman, where old-fashioned traditions are very important.

One of these traditions is the so-called Forever Letter, a letter, in general just written once per life or anyway written in important moments of the existence by a person and sent to a member of the family, parents, siblings, friends, relatives in general.

The book is very interesting, plenty of example of letters, memories of the author, including her dad's Forever Letter to her. Elana Zaiman will tell you moments to choose, and reasons why we should write a Forever Letter in a certain time of our existence at someone we love.
Sure the intensity is high, the written words marks a difference. A Forever Letter for being called like that must contain the essence of life.

It can be written for leaving a legacy, a trace of the roots of our family, in a moment of illness, when we think we have something important to communicate.
Mrs. Zaiman will explain also what to write, how to write it. The only guideline: don't tell family secrets in these letters. I guess that there is space somewhere else.
We live in a society where instant messages, social media are more important than reflection, meditation.

It's a world that rush this one but these letters, writes Mrs. Elana are wonderful because you can read and re-read them in moments of discomfort, in moments of weakness and when you need the most some balm for your soul and words.

This letter in fact, has been hand-written by someone who love you and wants to stay close to you if not physically, mentally. 
There is a different power in hand-written words although this art is losing appeal.

Personally I love letters in general. Today I received a letter from a correspondent. My God what a hallucinating trip did that letter! It returned to the USA, and my pen-pal sent that again to me and this time with success. It was great to read today her latest updates.
With another  American correspondent we share a book where we write and describe our life and our current events.
I haven't never completely lost the contact with paper, because it's natural, joyous indispensable.

Said that: enjoy this book and Happy Forever Letters to everyone.

I thank NetGalley and Llewellyn for this ebook.

 

Anna Maria Polidori

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