The Circle of Life

Draw a life circle/tree; place a few milestones on it together.

Children wonder and discover; you facilitate more than you lecture.

• What is a lifecycle moment?
• What makes a Jewish life?
• Why do we use circles and trees to represent life?

Lifecycle moments are the big thresholds — birth, coming of age, marriage, death. Circles and trees (eitz chayim!) show life as connected and ongoing.

• Eitz chayim — tree of life
• Dor l’dor — generation to generation

“Is everyone’s life circle the same?”

We share the big moments, but each person’s circle is uniquely theirs.

• Children distinguish everyday moments from lifecycle moments.
• Children discuss what makes a life a Jewish life and how these moments connect us across time.

Honor that lives unfold differently; no single path is the ‘right’ one.

Folktale. Solomon’s Ring: ‘This Too Shall Pass’ (Folklore) — a ring that humbles us in joy and comforts us in sorrow — wisdom for every stage.

Changemaker. Rabbi Harold Kushner — lost his son at fourteen and wrote the book a generation of grieving people were handed, which refuses to explain suffering and does not pretend to.

What makes a life a good life? (There is more than one Jewish answer.)

“We began mapping the Jewish lifecycle. Try at home: share a meaningful milestone from your family’s life.”