If you are ready to come in off "the sidelines," if you understand
that your local movement depends on your assuming leadership, if you are
willing to apply yourself to the task of being a
menahel— then you have started in the proper direction.
But there is no recipe for becoming a good menahel. I can give
you an outline to show you how to lead a discussion. I can give you a
book with many ideas for clever arts and crafts projects. I can tell
you about a hundred games. I can explain how our holidays should be
celebrated. All that I can give you with a great degree of objectivity.
But to tell you how to be a
menahel, well, that is not so easy; for it involves you.
What are you? That is the first question you must answer for
I yourself in the process of being a menahel. You have to become better
acquainted with yourself, with your own beliefs, with your likes
and dislikes, with your understanding of life and of our people and of
our future. Know yourself and know where you are going. Be honest with
yourself in your self-investigations.
Perhaps you are wondering what place the above paragraph has in
an answer to your problem of how to be a good menahel. Well, I shall
tell you. When you become a menahel, you have placed in your hands the
power to influence all the young chaverim in your
kvutza. They will imitate everything you do and say; they will copy your
mannerisms in dress, in speech, and in thought. You must never
disillusion them by being one thing yourself and simultaneously telling
them to be another. You will not be able to know them and to judge them
unless you first know and understand yourself. You will not be able to
convey ideas and action to them unless you first have clear in
your mind the ideas in which you believe and the action that you,
yourself, are willing to take.
So, if you would be a good menahel, first know yourself. This
would not imply for you that you must "know all the answers." I hope
that you have a questioning mind, that you will go through many periods
of pondering and self-searching and re-evaluation in your life. But it
should be clear to you that you must have a definite outlook on life, a
desire to be an active participant in that part of society that will
remake the Jewish nation.
Do you like people? That may sound like a silly question, but you
had better be able to answer it affirmatively, or give up the idea of
being a menahel. And by liking people, I mean—do you like them enough
to study them, to want to know all you can about them, their hopes,
their troubles, and their way of thinking? When you become
a
menahel) you will learn the names and faces of your young chaverim. Will
you learn more? Will you call them on the phone occasionally? Will you
know the hundred and one things about each of your youngsters that will
make you understand their
personalities
and their actions?
Will you be willing to listen, listen, listen to them? And will
you try to listen, too, to the things that they leave unsaid? That is a
difficult thing to do—to hear the words that are not spoken. But if
you really like your chaverim, you will soon be able to do even this.
Just as you know you must be a menahel, so you must know that
being a menahel spells work for you. First, you have to be an example
for your young chaverim. You have to participate in every machaneh
affair and be outstanding in your work. Nothing will make your
youngsters more proud of you than if you collect the most money for JNF,
or if you sell the most Furrows subscriptions. If you take a leading
part in the concert, if you arrange an oneg Shabbat, your young
chaverim will begin to picture the time when they will be like you.
Then you have to work on the kvutza itself. You have to prepare
every meeting activity with utmost care. You must always know what you
want to do with "the kids." Never come to a meeting without knowing what
your aim and program will be. For this you have to read, read, read; be
awake to everything that is happening to our people throughout the
world, to your city, and this country. When I was at school, a very
good teacher once told me, "Try to know a little bit about everything
and everything about one thing."
You have to find ways of presenting what you know to your
chaverim. You may not succeed at first, but keep trying. If you
are primarily a "good guy," you will find the affection of your "kids";
and they will be patient with you as you learn to educate them. Just
see that they have fun in the process; give them lots of activity.
Remember that as an educator, as well as a good chaver, you must
consider the importance of experimenting. Every single activity and
discussion you have is an experiment. Prepare for it. When it is over,
look back on what you did and how you did it, and evaluate your work.
Repeat methods that you find successful and discard your mistakes. Don't
be afraid to try something new. The oneg Shabbat, our Camp Kvutzot,
everything we have—even our form of organization—is the result of the
experiments of menahalim who started as you start today,
a bit unsure of yourself but well aware of the need of your effort.
More important than anything else is your
attitude to our movement. But to proper attitude, we must add
knowledge. And that is what you must acquire. Do you know your
holidays, their meaning, and their historical background? Do you know
about the history of Zionism? Do you know the work of the
chalutzim and what they have created in Eretz Israel? Are you keeping
yourself informed about what is happening to world Jewry? These are the
questions you should
answer before becoming a
menahel. Work to educate yourself.
And now, I wonder what else I should tell you? Need I tell you to
dress simply and neatly, always be punctual, always to set high
standards in your own "way of being" . . .? There is one thing more:
Do all your work with chalutz devotion. Leading your kvutza is your most important duty in Habonim.
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