i love the morning prayer. Or all the prayers for that matter, but Shararit is the longest and the one that confronts you with the most. It hits you fresh out of bed. Every prayer is a matter of trust. You are not left to your own devices or feelings. You are not even left to your own thoughts. All of our ancestors navigate us through it. The ancient rabbis, which in a way is just a word for all the many ancient people who made the prayers or recorded the prayers or ordered them, all the different people who did the trnaslation, all the people who said them before you and are saying them with you, uphold you. And of course it is sung and, if done properly, I think, sung in Hebrew. You awake to navigate through this thing. Or I do. My main prayer is that this become a song, that I actually can sing this, that my heart and my voice can get around these words and sing this song to God. My prayer is that my life become a song.

In a way the whole morning prayer is a large Kaddish, which is why it is peppered with Hatzi Kaddish and ends in full Kaddish. The Kaddish is essentialy praise in the face of the ultimate hardness of life, and singing when one nearly cannot. It is the prayer to get ones song back, to be able to make music out of life. This is the morning prayer, but it is the other prayers as well. At their times, throughout the day, we must get up from what we are doing and plead with God to be able to make music to him once again. This is why we say adonai sifotei tiftach, adonai open up my lips that my mouth may declare your praise.