Welcome to the Covenant & Conversation series, Rabbi Sacks’ commentary pieces on the weekly Torah portion, exploring ideas and sharing inspiration from the Torah readings of the week.

This audio on Vayishlach was recorded by Rabbi Sacks in 2016. Follow along here: https://rabbisacks.org/covenant-conversation/vayishlach/feeling-the-fear/

You can also and download this week's featured essay, and all translations, here: https://rabbisacks.org/covenant-conversation/vayishlach/fear-or-distress/

For intergenerational discussion on the weekly Parsha, a new FAMILY EDITION is now also available: https://rabbisacks.org/covenant-conversation-family-edition/vayishlach/fear-or-distress/
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For more articles, videos, and other material from Rabbi Sacks, please visit www.RabbiSacks.org and follow @RabbiSacks.

The Rabbi Sacks Legacy continues to share weekly inspiration from Rabbi Sacks.

With thanks to the Schimmel Family for their generous sponsorship of Covenant & Conversation, dedicated in loving memory of Harry (Chaim) Schimmel.

Feeling the Fear (Rabbi Sacks on Vayishlach, Covenant & Conversation)

Track 1 – The Call
The Call captures one of those rare conversations that change direction without making noise.
A phone rings, a friend speaks honestly, and suddenly something inside shifts.

The song explores the quiet power of being truly seen.
No pressure, no preaching — just a sincere question:
“How are you really doing?”
Between two men, this kind of honesty is almost sacred.
As they talk, old patterns become visible.
Heavy paths feel lighter.

Shared experiences weave together into something that feels like relief.
And slowly, almost gently, the metaphor of the crooked swing returns:
life aligns itself a little more when truth is spoken without judgment.
Musically warm, bluesy, and intimate, The Call carries the tone of real friendship —
steady, grounding, and deeply human.

This is not just a call.
It’s the moment the swing begins to straighten.

The Call

“Millimeter” is a song about the tiny shifts inside us that change everything long before we notice them.
It starts with a quiet tension — a feeling that something is slightly off, not loud or dramatic, just a subtle pull that won’t go away.

Using the metaphor of a crooked swing, the song explores how life can drift out of balance by the smallest angle. A millimeter. A breath. A moment of misalignment. And suddenly, nothing moves the way it used to.

As the track unfolds, the narrator realizes that the imbalance isn’t caused by the world outside.
It’s inside him.
In the way he moves, reacts, carries old patterns, lets things slide.

The rock-driven chorus widens emotionally, delivering the central insight:
A millimeter is enough to shift the whole motion of a life.
By the end, the song doesn’t offer a perfect solution — only honesty.
The awareness that something has been hanging wrong for a long time,
and the courage to finally listen to that quiet inner pull.

A raw, introspective track about noticing what feels “off,”
and admitting:
as it hangs now… it doesn’t run right anymore.

A Millimeter

“Misalignment” dives into the quiet, persistent feeling that something inside has been off for a long time — not enough to break you, but enough to tilt everything by a few degrees. The song uses the metaphor of a crooked swing to explore how life can drift out of balance in ways that are subtle, internal, and easy to overlook.

On the outside, everything seems normal: you wake up, you work, you function.
But inside, there’s a pull — a sideways tension you can’t name, but you feel it with every step.
As the track unfolds, the narrator realizes the truth:
the imbalance isn’t caused by anything external.
It lives within him.
A millimeter here, a slight shift there — and suddenly the rhythm of life no longer flows the way it used to.

The rock chorus opens wide with emotional weight, capturing the frustration of sensing that something doesn’t run clean, even if you can’t yet explain why.
By the end, the song doesn’t claim resolution.
Instead, it arrives at honesty:
admitting that something is crooked is the first step toward setting it right.

aa“Misalignment” is raw, reflective, and deeply human —
a confession wrapped in melody, and a moment of clarity wrapped in noise.

Misalignment

“Back Then in My Body” is a raw, introspective song about the weight we carry long before we understand it.
It explores the idea that the body remembers truths we try to ignore — old pressure, unspoken words, swallowed emotions, and moments we pushed away to keep going.

On the surface, life seemed functional.
Routine. Normal.
But inside, something had been storing every impact, every silence, every moment that hurt but was never named.
The body held it all quietly, patiently — until the day it could no longer stay silent.

The song travels deep into that realization:
that the patterns we live today were shaped years earlier, far beneath the level of thought.
Not in the mind, but in that inner place where honesty can’t be avoided.

The chorus hits with emotional force, revealing the truth:
everything began back then — long before the symptoms showed, long before the admission came.
It’s not about blame.
It’s about understanding where the misalignment truly started.

By the end, the song reaches a moment of stark clarity:
the body has always known the story.
And healing begins not with perfection, but with admitting what has been carried for too long.

“Back Then in My Body” is an honest confession set to modern rock —
a turning point wrapped in sound,
and the beginning of a new kind of truth.

Back then in my Body

“The Old Code” is a song about the invisible scripts that shape our reactions long before we understand them.
It’s about the rules we learned in childhood, the patterns we copied to survive, and the emotional reflexes that stayed with us long after they stopped serving us.
In this track, the narrator realizes that his body still follows an outdated program — a set of internal commands like stay quiet, endure, swallow it down, be strong, say nothing.
They once protected him.
Now they confine him.

The song unfolds like an internal dialogue:
Why do old emotions still flare up?
Why does the body react before the mind?
And why do behaviors from the past continue to run, even when life has changed?

The chorus hits with the core truth:
the old code is still active, still burning, but it no longer belongs to the man he is today.
Instead of blaming himself, he chooses honesty:
to see the code clearly, to recognize its patterns, to admit that it no longer fits.

The final conclusion is not resolution — it’s awakening.
A conscious decision to stop running on an inherited program and begin writing something new, even without knowing the next line yet.

“The Old Code” is a raw, modern rock confession about the courage it takes
to outgrow your own past.

The Old Code

“Back Against the Wall” is a dark, emotional rock piece that dives deep into the moment when the body freezes before the mind understands why.

It’s a song about patterns — old survival strategies — that still lock the system in place, even when life has changed.
The narrator finds himself stuck again, unable to move forward or backward.
There’s no dramatic collapse, no explosion — just a crushing pressure inside the chest, an internal shutdown that feels like hitting a wall you can’t see but deeply feel.

The verses describe the physical truth of trauma patterns:
muscles collapsing, breath shrinking, the body going soft while the soul turns rigid.
It’s not weakness — it’s protection learned long ago.

The chorus opens with full emotional intensity, admitting the hard truth:
the block isn’t outside — it’s inside.
It’s an old structure, an old reflex, an old rule that once kept him safe but now holds him still.

The bridge shifts from panic to clarity:
he doesn’t need to fight or run —
he needs to recognize.
To stand, breathe, and understand the origin of the wall instead of trying to escape from it.

By the final chorus, a small but crucial shift appears:
a crack.
Not enough to break through yet,
but enough to show that this wall isn’t permanent.

“Back Against the Wall” is an honest, heavy, and deeply human moment of awareness —
a song about seeing the pattern, feeling the pressure, and beginning the long process of freeing yourself from it.

Back Against the Wall

“Swallowed Down” is one of the rawest and most physical songs on the album.
It confronts the lifelong habit of swallowing emotions instead of expressing them — the anger, fear, shame, expectations, loneliness, and all the words that were never spoken but buried deep inside the body.

The song frames emotional suppression as something the body remembers long after the mind has moved on.
Every swallowed moment becomes weight.
Every forced silence becomes tension.
Every “I’m fine” becomes a layer the body carries until it can’t hold it anymore.

The verses describe how these stored experiences rise back up, not as thoughts, but as physical sensations — proof that nothing truly disappears just because it was pushed down.
The chorus hits with painful honesty:
He has swallowed things that were never his to carry.
And now they sit inside him, shaping how he feels, breathes, reacts, and lives.

The bridge is a confession:
for years, he acted as the “trash can” of his own history, absorbing everything, letting nothing out, believing that this was strength.
But the body kept the score — and eventually presented the bill.

By the final chorus, the song shifts from confession to decision.
He chooses to stop swallowing his life and start living it.
It won’t be easy.
It won’t be quick.
But it starts with the truth.

“Swallowed Down” is an emotional exhale —
a declaration that the cycle ends now.

Swallowed Down

Buzz into this brave and beautiful adventure! When Bartimeus the bee dares to enter the mysterious Shadow House, he tumbles into a world of wonder, whispers, and curious secrets. Will he find his way home, be stuck in this unnatural world forever—or something even more magical? A heart-lifting tale about courage and the hidden light inside every shadow.

The Bee Who Got Stuck - Preview

This track dives straight into the moment when clarity finally cuts through the haze. It’s about wanting the truth — even when it stings — because holding onto “maybe” hurts more than hearing what’s real. The song follows the tension of someone stuck in circles, waiting for honesty that never comes, until the realization lands: the love they hoped for just isn’t there. But instead of breaking down, the story leans into a raw kind of strength — facing the truth, letting go, and reclaiming dignity with a mix of frustration, humor, and self-respect. A soundtrack for anyone who’s done being kept in the dark.

Dieser Song springt mitten in den Moment, in dem Klarheit endlich durch den Nebel bricht. Es geht darum, die Wahrheit hören zu wollen — selbst wenn sie wehtut — weil ein „Vielleicht“ am Ende mehr schmerzt als ehrliche Worte. Der Track begleitet die Spannung eines Menschen, der immer wieder im Kreis läuft, auf Ehrlichkeit wartet, die nie kommt, bis die Erkenntnis einschlägt: Die Liebe, auf die er gehofft hat, gibt es nicht. Doch statt zusammenzubrechen, entsteht daraus eine rohe Stärke — der Mut, der Wahrheit ins Auge zu sehen, loszulassen und sich seinen Stolz zurückzuholen, mit einer Mischung aus Frust, Humor und Selbstachtung. Ein Song für alle, die genug davon haben, im Dunkeln gehalten zu werden.

Klartext, Baby!

Jetzt sag schon endlich, was du denkst 
Warum du mit mir nur Zeit verschenkst
Raus damit oder schweig halt für immer
Denn eins ist sicher:
S‘ wird eh nicht mehr schlimmer

Geh doch, wenn du gehen willst
Sags mir einfach
Wenn du lieber woanders chillst
Eier bloß hier nicht weiter rum
Oder hältst du mich echt für so dumm?

Klartext, Baby
Macht alles keinen Sinn
Komm schon, los jetzt
Hau‘s mir direkt unters Kinn
Klartext
Sag‘s mir endlich mitten ins Gesicht:
Du liebst mich nicht

Red Klartext oder geh
Weil ich kein „Vielleicht“ versteh
Geh doch, ich komm damit klar
Weil‘s früher einfach besser war

Roll halt mit den Augen
Lach mich aus
Hab eh keinen Bock mehr
Will nur noch hier raus

Klartext, Baby
So macht das alles keinen Sinn
Auf geht’s 
Knall mir‘s direkt unters Kinn
Klartext
Mitten ins Gesicht:
Du liebst mich nicht

Soviel ist sicher...

Du liebst mich nicht

Du drehst dich im Kreis
Und ich schau zu
Blinde Kuh, Blinde Kuh
Ich find dich einfach nicht mehr

Klartext, Baby
Mitten ins Gesicht:
Du liebst mich nicht

Du liebst mich nicht


Klartext, Baby!

Ich schreibe, was ich denke, fühle und erlebe. Schreiben hilft mir, Erinnerungen einzuordnen und ihnen Klarheit zu geben. Wenn Gefühle eine Melodie bekommen, entsteht etwas Wunderbares – eine Botschaft, die direkt ins Herz geht.

Für mich ist es ein Ausgleich, ein Stück Selbsttherapie. Die Texte sind ehrlich und frisch aus dem Herzen. Und wenn ich damit jemanden berühre, der genauso fühlt wie ich, freut es mich umso mehr.

Da ich selbst nicht gut singen kann, nutze ich KI für die Melodie und die Stimme. Ich bin dankbar für diese Möglichkeit, meinen Gefühlen Ausdruck zu verleihen.

Viel Freude beim Hören 🥰

Gruß, Marco Memory

PS: Ehrliche Kommentare sind willkommen – aber bitte keine Angebote, ich kaufe nichts.



I write what I think, feel, and experience. Writing helps me sort out memories and bring them clarity. When feelings find a melody, something wonderful is created – a message that speaks straight to the heart.

For me, it’s a balance, a bit of self-therapy. The lyrics are honest and straight from the heart. And if they touch someone who feels the same way I do, it makes me even happier.

Since I can’t sing well myself, I use AI for the melody and voice. I’m grateful for this opportunity to give my feelings a voice.

Enjoy listening 🥰

Best, Marco Memory

PS: Honest comments are always welcome – but please no offers, I’m not looking to buy anything.

Follow the audio shiurim, lectures and speeches of Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, global religious leader, philosopher, author of over 30 books and moral voice for our time. Rabbi Sacks served as Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth between September 1991 and September 2013. A full biography - together with an extensive online archive of Rabbi Sacks' work - is available at www.rabbisacks.org or you can follow him on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram @rabbisacks.

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