What is Kavana?

​There is a concept among Orthodox Jews called yeridat hadorot, or “the decline of the Jewish generations.” The understanding is, that as each generation is further removed from the Sinai Revelation, our understanding of Torah is weakened. One of the greatest causes of this phenomenon, to my mind, is when we as Jews forget what certain halachic concepts really mean.
One of the least understood, and yet most important, is the concept of Kavana.
Without kavana, one cannot pray, say brachot, do many mitzvot, and really, once we understand what kavana is - one cannot even really live their life properly without it. So what is it?
They say that in the future even the mystical will become revealed to the masses. For
some reason which I cannot fathom - the concept of “kavana” has been relegated often in Jewish circles to the mystical. This, to me, is quite a silly and harmful way to think. Yet, thank the Almighty, we have indeed reached that point in history where even the mystical is revealed. You may have heard of a “modern” concept called Mindfulness. Mindfulness is kavana. Simply put. Thankfully, due to people’s industriousness and the Almighty’s kindness, the world is filled with literature, videos, seminars, ad infinitum regarding mindfulness. But I would like to save you some money, and besides, I’m not certain many of you will bother to YouTube or Google “mindfulness.” So be it.
You can begin to have kavana now. Wherever you find yourself reading this. Right now.
There are many different breathing techniques... and that you should “Google” if you don’t
know how to breathe already. Choose which is most natural to you. Now. Simply focus on
your breath, that is all. Being in touch with your breath... quite literally how you breathe...
how the air, with its electric oxygen-energy is firing itself into your brain and throughout your nervous system, and how upon exhaling you are releasing all that you need to release in order to bring your spirit to stillness. Back to God... that is all. Applying this in everyday life is much easier than you might imagine. When reciting a blessing for
example... are you exhaling? Yes. What needs to “leave” your system at that moment? I
would assume... gratitude. Let it be. Let it go out of you with your breath when you utter the blessing. Simple. You are standing in a long, long line at the post office? What needs to be the focus of your standing? I would assume... patience. Breathe in the reality of all those around you... they are waiting too... breathe out your frustration... breathe out your desire to be somewhere else and just be here, now. Center yourself.
Can we see how kavana, which in Hebrew really means the act of going in a particular
direction, (as the root of the word is Kivun... direction), applies to real life as well as of
course to all prayers, blessings, and mitzvot? Can we understand with this simple definition
how kavana carries simultaneously the meanings of intent, understanding the words, meaning the words,
and properly expressing the words and actions? Not to get too Eastern on you... but kavana is the direction of one’s Chi, their essential life-energy.
Riding the wave of her breathing, she reads the words in the Siddur, she sees their meaning, she allows that meaning to fill her with understanding... and then she expresses herself with those new thoughts and feelings as she exhales her next breath, standing with her feet together, her posture at ease but attentive, her mind flowing with her breath. She has a wonderful shemoneh essray. She takes three steps back in humble gratitude, and almost reticently bids Hashem lihitraot, until next time.
Focusing on one’s breath is much like riding a bike or a skateboard. At first one is
clumsy as they learn to “pat their head and rub their stomach.” But soon, in some people almost immediately, it becomes second nature. One stops having to “think” about focusing on
their breath, except under certain circumstances, for example when life is suddenly filled with chaos and you find yourself hyperventilating. Then, like a surfer on a gnarly wave, you must
put all of your attentiveness into your breath, and bring yourself back to center. Bring your mind back down to the ground floor. But most of the time you can cruise... and take in the universe as it swirls around you.
Of all the areas in halacha where the Jew must employ kavana, clearly the most critical
is the recital of the shemonah essray, the silent Amidah. There is a unique halacha here, which applies specifically to the first blessing of the Amidah, that of the Patriarchs. If one does not understand and intend what he says, one does not fulfil the mitzvah of saying the Amidah, and the rest of the prayer becomes blessings in vain to some extent. Serious stuff. A study of the meaning of that paragraph, and its intent, are beyond the scope of this essay. Yet I cannot leave it untouched, important as it is.
The first blessing creates the context of who you are - what you are. This is important - because in the Amidah prayer (unlike other prayers) one is not speaking to God “in Heaven,” so to speak - but rather one imagines him or herself standing right in front of God. You must establish who you are in your own mind in order to properly understand why you are today attending a private audience with God. Just you and God, the Source.
Other prayers, regular blessings just weave their way into the fabric of our atmosphere, so to speak, and perhaps rise up to Heaven. But during the Amidah, one faces Jerusalem, because we are instructed (as another aspect of Kavana) to imagine we are standing right inside the Holy Temple - in front of the Holy of Holies.
So if we first must “announce” who we are, visiting the King, one must ask themselves... who the heck are you, anyway? Julius Greenstick from London? No. You are a Jew. What is a Jew? A child of Avraham/Sarah*, Yitzchok/Rivka, Yaakov/ Leah/Rochel (and the maidservants!). This is a wonderful place from which to define your relationship to the Almighty. Hello... Hashem? I’m one of the kids of those people You established an everlasting covenant with... actually... MANY covenants with! You are our God. We are your People.
The meaning of the rest of the paragraph, what is Ael, what is Gadol, what is Gibor, what is Nora... is discussed in the Talmud, and the subject of much writing even today, so I will leave that alone.
One can use even a single word as the vehicle for Kavana, breathing in and out and developing an ever and ever deeper understanding of that very word. One begins to quite literally inhale its meaning into the very core of her being and then is able to release it back to the universe. One then really feels the word, as she is filled by the word. Once we experience this, we can begin to appreciate why the early Sages of the Talmud, the real Chassidim, took an entire hour to say the Amidah. They also prepared beforehand in meditation for an hour, and meditated for an hour after.
In order to properly address God, they had to meditate and hour to reach the place inside that they needed to be. Then they spent an hour in blissful conversation with God. They then took another hour to absorb their new insights and revelations, and come back “down to earth,” so to speak. The Gemara asks... if they spent 9 hours a day in prayer... how was their Torah knowledge preserved, and when did their earthly work get accomplished? The Gemara answers, because they are (real) chassidim (pious), their Torah knowledge is preserved (for them), and their work is blessed. It was good to be a Chassid.
However, we are taught (too strongly, in my opinion) when we first start learning in Yeshiva... we are not at their level. Yes, and we are not at Moshe Rabainu’s level either. And yet, are we not taught to ask ourselves regularly... when will my deeds reach that of my forefathers?
Tehillim, the Psalms, are an important part of prayer. The very last line of the very last Psalm, #150, is this: “Let every thing that hath breath praise the LORD. Hallelujah.”
(Translation taken from https://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt26f0.htm)