When people learned I was traveling to Israel this summer, the question came almost every time, gently but persistently: Aren’t you afraid? We are, after all, still living in the post-October 7, 2023, landscape, a period that has reshaped so much of how the world and how Israelis themselves move through daily life.

My answer never wavered. No, I am not afraid. If anything, I feel more called to be there now than ever before. Israel has never been about headlines or politics. It’s about connection – to people, to culture, to history and to a place that has held my heart for as long as I can remember. Fear was never going to keep me away.

One of the most meaningful moments of the trip came when I had the honor of serving as a guest speaker at Hebrew University for Dr. Danny Brom, director of the Metiv Center for the Treatment of Psychotrauma in Jerusalem. Brom is more than a colleague; he’s a mentor and a dear friend. And his organization received a generous mental health grant from the Jewish Federation of Greater Houston in the aftermath of October 7.

When he invited me to address his international class of trauma therapists, I immediately felt the weight and privilege of that invitation.

Standing in front of that room, I spoke about grief – the kind that unfolds in stages,........

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