SYOT: Start your own trend 

Do you care to be cool?

Teenagers would be the first to admit that they care deeply about being cool. They’d chase any curren TikTok trend just because it’s current and trendy.

In fact, for most teenagers, being uncool seems to be the worst thing that can happen to them. Even worse than being in a plane crash.

But let’s be honest — it’s not only teenagers. Everyone has a strong need to follow what others do. There is a good reason companies spend billions of dollars on marketing: to tell us how cool it is to wear this shirt or drive that car.

And don’t think that this follow-the-trend trend just started recently. From the beginning of time, humans have always looked to be like others. As the Rambam writes, “a person is social.” Our social connections and relationships matter to us enormously.

Thinking about all of this, I wondered: how should we handle this need to be cool? On the surface, it feels like a direct contradiction with a Jewish way of life. After all, Judaism is all about ancient, eternal values. Trends shmends, who cares about all of that! Right?

And then I thought about the rebbe, and I realized he had a brilliant take on this topic.

While the rebbe definitely encouraged his chasidim not to obsess over materialism, even when it’s super trendy, he also presented the ultimate answer to this deeply human need. Instead of fighting the trend, the rebbe was himself a trendsetter. He started his own holy, Jewish-based trends.

Think about Times Square, the perfect neon gods made by human hands, a place filled with billboards screaming the most recent and up-and-coming trends. The billboards seem to yell at you: How dare you not buy what we offer? How uncool of you!

The rebbe didn’t spend his time telling his chasidim how so many of those trends are useless and temporary.

Instead, he started his own trend. He sent his chasidim with their mitzvah tanks to stand right under those neon lights, approach passersby, and say, “Are you Jewish? Would you like to put on tefillin today? Would you like to take a Shabbos candles kit and start lighting at home?”

Today, all of this seems so natural to us that it’s almost impossible to go back in time and understand how daring it all was. Think about what it meant to be a proud, visible Jew in the streets of America. Think about lighting a menorah and celebrating Chanukah out in the open. In 1982, the Jewish community in Teaneck successfully opposed placing a public menorah on their own streets.

Today, a menorah lighting is a staple in almost every American city. That is a revolution.

What the rebbe essentially said was: SYOT — Start Your Own Trend. Instead of fighting the world, leverage it. Instead of telling people it’s okay to be uncool, make mitzvot cool. Make kindness cool. Make Judaism cool.

Go all the way back to the Exodus from Egypt. For years, the Jewish people lived among the idol-worshipping Egyptians, where bowing to animals was simply what everyone did. It was the culture, the norm, the cool thing to do.

And then, just before they left Egypt, G-d commanded them to take that very animal and offer it to Him. This was the ultimate SYOT moment. The Jews stood up proudly and declared: serving the one true G-d, that is the coolest thing a person can do.

Thousands of years later, the rebbe did the same thing, in the streets of New York, Paris, London, and all over the world. And as we are about to commemorate 124 years since the rebbe’s birth, this is a question for all of us: Are we following the trends, or are we setting them?

Rabbi Mendy Kaminker is the Rabbi of Chabad of Hackensack and an editorial member of Chabad.org. He looks forward to your comments at rabbi@chabadhackensack.com.