The month of Tevet begins with an end - the end of Chanukah. Yet even though Chanukah is coming to an end, during the beginning of Tevet the power of the holiday is felt the strongest. All eight lights are burning. There is a satisfying feeling of completion. We can joyfully point to the Chanukah menorah and say, Zot Chanukah - this is Chanukah - which is what the eighth day is called.

But then what? After the last flame flickers and dies and the menorah is put away, what remains?

What remains is perhaps one of the most powerful lessons of Chanukah - the power of beginning again every day. While we were celebrating the holiday, we may not have known that we were putting this lesson into practice. If we become aware of it, we can take the light of Chanukah with us as we journey through the dark wintry months that lay ahead.

What "beginning" did we make on every night of Chanukah? On the first night we lit the first light - a definite beginning. On the second night we lit the second light and then we went back and lit the first light again. The first light got a second chance, so to speak, to do its work.

Did it dispel the darkness when it stood all by itself in the Chanukah menorah? Probably not. But on the second night it had the chance to start over and try again. And so it went for all eight days of the holiday. Every night the impact of that first light became greater and greater. It was still the same solitary light, and yet when it joined with the other lights it was transformed into something more powerful. By the eighth night, when the first light was part of a bright battalion of light, the darkness was dispelled. Zot Chanukah - the night that is the culmination of all the other nights - had been achieved.

And so it is with all our other mitzvot (commandments).

When we get up early in the morning to pray, or when we stop to saying a blessing before eating or when we take time out of our busy schedules to do a neighbor a favor we are creating one light. That light might not be able to dispel too much darkness in the world by itself, but it is a beginning. Every time we repeat the performance of that mitzvah - and add a new mitzvah to it - we are bringing more light into the world.

It's easy to see how this is so during Chanukah, or at other times when we are feeling inspired. When we approach a mitzvah with enthusiasm, we are sure that it does have a powerful effect on our lives and even the entire world. But what happens when we are feeling less than inspired, either because of setbacks in our personal situation or a sense of despair about what is going on the world? How do we make it through these periods of doubts and darkness?

According to Rebbe Nachman of Breslov (18^th century Chassidic master), the only way to climb out of the darkness is to begin again - even if you have to begin again several times a day.

In one of his teachings on Chanukah, Rebbe Nachman tells us that the will to live is intimately bound up with the ability to begin anew. In order to stay alive - truly alive and not just "functioning" - we have to be able to put past doubts and disappointments behind us, and start over as if we have never taken tried before. Do this once, he tells, and you find it easier to begin again in other areas of your life - just as on Chanukah the first light begins its work anew every night, as does the second light and the third light, etc.

Although we will never be able to understand the ways of God - why we have to go through periods of doubt and darkness - Rebbe Nachman assures us that the way to God is open to all.

"Snatch a good deed, a lesson, a prayer," he tells us (Sichos Haran 48), "and 'God will do what is good in His eyes' (Chronicles I, 19:13)."

May the new beginnings we perform this Tevet serve to increase God's light in the world, and may we merit to receive God's good in our own lives in ways that we can understand.