“How can we use the month of Elul to prepare to turn the wrongs we have done into merits?”
[From Mishkan HaNefesh, Yom Kippur service, new Reform High Holy Day prayer book, page 85]:
“The Talmud teaches: ‘Great is repentance, for it transforms one’s deliberate sins into merit’ (Talmud, Yoma 86b). In general, we think of repentance as a way of achieving expiation for the wrongs we have done. But the Talmud’s teaching points us in a new and surprising direction…The focus is not on changing the past, but in defining a new direction for the future. For repentance, after all, is ultimately about changing ourselves and evolving morally.”