When all is said and done, the essential question this Rosh Hashanah-Yom Kippur remains: Is the zebra black with white stripes, or white with black stripes?
Let me explain. Most of us think of the Yamim Noraim as a cosmic "wish list." On the one hand, we must erase all the negative things we've done, one by one. So we wrack our brains, dig deep into our psyche and name the places where we've gone wrong, promising not to go there again.
Then, we start to list all the various blessings and baubles that we'd like to have bestowed upon us: good health, parnasa, nachas from the kids, a good shiduch, etc. All this is quite normal and we all do it. But somehow, it misses the point and obscures the big picture.
We must search our souls and make an elemental decision.
Have you ever noticed that on the chagim - including and especially the High Holidays - the tefilot we recite essentially eliminate the check-list of requests that we normally set before G-d, day in and day out, in our weekday prayers? While on Sunday through Friday we ask G-d for wisdom, clothes, health, wealth, security, redemption, etc, on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur we hardly talk about those things at all.
Instead, we devote our prayers to talking about our unique destiny - as an individual and as a nation - and where we fit into the universe. Who is HaShem, and what was He thinking when He created the world and put us in it?
Just spend a moment examining the Rosh Hashanah Amidah prayer to detect its essence: "Oh G-d, create a brotherhood of all creatures; grant honor and glory to all who revere You; You chose us from among the nations; You draw us near to You; every being must know You have made it; give us a share in Your Torah; purify our hearts, let us see the truth."
On Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, we must search our souls and make an elemental decision: Who, exactly, are we? Are we a person who essentially is good and wants to do good, who seeks a stronger, deeper relationship with G-d, but sometimes, alas, slips out of sync and does the wrong thing or moves in the wrong direction? Or are we someone with no basic desire to be G-dly or to be holy, who takes Torah and mitzvot and life itself lightly, yet occasionally does good things and has periodic flashes of spirituality?
In short, who do we want to be? That is the real question that matters; everything else flows from it. And that is what we must focus on in our prayers and meditation. There are two paths, my fellow zebra, and the difference between them is, well, as different as black from white.