The great Talmudic sage, Rabbi Akiva, was taken captive by the Romans on Tishrei 5 of the year 3894 from creation (134 CE). His subsequent torture and execution is recalled in the stirring Eleh Ezkarah poem of the Yom Kippur service.
The 10-day period beginning on Rosh Hashanah and ending on Yom Kippur is known as the "Ten Days of Repentance"; this is the period, say the sages, of which the prophet speaks when he proclaims (Isaiah 55:6) "Seek G-d when He is to be found; call on Him when He is near." Psalm 130, Avinu Malkeinu and other special inserts and additions are included in our daily prayers during these days.
The Baal Shem Tov instituted the custom of reciting three additional chapters of Psalms each day, from the 1st of Elul until Yom Kippur (on Yom Kippur the remaining 36 chapters are recited, thereby completing the entire book of Psalms). Click below for today's three Psalms.
Chapter 100
Chapter 101
Chapter 102
Links: About the Ten Days of teshuvah; Voicemail; more on teshuvah
It is not so much that we need to be taken out of exile.
It is that we must take the exile out of ourselves.
What is exile? It is the belief that there is some place outside of G-d.
And that in that place, there are forces stronger than G-d.
And those forces will not allow you to do what your soul came here to do.
Fear no thing, no force, no being other than G-d. Do that which you must do as though nothing stands in your way.
Then you will have taken yourself out of exile. And G-d will complete the job.