Opinion (Michelle M. Duguid, Washington University, and Jack A. Goncalo, Cornell University): “Height is an oft used metaphor for power: Powerful people ‘feel like the big man on campus’ and ‘people look up to them.’ Development psychologists have suggested that a  metaphorical association between power and height may take root very early as, for instance, children are confronted with taller parents who have power over them and during adolescence taller children use their strength to physically coerce smaller children. This association continues to be reinforced as taller people earn higher salaries are more likely to be found in higher status occupations to emerge as leaders and to win presidential elections.
“This stream of research suggests that social perceivers judge the tall as more powerful than their shorter peers. For instance, when people expand themselves to take up more space, observers assume they are dominant, whereas when they constrict themselves, they are perceived by others as submissive. …

“In sum, there is strong evidence of a well learned positive association between power and height. An obvious prediction based on this research is that observers might use a target’s height to infer its power; not an unreasonable assumption given the robust correlation between height and power in naturalistic settings.”

“Here, we consider a more counterintuitive implication of the power-height association; that the psychological experience of power may cause individuals to actually feel taller than an objective measurement would indicate they really are.”

My Comment: In our egoistic world everything is measured quantitatively, the measure of egoism being “how much you get” (height, weight, distance, time, salary, etc.), while in the spiritual altruistic world, everything is measured qualitatively—the measure of bestowal. The difference is that receiving in our world is in the desire of a person himself while in the spiritual world it’s in the desires of others. Accordingly, there are no earthly sensations in the upper world, and that’s why the feeling of the gradual “disappearance of the body” is achieved there.
[77073]

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Opinion: (Dr. Alexei Yablokov, member of Russian Academy of Sciences, Center for Environmental and Ecological Policy): “The key implication of Professor V. Vernadsky’s biosphere concept is that the Earth is a peculiar living organism, in which the slightest fluctuations in its thinnest layers can trigger severe geological consequences.

“Later, British scientist James Lovelock also spoke about the Earth as a living creature. He stated a concept called “Gaia theory” or “Gaia principle” (“Gaia” stands for ancient Greek Goddess of Earth.)

The Earth (Gaia) might “cut off” humanity as a dangerous cancerous tumor. The population of Earth does everything to force it to get rid of us: over usage of irreplaceable natural resources, over-extraction of land, wood and water, pollution of the biosphere by chemical and radioactive substances….

“Ecologists’ approach to our planet’s resources takes into consideration long-term consequences, rather than merely present-day day “benefits.” As for economists, they look only 10 years ahead. Politicians’ thinking is limited to the time interval between two election cycles (4 – 6 years.) Discrepancies in calculation of time cause contradictions of various points of view. Politicians cannot agree with ecologists’ argument that “20 years from now it will be much worse,” since the main thing for them is to get their voters’ approval in the nearest future.

“Consumption-based society has to understand that at some point its development will exhaust itself. Common people give their votes to politicians who make ecologically dangerous decisions to attract voters. The only way to eliminate the environmental menace is to spread ecological information and knowledge as widely as possible. The worst thing that can happen to us is missing “the point of no return.”

“Ecologically oriented thinking should lead people to act conscientiously, to keep the environment safe and, to find our place in the magnificent biosphere we live in. Ecology is a science about keeping our home safe and sound. So far, the vast majority of earth inhabitants have not realized that the entire planet is our home.”

My Comment: For dozens of years, ecologists have been appealing to us, but since politicians and financiers are the ones who delineate our life, nothing ever changes. They will never invest in any endeavors that don’t bring immediate visible political or economic results. Is there a way out of the loop? The answer is to educate all layers of our society paying particular attention to widening the horizons of common people, since the upper layers of society will never voluntarily allow integral upbringing, because their goal is to keep the masses in front of TV sets.
[76469]

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We hope that we will gradually reach a level of agreement in society, the state, and between people when people begin to understand that no one else can change them but they themselves, and they will not be able to change the world without changing themselves, that the world is a person’s perception, his own reflection, and this is why it is necessary to play as if in the future so this future would become the present. As Kozma Prutkov once said: “If you want to be happy, be happy.” In general this is how it is.

This is why an instructor must also sort of be a psychotherapist. He must understand people very well and know all about this. Instructors must finish courses and have a lot of experience. They need to study exact formulas of behavior, change, and human reactions. In other words, the foundation of their experience must contain specific scenarios with proper inputs and outputs. They must understand what they are doing with people and the kinds of reactions that people might have, and they need to know exactly what they need to achieve the output.

Moreover, when working with a group of adults, we must also turn them into instructors while working with them because every person, in general, is his own instructor. And when he interacts with others, it turns out that everyone is instructing one another and themselves. In other words, this work is two-sided, it is the work of partnership between all the people.

And even though, in the beginning, there are instructors, educators, teachers, and methodologists working with the group, the group takes the entire method from them, the entire chain of changes that it must experience, the entire program, all the exact laws of behavior, the laws of influence and commutation between each other. At the end, everyone in the group comes to a point when they can apply this method to themselves and others, and actively interact with the rest, having exact understanding of how to change themselves under the influence of the group.

In other words, when a person ends up in any, even an accidental scenario, he feels exactly how to behave and how to fix this situation so he could influence it and make it have the right influence on him. This way he will always be able to work properly with the environment and simultaneously make it into an instrument for himself and the group that he influences.
[77105]
From a “Talk on Integral Upbringing” 2/27/12

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When I am included in society, I want to bestow upon all the other souls, all the desires that are outside me. But what can I bestow upon them? Then I (I) receive a very great Light from the Creator, the Light of Ein Sof (Infinity) (∞) that passes through me to others.

Eventually, each of us becomes similar to the Creator in his relation to others—the One who bestows, who feels everyone and fills them.

At the same time, we are all different and no one can take the place of another. Everyone has his own special abilities that allow him to join others and to give them something that only he can give them. It is this ability that makes a person similar to the Creator in his attitude to others.

The wisdom of Kabbalah tells us that a person shouldn’t be pressured or oppressed. The education should be free: We teach people about mutual guarantee, mutual connections, mutual help, and mutual fulfillment, but without coercion. If we dictate anything besides this to a person, we will deprive him of the ability to connect with others correctly and to bring his unique contribution for the benefit of all. He will not be able to be like the Creator in is attitude to the world and will not be able to raise himself to the Creator’s level, to the level of the One who bestows.

“Bestowal” is when I receive from the Creator and pass the Light that is meant for others through me. In order to enable a person to do that we have to give him the right education, without any pressure or oppression, according to the principle of: “educate the child in his own way.” In other words, develop his attributes, but don’t pressure, don’t oblige, and don’t break.

This is a special method and we have to learn how to use it. If we educate our children this way, they will become whole and successful people. This is because we will teach them to easily connect with others and thus provide them with the means to come closer to the Light. Thanks to this it will be easier for them to identify the general force that is concealed in nature. This is the uniqueness of our education.

A person in this world actually lacks only one thing, to know how to connect with other people. By learning how to connect, he will undoubtedly succeed in everything. This is the correction of the world. All our other dealings are only lies. We confuse ourselves by imaginary successes after which there are always disappointments, and crises and our troubles only keep on growing.
[77173]
From the Brazil Convention 5/05/12, Lesson 4

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Shamati #25 “Things that Come from the Heart”

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Question: What do you mean by the notion of “love”?

Answer: I mean that every one of us constantly lives others’ concerns.

It works the same way in the group, where we begin to work in practice mode so each of us wishes to create the most comfortable state for others. That is, I have to understand and feel others. I must continually send them the corresponding signals – verbal, physical, thoughts, and etc.

I must exist in mutual guarantee with them, where every one of us provides all the others with such an attitude or sensation among us that I am sure that by influencing them, I receive the same influence from them upon myself. Therefore, we constantly ascend together above our egoism into qualities opposite to it. This kind of mutual work is the most important work in the group.

After adopting this method, we will constantly feel repeated descents into egoism, “gravity,” and the emergence of various obstacles. This will continue until the full correction, until our full ascent above egoism.

However, in any state within the group and even outside – at home, and with others, I will immediately focus on the same idea, the same practice. And as a result, I will be able to interact with the whole world correctly.
[77260]
From the talk about integral upbringing on 2/27/12

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Initially in the world of Infinity we united as one, like one body all of whose parts are necessary to one another and totally interdependent. After descending from Infinity into our world, we became completely disconnected because all of the space between us was filled by egoism, which pushes us away from one another.

This egoism is constantly growing, and therefore, as history progresses we feel more and more flawed. But there comes a moment when egoism stops growing and reaches satiation. That is why people today are overcome by disillusionment and despair, and depression is becoming the most widespread illness in the world.

Man is losing the meaning of life. Previously he did not ask those kinds of questions since the egoistic desire constantly grew within him and pushed him forward. It deceitfully told him , “You want this, and this and that! You definitely have to get that and become bigger than everyone else!”

But today a time comes when we no longer want anything. And in addition, the general world crisis is unfolding, leaving us with no choice but to search for a way to change the situation and achieve correction, where correction lies in ascending back to the world of Infinity and becoming one man again. Yet this unity is already attained by our own efforts, meaning through work against our egoism, for the sake of unity.

This is the most hateful work to us, and we do not want it. I am willing to do anything but this – anything but to unite with the friends! I feel good by myself, this is comfortable! After all, my entire nature is the will to enjoy, and all I need is to fulfill it. I only want fulfillment.

Every person thinks only about how to make things better for himself at every moment. Our organism and brain works only to keep itself in the most comfortable state. And that is how our entire life goes by. Every person thinks only about how to make things better for himself now and in the future. All of our calculations revolve around this and we are incapable of thinking about anything else. All I care about is my own body. It turns out that I am doomed to a life of a poor, miserable animal that tries to support its body in every possible way so it would live for several decades and then die. But if all of life really comes down to just this, then what’s the point in it?

That is why it is so difficult for us to work against our egoism. There is a great psychological problem here, preventing us from reuniting with others in circumstances where our ego has reached the maximum mark. That is why the science of Kabbalah comes and explains to us how to do this by uniting into a small group.

Through the group we begin to attract this special force to us, which is concealed in nature and is called the Light that reforms. And if we try to extract this concealed force from within, it will surface and do wonders to us. It will correct us completely, will change us so we will be able to connect with others. And then a group will begin to come together among several friends, which will become a mini-model of the corrected humanity in which our unity is realized.

Instead of the previous, negative force of egoism, which separates us in a broken state and has various names (Pharaoh, Haman, Bilam, Balak, and all the “sinners,” meaning forces of disunity), inside of our connection we will begin to reveal the enormous positive force. This is the force of connection which comes to replace the negative force of disunity and is called the Creator. This is the force of bestowal, the force that gave birth to us and unites us. In it we reveal the program of creation and its goal.

That is why we have to unite into a group, since by virtue of that we will feel a higher state – the presence of a higher, concealed force, the Creator who is between us. We just have to reveal Him! Let us hope that we will feel this awakening inside of us during seminars, as a result of our efforts to unite with one another. This can even happen to a person who is at a convention like this for the first time.
[77268]
From the 1st lesson at the Brazil Convention, 5/3/12

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The group exists only in order to reveal the Creator, the force that bestows and operates on us. By adhering to It, we rise above our corporeal existence and feel the eternal life flowing in their infinite flow. The bodies change from one generation to another, but we regulate the connection with the soul and exist in it unified forever.

We can attain that only by connection and unity. Although it isn’t in our power to unite, the upper Light, the Creator is the one who unites us, but with the help of the group we can discover the need, the necessity for that. We need a great desire, a great need for the Light to unite us. So under what circumstances will we want that? It is in the state of separation.

This is why the negativity is revealed in the group: conflicts, separation, and alienation among the friends. We have to be ready, we have to know that all these things are revealed so that we will regulate the connection among us and unite above them.

Eventually the following picture is depicted: Below there is the ego (Ego) that separates the friends, and we connect above it by our mutual love (Amor). At the same time, no one disturbs the others. Even if I don’t get along with the friends, even if there are conflicts for different reasons, it all happens on the level of the human ego that separates us. Above it we build the connections of love.

The ego constantly grows, and we have to make greater efforts in order to be connected above it, above the jealousy ,hatred, passion, pride, and domination. I hug the friend internally despite everything that I feel against him.

The main thing is that the love doesn’t annul the ego, so that they will both grow stronger in their resistance. The ego is Malchut (M), and love is Keter (K). We don’t know in advance what tension, what gap will be between them (Δ), but eventually (℧) it has to make up the first ten whole Sefirot. Then I get a vessel in which I feel the spiritual world, the Creator, the Light.

This will happen only if Keter already grows inside me, which means the desire to love the friend above the great hatred is enough to create the first ten Sefirot.

All the problems in our relationships should be examined as urges that push us forward. Every “malfunction” indicates that we are worthy of intensifying the love and the connection among us. If a person cannot do that, if he doesn’t know about the tool that enables him to build the connection above the repulsion, his ego isn’t increased, and he lives an ordinary life. It is only from us that the growing ego constantly demands to be in mutual connections.

We did a great work in connecting during the convention. We felt what it means to be together in the warmth of mutual cooperation. Later we will feel how our desire grows weaker, how the tension diminishes, and how the indifference takes over. Thus our ego has grown, by asking a “logical question”: “What do you need all this for? We’ve celebrated enough…”

It is a perfectly natural feeling for a person, and he doesn’t feel that he is being played upon from above and that his ego is being increased intentionally by summoning rejection, indifference, and fatigue. It is all done on purpose, so that a person will overcome the obstacles. Try not to forget this, make a sign for yourself, try to see how the only force that exists Above is lying to you and confuses you so that you will begin to understand above your mood, “in which direction the wind is blowing,” and you will reach Him.

By rejecting us, this force wants us to want Him. It is like a woman who is courting a man, and seems to be keeping him away, rejecting him, only to ignite his desire. The wisdom of Kabbalah calls this a “dance”: We are getting closer and then getting further away, again and again, until the desire grows strong to be ten whole Sefirot. Then the Creator will be revealed to us and we will adhere to Him in a true connection.
[77203]
From the Brazil Convention 5/06/12, Lesson 5

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Question: The Creator gives us everything; He provides translators, study rooms, learning centers, etc. Why can’t He grant us correction?

Answer:  The Creator can give us everything, but He cannot make creation attain Him and become similar to Him.

What does that mean that the Creator grants us assemblies and provides us with land? Why did He create our congresses and countries we live in? What do we need them for? We could have stayed in the World of Infinity and that would be it. Why have we descended through five worlds to this realm? To sense the problems and experience the states we all go through? Who needs them? If you ask anybody in the world, you’ll see that no one wants them.

The Creator made only one thing—a point!—nothing more. Light entered the point and started to interact with it. The property of the Light is bestowal; the quality of the point is receiving. They constitute two opposing states: plus and minus, a microscopic power of the Light (bestowal) and a tiny force of receiving contrary to it. These two forces constantly continue to evolve.

The Creator didn’t do anything but this. The Creator is something intermediate, external, that is called Atzmuto (By Himself.) In order to attain the properties of Atzmuto and be able to perceive Him, we have to combine both properties together so that they become equal, similar to each other; the property of receiving should become identical to the property of bestowal. In other words, the property of receiving should learn to bestow the way the giving power does.

When we become equal to the property of bestowal (the Light) we start balancing between these two forces, thus experiencing the force called Atzmuto, which created both Light and desire. The Light originates directly from Atzmuto and is in fact His property called “something out of something,” whereas egoistic desire represents “something out of nothing.” Still, both of them stem from the Creator.

Therefore, as soon as we achieve similarity between desire and Light by making them parallel to each other, we start sensing a third force.

In Kabbalah, this notion is expressed by the idea of three lines. The left line stands for the power of desire (egoism); the right line signifies the power of the Light (bestowal), whereas the middle line is the third force that emerges out of comparison between the first two.

When we receive a part that belongs to desire and at the same time get another part from the Light, we compare them within ourselves in a way that they become balanced and equal; that’s how we reveal the Creator by utilizing the middle line.

We are talking about physical laws here; there is nothing beyond them. It is the same way in any science; we use the method of comparison in order to find a third parameter, the initial value. How else we can define it?

In order to be known, we need to demonstrate at least two of our opposing properties so that by comparing them another person can recognize and understand who we are. Only by contrasting various qualities is it possible to comprehend, measure, and weigh something.

This is the reason why the Creator gave us the possibility of existing between a “plus and a minus.” By receiving from Him and comparing what we have received, we attain Him. This applies to all spheres of our life. In technology, we determine what the source of energy is by knowing who the consumer is. Without egoism or the Light that flows through our ego, we cannot realize or sense who we deal with.

After the Creator generated a black point that is opposite to the Light, two qualities (plus and minus) continue to evolve on their own. There is nothing else going on. The act of creation stopped at that point; furthermore, we see that advancement happens by itself and originates from the two opposites. There is no interference on His behalf any more from Atzmuto (He, Himself.)

Our nature constantly evolves. That means that we can pronounce: “The Creator doesn’t exist!” We see that everything around us complies with certain norms; life is defined by rigid laws that exist universally.

However, if we strive to find Him (achieve the upper level) we have to start equating. How?—Only by positioning ourselves between “a plus” and “a minus.” How do we place ourselves in such a condition?—Only if we associate our “minus” with our ego and manage to link the “plus” with the group.

Under “our ego” we do not mean the desire to party, drink, eat, entertain, or have lots of leisure time. No. We mean our resistance to becoming connected with our fellow group members. This is the only factor that makes a difference. If we continue trying to unite with our friends beyond our ego, we will eventually get such a dipole, such strength of magnetic field that we’ll be able to reveal the Creator within it. At this level of merging with the group, the property of Atzmuto emerges.

I am talking about elementary physical conditions and laws. We cannot ignore them. The problem is that we have to be situated inside this scheme. We’ll try!
[74143]
From the Vilnius Convention 3/23/12, Lesson 1

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