Question: Creating a new kind of family relations is a process which gradually builds connection among us. With what does it start?

Answer: Everything begins with the course on integral education. It offers an explanation of our nature and our union with clarification of the general network that connects us together, the freedom of choice, our perpetually growing egoism, and the system in which everyone has to help the each other. We have to learn to listen to our friends in order to get inspired by them and to acknowledge the importance of self-rejection and to recognize the significance of inclusion into each other. And the most important way to advance are the workshops where we sit together, two of us (tête-à-tête) or in small groups, and discuss things trying to feel the process and figuring out the ways of building it.

There is a certain process that outlines the structure of our seminars; the instructor should lead us through it. He should constantly add questions and bring up new topics for discussion. He is the one who leads us step by step, stage by stage, and gradually allows us to develop our desires, thoughts, and aspirations. We face the situation when we have no other choice but to acknowledge certain qualities within us and compare them with what other people see in us. We also have to become aware of how we treat the same qualities in others and search for the ways of rising above our criticism.

We have to thoroughly study ourselves; however, the main thing is to learn to rise above our claims. I keep trying many times and finally achieve it! Have you seen a cat that is preparing to pounce? If it wants to leap from the floor onto the table, it flexes several times as if trying it on, and only then jumps. Similarly, we need to do the exercises and then jump.

Each seminar has a theoretical part, but the main thing is the discussion during which we get to know each other better. We learn from ourselves and bring up our doubts, problems, and difficult times that we would never bring up otherwise because of our manliness. A man (Gever – גבר) is the one who overcomes (Mitgaber – xמתגבר) himself instead of following his instincts. A hero (Gibor – גבור) is the one who conquers his egoistic predisposition.

So, we have to see our weaknesses, and what the true hero is, is overcoming them. In regular life, when people are arguing, fighting and screaming at each other, they look like little kids. Each seemed to want to demonstrate what a big egoist he is. In our workshops, we clearly demonstrate that we are the heroes, since the word “hero” (Gibor – גבור) has the same root as the word “overcome” (Hitgabrut – התגברות)

We have to talk about it openly and directly. Thanks to this mutual work, we will really start to feel each other. And never again will there be such reproaches as women frequently make to their husbands, “Why don’t you ever talk with me!” Her husband won’t even have to talk with her at all since at our workshops we’ll learn to sense each other internally. A powerful internal communication will be initiated among us.

It’s like people who have lived next to each other for many years. For example, I have lived together with my wife for 45 years now and we don’t need to talk a lot. Conversation is not a necessity anymore, but rather a tradition. If we were newlyweds who just started their married life, I would have to talk with her a lot. However, after so many years together we know each other so well that we communicate internally.

The same results can be achieved through the workshops that connect people together. If we rise beyond the family matters and talk about the world problems, the environment, society, the countries we live in, and the entire planet, all of them stem from the incorrect connection among people.

It is from this that the economy and finance are suffering. In some places, people are dying of starvation and in other places there are obese people throwing away surplus food. The reason for such a state of affairs is the wrong connections and lack of equality. That’s why it’s clear to everybody that if we manage to correct the family issues and go beyond them, we’ll achieve success.
[84774]
From a “Talk About New Life” 7/12/12

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Question: A question arises constantly as to whether or not I’m putting in enough effort because I constantly feel that I’m not working enough.

Answer: Naturally so, and this is very good. You have a constant opportunity to advance, which doesn’t depend upon me. Moreover, your work is measured as the sum total of your actions and the actions of the group as a whole in order to discover among you the point of higher power, the center of the group, its spiritual and moral center, its future, and the source of its strength, with the help of which the group and each individual member changes themselves toward greater integration with others.

In an integral group, people do their own work and pull themselves up on their own. The teacher observes from the sidelines. He organizes the seminars and sets the topics. He leads the students and guides them in a way that, from seminar to seminar, from one lesson to another, they really begin to see their advancement. This advancement can either be in the form of a revelation of greater evil or in attaining some degree of good.

Question: Is this working ability and effectiveness also determined by the group’s integral interaction?

Answer: Yes, by this alone. Nothing depends on the teacher. He acts like a supervisor. If anything can be added, he adds it. If not, then he waits patiently.
[91197]
From KabTV’s “Building the Social Environment” 9/25/12

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Question: During our acting workshop, I still have the feeling that this is not serious. It is clear to my ego that it is all a game. How can I really be incorporated in this game?

Answer: Look for the answer yourself and try to examine and to understand yourself better. Don’t expect any tips from me; the answer will come only as a result of your efforts. Thus you will gradually begin to know what needs to be clarified by your actions. With every action you take, you will become wiser, as it is said: “There is none wiser than the experienced.”

Eventually the light-headedness will turn into a serious attitude. Later you will realize that it isn’t a game, but actual training.

Let’s say I’m training for an important marathon, intending to participate in the Olympic games. In the meantime we hold pre-Olympic competitions in our country. These are not the real games but only pre-Olympic games. However, if I don’t go through these games, I will not go anywhere! If I don’t achieve good results in these games, I will not be able to participate in the Olympics.

This is not accurate, but it is still an example of what we are doing now. For us, however, the game and the performance are the same thing! When we come closer to the actual fulfillment, we will suddenly see that what we thought to be a simple game was all real.

With this game, we draw the Light that Reforms. This is called from Lo Lishma (not for Her name) we reach Lishma (for Her name). The meaning of Lo Lishma is that I don’t deserve the Light, but still it comes to me thanks to my participation in the game. This participation is not only my actual actions, but the fact that I feel that it is a serious means.

My actions draw the Light, and I do everything in my power, seriously, so that the Light will impress me. Otherwise it will not function.

Question: So I have to fight against what stops me from being seriously incorporated in this game?

Answer: This is your real evil inclination, which confuses you: “Never mind, don’t try, it is only a game.” This is where the real snake hides—see how cunningly it operates.

I sincerely wish you victory in this game!
[90045]
From the 3^rd part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/11/12, The Study of the Ten Sefirot

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Question: How is it possible to be in the same state that we felt during the work in the workshop every moment?

Answer: What is a workshop? During the workshop I enter a certain state of communication, in an environment that helps me begin to clarify and analyze myself with great intensity. Thus within a short time during the workshop, I can go through numerous states by my being integrated within the others, within their feelings, and they within me. It could be that I am not able to express it in words, but all of this happens in me in frays. I can be in the same conditions by myself on the street, and be mentally in contact with the others. You must try. I have no other advice.

Question: Does a factor of support exist here?

Answer: The factor of support is essential. Like in ballet, if your partner releases you, you will fall. Thus support is everything. Without a group, you are like a ballerina who is dropped.
[89432]
From “A Virtual Lesson on Fundamentals of Kabbalah” 9/23/12

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Question: When I am sitting in a circle with other women, are they my group? Should I attach my thoughts to the men’s part during a women’s workshop?

Answer: Why do you have to think about the men? It does not matter whether it is a man or woman in front of you. They are the friends with whom you are communicating now.

And if we could cross out the gender and not see this division? In front of me it is just a desire, and this desire transmits its thoughts to me. Then, there would be no problem at all. What kind of women and men are you talking about? It is only the lowest physiology and nothing more.

I do not believe that women can understand spiritual matters less than men can. If they really want to raise themselves, they can do this, but they have another problem: For some reason, they think that they are not capable. This pushes them down.

If it were possible to cancel their appearance so that it does not interfere, I think that there would be many equal partners among women. I know these women.
[89328]
From “A Virtual Lesson on Fundamentals of Kabbalah “9/23/12

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Question: How do I manage my states? Do they develop automatically or can I evoke them?

Answer: I manage my states when I am with the friends sitting in a circle with them and discussing different problems and options regarding the connections between us: When does the ego help us and when does it distract us? How can we attract the attributes of bestowal and love, connection, mutual guarantee, and so on?

When we discuss these issues, I am involuntarily in different contrasting states, such as “I don’t want to listen to a friend, but I have to listen to him, “he is higher or lower than me,” “I agree with his answer or disagree,” and so on. Why do I agree with him? It may be because I simply like him, but someone else not, so I don’t want to listen to him and I didn’t even hear what he had to say.

So, it isn’t just the process, but the issue itself, the words, and the interactions, everywhere at every level, when I overcome the egoism and the altruism. Eventually there is a revelation, an intensive clarification of these two opposing attributes inside me.

What is more, when I am in a discussion with all the friends, I first intensify my attributes and, second, I expand myself by absorbing them. Thus, a person develops in many aspects by the integration of and communication between the two opposing forces.
[89285]
From “A Virtual Lesson on Fundamentals of Kabbalah” 9/23/12

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Question: What do we consider to be the group?

Answer: The group can be considered to be the ten people who I sit and analyze our relationship with.

The group can also be considered the dozens of groups that attend conventions. For example, there were 120 or 130 groups at the congress. It also is a sort of a group, working together on a single task, a single question, and this is why, accordingly, all the participants had the same thoughts, the same questions, and the same goal. The fact that they spoke different languages does not matter, because they did the same thing: they interacted, helped one another, they were in one field.

Our sensory and mental fields intersect, they work together: This is the way we interact with one another. Moreover, there is no law of separation in these fields, unlike any physical field that diminishes according to squared distance; when you distance yourself by two meters, tension, light, or any kind of rays become four times smaller. But here, no. Fields of desires do not decrease with distance.

For this reason, when one is in Boston, another is in Alaska, the third is in Kentucky, and the fourth in Australia, they still make up the group together if they are able to have an inner contact, which we have partially experienced during the seminars at the convention. If they have already experienced this contact, if they are able to recreate it, revive it within, like rekindling glowing embers, then the “distances,” all the disturbances that arise, will help them rise above the interferences towards this state and be on a good spiritual level.
[89279]
From “A Virtual Lesson on Fundamentals of Kabbalah” 09/23/12

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Question: In the workshops we sit together and work on the cooperation among us, but what do I have to feel during the day when I am not in such an interaction with the friends?

Answer: Imagine that you are sitting with them, in a circle of ten men. How would you feel them, how would you mutually cooperate with them? Why would you do it that way? Go on clarifying the relations between you and don’t stop the discussions since this is the pattern of the soul, which will later grow all the way to Ein Sof (Infinity). That’s all. It is there in the relations that you clarify that you discover all the ten Sefirot, the whole network of the worlds; it is all there among you.

Let’s take the mutual connection between me and you and the general system for example. If we unite, I will attain Ein Sof, which means that there are no borders between us, that we are together.

Now there are five worlds separating us: Assiya, Yetzira, Beria, Atzilut and Adam Kadmon. By getting closer to you, I go up the levels of these worlds until I reduce the distance to zero and enter the world of Ein Sof.

Everything begins and ends here, in the connection between the souls. That’s all. The wonder is that if you are truly closing the gap with someone else, without lying to yourself, then you are also getting closer to all the other billions. It is exactly the same thing.

It is because we are in an integral, analog system and so all the other connections will concentrate in the connection between you and me. The whole system will display itself between you and the friend to whom you want to get closer.

An analog system is like a holographic picture—every detail in it is made of all the others. As a result of this wholeness, you will have to correct everyone and determine your attitude to all the souls in order to connect to your closest friend.

So don’t leave the picture of the overall unity, stay in it; carry on the workshop and you will succeed. It is the workshop that provides you with mutual work. The friends can awaken you and make you see how important the goal is and provide you with fuel. They help you and you help them. You want to and have to justify the friend, no matter what he seems to you, and you should carry on this work as much as you can, even internally, with other people.

Question: So what do they exist for? Why shouldn’t I spend my whole life in a circle of friends? Could it be that the others are just be interruptions that I should ignore?

Answer: No, you should also work with them, but differently. You have to accept all the external conditions as the corrections of the soul, the corrections of the connections with other people. Even if you work as a forester in the wilderness where there are no people, you still have to clarify your mutual relations with humanity: “Why am I doing this?” By that you are “feeling” and clarifying your own soul.

We have to see a network through which we enter spirituality in every situation in this world. You cannot draw away from everyone and be only with the group. One way or the other, we have to be connected with the whole world, and especially in our times when we have to correct the whole world.

So you have to work, you have to get married, you have to be connected with the world and be included in its suffering. Then, as it says, you will be rewarded with the comfort of the public.

Besides, if you turn to people in order to bring them the method of correction, in whatever form it may be, you are sufficiently incorporated in them by that, so that you can carry on the internal work. It is simply a wonderful opportunity to exit yourself and to come into the masses in order to include them later in the process of correcting the connection among us.
[88851]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/23/12, Questions and Answers 

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Question: What do we get from the workshops?

Answer: The workshops allow us to clarify the types of connections among us.

Question: Do I actually discover a lack of connection with the friends or is it the opposite?

Answer: Both. Through the questions in the workshop, I clarify where I am and what I lack in order to attain what I desire.

Together with nine other friends, I begin to clarify the question we were asked and to penetrate their opinions and their thoughts, such as what they think about the same type of connection or the type of clarification. Through that, I already am in contact with them. I already see to what extent we “connect.”

We are all different, and in the workshops we clarify how we should connect. Is it possible? With whom should I connect? Do I agree or disagree?

I constantly build the forms of connection among us. This is the workshop, and it already clarifies and reveals this collective network. Thus, I have a twofold task:

• On one hand, I must see the friends as great so that I can lower my head before them and be small among them. Compared to them, I am a zero, while they are all number one with several zeros after it. Then, accordingly, I am incorporated in them and become a “spiritual embryo.”
• On the other hand, I must be one, or ten, or a hundred, and they must be the zeros. However, “zeros” in this context mean how much I can bestow upon them and what help and support I can give to them.

So, a middle line is created between these two extremes that equalizes them (=•=). Thus, the point of balance is created at which we reach a common ground. Each one respects the others as much as he can, each one humbles himself before the others as much as he can and, at the same time, is ready to raise the goal and the work in their eyes.

All this is in our thoughts when I am with the friends, and we discuss the questions in the workshop. I hear them and I think that one speaks nonsense, the other didn’t understand the question, and the third speaks logically instead of emotionally. The fourth seems to speak to the point, but I resent the fact that his words are deeper and wiser than mine.

Thus, I begin to work mutually with the friends and experience different states, and that is great. We just need to take what is going on seriously. “I have come here in order to connect in order to pass on to them my energy and to receive everyone’s power. This hour and a half is the most beneficial time for me.”

Of course, I see how the strange thoughts throw me off in different directions and how my inner resistance doesn’t allow me to agree with the friends. Great! I will not find an opportunity for more intensive clarification and to work on a higher “frequency.”

It is a pity that during the workshops there are those who exchange words like politicians, others who use different expressions from the bank they have in their memory, and others become psychologists and analysts. The main thing, here, is the feeling I experience in my heart.

We must learn from the ego’s endless urges since it is a “helpmate.” Our ego is an “angel” in the hands of the Creator through which He evokes us. So, I must see how the Creator doesn’t leave me even one moment of rest, and how he evokes my ego again and again in different ways in order to allow me to advance as fast as possible.

The workshops are the most helpful time, but, if we begin having them every day, attendance will drop immediately, and it will become a burden, hard work. We may think that it is a good idea to continue the convention for another week or two, or a month or two, until we succeed, until we rise to the spiritual level, but we are weak. We can hold on for another day or two, but not more than that.
[88844]
From the 4^th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 9/23/12, Questions and Answers

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Laughter during the discussions in integral groups is a good state that brings people to the understanding of the fact that we are all animals. We can open up completely to everyone. I did not make myself this way, nature did, and if you have a problem with it, then this problem is in you because you fail to understand that we are all nothing but animals. The only thing I should be ashamed of is that I am not fully using my opportunity to ascend toward the integral state, the things that are in my power on the “human” level, and everything else is not “I.”

In general, “human” is the spirit above the “animal” because it lacks a corporeal manifestation. The human in us is our inner content. For this reason, for as long as my inner content, called human, does not prevail, process, and include all my animal instincts, functions, desires, and thoughts, I must, somehow, slightly restrain them.

However, overall, I must reveal and examine them in a group because I do not have another instrument. The group is a lab where we can open ourselves up completely, like an infant laying before his mother. Who is he and what is he? It’s just a piece of flesh, but she does everything she needs to do with him for his proper growth and functioning. The same must happen in the group.

When we have a sober and sane understanding of it, and have an adult attitude toward what is happening to us and what we need to do with ourselves, then we already are in a state where nature is working with us, guiding, growing, and developing us down the path of evolution. So, this is necessary.

I think that a person can open up in the group completely, and, naturally, the group needs to be ready for this. If they constantly interact this way between them, they will achieve it. Shame will disappear. There is no state of “shame!” You must only be ashamed of one thing: failing to rise and raise others. Internal reconstruction of the entire scale of the importance of thoughts, feelings, desires, and revaluation of values, it all happens very fast.
[88808]
From a Talk on Integral Upbringing 3/5/12

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