Question: In one of the lessons you said that America is built egoistically to unite more than other nations because it is comprised of different nations (is ethnically and culturally diverse), and that it is going to be okay in this crisis if the people unite. My question is: doesn’t this speak to some space in me? Some space inside me that egoistically would like to get along with the other people in my life?

My Comment: Of course, this is how we start correcting our nature: by searching for a better egoistic life. However, while studying Kabbalah we begin to feel the value of having a direct altruistic attitude to others; its independence, greatness, and the infinite, eternal sensations that become revealed in it. And then we discover how to attain this, and consciously aspire to come out of egoism.

In the News (translated from SvobodaNews): The Institute of Economics of the Russian Academy of Science (IERAS) reports that Russians are faced with a decline in income. They will have to take any job, save money, raise their professional qualifications, and support each other. At this time it is important to stay connected with family and friends, because people will have to come out of this difficult situation together.

My Comment: Indeed, this prolonged suffering will force people to unite – and not just within each nation, but all the nations together. Kabbalah enables us to understand what is happening, and then people will also be able to quickly understand what to do in order to attain equivalence with Nature, with the quality of bestowal and love. This quality is the basis for survival in the unified system of humanity.

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News Report (from the International Herald Tribune): “The chance for a new world order” by Henry A. Kissinger The very unsettled nature of the international system generates a unique opportunity for creative diplomacy. … Every country will have to redefine its national priorities. An international order will emerge if a system of compatible priorities comes into being.

My Comment: Compatibility is being imposed on us by the very nature of the crisis. We have to stop picking fights with each other, like little kids. We must realize that we are faced with the question of mankind’s survival.

There is just one answer: for everyone to unite in one system, on equal terms; to be as one body or one family in order to attain balance with nature. This is the only priority, and we shouldn’t try to invent any other. Learn from nature!

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News Report (from Marketwire): “Global Economic Meltdown: Systemic Shock” The present economic crisis is systemic and global. Consumer optimism has dipped across the globe, leaving no region untouched… Emerging Markets – heretofore stalwart guardians of global consumer confidence – have shown a precipitous decline in optimism as well. Case in point is China, registering a 42% decline in optimism from 2007 to 2008… In response to the crisis, a super-majority of the world’s consumers have already made cuts to their family budgets.

My Comment: Because some politicians don’t understand the fact that our world has become integral (one interconnected system), they say that “the crisis is happening over there, not over here.” Indeed, the world has become a single whole, and hence, regardless of any country’s level of development (whether economic, industrial, or other), anything that transpires in any part of the world will now reverberate everywhere. In addition, we can’t even tell how powerfully this will happen in different places, because we don’t know the true structure of each country and nation in the general system of souls.

The crisis began with something that is a common, unifying factor for all of us – money. However, we will soon discover that we are completely interdependent in all other respects as well! There’s only one piece of advice to give to anyone, from governments to average citizens: don’t do anything that’s against others, lower your pride, give in, and help others. At the very least, these actions are contrary to the crisis.

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News Report (from National Science Foundation): A team of researchers funded by the National Science Foundation is investigating the role of ethical and religious beliefs, or “sacred values,” in motivating human behavior. The team’s most significant finding is that individuals who hold sacred values are rarely willing to barter them for economic gain. “Our research tells us when there is a confrontation involving sacred values, then offers to give up or exchange sacred values for material incentives is taken as a deep insult…”

My Comment: Here’s the scale of human values, from the lowest to the highest:

• bodily desires (food, sex, and family); these arise from the bodily needs,

• social desires (wealth, power, fame, and knowledge); these arise from society’s influence,

• spiritual desires (revelation of the Creator); these arise from the awakening of a “Reshimo” or a spiritual gene.

Hence, it’s no surprise that we value even the “sacred values” of our world above all others. However, this does not apply to extreme situations, when the instinct of self-preservation compels one to choose the “bare minimum for one’s survival” over all else.

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News Report (from International Herald Tribune): “New worry in Europe over credit crisis” At the conference in Frankfurt, the chief executive of Deutsche Bank, Josef Ackermann, lamented the market’s lack of confidence, which he said generated daily rumors about the next bank or fund in trouble. “I think it is important to spend time with family,” Ackermann said.

My Comment: People agree that spending time with family is the best source of optimism in time of crisis, because you feel their support, love and warmth. But imagine that everyone felt familial support, love and warmth from the whole world – if every one of us felt that the entire world is our family! Then no crisis could ever scare us; they would all simply disappear!

News Report (from Science): “Does marriage sink a scientific career or send it soaring?” Satoshi Kanazawa, a psychologist at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand, analyzed a biographical database of 280 great scientists. Kanazawa noted an interesting trend, “The productivity of male scientists tends to drop right after marriage.” … Marriage has also been shown to have an adverse impact on the careers of female scientists.

My Comment: This cannot be considered damage caused by marriage, since it is certainly not obvious that scientific development is more useful than marriage.

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A question I received: Please give an example of the correct economic and social connections, how to begin building them, and how to make the transition. Please give practical suggestions.

My Answer: All of this can be seen using the example of our bodies.

An example from Nature: In our bodies, every molecule, cell, and organ, and the entire organism as a whole, have their own personal interests. When each part of the organism shows others that it’s interested in self benefit, everyone starts to “negotiate” with each other. At every given second, the negotiations taking place in our bodies bring the system to a state of harmony, because the interest of the whole system prevails over the interests of the smaller parts, which it incorporates. Everything is built according to a hierarchy, which includes everyone’s interests. Hence there is a place for the individual benefit of each part within the larger or higher structure.

Imagine the system as one whole. Then you will understand that each level of our system must remain healthy and retain the ability to care for its own interests, but doing so within the framework of the whole organism.

An example from our economy: What if the body behaved the way we conduct the world’s economy? Imagine that we took the heart (the respiratory system – the “industrial” organs), and gave it the power to use the resources of the rest of the body. The other parts would provide all the raw materials into the circulatory system, such as oxygen, and they would cleanse the blood. This way they will produce a useful consumer good: blood. However, the sales department of the circulatory system sets the price of blood in the organism, and provides it to the organs that can afford it. But what if some organs couldn’t afford it? Could our organism stay healthy?

Globalization: This is a natural biological process, aimed at forming one integral human family. We are already seeing this interaction take place in various areas of our lives. Nature has already prepared us to become a global family.

But there’s one problem: Our economy is aggressive, and the display of personal interests on all levels of the integral whole means that the global trade organizations will not be able to tell the local economic systems what is good or bad for them. They will be forced to consider the interests of each local ecosystem and economy. All of this means that we need a world that will be good for everyone. This is our evolutionary task: to create a sustainable global economy and to become a global family.

The transition: The old and the new civilizations must coexist for a period of time. We must create a Forum of the New Civilization, where we can discuss our new connections in order to build the new civilization. We shouldn’t worry about the old system that is dying out. Rather, we should respect the former egoistic civilization, which is now generating a new, global civilization, and we should try to avoid a collapse of the old system before we sufficiently establish our connections in the new civilization.

(Based on materials by Dr. E. Sahtouris, my colleague in the World Wisdom Council.)

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A question I received: When a person is intensely involved in correction through the method of Kabbalah, he can’t devote a lot of time to his family, children and their upbringing. So how does a child receive all that’s necessary from his or her father? How can I help my wife overcome her fear and accept that it’s necessary for her husband to dedicate most of his free time to spiritual development rather than the family?

My Answer: In the modern world, one shouldn’t complain about the fact that a Kabbalist can’t devote a lot of time to his wife and family, because he’s working to provide for them materially, and studying to provide for them spiritually. The wife receives her husband’s earnings in both respects.

Those working in the high-tech industry today are just as busy. Besides, children learn from the examples set by the adults, so it doesn’t matter how many hours you spend with them. A child feels what is most important to you in life and this is what he absorbs.

As for your wife, the more time you devote to her, the worse she will feel. You have to understand human nature. Chances are, the problem is that you simply don’t understand the purpose of studying Kabbalah. My advice to you is: instead of resisting it, think about the necessity and the benefit of spiritual studies.

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News Report (from Financial Sense Editorials): Andrew Gelman of Princeton stated, “The law of unintended consequences is what happens when a simple system tries to regulate a complex system. The political system is simple. It operates with limited information (rational ignorance), short time horizons, low feedback, and poor and misaligned incentives. Society in contrast is a complex, evolving, high-feedback, incentive-driven system. When a simple system tries to regulate a complex system you often get unintended consequences.”

Examples of Unintended Consequences of the Last 100 Years:

• The assassination of Archduke Ferdinand of Austria: All sides envisioned a short painless war. The war lasted 4 years and killed 20 million people, with another 20 million casualties.

• Treaty of Versailles: The harsh terms inflicted upon Germany by the victorious Allies eventually led to the rise of Adolph Hitler as dictator and ultimately to the deaths of 70 million people in World War II.

• Manhattan Project: Led to an arms race with the Soviet Union which almost led to nuclear war in 1962. The proliferation of nuclear weapons is one of the biggest dangers to world peace today.

• Richard Nixon takes U.S. off Gold Standard: The U.S. dollar has lost 93% of its purchasing power since 1971. The welfare statists have confiscated middle class savings through inflation.

• China Embraces Capitalism: Peasants in China were turned into workers (so as to narrow the gap between rich and poor), resulting in an economic crisis and social unrest.

• Cheap oil: will halt projects aimed at developing alternative energy sources and create an energy problem in the future.

My Comment: These were just the naive errors of the past, before we revealed the closed global system of the entire planet’s absolute interdependence. Today, however, any mistake made in any part of the world will lead to an unpredictable domino effect in various parts of the planet and on various levels. In this case the best thing to do is, as written in a Kabbalistic text, “Sit and do nothing.” Or in a word – freeze!

The only chance we have of making the right actions is to take into account the well being of all humanity. But this is only possible when one perceives everyone as one family. It is impossible to calculate this legally or mathematically! It is only possible to act this way under the influence of the Upper Light, which transforms our innate egoism into Nature’s quality of bestowal and love – the quality of the Upper World. This is the transformation we’ll have to undergo.

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News Report (from Gizmag): Remarkable new research from the U.K. Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER) concludes that for every unexpected 10% fall in housing prices, an extra 5% of couples will split up. … The study concludes that unexpected downturns in the housing market can damage family stability…

My Comment: Indeed, the crisis is multifaceted: it is a crisis of science, culture, the family structure, upbringing, society, depression, drug abuse, ecology, and climate. Moreover, all of its components influence each other.

Hence, all the different consequences of the crisis are yet to become revealed this year. Of course, it seems to us that the financial crisis is the most important one. But it will bring along all the other ones, until we realize that there is only one crisis – the crisis of our relationships with each another.

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A question I received: What is your opinion of how Americans are reacting to the crisis?

My Answer: I have two comments on this:

1. Americans are hoping to wait it out, and for everything to quickly end of its own accord.

2. They are placing big hopes on Obama. The public expects that once he comes to power, everything will be fixed within a couple of months.

But neither of these will happen! There may be short periods of “intermission” – but they will be followed by another blow! In addition, the crisis still hasn’t been expressed in a multi-faceted fashion; people still don’t see that it is interconnected with everything, including the high divorce rates, depression, the ecology, natural disasters, massive famine, and the outbreaks of violence and infection that are happening everywhere. We’re only reacting to it now because it got to our wallets. However, the crisis in science, upbringing, the family, and so on has been going on for a long time! But like true egoists, we only react when something goes wrong with our money! However, now we also have to feel the other facets of the crisis, which we did not react to previously.

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