Make a Difference! Use Words, Media and New Values
We’d like to thank everyone for all the comments, e-mails and contributions we’ve received! They are informative and inspiring. We feel that we have an active discussion on our hands and our hopes of a meaningful dialogue are gradually being realized.
We are continuing our efforts to develop a few pitches for Google’s “Project 10 to the 100th,” and the one we are now brainstorming on is – a media campaign. As we saw in our last post, many of you responded with examples of commercials and media that highlight the action of giving in society. We really enjoyed those examples, and we’d love to see more of them. This will not only inspire our creative process, but will also help all of us stay on the same page and think along the same lines.
So please send us links to videos that demonstrate the values of altruism and giving in an effective way, and keep sending us your general comments about the contest.
In one of the comments to our first post Mark Zimmerman wrote his idea:
“Create (and constantly develop) a worldwide marketing campaign, which focuses on promoting altruism as the “in-thing” – that we can be respected in society only by our altruistic actions toward others. In other words, we use all sorts of imagery, arts, music, media and culture to make it “cool” and respectable to help/give to/love/think of other people.
Moreover, this question of “how do we help other people?” should continually be raised to the public through this promotion, so that this question constantly resonates in people’s thoughts, and so people will start thinking more about how to fulfill others and less about how to fulfill themselves – that true fulfillment is only through the fulfillment of others.”
Here are a couple commercials that promote altruistic values:
What do you think about this idea? And what about the videos?
Do you think that such publicity might actually convince (and maybe even change) people? Would it make an effect on you?
We’d love to know what you think about it.
* Toward Integral Consciousness – Highlights from Düsseldorf 2006 international scientists conference “Wisdom and Science in Dialogue: The new Planetary Consciousness.”
* The Table of Free Voices – BERLIN (Sept 9, 2006): The Table of Free Voices question-answer symposium heralded a new, experimental approach to issues of global concern.
* Wisdom in Action – Highlights from the 4th World Spirit Forum (feat. members of the World Wisdom Council).
* Creating a New Civilization – The World Wisdom Council’s 3rd meeting “Creating a New Civilization” in Tokyo, November 2005.
Kabbalah for idiots, genius’s, the poor, the tired…
A person can be old or young, have all sorts of qualities, be smart or foolish – this is not important. His soul operates beyond all these properties and its functioning does not depend on them. A person may not have a sharp mind, and still be a great Kabbalist, yet he also can be very successful, clever, but at the same time be an angry and rude person. more…
Happiness
Happiness does not always mean some event that puts a big smile on our faces. It means moving toward goals that help us live the kind of life we think is in our best interest at the time. So that is the sense in which our actions are always aimed at making ourselves “happy.” (p. 35, “The Pleasure and Pain Principle” from The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Kabbalah)
Do You Really Want Spirituality?
A famous story about the Ari’s students demonstrates just how ripe the Ari believed the time was. One day he said to his students, “If we all go to Jerusalem [they were in a different city then], we will bring the end of correction, and reach the highest degree. We need only do it together.” Alas, most people couldn’t come: one had a sick child, another couldn’t come to terms with his wife and she wouldn’t let him go, and another just didn’t have the energy for such a long walk. They stayed in their town, and the end of correction stayed away from us. But the Ari believed that it was possible. (p. 55, “Debunking the Myths” from The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Kabbalah)
Self-Examination
Kabbalists explain that all creations are sensing beings. In other words, all we have are our feelings and emotions. This is because the purpose of creation is for us to feel pleasure. Even our rationale exists only to justify, to rationalize our feelings. Therefore, if you want to study yourself, examine your emotions. See what gives you pleasure – you’ll be surprised, and not always pleasantly. (p. 160, “Kabbalah and Your Life” from The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Kabbalah)
In all this havoc of egoism, we are forgetting the roots of creation. We are one soul. It doesn’t matter how many innocent people die; we will still be one soul.
In writings that were given the name “The Last Generation,” Rabbi Yehuda Ashlag wrote that if we don’t change the course of events, we will experience a third and a fourth world war. The relics, he wrote, will still have to do the job and correct our egos. We must realize that there is a crisis, and we must deal with it in the only way possible: through rising to the level of nature’s altruism. (p. 245, “The Malady: Trapped in the Ego Cage” from The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Kabbalah)
What you do affects the whole, and vice versa. A Kabbalah story from Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai perfectly brings home the point. One of several people in a boat suddenly began to drill a hole in the bottom. His friend asked, “Why are you drilling?” the person drilling replied, “What business is it of yours? I am drilling under me, not under you.”
Because all humankind is connected into one system, the irresponsible egoists subject themselves and all the others to suffering. It is the transformation activated by Kabbalah that makes us see the irresponsible egoists in ourselves and transform them into responsible adults, altruists in Kabbalistic terms. more…
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