Ghost of Israeli Bureaucracy

* This post may be boring for most people. But you may find it amusing if you like a tragicomedy. Anyway, I've warned you. ;-)

There is one thing that has been following me "faithfully" since I left Israel at the end of September 2023 - Israeli bureaucracy, or to be more precise, the "ghost" of one of its manifestations.

I seem to have underestimated its "faithfulness". I was naive enough to imagine that it would also leave me with my physical departure from Israel. But I've turned out to be completely wrong.

I first realized how formidable this specific manifestation of Israeli bureaucracy was since I became self-employed. Then I also realized that someone else had been struggling with it for me for many years, sparing me a lot of time and energy.

Two months before I left Israel, I received some incomprehensible letter (by snail mail) from one of the "bastions" of Israeli bureaucracy. Fearing that I wouldn't be able to deal with the issue from afar, I ended up visiting it six times in my last month in Jerusalem.

The letter was about something I had (not) done a few years earlier, so I barely remembered what I had (not) done. Every time I visited this "bastion" physically, I was told something else by someone else. It was only in my sixth visit that someone who accepted me helped me decipher this enigmanic letter and confirmed that the problem mentioned there didn't exist in the first place.

After I left Israel, I discovered that even this sixth "gatekeeper" failed to identify and help solve the problem. Having looked for ways to contact this "bastion" from afar for a long time and tried all of them, I was forced to realize that there is no way to contact it except by visiting it physically. In short, I remain stuck in this swamp.

As of now, I don't know yet when I'll be able to visit Israel for the first time after leaving it a little more than a year ago. And there is no guarantee that I'd be able to identify the issue and solve it even if I should visit this "bastion".

In the meanwhile I've made a hypothesis that these "gatekeepers" of Israeli bureaucracy create unnecessary difficulties to invent redundant jobs and justify their salaries. This may also apply to bureaucracy in other countries.

The only consolation I find in this swamp is that I don't have to work as part of such bureaucracy.

---

Website
Блог на русском

Gratification of the Ego

It's tragicomical that I haven't met any active linguist still working in academia who isn't controlled by language instead of controlling it. Since I realized how language controls us, I tried to explain this in language to some of my former colleages in linguistics, but I don't think any of them understood my intention. In short and again tragicomically, I don't have any common "language" with them any more.

The fact that most human beings are controlled by language and aren't aware of this isn't restricted to active linguists but is common to most human beings.

I for one have completely lost my interest in linguistics as it's totally powerless in helping us liberate ourselves from the mental prison of our ego with language as its gatekeeper.

In the meanwhile I've found a new "hobby" to observe how those who seem to have blind faith in their intellect, including many active linguists and other researchers still working in academia, use language to gratify their ego.

My most favorite manifestation of the gratification of the ego by many of these people is their inability to resist the temptation to start calling themselves in both speech and writing with a new academic title they've just acquired such as Dr. and Prof. I can easily recognized new PhDs as many of them start calling themselves Dr. Blah Blah.

Another favorite of mine is what seems to be their greatest pleasure in academia - emailing the (now electronic) offprint of their newly published article-shmarticle to as many people as possible, often by neglecting to put the addresses of the recipients on the Bcc line and putting them on the Cc line instead, resulting in a flood of public congratulations sent to all the receipients. For quite some time after leaving academia I had the "honor" of continuing to experience this specific gratification of the ego and often the resulting mutual gratification.

Some social media platforms, especially Facebook, have become perfect places for satisfy this insatiable desire of the ego. In addition to occasional posts for bragging about their "success" in seeming humility those with the most bloated ego list all the "glorious" life events and titles of theirs in their respective profile section.

These and other manifestations of the gratification of the ego are enabled by language. It gives its unawaked users an illusion that they are what they think they are, while the truth is that these life stories are nothing but experiences and not experiencers.

No Patience for History Books

Since I was a small child, I've always loved books. When I was still in academia, I read mostly those books I had to read for professional knowledge, and they gradually came to interest me less and less. Since I left academia, I've been able to allow myself to read those books I really want for life wisdom and spiritual growth, but I also continue to read for knowledge and skills in a wide variety of areas.

There are, however, three genres of books I have no patience for. History books are one of them. When I was still a student at junior high and high schools, I disliked three subjects. One of them was history.

Since I left academia, I've tried to read quite a few history books, but every time I tried, I couldn't continue to read beyond the first ten pages or so. When I recently saw that I had no patience even for a history on one subject I've taken a renewed interest in, I realized that I really have no patience for history books.

The English words history and story are the so-called doublets, that is, they have split from the same etymon. They are expressed in a single word in some other European languages such as Russian - история, which means both 'history' and 'story'. There is no wonder why I have no patience any more for literature.

This week I stumbled upon one history book and found the following quote as the very first paragraph there:

"History is created, manipulated and written by those who are predominantly on the victorious side of the nation which has supreme political, and especially military, dominance. Any 'truth' which has the slightest potential of weakening their total hold over the masses is not tolerated. Any truth which can impact their power is squelched or cunningly hidden by them, usually in a manufactured media release to the unsuspecting public, often in a jovial manner to render the information a laughing matter and display it as harmless." - Former NASA astronaut, Clark C. McClelland

Since then I've been unable to stop reading this history book. If I should continue reading it with this enthusiasm, it may be the first history book I'll read until the end.

I may have instinctively sensed something fishy when I read conventional history books as if they had been trying to brainwash their readers with their narratives to perpetuate the collective ego of a group of people through their authors. Similarly, I find many literary works as products of the individual ego of their respective authors.

Blind Faith and Truth

In the past three years I've been consciously observing people who have blind faith in three things. The common denominator between the three is that I also used to have blind faith in them until I woke up about three years ago.

The most subtle and problematic type of blind faith is that you have blind faith that you have no blind faith. Even observing the above mentioned people, I can't say with certainty that I have no blind faith that I have no blind faith, if not in these three things. Even after liberating ourselves from one matrix, we can never be certain that we aren't trapped in a higher-dimensional matrix we aren't aware of.

One of the main characteristics of many of those who have blind faith in something is that they aren't interested so much in truth as in depending the object they have blind faith in or their very blind faith itself. They already have a foregone conclusion.

This leads to another common characteristic of these people. They are not open to other views. Instead, they are only interested in "proof" that strengthens their conclusion and reject any counterargument as nonsense. This way they unconsciously decide to remain ignorant.

They also have blind faith in propagandists and propaganda tools that support the object of their blind faith and use them, whether knowingly or unknowingly, uncritically even after they have been proven wrong in order to stick to their blind faith.

In the past three years I've been encountering more and more people who have blind faith in these three things. Of course, I'm fully aware of their apologetic argument as I used to have the same blind faith. But few of them seem to have studied counterarguments and can refute them without emotionally blaming those like me who dare to challenge their blind faith. The moment they start using this "tactic", I simply stop arguing with them and ignore them.

Double Standards

Double standards are among the few things I simply can't tolerate, especially when some individual or collective intentionally violates all the rules it requires others to stricly adhere to. This is also known as exceptionalism.

In the past few years I've come to notice this exceptionalism practiced by one collective and its vassals as the worst kind of double standards as it has caused so many misfortunes to so many people around the world for so many years.

Every time I observe it, I ask myself when this can be stopped once and for all. One consolation is that many other players in the same "arena" are waking up to their double standards and saying no to them.

What is no less disgusting is how they justify their double standards. The most straighforward way is to make their "spokespersons" lie with a straight face or a smirk. I can immediately think of some of the most disgusting faces of such serial liars

A more sophisticated form of lying is to use propaganda tools to brainwash a wider public of people. Thanks to the Internet, especially two social media platforms, more and more individuals are waking up and saying no to these propaganda tools. As one of such people I can't help warning those who still seem asleep, but I often fall on deaf ears.

Spiritual Compatibility

I realize more and more clearly that if I am to begin and maintain meaningful relationships with other individuals as well as social collectives, I need to have a sufficiently high degree of spiritual compatibility with them, by which I mean that we share more or less the same state of consciousness.

Before I came to this clear realization, especially when I still worked as a linguist, I used to think naively that linguistic and cultural compatibility is the most important one. I wasn't even aware of such things as spiritual compatibility and the state of consciousness.

In my present state of consciousness linguistic and cultural compatibility, such as sharing the same language (in the literal sense of the word) and (more or less) the same cultural background, may still be a necessary condition but definitely isn't a sufficient condition.

In retrospect I can see clearly now why I couldn't stay any longer in such social collectives as academia and the Esperanto movement because of their respective collective ego, which in turn affects and subjugates the majority of their members.

I don't single out these two social collectives because only they show a low state of consciousness. I wish I were wrong, but I'm more and more inclined to think that the majority of members in any social collective are inevitably trapped in its collective ego. I'm also becoming more and more convinced that I'll never be able to feel comfortable in any socia collective.

In the past one year I've discovered the hidden face of some of the people I know personally. I still find it very difficult to accept the fact that they are so deeply (and dangerously) brainwashed by the collective ego of one social collective that I had to make a difficult decision to walk away from them, telling myself that my soul isn't for sale.

Collective ego can be far more dangerous than individual ego, but this doesn't mean that the latter doesn't have a far-reaching negative effect on individuals. Since I know its damage on both myself and my relationships with others very well on my flesh, I feel deep compassion for these prisoners of their egoic minds. But I don't think I can begin and maintain meaningful relationships with them mainly because their true self is blocked by a thick layer of their ego, so inaccessible to me.

Experiencing Four Seasons in Nature

I've experieced a full year of four seasons in nature for the first time in many years. When I still lived in Jerusalem, I couldn't fully experience four seasons not only because I seldom left my apartment except for daily running on weekday mornings and some other daily routines but also because to all intents and purposes there are only two seasons - summer and winter - in Israel with very short sprint and fall.

In this new place where I started living at the beginning of October 2023 there are full four seasons, and I also walk quite a lot in nature not only for my weekly self-seclusion in nature on Sabbath late afternoons.

Right after I moved here, I thought of taking pictures of the nature here, but I soon gave up this idea, realizing that I can't fully capture it with pictures, though I send pictures of the changing nature at least once a week to my closest friends in Jerusalem.

I've also realized how detatched I had been from nature in Jerusalem not because of the place but because of my life style. I was a typical city dweller, paying little attention to how nature changes and how this change affects the way I feel.

I still prefer living in a big city, and in its center at that, as I used to in Jerusalem, and will hopefully be able to do so again in the future, but I want to combine then the benefits of living in a big city with those of experiencing four seasons in nature.

Choosing a Community

Since October 2023 I've been living in social isolation with no community I can call mine in physical proximity. To my surprise and joy, I haven't been suffering from loneliness. I've even been feeling that I'd prefer remaining in such social isolation to being part of a community that isn't sufficiently compatible with my views, values and taste. For this reason I want/have to live in a city where there are at least several options I can choose from.

It took me years to finally realize that the single most important factor for me in choosing a Jewish community where I daven regularly is its ritual music that accompanies regular prayers. It's often said that music is universal, but at least for me nothing is less universal than music. On the one hand, there are types of music that make me cry out of joy, but on the other hand, there are also types of music that are nothing but tortures for me. I like East European music best.

Another important factor that is specific to my choice of a Jewish community is the pronunciation of Hebrew prayers. I prefer a community that doesn't use Modern Israeli pronunciation as its public norm. Here again I like Ashkenazic, or to be more precise, that variety of pronunciation used in the so-called Northeastern Yiddish in prewar Eastern Europe and still preserved, for example, in Chabad communities.

These two, musical and linguistic, factors generally correlate with worldviews of regular members. There is one ideological branch of Judaism I can't tolerate any more. Values are more subtle and less apparent. Another word for values is the state of consciousness of individual members and of a community as a whole. Ideally, I'd choose a community where the majority of regular members have systematically studied Chassidus and are aware of the roles the ego plays in our life. But practically, I already know that this is too high a demand.

A Year Since Leaving Jerusalem

Exactly a year ago I left Jerusalem for a few inevitable practical reasons after living there for 24 years in total. Hopefully I've learned and grown more from this experience in the past year than I had continued living there, not because I wanted to leave but because the new challenges I've been struggling with in this new place have forced me to get out of my comport zone.

After experiencing spiritual awakening, or liberation from the control of the ego, especially in thought, several years ago, I've been experiencing another kind of awakening, or liberation from the brainwashing by the collective ego in one important area. As I lost the common language with most of those I had known before my first awakening, I'm losing the common language with many of those I used to be in touch with before this second awakening.

This is also the second time that I left Jerusalem. When I left Jerusalem for the first time about 30 years ago, my new life in "exile" was very difficult. I spent the first two years doing nothing productive. But this time I'm not affected by this old new condition, mostly thanks to Chabad Chassidus, which I was lucky enough to have learned for three years back in Jerusalem prior to this "exile".

Though I live in social isolation with no regular physical contact with any Jewish community except once or twice a year when I visit a Chabad house in a distant city inside the same country, I've never felt lonely.

The fact that I've identified my life purpose in this past year helps me not only survive but also thrive in this new life as I can see clearly now that these new life challenges put me in an ideal condition for pursuing my life purpose.

This is also a very powerful experience for internalizing the Chassidic faith and confidence I learned in Jerusalem - the faith that everything is good, and the confidence that I'll be given the power to discover that everything is good.

Communication Skills

I started an online school to spread Jewish life wisdom anchored in Chabad Chassidus after leaving Israel at the end of last September and arriving at this new place soon aferwards. Recently I've decided to expand the existing menu of four courses and two types of life coaching by adding a third type of coaching - communication coaching.

While working with what few students and coaching clients I've had, I felt that some of them and potential clients like them have to improve their emotional intelligence first before improving their spiritual intelligence.

Before I starting this communication coaching, I thought erroneously that communication skills would be linguistic skills and some technical skills. What I've discovered can't be more distant from this. Linguistic skills constitute only a small part of communication skills. The latter are far broader and more complicated, which also makes them far more fascinating. Though excellent linguistic skills may be a minimal requirement for becoming an excellent communicator, they are far from being sufficient.

Now I'm convinced that everyone should acquire communication skills in parallel with the study of the first and foreign languages. In general, these skills are universal in that they can be applied to communication in any language though some sociocultural adjustments may have to be made to each language with its idiosyncratic sociocultural norms.

If I've succeeded in kindling your interest in the acquisition and/or improvement of communication skills, please allow me to recommend you the amazing book I use as the basis for my new communication coaching - Messages: The Communication Skills Book by Matthew McKay et al. This book has been translated into many other languages, including, for example, Russian - Как сказать: Главная книга по развитию коммуникативных навыков.

Almost Total Extinction of Meaningful Written Dialogs

When I first started using email in November 1994, almost nobody among my friends and acquaintances used it. Some of them even hadn't heard of it. But ironically, I remember having meaningful written dialogs with what few fellow early adopters of email.

In the meanwhile written communication has become identical to written digital communication though quite ridiculously, I'm finding myself forced to revert to snail mail in the year 2024 - three decades since I started using email - as the only way to contact one governmental authority in Israel, whose bureaucracy and system of digital communication are Kafkaesque.

These three decades have seen the rise and fall of email. Until around ten years ago email was still the most preferred means of digital communication. But since then more and more people, including myself, have switched to instant messengers for written digital communication. There are even enough people who have skipped email in their adoption of digital communication.

Theoretically, I know few people among my friends and acquaintances who have no means of digital communication. But again ironically, I have less and less meaningful written dialogs with them.

When I left Israel at the end of last September, I started to try to remain in touch with those with whom I had some kind of face-to-face communication in Jerusalem - about 50 in number - by sending them monthly updates of my personal mission in this new place. I stopped bothering about 20 of them, who never responded to me in the first six months or so. On the following months a few of them responded interchangeably, but this seldom lead to any meaningful dialog simply because they seldom or never answered my follow-up questions. I've decided to stop sending these public monthly updates as I've been feeling as if I were talking to the wall.

I wish I could say that my written digital communication in this new place is better. Unfortunately, the situation is more or less the same. I already have about 40 people living here, but I have meaningful written dialogs on a regular basis with only a few of them. They've told me that they have the same problem as I. I even have an impression that many people don't feel any need for any meaningful dialog, whether written or oral. I wish I were wrong. Some of them may even have a more serious problem of having lost the ability to express their (spontaneous) thoughts and feelings in writing.

I don't know how the situation is in other countries, but I wouldn't be surprised if I were told that it's more or less the same everywhere in the world. If so, meaningful written dialogs must be almost extinct. I'm still struggling as one of the remaining members of this "endangered species".

Self-Discipline and Perseverance

Self-discipline and perseverance are two of my character traits I've been taking for granted since my childhood. It was since I started coaching other people four years ago that I've discovered to my surprise that these two character traits are exceptions rather than norms among many people.

Then I've also started paying closer attention to other people than my coaching clients and haven't found too many people who are also self-disciplined and persevere to pursue their goals until they attain them (and even afterwards).

Regardless of how I've acquired these two character traits, they've definitely helped me in many ways, especially in coping with various obstacles in life. The following is a partial list of the years of my perseverance for specific goals in life in the chronological order:

• 4.5 years: self-study of Hebrew until being accepted as a PhD student at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem
• 11.5 years: preparation of a PhD dissertation in Hebrwe linguistics at this university
• 4.5 years: receiving a permanent position in Hebrew linguistics at Bar-Ilan university after PhD
• 5.5 years: receiving tenure at this university
• 53.5 years (since birth) ;-) / 8.5 years (since I started thinking seriously): getting married

When I received tenure and then got married, I thought I wouldn't have to repeat the same or similar Sisyphean labor again, but I was totally wrong.

It's four and six years respectively since I left academia of my own free will officially and practically, but I'm still struggling to earn enough to make both ends meet. Since I launched my private business six years ago, I've been updating my business blog at least once a week.

When it comes to my private life, my next goal is to get married again, mainly for further growth. I want to implement the lessons I've learned from all the mistakes I had in my first marriage. It's also about six years since I got divorced. Though I feel I'm already ready emotionally to get married again, I don't think I'm ready in a few other areas, which means that first, I have to persevere until I become ready, and only then I have to persevere further for this goal itself.

Negative Energy of Individuals and Social Collectives

My experience so far with many social collectives at various levels have convinced me that in any social collective about 70-80% of its members unconsciously obey its respective collective ego, which is also known as culture or mentality. And each social collective and its "law-abiding" members seem to emit energy that is often unique to them.

I have long suffered from the negative energy of a certain social collective. It was enough for me to spend one week or even less to absorb its negative energy. But I was seldom infected with it when I met and interacted with its members individually though I did sense it. It generally took me several days to restore my previous state.

After I started learning Chassidus, I started to notice something strange - I stopped absorbing the negative energy of this social collective even after spending one week in its midst! I don't know exactly what teaching and/or practice of Chassidus have come to serve as a kind of energy shield protecting me from the effect of this negative energy.

But this energy shield doesn't seem to be powerful enough. It works for passive negative energy but not for active negative energy, which characterized another social collective and many of its members. It's still enough for me to meet and interact even with one individual to become affected by his aggressive.

Recently I've also noticed another important difference between these two types of negative energy. The negative energy of this social collective can become far greater than the sum of the negative energy of its members. I haven't noticed this in the first social collective mentioned above.

My Morning Routine

Since I was a small child, I've known empirically that I'm the most productive in early mornings. Except for some exceptional years as a graduate student I've been getting up at five in the morning on weekdays (and going to bed at eleven at night).

Not only when I still taught in the university but also since I left it, I've been starting my work at eight in the morning. I need about three hours for preparing myself to start a new workday in a spiritually, mentally and physically fully charged condition, which is why I get up at five in the morning.

When I tell this to others, most of them, especially night owls, are surprised and ask me why I need three hours. As far as I'm concerned, I don't feel three hours are such a long period of time. They are the bare minimum for me! Anyway, here is my morning routine on weekdays:

• 05:00-05:30: contemplation
• 05:30-05:40: reflection
• 05:40-06:00: meditation
• 06:00-06:30: prayer
• 06:30-06:45: bodyweight strenghth training
• 06:45-07:15: running
• 07:15-07:30: shower
• 07:30-08:00: breakfast

The first hour of the day is my most favorite time of the day every day, and it's also my most productive time of the day. So I spend this hour, engaged in what sets the tone for the rest of the day. I learn the following materials from the teachings of Chabad Chassidus for contemplation:

• The Daily Sicha (online / Android)
• The Daily Dose of Wisdom (online / Android)
• Hayom Yom (Hebrew/Yiddish-English: book / online / Android // Hebrew/Yiddish-Russian: book / online / Android)

Then I use the following, also from the teachings of Chabad Chassidus, as well as other materials from my favorite nondual masters for reflection:

• Seeds of Wisdom
• Wisdom to Heal the Earth
• Bringing Heaven Down to Earth 1
• Bringing Heaven Down to Earth 2

My morning routine on Sabbaths is different not only because I can't check electronic and online materials but also because of a totally different, related atmosphere. I spend the first hour of every Sabbath before prayer studying one chapter of the first part of the Tanya in the original Hebrew together with its English or Russian translation and commentaries in English or Hebrew:

• Likkutei Amarim - Tanya - Bilingual Edition
• Тания - Ликутей амарим (Собрание высказываний) 1
• Lessons in Tanya
• The Practical Tanya 1
• התניא המבואר

Since this first part has 53 chapters, I can finish it in one year. I've already been studying this "written Torah of Chassidus" for several years - first daily, now weekly.

The Second "Exile" and the Second Possible "Redemption"

From time to time I still find it difficult to digest the fact that I left Jerusalem at the end last September after living there for 19 consequtive years. This is my second "exile".

I left Jerusalem for the first time about 30 years before this in August 1993 after living there for five years as a PhD student at the Hebrew University. It took me about ten years to return there. In my first "exile" it was very difficult for me not only to digest this fact but also to live my daily life in another place. It took me two full years to start functioning more or less normally in the new society.

When I look back now at this first "exile", I wasn't living the present moment. Instead, I sacrificed it by waiting for a possible "redemption". It took me about 11 years to realize my dream of returning to Jerusalem in August 2004 to assume a position as a full-time lecturer in Hebrew linguistics at another Israeli university. I also acquired Israeli citizenship after a while.

The reason for the first and second "exiles" was more or less the same - money, or to be more precise, lack thereof. I had to leave Jerusalem both times in search of a new source of income elsewhere as I couldn't find any in Israel.

But the similarity ends here. I can relate to this second "exile" in a totally different state of consciousness, largely thanks to the fact that I studied Chassidus in Jerusalem. Its profound teachings give me not only a totally new perspective on life but also tools to cope with various life challenges.

Perhaps one of the most important diffences is that this time I can live the present moment without seeing it as a stepping stone for a possible "redempltion". So each moment can be a purpose in itself. This can fill my life in this new place with totally different, positive, energy unlike the first time.

Of course, I can't deny that I think of the second possible "redemption" from time to time, but most of the time I'm busy occupying myself with the fulfillment of two self-imposed missions - one private and the other public - which give me in turn both meaning and satisfaction though the daily challenges I face are not so easy.

Also concerning the possible "redemption" I expect, there is a fundamental difference. In my first "exile" I dreamed of returning to Jerusalem, but this time I'm thinking of a different city in a different country for financial and sociocultural reasons as well as for my spiritual growth, and this time I'm not sacrifising the present moment by dreaming too much and too often of this another beloved city of mine.

Discovering My Life Purpose

To be the best of my knowledge, and at least according to Chassidus, our life mission and life purpose are similar in that both of them are why we were born, and they are different in that the former is external, or a contribution we are supposed to make to the society and the world we live in, while the latter is internal, or a specific type of spiritual growth we are supposed to make.

I discovered my life mission at the age of 54 as a result of participating in group coaching based on Chassidus in Jerusalem from November 2017 until February 2018. This discovery was truly life-changing for me. It gave me a lot of material for contemplation, and eventually made me realize that academia wasn't even a means to fulfill my newly discovered life mission and decide to leave it on my own will for something that was in tune with this mission.

It was only two weeks ago during my weekly self-seclusion before the end of Sabbath. While walking and contemplating in nature in solitude, I suddently sensed two words intuitively - patience and compassion - and immediately realized that developing them is my life purpose in this reincarnation.

Since then I've been reviewing the major life events I've experienced and convinced that the more challenging they were, the more they contributed to the development of my patience and/or compassion.

When I discovered my life mission, all my life experiences started to make more sense. Now after discovering my life purpose, they make perfect sense. I also feel why I was guided to leave Israel after living there for 24 years and try a new life in a new location. I'm convinced that if I had remained in Israel, I couldn't have developed these spiritual virtues further significantly.

Enshittification

What a "juicy" word! ;-) I encountered it for the first time this week while looking for an ultimate solution to one worsening technical issue on Windows. I immediately understood its meaning and felt no other word could describe my growing frustration with Windows and its intrusive disservice more accurately.

Of all the online artiles I've found the one by Paul Thurrott, whom I remember as an amazing Windows maven, entitled Microsoft is Silently Reversing Some OneDrive Enshittification in Windows 11 eloquently described the same frustration I've been feeling. In this article he used the word nshittification.

I also found a Wikipedia entry called Enshittification, through which I also found two articles by the person who coined this juicy word - Social Quitting and My McLuhan Lecture on Enshittification by Cory Doctorow.

I've understood that there seem to be many other people who have been experiencing the same frustration with enshittification of not only Windows but also a growing number of software programs and online services, especially once they have become very popular.

I bought my first personal laptop computer in late 1994. The bundled OS back them was still Windows 3.1. I had - and still have - a rather unusual combination of multilingual requirements for my computing. It was with the long-awaited release of Windows 2000 that these requirements of mine were finally met fully. Ironically and unfortunately, Windows has become more and more intrusive and less and less flexible, forcing its users to use it in the way Microsoft deemed fit. I've experienced less and less freedom to customize it and more and more difficulties in doing so if at all.

My frustration with post-2000 Widows reached its all-time high when my two-year-old Asus laptop computer suddenly stopped working physically, and had to order a new one (but not by Asus!) and configure the preinstalled Windows 11, which showed visible signs of further enshittification.

This newly discovered word has helped me reevaluate the frustration I've been feeling with other software programs as well as some popular online services. I have no choice but to continue using Windows as I like macOS and Linux even less. But I have zero patience with any other Microsoft products, including Office, especially Word, whose users I admire in a sense for their patience. For the same reason I've stopped using any product by, for example, Adobe, Norton, McAfee, to mention just a few, because of their "ingenious" intrusiveness. They are good at making bloatware, which is fundamentaly opposed to my principle of minimalism.

PS: My favorite environment in multilingual computing

Self-Seclusion on Sabbaths

A few years ago when I still lived in Jerusalem I started a new custom of secluding myself in nature on the last hour of Sabbath, let's say, between April and September, when the day is still long. I was inspired directly by a small (but fascinating!) book entitled Stillness Speaks by Eckhart Tolle and indirectly the the custom התבודדות of Breslov Chassidus.

All I do is to walk around and stay in nature, away from the incessant chatters of fellow humans, listen to its stillness, transform myself from a human doing to a human being, and feel the oneness of (or feel united with) the Universe. Once I'm transformed into a human being, I ideally stop talking to myself inside my egoic mind, so stop labeling anything around me. There simply exist no names, and nothing in the world is divided by linguistic labels.

This one hour is a culmination of the experience of Sabbath, or an "island in time", for me, and signals the return to the mundane state of a human doing. During this 25-hour period on this "island" I feel as if I were tapping into the wisdom of the Universe. I receive a flood of insights flowing into my mind without knowing why I know, and this flow suddenly stops once the Sabbath comes to an end.

Chauvinism vs. Patriotism

Fortunately or unfortunately, I've been able to witness, though from afar, two diagonally opposed manifestations of the most problematic collective ego - the ego of a nation-state - in the past few years. They are chauvinism and patriotism.

Ever since I had some traumatic experience with the collective ego of a junior high school I attended, I've come to show a very strong resistance reaction to the ego of any social collective, especially after spending there at least a few years as its member. Then I feel suffocated and unable to stand remaining there, and find myself leaving it for "fresh air", so to speak.

Chauvinism and patriotism are two manifestations of the same level of collective ego, but they have one fundamental difference. Chauvinists try to raise their self-perception by downgrading members of other social collectives such as dehumanizing and even mass-murdering them. So they are automatically upgraded by doing nothing for themselves. Chauvinism seems to be a result of collective brainwashing through constant propaganda in various layers of society.

Patriotism, on the other hand, seems to be a natural manifestation of one's love for the collective that has nurtured him. Genuine patriot doesn't have to sacrifice members of other social collectives.

Even before witnessing two disgusting cases of chauvinism in the past few years, I've always been repulsed by this social collective called nation-state. So in retrospect there is no wonder that every time I crossed any national border, I even felt like vomiting. But now I apparently underestimated the destructive power of chauvinism as I've been witnessing two of its cases being reported live.

On the other hand, I've also witnessed patriotism. In theory, it was also supposed to repel me, but to my great surprise, I've been deeply touched by it and even felt like supporting it wholeheartedly. When I recently shared this deepest feeling of mine with one of the few people I know who understand me, I was so overwhelmed with emotions and started crying.

The Next Possible Station in Life

On my second last day before leaving Jerusalem at the end of last September I went to see one Chabad rabbi who seems to be known worldwide, at least among Chabadniks, as a kabbalist who can read the souls of others.

Leaving Jerusalem for the place I live in now means, among others, that I have to sacrifice one important personal mission to achieve another, no less important, one. I wanted to ask for his advice about this first mission, that is, how to reconcile these two mutually exclusive missions.

I only told him very briefly about this dilemma of mine to give me invaluable advice, which still continues to resonate with me and give me hope. Like many other people who flock to him from all over the world for his advice, I only had a few minutes with him. But he advised me where to go after I've become ready.

The country he advised me to move to for the above mentioned first mission includes the city I had been thinking of - rather vaguely until then - as the next possible - and probably the last - station in life.

Actually, I even visited this second most favorite city of mine after Jerusalem last July before I made a final decision to leave for the present place. On the one hand, I fell in love with it anew, but on the other hand, I felt I wasn't ready yet to live there for a couple of technical reasons. Anyway, I was so sorry that I had to leave it.

Please don't get me wrong. I love and miss Jerusalem and all it offered me, especially in terms of Chabad Chassidus. But I also feel that I want to - or even have to - try something new I've never experienced for my continued growth.

The only worry I have is that I may be idealizing this country in general and this city in particular. After all, I visited it several times only as a tourist. But the fact remains that the mere thought of living there fills me with enormous joy. I've also found there a Chabad community that seems to fit me. Recently I even found out that one Chabadnik I made friends with there happens to daven in this very community!

In the meanwhile I try to live the present moment, focusing on one important personal mission because of which I came here (and will have to stay here at least until 2030).

Metapropaganda

I still remember vividly how someone to whom I showed a couple of media outlets I regularly checked then - and still continue to - looked at me as if I were committing a crime or were complicit in it. These media outlets have been among the most heavily smeared media outlets by the so-called "presstitutes" promoting the interests of the Empire of Lies.

Propaganda will probably be the last remaining legacy of this declining and decaying empire. It has already established a worldwide network of spreading its propaganda. One of its most favorite methods of silencing any other narrative that opposes theirs is to call it "propaganda".

But if you have enough media literacy, you'll be able to find quite easily that this smearing is nothing but propaganda about "propaganda", or metapropaganda, which suffers from logical and factual flaws as well as double standards and hypocrisy. It's so ridiculous that many of the self-proclaimed fighters against disinformation are spreading disinformation.

I can't help being amazed every time anew when I discover that someone who is otherwise intelligent has been brainwashed by these "presstitutes" so easily.

Calling something a "*onspiracy theory" is a special type of metapropaganda. But truth always prevails in the end. Some of what used to be considered "*onspiracy theories" have already turned out to be true *onspiracies.

Fortunately, more and more people are awakening, thanks to (more or less free) social media outlets such as X (formerly Twitter) and Telegram, and discovering the Empire of Lies and its "presstitutes" have been deceiving us to perpetuate its unjustified hegemony.

I have good reason to remain optimistic and believe, as a number of geopolitical analysts I trust and follow have been claiming, that this empire is finally falling.

Destructive Force of the Collective Ego

Just as an individual has his ego, any social collective has its ego. They are called individual ego and collective ego respectively. The common denominator between the two is that both of them are a survival mechanism. Unconscious, that is, unawakened, individuals and social collectives typically try to secure their respective survival by labeling others as inferiors to themselves. This way they can continue to live in the illusion that they are separate beings without making any effort of their own.

Individuals who are controlled by their ego also tend to be controlled by the ego of the social collectives (they think) they belong to, which include nations and religions, among others. Then many followers of the collective ego, who behave otherwise as law-abiding citizens, may say and do terrible things, including inciting atrocities and actually committing them. I've studied, though rather superficially, three pairs of followers of probably the most dangerous type of the collective ego in modern history - chauvinism - and their victims.

Though I try to be tolerant of others and their opinions that are different from mine, I don't find it morally right to even remain in touch with those who have turned out to be supporters of such poisonous ideology so that I may not be indirectly complicit in it.

PS: Collective Ego by Leo Gura

Maintaining Long Distance Relationships

When I still lived in Jerusalem until the end of last September, I used to be in touch with more or less 50 people with different degrees of frequency ranging from a few times a week to a few times a year, mainly by seeing them in person.

When I left Israel, I had no illusion that I would be able to remain in touch with all of them, not because I didn't want to but because I was afraid that more and more of them would stop investing their time in reciprocating my electronic messages.

Unfortunately, I was right. Maintaining long distance friendship in writing doesn't seem to be part of Israel culture. Even those I consider my closest friends don't write to me unless I write to them first.

I used to email my monthly updates to all of these 50 people, but a few months ago I stopped emailing those who had never answered me, and this month I decided to stop emailing all of them. I simply sent them a one-time message instead with a link to a special blog where I publish my monthly updates for them. I didn't want to force my monthly updates upon them. If someone is interested, he can simply follow it through RSS or email.

I've decided to accept this sad reality instead of resisting it. Some of them may say that they wanted to answer me, but for some reason or other they missed the opportunity to do so. Such an excuse doesn't convince me. When speech and action contradict, I trust the latter.

If I really want to maintain long distance relationships, including friendship, with someone, I never spare my time to write to him or her on a regular basis. Sometimes I enjoy such relationships that are maintained by our mutual efforts even more than those relationships with people we regularly see face-to-face. I still remember one special type of my long distance relationship as one of the most unforgettable experiences I've had in my life.

Rationality vs. Transrationality

[S]ince both prerational states and transrational states are, in their own ways, nonrational, they appear similar or even identical to the untutored eye. And once pre and trans are confused, then one of two fallacies occurs:

In the first, all higher and transrational states are reduced to lower and prerational states. Genuine mystical or contemplative experiences, for example, are seen as a regression or throwback to infantile states of narcissism, oceanic adualism, indissociation, and even primitive autism.

On the other hand, if one is sympathetic with higher or mystical states, but one still confuses pre and trans, then one will elevate all prerational states to some sort of transrational glory ([...]).

- Ken Wilber ("The Pre/Trans Fallacy")

When I was first exposed to Chassidus in general and Chabad Chassidus in particular several years ago, I was so fascinated that I asked every frum Jew I met in Jerusalem if he studied either of them. It didn't take me long to realize that those who are the most difficult to please are paradoxically those frum Jews who only study the Talmud. Compared to them, even non-Jews seem to be more open to Chassidus and its teachings.

There is no doubt that the Talmud as the most important work of the revealed Torah occupies a central place in the study of Judaism, but this doesn't contradict the study of Chassidus as one of the two important areas of the concealed Torah, together with Kabbalah.

As I continued to study Chabad Chassidus, firt at a format setting, then by myself, I've come to identify intuitively with a fairly high degree of precision who have studied Chassidus and who haven't.

It took me more time to realize what contributes to this difference. My conclusion so far is that the difference is between rationality and transrationality. The study of the Talmud is mostly rational, while the teachings of Chassidus transcend rationality.

Ironically, many of those who focus on rationality seem to have double blind faiths - the first is in their rational mind, and the second is in that they have no blind faith. ;-)

Recently I witnessed the same statement by a few (now former) rationally minded frum Jewish friends of mine. It was a most grotesque statement that could only be made by those who are totally trapped in the prison of their egoic mind and are even unware of this very fact.

In spite of their purported rational mind their statement was highly irrational. My attempts to explain to them rationally were met with their highl emotionally accusations against me. The only thing that was left to me was to walk away from them silently.

Celebrating Two Passover Seders at One of the Chabad Houses in the New Place

I celebrated two Passover seders on two consequtive nights, as is customary in the Diaspora, at one of the Chabad Houses in the new place. This has a symbolic meaning for me as the communal celebration of my "exile" with no clear end in sight so far.

Exactly 30 years ago I went into exile and it took me about ten years to get out of it. But unlike last time I don't see this as real exile as I left Israel this time with one important personal task and one clear public mission. I may participate in this communal celebration before I leave this country for a certain place where I've been thinking of spending the last chapter of this life of mine, which is not Jerusalem.

In the meanwhile I've been trying my best to live the present moment here. Because of the nature of my personal task and public mission my contact with other people is minimal, and I don't have a chance to spend time with such a huge group of people as in a communal Passover seder.

Spending time with 50-200 people at the same table for three communal meals gave me a unique chance to observe and experience anew how the individual ego and collective ego manifest themselves in the majority of people regardless of their cultural background.

As I expected, almost everybody I met there labeled me, the other people and themselves, thus confusing our essence with our bodies or our life stories. I still feel tired of this every time I encounter it, but I have no other expectation any more, which is a progress on my part. And after all this manifestation of the individual ego doesn't pose any immediate threat to anyone.

But one manifestation of the collective ego which I expected to encounter and I did encounter this time was a warning against one extremely dangerous thought and action. I verbally protested directly to one supporter of this dangerous ideology and received his very aggressive emotional counterreaction, which surprised not only me but also the whole community. The bigger problem is that he is not exceptional in the social collective with which he identifies himself.

From these two manifestations of the ego in a group of people I've realized once and for all that a common or similar state of individual consciousness is far more important to me that belonging to the same social collective when I decide with whom to remain in close contact.

Toward a Meaningful Marriage

I'm so excited that I find myself starting to teach a course on a meaningful marriage in this new place! I'm almost crying tears of excitement, remembering how I had to rebuild my life after experiencing divorce about six years ago. I've come a long way. This was the so-called descent for the sake of ascent.

When I descended and experienced the so-called "dark night of the soul". In retrospect, I understand that this life challenge prepared me for encountering and absorbing Chabad Chassidus and its profound teachings in that it broke my heart and made me humble.

One of these profound teachings I studied both formally and by myself concerns marriage, and a meaningful one at that. When I first encountered it after my divorce, I said to myself, "I wish I had encountered it before marriage."

So I have good reason to get excited now that I've started teaching a course on a meaningful marriage for local doctors through the intermediary of one local marriage agency whose three founding members are very satisfied ex-clients of my Jewish coaching.

In spite of my initial fear that my potential students may show some resistance to the fact that this teaching in general and this specific course of mine in particular are Jewish and scare them away, the first students reacted very positively, some even enthusiastically. This has made me realize that truth is universal regardless of its origin.

Teaching this course is also an excellent opportunity for me to deepen my knowledge and understanding of a meaningful marriage as a preparation for my possible marriage sometime somewhere.

Justice and Integrity

When I was still deeply trapped in my mind-made prison, I used to get angry very easily, until it destroyed something that was very precious to me back then. Paradoxically, it's this very anger that has made me stop getting angry since then. The destruction brought about by my anger was so devastating that it has even destroyed the very source that produced the anger itself.

These days I seldom get angry. But there is one thing toward which I still feel fierce anger, and mounting one at that. This one thing is social injustice, especially in international relationships. Even the word "anger" may be an understatament.

I can't stop feeling disgusted with the grave injustice committed by the "Empire of Lies" and its vassals in the rest of the world. I'm discovering, mainly thanks to X, where I follow consciencious and courageous individuals, that this injustice isn't new but has been going on for decades and even centuries. But thanks to X and other alternative media outlets, this injustice is being exposed, probably for the first time to the detriment of this "Emipire of Lies" and their vassals.

I'm no less appalled by their lack of integrity, or their hypocrisy and double standards. The "rules" they have been imposing upon others don't apply to them, and they have been continuing to commit the very crimes that often fabricate and falsely accuse their "enemies" for.

This has made me realize that justice and integrity are among the most important values for me. Fortunately, I have enough reason to be optimistic. For the first time in centuries, we are witnessing the decline of this unjust unipolar world order and the emergence of a more just multipolar world order driven by a couple of (re)emerging powers that are demonized by this "Emipire of Lies" and their vassals through their worldwide network of propaganda, which may be the last remaining "legacy" of theirs. Enough is enough.

Total Inner Surrender to What Is

One of the inner states I've been aspiring these days to arrive at and remain in is total inner surrender to what is, which in turn is supposed to bring peace. I feel I've really come a long way since I found myself starting this spiritual journal as a result of one totally unexpected turmoil I experienced in life several years ago.

In the process of this transformation I first became aware that I had been asleep in that I had been totally trapped in my mind-made prison and had been unaware of this. Little by little I've started to liberate myself from this prison, spending more and more time in the present moment.

Since I left Jerusalem about six months ago and started experiencing new challenges in this new place, I've also started to make a conscious effort to say "yes" to life by totally surrendering to what is.

The most difficult but the most powerful part in this daily exercise is to realize that what I experience each present moment is intrinsically good and internalize this realization beyond my rational mind. This way each present moment becomes a purpose in itself instead of remaining a stepping stone for some never attainable "brighter" future.

This way I've stopped seeing my present state as an "exile" or preparation for some "redemption". I've never been more peaceful than now in my entire life.

Use(fulness) of Parallel Texts for Language Learning

Several years ago I realized the usefulness of parallet texts for language learning and have started using them to improve my Russian, though not so systematically. This method of language learning seems more common in Russia than the other countries I've visited, at least considering the quantity of such texts in major bookstores in Moscow.

In my continued daily and weekly study of Chabad Chassidus I use such parallel texts in the Hebrew (and Yiddish) original and its Russian translation. What I like best (and continue to read every weekday and every Sabbath respectively) are two of the Chabad classics - Tanya (printed version / free online version) and Hayom yom (printed version / free online version).

From the next week I'm finally starting my long-year project to read some of my most favorite books in English in parallel with their respective translations in Russian (online list).

One of the greatest benefits of parallel texts is that you get the exact equivalents in the source and target languages in every specific context, assuming that the translations are precise.

Hopefully, this method of continuing to learn Russian, together with work with a private teacher, among others, will help me improve my Russian. I haven't been more highly motivated than now to raise my level of proficiency in both written and spoken Russian.

Death of Something That Used to Be Very Precious to Me

These days I've starting saying "kaddish" symbolically to something that used to be very precious to me. It started to die inside me a few months ago, but in retrospect it must have been dying for a long time in the eyes of those who see the reality more objectively. I was simply unaware how serious its sickness had been until rather recently. But now I can't fail to notice it, nor can I deny it.

I still have a hard time accepting this death as it forces me to totally replan the rest of my life accordingly. One thing seems certain, at least as of now. I can't and don't want to continue as if it were still alive for me though it may still look alive to those who have a blind faith in it.

Necessity to Press Olives to Extract Oil from Them

I still remember being quite tired of hearing "success" almost everyone wished me on autopilot when I told my friends and acquaintances in Jerusalem that I would leave Jerusalem for some personal mission in the Diaspora. I didn't ask each one of them what they exactly meant by "success", but I have good reason to assume that "success" for many, if not all, of them, means realization of what the ego wants.

The ultimate purpose of our life, or the reason why the soul "descends" to this physical world by borrowing a physical body and being coupled with the ego, is not to continue to "success", that is, to keep realizing what the ego wants but to accomplish spiritual growth.

Muscles of not only the body but also the soul can't grow if they remain in the comfort zone. Experiencing life challenges is one of the best ways to get out of the comfort zone. Chassidus teaches that each one of us is born with the necessary resources for getting over every life challenge we encounter.

When we only remain in the comfort zone, we often end up not noticing and making use of these resources that are buried inside us and are waiting to be used by us just as it's necessary to press olives to extract oil from them.

My "olives" are being pressed again since I left Jerusalem for my new personal mission. I wonder what kind of new "oil" will be extracted from this experience of encountering new life challenges and hopefully conquering them one after another.

Red Line Not to Be Crossed

There is a red line to everything not to be crossed. If someone crosses it, I have to walk away from him. This applies not only to individuals but also to social collectives.

Recently I've learned that what constitutes the ultimate red line for me. It the worst imaginable manifestation orinating from the worst illusion of the collective ego. If someone manifests this by himself, I definitely have to walk away from him. This manifestation contradicts my most fundamental belief so much that when I witnessed someone supporting it, thus being complicit in it, I had to make a very difficult decision to walk away from him.

Ideally, I would also walk away from the social collective itself that is deeply stuck in its illusory collective ego and is constantly nurtured by it. The individual I had to walk away from belongs to this collective. The saddest part is that he is not exceptional in supporting not only this manifestation per se but even its escalation and this collective ego is not the only one that manifests itself in the same, most horrendous, manner.

I still have to think thoroughly if I can walk away at all from this social collective, and if yes, how. This realization is the result of the third series of my awakening and is causing a tectonic shift to my life. I'm even starting to say kaddish symbolically to myself as something that used to be very precious to me has died.

Western Mainstream Media Outlets as Propaganda Tools of the "Empire of Lies"

"When exposing a crime is treated as committing a crime, you are being ruled by criminals." - Julian Assange

It's almost two years since I woke up to realize that Western mainstream media outlets are nothing but propaganda tools of the "Empire of Lies" and its "oligarchs". They tell lies after lies as if to breathe. The more lies of theirs I'm exposed to, the more disgusted I become, but the more helpless I also feel as what is at stake is a whole complex that is far beyond the power of individuals.

I even feel more helpless when I encounter people after people who consume these lies as if they were facts, without being aware that they are brainwashed. A recent poll in the US showed that only about 30% still trust mainstream media.

It's rather hard to believe this number as a number of individual journalists I trust and follow say that the US is the most propagandized nation on the planet. Most of my friends in Jerusalem seem to relate to Western mainstream media in blind faith. Some of them treated me as if I were a propagandist, repeating the same propaganda of these outlets to accuse whistleblowers as propagandists.

The last nail in the coffin for me with regards to these propagandists, or the "stenographers" of the "Empire of Lies" was their utter silence or intentional ignorance of the trial of Julian Assange in one colony of this empire. Corporate journalism is long dead for me, but this trial served for me its official deathday.

"If you don't believe me or don't get it, I don't have time to try to convince you, sorry." - Edward Snowden

PS: List of my favorite independent journalists

PPS: Please allow me to recommend you a courageous and eloquent Australian independent journalist named Caitlin Johnstone, who has been criticizing Western mainstream media outlets as propaganda tools of the "Empire(s) of Lies". The following are some of her best gems on this issue:

• Propaganda Isn't Something That Only Happens to Others
• Awakening from the Narrative Matrix
• Psychological Tyranny Is Still Tyranny
• A Prison Where the Prisoners Don't Know They're in Prison
• Most Propaganda Looks Nothing Like This
• Propaganda Restricts Speech More Than Censorship Does
• Why Propaganda Works
• Fighting Propaganda Is a Matter of Survival

Historic Interview of Tucker Carlson with President Vladimir Putin

* Update (2024-02-16): Links to some commetaries were added at the end of this post as PS.

As a kind of historical record, therefore without much ado, I'd like to recommend all of you to watch a two-hour historic interview of Tucker Carlson with President Vladimir Putin, which was recorded on Tuesday, February 6 in Moscow and broadcasted on Thursday, February 8, in English and/or Russian if you haven't watched it yet and especially if you've never listened to President Vladimir Putin in his own words:

• English
  • Tucker Carlson's website
  • Tucker Carlson's X account
  • Tucker Carlson's Rumble channel
  • Kremlin's website in English (with transcript)
• Russian
  • Sputnik's Rutube channel
  • RT's Rutube channel
  • Kremlin's website in Russian (with transcript)

I have much to say about President Vladimir Putin, Tucker Carlson and the contents of this historic interview as well as all the fuss Western "journalits" have made about it. But I've decided to add nothing personal here so that you may watch it with no prejudice and labeling.

Enjoy!

PS (2024-02-16): Some commentaries on the interview worth checking

• Tucker's First Discussion since the Vladimir Putin Interview by Tucker Carlson
• Tucker Carlson Interviews Vladimir Putin by The Duran
• The Vladimir Putin Interview - Part One by William Schryver
• The Vladimir Putin Interview - Part Two by William Schryver

Additional Educational Initiative in the New Place

One of my boyhood dreams was to become a polyglot. Since then I've learned 12 foreign languages and become fluent in four of them, so I can probably say that I've realized this dream of mine.

Later in my life something I hadn't even dreamed of happened. I fell in love with Hebrew, which was one of these 12 languages, and decided to dedicate my life to its study. I ended up receiving my PhD in Hebrew linguistics from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and then even tenure in Hebrew linguistics at another Israeli university.

Something even less expected happened afterwards. I decided to leave this tenured position of my own free will and started spreading through language what transcends language, first in Israel, then in this new place after leaving Israel at the end of September 2023.

Though I had no appetite for teaching languages per se, I continued to look for some way to make the best use of my experiences of learning and researching languages (and linguistics) for many years, until I had two fateful encounters in this new place in the middle of last month.

When I visited the local library of this new place to see if I could participate in some group of volunteers, I saw many high school students studying there in silence. Some of them must have been studying English. I was sorry for them as I felt they were wasting their precious time learning English in an inefficent manner. Then I was reminded of one method I encountered about 44 years ago when I was in their age.

Thanks to this method, my proficiency in English made a dramatic program. As I continued to study 11 more languages as an undergraduate, then graducate student in three universities, I applied this method of learning foreign languages to the study of all these languages and became fluent in four of them, which were (and still are) important to me. I didn't want to invest the equal amount of my time and energy in the study of the rest of the languages I studied as they were less important. Now I'm applying this method to my renewed study of Russian - my most beloved language.

I never told about this method to anyone else. At the same library later on the same day I had an even more fateful encounter. I stumbled upon a book that explains in a very convincing manner with evidential proofs why this method works. It's based on the principles of the so-called neuroplasticity. I felt a sudden urge to share it with these high school students as well as adults.

There must be many people who teach English and other major languages here (and elsewhere in the world), but I wonder how many people teach how to learn foreign languages by rewiring our brain. With this in mind I launched an additional educational initiative called "Multilingual Brain".

Ignorance of Ignorance

If you don't know what you don't know, how can you become aware of your ignorance as the first step to knowing what you don't know? And if you see someone else who doesn't know what he doesn't know, how can you help him become aware of his ignorance?

It's by sheer divine grace that I woke up from my sleep state about six years ago as a result of hitting the rock bottom in my life. Until then I wasn't aware I had been asleep. The more I woke up slowly but steadily, the more people around me, including my friends, acquaintances, and colleagues, I found who were asleep and unaware of this state of theirs.

Since then I've left academia, where I spent almost 30 years, to take upon myself a professional mission to help others wake up through the teachings of Chabad Chassidus, which I was lucky enough to encounter at the first stage of my spiritual awakening six years ago.

But I've been struggling with the challenge of this ignorance of ignorance by my potential clients, first in Israel, then in a new place I relocated to about four months ago. I haven't found any magical formula yet for breaking this vicious circle.

I've also started experiencing the same problem, mostly in my private life, after each of the two subsequent waves of my awakenings in two other areas. In these areas I've already given up the idea of helping others wake up as this has nothing to do with my income.

When someone who doesn't know what he doesn't know starts accusing me of my view in these areas that is incomprehensible and repulsive to him, I've already learned to simply walk away from him in silence not only figuratively but even physically sometimes without even trying to explain to him but with compassion for them. I also try to remain as humble and non-judgemental as possible.

Dwindling Possibiliy of Returning to Jerusalem after Completing the Present Personal Mission

Since I left Jerusalem at the end of September after living there for about 24 years in total, I've been asking myself if I can return there to live there after completing the present personal mission somewhere in the diaspora. I'm becoming more and more pessimistic about this possibility.

The main reason for this is a practical one - money. To be more precise, I'm afraid that the monthly pension I'm supposed to receive from the age of 67 from my personal pension fund through my former employer isn't enough to live in Jerusalem, especially in the same neighborhood where I lived for 19 years.

At least in relative terms my monthly pension isn't bad at all, especially in view of the fact that I only worked for 16 years in the university without waiting for the official retirement age. For this I'm grateful to my former emplorer. Right before I left Israel I was shocked to discover that the husband of someone I studied with 30 years ago worked as a doctor in a hospital for about 35 years and will receive more or less the same amount as I.

In addition to this "negative" reason, so to speak, I also have one "positive" reason for not returning to Jerusalem and spend the last chapter of my life in the present reincarnation there. I feel that I've already realized the dream of living in Jerusalem - the dream I started to have after spending five years as a PhD student at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. It took me about ten years to return to Jerusalem. There is one city I've been dreaming of living in.

Actually, I made a short visit to this "dream city" of mine at the beginning of July before leaving Jerusalem. I wanted to check how I would feel there after six years of absence. I also wanted to make sure that I hadn't been idealizing the city. To make a long story short, I fell in love with the city anew. On the one hand, I enjoyed every moment I spent there, but on the other hand, I was so sad as I couldn't remain there as I already knew I had to go on my personal mission somewhere else.

Anyway, I'm more and more inclined to this option of trying something Iv'e never trying. I also have a few other reasons for wanting to try this option, but they are too complicated and too personal to share with you here.

The First Professional Lectures and the First Private Lesson in the New Place

It's about three months since I came to this new place for some personal mission with public implications, the most important of which is my educational initiative to transform darkness into light.

This week I finally took the first step in this direction - perhaps a small step for others in absolute terms but a big one for me in relative terms - I taught the first lecture of each of the two courses I had planned as part of this educational initiative. I don't have many students yet, but I thought - and still think - it more important to start than to wait until I have enough students.

The two courses, both of which are based on the teachings of Chabad Chassidus, are commentaries of the Pentateuch by Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh, who is the teacher of my former teachers in Jerusalem, and positivity bias according to Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the seventh rebbe of Chabad.

I was especially touched to see a junior high school student as one of my students in the second course with his father. He was rather shy during this first lecture, but his father told me later that his son burst into talking in excitement right after the lecture. Those seeds of positivity I shared with them in this first lecture are just the tip of an iceberg, but I've already sensed anew that "a little light dispels a lot of darkess" as Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi, the founder of Chabad, said.

I also had another, no less important, first-time experience this week. I finally had my first private lesson in my most favorite language, Russian! I found my new private teacher in a local Russian course. Somehow I sensed intuitively that she must be an excellent teacher even before I took part in one lesson of hers in this course at a local culture school for adults. My intuition was correct. Right after this lesson I asked her to be my private teacher, and to my joy, she agreed on the spot.

I wanted to improve my practical skill of Russian in speaking and writing not only for its own sake as I love this language so much that I even consider it as one of the two daily spiritual nourishments but also for some practical purpose.

While waiting for this first private lesson for almost two months, I corresponded with her in Russian, which has already helped me a lot. I've been pleasantly surprised to discover through this correspondence that we also seem to share the same ideas about spirituality, Western mainstream media and geopolitics - the three areas in which I've experienced awakenings.

Pleasure of a Bath and Natural Hot Springs

By following the recommendation by my "sponsor" here I've started to taking a bath every weekday in the evening instead of only taking a shower, probably for the first time in many years. In the past 19 years of living in Jerusalem I couldn't take a bath simply because this was technically impossible. Now I realize what I missed all these years.

In the meanwhile I've stumbled upon a couple of professional articles on the benefits of taking a bath. Regardless of these medical benefits I simply enjoy this old new daily habit. It fascilitate my shift from work to sleep via this habit and a daily practice of yoga. This pleasure is first and foremost physical, but also affects my mental and emotional wellbeing. Physical relazation leads to mental and emotional relaxation.

I enjoy taking a bath so much that I've even started visiting a natural indoor hot spring I've found at the distance of a 50-minute ride by bus or a 30-minute by train from where I've been given where to stay for free. For a couple of practical reasons I can only afford this pleasure once a month. The day of this monthly visit has already become a special day for me.

I enjoy this natural indoor hot spring so much that I made a spontaneous decision yesterday to visit a natural outdoor hot spring I've found in the same region. In spite of the weather and its isolated location it was full of visitors, including many from other countries. I can't express verbally even one hundredth of the pleasure I had yesterday in this special outdoor hot spring that seems to be known not only in the region but also in the whole country and even beyond.