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LEGACY OF WISDOMwww.legacyofwisdom.org
Project Director: Jay Goldfarb Mostackerstrasse 11 4051 Basel, Switzerland Tel/fax +41- 61-361 5375
Team & Sponsors: Ram Dass, Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, Roshi Joan Halifax, Harry Moody, Dr. Sarita Bhalotra, Dr. Rodolfo Musco, Mickey Lemle, Judy Goggin
Wisdom Area: Aging Lifestyles and RelationshipsOur models of aging lifestyles are dramatically shifting. We are living longer and many of us are seeking new levels of engagement, activity and meaning. Staying creative appears to be an important part of a good quality of later life. Relationships with family, friends and an extended network are vital links to this creativity, yet relationship attachments, expectations and habits often guide older people to less flexibility and to become stuck in regimen. Complete with all of the psychological & physical issues that can accompany such a picture, it remains a fact that the majority of older people today are simply living alone.
Question: How important do you see the new internet technologies and virtual social networks as a tool to maintaining and developing relationships for older people?
YouTube Video: Legacy of Wisdom- Rabbi Zalman Schachter- Loneliness/ TechnologyYouTube URL: www.youtube.com/watch?v=pol01FiZu5MLength: 3:42
RABBI ZALMAN M. SCHACHTER-SHALOMI – "Reb Zalman". I was born in Poland in 1924 and raised in Vienna where I was simultaneously immersed in both traditional Judaism and secular modernism by attending a yeshiva and a leftist-Zionist high school. After fleeing from Nazi advance and imprisonment by the Vichy-French government, my flight from Europe led me to New York City when I was 17. I entered the Lubavitch Yeshiva; was ordained in 1947. I received an M.A. in the Psychology of Religion (Boston University, ‘56); a Doctor of Hebrew Letters (Hebrew Union College, ‘68).
For 20 years I was Professor of Religion and Head of the Department of Near Eastern & Judaic Studies at the University of
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LEGACY OF WISDOMwww.legacyofwisdom.org
Project Director: Jay Goldfarb Mostackerstrasse 11 4051 Basel, Switzerland Tel/fax +41- 61-361 5375
Team & Sponsors: Ram Dass, Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, Roshi Joan Halifax, Harry Moody, Dr. Sarita Bhalotra, Dr. Rodolfo Musco, Mickey Lemle, Judy Goggin
Manitoba, Canada. In 1975 I became Professor of Religion in Jewish Mysticism and Psychology of Religion at Temple University-Philadelphia where I am currently Professor Emeritus. In 1995 I was called to the world Wisdom Chair at Naropa University; later joined the faculty in the Dept. of Religion. I retired from the faculty & am now emeritus at Naropa.
My own experience of aging and eldering compelled me to found the Spiritual Eldering Institute in 1989, encouraged and assisted by professionals and colleagues in the field of aging. I have since developed and taught workshops to many thousands of individuals seeking to expand their awareness to match our extended life span.
Question: How important do you see the new internet technologies and virtual social networks as a tool to maintaining and developing relationships for older people?
Transcript:Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi:
I am having trouble with it but it is not bad I get so many invitations to join LinkedIn, this, that, and I refuse because I don’t have the time for all these things and if I were to ask with how many people in this world have I had contact and all these people would know…for instance when I am on Skype I make it so I am not available and if I have to talk to someone on Skype they call me on the telephone first and then I open the portal because otherwise I would be besieged.
On the other hand for many other people who don’t have so much on their plate at this point to be able to be with children, with grandchildren, with friends and so on and so forth and just talk, because the isolation is very great. Sometimes you can’t drive anymore, your license isn’t available to you, you’ve had a couple of accidents and so on and so forth, so how are you going to
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LEGACY OF WISDOMwww.legacyofwisdom.org
Project Director: Jay Goldfarb Mostackerstrasse 11 4051 Basel, Switzerland Tel/fax +41- 61-361 5375
Team & Sponsors: Ram Dass, Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, Roshi Joan Halifax, Harry Moody, Dr. Sarita Bhalotra, Dr. Rodolfo Musco, Mickey Lemle, Judy Goggin
communicate? That’s a wonderful way in which we can now have iChat or these ways.
I have a couple of DVD’s that I made for “shut-ins”. Imagine a person has Yahrzeit and would like to do an evening prayer but they can’t go to schul. So the DVD takes them into a place where they are davening Maariv and they are being invited to Daven along using this technology that we have now and make it possible for people to feel included. We overcome distance that way.
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