-The power of values!- Power Up Thursdays, session # 2

In the world around us, the moral values constantly change. Just 20 years ago same sex relationships were looked down upon and today if someone would speak negatively about gay marriage he will get himself in trouble. The levels of modesty changed a lot as well. Looking at pictures from the Brighton beach boardwalk from 40-50 years ago it becomes very clear how undressed our society became.

Rabbi Nahum explained how important it is to have an inner core of values, the values that are able to withstand the test of time and fashion. In our extremely fast changing world we have to be strong and stable in our morals. For this reason it’s essential to incorporate God’s wisdom and ethics in our everyday lives. Our emotions and directions tend to change, 

His wisdom does not. 

The ancient wisdom was brought down to us by our teacher Moshe (around 1312 B.C.E. ) and later passed down to his student Joshua and so on till the Men of the Great Assembly. “Anshei Knesset HaGedolah” – Men of the Great Assembly; founded by Ezra in approximately 520 B.C.E., this institution of Torah Sages led the Jewish People at the beginning of the Second Temple Era (ca. 520 B.C.E. – 200 B.C.E.). It included Mordechai and the last of the prophets: Chaggai, Zechariah and Malachi.

They made 3 major points: 1. Be patient when judging situations and/or people. 2. Establish a lot of students and make them independent learners 3. Protect the law by making a “fence” around it.

The entrepreneur of this week was Joseph Azaryev. He shared his exciting and challenging journey with us. From his core social circle of roughly 30 people from his high school age, many got swallowed by influence of the streets, some ended up in jail, others became drug addicts. And only few from that group made decision to succeed and “made it” into accomplished life. Yosef took his brother and himself and made sure they both get college education.

Coming from Soviet Union he felt that it’s important to understand how this democratic country was build and how it operates and thus he chose to pursue political science major in Baruch College. Later he obtain a second degree in business administration from the same school. By the time Mr. Azaryev was working in PWC as a system architect, he was running two businesses, one was a video store in Staten Island and the other one was cell phone business which involved shipping phones to Russia.

Joseph repeatedly said that everything he accomplished in life was given to him by God. He also made a very strong emphasis on being honest in your commercial transactions, “my credo over the years became-Never take what is not yours.” We were all very inspired and in owe by the man’s humility. He was so open and so sincere, answering all our questions and sharing the many intimate details of his career.

Thank you Mr. Azaryev for a truly inspirational evening, your presentation encouraged us to grow and to accomplish!