Audio Version Of The Blog – 11.10.14

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Love Neutralizes The Ego

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe convention is over and we are about to return to our groups in order to connect with other people. We are about to go outside this big hall and separate from our group of ten.

Of course, we should keep in touch with them, but we should see that anything that is added to my group of ten or what it lacks when I go back home is calculated from Above and this is actually what I should work with.

The Creator has given us such conditions on purpose and I should not feel sorry that I am not next to the same small group that I have grown so accustomed to for the last few days and with whom I want to stay forever. No! I am going to work with the whole world and with my local group.

We should attain a state in which there are several people I can work with everywhere, whether virtually or physically. There can be different groups of ten in the morning, at midday, and in the evening. This is only the beginning and we stick to a certain group of ten in order to feel that there we can find an answer, warmth, closeness, and mutual understanding.

But we can feel the same almost immediately in any other group. If I am surrounded by friends from all over the world who are advancing towards one goal, I can sit in any group and immediately feel that these are the same friends.

It makes no difference whether I know these people well or whether I don’t know them at all in the corporeal world. If we have a common goal, I can connect to them as if I have known them for years. It makes no difference at all how well we have known each other previously.

It is very important to express love to all the friends, so that every person in the group, in the group of ten, will feel that he is loved. The feeling of love neutralizes the ego if a person wishes to annul his ego. This is because the love of the friends evokes in me such a peaceful feeling that I cease worrying about myself.

Then I can ascend above my ego! I am free of worrying about myself and so I can bestow and give my love as a present to others because I no longer have to think about myself.

It is a very important point. We can agree that we will intentionally show our love to one of the friends and thus free him from his troubles and worries.Try it and see and how well it works, even if we don’t work that way on purpose with regard to one of the friends, each of us should still feel that the group worries about him.
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From the Convention In Los Angeles “Day Two” 11/01/14, Lesson 4

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Happiness For Money?

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: The emergence of money in our world is not accidental. What is its impact on our development?

Answer: Money means the ability to cover desires. At some time in history, we used a variety of substances for this such as golden sand, coins, and other materials.

Recently, humanity has had a critical attitude to the ability to cover its desires. We see that we cannot satisfy our needs in terms of the environment; the Earth just cannot withstand our extravagance.

We have created too many artificial needs for which there is no necessity. The planet is not able to provide every luxury and so many power plants. It is like the owner of the field consuming all his harvest, leaving nothing for the new crop. He used all his fixed assets and the following year died of starvation.

In human society, we have such a monetary problem we cannot cope with it. We need to change this process and play into something less threatening.

Of course, man cannot live without his needs for development. A person receives his needs from childhood. Growing up, he looks at the people around them. The desire to be like them creates needs, which advances him in life. If we organize an environment that develops not material desires, then we will constantly have needs and their fulfillment.

We will develop, strive forward, and hopefully enjoy attainment and grieve its absence. We will not remain at the animate level and our advancement will be in the area where we are able to develop needs without threatening our physical life.

What needs can we develop that have no end? It is written simply: “Go and make money from each other.” In addition to the interpretation on the material level, this proposal could be understood so that we can create new needs in the area of various kinds of connection between us. These connections will produce new needs, and we, like in a mosaic, will constantly create new forms of their combinations.

As these needs will consist of many individual desires, then we will have to fulfill them together. Our lives will become a collective game of establishing needs and fulfilling them. It will be literally endless among 7 billion people. We will never be disappointed in that because everyone will always have an opportunity to be hungry and be filled again.

We become included in the internal, hidden layers of nature and through the connections between us, begin to feel what is happening inside us. This is in fact, a true pleasure because a person is created for these internal layers, and that is why attaining them gives him true fulfillment.

Then his connections with other people in order to achieve these fulfillments is called real money. After a long historical development, we finally come to this true covering, a collective screen, with which we will really be able to cover all our needs.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 10/11/12

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A Group Of Ten As A Tool For Adhesion

laitman_934If you want to explore the upper force, the wisdom of Kabbalah says that you must create a tool appropriate for this. This is just like scientists who create measuring instruments: microscopes, telescopes, particle accelerators, and the like. But they are appropriate only for physical substances. So how can we explore the force that works within us, in our essence?

For this the Kabbalists recommend building a structure of ten people (Minyan) who try to create complete interconnection between them. They stabilize the characteristic of Light in their environment, whether they are ready for this or not, by wanting to make a single whole of themselves above their egos.

Such a structure already contains two forces within it: our natural egoistic force and the general force of bestowal, meaning the Creator. And the calculation here is simple: The more we overcome the force of separation with the help of the power of unification, to this degree we match, resemble, and equalize with the Upper Light.

Even when bestowal rises to a value of one percent, to that degree we resemble the Light and feel it. We feel it to the degree that the desire to bestow dominates the desire to receive.

If we try making an effort, in spite of our inability to overcome our egoistic desire, we begin to pay attention to where there is a shortcoming, how weak we still are, why we don’t succeed. And then a scream, a request, a prayer develops in us for the Light to help us, give us strength, and then we connect. Certainly we don’t have the power to connect on our own. It comes only from the Light.

That is how we advance: The Light acts and influences us according to our request; we overcome our desire to receive, absorb more of the desire to bestow; we connect between us more strongly again and again…. It is written about this: (Baba Batra 9b) “A penny and another penny accumulate into a great sum.”

And then the moment comes when we truly can unite. Then everyone feels how he disappears into the common connection between us.  “I” and the “friends” no longer exist; all merge into one. And at the moment in this state of “togetherness,” we feel fulfillment, the Upper Light, the Creator dwelling among us.

And then we can investigate Him. In other words, we have built and activated a device called a “group,” a “group of ten,” (a Minyan); and we can now advance forward by stabilizing ourselves more and more in various forms of connection. And the Creator, in accordance with our mutual connection, will be revealed more and more.

Through its influence, the Light will also awaken us to deeper and deeper layers of ego. We feel resistance, descent, and all kinds of disturbances, that makes it possible for us to turn towards the Upper Light with even greater force so that it will come and acquire the power for us to see our defects and the methods for their correction.

This is the way, 125 levels, that by ascending through them we ultimately reach “equivalence of form” with the Creator. And in this way we discover how important the characteristics of fear and anxiety are to us. After all, it is only concern and fear, “Am I capable of bestowal?” which pushes us forward.
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From the Convention In Los Angeles “Day Two” 11/1/14, Lesson #3

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It Is Not The Wise Who Learn

Laitman_165When we read books of Kabbalah, we are able to attract the Upper Light that Reforms. So it is very important at the time of the lesson to keep the right intention at every moment by remembering what one wants with each and every word that is read.

It could be that I don’t understand anything in these words about the subject itself. I came to the lesson and heard that it was necessary to open some book. I open it, read, and don’t understand anything because the things written there are completely new to me. But this is not important, I think only about my intention: What is it that I want to attain by sitting and learning?

Baal HaSulam writes in the “Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot” Item 155, that the Kabbalists also designed their books for people who are not yet on spiritual levels and don’t understand what is written. But precisely thanks to studying texts they don’t understand and not for the sake of understanding but to receive the Light, they advance.

It is said, “It is not the wise who learns.” During the lesson, it is important to decide that I don’t aspire to knowledge.  “Knowing” means connection, rising to the appropriate level. “The Study of the Ten Sefirot” talks about such high levels that it will take me a long time to achieve them.

But I demand the Light that Reforms, the higher power that will influence me and correct, elevate, purify, and connect me. I ask it to differentiate between desires that are possible to correct and desires that are impossible to correct within me, so that it will be clear to me what I must work with.

This is because there are such desires and thoughts that are worthwhile for me to distinguish and not touch them. And others, on the contrary, must be awakened and discovered. By means of them, I can communicate with the group and with the Creator.

Likewise, I need to discover in what way it is possible to help the group: It is not for my desires but for the desires of the friends. So I turn to the Creator and specifically ask for strength regarding these desires, to bring the Light that Reforms to the group.
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From the Convention In Los Angeles “Day Two” 11/1/14, Lesson 4

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Short Stories: The Last Exile

laitman_750_03After the Jewish people entered the land of Israel, which means that they attained a state of connection in which they began to work internally on themselves establishing love, goodness, and complete incorporation in one another. Then new leaders emerged, King David and the prophets in every generation.

These were great Kabbalists who continued Abraham’s path by working on the unity of the nation, helping it to unite, engaging in the education of the growing generation.

At the same time their ego kept on growing, increasing the repulsion people felt toward one another, an unstoppable process.

This was an essential phase both historically and dialectically, since the Israeli nation needed to set an example for the whole world as to how people should live correctly.

Therefore, after they reached the land of Israel, they grew apart in order to enter a state of exile, to live among the nations of the world for a while and to plant the seeds of the spiritual state in them in the form of religions, science, culture, etc.; and when this phase came to an end, to start raising these nations.

The descent from the level of the land of Israel to the state in which the people descended to unfounded hatred during the time of Rabbi Akiva lasted 800 years.

Rabbi Akiva was a great spiritual leader who called everyone to strengthen the love and the connection between them and asked: “Why don’t we keep the rule of “love thy friend as thyself?! After all, it is the general law of the Torah!” But no one listened to him.

People were so immersed in unfounded hatred that they were exiled from the land of Israel. They lost the connection between them because the attribute that kept them together was gone, and when they broke apart, they dispersed all over the globe.

The whole Israeli nation fell to a state of the “nations of the world,” totally forgetting that they had once attained and felt the spiritual world. This is the state we are in to this very day.

But we have fulfilled part of the plan of creation that way: We have conveyed religions, culture, philosophy, science, etc. to the nations of the world. Philosophers in the Middle Ages said that it all stemmed from the wisdom of Kabbalah, from our true Torah.

Rabbi Akiva had a great student called Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai (Rashbi) who received the spiritual method from his teacher and expressed it in The Book of Zohar. This is a very special book. For two thousand years it was passed from one generation to the next.

In the 16th century another great Kabbalist appeared, the ARI. He formulated the Kabbalisitic method in a convenient manner that we could understand.

At the beginning of the 20th century another outstanding Kabbbalist, Baal HaSulam (Rav Yehuda Ashlag) conveyed The Book of Zohar and the ARI’s wisdom to the contemporary generation in a language that we can understand. He established the practical scientific Kabbalah by which it is possible to understand the world we live in and what we should do in order to bring all of creation to the complete end of correction, which means to fulfill its mission.

We are living in a time when we have to implement the Kabbalistic method. Currently we are going through the same historical shattering in which the terrible egoistic state of the world is revealed to us, in which humanity doesn’t know where to turn to and what to do. It can lead to revolutions, wars, self-destruction, and practically to anything, but we have the method that can save the world.

It is a method of unity and connection, of creating mutual love, bringing the world to harmony, and to the revelation of the upper force, to the inner ascent of humanity from the level of our world to the level of a whole eternal existence. We can attain this here and now.
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From KabTV’s “Short Stories” 10/22/14

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When Everything Is Not Right

laitman_202_0The wisdom of Kabbalah conducts much more accurate and objective research than any other science. In the course of this study, we learn that there is only one force, one factor, that acts in reality. Therefore, we characterize it with the phrase “There is none else besides Him.”

This is not a name or a definition, this is just the way we want to emphasize the uniqueness of this phenomenon. Studying ourselves and all of reality at all degrees and at all levels, we can see that only the Upper Light operates and organizes everything.

And its corollary, beginning from a certain point, divided into two. The Upper Light affects something and we determine whether matter is opposite to the Light according to its properties or matches it. This is the main feature of matter: the ability to remain in a state of oppositeness or similarity.

Accordingly, our experiments may show polar results. If the matter of our desires is opposite to the Light, then we feel it as darkness. If we have prepared ourselves for the meeting with the Light and match it, at least partially, then we feel it as a blessing.

There is nothing in the Light, either good or bad, just the property manifested in giving, loving, fulfilling, advancing, and developing. And it all depends on the vessel, on the created being.

In this, the preparation of the vessel to receive the Light is carried out by the same Light. Indeed, It is primary; it marked the beginning of creation, the whole process; it causes all matter to develop. But matter itself is devoid of any ability to realize anything.

Consider where do atomic particles—protons, electrons, neutrons, etc.—take strength from to move endlessly and so rapidly? They do not stop, do not slow down, for billions of years. How can this be?

The Light supplies them with energy. It is primary and it acts. Otherwise each particle would eventually stop, which according to physicists is equivalent to its disappearance. All matter exists due to the power of the Light, the force of bestowal. This force gives energy to the dead material by its desire so that by receiving it, it would begin to move.

Why does matter have to be developed on the degrees of the still, vegetative, animate, and human nature?—To become like the Light in the end of development. Towards this purpose, the Light pushes all particles and their compounds, be they atoms, molecules, including biological organisms or spiritual forms, inherent in matter, which is already capable of performing bestowal, similar to the Light, until finally they both become equal.

The Light does all this. Apart from it, there is no other acting force in the process. We say about all of this, “There is none else besides Him.”

However, this upper force wants to give something greater to the created being, originally dead matter like dust, as it is said: “For of dust you are, and to dust you shall return.” The Light wants to give this dust vitality, not at the degrees where it inevitably develops, transformed into the vegetative, animate, and human nature. No, the created being is intended to develop in a particular direction above its nature and to acquire a higher nature.

This becomes possible due to the breaking of the vessels, because the Light “corrupted” the desire it created, cut it into many pieces, by force penetrated into the matter and left in it an egoistic urge to receive for self-fulfillment, the inclination to enjoy it, to desire it and do only that.

As a result, the desire became the complete opposite to the Creator. Now, it is not just the created being, a derivative, because it has its own momentum to resist the Creator, to be in antagonism towards Him. The dominant force, demanding power, was revealed in the desire.

And then the Upper Light, the Creator, begins to “play” with the desire that is opposite to Him. A certain system of relations is formed and develops between them; they mutually influence each other.

The created being begins to understand that it is in a complex world. At first, it behaves in our world as the “higher animal,” creates science, culture, education, and forms of human society develops…until a crisis occurs. And then the desire realizes that something is wrong here.

Today, humanity has entered exactly this era; it is not yet the genuine crisis of the basic paradigm but its threshold. From this era, the moral must be drawn: We are in the system, in a network of forces.

They all interact harmoniously, creating a single network, focused on matter, i.e., still, vegetative, animate, and human nature, in order to lead it to self-realization. In other words, so that it begins to realize what it is.

This makes it immediately clear: It is possible to realize only if the created being learns who controls it, who stands on the other side. Indeed, it is possible to investigate and understand anything only from the opposite, like black on a white background.

Therefore, we perceive that “there is none else besides Him,” by coming from the opposite state, when we are sure that there is nobody but us people. In our eyes, we are ourselves are the active force in reality, and no one else.

With this confidence, we boldly and resolutely go ahead, until under a hail of blows “on our own bodies” we learn that something is wrong. Something does not go well to the extent that the global crisis comes, and there is no success in anything. Nothing helps, not reason or senses, not science or culture.

It turns out that we are stupid, clueless, and cannot even establish our normal life or everyday relationships. Even animals somehow make themselves comfortable. And we, on the contrary, destroy the lives of those near and far, using all our strength and knowledge.

That is our nature and we cannot go against it. Our evil nature is stronger than our mind. Intellect does not help in dealing with it. We would like to establish healthy relationships; we produce so much we could make a paradise on Earth for everyone, but we are not able to. Instead, we have only troubles and problems, threats, and fear of tomorrow.

Thus, my nature reigns over me and I cannot do anything about it.

As a result, people become conscious of all the baseness of their own nature. And this, in fact, is the best starting point. Baal HaSulam indicates it in the “Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot,” explaining what questions we ask in the end of our development: “What is the meaning of our life, the years which cost us so dearly?” “What am I here?”—and in his thoughts only this persistent question remains.

Ultimately, explains Baal HaSulam, this question should lead us to the realization of the necessity of the revelation of the Creator. If a person is thinking about what he lives for, what the meaning of his life is, he eventually comes to the conclusion: “There is something above me. The fact is I cannot arrange my life. Even my nature is beyond me.”

The solution is formulated as follows: “Come and see that the Creator is good.” In other words, from an actual need we really can come to the revelation of the Creator, and then we will see that He acts in everything. We will see that the entire distance traveled was necessary only to get blows and to eventually understand that our only way out is to reveal the force acting in the created being and causing us to move.
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From the Convention in Los Angeles “Day Two” 10/31/14, Lesson 3

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