Audio Version Of The Blog – 10.31.17

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“Carrying Them On Its Pinions”

laitman_232.03Torah, Deuteronomy 32:11 – 32:12: As an eagle awakens its nest, hovering over its fledglings, it spreads its wings, taking them and carrying them on its pinions.

[So] the Lord guided them alone, and there was no alien deity with Him.

The language of the Torah is very poetic. But when Kabbalah explains what the Torah is about, it is revealed that there is no poetry there. What is meant is the forces that rule us, lead us through all these states: both when we rise above the screen and when we go down below the screen, and so on.

These are very serious, uneasy, heavy actions that the Creator performs on us. And we must participate in them.

The eagle that “spreads its wings, taking them, carrying them” is the anti-egoistic screen that lifts us higher and higher.

The eagle carries its nestlings away not in claws, but puts them on its wings and flies. It’s amazing, but that’s exactly what happens. This is a special action of Bina when she raises Malchut to her and thus protects her from egoistic arrows that fly to her from below.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 1/30/17

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A Kabbalist’s Inner States

laitman_588.03Question: How does a Kabbalist analyze his inner states with the Creator? How does the environment of our world affect this?

Answer: It does not affect it in any way. When I come to the lesson in the morning, can you tell in what condition I am with the Creator? What I had with him before, any talk or relationship? This is a different level, a different world.

Therefore, what I feel and what I give to my students are two different steps, and one does not affect the other.

It happens sometimes that it is very difficult to teach a lesson because everything has been “taken” from you. But it is taken on your own level, and when you switch to the students and use their desires while you are at their level, then you are practically being realized in accordance to them, and they do not feel it.

In this respect, I win and it’s easier for me. I hide myself, and students cannot tell what spiritual state I am in. It is impossible.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 1/29/17

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Does Freedom Exist in Our World?

Laitman_707Question: What is freedom according to the Kabbalistic understanding; does freedom exist at all?

Answer: There is no freedom in our world because an upper force governs the entire universe.

We can observe this total lack of freedom within the inanimate, vegetative, and animate parts of nature. They are constantly confined to some sort of framework; otherwise, they will perish. Animals are willing to give up their freedom and serve humans to receive food. This is why people were able to domesticate wild animals. The fact is that for the animal type of egoism, the most important thing is food. Therefore, he who gives them food, can teach them to obey.

But a person’s understanding of freedom is very twisted because on top of his basic animalistic state of dependence, he also has an inner psychological dependence on something or someone. Here, he falls under such a degree of lack of freedom that he himself cannot figure it out.

We imagine that we are free. We have a total illusion of freedom! In fact, people are absolutely not free in their actions and decisions. They do not even know who their master is, who commands them. And there is nothing you can prove to them.

If on the inanimate, vegetative, and animate level it is possible to prove the degree of lack of freedom, then on the human level we cannot control it, because we ourselves are at this level. But when we rise above the human level, it becomes clear to us what the lack of freedom is and how we experience it.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 7/2/17

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Could The Book Of Zohar Have Been Written By Ten Women?

laitman_260.01Question: Hypothetically, could The Book of Zohar have been written by ten women?

Answer: Hypothetically, yes. However, we are organized in such a way that the aspiration for spiritual unity between people resides with the men, while the force of supporting and uniting the men resides with the women.

This is why our world is initially divided into the opposite qualities: male and female, bestowal and reception. In Kabbalah, this is studied very seriously, for it is a cornerstone of our relationships with each other.

Generally, how do two men unite with each other? One in some way is a man in relation to the other, and the other in some way is a woman toward the first one. Obviously, we are not talking about physiology or psychology, nor anything related to our worldly notions, but only spiritual qualities. Any spiritual discernment that we reveal in us consists of a male and female part.

In our world, until we enter the level of the upper world, men naturally have an advantage here. They are considered crucial and of paramount importance in Kabbalistic societies.

The women form into groups around men and start receiving the spiritual qualities through them because the men make the breakthrough in this, as they do in everything else in this world; they are always the discoverers, builders, and destroyers—and the women follow behind.

However, when the men’s breakthroughs are followed by the women’s “battalions,” the result is the creation of spiritual qualities and the development of new souls. There is an activation of the feminine qualities, which are not simply complementary, but very essential, that come out to the forefront and start working on the spiritual planes.

Question: So the fundamental demand comes from the women?

Answer: Yes, it says many times in the Torah, that you have to listen to your wife, a woman.

The Torah is written in a very interesting way; despite the fact that it seemingly talks about men, there is always a woman somewhere that privately directs them, like a wife in a family.

A man is considered the head of the family, but in reality, whatever part of the world I ever visited and anyone I ever asked: the Indians in South America or anyone else, not to mention in European countries, or the Africans, the woman is always the foundation of life, the foundation of the world. And the same holds true in Kabbalah.

However, the breakthrough happens through the masculine force, which is followed, supported, pushed, influenced, and even directed by the feminine force.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 6/4/17

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My Thoughts On Twitter, 10/30/17

twitter

#Physics: Qnty of matter =qnty of antimatter, but then why no annihilation? Kabbalah: it is written, Creator has created this opposite that.

Creator, force of good, created the force of #evil for us to reveal Him in the union–not opposition–of these two forces. We never learn!

Physics: Qnty of matter = qnty of antimatter, but then why no annihilation? Kabbalah: To bring the + & – forces to fulfillment of the #soul.

The #ego (Pharaoh) grows so big that its rule goes from pleasant to unbearable, thus pushing us to look for a way out.

Stop! Start loving disturbances you see in the world. Then you’ll see that it’s not the world being negative to you, but you to the world.

Difference btwn me and the environment is the difference btwn rungs of the spiritual ladder. Rise to the environment, take another rung up!

World is ready to give abundance, but we manage to turn it into #suffering. Kabbalah shows how to add attainment of eternity to abundance.

What’s Next When US Is Divided Like Vietnam War Days? #Newsmax

From Twitter, 10/30/17

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New Life 910 – Natural Disasters

New Life 910 – Natural Disasters
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Yael Leshed-Harel

What is the most influential factor in the situation in the natural environment? Humans have an influence on all parts of the creation. Even though we don’t see the connection between all the levels of nature, this connection exists.
From KabTV’s “New Life 910 – Natural Disasters,” 10/10/17

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Daily Kabbalah Lesson – 10/31/17

Preparation for the Lesson

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Lesson on the Topic: “The Ten as an Embryo” (Prep for Vilnius Convention)

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Writings of Baal HaSulam, “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Item 145

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Writings of Baal HaSulam, “The Giving of the Torah,” Item 13

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Audio Version Of The Blog – 10.30.17

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Newsmax: “Trump Can Awaken Nation By Declaring Opioids Emergency“

The largest portal Newsmax published my new article “Trump Can Awaken Nation by Declaring Opioids Emergency

When President Donald J. Trump declares the opioid crisis a national emergency, it should give his administration the power to divert more funds, assign more manpower, and cut some red tape. Declaring national emergency to address an addiction epidemic is an unprecedented move, as it is typically reserved for short-term emergencies such as natural disasters or terrorist attacks.

Yet there is much debate on whether this move will actually help in solving such a complex matter. With 91 Americans dying from opioid overdoses every day, this number has now quadrupled in less than two decades, making opioids the number one killer of Americans under 50. That’s more than guns, car accidents and cancer. If we once thought that only certain communities are affected, today it’s all over the map.

In order to address a rapidly growing addiction of such magnitude, it is not enough to equip police officers with naloxone, expand controlled medications for addicts, or open more detox centers. These could alleviate the symptoms of the crisis, but won’t treat the addiction epidemic at its root.

What’s more, trying to hold the gigantic pharmaceutical companies accountable is a battle lost from the outset; Cracking down on doctors pressures them to under-prescribe, driving users to look for heroin on the streets a lot sooner, as was clearly shown in the case of Florida; the so called “war on drugs” has been recognized as a colossal failure; and that leaves some to blame the addicts themselves, which is like beating the messenger instead of reading the message.

The message we should heed is clear as a bell: we must look into the sociological factors that drive this addiction to massive proportions. In other words, we have to ask more profound questions such as “What makes people in our society turn to opiates to begin with?” And, “What is our society not doing to prevent the making of ever increasing numbers of opioid addicts?”

The Craving for Opiates Is a Craving for Connection

First, it’s important to recognize that the vast majority of opioid abusers don’t start from taking them for genuine physical pain. Rather, in most cases, those who abuse opiates turn to them due to a different kind of pain — an emotional pain.

There are opioid receptors all over our bodies, and they are designed to balance emotions such as panic and anxiety, in addition to physical pain. When we were babies, the milk we got from our mothers was rich with opioids, and when someone gives us a hug today, our brain stem generates opioids.

Many might be surprised to learn that, likewise, social support, mutual trust, a romantic relationship, a loving family or even just a safe and positive social climate, all drive the production of opioids right within our body. Thus, the need for opiates is deeply intertwined with our inherent wiring for human connection.

With this in mind, let’s look at what’s happening today: Our society actually makes people so stressed, anxious and lonely that their naturally balanced, healthy supply of opioids just doesn’t cut it. To put it into a simple social equation: We generate a lot more alienation, uncertainty and stress than we generate safety, compassion, and camaraderie.

Therefore, masses of people turning to artificial opiates can be seen as a natural counter-balance to an off-balance society.

A Wakeup Call for American Culture

Trump stated that the entire world has a drug problem, not just America. He’s right about that. What’s interesting about the opiate crisis is that it’s as if nature is telling us exactly what we need to change within our society.

This crisis exposes the deeply interconnected nature of the social species called humanity. We are connected with each other to our core, like cells in a single organism, and we are naturally drawn to each other for a sense of support and security. Both our biological and psychological resilience depend on positive and healthy relations within our social environment. And just like cells in a body, when we lose touch with the body as a whole, we grow sick and degenerate until we die.

However, this drug crisis also joins a list of other painful symptoms, all converging to show us that we cannot escape a massive transformation of Western culture. We have to acknowledge our dire need for healthy human connections and positive social climates. And sooner or later, we will have to actively heal our broken society.

In order to do that, we need to tap into the same mechanism we currently abuse – our inherent wiring for human connection. There is a method of circle-style workshops that provide safe and positive social interaction. These should be introduced into our workplaces, schools, retirement homes, and even kindergartens. They should be on our TV screens and all around the virtual world, so that anyone, long before they turn to opiate abuse, could easily find a supportive community that generates warm human connection.

Once we begin to do that, people will discover the natural high we are wired to experience just from being positively connected to each other. This kind of high won’t just solve opiate addiction, it will take us out of the narrow prism through which we view our social reality and empower us to envision how to reshape our societies.

We live in a time where the nature of human development compels us to deepen our connection to each other and enter a new level of human experience. The longer we stall, the more frustrated we will become, and more addiction will ensue. Instead, we should open our eyes to see the great opportunity for social progress that lies at hand.
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