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The World’s Only Chance

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: When will our work have a real impact on the reasoning of scientists and researchers?

Answer: We need to help them see the whole picture. They are already talking about the signs of an integral world, but they cannot gather individual observations into one system, into a unified methodology.

In addition, they are afraid to delve deeper into this topic because the idea of an integral world leads them to a confrontation with those in power. Current governments are still acting egoistically and individualistically, failing to realize that by doing so they are destroying themselves. Politicians lack an integral perception. Unlike them, scientists observe nature and speak about what they see. Who hears them is another story.

There is another problem: However wonderful the words spoken by various experts and specialists may be, no matter how much they pontificate about interconnection and the need to unify, they don’t have the means to implement it. Money and military might won’t help here. Even if all the people in the world exclaim, “Yes, we want to be one global village!” what will happen after this unanimous declaration of their will? Nothing, except for a world war. After sensing even more acutely the ties that bind them to each other, they will unleash a war in order to sever this connection.

Scientists do not have a solution; they don’t know how to change man. So why scream about how harmful egoism is if you do not have the remedy? In the past, doctors didn’t tell patients that they were terminally ill. There were no means to even slow down the progression of an illness, and therefore, a person was left in the dark so he would suffer less. “Do not put obstacles in front of a blind person,” says the Torah. Why reveal the truth if you are unable to help a person deal with it?

So without revealing the wisdom of Kabbalah, without the message of mutual guarantee proceeding from us, humanity doesn’t have a single chance to correct anything. And this is now our problem: How can we establish connection with people and explain to them that it is possible to correct egoism and thereby correct the world.

We are talking precisely about the correction of man. Nothing else will help here. Many already understand that all evil is contained in human nature. However, they throw up their hands: “A human being is egoistic and nothing can be done about it.” If we don’t supply people with the method of the correction of egoism, if we don’t explain that it is actually attainable, the world has no chance. So far, however, we’ve been working half-heartedly.
[74053] 
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 3/30/2012, “Preface to The Book of Zohar”

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Spiritual Search

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: There are people in the world who follow their heart’s calling. They are immersed in their goal completely and live only for it. Do these people possess a spiritual sense organ and do they need Kabbalah?

Answer: Kabbalah originated in the ancient Babylon, when it was immersed in the same crisis that we have today and its people lost a sense of direction in their lives. They suddenly felt that egoism confined them within an animalistic existence. Then they revealed this method of attainment of the upper force.

Kabbalah is necessary only for those who find themselves in a deep inner crisis and who question the meaning of life.

In general, the question about the meaning of life arises in many people for different reasons. If I, for example, lost money gambling, or trading stock, or something happened to me, I also think about the meaning of life. But this question arises in me as a result of a “minus,” that is, as a result of suffering and some loss in our world. In this case, people do not aspire to rise up; it doesn’t interest them.

We have to clearly understand what people come to us. You can clarify that with any psychologist or even independently.

Let’s assume a person has everything: a car, a house, a family, and a job. If this person lost something in this life (a minus), he or she will also question the meaning of life: “What should I live for if I lost it?” But it’s not the aspiration upward, forward. If you give this person a “plus” instead of a “minus,” it will be sufficient to satisfy him or her.

People like this do not need something spiritual, something higher. What speaks in them is not a Human higher than an animal, but an ordinary animate level: The sun is shining, the grass is growing, and all is well on the earth.

For a person who questions the meaning of life all of it as if stops to exist. It all isn’t worth anything, doesn’t mean anything because everything begins and ends. Life itself doesn’t specifically give anything; there is nothing particularly valuable in it except for the fact that I receive; nothing else is happening, and in the end, I simply live like a beast.

A person who thinks in this way and begins to question the meaning of life is questioning something different, something that is directed upward, above my beastly existence, the reason he is so limited in years of his life, abilities, and minuses that don’t let him have his peace of mind. “What is above this minus, what is it all for?” Depending on what level this question is originating from, this person comes to mysticism or somewhere else.

The desire is constantly developing within us. This is the development of the question about the meaning of life according to the five gradual levels of desire: 0, 1, 2, 3, and 4.


If a person is at the preliminary level of development, he will be satisfied with different philosophies. If it’s the next level, then it is psychology. Such people often become poets, writers, philosophers, and psychologists.There is a level of development where a person is drawn to some actions, to various psychological practices: “We will be dancing or sitting in the lotus position, we will be breathing or not breathing, that is, we will begin to attain upper substances through the body.”

This also relates to the search. If a person is at a level like this, he will be doing yoga, other various practices, and it will satisfy him. You can’t prove anything to him. It is the level of their knowledge, attainment, and sensations, it is the level of questioning that arises in them now. Partially, various religions are here, too. They are intended to reassure, to provide balance, and to give hope.

On the next level, a person can no longer be satisfied with various physical exercises, breathing gymnastics, and so on. He feels that it gives him nothing. After all, it is all about the body that strives to feel comfortable. “What if I start meditating?” And he begins meditating with some letters or symbols. It is already something more abstract, yet it also doesn’t go beyond his psychological framework.

Eventually, at the final level of development, the question arises within man: “Is there anything that exists outside of myself if I absolutely annul myself? Is there a method that will help me get rid of my current “I”? I want to perceive the world outside of myself.” These people come to us.

What does “outside of myself” mean? It means the perception of the world not inside of me, not through my five senses of sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch. These sensations penetrate us, are summed up, and thus we sense the world inside of ourselves according to a certain program within us.

On the screen situated at the back of the brain, the sum of all of these sensations paints before us a picture of the world in a certain proportion: We receive more than 90% of this picture through our sight, 7-8%  through our hearing, and the rest through our smell, touch, and taste. That’s it!

It means the program is changing inside of me, desires change, and accordingly, I receive a sensation of a different world. As if it moves, as if it does something inside of me. But how can I come out of myself and begin to sense the universe in its entirety?

Latest scientific studies say that only a field, a force, and nothing else exists around us; only one force and nothing beside it. Hence what appears inside of me, within me, and what we research now, all of it I have to see as my connection with this force. I have no other opportunity to reveal it, only through the impressions I receive.

That is, I have to constantly analyze that everything that happens inside of me, both a plus and a minus, everything comes from one force. If I constantly direct myself to it in this way, then even through my present perception I begin to attune myself to this force and feel it more and more. Accordingly, having attained such a state where I within myself receive an additional sensor, I begin to sense this force itself.

I begin to reveal it, and precisely through its opposite influence on me I feel infinity, perfection. It purposely confuses me and gives me various obstacles so that through them I could hold on to it. Thus I raise myself above my animal.

On the animate level, I am purposely given sensations of various negative influences so that I could rise above them and feel this force. This is what the entire method is comprised of. And the group, studies, dissemination, and everything else are only to help in attainment of the goal.
[73904] 
From the Vilnius Convention 3/24/12, Lesson 3  

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A Simple Law

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How do I begin feeling the upper force?

Answer: We begin to feel the upper force only to the extent we can attune ourselves to it in our unity. A person cannot feel this force alone.

Tuning into this force should be in accordance with it. If I do it on my own, it will be an egoistic tuning. The ego will rule over me. How do I exit this state?

I need more than a desire to exit and rise above myself—this is an individual and egoistic desire present in millions of people in our world. How do I feel this very force, precisely this force? To do that, I must become equivalent to it.

There is a very simple law in nature: You can sense some phenomenon only to the extent you consist of it. That is, if I feel, hear, see, taste, or smell something, it is because I possess certain qualities that are also present in what I feel. There must be a  law of equivalence of form. I have to build in myself a device that will detect waves existing on the outside.

Let’s assume that we have a radio set. What do I do when I turn its handles? I tune it in; I generate a certain wave in it. If there is a similar wave on the outside, the antenna will detect it according to the principle of resonance, equivalence, and I will hear some sounds; my ear will detect them.

It means I have to build within myself a receiver that will contain qualities similar to those of this force. If I simply desire to come out of myself and sense it, I will achieve nothing. That is the reason we gather in a group where I do not only desire to rise above myself, but rather want to rise above myself in the quality of bestowal, in the quality of love, which is the quality of this force.

There are millions of those wanting to exit and rise above themselves. However, it takes time for them to hear that besides rising above themselves, they can achieve it by building the quality of bestowal within.… It is only possible in the group, between us, when you begin to unite with others according to the principle of “love thy neighbor.” Then you begin to become equivalent to this force and are able to sense it.
[73907] 
From the Vilnius Convention 3/24/12, Lesson 3 

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Let The Light Do Its Work

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: I have the feeling that my ego “steals” everything from me. I sit with my friends and it seems that I ascend my desire to receive, but then I feel that they are the ones who are doing that. I feel that I am in the dark, that I don’t hear anything, and don’t feel the Light. What should I do?

Answer: You should try to dissolve into the friends, like someone who is small or like someone who is new in a society.

When you come to a new society you don’t know anything and you don’t know anyone. You try to enter it without being too prominent or standing out. Suppose you come to a new work place, you simply try to keep quiet in order to discover, to see, and to feel everyone else.

This is how you should behave. Then you begin to feel what they have. You will develop like an embryo in his mother’s womb. Then gradually, to the extent that you begin to feel yourself as real and safe, you begin to express yourself together with everyone else.

Try to neutralize yourself and only be inside. This is enough, because we will create the field that exists here. You shouldn’t worry, if you do that, you will feel it.

Question: But in any case my ego will feel satisfaction in that. How can I avoid stealing from myself and from others?

Answer: Who says this is bad if you want to feel spirituality? It isn’t bad.

The goal of creation is to enjoy, to be filled, but in bestowing. You want to enter the group and to acquire that attribute of bestowal, and in it you want to feel pleasure. In the meantime that’s okay. We cannot imagine anything else.

The most important thing for us today is the yearning for bestowal, to bestow in order to feel pleasure. This is our level, called Lo Lishma, (Not for Her Sake).

When the Light comes and is gradually revealed in us, (this will happen only if we yearn for it that way), as a result of its influence we will begin to feel that the attribute of bestowal is above everything else, greater than everything, and that I want to be in it. Even if in the meantime it is egoistically, “I want to be in it.”

Then the Light will influence us in such a way that you will suddenly begin to detach from yourself, from the “I want.” Your “self” will suddenly begin to disappear and you will feel yourself “outside yourself,” outside the “self.”

Leave it to the Light! You cannot do it by yourself. You have to yearn as much as you can in all your desires, including the egoistic desires—and the Light will do all the rest.

This is a “prayer.” You are asking the Light to do this work for you. It created your ego and it is the one that will change the ego. Our yearning should be only for that in order to enable it to do this work.

If we yearn for unity, the Light will do all the rest.

We are all egoists. We don’t know and we don’t understand anything. We don’t know what will happen to us in a minute. We don’t know our attributes, we don’t know anything, and we are not required to do so. We are only required to do one thing, to simply try, to make an effort, and the Light will do all the rest.

The maximum unity in the group summons the Light, and then it changes us. We don’t have to do anything artificially. Everything will be taken care of and you just try to connect.
[74105]
From the Vilnius Convention 3/23/12, Lesson 1

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Don’t Reject The Egoist

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Do people understand that the evil inclination exists in them? Can we openly tell them about this?

Answer: No, not under any circumstances! It is forbidden to tell a person that he is egoistic, or even to say anything bad about him. What right do you have to do that? If he is normal and usual and behaves like other humans, then how is it possible to tell him that he is bad, that his ego controls him, and so forth? The opposite should be done. You need to suggest something good to him, without telling him in any way that there is something bad about him. You need to approach him as if he is special.

How do we approach a child? If you want to educate him correctly, you don’t need to put pressure on him. You need to support him, to give him security that he is capable, that he is able, that he is big and strong. In this way, you will awaken the correct forces in him for advancing forwards, and thus he will develop. If you begin to put pressure on him, you will get the opposite result in the end. Unfortunately, we don’t know how to educate children. We aren’t taught this, and thus we ruin them.

It’s also the same in relation to adults. You need to awaken the good and correct feelings in a person, to praise and elevate him. And because he is special, you show him something special in the world that can raise him even higher. Then he goes together with you! You don’t lie to him because in truth this possibility exists in each person.

Don’t reject a person with the message that he is an egoist. It is forbidden to do this! After all, we all are egoists, but if you tell an egoist that he’s that way, then he will immediately be repelled by you, whereas you must come into contact with him. Simple psychology: It is forbidden to negatively relate to a person. It doesn’t matter whom. You need to look for a good connection. That is called, “to sentence each person to a scale of merit.”
[74098]
From the Vilnius Convention 3/23/12, Lesson 1

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A Leap To Freedom

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe attribute of bestowal is attained in the group, in society, under special conditions that are described by Kabbalists from the state that was prepared for us by the shattering of First Man (Adam HaRishon), the general soul. If we use the small environment that was given to us correctly, and in it, try to reach mutual bestowal, we will discover that we are in exile in Egypt.

We discover that there is no way we can attain spirituality, the Creator, the attribute of bestowal, if we don’t reach the love of friends first. But all our attempts to reach connection and love of friends end in complete failure, as it is written, “the Children of Israel cried from the work,” because we discovered that we built poor cities, Pithom and Ramses for Pharaoh, which means that we only increased our desire to receive.

Although we despair from this work, we don’t leave it and we shout: “Save us!” After all, our ego, Pharaoh, doesn’t let us connect, and if this goes on this way it will never let us leave the exile and attain the connection with the upper force.

This is really a cry of despair from the bottom of the heart. Then a special, general force called “Moses” is revealed. It is revealed in the group and goes through many changes. Once it is revealed and once it is concealed, until we stabilize this collective force and place it against our ego.

When we are ready to fight our collective ego that disturbs us from connecting by placing the collective force of connection called “Moses” against it, the life or death struggle begins. We support this force as much as we can and even above our power! Here we discover in our general collective point the help from Above. At this point, the Creator says: “Come to Pharaoh, let’s fight him together!” this means that He agrees to connect with our collective point, and so he takes us out of Egypt.

On the way different phenomena occur, which the Haggadah tells us about, and we have to go through all this. It refers only to our attempts to reach connection and to somehow fulfill it. Eventually we come out of this state, of our inability to connect, and attain what we wanted. The method of connection called Torah is revealed to us against the ego and the hatred.

Now the system we can use appears. It is called Torah, the Reforming Light that gradually begins to influence us in order to correct us. There is Mt. Sinai that separates us, the collective ego that stands in the way of the connection among us. When the Light corrects the hatred into connection, this mountain becomes the “mountain of Holiness.”

This is what the holiday of Pesach is about (from the Hebrew word meaning “to skip”), which symbolizes the transitions from exile to freedom. Exile is my inability to connect. I don’t know how to do it, but I yearn for it and demand it.

Redemption symbolizes the fact that I was given a chance, a system, a method that enables me to correct the evil in me and to turn it into good. Good means mutual guarantee, love of friends, in which I discover the force that enables me to fulfill this attitude and adhere to the Creator. After all, He is the goal I yearned for from the start.
[74151]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/1/12, Shamati #41

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The Privilege To Be Happy To Bestow

Dr. Michael LaitmanFrom a lesson of Rabash: We study that we should be in equivalence of form. What is equivalence of form? Just like the Creator bestows, so do we have to bestow. This is equivalence of form. When we have to bestow, we have no self-love, we cry. It hurts that we must do so. The Creator bestows, and the question is does He have pleasure in it or isn’t there pleasure for the one who bestows? So there is no equivalence of form! So there must be pleasure when we bestow, otherwise there is no equivalence of form. You can bestow without pain; bestow, I don’t need your pain, just bestow.

Enjoy the bestowal, who gives it to you? He should work, the body doesn’t want to! It isn’t that I need to suffer, there is no choice; the body doesn’t want to work. Why should I suffer; I don’t want to suffer. I need the exertion! And this isn’t a condition! A person who doesn’t feel the exertion, it is a sign that his intention is in order to receive, not in order to bestow. The body doesn’t agree to bestow.

You should never yearn for bad things. If it’s necessary to feel different changes, they will come by themselves. A person shouldn’t think about a descent, but always yearn for an ascent, both in his feelings and his thoughts: for goodness, adhesion, connection, and wholeness. But at the same time, a person should assess himself critically, understanding that if there is nothing inside him that objects to bestowal, it’s a sign that there is an egoistic matter here. If a person manages to advance happily and without exertion, it’s a clear sign that he does it egoistically, in order to receive. Only when he receives above the power of bestowal, will he be able to bestow and at the same time be happy.
[74131]
From the Preparation to the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/1/12

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Signs Of A Period Of Transition

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: You have said that a person is like a cancer cell in the body of nature. How long ago did this occur?

Answer: Our egoism develops gradually and we’ve undergone a few stages of its development. Starting from the 5th century BCE until the 5th century CE, humanity developed in its aspiration toward wealth. From the 5th to the 15th century humanity developed in its aspiration toward power. From the 15th to the end of the 20th century development was in the aspiration toward knowledge. These are the prevailing tendencies.

In the beginning of the 20th century, an academic named Vernadsky defined our development as ending and leading to a noosphere or balance with nature. Later this idea was embraced by many other scientists. This research was continued by the well-known Club of Rome with other branches of researchers appearing later.

Essentially, egoism ended its development in the 1960s during the birth of a new culture among the youth characterized by detachment from life in what is called the “Beatles generation,” hippies, flower children and so on. This was the beginning of an inner skepticism, which meant that the new generation didn’t wish to nor did it find it necessary to constantly strive forward due to the fact that it felt empty.

We are constantly developing under the influence of our desires. After all, a person is a desire. We don’t know what to do when our desires for wealth, fame, or knowledge run out and we suddenly feel that we no longer receive the needed fulfillment from them.

This is when general depression appears. This is what we now see in our society: growing rate of suicides, families falling apart, detached attitudes of children, and so on. This is a transition period, which should be relatively quick. We are in the midst of a serious developmental acceleration.
[74307]
From a Lecture at Šiauliai University, Lithuania, 3/22/12

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The Staff Will Help Us Not Trip Along The Path

Dr. Michael LaitmanThere are the terms “staff and snake.” If I constantly try to keep the Creator above and myself below, then it is a staff; it is below in its importance (same root in Hebrew) so it supports me on the way. But if I don’t work this way and my egoistic desire makes all the decisions, this means that it throws the stick to the ground and it turns into a snake. Then I am under the control of my ego.

A person should constantly check to be certain he is not a partition in the sea of Light; thus he annuls himself, surrenders, and is included in the Light. He should constantly check himself this way and see himself in relation to the friends and the group. They guarantee that you won’t start imagining that you are completely corrected, completely righteous. This is why we are given such a specific method of measurement, so we can always correctly assess and check where we are in relation to the group.

I should constantly check whether I am “transparent” in relation to the group, so I do not disturb the group, but I participate in it. Thus, I build balanced and equal relationships. In this case, I will constantly find something in the work that will keep me in balance with the upper Light. This will go on until all this work becomes a habit for me, and I begin to feel the upper Light permanently.

This work is done in “exile” when we don’t feel the greatness of the Creator but only want to imagine His greatness, the greatness of the attribute of bestowal, above all the obstacles that disturb us from feeling its importance. I constantly check myself in relation to the group because in the meantime, I don’t feel spirituality, and I see myself as a righteous person who is totally transparent and doesn’t stand in the way of the Light.

It may seem to me that I am already on the level of harmony with the Returning Light, repeating its movements by bestowing upon everyone like it does. How else can I know whether this is true or not? There is no other way I can check myself, except in my attitude towards the friends.

If I succeed in being the connecting, balancing part that equalizes everyone and draws them to one collective center in which our connection exists, then there is no doubt that in this way I equalize myself with, and do not stand in the way of the Light, the Creator who fills all of reality.

This is possible only in the group, and there is no other way to check it. This is the reason for the shattering and all the preparation work—in order to create a system of measurement for us.
[74218]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/2/12, Shamati #59

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