Question: If it has been revealed to a Kabbalist that our world does not exist, does he forget the sufferings that happened to man and humanity?

Answer: It is not that he forgets. He feels that all this did not happen to him.

Question: Therefore, he does not associate himself with that entity that felt all this. Who felt it then?

Answer: The desire to enjoy oneself did. This is not his desire because it has been given to us from above, from the Creator.

Remark: But a man felt reality within himself.

My Comment: Yes, since it was given to him, he experienced it within. When this desire was taken away from him, he started to feel that it is not his.

Question: Is it like a caterpillar that when it becomes a butterfly no longer remembers that it was a caterpillar?

Answer: Not that it does not remember. After all, there is nothing but desires. If there is any desire in me, then I live it. If it disappears from me, then it is not mine. Therefore, if we connect our desires and our intentions then the whole past disappears and we become an absolute one.
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From KabTV’s “Fundamentals of Kabbalah,” 6/10/19

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Question: How does a Kabbalist perceive nature? Does he feel it as something intelligent, sensible and responsive?

Answer: Of course, because we are part of it.

We are inside a common sphere called “nature” or “the Creator.” In this regard, we are a part of it, no more. Therefore, a Kabbalist thinks about how to connect with nature, how to make himself an integral part of it, as he has entered into merging with the Creator.

Question: Does nature feel our pain?

Answer: Naturally. If nature created us as sensitive and sensible creatures, why should it be deprived of these properties itself?

Comment: But it hurts a person.

My Response: Doesn’t nature hurt as well? You just don’t feel it. After all, you don’t feel the pain of another person either.
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From KabTV’s “Fundamentals of Kabbalah,” 4/12/20

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Question: You have said that a person has a Jewish point. Is this the black dot or is it the point of non-identity, and when does it begin to be revealed?

Answer: When you begin to think about the meaning of life.

Question: Is it in every person?

Answer: Yes, in everyone. This point is called “Jewish – Yichudi” from the Hebrew word “union – yichud,” union with the Creator. It gradually becomes a Sefira, and then a Partzuf.

It is a whole spiritual structure. This point is in every person in the world. Those in whom it awakens are called Jews, Hebrews from the Hebrew word “la’avor – to pass,” to transcend from an egoistic state to an altruistic state. It has nothing to do with the Jews in our world. It is a spiritual definition.
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From KabTV’s “Fundamentals of Kabbalah,” 12/15/19

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New Life 1208 – The Right, The Left, And The Balanced Approach
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Yael Leshed-Harel

The middle line, the golden path, is a spiritual connection between the right and the left, above all the differences. The left is a tendency toward rejection, restriction, and limitation. The right is a tendency toward wholeness, connection, and compromise. Humanity fluctuates between “What is mine is mine and what is yours is mine” on the extreme left [Pirkei Avot 5:10] to “What is mine is yours and what is yours is yours” on the extreme right. The more we develop, egoism and aggression grow, but simultaneously, the understanding of mutual dependence also grows. Even though there may be short periods in which the right or the left will dominate, both of them are required for our development over time. We are living today in an uncorrected, distorted, egoistic society. Contradictory tendencies will continue to intensify, and humanity is therefore in danger of world war and general destruction. We need to learn to balance between right and left as between plus and minus so that there will be an opposing buffer between them.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 1208 – The Right, The Left And The Balanced Approach,” 2/11/20

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Question: How can you convince your mind of what you want to believe in your heart?

Answer: You must abandon both the heart and the mind.

You can live neither by the heart nor by the mind because they are purely selfish. They twist us around their finger, they confuse us all the time, they do whatever they want. The only thing you can do is surrender to the upper force so that it works on us and shapes us.

To do this, we need a small group of ten people where we are connected to each other and try to connect over our egoism. Then it turns out that I surrender to the attributes of this group. And so does each of us.

Thus, in this mini-group, we create a positive force that is already around us throughout the universe. And it turns out that we assemble, as in a laboratory, a model that attracts the general positive force of nature. Through feeling its action, we unite among ourselves. We begin to be nourished by it, and our actions become better.

Question: Can we say that everything is given from above and we must surrender to this process? Today, a huge number of people are getting sick. How can they correctly relate to what is happening?

Answer: In order to correctly perceive the attitude of nature toward us and to be objective, independent of our animal properties, we still need to rise above ourselves. This means making what is called a restriction of our selfishness. Kabbalah teaches this.

When you are at least at the zero level, that is, when you have not yet mastered the next, altruistic level, but you are already rising above egoism, then you can correctly perceive the actions of nature with respect to yourself. This way, you can impart it to your children, family, and friends.
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From KabTV’s “Meetings with Kabbalah. Victoria Bonya,” 3/29/20

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Lesson Preparation

Lesson on the Topic “The Approach to Studying the Wisdom of Kabbalah” 

Lesson on the Topic “Concerning Above Reason” 

Writings of Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to The Book of Zohar,” Item 39

Selected Highlights

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Listen to an Audio Version of the Blog
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My new article on Linkedin “The Four Colors of the (Human) Rainbow”

In 1954, the Supreme Court, under Chief Justice Earl Warren, unanimously revoked the constitutionality of segregation. But court rulings don’t change hearts. Deep inside, the hatred that created the segregation is very much alive and fuels the flames of the protests we are seeing. There is no solution to the racial tensions in America, other than to find a way, however unrealistic it may seem, for the parties to love one another: blacks, whites, yellow, and red. Just as the rainbow in the sky marked the covenant between God and Noah, the human rainbow should mark the covenant among all people.

America is at a crossroads: Either love will cover everyone, or hate will cover everyone. The future of the country depends on the choice between them.

Why is it that we love diversity in nature, but hate it in ourselves? What would happen if zebras wanted to be lions, and lions wanted to be elephants? It is precisely the diversity of nature that gives it its beauty and power. How long would we last if the heart suddenly insisted on being the liver? Existence is based on different elements forming a harmonious, beautiful, and vital ecosystem that needs all of its parts in order to survive.

There is no hatred among any of nature’s parts. On the contrary, there are mutuality and harmony. Unless America emulates this approach within society, the factions will destroy each other. And today, it is clearer than ever.

Harmony seems impossible under the current circumstances. People are too absorbed in their own anger to respect one another. Therefore, respect, consideration, ethics, and so forth, are not viable solutions since the entrenched hatred will throw them out the window. Instead, the parties must uproot the hatred itself, realize that they cannot exist without each other, and therefore try to learn to love one another, nothing less than that. All people are parts of the same system, the same organism of human society. If you hurt one part, you’ve hurt all of humanity. If people loved each other, there would not be discrimination, humiliation, suspicion, or violence. But in order to come to it, people realize it’s necessary, and choose to work for it. America is at a crossroads: Either love will cover everyone, or hate will cover everyone. The future of the country depends on the choice between them.

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The most important thing in the wisdom of Kabbalah is to reveal the Creator —the one who governs me, and how I should accept this governance. Am I under the Creator’s complete control, or am I mistaken in that I am?
One must annul oneself, calibrate oneself properly to understand who am I and what is the world.

The Light of the Creator—the light of bestowal, the power of faith, allows us to rise above our ego and see everything not with the ego-eyes, when I complain to the Creator, the world, and myself.
If I regret what I did and blame myself, I do not seem to believe in the single upper force besides which there’s nothing.

The Creator is the result of all my efforts to unite in the ten. I am constantly looking for this solution, but I keep circling around it, around the center of the ten, missing it. Because egoism knocks me off of this goal. Only with equal striving toward Israel – Torah – Creator can I get to the center.

The center of the tens does not apply to any of us, but only to all in equal measure—this is the Creator. As if I took 10 paints of different color and began to mix them together until there was not a single predominant color left. The resulting connection is a quality of the Creator!

Faith is determined by the discrepancy between what I see and what I have to see. If this world is perfect, because the Creator created it, and there is no one but Him, then I must see it as ideal. But I see many problems in it now —this is the level of knowledge.
From Twitter, 6/4/20

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Medium published my new article “What Happens When We Get Diversity and Inclusion All Wrong”

Can you mix water and oil? No, you can’t. But can you do without either of them? No, you can’t. Can a wolf become a moose? No, it can’t. Would we want it to? God forbid! So why are we excluding diversity and inclusion when it comes to people? Why are we fighting to make everyone the same when it’s exactly the differences between us that make humanity so beautiful, if we work harmoniously with one another?

By trying to make everyone the same, we are misinterpreting inclusion and increasing the hatred that already exists within us.

Just as men and women are different from each other, so are the four different types of color: white, black, yellow, and red. And just as men and women are complementary, so are the four types of people. Neither is better; neither is worse. They are simply that — four types of people, whose differences manifest, among other things, in skin color.

You might ask, “But if one is not superior to another, why is there bigotry?” Bigotry has nothing to do
with skin color, and everything to do with human nature: We are self-centered and alienated from each other. In simple terms, we are hate-filled creatures. This is not news, of course; it’s been known since Genesis (8:21), when God stated, “The inclination of man’s heart is evil from his youth.”

This inclination is the reason that more than half a century after the retraction of segregation in the United States, there is no inclusion. By trying to make everyone the same, we are misinterpreting inclusion and increasing the hatred that already exists within us.

Inclusion does not mean that everyone becomes the same. It means that everyone is included in the making of a common society, each according to his or her unique characteristics, and the diversity of unique qualities that are included under one common whole creates a healthy and robust nation.

But to do that, people must overcome the evil inclination that rules their hearts. And to overcome that innate nature, we need to know several things: 1) All parts of American society are indispensable. Extract any part of it, and you have handicapped the entire nation. 2) The various factions are indispensable precisely because they are different. What one can do, none other can. 3) The uniqueness of each group must function as a positive contributor to all of society. In this way, the diversity will strengthen the society and increase solidarity, as opposed to being a cause for tension and disintegration in the current situation, when hatred separates the factions. 4) The ultimate goal of all the factions must be the strengthening and solidifying of the entire American society. If even one of the four groups pulls its own way, the entire society will fall to pieces.

As an example, think of a basketball team. Each player on the team has a specific role (or roles) to play, and every player helps the other teammates do their part, as well. If the team wins, it is not one player’s personal victory; it is the team effort that pulled the feat.

In much the same way, today’s American society needs its players to play their parts, then help each other, and together accomplish the task of uniting the American nation. The diversity of the American population can create the most beautiful and thriving society on Earth, but first people must decide that they prefer to love one another rather than to hate.

Choosing to love is not easy, but there is no other way. It is said that necessity is the mother of invention. Today, it is necessary that American society reinvents itself, because it is on the brink of collapse. The coming weeks and months will determine whether America defeats the hatred that has spread throughout the nation and becomes a beacon of hope for a fractured world, or gives in to the odium and relapses into civil war.
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