Audio Version Of The Blog – 7/22/20

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Why Did The Virus Distance Us From Each Other?

laitman_963.6Question: If I need to change myself, then why do I need the whole society? I can lock myself in my apartment and meditate and pray for the whole world. Will this help?

Answer: No. You can change yourself only when you are in society, under its influence, adjusting yourself to it.

Question: If I need a society to change my qualities, then why did the virus quarantine us, separating us from each other? How do I connect with other people from a distance?

Answer: Yes. The virus has isolated us from each other so that we realize how much we are connected, and how this connection must undergo some positive changes.
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From KabTV’s “The Post-Coronavirus Era” 4/30/20

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“Millennials At The Forefront Of The Economic Pandemic, Why?” (Medium)

Medium published my new article “Millennials at the Forefront of the Economic Pandemic, Why?

REUTERS/Nora Savosnick

While the elderly are much more vulnerable to the coronavirus disease, the brunt of the economic pandemic certainly has a young face. Millennials in America and around the globe face a particular economic upheaval due to massive job losses in the service-related industries that provided their main source of income. This is no coincidence; the hardship comes as a call to action for the new generation to lead the world to a more promising future by rebuilding the old, failed economic and social systems.

The crisis demands a new education for a new lifestyle based on the same laws of mutual support and reciprocity that exist in nature.

For millennials — those born between 1981–1996 who are now 24–39 years old — the coronavirus epidemic has been especially harsh. They had not fully recovered from the 2008 financial crisis before being hit hard by this new crisis caused by COVID-19. Their limited savings affect their capacity to weather the crisis. A recent study revealed that 76% of surveyed millennials said their household income has been negatively affected by the pandemic, making them the hardest hit demographic and one struggling to cover their most basic needs.

The coronavirus pandemic has revealed how our current economic system founded on destructive competition at the expense of others leaves large swaths of society vulnerable and in danger of crumbling into dust in the blink of an eye. It shows how our current structures do not offer young people what they need to prosper. Feeling discouraged and frustrated, they see no future within such systems.

The millennials will be the pioneers, and they need to realize that all this upheaval is happening to them specifically to push them to take their future in their own hands and start creating a new and better world for everyone.

Although we may not yet grasp it, a huge change in reality is now underway. The pandemic has placed on the shoulders of a new generation of young people, one now suffering greatly, a special role and responsibility to build a new social structure that fosters stable connections above all the differences and disparities in society for the benefit of all.

Millennials beg to be heard, but we do not know how to listen since our generation still operates according to old paradigms. Until now, the careless patterns of human interactions that permeated our economic and social systems have created a vast chasm between the generations. To make matters worse, we have failed to build an educational system that is suitable for them. We have built a narrow and conflicted worldview around us that divides the world and forces everyone to fend for himself and compete with others at all cost.

The crisis demands a new education for a new lifestyle based on the same laws of mutual support and reciprocity that exist in nature.

A new wind is blowing in the world, changing orientation and old ways. Young people are sucked into a whirlpool of despair, the depths of which will push them to anchor on new safe shores. The safeguard and life-buoy in this scenario must be the tenet “love thy neighbor as thyself,” the most important principle for reaching endless fulfillment — the kind of perfection every human being aims at, and which is achievable only when all the contradictions within man connect in the mind and in the heart.

Meanwhile, the young generation fights a war for survival. We have yet to realize that something in reality is resetting, the old world is dying and a new one is being born. The change is rapidly evolving, so we have to hurry to keep up by quickly opening many courses and education centers to help young people transition smoothly between the two worlds. The millennials will be the pioneers, and they need to realize that all this upheaval is happening to them specifically to push them to take their future in their own hands and start creating a new and better world for everyone.

It would be wise on the part of countries and nations to provide young people with alternative shelters
in hotels and sponsor studies in how to survive in a new world that is founded on improved social relations and more balanced systems. Teach the young pioneers how to be citizens, not in the sense of habitants of a specific country but as builders of a new human society, founded on good connections that encircle everyone in brotherhood. From these young citizens tomorrow’s leaders will emerge. They will understand what forms the new state should take, what connections should prevail among people, and how to educate new generations. They will create a good and beautiful atmosphere that the entire society will enjoy.

This is the time for millennials to exert leadership by uniting all factions of society and merging them into one system with a common vision — a vision that America and the world needs for this generation and for those to come.
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Team Building Guide, Part 1

laitman_527Goal of a Group Working on Uniting

Question: A team is a group of people united by a single goal and mission.

People create sports teams to win games, business teams to make money, and spiritual teams to strengthen in faith. And for teams working on uniting, the goal and the means are the same. How can it be?

Answer: If we create a team whose goal is to unite, the question arises: Is unification a goal or only a means to achieve the goal?

Many relate to unification not as a goal in and of itself. For instance, when creating teams, unity is necessary to successfully perform certain tasks. Therefore, in our case, we also need to determine what the goal is.

We want to achieve unity in which feel the next level of human existence, where a special principle of similarity to an integral and unified nature is inherent in the unification.

If we reach a state of unification to strive for a single goal, ready to sacrifice our private egoistic goals, then we will rise above ourselves, above our egoism, and begin to feel the next level of nature—integral, global, and unified.

In principle, this is the purpose of our development. We create a group in order to learn how to unite, to reach a state where all members will feel as a single whole.

Question: Can one say that the goal is a good, harmonious life in family, in society? After all, it’s hard for a person to understand what this new level is.

Answer: Of course, because that is more understandable and closer to everyone. That is, the goal is communication skills. If we learn how to interact correctly with others, we will have good lives.
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From KabTV’s “Management Skills” 6/18/20

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“COVID-19: Painful Symptoms Of Recovery” (Medium)

Medium published my new article “COVID-19: Painful Symptoms of Recovery

Everyone is waiting for the coronavirus pandemic to finally end. But COVID isn’t going anywhere. It has come to change our thinking and will not leave before it’s done. And it will take some time. Humanity is a huge mass of very different people. We need time to adjust, to feel the new reality, understand where it comes from, and why.

If we could think about others rather than ourselves, the virus would not pose any danger. We would be able to go anywhere because if we care about others, we will not harm them.

We will get used to COVID. By autumn, we should already feel more familiar with it. After all, people can get used to anything; they even get used to chronic diseases and learn to live with them, so the same will happen here.

At the moment, the system is still unstable; it is still jerking and jolting from the impact of the virus. But the transition phase will subside and the system will take on a new appearance: a perception of humanity as one whole. Humanity is suffering from all sorts of problems: hunger, fires, droughts, hurricanes, the list is endless. But even now we are beginning to perceive these problems integrally, together, as one whole.

The next blow after the coronavirus is going to be a shortage of the most basic necessities: food, water, medicines, and electricity. This will lower people’s demands and will force them to become more modest. People will have no drive to travel around the world.

As it continues, the coronavirus will teach us the wisdom of life. We only need to know that we are in an integral system that is moving toward a new state of balance, preordained in nature. As this process unfolds, it takes us through different states. If we support the process, we will experience the states as good. If we resist it, we will feel it as painful and oppressive. But it’s all in order to lead us toward complete recovery from egoism.

Nothing happens by accident, but only for the purpose of correction. If we examine what is happening today with the final goal of unity in mind, we will find that there is a clear line leading from the current position to the end point. If we can see that, we will see that everything is done with purpose.

The essence of the process is an ever-increasing connection. Currently, we feel divided, strangers. We suffer because of our oppositeness from the rest of nature, but that suffering will impel us to connect. As we connect, we will become increasingly similar to the rest of nature and as a result, the pain will invert to pleasure. The sooner we transition to the state of connection, the sooner we will invert any suffering to pleasure.

Although we naturally oppose connection, since our nature is inherently individualistic, nature guides one state at a time until we agree to connect. When we agree, we will discover its myriad benefits. Just as brothers quarrel and fight when they are young but become close when they grow up and grow wiser, so we will come to see the benefits of connection after we grow out of our sense of entitlement.

We were given COVID-19 to cure us. At the end of it, we will be much healthier and our relationships will be much kinder — both between people and between countries. Now the borders are closed due to the pandemic. But in time we will realize their futility because connection is the only solution that allows us to overcome the problems that the virus has imposed on us.

It turns out that COVID is not a disease; it is a symptom of recovery. This is what happens with every disease: We do not feel the disease itself, but the body’s reaction to it as it tries to recover. Painful symptoms are signs of recovery. The coronavirus pandemic is showing us the way to recovery from self-centeredness. It is propelling us forward and we should respond accordingly.

We shouldn’t simply hide from it. Although at first we must distance ourselves from each other, subsequently, we should examine how we can grow closer. If we could think about others rather than ourselves, the virus would not pose any danger. We would be able to go anywhere because if we care about others, we will not harm them.

I know that most people still do not see it this way, but in a few months it will be clear that the coronavirus is building the correct connections between us so that everyone thinks about others rather than about oneself. When we achieve this, we will all be healthy.
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What Is More Valuable: Human Life Or Economic Development?

laitman_547.06Comment: The fact that human life during the pandemic appears to be higher on the scale of state politics than economic development is unique.

All of a sudden, all the governments started taking care of people and abandoned the economy that had been their first priority throughout history. The economy determined everything, not people. People were not considered at all. And then the turning point came. It is not that the rulers have changed. It is how some upper force acts.

My Response: In principle, we can’t talk about the upper force as if it exists and commands us; we can’t take it into account because we have no mutual connection with it.

The fact that governments were obliged to take into account the fate of ordinary people is because the virus does not distinguish between us. It affects all levels. We have seen the Prime Minister of England, Hollywood stars, ordinary workers, women, and men all contract the virus. It spares no one and spreads everywhere.

Therefore, governments had no choice but to send everyone home. It was the only way to stop the pandemic. It is unknown how many deaths and losses would have come about otherwise, and how it would have all ended.

In addition, when one country does this, the others can no longer stand idly aside.
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From KabTV’s “The Post-Coronavirus Era,” 4/30/20

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Counter-Egoistic Movement

Laitman_115.05Question: Our egoistic nature seemingly has two sides. On one hand, the desire for wealth created inequality and poverty. On the other hand, it led to the development of technology, trade, and communication.

On one hand, the desire for power and glory was the source of various intrigues and wars. On the other hand, the state and legislation were established.

Today we are in a unique situation where selfish lures no longer work. What will be the driving force of progress in the near future if egoism has stopped working, when nature does not allow it to work, and there is little that attracts us from within?

Answer: I think we will come to realize that we need to move in a completely different direction opposite to egoism and develop the attitude of human society for the other levels of nature to be absolutely altruistic and integral.

We must pull ourselves together and begin to act with the understanding that we must go against our egoism to unite and take care of each other according to the principle of “love your neighbor as yourself,” and thus move toward a state where “love will cover all crimes,” absolute connection and mutual care.

Then we will be able to overcome the huge potential barrier between our own nature and the common nature so that we will begin feeling the good force that renews and contains all of nature. In this way, we will achieve the revelation of the Creator.

Question: Today a person gets pleasure from taking care only of himself. And you say that he will begin to enjoy taking care of others. How can such a transformation happen since it is against our nature?

Answer: It can happen under the influence of our desire and the upper force.

Question: Then why is egoism needed and what is its purpose?

Answer: So that we ourselves, in contrast to egoism, will become aware of the need to care and be connected by good ties with each other. This is our task.

Question: So egoism is not destroyed?

Answer: No, we must work above it, in spite of it.
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From KabTV’s “The Post-Coronavirus Era” 4/30/20

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We Will Not Be Able To Hide In An Eco-Bunker

laitman_547.05Remark: In 1991, an experiment was conducted where scientists decided to seclude themselves for two years under a dome divided into sectors with fresh water, plants, and animals. An eco-environment was created for everyone—for plants, animals, and people.

The purpose of the experiment was to find out whether this ecosystem could develop harmoniously. They planned that plants would supply oxygen. Water had to be provided by natural circulation, and food would come from plants and animals.

What did the experiment show? Once the scientists settled in the dome, problems arose very quickly. Within a few weeks  one of the participants cut her finger while treating some plants. She was evacuated, had an operation, and returned.

Two teams of scientists were formed, who opposed each other in conducting experiments.

Photosynthesis did not happen as planned. Microorganisms began to multiply in large numbers, which consumed a lot of oxygen and destroyed the agricultural crops. Many plant species died. There were a lot of cockroaches, although they were not even brought there, and it was unclear where they came from. Due to the lack of wind, the trees became very fragile and began to break quickly.

Scientists barely lasted two years and decided that the experiment failed.

The experiment showed that all ecosystems are very fragile and highly dependent on external influences. It is very difficult to recreate a working ecosystem of Earth.

My Comment: Of course! Do they think that they will do the same thing on Mars later? They will be so disappointed there!

Question: It seems that people brought in a little bit of everything, as in Noah’s ark—a certain number of plants, a certain number of animals. They created an ecosystem so that there would be a cycle of metabolic cycles of substances in nature, and they failed. Why?

Answer: They wanted to do it artificially! Copy nature? If we are in it, then why? If I copy it through
my rotten brain, my egoistic qualities, then what will come of it?

Remark: Today we are talking about the fact that huge anomalies are occurring on Earth: an increase of carbon dioxide, burned down forests, and so on.

My Comment: This is the beginning of the end.

Remark: Man is trying to artificially recreate nature.

My Comment: You will not be able to build a bunker! No one could—not Hitler, not Stalin, nor anyone else. No man can escape from his purpose. Buy yourself a cottage, a villa, on some islands in the ocean, wherever, it will be flooded or something else will happen. It won’t work!

Remark: Everything seems to be perfect; everything is selected and weighed.

My Comment: Failure to comply with the main law of nature immediately leads humanity to destruction. You can make a garden of Eden on some island—which is what the scientists wanted to do—and you will see that it will all fall apart very quickly.

Remark: It would seem that the ecosystem is harmonious and recreates itself.

My Comment: Except for man! It is because he is the only pest in nature. Remove him and all of nature will simply flourish.

Question: What does man bring? Even if he enters with good intentions, something immediately begins to collapse.

Answer: He has no good intentions and cannot have because he is completely egoistic. He can only build everything to the detriment of others. Precisely to the detriment of others!

All animals, when they eat each other, do not harm each other. They, on the contrary, destroy the weakest, the sickest. Man is not like that. The intention is different.

Animals destroy what is harmful to everyone. Therefore, when a wolf catches a sheep or a goat, no matter what, it destroys the worst, from which only something worthless would be born and develop. All nature—inanimate, vegetative, and animate—is created perfectly. And man is all evil.

Remark: Man is also a creature of nature.

Answer: Man is not nature. There are inanimate, vegetative, and animate parts of nature in a man, but in all this his human essence prevails—evil, egoism.

Human egoism does not belong to nature. In nature, everything is balanced, but human egoism is not balanced. If there were some device that could suck this egoism out of a man, everything would be fine.

Question: Why was man given to Earth, and with such great egoism at that?

Answer: So that he would add himself! So he would add a good force to himself! This good force exists in nature, but it is concealed so that a person would discover it, would want to add it to himself, would want to consist of two opposite, equal parts and arrange himself between them.

Question: In one of your programs, you said that if humanity had followed the path of harmonious development, we would now be at an incredible level. Why was it given to a person to develop this aggressive force and then face the catastrophe that is now happening on Earth?

Answer: It is in order for a person to understand what good means. He has to grow out of the bad because the light can only be revealed from the darkness.

Question: Only by destroying everything, ruining the entire planet?!

Answer: There is no need to destroy. No one will let him destroy anything. However, he must feel the destruction.

Question: Does it mean that he can only understand the taste of Earth, the taste of this harmony, from the opposite?

Answer: Of course, how else? There is no other way! How do we attain anything? How do you attain this harmony? Only from the dissonance.

We start our lives from the fact that we break everything. We also bring up our children in this way—to assemble blocks from broken toys. We must create ourselves, and all of us together, from completely broken parts.

Where did it all start? From the Big Bang. That is, everything was shattered. Now we need to assemble it correctly. “Children’s blocks”—that’s what we have in front of us. This entire universe, everything there is—we need to assemble together with the correct connection between them.

Question: One can already see how everything is interconnected by the example of nature. Why do we follow a different path of development inventing additional systems?

Answer: Our little egoism does not let us! Take two children and try to make them play together. Each will grab a toy and will not give it to the other. He will hold onto it tightly and will not play with it. Here is what we are.

Question: How can a person break through, get off one path and move to the other?

Answer: Study the wisdom of Kabbalah. It will explain everything to you. There is nothing else! We have reached the point where we slowly realize this and can talk about it to ourselves and even to others.

This is a very good time! I am very glad that I was born and live in this time.

Question: What does Kabbalah give us? What additional thing will it give that a person would want to see?

Answer: It will give him relief from suffering on the one hand, and on the other hand, the attainment of perfection. Perfection! Attainment of the integrality of all of nature, its completeness, when from all the opposite parts the great absolute nature is assembled.

There is no greater happiness, no greater attainment, and no greater perfection than to attain the mutuality of all the parts of nature from their absolute division and opposition.

Question: What will egoism do in this corrected system? What role will it play?

Answer: It will play its role of the repulsive, despising, pushing apart, and distancing. That’s what the whole system will be assembled on. It is not possible to exist without a minus.

Question: In other words, will it be like a Pharaoh who disperses everything?

Answer: But how is it possible without him? It is not possible.

Question: Will a person just rule over it? Will he know how to do that?

Answer: When it is said that the people of Israel came out of Egypt, they came out of Egypt with gold bars, vessels, and livestock. That is, with vessels in which they can receive, already outside of Egypt, the upper fulfillment. How would you receive anything without Egypt?

Question: Is it the fuel that moves you toward the goal?

Answer: Egoism is the basis of nature. It is only thanks to it that we can attain the other side of it.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman,” 2/11/20

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Idyllic Future

laitman_761.3Question: A person does not understand what nature demands of him, and continues to take wrong actions. Could this lead some part of humanity to perish?

Answer: This can lead to the death of even the vast majority of humanity, but do not blame everything on nature.

You are given the opportunity to prevent all this and make our world stunningly beautiful! Not a single disease, no problems! You don’t understand what changes can occur.

Imagine everything is fragrant, the birds are singing, you are lying in a hammock with birds singing and you are eating cherries, and monkeys and bears are rocking your hammock.
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From KabTV’s “Fundamentals of Kabbalah” 5/10/20

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So As Not To Repeat The Blows

laitman_600.02Question: How can we learn to justify the Creator in everything?

Answer: The Creator has a very simple program. He created egoism in relation to Himself, opposite to Himself, and gradually reveals Himself to us. Therefore, with each generation, we feel worse and worse in relation to the Creator.

Today we have come to a state when we must change ourselves, i.e., to correct ourselves involuntarily, in a hard way. Such a state should force us to reconsider our attitude to life, to the family, to society, and to the world.

Therefore, the Creator can be justified only when we see the beginning and the end of creation and understand what He is leading us to. But for this, it is necessary to study Kabbalah and to begin to feel the upper world a little, the state of equilibrium between us.

Of course, life in all countries goes on, but it flows in the same vein.

Due to the coronavirus, the world has become more integral. Its integrality has been felt, in different countries in a little different way, but still, it has been one and the same anyway.

The virus has done its great work and will continue to do it. Due to it, we are moving toward a certain common future now, toward a more conscious state. I am very glad that we have passed this stage and are now starting to get out of it slowly.

It is desirable to get out of the state of the coronavirus in such a way that we do not need to repeat these blows. Let us try to be more connected. The main thing is to disseminate as far as possible the idea of mutuality, rapprochement, the integrality of nature, the need to not be opposite to nature—we have no gain from this, only loss.

We cannot be above nature; we are inside it. Therefore, the more we are integrally interconnected, the better.

If we try to exist this way, we will see how the integrality, the need for balance is revealed gradually in the world instead of the uncontrolled pursuit of profit that no one benefits from besides our inflated egoism.

Let us think about how to make us a steady, normal, balanced human society. It is in our power.

In fact, there are many of us. Today, several million people in the world can change the direction of thinking, perception, and desires of society. I hope we can do it.
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From KabTV’s “Fundamentals of Kabbalah,” 5/3/20

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