Audio Version Of The Blog – 8/23/20

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My Thoughts On Twitter 8/23/20

Dr Michael Laitman Twitter

Liberal politics and the Coronavirus have turned Hollywood into a town of druggies and criminals. The streets of LA are full of filth and zombies, used furniture and needles, against the backdrop of million-dollar villas. Those with the means are fleeing the city!
America’s problem lies in legitimized #egoism unmitigated by a common history and culture.
From Twitter, 8/23/20

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“What Are Some Basic Understandings You Should Have Before Reading The Zohar?” (Quora)

Dr. Michael LaitmanMichael Laitman, On Quora: What are some basic understandings you should have before reading the Zohar?

Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam), who wrote the Sulam (Ladder) commentary to The Zohar, wrote four introductions to The Zohar in order to provide us with a sturdy foundation for approaching the book.

Without thoroughly understanding the concepts that Baal HaSulam describes in these introductions, it is impossible to reach an accurate understanding of The Zohar, as well as approach its reading effectively to advance toward its attainment.

The Zohar describes the spiritual world, i.e., the desires, intentions and actions of the created being when in contact with the Creator.

Since we exist in an opposite corporeal reality, we understand nothing about the spiritual world.

We are born and raised in an egoistic human nature, which aims to benefit itself alone, with no consideration of others.

Thus, when we read The Zohar with no prior preparation, it appears as if it is written in a foreign language (even if we read it in our native tongue), with strange fables and other depictions that seem to be codified.

No matter how much we try to make connections with what we read in The Zohar, if we have no perception and sensation of the spiritual world, through an opposite giving sense to our inborn receptive senses, then we have no access to understand and feel what The Zohar truly describes.

In addition, both The Zohar itself and various Kabbalists discuss the notion of The Zohar’s revelation in our times, that specifically in our era, more and more people will feel a need for what The Zohar contains.

If our egoistic nature of receiving for self-benefit alone was replaced with a spiritual one of love and bestowal, we would immediately understand what The Zohar describes. Reading The Zohar with such an inclination would then reveal more and more layers of the spiritual world to us.

However, is there anything we can get from The Zohar while we lack the spiritual nature, locked in the human ego?

What we can get is called “Segula,” a special kind of remedy. Reading the book, not understanding a single word, attracts forces from the spiritual world it describes. If we approach reading The Zohar with the intention to transform our nature—from egoistic to altruistic, corporeal to spiritual—then the book serves to illuminate upon us a special light called “Ohr Makif” (“surrounding light”), which acts on us to ignite that transformation.

The spiritual forces from the reading work on us, gradually leading us to the revelation of the spiritual world, to access the quality of love and bestowal that fills reality.

Since The Zohar was written by a group who attained the highest degrees of attainment of the spiritual world, and who shared a nature of love and bestowal, then only by attaining a similar nature can we understand and feel what The Zohar depicts.

“What Is The Reason For So Much Violent Crime In The USA?” (Quora)

Dr. Michael LaitmanMichael Laitman, On Quora: What is the reason for so much violent crime in the USA?

There has indeed been an upsurge of violence recently in America. For instance, murders in Chicago and New York are currently 50 percent higher now than what they were at this time last year, and then there are also the protests-turned-riots in Portland, which show no end in sight.

The deeper reason behind the violence is the alienation and estrangement at the core of today’s American society—the feeling of not sharing the same views, nationhood and ideologies with others—clashing with an increased interdependence and interconnectedness that demands more unification.

And we can expect the situation to get worse if the country’s divisions are left untreated.

Instead of rummaging through the reasons for the violence, I’d like to shift the emphasis to the solution…

The solution is that Americans need to work out how to live together.

On one hand, violence, racism and politically-fueled division extends far back into America’s history, but on the other hand, it has never been as extreme and widespread as it is today.

It is as if problems that were lurking in the shadows for many years have exploded into the limelight, with much more resentment and hatred added in the mix.

Therefore, in addition to inevitably dealing with the problems on a case-by-case basis, there should be a more enveloping shift to develop mutual responsibility and consideration in American society above the divisions and differences.

What this means in practice is that every citizen should be cared for by having a respectable living standard secured in exchange for their participation in activities that aim to increase unity above the divisions.

Such a formula would allow American society to move in a new positive direction, as it would be aligned with the interdependent nature of our times.

As the past paradigm of materialistic individualism that America thrived on transitions to a new era where success depends on more unity and cooperation, the times are calling on Americans to emphasize what unites them above their differences. If Americans fail to meet this new challenge, then we can expect a historic decline of the superpower into a third world country status.

For the time being, many people are focused on pointing out the perceived shortcomings of the views that oppose their own, and would seemingly be happy to destroy those who hold contrary views. But there is no effective long-term solution in such an approach.

Like any live organism that is composed of many systems that have pluses and minuses, conductors and resistors, we have to learn how to rise above the level of our individual “cells” and “organs” that we exist in, and see the whole organism to which we all belong. We would then see the need for opposing opinions and their role in balancing society. However, more importantly, we would see how the focus on unity above division is of utmost importance in discovering a newfound social harmony.

Therefore, America’s positive thrust forward from its current divisiveness is in each member of society internalizing the mutual dependence that all Americans share. The more that everyone feels the dependence that they have on others, and likewise, the importance of their own influence on others, then the more everyone will have to recognize both sides of the coin as belonging to the same coin.

It is thus my hope that Americans will rise to the current test of the time and start feeling the need to shift the emphasis to unite above the divisions. Their positive future depends solely on this.

Above photo by Harrison Moore on Unsplash

“The End Of The Ego Era” (Medium)

Medium published my new article “The End of the Ego Era

The ego was great as long as it served us. The desire for power, knowledge, and wealth drove civilization to innovate, create, and challenge its own limits. Thanks to the ego, we now live longer, lead easier lives, and engage much more in realizing our dreams than in survival.

Now that nature has demonstrated what humanity can be like, we can rise above it and end the ego era.We can keep it as a reminder of what we can be like if we are unaware, but instead of the ego, it is time we ushered in the age of care for one another.

But over the last several decades, the human ego has grown out of proportion. It is no longer working in our favor; it has become toxic and noxious. Today the ego is making us intolerant to other views, exploit other people and all of nature, and disregard the ruin we are leaving for our children. In fact, in some countries, even children are becoming somewhat of a rarity as people see child rearing as an unrewarding task.

Through such unnatural tendencies, and through excessive self-absorption, the ego is destroying the planet we live on, the society we live in, and even our own bodies. The ego, in a word, is killing us.

Today, the ego is telling many people not to wear face masks and fight for their freedom of choice. But at a time of a global pandemic, what could be more ruinous to ourselves and to others than not to follow the minimal requirement for avoiding contagion? Yet, egoism is blinding us to the fact that it is risking our lives and the lives of our loved ones in the name of fake freedom when in truth, the ego is the master and we are its slaves.

Or, take nationalism, for example, a classic type of egoism. It demonizes another country or nation and convinces us that if we only ruin, impoverish, or conquer that monster, our lives will be all rosy. It entices us to launch a campaign against our perceived nemesis and when we end it devastated and heartbroken, it tells us that we’ve been used again by opportunistic politicians and heartless tycoons. And so we end up broke, downtrodden, and hopeless. But behind the scenes, it is the human ego that is running the show, laughing at all of us behind our backs.

It is time to put an end to the ego era. It is time to see that if we raise our heads and look at each other instead of catering to our quirks, we will find that we have no enemies. Every person who is different from me shows me something I could never see alone. We show each other new beauty, teach new ideas, and introduce new ways of thinking just by being different. It is diversity that makes the world we live in beautiful, and it’s diversity that keeps it going.

Even the most extremist views must not be destroyed. They are extreme because their opposite extreme exists as well, and together, they allow us to tell good from bad, choose unity over separation, care over carelessness, and connection over alienation. Were it not for extremists, we would not be able to develop ourselves.

In fact, if we try to annihilate them, they will only grow under the surface and infest our whole society. This is when they become dangerous, when we do not use them to cultivate unity and try to forcefully uproot them.

The same nature that runs the world we live in creates the most bizarre phenomena in humanity. And just as it does not make mistakes when it creates trees, it does not make mistakes when it creates different people. We are the ones with the wrong perspectives. We are the ones who think that one view is good, as long as it is mine, and cannot see that in nature, nothing is uniform, diversity rules, and thanks to it we thrive. Had nature made humanity uniform we would not know we have to change and would continue to lead our unsustainable lifestyle to our sorry end.

But now that nature has demonstrated what humanity can be like, we can rise above it and end the ego era. We can keep it as a reminder of what we can be like if we are unaware, but instead of the ego, it is time we ushered in the age of care for one another.

Managing Stress, Part 6

961.2Coronavirus: Pluses and Minuses

Remark: Everyone today is looking for where the coronavirus came from. Whether it is biological, artificial, or allegedly launched by the Chinese.

Answer: What is the difference? It does not matter; it already exists.

Question: Is there a need to look for what is behind this virus?

Answer: Yes. To investigate what nature wants to tell us by it.

Question: Do we have any research tools for this?

Answer: Let’s see where this leads us. Let’s write down the positive and negative consequences of the coronavirus’ impact on human society and decide.

I think that it has many more beneficial consequences than harmful ones. Then maybe we should not fight against it but agree with it in some ways.

Remark: Most people do not believe that nature has a plan. I have never heard anyone talk about it.

Answer: We have no other way of knowing anything about it at all if we do not investigate nature in this way. Otherwise, we will begin to study some random effects on ourselves.

I see that this virus has brought many beneficial things to humanity. It saved us from unnecessary work, from misusing natural resources. The sky and water are clean. People stopped twitching, flying around the globe, and pointing their fingers at various tourist sights like monkeys. They stay at home more and pay attention to their families.

A lot of beneficial things happened. Let’s write this down and see that there have been so many positive changes for which we should thank the virus.

On the other hand, what harm is it doing to us? Ah, we get infected from each other by some unknown, incomprehensible phenomenon. We should be more distanced from each other. So, let’s distance ourselves, let’s make our lives more peaceful, let’s not jostle in the subway, on buses, and in crowded offices.

We can make our life completely different. We do not need the old life. We ourselves were cursing it. Six months ago, I read a lot of articles about how our world is coming to an end, that we will eventually just bring it to the edge by air pollution, volcanic eruptions, tsunamis, the threat of war, or anything else.

We made the world such that this virus just stops us and says: “Take a step back and see how to arrange yourself better, more kindly, calmly. Otherwise, your place will be taken by those wild animals that started to come out of the woods.”

Question: Will the very process of studying and analyzing the cause of what is happening relieve a person from stress?

Answer: Of course. We will draw the correct conclusions and this will help us.
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From KabTV’s “Management Skills” 6/25/20

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A Ten The Size Of The World

laitman_933If everything depends on our connection within the ten, why are we given this whole world? How do I connect it to this picture?

Indeed, there is nothing else apart from the ten. And all the wider circles, the world Kabbalistic group and all mankind, are the same ten, only with more and more resolution.

I see a whole kaleidoscope of all sorts of colors, different people and things, but all this was originally in my ten, only I couldn’t see it. And now I see different continents, a multitude of people and forms, revealing a greater desire in the same ten.

The desire of friends suddenly grows to the size of a world group, and then the ten swells to the size of all mankind. But there are still ten of them, not nine or eleven—just one Kli. In every particle of the universe only one law exists, the same ten.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/13/20, “From the Prayer of the Ten to Its Prayer for the World” (Preparation for the Virtual Convention “A New World” 2020)

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Make Room For The Creator

232.06Virtual Congress “New World” Lesson #3

The most difficult thing is to imagine a love that is always based on hatred, and both of them support each other, strengthen and exist only thanks to this.

This is how the spiritual differs from the material world where one cancels the other. We are used to our world where we can only love when we forget about hatred. And then hatred flares up again, and we forget about love and are ready to kill each other.

This does not happen in the spiritual world; there is both hatred and love at the same time. Both of them come from the Creator, and it is through hatred, which is the basis of this world, that we can rise to love, to the nature of the upper world. We exist in this sandwich, both in hate and in love, and these two lines, right and left, exist on equal terms. One can’t be bigger than the other.

And then we will feel the middle line revealed. It can’t be revealed yet because otherwise we will cancel one of the two lines. Only if there are two lines and we understand that one cannot be without the other, through our desire to preserve both of them, we create a middle line.

Do this exercise: Where I see my egoism toward my friends, I try to remove it, to uproot it. I cut it out as if with a knife, and I keep the space that is left and want to fill it with the Creator. I want the Creator to be revealed in it, otherwise He will not be revealed. If I want to reveal the Creator, it is possible only in those places and qualities where I have made room for Him.
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From the A New World – Virtual Convention 8/15/20,“Love Covers All Crimes,” Lesson 3

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Do We Need A Vaccine Against Egoism?

552.03Question: If you had the opportunity to vaccinate people against egoism so that all people would begin to lead a social lifestyle and believe that society is higher than each individual, would you take the opportunity? Or would you still wait for a man to consciously get to this?

Answer: In no case would I do this because to kill egoism means to kill our nature. To make a man good without having to fight his egoism means to make him a kind, naive idiot.

A person must educate himself and rise above his egoism. This is immense work that does not end within one earthly life, but continues during many life cycles.

Therefore, we must not interfere with nature because we will simply remove the most precious thing from a man—his egoism and the opportunity to independently decide what freedom of will is and how he should try it on himself.
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From KabTV’s “The Post-Coronavirus Era” 5/7/20

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The Ten Is A Standard Spiritual Vessel

934Spirituality is different from corporeality. In corporeality, the size of a vessel is usually measured by quantity: one liter, two, three, thousand, etc. The larger the volume of the vessel, the larger the vessel is. But in spirituality, the size of a vessel is determined not by its volume, but by the number of different properties that increase its resolution: the number of pixels.

Therefore, in corporeality, a single person can be very smart and elevated. But in spirituality, the connection with the ten means much more, which gives a huge spiritual addition. The number of different properties acquired from connection with other people determines the size of my spiritual vessel (Kli).

Therefore, advancement in spirituality means that the number of people with whom we connect, the number of souls, desires, and opinions that we include, grows. This is a qualitative difference between somebody who is considered great in the corporeal world and in the spiritual world.

In the corporeal world, I expand my own vessel into which I can receive more and more. But if I want to increase my vessel in spirituality, then I must include additional desires that are different from mine, and by this I increase my Kli.

Ten people, “the ten” is a standard spiritual Kli in which I do not cancel, do not suppress, and do not repulse anyone, but unite everyone on absolutely equal terms. This means that I do not even evaluate them in order to equalize, but everything is equalized by the upper light; it unites the friends in my mind and heart in absolute harmony and merger and turns them into my spiritual Kli.
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From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 8/13/20, “From the Prayer of the Ten to Its Prayer for the World” (Preparation for the Virtual Convention “A New World” 2020)

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