Audio Version Of The Blog – 11/5/20

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“When You’re A Polarizing Factor, Don’t Be Surprised If You’re Hated”

Dr. Michael LaitmanFrom My Facebook Page Michael Laitman 11/5/20

According to a recently published survey by the American Jewish Committee (AJC), nearly 90 percent of US Jews are worried about rising antisemitism. As always with antisemitism, Jews don’t think they deserve it. At the same time, Jews are leading figures in pitting the parties against each other. Nobody likes warmongers, especially Jewish ones, since they are supposed to do the exact opposite—to bring sides together, to reconcile them. So unless Jews quickly reverse course, they will pay the same price that Jews have paid through the ages, if not worse.

The only thing that makes American Jewry Jewish today is customs, nothing more. It’s a culture based on fading traditions and a feeling of belonging to a community. But why does going to shul on Yom Kippur or donating to charity make one Jewish? They may create a sense of belonging, but they don’t promote what Jews were made to promote.

As just stated, Jews are supposed to bring the opposite of partisanship. They came from dispersed nations and peoples from all over the Fertile Crescent in antiquity and forged a nation by rising above their instinctive hatred and suspicion. They did that by lauding the value of unity, mutual responsibility, and love of others to such levels that they became more important than anything else, more important even than their instinctive hatred. Only when they achieved that, at the foot of Mt. Sinai, they were declared a nation, and only then were instructed with being “a light unto nations.”

They were told to show the world how they united. They were instructed to set an example of uniting vicious enemies into the closest of people. But what do they do instead? They employ tactics in legal wizardry that help people cheat, bamboozle, and dupe their way to the top while portraying themselves as paragons of virtue, and the other side as demonic, immoral, and corrupt.

In my eyes, such people are not Jews. They have abandoned the core of Judaism, namely unity above hatred. Instead, they vilify in the name of war against corruption; deride in the name of exposing incompetence, and spread venomous hatred in the name of being “ethical.” In short, they are polarizing factors, warmongers, and deserve what warmongers deserve.

Of course, not all Jews are like that. Most, simply want to live their lives and not worry too much about anything. But tacitly agreeing to what their leaders do is bad enough these days. The Jews are seen as a collective and will be punished as such. It’s not my wish, it’s how things have always worked, and nothing will change that. The only way that Jews can change their dismal fate is if they, as a collective, reverse course and show how they reconcile their own divisions, set an example to American society, and this way help solidify it rather than divide it.

To conclude, Jews must show how they cultivate affection instead of rancor, kindness instead of malice. This is the purpose of their existence as a nation and as individuals. As of now, they’re nowhere near it.

“How Can We Read Someone’s Mind?” (Quora)

Dr. Michael LaitmanMichael Laitman, On Quora: How can we read someone’s mind?

It is possible if we work on ourselves in such a way where we become different people. In other words, if we pass ourselves over to the states of others, as if copying their states onto ourselves, then we can read their thoughts and desires.

However, it is no simple task. Doing so requires prioritizing the thoughts and desires of others ahead of our own, devoting and even annulling ourselves to them. We then make our mind as their mind, and can feel their desires and thoughts.

Such is the outcome of a process of increasing the greatness of others, up to a point where we feel them as being of utmost importance. When we start relating with primacy to the thoughts and desires of others, we then start feeling a whole new and enormous world open up: Instead of perceiving within our own narrow individual perspectives, we add a perception through the thoughts and desires of others. It can be likened to how cells feel their host organism as much greater than their own individual status, which causes them to act maximally for their host organism’s benefit, and receive from the host organism only what they need in order to act for the host’s benefit.

When we discover that kind of connection to each other—where we each think of the other as greater and more important than we are to ourselves, and create an atmosphere of support and encouragement in providing each other with everything necessary in order to nurture that connection—then we will experience a newfound harmony stemming from our unified inclinations to come out toward one another.

The laws of nature, which are laws of love, altruism and connection, set the scenario that reading someone’s mind is possible on condition that we approach them with a genuine intention for their benefit. If any shred of egoistic and exploitative intention is laced within, then we will remain mentally and emotionally detached.

Fear—Agent Of Development

562.01Question: Anything that we feel as a lack causes fear in us. It can be a lack of money, security,  knowledge, health, or confidence in the future. We are always overwhelmed by a feeling of inner panic because we are missing something.

Is it possible to say that a person develops due to fears?

Answer: Yes. It is a very powerful developmental agent. The basis of fears is the need to preserve one’s existence. But they can be controlled.

Question: Is it possible to get rid of fear at all?

Answer: No. Only if we turn off the mind. Fear is an instinct for self-preservation.

Question: A person cannot satisfy his own needs. But society can. Can you get rid of fear only through communication with society?

Answer: Yes. Society can give a person such a quality of confidence and support that fear will disappear to a certain extent. It is very difficult for a person to do this except only with the use of a special technique, and only in a limited form.

Question: Is there also such a thing as fear for others?

Answer: Fear for others is a feeling of belonging with others.

Question: When a person is afraid for his family, it is understandable. Is it possible to develop a sense of fear for complete strangers?

Answer: Yes, of course.

Question: It turns out that a person does not need to get rid of fear. Is it enough to direct the vector toward others?

Answer: We should not get rid of anything but only treat correctly all the properties of our body.

We need to come to the highest, general sensation of the space in which we are so that all our properties cause in us the ability to measure everything, feel everything, cognize everything, and ultimately achieve one common integral sensation of nature.
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From KabTV’s “Communication Skills” 8/7/20

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Mark In Life

270Remark: Most people want to leave some kind of mark of their lives, like with works of art, sports achievements, good deeds, and ending with an idea.

My Comment: They don’t feel like they live forever, and therefore they take care of it. If they felt that our world is practically a part of the eternal world, they would not think of how to leave something behind.

When a person feels that he lives forever, he has no worries about his future. Then he thinks about what exactly he can do for people.
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From KabTV’s “Kabbalah Express” 9/27/20

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New Life 465 – The Jewish Potential, Part 1

New Life 465 – The Jewish Potential, Part 1
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Tal Mandelbaum ben Moshe

Abraham gathered the most developed people who lived in his time and taught them to connect in order to reveal the upper force. They have the ability to see the world in depth, from the perspective of two opposite forces, the force of receiving and the force of giving. An ordinary person sees the world only according to the force of receiving, which is based on the survival of the fittest and the power of the human ego. It is like seeing the world through one eye rather than two.

These people, the Jews, lost the ability to reveal the force of bestowal since the days of the destruction of the temple. The goal of their evolution is to re-awaken these abilities, rebuild the attribute of giving inside of them, and identify the force of love and bestowal in reality.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 465 – The Jewish Potential, Part 1,” 12/4/14

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The Prerogative Of The Upper Force

610.2Question: Why can’t we measure our feelings?

Answer: We do not have this ability. We can partially measure the reaction of our nerve endings and impulses with certain devices but not the feelings themselves because they are measured by desires.

It is also impossible to measure desires. The Creator, or the most internal force of the world, is a desire. Therefore, we just have to accept that we can work with them in a very external form, but we cannot understand, measure, or manage them.

This is the prerogative of the upper force that created a desire on the inanimate, vegetative, animate, and human levels and then formed matter around this desire.
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From KabTV’s “Communication Skills” 8/7/20

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Respect And Self-Control

546.02Question: Is it possible to teach a person to respect someone?

Answer: We learn only from examples. Thus, when we show someone a good example, they grow up to be good people. Respect is a positive feeling. But sometimes it can limit a person and cause one to regress. Therefore, one needs to develop self-control.

Expecting purely egoistic respect from others can cause one to close in on oneself. After all, if everyone starts honoring him, he stops growing and only demands more respect no matter the situation, as long as it is given to him. But if respect is directed outward, it facilitates our advancement.

Remark: You have repeatedly mentioned that signs of respect from society are very detrimental to someone who wants to achieve self-actualization or spiritual development.

My Comment: It is simply disastrous! Sometimes, of course, it is good to hear positive feedback about yourself but, in general, it is enough for the environment to only point out the correct direction for your advancement.

Positive feedback and compliments make one feel content, limits their development, and smooths out all sorts of feelings of self-inadequacy.

It is not about putting pressure on a person so that he cannot lift his head. But there must be a very serious line of self-control that keeps revealing additional deficiencies in a person that need to be filled with knowledge and attainment.

Much is written about this in our sources. For example, they say that if a teacher receives a lot of attention and respect from his students, he may stop developing spiritually. This should be avoided.
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From KabTV’s “Communication Skills” 8/7/20

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The Relationship Of Teacher And Student

165Question: What should be the interaction between teacher and student? Does their relationship depend on the requests of the student only or on the teacher also?

Answer: More on the student. The teacher is ready to accept all of his requests.

Question: The sages say that a person should study what his heart lies on. You, too, often ask students: “What would you like to study today”? But this isn’t this wrong. Shouldn’t the teacher make the lesson plan himself?

Answer: Yes, but I want them to understand what they want and not passively accept what I give them.

Question: So, is what the student wants more important to you?

Answer: Sometimes I ask them about it to give them a chance to test themselves.

Question: Do you know in most cases what kind of material should be given and in what dose?

Answer: It is not my choice, it is the time. It dictates to me what materials to give them.

Question: Don’t you also think that the teacher should explain the material so skillfully that the student will have even more questions by the end of the lesson?

Answer: Yes, questions that would not confuse him, but would lead him further. This is necessary for the study. The student must accept my answer and, starting from it, continue to ask further. Then he will feel twofold in the answer and will be able to navigate correctly.

Question: How should students relate to other students’ questions?

Answer: Learn from them. It is the answers to the questions that carry the most information. This is necessary for students because they want to connect together with their souls—inner qualities, feelings, and intentions.
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From KabTV’s “Management Skills” 6/24/20

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Daily Kabbalah Lesson – 11/5/20

Preparation to the Lesson

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Lesson on the Topic of “Work with Faith Above Reason”

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Writings of Baal HaSulam, “Table of Questions for Topics, Vol. 1, Part 1, Item 69”

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Lesson on the Topic of “Noah”

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Selected Highlights

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