Audio Version Of The Blog – 12/9/20
Posted on December 9th, 2020
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Faith above reason is the understanding that reality is not the way I imagine it. I am inside the Creator, the upper force that governs me. The enormous world that appears before me is inside of me. I have to attract the Creator’s force so it will fill my entire world and set everything right.
It seems to a person that he feels the external world. He is locked inside himself and feels himself from inside. Reality is inside of us. It’s as if I am sleeping and seeing dreams about how I’m doing something, somewhere. When I awaken, I see that the true reality is different. Likewise when revealing spirituality, we understand that we were as dreamers.
We do not feel where we are—like the blind and deaf, we don’t feel the true world, progressing through it by feeling around. This is the correction. The Creator created concealment so we would attain perfection. From concealment we would reach revelation, from reason we would rise to faith above reason, from reception to bestowal.
The pressure between fragmentation and the aspiration to unite reaches a size, like in a lightbulb, which lights up when the pressure is 220 volts. Out of darkness we draw the Creator into our unity. We have to value the dark states because they unite us, and by that I ignite light in my dark soul.
When we overcome egoism’s resistance in the full measure and attain unity in a ten, the Creator becomes revealed between us. The opposition of the light and darkness, fragmentation and unity, reaches the extreme when contact between ego and holiness is sufficient for darkness to shine as light. We are on the path of light.
The declaration on fighting #antisemitism was unanimously passed by the EU member states. But the declaration can’t change the negative attitude that the nations of the worlds have toward the Jews. The reason is that only Jews can reveal for themselves, and then for the world—the program of the world’s development—and the world will calm down!
From Twitter, 12/9/20
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Thrive Global published my new article: “People of Israel: the Hanukkah Menorah to Light Up the World”
The holiday symbolizes our inner struggle to overcome our egoistic nature called “the War of the Maccabees against the Greeks.”
Leslie Moulard lights a menorah with her two-year-old daughter Moira during Hanukkah festivities at Temple Mizpah Friday Dec. 27, 2019.1231hanukkah2
There is no better timing for the celebration of Hanukkah, the Festival of Lights, than the current period when the world is characterized by divisiveness and light is so much needed. Humanity now faces the impact of a global virus that has basically penetrated every corner of the planet while the pandemic of hatred and separation continues to spread worldwide. It is precisely the Jewish nation that has the power to ignite love above hatred and light above darkness.
The word “Hanukkah,” from Hebrew “Hanu-Koh,” or “park here,” actually refers to a spiritual process. It represents the first stage of spiritual development in which we start correcting the desire for selfish enjoyment and invert it into a desire to bestow upon others, a state that liberates us from the darkness of separation, conflicts, arguments, ruthless competitiveness, and the drive to exploit and dominate others.
The holiday symbolizes our inner struggle to overcome our egoistic nature called “the War of the Maccabees against the Greeks.” The “Greeks” personify the hedonistic characteristics that yearn to control everything around us, in other words, for our egoistic attributes of self-indulgence to dominate. There is nothing wrong with wanting to enjoy. In fact, our very nature is a desire to receive pleasure. What is problematic is using our skills and talents in a self-centered way, for our self-aggrandizement rather than for the common good.
We see this in the way the Greeks adored competition and admired winners. The Jews, on the other hand, cultivated “love your neighbor as yourself” as the highest ideal. That principle has become lost in our endless quest for success at the expense of others, yet it is precisely what we need to reclaim and implement in order to raise the whole world to a positive state.
Therefore, the war described in the story of Hanukkah refers to an internal struggle that we have fought throughout generations. Even when we do not have an apparent enemy, our inner enemy always rebels within us, again and again pulling us toward worshiping various idols like power, fame, and control. We are still drawn to them, but we understand they are temporary and harmful and bring no good results.
The victory over the Greeks is the first step of every person’s progress up the spiritual ladder. When we can rejoice in each other’s successes and share our concerns in mutual connection, we will realize what nature tries to teach us: that we belong to one single body. But today, the opposite happens and the Jewish nation is more separated than ever. Thus, these challenging times are an opportunity to realize that our most urgent call to action is to unite and become a positive example of connection like modern-day Maccabees who win the war over our egoistic inclinations. If we take just the tiniest step in this direction, we will see miracles along the way. We will see how a small lamp, the smallest jar of oil, will kindle a strong and warm fire that illuminates the life of every person.
The holiday of Hanukkah signifies the victory of light over darkness, unity over division. Indeed, such a victory requires no less than a miracle, but it is one within our grasp. We need only know how to light the candle to make it happen. Through our connection, we strike a match against the darkness and ignite the light in our lives. This is the brilliance of Hanukkah. Like with a match, a little friction transforms into a bright flame.
Happy Hanukkah!
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— Published on December 8, 2020
Medium published my new article “The Democracy that Never Was”
This presidential election has demonstrated clearer than ever just how powerful the media are. Their ability to choose what to show, what not to show, and how to show what they choose to show fashions people’s views and thinking according to their whims. It’s come to a point where they don’t wait for the declaration of the official results of the presidential election in order to report them; they decide them, and even an official denial by Congress will not make them change their reporting.
The media didn’t come to prominence overnight. Over the years, they realized the power they have over people’s views and understood that this power is worth a lot of money. This created a link between power, wealth, and the transfer of information. From that moment on, there was no democracy. It’s not as though the people were really the sovereign before, but at least the rulers were somewhat accountable to their constituency because of their desire to keep “serving the people,” namely to be reelected and stay in office.
However, once politicians realized that to be reelected, you needn’t serve the people but the people who report to the people, their commitment to their constituency vanished. Instead, politicians started placating the press in order to get favorable coverage. Afterwards, tycoons started buying newspapers and TV channels left and right and became media moguls. They did this not necessarily because the media was such a lucrative business, but because an owner of a newspaper or a TV channel can decide what is written or aired, how, and what conclusions the media stories will promote regarding topics of interest. Now, when politicians want good coverage, they have to pay the media moguls with benefits such as energy production contracts, passing of certain laws, land ownership acts, currency laws, favorable tariffs and customs, lower taxes, and so forth. The rich have many needs that politicians can satisfy. If all it takes is to say or write some nice words about them on television, why not? Everyone benefits, except the public.
The recent presidential election has exposed this dismal state more than any prior election, and the whole structure is now falling apart. It is high time it did that. Now the question is what will come instead of the corrupt structure.
In the end, there are only two ways: up or down. Right now, the situation is going down fast. The tensions between the two sides are escalating, the media are fueling them, the hatred is unrestrained, and both sides feel that they are fighting for the future of the nation. This is a recipe for war.
There is, however, another option: to go up. Going up means canceling the Cancel Culture and accepting that neither side will change. Moreover, only if both sides maintain their positions, something new will come out of the carcass of democracy: a new thinking, a new perception of the world.
It is not a compromise; both sides will maintain their views and will not give an inch. However, they will also allow the other side to maintain its position, and both sides will grasp that without the other, they themselves do not exist. The existence of one side enables and defines the existence of the other. Just as there is no heat and you cannot even define heat in the absence of cold, there is also no Right in the absence of Left, and no Left in the absence of Right. Nor can either be defined.
Once we come to value the existence of the other side, we can gradually develop positive emotions toward it. However, that will come later. The first step toward mending the American society, after the demise of democracy, is the acceptance of all political views without expecting any of them to change, and without trying to reach a compromise, but simply to accept that all views are genuine and reflect people’s true feelings, and this is what makes them legitimate.
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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What is confidence in yourself?“
You can achieve genuine confidence in yourself by being part of an environment that upholds loving, supportive and encouraging values, where its members positively connect and aim to support each other to reach a common harmonious goal.
On the contrary, we feel the fear of being lesser than others, which is ultimately a fear of our egoistic pride taking a blow, when we engage in environments that value competitive, individualistic and materialistic values.
The human ego is constantly concerned about the reception of fulfillment at the expense of others. Therefore, pride that stems from the desire to exploit others for personal benefit is a negative, empty and disgraceful quality.
Since we are social creatures who respect and disrespect relative to our social environments, we thus can achieve true self-confidence in societies of people who aim at a common exalted goal of unifying above this ego together.
In such societies, pride takes on a positive form: it protects its members from being hurt, and lets them positively connect above the human ego, which in turn has a positive effect on humanity at large.
In short, when we engage in a society that observes the rule of “Do not do to others what you hate,” and by adhering to that rule, aims to reach “Love your friend as yourself,” we develop a genuine form of self-confidence.
Photo by Husna Miskandar on Unsplash.
Question: The famous psychologist Viktor Frankl wrote “Life is never made unbearable by circumstances, but only by lack of meaning and purpose.” Some research today says that a person becomes happy not from having meaning, but depending on how easy, pleasant, and free from problems life is.
What is happiness?
Answer: Happiness depends on what level a person is at. In principle, happiness is when all your desires are not satisfied, they are waiting for fulfillment, and everything is in anticipation, like a child who has a birthday soon.
When you feel as on your birthday, something will be given to you, it will be something good, i.e., you anticipate a reward from life, that is happiness. Everyone has their own.
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From KabTV’s “Kabbalah Express” 11/6/20
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Question: The formation of moral principles is greatly influenced by religion, spiritual teachings, culture, education, and personal beliefs. By adhering to moral standards, a person does not let himself sink to the status of a wild animal and keeps his instincts within the frameworks settled in this society.
Do you agree with this statement or will all these moral norms not work in extreme situations?
Answer: It depends on which standards, who fulfills them, and from whom they are required. But in principle, a person always acts according to the norms he has absorbed into himself that will guide his behavior.
Question: But if some kind of extreme situation happens, for example, a crisis, then isn’t it clear that a person will behave in a completely different way.
Answer: No. These norms will still guide him. Nothing will change in him.
If I really love someone, then my love values this person’s life more than my own. And that is why I treasure his life more than mine. This is all a strict calculation, there is no poetry here.
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From KabTV’s “Communication Skills” 10/9/20
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The main question that should trouble us is how to restore and rebuild the general vessel of the soul that was shattered by the egoism that entered it. Just as water flows from a mountainous area and fills the valleys between the mountains, the egoism that was revealed filled the voids in the connection between us and began to divide us and draw us further away from each other. Since then, the problem of how we can build bridges above our egoism arose.
Egoism will not disappear. It is impossible to fight it, and there is no need to do so. It is a force that was created by the Creator that governs us. It is impossible to do anything with it, to erase or destroy it in any way. The only thing we can do is to balance it.
It is due to the fact that egoism divides us that we will begin to ascend above it more and more and build large bridges that will enable us to connect the “valleys” that separate us, so that the water, the sea, the ocean, will remain below and we will be able to build a second floor.
When we build these bridges above the water in order to connect with each other, we will feel a totally new integration in each other. We will need to take our egoism into account, because on one hand, we will not be able to build these bridges without it, and on the other hand, we need to raise the connection between us to the next level.
This is a very interesting level. We are all different and opposite from each other. We don’t understand each other and cannot agree with and join with each other so much so that we draw further away from each other and become strangers more and more.
See how young people today cannot connect anymore in order to marry, to raise children together, and maintain a home. Consequently, the foundations of many institutions in the world are being destroyed: villages, traditions, whatever, are actually disintegrating and crumbling.
Egoism grows continuously and the distances between us are filled with more and more water and bring us to a state where we can no longer exist in this world, especially today.
There is no longer a global integral world in which everyone is connected to each other to some extent, at least by egoistic forces. The 20th century was typified by unity between people in order to reach mutual gains in the fields of banking, commerce, politics, and international relations. But this era has passed and the state of estrangement is here again.
This is the reason that we have to learn to build the right bridges between us on top of the previous states, above the divisiveness we feel today, as it says: “love will cover all crimes,” which means the intentions against others, and thus, we should build bridges of love.
We will have to realize and understand how we can do that. What kind of connections can there be between us if each one sticks to his own views? If each one can switch his view to the view of another, what will happen then? A dictator will emerge and everyone will begin to obey him? This also cannot happen.
On the whole, the correction of the world is about taking all the gaps and the attributes each one has into account so that we can unite correctly. But how is that possible if each of us has a different view? What is more, the more developed we are, the greater the polarization between our different views, desires, understanding, and concepts.
The wisdom of Kabbalah, on the other hand, calls us to connect above our attributes, our understanding, and our concepts. How is it possible for two individuals to fulfill their needs, their goals, and operate in mutual understanding? This is a problem.
There is nothing we can do about this. We cannot understand the world that operates on two totally opposite dimensions at the same time.
On the lower level each of us is within himself, and we understand that we can come in contact with each other only above something distant and external, like different countries that maintain a relationship of “you are for me and I am for you,” and nothing more than that. But the plan of creation pushes us forward toward absolute connection.
Here we are in an increasingly growing contrast to the Creator who wants to connect us at any cost and thus pushes us toward each other in an egoistic manner. But the closer we get to each other, the more we feel like sworn enemies and that we cannot get closer. This means that the Creator constantly invokes and summons wars, conflicts, competitiveness, rivalry, etc. between us.
We see that even in our childhood and our youth, and also as adults and in old age, we cannot reach agreement on any level. Egoism grows and we become increasingly opposite from each other. Even the nations of the world feel this estrangement today and disperse in every direction.
A person doesn’t feel that he has to live among his nation, in his state, on his land, because compared to his ego, the nation, the state, and the land are lower levels. So the personal ego overcomes.
Statistically, today masses immigrate in search of new places to live. They don’t care if they live in their homeland or not, as long as the language barrier is not too great, and so they try to change their home place every way they can.
However, we are under the influence of the general force of nature, the Creator, who crushes us together no matter what, and pushes us closer and closer to each other by a force field. This is the reason that we feel increasingly worse and scared to be with each other.
Of course, we cannot connect on this level since it will bring us to another explosion. What can we do? According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, we need to build another level of bridges between us, but we need to know how to build them.
This is an attribute of Bina, which does not exist in our world. We must therefore begin to engage in creating tens in order to build within the tens the connections between us on the second floor, on the second level.
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From KabTV’s “Fundamentals of Kabbalah” 2/6/19
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Question: There are seven basic emotions that are accompanied by facial expressions: sadness, anger, contempt, disgust, fear, surprise, and joy. Charles Darwin also considered love as a basic emotion, although it has no facial expression.
How can you properly express your feelings, including love?
Answer: It depends on the character of the person. Everyone expresses emotions in their own way. Certain expressions correspond to certain types of people.
But, in principle, you don’t have to think about how to express them. You just need to be more frank with others, try to make them feel good near you, and then any of your facial expressions will be read correctly.
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From KabTV’s “Kabbalah Express” 11/6/20
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Comment: Bill Gates says that the coronavirus pandemic has taken us twenty years back, if not more. He also says another very interesting thing that does not go along with what you say at all. In a New York Times interview, “Nonetheless, Mr. Gates was optimistic that the lost ground would be recovered ‘in two to three years.’ The pipelines of money from tourism, remittances, World Bank loans and other sources would begin flowing again as soon as the whole world was vaccinated, ending the pandemic; he expected that to be accomplished by sometime in 2022.”
This means that he wants to restore the past.
My Response: Well, what can we do? He is like a small child confused with all his economic calculations. He has probably also lost quite a bit of money or perhaps the opposite, maybe he has made more money.
Comment: He is an optimist and he calms the world by saying that it is possible to return to the state we were in before, yet you are saying that the world will never be what it was before.
My Response: Never.
Comment: You don’t calm the world.
My Response: No! I tell the world, “things will be much worse for us.”
Question: Can you elaborate on that? What is so optimistic about that? Why does the world have to hear this?
Answer: They need to hear that unless people correct themselves and the relations between them, all people will feel bad. All people will feel bad! This means that we have to correct ourselves. There is nowhere you can escape to and there is no other choice. What am I saying that is so bad?
Comment: I personally don’t think there is anything bad about that, but people want to return to the world in which we flew around and went on holidays all the time and visited people.
My Response: You can fly wherever you want to, but you will not be able to restore the old world in any way.
Comment: People don’t want to erase the old world from their memory.
My Response: You know, there are movies like that in which a person leaves a certain place, abandons it, and then within two or three years everything there simply disintegrates, everything falls apart.
Question: So you believe that this is very superficial thinking and that the correct thinking is that we will not return to the past and we need to think about the future?
Answer: There is no going back! Show me even one historic event, one case in which people went back. There is no such thing. Even if they did go back after a war, after restoration, it was totally different. There were new cities and new relationships!
Comment: This is the most important thing for you, a new relationship.
My Response: It is not for me. It is the most important thing for nature and this is the reason nature puts us in such states.
Question: It isn’t about tourism, not cities, not industry, not food, nothing, only relationships?
Answer: It is about bringing a person to the state of one whole.
Question: Is this what nature wants and will attain no matter what?
Answer: Of course, and we choose the good way or the bad way.
Question: Can nature whisper to us, “Choose the good way?”
Answer: Nature constantly whispers to us, but we don’t want to hear. It constantly suggests this to us!
Question: Does this mean that we don’t hear this voice of nature?
Answer: We don’t hear it.
Comment: We hear ourselves and only shout, “Take us back. We don’t want to live like this!”
My Response: That’s the only thing we do!
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 9/21/20
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