Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Why do people pretend their lives are perfect on social media?“

We want to feel proud and better than other people, that they will envy us.

Our egoistic human nature prioritizes self-benefit over benefiting others, making us want to see ourselves in a better position than others. We thus want to show others that we are special and worthy of respect, and we see what lengths we go to for respect.

When our desires developed beyond mere survival necessities for food, sex and family, we then started comparing ourselves to each other, sizing up what we have compared to what others have. Then, our social desires for money, respect, control and knowledge developed.

The desire for respect becomes a major problem as it is behind much conflict in the world. Whether it is a person’s own pride or the pride of one group or nation pitted against others—where that person, group or nation wants more on their side and less or even nothing for the other side—then it becomes clear how our desire for respect, honor and pride brings about so much conflict.

While we can identify the problems that come with this desire, what we need is not to try and make it smaller or eliminate it in any way, but to redirect it, i.e. to change what we respect. When society values people solely according to their contribution to society, we will then necessarily strive to think and to act in favor of society. If we get rid of the awards that we give for individual excellence, and instead respect each other for our concern that we express toward society, then we will want to win the respect of society by wanting to do good to each other.

We will then gradually come to feel that expressing altruism or unselfishness toward one another is a special and sublime value in and of itself, regardless of the respect that we receive from such an inclination. In doing so, we will find that altruism is a source of perfect and unbounded fulfillment. Moreover, we will find that such an attitude is nature’s comprehensive law, which controls and sustains us.

Based on the videos “Why Do People Pretend Their Lives Are Perfect on Social Media?” and “The Needed Shift in Human Consciousness” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.
Photo by Josh Rose on Unsplash.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What are your thoughts on those who aspire to be perfect?“

Perfection differs for everybody. For one person, Schwarzenegger represents perfection, while for another, Einstein does it for them, and of course, the list goes on and on for more and more people. It is all subjective. There is no perfection in this world.

According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, perfection is something else entirely: that we reach a state of completing our place in humanity. In other words, when we become immersed in an inclination to support everyone as much as possible in order to bring humanity to its completion, then we can be considered perfect.

We then experience perfection because our desire to bring humanity to perfection aligns with the perfect quality of the upper force: one of absolute bestowal, with no shred of reception laced within. We then become partners with the upper force in achieving the same aspiration. Also, we attain perfection through our connection and annulment to the upper force, which then starts acting through us.

Behind our every desire for perfection, whether we want to be the next Schwarzenegger, Einstein, or whoever else we might picture to ourselves, or whether we simply want to have what we imagine as a perfect life for ourselves and our families, there is a deeper desire at play: a desire to experience the perfection of adhesion with the upper force.

We ourselves can never be perfect, but we can adhere ourselves to a perfect force, and perform perfect acts through what we request from that force. Through our intentions and requests to adhere ourselves to the perfection of the upper force, we can also merit becoming perfect. The upper force performs the perfect acts, but we invite and request them in order to benefit humanity.

Based on the video “Is it Realistic to Aspire for Perfection?” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman and Oren Levi. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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My new article on Linkedin “Time for the Next Impact”

In the first wave, Israel went into a strict lockdown. It was nothing like the curfew that we see in China, but still, businesses were closed and people’s movements were heavily restricted. In the second wave, the lockdown was not as strict, not all businesses were closed, and people’s movements were restricted less than in the first. The third wave was even more lenient, and so on. Now that we are at the beginning of the sixth wave, no one is paying attention. People, even those in charge of coping with the pandemic, have come to treat Covid as another type of flu.

It is not as though the virus had no impact on humanity, because it did. However, for the time being, it seems as though it did what it came to do and it is time to move on to the next phenomenon that will bring about the next change in humanity.

Speaking of which, I think that the next phase will have a bigger impact on our feelings than on our bodies. It will impel us to draw closer to each other emotionally as a means to protect ourselves against illness. It will somehow be combined with human relations and will be less about physical closeness and more about emotional, internal closeness. This phase will force us to examine how we relate to one another, and how that relation influences us—positively or negatively.

It is still not clear to me how this phase will manifest, but I do hope that we will see it in the near future.

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Medium published my new article “Understanding Social Impact”

Humans are social beings; this is how nature created us. As such, the society we live in has a decisive influence on us. We already know about mirror neurons and other mechanisms of social influence, but there are other forms of social influence, as well.

For example, there is the idea that all people are six or fewer social connections away from each other, aka six degrees of separation. Yet, this is true not only of familiarity, but of every aspect. Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler write in their celebrated book Connected: The Surprising Power of Our Social Networks and How They Shape Our Lives — How Your Friends’ Friends’ Friends Affect Everything You Feel, Think, and Do, that good behaviors — like quitting smoking or staying slender or being happy — pass from friend to friend almost as if they were contagious viruses.

Even more surprising was their discovery that these infections can “jump” across connections. It turns out that people can influence each other even if they have never met or even heard of one another. Moreover, Christakis and Fowler found evidence of these effects even three degrees apart (friend of a friend of a friend).

Since we are all connected, we are all affecting one another. Everything we do, say, or think, inescapably affects everyone else.

Moreover, we already know that the entire planet is one ecosystem, and any change in any part of it affects all the other parts. As a result, any change in human society affects not only all of humanity, but the entire planet. And the opposite is true, as well: Any change in any part of nature, on any level, affects all other parts of nature, including all of humanity.

Even if we are unaware of it, we feel our connectedness. This is why wherever we are, we want to “fit in.” To feel secure, that we belong, and to guarantee that the environment accepts us, we adapt ourselves to the social norms and values around us. If we do want to stand out, we first check what the society around us appreciates, and then try to stand out in these activities or values.

Even the most negative values in our eyes today can seem perfectly acceptable and even desirable in the eyes of others, or even in our own eyes at different times and different circumstances. The Nazis, who perpetrated the extermination of European Jewry, were not born genocidal; their values changed as their social environment had changed and molded them into what they eventually became.

The same process took place during the notorious 1971 Stanford Prison Experiment, where volunteers were chosen after assessments of psychological stability, and then randomly assigned to being prisoners or prison guards. The plan was for the experiment to last two weeks, after which the results would be examined. Instead, the volunteers selected to be guards quickly became so brutal and abusive that the experiment had to be terminated on the sixth day.

Because the environment has such a critical effect on people, we should dedicate the majority of our efforts into creating a positive social environment, which creates socially positive people. With narcissism constantly on the rise, and with people’s self-absorption running amok, the global society is heading toward a very negative place.

We cannot influence every person, but we can influence the social environment that we create around us. We can monitor the media we consume, the people we hang out with, and the people that our children hang out with. We can also select the educational programs where we place our children, and the values we live by at home.

The reason for the growing frustration and depression in all parts of society is that we are trying to succeed alone. If we realized that we are all dependent on each other, and began to work on bettering our social environment, we would be in a completely different place, both personally and socially.

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Question: What is reward and punishment from the point of view of the wisdom of Kabbalah?

Answer: From the point of view of the program of creation the yearning of a person to be similar to the Creator is a reward. And in the place where he is unable to mobilize himself for this, he should see punishment.

In other words, if a person is given the opportunity to become similar to the Creator, and he uses it, then the work itself becomes a reward for him. And vice versa.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 5/31/22

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Question: Why does a person always measure himself in relation to others? What is the reason for this perception?

Answer: We do not perceive anything otherwise! We came out of the caves. And everything that is above the most necessary level, we always measure relative to others.

If I have a house, a cow, a dog, a vegetable garden, I live and see only such a world as mine, then I see how much I am not worse than others. And if it’s better, then I’m already a big man, rich, noble. That’s how I measure myself.

If everyone has a car, a green lawn, and so on, then I also want to be no worse. And if there is also a yacht, then I am already comparing who has the bigger one, the oligarch or me. The little man looks at everything only like that. How can he have any absolute measurements?
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Branch of Sakura” 5/15/11

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Question: It is written in the Torah that those who are engaged in spiritual development go toward the Creator and want to reveal Him are above the stars and signs of good luck. What does it mean?

Answer: If we study Kabbalah, meaning the upper laws of the world, and invite them to influence us for the better, then by this we, in fact, determine our good future. Therefore, the Torah advises us to act this way.

Question: What does it mean that a person is above the signs of good luck?

Answer: This means that in our world we would be following one current, and by practicing Kabbalah, we invite upon ourselves upper, good forces that influence us, and we rise to better forces, higher than those that usually influence us. In this way we invite upon ourselves the forces of luck.

Question: Can we say that if I simply go with the flow of life, this is called fate, but if I invite upon myself upper forces, this is already luck? That is, I am becoming higher than the program assigned to me.

Answer: Yes. This is basically what happens. Fate is the path that you would have taken if you had not used the forces of luck. And if you use them, it is no longer fate, but your decision, your conscious development.
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From KabTV’s “Spiritual States” 5/24/22

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Question: Why are there two kinds of egoists in nature: egoists as such and egoistic altruists?

Answer: They are not altruists. In a sense, they feel like they are in the place of those people who are suffering and they admit that such a thing may happen to them. A person passes everything through himself, otherwise he does not feel.

There are people who feel suffering far away from themselves and they rejoice that the other feels bad. And there are people who feel that this can happen to them and they sympathize with the other because they can also feel bad.

Question: Why is there such a division in nature?

Answer: Because this is a quality of egoism, and egoism is our nature. There is not a single person who would not care at all about what is happening somewhere. But there are people who feel it closer to themselves and there are people who feel it further away from themselves.

We must try to fight both of those things. After all, if the world is global, and we ourselves are not close to globalism, then we oppose nature.

We still have no idea how much nature can change and suddenly manifest itself in different forms. If it needs to hit someone, then he will receive blows no matter how well he hides and where he is.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Branch of Sakura” 5/15/11

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Comment: Many journalists called founding the WikiLeaks website a new step in the development of humanity. People no longer trust the rulers.

In addition, the most secret materials, such as a one-on-one conversation between the presidents under lock and key, are now becoming public. This also tends to suggests that it is impossible to hide anything nowadays, everything is open.

My Response: Of course. I am very glad that such opportunities are being uncovered on the Internet and in general in humanity.

The main thing is that humanity feels even more connected, even more transparent, even more united, that people get to know each other and those who, so to speak, control them even more. They see who they are and what they are. The fact that the cards are being disclosed is good.

I think this is a giant leap toward becoming more open with each other and are not hiding behind fake diplomacy, which only separates people and leaves them an external, dry diplomatic form that sounds like mockery or blasphemy.

Diplomacy should be heartfelt. It should be conducted in such a way that we can always agree and not confront each other and think about our own benefits.

There is no such thing as my own benefit in the world today! If I harm someone, it means that in the end it will harm me, and even to the greater extent.

Therefore, the disclosure of WikiLeaks and of all classified documents is a big step forward.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Europe Today” 1/26/11

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