Audio Version Of The Blog – 7/4/22
Posted on July 4th, 2022
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From My Facebook Page Michael Laitman 7/4/22
The struggling U.S. economy is spoiling Independence Day celebrations this year. The traditional barbecue is getting much more expensive and traveling by car is becoming a luxury due to record-high gasoline prices which have risen nearly 56% over last year.
No wonder the vacation spirit is dampened. Americans are cutting back on spending as inflation in the U.S. hits a new 40-year high. According to official data, consumer prices rose 8.6% last month compared to 12 months earlier. The U.S. economy contracted 1.6% in the first quarter of 2022, and the capital market closed its worst six months in at least 50 years.
On one hand, the economy always fluctuates between ups and downs. On the other hand, Americans today can no longer live in the same conditions they once did. They accept many immigrants into the country and run many programs that their financial system cannot support.
I am not an economist and certainly do not have the grasp over the American economy that the experts do, but it seems that America is not taking all the global data into consideration.
The situation is more complex than being just an economic problem. The economy itself reflects the way that people relate to one another, and these relationships need care and correction. It is a mistake to think that the world will be able to operate on a “business as usual” basis, because it is the quality of the interconnections between people that stabilize social and economic systems.
Americans continue to behave as they have always done, however, they are gaining less and less, or even losing ground because they fail to take into account that people are continually changing, that human society is changing, and that it is imperative to adjust and improve relations accordingly: social development must be adapted to the laws of the interdependent global world, otherwise America will continue to fall further and further behind.
While the U.S. economy is still more important and larger than that of China and the rest of the world, if America loses power significantly, it will affect the whole world. At that point all of us will finally understand that we are locked into an integral system, an interdependent system. When each nation and individual within the nation clearly sees that harm to another either directly or indirectly harms itself, we will be alert and ready to communicate and cooperate properly with one another.
It is still possible for America to lead humanity on the right path. The country is no longer as strong as it appears either to itself or the world–because strong is a country that knows how to control itself by considering and balancing the needs of everyone, and Americans still lack this skill–but America is still considered an important nation.
May the 246th Independence Day reveal to America its close ties with other nations and peoples. Independence describes not only the state of a free and liberated nation that has an independent government and is not under foreign rule, rather, independence is a state in which the nation itself can determine and choose what to do next to strengthen its relations with the other countries–it describes an ability to perceive its interdependence. For it is only within close relations between countries that prosperity and flourishing will prevail.
In the global world where every nation is connected to another, the time for old notions of the independence of individual nations has ended. We see this today with Russia, and soon we will see it with China. If America will learn to connect with the rest of the world in good relations, it will be broadly successful. It will be able to set positive laws in society that will be passed on to everyone, and it will gradually recover from its socioeconomic problems. Happy independence, America!
Medium published my new article “Why Have More Americans Stopped Looking for God?”
Belief in God is a strong sign of the perseverance of American religiosity over the years. But a new study found that faith in God has plummeted to 81%, an unprecedented low since 2017 when that percentage was six points higher. How can this significant change be interpreted?
The study conducted by Gallup (a company with vast databases from 1944 that allows it to track the processes of change in America) showed that belief in God faded mainly among the young American population, while among married people, adults, women and those who did not attend college, belief in God was higher. The most notable differences were in political ideology: 72% of Democrats said they believed in God, compared to 92% of Republicans.
Why do liberals believe less and Republicans more? It all depends on education and the impact of one’s environment. Why do adults believe more than young people? Because they have been accustomed to it from early childhood; and why are those who are married more stable in their belief in a higher power? Because believing in God helps them, shields them from volatility, which is good and gives them stability to family life.
If churches and synagogues were once a center of pilgrimage for Americans, today, a multitude of new and challenging worlds can be discovered from anywhere at the push of a button. That seems to be more interesting than an abstract supreme divine power. Nowadays confusion is celebrated and the mind spins.
The biggest question is what is the main cause of fading faith in God among Americans? And the answer lies strongly in social influences from the likes of Elon Musk and his technological initiatives to Mark Zuckerberg and his popular social networks. Every week pours in new innovations and inventions as fruits of the labor of international entrepreneurs and network influencers who revolve around public opinion. Every day sensational news stories fill our eyes, fake or real doesn’t even matter. Every moment is filled with flashes of something to capture our attention. Where is the time to even ponder God and eternity?
If God is somewhere in heaven and we are here, what connection can there be between us, and why should we relate to Him? If once the public used to read the week’s Torah portion or flip through the pages of the Bible, today who has time for that in our crowded schedule? It is more convenient, accessible and fun to surf the web and get instant responses, isn’t it?
If a person does not need God and does not feel the lack of Him, then he or she does not think of Him at all. Only when a person suffers greatly, whether from a serious illness, old age, or any other great suffering, does one begin to even wonder or ask who really runs the world.
In times of distress, even the most secular people find themselves pondering the Upper Force. If death had not peeked around the corner, human beings would not have thought to raise their head and look. By nature, we would prefer to immerse ourselves in the materiality that the world around us has cultivated, to flow with the earthly and familiar, not to hang on to the heavenly and the unknown.
Today’s God is expressed and shaped by the aspirations and dreams in which our lives hang, our future and hopes. The Creator does not describe some supernatural being distant and detached, but rather the next degree to which we must reach in our aspiration to discover a higher knowledge. The Creator is the attribute of love and giving. We are the opposite of this trait, separated from each other, and concentrated in egoistic self-interest, and therefore, we perceive the material world for all its “idols.” But if we make an effort to care for each other, we reveal a positive force, the Supreme Force between us.
The Hebrew word “Creator” (Bo-reh) consists of the words “Come” and “See,” which is a personal invitation to come and experience the spiritual world, to discover the Creator within us. The choice is ours.
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Question: How is the brain able to translate such an avalanche of frequencies that it perceives with various senses: frequencies of light, sound frequencies, our specific perceptions of the world? How do we produce this avalanche from the general flow of information?
Answer: All our senses are only conductors, nothing more. These are nerve endings that are supposedly involved and carry out some kind of influence inside. In fact, they get nothing from the outside.
Such innervation is given to us so that we feel ourselves and create this picture within ourselves. In practice, we are the final recipients of information that we receive from outside. This information exists all around us. And everyone forms a picture out of it within himself.
This picture is allegedly created by our eyes, ears, with our five senses. In fact, it is created from the information that we receive. We depict a picture of the world within us.
It seems to us that this world is outside, and supposedly our senses receive all the information from outside. This is such a deceiving thing. In the future, humanity will reveal this in full.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Hologram” 7/28/11
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Question: Why is a country like Thailand, which appears to be inhabited by people with very little selfishness, constantly being attacked by nature?
Answer: This is a very difficult topic that is completely incomprehensible to us because it has to do with the origins of souls.
The fact is that there are connections between souls that are intertwined from ancient Babylon, from where all human civilization originated. Therefore, from the current geography we cannot say what is happening at all. The poor Thais or unfortunate Japanese, who are they actually? What relation do they have to all of humanity, to egoism, to suffering?
We do not understand this. But according to the law of the general spiritual desire, the so-called vessel, the most subtle, most receptive parts are first to receive blows.
Basically, where do I feel physical pain? Actually in my head, although it seems that I feel it in my leg. But if you disconnect the leg from the head, then the leg will not feel this pain because it is felt precisely because it passes through the brain.
There is such an internal connection between us that if something we think of as good happens in one part of the world, then something bad can result in another part and vice versa, or these parts are somehow divided among themselves.
This is similar to the way a fetus grows in the mother and how completely different parts of its body develop seemingly without any connection with each other. In fact, it occurs according to a strict internal program, but we simply do not know it.
However, it can be revealed, but for this you need to know exactly the map of the soul, its parts, and their interconnections. And that is the entire world.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Branch of Sakura” 5/15/11
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Comment: Today there are many theories and studies that say that we are not the only civilization in the universe, that there were more advanced civilizations.
My Response: This calms us down when we begin to think: “What will happen after us? Will there be dinosaurs again or something else?”
I cannot imagine the reverse development because it is always moving forward. It cannot turn back in any way, this does not happen in nature.
Even if we throw ourselves back as a result of wars or some natural disasters, this nevertheless is not a throwback. Egoism is constantly developing.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. The Future of Humanity” 7/17/11
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In Kabbalah, the effort of a person is his personal aspiration to the Creator. If it is made on the background of contradictions and rejection, then this effort is directed toward the Creator.
If it passes through a group, through a person’s laziness, if it is built in accordance with the instructions of the Kabbalists, then in the end, obviously, it is correct, and this is felt in the way you fulfill it, realize it.
And if there is no resistance of the body, then there is no spiritual action, because such an action is directed against egoism, bounces off it, rises above it, and is carried out in spite of it.
But what does “against it” mean? Can we do this? We can if we raise the importance of altruistic action above the egoistic, that is, we will work in a group of like-minded people and then gradually we will receive from them the importance of actions that are completely unusual for us.
But then, if we understand it well, we will realize that these actions were egoistic too. We just picked them up from the group, from the environment, like a soldier who runs into battle because everyone around him acts like that and infects him with their desire.
However, this is not yet a spiritual action. Another one is built above it when you begin to realize that this action must be directed toward the Creator. But you do not see and do not understand its meaning. Then you start asking for strength to fulfill it.
You do not want anything, only that the idea of the importance of the Creator would be so strong in your feelings that all other actions of this world would fade before it. You cannot give this action any real justification, but it is the yearning for it outside of yourself, from yourself, that leads to an understanding of what spiritual reality is.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Against One’s Will” 11/3/09
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Comment: In 1982, Alain Aspect conducted quantum mechanics experiments that led to validate quantum entanglement. Scientists have discovered that under certain conditions, elementary particles, for example, electrons, are able to communicate with each other instantly, regardless of the distance between them. It does not matter if it is 10 feet between them or 10 billion miles, each particle always knows what the other is doing.
This discovery violates Einstein’s postulate that the limiting value of propagation speed of interaction is equal to the speed of light, and therefore repels some scientists and inspires others to even more radical explanations.
For example, David Bohm, a physicist at the University of London, believes that this discovery suggests that objective reality does not exist, and despite the obvious density, the universe is basically a giant, luxuriously detailed hologram.
My Response: The universe is much more complex than a hologram. There is indeed an instantaneous connection between all its parts. We are in a volume that is absolutely rigidly connected between all its smallest particles, forces, and information fields. None of them is free from instantaneous impact on other particles and from their influence on it.
In fact, our universe is an analog system in which everything instantly connects to each other. Instantly! If something is done in one part, in another, in third and fourth, meaning there is some kind of shift, a change of one millimeter, one milligram, one unit, it instantly causes a change in the entire universe. This is how we are arranged. This is the world we live in.
However, people perceive information differently. With our lagging induction qualities, it takes a long time while all this spreads within us, is recognized, and passes a period of adaptation. Our perception of the universe is not what the universe itself is.
Therefore, here we can talk about two things: about what really exists, and about how a person perceives what is happening through his five corporeal sensory organs or with the help of tools that slightly expand the range of his sensations.
That is, we are talking about the fact that there is an objective reality and how subjectively it is perceived in us as it passes through our filters.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Hologram” 7/28/11
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Preparation to the Lesson
| [media 1] | [media 2] |
Lesson on the Topic “Mingling, Inclusion”
| [media 3] | [media 4] |
Writings of Baal HaSulam, “The Love of God and the Love of Man”
| [media 5] | [media 6] |
Selected Excerpts
| [media 7] | [media 8] |
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