Question: What is money? What is striving toward a goal? How can one change habits? What does Kabbalah say about this?
Answer: It is very simple. Money (Kesef) is a covering. “Kesef” comes from the word “Kisuf,” which means covering, that is, a covering over my desires.
Money is not just paper or something stored in a bank. If I can cover my desires and aspirations for what I want with a screen, it is considered that I pay for my desires. Through this covering, I can rise above them from the desire to receive to the desire to bestow, and thereby achieve any fulfillment according to the strength of my desire.
Question: With money, I can satisfy my desires. But what does it mean to cover desires with a screen?
Answer: To cover means that a desire is truly fulfilled only by its covering, which is the transformation of the intention behind the desire from oneself to others.
If we want to earn correctly, to truly earn life, then we need to understand what money is, what covering means, and what the transformation of intention is. It is about a screen that covers egoistic desires and transforms them into altruistic ones, and in this altruistic light, we begin to receive upper fulfillments. This is true wealth.
Question: Do a person’s thoughts shape their life?
Answer: In general, yes.
Question: What are thoughts, and how can one change the course of thoughts to shape and improve life?
Answer: A person’s thoughts shape their life, meaning their attitude toward who they are, what they are, what surrounds them, and their purpose. All of these are called their thoughts.
One must answer questions such as: “Why do I exist? What is happening to me? How will my life end?” Initially, these questions may arise purely in an egoistic form, but one must start answering them. They must understand that if they focus only on satisfying their egoism, they will end up in portions and eventually finish the same way. And then what? Until they die. Because our physiological, animalistic body defines our life.
If I want to rise to the next level, to exist not in the animalistic body, but in the spiritual one, I need to rise and begin to exist according to entirely different values, not to fill my physical body and see that as the purpose of life, but to fill myself with qualities of bestowal and love, qualities that resemble the Creator. This is a completely different value system.
Here, a person faces a significant challenge. It feels as if they are in a vast field meant for them to explore asking why, for what purpose, and how to break away from past values, from wealth, money, notions of happiness, and egoistic success. They must begin to reposition themselves entirely differently regarding their existence.
Question: “We are slaves to our habits. Change your habits, and your life will change.” But what should we change them to?
Answer: They need to be replaced with some kind of spiritual actions and relationships. First, I must study them, understand where they come from, how they form, and how I can make these changes.
Question: What are truly good habits for a person?
Answer: There are no good habits. A habit, by its nature, cannot be good. Habits are always bad.
What can be good is when we rise from one positive action to an even greater positive action. But that is not a habit; it goes against our habits. This requires great effort and work on oneself.
Question: But for this, we need to have a distant goal to consistently overcome our habits, right?
Answer: Yes. In addition to having a distant goal, you also need a small group in which you can implement this.
Comment: “The main obstacles in life are self-doubt and fear. Our doubts paralyze us.”
My Response: Our doubts and fears drive us forward, and these are very good qualities of our nature.
Without doubts and fears, we would not move anywhere. We would dig into our current situation trying to minimize the feeling of evil and barely experience any good just to avoid triggering doubts and fears.
Let doubts and fears arise! Let them push and pressure us forward!
If I am in the right environment, all my doubts and fears will be directed correctly in my interactions with that environment, and together we will move forward. Nothing in nature is created in vain! Under no circumstances should we diminish, suppress, or erase anything!
Comment: “Goals should be clear, simple, and written down.”
My Response: A person who is truly developing has no clarity. They are constantly in turmoil and engaged in clarifications. As soon as they resolve something, new turmoil immediately arises.
A true human being is constantly in a state of turmoil and clarification, turmoil and clarification. Greater and greater desires, doubts, and thoughts arise in them. They continually ask themselves: “How can I truly find the purpose of life? What is worth living for?”
Comment: In one of your talks, you drew a coordinate system where a person moves along a sinusoid line, progressing toward the goal through increasing ruptures. I shared this example with a friend, and she said: “So do we have to hit rock bottom to rise again?”
My Response: Yes, of course! Even the greatest Kabbalists, before reaching complete correction, find themselves at the lowest point! Absolutely!
Question: What lifts a person from this rock bottom?
Answer: The environment and the upper light that one receives through it.
Comment: And here is one of the latest quotes: “Find the courage to go against the flow and get rich.”
My Response: This means going against egoism. It is possible. But keep in mind that you are weak, that you cannot do it alone! There is no need to fight stubbornly and go against everything if you are on your own.
You must build a system that will help you reach the goal. It should be a system within a group of like-minded people who have a clear goal. Only together, by constantly strengthening their connection, can they achieve the goal.
Comment: To conclude: “Poor, unlucky, unhappy, and unhealthy is the person who often uses the word ‘tomorrow’.”
My Response: Yes, of course. We have no right to postpone anything until tomorrow.
But that is not the only issue. Weakness is not just about procrastination. Weakness is in closing your eyes and refusing to connect with others.
To delay until tomorrow or not? The problem lies in this: all human actions depend on their interaction with others. If a person is in the right environment, they will not postpone anything until tomorrow. They will not even delay today, they will act immediately. The environment will compel them to move.
The most important thing is to establish the right connection with the right environment. There must be a group. Only then will they progress. The group determines everything. Find the right group, and you will find happiness.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 6/3/19
Related Material:
Reward And Punishment In Our Lives, Part 4
Money: Past, Present, Future
Happiness For Money?
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How do I study the actions of the Creator? I imitate them like an infant. I observe what the Creator does.
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