Entries in the 'Conventions' Category

Why Doesn’t The Creator Hear Me?

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: I understand that “there is none else besides Him,” I feel His presence, and understand that it is a game. But why do I feel pain and sufferings, why am I ill?

Answer: A person has to act in the state he is in. Why are you given such states? If you were healthy, beautiful, and everything was fine, you wouldn’t be here yet.

Question: Where is the manual? I want to discover it! I don’t understand the Creator’s language!

Answer: The Creator’s language is nature; it is everything that surrounds you. Start seeing only the Creator in everything that happens.

When your children were small you arranged different games for them; you arranged the toys and tried to keep them busy somehow in different situations, so they would be doing something and keeping busy.

This is exactly what the Creator does with us, just as you thought of what to give your children and what you wanted to bring them to, so does He relate to each of us.

Solve His riddles like a wise child solves what his parents devise: Why did mother arrange the toys this way; why did she give me these pictures, why is she playing this music, why did she turn on the TV on this particular channel, etc.? There is a subtle clue in all this about the response she expects from her child.

So look for the answer to the question: “What is the response that the Creator is expecting of me to each of the states that constantly emerge?” In the question itself, look for the answers in the actual questions. Demand that He give you the answers: “What do You want from me?”

Question: I demand, but He doesn’t listen.

Answer: He doesn’t listen?! You don’t listen, since your ear is actually egoistic, your heart is egoistic; otherwise, you would hear Him.

When you want to hear not for yourself but in order to bring Him joy, you will immediately begin to hear, all your senses will open up. Instead of the five corporeal senses (sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch) the inner senses will open: Keter, Hochma, Bina, Zeir Anpin and Malchut.

But in order to do that I have to constantly worry about: “How does He feel my response? How should I respond so He will be glad? How can I do that? Does it make Him happy? Perhaps I should try it on my friends.”

You will reach the understanding that the Creator has shattered you into a billion parts on purpose, so you will be able to sharpen your senses by hate, anger, love, envy, fear, etc. towards others, and they were all created to sharpen your senses towards Him.

Start focusing yourself on working with the environment this way, in order to later turn to the Creator. But in order to do that you must first love the other: “From the love of others to the love of the Creator.” You can start working with the other, try it and see whether they hear you or not.

Thus, you will gradually attain the recognition of the importance of the group. Otherwise, you will not tune yourself like a musical instrument in order to feel the Creator.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk Day One 6/14/13, Lesson 3

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Don’t Hope, Act!

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How can I correct my ego? What should I do with the pain it causes me?

Answer: Simple, think only about how to do good unto others and rejoice at their joy. This is the only way we can transcend ourselves.

Question: But I am a human being! If I am cut it hurts. How can I think about others if I feel pain now?

Answer: Try to be in him instead of in you despite the pain. Is there any other way?

When you reach the state that you want to be in someone else instead of yourself and to feel only him and even the group, since there everything is “spread out,” and everything is selfless, and you cannot do that, the Creator will help you.

He will come to your aid, since here you are already asking for a change that you cannot perform by yourself. Then He will come and take you to the next level.

It is an anti-egoistic action. In the meantime you are not asking for it yet. When you cry out not because you feel bad in the exile on Egypt, but because you cannot bestow since you are in your ego, you will be awarded with the exit to the upper world!

However, you shouldn’t just hope for this, but act! You should clearly understand what it means to exit the ego, what the revelation of the Creator means, and what spiritual birth means.

If you want to perform anti-egoistic actions, it means that your suffering shouldn’t interest you anymore! You should only be interested in bestowal: “No matter what I feel, I cannot bestow, and that hurts. It hurts!” Then you are allowed to enter the upper world.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk Day One 6/14/13, Lesson 3

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Co-dependence

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: The time of transition from one level to another depends upon what?

Answer: The time of transition from one level to another depends only on you. Each one of us must have free choice. If I depend on others, I have no free choice.

That is, on the one hand we depend upon each other absolutely, but on the other hand, we don’t depend on anyone at all. I must tell myself that the entire group is found in an ideal state and that everything depends on me alone.

I need to consider this and clarify it in the following manner: “Everyone depends on me. But I also depend upon them. Will I be able to advance if I look at their faces? If they are friendly and inclined to be kind, then yes, and if they are not friendly, then no, so how should I behave?” Which is to say, their states and their influence on me also depends on me; I need to work on them. This is to say, I already depend on them but this depends on the degree that I can influence them myself. And here the opposite connection takes place, which also depends on you.

We can see and be convinced, that on one hand we are completely independent and free people, and on the other hand, are absolutely, mutually connected between us, and on the third hand, we can take from the others any form that we want. This means in fact, that we are always working in the presence of a group that is found in the infinite world, it’s only our ego that portrays them as we are describing them to ourselves now. Solely and only! And therefore, in order to advance, we need to “work” on them, to elevate them in our eyes. And in order to elevate them in our eyes, we must actually work.

During the process of spiritual work all questions will gradually become clearer because in order to clarify every one of them we need to create within us newer and newer sensations all the time, which we didn’t previously experience. Therefore think, clarify these questions, and in the end, they will mix together into one single whole, but this will already be a spiritual state. Then we will feel how much it is closed, complete.
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From the 2nd Preparation for the Convention in Krasnoyarsk 6/13/13

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Why Does The World’s Population Grow?

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What is the easiest way to explain to people who are far from Kabbalah that the soul is eternal and unchangeable despite the fact that the world’s population is growing?

Answer: The world’s population increases as a result of further fragmentation of the common soul. Since we are falling all the time, increasingly losing spiritual support, then egoism becomes greater. In order for us to correct it in an easier way, the particles of the soul are becoming smaller and smaller. Otherwise, we will not be able to cope with such huge egoism.

The soul is one for everyone, and we are all its particles. To the extent that we can fit together, we discover this property, this vessel, that is called the “soul.”
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From the Convention in Krasnoyarsk 6/14/13, Lesson 2

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Understanding The Friend

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Trying to feel the friend’s desire, will I be able to feel specifically that it is his desire and won’t confuse it with anything else?

Answer: I am not interested in the friend’s earthly desires. I am interested in something else since his desire is the same as mine. To achieve the spiritual goal, he needs my support and I need his. I need to think about this support.

I do not have to know his taste, what he likes to eat, drink, see, or hear. Only one thing is clear—his desire is the same as mine. He wants to achieve the same goal as I do: to reveal the upper world, to reveal himself in the eternal perfect state, in the property of bestowal. That is why I understand how I can help him, what I can give him.

If you want to understand him, understand yourself. It’s very simple. There are no excuses. It’s all so natural that you should take this as a basis and begin to act.
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From the Convention in Krasnoyarsk 6/14/13, Lesson 2

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Many States Per Second

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Can we advance faster without an inner crisis? How could we do that?

Answer: We can go through inner crises at unlimited speed, at least ten crises a minute.

Then, you will see that time expands. Perhaps, you already feel that sometimes a second lasts much longer. It is as if it stretches. You enter it and it has a volume. You actually will feel that.

So, it is possible to go through many states per second, but then again, it is serious internal work in the group. We need the friends to remind us constantly about that. When there is constant mutual support, you enter another dimension.
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From the Preparation for the Convention in Krasnoyarsk 6/13/13

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Directly Through The Friends To The Creator

Dr. Michael LaitmanThe topic of the lesson is “How do we reach the love of the Creator from the love of friends.” Our main goal and actually the only one is to reach the love of the Creator, which is the attribute of bestowal. All the other goals are only the basis for attaining the one goal and understanding it.

“Loving the attribute of bestowal” means being constantly in this attribute, wanting and yearning for this love. So how is it possible to yearn for the attribute of bestowal and to love it in the same way that we are currently subconsciously and instinctively attracted to receiving, to feel the filling inside us?

I constantly feel that something is missing. I choose the optimal, most comfortable position automatically; out of all the possible conditions, I choose to receive the maximum pleasure in life that minimizes effort. This is how we are programmed, and so our body and every cell in our body constantly work according to this principle. So how can we reach the same situation but in its opposite form, to receive pleasure from the attribute of bestowal and choose automatically how to do our best and bring Him contentment all the time?

This is possible only if I love someone very much. Then I am constantly focused only on giving him as much as possible. Just like a mother who holds her baby and thinks only about how she can give him more, constantly checking what he needs. We can observe how a mother constantly looks at her child, and all her thoughts are focused only on him. This is the attitude we should have with regard to the attribute of bestowal, to general love.

No matter how much I try to convince myself that the people around me are me, parts of my soul who are intentionally depicted to me as foreign “creatures,” I don’t perceive them as something that I need and that belongs to me. The attribute of bestowal is perceived as an unclear, abstract concept. The wisdom of Kabbalah tells us that the attribute of bestowal is formless and is not felt in itself but is revealed only with regard to someone else.

We are the carriers of this attribute! So how can we express it; how can we feel that we enjoy bestowing upon the other and that there is no other pleasure for us?

If I felt pleasure every time I bestowed upon the other, it would be much easier to bestow, then it would be to bestow in order to receive, which means that the ego is disguised, concealed receiving, and nothing would allow me to exit myself. People bestow a great deal in their life in order to receive pleasure. We constantly make a living in order to exchange the fruit of our efforts for pleasure and different fillings and comforts.

But how can I rise above that and bestow in order to bestow so that the actual action will also take place in the other and the pleasure will be felt in others and not in me, not in my ego, not in my desires, as if I have entered the other? Is that possible? No it is impossible! We cannot reach this by our nature, and in order to do so we need the intervention and the cooperation of the upper attribute of bestowal that is external to us and detached from our ego.

The upper force called Creator must help me detach from myself and start feeling the actions, the result and also the filling of the result, which is all external to me. I remain with only my Reshimot (spiritual genes), with the point in the heart. My ego will not be filled anymore and will remain empty. Only the law of the “first restriction” operates on it according to which egoistic desires cannot be filled.

This means that I have to totally give up the desire to feel pleasure inside me and to move on to the feeling of pleasure in others, to turn it to my own. I don’t want to weaken you, but a person is usually scared when he suddenly understands how far this is from our egoistic reality.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk Day Three 6/16/13, Lesson 5

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A Self-Attack Forward Together With The Group

Dr. Michael LaitmanWe were given a group in order to resemble the Creator and to live only in the pure attribute of bestowal without any movement in my direction and without looking backward at myself. In it we need to do all that, to speak about it, to get to know it, and to feel it. We have to experience this, to try all the possible options, and to find out that we cannot do that and still try. We have to grab each one “by the teeth” and not let go. Although I am indifferent to these faces and I am even repulsed by them, I want to give to them and feel my gladness, my outcome, only in them.

To this is extent they will evoke even greater hatred in me. It’s because I will feel how opposite it is from my ego: Working for someone else so that he will constantly profit, I have to enjoy his successes, his pleasures, his gladness, as I increasingly detach from myself and increasingly feel that I have to feel my gladness and my pleasure in him. Everything is for him!

It’s impossible to attain this alone. I need the examples that the friends set for me which clearly show me that they operate in the same way. We are all in an attack against ourselves, and we see the other as the object and the result of our actions of bestowal!

All our work and our attention focus on one point, on clarifying where and in whom I feel my pleasure: Is it inside me or in someone else? Do I enter the other and try to evoke pleasure in him by my actions and feel how he enjoys this and am happy and pleased about it? I have to constantly guard myself and check whether I am trying to do so.

I constantly do this work, this full inner surveillance, under pressure, and I want to feel the gladness in my friends. My gladness stems from the feeling that they feel good and that I have made them feel so. I am proud that I awaken this pleasure in them and that they are glad as a result of my intentions and my work.

I have the right to be proud since this is the attribute of bestowal. I can be glad since I didn’t do it for myself. This is what I have to do, to live in them. If I focus my work this way and constantly exit myself, enter the friends, transfer myself into them, and feel glad as my egoistic desire remains empty and all the pleasure is passed to the other, it’s called creating an external vessel, Returning Light.

Then I begin to discover the attribute of bestowal in the friends, which I actually create by myself, thus creating the Creator. It says that we create the Creator, we make Him. This means that we discover this common attribute in the efforts we make for one another. Thus, I gradually transfer all my ego from me to others, and when I am totally empty of my ego, I complete a certain measure called Seah (an ancient measure of volume).

When I complete the transfer of all the things I thought of enjoying by giving to them, by bringing them pleasure, and feel my pleasure in them, I enjoy this, as it says: “in Him our heart shall rejoice.” At the end of this process I begin to feel the first spiritual level, in them, in my friends, inside them, adhesion with the attribute of bestowal that was finally created in the measure that I have given. I feel the integral attribute of bestowal that was collected by all my attempts.

There are ten major attempts, although we cannot differentiate them and count them. On the whole they are divided into tens and even hundreds of other efforts, as a result of which I begin to feel the collective attribute of bestowal that I have evoked, when it becomes a single attribute that begins to exist independently: It is called “Creator.”

Of course, this attribute also existed before, we receive the understanding from the Creator that this attribute created us with our ego, so that now you will collect it and work on it and transfer yourself into others, and thus discover your spiritual vessels and leave your ego empty, restricted under the “first restriction.”

The attribute is called “Creator,” and so it says: “from the love of the created being to the love of Creator.” The method is in this whole explanation.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk 6/16/13, Lesson 5

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Dr. Michael LaitmanThere is nothing but giving yourself to the friends and finding the general attribute of bestowal or the Creator in what you have given. But you discover a new dimension, a new world in this attribute, the upper world that is based on the attribute of bestowal and therefore it’s not temporary but eternal, constantly developing and infinite. You feel that you are in this eternal world.

If it all ended here, we would remain in this eternal state and in fact feel detached from our body. After all, the body, which means our desire, would remain totally empty. We don’t identify with anything else but the desire, so people who feel total emptiness in this world commit suicide, since they don’t feel that there is any reason to go on.

But the point is that this is only a very small part of our ego compared to that. The Creator, the force of bestowal, wants us to fully attain Him, and so He immediately adds a new ego of a totally different type. This isn’t the corporeal ego anymore, like on the first level from which we had to rise, but a spiritual ego called a “shell.” In it we already begin to receive serious spiritual interruptions.

In this ego we begin to feel the negative spiritual world. It’s the real egoistic world on which we will have to work again, like in the past, with the friends. But among them I already understand (forget and then remember again) how I should fulfill myself according to the exact principle of the first level. But now my desires are much more egoistic. I begin to see them more deeply and understand my negative and positive attributes more deeply.

This means that the struggle becomes essentially different, but I have to act according to the same principle: to transfer myself into the friends, to feel myself in them, to be glad in them, and to totally cover myself from the implications of my good deeds of any kind. I must constantly invest only in them.

The feeling that they are my soul, which I have attained on the first level, disappears and once again I think, “Why on earth do these people who are so distant from me, and who irritate me, have to be part of my soul?” On the first level I was simply indifferent to them and they even seemed pleasant, but now I begin to hate them. Their actions and their words seem repulsive; their words seem a total lie and their actions seem proud. Everything that they do is a kind of performance.

In other words, new gigantic, very serious, deep and real interruptions come along, which are absolutely justified by my rational thinking. It’s much more difficult for me than it was on the first level which now seems like child’s play. Then we simply played together and now it’s as if they are transparent: I see their dishonesty, their pride, their terrible ego. Despite all this I have to rise, which means to find certain opportunities to act for their sake, to feel joy that I do something for them, for their success and their pleasures.

I have to see my success only in seeing them fulfilled, by me or by others. It doesn’t even matter who fills them as long as they are fulfilled. If on the first level I was glad that I fulfilled them and that I somehow managed to connect this to me, now it isn’t so anymore! I can work through others and thus fill the friends in a concealed way, as long as they feel good. This means that I feel that I am more detached from the outcomes of my work and that it isn’t so important for me anymore. The main thing is that they will enjoy and be full.

They can look at me with disrespect, not want to be connected to me, or think that I am an egoist and not advance, but I don’t care, as long as they feel good. Imagine how many mutual interruptions there are here, with regard to me and to them. The Creator plays with a person in an amazing way. But if a person can close his eyes tightly and not look into his ego, into his heart and mind, and act like a blind man, despite everything, he wins.

This is called “faith above reason,” which means that I tell the Creator: “I accept your game! You are laughing at me, but I accept the rules of the game and am playing against you.” It turns out that my opponent is the Creator! Or it’s my ego, which is the same thing, since “there is none else besides Him.” He is the only one who plays with me and fixes all these dirty tricks.

I have to hold on to the main point that is determined by whom I enjoy in: in others or in myself. Thus, gradually, we discover the Creator by working with the friends in the group.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk 6/16/13, Lesson 5

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Dr. Michael LaitmanIf we continue with the explanation of how a person reaches the Creator through the friends, then in fact those words are repeated, because we don’t have that many words to express these actions. This is even though they differ greatly in quality and diversity. Such a wide range of emotions that don’t exist in our world are opened, so our dictionary is not prepared to convey them.

During our ascent, we pass through 125 levels, an infinite number of small states. All of the states are absolutely different emotions but are expressed by the same word: for example, “happiness,” “disappointment,” “anger,” “insult,” and “jealousy.” It’s possible to count several dozen words of this type, but they are all identical, beginning from the smallest step to the greatest step. Therefore the Kabbalists rank everything by number: The depth of the desire to receive (density), the height of levels of attainment, and in this manner they understand what is being said.

If I express a spiritual coordinate, then another Kabbalist knows what I am talking about, because he recreates this within himself. This is precisely the way one musician says some note to another musician, and this note plays within him. For a regular person who didn’t study music, this note doesn’t say anything; whereas, the musician hears it within himself and understands. That is also the way that Kabbalists understand the language of Kabbalah.

I hope that in the near future, instead of expressing emotions in words, we will express them together with you through Kabbalistic terms, and we will transmit them to each other in a form like this, feeling them simultaneously. We will be united by our sensations and discover the emotions within this unity.

In our world something like this doesn’t exist. It only seems to us as if we feel each other, but in fact we don’t enter into one another because we don’t have the characteristic of bestowal. We simply more or less react appropriately and feel a similar picture because we were created as similar animals. But we are not prepared to compare our comprehensions and certainly we are not prepared to connect with our sensations and emotions.

But when we connect with the characteristic of bestowal, then an amazing phenomenon takes place: We no longer feel within us but within our shared unity. There the same symphony is played for everyone! By being united within it, we feel the emotions of all the listeners, even though, at the same time, each one is feeling this within himself. We still cannot understand this “duality” of spiritual comprehension now, but it’s like this.

In conclusion, without the group it’s not possible to realize any spiritual movement. And a group doesn’t mean that we are just found physically in one location. A group is those people who share a realization of what I am now trying to explain to you. Therefore, Kabbalists dedicate so much time and attention to creating the group.
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From the Convention In Krasnoyarsk Day Three 6/16/13, Lesson 5

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