In the News (ipso.com): “Ipsos’ What Worries the World survey tracks public opinion on the most important social and political issues across 28 countries today, drawing on 10 years of data to place the latest scores in context. This global summary report presents the top concerns around the world… .

“At a global level, over one third (36%) on average say that Covid-19 is one of the top issues facing their country, level with June, which saw a 6-point decrease vs. the month before. Unemployment is the second biggest issue across all countries at 32%, followed by Poverty & social inequality (31%), Financial/political corruption (30%) and Crime & violence (26%).”

Question: Education is not the main problem. Why do you keep saying that this is a problem?

Answer: It is the most important and only problem. People don’t understand that our upbringing will change the world. Change in the world is in the change of a person.

Question: But people have children, they see what is happening around them. Why does it not enter their consciousness?

Answer: Because it is against our egoism.

Question: For our egoism, the pandemic, poverty, and social inequality are the problem? Something that concerns only me?

Answer: Only me and I don’t care about anything else, just my own skin.

Question: How do you want to lead humanity to some kind of change?

Answer: It’s very simple, on one hand we just need to show that this is the only problem that separates us from happiness. That’s all. If we change, the world will change and everything will change: this virus will go away, and all other problems. Everything will go away.

Otherwise, there will be a long path of suffering, which will still teach us that we need to change ourselves. Changing a person is the key to changing the world. There is no escape. This is a long way of suffering until we realize it.

Question: And what will happen to a person as a result of suffering on this long journey?

Answer: He begins to realize exactly the cause of his bad state. He realizes that his egoism, his bad attitude toward others is the cause of all the problems of the world.

Question: Are you sure that as a result of suffering, a person will understand this? As a result of great suffering.

Answer: Yes, but it’s a long way.

Question: Do you think that a person will not hear now, on his own?

Answer: Some part will hear. It seems to me that today it is already possible to create such societies, such circles that would live by the fact that changing a person is the basis for changing the world.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 7/1/21

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Question: “What to do when your children fall below the base and do not want to ascend spiritually but continue to chase the golden calf? They say: ‘Do not teach us how to live better, help us financially.’ I want to hear Laitman’s answer, not in general, but specifically, in essence. Thank you in advance. Raya”

Answer: Dear Raya. If your children have grown up so that they are chasing the golden calf, then you should help them in some way to enter this field.

The rest is God’s will. You do not have to fully participate in this, but you must give them an initial push, you must help them at the beginning, as they are your children. It is written: “One learns specifically where one’s heart desires.”

If they really have an aspiration for something, help them a little, not hundred percent, but help normally, so to speak, push them forward. But no more than that.

Question: So I should not load them with the pursuit of spirituality? I shouldn’t tell them: “You are not looking for spirituality, you are only looking for the material. What are you doing?!”

Answer: No.

I looked at my teacher’s family and saw how calm he was about it. There were many children and many grandchildren there. He always used to let them do whatever they wanted, move out, separate, have children. This is their business. If they want to, they will be interested in life, the source of life, the purpose of life. If they do not want to, that is their business.

Question: Does that mean to let them go? Help them in whatever they want, and let them go?

Answer: Yes.

My daughter also wanted to go to a certain university, please, go. The second to a different university, no problem. The son wanted a certain direction, please. That is it. In whatever I could, I pushed them forward.
[285975]
From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 7/8/21

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Comment: The world has now become a world of clips; people watch clips, listen to audio books, and read less.

But according the World Literacy Foundation: “Reading is found to decrease blood pressure, lower heart rate, and reduce stress to significant degrees. According to a 2009 study at the University of Sussex, stress is reduced up to 68% just by reading! Only six minutes of reading can slow down the heart rate and improve overall health! It calms the mind and relaxes the body. This will not only help prevent potential conditions caused by stress, but will also set a person up with a clearer mind.”

My Response: I think that reading allows a person to deepen himself, to examine himself in relation to what he is reading, to develop internally. But for the new generation, this is unrealistic.

They will not read. They cannot. We have left them such an environment that kills them completely. This is clip-thinking, only these tik toks and so on. All of this, of course, simply kills the person within a person.

Question: So where is this leading us?

Answer: Through evil, we always come to something, to the realization of evil.

Comment: But you say that we will practically not read any more.

My Response: There will be other books, other things to read. There will be more questions, more answers, more of something purposeful in nature. These will not be volumes of solid text like we used to read. I remember how I would go to the library in the fifth, sixth, seventh, and other grades: I would take three or four volumes home and read them. You return them, take the next three or four volumes, and so on.

Comment: Reading was introduced in your home was the main thing.

My Response: That is all, this is the main thing. Where else can you draw anything from?

Comment: I see that you have gone through a lot of literature and not only technical.

My Response: Mostly what was available, that is, world classics. That was all we had of course.

Question: And if we still take on and develop children today, teach them to read?

Answer: I don’t know. They would be very disconnected from modern life, from their peers.

Question: So you do not especially advise this to push the child to read?

Answer: No. Society, the environment, still shapes a person. It is just that these children grow up in such times and they should exist in it.

Question: So you cannot say it is bad or that it is good?

Answer: You cannot take them to the jungle. That is how it will seem to them with all these writers. Imagine taking them back 50 years.

Question: To read there? When they read?

Answer: In general: in culture, in communication, in all that they get from books. Therefore, they are now detached from books because of the previous society, like another language. I believe that everything will be fine and there is nothing for us to worry about. It is none of our business.

Question: Is this how nature leads and develops?

Answer: Yes, of course.

Question: What does it lead us to as a result of this generation?

Answer: Each generation grows up in the environment that generated it and shaped it, and it should develop in this way. Do not disturb it. It is just that there are a few “dinosaurs” left in the modern generation and they are preventing the modern generation from living a normal life.

Comments: And they point out: read, read, only read.

Answer: Yes.

Question: What is education then?

Answer: It is if you, along with what they know and have learned from their social networks and so on, give them an educational program: that there is a special mechanism in the world, nature, that still guides us and leads us somewhere. It would be good for us to master this mechanism. We cannot get away from it, we exist in it.

There is a science that talks about how this mechanism works and how you can master it. You cannot change it, but finding out how to adapt to its nature, learning its algorithm and how to interact with this mechanism is good. It is useful.

Question: Is this what education will be like—to interest them in the study of nature?

Answer: Yes. Today, we have more and more such questions that we dismiss because we cannot do anything about them. So, to find out why, how, for what reason nature does something to us and what we can do about it ourselves, what is in our power—this can be learned only from those states that we find in the science of Kabbalah and nowhere else. This, I think, they should add to today’s worldview.

Question: So you think that this science will come to life one way or another, sooner or later?

Answer: Instead of all the millions of volumes and everything that humanity has collected, accumulated, discovered, written, and designed for us, we need only one science—the science of Kabbalah to learn what nature wants to do with us, how it affects us, and how we can respond to it correctly, adequately, all in order to achieve pleasure, to achieve happiness, knowledge, cognition, and live our years in this state as fruitful as possible.

Each generation requires a different approach to the world.

Question: And this generation will demand the science of Kabbalah?

Answer: I hope so. I hope that this generation will not fall into a trap, will not lose itself and wake up after a couple of generations. And so that already today we will begin to understand the plan of nature regarding us.
[282800]
From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 12/04/21

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Comment: From a letter to you: “I have a child with Down syndrome. Please tell us, how does Kabbalah treat such people? In modern medicine, this is a mistake of nature. But the Creator does not make mistakes.”

My Response: No, the Creator does not make mistakes, and this is, of course, natural. We cannot determine the cause of this pattern. But in general, it is natural, and we must accept it not as a mistake, but as the correct action of the Creator and try not to disappoint Him in this. What we get from such a patient in our close circle is for us to take care of him, help him, and make sure that this child does not feel defective.

Question: Is this especially given by the Creator?

Answer: Yes.

Question: Is it more for the parents and for others than for the child?

Answer: Of course. This is a correction of the soul.
[285693]
From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 7/1/21

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At the just-ended Olympic Games in Tokyo, there was a very touching moment when an Israeli athlete Linoy Ashram, who won first place in rhythmic gymnastics competitions, took off the gold medal she received and hung it around the neck of her coach. And in fact, this is not surprising, because a coach for an athlete is like a father or mother, everything depends on the coach. Without him, an athlete is only raw material in the hands of a sculptor. The coach makes him a champion, and, of course, the medal rightfully belongs to the coach.

The athlete feels that it is the coach who took first place. And the coach feels that the athlete sacrificed himself to faithfully follow the instructions of the coach, and this is their joint success. There is usually a very close, warm connection between a coach and an athlete, and it cannot be otherwise.

It is said that “a person is jealous of everyone except for his son and his student.” After all, a real teacher puts everything he has into the student, and the student’s achievements indicate the teacher’s skill. The medal is awarded not to the coach, but to the athlete, but it does not matter. After all, the teacher’s reward is not in a medal, but in an inner feeling, in reaching a new degree.

If I ever achieve high achievements in spirituality, it will be only thanks to my teacher. I can still feel him guiding me.

I really hope that my students, whom I “coach” for spiritual ascent, will reach such high levels that the Creator will be revealed in each of them, and they will also turn into great teachers for all mankind.

I see in the students the continuation of the path. The student becomes the hands of the teacher, his mind. Everything that I want to achieve in life, I bring to my students, and they continue to pave the way.
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From KabTV’s “Look from the Inside” 8/9/21

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Comment: Many rules and protocols dictate the life of Queen Elizabeth of Great Britain who is already 95 years old.

She usually wears the St Edward’s Crown when in full ceremonial attire. But several times more recently she opted to wear a smaller tiara. When asked why she didn’t wear the crown for a ceremony, “she described it, ‘as unwieldy.’

“‘You can’t look down to read the speech, you have to take the speech up, because if you did your neck would break – it would fall off,’ she said, smiling.

My Response: Right! Dynasty, kings, all this is very necessary for the world. The king is the king! Just as there is a king in heaven, there must be a king on earth! To keep Australia, Canada—its dominions.

Question: Do you need education and do you need dynasties?

Answer: Yes! It must be an inner feeling. Like this Queen Elizabeth. And she is respected everywhere in the world.

Comment: She said: “It has always been easy to hate and destroy. It is much more difficult to build and cherish”(“Christmas Broadcast 1957”) “Cherish” refers to people.

My Response: Only the king or the queen can afford it.

Question: If this is a dynastic upbringing, then there is pain for the people?

Answer: It is hers! It is his! “These are my servants, these are my people!” “This is me and mine. This is my home!” And not that you will now be elected for five years or for another period. There is nothing to talk about here!

Comment: She also said in 1957: “There is no doubt that the darkest phenomena in society come from divorce and general separation” (The Queen: Life and Times of  Elizabeth II).

My Response: Yes. On this, she completely agrees with me. I am in favor of such a marriage, which is usually called Catholic. That is, there is no divorce. Everything!

Question: If there are children?

Answer: If there are children, there is nothing to talk about at all! But even if there are no children, people should know in advance that there can be no divorce! The only thing is that there should be parental consent too. So that the young do not do stupid things.

Question: What does parental consent give?

Answer: It gives a seal that they are serious, that they deliberated it, convinced their elders on both sides that they were going to start a serious family.

Question: And when the queen says: “general separation,” does she mean when the right and the left are fighting among themselves and so on?

Answer: As if people know what ideals they are fighting for …

Question: That is, she, as a queen, must ensure that everyone rises above this separation?

Answer: Yes. She does everything only for the sake of the country, for the sake of the people.

Question: Is it imbued in her?

Answer: Yes, this is the old upbringing.

Comment: The Queen is also said to have said that she often throws unpleasant thoughts out of her head.

My Response: That is why she lived to be 95 years old and still continues to live. If unpleasant thoughts suddenly come, do not digest them, do not chew them over.

Question: Is that what you do? If an unpleasant thought comes to you, what do you do with it?

Answer: I have a lot of study material. I immediately plunge into it. I give lessons every day. Life arranged itself in such a way and I arranged it myself in such a way that I am obliged to go forward all the time.

Comment: “I know of no single formula for success. But over the years I have observed that some attributes of leadership are universal and are often about finding ways of encouraging people to combine their efforts, their talents, their insights, their enthusiasm and their inspiration to work together” (UN General Assembly July 6, 2010).

My Response: Absolutely.

Comment: She says that this is what a leader should be—uniting.

Answer: Yes.

Question: Why does no one hear it?

Answer: They cannot rise above their petty egoism! She does because she has an empire. She must hold it, she must represent it, take care of it. She has no other choice. And they do not have this importance, mission, nothing.

Question: They are in their egoism, and she can rise above it. Is this the key word, what you said: “This is my home, my people, this is mine”?

Answer: That is what a king has.

Question: Does the fact that someone is elected for five years, that he fights to be elected, is this killing everything? Because it is not dynastic, it is not inherited?

Answer: Yes. And the king does not need it! He builds his position on completely different grounds.

He can respect, he can explain, he can speak. He has a representative office, he has it all. And moreover, the most important thing that is in him, although in recent generations this is perhaps not visible, he has upbringing! He is raised to be an heir, a king, and so on. There is a huge amount of science and everything that he should know.

Comment: “ We cannot put an end to wars or stop injustice, but the effect of thousands of small good deeds put together can be stronger than we can imagine” is another quote attributed to Queen Elizabeth II.

My Response: Indeed, everything is achieved with the help of very small corrections, which together give us the final complete correction.

Question: And what is really a good deed?

Answer: In my eyes, a good deed is when you rise above all personal, social, and other egoistic approaches and refer them only to the Creator, when you understand that all this comes to you from above in order for you to rise above it.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 4/29/21

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Question from Facebook: Is it realistic to unite everyone into one society? If so, how should it be done? The fastest and safest way is when two enemies unite when confronted with a third enemy, and the third enemy is another civilization. But I may be wrong.

Answer: It is good that you understand that you may be wrong. Where is the third civilization that can unite all the enemies?

Do you think that if some giant spaceship or a flying saucer that covered half the planet and totally darkened it, hovered above us, we would begin to love one another? No, this does not mean to love.

We cannot be forced to love. The only way is to begin to educate ourselves, through our consciousness, and not under pressure, to develop a yearning for each other, like mutuality, love, and bestowal. Love is when I feel what you want, and you feel what I want and we fill each other. But no one can fill himself.

So, a third civilization will not help. Our civilization is quite enough. We are the only ones in the universe and we do not need to look for anyone or anything. All we have to do is to correct ourselves, to fulfill, and to attain the most sublime state of eternity and perfection, which means a civilization that no one has even dreamed of. Let’s do it!
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From KabTV’s “Answers to Questions from Facebook” 3/10/19

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Question: What is your attitude to the fact that now the family is based on the principles of the marriage contract? Moreover, everyone tries to win at the expense of the other and run away from responsibility, if something happens to a partner, if he gets sick, etc.

Answer: So you come to me with a broken leg and ask: “How can I jump from the second floor?” and you cannot even walk. That is, you have come to me with a problem and are trying to solve another one with its help.

The initial problem is education. Today we cannot demand from a couple who is going to unite some unrealizable, completely unrealistic conditions when they are absolutely not prepared for it.

Nobody taught them this, nobody educated them, nobody raised them to the required level. They grew up on television shows, beer, cigarettes, and discos. Now they suddenly decide: “Let’s move in, we will live together. Okay, let’s get married.” And that’s all.

They act in accordance with the way they were raised. How can you demand something from them? Or what can they demand from each other? Of course, nothing. They do not ask each other the simplest life questions: “Where are we going to get money for living? How are you going to provide for the family? What kind of upbringing are you going to give our children?” Nobody talks about it.

Therefore, the problem here is not in marriage, not in the marriage contract or agreement, but in educating such people from infancy who will then come in the right way to creating a family. Yet, when they are going to sign an agreement between them or just decide to move in together, it’s too late to talk about it.

If a person was brought up to think only of himself, nothing is going to help him, and you will not force him to do anything. All the same, he will avoid alimony and you will not even want to deal with him.

There is absolutely no such concept as duty in the new generation. My place in the world, in nature, me as a father, as a husband, as a man, as a citizen, as a soldier; there is no such thing! No! And this is natural. Our egoism was developing all the time and we did not give it the appropriate framework, a program for its correct behavior.

Comment: We were constantly trying to restrain it.

My Response: This is all we did, we were constantly putting pressure on egoism and it broke free. In the end, it broke free. “You can’t do anything to me!” This is what any small child declares to his parents.

Indeed, try to slap him, he will go to the police (children already know that you can go to the police). That’s it. This is where it all starts, with absolute freedom. If you try to stop serving him, he will also go to the police: you owe him.

On the one hand, you have no right to put pressure on him with your education; on the other hand, you are obliged to completely serve him. Modern children know this very well. They are ready to use this without any sentimentality. You cannot command them, and you are not an authority for them.

This is egoism. I do not blame them at all. This is how our egoism grows within us. If I were in their place, I would be the same.

If we considered the evolution of egoism in us correctly, then in accordance with this we would give children the correct program of behavior so that they would be happy in the end. If we really took care of them sensibly, correctly, then all this would not have happened. However, today, when you already have a broken leg and tell me: “I want to jump,” you have to wait until it mends, you need to do something with it, treat it.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Marriage contract” 8/19/09

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Comment: A young girl writes: “I can draw well and play a musical instrument. I would really like to change the world, give it something. But what is the point if I study to be a musician or an artist if the world no longer needs it. Where can I put my skills, my desire to do something for others?”

My Response: First, there is a difference between a profession and a vocation. A profession is imposed on us by society based on what it needs. Therefore, if once artists, musicians, and poets were held in high esteem, today this is not the time. Maybe soon it will be like that again, but any period can drag on for two hundred years.

Question: So she needs to look for a calling?

Answer: Yes. If, for example, she draws, let her be a teacher of drawing. But the main thing is how she realizes herself internally in addition to earning. She also wants to make a hobby out of her profession. Not many people accomplish that. So maybe she needs to come to terms with it.

In addition, she is a woman, she will have a family and children. All this will overshadow her noble impulses a bit.

Comment: You have just touched on the matter of profession and vocation. Society pushes us to make a lot of money. Therefore, people with a vocation that does not bring large incomes have an inner break. A person does not know how to deal with the desire to make money, to become great, to change something on a global level.

My Response: First of all, making money is one thing. Changing something at the global level is different. Make it your profession? Make it your hobby? The person hasn’t decided yet. Therefore, it is difficult to give specific advice here.

I would advise him, first of all, to decide. He needs good, smart, grown-up people, maybe even a psychologist who would gradually explain to him what is best for him. Together they would “speak through” his inner world.
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From KabTV’s “Integral World” 7/13/18

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My new article on Linkedin “Time to Revamp Our Thinking about Our Children”

According to an essay published on July 20, 2021 in the Journal of Adolescence, over the past several years, there has been a significant increase in loneliness at school among teenagers. The essay, titled “Worldwide increases in adolescent loneliness,” written by acclaimed Professor of psychology Jean M. Twenge and several other researchers, concludes that between 2012 and 2018, “adolescent loneliness increased … in 36 of 37 countries. Worldwide, nearly twice as many adolescents in 2018 scored high in loneliness than in 2000, with much of the increase occurring after 2012.” However, the researchers add that “Even with the recent increases … the majority of students did not report high levels of loneliness.”

So are adolescents lonely or are they not? I think that the problem is not that they are lonely, but that we don’t understand how they think and feel, and therefore often attribute to them emotional states that they are not experiencing because we think they’re built like us, but they are not.

Today’s teenagers are smarter, more sensitive, and more understanding than we often think. They look at us, at what we have (or have not) accomplished, at the consequences of our actions, and draw their own conclusions. They’re not as excited as we were about academic titles, about traveling, or about accumulating wealth and possessions. Everything is accessible for them at the touch of a finger on the cell-phone, and they don’t have the drive that we had to achieve, to be “somebody.” They see how “happy” it has made us and what a world we’ve built because of it.

When I look at my grandchildren, they don’t seem to me like they are suffering. It is a new generation with a different character. They ask pragmatic questions; they want to know what they will get out of everything they do, and when they don’t get satisfactory answers, they order a pizza delivery and stay at home with their social media apps and games. At best, they might ask a friend or two over, but often, they will communicate with friends only on social media.

Yet, the fact that they are alone does not mean that they are lonely. Some are lonely, and some or not, just as we were. For them, being alone for many hours does not mean that they are lonely. When we wanted to socialize, we went outside. When they want to socialize, they go online. They’re living in a different world, and the sooner we realize it, the easier we will make it on them to grow in it.

We must support them and care for them, but we must also let them grow on their own terms and in their own way. They’ll have their challenges like the rest of us, and they will need our help, but we must not force our worldview on them, since it will only prevent them from developing the worldview that they need to have in today’s reality, where everything is mixed and interconnected—physical and virtual, local and global, alone and together.

I am not implying that we should not see that they do not go the wrong way. However, we should also not force them to go our way just because we think our way was right for us. In fact, if it was right for us when we grew up, it is certainly not right for them, since the world where we grew up doesn’t exist anymore; we’re living in a different world. Therefore, today’s adolescents must find their own way, and we must help them search for it with confidence, knowing that they have a cushion to fall back on if they need to.

In addition to the above, I would teach them the basics of the wisdom of Kabbalah. The wisdom of Kabbalah is the science of connecting people, so learning the principles of positive connections with people can be very helpful in a hyper-connected world. I think that if we adopt this approach, we will go through our children’s adolescence more easily and pleasantly.
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