Entries in the 'Crisis' Category

Drachmageddon

Dr. Michael LaitmanIn the News (from The Times): “A win by the Radical Left Coalition, known by its acronym Syriza, would raise the prospect of a Greek exit from the euro — and secret talks between European finance officials this week are said to have examined possible limits on withdrawals from cash machines, reimposing checks on the country’s borders, and reinstituting capital controls.”

My Comment: But most importantly, all of it will not help, and the entire EU is to slide down. If we are talking about an interconnected system, it’s impossible to sacrifice one organ and hope that the rest will become healthier.
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The End Of The World As We Know It

Dr. Michael LaitmanOpinion (Dani Rodrik, a professor at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government): “Over the next few years, the world economy slumps into what future historians will call the Second Great Depression. Unemployment rises to record-high levels. Governments without fiscal resources are left with little option but to respond in ways that will only exacerbate problems for other countries: trade protection and competitive exchange-rate depreciation. As countries sink into economic autarky, repeated global economic summits yield few results beyond empty promises of cooperation.

“As in the Great Depression, the political consequences are more serious and hold longer-term significance. The eurozone’s collapse (and, for all practical purposes, that of the EU itself) forces a major realignment of European politics. …Centrist parties pay the price for their support of the European integration project, and are repudiated in the polls by parties of the extreme right or extreme left. Nativist governments begin to kick out immigrants.

“For nearby countries, Europe no longer shines as a beacon of democracy. The Arab Middle East takes a decisive turn towards authoritarian Islamic states. In Asia, economic strife between the US and China spills over into military conflict, with increasingly frequent naval clashes in the South China Sea threatening to erupt into a full-scale war.”

My Comment: To prevent the downfall of humanity, it’s necessary to tell the world, like a sick person, about its illness and to spread this knowledge widely, to everybody, so that society becomes aware of the peril it is in. Knowing about the illness and its possible consequences is the first step towards overcoming it. Then it’s necessary to explain the reason for the situation we find ourselves in, the reason for the crisis. Having analyzed it, it’s possible to understand how to treat it. This is how the integral upbringing course is built.

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Education Will Save The Economy

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Now under the conditions of the economic crisis, people’s level of wellbeing is decreasing. Will the result be that the rich will rise even higher and become “kings” and people will envy them even more?

Answer: No, there is a splitting point here. The point is that wealth has reached its extreme expression. Therefore, the national and private debts, the economic pyramids, have all become so unmanageable that they are actually facing the danger of disappearing. You might need to get rid of these debts, and these people may lose everything instantly. No matter how many pieces of papers they have, they will be worth nothing.

So the question is what should we do with what we’ve reached in the last 50-60 years, when we have switched the real value of gold with “green papers,” and have created a pyramid, network marketing, which in the absence of economic growth the whole pyramid collapses and there is no way to stop it. In addition, further growth of the pyramid is also impossible since it has reached a critical point. So the powers that be in the world are trying to get together, but they cannot reach any conclusions since there is no other way but to destroy this pyramid.

We must show them that there is no need to destroy it. We should only start dealing with education. If we begin to educate the public, we will find a new way to reach harmony, which can gradually be introduced into the current system. Then we will be able to come out of this crisis in an easy, gentle way. The rule of money will continue only in certain frameworks, let’s say the highest salaries might be ten times higher than the lowest, but no more than that. After all, this is better than the collapse the banks and all these people may suffer, if they fall from a great height.
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From a “Talk on Integral Upbringing” 5/21/12

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A Harmonious Family In An Egoistic Society

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How is it possible in an egoistic society to change the system of domestic economic relations of a family to an integral system of relations? In what way is it possible to look at this situation?

Answer: If the society remains individualistic, then individuals under the influence of the integral education and training system will change; they will perceive the world in a new way. So how does this person change his small world?

I think that people in a family will begin to relate to everything they do, interacting between them and consuming information for their small mutual home from the viewpoint of correct economic consumption. This means that they will have everything they need for life. And all the rest, the feeling of fulfillment, harmony, happiness, wealth, all that a person wants, will come to them specifically from the feeling of their harmonious relation to the world.

Of course, along with that, the influence of the egoistic and unharmonious world won’t overlook them, but they will actually, in any case, be internally filled with happiness and harmony that they constantly achieve for themselves.

Domestic economics will change. Out of necessity, people will be satisfied with simple food, simple clothing, plain furniture, and so on. The search for pleasure has exceeded the boundaries of corporeal interests, thus these needs will not be found at the level of self-restraint, but at the natural, necessary and correct level for existence.

The same thing also pertains to the level of income. When a person understands that he has no special demands, when he looks at the world in this way, then of course, it will be simply, easy, and free.

Moreover, the needs of people to communicate will naturally be at the level of the environment that resembles them according to their structure, according to the integrality. In this way, these societies and groups will develop.
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From a “Talk on Integral Upbringing” 5/21/12

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On The Crest Of The Protest Movements

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What should we do so that our quiet voice, the drop in the ocean, will be heard as loudly as possible so that the drops will become streams and people will finally hear us?

Answer: I think that we have to be on the crest of the protest movements, because the government studies them and is afraid of them. If we take our place in this protest movement and rise above everyone by showing them and convincing them that the solution is not to destroy, rob, break shop windows and set fire to shops, then first, the government will see us as a positive factor and second psychologists, sociologists, political scientists, and others will study this phenomenon. We have to enter these protest movements and act in parallel by showing everyone our ideology, our method.

I hope that with the power of the great protest movements and their millions we will become known.

Of course, the protest movements themselves don’t want to use the gentle methods that we offer, but on the other hand, they have no method of their own—robbing banks like the Bolsheviks or the French during the revolutions?

So how can we act? If these are free democratic counties, we should use the parliamentary systems and ask them to vote for one member or another, since the protests on the street have never really led to anything.

The point is that there is a totally different picture here. If at any time the protest movements were a kind of a catalyst of social, economic and socio-political processes, today they cannot do anything because we’ve reached a state that has no place to be catalyzed.

The government cannot do anything. You can’t push it to make any decisions. It can cut the political pie a little differently to throw you some small handout, to buy the leaders of the protest movements, or some other such action; there are many methods they can use here.

The main thing is that neither the government nor the protest movements can offer anything that is real, even if it isn’t ripe yet so that the movements will lead us faster to a point where something new is born. Here nothing can be born. So they understand that except for shouting, “Give me!” There is nothing they can do and the government has nothing to take and to give.

We’ve reached a state in which all the countries are deep in debt. Where will they take from? There aren’t enough funds to give to everyone. What does it mean to share? It means to cut spending on other needs. Suppose the officials steal, okay, so they give out what they steal. Even if you put them in jail, take what they stole, and suppose that from now on no one will steal; it won’t change anything. I am not talking about corruption in certain countries, but about normal democratic countries. No matter how you calculate the budget, nothing will help, because we are in such a state that people are being fired from their jobs since they are not needed. There is no need for them!

It isn’t just another crisis that can be overcome, like in the past, by introducing new technology or by war. We understand that today this isn’t the solution to the problem. Therefore, we don’t take the role of advocating cutbacks, but the role of the teachers, teaching the source of the solution that no one has.

This means that we should show the general population that they don’t have a solution. We see what is happening with the protest movements: Their attempts to make seemingly positive changes lead to the opposite results after a while. What is more, it happens every time. So it’s better not to do anything. When the state tries to help and begins to look for reserves and give people more, eventually it leads to higher prices and to even greater imbalance.

No one has a solution, and we only need to constantly, persistently, and stubbornly offer our method until it is heard—the method according to which a person will change by himself and become an integral part of the integral society. Then we will be able to balance ourselves, society, and nature and will reach general harmony.
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From a “Talk on Integral Upbringing” 5/21/12

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Preventing The Impending Threat

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Suppose we have information about future threats that worry us. We hear it and we agree with it. What can we do in order to prevent it?

Answer: We have many options, and many ways to disseminate. First we have to use all the different protest movements, since they are actually an internal protest against everything that is happening in the world these days: against the rising prices, the uneven share of the wealth, and other such phenomena. This protest is against the current state of society. We can use the protest actions successfully in order to convey the massage to the masses. We can use the concern a person has for children. We see the ugly way children are being educated these days. They don’t receive any form of education but merely information, and they don’t want that either. There is violence in schools, drug problems, sexual abuse, etc., families are falling apart and few want to preserve the family.

We must somehow try to show a person that it is certainly possible to live differently, although he has grown tired of all the attempts to do something. It all so simple: He simply needs to surf the net and to reach the course of integral education.

Working with school children, we use a very interesting method: First, the teachers are trained and then they use the integral method in the classroom. We can see the results within several weeks as the children change. Parents suddenly see totally different children who have become better, more pleasant, obedient, and so on. Then there is the need to change the parents, since the environment influences the children. This means that they, too, have to participate in a course of integral education. There is no need to tell them about the future changes, since the moment they begin the course and participate in the workshops, they suddenly discover a totally different existence, a different way of communicating, another life.

Today we are actively and intensively preparing a whole team of lecturers, teachers, educators, and organizers who will be dealing with this. But in the meantime, it is just a drop in the ocean.
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From a “Talk on Integral Upbringing” 6/13/12

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Shifting The Bifurcation Point

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: If the path to the point of bifurcation is inevitable, then what is our task, what is the purpose?

Answer: Our task is to advance this point before it appears naturally. This can be done if we explain and demonstrate the evil we’re heading toward, the forced state in which we are, and how this forced state can be corrected to conscious good development. This is not only the recognition of evil, but also a correction.

Here, we need to play on a very simple, basic human feeling, our attitude toward children. We still have some predisposition left for that, although it’s far from what it was, let’s say, fifty years ago. Today, there’s a noticeable emptiness and coldness in relationships between parents and children, but a certain basis for that still remains.

In addition, we can work through mass media and celebrities. We need to introduce integral upbringing and self-education to the world as a fashionable trend so that it would be respectable, give a person honor, exaltation, respect, self-esteem, and a sense of belonging to an elite movement.
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From a “Talk on Integral Upbringing” 6/13/12

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Is Man A Rational Being?

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Is man a rational being after all?

Answer: This is a big question. In our time, the consciousness of mankind is aimed at self-destruction. Today we are not rational in any regard.

We call it a “crisis,” but I would call it something else. These are sequential steps towards self-destruction, just like a rabbit that moves straight into the jaws of a snake as if it were hypnotized, and there is nothing it can do about it. Hypnosis pulls him forward, and he must come to it. I do not consider this to be a rational approach to life.

Today we are simply slaves to our egoism. It has reached its maximum, and it rules over us without any subtleness or other calculations and leads us towards self-destruction so we would finally reach the realization of evil.

I cannot say if this will be reached through enormous suffering. This depends on the people, on the dissemination of the method of integral upbringing and education.

But our current development is not rational. We neither see anything rational in our consumption, communication, arts, sciences, nor in their use.

We see that money rules everything. Mass media is above politics, government, the judicial system, reward and punishment: All are ruled by money. And this is absolutely not rational! This is a purely egoistic category, which does not exist in nature!

We could understand it if it were done for power, knowledge, and fame. If wealth were synonymous with power, fame, and knowledge, then this would be a different story, but it is simply wealth for the sake of wealth. It is beyond the limits of corporeal values and categories. It is becoming something virtual.
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From a “Talk on Integral Upbringing” 5/21/12

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Is Humanity Threatened With Extinction?

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Today, our planet is swept with an unconscious instinctive need for destruction. How can we stop this? For example, a person who is destroying himself with alcohol reaches a certain point where he either perishes or changes radically and begins to lead a normal life.

Answer: I hope that a turn for the better will happen here in the near future too. I hope that it will happen before we have completely depleted the entire planet and annihilated most of its population, after which not even the skeleton of the ruins will remain, like in science fiction movies about the future where people roam the Earth like primal creatures, feeding on some roots, after having survived this catastrophe, the bifurcation.

To make this positive turn take place as soon as possible, we’re trying to disseminate the method of integral education and upbringing. But, frankly, we haven’t found sufficient support among the general public; we have little strength. So I cannot say that I feel a deep sense of satisfaction.

However, I don’t believe that humanity will die out, because this isn’t nature’s intent or its course: This entire chain is built on very rational cause-and-effect constants, laws, and degrees. Therefore we won’t bring ourselves to a complete annihilation.

But we can bring ourselves to a state where the remaining tiny fraction of people that survive after all the disasters (both natural and world wars), which we ourselves will evoke, these people will nevertheless come to a balance with nature and reveal the upper nature as absolute harmony, integrality, unity, and wholeness, and they will exist on this level.

This is not an earthly degree. It’s now a degree where a person attains not the universe that we see today through our individual egoism, but a completely different picture, the full stereo image of nature. We don’t see a flat picture of creation but its depth, along with the forces that evoke this picture and govern it, and all of us together.

We will see everything that stands behind this screen, behind this theater. After all, we don’t know the forces that govern us. We don’t know what will happen in the next moment. We need to get acquainted with these forces, to reveal them. I hope that all of this will manifest itself. But it will only manifest when man will become in at least in some way similar to the integrality and wholeness of nature.
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From a “Talk About Integral Education” 5/21/2012

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Our Fear Of The Future Is Our Helper

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Is there a way to avoid reaching the point of catastrophic bifurcation and to turn to a good path in time?

Answer: A smart person is one that can foresee a future outcome, and because he’s able to see it so clearly, he’s able to change the present. For instance, a person wants to do something that will bring him instantaneous pleasure; however, seeing that this action will result in future suffering, a person will annul the urge for this pleasure, he will become cautious, and will have the strength to overcome the urge.

For example, if a drug addict would see the future picture that his drug use would lead to, it would convince him to give it up.

This is why people need to be shown the picture of the horrible future, even though scaring people isn’t what we want. It’s very difficult to present such information, but since people are closing their eyes to what’s going on, it is necessary to find suitable means of informing people of the threats. So now there are more and more films on this subject.

I hope that reason will prevail. I see it actually happening in our awareness of the nature of evil, although I would like to see it happen more quickly. But only a vision of a threatening future and fear can help a person, nothing else will stop him.
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From a “Talk About Integral Upbringing” 6/13/12

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