Question: Kabbalists talk about this concept of building a society where everyone is united. How do they envision it?

Answer: First of all, we must fully recognize the evil of egoism. But once we realize this, what then?

Let’s say I understand that there is nothing in the world but evil. Can I replace it with an opposite quality?! After all, there is either a force of attraction or a force of repulsion. We are either giving or receiving. Can I work in a mode of giving instead of receiving? No this is our nature.

But it turns out that there is a force in nature that can change us into the opposite and simply transform us. Today I work only in the receiving mode: where, what, and how to receive. Not to mention, I want to do it more comfortably, more cheaply, with less effort and while giving less and receiving more because this is the formula for my whole life and my activity at every level: physiological, mental, spiritual, whatever.

Can I really change myself? Yes. There is a force in nature that created egoism. It can have such an effect on us that it will change us toward the opposite direction. And suddenly, instead of always acting according to the formula “give less and take more,” we will begin to live according to another formula: “The connection between us is the most important thing and it determines all my actions.”

That is, my actions will be aimed at being as connected as possible with others, not receiving for myself, and uniting with everyone. At the same time, I will discover myself and the whole of nature as one single entity. And if this single whole is not connected together, then it will become more and more destructive and eventually destroy me just like cancer destroys the body.

If I understand this clearly, I will have no option but to find a way to change myself and connect with others. Now, when we are approaching a global catastrophe and because the whole world is externally connected and everyone depends on each other, we are simply obliged to do this.

And here Kabbalah becomes revealed, saying: “There is such a force in nature. This is the same force that created your egoism and keeps influencing it. It can affect your ego and make such an inversion instantly. If you understand that you have to be interconnected with others through good connections, this force will do all the work for you. How? Here’s a methodology for you.”

Then we will really be able to change the nature of man. Not ourselves or any political dictatorships, but the force that we invoke. We see this in the example of the Kabbalists who have been putting this into practice for many generations.

Today we are approaching a state where it can be done by all of humanity. And In this lies our bright future.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up. Gene of Altruism” 9/19/10

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My new article on Linkedin “We Need a New World”

A student wrote me saying that today, many people believe we need a new world. He asked, “If you had a chance to build the world from scratch, where would you start?” I answered him that I would begin with one country, one self-sufficient country. Then I would ask for some time to develop people, to develop the society.

The problem is that we are like little children who expect the world to work the way we want it to work simply because we want it. It doesn’t work this way. For things to work the way we want them to, we need to learn how to make them happen, how to do it properly.

By learning, I do not mean that we should learn about the world, but about ourselves. We need to change ourselves so we can build a world where we will accomplish what we want without polluting the air, ground, and water, eliminating entire species of plants and animals, and eventually destroying ourselves.

The change we need to make in ourselves concerns our relation to society, the importance we attribute not to ourselves, but to the society we live in. In other words, the connections between us should be our main focus, as opposed to our current disposition to focus on ourselves.

Only once we change ourselves, the products we create will be contributory to the world as a whole. As our mindset will change from narcissism to mutual consideration, everything we do will aim to serve everyone rather than only ourselves.

This does not mean that we will not have personal items or that we will not need personal things, but the way we make and use them will inherently incorporate the thought about the common good. As a result, we will not need to worry about making sustainable products or environmentally friendly production processes because it will be our nature to work with everyone’s benefit in mind.

In other words, the degree to which we elevate humankind is the degree to which society will rise. The success of a country does not depend on technological advancement, mode of governance, or educational paradigms.

The success of a country depends on the extent to which people keep the common good in mind. Social cohesion and mutual responsibility are the sole factors that determine the fate of a nation.

Once we have built one such country as a role model for humanity, it will be possible to emulate it throughout the world. This was my reply to the student who asked how to build a new world.

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Comment: Michael writes to you: “In a quiet, peaceful time I could agree with you that it is necessary to embrace your enemy and that love is above everything. This is what I used to do by the way. But now I see how impossible it is. Man cannot do that. You will never embrace a murderer or a rapist in your life. You will not hug them! So why are you talking about it?”

My Response: I am not saying that you must physically hug him. Even internally you cannot hug him. But you should try to imagine that you have descended to his level, because if he is a murderer and a rapist, then he is below you. Yet, you descend in order to somehow get in touch with him, to understand him in some way.

Question: So, in fact, contact is impossible, right?

Answer: No? Then you will not do anything. You must understand that man was programmed this way from above. After all, we are talking about Kabbalah, about Kabbalistic correction.

We must understand that a person was simply directed in this way. With all his egoism and inclinations, it is not his fault. The Creator arranged it all for him, the kind, almighty, and loving Creator. Therefore, we still have a great deal to correct in our understanding.

Only when you descend to his level and realize that everything that is in him comes from the Creator and this is depicted before you and within you so that you correct your attitude to what is happening and to the Creator, then you will be able to somehow come closer to him. You will not be able to hug him yet, but you can come closer to him and start correcting this condition together with him so that in the end you would be able to understand him, because it does not depend on him.

This is all the fault of the Creator who did it and did it in order to correct you so that together you can rise to the level of mutual understanding and then to mutual love between you for all of humanity, for the entire universe, and thus to correct everything.

Comment: What an impossibly difficult science we are engaged in!

My Response: This is not science. This is nature! Otherwise, we will not do anything!

Comment: It requires turning the guts inside out, washing the entire heart, and clearing the entire mind.

My Response: When you do it constantly for a long time, you reach it. People will go through these wars. These will be internal wars, wars of the Messiah. And everything will work out.

Comment: You understand, don’t you, that we are talking about a loved one, about someone dear who is no longer with us.

My Response: All relatives and friends will suddenly manifest in such a way that you will not see anyone who would be more distant from you than the closest one. And the most distant ones will turn out to be the closest.

Everyone will turn out to be absolutely close and absolutely ugly. And suddenly, you will have to love them and just adore them. There are real wars ahead; they are called “the wars of the Messiah,” the wars of liberation from our egoism.

Messiah (Mashiach)—from the word “Limshoch,” to pull out— is the one who pulls us out of our egoism. We stop looking at the world egoistically, we stop blaming people for it. We must relate this to the Creator and correct our attitude to Him from absolute hatred to absolute love.

Comment: Can you imagine! You say: “He is to blame for everything, He did everything, He is the main enemy of man.”

My Response: If this is how I perceive the world, then yes.

Question: What if it is the other way around?

Answer: If it is the other way around, then I must turn myself upside-down again; in the end, I must correct myself and there is no evil and harm in the world except for myself, my egoism. I have to correct it into the quality of absolute love where I see everyone as my enemies and haters and correct them into everyone I see loving and loved.

Question: Does it mean that I correct myself and they become loving and loved?

Answer: Yes.

Comment: That is, everything is aimed at making me sort myself out.

My Response: Yes. There are still things to do ahead of us.

Question: You say that there are serious wars ahead. In any case, are we being prepared for them, or will we be thrown unprepared into this scorcher?

Answer: No! Who is there to throw? It is like throwing a baby into a real fight.

Question: Are we being led to them one way or another and we will come to this already wanting these wars?

Answer: Yes. We will understand their necessity.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 3/17/22

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Comment: Kabbalah explains all the sections of the structure of desire and you see how it works.

Why can’t people understand and accept that you just need to reconsider many things and rebuild your life? It is more pleasant for them to live in some kind of abstract mass, that there is a big world, that there are prospects beyond the horizon. It could be an adult, maybe even an elderly person who has lived his life, but still thinks like a child.

My Response: There are no prospects today, I do not see people who still live with them because the world knocks them out of all prospects. Everything changes so unpredictably quickly, everything closes and opens so that a person cannot plan anything, and therefore lives case by case, so to speak. In addition, the new generation is very special, it has completely different views and approaches to the world.

Question: What does this click, this transition to a new understanding, depend on?

Answer: It depends on the recognition of the need for this transition, the recognition of evil, when I can no longer live like this, in the present state.

After all, a person comes to our community because he believes that without attaining the cause, the purpose of the world, he has nothing to do in it, there is no point in existing, “I must understand, I must realize, I must figure out why I live at all, why everything exists, what meaning each of my actions and each of my days has; I cannot just live like that, I need meaning, purpose, fulfillment, otherwise I do not have the energy for movement.”
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Forecast for the next hundred years” 12/10/09

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Question: Why do people constantly compare their achievements, for example, who has something that is more beautiful or better?

Answer: Because it is a symbol of power, wealth, or height. After all, this is why egoism values people. How can you know what kind of person I am? I can be a great sage and sit somewhere in a corner in rags. Or I can be a great ideologist and at the same time be very modest and humble.

When people put themselves on display, it is clear why this happens. Everything is moving toward a common recognition of evil. This serpent must come out completely, show itself in all its metamorphoses and guises, and manifest itself so that every person will see how much it is devouring him from the inside.

Only then will it be possible to talk about correction.
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From KabTV’s “I Got a Call. Whose iIs Better?” 4/24/10

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My new article on Linkedin “A Weekend of Worldwide Unity”

This past weekend, my students from around the world convened online for a weekend of profound unity and love. Transcending distance, culture, faith, ethnicity, and gender, they gathered in sessions and workshops, meals and celebrations, and rejoiced in their shared desire to bond. More than 6,000 students convened on the platform they have built themselves, and which they named Arvut (mutual responsibility). They spoke in dozens of languages, all with simultaneous interpretation, and talked of nothing but love and responsibility for one another.

Unity will determine the fate of the world. If we establish it, we will reverse the trajectory of enmity, aggression, and violence. If we shun it, the world will plunge into another war.

This weekend, we discovered once again that when there is a will to unite, there is always a way. The differences did not divide us. On the contrary, they brought us that much closer.

As a teacher, my greatest joy is to see my students accomplish themselves. This weekend, I was given a demonstration that my students have accomplished a great deal.

Indeed, this convention was the most powerful, intense, and serious of all the conventions thus far. My students proved that they are willing to fight for the unity of the world, to rise above their own ego, unite, and share that unity with the entire world.

There is nothing that the world needs more than unity. Accordingly, there is no greater gift that we can give to our fellow human beings than our unity and the invitation to join in.

Unity will determine the fate of the world. If we establish it, we will reverse the trajectory of enmity, aggression, and violence. If we shun it, the world will plunge into another war.

Great transformations lie ahead, whose nature depends on the degree of our unity. I hope and pray that humanity will join the unity we have achieved this past weekend, and raise itself from the nadir of abhorrence to the zenith of love of others.

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Michael Laitman, On The Times of Israel: “Wheat Storage with Jordan Will Not Yield Good Crops”

According to World Israel News, as well as other papers, an AP report writes that Jordan’s king, Abdullah II, proposed that Jordan and Israel will set up a joint wheat reserves and a food storage center. The purpose of the center is to offset “the negative repercussions of the Russian war in Ukraine,” since the two countries “account for a third of global wheat and barley exports, which countries in the Middle East rely on to feed millions of people who subsist on subsidized bread and bargain noodles.” Regrettably, I have never seen a connection with Jordan, under this king or the former, that yielded anything good for Israel. I have no faith in his “good intentions.”

Until today, and I have no reason to believe that it will change going forward, anything that we have given King Abdullah has been used against us. As it happened with the water and electricity agreement, so it will happen with the wheat, and with everything else we will include in that “joint” storage.

Despite the warm welcome that Israeli president Herzog received in Jordan, the voices coming from there now are the complete opposite. They will turn against us in an instant.

I can understand Abdullah’s interest. Such an agreement will give him power among the Arab states, but I do not think it is our job to give him that. The better we relate to him, the more we strengthen his negative attitude toward us.

If we lived in a corrected international relationship, it would look very different. There would not be exploitation but real partnership. We would still establish joint ventures in agriculture, water, and energy, but we would do so with a very different aim in mind: not to exploit but to strengthen the bonds between us. If that were the motive, I would be all for it.

As it is, when we give and give and give, and see only hostility in return, I see nothing good in this relationship. Jordan wants to get the most from us, give nothing back, and gain respect among our enemies. I do not see why we should go along with it.
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Comment: Vladimir writes, “Dear Michael Laitman! I wanted to share my thoughts with you. My friend’s son is fighting in the current war. Recently I tried to do an exercise to imagine myself in the place of that friend. And I could not stand this exercise. Five minutes later, I found myself in a state of shock. After all, we exist in the same space with smartphones, this is a miracle of the 21^st century, without which it is impossible to imagine modern life. And this item is on the table. Any call makes my heart skip a beat! My hand becomes like lead and the horror strikes with the fact that on a familiar number you might suddenly hear someone else’s voice, ‘Your son…’ And so on, second by second, day by day, I could not imagine it.”

Tell me, please, what kind of world do we live in? Before you really could somehow exist in these pauses, even terrible, terrible ones, until, God forbid, something happens; time went by, you lived. And now, the distance from the shot to the sensation has shortened so much.

My Response: I understand that.

Question: What is it? Tell me, why is this given to us today?

Answer: So that we can experience all this and determine how we really live, how we create our reality.

Comment: Our reality is like this.

My Response: So let us place all the people who command our reality in this reality.

Question: Those who are twisting all this, let them have such a feeling?

Answer: Yes, so that they sit in the room and wait for the phone call. And so that they have no opportunity to change anything! Leave them that way for a week. And then see what happens to them.

One should feel that these are his own children. It does not matter that his real kids are in London.

Question: Will the prayer of parents arise from this state?

Answer: Yes, it is natural. Even if they do not understand, the heart itself will react like this: “Please do not let anything happen to them!”

Question: And where is the Creator’s answer to all this? Let everything be over, that is enough! How long can we be imposed on?

Answer: The Creator will bring them to a state so that they actually turn to Him, and so that they do everything in this world that depends on them so that there is no war.

Question: You say “they,” do you mean practically all people?

Answer: All people, mainly parents, on whom this decision depends.

Question: So until this prayer is raised with sufficient force, it will continue, and we will be brought to prayer all the time?

Answer: Yes.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 3/21/22

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To come to complete transformation and exit to the next level, humanity must reach the state of revealing a terrible evil: when people will literally devour each other, children and parents will hate each other, man will live in a house among his haters, among the most ardent enemies. We will reach such a state so that we force ourselves to look for a way out of it, a real way out, i.e., to rise above our nature and not just embellish it.

Nature will force us to deal not with all sorts of small compensations and small improvements, but to reach a complete crisis where we cannot do anything with it in education, upbringing, social relations, broken families, drugs, depression, technology, or financial affairs.

The crisis will cover everything that man does. And regarding the surrounding nature, there will be an ecological crisis. When all this begins to put pressure on us from the outside and from the inside, from all sides, then we will feel that we are obliged to do something.

Only then will we realize that there is an exit to the outer world: a small hole in the sphere in which we exist. This way out is in changing our egoistic nature.
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From KabTV’s “Close-Up, Unwanted Children” 11/28/10

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Medium published my new article “Are Rivers in the Sky Flooding the Earth?”

“When temperatures in Antarctica soared to 38 degrees Celsius above normal — around 70 ‎Fahrenheit — in March, a teetering ice shelf the size of Los Angeles collapsed,” wrote CNN. “The heat rushed in through what’s known as an atmospheric river,” the story continued, “a long plume of moisture that transports warm air and water vapor from the tropics to other parts of the Earth. … these ‘rivers in the sky’ — which dump rain and snow when they make landfall — are also causing extreme temperatures, surface melt, sea-ice disintegration and large ocean swells which are destabilizing ice shelves on the Antarctic Peninsula.” Every time disaster strikes, we search for its immediate cause. This is how we avoid acknowledging the real cause of our adversities: human nature.

It is not only the climate that is becoming inhospitable. It is also the disappearing forests and the raging plagues that are telling us, “You are the menace! You are the plague! You have worn out your welcome!” Scientists warn that if we do not curb global warming, we will lose our coastal cities. I think it is far worse than that: Our entire planet will become uninhabitable for humans through our own making. Earth seems to be disgusted with us.

We are told that this is happening because we pollute the air, water, and soil, destroy forests, hunt other species to extinction, and extract from the earth much more than it can give without collapsing the entire ecosystem. These are certainly flaws in our behavior, but there is a reason we behave this way. Our prime crime is our attitude toward each other.

Whatever harm we do to Earth, we do it ten times worse to one another. The harm that we inflict on Earth is part of our efforts to inflict harm on other people and nations; it is another facet of our battle against each other. If we stop fighting each other, we will also stop destroying our common home, and nature will recuperate and become friendly toward us once again.

Granted, it is not easy to stop fighting one another when mistrust and hostility reign supreme. From nations to individuals, aggression and intimidation dominate, and indeed define our relationships. Yet, since Earth is already driving us out, we have no other choice but to change, if we want to survive.

It is a learning process, but it must begin with acknowledging that our problem is not that we are burning too much fossil fuels, eating too much meat, or soiling the ground and water with plastics. Our problem is that we are doing all those harms in order to hurt and destroy others, to overpower and subdue, to take pride and cater to our egos.

Once we acknowledge that our egoistic attitude to others is our root problem, we will be able to deal with it. We will teach ourselves to rise above our egos and work together. However, first we must stop deluding ourselves that rivers in the sky are drowning us. We are drowning in egoism, and this is our real problem.

[Photo Caption: Satellite Images Show Conger Ice Shelf’s Dramatic March Collapse Where: Antarctica When: 29 Mar 2022 Credit: NASA Earth Observatory. It is relatively common for ice shelves in Antarctica to spawn icebergs. It is less common for an ice shelf to completely disintegrate. In March 2022, an ice shelf in East Antarctica did both. The collapse has reshaped a part of the Antarctic landscape where coastal glacial ice was once thought to be stable. The change happened fast. At the start of March 2022, the floating shelf fed by the Glenzer and Conger glaciers was still intact. ,By the middle of the month, it had fallen apart. This image pair, from 9 January and 23 March acquired by the Operational Land Imager (OLI) on Landsat 8, shows the shelf before and after it disintegrated. “The whole shelf collapsed in just around two weeks,” said Christopher Shuman, a University of Maryland, Baltimore County, glaciologist based at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. The icy remnants of both glacial shelf ice and adjacent sea ice dispersed from the waters around Bowman Island within weeks. “All of this took less than a month,” Shuman said. “It was quite the blowout.” The loss of an ice shelf is problematic because it can indirectly contribute to sea level rise. “Ice shelves are essentially the ‘safety band’ holding up the rest of the Antarctic Ice Sheet,” Walker said. When they collapse, the ice behind them can more quickly flow into the ocean. “And that is what raises sea levels.” By Antarctic standards, the ice shelf and glaciers that it held back are relatively small, so the impacts from the collapse are expected to be minimal. Scientists are more concerned about the location of the collapse. “All of the previous collapses have taken place in West Antarctica, not East Antarctica, which until recently has been thought of as relatively stable,” Walker said. “This is something like a dress rehearsal for what we could expect from other, more massive ice shelves if they continue to melt and destabilize. Then we’ll really be past the turnaround point in terms of slowing sea level rise.” REUTERS]
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