Entries in the 'Health' Category

Europe’s Concerns

laitman_926_02In the News (from The Times): “The French are turning to tranquillisers as never before to overcome the anxiety provoked by last week’s terrorist attacks. Sales of anti-anxiety drugs and sleeping pills were 18.2 per cent higher than usual between Friday and Tuesday, researchers said yesterday.

“French shoppers are staying away from the seasonal sales, too — not only because they are afraid of more attacks but also because they are too demoralized to buy new clothes.

“Only 49% of the French made purchases in stores in the first week of sales, which began on the 7th of January – on the day of the shooting at the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris.

“Experts call this situation unprecedented not only for France, but also for the whole world. … There is also an increased demand for psychotherapist services.”

My Comment: Unfortunately, this is only the beginning. After all, to make Europe “come round,” to act according to the plan of creation, to understand the necessity of real unity, not just one event like this but more “serious pressure” on French Jews will be required.

I can only urge anyone who understands the meaning of what is happening to try to convey it to all his friends. This can effectively reduce the suffering!
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Anticipating The Remedy For An Illness

laitman_560Question: Is it true that a person is open to a negative influence more than a positive influence? How much easier is it to go into a panic and worry than to be relaxed?

Answer: They simply haven’t taught us to oppose panic because the evil inclination, the ego, is what always motivates us: a thirst for control, respect and fame, envy, and so forth.

But if we turn these characteristics in a positive direction, they will influence us to the same degree as the negative, and even more.

In every situation we make some kind of calculation. I remember that when my son was a student, he was given the opportunity to travel in Europe. And I let him. He wasn’t home for two months. Certainly I was worried. This was more than twenty years ago; there weren’t any cell phones then.

Much later he traveled to the Far East, to even more dangerous places, to South America. How could I not let him? I put myself in his place. How could he have otherwise discovered life at such a young age? I had to let him, even though it worried me.

Question: But I am sure that there are other people who allow the same thing for their children and cannot sleep from worry.

Answer: This is called painful sensitivity. It is very difficult to overcome it alone. It is absolutely possible to program yourself for other behavior. For example, put yourself under the influence of the environment.

Question: Come, let’s imagine some kind of state of panic. Last night my daughter was delayed somewhere. I called a friend of hers, after that I called the police, hospitals, and didn’t get any answer. I didn’t know where to run. I called my wife and only got annoyed because she received this information in an absolutely relaxed manner. I panicked. So Influence me somehow so that I will stop being in a panic.

Answer: It is necessary to leave this state completely and consider it in a completely neutral way, without touching the problem point. Turn on some music, put some cake and coffee on the table. From this moment on we behave as if nothing happened, as if we are simply sitting in a coffee house and talking about daily life.

And so gradually we move to the subject of fears and worries on condition that in the beginning we talk about our positive attitude in similar situations. In other words, the remedy must anticipate the illness. After that it is necessary to talk about how good it is to be confident and calm. We try to relax ourselves, for example, we imagine ourselves on the beach.

And after this we begin to think about how to remain in this state of calm in our ordinary life. After all, children have their own lives. And what will be when in another five or six years your daughter goes into the army? Will she become more mature and smarter or will I stop being concerned about her? I must understand that all of my concerns don’t bring any benefit.

Question: And what if I see that someone relates to the given situation disparagingly?

Answer: This is not important because “Whoever condemns does so through his own flaws” (Kiddushin 70a). If I will begin to compare his irresponsibility with my inclination towards exaggerated concern, I will be left with nothing. And even if someone doesn’t know how to act nicely, in any case, I am included in his state.

Question: But I don’t want to plunge to the other extreme….

Answer: Don’t worry. Before you reach a balance, it will be necessary for this to “throw” you in the opposite direction. Ultimately everything will return to normal.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 10/21/12

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A Win For Marijuana Is A Loss For Everyone

Dr. Michael LaitmanIn the News (MercatorNet): “Popular media’s treatment of marijuana, in contrast, is often characterized by sloppy reporting, and increasingly appears to have pot fast-tracked for canonization as the panacea to all medical, economic and social ills. Twenty-three states and the District of Columbia currently have laws legalizing marijuana in some form.

“Even medical marijuana alone, which remains scientifically problematic as explained in a previous MercatorNet article, increases the availability of pot among adolescents. A 2014 survey of Colorado teens in substance abuse treatment centers found that 74 percent obtained their pot from a medical marijuana patient.

“The notion that marijuana is less harmful than tobacco is a myth. Further legalization will be accompanied by increased marijuana use resulting in more individuals suffering its untoward effects, with children being disproportionately affected. This will deal a devastating blow to America’s long-term national health — both medical and economic — by adversely affecting workplace productivity, academic performance, behavioral and somatic health, automobile safety, parenting and family functioning.”

My Comment: There are no other means to calm the masses of unemployed, dissatisfied, and angry! It is beyond the power of the United States to raise their level of general education. The main thing is to calm everyone down. That is what this “harmless” drug does.

All this is happening under the banner of struggle for the health of the people by quitting smoking cigarettes! So, it is impossible to blame the state for harmful actions!
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How Do We Stop Being Concerned About Inconsequential Things?

laitman_232_02Question: Yesterday evening when I had got ready to go to sleep, my 12 year-old daughter still hadn’t come home. My wife and I were unable to reach her by telephone and I, knowing about the criminal situation in our city from the newspapers, could not sleep.

The next day, she let us know that her battery had died. How can I stop being concerned about inconsequential things and overcome my hypersensitivity?

Answer: All of us understand that you are justified. Actually, since a person knows what can happen, he should be concerned and not think, “Whatever will be, will be.” However, there is a way to influence your overprotectiveness. This is through the power of the environment.

For example, we are sitting in a circle and are discussing your situation, among other things, certainly without any disrespect, without dismissing your concerns, for this could push you away. Suppose that one of the women says, “I would go to sleep.”

Later, a man adds, “Nothing will happen. Leave the statistics alone. They inflate them on purpose. I don’t want to hear anything about it. I would go to sleep relaxed. All of my neighbors would do that.”

In other words, we instill you with our behavior, for when you are gripped by panic, you become more sensitive, you absorb more, and we can influence you more strongly than an ordinary person. That is,  you will change more rapidly because you absorb what is going on outside of you more quickly.

Whether you want it or not, you will be influenced greatly by us, and suddenly, you will become more relaxed than everyone else, and then your wife will ask you why you didn’t tell her that your daughter didn’t answer your telephone calls, and you will suddenly say to her, “I didn’t think about it. I went to sleep.”

It only seems to you that this is impossible. The environment can do everything! It is ready to bring us up from every black hole to the Light, to a wonderful, good and comfortable life. Everything depends on us, on how we organize this environment.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 10/21/12

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A Burning Question And The Solution

Dr. Michael LaitmanComment: The method of correcting the relationships between people, which is the remedy for every illness, nullifies all of modern medicine.

My Comment: But we don’t need it either. The current health care system doesn’t care about a person, but only about itself. The media conveys information that arouses fear, and no one cares about people.

What is the actual problem? Humanity has long reached such a level in its development that it can fully provide for all its needs. This was true in the 70s of the last century, but everything has come to a halt since the questions of “What’s next?” and “Why should we go on living?” have come up.

But man didn’t think about that and new problems have to be created in order to make it will be clear that we live in order to solve them. Otherwise such questions will come up and will make both the elite and our leaders feel bad.

Thus everything began to revolve around creating different imaginary needs, and health issues are not imaginary at all. Consequently, medicine has gradually reestablished itself by creating new symptoms, so that by using medicines that help heal certain symptoms, people will stay busy spending money on medicines and traveling from place to place in order to seek treatment, etc.

Question: Was this scenario laid in advance? Did people consciously examine this option in advance?

Answer: Of course. We can see advertising on TV for products that are 99% absolutely unnecessary. We have no need even for the one percent that is left, but we only think that we need them. After all, we have become used to advertising, are nourished by it, and the ideas it sells us have already become an inherent need. Therefore, we look for what else we can buy. We cannot manage without these things anymore, just like a drug addict who cannot manage without drugs. We are used to being obliged to watch commercials and implement what they advertise.

A few years ago I was in the hospital after a car accident and I saw how patients behave. One of them constantly spoke to the doctors like they were old friends. When I asked him why he spoke to them that way he answered proudly that he had had 12 operations. It is as if he wanted to say, “Look I am your loyal patient, I am yours!” and subconsciously, they treated him as if he was one of theirs—”He is one of ours!”

This means that it reached the state that they were making a living off one another. It is just like cops and robbers who cannot manage without each other. The police have to solve crimes or conspiracies and therefore cooperate with the mafia so that it will give them some clues or sacrifice one of its accomplices. The police arrest the victim and present it as their achievement, but usually it is the mafia that gives them the lead.

It is the same here. It has become a custom, and it is very interesting to observe the beautiful work of the ego from the outside.

Society imposes its values on us and feeds us these values as if they are a business dinner. They teach us to love, have children, raise them, build, play societal games, consume certain medicines and to be connected in a certain manner. It is all based on the notion of how to fill our day with worries, work, tasks, and not allow us time to think about the meaning of life.

But humanity has already developed to the point where this issue becomes vital. In order to make sure that we don’t engage in it, the authorities have denied us of all our free time, down to the very last moment.

The point is that the question about the meaning of life is much greater. If a person doesn’t find this answer, he becomes so depressed that he cannot overcome it. He doesn’t feel pleasure in anything: not in food, sex, family, his children, in nothing. Therefore the elite suppresses this question.

But the time has come to reveal the meaning of life to the masses. On one hand, it is as if we are playing on the edge. But on the other hand, we say nice things such as, “Let’s live in unity, let’s begin to love one another so that everything will be good.”

The wisdom of Kabbalah is not intended to arouse revolutionary passions in any one, neither in the elite nor in ordinary people. It doesn’t call people to fight but offers to make a soft revolution in a peaceful manner. This is the true spring, when after the long frost, after the inner emptiness, the gradual return to life begins.

Question: Will the elite agree to that?

Answer: The leaders will also change along with the masses, since we all change together. They will begin to realize that, first of all, the environmental situation doesn’t allow us to remain on the same level. We can see what is happening to us.

Disrupting the ecological balance involves a much greater imbalance of the whole earth. No one knows how many billions of dollars have been invested this year and are still being invested in order to overcome the environmental disasters all over the world.

Along with ecological and climate problems, we will also encounter nutritional problems since we have polluted the soil even at the level of thoughts and feelings. But when the authorities begin to change, they will see that everthing has a limit and it is nature that limits us.

They will realize that we have to acquire a totally new perception, and instead of money that has lost its value, a new coin will appear that is related to the communication between people.

Money is a method of connection that emphasizes how much greater you are and how small I am compared to you, and how we can satisfy each other’s needs. In Hebrew the word “money” (Kesef) stems from the word “cover” (Masach), which means that I cover the difference between us.

New methods of communication between people will emerge instead of relationships that are based on money. They will become popular, because society itself will begin to change. If it were only the environment that changed, we would still remain the same puppets and the authorities would continue to endlessly play with us. But because everyone will change, the perception will also change, and the authorities will operate in a totally different manner.

I believe that this will happen in the near future and I hope to see at least the beginning of this change. This is what I am living for.

We assist in the hastening of time. Our ideas automatically flow into society since we are an integral part of it. Accordingly we hasten the development of the elite as well.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 2/18/14

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The Force Of Good And The Force Of Evil, Part 3

laitman_759Suffering Due to a Lack of Balance

Question: Why does an evil force exist at all? Was it impossible to make things so life would be all good without any pain and torment?

Answer: The pain and torment testify to some kind of lack: a lack of oxygen, cold, heat, or nourishment. We suffer from a lack of fulfillment, wholeness, and balance. This suffering obliges us to remove the imbalance, to attain what is missing to complete ourselves.

We always feel pain; even the hand that rests comfortably on the table endures the pressure of the table. But if the suffering is not great, it helps us to feel objects and use them, which is to say, to react to the surrounding world.

But there are such reactions that have already crossed the threshold of pleasant feelings and begin to be felt as true suffering and pain. Pain is also a useful phenomenon. Pain protects us, obligates us to flee from danger, and forces us to heal our illnesses. There isn’t just evil in the world; everything depends upon how we relate to it.

Question: I will give an example: Yesterday when I was not around, they smashed the window of my car and stole a bag with money and documents. How can I remove this lack and imbalance? What can I do to become whole and balanced?

Answer: This is an excellent example. You are certainly suffering, and this testifies to your illness. Our whole society is sick.

You still don’t know that in this way they are showing you that you are sick: every citizen of this nation and all of us together are sick. And now you should try to find a remedy.

Don’t think that this happened for no reason like a little child who drops a cup and claims that it broke by itself. For every phenomenon there is a reason and it is necessary to learn it so that it won’t come back again.

Question: Does it follow that from the start we are condemned with illnesses if the world was created with weaknesses and pain?

Answer: No, we ourselves create the diseases. The pain is given only to show us where wholeness is required. If I put my hand into a fire and I don’t feel the pain, it will be burned. This pain is useful.

Suffering becomes bad not because it hurts me but because I don’t react correctly to the pain. This evil is found only in me, and not in some additional place somewhere.

If a lion wants to devour me, it is impossible to blame him for being evil. He acts according to his nature, his internal instincts. He became hungry and I looked quite tasty to him. It is not the lion that is bad; rather, it is I, because I put myself in a situation where he could attack me.

So it is worthwhile for me to stay away from this evil so that I won’t be hurled into bad situations. I won’t travel to a jungle anymore or I will put the lion in a cage.

There isn’t any evil! If I make a mistake once, then this is a lesson for me. If I repeat the same mistake, then this is stupidity.
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From KabTV’s “A New Life” 6/3/14

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Mental Exercise That Replaces Physical Exercise

Dr. Michael LaitmanIn the News (DailyMail): “A new research study suggests that just thinking of exercising can have the same effects as actually hitting the gym, officials say.

“A recent study published in the Journal of Neurophysiology found that simply imagining exercise can tone muscle, delay atrophy, and even make your muscles stronger.

“Researchers at Ohio University, according to the Breitbart News Network, conducted an experiment using two sets of ‘healthy individuals.’

“The researchers wrapped the wrists of one of the sets in a cast and gave them instructions to sit still for 11 minutes, five days a week, for four weeks, and ‘perform mental imagery of strong muscle contractions,’ – or, imagine exercising.

“The other set were not given any instruction.

“The results illustrated that the body and mind are more intertwined than we thought.

“At the end of the four weeks, the participants who engaged in the ‘mental exercise’ were twice as strong as those who didn’t, Breitbart reports.

“Additionally, those participants had a stronger brain because the exercises created stronger neuromuscular pathways.

“Scientists have long known the connections between the brain’s cortex and its ability to control and coordinate muscle movement, according to Ohio University’s Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine.

“However, the University’s study is the first to prove that the imagery can delay or stop muscle atrophy.”

My Comment: Gradually, we discover the increasingly greater influence of thought, imagination, and intention on the world, until we realize that only thought affects the world and that actions are only to supplement ideas.
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Where Is Happiness Hiding?

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Does the wisdom of Kabbalah enable a person to be happy? How does it happen?

Answer: A person asks questions about the meaning of life from childhood until he begins to develop hormonally. Then he forgets about these questions. But if they arise again later in life, he looks for answers to these questions.

Today there are quite a few such people. We can see this according to the number of people who are depressed or who suppress these troubling, tormenting questions by using drugs. Today these people make up half the world’s population and at least a high percentage take anti-depressant medication.

Therefore, the time has come for people to know that the wisdom of Kabbalah provides the answers to all their questions. Moreover, these are the exact answers they discover on their own and perceive as their attainment of the world, as the attainment of nature. At the same time, the answers they find don’t simply and abstractly connect to their questions, but they see how it works in their feelings, in the revelation of the world.

Thus, we should allow people not only to attain the world but also to change it, to change themselves and bring themselves and the world to the right connection that results in happiness, comfort, and harmony and balance between man and the world around him.

Here the wisdom comes to our aid, telling us how nature is arranged and what can be changed in man in order to reach harmony with nature and to exist in our world in a state of perfect balance. Balance is happiness.
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From KabTV’s “The New Year” 12/25/14

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Don’t Turn To Medicine Men

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: The Torah says, “Don’t turn to medicine men.” Why is this forbidden?

Answer: In principle, a person should turn only to the Upper Light for help; not to wait for help from below, but to look above. This is the problem. We usually run to doctors and look for something in order to make our situation easier.

Of course, this is not excluded. The Torah tells that it is impossible to manage without it, but only to the extent that it is necessary within the framework of the accepted direction of the society. All other efforts need to be directed to the Creator, the source of the problems.

Question: In the Torah it says that if you get sick, then go to a doctor. You said that your teacher would first go to one doctor, then to another doctors, and only afterward would begin with the treatment. Why?

Answer: You need to hear the opinion of both doctors and then choose one of them. Of course, they need to be respected and serious. And if both of them don’t agree, then go to a third, since from the first two you learn what the third should be. The choice is in your hands. Don’t trust blindly!

In this way, it is forbidden to trust the medicine men. Medicine men are those who don’t turn to the Creator but to all kinds of healing methods with the help of all kinds of spells and other such technology, which are not able to correct the person himself.

However, you can attain peace, tranquility, and good health without correcting yourself, but instead through some kind of alternative means. Thus, with people like alternative health practitioners, one must be very careful.  Without knowing it, they make our path even longer and increase sufferings. We must try to avoid experiences with them.

Very regretfully, a person gets used to acting as the others act in his surroundings and there is nothing to be done about this since a person must live within society. As it is said, “I am found within my people.”
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 4/16/14

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Hugs Can Fight Infections

 Dr. Michael LaitmanIn the News (Association for Psychological Science): “If you’re worried about catching a cold, there’s a simple act that may protect you against the virus and help you feel better right away: hug someone.

“Hugging can help prevent a cold virus or lessen symptoms in people who are already sick, according to a recent study published in Psychological Science.

“’We’re told to avoid sweaty, germy handshakes during cold and flu season, but the warm embrace of a close friend or loved one may actually improve immune system functioning,’ says Sheldon Cohen, a professor of psychology at Carnegie Mellon University and lead author of the study.

“Stress lowers the body’s defenses against viruses and other pathogens, research has shown.

“People who were stressed —but got hugs —were less likely to become infected with the virus. Hugs made no difference among those who weren’t stressed in terms of developing an infection.

“Those who did develop an infection with the virus were less likely to feel sick if they’d been hugged in the prior two-week period. The more days someone was hugged, the lower the risk of infection (among those who were stressed). Similarly, the more days someone was hugged, the less likely they would experience cold symptoms when infected with the virus.”

My Comment: The laws of nature are true at all levels. Therefore, convergence is always for the good, and it can cure all human ills!
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