I spoke today with parents who complained about the depressed state of their children. They are perplexed and don’t know what to do. Depression often pushes youth to do stupid things because they are doing everything to blur and suppress depression as deeply as possible.

Depression among teenagers is an international problem. Around 15 percent of teenagers are depressed and in some nations the number is higher than 15 percent.

It is very painful to see your children or your grandchildren in a situation like this. So it is up to us to try to provide them with a meaningful existence because life is colorful, complex, and very profound.

If we “swim” and glide along the surface of life, we are like sewage floating in the whirlpool of life. But if we sink into it and reach its depths in particular, we find the meaning of existence in it, the developmental plan of creation, and we realize that we are in fact the most unique creatures in the universe.

There is great meaning in our lives. We can “rise above the stars,” meaning, we can transcend time and space and attain an unlimited state.

It is up to us to discover and disseminate the knowledge about this not for ourselves, but for our children and grandchildren so that they can attain their own happiness. Let’s think about this today.
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From KabTV’s “The Wisdom of the Day” 7/17/16

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New Life 737 – Free Yourself From The Cycle Of Suffering
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

Suffering is the basis of life. It comes as a result of various shortcomings that constantly change and a person suffers without them. On the other hand, the foundation of creation is the Light in which nothing is missing.

The goal of human evolution is to come to the question, “What reason is there for living?” and the discovery of perfect and eternal fulfillment. After much running, a person gets tired of chasing transient fulfillments and awakens a desire to understand the source of life and the purpose of existence. Basically, all the suffering in his life comes to lead him toward the question: “What am I living for?”

People come to the wisdom of Kabbalah who are asking about the meaning of life, often suffering derived from loss. The wisdom of Kabbalah teaches us that our lives here in sum are quite brief within our eternal existence, and the understanding that we are constantly evolving toward the infinite gives a person a new perspective on life. The ultimate goal is to reach infinite and eternal fulfillment with Light, reaching this through realizing the general rule, “And you shall love your friend as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18).

Love your neighbor as yourself is the operation that explains how to connect with each other into a single soul. The wisdom of Kabbalah teaches us that innate drives and environmental influences are managing us, and we have no choice.

If we want to gain control over our lives, we must build a unique society that will bring the Upper Light closer to us and connect us with, “And you shall love your friend as yourself,” filling us with supreme abundance and happiness. Within a special group like this, the suffering will disappear and the aspiration will be only how to rise higher toward the eternal.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 737 – Free Yourself From The Cycle Of Suffering,” 6/23/16

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In the News (Time): “When teachers are stressed, so are their students, according to a new study.

“In the report, published in the journal Social Science & Medicine, researchers assessed the burnout levels of 17 teachers of fourth through seventh grade. They also assessed levels of the stress hormone cortisol in their students—more than 400 of them—by taking saliva samples at three different times during the school day.

“The researchers found that students had higher levels of cortisol if their teachers reported higher burnout levels. …

“The study is the first to link teacher burnout to physical stress changes in their students.”

(Psychological Science): “‘Stress Contagion,’ Emotions are not simply concepts that live privately in the mind, but rather affective states that emanate from the individual and may influence others. … infants’ physiological reactivity mirrored mothers’ reactivity engendered by the stress manipulation … These findings suggest that mothers’ stressful experiences are contagious to their infants and that members of close pairs, like mothers and infants, can reciprocally influence each other’s dynamic physiological reactivity.”

Answer: Look at what scientists are discovering . All people are connected to one another; there are “threads” that connect our thoughts, desires, intentions, and impulses. Could it be that the wisdom of Kabbalah is right in saying that we are in a global network that totally connects us in every respect? It turns out that it is indeed so.

Scientists have discovered that a student’s bad mood affects the teacher and vice versa, so what’s new? See what scientists research compared to what the wisdom of Kabbalah explores, to what it teaches us, and what it tells us when it explains the laws of the network in which we are all connected.

If we change the mutual relations between people somewhere in the world, we will affect people who are at the other end of the world by that action.

Of course there is a tight connection between everyone. We simply need to know this system.

If I turn on my computer but don’t know how to use it, what can I do with it? But if I’m familiar with the program and how to use it and what the effect of my fingers on the keyboard and through the keyboard on the program is, I can affect it.

At the same time, if I know what my computer can do and how it can affect the whole world, assuming that my computer is connected to the global computer network, it is a totally different matter.

Similarly, I can play my internal keyboard, which is Tzimtzum (restriction), a Masach (screen), and the Returning Light, and thus affect the network between us that is called the one general unique soul. If I can consciously affect this network by being inside it, through my thoughts, feelings, and desires, by wanting to bring it to the good future state it will reach anyway, by wanting to push it there because otherwise I will not be able to affect it, of course I affect it! I begin to see and to realize how it undergoes all the changes and how it develops.

So why is it surprising that everything affects everything? Are we talking about the fact that children drive a poor teacher crazy with their childish nonsense? Everything and everyone is mutually connected and are in one system. No one can escape, there is no escape. So let’s learn about the essence of the connection between us, its nature and how we can affect one another and bring everyone to the one unique whole.

Thus we will gradually discover a totally different level of mutual cooperation between us, a different level of our existence! Today scientists are publishing studies about things the wisdom of Kabbalah has been talking for 6,000 years.
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From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 6/30/16

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New Life 736 – The Origin Of Our Suffering
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

The wisdom of Kabbalah is based upon the fundamentals of creation. The Light created the desire to receive, which suffers when it is empty. The source of suffering in our lives is lack of fulfillment, whereas Kabbalah is a method for fulfillment of our desires.

The role of suffering is to advance us, without it we would not be able to do or feel anything. A person who stops suffering, stops feeling that he is missing something, becomes indifferent, withers, and finally dies. Suffering develops us.

Our origin is in the shattered collective soul. A different kind of fracture is constantly being discovered. The correct response to suffering is understanding its purpose. We don’t know why we are living. The greatest suffering is when a person feels that he is not the “master” over his own life.

Today many people use tranquilizers and drugs, but in fact, all fulfillment of desire is a type of drug because the relaxation of the suffering that appears as a result of the lack of fulfillment, prevents the person from developing further. We are destined to receive complete and eternal fulfillment, filling of the Upper Light, and suffering is designed to move us forward toward it. The correct use of suffering brings pleasure. For the same reason, we want to have an appetite for food, a desire for sex, and so forth.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 736 – The Origin Of Our Suffering,” 6/23/16

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In the News (Atlantic): “For centuries, philosophers and theologians have almost unanimously held that civilization as we know it depends on a widespread belief in free will—and that losing this belief could be calamitous. …

“The sciences have grown steadily bolder in their claim that all human behavior can be explained through the clockwork laws of cause and effect. This shift in perception is the continuation of an intellectual revolution that began about 150 years ago, when Charles Darwin first published On the Origin of Species. …

“Galton launched a debate that raged throughout the 20th century over nature versus nurture. Are our actions the unfolding effect of our genetics? Or the outcome of what has been imprinted on us by the environment? …

“In recent decades, research on the inner workings of the brain has helped to resolve the nature-nurture debate—and has dealt a further blow to the idea of free will. Brain scanners have enabled us to peer inside a living person’s skull, revealing intricate networks of neurons and allowing scientists to reach broad agreement that these networks are shaped by both genes and environment. But there is also agreement in the scientific community that the firing of neurons determines not just some or most but all of our thoughts, hopes, memories, and dreams. …

“Many scientists say that the American physiologist Benjamin Libet demonstrated in the 1980s that we have no free will. It was already known that electrical activity builds up in a person’s brain before she, for example, moves her hand; Libet showed that this buildup occurs before the person consciously makes a decision to move. The conscious experience of deciding to act, which we usually associate with free will, appears to be an add-on, a post hoc reconstruction of events that occurs after the brain has already set the act in motion. …

“The 20th-century nature-nurture debate prepared us to think of ourselves as shaped by influences beyond our control. …The challenge posed by neuroscience is more radical: It describes the brain as a physical system like any other, and suggests that we no more will it to operate in a particular way than we will our heart to beat. The contemporary scientific image of human behavior is one of neurons firing, causing other neurons to fire, causing our thoughts and deeds, in an unbroken chain that stretches back to our birth and beyond. In principle, we are therefore completely predictable. If we could understand any individual’s brain architecture and chemistry well enough, we could, in theory, predict that individual’s response to any given stimulus with 100 percent accuracy.

“Saul Smilansky, a philosophy professor at the University of Haifa, in Israel, has … come to a painful conclusion: ‘We cannot afford for people to internalize the truth’ about free will.

“Smilansky is convinced that free will does not exist in the traditional sense—and that it would be very bad if most people realized this.

Answer: According to the wisdom of Kabbalah there is no free will according to the common definition. All of a person’s actions are unconscious, and are performed unconsciously and only then understood, and some of them are not always understood either. According to many Kabbalistic texts, like Baal HaSulam’s articles “Thou Hast Hemmed Me In Behind and Before,” Shamati articles, etc. speak about that. Another part of Kabbalistic literature describes what does depend on a person. All of the Kabbalistic literature is divided into two parts: the part that depends on the Creator and the part that depends on a person.

The study of Kabbalah actually comes down to the study and implementation of our free will, but we can define and implement it only to the extent that we understand the Creator’s actions and when our attributes become equal to His through adhering to Him like to a partner. The meaning of our actions is in our understanding and our complete connection between all of a person’s actions and the Creator’s. This is called adhesion.
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Comment: American bio-technologists are studying how to resurrect people who have died. It refers to people who are brain dead but whose internal organs are still functioning. It is possible to revive a person who is a vegetative state and to bring him back to life. Such experiments will now be performed on human beings and substantial funding has been allocated for this research.

Answer: The whole point is that they are working for the funding since otherwise they will have nothing to do. The question is what for?! According to Judaism when a person dies you should call the funeral home to bury the body in the ground as soon as possible. He doesn’t feel anything anymore anyway; he is dead, so why should he be resurrected?! When the brain dies it is actually complete death. After that a person will never be the same but can be like a robot or a zombie.

If the brain is dead nothing can be done, the body will move automatically, but it will not be a human being anymore since the neurons die first. I believe that such resurrection of the dead makes no sense at all. We have recently spoken about the fact that people will live to be 150 or even 200, but what’s the point? Is it only because of the fear of death that we postpone it?! I am for the natural course of events.

Comment: But we still need to maintain the life of a person who is brain dead and who is in coma for a long time.

Answer: I don’t think this is necessary. Everything should happen naturally. What is the point of connecting a person to instruments that keep his organs alive? This isn’t the normal functioning of the body since a person doesn’t connect to the external world this way, so what is the point in that?

Question: Do you mean that it is all done mainly in order to attain funding?

Answer: Of course! Science is holding onto and relying on funding. Otherwise what will scientists do? We should eventually realize that we cannot defeat the natural flow of life. We will only find out that we have to live under natural conditions since this is what our body was created for. No one will gain from extending our life expectancy. It is a finite process in any case, since the future holds different kinds of life for us, which are much better than the worst of all the worlds.
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From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 4/25/16

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 Remark: According to studies that were conducted recently, Europe is becoming a continent of drugs. Recently 98 new drugs have appeared that have a narcotic effect. For every 1,000 of the European population, there is a need for 500-1000 milligrams of drugs.

Answer: The phenomenon of drugs hosted by the government of every nation and the world government as a whole, is very easy: give a person so many grams of drugs and he is calm and happy.

So soon they will give everyone drugs in the form of cocktails or a special cup of coffee for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. They will even give them in schools instead of the drugs given to children today for various problems. This is something that will happen in the near future, and as a result of this, it will be easier for the world.

But the fact is, this is not a correction. After all, we are in a certain natural system that must bring us to the disclosure of the managing force to ensure we will take upon ourselves the management of the world.

We need to rise to the level of the upper force (the Creator); this has been given not just to the Kabbalists, but to everyone. When a person understands everything that is happening, he can consciously participate in the work of the one integral system, independently turning this entire “clockwork” in unison with everyone else, meaning that he feels the entire system of creation, its flow and direction. This should be discovered soon.
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From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 6/2/16

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New Life 581 – Eternal Beauty
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

Our desire for immortality is natural; the aspiration for beauty, power, and appreciation motivates us in life because we are social creatures. The ego constantly develops. Today, it assures us of happiness through the prevention of aging and beauty care. But the investment in anti-aging will not bring us to eternal and complete satisfaction, to which we really aspire.

Ultimately, we realize that to remain young forever it we need to develop the soul. It is very important to be concerned about the health of the body, but interest in beauty is something else. There is internal beauty and external beauty.

The spiritual source for the feminine concern about beauty and facial appearance is the radiation of Light, a good attitude toward others. Instead of running for operations, it is worthwhile to invest in an “internal operation,” upgrading your attitude toward others for the better.

When an internal attitude of warmth and love is radiated from you toward others, your outer expression will also improve. In principle, a person is supposed to look as nature created him. The appearance reflects his internal forces. As much as a person relates well with others, they will accept him nicely, as in the relationship of children to their mother. A person who corrects his internal attitude toward others to love will also feel younger.

Try to relate to others as if you were their mother, radiating love and trust. They will feel that you are more beautiful.
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From KabTV’s “New Life 581 – Eternal Beauty,” 6/2/15

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New Life#580 – Remaining Young Forever
Dr. Michael Laitman in conversation with Oren Levi and Nitzah Mazoz

Why does a person want to remain young forever, how is it possible to attain immortality, and why is the matter contingent on the correction of the basic characteristics we were born with?

Summary

There is a hidden power in the world, the power of love and bestowal, the power of life. This power radiates goodness and love to everyone, like the sun. And we, the human masters of nature, are its opposite. We absorb and receive the power of life from it, but ultimately the power of life weakens and we grow old and die.

To reach a state of eternal life, it is up to us to be like that life force, to be love and bestowal.

This life force is called Light. It is found everywhere. We are capable of absorbing only a small spark of it. The secret of life is that a person must correct his nature from reception to bestowal, resembling this eternal Light. A person who corrects his nature from reception for himself to bestowal of goodness to others, merges with eternity.

Our physiological body is condemned to die. We have the ability to develop a spiritual body, a “soul,” and live in it forever.

Every person naturally strives to escape death, and for women there is a natural inclination to strive for beauty.

Spiritual beauty is beauty that radiates from you as love for others. If we cultivate inner beauty, a relationship of love for others, this will radiate outward and people will love us.
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From KabTV’s “New Life#580 – Remaining Young Forever,” 6/2/15

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Question: Great demographic changes are expected in the near future. Life expectancy is rising and the number of elderly people is growing, while the number of young people is declining.

For 51 years, from 1960 to 2011, the world population grew from three billion people to seven billion. The European population is expected to decrease by 10%, while the population in Africa and Asia is expected to grow by 30%. From 2010 until 2030, there will be a demand for 734 million new jobs and society’s greatest enemy will be aging.

The fact that people today can live to the age of 85 to 90 is a big problem for all of humanity.

Answer: Of course, and why do we need to live for so many years?

Question: A person has a desire to live.

Answer: Suppose we could add some magic potion to our drinking water and prolong people’s life by 50 years. What then?

I believe that a person was not born to work and produce more, sell more, buy more, pollute the earth more, and so on.

A person must dedicate his life to studying and exploring the structure of humanity and to correcting the connection between people since through that he attains an upper energy, the upper goal.

If a person comes to this state, through correcting himself and the world, he saturates the world with goodness, with the upper energy, and then life is worth living.

Therefore, all of the billions of people who come along and the billions who will live 50 years longer must become part of a new integral education system so that they will be taught to be human beings who will bring affluence, freedom, and “oxygen” into our society.

Thus, the problem of unemployment will be solved, the problem of “extra mouths to feed” and all of our problems will be solved without exception.

Everything depends only on the degree to which we are harmonious with nature, a harmony that can exist only when we ascend above our ego. If we do that, everyone will feel good, and if we don’t, then no matter how many people there are, things  will only get worse.
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From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 5/29/16

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