The largest portal Breaking Israel News published my new article “Prominent Kabbalist Describes Near-Death Experience“

It happened twenty years ago but I remember it as if it were yesterday. I was driving with a few of my long-time students on a road outside Jerusalem when another car violently crashed into ours. We all suffered severe injuries, but I was the only one declared clinically dead.

Right after the impact, I didn’t realize my state. All I knew was that I couldn’t breathe. My lungs began filling up with blood and I almost lost consciousness. Then, the ambulance arrived. While we were on our way to the hospital, I had only a vague sense of my surroundings, conscious one moment, and unconscious the next.

My Out-of-Body Experience

Once at the hospital, I was asked to sign a paper. They took my arm and I scribbled something. Afterward, I experienced a total blackout. I could, however, somehow see the doctor trying to resuscitate me. He aggressively raised and flexed my leg, pressing it very hard against my torso. He later explained to me that although I was technically dead, he had tried to stabilize my blood flow that had unsettled due to internal bleeding in my liver.

I had never met the doctor before, and I would not until after three weeks of recovery in the hospital. Interestingly, I clearly saw him pushing my leg. I did not see him with my eyes. I was seeing myself and what was happening to me from outside my body. Yes, this is what people commonly refer to as an “out-of-body experience.”

What Is an Out-of-Body Experience?

Since I’m a teacher of Kabbalah, my students have since asked me: If I didn’t see the doctor with my eyes, what did I see him with? Also, what exactly is an out-of-body experience? Is it connected to spirituality?

I did not see the doctor or my surroundings with my eyes, but with an internal sense. However, I do not connect this internal sense or my out-of-body experience to spirituality. Such experiences are mere psychological, non-coincidental impressions that are processed by our brain and manifest in a supranormal form.

After surgery, when I was recovering and going in and out of consciousness, I saw blurry, colorful images, but no concrete shapes. Yet it was clear to me that all this had nothing to do with spirituality. When people grasp images as if they are from outside, they actually see a resemblance of what they have learned, heard and processed throughout their lives.

Corporeal Laundry

First of all, there is no such as a thing as “clinical death” according to the wisdom of Kabbalah. Death is death, and there are undeniable scientific signs to measure it through the physical human functions or the lack of them.

The body exists only for the sake of wrapping the soul. The material body dies and disintegrates, but the soul lives on by clothing into a new body to continue the spiritual cycle until its full correction.

Only while we’re alive in this world is our spiritual advancement possible. So what happens when you die? Very simply, if we do not make efforts to develop a soul in our lifetime, we keep reincarnating. As explained by Kabbalist Yehuda Leib HaLevi Ashlag (Baal HaSulam) in his article “From My Flesh I Shall See God,” “The connection between the body and the soul is only that in the former, things happen to it naturally and by themselves, and in the latter they happen through work and joint relation between the spiritual and the corporeal.”

I remember when I came to Baal HaSulam’s son, Rav Baruch Ashlag (Rabash), who was my teacher for over a decade, one of my first questions to him was: “How does a person who has attained spirituality relate to life and death?” He answered: “I see that today you came to my lesson in a nice, new, white shirt and later you will change it. You know that you will have to change your shirt. This is exactly how a person living in his soul views his body: he knows that the time will come when it will have to be changed.”

So why do we make such a big deal about dying? From a Kabbalistic perspective, it is not important whatsoever. If we invest in our spiritual development and the correction of our soul, we remain alive after “taking off” the physical body in the same way we remain alive after we take off our shirt. It’s a sort of corporeal laundry; we just get rid of dirty clothing.

Unraveling Humanity’s Google

If a person does not develop his soul during his lifetime, it means that he did not prepare for the second stage of his existence, which is life above the corporeal egoistic desire, the self-aimed desire to enjoy. This desire renews itself and appears in different ways, undergoing an upgrade from one incarnation to the next. It gets a new opportunity to develop until it acquires what, according to Kabbalah, it was created for: the attainment of the soul—connection to the spiritual world—while still in this world.

When the material body dies, the remaining desire is called a Reshimo (from Hebrew “roshem” – a record or reminiscence), a sort of code that includes everything a person consisted of, a kind of spiritual DNA passed on from generation to generation. It is the particle from which we eventually develop a soul .

Baal HaSulam explains this in his article “The Peace”: “Thus, in our world, there are no new souls the way bodies are renewed, but only a certain amount of souls that incarnate….Therefore, with regard to the souls, all generations since the beginning of creation to the end of correction are as one generation that has extended its life over several thousand years….”

This collection of spiritual information is “humanity’s Google,” so to speak, a system where we are all connected. Through Kabbalah, we can open, explore, understand and use that system, entering its “control room,” a heightened sense of balance and harmony with our surrounding reality.

Moreover, Kabbalah states that reaching such a unified and harmonious state is the reason we’re alive: the purpose of our existence. Its attainment grants us the perception of our eternal soul and the connections between us, and sensations of unbounded tranquility and bliss, without departing from this material existence.

Freedom from Fear

What I felt in my near-death experience, and what many people have reported to feel, does indeed exemplify a certain sense of freedom from the corporeal body. While in that limbo between life and death, I thought about my state and felt it vividly. I did not feel fear or pleasure, only a sense of transition to a new state. I did not care about whether I died or stayed alive, and had no perception of good or bad. I only felt the sensation of some flow taking me wherever it wanted, here or there, and that nothing depended on me.

Fear is experienced only when a person is strongly attached to life and gets frightened by the unknown. However, on the verge of death, when the five senses are shut down, you become free from the corporeal body; there is no sense of belonging to it.

However, such feelings of freedom are temporary, limited and miniscule compared to the boundless sensations of fulfillment, connection and delight that come from attaining our eternal soul.

The wisdom of Kabbalah invites anyone who so desires to embark on the journey of the soul’s discovery during our lifetime. Moreover, both Baal HaSulam and The Book of Zohar (a principle Kabbalistic text), pointed specifically to our era as the one when more and more people would increasingly question the meaning of their lives, becoming ready to make steps toward their soul’s attainment, learning and using the wisdom of Kabbalah for this purpose.

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The largest portal Newsmax posted my new article: “How Misguided We Are in Thinking That God Is Anything”.

Even as a child, long before I knew the wisdom of Kabbalah, I never thought about the upper force as anything similar to a flesh and blood human who consumes food and secretes waste, sweats, gets sick from time to time, and is not always “aesthetically pleasing,” to say the least.

It didn’t make sense to me that this limited, transient body somehow reflects a force that is supposedly universal, eternal and lofty.

So I was surprised to hear that a new research asked participants to describe what they thought the face of God looked like. Merging results from hundreds of American believers, the researchers assembled the “face of God.”

Now, if the image of the Creator was indeed like that of a human being, then something went wrong with that Creator…

According to Kabbalah, “God,” or “the Creator,” is the quality of complete, unconditional love and bestowal. It’s a spiritual force devoid of any corporeal depiction, a force that guides and sustains the whole of reality, and its purpose is one: to do good. To that end, the Creator created a creature who is destined to reach the ultimate goodness — acquiring the godly, eternal quality of absolute love and bestowal.

However, the path to perfection begins with imperfection. The Creator “shattered” the created being, which put him in the exact opposite state — a quality of self-reception. As a result, all of us are shattered pieces of the created being, and the corporeal reality we are familiar with is the farthest state from the Creator.

In fact, we have no connection with the quality of absolute love and bestowal. And even when we think we are giving to others, it’s an illusion; our acts of giving are mixed with self-interest.

Therefore, it’s not surprising that participants in the study chose the most beautiful and lofty image they could think of. It’s the top of what the human imagination can conjure up. It also explains why some participants chose images that reflect their position on the political spectrum.

Sorry to kill the romance, but whatever human image we come up with, as beautiful as it may be, will never have any connection with the true image of the Creator. That is, with the quality of unconditional love and bestowal.

Then how do we “draw” the correct image of the Creator?

First, erase any corporeal depiction. Second, internalize that the Creator cannot be perceived through our five senses. And third, learn how to develop inner qualities that are similar to the Creator’s qualities.

A person who learns how to develop a universal attitude of love and bestowal to all created beings and to reality as a whole, becomes internally similar to the Creator. Thus, through his new thoughts and desires, he builds the image of the Creator within himself.

The authentic wisdom of Kabbalah is a method that was weaved for generations based on the practical experience of thousands of people who detached from the corporeal depiction and acquired the inner qualities of the Creator.

Some of them recorded their findings in writing and passed them down to the next generations. Today, any person can use their method to develop a new, inner set of “brushes and color palettes,” with which one can draw the image of the Creator.

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Medium published my new article “The Ideal Framework For A Happy Existence” 

How to be happy has become an algorithm hard to decipher. Is it because we are using the wrong formula? Fulfillment does not depend on money, power, or luck, but on positive human relations. This is the principle of the happiness course at Yale and Stanford, with the course already the most popular in the history of both universities.

The course is based on positive psychology. It states that our level of joy in life is determined by the quality of our interaction with others. In fact, people are more satisfied in an environment where solidarity, support and a sense of belonging prevail. In contrast, competition to dominate and be above others put a person under constant stress, pressure and isolation.

It explains why people that seem to have it all may suffer severe depression to the point that some are taking their own lives. The recent suicides of the American designer Kate Spade and the TV personality Anthony Bourdain exemplify this situation. As a contagious effect, days after their deaths, the number of calls to the crisis hotlines in the US rose by 65% and the volume of text emergency lines spiked to 116%.

Globally, around 800,000 die due to suicide every year, about one person every 40 seconds, according to the World Health Organization. The statistics show that the lack of fulfillment is reaching epidemic proportions. Attributing it to external conditions would be a simplistic explanation. A person can live in the middle of a forest in a log cabin and feel happy, or have a luxurious apartment in a skyscraper yet feel miserable and lonely. What is the key factor that makes the difference between those states? It is the influence of the environment.

What distinguishes us from other species is the social aspect. We are shaped and influenced by our surroundings at every moment of our lives, through our family, work and the media. One can be oppressed or elevated by the environment depending on how the person absorbs such influence.

An egalitarian society based on solidarity, where everyone cares for each other — gets as much as one needs and works for the good of all — is the ideal framework for people’s happy existence and a solid ground for their children’s thriving future.

On the contrary, our egoistic and aggressive pursuit of wealth, honor, knowledge and power cannot be a source of happiness. This is because the moment we fulfill those desires, a new void appears leaving us dissatisfied again. Therefore, the ultimate joy can only be at a level above individual pursuits of happiness, by building together a cohesive social fabric that will positively influence every member of society.

As written by Kabbalist Rav Yehuda Ashlag in the newspaper The Nation:

“It is a must for every nation to be strongly united within, so all the individuals within it are attached to one another by instinctive love. Moreover, each individual should feel that the happiness of the nation is one’s own happiness, and the nation’s decadence is one’s own decadence… It means that the people of that nation, who sense that harmony, are the ones who make the nation, and the measure of happiness of the nation and sustainability are measured by their quality.”

However, our current education system and environment revere competition and achievement for personal gain, even if it is at the expense of others. This might be the most important discovery for the students at Yale and Stanford: that it is naïve to think that something will change if we continue being controlled by our selfish nature.

Michael Laitman at the World Kabbalah Convention, New Jersey, May 2018.

Therefore, even the most prestigious institution cannot teach us how to be happy. The solution would be to enroll the entire society in happiness studies, but it is somehow comfortable with the status quo, which is the core message that the person, a product of the environment, is exposed to.

However, from one heartbreak to another, from crisis to crisis, from despair to pain, gradually the whole society will be aware of its current bad state. Then it will discover the path of Kabbalah, chosen by unique individuals “disengaged” from the devious values of society to implement a transformational process to encourage close bonds of unity and love, wherein, as mentioned above, lies happiness.

Kabbalah is a method of building a unified and happy human society. It is a method that teaches values necessary for existence in a healthy social framework, how to relate to others in a balanced manner. Moreover, it teaches a step-by-step process on how to positively connect in order to draw a force dwelling in nature that can change human nature. Thus, a person will learn not to aspire only to fulfill his or her own happiness, but that of others as well. A harmonious human society will then be built to ensure each other’s happiness.

In such a society, the way to measure an individual’s happiness will be simple: A person whose happiness and positive emotions burst outside all the time — from the individual to others and from others to the individual — is a happy and satisfied person. We will then all graduate with honors from the university of life.
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The largest portal Newsmax published my new article “Winds of Change: US Withdraws From UN Human Rights Council“

When you have an international watchdog that seems to look obsessively in one direction, isn’t it a sign that there is an elephant in the room? The unprecedented move by the U.S. to withdraw from the UN Human Rights Council marks a turning point in a new global approach aimed at reaching balance and efficiency of the world’s monitoring bodies.

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, champion of this new transformational approach in the diplomatic arena and representative of the vision of the current administration, was adamant in exposing why the decision was adopted: “For too long, the Human Rights Council has been a protector of human rights abusers, and a cesspool of political bias. Regrettably, it is now clear that our call for reform was not heeded.”

The move is refreshing. It symbolizes the beginning of the end of the old world, characterized by the prioritization of the interests of a few at the expense of the majority’s interests. Winds of change have been ushered in by a new order of humanity’s increasing interdependence. And when it concerns a money-feeding machine such as the United Nations, which has a highly questionable record in resolving the world’s most pressing issues, such a change is necessary.

The UN busily singles out certain nations and turns a blind eye to others’ violations. According to UN Watch, from 2012 to 2015 a staggering 86 percent of resolutions adopted by the General Assembly were against a single country: Israel. Particularly, the Human Rights Council has been a key participant in this activity. Within a decade since its establishment in 2006, it has passed 135 resolutions criticizing countries, more than half of them against Israel.

As a paradox, many of the member countries evaluating human rights standards and lecturing others are ranked as “not free” by Freedom House: Afghanistan, Angola, Burundi, China, Cuba, Congo, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iraq, Qatar, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Venezuela.

The current state of affairs is leading us to rethink the relevance of international bodies for humanity’s betterment, as well as revise whether we should continue perpetuating the existence of organizations that primarily serve the interests of political and financial elites.

The good news is that there are signs of global transformation. The boundaries of international relations are becoming increasingly blurred, as we recently witnessed with the G7 Summit and in the meeting between the U.S. President and the leader of North Korea. Today, any meeting can be setup at any time according to need. There is no need for fabricated gatherings of representatives in a pluralistic guise.

Today’s interdependent world doesn’t require artificial representative bodies to help us get closer to each other. We ourselves can strengthen our solidarity and cause a fundamental change in our relations. When nations’ leaders and people in general realize the extent of our global interdependence, we will be able to make great strides toward a harmonious global society.

How? By establishing connection-enriching educational programs that would help us positively adapt to the new globally interdependent conditions. People ultimately need to learn how to accept, understand, and get along with everyone, as well as become influenced by an atmosphere of mutual understanding, support, awareness, and sensitivity. Such programs, guided by a “wisdom council” of people who have society’s best interests at heart, would then make it clear that the world’s bright future does not depend on the UN or any other actor on the international scene, but on the quality of human connections.
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The largest portal Newsmax published my new article “4 Steps to Curing Video Game Addiction, Returning to Reality“

Gaming addiction has been classified as a mental health condition by the World Health Organization (WHO). According to the WHO, gaming disorder is characterized by a lack of control over gaming, and gaming taking higher priority over other interests and daily activities, impairing the gamer’s personal, family, social, educational or occupational functioning.

I saw this problem firsthand about 30 years ago when one of my friends, a man in his 40s, became addicted to computer games. The game he was playing back then took over his life. Each day, from morning to night, he was completely focused on improving his performance, thinking about how to get more soldiers and weapons for the game he had become addicted to.

The climax came when he went bankrupt. Since then, multiple similar examples of gaming addiction have made the problem apparent to many more people.

Video games disconnect people from reality. But what makes them so addictive?

It’s not only the act of playing the games themselves. Behind the scenes is a massive industry inventing, producing, marketing, and investing in the games and their accessories, i.e. many people seeking to maximize their profits.

And when profit motives become entangled in the phenomenon, then a lot of effort goes into, on one hand, contacting governments and finding ways to encourage the enjoyment of video games, and on the other hand, optimizing the games themselves and the world of accessories and imagery surrounding the games to keep people playing.

The major setback is that these people are mostly children and youth. They can easily slip away from reality into video games. This becomes especially disappointing considering that video game addiction can wane certain aspects of their mental and emotional development, as well as cause mental illness and damage to their personality.

The raised awareness of gaming disorder and the potential of video games to deteriorate people’s development is one thing, but what could be done to improve such a state of affairs?

The following are four steps:

1. Restrict access to video games. The authorities who permit addictive video games to flood the market can be requested to restrict access to them, or at least, to sites that make them available. Although this seems unrealistic, especially since these same authorities also make a significant profit from the industry, it’s still doable. The clear example is with countries that restrict free access to the Internet for various reasons.

2. Detach a person from video games. This is the most effective detoxification. We humans are egoistic, pleasure-seeking creatures by nature, and we will always seek new ways to enjoy in different areas of interest.

3. Create parallel educational games or integrate educational aspects into existing games. Instead of leading the protagonist into struggles and victories over other players—fueling players with pride, which attracts them to keep playing — channel the players’ success in the direction of constructive social values. The question is, who will raise such an initiative?

4. Education. Learning tools and programs that focus on strengthening and improving what’s most important in life: meaningful human connections. Such tools should help people navigate through all kinds of interferences to achieve connection, including the wild deluge of virtual products incessantly popping up on our screens. If such education is done successfully, the next generation will know how to manage stable relationships and create positive connections in wider social circles.

The fourth step is definitely the most significant and overriding one. That is, only when our social environment is filled with more meaningful connections, when we will feel that we are genuinely important to each other, like in a family, will we have the means to raise happy and confident human beings. Then, we will no longer seek an escape from reality.

Instead, we will seek a deeper entrance into this reality, and will invest our inventive, productive, playful, and promotional powers into constructing this supportive environment that will prevent any mental illness and impaired development.
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The largest portal Newsmax published my new article “Is Human Connection Without Borders Possible?“

President Trump’s executive order reversing the policy of separating children from parents sent to jail for crossing the border illegally comes as no surprise, due to the international uproar the children’s ordeal caused. But what is next?

It is impossible to be indifferent to the humanitarian crisis of the last few weeks affecting more than two thousand children. The images of children crying inside cage-like detention centers struck a chord with me and the rest of the world, as families were torn apart.

It is understandable that those parents were looking for opportunities and a good future for themselves and their offspring, which they could not find in their home countries. But what would you do if you were the president of the United States, and promised to your constituency to implement a zero tolerance policy to stop illegal immigration?

That is what millions who trusted President Trump with their votes expect from him. And he is doing just that. So in keeping his word, he is trying to change the economy, trade, financial system, and homeland security, among other areas.

Solving illegal immigration to the U.S., however, is one of the most challenging conundrums. A permanent solution to the problem has been sidetracked for decades. Both Democratic and Republican policymakers have even turned a blind eye to let people enter the country illegally for their party’s own political gain.

A solid immigration reform that deters more people from breaking the law and encourages others to immigrate legally should start with an educational plan. Those applying for a permanent status would need to enroll in absorption sessions to get deeply acquainted with the American society, the country’s history, social norms, culture, language, and its laws.

The key is to evaluate the applicant’s true desire to become an integral part of society, and not add to segregated cultural ghettos in the country. Most of the problems with such isolated cultural conglomerates stem from an inappropriate absorption process.

Moreover, this situation is not limited to America. The United Nations Refugee Agency (UNRA) reported this week that the total number of displaced people worldwide rose to a record 68.5 million last year. No leader or organization today seems to know how to successfully handle immigrant integration into their respective countries and societies, because there is no clear understanding of what has led to such a large-scale displacement.

And what is this current state of affairs ultimately a consequence of? It’s the consequence of a new level of connection and interdependence among countries and peoples. Humanity is gradually erasing its boundaries, becoming a melting pot that will need to learn how to share and respect common values by developing a sense of a common destiny.

This is not only relevant for immigrants. As the world evolves, human society the world over will have to engage in a new process of learning and transformation, one that expands our perception of the world, the needs of our fellow man, and brings us to a realization that we depend on each other to not only succeed, but to survive.

There is still a long road ahead. A country should protect its frontiers, but humanity will continue developing to a state of one global family without borders. As Yehuda Ashlag, one of the great Jewish sages of the 20th century, wrote in his book “The Writings of the Last Generation,” “The whole world is one family … and every country is obligated to ensure that it won’t detain citizens who come to another country, and won’t close its gates to immigrants and foreigners.”
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The Jerusalem Post published my new article “Why Do We Construct Theories and Philosophies about What Happens After We Die?“

Why does a person who is alive need to construct theories and philosophies about death? It’s an inseparable part of life, so why is it concealed from us?

The still, vegetative and animate levels of nature have no awareness about death. They feel weak when they’re nearing death, but only in terms of their survival coming to an end. Therefore, they have no questions beyond death, nor about the past, present or future in general. Those questions emerge only in humans, because we have a special point above the bodily, animal existence.

We feel no life while we are gametes in our parents. We don’t know how our parents met and brought about that initial live cell from which we developed. We also lack the sensation of how our body gradually disbands until something causes its death, as well as what remains of it afterward.

What we especially fail to understand is that, as opposed to animals and plants, we feel ourselves as existing in something higher and greater than our bodies. We can’t pinpoint this sensation, but in general, we call it “life.”

There is subsistence, living for the sake of survival and reproduction, and there is life, living for the sake of something greater.

We spend much of our lives contemplating, examining and researching this point of what life is and how we can fill our existence. This additional desire above our will for survival means a lot to us. We’re ready to toil and suffer for it.

Humanity’s development is leading us gradually toward an increasingly greater desire to understand the addition of life above our mere survival needs. What is especially evident in our era is that, while we have an abundance of life’s necessities — more than in any other historical period — the eternal question about the meaning and purpose of life awakens more than in any other era.

Yet, the answer to that question is elusive.

The myriad theories, fantasies and methods we have developed, whether religious or secular, are all baseless speculation.

Why?

It’s because the form of our current lives is sealed in our inborn corporeal-material nature, which is a desire to receive enjoyment and pleasure. We feel and identify ourselves in this desire and have no ability to envision anything outside of it.

Our sensations, thoughts, desires and fantasies are all aimed at the fulfillment of our desire to enjoy.

But is this our only desire?

If we had only the desire to enjoy, then we would be like animals, locked solely in an instinctive drive to fulfill ourselves maximally at every moment of our lives.

However, we have a very small point, a spark that comes from a higher level than our animal existence. Due to this point awakening in us, we ask the questions: “What is the meaning of life?” and “What do we live for?”

This point also awakens negative sensations in us — dissatisfaction, emptiness, depression, helplessness and despair — which our generation senses more than any other. We’ve organized our lives to allow us freedom from worries about providing for our necessities, and precisely because of this, the question about life’s meaning is liberated, causing more forceful demands to surface. As a result, many new problems in human society are emerging.

We think that we have all kinds of different cravings in humanity for money, honor and knowledge, for all kinds of things beyond the level of food, sex and family. However, we really only have the question about life’s meaning and purpose, which demands a response.

There are differing levels of feeling and awareness of this question in different people, and it is a major influence in our daily lives.

The different mannerisms, cultures, customs and beliefs of every nation are all ultimately responses to the question about life’s meaning and purpose. In our basic needs for food, sex and family, we are all essentially the same. However, the moment we enter our social desires for money, honor and knowledge, our lives are shaped by the character of how the question about life’s meaning and purpose surfaces in us, and how we respond to it. We differ precisely in how we respond to that question.

We move in different directions trying to answer the question about life’s meaning and purpose. However, lacking a true answer, one that gives us lasting fulfillment, we keep finding ourselves falling short, empty and desperate. As a result, nowadays we are witnessing a reduction in our mental and emotional development. In past eras, we had far greater respect for philosophy, science and the arts. Today, however, society is turning toward heightened comfort and convenience, and valuing technologies that can serve as a means to this end.

Despite all these comforts and distractions, it remains true that if we won’t find a satisfactory answer to the question about life’s meaning and purpose, then we will increasingly suffer. While the younger generation today focuses more on technologies, that will come to an end. With less and less of a drive to build families and give birth to children, they don’t want to be “ordinary beasts” that live as if in a herd, because the question about the meaning of life lives and breathes in them.

Up to now, the younger generation passively responds: “We’re not in your game. You want to live and succeed, so be it. It’s not for us.” The next stage after this generation will be sharper, and its response, far angrier.

The more the answer to the question about the meaning of life will elude us, the more we will see the rise and fall of all kinds of distortions that try to appear in its place. The legalization and promotion of hard drugs will rise to try calm us down. Technologies will continually emerge to make our lives easier, to make us feel content sitting in our residences all day. But such efforts won’t hold.

Indeed, if we set our hearts to answer but one very famous question, I am certain that all these questions and doubts will vanish from the horizon, and you will look unto their place to find them gone. This indignant question is a question that the whole world asks, namely, “What is the meaning of life?” In other words, these numbered years of our life that cost us so heavily, and the numerous pains and torments that we suffer for them, to complete them to the fullest, who is it who enjoys them? Or even more precisely, whom do I delight? It is indeed true that historians have grown weary
contemplating it, and particularly in our generation. No one even wishes to consider it. Yet the question stands as bitterly and as vehemently as ever. Sometimes it meets us uninvited, pecks at our minds and humiliates us to the ground before we find the famous ploy of flowing mindlessly in the currents of life as always. –
Yehuda Ashlag, Introduction to the Study of the Ten Sefirot.

Centuries ago, The Book of Zohar, as well as renowned twentieth century Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam), predicted that starting from the end of the 20th century, the question about the meaning of life would intensify throughout humanity, demanding more and more people to seek its true answer. Those who remain unsatisfied with what our culture creates to deal with this question in the meantime, who keep exploring different approaches, methods and environments to no avail, are expected to eventually find themselves delving into the wisdom of Kabbalah.

The wisdom of Kabbalah is a method of how to perceive and sense the eternal reality while living our current lives. Attaining such a perception ultimately answers questions such as “What happens when you die?” and “What is the meaning of life?” because by doing so, we access our spiritual life that continues living after the death of our protein bodies. By engaging in the method, we undergo significant changes that reveal a completely different perception of reality, discover lasting fulfillment, a deeper connection with others and with the causal force of reality, and gain a sense of wholeness and harmony with the world around us. This wondrous wisdom is open to all, and awaits anyone with a sincere desire to find the core reason of why we appeared here on this planet.
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The portal Medium published my new article “Childcare Abuse: Mirror of the 21st Century Society?”

We cringe when we hear about another horrifying childcare abuse story, such as the abusive daycare workers that were arrested last week, both in Israel and Arkansas.

Inconceivable as it is, abuse in daycare centers appears to be systematic and widespread. Data gathered from 39 states in the U.S., for instance, shows that 5,321 daycare providers were found abusive. In Israel, efforts are being made to push legislation that will require all kindergartens to install security cameras, as parents realize that no one can guarantee their children’s safety.

But what is causing those we hire to take care of our children to behave in such a monstrous way? And how can we constrain this phenomenon when we don’t have control over what happens inside daycare centers?

It’s hard to grasp, but these horrifying incidents reveal the cold, stony heart that beats within the human being. When the ego overpowers us, it floods us with such a high degree of agitation and fury that conquers all, driving us to harm anyone in our way, even a helpless little toddler.

And with little children who cannot express themselves well, there’s nothing to stop the monster from breaking out. Likewise, data shows that the age group most likely to be abused is between 0 and 3 years of age.

“What Kind of Monster Can Do That?”

“If I myself had seen such a video online,” said the Israeli kindergarten teacher as she was shown footage of her own abusive behavior, “I would ask: what kind of a monster can do that?”

Evidently, we cannot see our own fault in the moment of truth. The stony heart blinds us and removes the sense of guilt, causing us to lose our senses without being aware of it.

Thus, even if we put cameras everywhere — we won’t be solving the root problem. The monster lies within every caregiver, and in fact, in every one of us. The question is who awakens the monster from its sleep?

We can easily blame individuals for their abusive actions, and we should certainly prevent them from continuing. But these are merely results that float above the surface. The monster that awakens is a social disease that has been incubating for decades and is erupting increasingly in our time.

How We Got Here

Until the midst of the 20th century, raising kids was completely different to what we are now used to, and yet closer to our natural development as human beings. Mothers used to have better conditions for bringing up children and caring for their wellbeing. And they were socially acknowledged for doing so.

Then came the industrial revolution, along with powerful vested interests who sought to modify the social order for the sake of profit. Efforts were made to drive women into the workforce, by relating it to liberal ideals of women’s emancipation and their equal status in society. That was in order to maximize production and consumption to a level the world has never seen before.

The resulting consumer society was designed to plunder the planet’s resources so as to orient human life around material excess. Gradually, people embraced a new lifestyle that reshaped the social order and the family unit.

However, as happiness studies uncover, neither we nor the wealthy few actually find any genuine satisfaction and comfort in the cyclical chase for material acquisition.

The result? A society where toddlers are torn from their mothers and thrown into the hands of a nanny who also competes in the material race. A “free” society where everything is permitted and boundaries are blurry. A society where the natural connection between parent and child has been significantly compromised and devalued. A society where monstrous, uninhibited ego can erupt even towards helpless toddlers.

Childcare abuse is the mirror of human society in the 21st century.

Our Children Need a Social Revolution

So what are we going to do about it? How will we prevent similar incidents in the future? How will we heal the sickness of our society?

As long as we fail to work towards a fundamental change in social values, we can all pledge guilty for the abuse in daycare centers.

This is not a call to go back in time. On the contrary. It’s a wake-up call for the next revolution to occur. Just as the industrial revolution taught us to lead a material lifestyle — the next revolution must teach us to lead a social lifestyle.

First, we must re-prioritize education. It should become society’s most valued profession. An educator must receive social recognition along with the conditions to maintain professional integrity. We have to choose caregivers who prove their passion to bring up our children, who will gain a deep understanding of human nature, and who will be trained extensively to practice restraint and self-control in any situation.

These are just a few preconditions for any educator who works with children. But the true revolution will happen when we, adults, will sit together in circles, much like in kindergarten, and cultivate the human being within us, against the monster that may awaken.

When we redefine the goal of life, we will replace the material rat-race with a growing sensitivity to our deep human connection, and it will give us a new sense of meaning and fulfillment.

Specifically the wisdom of Kabbalah becoming revealed in our time, is designed to shed light on the natural human connections between people and help us develop them to the ultimate level: discovering the system of connection the binds all of us together as a single family.

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The portal Medium published my new article “What Did Kate Spade & Anthony Bourdain Have in Common?”

It’s challenging for us to understand why successful, famous, rich people such as fashion designer Kate Spade and TV chef Anthony Bourdain decide to put an end to their lives.

Typical answers will vary between hidden loneliness and depression, drug addiction, and mental issues. But if we delve into a deeper, more fundamental layer of human nature, the answer is one: lack of meaning and purpose in life.

From an ordinary person’s point of view, the rich and famous already have everything that the rest of us dream of. But as we focus on what they’ve got, we miss what’s happening inside their minds and hearts. Thus, we overlook what they’re losing.

When people reach the heights of fame and fortune, their lives change dramatically. Their new status and power separate them from the rest of society. People treat them as symbols or idols, and stop looking at them as ordinary human beings with feelings. As a result, they gradually lose a lot of their friendships and human connections.

But it doesn’t end there. As they reach the top of their game and conquer their dreams, they are more prone to lose their passion and drive to keep going. Paradoxically, their accomplishments and abundance put them in front of the undeniable question: What do I aim for next? What else is there to live for?

It’s as if they lose the drive to carry on in this world, while on the other hand, there’s nowhere else to go.

When that happens, even highly creative and passionate people who initiate meaningful projects will struggle to find the reason and purpose behind anything they do. And then, a single emotional trigger could be enough for them put an end to their life.

In contrast, the average person struggles to get by through the daily grind, craves a promotion at work and dreams of the next vacation. His or her relations with other people feel a lot more real even if they’re challenging. He has a desire to make his life better in various aspects. And hope for a better future means there’s something worth living for.

The irony about fame and fortune is that those who achieve it may feel like there is nothing more to aspire to, and those who do not, still have a drive to achieve it.

But beneath the surface, these opposites complement each other as a single system. There’s a collective process of development that gradually brings all of us to face the question: what is the meaning and purpose of life?

A human being has a need to discover the purpose of his or her existence. It is the only thing that truly differentiates humans from animals. In fact, all of human culture can be seen as an attempt to answer that very question of meaning. And in our time, it is becoming increasingly necessary to provide a satisfactory answer.

It is not by chance that suicide has become characteristic of the modern western world, with suicide rates in the U.S. increasing more than 25% since 1999, and close to 800,000 people globally committing suicide every year.

Yet, the meaning of life is not a philosophical or mystical question that doesn’t have a clear answer. The exact opposite is true: it is a natural question that has a natural answer.

When human beings tap into their inherent wiring for connection, they reveal that they are parts of a single integrated system, connected to each other and to the natural source of life itself. Then, their craving for meaning and purpose finds its fulfillment in connection with the harmony and wholeness of nature.

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The largest portal Medium published my new article “Kim Trump Summit: Dealmaker Meets Dictator”

Trump’s interest in meeting Kim Jong-un is obvious: if he becomes the one to denuclearize North Korea, it will be an unprecedented achievement for America, for the world, and for Trump himself, who will be remembered in the history books.

Coming straight from the G7 summit in Canada, Trump will carry on with the same approach: positioning himself for getting the best deal possible. But will it work with the young dictator with whom he mostly traded insults so far? “Within the first minute, I’ll know,” said the businessman turned U.S. president.

President Trump at G7 (Reuters)
At the time of writing these lines, no one knows what will come out of the historical summit. But certainly, Trump intends to get Kim to consider denuclearization in exchange for diplomatic recognition and some economic package. He will aim to put Kim — whose country is desperate for economic relief — in a rational give-and-take mode of behavior.

In fact, Trump probably already has plans for how to get Asian and European countries to help write a check for Mr. Kim.

But it should come as no surprise that Trump will become the first sitting U.S. president to meet with a North Korean leader. It fits his habit of shaking up the status quo and countering the existing global order. Just take look at the photo from the recent G7 summit, which does a good job of capturing the “World vs. Trump” dynamic.

Trump is a relentless business pragmatist in a position to move the world’s leaders into a direct give-and-take relationship. By putting American interests first, his moves are tearing down international agreements between powerful global players. And by doing it in his non-politically correct way, he is bursting ideological bubbles and facades that became the norm in international relations many decades ago.

That being said, Trump doesn’t necessarily understand the epic turning point that human society is now facing, all the more so the unique role he himself plays in it. In truth, most of us can’t conceive of the momentous transformation that the world is now going through.

Every day, human society is becoming more interdependent across the globe. And as this reality becomes more evident, the fallacies of the modern world become evident as well. Thus, we gradually come to recognize that humanity needs a new operating system by which to run its programs and synchronize relationships between people and countries.

But first, we have to reset the current operating system — and Trump is hitting that button.

Lastly, as I have expressed before, when I comment on Trump-related matters, his popularity or lack of thereof is irrelevant to me. I don’t take my cues from mainstream media or what people say, nor do I pick any side in favor or against Trump or anyone else.

Rather, I explain the world through the lens of the wisdom of Kabbalah, which sheds light on the fundamental laws of nature that shape the global and collective development of humanity.

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