Michael Laitman, On Quora: “How can the increase in access to the Internet among low-income communities help to promote social and economic development?“

With the help of the Internet, every person in the world can access unlimited sources of information almost at no cost. This means is equal for everyone all around the world. Even though the human ego is behind its development, nevertheless it is bound to awaken in us an understanding of humanity as an interconnected single body. Through increasing awareness about our true state as an interconnected humanity, I hope that we will experience positive global transformation, as quickly as possible, even in our days.

In the end, information, communications and technology might not achieve socio-economic development of the poorer layers of the world’s population, but we will understand that we must change our attitude to the world and to our connections—from egoistic to altruistic.

As such, we will become equal. We cannot remain in the illusion that if we will now divide everything equally, then the world will change. Such a division will not lead to beneficial changes in the world. We have already seen how this happens. By doing so, we only interfere with people working and developing. On the contrary, we need to bring a new realization to people, according to which everyone should be treated as a single family, altruistically. We will then make the world equal, happy and perfect.

Based on a Q&A with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on September 9, 2006. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “How can everyone acquire access to clean water without conflict?“

It is impossible to achieve positive results by means of conflict and war. Instead, we need an approach of raising global human consciousness so that we will understand the extent of our interconnectedness and interdependence.

If anyone has negative feelings, it means that I have negative feelings; if someone else feels bad, the bad feeling boomerangs over to me and I will feel bad.

We are like one person with one body, connected in one system. If the life and health of another person will be as important as our own life and health, then we will obviously not have to engage in conflict for clean water, as the general attitude that spreads throughout human society will obligate us to make sure that everyone’s needs are sufficiently met.

The global solution to this problem is in education. Just as we teach our children to be altruistic, since we understand that altruism gives us confidence, invites a positive response from others, and makes our lives easier, then likewise we need to expand such altruistic education to human society at large.

If we fulfill ourselves altruistically, then we will experience greater health, happiness and well-being. We should consider our future generations, our children and grandchildren, that they will receive a positive example from us of the fact that only thanks to an altruistic upbringing can they achieve a good life. When we express such care for each other, then we will be able to provide the world with a healthy and pure life, including clean water and food.

Based on a Q&A with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on September 9, 2006. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Comment: Igor writes to us: “I have discovered the ability to heal with my hands. At first, I healed my relatives as I continued my regular job. I am a master cabinet maker, I make fine furniture. Somehow it just so happened that people started coming to me and I began healing them. They suggest that I leave my job and earn money as a healer, but I am not sure about it. It doesn’t feel right to charge money for this kind of work. I want to ask you what I should do? Why did the Creator give me this ability? And can I make a living from it?”

My Response: I don’t know. I can’t advise you here. If you can help people, then this is a good thing. So by all means, try it and do it. And if you can also free up from your job and earn money by healing people, there is no prohibition against it. I don’t know.

Or you can keep it as a hobby. Although, the work of a wood carver is also a very interesting job.

Comment: It’s rare today. And it is clear that he loves this work. That’s why he is having these doubts.

My Response: This is a very special kind of work. Such people are worthy of envy. He creates with his hands, giving pleasure to himself and others.

Comment: And if he’s given the ability to heal, what is it given for? This, too, follows along the same lines?

My Response: But this already gets tricky. Now he can heal without any self-benefit, without taking any reward for it. Therefore, his healing is more effective. But when he starts charging money for it, this already poses a problem, what will he do? That is, will he be healing for the sake of money or in order to heal?

Once my teacher Rabash and I came to Haifa to see my friend, a good doctor, and he cured Rabash. And then I paid, although he was willing to do it without taking money. I was surprised. He named the exact amount, for example, 363 dollars, and began to write out a receipt.

I said: “Are you writing me a receipt?!” He replied: “If I don’t write out a receipt, I won’t be able to think right. I will have the wrong attitude and thoughts. I will be looking at things differently. I will think about crooked paths.”

And when Rabash heard this, he was so pleased! He said: “Wow, this is a real doctor, he does not allow himself to think crookedly.”

Comment: That is, crooked means thinking about money, and straight means thinking about a patient’s recovery.

My Response: Yes. I treated you, you have to pay. And the amount was, I remember, some very odd number. “I have to write out a receipt for you, and everything must be absolutely proper!”

If you go into healing with your special abilities, you should think about making sure these abilities do not disappear. And this can only happen if you have the right attitude to the world, to life, to what you do with people.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 7/1/21

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “How will the world compensate for the growing energy needs and resource consumption of developing nations like China and India when nations like the United States consume resources disproportionate to their populations?“

It is impossible to stop the struggle for natural resources used to produce raw materials. This struggle will lead to major problems such as imbalances between countries, and also wars. The extent to which our world lacks balance and equality is only now becoming apparent.

The balance between what we need and how much we can receive from the world is possible if the world will accept the altruistic law upon itself.

What is the altruistic law? It is a law present in nature, which human society is obligated to reach.

The countries of the world will then start sharing everything they have, including their production, raw materials, energy and information—equally for everyone, according to the population numbers, their culture, education and consumption, taking into consideration the conditions of the climate, and so on. In other words, only the realization of the fact that we are in a single global system and are thus obliged to treat everyone accordingly will bring us to balance in how we use the world’s natural and technological resources.

Based on a Q&A with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on September 9, 2006. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Comment: Irina wrote: “How can I explain to my husband that he has no right to leave me? We have three children. I forgive him everything, all his infidelities, his lack of love, and so on. I told him: ‘Do whatever you want, just don’t leave.’ He’s leaving. And I realize that I won’t be able to manage without him and neither will the children. What should I do? Tell me. Beg him to stay or let it be? I don’t know.”

My Response: My rule in life is that anything can happen, but if children are involved, then one is obliged to live with them and raise them. It cannot be any other way!

Comment: What should this woman do?

My Response: Well, what can you do? You understand, you can’t keep him by force. There are no such laws.

Question: What is it about us, that is just so…?

Answer: Dumb male egoism, which is spoiled by the mother’s attention. So nothing is good enough for him.

But women, too, are not brought up to make a place for a man that he wants to call his nest, his home, etc., so that he wouldn’t want to leave. Not even to go to work or anywhere away from his home. A place that would be calming and inviting. This should be taught, and it is not.

Building a family should be a subject taught in middle school—a separate, serious lesson, held a couple of times a week, when all of this is discussed from an early age by both boys and girls. It should be discussed seriously so they will gradually get used to such relationships that they will build between them in the future. This is very important! It doesn’t exist. This is real home management.

It is amazing how much we are advancing in some things, but in this, we have an absolute regression. And we can’t replace it with anything. It’s not like creating another machine or a new technology to replace another. This is simply irreplaceable!

Comment: Well, they say that a person has become freer, he has become…

My Response: One becomes freer! From the duties necessary in life. And in the end…

I think this pandemic and a few more such waves will come our way. It will force us to create a home, home sweet home, as they say, for each of us. It sounds like an outdated, repulsive word.

But we will be forced by this pandemic and by some other things because in the end, it will turn out that a person will have to stay at home more, and he or she will need to be looked after. A man according to his ways, and a woman according to hers. And the children as well. Nature will put us in our place, but it will take some time.

Comment: So we would tell this guy who is about to leave to think many times about the children he is leaving behind?

My Response: Certainly! If he has such a wife and children. There is no better woman than the one you live with and have lived with for a long time. You have children and you raised them together. This creates a bond, of course, that is clear.

Maybe you already have grandchildren too, or something. This is all set up by nature and there is no substitute for it.

Question: This has to enter the heart right?

Answer: Yes. Everything happens in life, even things that are too difficult and shameful to recall or mention. But there should be one taboo: the family should not be broken up. Even a bad family, no matter what it is, should not be broken!
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 6/24/21

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Why do we still believe more in nationalism than in humanity as a whole?“

The more developed we are, the broader we perceive our lives and human life in general. We become interested in an increasingly wider world. In ancient times, we were closed within our families, and afterward, in our villages, and then in our cities. Today, we are closed in our countries, but modern development and globalization show us that we are globally interconnected and interdependent.

This is why our ego today envelops the entire world. To the degree that we understand our global interdependence, we will accordingly feel the entire world as our home. There is no way out, and it appears as if we are obligated to take care of everyone. When we feel this small global village as our common home, we will then exit our national boundaries and enter into human boundaries, into a dimension that is common to everyone.

In the meantime, however, we find ourselves unable to get on with each other, and that we are closed within our ego, each one in our respective shells. This paradox, this collision, gives rise to a lot of tension and poses a threat to our existence. Accordingly, we will need to seek a solution so that the world will become less menacing. So let us have faith that we will soon ascend above our national boundaries and head into boundlessness.

Based on a Q&A with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on September 9, 2006. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Can a person be perceptive enough to see our planet in a way that tells them that they too are a part of nature?“

We are incapable of understanding that we are parts of humanity, nature, the world and the universe. Our inborn ego limits us from seeing such a picture.

In order to feel the all-enveloping nature that surrounds us, we need to shift from an introverted perception of reality, where we accept everything into us with the help of the five senses that merely absorb information—to a state where we come out of ourselves.

We can impact such a shift in our perception of reality with an altruistic perception of the world.

This is why, for now, we are unable to see that the world is global and that we are integral parts of the world. However, our ego pushes us forward, and by means of suffering, we start feeling that we have no way out, and we need to understand the world in which we live. Otherwise, we will continue suffering until we eventually destroy ourselves.

Suffering makes us more perceptive because it develops our mind. In the beginning, suffering develops our mind in order for us to avoid it. Afterward, suffering nevertheless brings us to the realization of the integral and whole reality. We gradually discover that, in the end, our entire universe and we inside of it are parts of a single integral system, which has a law, a general law of nature—the law of love.

Therefore, we too need to become equal to this law. Nature works as a single organism, and only we are given free will in order to freely reach this understanding and to make ourselves integral parts in each of our personal statuses. When we achieve such a state, which I hope will be in the nearest future—then we will see that we rise above the animate level—where we live as animals, aiming to fulfill our personal needs alone—to the speaking level—where we come out of ourselves and aim at fulfilling others.

We will then feel ourselves as the global, interconnected and interdependent nature: all-embracing, eternal and perfect.

Based on a Q&A with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on September 9, 2006. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Question from Facebook: Freewill is how to attain the Creator, but if our actions are predetermined, is the way to attain the Creator also predetermined?

Answer: The way to the Creator consists of two branches. One way is straight, smooth, and comfortable, like a highway. The other way is bumpy and you cannot drive a Mercedes on this road, but only a cart pulled by a pair of worn out horses. So our choice is in which way; a person chooses that.

The goal is set, the starting point is also. It is only which path that depends on a person. There are people who overcome it quickly and are already at the end of the way, already enjoying the attainment of eternity and wholeness above this world. You don’t need to die in order to attain this. You can attain it in our world. There are, however, people for whom it will take a long time to reach the ultimate goal. Still, everyone will reach it, but the question is how much suffering they will have to undergo.

The role of the wisdom of Kabbalah is to guide a person on how to follow the fast and easy road toward the predetermined goal.
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From KabTV’s “Answers to Questions from Facebook” 3/10/19

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “How can we contribute to create a sustainable community for the sustenance of life on the Earth?“

We can create a sustainable human community by means of education and dissemination of the knowledge that the quality of our life depends not on the extent to which we fill ourselves with all kinds of technical, technological and technocratic fulfillment, but on the contrary, our fulfillment depends on psychological comfort; it depends on the satisfaction we feel as a result of being fulfilled and of living in a harmonious world. The degree of our progress toward such a world depends only on such education and its promotion.

It can be achieved on condition that we organize our life as an altruistic and positively-connected human society. We can do so when we each “absorb” or take for ourselves only as much as we need to exist, and give the remaining part of our earnings or production to benefit the life of the worldwide global society.

This is how cells of a living organism exist and function. It is nature’s law, and it is how nature organizes life on the animate level. Every cell exists only for the goal of the existence of the organism as a whole, otherwise the cell becomes cancerous. This is how we need to behave: each person needs to act like a human cell relative to the whole “organism” of humanity. If we do so, then unquestionably we will each feel confident and live as a peaceful and harmonious society.

Based on a Q&A with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on September 9, 2006. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Question: Lyudmila writes to us: “I don’t know how to forgive. I also believe that any action should be punishable. But if I could forgive, I think it would be much easier emotionally. Can we learn to forgive?”

Answer: We can learn to forgive only if we understand the evilness of our nature.

Once I realize what I am: an egoist, forgetting about others, never paying back with kindness, and so on and so forth, then I come to a state where I cause all the negative effects upon myself. Thus, I have no one to forgive. I just need to have good thoughts about others.

Comment: What you just said: “I cause negative effects upon myself.” It sounds a little scary.

My Response: Of course, I cause it. How else? With my egoistic nature, I turn the whole of nature against myself. Therefore, it follows that I need to change myself, to at least want to change myself even if it is not possible to accomplish anything. And then everything will change. The world is actually all about the relations between us.

Question: So I am beginning to understand that criminals are all inside me?

Answer: Of course.

Comment: As soon as I change that, everything will change around me?

Answer: It all depends on me.

Question: Will this formula work if I truly understand that I need to change and then everything around me will change?

Answer: It does not change instantly, at will. But it does change.

Question: Given that there is such a process, will humanity have no choice but to follow it?

Answer: Humanity must be convinced first of all that there is no other way. Only then will it follow this process exclusively.
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From KabTV’s “News with Dr. Michael Laitman” 6/24/21

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