Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What is every single benefit of physical pain?“

Pain protects us by making us feel a boundary, where if we cross it, then we enter a danger zone.

We typically want to simply not feel pain, and if we feel it, we want it to disappear right away. Together with this tendency, it is worthwhile to add a scrutiny of why we feel pain, and how we can get rid of it. Or on the contrary, it could be that we feel pain due to a disease that surfaces, which is a sign that we need to get ourselves treated.

However, more importantly, we should understand that our nature is a desire to enjoy, which wishes to move away from pain and move toward pleasure, enjoyment and happiness. What, then, stands between our experience of total enjoyment and happiness in life compared to a life full of various pains? It is simply a different screen by which we can perceive and sense reality.

In order to achieve this change where we perceive and sense a world full of goodness and happiness, we need only connect with our desires and apply efforts to change them so that we will start perceiving everything in our world as good, enjoyable and pleasant.

This is an inner change that requires us wanting to give others everything that is good for them, and then in return, we will receive all the goodness that we want for ourselves.

If we make such a transformation, then we will experience utter perfection and happiness, or as it is expressed in the Torah, “a land of milk and honey.”

It all depends on our desire to give to others. The moment we get rid of our egoistic intention to receive at the expense of others, and replace it with an altruistic intention solely to benefit others, then when we attain such a giving desire, we will see that there is an abundance of everything good in life in front of us, and we will want only to give that abundance to others. It can be likened to all the gold, silver and diamonds in the world suddenly appearing right in front of our very eyes the moment we have no intention to receive any of it for ourselves, but only wish for others to benefit from it. When we reach such a degree in our intention, then we will experience total perfection and happiness.

Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “How will the world change after the COVID 19 pandemic?“

We are in the midst of a major transitional era where we are starting to understand the tremendous extent of our interconnectedness and interdependence.

Likewise, we also find ourselves destroying our world. This is because a key aspect of interconnected and interdependent systems is that if all of their parts act for the system’s benefit, then the system functions harmoniously and its parts experience the health and vitality of the entire system. On the contrary, if its parts prioritize self-benefit over benefiting the whole, then they bring about the system’s demise.

Since the latter egoistic tendency defines the general attitude and behavior of human society in 2021, then we can expect the world as we know it to crumble. On one hand, we will see the increasing frailty of our financial and industrial mechanisms, and on the other hand, we can expect natural disasters to shake us more and more, because nature principally reacts to us according to how we relate to each other.

We will continue heading down a negative spiral until we will wake up to our helplessness to live positive, healthy and balanced lives. At that point, we will develop a major need to revise the way we live. We will then feel an increasing need for updated explanations about how the interconnected and interdependent system we are all parts of functions, what its purpose is, what our role is within the system, what is the system’s nature and what is human nature, how we can balance between them, why and how we are dispersed in this system, and what we can do in order to become closer in our attitudes to each other. In other words, we will need to undergo an upgrade in our connections to each other, and that upgrade will not be able to happen on its own. It will require a new method capable of guiding us to positive connection, harmony and happiness in an interconnected and interdependent reality.

Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What should I live for?“

What is the meaning of life? It is to rise to a level where we become as one with our life’s source—while we are alive.

In the wisdom of Kabbalah, that source has various names including “the Creator,” “nature,” “upper light,” “upper force,” and others. It is essentially a force of love and bestowal that emanated everything, and in Kabbalah, we study how it created everything through a process called “the four phases of direct light,” a series of causes and effects until our creation and development here in our world.

While we are in the reality we know as “our world,” i.e., a perception and sensation of reality through senses of sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste, our purpose is to return to where we came from, until we reach adhesion with our life’s source. Kabbalah calls the process of rising back to where we came from “climbing the ladder from below upward.”

When we reach our life’s final destination—adhesion with our life’s source, the Creator—we will experience newfound eternal harmony and perfection. Moreover, everything we currently experience, increasing amounts of problems, crises, suffering and lacks of fulfillment, are all necessary elements of a maturation process that is gradually preparing us to become willing and ready to climb the ladder back to our source.

Based on the lesson “Fundamentals of Kabbalah” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on December 16, 2018. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “How has pandemic affected the education system?“

The pandemic has shown the ugly face of our education systems.

These systems should have educated our children to become independent and responsible in their learning and knowing of how to positively connect among themselves and with their teachers, as well as willful and responsible participation in their studies through various media.

Unfortunately, we instead see quite the contrary: that these systems fail to prepare children to be independent and responsible. That is why, over the course of the pandemic, we have seen multitudes of children disregard the connection among each other and with their teachers, and many relate to what they study as meaningless and useless. Such an approach has contributed to a general crumbling of the systems.

We should treat this educational crisis that the pandemic revealed in order to revise our education systems. Today, we do not need to raise children to simply fill job positions, several of which we will no longer need. Instead, our education systems should adjust their aims to raise children into happy, successful and confident human beings, in the fullest sense of those terms.

To become truly happy, successful and confident, we need to live in a society where we actively participate in constructing positive connections among each other, above our myriad divisive drives. Accordingly, we should encourage children to participate more and more in society, since social participation and contribution are quickly becoming the most important components in building a society of happy, successful and confident individuals.

Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What are 5 facts about spiritual love?“

1) The attainment of spiritual love and spiritual connection can only take place above sensations of hatred and rejection. If we love others without having built love above hatred and rejection, then it is not spiritual love.

2) It is written about the attainment of spiritual love in the Torah, that “Love will cover all crimes” (Proverbs 10:12).

3) Spiritual attainment requires holding onto the rule of “Love will cover all crimes,” and that we cannot hold love without feeling the “crimes,” i.e., hatred and rejection of others. The attitude to love and hatred thus needs to be equal in importance. We attain spirituality between them both, and thus those who wish to attain spirituality need to equally position love and hatred, or connection and rejection, before themselves.

4) The human ego, which is a desire to enjoy at the expense of others, is the cause of feeling hatred and rejection toward others; it is an “anti-spiritual” quality. Developing spiritual love thus requires feeling hatred and rejection illuminating in our ego’s rejection of spirituality, then reaching a decision to restrict the ego, and then above the ego, developing an attitude of love and connection to others. Moreover, such an attitude needs to be constant, where we feel love and hatred simultaneously, and choose love above the hatred. It is unlike our corporeal world, where we love and hate at different times. Holding these qualities together gains us access to the sensation of eternity.

5) The development and discovery of spiritual love above its opposite hatred and rejection is the “artistry” of spirituality. In the language of Kabbalah, it is expressed as follows: that the spiritual Partzuf (a spiritual entity or identity) takes its Aviut (coarse egoistic desire), which is a sensation of hatred and a complete lack of connection to others, and through a Tzimtzum (restriction) of the egoistic desire, the Partzuf rises above the Aviut to connect—elevating values of connection much higher in importance than the natural egoistic inclination—and to the extent of the oppositeness between qualities of love/connection and hatred/rejection, the new, higher, more spiritual and giving Partzuf is discovered: both through the Aviut (coarse egoistic desire) below, and the Zakut (purity) above.

Based on the Daily Kabbalah Lesson on January 27, 2021. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “If spirituality is a lifelong journey, how does one know whether or not they have made progress?“

Spirituality is a quality of love, bestowal and positive connection that becomes revealed in our connection as a single soul. By contrast, corporeality is a quality of reception and characterizes the perception we have in this world.

Therefore, spiritual progress requires a method of connecting to each other where we discover our eternal and perfect interconnection as a single soul above our corporeal state of transience and detachment in this world.

Spiritual progress thus becomes revealed after we try to resemble its purely altruistic connections in connection among each other, and we discover our opposition to spirituality: that we are egoistic, and constantly want to receive self-aimed fulfillment. We feel such oppositeness as a “crime” that we need to detach from and rise above. Moreover, our corporeal quality remains with us as a foundation upon which we elevate ourselves into spirituality. As such, time and again, we increasingly feel this clash of qualities the more that we try to spiritually progress.

Therefore, by engaging ourselves in a supportive environment of fellow spiritual seekers who wish to attain spirituality, and applying the method of connection—the wisdom of Kabbalah—which lets us attract the forces of love and bestowal from our spiritual root as one soul, then we eventually discover how indifferent we are to each other, and afterward we feel rejection to each other and see all kinds of negative qualities in others.

Such revelations are in fact positive signs of spiritual progress, where the spiritual forces of love and bestowal (called “lights”) that we attract reveal the distance between us—the extent to which we are opposite and different from our spiritual state as a single soul—and from that revelation of oppositeness, we can start establishing a spiritual form of connection with each other and spiritually progress.

Spiritual progress is thus felt as an increasing need and yearning to positively connect with others. And when do we know that we need positive spiritual connection with others? It is when we know the extent to which we reject each other, do not want each other, and have all kinds of complaints about each other. At this juncture, we can say that the breaking of the soul starts revealing, i.e., the point where we originally detached from our perception and sensation as a single soul, where we all functioned as parts of a greater whole, and thus felt the eternal life of that whole.

The coarse desire that detached us then becomes revealed, and we have work to not cancel or revoke that desire, but above it, start building connection, so that the spiritual connection that we build will not neutralize the rejection between us, but that they will exist together.

Spiritual progress is thus a process of increasing wisdom and inner growth where we mature in our understanding and ability to hold onto two opposite states together, that reception and bestowal, egoism and altruism, hatred and love, will live among us, and we relate to every negative quality that surfaces in us as a foundation upon which to apply increasing yearning for love, bestowal and positive connection upon it.

This is the meaning of “one recites a blessing for the bad that befalls him just as he does for the good” (Masechet Berachot 9:3), because all bad and good surface only for us to reveal more and more positive connection between us, and ultimately, to discover our connection as a single soul in contact with the force of love, bestowal and connection (called “the Creator”) that vitalizes us. The outcome of this spiritual progress is the sensation of eternity, perfection and truth, which in the wisdom of Kabbalah is called “the revelation of the Creator to His created beings in this world” (Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag [Baal HaSulam], “The Essence of the Wisdom of Kabbalah”).

Based on the Daily Kabbalah Lesson with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on January 28, 2021. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Is spiritual love different from the love we know? If yes, can we do something to nurture it?“

The love we know, or corporeal love, involves loving whoever or whatever gives us pleasure. Spiritual love, by contrast, is built on feeling an inner distance, rejection, and opposition to others, and building love upon that distance.

In other words, the love we know is that which appears in our inborn ego, where we feel a natural attraction and closeness to one another. Each person who feels such love does so based on the calculation that they will ultimately benefit from that love. Such is the calculation of our egoistic nature, which is a desire to enjoy from other people and things. Therefore, according to the love we know—corporeal love—we feel love, attraction, and closeness to each other sometimes, and at other times, hatred, rejection and distance.

Spiritual love, however, requires feeling distance, rejection, and opposition to each other together with an attitude of love, connection and attraction that we build above those sensations. In our current reality, we cannot simultaneously feel love and hatred toward others, but we feel those sensations at different times. Spiritual love, therefore, requires great artistry in the spiritual process of rising above the ego to positively connect with others, and we need to become worthy of attaining that lofty level of love.

However, we are reaching a level in our development where we become increasingly prepared to experience spiritual love. On one hand, we see that the love we know is leading us into more and more problems. The bigger our ego becomes, the more we demand in order to fulfill ourselves, and the harder we find it to become fulfilled. On the other hand, we are getting prepared to become more mature.

Sweet food can help us see an example of this maturation process. Children usually like sweet food that is only sweet, but when we grow up, we often like to have sweet food together with or after something spicy, bitter or sour. The more we mature, the more we feel incapable of enjoying from one thing alone, but require the thing and its opposite.

We also see how if we had experienced only positive states in life, without the need to strive and overcome, and without feeling boundaries and criticism, then we would feel as if our life lacks something. We are built in a way where we desire to have graspable points for other calculations, and thus we develop a need to add bitterness, sourness and spice in order to taste and enjoy the sweetness. This tendency stems from the basis of our existence, where we—created beings—were originally created opposite from nature: Nature is a quality of love that solely wishes to bestow pleasure and fulfillment, and we are made of an opposite quality that solely wishes to receive pleasure and fulfillment.

Therefore, in order that we “taste the sweetness” of spiritual love, we need to attain the quality of love and bestowal that does not exist in our inborn receptive nature, and thus need to build that quality in us upon our natural rejection and distance from those qualities. This is possible with the guidance of a method—the wisdom of Kabbalah—which teaches the ways of rising above the transience and incomplete nature of the ego in order to discover the quality of spiritual love, which is eternal and whole.

Kabbalists have written about spiritual love—“Love will cover all crimes” (Proverbs 10:12)—where the “crimes” are the distance, rejection and opposition we feel in our ego. The more we implement such a form of love in our spiritual development, the more we will attain everything that nature laid out for us in order to attain our ultimate purpose of existence: the sensation of love in its perfection, wholeness and eternity.

Based on the Daily Kabbalah Lesson with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on January 29, 2021. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

Photo by Tamanna Rumee on Unsplash.

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Question: If a person becomes an altruist, there will certainly be those who would like to profit from it. How can I avoid being used by someone?

Answer: You are right. Unfortunately, today’s world is like that.

Therefore, we can develop our altruistic properties and identify, explore, and implement them only in a small closed society, where we can trust each other.
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From KabTV’s “Ask a Kabbalist” 12/31/18

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “What does it feel like to be spiritually enlightened?“

The feeling of spiritual enlightenment is a feeling of unification with nature.

It is that we exist in a field of a single common connection, with a force of love and bestowal connecting between us.

Moreover, total unification as integral parts of nature is our life’s ultimate destination; it is what we discover when we reach the purpose of our lives.

Through positive connection among us all and with nature, the force of love and bestowal dwelling in nature awakens and illuminates. It gives us a new heightened sensation of harmony and eternity—a feeling of enjoyment through giving contentment to each other and to nature.

Based on the “Fundamentals of Kabbalah” lesson by Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on December 9, 2018. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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Michael Laitman, On Quora: “Why aren’t we born knowing everything?“

If we were born with complete knowledge about ourselves, the world and reality in general, then we would be no more than machines or robots.

The desire of the force that created us, called “the Creator” in the wisdom of Kabbalah, is to create us in a way where we reach total resemblance to it. Therefore, we are given room for freewill, choice, decision and action.

It is impossible to reach sameness with the Creator if we experience zero problems, descents and ascents, and develop in our understanding of reality.

We are thus on quite a tough path toward a complete attainment of reality. This path, however, constantly shapes our inner consciousness.

Eventually, we will reach the understanding of our life’s source, the thought of creation, i.e., the Creator’s thought and intended purpose for us, and implement it. When we do, we will realize why everything has taken place in our lives the way that it has, and how it was exactly what was needed in order for us to rise to a new level of likeness with the Creator.

Based on the TV program, “Ask the Kabbalist” with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on March 20, 2019. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.

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