Question from Facebook: How can we reconcile emotions with reason because our emotions arise as responses to life events that are far from the rational way the world is run?

Answer: Our emotions have nothing to do with mind. They manifest because they “jump out” of desire. And desire is our innate nature.

Reason is an acquired additional system designed to collect emotions, sort them out, compare, curb, etc. But generally, reason is weak before emotions; before desires, it is secondary.

Question: Is it possible to curb emotions?

Answer: There is no point. You have to reach a state where your emotions are balanced. After all, negative emotions can be balanced with positive ones and then you can feel comfortable with them, because both negative and positive emotions will work together toward a lofty goal.

And you know that you need all of it. You are not fighting your nature or the people around you. On the contrary, you enter a state when you are in harmony with each other. One person’s plus is compensated by the another’s minus. We are created in such a way that if all of us would correctly connect with each other, we would form an ideal system, and all our pluses and minuses would fit together perfectly.

Question: So the pluses and minuses are scattered around the world in order to connect?

Answer: That’s the problem. We have no other choice. We try to do something among each other, we get discouraged seeing that nothing helps, and eventually we die.

But in fact, we need to see that we cannot do anything by ourselves and must ask the Creator to help us. Then He will shine upon us with the upper Light, under the influence of which we will quickly assemble into the correct mosaic and complete each other.

Then we will have the perfect combination of everyone with each other. All negative and positive emotions will be supplemented, every person will be necessary for another. That is how we will reach perfection.
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From KabTV’s, “News with Michael Laitman” 4/24/18

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In the News (Nautilus): “Unhappiness Is a Palate-Cleanser,” by Indira M Raman, “…We often behave as though we might find a route to contentment—comfort, satiety, warmth, or some other reward—and be happy all the time if we could just make the right choices. But pleasure is often fleeting, even from the most appealing experiences, giving rise to ennui and sparking the drive for something new and sensational. As a neuroscientist, I can’t help wondering whether the transience of our satisfaction may not in fact be inescapable and instead may reveal an inevitable aspect of the way the brain works, the understanding of which might provide a clue to how to contend with it. …

“Without one’s being able to make comparisons, the world goes gray. In other words, it’s not just that variety is the spice of life; it’s variance that lets us sense anything at all. …

“We perceive things not by their absolute value but by their contrast to what came before. …

“…I think it offers a key to happiness that is compatible with how the brain works. The ability to detect even familiar stimuli can usually be restored by a brief palate cleanser, which literally permits a recovery from desensitization sufficient to intensify a subsequent experience. … Because the brain grades on a curve, endlessly comparing the present with what came just before, the secret to happiness may be unhappiness. Not unmitigated unhappiness, of course, but the transient chill that lets us feel warmth, the sensation of hunger that makes satiety so welcome, the period of near-despair that catapults us into the astonishing experience of triumph. The route to contentment is through contrast.”
Indira M. Raman is a professor in the department of neurobiology at Northwestern University

My Comment: I agree with her. It is impossible to distinguish light without darkness, joy without grief and so on. Our feelings are built on two opposite perceptions, and everything depends on how we evaluate them, weigh them.

The most correct way is for us to begin realizing that bitter sensations were necessary to feel sweet. And then they too become part of the sweet. I wish you such a feeling.
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From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 3/20/18

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Question: By what means do we measure spiritual distances?

Answer: In the spiritual world, distances are measured by differences in characteristics.

Question: According to the wisdom of Kabbalah, each one lives in his own small world, in his own personal reality. Is there some kind of common and united realty?

Answer: No, there is only the Creator. Through Him, we begin to perceive and understand our common Kli, our shared mutual connection, His revelation within us.

Question: If two systems come out from the Creator, both the evil and the good, why can I not see good and evil in a friend who is managed by the Creator 100 percent?

Answer: Both the friend and the entire world must be seen as the revelation of the Creator.

Question: How does one correctly understand people and have concern for them? Are we to write it all off to nature and the Creator in one person, or are we to see the control and action of the Creator through people on oneself?

Answer: See it as the activity of the Creator through people on me. I never see the revelation of the Creator in nature and in humanity. I see what is clearly presented to me.

Question: So, I don’t need to correct anything within me except my attitude toward others. Is my attitude toward others not within me?

Answer: Yes, but it is possible to correct this. I need to relate to others as I do to the Creator. When the entire world, except for me, is filled with the characteristic of bestowal and love, then I will be able to connect myself with this characteristic.

Question: We encounter the expression: “I am lovesick” (Song of Songs 2:5) in the wisdom of Kabbalah. What is this talking about?

Answer: That is what Malchut says in relation to Keter (the Creator) when she attains the characteristic of Bina on the way to the Creator. When Malchut attains Bina, she first acquires the full characteristic of bestowal, and after that, through her ascent from Bina to Keter, she acquires the characteristic of love as well.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 12/3/17

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Question: If you begin to see and feel that other people are a reflection of your egoistic characteristics, does this feeling somehow apply to the spiritual world?

Answer: Yes. This is already a good step.

Question: Why does the Creator give desires that harm me? How should I work with them?

Answer: There is nothing harmful in the world! You only need to balance one thing with the other. It is not necessary to restrict desires or to reject them. It is only necessary to balance them. There is no evil in the world; there is simply imbalanced goodness.

Question: Does the Creator act in our world through all people to reveal His actions?

Answer: Certainly.

Question: Do you feel the audience during a broadcast?

Answer: In general, yes. But it is not necessarily the same audience that is in front of me now on the screens.

Question: If a person must become like the Creator, isn’t this arrogance?

Answer: There is no arrogance here. This is a task that the higher power established from the start at the time of the creation of the desire to receive and enjoy so that it would become a desire to give pleasure.

Question: What can be done if one has a desire to bestow and give to others, but suddenly discovers that he doesn’t have anything to bestow and give?

Answer: You should not give anything to others other than your desire to bestow. Everything else is in nature is in infinite quantity and quality.

Question: What does it mean to restrict desire?

Answer: It means that you are not thinking about yourself.

Question: What is love? Is it possible to feel it in our world, after attaining and studying the wisdom of Kabbalah, outside of a group, in the ordinary life of all people?

Answer: Love is an expression of concern for others more than for oneself. That is all. It is very simple.

Question: If a person does something bad, does this mean that the Creator, not evil forces, wanted him to do this?

Answer: We cannot clarify this. To do this we must enter into a system where we can see exactly how the Creator acts through us.

Question: Does the concealment of the Creator depend on my actions, or does the Creator conceal Himself?

Answer: We conceal the Creator through our opposite characteristics.

Question: Does the concealment of the network of forces that manage us belong to one of the three reasons for the concealment of the Creator?

Answer: All three reasons for concealment work on us simultaneously, sometimes one is more, and sometimes another.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 11/12/17

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Question: If one day goes by without the wisdom of Kabbalah, I feel miserable. Why does Kabbalah have an influence on me like a drug that provides happiness?

Answer: This is because otherwise you would not be connected to a system that can fulfill you.

Question: If the world is perfect, and I am intentionally faulty, then quarrels and confrontations are unavoidable. So how do I balance the good with the bad within me like “plus” and “minus”?

Answer: In any case you should not condemn the good or the bad or elevate this or that, rather only try to achieve their mutual connection, adhesion, and completion. Perfection is found between us, in the middle line.

Question: In our world, are people who are altruistic egoists happier than people who are just egoists?

Answer: Egoistic altruists are still less limited. But to be an altruist in our world, one must be born like this or enter a society like that where they “brainwash” you, and then you will be able to become an altruist and enjoy it. But this is already a particular kind of persuasion, and not a person’s inner inspiration.

Question: What does it mean to acquire the characteristic of bestowal? Explain it regarding feelings as much as possible.

Answer: Ask a mother who is concerned about her baby how she is happy to give him something, to do something for him. See how she takes care of him, follows him, and constantly wants to touch him, to improve something. This is the beastly characteristic of bestowal that shows us that it is possible on the physical level. It is partial and temporary, but it is possible.

Question: What are your wishes for students?

Answer: You have to rush to and resolve everything in the middle line: issues at home, topics in the group, and even in the kitchen, at work, in your attitude to life, and most importantly—the relations between us. Do everything in the middle line—there is no bad and there is no good—there is only everything for the benefit of spiritual progress.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 12/17/17

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Question: What principles will determine the success of realizing my point in the heart?

Answer: There is only one principle: through the group to the Creator. You can use all other Kabbalistic principles only to the extent that you will climb the spiritual steps. Then you will see how they can apply to you.

Question: According to the law the “general and particular are equal,” are all the Kabbalistic principles universal for all the levels of the worlds?

Answer: Yes, because the difference between the levels is only according to the intensity of and connection between the forces of bestowal and reception.

Question: What is work according to the wisdom of Kabbalah? Who is the employer, who is the employee, and what is the essence of the work?

Answer: Work in Kabbalah is the work on my egoism, on its correction. The Creator, the upper Light, is what corrects egoism. A person is called “a worker” because he asks for this correction from the Creator. Only according to a request, a prayer, raising MAN, does the Light, which corrects an egoistic intention to an altruistic intention, descend from above.

Question: What is the correct relationship with the environment?

Answer: By “environment,” we mean the group through which we attain connection with the Creator. The correct relationship with the environment is the same relationship that must exist between the person and the Creator.

Question: What does manipulation of the ego mean?

Answer: Manipulation of the ego does not mean manipulating the ego itself, but the intention above it. In other words, I use the ego only to the degree that I have an intention to use it for the sake of bestowal, for the creation of a connection.
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From the Kabbalah Lesson in Russian 11/26/17

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Question: Can a Muslim, Christian, Buddhist, or any other religious person be a Kabbalist?

Answer: It is not a matter of faith. What matters is that a person who was told something, has read, or somehow received information, accepts it as a belief, meaning he uses it as data, as a fact. In this case he is called a believer.

Kabbalah is not a faith. It is a science that researches something that is unattainable for an ordinary person. However, every person can achieve and discover the new spaces and new forms. This is even discussed in physics today.

It confirms that there is matter, energy, spaces, and volumes that we cannot sense. There is movement above knowledge, above light and time, and beyond time and space.

It seems as if science starts discussing this even though a person does not enter it with his own senses. He pictures this solely in theory. However, the wisdom of Kabbalah helps us develop sensory organs within us that will enable us to feel and sense spaces beyond time, matter, or dimensions, and to exist within them. These spaces are considered spiritual.

Question: Do I have to believe you?

Answer: You don’t have to believe me when I tell you that this exists like how you don’t have to believe physicists who tell us that the light disappears, that there are white and red dwarfs, other universes besides ours, and so on.

You don’t have to believe them or me. It all depends on whether you desire to attain it yourself, whether you think that it is important to you. If it is important to you, then you are invited to travel to “another world.” If this has no importance to you, then stay in this world. Good luck!
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From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 3/20/18

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Question: What is primary from Kabbalah’s point of view: form or matter?

Answer: Of course, matter (desire). Desire develops to its egoistic form, and then this form goes through certain stages of development, awareness of itself as the opposite of the Creator, and then aims to correction and similarity with the Creator until it reaches complete similarity with Him. It is all form.

Baal HaSulam has a very interesting article, “Matter and Form in the Wisdom of Kabbalah.” I advise you to read it.

Question: So, are you a materialist?

Answer: We are involuntarily materialists because we work with matter, with the desire to receive, to enjoy, and to receive fulfillment.

Question: Spiritual practices, Kabbalah, etc. seem to be detached from matter to many people. But no?…

Answer: Those are not spiritual practices. This is a kind of inner psychological phenomenon that one imagines and nothing more.
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From KabTV: “News with Michael Laitman” 3/20/18

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Question: How can you convince a person who categorically disagrees with you? Why don’t we feel the thoughts and feelings of other people through written messages? What is the algorithm of actions, thoughts, and desires?

Answer: If someone sends me something, he must very clearly imagine how I will consider his message in the way that is necessary for my egoistic existence.

Question: Does this mean that I always need to imagine the other and by imagining him, his way of thinking, to choose the words?

Answer: Yes. As far as by these words I am awakening the desire in him to adapt the message for his own benefit. That is, when I am sending the message, I need to imagine the interlocuter, his benefit, and adapt myself to him.

Question: How can you resolve a situation of conflict, when one agrees and the other does not? How do you resolve conflicts as a Kabbalist?

Answer: I do not resolve them. I embrace conflicts because eventually they advance me to the goal. I am grateful to all my opponents because thanks to them, I advance to the goal faster.

I do not need to satisfy or cajole them. No way! On the contrary, when they “poke” me that way, although it affects me very little, I am extremely grateful to them because then I begin to think: why, what for, how should I react correctly, why this was sent to me?

Everything a person experiences was sent to him by the Creator. All the puppets, dolls, that exist around me are just conductors of His message to me. Therefore, I appreciate them very much: for any message—good or bad. Moreover, I am happier with the bad since they leave a deeper impression in me, and in that way, I correct myself faster, more vigorously. There is nothing else in a person’s life and in the world but to connect everything that happens to him with the Creator. The fact that it seems to him that whatever happens comes from other people, from natural phenomena, or from anything else, is just a cover in which the Creator dresses until a person is ready for direct connection with Him.

Therefore, I look at life very positively. For me, a bad person can be more desirable than a good one. Any conflict is beneficial.

We always need to turn to the Creator who is behind both a person and the conflict and understand that whatever you do, feel, or decide is also the Creator, because He stands behind you too.
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From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 2/13/18

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Question from Facebook: I have been studying Kabbalah for more than five years. Before each lesson and each convention, I experience a feeling of fear, as if the world is collapsing, although there is no apparent reason for this feeling.

Answer: I have internal work to do. I experience the states of ascents, descents, happiness, fears, searches … I prepare for the lesson in advance to be together, in constant connection, in contact with the Creator, according to the principle “There is none else besides Him.” Even looking through the news I realize that everything comes from the Creator’s management, that the world is my reflection.

As a result, coming to the lesson, I have already been completely “formatted” to correctly perceive it. It is not a “hypnotic” fear that lives in me, but a sense of responsibility. I must constantly take care of my inner spiritual mood. And I’m very grateful for this need to set myself up like this.

The Creator sends us very different, sometimes very difficult circumstances. And we must relate to them responsibly, first and foremost. Caring for others, the constant aspiration of oneself outwardly, cancels fears. Take example from me.
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From KabTV’s “News with Michael Laitman” 2/27/18

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