Entries in the 'Q&A' Category

The Role Of Women’s Groups

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: Do we need a women’s group? What is the role of women’s groups?

Answer: In principle, there is no such connection among women as there is among men. A man should be united into a single vector with his friends, so much so that there is no difference between them. That is, on the earthly level, they must try to achieve an absolute fusion with each other in their feelings and thoughts.

This quality, this ability to connect is inherent in men; they simply must work on this. Only egoism separates them, and they have to unite above it. If there are two friends and between them there is mutual egoism that pushes them apart, they still have to make contact.

This is the duty of men. The woman’s part cannot do that.

The men’s part includes the objects that carry in themselves the potential quality of being able to connect with each other. Potential! They must create this network of connection among themselves. They can do this. This is their correction.

The woman’s part is created in such a way that each woman is on her own like a queen. She cannot be connected with other women by ties, like the men are among themselves. However, together with other women, she can create one common desire to reach the goal.

This is the women’s task. This desire has to be directed, as if passed, to the men’s part and through them, to the Creator.
[45483]
From the 2nd lesson at the Moscow Convention 6/10/11

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Do Not Expect Miracles From A Kabbalist

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: You have mentioned many times that people who have been studying Kabbalah for many years look just like everyone else and cannot be told apart. At the same time, people whose desires have been corrected change the reality around them and possess a completely different power of attraction. Are there any external signs that distinguish a Kabbalist?

Answer: I have met and spent some time with several students of Baal HaSulam. I was 35 years old, and they were 75. I felt like an infant in their arms. I never saw them do any miracles nor did I hear any special conversations. They all tried to be very regular people, and they actually were.

A Kabbalist does not spread any waves around him. A person who begins to listen to a Kabbalist, to understand him, to correctly adapt his words and thoughts, and to realize his suggestions within him begins to perceive himself and the world in a different way. This is not because there is a Kabbalist influencing him. Kabbalists do not influence other people. It is not permitted! This would kill another person’s freedom of will.

How do we teach a child? We constantly provide him with exercises and tell him how things are done, but he must do it on his own. Otherwise, he will not grow. This is why Kabbalists never change and can never change anything around them. There are no tricks. Nothing can change if man does not change.

I have many relatives, friends, and beloved students, and there is no way I can help them besides explaining it to them one more time, telling it in some other way. There is no other way. And when a person turns away from me, there is no way for me to turn him around. I also leave him. That is it. There is nothing I can do, even though it hurts.

Do not think that a Kabbalist is capable of something supernatural that a regular person cannot do. No, he cannot. Of course, he reveals this world to a greater extent as his desire becomes corrected, but he only reveals it for himself.

Over the course of history, there were many Kabbalists who were unable to teach. They attained spirituality, performed corrections in the upper world in the network of souls between us, and prepared this entire system to be closer to humanity, but not more than that. It’s the same way that we prepare the current world for our children and grandchildren, and no other way.

Do not look for tricks in Kabbalah. There are no miracles. This is an enormous, difficult job for each one of us to correct ourselves against our nature. This is what all of humanity must realize in our time.
[45487]
From the 3rd lesson at the Moscow Convention 6/11/11

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Five Steps To Get Out Of The Crisis

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: I have a question about the upper and lower degrees. What does it mean in our state to take a desire from the lower one? What can I do with it, and where can I direct it? How can I take this desire sooner and advance without wasting time?

Answer: In truth, we are between the upper world and humanity. If we want to get desires from all of humanity in order to raise them and receive the upper Light from Above to carry it down, then this scheme will work. To do that, we must disseminate to the wide public knowledge about the solution to the problem of our general crisis from which humanity is only beginning to suffer. There are many problems ahead.

Hence, we have to take the following steps: 1) We need to give humanity knowledge about the crisis, that it is purposeful and not random. 2) In order to raise us up, we have to get from humanity their desires to ascend, to get out of this crisis. 3) We have to raise these desires in order to realize them within ourselves, 4) receive general fulfillment in them, and 5) pass it down. Thus, we work: the upper and the lower one.
[45492]
From the 6th lesson at the Moscow Convention 6/12/11

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Together Towards The Light

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What efforts should a woman make so the Light would correct her?

Answer: She should make all other women and men participate in the movement towards the Light. And she has to do that with her desire! Not by yelling or throwing tantrums, or by making any kind of movements, but only by the inner desire.

Nothing exists besides desire. It is the only thing that operates. If you are not acting with your desire, from the inside, then by making physical, external actions, you won’t really correct anything.
[45594]
From the 2nd lesson at the Moscow Convention 6/10/11

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Giving Birth To A Spiritual Degree

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What is the correct environment for women, and how can we use it when it is difficult to work with joy and enthusiasm?

Answer: The correct women’s environment facilitates in a woman an aspiration to calmly, constantly analyze and synthesize the correct desire: What it should be; how we, the male and female parts of our family, unite and give birth to a spiritual degree.

We produce it between ourselves by uniting with each other correctly. Our correct contact brings forth the next degree. This is what the women have to think first. Then, the men will perceive everything in the right way and will act.
[45480]
From the 2nd lesson at the Moscow Convention 6/10/11

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Is There Any Good In The World?

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: I see not only evil but also good in the world. I have to find the evil inside myself and correct it. And what can I do with the good?

Answer: In fact, there is no good in the external world. This is a picture of my egoism. If I aim at the goal correctly, I begin to notice the good root in everything that surrounds me because I start seeing it as the manifestation of the Light, the Creator. And this is revealed only to the extent of my striving to reach the goal through this world.

I do not think that you should pay particular attention to this world or analyze it. Begin to aspire to the goal through it, and this world will pull itself up, will change its form.

You will discover that there is nothing good if you do not connect your correct intention to it. There is no good in and of itself. There is one huge corrupted desire which turns into good with the intention to bestow, with the intention to work for the benefit of others.
[45497]
From the 7th lesson at the Moscow Convention 6/10/11

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Making A Shish-Kebab From Desires

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: I have a question about becoming disconnected from this life. What happens is that the desire for the Creator leads a person away from corporeality. It seems as if I force myself to love my child, husband, family and go to work because I am supposed to. It feels like a game. For a woman, it is an endless torment, meaning that internally, you are in a state of desire, but live in this world as if playing a game.

Answer: It is indeed so. A person cannot tear himself or herself between the two, three, or five desires since desire can be only one. What is the solution then?

I heard the same question from men and women alike: “How do I go on without losing desire toward this world, my job, family, and significant other? How can I keep up with it all if a greater desire consumes, pressures, or annuls the smaller one?”

This occurs if you don’t link and accept all these desires as coming from the same source. You must gather, connect, and make such a “medley” out of them that would erase all the differences entirely. Desire for the child, the husband, the Creator, the group, the parents, and the purpose of creation itself must be unified. It has to “string” all these desires as if on a shish-kebab.

If this isn’t the case, then your work is not wholesome, and you are not wholesome in your desire. This will not do for we are given such diversity of desires in our world so we may pull them together and view them as one.
[45501]
From the 7th lesson at the Moscow Convention 6/10/11

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Old Age Is A Garment For Wisdom

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: What does it mean to become a sage in Kabbalah?

Answer: A “sage” is a person who has gained wisdom (Hochma). However, the Light of Hochma remains at absolute rest, and in order for us to obtain it, we have to possess the Light of Hassadim (Mercy), the “garments.” This means that a “sage” is honored not for his “wisdom,” but because he has made himself a garment from the Light of Hassadim, which “wisdom,” the Light of Hochma, was able to clothe in.

We regard the Creator as the sage. A wise man is regarded as “Talmid Hacham,” “a disciple of the sage,” since he is learning how to obtain wisdom (Hochma) to let the Creator clothe in him. We honor Kabbalists for the anti-egoistic screens and faith they acquired, thanks to which the Creator’s wisdom had clothed in them. It isn’t the case that they simply got smarter naturally. Hence they are called the “disciples of the sage,” the Creator.
[45313]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/28/2011, Writings of Rabash

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Not A Crisis But A Breakthrough

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: How do we explain to the public that the era of unbridled consumption is ending?

Answer: A person doesn’t need explanations to feel hungry; however, when the crisis hits, only the government can provide them with food.

Question: So we are building a state of common welfare, aren’t we?

Answer: We certainly are since a state’s job is to provide everybody with food, shelter,  clothing, healthcare, and so on. Vital necessity is not a loaf of bread and a glass of water per day. No, we are talking about a normal existence but not more than that. As to the rest, we educate a person how to receive ideal fulfillment from another source instead of running after the “blessings of civilization.”

It is coming to an end anyway, and there is nothing we can do about it. The world is sinking into crisis, which is supposed to demonstrate to us that we cannot consume more than we need. You may not wish to accept it, but nature will force you to, like it or not. Besides, we can’t explain to the public what’s happening and tell them how they need to act, meaning how to build a new government, a new integral world, unless we send them to school.

As we teach little children, so will we teach adults about the laws by which the world operates, the world that they now find themselves in. After all, if a person doesn’t comprehend the mechanisms of a fully integral world, he or she cannot survive in it. There isn’t a more effective and affordable solution to transform people than global education.

Do you wish to keep getting what you need? Here you go, just don’t forget that you are supposed to come to the lesson. You want to riot? It won’t solve your problems.

Recently, Amr Moussa, the Egyptian presidential candidate, has admitted that instead of a new beginning, the revolution has resulted in a deeper crisis which doesn’t seem to be ending. In his words were sincere pain; he did not expect this turn of events. It isn’t his or Mubarak’s fault: They simply didn’t see the process as a whole. People thought the new government would find the funds, but money alone is useless.

Hence, there is no other way but to figure out how many tailors, farmers, and other workers we need in order to keep a small percent of the population in the necessary areas of production, while the rest of the people have to be sent to school. There is no alternative, this is the way it has to work. This is the only solution that will provide people with the basic necessities so they don’t riot and understand that there is no place to go: The is the new world and the integral system we live in.

The truth is that we have stepped into a new territory rather than into a crisis; we must operate in the new format governed by different laws. And we have to pass through this bottleneck in order to reach perfection.
[45270]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 5/25/2011, “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah”

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Dissemination Is Like Giving Birth In The Spiritual World

Dr. Michael LaitmanQuestion: I do not feel that my spiritual progress depends on the men. How can I hasten the emergence of this feeling?

Answer: There are many women who feel self-sufficient. They are involved in dissemination, watch the lessons, and they are together with us with their heart and soul. They do not feel that they are dependent on the men. That does not matter. They are still included in our collective desire, Kli. They are nevertheless together with us.

Even if a woman is completely engaged in a particular work such as translation, processing materials, or something else, her participation covers everything because dissemination is virtually the most important application of women’s desire. It’s similar to giving birth in our world.

Thus, the participation of women in dissemination is their best action for correction. There are many women who exist somewhere separately, not in contact with others. Maybe we need more virtual contact. I am in favor of a good virtual connection. But even if a woman is on her own and takes part in dissemination, she is still in our collective aspiration to move forward. She definitely feels that and advances with us.

I have many such examples. I work with so many women on the blog, in the processing of materials, in translation, in book publishing, and in many other capacities. I value this work highly. They are loyal, trustworthy assistants, and I see their progress. Even though the women’s group is not organized well, they are advancing, and advancing well along with everybody else, at least as well as the men’s group.
[45364]
From the 2nd lesson at the Moscow Convention 6/10/11

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